#and i must get over the internalized guilt of not responding the moment of just because that person wanted me to

[cinewhore]

i hate being readily accessible to people :)

[m0chisenpai]

Hi! Can you do a Armand x Fem!reader x Louis? She would be an assistant of Daniel’s. They have sorta a thing for her but are trying to ease up because she’s not as open to the whole camp thing or lowkey doesn’t believe them.

off the record

˚｡⋆ louis de pointe du lac x black!fem!reader x armand

in which Daniel neglected to coach you how to deal with the behind the scenes of the creative process

author note: I had too much fun writing this, I love the idea of this trio so much

There takes a certain level of thick skin to work for Daniel Molloy. He wasn't a terrible boss. Just a difficult old man with extremely particular needs and ways he worked. But when he found you, you were an intern with well regarded credentials and grades, but according to your counselor you were headstrong and outspoken.

He accepted your application instantly and by the next year you were his official, and most longstanding, assistant. You juggled his interviews and meetings with editors, and only recently have you begun to manage his doctors appointments.

You traveled with him, it was a non-negotiable that you were to come and expenses were covered, but Dubai was the last thing you'd expected. You’d been nearly to all the states, but for Daniel’s health anything out the country was once in a while and planned carefully.

The first night of the interview you aren’t present. Daniel can tell when he stops by your room, how your eyes droop. Your feet shuffle to greet him at the door and when you speak your words are mumbled.

He lets you sleep, but he won't say its out of care, that he's filled with guilt for dragging you into a penthouse of supernatural apex killers. "Get to sleep unless you wanna read through my mess of a notes kid." He raises a brow that you hum and nod at closing the door so you can return to the warm sheets of the bed. After that you are a fly on the wall just as he always instructed you to be.

Beside him, eyes down, fingers moving and taking notes when he mutters something to you.

Louis asks who you are on the third night, "I never took you for a man who needs help Daniel." You won't admit, but your heart picks up, but you keep yor eyes on the computer screen and let Daniel respond for you.

"Not an intern, she's one of the few ones who didn't run crying after a week working for me."

Your lips turn up at this, one of the few moments he would ever compliment you.

"She truly is like you." His eyes must be on you again, but a shiver washes dwn your spine. Like someones nail ghosts the skin on your back, trailing down your spine. And another hand, caresses the back of your neck.

"Stay out out my mind," you mumble.

"My apologies, just wanted to know about our surprise second guest." Now you dare to look up at him. Ghosts, goblins, vampires werewolves were for shows pandering toward a female audience that wanted to drool over men too beautiful and perfect to ever enter their mundane lives.

You scoff and return your focus to the notes in front of you. "Save the immortal hack for Daniel, Mr.Du Lac."

Your skin crawls at the way he tilts his head ever so slightly, and in that cocky drawl offers another apology.

"Mr Du Lac and his companion would like to dine with you."

You assume it's in regards to the interviews. You bring your computer and personal notepad along with Daniel's. But what you are met with are two wine glasses side by side paired with the men on the couch, one sits in front of them.

Their gazes are unblinking as you enter, setting your things and carefully crossing one leg over the other.

"I'm sorry we are meeting so late, or would it be early Mr.Du Lac."

"Call me Louis, the pleasure is mine. My companion Armand wanted to join our meeting this evening."

Armand creeps you out the moment your eyes lock, how his golden eyes stare you, analyzing you. He isn't as old as Louis. he actually seems to be the age of some of the TA's from school. Though you'd prefer it if it were just Louis and you. You can manage being alone with the latter.

"Daniel tells us you think none of this to be real." Ah, so it does speak.

"It's true. I find the supernatural charade boring," you pick up the yellow pad and pen. "But I'm not paid to to dig any deeper than he asks me to. I polish and prime what he asks, and he does all the writing."

"You weren't able to join the first interview because too were tired. I could hear your heart the entire time, you didn't sleep. Kept tossing and turning the entire night." Now you look at Louis, here he goes again.

"An easy observation, can we please focus on-"

"Thoughts were racing an awful lot too," Louis looks up in fake thought "is any of this worth it, why waste my time on a rich hack. I could be back home working on my portfolio."

Once again you cut him off. Pinching the bridge of your nose, "another keen observation please try and do better, now in session 2-"

"Your father took your mother here." Armand speaks up now and your heart stops, "those earrings she gifted you were from here. In fact in your dreams the previous evening you dreamt of taking them both here. You started planning it with the money that will come out of this interview."

Every word accelerates your heart, it makes Louis smile "Careful cher, your heart might beat out your chest."

Your hands shake as they swipe the glass of wine in front of you, you take two large gulps. Clutching it for comofrt.

"My apologies, I did not wish to cause any distress."

"I'm sorry, I need a moment." You leave your things behind and return to your room that night. You feel childish locking the door behind you and running to the bathroom where you stop for a moment closing that door behind you as well locking it and taking the hottest of showers. The next morning a letter from the two sits by breakfast along with your things in a neat pile.

Eerily it is exactly what you were thinking of yesterday morning, it is french toast made from the fluffiest brioche. With a side of bacon, turkey, you hated pork. Armand asks to speak to you while Daniel rests along with Louis.

Once you eat and shower quickly putting on a sweater to combat the chill you find him in the study.

He sits, almost like he knew you would come.

"It was not our intent to alarm you" his eyes follow you as you sit. "You did not rest last night because of us. Please use tonight to rest."

You refuse to look at him, favoring the thread on your sweaters sleeve.

"You are more than qualified to work for any other reporter on your own, yet you work for...him. Why?"

"He was the only one to look pass the observations of my advisor, I wasn't going to be just an errand girl. Not too many publishers cared for my opinions. I was too blunt and rough along the edges to be a writer."

"You didn't believe Mr.Molloy was interviewing a vampire yet you still followed him here."

"It's not my book. I'm a fly on the wall remember?"

"But if it were your story?"

You pause in thought, and now you look away into those unsettling eyes after a moment. "I would have interviewed Claudia had she survived. I feel her story needs to be heard."

You answer more of his prodding questions till you return to your room for lunch. A wrap of some sort with nuts and fruits on the side. And a pile of little girls diaries with white gloves and a note to handle with caution.

Armand won't voice his affinity for you as Louis does. You won't admit the way his eyes settle on you as you enter the room makes you preen, makes your heart fuzzy and your head feel like it wants to float away.

The interview goes on tonight with Armand joining. They once more talk about Lestat. You try and fight your eyes from rolling as you read through an email.

'If I hear his name one more time I might gouge my ears out.'

'Don't torture yourself like that cher.' Your eyes look to him, but he remains focused on Daniel, listening to Armand. How does one multitask like that? Two conversations at once must be hard.

'Years of practice.'

'And what's with all this chere nonsense?'

'Would you prefer your name instead?'

'No' your cheeks warm in embarassment "I...enjoy it."

"Get me some pictures of this theatre." Daniel's instructions get your attention, "and whatever memorabilia you can find." You nod typing that onto your list of many other things to do.

'I will help you with that tonight, after the session I've arranged for dinner tonight' Armand now stares at you and that damned feeling begins to creep back in 'no pork as per your request.' You hate how quick you are to forgive him. But he slowly is earning your trust again.

Daniel coughs obnoxiously getting the elder vampires attention. "You were saying?" This time when you look down, a smile only the pair can detect makes its way upon your lips.

They stare at you less, leave your mind alone as per your request. And indulge in your blunt questions. Each night you find yourself slowly feeling less discomfort. You almost wish you could stay, you think to yourself one night now dining with the two looking at pictures of Louis in his younger years.

He sits beside you, smiling as he watches your hands carefully hold the photos from their time in France.

"No fair, Paris is top of my bucket list."

"I'd be more than happy to take you," Louis gives you that smirk which you roll your eyes in playfulness at.

"Sure you will."

"We could take you anywhere you would like" Armand states.

"Ibizia?"

"Gladly."

"Bali."

"Sure."

Even though you still doubt their supernatural nature. You indulge them. Unknown that just as much as you have them wrapped around your finger, they have you caught in a web.

