#and fyi i am still in college

[cousinsam]

i'm really glad i no longer live in a dorm but in my parents's shitty house, even if said shitty house has terrible everything and i have to share a bathroom with 2 people, one of which being my older brother who seems to have a vested interest in the toxically masculine trait of not changing his towels frequently enough and in my last dorm i was in special housing bc trans and disabled so i had my own bedroom/bathroom with a door that opened by button and all i had to do was hold my ID in front of the keypad since the campus understood the hands don't work bit.

all that.

glad i don't live in a dorm anymore bc nobody needed to hear the coughing fit i just had from my diet weed vape pen.

[blkkizzat]

❝DIGIMON—BUT MAKING U CUM IS MY REAL HOBBY!❞

⏯ OTAKU!GOJO X BIMBO!READER

⏭ summary: your best friend gojo is a hopeless otaku virgin with zero rizz that's still obsessed with digimon—despite being a grown ass man. you're a slut who despite her best whoring efforts—can't cum. you'll take his v-card and he'll fix your broken pussy, deal? college au.

⏭ cw: virgin!satoru, gentle sex then rough sex , spanking (ass & pussy), slight sugar daddy/baby dynamic, coercion, dubcon, ecchi/pervy/freak nasty satoru, apprehensive bimbo!reader scared to nut, reader is also a bit of a tsundere brat but this isn't brat taming per se, oral fixation, toe licking, riding, prone bone, missionary, pussy eating, deep-throating, forced gagging, fingering, squirting, edging, olfactophilia, hand-job, protected & unprotected sex, bdsm references, masturbation, bit of somnophilia, pet names: Bunny (reader is called that in lieu of y/n), suggestions of geto x reader, mentions of satosugu and shokohime.

⏭ a/n: in my crack smut bag again cause this white haired demon wont let me rest until i write this nasty shit. fr tho this fic 13.3k and literally 10k of it is Gojo fucking you six ways to sunday. fyi this is the same y/n from nerd!geto but this is a different version of that AU where suguru is the one who has rizz and satoru is the nerd. y'all better read this or i'll never write gojo again istg lmfao. also shoutout to @halosdiary for beta reading and telling me it was good enough to post lol.

eta: y'all won. its a series now lol

“FUCK YEAH, LET’S GO!!! I ALONE AM THE CHAMPION OF THE DIGITAL WORLD!!!”

Startled by Gojo’s sudden outburst—you nearly rolled off the bed. 

Thankfully Suguru is sitting next to you and caught you before you fell off completely. 

Fully energized by his win Gojo sprang up from his elaborate PC setup, bouncing around the room in celebration. Fist-pumping the air he couldn’t contain his excitement after winning the Tokyo Regional Qualifiers for the Digimon Online TCG. 

“Guys, hey guys! See! I told you I’d win! I’m the strongest! The digidestined!”

You and Suguru exchanged exasperated glances before side-eyeing the hell out of Gojo.

This went on for a good 10 minutes so you had since returned to mindlessly scrolling TikTok, not wanting to encourage your grown-ass-almost-22-years-old-best-friend’s excitement over a children’s game.

“You sure showed those middle schoolers, Toru.”

Suguru quips with a smile. He’s clearly being sarcastic but Gojo is unfazed—nothing could damper his mood.

“Damn straight I did!”

Both you and Suguru have to chuckle, rolling your eyes at his childish enthusiasm. 

Despite the shared sentiment of annoyance over your best friend’s hobbies, you both were just happy to have Gojo back again. Two long years had passed since his parents made him travel the world on a rotation program, tasked with visiting the various Six-Vision Industries offices he would one day inherit. 

Being the nerdy genius he was, Gojo stacked a mass of university level credits in high school. So even with missing the first two years of college he’d still be joining you as a third year at your university come fall. 

After being apart for so long it was refreshing to hang out again and kicking it at Gojo’s mansion had been a daily occurrence since the start of the summer. Although things had definitely changed in the two years Gojo had been away there was one thing that certainly hadn’t.

Gojo was still a fucking huge otaku nerd. 

You’d thought his time spent in the business world would have matured him. However, being abroad, away from his friends and spending all day around the ‘stinky old fogeys in suits’ as he called them, only made him retreat further into otakudom. 

That much was evident as his collection of posters, figures and manga had somehow only seemed to grow even with him away. 

“Alright, while I just would love to stick around and hear more about you destroying the dreams of 12 year olds Toru—beach girl just texted me, gotta bounce!”

Suguru tries to leave but Toru clings onto him practically spider monkeying himself onto his back in an effort to get him to stay. 

“Sugu! Don’t leave! We’ve already been apart from each other for too long~~”

Sighing, Suguru attempts to pry his incorrigible bestie off of him.

“Satoru, you just spent the last 5 hours playing Digimon acting like me and Bunny weren’t even here. I’m sure if you go back to playing you won't even miss me.”

Gojo continues to pout as he whines for Suguru to stay.

“But I miss you already Sugu!”

Gojo presses his cheek against Suguru’s as Suguru’s eyebrow begins to twitch.

“I know! Invite your date here! Our chef is 10 times better than any restaurant you’d go to and you know we have an infinity pool grotto and onsen!

While the offer was tempting as any potential date would be thoroughly wowed by the decadent splendor that was the Gojo Family Residence—Suguru would also thoroughly cuck himself once his date was given the grand tour. 

Particularly the stop which included Gojo’s anime figure and otaku memorabilia rooms. 

While a good number of them were harmlessly nerdy shonen or slightly ecchi isekai figures—the rest? Well the rest contained every kind of freak nasty hentai figure you could think of—shibari, futanari and even the classic La Blue Girl tentacle dioramas—it was like a horny museum. 

Although at this point it should be considered a horny mausoleum as no woman who walked in would be walking out still in the mood—it was surely a place where horny went to die.

“Uh yeah, sure next time Toru….”

Suguru reaches back to pat Gojo on the head reassuringly. 

Lying as he was more than certain there wouldn’t be a next time. There wasn’t even going to be dinner—this was purely a hookup situation. 

“...but she’s already waiting for me outside my place—gotta run!”

Realizing Gojo still wasn’t letting go, Suguru sighs realizing this would require him utilizing his Judo training. 

In one swift movement, Suguru manages to shoulder-wheel Gojo and toss him onto the other side of his massive bed. The bed rebounds as he lands, slightly lifting you off your belly but you still are more interested in your phone. 

This isn’t the first time Suguru has Judo thrown Gojo off of him (likely wouldn’t be the last either).

Saying quick goodbyes before Gojo could recover, Suguru manages to slip away.

“Traitor!!! So much for bros before hoes!”

Utterly dejected, Gojo crawls up next to you on his massive bed.

“At least I still have you here Bunny.”

“Uh, not to pile on but you know I’m only here until Shoko and Utahime text me they are ready to go to the mall, right? I’m in dire need of a new handbag!”

Now clinging on to you Gojo throws another small tantrum as the weight of half his sinewy body presses into your back, his lean muscular arms wrapping around your shoulders.

“Not you too, Bunny puhleeease!”

You’ve known each other since you were in diapers so it wasn’t odd for you, him or Suguru to be found giving the others platonic cuddles like this—often all together too. The both of them were always so much bigger than you so you often enjoyed the comfort and security of always being the filling in the cuddle sandwich.

Gojo rests his chin on your shoulder watching as you continue scrolling TikTok. You sit in comfortable silence for a few minutes before his irritatingly hyperactive nature gets the best of him, and he starts poking around your phone to click on other videos that weren’t the 'mystery and makeup' ones you were watching.

“Toru, you know you could get a lot of your own hoes to hang out with if you weren’t such a huge otaku nerd…”

You had to swat Gojo’s hand away again as he tries to click on another prank video and he rolls off of you with a frustrated sigh. 

“...you’re almost as good looking as Suguru…”

Muttering the last part of that under your breath. Arguably Gojo’s features were just as if not more striking than Suguru’s. 

He was too hot himself for all of it to go to waste for being such a big dork.

“I’m sure Sugu would be happy to teach you ‘the way of the fuckboy’ if you asked Toru—that is if you’d actually go out clubbing like a normal 21 year old.”

“Why would I do that though? My house is 100 times better than a club!” 

Touché. 

While no one in your friend group was what someone would consider poor, Gojo’s wealth paled in comparison to anyone else’s and that went without saying. He’d had everything—if not more—than even the nicest tokyo club had. This was all thanks to his parents as socialites in their own right, often entertaining businessmen, dignitaries or foreign representatives with their ultra-exclusive parties.

“Besides, it wouldn't work—”

Gojo continued to pout.

“—Suguru would just get all the hoes anyway.” 

Easily able to walk up to even the most standoffish looking women, Suguru would have them reduced to bashful school girls in under 5 minutes. The women were always willing to hand over their numbers or drop any immediate plans to hang out with Suguru instead.

A good number of them had boyfriends already too.

Yet despite having the looks, Gojo opening his mouth ruined any advantage his lustrous blue eyes, exotic snow white hair and sharp handsome features gave him.

“Well, Suguru has a normal 21 year old’s room for starters, Toru. Not full of nerdy ass anime posters and Digimon tournament trophies.”

Gojo goes quiet. 

Driven from an early age to fill his head with knowledge of politics, technology, and international business relations, he spent the precious free time he did get with his friends or consumed by his own interests. Interests which just happened to be a bunch of otaku shit—Digimon in particular. 

It was an escape he’d cherished as a child and that didn’t change growing into adulthood either, if anything he needed it more now.

When Gojo doesn’t answer you look over to see him actually sulking for real now—face buried in a giant Agumon pillow plushie. 

What a crybaby. 

But the crybaby was one of your besties so you decided to lighten the mood and tease him a little.

“Ya know Toruuuu….you could just fuck Sugu then. Don’t think I haven’t seen y’all get a lil’ handsy during our cuddles!”

You give him a playful smirk and mime grabby hands at him.

“Oh and you haven’t? Don’t act like you wouldn’t fuck Suguru either!”

No longer appearing mopey, Gojo is up and laughing again. Mission Accomplished.

“Hey! I never said I wouldn’t but this isn’t about me, this is about you finally getting some play!”

You snap back but you’re blushing.

Like damn, who hadn’t thought about fucking Suguru though? 

“It's not the same if he makes me bottom! Plus no one thinks I can get pussy!”

Gojo grumbles, hugging his Agumon plushie to his cheek. 

You can’t help but notice how cute and baby girl he looks all pouty. 

He’d definitely get women lining up around the block of his huge ass mansion if he could at least get to the dating phase without giving out the otaku ick. 

“Because you can’t Gojo—Hoes don’t want to fuck guys who play Digimon!”

“But you’re a hoe and you like digimon too!”

Turning to look at him, you’d had half a mind to slap the shit out of Satoru but he had said it so earnestly. There was no sass nor malice behind his words. 

Besides, you were a hoe. That wasn’t something you ever denied.

You sigh. 

“Yeah I am a hoe now and I—keyword—liked Digimon. But that was back when I was a kid, Toru!”

Gojo scoffs and rolls his eyes.

“Listen, you’re my friend so m’gonna keep it a buck with you—a guy concerned with being digidestined is definitely not pussy destined, you digidork!”

You playfully hit him with the pillow you were laying on, not wanting him to start sulking again. 

Finally stimulated by something interesting Gojo wastes no time joining the pillow fight you initiated and you tussle with him on the bed until you both are exhausted and out of breath. 

Of course you come out of it victorious though. By the end you’d pinned both the pillows and Toru under you. 

Gojo however is back to pouting.

“Ugh, Bunny seriously though—I can’t go into junior year of college as a virgin!”

You smirk at his complaints as the answer is obvious.

“Throw away your figures and digimon cards then.”

“I’d rather die.”

“A virgin? At this rate you will.”

Gojo huffs in defeat as you settle comfortably on top of him this time. 

You’re about to reach for your phone again until you see a curious look flash across his face—the kind of look he always had as a kid when he thought of a hair-brain scheme that would lead to getting you all in trouble.

“Toru—what is it? And why do I have the feeling m’not gonna like it?”

You pull away cautiously, but his large hands grip your waist, stopping you and causing you to squeak in surprise.

“Hm, I dunno—was just thinkin’... why don’t you fuck me, Bunny?”

Your deadpan expression has Gojo scrambling, holding you closer in a vice grip when you try to squirm away. 

“Hey! Wait, I’m serious! Come on, Bunny! I need the experience and you always tell us about all your hookups! You have the experience—help a guy out!”

Staring at him skeptically you considered.

I mean sure, you always thought Gojo was attractive, more so since he returned this summer nearly a half a foot taller—but he was Gojo Satoru.

Your dorky, goofy, pervy otaku bestie practically since birth! 

You couldn’t just go and fuck him could you?

God, you could only imagine the taunts you’d get if word got out. Your friend group would never let you live it down! 

“Nah Toru—that would be too weird!”

“Huh, how come? You said I was almost as attractive as Suguru earlier!”

You stiffen.

Fuck, he’d heard that after all. 

“Ooo, ooo! Annnnd, you said last week you wanted a sugar daddy… Well, hi! I’m right here!”

The huge grin on his face has you frowning although more so because he was actually making some sense for once. I mean you were half-joking when you said it—well, let’s be honest not really. 

However, you mostly said it because while your family was well off enough, you still weren’t living in the lap of luxury by any means like a Gojo clan member. Unfortunately for you though, you were born with the expensive tastes of someone who was. So while you could afford a cute Chanel bag or a MCM wallet here or there, you’d set your sights on something higher—a coveted Hermes Birkin. 

Toru certainly could afford to buy you a whole truck load of them with what his family made in less than an hour. 

Nevertheless that wasn’t really the issue at hand. 

In spite of you being far from a virgin, there was actually a good reason why you wouldn’t be a good choice for Gojo to lose his v-card.

“Er, em—that’s really not the issue, Toru…” 

Trailing off you’re the one pouting now as you glance at your nails. 

“Then what? Don’t tell me our lil’ Bun Bun is shy now? Over lil’ ol’ me?”

Gojo teases you by sticking out his tongue—chuckling when you snap your head up to glare at him.

“You wish…” 

You grumble, chewing your lip now and debating whether or not to tell him the truth while Gojo looks at you with wide and glassy puppy eyes. Shaking your head you come to the conclusion you could trust him with your secret. 

He was the virgin otaku after all—he’s the one who should be embarrassed here!

“It’s just that…I–I can’t cum.”

Gojo just blinks at you. 

Clearly confused with metaphorical question marks surrounding his head as that's definitely not the answer he was expecting.

“I’ve slept with plenty of guys before but I never had an orgasm. I don't even really get close—I mean, sure, it feels good, I guess—mostly just a little weird. I heard some people just can’t and maybe that's me.”

You shrug, a bit nervous to look Gojo in the eye as you thought he may tease you further about this but was lost in contemplation. Almost as if he was seriously trying to do the biological math around what you’d just told him.  

After about a minute more he finally asks—

“—Does Suguru know?”

A simple question, unloaded in tone as Gojo is genuinely curious but it leaves you flustered nonetheless. 

“What?! Are you crazy?! Why would I tell him?!”

“Just figured if anyone could then—”

“—Hell no, Toru! Besides, what if he does? I’m not trying to be reduced to a fuckboy’s pick me if he ends up being the only man alive who can give me an orgasm!”

Sure Suguru was hot as fuck—as was a lot of your other fuckboy friends (Toji and Sukuna)—but you definitely didn’t want to end up like the dickmatized girls that would follow them around and literally box each other in the streets over some cock. 

You weren’t much of a fighter anyway and your face was far too cute to be getting scratched up.

Pussy should be put on a pedestal, not the other way around. You’d continue to be orgasmless before it came to that.

“Mm, but Shoko and Utahime know?”

You’re blushing more than ever this time.

“Um, yeah—T-They said once I realized all men were worthless to call them and they’d give me multiple of them.”

Gojo snorted at that but he was now convinced you both could help each other. 

“So we have no other options—then it's settled!”

In one fluid motion Gojo snatches away the pillows from between you and swaps positions—now with you on the bottom.

“Huh–wait—Toru!?”

Gojo groans.

“Come on, Bunny! I want pussy, you want to cum on top of getting that Bikram bag—

“—Birkin bag.” 

You corrected him.

“Yeah that one! So let’s help each other out, eh?  PULHEEEASEEE—Just the tip?”

You weren’t at all convinced that Gojo—whose sexual knowledge came purely from JAV, hentai and onaholes—could make you cum.

But then again sure, fuck it, why not?

You were getting bored waiting for Shoko to call you anyway and if Toru was willing to come off a Birkin for a lil’ pussy, you might as well fuck him. 

None of the other guys you had fucked even came close to making sex this worth it. Frankly this would be worth it even if you didn’t actually cum.  

“Fiiiine Toru, let’s have sex—”

“FUCK YEAH!”

“—BUT we’re laying down some ground rules!”

Sitting up with a straight back, Gojo obediently awaited your orders.

“Anything you want Bunny, name 'em go’on!”

Gojo’s overenthusiasm was like a puppy and you were sure if he had a tail it would be thumping on the bed like crazy now. 

You wanted to crack a smile but you know from prior experience that if you give men an inch they will take the whole goddamn mile—and Gojo of all people was no exception—so you are firm as you sit up to look in his eyes and lay down the law.

 “First—like you said, just the tip.”

Gojo started to protest but the raise of your eyebrows had him changing his tune immediately.

“Got it! Got it! Just the tip would be amazing Bunny, what else?”

He chided himself and you continued.

“And secondly, just because you bros have no loyalty, it’s still ‘chicks before dicks’ over here. You better get your nut quick cause I’m still leaving to go purse shopping when Shoko and Utahime call me.”

Gojo waves you off with that rule. 

“Psh, we should have plenty of time, it's almost 6pm! They’ve probably been too busy bumping their own purses together to go shopping with you for one. You haven’t heard from either of them in hours!”

Fair point—wildly out of pocket, but fair. 

Still. 

“Bumping Purses!? Really, Toru?”

“You know I’m not lying—but that’s it then, right Bunny?”

Not waiting, Gojo throws his shirt off and starts fumbling with the ties on his sweats before you stop him.

“Nah, Toru, hold your horses! One more rule!”

Freezing mid-action, Gojo's hands are shaking as he expectantly gazes at you, waiting for the last condition before you give him the green light.

“Finally, third—and most fucking importanly—if you make any, and I mean even just ONE—otaku reference, especially Digimon while you’re inside me I’ll snap your lil’ digidick off, understood?”

Gojo swallowed. 

Hard terms to live with but something he would be willing to abide by for pussy.

“Yes ma’am! Got it! Just the tip, you will ditch me for the purse bumpers and no Digimon!”

Gojo repeats your rules matter-of-factly. 

You roll your eyes but are satisfied enough he understood and you wave him off in the direction of your bag.

“Good. Now, be a good boy and go get a rubber out of my purse.” 

Bolting over to your purse Gojo grabs a pack of condoms and is back on the bed in an instant.

Reality sinking in on what you were about to do and who you were about to do it with, you suddenly become hyper aware, appraising Gojo. 

You note just how much in the two years since high school he’s grown. Still a bit lanky in areas but overall he filled out more for sure and his muscles were much more defined rippling underneath his skin as he eagerly clambered over you. Gojo still possessed the same piercing sky blue eyes that lit up a room but they looked all too predatorily hungry now that he was hovering over you. 

You swallow.

You’d feel almost completely out of control of the situation if it wasn’t also for the bundle of nervous energy radiating off of Gojo—his hands spasming like he might bust his pants the moment he touches you.

You try to maintain your composure, but your jaw drops and your eyes widen in shock when he finally pushes his sweats and boxers down in one swift motion.

Gojo was fucking huge!

“Toru—what the actual fuck?!”

Third leg was a massive understatement. 

I mean you didn’t think he’d be small—you’d been around him enough in boxers, sweats, pjs, etc growing up—but you didn’t expect this. 

He was definitely a grower and Christ did he just fucking grow!

Gojo looked puzzled until he followed your wide eyed gawking down to his lower half. 

Heh. 

“Am I the biggest you’ve seen, Bunny?”

Growing prideful Gojo pokes at you a bit and your ogling only grows more incredulous. 

You didn't know if he was the girthiest but certainly the longest by far. He’d actually puncture a lung if he stuck that whole monstrous thing in you!

It would literally have to be just the tip and you are thanking God right now that he’d already agreed to those terms. That would be much too uncomfortable to cum from and you are beginning to question how the pornstars manage. This wasn’t a JAV but Gojo, if his company ever went belly up, certainly had a promising career on OnlyFans ahead of him.

Gojo’s chest puffed up ten times more from your staring as he slipped the condom on (which only fit two-thirds of the way down). 

“O-Ok, Bunny now you!”

His cock throbbed more violently the longer you looked at him. The anticipation is contagious to say the least and you can't help but feel your chest warm at his eagerness. 

Gojo wants to get the attention off of him and you smile at him knowingly.

“You mean you don’t want to take my clothes off yourself?”

The thought never occurred to Gojo but he dumbly nodded. Your yelps echo in the room as his massive hands are on your hips faster than lighting pulling you towards him. 

The motion causes your tits to jiggle, the soft mounds moving freely beneath your spaghetti strapped halter and Gojo berates himself on how he only now is noticing you weren’t wearing a bra all this time. 

Gojo’s mouth goes dry at your nipples, already peaked and poking through the thin fabric. 

Your nipples pucker further when the crisp air of the A/C hits them after Gojo pulls your top overhead and you arch up to assist, not realizing you presented yourself to him like a treat to a dog. 

“T-Toru!!!!”

Gojo wraps his strong sturdy arms fully around your body. Pressing his face deep into your chest as his warm wet lips latch onto a nipple. His mouth now suctioned to you, Gojo swirls and flicks his tongue around the hardened bud. Gojo moans around your flesh, pleasantly surprised at how addicting the sweet salty taste of your skin is. 

If Gojo wasn’t sure he had an oral fixation before he surely knows now. Zoning out everything else except for the sloppy sounds of him worshiping your breast, he relishes the contrasting textures of his rough tongue suckling the soft skin of your swelling bud. 

Gojo surely would have been latched onto you for hours and you are only able to pry his head away when he releases your nipple with a wet pop to take a breath.

“TORU!!!”

You’re panting and red faced as you yank his head back. 

But Gojo is a man solely focused—tongue hanging out off his mouth captivated by how cutely your areola puffed as it glistened with his spit and fighting overwhelming desire to get the other one in a similar state.

“Huh–Bunny, b-baby—you taste so good n’ your tiddies are so nice—so fuh-kin’ soft.”

Gojo’s tongue is hanging out of his mouth drooling as he attempts to dive back into your chest. you feel his heavy cock on your thigh as his hips begin to rut against you. 

This was too much!

“Stop Toru! You’re being too rough, they are sensitive! Besides, times’ ticking! Remember I have no problem leaving you blue balled if Shoko or Utahime call me!” 

You do your best to give him a disapproving look as you blush.

“Awe but you seemed like you were liking it, you were whining loud enough.”

“Shut up n’just get on with it!”

“Yes ma’am~~”

Enjoying your breasts so much Gojo almost forgot he hadn’t even seen your pretty pussy yet. 

Making quick work of your shorts, Gojo manages to pull them down just over your core but is stunned once again as he burns the image of the skin-melding fabric of the mesh hot pink g-string covering your cunt. The thin satiny straps dug into your supple hips amplifying your curvaceous form.

Fucking slutty as hell!  

Rivaling that of even his most favorite and most scandalous hentai figures. 

This was so much better, so much more lewd as the clingy fabric struggles to cover the fat of your plump pussy lips—not like the transparency of them left much to the imagination. 

God help him, he just wants to tear them off with his teeth and open mouth swan-dive into your dewy lil’cunt—-pushing his tongue deep into your peachy core tongue fucking orgasm after orgasm out of you until he drowned in your milky nectar—but he has to restrain himself.

You probably wouldn’t like that too much given your reaction earlier and he’d die if you’d happen to just call the whole thing off.

Mouth drying and hands twitching—Gojo is trying so hard to be a good boy and contain his more perverted instincts.

“Earth to Toru! Y-You good?”

Gojo looked like a tightly wound coil ready to pop in every sense of the word and you hated that his nervousness was making you nervous too. 

So on edge you almost jumped once his eyes snapped up to meet yours.

“G-Great, Bunny…j-just fine.” 

Gojo’s voice falters, becoming more pitchy and you giggle. As much as Gojo wants to look at your pussy as he peels the flimsy moist fabric off of them he couldn’t do that at this moment—he would actually bust his pants.

Instead, Gojo leans in to kiss you, but you block him. He ends up kissing your palm instead.

“Toruuu… that be too weird, we’re friends remember?”

“Yeah friends who are fucking, Bunny! You mean you won’t let my tongue in your mouth but you’re letting my dick inside your pussy?!”

You knew it sounded nonsensical even before he said it back to you. But your heart was pounding so loudly in your ears you could barely hear him anyway.

You didn’t know what you were scared of this time? 

You had let all your other previous hookups makeout with you but Gojo was different. 

This felt entirely different.

You didn’t know why, you just knew it was and you were apprehensive of the unfamiliar emotions he was stirring in you and this wasn’t supposed to be anything more than an arrangement between friends.

“Don’t you need to warm up tho Bunny? Obviously m’no pro at this—but even I know a little bit more foreplay is usually needed?”

Your heart beats louder at his concern but you push that aside trying to focus on your breaths. 

Satoru should have been the easiest lay but for a reason that alludes—you were coming undone before him.

“Shut up Toru and just fuck me! The foreplay stuff doesn't matter, it won't make a difference anyway, m’not gonna cum! Also you’re big af so grab your lube. We're gonna need lots of it!”

Toru pouts but follows your commands without fuss. 

Although he’s anxious to get his dick wet he also is still thinking of how he can hold up his end of the bargain other than a stupid purse. 

You said he didn’t need to but he wanted to. 

The thought of finally losing his v-card excited him but there was something that made his cock throb harder at being the first man to give you an orgasm. 

But you don’t want him to touch you beyond what was absolutely necessary, so how was he going to accomplish that exactly?  

Gojo was a genius and had the IQ score to prove it, he’d be able to solve the problem once he was inside you, right? 

Turning back to face you after retrieving the lube from his nightstand, Toru has to grab the base of his cock this time to keep from prematurely coming in the latex that was already starting to thicken with his precum.

There you were laid out like a slut—panties pulled to the side—fingering yourself a bit to loosen up, having reconsidered his suggestion of foreplay when the twitching on your thigh reminded you of how big he actually was.

“OH SHI—”

You notice his jaw hanging open, utterly entranced as his eyes follow the motions. 

You knew you should be letting him do this to get the experience but honestly there was no sense in setting Gojo up for failure—delivering a significant blow to his ego when he inevitably couldn’t make you cum. You didn’t want to damage him even more if he felt it was his fault your pussy was apparently broken, you having tensed up completely every time a guy had tried before.

But you can’t deny you are getting some pleasure—if only through your own amusement—as you grab his cock and pump the lube he poured down his latex covered shaft, still fingering yourself—much to Gojo’s delight and wonder of seeing an actual real pussy up close. 

Gojo sucks in air and groans pitifully as your hand spreads the cool gel over his length which only intensifies his ache to be inside of you. 

“C’mere, Toru…”

You beckon sweetly, guiding him forward with your back against the pillows, you tease the crown of his tip through your folds preparing him for missionary. 

Gojo nearly bites a chunk out of his lip when his thick cockhead finally catches over your slicked entrance and you’re left wincing.

“T-Toru, e-easy—o-ok? Not too deep...”

A breathy confirmation shudders out of Gojo as he’s easing himself into your warm tightening cunt. The stretch is immediate which mentally confirms for you he is also the girthiest you’ve ever had as well. 

Your heels dig into his hips to brace yourself while he hovers over you, arms shaking.

“FUUUUUHHHH—”

Even with the rubber on, Gojo still thinks he might melt from how warm and tight you are—so much better than even his onahole with the custom grip and heating features. 

Screwing his eyes shut, Gojo has to count backwards from a million, recite Japan’s national anthem, list the GDPs of the top 10 wealthiest countries—anything—or he will cum too soon or worse, crack and drive his hips until he’s all the way to the hilt from the way your dangerous lil’ pussy is sucking him in.