And they'll patiently wait for you to realize that there are some beings whose hearts you should never toy with. For the results afterwards, are eternal.

[defectivevillain]

rest for the weary

pairing: Bigby Wolf/Reader

reader's race & gender are ambiguous; no pronouns or physical descriptors used.

summary: There is silence for far too long. You’re intently focused on wiping his skin clean of the dried bloodstains, making sweeping gestures with infinite care. Bigby wants to reassure you that you don’t have to be so careful, that he’s used to cruelty and maleficent gazes and bloodied knuckles. But the words feel caught in his throat. This compassion is so foreign to him; he can’t help but instinctively wonder if there’s something you’re getting out of this.

word count: 2.3k | ao3 version

warnings: canon-typical blood and violence, exhaustion/fatigue

After his long patrol, Bigby wants nothing more than to fall asleep and never wake up. He manages to get to his apartment, albeit with a bit more clumsiness and lethargy than usual. When he finally opens the door, he’s greeted with Colin’s irritated expression. The annoyed look on his face fades when he evidently gets a full glimpse of Bigby’s injuries. The wolf knows he must look horrible; he doesn’t have to look in the mirror to know there are dark circles under his eyes and dried bloodstains on his clothes. 

“You look like shit,” Colin remarks helpfully. 

“Thanks.” Bigby responds tiredly, limping towards his armchair. Colin is merciful today, and doesn’t even utter a word of argument as he gives up the seat and moves to sit on the floor. Bigby sinks into the armchair and just barely holds back a pained hiss. He tilts his head back and stares up at the ceiling, still reeling from the events that occurred on his patrol today. His adrenaline carried him through multiple fights, and it isn’t until quiet moments like these that the gravity of what he’s been through dawns on him. 

Bigby’s eyes are slipping closed when he hears a harsh knock on his door. He groans and shuts his eyes again, wincing at the pain concentrated in his temple that is gradually migrating to his jaw. A nasty headache on top of his injuries—somehow, that tracks. Bigby waits to hear the sound of footsteps gradually growing further away. 

Instead, there’s another knock—even louder than the previous one. Bigby groans again and Colin raises an eyebrow, as if to ask if he’s going to answer the door. 

“Bigby.” The wolf’s heart skips a beat as he recognizes your voice. You live in the apartment below his: 104. You’re one of the only people who is nice to him, aside from Snow and Beauty. You never seemed to be afraid of him, which was refreshing. Selfishly speaking, Bigby doesn’t want you to see him in this state—doesn’t want you to start thinking of him as the Big Bad Wolf. You continue, immune to his internal dilemma. “I know you’re in there. Open up.” You say insistently. 

Bigby doesn’t make a move to get up. He doesn’t think he can get to his feet and walk over to the door, even if he wanted to. Exhaustion is settling in his bones and he is close to drifting off into unconsciousness once he realizes that the knocking has stopped. 

Suddenly, there’s a loud crash. Bigby is mercilessly tugged back from the throes of sleep as his front door swings open and crashes into the adjacent wall. He blinks slowly and pushes himself up in the chair, glancing at the front door to find you stumbling forward with uneasy balance. The two of you exchange looks and Bigby sees a flicker of regret and guilt appear on your face, before the emotions are replaced with a mischievous grin. 

“That was fun,” you remark with a look of surprise. Then you glance around the room, murmuring a quick greeting to Colin, before looking back at him once more. The wolf stares at you in disbelief. “I can see why you do it so often.”

“What the hell are you doing?” Bigby asks, once he manages to process everything that just happened. He’s usually the one kicking doors down—he’s never been on the other side of the situation before. Bigby can’t say he likes it much. 

“Checking in on you, obviously,” you answer, crossing your arms over your chest. Bigby realizes that this is the first time you’ve been in his apartment; typically, he visits you at yours or the two of you meet in the lobby. He’s mildly embarrassed by the dirty clothes and empty bottles laying around. The pain makes it easy to forget any potential humiliation, though. “I can see I was right to be worried.” You say as you study him, your lips pressed in a thin line. 

“How did you-” Bigby chokes out. 

“You were a bit louder than normal,” you respond easily. You’re looking at him with a scrutinizing gaze, as if you’re able to see straight through him. Bigby feels strangely exposed. “And your footsteps were… uneven.”

That’s it? Bigby thinks to himself. While he doesn’t utter the question, the sentiment must be clear on his face. 

“I just knew something was wrong, okay?” You say defensively. You take a step forward and look him up and down, evidently concerned for his wellbeing. Bigby wants to remark that he’s suffered worse, but he knows that wouldn’t reassure you.

“Well, I’m fine,” Bigby remembers to say moments later. It’s getting a bit hard to breathe around his bruised ribs and he has to put conscious effort towards inhaling slowly.  

You don’t seem to believe him for a moment. “You sound like a broken record,” you huff, rolling your eyes. “Come on.” You act as if you own the place, pacing past the entryway and moving towards the bathroom. Bigby watches you for several moments, before giving in with a sigh and pushing himself off the armchair. Every small movement sends pain shooting through him. He takes an uneasy step forward and stumbles, but Colin wordlessly pushes against his left leg and corrects his balance before he can fall. Bigby murmurs a word of thanks and heads to the bathroom. 

When he finally makes it to his far too-small bathroom, you’re waiting for him. You gesture for him to sit on the toilet seat, which he does after a moment of hesitation. You have a damp cloth in hand and, once he sits, you’re washing the blood and dirt from his face with a gentle touch. Bigby flinches at how cold the water is, and you murmur a quick apology before continuing. 

There is silence for far too long. You’re intently focused on his skin beneath the cloth, making sweeping gestures with infinite care. Bigby wants to reassure you that you don’t have to be so careful, that he’s used to cruelty and maleficent gazes and bloodied knuckles. But the words feel caught in his throat. This compassion is so foreign to him; he can’t help but instinctively wonder if there’s something you’re getting out of this. 

Eventually, you finish with his face and begin cleaning his forearms. You push up his sleeves, wiping away the blood before staring at him with an unreadable expression. When you break the silence, Bigby notices that you’re suddenly averting your gaze. “You may need to… take off your shirt.”

Bigby stares at you for a moment, before comprehending the question. “Right,” he mutters, moving to unbutton his shirt with trembling hands. You don’t comment on how long the effort takes him, but Bigby does hear the stifled intake of breath that escapes your lips as your eyes rove up and down his torso. He looks down, finding the gaping wound at his side that you can’t seem to look away from. 

You almost look sick to your stomach. But Bigby knows it can’t be from the grotesque nature of his wound—he knows you’ve seen your fair share of blood and violence. You live in the Fables, after all. Violence is an everyday occurrence. The wolf watches as you take a slow breath, as if to steady yourself, before grabbing the cloth and bending down to dab at the wound. Your equilibrium seems to be off, as you lurch forward with the movement. Bigby steadies you with a hand on your shoulder and you place your free hand on his side to steady yourself. He promptly ignores the heat that spreads across his skin at the casual touch. 

A seemingly endless time later, you lean back and Bigby can breathe again. You assess his wound once more, eyebrows furrowing. “Do you have bandages?” Bigby shakes his head imperceptibly. You seem to be expecting that answer, as you sigh exasperatedly. “I’ll be right back.”

In the blink of an eye, you’re standing in front of him once more—holding a nondescript tube of ointment and a roll of bandages. At his questioning look, you explain that the ointment will prevent infection; you then apply a small amount on his wound, before placing the bandage on his skin and slowly wrapping it around his chest. Bigby remains silent the entire time, at a loss for words. Admittedly, this feels like a dream. He wouldn’t be surprised if he woke in a few minutes, staring up at the ceiling from his armchair in his bloodstained clothes. 

But this is no dream. Your touch is all too real. Bigby feels as if his skin is doused in flames. Time seems to drag on with unrushed lethargy, trapping him in this horrible, incredible feeling. You step away too soon and too late. 

“Sorry, I’m afraid that’s the best I can do,” you say with a frown. Bigby looks down at the bandage. His gaze returns to you. This is more than anyone has ever done for him. He has never been treated so delicately before. The warmth of your skin still lingers and Bigby thinks he wants it back. Your eyes are bright in the dim lighting of his bathroom and the realization comes crashing down on him. He thinks he wouldn’t mind if every day were to go like this, if he could return home to you every day. Indulgently, selfishly, he wants to drown in this very moment. 

Bigby doesn’t know how it happens. One moment, you’re breathing a question he never imagined he would hear—not even in his wildest dreams. The next, he’s tugging you closer by the collar and kissing you. You lurch forward and place a hand on his shoulder to steady yourself. Bigby pulls you impossibly closer, relishing in the surprised sound that wrenches its way out of your throat. Your fingers run through his hair and goosebumps prickle along his forearms. 

“I’m still here,” Colin announces from the living room. The moment is immediately broken, and Bigby regretfully lets his hands fall from your face. Your hands slip from the nape of his neck and the wolf feels a shiver roll down his spine. You’re staring at him again.

“I should get you some clothes,” you then announce, stepping out of the bathroom. He hears you pacing around the apartment until you find his closet; you return moments later with a shirt and sweatpants in hand. Admittedly, Bigby hasn’t worn that pair of sweatpants in years—he forgot he owned them. You then close the door and leave him to change. The effort isn’t painless, but within a few minutes, he’s in infinitely more comfortable clothing. Bigby gets to his feet and opens the door, walking out to the living room. 

You look over from where you’d been speaking to Colin. “Now you should rest,” you order, walking towards him. “Let me get you to bed.” You place a reassuring hand on his shoulder and start looking around the space. 

A maelstrom of unsavory emotions hits him all at once. “I don’t have a bed.” Bigby blurts out within moments. Your gaze snaps to him and your eyes are blown wide. 

“What?” You exclaim. “You don’t have a bed?” You then look to Colin for assistance, as if waiting for him to disagree. Colin makes a gesture similar to a shrug. Bigby tries to explain that he simply never needed one, but he fears it’s too late—your eyes are already gleaming with resolve. “Then you’re coming downstairs with me.” You assert, taking a few steps towards the front door before turning back around. “It was nice talking to you, Colin.” You say with a small smile. 

“See you,” Colin murmurs, sending Bigby an unreadable look when you turn your back. Bigby just shrugs and follows after you, knowing there’s no point in arguing. This is not a debate he would win and, frankly, he’s too tired to refuse the offer of a soft mattress. The wolf closes his apartment door and heads down the hallway after you. Now that his adrenaline has died down, he feels his exhaustion setting in. When the two of you make it to the elevator, Bigby grasps at the railings and closes his eyes. 

“Almost there,” you say, breaking him from his thoughts. Somehow, the elevator is on the first floor already. The wolf takes a deep breath and manages to summon enough energy to make it to your door. You unlock it quickly and push it open. From there, you guide him to your bed. Bigby doesn’t have the awareness to think anything of sleeping in your bed at the present moment, but he’s sure it’ll dominate his thoughts in the morning. 

He reclines in your bed and is abruptly thrown back into the past, into a different bed in a cabin in the woods and a different identity— 

“Rest,” you remark, breaking him out of his thoughts. You step back and, for a fraction of a moment, Bigby thinks you’re leaving. But you simply walk around to the other side of the bed and turn on the small deskside lamp, grabbing a book from the nightstand. “I’ll be here.”

The knowledge that you’re watching over him makes him feel… cared for; valued; appreciated; and seen for who he truly is. Bigby takes a shuddering breath, pretending his heart isn’t racing out of his chest. He feels incredibly vulnerable. His throat is burning with unshed tears. A small part of him still fundamentally distrusts your kindness, no matter how much of it you have shown him. That small part of him beckons him back to the shadows, proclaiming that no one will ever love him, that he isn’t worth loving.  As if sensing his spiraling thoughts, you reach out and clasp his hand. “It’s alright.” You speak with such certainty that Bigby finds himself instantaneously relaxing, his shoulders loosening as he practically sinks into the mattress. For the first time, he wholeheartedly believes that maybe, just maybe, everything will actually be alright.

[obligatory bigby wolf playlist]

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[ozai-the-bonsai]

Memento Mori

| Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 |

Pairing: Daemon Targaryen x fem!reader

Warnings: this time none i guess

A/N: The third chapter is a little more slow-paced and has less Daemon - still, I hope you enjoy it!

Credits for the gif: @cinematic-gif-archive

“There is a hidden sigil on the wall, right beneath the torch.” You told Daemon, causing him to divert his attention to the wall on his right. With slow movements, he moved his hand on the brick, you could realise from the way his expression changed that he found the sigil carved into the stone. “It is the source of the magic keeping me here.”

Daemon made a clicking sound with his tongue as his slender fingers studied the sigil. “And how do I break this magic?” He asked, not looking at your direction. “I am not the one who is supposed to cast spells in here.”

“Blood,” you responded coolly, causing Daemon to finally look back at you. “It was Targaryen blood that sealed the spell. It must be Targaryen blood that breaks it.”

Studying your features for a while, Daemon nodded at you, no words exchanged. He kneeled to take the small knife attached to the side of his left leg on the fabric of his clothes and with a swift movement, he made a small cut in his left palm, flinching when the blade cut through his flesh. After letting a few drops of blood meet the ground, Daemon pressed his left palm to the sigil. 

At first, nothing happened. You could feel Daemon’s impatience grow stronger with each passing second – he still did not fully trust that you weren’t some fraud. You could not blame him, though, after having his mind continuously poisoned by the witch ever since he had set a foot in the cursed castle of Harrenhal, he had every right to doubt you.

A smirk formed on your lips when the iron started to turn into dust. 

It took a few minutes for the bars to fully disappear but once they were all gone, you finally stepped out of your cage after over 130 years. A sigh left your lips the moment you felt magic rushing through your body once again, the feeling tingled on your fingertips and made your head turn, making you feel dizzy. 

You felt as if you were reborn.

When you opened your eyes, you found Daemon watching you with a deep look in his violet eyes, though he gave it his all to hide his admiration, you could read it in the aura surrounding him – he adored you more with your every move. His internal turmoil was almost impossible not to hear; however, he felt it getting calmer the more he got to know you.

Interesting, you thought as you eyed the Targaryen Prince in front of you, even the ‘mighty’ dragonlords cannot completely hide their thoughts from the strength of Lùthril.

“What was that?” Daemon asked you as he took a step towards you. “You experienced something intense there. Tell me.”

A smirk found its way to your lips once more that night. “My magic,” you spoke with a tranquil tone, “is back. Having that kind of power back in your grasp after a century is… intoxicating.”

His next move, however, took you by surprise.

Taking another step towards you, Daemon cupped your face, looking down at you. Even though you were taller than almost any other human being because of the physical characteristics of the Valargon, Daemon Targaryen could still look down at you.

“Intoxicating,” he whispered, “just as your beauty.”

For a split second, the two of you stood there, looking deep into each other‘s eyes, surrounded by a foreign feeling.

As soon as Daemon realised what he was doing, he abruptly pulled himself back and you got to see Daemon Targaryen hesitating – something not too many get to experience in their lifetime. Moreover, you were not able to sense his aura anymore; it was covered in the mist of confusion and guilt, not letting you take a glance at what lied ahead.

“What will happen now?” Daemon asked you, breaking the odd silence while taking the torch from the wall. “Now that I have set you free, what will be your next move?”

You chuckled at his words. “There is no longer such a thing as my next move, Daemon Targaryen.” You told him as you both walked towards the exit of the dungeons. Daemon raised an eyebrow at your direction. “The moment you decided to set me free, my fate got intertwined with yours – none of us can make a move without altering the moves of the other.”

“Is speaking in riddles a trait of your people or does it come with being an ancient being?” He asked mockingly, causing you to laugh silently. “Let me ask it this way, Lùthril: What will be our next move?”