God, it felt like your slutty cunt had a mind of its own calling for him to push in a lil’ deeper, greedily begging for him to go a lil’ further but Gojo resists. 

Sweat beads on his brow from the exerted effort of sheer willpower to keep his promise to you.

To Gojo’s credit, he really is doing his best, only a little less than a third but due to his length that's still a lot. 

Your eyes wander up to Gojo’s face and away from where he is wholly splitting you open, lest you clench on him even tighter and you knew you needed to relax. Even if you weren't really feeling much but the overwhelming strain from the tight fit, looking at Gojo you were happy that he appeared to be in bliss at least. 

His eyes still squeezed shut, mouth hanging open and spittle flowing down his jaw Gojo was in his own world as he continuously babbled nonsense about how perfect your cunt felt around him.

Just the tip in you for all of 20 seconds and already pussy drunk from just this much. 

“B-Bunny, Oh SHHIII–B-Bunny—m’cute Bun—FAH-ACK s’gud—m’gonna cum soon UHH–pussy feels s’good—oh-oh my god!” 

Although his entire body is quaking with pleasure, the few functional brain cells that survived the fiery blaze of your sinful lil’ pussy are still thinking of you. 

Gojo tries to give some attention to your neglected lil’ clit, but a single swipe causes your leg to jerk and you promptly push his hand away again.

“N-NO! Pleaseee, m’too sensitive Toru! J-Just focus on your thrusts! Y-You’re s’close, m’can feel your cock twitching i-i-inside me...”

Gojo wants to challenge you on this—suspecting from the way your cunt felt constricting around him you felt something pleasurable then—but he’s too far gone and much too inexperienced to keep focused on anything else. 

Especially when you are so explicitly describing him fucking you. 

Grabbing his face you bring your foreheads to touch to help calm him so he’d last a bit longer. Although you still hold his face to prevent him from kissing you, he's close enough that you're sharing the same breath, now looking into each other's eyes. 

He struggles to maintain eye contact though before the magnetism of your heated core had them rolling back again.

You're still not close to cumming, yet you are beginning to enjoy the warm comforting feeling of being this full as he holds you close, his short thrusts gaining momentum. 

Sharing intimacy with someone you actually cared about for once is really nice and you wouldn't mind having more sex like this even if you couldn't cum. 

Thumbing over Gojo’s moist lips you coo sweet praises to him as he desperately moans around your delicate appendage. Suckling your thumb between his lips and nursing on it until he can no longer contain the heavy breaths that overpower him and fan across your face. 

Sharing the same exhaled breath is making you light headed and you mewl at the keen sensations it stirs in your pussy that has him full on gasping now. Gojo releases the whiniest moan as he falls into you, unable to support his arms any longer. 

Showering your neck with open mouth kisses as his body curls more into yours.

However it all proves far too much when Gojo faltering more in his promise, slips more than halfway into your cunt—instantly filling the latex as it balloons inside of you as you scrape your heels against his back.

SHIIIIIT! He s’big! 

Despite nearly splitting your poor pussy into two at the end though, Gojo did such a good job for his first time. 

You’d forgive him just this once though as you wrapped your arms around his head, gently petting his undercut. His heaving breaths quiet under your soothing touches, finally ceasing the stream of his spit and tears that had been pooling in your collarbone.

Staying like that for a while holding him while his heartbeat calms to match yours and his length softens inside you. You close your eyes peacefully for a few moments before you hear your phone vibrate next to you. 

It's Shoko!

Shoko’s text apologizes for the delays and offers to get dinner instead��promising to go shopping with you and Utahime tomorrow since they got held up and you make plans for dinner in two hours. 

Perfect. That gives you plenty of time to clean up and get yourself presentable. 

“Did you cum even a lil bit, Bunny?”

Oh sweet baby, if you have to ask…You think to yourself but it's not poor Toru’s fault your pussy is out of order.

“Um, no Toru baby—but you did so well! Ya know you’re actually pretty cute and considerate when you get a little pussy. I’m sure you’ll manage to make any girl you happen to get naked happy!”

Gojo counters you with a disappointed look still panting slightly as he pulls out and rolls over bringing you towards him to cuddle. Allowing him, reasoning that you don’t have to get up right this second.

Yoour back meets his chest and it’s then you notice the condom still inside you. Figures since it was much too small in the first place. Yet you couldn’t complain as it managed to do its job due to Satoru not going all the way in. Breathing out you grimace a bit as you still had to give it a pretty good tug to lodge the filled latex out of your sore cunt. 

“Goddamn Toru, you were pretty backed up huh?”

Having witnessed the entire display from over your shoulder and the sight of the light blue rubber covered in your fluids while drooping heavily with his own has Gojo’s dick stirring again as you jiggle the rubber demonstrating its fullness before tossing it into the bin beside his bed. 

Conflicted Gojo broods for a while as he hugs you to him. 

While his body felt mostly satisfied, seeing you still unsatisfied put a huge damper on his mood. 

Sure you had told him you couldn’t come—but would any girl cum without much foreplay or stimulation? 

Even the darker hentais and JAVs he’s seen had more foreplay than this!

Hmmm... 

Thinking over the experience again in his mind he had a hunch that if right could cure your lack of orgasms but needed you to let him fuck you once more to be sure. 

“So you’re gonna hit and quit just like that, Bunny?”

He teases clinging onto you again when you try to maneuver out of his embrace.

“No time for more cuddles Toru—Shoko texted, we’re getting dinner in two hours.”

“Wait! Bunny! That’s so far away—Let me go again, pleeeease!”

Gojo is determined this time to make you cum for real! And, yeah you know—your slick heat sliding up and down his cock again would be a highlight too.

“Toru–”

“—Come on bunny! We solved my problem but we haven't fixed yours, you still haven't cum yet!”

“Toru, I thought we understood we were never going to solve my problem in the first place—so don't stress! Also I know this is probably the first time a girl has said this to you and actually meant it—but it's really not you!”

Gojo puts his negotiation face on. 

You wanted to play hardball? Bet.

“I’ll give you my black card for a whole week!”

Gojo turns you around to look him in the eye so you could see how sincere he was, he really wanted to try again—he knew he could make you cum this time!

You sighed. 

You couldn't really be mad at him—in fact, it was actually the cutest thing—that he wanted to keep trying for your benefit—but you didn’t see the point when it would just lead to the same result. You don’t even need to glance down to see Gojo’s cock was just as resolute as he’s already recovered and fully bricked—length pulsing against your ass. 

Well—given his last performance you were sure he’d last all of five minutes and if you had his black card for a whole week you were about to tear the entire Hermes store up—a Birkin and a Kelly in every color!

Hell, maybe you could even get the coveted baby pink ostrich one. 

“Mmm’kay, Toru—black card for a week! No limit!”

“Yup of course! Oooh no—Wait, no rubbers and I'll let you have my new g-wagon too! I hear raw sex is sooo much better you will cum for sure then Bunny!”

Well you knew a good bargain when you heard it.

Throwing the unopened condoms to the side you laid back down.

Imported European cars are stupid expensive to get in Japan and if he was coming off a g-wagon—especially as it was a custom powder blue matte with dune colored seats and shiny platinum rims—then he could have as many two-minute pump sessions as he wanted.

He’d likely pass out from dehydration in less than twenty tops anyway.

“Okay, but same rules as before except no cumming inside Toru! I mean it! It's too much of a mess to clean up after, it’ll be dripping all night especially all that you came last time…”

The thought of your gooey tender cunt weeping his nut for hours has Gojo’s balls tightening in want of making it a reality—but he knew if all went to plan you’d be begging for it! 

First—he needed you to take a more active role this time. He saw you settled back onto the pillows and that simply wouldn’t do. 

“Um Bunny, can you be on top? I-I’m dying to see what your cute tiddies look like jiggling all crazy like in my face.”

You cover your chest, frowning in offense at his more debauched ecchi preferences but you agreed nonetheless. 

Relenting as it’d likely have him cumming sooner and then you could finally get ready to meet the girls—all in your new g-wagon, although you’d definitely have to make up a lie as to how you scammed it out of Gojo.

Gojo takes your place on the pillows, amused as now it’s his turn to beckon you forward. Steeling yourself, you embarked on your climb to mount him. Tall and lean with wisps of hair sticking to his face Gojo looked more like he belonged in a painting, unnerving you that a face only an artist could sculpt admired your body with his lustful gaze. 

He was too sexy for his own nerdy ass good like this and you failed not to whimper when his strong hands settled at your waist.

Lube in your hand you smirk, gaining some confidence back when you hear Gojo hiss as the cool gel once again spreads down his fiendish girth that pulses restlessly at your touch. The sensation is all the more agonizing without the latex barrier hindering him as your, your silky smooth palm glided over his bare cock before tugging back the sensitive foreskin covering his crown head. 

Licking your lips you almost want to bend down and taste the pre marbling like a pearlescent jewel on his pretty exposed cockhead.

He’d probably cry like a baby if you did, you mused with a grin. 

Good God girl snap out of it! 

You chastise yourself—no, you had to focus and end this quickly before you lost your mind. The idea of fucking Gojo beyond what he could buy for you started to get more appealing and you couldn’t allow that.

Readying yourself to mount him this time you realize your pussy is quivering in anticipation of the stretch—it was uncomfortable last time so—why was your body reacting this way?

Your own pussy betraying you as she seemed to yearn for the opportunity to gobble him up, taking him in with less resistance in spite of you. Flexing around the thick intrusion inside your core you shiver in feeling the curve of every vein on his girthy cock as you lowered yourself onto him.

The way your pussy flexed as a jolt of electricity ran through you scared you—a new sensation bubbling up inside, threatening to make you lose yourself in the feeling.  Must be survival instincts you rationed—your cunt scared for its life never having encountered such an acute danger like Gojo’s dick before.

The burn was pleasurable this time, sucking in sharp breaths at every slight movement of him moving inside your core. Yet Gojo is in even more bliss—from the serpentine motion of your hips cascading over his own to how your your puffy pussy lips looked so wonderfully parted, stretched open around his cock—FUCK!

How was he going to complete his plan if his brain just started turning to mush everytime your dangerously succulent cunt grinded against him.

“O–ooo shiiiiiit!”

“Y-You okay, Bunny?”

Although Gojo himself looked like he was in agony his face was reddening from how good your raw gummy walls were surging around his length.

“Hhnng, fine Toru—y’er j-just big.” 

Gravity was your natural enemy in this scenario and you took him a bit past halfway this time.

Wanting to distract you, his large hands grope your tits but you knock him away—your stomach fluttering. 

“What's wrong, this time?”

“...s’n-nothing, it’s—just put your hands on my hips, it helps me so my legs don't get tired.”

You lied.

Well your legs were quivering but more pressingly your heart started to race and you didn't know if it was because a cock like this could actually relocate your uterus to your lungs or if you’d actually started catching something similar to romantic feelings for Gojo Satoru. 

Either one was unacceptable in your book.

“Hurry up and cum, Toru!” 

However Gojo is about to say something, your phone rings.

“I-Its Utahime…”

“Don’t answer Bunny! Focus or you’re never going to cum!”

“I can multitask, Toru! Besides, on the small chance I do I know it's definitely going to take longer than the two minutes you lasted before.” 

Hushing Gojo’s protests and eyes flaring at him to be silent, you answer the call. 

“Bunny!”

“Hime!”

You greeted each other with your usual peppiness—like Gojo wasn’t 6 and a half inches deep with 2 and half more to go—give or take—inside you.

“What’s up? Oh erm, what am I doing—”

A sly and haughty smile plays on his lips and you scowl at him.

“—I’m still at Gojo’s and no—I’m not doing much at all right now! Haha—yeah. I can definitely talk, of course!”

Gojo frowns as his eyes narrow and to placate him you start half heartedly rotating your hips.

You still looked sexy as hell though. Even with less effort expended it was still a workout as shown by the sheen of perspiration glowing off your body. That delectable sight combined with the light swaying of your tiddies was more than enough for him to cum if he just focused on himself.

But he was determined not to this time, not until you had.

“See Toru? They were helping Shoko’s parents!”

You stick out your tongue and he makes a face back at you.

“Oh what?—s’nothing—Ha! Well ok! He said you were too busy bumping pussies to go to the mall with me! Psh—typical am I rite? Huh—put you on speaker? LOL O-OKAY.”

Snitch! 

Gojo mouths to you offended you’d rat him out like this as Utahime’s voice shrills through the phone.

“Satoru you loser! You have to talk about our pussies cause you could never have one of your own in a million years!”

Snorting with laughter Gojo is more than amused. 

If only they knew.

You pale signaling at him to ‘STFU’ or he could finish himself off.

“Aww, is that so Utahime? I’m so hurt.” 

The mischief in Gojo’s voice is obvious—he’s clearly mocking you.

Annoyed with him getting the upper hand and feeling sassy, you pile on—

“Exactly Hime! I mean he might get some—but a total otaku like him wouldn’t know what to do with a pussy if he even ever got in—EEP!”

A heavy handed smack comes down on your ass—hard. 

The force ripples its way into your cunt causing you to feverishly tighten as your tongue pushes a low moan out between your lips.

“Oh ho ho—what's this? You actually like getting spanked huh, Bunny? You dirty, dirty girl…” 

Gojo is whispering again before his hand once more swats at that same cheek.

The sting causes saliva to pool in the corners of your mouth. 

If looks could kill Gojo would have died a horrible death—that is if you could focus enough to even glare at him. You’re absolutely mortified—too consumed by the spanks that fiercely rained down on your reddening bottom, your pussy getting shamelessly wetter with every hit.

“AH–FAHHH—”

“Bunny! What’s happened?!”

You hear Shoko’s concerned voice this time.

“N-N-Nothing, G-Gojo’s being mean to me cause I told on him! H-He pinched me so hard Shoko!”

“Liar!”

Gojo mouths again and his demeanor turns absolutely devilish. 

Oh? So that's how you wanted to continue to play? 

You were such a brat sometimes but then again so was he and his competitive nature soared at the challenge.

“Oh did I? Like this, Bunny?”

Gojo’s  palms cup your tits roughly before he pinches them, twisting your nipples causing the slobber that collected to dribble down your chin and onto your chest.

“Shiiii—T-Toru! S-STOP YOU A-AHHH–SSHOLE!!”

The grip his thumb and forefingers have on your sensitive buds intensifies and you can barely keep the phone in your grasp as you hold it out arm extended to keep your cries from being heard. 

With only one hand free there’s no way for you to worm nor pry his hands from your tits as you are still struggling not to sink lower and choke on your own tongue from the electrifying sensations assaulting your cunt.

This couldn’t be what it was like could it? This overwhelming feeling?

You didn’t want to admit it but as tear-inducing as the sensations were—they felt real fucking good. 

Your hips began involuntary rocking as your core now craved how Gojo’s cock scraped against your walls like it was trying to carve itself even deeper inside you if you’d let your hips drop just a little bit lower. 

“Toru! Stop picking on our Bunny! Don’t make us come over there and kick your ass!”

The sweat that now runs down Gojo’s brow threatens to blur his vision but he’s locked in and focused. The phone situation being so fucking raunchy combined with the way your pussy is creaming on him (despite you trying your hardest not to feel good) has him stressed. 

Swallowing he had to try hard to keep up the act as well as please you without cumming—it would be a feat if he accomplished it to say the very least.

God, this was all so shamefully vulgar. 

Did you do this on purpose answering the phone? 

He didn’t even know this was a kink of his—or yours apparently.

But your “problem” was now clear to Gojo:

It’s not that you couldn’t cum, it’s just that you were scared to cum. 

Any real stimulation triggered your fight or flight. 

You were perfectly capable, you just needed a bit of forcefulness—however the effect of it terrified you and you bolted from it every time you had sex with someone—until now. 

Heh, there would be no more running from the nut for his little bunny rabbit.

Gojo wonders how far into his ecchi depravity he can take you.

“Your Bunny, huh?”

Gojo's eyes squinted as if he could stare down Shoko and Utahime through the phone.

You were his. 

He was the one who was going to make you cum and frankly he didn’t give a fuck anymore if Shoko or Utahime heard it—in fact he wanted them too.

Planting his feet into the bed, Gojo’s form shifts as he swiftly grips your waist simultaneously bringing you down while driving his pelvis up—pummeling his entire length into your guts. The prickly patch of groomed hair at his base tickles your poor abused lil’ clit which had been forcibly nestled into them—the result of being smashed against his pubic bone. 

“FUHCCCK—MUTHERFUHH—SHHHH–HIIIIIT!!!” 

Vision momentarily blacked out and burning with tears mixed with your running mascara, your pussy still reeling from the sheer magnitude of Gojos long girthly length now all the way sheathed and practically tearing through your womb. Your eyes are firmly lodged in the back of your head, the electrifying vibrations cause you to drop the phone entirely. Your world is spinning from experiencing your first small orgasm that only increased intensity as your efforts to escape Gojo are in vain. 

Your cervix is screaming at the probing intrusion of his bulbous tip ramming so far up into you but Gojo has you anchored to him unable to flee from his onslaught of thrusts.

If you could string together a coherent thought you would have wondered if in fact your stomach had been relocated next to your lungs as you felt so full you couldn’t breathe. 

Your pussy violently spasms around his girth, creamy fluids seeping down onto his base from your cunt sloshing around him.  Gojo grips your cheeks spreading you wider increasing the squelching noises echoing from your cunt.

Shit though, Gojo thinks your perfect pussy might actually break his dick off from how fervently you were clenching him. 

Tongue fully lolled out of your mouth, you’re grasping onto Gojo’s shoulders for stability as your saliva drips down his pectorals.

“BUNNY!! Are you still there?? What’s that noise?”

Shoko and Utahime’s calls for you go unanswered. Gojo on the other hand is grinning, albeit through gritted teeth, pleased at how his long trunk-like cock is rendering you nonverbal. 

“Hehe, you definitely came a bit that time didn’t ya—ya nasty lil’ Bunny, don’t lie.” 

“N-N-Nooo T-Toru–s’like I-I c-can’t breathe—”

“Heh, a’course you can baby Bun—that's what it feels like when you cum, even I know that.”

SMACK!

Another firm smack to your ass has your cunt quivering wildly.

You feel like the virgin in this situation now—and honestly—are you not? 

Did those other dicks really count? 

It felt like you were having sex for the first time as this was a totally different experience even from the earlier round with Gojo.

“Don’t worry though, now that I know what kinda shit you’re into—I’mma take care of that pervy lil’ princess pussy sooo good, Bunny.”

Oh god—That couldn’t be true could it? 

Spanking? Nipple twisting? Having your insides pushed up to your throat? 

You didn’t actually like this kinda freaky shit did you?

Yet your body’s reactions remain true even if your mind doesn't want to accept the cause of the fire that is burning within you. Your pussy is in raptures at the feeling of being molded into the exact shape of Gojo’s cock—veins and all.

“HELLLOOOOO BUNNY!!!!”

Absolutely pleased with himself Gojo retrieves the phone.

“Awe p-poor thing, just stubbed her toe runnin’ from me. My—SHIII–room is—FUHHH—k-kinda a m-mess—S-See? I almost tripped just now too. Isn’t that right Bunny?”

Gojo brings the phone closer and you bat it away wishing he would just hang up and spare you the humiliation. Although humiliation seemed to be your new kink as mirroring his earlier actions as you’re pathetically moaning into his skin. Gojo’s masculine scent, mingled with the salty aroma of perspiration, floods your senses, making you feel even more lightheaded, increasing the sloshing of his cock buried deep in your cunt.

The crude noises that rang from your bodies squelching and slapping against each other renders Gojo unable to keep up the charade either. Making up a quick excuse—he has to go get ice for your toe—he quickly hangs up on Shoko and Utahime whose puzzled protests of concern he couldn’t give a single fuck about anymore. 

God fucking you while on the phone with them was so fucking hot, he’d have to get you to do it again—maybe with Suguru next time, he’d probably even be into it.

“Hey B-Bunny—y-you think Shoko and Hime were naked too?”

You groan.

This fucking hentai otaku perv—you already told him that they were helping Shoko’s parents! 

You want to glare, scream, chastise, get up—but you can’t—you’re at the mercy of him ruthlessly drilling up into your cunt and can only heave out tired mewls in reply.

“Fuuuck–imma cum again soon! Do you feel the way your naughty lil’ cunt is squeezing like she wants to wring me dry, wan’t me to give it all to your pussy Bunny?”

“N-Not i-inside m’pussy, T-Toru!” 

A devious smirk appears. 

Heh, yeah he promised not inside your pussy.

Without warning Gojo rips his cock out from your sopping core and manhandles you onto your back. Thinking he will simply cum outside somewhere you're finally able to breathe again and you exhale—only to feel his monstrous length being shoved down your throat.

Your eyes shoot open. 

Greeted with the image of Gojo's heavy balls in your face, his ball hairs tickle your nose as you gag around his girth straining your throat open wide. You think if he didn’t reach your lungs through your guts he certainly would now that he’s eight and a half inches down your esophagus.

“You said i couldn’t cum in your pussy Bunny, so let’s use that pretty lil’ mouth pussy instead—sweet fuck, ya know she’s almost tighter than your actual cunt.”

Your hands fly to the outside of his thighs pawing over the sweat glossed skin as you drag your nails down them, leaving welts in an effort to get him to ease up. The potent musk of your shared lust that had dripped down his balls was now rubbing on your face assaulting your senses. 

It was fucking nasty, so gross and yet your own pussy betrayed you—burning with an ache to be filled again at the smells that stimulated your own primal hedonistic urges.

“Awe, don’t be like that. I know you like it rough, yeah? I haven’t forgotten about you either baby.”

Gojo of course at this point isn’t talking to you but your cunt.

With one hand squeezing your already constricted airway, Gojo’s other snaked its way over your body and reeling it back before delivering a mean open palmed slap to your clit. 

The sound of your soaked cunt echoed through his room and he almost came from that alone as your fluids trickled out of you faster, further soiling his expensive sheets.

“This pussy likes being spanked more than those cherry cheeks of yours huh, Bunny? I know my filthy hentai pussy does.”

You’re obviously unable to answer but the way you’re gurgling moans around his cock lets him know this is exactly what you like. Thrusting two thick fingers into your quivering core his burly appendages bullied themselves in as far as they could go. 

“You know—G-God, FUCK you’re tight—Bunny, you know I read in an h-manga how girls can squirt from a lack of air and a little bit of prodding, s’ppose—S-SHIII—t’be something in here that sends em absolutely wild.”

Fingers searching deeper it's not until Gojo pulls back to add a third that he scrapes past a firm spongy spot that has your legs buckling.

Astonished by the amazingly sexy reactions of your body—Gojo’s eyes are blown out wide over how much your clit swells, your hole twitches and your juices spurt out of you as your tears run over your cheeks to wet his balls further. Gojo doesn’t even need to thrust as your throat tightens around him like crazy with him jamming his fingers into that particular spot over and over.

Lost in your own ecstasy you’re proven wrong as contrary to your belief you thought his otaku sex-ed would be to his detriment to his skills. However it's exactly because of all of the lecherous and depraved shit he collected and consumed did he know exactly what to do to you now that got you all messed up. Eyes lodged into your skull, squirting and practically blacking out with his dick stuffed down your throat on his long dexterous fingers abusing your cunt.

“SHIIIIIIT—”

With a keen grunt Gojo cums, pumping loads of viscous fluid down your throat forcing you to gorge on his thick cum. 

“F-Fuck Bunny are you a throat goat? M-Milked me dry...”

He’s still driving his pliable fingers in and out of you, his arms are shaking from his own orgasm but he doesn’t care. Nothing on earth could stop him from replicating the beautiful sight of your pretty lil’pussy spurting out juices that run all the way down his forearm.

“…heh, looks like I can milk you too, Bunny.”

Gojo finally dislodges his dick out of your throat but still runs a hand through your pussy folds to rub soothing circles on your clit. You whimper through your coughs as you spit up some of his cum, still gagging after what were mere minutes but seemed like hours of choking on his beefy cock.

Vision spotty, tremors run through your body—both ends so thoroughly fucked out—that it doesn’t register that Gojo is once again lifting your body bringing you towards the edge of the bed.

If you thought Gojo was going to give you aftercare from having used your body like one of his anime fleshlights, you’d be correct—but not before one last round. 

Lifting your hips off his luxe bed Gojo positions your wobbly legs on his shoulders. His eyes are blown out and crazed with his own twisted perversion. Weakened and spent himself as cock twitched from overstimulation but he’s never been a quitter—determined to make you cum again and again before one of you finally passes out.

Your toes wiggle and you keen as his tongue ravenously dips between your toes. Trailing his tongue past the arch of your foot to bite your heel.

“You’re so fucking sexy, Bunny—the best pussy in the whole world, how could you ever think she was broken? You were just waiting for me to use her huh?”

“S-shut up–Toru, j-jeez…”

Your windpipes had been fucked raw and you’re croaking which to your dismay only seems to turn Gojo on more and he’s tapping his tender engorged cockehead on your clit. Your brows pinch together as you bite back moans from his frenulum catching and chafing so wonderfully over your clitoral hood.

“Puhleaseeee, Honey Bunny! Let me fuck you a bit more now that we know you are as ecchi coded as I am, m’kay my pervy princess?”

The very thought shames you and you think your heart might seize from embarrassment if it doesn’t give out from pleasure first and your heart feels like it might beat out of your chest chest from all the pet names Gojo is bestowing upon you. 

“Toru…”

You try to reason with him through your defeated huffs as you press your legs shut together.

“...y-you made me cum from your fingers n’ your cock.. Y-You won. Pleaseee—I-I don’t even think I can cum any more.” 

Not convinced Gojo pushes your legs back.

“Oh, is that right? Let’s ask her then!”

Gojo delivers another smack onto your slippery pussy as if on the command of her new owner your obedient cunt immediately leaks a bit more creamy slick onto his palm.

“See, baby? She says you can though and that she’s tired of you running from it Bunny—”

Still hugging your legs together in his grasp, Gojo lowers himself to rub his cheek against your pussy like it was his favorite pillow. 

“Don’t fret my pervy lil’ pussy I won't let Bunny deprive you any longer from what you really need.”

You groan yet Gojo is more gentle this time as he gingerly rolls you onto your belly and lifts your hips to slide his giant Agumon pillow underneath.

Urgh, did it have to be this one!?

There's no time for complaints though once Gojo spreads your cheeks wide. A glob of spit hits your crack as his thumb prods against your shy puckering rear hole while he humps his cock between the fat of your thighs through your soggy swollen folds. 

“Shiiit imma fuck this tight lil’ bunny hole next time baby, m’kay?”

The threat causes you to shudder yet all your back talk and sass is gone from his illicit preparations as he elicits heady mewls from your hoarse throat. Your cunt flutters eagerly to have him fill you again as his fingers imprint themselves into your bottom.

The anticipation is so intense as bracing for his size ripping through you you nearly fail to notice Gojo is now humming to himself—humming—THE DIGIMON CHAMPIONS THEME SONG!?

OH HE HAD YOU ALL THE WAY FUC—

—And suddenly you’re screaming again, eyes glued to the back of your skull as his hips jerk forward, drilling his dick past your walls to pound directly into your cervix with the tempo of a  madman.

OH FUCK! …s’good!

You finally surrender letting your cunt control your brain as you throw ass back to meet his frenzied thrusts. Like a drug addict from the first real taste your pussy is already addicted to the feeling of his cock destroying you.

“S’toru–S’toru–S’toru–FUHHHHCK!”

His name fell from your lips like a mantra, the only word your brain—now thoroughly fucked smoothed—could remember.

The sight of you chasing your own pleasure as your ass slammed back onto his pelvis, your skin rippling as it bounced and splashed frothy fluids onto his abs sent him further into perverse degeneracy. 

“F-Fuck Bunny—baby, this pussy too good—We can’t tell Suguru for a while, kay? He’ll want to fuck you too and this pussy is just f’me. Suguru gets all the pussy s’tell me you’ll keep yours f’er me. Thought you were broken but you just needed my cock this whole time—”

Burying your face in the sheets bashfully at the mention of Suguru, your cunt pulls more taut around Gojo’s cock.

“—FUHH, g-go out with me yeah, Bunny? Love you s’much—SHIIIIT—buy you whatever you want—t-take you where you want—this dick s’yours Bun Bun—all yours!”