As you reached the corridor leading up to Daemon’s chambers, you slowly stopped. “As for now, you should get some rest.” You spoke with a soft voice, which was like lullaby to Daemon’s ears. “And I shall speak with the Gods, in the Godswood. Meet me there tomorrow morning, after sunrise.”

A frown appeared on Daemon’s face. “Will you be spending the hour of the wolf in Godswood?” 

“You need not worry about me,” you reassured him with a soft smile on your lips. “It takes more than darkness to scare an ancient, powerful enchantress of the Valargon.”

After parting your ways with Daemon, you headed outside to Godswood with quick steps for you had questions that needed to be answered. You knew enough about Daemon Targaryen’s fate – when you were trying to alter the fate of your people, you had had various visions about your own future as well, which included the intertwined destiny of a silver-haired man with your own. At that time, it was not known to you that the silver-haired man was Daemon Targaryen.

However, you had the feeling that the destiny shown to you had not been final – you needed to know more about what awaited the both of you so that you could guide Daemon through it all more carefully to make sure he took the right path – there had been only one path laid for him which would lead to eternal bliss and happiness. All else would only lead to his suffering and end. 

The moment fresh air from the night filled your lungs, you let out a sigh of relief, you could feel the air burning through your lungs after years of being held captive in a mouldy dungeon. The cold wind licking your skin through your silver dress made you shiver; however, you were enjoying each and every bit of the nature. Valargon were known to be one with the nature; they loved it, worshipped it, adored it. Hence, being separated from the nature for over a hundred years had left you yearning.

Your bare feet brought you to the Weirwood tree. 

Closing your eyes, you placed your right hand on the tree, immediately feeling the ancient magic flowing through its very essence. “The Old Gods,” you chanted with a loud voice in the language of your people, “the protector of the eternal light and the bringer of harmony, hear my prayers! Your child needs the beacon of your wisdom!”

Your eyes shone with a white light as the voices of your Gods filled your ears, all speaking simultaneously. Be welcome, my dear. I have been awaiting your return. What wisdom is it that you seek?

Before moving onto your main quest, you could not resist asking the question which had been a burden too heavy to carry on your chest ever since you had seen dragon fire in Harrenhal. “My sisters and brothers… are they at peace? Did they… forgive me?” A tear rolled down your cheek.

The voices of the Gods merged. All our children are in the land of eternal light and harmony with us, you need not burden thyself with thy sorrow, dear Lùthril. Forgiveness has been given to you long ago.

“Thank you,” you spoke in common tongue as you wiped away the tears, your eyes still bright with the celestial light. “I seek guidance about the path laid before Daemon Targaryen. Our destinies have been intertwined; however, I fear his path might have changed since it was shown to me.”

To guide a man through the paths of destiny, once again all the Gods were speaking at the same time, a Lùthril shall know what awaits him in the dark. Go to the river, my child, and let the water wash away the lies. Only then you shall see the naked truth.

You felt the hands of the Gods leaving your soul before the celestial light disappeared. 

It took you a few minutes to fully gain control of your body, your magic was weaker than you had known it so far; however, it was only a matter of time before your strength would be restored to its former glory. With the heavy burden of the thought of having the blood of your people on your hands gone from your chest, you were able to use your shapeshifting abilities. In the form of a white eagle, you flew towards the river.

I can now let go of the past, you thought as you floated in the night sky. I have one last mission here, on this world, before following my brothers and sisters to the Land of the Gods and I intend not to fail this time.

The waters of the river were ice-cold against your skin as you stepped inside, back in your human form. With slow steps, you let yourself submerge into the river, not even shivering, and let all the lies flow away to distant shores. It took some time for the visions to hit you but when they did, they showed you everything.

You saw everything Daemon had done – from his childhood to this day. The way he struggled to stay in the court of King Viserys, how angry he felt when he was shipped off to the Vale, the way his first marriage failed…

Then came Rhaenyra Targaryen, the Realm’s Delight. 

The complicated relationship between Daemon and Rhaenyra somehow fascinated you – even though incest was frowned upon amongst Valargon, you knew it was different for the Targaryens; hence, you cast aside the values of your people to understand Daemon even better.

Strangely enough, Daemon Targaryen found himself in love with the very person who replaced him as the Heir to the Iron Throne – the one thing Daemon wanted the most his entire life. As if such an irony was not enough, he had chosen to leave King’s Landing behind during his second marriage – before, he was trying to cling onto any piece of King’s Landing he could find to stay there, in Viserys’ court.

After Leana Velaryon’s death and Daemon’s marriage with Rhaenyra, the events shown in the vision caught up with the present. You saw the very first seeds of the war with the dragons, losses of the Black Queen and how she and Daemon fell apart. The current motives behind Daemon’s stay in Harrenhal flooded into your mind – the fact that he aimed to raise the banners for himself, not for the Queen. 

And then, a silver light appeared on the path that was laid down before Daemon’s feet. A silver star, shedding its light, freeing him from the darkness devouring him and everything left of him.

It was you.

The silver star floated in the air before gently going through Daemon’s heart and at that moment, you understood that your destinies were intertwined in a way you hadn’t thought possible. It was not simply guidance Daemon was seeking, it was a far deeper connection which could potentially hurt you both in the most unimaginable ways possible, should you fail to lead Daemon through his path.

The river showed you the path Daemon needed to take – at the end, it was all crystal clear to you: why he had to pledge to Queen Rhaenyra Targaryen again, why he had to come back to Harrenhal, and why he had to meet his fate above the Gods Eye. 

However, the vision did not stop when Daemon’s path in the world of men came to an end.

It took you north – far, far north – beyond the Wall. The feeling forming in your stomach was making you nervous for you feared what you might face. When you saw an army of dead men with blue eyes being led by men-like- creatures which seemed as if they were of ice, you knew your fears were true.

Nwalmaethor.

After resurfacing from the river, a different kind of determination was visible in your eyes. You knew what was at stake – should you fail this very last mission of yours, the ancient enemies of the Gods and the Valargon, which were called Nwalmaethor in your tongue, would wreck havoc on everything the Gods created with love and harmony, on everything your people died trying to protect.

Taglist: @throughgoeshamilton @mirandastuckinthe80s @xicesam @mariamyousef702 @eddiemadmunson @dont-try-pesticide @sweetybuzz25 @hc-geralt-23 @schniiipsel @ttae-yong @syrma-sensei @asiludida164 @kaitieskidmore1 @irmavanity-blog @pax-2735 @trickrtreatart @shanzeyxsyed @random-human02 @scarwicht @xcallmetaniax @instabull @niiight-dreamerrrr @my-dark-prince @stargaryenx @abaker74 @babywolff @sonnensplitter @bi-narystars @softtina @sadmonke @avalyaaa @superintenseart

[azrielsdove]

Love and Loss Ch.3

Warnings: Angst, Some Smut, 18+

Ch.2 Here | Ch.4 Here

***

Rhys spent the next few days doing everything to make up for the way he acted. He took you out to the fanciest restaurants in Velaris, walked you along the Sidra, flew you high into the sky. He took his time with you, slow touches and long kisses. You knew he needed to reclaim his own body, using yours to help him gain that confidence.

You were happy.

You were sitting at lunch with him, pleasantly talking and eating when he suddenly stilled. His hands gripped tightly to his cutlery, his eyes glazing over. You stood and rushed to his side, calling his name. “Rhys! Rhys? What’s wrong?” You were tugging on his arm, begging him to snap out of whatever had a hold of his mind.

His eyes shot to yours, a visible panic taking over them. “She needs me.” He said, hardly above a whisper. You couldn’t help the rush of cold that ran through your body at his words.

“Who?”, you asked calmly, already knowing the answer.

A shadow of guilt fell on his face as he responded; “Feyre.”

You nodded, unsure how to respond. Rhys grabbed your hands in his, pulling you close. “I know my love, this is nothing more than helping her when she needs it. As a friend. You are the only one in heart, I promise you.” You softened at his words, leaning down and giving him a gentle kiss.

“Fine.” You said, pulling back from him. “What does she need saving from?”

He looked down, shame radiating from him. “Her wedding,” he whispered, refusing to look at you.

“I see,” you said, removing your hands from his. “And is she asking to be saved, or do you just want to ‘save’ her?” You knew you were being unnecessarily cold, but how were you supposed to feel when your husband wanted to rush off to interrupt his mates wedding?

He stood quickly, a slight anger to his form. “Enough. She is asking. Begging. Am I supposed to let a helpless female get trapped in a toxic marriage?” Rhys’ eyes were dark, looking at you in a way they never had before. You wanted to shrink down against him, to run and hide.

You chose to stand strong. “You can’t pretend you don’t know how it sounds, Rhysand.” You said coolly, crossing your arms in front of you. “If you must go, then go.” You waved dismissively, turning to leave the room. A hand on your arm stopped you.

Your husbands eyes softened, an internal war going on behind them. “It is nothing more than helping her in this moment. Nothing. I love you.” He said, hand holding tight to you. You nodded, pulling out of his grasp.

“I believe you,” you sighed, “now go save her.”

***

Rhys didn’t bring Feyre to Velaris, a fact you were glad of. Unfortunately, he chose to stay in the Moonlight Palace with her for the week she was here. You heard from Mor how their initial meeting went, snorting at Feyre throwing her shoe at him. Good. He deserved it.

A part of you felt guilty for being upset with him, knowing he was trying to help someone who was at her lowest. You knew your husband had a good heart and was a kind man. You had heard of how sickly Feyre looked, how damaged she was from what happened Under the Mountain.

The angry snake of jealousy in your heart didn’t care about any of that.

All you could focus on was your husband living in the palace with his mate. The Cauldron-Made being, just for him. Was it selfish to keep him from being with her? No, you thought, shooing that idea away. Just because they were mates did not mean they would be happy together. Look at your husbands own parents, mates sure, but happy? Perhaps not.

You tried to distract yourself with reading, falling into story after story. You spent lots of time sitting in your townhouse, waiting for your husband to come home. You heard the front door open, running to it in excitement.

You tried not to let Azriel see the disappointment on your face.

“Good morning, Az. Rhys isn’t here.” You greeted, welcoming him inside. He stepped in and nodded at your words.

“I know,” he said, “I came to check on you.” You looked up at him, stunned.

“Me? What for? I’ve just been…here.” You spoke, hating how dreadfully dull you sounded. The ever-dutiful wife of the High Lord, patiently waiting for him to return.

“No, I know. I just wanted to make sure you were okay. It can’t be easy knowing he’s there with her.” Your friends words were true, a sharp stab to your heart. It wasn’t easy.

“Oh, I-,” you paused, thinking over what to say. “I know he just wants to help her. They both went through a lot, down there. I would never dream of making it harder for her,” you answered politely. Truthfully, you couldn’t remain upset with Feyre. She had done nothing to you, she didn’t even know the mating bond or you existed.

Azriel shifted on his feet, not seeming to know what to say. “You’re a very good wife to him, truly. He is lucky to have you.” He finally said, giving you a small smile. You returned it with one of your own, shrugging your shoulders.

“I try to make things easier for him. Being High Lord brings lots of stress to his mind. I know you understand that too.” You replied, moving to sit in the living room. Azriel followed, making himself comfortable on the armchair. You tucked your legs underneath you on the couch, watching the fire in front of you.

“He wouldn’t hurt you.” Azriel said, breaking the silence. You looked at him, sighing at his words.

“I know he wouldn’t. Not intentionally at least.” You spoke the second part softer, embarrassed by how jealous you were of Feyre.

Sympathy flashed across Azriel’s face, a look you could’ve gone without. “He just wants to help her. None of us were down there-,” he began to say, cut off by your sharp voice.

“I know that, Azriel. You think I don’t remind myself of that a hundred times a day? That I have no reason to be jealous of a girl who was tortured and killed, when I have been his wife for 150 years? I know it is selfish and irrational to be so upset about him helping her, but I can’t stop.” You buried your face in your ands. “I can’t stop.” You whispered, hot tears flowing down your face.

You felt the cushion next to you sink down and a strong arm wrap around your shoulders. You melted into Azriel’s hold, letting all the conflicting emotions take over. He held you close, his other hand holding onto your arm, rubbing soothing circles over it. You cried until you fell asleep, comfortable in the safety of Azriel’s embrace.

***

AZRIELS POV

He loved her. He knew it was wrong, that he should not feel this way about his brothers wife. However, that very same brother was currently entertaining his mate in a different city. Azriel knew Feyre was innocent in all of this, but that did not mean he was.

Rhysand.

He was disappointed in him. He could understand saving Feyre from marrying the Spring Court High Lord. He could even understand the deal they made Under the Mountain, knowing all too well how Rhys will do anything to get under Tamlin’s skin. He didn’t understand why he stayed there with her, not coming home to check on his wife.

His wife who had waited for him for so long, praying for his safety everyday. His wife who always stood by his side, even in the darkest of times. His wife who was curled up against Azriel, sleeping with fresh tear stains on her face. It shouldn’t be him sitting her holding her, it should be her husband.

Azriel was interrupted from his thoughts by the sudden appearance of Rhys in the living room. He noticed the anger in his eyes as he took in the sight of his wife sleeping on the shadowsinger. “What is going on here, Azriel?” He asked, his voice cold.

It took everything in him not to roll his eyes. “She was upset, I helped. Much like you and your Feyre, no?” He knew it was a bad idea to get the High Lord riled up, but he couldn’t bring himself to care.

The room darkened, Rhysands magic creeping in. “You don’t speak to me like that, Shadowsinger.” He growled, teeth barred.

“I will speak to you how I wish if you continue leaving your wife to cry all alone.”

The words sucked all the air out of the room. Rhys stilled, his hands tightened into fists.

“Get out.” The demand was quiet, deadly. Azriel knew what Rhys could do, the power he could throw at him.

“Why? So you can suck up to your pretty little wife, beg her forgiveness for spending the week entertaining your mate? Never once coming to see her?” Azriel shot back, keeping his voice low as to not disturb the sleeping female next to him.

“I’m warning you once, do not provoke me today. Leave.” Rhys commanded, taking a step closer to the couch.

Azriel couldn’t help the way his arm tightened on her shoulders. An action that Rhys so meticulously noticed. He stepped forward, pulling his wife out of his arms. He cradled her close to his chest, moving to take her up to their room.

Azriel stood, shadows swirling angrily around him. “You will lose her if you are not careful, Rhysand.”

The High Lord turned, an unmovable darkness in his eyes. “Is that a threat, Azriel?”

Silence. Then; “No. But when you break her because you are too busy playing with Feyre, I will be there to pick up the pieces.” He knew he shouldn’t push this subject, not when it had been an almost friendship-ending fight 155 years ago.

“You are not the one she chose, Azriel. You would do well to remember that.” Rhys spat at him before walking up the stairs and out of view. Az was left standing in the room, anger and embarrassment swirling around his gut.

***

READER POV

You woke up, snuggling closer to the figure holding you tight to them. “Mmm, Az?” You said, not yet opening your eyes. The figure went rigid, arm loosening ever so slightly on you.

“No,” came the cold voice of your husband, “sorry to disappoint.”

Your eyes shot open, an excited “Rhys!” coming from you. He rolled his eyes, shaking his head.

“Don’t ‘Rhys!’ me now, sweetheart. What game do you think you’re playing, messing with him like that?” He demanded, moving to stand up next to the bed. You sat, draping your legs over the edge.

“What do you mean, my love?” you asked, confusion on your face. Rhys scoffed.

“I come home, excited to see my wife, only to find her tucked under my brothers arm like she belongs there. Like she had found a way to replace me.” His voice quieted at the end, a pain to his words.

You shook your head, reaching out to grab his hands and pull him closer. “No, Husband. Never. Azriel is just my friend, as we have been over so many times. He was consoling me, I just missed you so.” You spoke earnestly, catching Rhys’ eyes.

He sighed, stepping in between your legs. “My love, my life. I know you understand how I feel, don’t you?” He leaned close, hand coming up to wrap around your throat. “You reek of jealousy.” His words were a deadly whisper, a jolt shooting through your body.