Plunging into deeper if it were even possible Gojo’s blunted nails drug into the fat of your ass and hips, it wouldn’t scar but it would certainly add to the inevitable bruising. 

“I’ll never even look at a non 2D woman again as long as I have you as my lil’ onahole—shit I’ll never even buy one of those again unless it's in the shape of your pussy—F-FUCK, w-wait–y-you think we could get one made in the shape of your pussy–my girlfriend’s perfect pussy?!”

It’s too much—too overwhelming and your mind is slowly but surely being corrupted by Gojo. Otherwise the image of him whining while fucking a onahole casted from your cunt as he watches you finger yourself would have never in a million years popped into your mind. 

Determined to see you unhinged in every respect, Gojo didn’t want to deny you pleasure but if he had to be a little mean to you so you could finally be honest with him then so be it. 

Slowly pulling out, your expression is near frantic as you look back at him. Your mouth gaping and babbling nonsensically for him not for him to stop—you were so close.

Gojo simpers, relishing in your cute cockdrunk face scrunched with confusion from him pulling out so suddenly. 

“W-Words baby, c’mon I just spilled my heart out here!”

Your pussy weeps longingly for Gojo’s cock as your body shakes with a yearning begging to be filled again. 

God help you, you want him. 

You want him and his sinfully curved demon dick badly, it’s all you could think about—Not even remembering what life was like before he so perversely rearranged your guts.  However, not only did he know how to hit all your spots, he knew you—and despite him completely disregarding all of the rules you had initially set, he was the first guy who actually cared about how you felt during sex, even if he was a perverted otaku.

There was simply no use in denying it any longer. 

You caved.

Tears streaming down your face as you hiccupped your admission of affections for him, red-faced and flustered.

“S’toru, I-I’ll be your girlfriend—need you n’need your cock s’much—”

Pressing the side of your face against the mattress you bring a shaky hand through your legs, fingers slipping over your slick as you part your pussy lips—your vacant core exposed and fluttering, begging for him just as hard.

“—m’also you’re onahole T-Toru, I promise i’ll only fuck you, j-just please keep fucking me, i wanna cum on your cock, want your cum in me Toru baby!”

You might die from the shame of it all once you sober up from being utterly cockdrunk and stupefied but all you could think about right now was Gojo’s hard dick laying heavy pipe back into your cunt.

Something snaps in Gojo.

Head over heels for you now, Gojo knew from that moment on he’d never let you go. 

Real or 2D—no could compare to you in Gojo’s eyes. 

Toru finally found something he loved more than digimon—your perfect lil’pussy.

And he was going to show her how much he loved her right now.

Taking what was so graciously presented to him this time around, you’re short circuiting once he’s finally inside you again your most base needs being satiated turning you into a cockfiendish whore crying for him to fuck you harder as you grip his sheets like you could rip them apart. 

His strokes become more merciless, unrelenting on your pussy and Gojo leans his weight onto your back, legs bent crouching on top of you, his hips becoming manic they thrashed forward in short heavy thrusts to hammer you into the mattress.

Gojo himself is beyond gone. 

Disregarding all promises of mentioning otaku shit while he was wrecking your cunt.  

“Fuck bunny this feels better then what I thought Agnewomon’s pussy would be like— you'd look so sexy in that cosplay. Gonna have you dress up for me and show you off at cons. I’ll buy you whatever you want, anything, the whole fucking world yeah? Just fuck—wear those those vibrating panties while you cosplay too, you’d like that?”

You tightened groaning at his debauchery, something that was not missed at all by Gojo who by this point had fucked his own self dumb in your angelic cunt. White strands of his hair stuck to both of your faces as he tiled your head back so he could see how desperately those little hearts danced in your dilated pupils before they were reduced to nothing more than mere splotches whiting out your vision.

“Fuck u really are a slut huh bunny? Tightening at the thought of all those otaku perverts looking at you in that skimpy outfit while I control the buzzing on that lil clit. But they can’t have you—m’the only otaku pervert that knows how to make you cum!”

Delirious with melodic honeyed cries spilling from you, you just wanted him to stop talking—pointing out every single time your body responded to his ecchi tastes becoming your tastes and now just yearning for a taste of him. 

Reaching back you’re pulling him down to smash your lips together. Messy, but you could care as Gojo tried to swallow your tongue fucking his own into your mouth with a force that matched his cock. If fucking you was heaven then kissing you was nirvana���he’d give you the whole world if he could keep fucking you like this forever.

Gojo needs you to cum again soon as the feral need breed your tummy until it swells with his seed has him losing the little sanity he even had to begin with. A virgin until today he’d saved up so much waiting for your tight cunt this whole time. 

Moving his lips away from yours only for air, your chest heaves harmonies cries from his hand weaving under your bodies. Jittery fingers swiped frantically over your clit, hurling you towards your euphoric climax as his lips descend back upon yours.

“Cum Bunny—I got ya baby.”

Deliberately plowing himself harder against your cervix, your body seizes up releasing tension into pure white energy that you swore was pumping through your every vein as an extension of your pussy as his heavy load spurts to paint your walls and sear your insides as his thrusts continue to swill his seed inside you, pushing it further into your womb—-thank fuck for birth control.

However that was the last thing you remember before you go limp, temporarily blacked out as you swear you’ve transcended to a celestial plane of existence. One where all slutted out souls went to escape from the unearthly pleasure they’ve been tortured by. You don’t know how long you’ve been out but you're squirming as you come back to consciousness. Realizing your now back on your back as your hips involuntarily rocking against something thick and wet. 

When you finally manage to open your eyes you're greeted by Gojo tongue slurping at your clit and lapping up the cum oozing out of your battered hole like it was a refreshingly creamy bowl of kakigori. His hands embedded themselves into your thighs pinning them to the bed nibbling on your clit and having your already overstimulated core climaxing on his tongue once more.

Strings of your sticky nectar connect his tongue to your cunt as he looks up at you. Having the audacity to grin lovingly at you as if he didn’t look like a downright starved and deranged man with a sheen of shared fluids dribbling down his chin. He’s pussy drunk once again this time buzzed off the pungent yet sweet taste of his cum marinating in your creamy tenderized cunt.  

Gojo is cheesin’ at you like he’s found his favorite spot in the world—and he had as far as he was concerned.

“You said it was too messy, remember Bunny? The least I can do to make it up to you is scoop every drop out of your runny lil’ cunt with my tongue! What kind of boyfriend would I be to have all this cum soaking my Bunny’s slutty little thong and spilling down her thighs while out to dinner—so I decided to have mine a little early.”

FUCKING HELL—DINNER! What time was it?! 

Disordented, your head is fuzzy and you could feel the soreness settling in your muscles. You didn’t think you’d be able to get out of this bed in the next 24 hours, let alone make it to dinner—if you hadn’t already missed it! 

“Nnnn, n-not like I can go anymore Toru, s’all your f-fault!”

Your bruised lips poke out into pout. Gojo chuckles at you how cute you look and he rises up from between your thick thighs to boop you on the nose as he gazes adoringly at you.

“I know princess m’sorry—I already texted Shoko saying you couldn’t, don’t worry~~”

But your eyes widened as you were now fully worried. 

Worried as to what the fuck Gojo actually texted them! 

“T-Toru—”

“—I just told them you weren’t feeling well, was that okay?”

Quickly assuaging your fears—you can relax a bit for now (although you were sure you’d have a lot of explaining to do later) as Gojo pulls you to him again and softly kisses your neck, hands returning to your ass to rub soothing circles on your chaffed skin. 

Relaxing again floods sleep into your eyes. A welcome godsend honestly, so you can process everything that just happened, especially Gojo aggressively fucking a love confession out of you. 

“And m’sorry if I got carried away Bun… but you were so good for me, so fucking perfect! Just relax and I’ll take care of you! I’ll handle everything—for you and your nasty lil’ cunt. I love you both and I’ll keep both my pretty girls happy forever! I promise!”

Gazing at you with cartoonishly sparkling eyes, you have to look away from Gojo lest your ears altogether burn up in embarrassment from his shameless and yet a hundred percent earnest vocalization of affections that somehow still got your heart racing.

“—oh and my parents will be here tomorrow—we can tell them right? They will be so excited! They've been telling me since I was little I shouldn’t let you get away! Ooo! Ooo! Maybe now that we're dating they’ll let us use their sex dungeon! We need to think of a safe word though Bunny—”

Scarcely comprehending anything he is saying to you, your mind like your pussy had been fully liquified. Both ruthlessly corrupted by Gojo’s long otaku cock and pervy ass fantasies which is no surprise seeing as his family even owns a—

HOL’ THE ENTIRE FUCKUP—A SEX DUNGEON!?

Like a shot of caffeine directly into your veins your eyes nearly pop out of your head as you blink at him dumbfounded, mouth hanging open.  

“Doesn’t that sound fun, Bunny!? My parents are so cool! When I turned 18 my dad even gave me some of his rare and one-of-a-king hentai figures for my collection to get me started and then—”

Tuning him out you’re gagged at the unexpected revelations—and his parents always seemed like such charming n’ decent God fearing people too. Well known to be ruthless in the business world, but upstanding global philanthropists nonetheless.

Well the apple sure as hell didn’t fall too far from the sordid sex fiend tree, that was for damn sure!

Clearly you had no idea what you were getting yourself into or had unleashed by agreeing to be Gojo’s girlfriend. I mean, could no longer deny your growing feelings for him—plus he did just give you multiple back-breaking-terrifyingly-mind-numbing-earth-shattering-orgasms. Not to mention, you would definitely be getting one of every Hermes bag ever made if you wanted one—but at what cost?

Your Dignity? 

Self-respect? 

The right to call yourself a functional and contributing non-degenerate member of society?

Who knows really…

Although perhaps dating a Gojo, the next heir at that, you’d be too rich and highly regarded for people to even care (we’ll except for your friends giving y’all hell but you could eventually make peace with that).

You internally groan as the gentle touches on your bottom morph into lustful gropes and you know your brand new boyfriend would not be granting rest for your totally demolished lil’ pussy anytime soon unless you could distract him a bit.

“—Toru, Toru baby listen, please.”

Interrupting him, you muster the energy to put on the sweetest face you can manage in your exhausted state. 

And of course, Gojo, as always and yet unknowingly, tests the limits of your tolerance.

“Yes, my whittle Bunny, my kinky baby girl—hentai goddess divine?”

Gojo nuzzles your nose in an eskimo kiss as he showers you with ‘loving compliments’. 

Scrunching your face, you grit your teeth through your already weak smile to stop yourself from losing it at him referring to you as ‘hentai goddess divine’—y’all would definitely be having a talk about that as well as appropriate in-public pet names later though.

“Babyyyyy—I’m so sticky and sore, why don’t you be a good boyfriend and get stuff ready for us to take a bath, hm? Maybe find me something else to wear too, hm?”

You did need a bath and you calculated even with his energetic disposition it should take him at least 15-20 minutes to delegate the tasks and get everything together considering how huge his mansion was.

“Oh! Of course, of course! Just wait here! I’ll be right back, my ecchi angel.”

Brow-twitching you sit up to wave at him with another strained smile as he scrambles to put on pants and heads out of his room.

You sigh tiredly and make yourself comfy on his cloud like pillows. 

Thinking he’s finally left and you can savor some much needed time to make peace with what you got yourself into by agreeing to be the girlfriend of an otaku nerd like Gojo Satoru—

—when his head suddenly peaks back in the room with a sheepish look on his face.

“Heh, you know Bunny, was thinking—you really didn’t think I could code crack your cute lil’ cunt now did ya?”

Your eyes are closed but your fists are balling angrily gripping onto the pillows surrounding you.

“Don’t worry Bunny, yours is the only pussy my dick is digidestined for!”

With that, Gojo narrowly avoids the Agumon pillow plushie that is swiftly hurled at his head as he dashes away from the door, his merry yet hysterical laughter echoing through the halls.

©blkkizzat 2024. do not steal works or gfx, do not translate.

⏭ a/n: this fic was wayyyy too long but i've been kinda mean to y'all gojo glazers lately rejoicing in your sorrows cause you are now miserable like the rest of us lmfao, so consider this y'alls bone :P tbh im kinda surprised this is the first full gojo fic i've written lol, it was fun tho cause otaku!gojo is a freak for pussy would drive you insane in all the right and wrong ways. i still have invisible man gojo and ceo/professor gojo planned tho (plus that frat boy satosugu request).

eta: serieslist

reblogs and comments are my life's blood ty ᥫ᭡ .ᐟ

[jealousmartini]

✦ My average schedule + Get ready with me on a random college day as an art student and an LOASS babe ⊹₊ㆍ👜

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Long ass post ahead

FYI!! We only have 4 days of college, so we get Friday off. My longest days in college are Monday, 11:15 am to 4:45 pm (depending on if we have tutorial first thing. If not, we will come in at 1 pm), and Tuesday, 11:15 am to 4:15 pm. My shortest days are Wensdays, 11:15 am to 3:00 pm and Thursday, 9 am to 12:30 pm. The days that are shorter than the others (mainly Thursday) are the ones that I prioritise focusing on extra work after hours. It is super important to me to use my Thursday free time for extra research/analysises/art work at home so I can so I can stay ahead and not fall behind in class

╰┈➤ " She's an overachiever " click here!

«───────── « ⋅��♡ɞ⋅ » ────────»

GRWM! The longest day of the week, Monday!

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The goal is to get a bus around 10:25 am to 10:45 am in order to get to college at 11:15 am

[ 000 :: Getting up ]

✦ I wake up at 9:15 am and immediately make my bed because no one likes to come home to an untidy bed.

✦ And then my first favourite thing I do is wonder what I wanna smell like today, I take out my specifically scented body wash, 2 in 1 shampoo, hair gel, body cream, deodorant (preferably scentless), and perfume with the scent I chose and then I do my blanket affirming in my 15-20 minute shower. After the shower, I moisturise my body with my scented body cream, spray deodorant, and move onto my clothes.

[ 001 :: Getting dressed ] — estimated time 9:35

✦ I love dressing up. At this point, I do my best not to overthink what to wear because I know I will be there forever, making multiple outfits but never choosing one. So I focus on what style I'm going for and pick out my clothes, always being mindful of the colours of course and then put them on

✦ Next I decide wether or not I want to wear make up (more times yes than no) but before I do my usual make up look, I quickly do my skin care routine to protect my skin and then I do my cutesy girlie make up all while affirming my blanket affirmations

✦ And then I move on to do my hair. Because I have super curly hair, depending on what style I want, it takes a bit of time to manage. So I usually settle with doing something simple like brushing my curls out into a fro and then putting it into a bun or puffs, or I leave my curls defined and either leave my hair down or put it in a bun, space buns or a tail type which usually takes me 10-15 minutes, taking us up to 9:55-10 o'clock.

✦ But if I'm feeling ambitious, I'll straighten/blow out my hair and do a straight hairstyle. I usually go for bantu knots, spikey buns (my signature half up, half down), pigtails/ponytails, or leave it down. Doing this would take me around 15-20 minutes, taking us up to 10 o'clock to 10:10.

[ 002 :: Breakfast time ] — estimated time 10:00

✦ It's always important to start your day with a satisfied stomach, which is why I always make sure I know what I want to eat for breakfast and if I want to eat a lot. Once I've made my breakfast, I like to look over the work I have already done on my ipad to see what more could be added while I eat.

✦ I try not to eat too slowly or take too much time doing tiny bits of extra work because I still need to brush my teeth and get my bag (which is always already packed). When I have finished my food, brushed my teeth and got my bag, I should be at the door by 10:30 to 10:45

[ 003 :: Ready to leave ] — estimated time 10:40

✦ I don't live far from my bus stop, so it usually takes me around 5-6 minutes to walk there, and then around 25 minutes to get to college on the bus.

✦ But sometimes my man best friend drives to my house to pick me up and then we both go to college together. I don't know which one I prefer the most to be honest but going by car is definitely a lot quicker (given that there isn't any traffic) and I just love beening in the presence of my boyfie bff

[ 004 :: College hours ] — estimated time 11:15

✦ Hurray we arrived on time! Looking delicious and smelling delicious. Now it is time to get to class and get a load of work done like the overachiever I am.

✦ Lunch time comes around and I leave the classroom to the couch area where my (girl) best friend is waiting for me. We chat and eat and chat some more until it's time to part ways back to class.

✦ Another more than generous amount of work gets done be me and my two super cool art besties, I'm sure the same can be said for the rest of the class but this isn't about them rn.

There's five people per table in my class, but only two tables in the middle have the ten of us, the other 3 tables are empty because we're a small class but I sit along side my two good classmates on the left side. We are very attentive, concentrated, and skilled art students. We always check up on each others art and written work, giving each other ideas and such. We are even jokingly referred to as "competition" by two of our other classmates (im not a fan of those two but it is what it is)

[ 005 :: Home time ] — scheduled time 4:45

✦ Sometimes, college can be grueling. Especially on Mondays. So to be able to have a close friend group to reunite with after the last hour of college is so so comforting. ESPECIALLY WHEN ITS AUTUMN/WINTER SEASON because it gets really dark in the late afternoon very quickly and I always prefer to go home with company in these seasons.

✦ I take the same bus as I did to college back home with my friends, usually right after getting a snack together and because we are a group of four (six if i include boy bestfriends sister and her boyfriend), none of us have to worry about strangers sitting next to us.

The bus drive home is always relaxing and in my opinion fun too.

[ 006 :: Arriving home ] — estimated time 5:10

✦ First day of the week done. Time to unwind, clean up, eat, relax and sleep. As soon as I get back home, I love to have a quick gossip with my mum about my day and get unready with my best friends of face time

There's this very common belief that you always have to talk of face time, but that's not all ways true. Me and my friends just like to have each others presence in silence, occasionally being nosy every now and then about what's for dinner, what's on TV and that's about it. Nothing more nothing less and its perfect that way.

I inform my friends I'm off to get a shower, I like to use my scentless soaps and body creams for bed time or maybe some light essential oils like lavender, I get out and throw an oversized T on because I don't like sleeping with bottoms on, yank my pink bonnet over my curls, slip my feet into some fluffy pink sliders and whatever I choose to do with the rest of my evening is random and spontaneous depending on what I'm in the mood for in the comfort of my home that I manifested ♡

∘₊ ✧───────────────────✧₊∘

જ⁀➴. And that's my average GRWM/schedule of a random day on a random college day as an artist and an LOASS babe ⊹₊ㆍ♡⋆₊˚⊹ I dunno if you could tell but this was secretly a vault lmao

[sanest-bsd-delegate]

IRL MEETS WITH DAZAI, SIGMA AND FYODOR

Headcanon: How I imagine you and the boys meeting after being online friends Genre: Crack A/N: Still questioning why i tried writing this... Warning? Bad grammer and 0 proofread →Masterlist

Dazai:

You both pretty much met on twitter when you were concerning who was behind the chuuya hate acc 🤩 I mean who can hate chuuya?

you probably were a new member in the mafia for not knowing about THE Dazai oSaMU

or you were a member of Detective agency dense enough to know that they both were infact enemies and not enemies soon to be lovers 🤩🤩😔🏳️‍🌈

OR You were a freelancer fresh college passout student who was wasting their time online getting blocked by 12 year old kids 🤩😋that was until you accidentally befriend him

successfully had 6th month friendaversy. 🤩🤩

when you both exchanged your place of residence you were shocked to know there are actually useless people in Japan apart from you

OR You were just concerned to know that he used to stay up late at night to talk to you while you message him in between work hours. 🤩🤩Dazai is such a romantic mood NGL

AHHHH Its the day of THE friends meeting.

You lowkey regret befriending him.

He probably sends you discord kitten memes and his hand pics for no reason. [BUT CSN WE TALK ABOUT HIS HANDS-!!?]

Mf once tried to video call you when you specifically told him NOT to.

He was blocked for a whole week before someone named 'iaminlovewithdeathtoes' spammed you.

🤡honestly you realised you both never shared your name, so pretty much to arrived at the meetup place, thinking of ways how to say 'chuuyahater6fttall' and knowing him, he prob would have you come over the agency cause bitch is lazy asf.

Dingdong you arrive at Yokohama or pretty much at the agency 🤩🤗except you were shitting in your pants cause what the actual fuck. So the person you talked with, who encouraged all kind of illegal stuff and told you to shoplift and send a pic was actually a detective??? Nah dawg you wished he was a lowkey an accountant cause which detective will have so much time to be online and chat?

boi you were wrong. And to have cherry on the top, you bumped into a brown coat bearing man who looked like he was high on nuts. But damn he looked hot

did you say "sir please scream me without the s 🥺" to yourself? Did he hear it? probably

🤩boom your headphones got disconnected for a moment and the whole agency went silent as the lyrics of "good lookin" started to play.

The man infront of you laughs before kidnapping you and dragging you out of the agency, a queue of screams and shouts for the man to comeback and you desperately trying to switch off your phone. (🤩🤗The lyrics were blasting through the area)

honestly you didn't mind as long as he turns out to be those Wattpad overprotective mafia bosses 🤩🤩🤗🌟 so you can have ur Y/N moment

'Help I am getting kidnapped by brown coat man and am left all alone' you typed, as the three dots indicated that chuuyahater typing before he replied, 'I am the man'

The way you audibly screeched as your turn back and your hand automatically made a way to his face to give him a slap. (🤩You heard laughing in the background, it was chuuya fyi)

"Aww belladonna, I thought you loved me" "THAT DOESN'T MEAN YOU KIDNAP ME AND MAKE ME STAND ON TOP OF A HIGHASS BUILDING" "But you agreed to do it once we meet!"

Oh he was serious when he said that 🤡

You ran away as fast as you can away from him, as you typed

'you are a bitch you know that?' 'And you are really beautiful you know that?'

😍🤩 you were greatful to get away from him, except he was knocking at you door (hotel door if u came from other part of the world) at 3am playing THAT part of the song "redbone by childish gambino" (iykwim) outside your door

Sigma

you both honestly never befriended.

You accidentally messaged him asking him to deliver you a pizza

🤩and when he replied with 'wrong number' you lost your shit. 'The fuck you mean wrong number you son of a-' 'Dont have one?'

Sigma maybe anxious in real life but online? Pretty sure he is a full on sassy sarcastic not so sweet Sigma (respectfully)

You both might have had a very professional verbal conversation over phone that day.

He and you might have bonded yet again when you, my dear reader accidentally send him a meme you were suppose to send someone else (guess who) and Sigma lost his shit.

Why was na unknown number, with memory of a snail sending him 20 pictures of a fisheye doll at 3am in the morning?

'Are you okay-?' He probably asked, 'Do I look sane?' you probably answered.

😭 but lowkey thinks that you both exchanged your insta Ids or smthg.

😡😡He didn't even acknowledge your following and never followed you back. 😔 rip your follower count

You spam him with reels and he? REPLIES TO ALL OF THEM LIKE GOOD BLESS THIS MAN TO RUN A WHOLEASS CASINO AND STILL HAVE TIME TO WATCH YOUR REELS

You would rant to him and he will listen 100%

Pretty sure you never tired to meet up. It was your ass being dragged by one of your friends to accompany them to a flying casino and get bankrupt.

Prob msged him saying how edible the manager of the place you went looked😭😭 (you didn't tell him u went to a casino so)

He replies with 'go get your man and stop telling me details about his hands'

And so you did, pretty much used your luck and became the star of Casino😡😡

Society validation? Nah 👎 but Casino manager acknowledge? Yah 👍

Now the thing is, Sigma probably got really indulged on how you managed to beat records that he spent time doing a background check rather then opening his phone and seeing your 99+ texts.

You on the other hand? Went wild. Your online friend wasn't responding!!!?? 😡😡 and you were telling him the tea how the manager put his hand on your shoulder acknowledging you.

Little did you know, you were so blinded texting 'the casino manager' You failed to realise you bumped into him.

phone drop, heart stop screen crack, gave you a heart attack.

worst part? The 'Manager' picked up your phone, looking down at the chat only to see his pfp and his contact named "Pizzah Guz" and your half written text of 'Where are you, I miss talking to| '

You were whereas unsure whether to feel embarrass or cry. You see his face only to realise the amount of shock you gave to the manager.

😭😭Pretty sure it took some time for him to cool down.

BUT I THINK he totally appears in front of your room, with a pizza guy costume and a box full of pizza, messaging you 'Open your door'

You were a little freaked out by his message. I mean Imagine texting a random guy and the only thing you know about him is that he is not a pizza guy and he tells you to open your door?

You open your door to see the manager in a pizza delivery guy uniform, a pizza in his hands while he holds his phone together, before he hands it over to you, before your phone notification tings, your online friend sends an image capturing 'Pizza delivery'

You fainted on the spot of pure embarrassment and realisation when you realise you were texting the manager while simping on him and describing details.

Or you just take the pizza and close the door, switch off and throw your phone on the bed and eat the pizza while the realisation hits.

Fyodor:

You both probably met on discord while bullying middle schools for their pfp choices 😭

10/10 had bombing conversation 👁️👄👁️ that is until you realise he was serious about it.

You be joking about how you will learn hacking to hack him and that moment all your dms get 'Join the rat cult' Picture.

😭😭please idts you met physically…like the possibility of fyodor arriving at your doorstep while you are half asleep eating a pizza and watching TV is insane.

Imagine you peep through the peephole and see fisheye fyodor 🤩🤩 10/10 scared

Online friend? Nah man he is your offline terrorist. That was until his wholeass body blewup and the only thing that was left was his arm from which he used to type to your responses from.

10/10 Power of Love and friendship

I feel like whenever you both VC, your silly self will try to use the soundboard and he probably vibe to it.

You both accidently made a cult.

Fyodor NGL prob just stalked you out of boredom.

Nikolai probably be backreading your chats and the next day you have a new coworker named "Fyolaya"

Honestly there is a possibility that fyodor has zero interest in meetup and then bam Nikolai scopes you in the middle of your work and drop you on fyodor's lap🤩

Imagine the tension when you, a average worker in the society lands on the lap of one of THE Doa members

Y/N x hot mafia boss who kidnaps Y/N accidentally cause Y/N met his man au? Terrorist edition?

You living a Wattpad life? Possibilly

A/N: Look i am sane

TAGLIST: @averagehisoilluenjoyer, @high-on-dazai @ruru-kiss Join or remove your user here.

[kiritila]

Are you still gonna be updating no one saw me?

this is such a long time overdue, but since ive been away so long i figured this would be a good way to address everything, like whats been happening in my life and my future plans for no1sm for everyones clarity.

to put it shortly, i work full-time, and have done for nearly 2 years now. i am a product designer and i work monday-friday, 9-5. i attend a full day of college classes once a week, this day being even longer than a work day, and on top of that i have a personal work-based tutor that i have to complete work for as well. so in terms of professional obligations, im extremely busy. in my personal life, ive been seeing friends a lot, running errands, planning for weddings, parties, buying a car, SO MANY THINGS. my life has been so hectic.

ive also been suffering some health problems recently. my earliest or readers that are close friends probably know i began writing no1sm to vent my feelings about trauma i underwent, and this obviously still affects me quite greatly alongside depression and anxiety. ive also been suffering quite badly with insomnia and fatigue problems, as well as, embarrassingly, moderately bad eczema.

perhaps the most ridiculous development of all: I AM NOT CURRENTLY HYPERFIXATED ON SOUTH PARK. SHOCK HORROR. BUT PLEASE DONT PANIC: it is still my spin, stan and kyle are still my most favourite characters ever, and most of all i still ENJOY south park and enjoy thinking about, planning, and writing no1sm (when im not completely utterly knackered). ive actually recently gotten majorly into formula 1 as a result of my friends, so if there are any f1 fans following me PLEASE SAY HI!!!!! i plan to do art for it but i have been busy and im also very much a perfectionist. (FYI: my favourite driver is max verstappen. no questions asked. i also love charles daniel lando oscar and honestly most drivers on the grid. i love niki lauda james hunt seb vettel and jenson button. i had a brief mclaren tooned hyperfixation. I AM CURRENTLY INCREDIBLY DEPRESSED OVER DANIEL RICCIARDO LOSING HIS SEAT)

anyway.. getting back on track.

AM I STILL GOING TO BE UPDATING NO1SM?