“Darling wife, how naive you are. How could I think of anyone else when I can come home to this perfect pussy anytime I want?” He growled, his other hand shooting up the slit in your dress, finding how wet you were for him. An embarrassingly needy moan fell from your lips as his fingers explored you, teasing you.

“Could Azriel make you feel like this? Fall apart at the barest touch?” His words were heated, a fiery passion in his eyes.

“No,” you choked out, his hand tightening on your neck. Rhysand gave a cruel smile at your gasping word, two fingers sliding pleasurably inside of you. You opened your mouth in a silent scream, melting into his touch.

“Mmm,” Rhys hummed, enjoying the feeling of you around his fingers. “How obedient for me.” His thumb came up to circle you, your hands gripping onto the bedsheets below you. You gasped out, breathing hard from the pressure Rhys had on your neck.

“You are the only one who gets to feel this, love. Not Feyre.” He groaned out her name, thrusting his fingers in and out of you. “You enjoy being a selfish, dirty slut, don’t you?” He asked, tilting your head up to him. “Answer me.”

“Yes.” You moaned, lost in the pleasure of his anger. His thumb circling faster, the increase causing your legs to shake.

“Open.” Rhys commanded, watching as you opened that perfect pink mouth for him. He spit into it, forcing you to swallow. “So obedient. So perfect.” He murmured, fingers pulling your pleasure from you. You moaned out his name, shaking as your orgasm took over. He worked you through it, only stopping to remove his cock from his pants.

“Now,” he said, picking you up and turning you around. “You’re going to place those hands on the bed, and I am going to fuck you so hard your screams are heard in the Spring Court.”

***

Here is Ch.3!! I have lots planned for Ch.4, i’ve already begun writing it. I have a request to do, and then I will get it out for you all!! Please keep leaving your comments!! ALSO if you want to be on a taglist for this story, please reply here!

Tags: @amara-moonlight @tothestarsandwhateverend

[supercriminalbean]

Jets of panic.

Spencer Reid x Gender Neutral Reader. 

Summary: After a bad case Reader has a bad panic attack on the Jet and Spencer helps calm them down. 

Warning: Panic attacks, anxiety, mental health, bombings, death, blood, school bombings, slapping, crying, angst, fluff. (If I have forgotten anything let me know)

Words: 1.8k

A/N: I rewrote this/ edited this in 10 minutes and then got bored near the end so I'm sorry for the rough ending but I tried its been a long day. I wrote this last year before I knew how to write (spoiler I still can’t write) so yeah I would love some feedback, thank you enjoy.

As you sit there on the jet couch, staring off into space. Beginning to daydream as the team starts their debriefing of the last case. Your head is buzzing, with the events of the last few days, still trying to process everything you have been through. This case wasn't the worst that you have had, but that doesn’t mean it was easy. It's never easy when you watch someone you were meant to save die right in front of your eyes, and manage to get out of the situation, with only a concussion and small scratches.

~~~

You can’t help but let the bombing replay over and over again in your mind. The way you fell to the ground, unable to move for a good minute. Only able to open your eyes and watch as the student you were escorting out of the building lay lifeless in front of you, her eyes staring straight into your soul. Everytime you try to close your eyes, you just see her face staring back at you, a feeling of helplessness and guilt filling you up, knowing it should be you instead. The room is a blaze, you can feel the room starting to heat up, but still your body refuses to move. Your ears are ringing from the loud blast, your mind unable to process what is happening in the moment, until you feel a pair of hands on your body pulling you up. Your eyes shoot over landing on a pair of scared eyes belonging to Morgan. Who you know must have run inside the building, after the explosion. 

“Save her, we need to help her” Your words are a mess, as you try pulling away from him, your strength suddenly returning to your body.

“We need to go, there’s no time,” Morgan says firmly. Wrapping his arm around your waist pulling you along with him. Ignoring your pleas to go back and help the girl, his mind is more focused on the second bombing in the building. 

~~~

Your mind stays centred on replaying the scene over and over again, focusing on the girl's face. Never hearing Hotch call out to you repeatedly, the whole team now watching you worried. They all know you’re taking this case hard, going internal rather than speaking about your worries. Morgan, who's sitting beside you, places a hand lightly on your shoulder to get your attention. You jump quickly, so far away in your own mind, you didn’t even notice that your hand had gone up as you turned round to face him. Only realising when the smack echoes around the jet, a gasp leaves your lips as your eyes widens. Fear and panic spreading throughout your body.

“I'm so sorry” You squeak out, As you spirit off to the bathroom, before anyone could stop you. Locking the door as you fall to your knees.

~~~

Tears are flowing down your face, as you lean against the door. Heart racing away in your chest, as you struggle to breathe. You're fully aware that you're having a panic attack, but your team is right outside the door, so you know you have to do your best at staying quiet. Pulling your knees up to your chest, hiding your head between your knees, allowing the tears to roll down, as your mind continues to race. You didn't mean to hit Derek, you just got startled. One of your reactions is to spin around, but your hand was already up and apparently had different plans. Morgan must hate you now, why wouldn't he? You slapped him for no reason. You never wanted your team to see you like this. 

~~~

There's a gentle knock on the door, making you jump slightly, you don't respond. 

“Hey (Y/n) can you open the door please, we just want to make sure you're okay” JJ's soft voice comes through. Shaking your head as a response, deciding to stay verbally quiet. You weren't ready for everyone to see you like this.

“Come on (Y/n) please, just let us check on you okay?” JJ sighs softly, knocking again. The whole team became filled with worry, when they saw you run off to the bathroom, after slapping Morgan. Morgan was shocked when he realised you had slapped him, more concerned than anything else. He got up straight away, wanting to go after you. But Hotch stopped him, wanting to give you some space to calm down first.

~~~

You wipe the tears off your face, but somehow they seem to keep flowing. You hear more footsteps approaching as a harsher knock comes against the door.

“(Y/n) open the door now, I don't want to have to kick it down but I will” Morgan sighs, looking at JJ with concern. “Come on kid, you're worrying us” Morgan's voice calls out, gentle but harsher than JJ. You close your eyes tired, pulling at your hair feeling stressed out. You don't want people to see how broke you are. You get that they are worried about you, but you just can't deal with it, not right now. Hearing more rushes footsteps quickly approche, the talking outside, sounding like an argument beginning to break out. It soon goes quiet as you hear the footsteps walking away.

~~~

It stays quiet for a minute, before you hear a soft knock on the door.

“Hey (Y/n/n) its Spence, I've sent the others away, can you just unlock the door for me?” Spencer speaks softly, his voice calming you. Slowly you reach up unlocking the door, moving out of the way so he can open it. The door opens quietly, he slips inside before closing it behind him. He looks down, spotting you leaning against the wall. Staying silent, he joins you on the floor, breaking his heart as he sees you like this. Your face stained with tears, your hair a mess where you were yanking at it. 

“Are you alright?” He asks after a bit of silence, turning to watch you. Shaking your head faintly, your tears having finally stopped. Spencer places his hand carefully on your knee, rubbing a circular pattern. Gradually you lean your head on his shoulder, your heart still pounding away. While your mind now just feel empty and froggy. Feeling like you can’t even think straight even if your mind has just fallen quiet all of a sudden.

~~~

“Morgan okay?” You finally speak, your voice is rough due to the crying.

“He's fine, he's worried about you, everyone is” Reid speaks gently. His hand is still drawing patterns on your knees, the sensation helping calm you. 

“I didn't mean to slap him” You let out a heavy breath, closing your eyes. 

“We know, It was a good hit though” Spencer smiles at you gently, earning a small laugh.

“I don't want to go out there, not yet” 

“We don't have to, we can stay in here as long as you need” Smiling weakly as you listen to Reids breathing, matching his. Helping slow your racing heartbeat down to a normal pace. 

~~~

“Spence, can you tell me something, just anything please?” You ask faintly. Feeling tired and weak, keeping your eyes closed. Reid stays quiet for a bit, thinking.