YES. YES YES A MILLION TIMES YES. i dont know when, but this story is something i have to complete for myself and for you guys. i realised i was putting myself under so much pressure for it to be perfect that it sapped the love i felt for it from me. now that i no longer have visible eyes on me waiting for updates on twitter, i feel much freer and relaxed with it. i dont know how or when, but yes, the story will be completed. do not ask me about the kyle prequel ive planned though DONT DO IT.

i also dont plan on posting about updates anywhere other than tumblr going forwards. ive since moved on from the twitter south park fandom where i was most active, as i felt like i was too old to be in a fandom of minors and the discourse was simply too much. so i decided to move to a fan space and sport that is a million times worse but still somehow has been better for me. so if you still want to follow me on twitter even though i dont south park post anymore, you can follow me at @vrstappns :)

WILL NO1SM HAVE AN UPDATE SCHEDULE?

NO. sorry, my mental health and my career comes first. i want to try and find a better balance that leaves me time to write but im afraid i need time to ease myself back in after so long off and theres no guarantee how long that will take me.

WILL YOU STILL BE MAKING ART FOR NO1SM?

YES. I HOPE. who knows when though cause i havent been able to draw in a long time and im still pissed off that i cant draw max verstappen as easily as i could ever draw kyle broflovski.

AM I ALLOWED TO USE YOUR STORY AND WRITE THE ENDING FOR MYSELF?

NO. PLEASE DO NOT DO THIS. as much as other authors may encourage this I REALLY DO NOT LIKE THIS. you dont know how much work i have put into this fic as well as how much of my own life and traumas are embedded between the lines of writing. this fic is practically half of me in the same way my parents’ DNA is a part of my make-up. not to sound rude but to even think you could possibly imagine how i intend for this fic to resolve and end when you dont even know me is laughable.

HOW WILL THE INTENSE HOMOSEXUAL RIVALRIES OF FORMULA ONE INFLUENCE THE INTENSE HOMOSEXUAL RIVALRY OF STAN AND KYLE GOING FORWARDS?

im sure 2019 charles leclerc and max verstappen guided carefully by brocedes and james hunt and niki lauda will figure something out. maybe not brocedes actually i am unsure if i want stan marsh to end up like nico rosberg. but i guess he is a good youtuber too and has great hair which is two things stan is NOT. gay loser. also david coulthard and sebastian vettel are there somewhere. GAY RED BULL RACING WILL LEAD US TO WORLD PEACE

thank you so much for reading, i know youve all probably moved on with your life but its a weight off my chest to finally write this out. i love this fic and i love that you all love this fic, if you are still here. i can only apologise for how long ive made you all wait.

please just have patience with me,

thanks muchly,

mike (formerly marshplaylist) vrstappns

[capitalism-and-analytics]

Idk if you ever heard of it, but usually people, who go for minimum wage do it simply because they don't have any other option. You seriously think someone will intentionally choose a job with the least wage? Ofcourse not. And that kind of jobs commonly require a lot of energy and physical effort or sometimes people who work in it have some other kind of work to do like students or mothers, that doesn't allow them to quickly improve their financial situation. Do you live in a world, where none of that exists?

I'm assuming this is in response of another post, so apologies, if I am missing some context, but I will still aim to answer your post/question.

"You seriously think someone will intentionally choose a job with the least wage?"

Yes, but not for the wage, they are choosing it for the other characteristics of minimum wage jobs: flexible scheduling, part-time hours, low or minimal qualifications, culture, development of skills/networking, and/or available in most areas. People commonly choose lesser paying jobs over higher-paying jobs for a plethora of reasons, at all income levels.

"...And that kind of jobs commonly require a lot of energy and physical effort..."

Relative to what? If you are comparing them to office jobs, then sure, but most minimum wage jobs aren't nearly as physically exhausting as you are trying to portray them.

"...in it have some other kind of work to do like students or mothers, that doesn't allow them to quickly improve their financial situation..."

First off, being a student is literally the worst example of someone being unable to quickly improve their financial situation. FYI, you don't need to graduate to be able to move away from minimum wage.

Second off, as much as being a parent is an appeal of emotions, that doesn't change the fact that outside obligations exist for everyone and hold no influence to the value of one's labor, except when improving one's qualifications.

The same way an accountant can't charge more for being a father, a cashier shouldn't expect more either.

"Do you live in a world, where none of that exists?"

I live in the same world as you. The difference though is that I try to look at the world critically and try to avoid letting myself being misled with blatant exaggeration and irrelevant appeals of emotion.

Many minimum wage jobs are tiring and physically taxing, but they are not as inhumane or physically draining as you claim.

The knowledge and skill barrier for escaping minimum wage is absurdly low. Life is a journey, it is okay to progress incrementally. People are too busy focused on the final destination without considering all the potential stops they can take along the way.

To be clear, I'm not saying we can't aim for a better world or better society, I am just saying we need to direct our efforts appropriately. In this case, it isn't just employers being greedy and selfish, it is society as a whole. Most consumers consider price to be the leading indicator for making their purchase decisions and changing minimum wage laws isn't going to change that belief.

PS: Not that it should matter, but I was a full-time dishwasher at a large buffet for the first two years of college (also as a full-time student). I then went on to work 60-80 hours per week for the first 2-3 years after graduation (70-90 if you count travel time). In both cases, I never stopped upskilling myself outside of work. I'm not saying it's easy, but it is not nearly as "bad" as you are trying to portray. Additionally, it has nothing to do with "I did it, so they should have to as well" and more to do with "It was my choice, therefore my responsibility."

---------------------------------

INB4: "What about Jane Doe who has twelve chronic illnesses, three physical disabilities, four kids, and their husband recently got hit by a bus?"

I'm referring to the common scenario that describes 99% of people, not the 1% edge case scenario. For those 1% edge case scenarios, I'm more than happy to discuss alternative solutions, but that should define the exception, not the rule itself.

[ladamedusoif]

Visiting - Chapter 12: If I Must Have A Future

(moodboard by @agentjackdaniels)

Pairing: Professor!Ben (College AU) x OFC Lydia/fem!Reader (reader POV/2nd POV)

Summary: Seeking a change of scenery after her life falls apart, Lydia crosses the Atlantic and arrives in a small New England town, to spend a year expanding her intellectual horizons as a visiting professor of art history at a small liberal arts college. Her growing friendship with Ben Morales, professor of Hispanic literature, forces Lydia to confront the fallout from her past - and raises unexpected questions about the future.

Chapter summary: Spring break comes to Barrow, and with it a European trip with major consequences for Ben and Lydia.

Word count: ~18k words (I'm so sorry but HEY LOOK THEY'RE BACK!)

Rating: Explicit (18+, MDNI)

Warnings (chapter specific): Smut; quite a lot of smut really; oral sex (M and F receiving); unprotected but safe PiV sex; fingering; praise kink; very mild submission kink if you squint; self-esteem and body/weight insecurity; anxiety; angst; family dynamics; strong language; alcohol consumption; references to past instances of emotional abuse; fluff

A/N: Oh, boy. This was a labour of love. An incredibly important part of their story, and one that took me ages to get ‘right’. This is not the end of Visiting - I’m planning about three more chapters, which will not be as long as this one. So there is still more to come from Ben and Lydia.

I wanted to say a huge thank you to everyone who was so kind and excited about the little Christmas one-shots I wrote for this pair - sometimes I feel like my dorks are the last kind of characters people want in this fandom, and it was lovely to see that they have readers who actually care (and even miss them!). Thank you too to everyone who voted in the poll about the chapter length. You wanted the full-on 18,000 words - you’re getting it.

And a special word for @agentjackdaniels, who screamed with me when we got one of the most Benergetic red carpet looks I’ve ever seen at the Emmys, who made my gorgeous new header image, and who has helped me see more times than I’d care to admit over the last few months that I matter and make a difference, especially around here. I hope I have done the same, too.

See the Series Masterlist for an outline of Lydia’s story and background.

Chapter 11 - Chapter 13

Cross-posting to AO3 (and if you’re reading on there, too, and yelling along in the comments, love you!)

Further A/N at the end of the chapter.

The title of this chapter is a line from the Fontaines DC song “I Love You”, which is not terribly romantic, all told, but I heard it over the holidays and this lyric hit me hard: If I must have a future/I want it with you.

Taglist: FYI I’m retiring taglists as they are giving me so much trouble with people not getting notifications - follow me on @ladameecrit and turn on notifications. But just in case: @agentjackdaniels, @tessa-quayle , @vermillionwinter , @iamskyereads , @tieronecrush, @perennialdoll247 , @love-the-abyss, @javierisms, @fuckyeahdindjarin , @littlemisspascal , @khindahra , @pedrostories , @readingiskeepingmegoing , @rhoorl , @red-red-rogue , @princessanglophile , @katareyoudrilling @survivingandenduring , @trulybetty @fictionismyreality @sunnywithachanceofjavi , @joeldjarin , @lahoozaherr, @s-u-t, @its-nebuleuse

“We will shortly be beginning our descent. Please return to your seats and fasten your seatbelts.”

You have never been one for sleeping on planes. Ben, on the other hand, has been snoozing away for the last two hours, the thin airline blanket comically small on his broad frame. 

You put a hand on his arm to gently rouse him. “Love? We’re almost there.” 

He blinks awake, eyes sleepy and hair askew, and stretches out his arms. “Mmmmfff. Hi, Lyd. You excited?”

“Yeah, I am. I’m really looking forward to seeing them.” 

You’d mentioned the trip shortly after Valentine’s, during a conversation after dinner about plans for the spring break. 

Your spring visit home had been booked since well before Christmas. A few days at home, visiting your family and catching up, and then to Paris for a week of tying up loose research ends and some vacation time. 

It sounded blissful at the time. Now, your anticipation was tempered with disappointment at the prospect of leaving him here. 

“So, uh, what are you doing for spring break, love? You going west, or…”

He shrugs. “Ordinarily I’d try to get a few days in San Francisco. But everyone’s got plans and is out of town on various trips, so there’s no point.” He looks a little resigned. “So it’s time catching up on work and my reading here, I guess. Maybe do some prep for directing the student play after the vacation. When are you back from your trip?”

There’s a nervous knot in your stomach. Just ask. Just do it. 

“Could you take your reading and directing prep on the road?”

He looks perplexed. You take a deep breath. 

“What if you came with me?” 

Ben’s eyes widen. “Come with you? To see your family?”

Oh, fuck. You’ve pushed your luck. This is too weird. 

“No, don’t worry about it.” You stand up from the table and pick up your plates. “I just knew I’d miss you but it’s probably too much. It’s fine. Forget I said it.”

He follows you into your tiny kitchen and leans against the doorframe. “What if I wanted to come?”

“Wanted? I mean, you seemed totally stunned that I’d even ask.”

He shakes his head and smiles gently. “Not stunned, as such. Surprised, maybe? But not in a bad way.”

“Why surprised, then?” You cross the small linoleum floor and wrap your arms around his waist. He blushes, tucking his chin against his chest bashfully. 

“I dunno. Just that you want to bring me home with you? It… it means a lot to me.”

“It means a lot to me just to ask you, love. But you don’t have to come if you don’t want to.”

He looks at you with those big dark eyes and you feel your heart swell. “But I think I’d like to. As long as that’s okay with your family, of course? I don’t want to be in the way.”

You laugh and raise your eyebrows. “In the way? I think they’d be more excited about seeing you than me.” You rest your head against his chest, listening to his heartbeat. “You know they think you’re great, you’ve been on the video calls. My mother asks me more about you than she does about myself.”

He wraps an arm around you and kisses the top of your head. “It’s different in person, sometimes.”

You shake your head. “Mmmm, I don’t think so in this case. You haven’t been dealing with daily queries about the welfare and wellbeing of Ben Morales. And no, she doesn’t yet seem to realise she can just call you by your first name.”

He chuckles and holds you closer. “Guess I’d better go book some flights, huh?”

Ben pushes the luggage cart towards the sliding doors and out into the bright, bustling Arrivals area, where families wait excitedly at the barrier to greet their loved ones. 

“LYDIAAAAAAAA!” 

You immediately spot your parents, standing right in the centre of the barrier, aligned with the sliding doors. It’s still very early in the morning and you wonder how long they’ve been here, waiting at the perfect spot to see the two of you emerge. 

You give Ben’s arm a reassuring squeeze as the two of you walk towards your excited family. “You’re not a stranger, love. They already love you. Remember that.”

Ben has barely exited the arrivals area when he’s enveloped in a warm embrace by your mother, who seems to have forgotten you entirely. Your father puts an arm around you and smiles widely while your mother coos over Ben. “And Ben Morales! Welcome, welcome. We’re so delighted to have you.”

Your mother has had her hair done and is dressed in an outfit that feels somewhere between “weekday lunch at a nice restaurant” and “Sunday best”. She’s also using what you and Kate refer to as her “telephone voice” when she speaks to Ben, more clipped and flatter than her usual tones. 

“Mom, he knows what you sound like normally, you don’t need to put on the fancy accent.” You hug your father tightly and notice that his eyes are shining. He’s similarly neatly dressed, wearing a nice smart-casual pair of pants and a matching shirt and v-neck light sweater. 

“I am talking normally!” your mother fires back, followed by a tinkly laugh as she tilts her head and smiles at Ben. He smiles broadly, though you know he’s shattered, and your mother gives you a look that says “See? Ben likes me.”

Your father shakes Ben’s hand before embracing him. “The two of you must be exhausted,” he says, arm still wrapped around Ben’s shoulders. “Let’s head to the car.”

Ben and your dad lead the way, your mother reaching for your hand and giving it a warm squeeze as you walk companionably a few steps behind. 

“Welcome home, pet. I’m delighted he’s here too. We’re so happy for you.” She looks ahead and appraises Ben’s broad frame as he pushes the luggage cart and chats to your father. 

“Grand big man, isn’t he?”, she says approvingly. “Don’t look at me like that, Lydia!”

“There’s milk there and bread and tea and coffee and a few biscuits and butter and a couple of bags of crisps and -“

“Mom, we’re fine. We’ll take care of ourselves. Okay?”

Your mother throws up her hands in resignation. “Alright! Just wanted to make sure you didn’t starve.” 

Kate, Marc, and their little girls have taken over your parents’ house for the duration of renovation works on their own home, and in the interests of space (and your sanity) you’d booked a small holiday flat in your hometown for the visit. Now, with Ben in tow, the privacy of the flat was even more welcome. 

“Thank you. I mean it. Now, can we please go and get some rest?” You hug her tightly and she kisses your cheek, before looking in Ben’s direction. 

“Of course. We’ll see you later, though? For something to eat? Kate and Marc and the girls are that excited to see you, I think they might burst.”

You stand beside Ben, bringing your hand to the small of his back, and wave your parents off as they return to the car. They’re not even out of earshot when you hear your father saying “He wouldn’t let her lift a single bag! Not one! Helped her all the time. Lovely chap. Very nice. Far cry from the other fucker…”

Subtlety has never been their strong point. You just hope Ben is too jet-lagged to have heard what they said.

A relaxed family meal, she said. Nothing special, she said. Come over in the early afternoon. It’s just like a Sunday lunch, she said. 

Your mother is reading Ben a list of menu options that’s longer than in some restaurants. His eyebrows rise and fall as he takes it in and considers the possibilities.

“Honestly, Mrs -“

“MARIE. I told you.”

“Honestly, Marie, I’ll just have whatever everyone else is having. It all sounds great. Do you need any help in the kitchen?”

“I most certainly do not. You can have whatever you want. You are the guest.” 

“Seriously. Whatever’s easiest.” He looks nervously at you and speaks in a low voice. “What is easiest?” 

You shrug. “Probably the beef.”

He beams at your mother and tells her he’ll have some beef. She tilts her head, smiles delightedly at him, and does that tinkly laugh again before returning to the kitchen. 

The meal is delicious but, inevitably, chaotic. Your three-year-old niece Cora, who had insisted on sitting between you and Ben (Benjamoo, as she persisted in calling him), realises quickly that the family-style service meant she could help herself to her favourite sides as and when she wanted, chubby little hands rapidly making a mark on the mashed potato and carrots. Your mother keeps asking if the food is hot enough. Kate and Marc try to talk to Ben while corralling little Evie and making sure she gets fed. 

Your father, meanwhile, veers between talking delightedly to the little girls and engaging Ben in a rapidly-shifting conversation that covers San Francisco, transatlantic flights, whether Ben liked sports, and a detailed description of the plot of a film he’d watched the week before. You couldn’t work out which film it was, but you knew it had Kevin Costner in it. Mostly because your dad kept referring to him as “Kevin Costner”, rather than by the character’s name. 

You rest a hand on Ben’s knee, under the solid dining table your father had made for the family home when you were barely two. 

“You doing okay? I know we’re a bit much…”

His warm hand covers yours and he smiles softly. 

“I’m great, Lyd. And you haven’t been to a Morales family meal yet - now that’s a bit much. Just you wait and see.”

You grin and lean your head affectionately on his shoulder for a moment, winding your fingers through his, never noticing the conspiratorial, knowing look exchanged between Kate and your mother. 

You and Ben insist on clearing the dishes, making short work of loading the dishwasher before your parents can tell you off for letting the guest do the chores. Through the kitchen window you see Cora running towards her little plastic play house, on temporary loan to your parents’ back garden while Kate and Marc’s building work is being completed. Kate follows swiftly behind, waving a soft fleece jacket at her daughter.

After wrangling Cora into her jacket, she appears at the back door. “Cora wants to know if Ben can come and visit her tea shop. Not you, Lyd. She was very clear about that. Only Benjamoo.”

He smiles happily and puts down his dish towel, before making a sympathetic face at you and kissing your cheek. “Sorry, Lyddie. I guess I better take up my invitation.” 

It’s a hilarious and adorable sight: Ben, sitting cross-legged on the mat beside Cora’s house, hair a bit messy and eyes still a little tired behind his glasses, broad-shouldered in his grey Berkeley sweatshirt and decidedly out of proportion to the pink-and-white plastic cottage. You can hear him giving Cora his order and talking rapturously about the “tea” she serves him in a little pink cup, while she giggles and claps her hands. 

Marc and your father arrive in the kitchen, your brother-in-law carrying little Evie in his arms. “Evie thinks she’s missing out on the fun with Ben and Cora,” he announces, opening the back door. “And we want to make sure Cora doesn’t try to force-feed mud cakes to your boyfriend.”

You’d been so nervous about this - not because you thought your family wouldn’t like Ben, or vice versa, but because by definition the first visit to your partner’s family feels a little like an audition of some kind. It has the potential to go horribly wrong, no matter how well prepared you are, or how many video calls you’ve had over the last couple of months.

But here he is, now, integrated happily into your close-knit family of origin, getting on famously with your parents, sister, and brother-in-law, and making your beloved little niece laugh like a drain as he pretends to drink from her toy teapot. Like he was always here. Or always meant to be here.

There’s a surge of emotions in your chest: deep love and affection, above all, but with it a reminder that your future together is by no means assured. Assuming, of course, that he wants a future together. 

“He’s good with kids, isn’t he?” 

Kate’s voice startles you. “Where did you come out of?”

“I’m stealthy when I want, Lyd. Anyway, you haven’t answered my question.”

You throw a bombastic side eye in your younger sister’s direction. “I know what you’re getting at.”

Kate shrugs, the picture of innocence. “I’m just observing.”

“Ben is a wonderful uncle. Just as I am a wonderful aunt. We like that. And that’s one of the things I love about him.” You lean on the kitchen counter, voice quieter. “So…what do you think?”

Kate arches an eyebrow in your direction. Your mother arrives in the kitchen with impeccable timing, as ever. 

“What do I think of what?”

“You know what. Who. Him. Ben.”

Your mother laughs as she fills the kettle with water and puts it on to boil for some teas and coffees. She turns round to face her two daughters. “Well, Kate, I don’t know about you, but - he wouldn’t be for me.”

Your jaw drops. “Excuse me?”

Kate opens a cupboard and starts to take out some mugs. “I know what you mean, mom. Not really for me, either.”

“You know yourself, Kate,” your mother adds, finding a carton of milk in the fridge and filling a small milk jug, “Just not my thing at all.”

Anger spreads hot and warm across your face. “Good, because he’s not your fucking ‘thing’, he’s my thing and I can’t believe how two-faced you’re being. All sweetness and light and then saying he’s not really for you and -”

Your mother holds out a hand, expression deadpan. “Lydia, not everyone wants a man who’s kind and funny and genuine and clearly worships the ground his girlfriend walks on.”

“Exactly,” Kate chimes in. “Just because you love someone who’s really smart and nice and good with kids and is actually kind of cute in a dorky way doesn’t mean the rest of us do.”

For a moment, your confusion and anger doesn’t quite let you hear what they’re saying. “I’m not asking you to be in love with him, I’m just - oh. Oh.”

Marie and Kate burst out laughing. 

“Well, fuck the two of you. Forty-two years and you’re still winding me up.”

Your mother wraps you in a warm cuddle. “Ah, poor Lyd. We’re sorry. We just couldn’t resist.”

“He’s so lovely, Lyd,” Kate adds, embracing you from behind. “I mean it. Marc thinks so, too. I know I said at Christmas that he looked like he’d been engineered in a lab for you and it looks like I was right. And Ben’s even cuter in the flesh, not that I notice such things.” She coughs for dramatic effect. “What with being a married mother of two.”

“And he loves the bones of you, darling girl,” your mother whispers. “And sure, why wouldn’t he?”

“I don’t know about you, love, but I’m shattered.” 

Ben glances over at you and wraps his arm around your shoulders, bringing you in to nuzzle against his chest. He holds up his copy of the script for Samuel Beckett’s Endgame, multicoloured tabs fluttering like tiny flags. 

“I’m just going to work through one more scene, is that okay?”

You hum contentedly. “Of course, love. How’s it going, anyway?”

He flicks through a few pages, scanning his notes and annotations. The comparative literature students put on a play every year, towards the end of the second semester, and Ben had to step in at short notice as director after a colleague in French fell ill. “It’s a relief we’re doing it in the English translation, put it that way. I just don’t know why Jen thought I could take this on, after Michèle went on sick leave.” 

You idly rub his tummy and kiss his side through his old shirt. “Because she knows you’re great and talented and the students love you, Mr Director.”

He huffs a laugh, marks up another section, adds a tab, and closes the book before taking off his glasses and shuffling down the bed and wrapping his free arm around you. He kisses the top of your head and holds you tight. 

“Thank you for bringing me home with you.”

You open your eyes and glance up at him. “Sure they haven’t put you off?”

“It would take a lot to put me off, Lyd. Anyway, they’re great. It - it meant a lot, to be welcomed like that, by the people you love.”

He looks down at you, and you place a light kiss on his jaw, smiling at the bristle of his beard against your lips. His gaze is solemn and intense as he reaches for your hand.

“I’m serious about this, Lyd. About us. You know?”

“I know. I’m serious about us, too. Deadly serious, in fact.”

He smiles, eyes shining, and kisses you, soft and slow, pulling you closer and working a path of kisses down the side of your neck as your body writhes against his. Tiredness is forgotten, for the moment, as you slip your hand inside the waistband of his loose boxers and tug them down, fingers wrapping around his cock. Ben sighs against your chest as you stroke him, his mouth finding your nipples as his long fingers trace the wetness building between your legs. With one leg hitched across his, you angle your hips just so and guide him inside you as he whispers your name against your ear. 

After you’ve made love, Ben falls asleep mid-cuddle, and you tuck yourself against him and close your eyes. But sleep doesn’t come easy. You should be delighted, after the beautiful day you’d had. But there’s an anxiety building in the back of your mind that you can’t quite shake. 

Serious this relationship may be, but spring will soon turn to summer, and with it the prospect of being separated indefinitely by an entire ocean and several time zones. Kate was wont to remind you that you “could just do distance for a while”, and she meant well. It was intended to reassure you. 

The problem was, the more you thought about what that option would actually mean, the less comfort it provided.

Over the next couple of days, you introduce Ben to the world of your hometown, to the places and people that shaped you. It is strange, at first, to see him, whole and present, in the spaces that defined your childhood. But it is a beautifully intimate thing, sharing memories with someone you love. You lay yourself even more bare before them, revealing the you that was before they knew you. 

The two of you have, of course, shared so much about yourselves and your pasts with each other in the time since you met. But this was different. Walking with him, pointing out your old schools, old haunts, swapping memories and stories, introducing him to random relations you meet in the streets: you are quietly knotting the strands of your past - with all its love, loss, joy and sorrow - with the man who, you hope, represents your future. 

Kate and Marc insist on bringing you to dinner one night. “It’d be wrong not to,” Marc had explained as you sat in your parents’ living room, Ben playing peek-a-boo with Evie while your mother looked on approvingly. “Sure we have built-in babysitting while we’re staying with Joe and Marie.” 

Your mother’s expression shifted instantaneously, shooting daggers at your brother-in-law. “Cheeky.”

Your hometown is not known for haute cuisine, but Kate booked a table at the nicest restaurant in town and it has been a perfect evening: good food, decent wine, and the pleasure of seeing how well Ben, Kate, and Marc are getting along. You and Kate go to the bathroom at one point, and she eyeballs you as you top up your lipstick, side by side, in the mirror. 

“Think he’s passed the audition, Lyd.” She pouts and blows a kiss at her reflection. “Oh, and guess what? We’ve got a special immersive cultural experience planned for the rest of the night.”

You swivel and glare at her. “And what does that involve, exactly?”

Kate picks up her handbag and does a little shimmy on the spot. “The Roxy, Lyd. The ultimate method of integrating your lovely Benjamin into your native place.”

“You have got to be kidding me.” 

The Roxy was once the town’s cinema, built in the 1940s and made redundant by the coming of the multiplex in the 1990s. Its owners had moved swiftly, though, and transformed the Roxy into a nightclub. It was a site of memorable nights out dancing with your friends, of crying in the bathrooms when you realised your crush was interested in someone else, of bad kissing, of telling random men to fuck off when they told you to smile, of screaming with glee when “Hey Ya” came on.

 If the Roxy was a taste, it would be peach schnapps and orange squash. Its smell, meanwhile, had lodged permanently in your memory: old cigarettes, sticky carpets, cheap aftershave, vanilla musk body spray. 

She was not kidding. You and Kate sit on some banquette seating in a corner of the Roxy’s lounge - which was just a separate floor with slightly better, more old-school music - and take in the completely incongruous sight of Ben, followed by Marc, weaving his way through the habitual crowd of locals with your drinks in hand. 

“Vodka tonic for Lyddie, gin and tonic for Kate.” Ben places the glasses on the table and nestles in beside you, giving your thigh a little squeeze. He reaches for his bottle of beer and raises it slightly. “Uh, cheers, I guess?”

Kate enthusiastically clinks her swimming pool-sized glass of gin and tonic off Ben’s drink. “Cheers! Now, you have to promise me you’ll dance. Otherwise it’s not full assimilation.”

You groan audibly and stir your drink with the straw as Ben chuckles. “C’mon, Lyd, you’ve got moves.” He raises an eyebrow at you mischievously. 

You manage to stave off the inevitable for a while, finishing your first vodka tonic and about to suggest you go to the bar when a familiar opening melody sends Kate leaping out of her seat, excitedly grabbing her husband and beckoning to you. 

“AS IT WAS?!? COME OOOONNNN LYYYYD!” Kate bellows back to you and Ben from the tiny dancefloor, where Marc is already showing off a move you can only describe as “rhythmic shuffling” while mouthing Harry Styles’ lyrics.

You look at Ben. He stands, removes his jacket, and offers you his hand, smiling expectantly. His hand rests gently on the small of your back as you join your sister and brother-in-law on the dancefloor, and he pulls you in to whisper in your ear. 

“We can do better than them, can’t we?”

You laugh, leaning in as he wraps an arm around your waist, takes your hand, and helps you exorcise all those demons of heartbreak long past on the dancefloor. 

As she clambers into a taxi in the early hours of the morning, Kate turns and yells “I’m telling mom you’re bringing a boy home with you from the Roxy!”, before collapsing in hysterics as Marc takes her hand and pulls her into the car. They grin and wave at you and Ben as it disappears up the street and back towards your parents’ house.

You lean against Ben as you walk back towards the little flat you’d rented for your stay at home, sighing contentedly as he drapes an arm around your shoulders. 

“She’s right, though,” you giggle, “I’m actually bringing the hot boy home with me from the Roxy. I’ve come a long way from endless rejection and the odd bit of bad kissing.”

Ben huffs a laugh as you open the main door of the building and climb the stairs to the apartment. “Well, fuckin’ good.” He adds a sassy little head movement for emphasis. 

“Excuse me?”

“Fuckin’ good. Because what would have happened to me if you’d been swept off your feet by one of those bad kissing boys back then?” He follows you into the little entrance hall and, for all his joking tone, there’s a vulnerability lurking in his beautiful eyes.

You cradle his face in your hands. “I’d have found you one way or another, Benjamin.” A coy smile crosses your lips as you take him in - danced out, hair mussed, and so stupidly sexy you still can’t quite believe he’s real. 

Your fingers hook inside his waistband as you pull him tight to you, leading him into the living room and pushing him against the wall as you bring a hand to his crotch. “And I’d like to make the most of bringing the hottest man home from the club for once in my life, if you don’t mind. Especially seeing as he was worth the wait.”

Ben’s eyes widen and he half gasps, half chuckles as you undo his jeans and slip a hand inside his boxers, stroking his cock as you pepper his throat with tiny kisses. He leans down slightly to bring a hand under the skirt of your dress, hitching up the fabric and slipping two fingers into your panties to play with your clit as he kisses you: hungry, urgent, wanting. 

But you’ve had something else on your mind all night. You break the kiss and begin to sink to your knees, hands around Ben’s waist for balance. 

Your eyes flit up to meet his. “Let me make you feel good, darling.”

His breath hitches as he takes you in: hair a little messy, eyes wide and wild, lips slightly parted, the soft flesh of your tits rising and falling with your breathing. 

“Fuck, Lyd, you’re amazing.”

“That a yes?”

He swallows hard and nods rapidly. “Fuck. Yes. Yes. Please.”

You lick your lips and smile as you carefully tug down the waistband of his boxer briefs. Your mouth presses into the softest, most sensitive parts of him: a kiss, a lick, a little nip to his belly; a course plotted down from his abdomen to the hardening cock you hold in your hand. You take him into your mouth, tongue swirling gently over the tip as you stroke him, revelling in the sensation and the moans of pleasure you’re pulling from the gorgeous man above you. Ben rests his hand on the back of your head and leans back against the wall, panting harder as you find your rhythm. 

The ache between your thighs builds with his every grunt and groan. Your fingertips find your clit, rubbing little circles over it in a fruitless bid to find some relief. You ease his cock out of your mouth with a pop and Ben helps you to your feet before you take his hand and guide him to the couch.

You slip off your panties and encourage him to lie back on the sofa as you gather the skirt of your dress around your waist and straddle him. “Need to fuck you, my love.” 

He grips the flesh of your hips and thighs, fingers pressing into your body as you take him inside you and begin to ride him, relishing the slow drag of his cock as you come undone. He looks beautiful underneath you, eyes wide and shining as he watches every move of your body.

“Fuck, Lyd,” he pants, smiling up at you. “You look incredible.” He reaches up and pulls down your neckline, groping your breasts and gazing at you like you’re the sexiest thing he’s ever seen: head thrown back, eyes closed, and vocal. 

He begins to thrust up into you, finding a rhythm that complements yours, intensifying the sensation so much that you can’t help but cry out with pleasure. 

“Yes, baby…fuck, that’s so fucking good, Ben, that’s fucking it, fuck!”

“Take it, Lyddie.” His dark eyes stare into yours, hands still gripping you firmly. “Ride me, take what you need…fuck, good fucking girl. I’ll give you whatever you need, whatever you want.”

And he knows what you need, in that moment. His thick fingers slip between your thighs and find your clit, circling it over and over as you keep on fucking him. 

You come hard, the last flutters of your orgasm still working through you when Ben follows suit. He’s still inside as you bend forward to kiss him, trailing your hands over his beautiful face and through his damp hair. You rest on his chest and let the sound of his breathing start to steady you as he holds you close for a couple of moments.

“I love you so much, Lyddie,” he pants quietly, chuckling to himself. “You’re a hell of a woman.”

For your last day, Ben suggests that he might make dinner at the flat, as a gesture of thanks for your family’s hospitality. You suggest lasagne with some sides as a general crowdpleaser, borrow some dishes from your mother, and Ben gets to work while you lay the place settings. 

The lasagne is cooking away happily when your mother arrives with Kate, Marc, and the girls. You look puzzled. 

“Where’s Dad?”

Your mother rolls her eyes as Cora goes tearing off around the flat, Kate following swiftly behind. “He insisted he had to go to the football match tonight. Of course. Anyway, he said he’ll be here shortly.”

Ben emerges from the kitchen, clad in a navy and white striped apron you’d used back when you (briefly) did home economics at school. He kisses your mother and Kate on the cheek and hugs Marc, before bending down to give a delighted Cora a high five. 

“I made you a present,” she says quietly, suddenly shy. 

Ben brings himself down to her level. “A present? For me? That’s amazing.”

Kate rummages in her bag and produces a rolled-up piece of paper, handing it to Ben. “She did it all herself. Mostly.”

You stand beside him as he unfurls it and Cora looks down at her toes. The drawing features a large figure with a mop of dark wavy hair and a wide smile - “Benjamoo”, Cora points out helpfully - standing close beside a slightly smaller figure immediately recognisable as you. “Auntie Lyd,” she adds seriously, in case you weren’t aware. 

The figures’ stick arms are touching. “Holding hands,” Cora says. 

Ben looks at Cora, then up at you, and back to the little girl. “This is the best art anyone’s ever given me. I’m going to put it on my wall when I get home.” He stands, and reaches for your hand, noticing the tears threatening in your eyes. “Auntie Lyd will help. Won’t you?”

You nod and squeeze his hand. Cora starts to giggle and points at you and Ben. 

“See? Holding hands.”

Ben and Marc pop out to the nearest supermarket shortly afterwards, when you realise you had neglected to buy garlic bread. You sit in the open-plan kitchen and dining area with your mother while Kate plays with her daughters in the living room. 

“You alright, love?” Marie notices how you fiddle with the place settings and rub your fingers together, sure signs that something’s on your mind. 

“Mmm? Sorry, I was miles away. Yeah, I’m… I think so.” You exhale. “I don’t know.”

Your mother gives you a little breathing room, waiting to see if you’ll open up more. 

“It’s just… fuck. I don’t know. I - what the fuck are we going to do?”

She sighs softly and pats the back of your hand. “You and Ben?” 

“Me and Ben. It’s spring break. And there’s no clear pathway about what we’ll do when my year in Barrow ends and I have to come back to my job over this side of the ocean.”

“Well, I mean… I know you hate the thoughts of it, Lyd, but have you talked about it? Kate’s right, you could always do long-distance for a while, until you knew what you both really wanted.”

You put your head in your hands. “We’ve said that we’re very serious about the relationship.” 

“So then! There’s your answer. No?”

You look up at her mournfully. “Yes and no. Yes, we’re serious about each other. No, that doesn’t mean we have any idea how to manage the distance.”

Marie adjusts the salt and pepper cruets in the middle of the table. “People do it, Lyd. It’s a commitment but they make it work.”

You nod slowly. “I just don’t know if that’s what I want, at this stage in my life. We see each other every day. We’re practically living together.”

Your mother fans herself in mock horror. “And not a hint of a ring on the finger, goodness!”

You roll your eyes good-naturedly. “Forty-two, mother dear. But yeah. I don’t know if I could go from that to not seeing Ben for weeks or a month or more at a time. Not now.”

“So what does that mean?”

You swallow hard. “I don’t know. One of us moves. He moves for me. I move for him. But that means trying to find a permanent academic job and in both places that’s like finding a needle in a haystack.”

“And if there’s no job? Distance as a temporary measure?”

You bite your lip. “But what if that’s still too hard?”

“So move.”

“But that means him giving up his life for me, or me uprooting for him, and being so far from all of you and from here and…” You look up at your mother, feeling like a scared little girl again.

“I love him so much, Mom. I never thought I’d love anyone like that. Never thought I’d even meet someone like that. And for him to love me in return…fuck.”

Marie shifts closer and wraps her arm around your shoulders. “I know, love. I know. You love the bones of each other. And it’s real love. Everyone can see it.”

“What do we do?”

“Lydia, I can’t tell you what to do one way or the other. Only you know what’s right for the two of you.”

You lean your head on your mother’s shoulder and she gives your hand a squeeze. “I know. It’s just - fuck, why does it have to be hard? Don’t I deserve things to work out, for once?”

“You do, pet. Of course you do. No one deserves it more.”

“Sometimes it feels crazy, y’know? This time last year I didn’t know Ben existed, and now -”

“Now it’s like you’ve known each other forever? Like you can’t imagine life without him?”

You turn to face her, and smile. “Exactly.”

“That’s love for you.” Marie purses her lips, thinking. “I’m only going to say one more thing. Your happiness.”

“Huh?”

“Lyd, for years you prioritised someone else’s happiness over your own. I know, I know, that fucker moved for you when you got the job away, I know that. But apart from that…it was all you. All you, trying to keep someone else happy and cracking under the strain.” She inhales and exhales, trying to curb the fury that still burns in her when she remembers how you were treated. 

“All I’m going to say is this: don’t worry about anyone else, Lyd. Not me, not Dad, not Kate, Marc, the girls, your job - nobody. Well, worry about Ben. But above all, prioritise your happiness. We have ours over here. It’s time for you to find yours.”

You hug her tightly. “One final question.”

She nods and waits. 

“What does Dad think of Ben? I know it wouldn’t change my feelings but given everything from the shitshow, I’d like to know he doesn’t absolutely loathe him.”

She looks at her phone and pushes away from the table, walking into the living room and opening the door of the flat. “Ask him yourself, Lyd. Here he is now.”

Your father comes into the kitchen, talking about something that happened at the local football match he’d attended that afternoon and eyes already locked on the kettle, his mind focused on making a cup of tea. 

“Joe? Lyd wants to ask you something.”

You roll your eyes at your mother. “It’s not a big deal.”

He turns around, tea caddy in hand. He’s been to this flat twice, you think, and he knows exactly where all the tea-making equipment is kept. 

 “Alright. Ask away, Lyd. Are you alright? Is everything okay?”

“It’s fine. Everything’s fine. I just - Dad, what do you think?”

“What do I think of what?”

“Ben. Me and Ben, specifically. But also just Ben.”

Joe switches on the kettle and leans against the kitchen counter. “Sure, my opinion isn’t what matters. What matters is how you feel. Isn’t that right?” He looks to your mother for backup. 

“I said that to her, but she said she wanted to hear from you.”

He takes a mug out of the cupboard and drops a square teabag into it. “Lydia, is everything okay? Are you having any doubts about him, is that it?”

You laugh and shake your head. “Not a one.”

“And you don’t think he’s having any doubts about you? Because if he is I’ll fucking -“

“No, Dad. He… he’s very clear about how he feels.”

Your father nods in satisfaction. “Well, that’s reassuring. Would be strange if he wasn’t, given how he is with you. At least, what we’ve seen here.” He pours the freshly boiled water over the teabag and opens the fridge in search of milk. “But the point stands. You love each other, don’t you?”

You aren’t sure if your father has ever been so open or explicit with you in asking about a romantic relationship. Perhaps, you wonder, he regretted not being more honest about his concerns over the years of your longest one. 

“We do.” Your eyes fill with tears, unexpectedly. You swallow hard. “We love each other very, very much.”

“Okay then.” He stirs his tea vigorously, the metal of the teaspoon clinking off the stoneware mug. 

“But I still want to know what you think. It matters to me. Especially - especially after the last time.”

Joe pulls out a chair and settles at the table, your mother reaching automatically for a coaster and sliding it under the mug. “Lyd, you know what I’ve always said. There’s not one person walking this earth who deserves our lovely Lydia. Not one.”

Your heart sinks a little, and you nod. You’ve heard this a lot since your ex cheated and fucked off. You never really believe it. 

“But.” Your father pauses and sips his tea. 

“But?”

He looks at you and reaches out to touch your hand. “But - that lovely man you brought home definitely comes very close indeed.”

Right on cue, the front door opens and you can hear Ben and Marc chatting companionably and laughing together. Marc does a silly little dance into the kitchen, waving the garlic bread around like glow sticks.

“Now, please don’t destroy the garlic bread before it’s even gone into the oven, Marc!”

As your mother grabs the bread and sneaks a peek at the lasagne, now browned to perfection, Ben pulls you in for a quiet word.

“Lyddie, are you okay? You look like you’ve been crying.”

You lean against his chest as he wraps his arms around you. “I’m okay, darling. I just needed this. Needed you.” The oven timer pings and you look at him. “Time for Professor Morales to serve us his delicious lasagne. C’mon, we can plate up before my mother takes over.”

You thought goodbyes would get easier the longer you worked away from home, but the opposite turned out to be true. Your parents are doing their usual brave face routine at the airport: Joe clearly trying not to cry, Marie overdoing the levity to distract you and stave off her own sadness at seeing you go. 

“Paris in the springtime, Lyd! It’ll be gorgeous. She’s a great tour guide, Ben, she knows it all.” 

“She’s brilliant, Marie. But you knew that before the rest of us found out.” He reaches for your hand, holding it tightly as you start to feel the tears prickling. 

He only lets go as you both embrace your parents in turn, Ben thanking them repeatedly for their kindness. Then, his fingers curl around yours again, holding you strong and steady at the entrance to departures. 

“I love you both so much, you know? We’re so grateful.”

Your mother can’t hold back her tears any more, and her wet cheek presses against yours as she pulls you in for a final hug. “We love you so much. Both of you.” 

She pulls away and holds your gaze. “Both of you. Remember what I said to you, Lydia. Remember that.”

You nod and give Ben’s hand a little squeeze. “We should probably head on through. Safe home - message me when you get back, okay? We’ll see you soon.”

You keep waving back with every sharp turn you take in the queue for security, until eventually your parents’ faces are obscured by the crowd behind you, and you face forward into the security area, still holding Ben’s hand.

“Paris par train ou Paris par bus?”

Ben shrugs as he pushes the luggage trolley. “You’re the expert, Lyddie. What’s easiest?”

You summon up the mental map of Parisian transport options that is always ticking over at the back of your mind. “Train is quicker but involves a change at Châtelet Les Halles - ugh - and then again at Bastille. Bus gets us to Opéra which means we can get right on to line 8.”

“Bus?”

“Bus.”

Ben stacks your bags carefully in one of the Roissybus’s luggage areas and exhales as he takes a seat beside you. “You know it’s been almost thirty years since I was in Paris?”

“Excusez-moi?”

He chuckles. “Came up on a very poorly-thought-out visit with some friends while I was on exchange in Málaga. Overnight trains, hostels, no money, cheap wine. I barely saw the Eiffel Tower, let alone anything else.”

The bus pulls out of Charles de Gaulle Airport and onto the motorway. You squeeze Ben’s thigh affectionately. “Isn’t it a good thing that you’ve come to Paris with a ready-made guide, then?”

He smirks and arches an eyebrow suggestively. “Oh, I’m really looking forward to doing some, er, exploring with her.” 

“Is that so?” You move your hand ever so slightly up his thigh, smiling with satisfaction as Ben gasps a little and shifts in the seat. “I always like to try out new pleasures here, you know?”

A wiggle of your eyebrows has you both giggling, leaning against each other as the bus makes good progress towards the périphérique, the motorway that rings the city, and into Paris proper. You start to point out landmarks, locations, shifting into a stream of consciousness that spans history, personal memories, places to visit, and random observations. 

Ben smiles to himself as he watches and listens, delighting in your joy and excitement as you prepare to see your old friend - to walk her streets, listen to her voice, and write another chapter in your long love story.

The advantage of Parisian connections: your friend Sophie offered you her apartment in the 11th arrondissement for the duration of your stay, as she was away in the south of France. You meet her upstairs neighbour outside the narrow, early nineteenth-century building on a quiet street just off the rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine and collect Sophie’s key, taking note of the door codes. 

“Holy shit. Look at this place!”

Ben has carried the bags up the stairs - thankfully, Sophie’s flat is on the first floor - and followed you into the little apartment. You turn and grin when you notice how entranced he looks, staring up at the wooden beams in the tiny hallway, peeking out into the communal courtyard, tilting his head this way and that to check out the books on Sophie’s shelves. 

“It’s amazing, isn’t it?” You pick up your suitcase and lead the way into the bedroom, sitting on the end of the bed as you take off your shoes and wriggle your toes happily.

“It’s incredible. Exactly what you might imagine a Parisian apartment to be.” He drops his own bags in the corner and joins you on the bed, flopping back onto the mattress and yawning.

You lie back and turn to face him, resting a hand on his stomach. “Let’s do some exploring. I know we’re tired, but I want to show you around, get some dinner, buy some wine…”

The featherlight touch of his fingers, working their way under your denim blouse and stroking the soft skin of your waist, sends delicious shivers through you.

“We could do some exploring here, right now…?” he asks, eyes twinkling and a smile on his lips. 

“You know how tempting that offer is, Benjamin, but let’s restore our energy first, hmmm?”

Dinner is Vietnamese food from a tiny restaurant just around the corner, a staple favourite from your time living in the city, followed by a walk around the neighbourhood and a stop at a nearby supermarket, to stock up on some essentials and a bottle of wine. As you climb the stairs to the apartment, the fatigue from a day of travel and the underlying, gnawing anxiety about your future starts to hit you. 

You should just say it to him. Ask him outright what he wants to happen.

You push the thought down, down, as deep as it will go as you settle on Sophie’s tiny sofa and watch Ben uncork the wine in the coin cuisine, the little kitchenette tucked into a corner of the living room. You spot a portable speaker tucked on one of the bookshelves and connect it to your phone, scrolling through your playlists until you find what you want. 

“Never let it be said that you don’t cultivate an atmosphere, Lyd,” he says, handing you a glass of the purple-red wine and joining you on the couch. “Let me guess: this is a Paris-specific playlist?”

You hide your face behind one hand and peek at him through your fingers as he laughs, leaning in to kiss your cheek as Serge Gainsbourg’s ‘La chanson de Prévert’ starts to play.

He rests his head on your shoulder as you listen to the song together. It’s a favourite of yours regardless, but tonight, with the man you love so deeply but still fear losing nestled in beside you, Gainbourg’s plaintive melody and lyrics about lost love are like a punch to the gut.

“Lyddie?”

Ben is sitting up, looking at you with concern. “You look so sad, all of a sudden - you okay?”

“It’s just the song, it’s so –” You halt yourself. No. Time to say it.

“I guess I’m just really feeling how close I am to the end of my time in Barrow, that’s all.”

His chocolate-brown eyes soften and he wraps you in a warm embrace. “Still got plenty of time, Lyddie.”

“And then?”

“And then…?”

“What happens? To us, I mean.”

He looks surprised at the question. “We’ll be okay, one way or the other. Right?”

But what does that mean?

You’re too tired to ask the question, you tell yourself. In truth, you’re too scared to - not because you fear his reaction, not at all. Rather, it’s because you fear that your concerns might upset him.

Ben’s head has barely hit the pillow before he’s sound asleep, one arm draped loosely around your waist. For you, though, sleep is elusive, arriving only as the dawn starts to break over the city of light. 

You wake, exhausted, to the aroma of fresh coffee brewing and the sound of Ben pottering around the apartment, humming the melody of “La chanson de Prévert” to himself. With a groan, you remember you’d planned to do some research today and force yourself out of bed.

“Bonjour, la belle Lyddie! Du café?” Ben waves a little espresso mug at you and you nod weakly. 

He is bright and cheerful as he moves around the kitchenette, pouring the coffee and joining you at the tiny dining table that acts as a kind of divider between the kitchen and the rest of the living area. 

“Did you sleep okay?”

You look up, and his face falls when he spies the telltale redness in your eyes. “I’m taking that as a no. What’s going on, Lyd?”

A fortifying sip of the strong coffee. You sit upright and look at him, studying his beautiful face. “Darling, I meant what I said last night. About how anxious I am, how scared of what comes next, the…uncertainty of it all.”

“But we know we’re serious about each other? We talked about it,” he replies, sipping his own coffee. “You know that. Don’t you?”

“I do. I really do. And we are, but -” you pause to gather your thoughts. “But that doesn’t mean there’s an answer for what happens when I have to go home, and that’s eating away at me.”

He looks at you kindly, but you can see the confusion written all over his face. “What do you mean, exactly, Lyd? Surely we can see if circumstances change over the summer, and if not then we do distance until stuff gets figured out. Right? Things are going to be just fine.”

It’s so tempting to smile and agree, but you can’t. You owe him honesty, as much as you want clarity. 

“Is that really what you want?”

“Distance? It’s not ideal, but if it comes to it I think we can make it work and - Lyd?”

You have closed your eyes, fearful of tears falling. 

Say it. Say it. Be honest with him.

“I - I don’t think I want a long-distance relationship.”

Ben makes no effort to hide his shock. “You don’t want a long-distance thing?” He shakes his head in amazement. “Even if that’s the only option for the moment?”

“I just want certainty, not constantly saying everything would be okay or we’d see what happens when we don’t know that things will be okay, or what’s going to happen. I want you, love. I want a life with you, you know that. Don’t you?”

“But you don’t want long-distance with me.” His brow furrows and his jaw ticks as he stares at the floor. 

“I don’t know, I mean I just want what we have now, I don’t know if I could cope with the implications of that kind of distance and -”

He exhales sharply, exasperated, and reaches for his light cotton jacket. “So it’s all or nothing. You would rather have no relationship than even try distance, is that it?”

Fury and sadness mingle and build in your chest. “Ben, that’s not what I fucking said.” Your hands fall to your sides, defeated. “I’m just - fuck, I’m not finding the words right now.” 

“Well, if you find them later let me know.” He opens the door of the apartment and pauses for a moment. “See you, Lyddie.”

You sit staring into space for a good half hour at your appointed desk in the print room at the Bibliothèque nationale, before you open the grey archive box of lithographs you’d called up for the day. 

The ritual of research is familiar and soothing, a useful distraction from the memory of the argument that morning. You set out your camera and prepare your customary scraps of paper inscribed with the call number of the collection, to make it easier for you to match up images with notes when you return to the materials at home. Wherever the hell “home” is supposed to be, now. 

Assess each print. Study it. Immerse yourself in the details before photographing it and writing up your observations on your laptop. Repeat over and over, add to your research materials and stave off the metaphorical wolves circling in your brain. 

Your stomach starts to rumble just before one o’clock. The garden courtyard outside the building that houses the print room is busy, with researchers and visitors taking an al fresco lunch and chatting over coffee. Salad consumed, you take your phone out of the transparent plastic briefcase you are required to use inside the library. 

No message from him. Nothing. 

You decide to make a call. She should be on her lunch now, too. 

“Lyd! How are you? How’s Pareeeeee?” Kate’s voice is cheery and comforting, and exactly what you needed to hear. 

“Hiya… um, can you talk for a few minutes?”

She immediately knows there’s something wrong and her tone shifts. “Of course, always… Lyd, what’s happened? Are you okay?”

Deep breaths. “Kate, I think I need to make a decision and I’m fucking terrified.”

Kate pauses, aware that she doesn’t need to ask you what this is about. “Okay. Talk to me. Let’s work through it.”

BEN: When do you think you’ll be finished for the day? We should talk. I’m so sorry about this morning x

LYDIA: Probably by 4.30 or so. Do you want me to come meet you?

BEN: I’ll come to you. You want food? It’s a nice day for a picnic dinner. 

LYDIA: It is. Dinner is your choice. Meet me at the rue Vivienne exit at 4.30 or so? x

BEN: You say that as if I know where that is… I’ll find it. See you soon, Lyddie. Love you. 

Ben Morales leans against the railings of the Bibliothèque nationale and looks at his watch. He’s early, so he meanders across the street and wanders into the Galerie Vivienne, admiring the fine detail of the mosaic floors and brass light fittings that adorn the nineteenth-century covered arcade. He pauses at an antiquarian bookstore and print shop, perusing the selection of vintage postcards displayed in wooden crates outside. 

He’s standing at the entrance to the arcade when he looks up and sees you coming through the gates of the library, somehow managing to carry a backpack, tote bag, and small cross-body handbag all at once. 

You don’t notice him at first, instead turning your head in both directions as you look for him. Ben’s heart soars when he sees you, in spite of the nagging ache he’s felt in the pit of his stomach ever since the argument you’d had that morning. 

He calls out to you from across the street, raising his hand in an enthusiastic wave, and a warm, delighted smile spreads across your face when you realise he’s there, waiting for you. He’s as impossibly handsome as ever in his navy blue shirt jacket, white tshirt, and jeans, tote bag slung over one shoulder. 

You keep Kate’s words from your lunchtime conversation in the forefront of your mind. “You know what you want, Lyd. You know what you need to do.”

“Sorry, I got delayed on the way out of the print room and then it always takes longer to pack up than I’d anticipated and then I thought I should pop to the bathroom before I left and then -”

Ben interrupts your explanation with a kiss and a hug. “I’m so sorry, Lyddie. I’m sorry about this morning.” He pulls away and holds out a small, flat brown paper bag. “A peace offering.”

The bag contains a selection of vintage postcards of Paris, postmarked in the early years of the twentieth century: Notre-Dame, photographed from the Left Bank; the place de la Bastille; the facade of the Bibliotheque nationale you’d just left. 

“Some of your favourite places, right?”

You reach for his hand and lean in for a kiss. “You know me so well. Thank you, my love, they’re beautiful.” You spot a larger brown paper carrier bag in his other hand. “Dinner?”

Ben smiles, holding out the bag for your approval. “I ended up getting a selection of stuff from one of the Asian takeout places near here. And I picked up a bottle of chilled white wine, and some paper cups. Sound good?”

“Sounds perfect. Let’s go, Benjamin - dinner at the Palais-Royal awaits.”

“I have to admit, I did wonder when you said we were going to a royal palace. Didn’t seem very…Lyddie.”

Ben quirks an eyebrow in your direction. You giggle as you reach into the bag of takeout and retrieve boxes of rice, steamed buns, gyoza, and nems. 

“I mean, technically it was a royal residence. But the gardens - where we are now - were public, as were the arcades and shops.” You set the boxes of food on a green metal park chair, serving as a makeshift table in front of your bench. “And it was an important location in the revolutionary period, so…”

He grins and opens the bottle of wine. “Ah! There it is. That’s my Lyd.”

His Lyd. Affection surges in your chest, and you place a hand on Ben’s knee, giving it a light squeeze as he pours some of the white wine into a paper cup and hands it to you.

He raises his own cup in your direction. “To my clever, revolutionary girl.”

You swap stories about your respective days as you dig into the food: Ben describing his informal solo tour of literary locations on the Left Bank, you talking through your finds in the print room. He shows you photos he took of Richard Wright’s apartment building, of the original site of Sylvia Beach’s Shakespeare and Company, and a selfie of himself looking completely perplexed at the plaque on the rue du Cardinal-Lemoine that refers to James Joyce as a “British writer of Irish origin.”

You burst out laughing at that one. “I’m so glad you found that. It annoys me every time I see it.”

“I sent it to Evan. He was not impressed.” He slips his phone back into his pocket and reaches for another spring roll. “And then I went and sat in the Luxembourg Gardens for a bit, worked over a little more of the play, thought about Beckett in Paris, watched the world go by. I remembered you said it was one of your favourite places to just sit and think.” 

He smiles softly, almost shyly, at you, and with a pang you remember that some serious conversation lies ahead, no matter how tempting it is to sit here forever in the Palais-Royal, eating your picnic dinner and drinking your wine surrounded by the ghosts of writers and lovers and revolutionaries long past. 

Lemon-scented wipes remove the residual traces of nems and dipping sauces from your fingers, and Ben stacks the empty food containers in the brown paper bag before topping up your paper cup of wine. You rest your head on his shoulder, and he wraps an arm around you to hold you close. 

He sips his wine and takes a deep breath. “I wanted to talk about earlier.” 

You raise your head, turn to him, and nod. He rests a hand on your thigh, tracing circles with his index finger on your leg. 

“I’m sorry if it ever felt like I was dismissing your worries, Lydia. I - well, I guess I was avoiding the issue. Like if I kept saying things would work out, they’d just… work out.”

You smile gently and reach for his hand. “Without having to make the hard call.”