“I was thinking about entering a chess tournament this weekend, but I think that would be a bit unfair seeing as I would easily beat everyone,” Reid laughs lightly, earning a small chuckle from you.

“You really think you can beat everyone, don't ya Dr Reid” Smirking slightly, opening your eyes. 

“Well I mean, I can easily calculate what moves they will make and be able to beat them in less than 5”

“That is why I don't like playing games with you” You laugh slightly, teasing him.

“It's not my fault you're easy to read (Y/n/n)” Reid teases you back smiling. Happy to see the colour returning back to your cheeks.

~~~

“Are you ready to go back out?” Reid asks, removing his hand on your knee, you nod. Ready to stand up, as your heart starts beating faster and your mind decides to start spinning once more. They are all going to ask you questions, staring at you. What if they are already talking about you, who knows what they could be saying. What if Hotch doesnt think you're fit for the job anymore, and fires you. You can’t lose this job, you don't want to lose your team, your family. Your breathing picks up speeds, finding it hard to breathe once more.

“Hey hey, (Y/N) look at me, look at me” Reid speaks gently, placing his hand on your knee again. You shake your head refusing to look at him, while your mind starts to spin. Spencer places his hand on your cheek softly, turning you to look at him. Tears slide down your face again.

“I'm sorry , I'm so sorry” Crying out, your head dropping, trying to get away from him. Reid doesn't let you, wrapping his arms around and pulling you into his body. Your face hides away in his chest, snuggling into his touch.

“Don't be sorry, it's alright, just listen to my breathing okay” His voice is calm but firm. He starts taking deeper, calming breaths. You start doing the same, keeping in time with him. Listening to his heart beat, closing your eyes, finding peace in his heartbeat. You stay there for a while in silence. Soon he starts humming your favourite song, earning a faint smile from you. Slowly moving your head out of his chest, resting against his shoulder. 

~~~

You two sit in the bathroom, for close to an hour. Once you are fully calm down, thanks to the help of listening to Spencer , talk about random facts. Earning smiles and small comments from you.