He squeezes your hand and nods. “Exactly. But I did a lot of thinking about that today. About the future, about what I want - what you want.” He gives you a nervous glance.

“You were right, Lyd, long-distance couldn’t give us…I don’t want long-distance with you, either. I couldn’t, Lyd. I want what you said you want - a life, us, together. Like now.” He caresses your cheek with his thumb. “I can’t imagine anything else.”

You bring your hand to rest on his and close your eyes, feeling tears prickling against your eyelids. 

He takes a deep breath. “Lyd, look at me.” Your eyes meet his, dark and warm and serious all at once. “Lyd, I - I want to spend the rest of my life with you. That’s all I want, and - fuck, I think I’ve known I wanted that for a while now.”

You open your mouth to respond and he shakes his head gently. “Lyddie - Lydia - I want to be with you, no matter what it takes.” Another deep breath. “And that’s why - if you want, of course, only if you want - I’ll move back with you at the end of the year. I’ve got some job alerts set up, I’ll find something, you know? I - I just want to be with you.”

“You can’t give up your whole life, darling.” Your voice is quiet as you take in the significance of what he’s telling you, what he’s offering. To his astonishment, you burst out laughing.

“What’s funny, Lyd?”

“I did a lot of thinking today, too. You know you’re all I want, don’t you?” You look at him expectantly, and he nods. “And I was going to tell you that - if you wanted - I would try to stay in the US, so that I could be with you. So that we could make a life together, plan our future.” You turn to him and grin. “But now it seems we’re still going to be on opposite sides of the pond, just with swapped continents.”

Laughter rises from Ben’s chest, emerging as a bright, wide smile and eyes crinkling with delight. He cups your face with his hands and kisses you, over and over, before pulling away abruptly. 

“Wait. You said I couldn’t give up my life, but you want to give up yours? And you know Barrow doesn’t do partner or spousal hires…”

“I mean, it wouldn’t be giving up my life. It would be living the life I want to live, with the man I adore. That’s better, no?” You reach over to brush an errant curl off his forehead. “Anyway, I can look for a position within commuting distance, right? I’d rather that than feel I had got a job I didn’t really deserve.”

He blushes slightly and looks at you from under his lashes. “Even so. I meant it, I would follow you anywhere. I’ll go wherever you want me to be, wherever you want to be.”

“Okay. How about this?” You sit up a little straighter, hands resting on his. “We’re clearly both prepared to move. So…we both start looking for jobs, you near my place and me around Barrow, and whoever gets an appointment first - that’s where we go.”

Ben looks into the middle distance and nods, turning over the proposal in his head. “That sounds like a plan, baby.” 

“Then it’s a deal?”

He grins and kisses you softly. “It’s a deal.”

The evening is bright and warm as you meander hand in hand through the narrow streets of the Marais, heading east, homeward bound. 

You spot a buzzy corner café and nudge Ben. “How about a drink, darling? Something bubbly, maybe?”

He smiles, and you know his eyes are sparkling behind his sunglasses as he squeezes your hand and follows your lead towards one of the small round tables arranged outside the café. The server is typically Parisian: efficient, polite but not overly familiar, and they take your order and return promptly with two glasses of champagne and little dishes of olives and mixed nuts. 

“À nous deux, Paris!” Ben clinks his glass to yours and you giggle as the first sip sends bubbles bursting on your tongue. 

“Quoting Balzac in the original French?! Where were you all my life, Benjamin?”

He shrugs and smiles to himself. “Could ask you the same question.”

Long, thick fingers begin to rub circles on the flesh of your thigh, feeling the heat of your skin through the light fabric of the button down sky blue shirt dress you’re wearing. You echo the gesture, tracing patterns on the back of his hand, and your expression becomes more serious, more intense, your voice quieter.

“I love you, Ben.” 

He squeezes your thigh gently. “I love you, Lyd.” 

Sipping champagne and nibbling on the snacks, you watch the world go by, content and cosy in the little bubble that is just you and him. You’re checking your appearance in the bathroom mirror when a realisation sweeps through you. Your eyes widen, mouth forming into a little “o” before stretching into a happy smile as you ascend the stairs from the basement to the main café and rejoin Ben at the table.

“So something occurred to me.”

He chases the last olive around the dish with a cocktail stick. “Mmmmm?”

“We’re doing this, aren’t we? We’re going to spend the rest of our lives together. That’s what we’ve said we want. Right? I didn’t imagine that?”

Ben lifts his head, puts down the cocktail stick, and looks into your eyes with a bemused smile on his face. “No, you didn’t. And yes, we are.” His eyes crinkle as he smiles broadly. “And isn’t it fucking wonderful?”

You nod excitedly and a surge of laughter erupts from both of you, quietened only by a warm, passionate kiss. You break away and run your fingers through the messy strands of hair around his forehead.

“I know people might think it’s soon, love. But… it’s not. I know.”

“I know too, Lyddie. When you know, you know.” He reaches for your hand and brings it to his lips. “And to be honest, I don’t think anyone who knows us will think it’s too soon.”

The server returns to take the empty glasses and dishes. “Autre chose?” [Something else?]

Ben winks at you mischievously and orders two more glasses of champagne. 

The walk back to the apartment should have taken about twenty minutes. Or at least, it would have had you not both been tipsy, incredibly happy, and unable to keep your hands off each other. 

It takes just under an hour for you to get from the Marais back into the heart of the faubourg Saint-Antoine, stopping here and there along the way to indulge in some making out in quiet side streets and passageways. 

“I’m so glad there’s only one flight of stairs,” you hiss theatrically, Ben trailing a hand over your ass as you reach the landing and the door to the flat. 

Once inside, you pull him tight to you and move swiftly in the direction of the small bedroom, fingers already hooked inside the waistband of his jeans as he holds your face in his hands and kisses you deeply, tongues sweeping over each other and lips pressed together so hard you swear they’ll be bruised by morning.

“Sit on the end of the bed, baby.” He nods and follows your instructions, undoing his jeans as he watches you standing before him. 

You start to unbutton your dress, keeping your eyes on him as you ease it off and let it fall to the floor. Ben’s eyes roam slowly over you, mouth falling open slightly as he takes in the floral print of your panties, the light blue lace of your bra, the softness and curves of your body. 

You move closer to him, standing between his legs as he wraps his arms around your lower back and buries his face against your breasts while you languidly trail your fingers through his hair. 

You pull back and look at him, immediately giggling. He still has his glasses on, and those coffee-brown eyes are half-hidden behind a fog on the lenses. 

“Let’s take these off, shall we, Professor Morales?”

The combination of champagne and a decision about your future together has made you joyful, more confident - and more direct. 

“You’re so fucking hot, you know that, baby?” 

Ben raises his eyebrows and his ears flush pink. “I don’t really think…uh…”

You kiss him, his hands moving to grab the flesh of your ass and pull you tight to his body. 

“I think you’re hot as fuck, Ben Morales, and I’m going to tell you. And show you.” You wrap your arms around his neck and encourage him to move backwards a little, so that you can straddle him. “Lemme show you how gorgeous you are to me, my love. Hmmm?”

He grins, nods, and moans as his mouth passes over the velvet skin of your heavy tits. You help him out of his white T-shirt, and pause to take in the sight of him: your thighs framing his hips and waist, his hands resting on them; his tummy, somehow both broad and solid and yet soft, pressed deliciously against your own belly; his beautiful face, eyes filled with desire, and mouth begging to devour and be devoured. 

The temptation is too strong, your hands moving to caress his face as your lips meet his again. You keep your forehead pressed to his as you break the kiss and whisper to him, murmuring about how his dark gaze can make you ache for him, what it feels like to have his lips pressed to your body. 

Your hands move slowly across his shoulders and down his back, feeling the warmth of his golden skin, the strength underneath the surface. “This beautiful body, baby,” you murmur, placing tiny kisses to his collarbone. “When you’re above me, fucking me, or about to, and I look up and see you so fucking broad and solid…”

His breathing hitches as your mouth works its way down his chest and towards his tummy, lips and tongue picking out those little patches of freckles that you love so much, teeth sometimes scraping lightly over his warm, solid middle as you carefully move your body off his and onto the floor between his legs.

“You know how fucking sexy this tummy is, baby. Told you the first night we were together.” He looks sceptical and your hands roam over the warm softness of his skin, your cunt positively aching with need at the sensation. 

“I’m serious, Ben. It’s so fucking hot, the way your body looks, the feeling of your tummy against mine…” You whine as you roll your hips and clench your thighs, and he sits up slightly to drag down his jeans and underwear, a hand wrapping around his cock as he seeks some relief of his own. 

You reach for his other hand, holding it gently as you suck each finger in turn. “I love these hands, baby.” You kiss his palm and he gasps. “I love the sight of them, the feeling of them on me, in me, the things they do to me.”

His eyes are wide and dark with lust and adoration. “Fucking hell, Lyd, you’re incredible.”

And then your fingers join his, working the base of his cock and making Ben gasp with sheer pleasure. He moves his hands up to grope and caress your breasts, long fingers slipping under the lace of your bra to play with your nipples. 

“Touch yourself,” he hisses, hands full as he massages the soft weight of your tits. You obey the instruction, keeping your eyes locked on him as you bring one hand to part your soaking folds while the other continues to jerk him off. 

Ben watches for a moment as you rub small, firm circles over the aching bundle of nerves while pleasuring him simultaneously. “Fuck, baby, this is so fucking hot. You’re so good to me.”

You’re on your knees, now, and your mouth is actually watering at the sight before you. “Can I suck your cock, baby?”

He grunts his consent. “This…” You flick your tongue over the tip. “This is fucking gorgeous.” 

“Please, Lyd.” You look up at him and he whines a little, completely turned on by the sight of you between his legs, one hand now caressing the firm muscles of his calf and the other holding his cock in place. You oblige, expertly trailing your tongue along his full length before beginning to take him, bit by bit, inside your wet mouth. 

Ben cries out your name as you continue your ministrations, looking down at you with his eyes blown wide. “I‘ll come if you keep going, baby,” he hisses. “Wanna fuck you, please. Please. Need you.”

You swirl your tongue around the tip one last time before releasing him, bringing your hands to rest again on his legs, fingers massaging the muscles of his thighs as you hum in satisfaction. 

“C’mon, Lyddie.” He gestures with his head and you stand. He pulls you to him with one hand, palm and fingers splayed across the small of your back as he tugs down your panties with the other. Two thick fingers slide into you with ease, and his eyebrows quirk with surprise.

“You’re fucking soaking?” 

The tone of his voice makes you laugh, and he chuckles against the warm softness of your belly before kissing it, over and over, as your fingers wind through his curls. 

“I told you, love, you’re so fucking hot. Don’t even have to touch me and I’m ready for you.”

Ben grins wickedly as you push him back onto the bed and straddle him again, reaching down and stroking his cock a couple of times before you ease him into you and sink down, moaning loudly as he stretches you, fills you, takes you. You’ve had each other so many times now, and yet the sensation of him inside you remains new and thrilling. 

You start to move, shifting and rolling your hips in a careful, deliberate rhythm that has the two of you sighing and gasping with deep, delicious pleasure. You lean forward to come closer to him, desperate for his touch, for the warmth of his chest against yours. He eases down the straps of your bra a little and caresses your tits as he starts to fuck up into you, meeting your movements. 

He lifts his head up, greedily seeking your lips. His hands trace the curve of your back down to your hips and ass as he watches your bodies moving together, and he smiles wistfully as he brings a finger to your clit. “God, I love fucking you, Lyd.”

You giggle and cry out at his touch, riding him harder still as you edge closer to coming. His finger draws firm, tight circles over the swollen bud, tracing the familiar path he has carved out in you so many times. “Fuck me, baby - gonna come, don’t fucking stop - you gonna come?”

He closes his eyes tightly as the fingers of his other hand press hard into your thigh, breath hitching and voice raw. “Mmmmhmm. I’m so fucking close. Hold on, can you?”

You nod and try to temporarily quell the orgasm that’s been building in you since you got him home, Ben slowing his finger’s steady movements over your soaking clit.

And then the pace increases again, and you’re there, and he’s there. Together. 

Morning announces itself with a rustle of paper and a delicious, buttery aroma. Eyes blinking open, you become conscious of Ben’s soft lips on the nape of your neck - and aware that the enticing smell is right under your nose. 

“Bonjour, Lyd.” Ben is holding an open paper bag just under your nose. “Croissant?”

You turn to face him properly and sit up in bed beside him. “Hi, darling. How long are you up?”

He reaches into the bag and takes out a croissant, before placing it on a plate and handing it to you. “Not that long. You looked so beautiful and content, I didn’t want to wake you.”

The flaky, buttery pastry melts in your mouth as you sigh with pleasure. “Jesus fucking Christ. Nothing compares.”

Ben stops just as he’s about to bite into his own croissant, throwing you a cheeky glance. “Nothing? Nothing compares? You’re sure about that?”

You rest your head on his shoulder, the cotton of his long sleeved T-shirt soft and comforting against your face. 

“Nothing compares… in the world of baked goods.”

 He nods, satisfied, and takes a mouthful of the golden viennoiserie. 

“Oh, fuck. Maybe you’re right, Lyd.”

You giggle. “Thanks for these, love. You’re so kind.”

Ben shakes his head. “As if you wouldn’t have done the same.” He chews thoughtfully on the pastry. “Anyway, I feel like I still need to make it up to you. Yesterday morning, I mean.”

“You apologised, love, and we sorted things out. It’s fine.”

He shrugs. “I just feel bad. I shouldn’t have made you feel bad. Should have known by now that you struggle with this kind of uncertainty.” Ben reaches for your left hand, bringing it to his lips. “I’m sorry, Lyd.”

“Thank you, Ben. But we’re fine. I mean it. That’s what makes a relationship work, isn’t it? Learning about each other and knowing when we need to learn or listen more.”

He nods. “Exactly. And that’s why I’m so excited to spend the rest of my life with you. No matter where that is.”

The rest of the week is spent partly in research libraries, at least in your case, but mostly in the streets and cafés and galleries and museums of the city you love so much with the man you adore. 

You watch with quiet joy as he sees Manet’s Olympia in real life for the first time, shaking his head in admiration and awe as he takes in the painting. He steps back and folds his arms. 

“She’s really something.”

“She sure is. I’d be that confident too, if I was as gorgeous as her.”

He arches an eyebrow and looks at you. “You are. Much more so.” 

You huff a laugh as you link his arm and wander off to see Courbet’s Burial at Ornans. “You want me to pose like one of Manet’s French girls, Ben?”

“Wouldn’t say no, Lyd.”

At Harry’s New York Bar, the legendary cocktail bar near the Opéra, you cuddle up in a cosy corner of the piano lounge in the basement, and drink French 75 cocktails while the resident pianist plays Gershwin late into the night. You follow your own tailor-made walking tours, spotting literary landmarks and movie locations. A night in a Saint-Germain bar ends with a visit to the late-night bookstore L’Écume des Pages (and an inevitable bag full of newly-purchased books). Ben oohs and aahs over the bouquinistes’ boxes that line the walls overlooking the Seine, unable to resist a quick perusal of their selection of rare books and vintage magazines. You share a Paris-Brest pastry from Angelina, moaning appreciatively as you devour the delicious dessert. Together, you drink coffee and sip wine and talk and laugh and people-watch to your heart’s content. 

You could never tire of Paris. Even so, Ben’s wide-eyed excitement and enthusiasm makes everything new: the landmarks, the streetscapes, the food, the drink, the sounds and smells.

And you. He has made you new, too.

You feel it in the way he looks at you when you wave your hands and wax lyrical about god knows what painting or book or historical event. It’s in the reassuring weight of his arm around your shoulders as you wander through the narrow back streets, feeling like you’re ten feet tall. It’s there in the hundreds of little opportunities he finds during each day to touch you: the small of your back as you enter a building, the back of your hand as you sit together on the Métro, the side of your mouth as he brushes away an errant croissant flake. 

It is in the moments when you stop on the street and pull him to you for a kiss, unconcerned by the Parisians tut-tutting as they have to walk around the two of you. It’s in the moans he pulls from you, and you from him, when you are tangled in bedsheets at night, or in the morning, or even - after a lunchtime trip to the movies that escalated into some heated back-row kisses - in the middle of the afternoon, languidly stretched out naked for him on the bed. 

Just like one of Manet’s French girls, he joked.

Most of all, it’s there in the light that always seems to be shining in your eyes whenever you look at him, knowing that he is yours and you his. 

“You’re a tolerant man, Ben Morales,” you say with a chuckle as you walk through the imposing gates of Père Lachaise cemetery one bright morning. “Willing to hang out in Parisian cemeteries with me as I fangirl over the tombs of people no one has cared about for a hundred years or more.”

Ben looks at the list of names on the cemetery map and smiles at you, squinting slightly behind his sunglasses. “I rather like your Gothic side, Lyddie. And I appreciate this too, you know - I want to find Balzac and Proust’s tombs, while we’re here.” He drapes an arm across your shoulders as you climb steadily up one of the winding paths leading through the oldest part of the cemetery, stopping here and there to look at some of the more unusual tombs and memorials. 

There’s a certain part of Père Lachaise, its highest point, where you can look out and see the city unfolding below. You lead him there and sit on a bench, keen for him to take in the view. Other visitors and tourists meander past with their maps, chatting in various languages about Oscar Wilde and Jim Morrison or any number of the luminaries whose remains lie alongside those of many more ordinary Parisians in this leafy enclave. 

And then it’s just the two of you, side by side, contemplative. Little birds chirp and chatter in the trees, their song a moment of peaceful stillness in the bustling city. 

Paris has a tendency to look particularly magical when you’re entering into the final hours of a visit. This evening, the fading spring sunlight cuts a path along the street below, gleaming off the windows and shop signs that line the ancient thoroughfare.

“My heart always breaks a little when I have to leave.”

Ben finishes combing back his hair, still damp from the shower and curls starting to form at the nape of his neck. He turns from the mirror just inside the door of the apartment, adjusting the collar of his white shirt. 

“This isn’t the last time, Lyddie. Not for you, not for us.”

You nod sadly, picking up your purse and slipping into a pair of dark red patent ballet flats. “I know. I’ve been telling myself that for twenty-odd years, but it never gets easier. Stupid, huh.”

He shakes his head as he reaches for your hand. “Not stupid. You love this place, and twenty-odd years is a long time to be in love.” He looks you up and down admiringly. “You’re all fancy.”

You cock your hip and strike a pose as Ben laughs. “I like to dress up for my long-term lover, the city of Paris, Monsieur Morales. Anyway, you’re all fancy too.”

“Not like you, I’m not. You look…” He exhales as he takes you in. “You look like you walked out of a perfect French movie.”

Even you have to admit he’s got a point. Sure, the outfit had been a bit of a splurge, a treat to yourself from the BHV department store. But a classic, knee-length little black dress would never go out of style. At least, that’s how you justified it. That, and the fact that it hugged your body just so, working wonders with your curves, somehow narrowing your middle and accentuating your tits and hips in a manner that was impossibly elegant and incredibly sexy. It was a marvel. 

For once, you got a flash of what Ben always told you he saw when he looked at you. It made for a pleasant change.

This evening you have accessorised with a vintage brooch and chunky brass earrings, the gold necklace Ben gave you for Valentine’s Day a permanent fixture around your neck. The spring evening is warm enough for you to get away with a dark red pashmina shawl in lieu of a jacket, though you worried bare legs might be a step too far and decided not to forego your black hold-up fishnet stockings.

Ben slips into his olive green suit jacket and you squeeze his hand. “Thank you, my love. You look beautiful, too.” 

He does. But then, he always does: his beauty is easy, natural, effortless; as obvious to you when he’s bleary-eyed and bed-headed in his old t-shirts and pyjama bottoms as it is now, with him suited and booted and looking every inch the debonair Parisian intellectual in his clear-framed glasses.

For an instant you wish you could travel back to your broken-hearted self all those years before, to tell her that a better day would come, that real love would find you when and where you least expected it, and that it would arrive in the form of a man as beautiful on the inside as he is on the outside.

Most people would say the two of you are a little overdressed for your dinner destination. But then, you aren’t most people.

You catch a glimpse of the two of you reflected in a shop window as you walk along boulevard Henri IV. You, black dress and red accessories; Ben, green suit with his top shirt buttons undone, hair combed back and starting to form soft waves a little as it dries. The fact that you are both wearing sunglasses only enhances the sense of slightly retro European chic. 

“Look at us. Not bad, hmmm?” 

Ben stops, puts down the wicker basket he’s carrying, and winds his arms around your waist, kissing the side of your neck. “Perfect.”

You stroll past a little park near the river, pointing out a reconstructed bit of the Bastille to him, and wander in the direction of the Pont Marie and onto the Île Saint-Louis. It’s a little out of the way for where you’re going, but you have a good reason. He asked you a couple of days ago what your favourite view of the city was, and you intend to show him. 

The evening sky is streaked with a palette of pale blues, pinks, oranges and reds as you reach the Pont de la Tournelle and stop to lean on the parapet of the bridge. 

“This is it.”

He stands beside you and rests his hands on the parapet, following your gaze westwards along the river, taking in the silhouette of Notre-Dame - still obscured by scaffolding - painted against the vibrant canvas of the sunset, and the curve of the quaysides as the Seine splits around the Île de la Cité. 

“This is my spot. When I stand here I feel as though I could wrap my arms around the city and as though it wraps its arms around me.” You look at Ben, a little embarrassed. “Sorry. That’s a bit weird, I know. I am aware that it is a city and I cannot hug it, please don’t run away.”

He looks at you with affectionate bemusement. “You know how beautiful that is, to have those feelings and be able to articulate them like that?” He reaches for your hand. “It isn’t weird. It’s you, and it’s wonderful.”

You rest your head on his shoulder and squeeze his hand. “The first time I came to Paris after…everything, I came here the first night. I stood here and I looked at the cathedral and the city.” You pause as the memory resurfaces. “And then I had a massive cry. See? Weird.”

Ben shakes his head and chuckles, pulling you close to him. “Not weird. Catharsis.”

“I guess it was. I was still here. Notre-Dame was still here. Paris was still here. It gave me a sense of hope, I think, for the first time. Like, I knew things would get better.”

“I’m so fucking proud of you, you know?” He kisses your forehead and leans in to murmur, cheekily, in your ear: “So did things get better?”

You wrap your arm around his waist, slipping it under his jacket so you can feel the strong muscles of his back under his shirt. “Eh, I guess you could say that.”

Dinner is simple: a baguette, a selection of cheeses and charcuterie, and a bottle of champagne. But you’ve made the effort to bring proper glasses and plates from the apartment, and you can’t fault the location: watching the river from the Quai Saint-Bernard on the left bank, waving at the people on the big tourist boats - the bateaux-mouches - as they pass. 

“Hell of a view,” Ben muses in between mouthfuls of baguette and Brillat-Savarin cheese. 

You gaze across the river at the Île Saint-Louis and smile contentedly. “It is perfection.”

He chuckles and leans in to kiss you. “I was talking about you. But Paris isn’t too bad, either.”

He looks back at the river, a smile playing on his lips, and you take a moment to admire a perfect view of your own: Ben’s handsome face in profile, hair moving gently in the breeze, the light tan he had acquired after a week of wandering in Parisian spring sunshine complementing the patches of grey-white hair at the hinge of his jaw. 

You can’t help but marvel a little at how fucking gorgeous he is. Well done, Lyd. In that instant, as you take him in, you concentrate on the wonderful feeling of calm and safety that suffuses your body when you’re with him. 

You’d only realised after the abrupt end of your last relationship that you’d spent a decade and a half walking on eggshells, constantly anxious and never wholly comfortable - even with someone who claimed to love you. You feared suggesting the simplest thing: a movie, a dinner, a holiday, lest it prompt a negative reaction or criticism.

With Ben, though? Even with the ongoing uncertainty about where, exactly, your future would be, you had never felt anything other than safe. With a clearer path ahead agreed together, the residual anxiety faded, too. 

It was a new and marvellous feeling. 

As the evening draws in, a little group of musicians set up nearby on the quay, accompanied by a cluster of couples who immediately began to dance to the band. Ben turns and smiles at the spectacle.

“They do this as soon as the weather gets warm here,” you explain, smiling widely as the dancers move around an open area on the quayside. “Sometimes it’s French classics, sometimes American big band, sometimes Latin, sometimes a more contemporary mix, like tonight.”

Ben stands up, dusts off his pants, picks up the picnic basket and extends his hand to you. 

“Would you like to dance, Lyddie?”

How can you refuse, when he’s looking like that and asking you in that voice and smiling at you with such love and affection? 

“I’m not good at this sort of thing, Ben, I warn you.”

He rolls his eyes affectionately. “Bullshit. Now: dance with me, Lyd.”

You get to your feet and he leads you in the direction of the makeshift dancefloor, leaving the picnic basket to one side as he brings you into a dance hold and begins to move, pulling you close to his body as the band and its female lead singer begin a cover of Mitski’s “My Love Mine All Mine”.

The rest of the city falls away as you dance with him, nuzzling against his neck as his hips sway gently, rhythmically against you in time to the slower tempo of the music. Ben’s lips press softly to the top of your head, and you hum in absolute contentment. 

“I love this song, you know.”

He chuckles. “I do. You sing it very beautifully in the shower, sometimes.”

“I doubt it’s beautiful.”

“Trust me. It’s beautiful.”

You nestle against him and sing along, joining in with the lyric that always made you think of him, of how he had broken through your sturdy defences, smoothing and healing the jagged, broken pieces of your soul: “My baby, here on earth/Showed me what my heart was worth”. 

You sing the words quietly against his chest, feeling the vibrations from your voice meeting the rhythm of his heartbeat in a curious music made of two lovers. As the song draws to a close, Ben tenderly lifts your chin and kisses you, enveloping you in those strong arms. Cologne, coffee, bread, paper, something that is just his: his scent, the scent of love and safety.

His big hands skim appreciatively over your figure in the new black dress as he inhales your own perfume, nose buried in the crook of your neck. “Delicious, gorgeous girl,” he murmurs against your velvet skin. “You look incredible tonight, you know?”

Ben pulls your body even tighter to his and you whine softly, the press of his broad form to yours enough to send a rush of wetness to your core. 

“I think we need to get back to the apartment, my love.”

Ben sits at the end of the bed, wearing his shirt and boxers, watching as you take off your jewellery in front of the bedroom mirror. There’s something fascinating about the ritual: how you take out your earrings and put them in their box; the way you tilt your head forward as you remove your necklace.

He still can’t believe it, sometimes, the kind of love he has with you. He’s been desperate to get you home ever since you danced close and slow on the riverbank. That fucking black dress. Driving him slowly crazy all night, every time he looked at you. It’s the way it hugs your hips, accentuates the ample, full curves of your tits, and reveals just enough of your skin to make him want to ease it off your soft, welcoming body. 

His cock twitches at the thought. 

He stands up and crosses the floor, standing behind you. His hands gently caress you as you smile at the reflection of the two of you in the mirror.

“I love this.”

Ben kisses the top of your arm. “I love this, too.”

His lips find their way along the line of your shoulder until they reach the crook of your neck. A little tug to the zipper of the dress and his mouth moves downwards, kissing and sucking at the back of your neck, hands roaming over your body and grabbing handfuls of you as he goes.

He���s pressed against your back, murmuring your name. The extent of his desire is already very much in evidence.

“Fuck, Lyddie.” His breath is warm and urgent against your neck.

“Mmmm?”

“I’ve wanted to take this off since the minute I saw you in it.”

You chuckle. “Looks that bad, huh?”

Lips still on your neck, he caresses your breasts as he shakes his head. “Looks too good on you.”

Ben licks a stripe up the side of your neck and you whine with pleasure, closing your eyes and reaching to caress his face.

“Can I take it off, my love?” His voice is lower, smokier.

You nod, locking your eyes on his. A frisson of excitement courses through your body as Ben eases down the rest of the zipper and eases you out of your little black dress, letting it pool at your feet. 

“Oh, fuck me. These new?”

When you bought the dress, you’d bought new lingerie, too. A bra in caramel and black lace whose delicacy belied its incredible construction, supporting your breasts perfectly. Matching underwear, high-waisted and full but completely sheer, made out of the same black lace that trimmed your bra.

And of course: the stockings.

You nod and close your eyes, trying to avoid seeing yourself in the mirror. You looked alright in the dress, but you still can’t quite face the body underneath it. Ben’s breath ghosts across your shoulder blades as he fondles your tits and kisses the top of your spine. 

“Open your eyes, Lyd.”

You hesitate.

“Lyd. Open your eyes.”

You obey. But you keep your gaze fixed on him, afraid of your own reflection, of a body that you still cannot believe anyone like him would ever really want. 

“Lyddie, please look.” Ben’s voice is firm but pleading. “Look at your beautiful face. Look at this gorgeous, sexy body.” 

He trails a finger along the contours of your breasts, tracing the lace trim of the bra. He brings his hands to your waist, to your hips, pulling you back against him ever so slightly so that you can feel how hard he is. 

You don’t think you’ll ever love your body. But, watching Ben drinking you in with his eyes, running his fingers over the black Parisian lace that clings to the most sensitive and sensual parts of you, you understand that you love the way he loves your body.

“This is what you do to me, Lyd, and I will tell you every day for the rest of our lives that you are the most beautiful fucking thing I’ve ever seen in my life.” You turn to face him, his hands cupping your face as he kisses you deeply. 

He breaks away and looks into your eyes, dark irises searching yours. There’s a vulnerability there, a hint of doubt, lingering in spite of his words. 

“What is it, Lyd?”

You shrug, fingers lightly caressing the curls and waves that cluster around his ears. “I love that you think I’m beautiful. I… still don’t know if I ever will.”

He kisses you again, softer this time. “Can I at least try to convince you? Show you?”

You smile against his lips and wrap your arms around his neck. “I’d like that. Could… could you, like, take charge? For tonight?”

He quirks an eyebrow and returns your kiss, humming against your mouth. “Take charge?”

You feel embarrassment rising in your throat. You’d never really felt able to just ask for what you needed like this before. Old habits die hard.

“Ben, I never felt safe enough to ask a partner to take the lead like this…not before you.”

His expression softens. “I’d give you anything, Lyd. Anything you want.” He wraps his arms around you and pulls you to him, chin resting on your shoulder. “And I feel safe with you, too.”

You tilt your head to kiss him. “So…?”

“So, I’m going to take charge and show you exactly how fucking beautiful you are, how sexy you are, how fucking happy I am that I get to be with you.” He pauses to kiss you again. “And if I have to, like I said - I’ll do this every day for the rest of time, if necessary, until you see what a perfect goddess you are.”

Another, deeper kiss; the sensation of his broad hands on the soft skin of your tits and belly, pulling you tight to him, the press of his erection against you as he guides you to lean back against the wall and slips his fingers under the crotch of your panties, parting your folds and working your clit and pussy until you’re panting with desire and need. 

For a moment, you think he’s going to fuck you. But then slowly, steadily, Ben sinks to the ground in front of you, mouth and teeth and tongue finding the softest, most yielding parts of your body as he works his way to his knees. 

Ben looks up at you, eyes glittering with lust and adoration. He is a supplicant before you, ready to worship, to seek and give a pleasure as sacred as it is profane. He venerates your body with his mouth. His tongue traces the outline of your hips, his lips kiss the softness of your lower belly, his teeth scrape across the thick flesh of your upper thighs. He tugs the panties down completely, parting your legs and helping you out of the garment. 

“I want you to keep the stockings on, okay?”

You nod your assent. Those perfect dark eyes find yours, a flash of mischief crossing his gaze as he gently pushes a finger inside you before placing both hands firmly on your hips, pressing into your flesh. 

And then he tilts his head, just so, and you cry out as he brings his lips to your wet pussy, mouth and tongue working your entrance as his nose rubs with precision against your clit. You buck slightly against him but he holds you in place, grunting and groaning with pleasure as he goes down on you. The warmth of his breath against your core makes your cunt clench around nothing, desperate for him.

You wind your fingers through the soft waves of his hair, holding him in position and throwing your head back as you revel in every lap of his tongue, every brush of his beard against the sensitive skin of your inner thighs, every nudge of that beautiful nose against your clit. He’s eating you out like you’re his last meal, your moans and writhing body seemingly only serving to spur him on. 

Even so, Ben senses that you’re holding back. The position is incredible, the sight of him, the sound of him, the feel of him making you want to come harder than you’ve ever done before. But you worry about whether your legs will give way - whether you’ll hurt him if you fall forward. 

“I’ve got you, Lyd,” he murmurs, face still buried between your thighs. “Let go. I’ve got you. You’re so close. Come for me. Want you to come like this.”

With his fingers fucking you and his lips sucking and licking at your clit, your body yields and you cry out as you come against his face. 

He stays on his knees as you ride out the orgasm, thumbs rubbing a gentle circle against your hips, before scrambling to his feet and wrapping you in his strong arms. Your legs are still trembling as you lean in and kiss him like your lives depend on it, tasting yourself on his lips. He manoeuvres you to the bed, laying you down with the utmost care. 

You look up at him as he shifts into position above you, the low light catching the traces of your release that glisten across his face and his beautiful eyes flitting greedily over your face and body. You reach up to unbutton his shirt and he shucks off his undervest. An electrical current of desire courses through you as you rake your hands over his broad shoulders and down to that soft tummy you love so much. His eyes are warm and wanting: your darling, your lover, your partner. You are safe in his hands, and you are ready to give yourself entirely to him.  

A little smile quirks at his mouth as he lies down beside you, turning on his side and trailing his long fingers across the velvet skin of your tits, still enclosed in the delicate lace of your bra. 

“Do you know how much I want you, Lyd?” he murmurs, mouth working hot, needy kisses across your breasts. 

“Tell me.”

“Want you all the time.” You can feel his cock hard against you. “Want to have all of you, want to touch and kiss and fuck every last inch of you. I’m going to use my mouth on you now, baby, okay?”

He nips and sucks at the soft flesh of your belly as you moan, pussy aching for him. “And the more I have you, the more I want you.” He finds your soaking folds again and drags two fingers through the slick, bringing them to your lips so you can suck them clean. “I love you. And I can’t get enough of you.”

You let out a half-laugh, half-groan as he pulls you to him and quickly takes off your bra, mouth finding your breasts and tongue swirling over your nipples. You slip a hand between the two of you, tugging down his boxer briefs and wrapping your fingers around his cock as you stroke him, feeling him becoming fully hard under your careful touch.

“Do you think you have another in you, my love?” 

You nod. 

“Use your words, Lyd.”

“Yes. I think so…fuck, yes sir.”

He groans loudly against you and slips his fingers back through your soaking folds, chuckling a little at the whine of pleasure you let out as his warm breath ghosts against your ear. “Fucking hell, Lyd. You look so fucking beautiful. Such a beautiful woman.” He hooks his fingers against the perfect spot inside you and you buck against him, hand still working his dick. “And such a pretty pussy, so tight and so wet for me.”

He eases you into a different position, your back against his chest as his erection nudges against you. First his hands, then - with a shuffle down the bed - his mouth caresses the plump flesh of your ass, lips and teeth scraping over the sensitive skin as you whimper. He shifts your leg up and nestles himself into position.

“Can I have you, darling?”

You whine into the bed, feeling your orgasm building and building. “Please, baby, I need you inside me - fuck, baby, please…”

“I thought I was in charge?” 

His voice is low, honeyed, hot as he whispers in your ear. It tips you closer and closer to the edge. 

“You are… I just want you so fucking much.”

“You want me to fuck you, is that it?”

“Please. Fuck me, my love. Hard as you want to.”

“Fuck, Lyd.” With a groan and some muttered expletives, Ben sinks inside you, pausing for a moment to enjoy the sensation. “Always feels so incredible inside you, baby,” he pants, one arm holding you around your tits and the other against your belly. “Just - oh, fuck - just perfect.” 

It is perfect - perfect angle, perfect feeling of him stretching you, of his hands on you. He drags himself out of your cunt slowly, steadily, making you whimper at the loss of him. A snap of his hips and he’s buried inside you again, beginning a hard rhythm that has you crying his name into the bed as he fucks you, fast and deep, the softness of your ass cushioning his thrusts as he showers you with praise. His good girl. His beautiful woman. His love. 

His. His. Only his. Repeated. Possessive. Perfect.

He shifts his hand from your belly to your pussy, working tight circles over the swollen nub of your clit as you get closer and closer, mouth sucking on the delicate flesh of your neck, never letting up the rhythm until you cry out and come on his cock, the wetness audible as he fucks you through it. 

“Good, baby?” He pulls out as you’re still coming down, easing you onto your back and settling himself on top of you, carefully parting your legs. 

You look up at him, cockdrunk, seeing stars, and with no way to express how you feel other than a satisfied whine as you pull him to you for a hungry, sloppy kiss. Ben smiles and chuckles against your lips as he reaches down to gently hook an arm under your knee as he sinks back into you with a guttural moan. 

He picks up the pace again quickly, taking you harder now, rougher, even, and gripping the headboard of the bed with his free hand. His hair is dishevelled, errant short curls falling over his brow as sweat runs in rivulets over the freckles scattered underneath the hollow of his throat and lips finding yours as you start to babble to him incoherently, surrendering to the sensation. 

He drops his hand from the headboard to find yours, pressing your hand and arm into the mattress as he holds you down while he fucks you. 

“Talk to me, Lyd. Tell me. See how much I want you? Tell me.”

You mutter filthily about how deep he is, how big he is, how you love having him inside of you, how much you want him - need him - to fill you up. But then you look at him - at his beautiful face, screwed up and teeth gritted as he makes love to you - and another urge takes over, displacing the dirty talk with something no less intense, but softer, all the same.

“I fucking love you, Ben - fuck, keep going, that’s so good, fuck…”

He groans and reaches for your breast, groping it as he nears his own release. “You’re mine, Lyddie. All mine.”

“Yours, Ben. Every bit of me. Yours, forever, like you’re fucking mine.”

“My woman…my - oh, fuck - my good fucking girl.” You know he’s really close. “Keep talking, Lyd. Want to hear it.”

“You’re mine, baby - oh god, Ben, that’s so fucking good - all mine. I’ll give you anything. Everything.”

Ben rests his head against your neck, panting and moaning as his rhythm falters. “I’m all yours, Lydia, always - f-fuck, I’m gonna…”

You hold him tight, hands across the breadth of his back. “You’ll never be alone again, baby - fuck, Ben! - gonna take care of you, gonna be our own little family…”

He positively growls as he comes inside you, your head knocking against the headboard as he snaps his hips against yours before collapsing against your body. You hold him tight, gentle, slow, one hand winding through his curls and the other reaching for his hand as you plant soft kisses along his hairline.

He eases himself out of you with a final kiss and flops back onto the mattress beside you, still trying to catch his breath and with the most beautifully blissed-out expression on his face.

“I’m just going to clean up and take these stockings off, my love,” you murmur, shifting your body to the edge of the bed. “You okay?”

Ben grins and giggles to himself as he looks at you. “I am fantastic. Don’t know my name or what year it is, but I am fucking fantastic.”

You pad back from the bathroom as quickly as you can, discarding your stockings and climbing back into bed beside him. He’s reaching for you before you’ve even settled your body on the mattress, broad hands gently rubbing your belly, your hips, the line of your breasts. His breath is steadier now, face and body completely relaxed in the gorgeous afterglow.

“You are such a beautiful man.”

Ben opens one eye and meets your gaze. “Hmmmph?”

“I said, you are such a beautiful man. Don’t dare deny it.” 

He smiles softly, closing his eyes again as your fingertips trace the line of his nose, brush against an errant curl, find the outline of the little bare patches on the side of his jaw. Your thumb swipes gently across his lower lip, fingers seeking out the texture of his moustache. 

You go to speak, and stop yourself. 

“What were you going to say, Lyddie?” His voice is heavy, sleep beckoning him.

“Nothing, I was just - no, it’s stupid.”

“Nothing stupid could ever come out of your pretty mouth.”

You giggle quietly and bring yourself even closer to him, resting your hand on his chest. He reaches up to hold it. 

“It’s just that… I don’t know. When I look at you like this, at all the little things that are just uniquely you, it feels like everything fits. You know?”

He opens his eyes again. “Everything fits?”

“It’s like, ‘aha. Yes. That.’ Like I was always meant to be looking at this face. Like there was a bit of me that I didn’t even know I was missing and it just was…it was you. Even if I didn’t know it.”

He smiles and leans in for a soft kiss. “And now everything fits.”

He wakes her with coffee and kisses, knowing how much she hates prising herself from the warmth of their shared bed. A little incentive, a way to help her avoid panic later in the morning, one of those tiny acts of love they perform for each other every day. 

She orders a taxi for a couple of hours’ time and strips the bedsheets, casting an eye over their shared luggage waiting for departure as she joins him in the living area. Having put the sheets on a wash-dry cycle, her hands rest lightly on his broad shoulders as she quickly kisses him on the cheek and heads for the bathroom to shower. Instinctively, she gathers all but their essentials - toothbrushes and paste, shower gel - and slips them in a ziploc bag, ready to go into one of their cases. 

Once he’s showered, they continue their seamless little ballet of co-operation and partnership as they prepare to depart: a reminder to empty the trash here, an almost-forgotten phone charger spotted there, last few belongings squished into their hand luggage, and a final check on their passports and tickets. She checks every drawer and cupboard one more time while he places their trash bag in the small communal dumpster in the building’s courtyard. 

It is a banal ritual: unthinking, unrehearsed, instinctive. But there’s something in the way they slot together so neatly, the way they complement each other, the easy, naturalness of it all, that speaks to a sense of partnership that works as well in the routines of everyday life as it does in the bedroom. 

He carries the cases down to the main hallway as she checks the apartment’s small windows and locks up, following him downstairs after she drops off the key to Sophie’s neighbour. 

He’s outside, standing with the bags on the pavement outside the building. The G7 taxi pulls up almost immediately, and he can’t help but smile with pride when he hears her confidently chatting away in French to the driver as they load the trunk with their luggage. 

Her hand finds his in the backseat, head resting against his shoulder. Partners. A team.

As the car heads northwards towards the edge of the city, he casts a glance at his phone. Two new job alerts, for positions at institutions in Europe. 

He resolves to check them out properly once they get home. For now, though, just a squeeze of her hand, a kiss to the top of her head, and a silent resolution that he’d follow her to the ends of the earth. 

*******

Further A/N: I'm going to make a separate post with more details on the music, the locations, and the food in this chapter...

[towriteloveontheirarms]

I guess I wouldn´t believe you (modern!Best friend!Jacaerys Velaryon x Reader)

synopsis: When you moved in with your best friend since childhood for college, you never would have thought the outcome of it.

warnings: kind of angsty, best friends to lovers, kissing, afab reader

word count: 2k

taglist: @hopelesswritergall, @urmomsgirlfriend1

(If you want to be tagged for a specific character/fandom/series or in general let me know in my asks, comments or DMs)

For as long as you could think, Jace had been your bestest of friends. You stuck together through every little (and not so little) problem life threw at the two of you. Every fight between him and his uncles, every fight between their families, your parents’ divorce and in the end his family moving away from King´s landing. The two of you never lost contact. They say distance makes the heart grow fonder after all. Though when the two of you finally see each other in person again, after years of strictly conversing over the phone, you get floored by how much fonder your heart could grow. That first hug in such a long time makes your heart swell and your whole body tingle with what you think at first is platonic happiness to see and be close to him again. You should soon be taught better.

It´s the first week of College and, even with only having moved in a week ago, the two of you were already as inseparable as you were in childhood. At first you had thought sharing a cute, little apartment seemed like a good idea. Well, if you knew how much you wanted to bite yourself in the ass at the mere sight of other girls hanging around for “study sessions” throughout the year, you would have moved into the dorms.

As the dumbass that you are when it comes to your own feelings, the realization that it was jealousy and your feelings for your best friend have been more than just platonic, hits you over the head when it is almost too late. Literally, in the form of your friend Baela.

The two of you sit in the campus café on lunch break, talking over coffee as you always do. When she breaks out "So when will you stop being a little bitch and ask my brother out?"

She had always been one to tell hard truths in a rather harsh tone, but that's why you loved her so much.

"Baela!" You whisper at her loudly. Looking at the tables around you to see if any of them have heard you with a scandalized expression.

"What? Just the facts... You've been whining my ear off about Jace fucking around for the past year now, too blind to see that you're so deep in love with him it's grossing everyone out." She sticks out her tongue at you.

"Okay, so maybe I am in love with him... That still doesn't change the fact that he is my best friend. And more importantly he's not interested in me. OUCH!!" One of your hands shoots up to soothe over the spot of your head that just had made painful contact with Baela's hand. “What was that for?”

“That´s because you keep being a little bitch about your feelings.” She just says matter of factly.

“Fuck, Bae. That really hurt.” You whine at her.

“Good. It was supposed to.” Baela claps her hands and then stands up. “I have to run, but I swear I will do it again if you whine about anything regarding Jace again that isn´t him telling you he doesn´t reciprocate your feelings. Which, fyi I can promise you, won´t happen.”

With that little piece of wisdom your friend grabs her bag and the coffee cup and leaves you to ponder her words. And you come to the conclusion that, as much, as you hate it, she is once again right. You had cried to her about her brother for the past year. Drunk, sober, high, with actual tears or like right now. Now you just felt sorry for her. If you were her, you wouldn´t want to hear that much about your siblings being crushed on. Opening the door to your shared apartment with a huff you hear laughter from Jace´s bedroom. Throwing your keys into the bowl near the door you piss off to your room. Thank the seven for noise cancelling headphones, you think and put on some music as loud as you can. Anything to not have to hear what is going on in the room across the hall. Laying down on the bed, you don´t even notice when you fall asleep. Neither do you know how long you have been gone, but it is dark outside when a gentle hand shakes your shoulder.

“Hey.” Jace´s quiet voice rings through to your half asleep mind. “I made dinner, if you want some.”

“Yeah, yeah. I´ll be out in a sec.” You wave your hand in the air and unsuccessfully fight of a big yawn.

“Alright.” Jace goes back to the kitchen to wait for you. “So, how was your day?”

“Good, I guess. Not as good as yours though, I´d bet.” The comment comes of more cutting than you had wanted it too, but luckily your best friend is also a part time golden retriever and so he pushes your tone off to your brain still not having caught up with waking up fully yet.

“Did you do anything fun today?” He asks taking a full spoon of food into his mouth.

“Not really. I met up with Baela at the café earlier. Talked for a while, nothing interesting though. Sorry for not saying hi earlier. I didn´t want to interrupt your… visitor.”

“You wouldn´t have needed to. Sarah is just a good friend.” He looks at you with such a warm, unsuspecting gaze that you feel really bad for how mad you get with jealousy.

“A friend, sure.” You shake your head with a bitter chuckle. Trying to shake Baela´s words and the swirling feelings out of it. To no avail. Pocking the food on your plate some more, the fork in your hand soon meets the plate with a loud clink.

“What do you mean with that?” Jace´s now puzzled brown eyes search for an answer in your ones, but you don´t give him a chance. Turning to leave for your room, before things turned truly ugly or you could admit to something you weren´t ready to admit to.

“Hey, wait! What did you mean just now?” You can hear Jace raise his arms in confusion, but ignore his plea for an answer once more.

Regarding him only with a clipped "Nothing, forget about it."

Slamming the door to your room it gets opened again only moments later. Gods, why couldn't he leave this alone.

"Why are you so angry all of a sudden? Did something happen? Do you want to talk about it?" He asks stepping close to you, but still keeps a safe distance as he sees your disgruntled face.

"Can't you just forget it?" You ask exasperatedly.

"No. We used to talk about everything. What happened to that? We barely even talk anymore even though we literally live in the same place." The brunet was getting worked up too now. Slightly raising his voice.

It wasn't something you had never heard before. Naturally in all the years of your friendship you had fights before. They just never felt so stupid and avoidable.

"Of course you would say that... How could we have talked, when the second the school year started, you busied yourself with Cregan Stark and literally seemingly every girl on this campus?” Your tone is sharp and accusing. Your breath fastens in your chest the more you raise your voice. Your heartbeat speeding up at an equal pace.

“Are you jealous of Cregan? You know you will always be my best friend, right? No one could ever replace you. Not even Cregan Stark.” His amused chuckle makes you think you really are going insane.

“How can someone be so smart and so stupid at the same time? I´m not fucking jealous of Cregan!” A hand rubs over your face, pinching the bridge of your nose.

“Then what is it?” He questions and the words spill out of you before you can think about them.

“I´m jealous of the girls you are with.” You clasp a hand over your mouth as to not reveal more but the damage is done. Instantly a heavy silence lays itself over you.

"Why would you be jealous of them?" Jace finds his voice again first. Its uncertainty still cuts through the quiet like a knife.

"Because I don't want to be just your best friend anymore. I have for a while, but you were too busy with those girls to notice that the guy I´ve been having a crush on for the past year.” Your voice turns desperate. There had been so many better ways to reveal this, but of course it had to come out in an argument. You are pretty sure you have just the worst possible outcome to this situation possible.

You raise your hands in defeat. "You know what? Forget it. Let's just forget I said anything. It's been a long day and I don't want to argue about this.”

“No. I´m not gonna forget about this. You are my best friend, why didn´t you tell me about your feelings earlier?” Jace takes another step closer to you now. Almost close enough to touch if you were to stretch out your arm a little. But you don´t. If anything you keep as far away as possible from him. Your face burns and your breathing goes into overdrive from everything you are feeling right now.

“Because I know you don´t feel the same and I didn´t want to make it a whole thing like it has become now, that eventually ruins our friendship.” Gods, why couldn´t you just stop talking? Why couldn´t he just stop talking?

“How do you know that?” Another step towards you and Jace´s voice becomes quieter again. Having an almost intimate ring to it now.

“How do I know that? Come on Jacey… I´ve known you forever. I know what it looks like when you have feelings for someone.” You try not to make it sound too obvious, but you can´t help it. It just is.

“Oh yeah? And what does it look like when I have feelings for someone?” His question distracting you from the way he moves ever closer.

“It definitely doesn´t look like you are a second version to your uncle Aegon. That´s for sure…” You murmur lowly.

“And what if I told you that Sarah is actually just a friend and all the other girls were just a distraction because I thought the girl I really liked wasn´t into me?”

“I guess I wouldn´t believe you.”

What happens next is truly incomprehensible to you. Jace leans in to close the gap between your faces. The touch of his lips is feather light as they tenderly brush over yours. They are unexpectedly soft and have your stomach turning as butterflies take flight in your stomach. You had dreamt this moment a hundred times maybe more, but you never could have imagined how good it would truly feel to have Jace´s rough palms wander over your bare arms, up the back of your neck to keep you as close to him as possible. Eager to keep this moment going for as long as he can. After a solid minute or two you lay one of your hands to his chest. Feeling the soft fabric of his shirt as you gently push him away.

“Do you believe me now?” He asks. Equally as breathless as you are.

“I… I don´t- I don´t understand…” Your eyes search the warm, brown pools of his for an answer but you are still too perplexed to find any.

“It´s you. I have feelings for you too. I just never thought you would return them, so I- well, you know.” Jace sheepishly rubs his neck at the admission that leaves his lips. A gesture that you always have thought made him look incredibly cute.

“You do?” You whisper. Feeling stupid that you can´t say something more.

“I do.” Jace responds. He is still so close you can feel his hot breath fan over your face. A sensation that makes a shiver run up your spine.

This time it is you that moves in for a kiss. Grabbing his shirt tightly in your hands as you lock your lips in a frantic manner. When you feel his tongue press against your lower lip, silently asking for entrance, you gladly grant it. Pulling him to your bed with you as your lips enter in a slow and intimate dance.

“I love you so much.” You whisper into the kiss.

“I love you more. Gods, I waited so long for this.”

[alaydabug2]

Tag list: @sparklenarniawizard @imobsessed123 @nowjumpinthewater @ilikebookssomuch @insert-clever-username-1133

Broken heart/Broken mind

Chapter Eighty-three

(Human AU)

Sophie and Keefe met in the children's hospital when they were little. Because of how long they were confined to the four walls of the hospital, they became very close during their stay.

As the years pass, they wind up being in the same classroom together due to their physical conditions. This makes their bond deepen.

But are they able to handle when life gets tough, throwing problems and complications their way?

(FYI, for the college chapters, it's just gonna skip around from here. The timeline is still moving forward, but it's just random at this point, not like the other grades.)

Sophie groaned. She was currently sitting at the library with Keefe, trying to work on her paper for history class. It was over World War Two.

Keefe laughed. "That must suck."

"Shut up!" She snapped. "You haven't even started on yours. You realize it's due tomorrow, right?"

"I've got a twelve pack of redbull in the mini-fridge back at my dorm," he shrugged off. "It'll be fine."

"I'm sorry, I can't just chug an energy drink and then finish a twelve page essay at three in the morning." She rolled her eyes. "Seriously, I'm no stranger to all nighters. But that just ridiculous!"

"It's a special skill," he bragged.

"Special is right," she grumbled under her breath.

"Hey!"

She snickered.

The next day, low and behold, Keefe had finished his paper at four am. Sophie had no clue how he ever managed it. Especially because he usually got As.

"Ok, that's not even fair," she informed him.

He shrugged. "Skill issue."

Sophie sat back in her seat, waiting for her turn to present. Dozens of boring papers later, she was called to the front.

She got her papers in order and started from the top. Part way through her vision started going hazy. Crap.

Just. peachy.

None of her professors knew about her seizures.

She rasped out what was about to happen. The papers slid from her hand and scattered across the floor. As her vision tunneled out and tilted, she saw Keefe sprinting down from his seat.

She attempted to catch herself. But it was too late. She was out before hitting the ground.

Sophie grumbled something as she awoke. She squinted her eyes shut as quickly as she opened them. The fluorescent lights gave her an even bigger headache than she already had. She was pretty certain she bonked her head on the way down.

She could feel the shadow of someone hovering over her. Then two someones. She forced herself to open her eyes. She found her professor standing over her. Keefe knelt down beside her. He brushed a little hair away from her face.

"You alright, Foster?" He whispered.

No. She wasn't. She shook her head and held out her arms. He wrapped his arms around her. Even though he was careful while sitting her up, it still sent a blood rush to her head. It gave her a migraine.

Keefe gently prodded the side of her forehead. "Yeesh. That's a pretty good goose egg you've got there."

She buried her face in his chest.

The professor turned to Keefe. "Mr. Sencen. Do you mind taking her down to the nurses' station?"

"Not at all, sir."

Keefe helped her to her feet, and they started down the hall.

[am-i-the-asshole-official]

Am I the asshole for bringing my friend to stay for the weekend?

Didn't think I'd ever make this, but here we are. So, I recently moved in with a roommate for this year of college. We never met before and we live in different parts of the country (not USA, it's a country in Europe).

Anyway, things were going great. Then I came to her one night like my friend and I wanted to go see a movie on Saturday in cinema and we'd come here afterwards to watch a show on TV since she doesn't have one in her dorm and she will likely sleep over since it's on the other side of the town and I don't want her to have to go by bus and if she wanted, she could also come with us. She said ok, but she won't join us. She will be in her room with earphones.

So, just as an fyi, the appartment has 2 separate bedrooms, huge ones, a huge bathroom (don't take this lightly, it is fit for a couple with two children and has a bathtub), the living room and dinning room are connected but there is literally space for 6 at the table and the couch can fit 4 people plus there is an armchair, the is also a spacious kitchen and a long hall and small office. When we moved, her idea was that since she has a work table she can bring, she'll take a room close to the door and put it there and I can take the room next to the office and take the office for myself. We split the bills and rent in half and our landlord told us we don't have to pay anything aside from rent the first month as a welcome gift (not unusual here).

So, Saturday, my friend asked me to help move from one dorm from one part of the town to the one in another, since it was the end of the month and everyone is coming back to college and now the one she got opened again. We went there and the lady at the desk told her she couldn't move in without a doctor's note telling them she is alright, essentially meaning she would have no place to stay untill Monday since the doctors that give those notes don't do weekends and she would have to wait. I told her that since she already is staying at my place for Saturday, she can also stay for Sunday since she had nowhere to go. We weren't paying anything except rent that month, so my roommate couldn't argue that she shouldn't pay something she didn't spend or anything. Here, it would be considered rude to say that, but people are colder to others to where she is from, so I wouldn't put it above her.

Anyway, we came to the appartment and put all of her stuff (a suitcase and a few bags) into the office only I use and I told my roommate like sorry, but there was a slight change in plans, we didn't anticipate this happening, we won't bother you etc. She said okay. I, like any well raised person here, offered my friend a drink (we had water, tea and coffee, she picked tea, I bought that, no alcohol or anything similar involved) and we went to the movies afterward.

The movie was shorter than we thought so we came back earlier and we decided to watch other stuff on TV to pass time and I made some coffee (it is custom to drink coffee in the afternoon here). Meanwhile, my roommate was showering. After she came out of the bathroom she came to me and said we needed to talk. I was like ok, confused as to what. She came to us, we were sitting on the living room floor since the couch was too far away from the coffee table and she told me that in the future that I need to tell her when my friend is coming since she has stuff to do outside of college (still unclear as to what), that this ruined her plans and that I need to tell our landlord my friend is staying over. I was like, I told you, I remeber that, and I told you she would sleep over, you were fine with it, the plus one night wasn't planned, but I can't let my friend sleep on the street and our contract says nothing about me or her for that matter letting a friend sleep over. She was like, yeah, I understand that you didn't plan that, but I didn't see what you said about her coming here on Saturday as that, and I was like what, I couldn't be clearer and then she just left to go back into her room.

Soon after, my friend and I went for a walk to discuss the situation and to see if it was just me. We came back, watched the show we planned and when to sleep in my room. We got up the next morning and steered clear of the appartment for the day as to not disturb my roommate. We came after she went to bed and went to sleep ourselves.

In the morning, Monday, I got up to get milk and breakfast for me and my friend since my roommate has her own diet because she has a sensitive stomach so I didn't get anything for her, considering that. We said hi and she went to her room. My friend came out of my room and we sat down to eat and when my roommate came out of her room she said hello, but my roommate ignored, picked her breakfast and went back to the room, which is odd considering she usually eats it at the table and that table is fit for six people, maybe more and her spot was still free, on the other side of us. She left without saying goodbye and she didn't say a single word to me after that first good morning.

I wanted to talk to her about the situation this afternoon after we both come back from the classes. I would have done so earlier, but I didn't want to have an audience aka my friend since this is a problem between my roommate and me.

She came back late, but she didn't even try to say a word to me at all since that morning and I don't want to leave this unresolved, but it's late and I have classes so I was thinking about leaving her a letter to read, but I also feel like I did something wrong, I just don't know what.

So, am I the asshole?

What are these acronyms?

[frannyzooey]

Hi Kelli! Tumblr errored out while I was sending this the first time so I think it didn’t go through but if you did in fact already get this feel free to ignore the duplicate! (Damn you, tumblr)

I really appreciated reading your thoughts on age gap a little while ago and had a follow up question for you. What are your thoughts on the idea I see circulating sometimes that age gap fics are alienating to folks who don’t want to read them or feel like they can’t identify with it? I never see myself as “reader” personally, but I know some folks do and would never want to perpetuate a problem or make anyone’s experience in fandom less cozy or welcoming. It’s definitely something that makes me nervous to post any of my writing (even the majority non-age gap stuff) especially in the Pedro fandom space, and I know the argument that everyone curates their own space and can choose not to read something probably applies here, but it still makes me hesitate.

I did not get this ask the first time! *shakes fist at tumblr*

FYI: the other ask, for reference ❤

So, I have not come across this particular sentiment but I have seen my fair share of hate on age gap for various reasons, and I wanna touch on a couple things in this ask because you are being so brilliantly vulnerable sending it in ❤

First off: the main thing I write is age gap: Weeknights, In the Dark, The Secret, Dave/Nanny, Dave/Intern, SDLN. Now let me tell you something else: I am 38 years old.

You would think that I wouldn't be able to identify myself in those stories because of my age: I'm not in college, I'm not in my 20's, I'm not some young, pretty thing. I also don't want to envision myself as a younger person, I also have nothing against aging and it's not because I secretly loathe older women.

It's the dynamic.

In truth, I find them soothing/cathartic to write about/read because they describe something that was missing for me at not only that age, but to some extent now as well: care.

To read about a situation in which an older person cares for and desires the younger one: that is something I seek out because I like it. I'm soothed by it, it's my favorite daydream, it's a situation that I have always been drawn to. I have always been attracted to someone experienced in the ways of the world taking care of me, in whatever form that takes shape in.

Will everyone in the fandom find it soothing? No. In fact, some might be triggered by it, or have their own life experiences that tell them it's inherently wrong, or like you stated above, for whatever reason they just don't identify with the desire to read about it.

However - I do. I'm not everyone, and I get that, but I write (and consume) for me, and for (hopefully) others who are like me to enjoy.

The act of sharing your work is a very vulnerable thing, and to pair that with posts about how some people will never be able to identify with the things you want to write about in a very shame filled manner of speech makes it even more scary, and I get that.

I really do, I've felt it and it’s a hard thing to have to see and feel.

However, in order to post online in any fandom, you sort of just have to say "self, this is important to me, so fuck it."

They can read it, or they can not: that's up to them. If they don't identify with it, then they can go seek out other media that they do identify with. If they don't like it, that's not on you. There are plenty of stories in which I don't identify with the reader for various reasons, but I either enjoy the fics for different aspects of the story, or I scroll on by.

I have a lot of opinions/theories on why people make posts like that but I won't bore you - at the end of the day, you create the content you want to consume, and don't let anyone make you feel bad about it. ❤

[doctorweebmd]

hello just in case anyone is checking in on where i am lmao:

i gave myself up until the end of labor day weekend to dick around (i.e. working on tptp) and not do things i need to be doing (i.e. everything else) with this self-imposed deadline being imposed as such because i have a LOT of shit i need to work on in the coming weeks. i actually am, like, 32 years old, and have a full time job in academic medicine (… well, ish, im a perpetual fellow) and have a TON to get done on top of just working INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO:

-> research that i am so so regretfully the principal investigator on and have funding for somehow so i actually have to do it and produce results

-> meeting after meeting after meeting for said research. Why is there so much politics in research. Why is medicine such a fucking joke.

-> leaving country in 2 weeks

-> prepping to leave country in two weeks including tying up loose ends at work, doctors appointments, meds, clothes on top of making sure everything is planned and updated for the travel itself because I planned the entire trip lmao

-> finish updating my CV

-> cold-calling and emailing local programs for jobs because you would think after four years of college, four years of med school, three years of residency, three years of fellowship and another one year of even more fellowship people would be falling all over themselves to recruit MY ass but FYI unless you have a large NIH grant or you have a personal relationship with program heads your ass is NOT getting headhunted. and also MD jobs worth getting never get posted about online because, as mentioned above, openings are rarely made public and if they are they're desperate to hire anyone which is often not a good sign. Anyway most people say have a contract in hand between December-February which is… something.

-> abstract for (conference) due in a month, for (conference #2) in two months

-> critical care boards in two months that i need to start studying for!!!

-> lecture series for (x) fellows development and execution that I don’t have the dates for yet…

… anyway. I’m tired. I’m hoping to have time to write when traveling but damn. These are non-problem problems because I’m privileged to get to do any of this but at the same time it feels like a lot to manage. The good news is since I started getting medicated like 6 months ago I’m not totally shutting down at the prospect of this, but it’s still a bit stressful. Sigh.

[edward-evans-blog]

Edward Evans Blog, [Entry #1]

“The Flatmate…”

Hello, I am Edward Evans, The writer of this Blog. For my final assignment in one of my Courses In college I was given the task to document all the exciting things that happen to me over the course of three months. Sadly I’ve already wasted about three days trying to decide what exactly people might find exciting, I mean as far as exciting goes I’m really not sure my life fits the quota.. I’m a 19 year old English man who’s only friend is a bird who pop’s by my flat to eat from the bird feeder I installed outside my apartment window, so yeah.. not too exciting as you can see. well. At Least it wasn’t exciting until around breakfast time yesterday.

I was Just doing my regular every day routine. I got up at 5:36 and made myself a tea with avocado toast on the side and Refilled the bird feeder outside my flat and watched the birds eat while I ate, then at 6:47 I went outside and did a quick jog around the block once I came back to my flat around 7:40 I got a nice cold shower.. and after I got out and dressed that's when it happened. The thing that might just change my life forever…

I was sitting at my writing desk in my living room when suddenly I heard the strangest noise coming from my bedroom… I got up to investigate, holding a broom in my hands ready to hit anyone or anything that tried to jump out at me.. and that's when I quickly opened my room door just in time to see a strange looking man climb in through my window holding some sort of.. sack?? Well of course I wasted no time as I ran over and put my intruder into a choke hold, I guess those self defence classes I took over the summer did end up paying off… either way the intruder didn't seem to put up much of a fight.. He just kind of flailed around but I held my ground and kept a firm hold on him. At this point the man had dropped the sack he was carrying, this is around the time I started asking questions. I had asked him who he was and why he was breaking into my house though I didn’t get a very straight answer all he said was “get the bag” and “run” I started to get a bit confused by this so I dropped him from the choke hold and instead picked up the bag, but right as I was about to look into it I heard sirens and before I knew it the strange intruder had grabbed my hand and told me to follow him as he lead me out of the window in my living room!! (Fyi I live on the second story of a building.) we got lucky(?) however and landed in a dumpster full of soft discarded fabrics as I live right next to a fabric shop. The intruder still hadn’t let me go and now I was being dragged throughout the streets by some sort of crazy man?? Well not to my surprise the police soon caught up with us right as the intruder hailed a cab over and as the police were arresting him he yelled at me to “put the bagels in the back and run!” Still confused I opened the back of the cab door and opened the sack as I slowly realised the bag I had been carrying was filled with… Bangles..? 72 Bagels to be exact. I looked back at my intruder with confusion plastered to my face as he tried to fight off the cops. Yet he still yelled at me to put them in the cab and for some reason.. I did. Well.. after an hour or so we did get arrested. Apparently the stranger had robbed a bakery of 72 bagel’s .. not because he was poor and needed to… just because he was hungry and thought the price for a bagel was obscene.

I was arrested… over bagels… I didn’t even steal myself. “God this guy is inase.” Is all I could think as I sat in the holding cell. But then the most unexpected, unpredictable, surprising thing happened.. John Watson and Sherlock Holmes walked in! In the flesh!! I thought perhaps they were here to question someone for a case but instead they walked over to me and my intruders cell..

“Percy. What did you do?” Is the first thing I heard Sherlock say. I was confused and glanced over at the stranger in the cell with me.

“So your name's Percy?” I asked him, though he didn’t answer.

“Uncle Sherlock..John. Good to see you as well..” The stranger nodded up to the two celebrities nonchalantly.

“Percy, your father sent you here so you’d stay out of trouble not to get yourself and this poor boy arrested.”

John said, sounding more angry then I would imagine my first time meeting my idol would sound.. the bickering between them continued for a few minutes until suddenly Mr. Holmes had asked Percy, who I'm assuming is the man in the cell with me. “You can’t just run away Percy, where on earth would you go?”

And this was the moment that made me completely stunned.

Percy crossed his arms and looked up at Mr.Holmes.

“I could go to lots of places. In fact I might just move in with-“ he turned to look at me. “What's your name, tiny man?”

I looked at him confused and for the first time spoke with him. “Oh- uh- .. Edward? Edward Evans.”

I Answered the strange man a bit hesitant.

“Right. Well I might just move in with Eddie!”

He yelled, crossing his arms again.

“Oh- actually its Edward-“

I cut myself off quickly

“Wait- move in???? I don't even know you!!”

At this point John Watson, my Idol! Might I remind you, smiled

“Well. Fine. Move in with Eddie.”

I was shocked. Why on earth did they think That I would just let some random guy who broke into my house, made me a partner to his crime and got me arrested!!! Live! With! Me-

John spoke again. “It might be good for you. That’s actually how I met Sherlock. Moved in with him the second day I met him.”

…

It has now been a day since this happened and now I have a flatmate.

I've gotten to learn more about him thankfully. He is 19, just like me, but he’s not in school as he thinks he's too smart for it or something.. he likes bagels and solving crimes. And his uncle is the famous Sherlock Holmes.

He and I have come up with an agreement. He will help me with this assignment by letting me tag along with him on his cases and blog about them. And in return I let him live with me for a few months until his father “Mycroft” lets him move back in with him.

So.. This is the start of my blog.

The amazing adventures of Percy Holmes and Edward Evans.

Thank you for reading and stay tuned for more updates on our wonderfully unbelievable stories.

-Edward Evans.

[princessdarerina]

Okay so I want to get this off my chest because honestly I am so sick of this dumb ass cunt running her mouth constantly about me and not only that she mentioned my friend for no reason on her blog. I want to just put this into steps for her to also understand because obviously her dumbass brain cant process it no matter how many times people tell her.

1. Becs never stalked your blog she went to block it but she accidentally followed you. She does not want anything to do with you at all.

2. Your “private” venting blog which isn’t venting its pure harassment and not only is it harassment it has all the proof that you been the harasser and stalker. Fyi, if you want it private go to your actual browser and put a password on it that way only you and the people you want to see can see it with that password.

3. The blog was sent to me. I will not say who it is and I won’t give out their account mainly because it’s now gone.

4. I am rarely on. I am spending time with my son, hanging with real life friends, spending time with my boyfriend playing overwatch 2 or Apex Legends, studying for college, helping on the ranch, and not only doing all those things I start my full time job monday. Most of my posts minus the reblogs are scheduled posts and post automatically. I am never around.

5. I am not sending Rose/Fae/Syrena or whatever her name is anons she is blocked and gone completely from my life. Whenever I get an account messaging me about her or an account that is hers I automatically block her. My friends and family hate her and dont want her around period.

6. I don’t have a life and I seek attention? Oh sweetie, you are truly delusional as all hell. I do have a life I just don’t post it on my tumblr all the time like seeking attention like you do posting about shit from your life that no one on here cares about.

7. I don’t want Zack never have never will. So whoever is sending you that bullshit is clearly lying and if you believe all this shit you are really insecure.

8. No one is sending you anons sweets because no one likes you. Stop sending yourself anons. Its pathetic.

9. Just leave me alone. I almost forgot you existed till that random showed me that blog. You think I am obsessed with you? I am not. It’s actually the opposite. I hate you more than I hate my ex and both him and I can still agree we both hate you still and that says something. I am not obsessed with you at all. There is nothing to be obsessed with. Wanna talk obsessed you literally had to stalk my dads death and my old school. Thats obsession and stalking. Thats a psychopath.

10. If I wanted to say something to you I wouldn’t do it through an anon. If things don’t come from my actual account it’s not me. Also stop bringing Daisy and Dia into your posts man. They are barely around too. I know Dia, Daisy and I are not close but god damn. Just leave us all alone.

11. Leave my friends alone. Becs did nothing to you. Stop trying to play victim when you are not and stop lying to your real life friends and family about me as well because if they message me I will gladly tell them the truth with all the screenshots.

12. I am a narcissist? Honestly you dont know the definition of one; so let me put out there for you: Personality qualities include thinking very highly of oneself, needing admiration, believing others are inferior, and lacking empathy for others.

Narcs also do this:

Narcissists may use gaslighting tactics to make a partner or friends doubt their perception of reality. They may twist the truth, deny facts, or blame the partner for things that are not their fault, causing the other person to question their sanity.

Which rose is clearly all of that because she has gas lit so many people its not even funny. I am the complete opposite of a narc. She clearly needs to learn definitions because she clearly does not know anything.

13. As for kim; If she wants to talk she can come talk to me. I don’t care if she has family in law enforcement i have family in law enforcement too sweetie. But thats what you do, you run to the cops about everything. Have you ever thought to just shut your yapper and just hit the block button instead of being a karen because you are the one who causes the bullshit. I have the proof of you admitting to you doing it on purpose to.

14. You were extremely homophobic when I came out about my sexuality. When note: it’s extremely hard for people to come out. Not to mention you said I was copying your sexuality. Bitch I don’t want to be you and never do. You live in this delusion where you think everyone is jealous or wants to be you when they don’t especially when you look like a damn skyrim orge:

No one wants to be you, copy you, be you, and they are clearly not obsessed

This is all I have to say about this. I am not part of her bullshit drama anymore. I didn’t even want to be her friend to begin with because I couldn’t be myself and I had to walk on egg shells. Don’t come to me anymore about her this is why I have anons off and others set to followers only. She stole my writings, my hobbies, things I enjoyed in general and almost ruined them for me. I don’t want nothing to do with that person. And to whoever hears anything about me remember its very one sided because I barely on any social media anymore. So that shows how delusional she really is and obsessed with me she is. Which I don’t blame her, I am awesome as hell to be around. But for real, I seriously am done with her shit I just wanted to clear this up. My boyfriend, my friends, and my family don’t want anything to do with her so please don’t bring me anything about her. She’s literally the Karen of tumblr and I don’t want to be around her bullshit. Things are extremely peaceful with her not around. Now I don’t wish harm on her I wish her the best and I hope she gets where she needs to be in life and changes for the better.

I also do not have any other blog this is my only blog. So if someone has another blog and saying it’s me it’s clearly not.

@aurorahighgate @protectivesoul4u

[cherry-pop-elf]

Life Update: Good News!

So! I am on a new medication called Gabapentin! It’s greatly improved my joint issues and muscle pains!

It’s given me so much energy now, that I can finally do stuff again! And exist as a human!

Obviously not all my pain is gone or cured. I still have issues, but I can actually function a lot better

I’m able to get ready for college, and clean my room!

I’m also getting stuff to help with my fatigue. Like a portable smoothie maker and a mini popcorn maker to help reduce my calorie intact and just eat cleaner!

I also got a mini vacuum cleaner to help clean my room

And fyi. HIGHLY RECOMMEND ACNE PATCHES! Like those cute stars and stuff. From someone with eczema and cysts, they work!

A lot of positive things are in my future. I’m gonna become so much more productive and happy!

Also shout out to @george-weasleys-girl for being very supportive in these trying times. Means alot! Really!

I’m excited for the future! Something I haven’t been in so long. I’m gonna be more productive, and live a healthier happier life!

My meds and health declined caused alot of issues. Like me ending up over 200 pounds. But with my life back in my hands I’ll lose that weight and have more energy than ever before!

Cheers to me and to you! Chemistry major here I come!

[misha-moose-dean-burger-lover]

alcoholism fairies and bad decisions

drunk dean calls to tell cas they're going to end up together. eventually. wc: 2k

"Hi, hic , Cas."

Castiel, on his end of the call, puts his mug down on the counter. Icy cold coffee, with froth on the top. If Dean hadn't called him out of the blue, he would probably have sent him a picture of it in guise of documentation - or, well, to get him to tell him how much he wished to be there and drink it with him. If Dean hadn't called him drunk, he would at least have asked him to wait until he took a picture, with the froth all perfect and frothy. 

Given the circumstances, however, he sits down, and nets his eyebrows in a frown. 

"Dean? You okay?" 

Drunk calls weren't that rare, but they were usually pre-planned. Or at least, you know, he’s aware Dean’s drinking when it happens. 

"Oh!" Dean says, voice too bright and too loud. It’s like he’s somewhere that’s making it echo. "Of course. I'm drunk." 

"I can tell." Cas rolls his eyes, for absolutely no one's benefit. His coffee grows warmer, untouched. "Where are you?"

A hum resounds. "So - it's not my room. I can tell that much." 

"What the -” Cas swears under his breath. “Who're you with?" 

"Friends." Dean says, dismissively. "I'm safe, it's all safe. Familiar faces. I just came away for a bit because I wanted to talk to you." 

At that, Cas finally lightens. Stirs his cup (still admiring). "Uh-huh?" 

Friends wouldn't be enough to describe what they were. And yet - it was what either of them would've said. Rather, convinced themselves to say. 

They were the video-call-at-three-am, watch-the-worst-movie-known-to-man, a-football- match-just-afterwards-where-they-root-for-the-wrong-team and go-to-bed-consoling-each-other kinda friends. The kind who had nothing in common - from colleges, to friends, to hopes and dreams - but still let themselves be strung along for the ride and stuck together for whatever it counts. Texting day-in, day-out - with any excuse to think of the other person kinda friends. And the kind who didn't even get weird about girlfriends and boyfriends - which, well, both had, respectively - because they knew nothing would ever change what they had - and nothing could ever come close. 

At one point, they'd come close to dating. At two different points, they'd had larger-than-life cruhes on each other. And now? Now they just danced this familiar dance around each othis, toeing blurry lines - hands-tied behind their backs at risk of twirling too close and falling indubitably into each othis's arms.  

Oh, and they lived half a country apart. Thise was also that. 

"Uh-huh." Dean repeats, definitively. Then, more distracted, "Cas, the whiskey today, I swear to god . I should go get more." 

"You sound pretty whiskey-ed already, just FYI." 

"And you sound jealous." 

"Dude, I have coffee. The Castiel-Novak special, with the expensive kind of cream and all that schtick, because Gabriel just visited." He smirks. "I do not want to be drinking evil-tasting liquid hellfire right now, thankyouverymuch ." 

"Jea-lous." He sings, and Cas scoffs. 

Dean hiccups again, almost like he'd forgotten he was having hiccups for a while, and then remembered again, now that there was a lull in the conversation. 

"Oh, boy." 

"Dean, you okay?" Cas raises his eyebrows, repeating himself. Something sounded different about that oh boy. Not very average-drunk Dean, no, it wasn't. Cas is more or less a connoisseur by now. And he prides himself on it.

"I think so." 

"How do you feel now?" He asks, bordering the line of concerned again.

"Strangely happy." 

There's obviously a smile in his voice when he says it. Cas smiles too. "Oh. Why?" 

"'Cause I figured something out today, Cas." Dean didn't pause for questions, went on rambling. "Realized we're going to end up together. It’s final. And it's a strangely happy thought." Before Cas could say a thing, "Uh, I guess thoughts can't be happy. Or unhappy. The thought made me happy. Or not unhappy. Yeah, that makes more sense. I think." 

Cas just blinks. A warm feeling starts spreading in his chest that he doesn't exactly know how to define. Or, worse, confine . "How'd you figure that out?" 

Another smile in his voice, and this time, Cas can picture exactly what he looks like. Knowing, crinkled eyes, lips curled, head just a little bit quirked. (They'd only met once - a whopping 10-hour first-’non-date’-date that'd been, story for another time - but they'd been through enough movie nights at this point for him to know his I-know-what-happens-and-you-don't look.) "I'm not going to tell you." 

"Wh—"

"Because, you're not drunk . So you won't get it." 

"So the fairies of alcoholism and bad decisions deigned this upon you, did they?" 

"Maybe." He draws out the vowels. "Point is, I know it's true. End up together, you, me. Eventually. Boom." 

"Is that the sound of us having sex?" Cas snorts. The warmth has concentrated in his stomach, making it feel fluttery. He doesn't want to dwell on it too much - because he's so clearly drunk, and he has Jimmy - and things are not even that bad with him right now, really - but. But it’s not like he’s ever known how to not feel things when it comes to this dumbass. 

"I know you think you're kidding," Dean interrupts him, seriously. "But you're not that far from the truth. Keep seeking it."

"The truth of the sound of us — okay. Slightly too much alcohol for you, Dean." 

"Mmm-hm." Dean hums again. "Wait and watch." 

"Is that a threat or a promise?" Cas mumbles, out of habit. 

He knows this isn't exactly a normal conversation for them to be having - but he also can't say that it isn't something that has crossed his mind in the past. 

All that chemistry - all those times he’s been complaining about something and he’s known just the right thing to say, or do, or be - and then there was that one time that they met. Cas still can’t get it out of his head. He’s always had a good memory - but this is a different level of good. Maybe it’s not entirely normal to remember what it felt like to hug his friend at the train station before he left. How they fit just right against all of you. Only maybe. 

But then, it’s also impossible, right? They live hours away - and are certainly both the clingy, affectionate kind of fools who may think they can ace long-distance-relationships but are doomed from the beginning. Of course they are. Plus, he knows Dean has a girlfriend. And he has Jimmy. So yeah, things are fine right now - they’re safe, they’re innocent, okay, they’re half-innocent , half-kidding-themselves, but they’re safe and nothing is fucking them up right now. Because Cas, well, he can’t stand to lose his. 

It doesn’t matter how easy it’d be to remove Dean from his life tangibly since he’s barely there at all, outside of one of his top three chats on WA at all times, and the ever-so-occasional co-movie-marathoner — none of that matters, except from the fact, that two years into this strange friendship, and he’s forgotten what life was like, before. But in a good way. In a healthy, he-gets-him, matching-wavelengths-of-weird, tries-to-make-him-a-better-person-sometimes kind of way. 

So yeah, he can’t say the thought of a relationship hasn’t crossed his mind. He can’t even say that it’s ever really stopped crossing his mind. But Cas can’t have nice things, can he?  

"It's an omen ." 

Cas sighs. "You're so weird." 

"You love me." Dean justifies, as if somehow that makes him weirder than him. It might, but Cas doesn't want to think about that right now. 

"And you're a massive simp - as long as we're just stating facts." 

"I am." Dean sings, again. He sounds a lot mellower now. Tuckered-out would be the word, if he wasn’t all of twenty one. He sounded ready to drift off to sleep, like that forecast had tired him out entirely. A classic drunk-Dean move, Cas rolled his eyes. "And you love me." 

"Yeah, I do." He admits, a little quieter and is encouraged by another mmm-hm . 

"Okay. I love you too." Scuffling sounds, as if he's getting up. Something clutters and falls, sounding queerly like stationery. So he's not outside, then . Probably in, like, a closet or something. The sound of a knob follows, and then, when he speaks, it's a lot less echo-y — with the contrast, Cas can definitely pin it to the previous place being a closet. "I'm going to go back to my friends. Amara's here too, uh, I'm definitely being rude." 

(The girlfriend. Not an altogether bad person but severely, severely undeserving of him. 

Dean had to know that too.)

"It's fine. You’ll make it up to them." Cas consoles, trying to avoid the strange hollowness in his gut at the mental image of him cosying up next to Amara, drunk, trying to make it up to her - okay, that’s never come up before. 

(Not in this magnitude, at least.)

"Yeah, I will." he laughs. "G'night, buddy." 

"Yep." Only a little miffed, Cas repeats it. "G'night." 

"Don't forget, okay?" 

Cas knew he'd be lucky if Dean didn't forget this entire conversation in the morning. But he didn't want to push the conversation any longer and make it weird - for him, or for Amara . "I'll try not to, but not making any promises." Dean makes a sound of affectionate disapproval, and then there's the familiar holler in the backdrop, of a group of ‘friends’ - rewelcoming his to their midst. 

And that's that, for the night. 

Cas stares at his coffee, now almost irritatingly room-temperature-d. Finishes it off in a gulp, while staring at his phone for good measure. Maybe the fairies of caffeinism and moderately-okay decisions would grace him with a visit, but it didn't seem very likely. Dean also doesn’t text for the majority of the night, except a view-once image of Amara's roommate licking a beer bottle (he’s made generally unfunny jokes about setting Cas up with the roommate in the past, probably playing off of that) and Cas replies righteously with eggplant emojis. He then sends a goodnight, at like six am, when Cas has already worn himself out with thoughts - and their annoying brethren, feelings - and passed out on his own couch. 

Many years later - many Amara's and Jimmy's, moving-apart’s and mildly-closer’s, more degrees and a few salaries later - it happens. 

(Of course, it does.)

Dean claims to have known all along. Sunday morning, breakfast-ing in bed with bread-and-jam and Castiel-Novak-specials, Dean solemnly swears he’d seen it coming. Not that he’d gone out of his way to jeopardize anything else for it, nope, but that he’s always known. “ Seriously .”  

Cas laughs. Turns out, Dean didn't forget everything after all. But he did forget the call - too many inebriated misadventures in one night to recall life-changing conversations, of course - and Cas doesn't think he’ll tell him yet, that he’d known it equally long himself. Not right now , when Dean's half in his arms, Cas is halfways to shirtless, and they’re half a minute away from carefully sliding the plates and novelty mugs away to commence a different, but equally compelling Sunday-morning ritual altogether. And not when he’s this thrilled to be acting like a prophesier, an unbearable, inevitable all-knower, and the apparently- destined love of his life. 

Maybe, maybe some other time.