“Okay Spencer, I'm ready” Smiling weakly, he smiles back, getting up. He holds a hand out for you, taking it, pulling yourself up. You fix your hair before walking out.

~~~

It's been over an hour since you locked yourself in the bathroom. The team has been extremely concerned about you, but decided to give Reid and you some space. Rossi and JJ are still sitting in the same place talking and laughing, while Morgan and Emily have moved to sit at the back. Emily is reading her books and Morgan has his headphones on staring out the window. Hotch is doing his usual round of after case paperwork, on the table opposite them. Morgan looks up as you walk past, giving you a small smile. Reid takes your hand in his, leading you towards the couch. Taking a seat on the couch, resting your head on his shoulder. Positioning yourself, so that you're half laying down, with your leg out on the couch. Spencer wraps his arm around you, holding you close, as your body begins to relax, feeling at home in his arms. Closing your eyes, knowing you need to deal with everything that has happened. But, you can do that when you land, as you let yourself drift off to sleep in Spencer's arms.

[agentmarymargaretskitz]

@wwheeljack asked: A cuddle pile/some comfort for the original four after a mission during the TCW era, perhaps? Maybe Cross was injured and Tech supports him? Need some gen with the original four badly.

(CW for injuries. Also I’m writing this on my tablet as I am in the middle of moving. Yay. However, this was a lot of fun to write on a break)

“Crosshair, get to the ship!” Hunter ordered over the comm channel.

Τhe sniper ignored his older brother’s command and realigned his next shot up in he tree. Another droid’s head sailed off while the body hit the dirt. B1s were almost too easy at this point for him to pick off, even though Clone Force 99 had received combat clearance five months ago. It had hit the point where he and Wrecker created a competition to see who could take out the most in a standard week. Loser scrubbed down the can.

Crosshair had no intention of losing this week.

Two more shots. Two more heads.

“Get down now, Crosshair!”

“You’re not clear yet,” he argued back, peering up from the scope to see them running for him. “Hold on.”

Tech’s voice now came onto the channel. “You have done sufficient damage. Now please get down from there.”

“Ugh, you-“

Shots came firing at him now. Crosshair pulled his scope back up to see a wave of B2s flanking a tank. He positioned the barrel to get a shot right through the barrel of the tank. One shot, and then-

The tank fired first and splinters erupted below him. Crosshair tore his helmet away as the branch he was seated on suddenly gave way.

“Crosshair!” Wrecker screeched.

He must have been twenty five feet high above the fast-approaching ground. Someone was screaming. Instinctively, Crosshair closed before he hit the ground. His whole body jolted by the impact when something harder than dirt struck his side. For a moment, breathing was a forgotten bodily function.

“Crosshair!”

His mouth opened to suck in a deep breath. Instantly, pain crackled around his rib cage. Crosshair blinked his eyes open to see Hunter sprinting towards him, yelling something he didn’t comprehend.

He closed his eyes again.

~!~

“Crosshair.”

He didn’t remember falling asleep.

“Crosshair, you must respond.”

“Go,” he whined, but his chest ached when he inhaled and opened his eyes.

The first thing that struck the sniper was the interior of the Marauder, followed by the realization of laying flat upon his bunk. Hanging off the edge of the rack was his twin brother, typing rapid fire onto his datapad. Tech paused for a moment and looked back at him before reaching into one of his multiple pouches.

“There’s not rocks in there again, are there?” Crosshair attempted to joke until he saw a tube of bacta come out of the pouch.

Tech fixed him with an unimpressed expression. “Had I known those sedimentary deposits I collected for geological examination would take up so much space, I would have left most of the samples behind. That incident also occurred four months ago. Now, how are you feeling?”

“Like I went a couple rounds with that trainer who had the lip ring,” he sighed.

Tech leaned down and pulled up their well-used medical kit to take out a gauze package. “I suppose falling from such a height could be compared to combat training against Lees Bardeux. Fortunately, you only broke two ribs, cracked three others, and suffered a moderate abrasion to your temple.”

“Which you’re lucky for.”

Crosshair now realized Hunter stood right behind him, arms crossed. His face seemed to be trying to scowl, except his eyes were somewhat shiny. Seeing that was enough to make the sniper feel crappier while Tech applied the bacta and gauze to his head wound. Hunter always internalized every failure like Crosshair did, although Hunter did it with things that weren’t even his fault.

“I’m alive,” Crosshair quipped, hoping to squash Hunter’s guilt with ill humor.

Unfortunately, the scowl dropped and Hunter looked frustrated instead. “For once, can you just listen to orders?”

A reply of how that went against what their squad did was on the tip of Crosshair’s tongue. However, he found the words difficult to say out loud. Sure, he was a cold-hearted piece of shit. Hurting his brother drowning in guilt though…that would be taking it too far.

“Next time, I’ll listen the first time,” Crosshair promised, hoping it would appease his brother.

The sergeant seemed satisfied with that. Tech gave Hunter a somewhat smug look before Wrecker appeared around the corner. “You didn’t tell me he was awake!”

“Good news, Crosshair is awake,” Tech said bluntly.

Crosshair chuckled before his ribs protested again. “Kriff.”

“You should be feeling better in a few days,” his twin explained, returning his gaze to the datapad. “Unfortunately, you will need to rest and use cold packs, as well as sleep upright and perform a few breathing exercises. Fortunately, none of your vital organs have been perforated.”

“Goodie.”

“We flew outta no man’s land into that Republic-occupied area while you were out,” Wrecker explained as he started pulling the blankets from the other bunks. “Also, we ‘lost’ the comm signal after General Windu kept asking Hunter what happened.”

“Droids get it?” Crosshair asked.

“Chewed wires,” Tech corrected, a gleam in his eye. “Such a surprise for a vessel such as ours, but these things happen.”

Hunter nodded. “They scraped away enough coating before cutting them that even I can’t tell the difference.”

The sniper laughed again before remembering it hurt. “Ow.”

Hunter dropped down and brought their heads together, ruffling Crosshair’s hair. “Still, thanks for covering our asses.”

“Who else are you going to get to do the job?” Crosshair quipped back

[missjanjie]

9+13, "It's cold"

i just realized while i havent written this pair, i have written all four of them as a quad lmao (or actually i think it was jackie/jan/lemon + nicky for funsies)

i also just now (a half hour after posting) realized this said ‘it’s cold’ not ‘im cold’ bcs i am what? illiterate!

9. Lemon + 13. Nicky Doll

-

As much as Lemon enjoyed the double dates she and Nicky went on with Jan and Jackie, she often found herself frustrated at her inability to one-up the other couple in terms of affection and cuteness. It wasn’t that Nicky wasn’t affectionate – they loved each other very much and never shied away from it. But the other two were just so damn saccharine. 

“Are you okay, love? Jackie asked, noticing the moment Jan started to shiver. 

Jan was barely able to get out, “I’m cold,” before Jackie had her jacket off and wrapped around her. She smiled, properly putting it on. “Thank you, baby,” she cooed and kissed her cheek, leaning into her as her girlfriend kept an arm wrapped around her. 

Naturally, Lemon crossed her arms and rubbed her upper arms to signify she was also cold. When Nicky didn’t notice, she pointedly remarked, “it is really cold out.”

“And how many times did I tell you to bring a jacket?” Nicky responded without looking over at her. “I am fairly certain it was at least three,” she added as she opened her bag. “Here, dummy,” she said and handed her a cardigan she’d grabbed, having anticipated her girlfriend’s stubbornness. 

“Thanks,” she murmured as she pulled it on. At first, she felt frustrated and disheartened that she didn’t get the cutesy moment the other couple had, but then a realization dawned on her. This was Nicky showing love, demonstrating that she cared, that she knew her habits, her quirks. Maybe it was quieter, more understated, but it was there. 

Lemon spent the rest of the walk home reevaluating her behavior, how she reacted towards Nicky, and guilt slowly began to consume her thoughts.

The distraction must have shown, because by the time they were alone, Nicky asked, “what is wrong, you don’t seem like yourself?” 

She hesitated, pressing her lips into a fine line. “I’m sorry, baby. I realized I wasn’t being fair to you by comparing us to Jan and Jackie. Just because our love languages are different doesn’t make our relationship any less amazing. I’ve been… I dunno, internally competing with them, and that hasn’t been fair to you.” 

Nicky smiled and pulled the smaller woman into her arms. “You are so stupid,” she cooed affectionately. “If you wanted to show them up, you should’ve just asked. You know how much I love to win.” 

Lemon grinned and pecked her lips. “Next double date night, we’re gonna be the ultimate couple goals.”

[imspardagus]

Ammo, Hamas, Heimat

Perhaps it has something to do with having grown up in the fifties and sixties, close enough to all those bloody conflicts that plagued the 20th Century but I hate war. More than that, even taking into account the “war against fascism” between 1939 and 1945, I think there is ultimately no such thing as a “good” war, or a “just” war or even a “winnable” war and I do not believe that we should ever accept that there is an “inevitable” war. All war is a failure. A failure of common sense, a failure of decency, a failure of reason and a failure of humanity.

I know it is trite to say so but in war it is always the innocent who suffer. And don’t try to persuade me that there are no innocents in war. Try explaining it to the dead, the maimed, the traumatised, the orphaned, the bombed-out, the refugees, the children, the parents of killed children. The only winners are the makers and purveyors of armaments, the spivs and the politicians. And the politicians’ wins are always short-lived, cf 21st Century Britain. But some people, it seems, just love to pick a fight, regardless of who gets hurt.

This latest debacle in the Middle East is a classic. Israel, originally intended to be a haven for an egregiously persecuted people, has, as a state under the protection of an empire in hock to its own armaments industry, been bullying and mugging its neighbour and brother, Palestine for years; often, like 70s skinheads in a pub, using the excuse of isolated slights and crimes to justify disproportionate “retribution”. This is not, with respect, Mr US Defence Secretary, a matter of “false equivalence”. State terrorism is terrorism, no matter who perpetrates it.

But it is no use saying that Israel, having suffered so appallingly at the hands of others, should know better. Hamas must surely realise that retaliation of the kind it has just inflicted on the Israeli nation - itself an almost copybook definition of terrorism - can only result in the annihilation of its “own” people. Set aside for the moment the gross injury done to the many blameless residents of Israel (not that we can, or should, of course: what took place was grossly, medievally barbaric and therefore inexcusable), or the thousands of Jewish adherents in the wider world who have done nothing to warrant the aggression they will now face, Hamas has set a course that can only make things worse for its own already oppressed Palestinian community, in Palestine and abroad.

This is our doing, make no mistake.

We, the Western powers, facilitated the expropriation of a significant part of the Palestinian homeland to appease our own consciences over our centuries-old despicable treatment of people who identified as Jewish (we were, and remain, significantly less concerned about those who identified as Roma, communist or disabled). But the people who moved in to the stolen land, instead of settling into the neighbourhood with, perhaps, a sigh of relief, went back to their age- old ways of treating their neighbours with contemptuous violence (the ways that had, history tells us, centuries ago, earned them first internment by the exasperated rulers of the region and then their expulsion from it), prodding and provoking their brother and sister Semites and stealing yet more of their land.

We should have reined them in, helped them to live in harmony with their new neighbours, but instead we sponsored their aberrant behaviour and promoted their militarisation and aggression. We were like an enlarged version of when the rich parents of a spoiled child are told by the teacher that he has been bullying the other kids in the class and stealing their lunch money and respond that the poor sweet darling could not possibly do anything so mean and it must be that the other children are just jealous of his good nature. Except that in the case of Israel our actions were less fuelled by parental indulgence and more by the pursuit of profit allied to an abiding sense of guilt.

It was inevitable that this state terrorism would give rise to resentment among the oppressed and displaced and that resentment would provide the grounding for a desire to fight back. Unless we nipped it in the bud. We didn’t. Rather, we doubled down on little Johnnie’s brattishness.

But, okay, given all that, in what Universe did Hamas convince themselves that the solution lay in openly attacking the unarmed and generally peaceful citizens (including children and babies) of a delinquent nuclear power backed by the most heinous imperialistic and morally bankrupt arms dealing thugs on the planet?

Hamas are about to learn the truth of the biblical expression “He that troubleth his own house shall inherit the wind”. But it is “their” people who will pay the price. The only thing that will stop the Israeli government from nuking Palestine is that it would lay waste to the land they covet for thousands of years to come. But they do not need the ultimate weapon. They now feel entitled to blast the impoverished Palestinians into the sea. In doing so, they will, ironically, inflict genocide (while ostentatiously wringing their hands). And we will let them. While wringing our own hands in harmony.

If that were not bad enough, the danger is that it will not end there. Because there are vested interests on the other side too: those who have stood by and watched the rape of Palestine over the years because it served their purpose better to allow it than to stand up for their brothers and sisters, but who could now be prompted to take advantage of the situation to unleash a proxy war aimed at their long wished-for elimination of Israel and then, by extension (and by grim desire) any Jew anywhere. And so it will go on. More and more lives will be needlessly lost so that the privileged and corrupt on both sides can perpetuate and enlarge their tawdry squabble for more power. The power to manipulate the basest instincts of man.

Did we not learn the lesson of Vietnam? Of Cambodia? Of Korea? Of course not. Democracy is only allowed to exist because it gives ostensible affirmation to the pillaging greed of a small number of psychopathic degenerates whom we grace with the multitudinous names for leader. Rulers rule by making their own people scared of “outsiders”. And where it suits their purpose they will invent outsiders to be scared of (cf “boat people”). It’s the same the whole world over… 

But what am I suggesting? That when a bully sets his sights on you you should just roll over in perpetuity? That the Palestinians should simply turn the other cheek? Didn’t some poor misguided Jew get nailed to a cross for suggesting that? No, the only way we can get out of this bind is to understand finally that the whole world is our heimat, our homeland. We are all in the same tent and we should not be shitting in it. It is the arms dealers and their puppet kings and wannabe presidents that need to be given the push. Only then, perhaps, may we live in peace with each other.

There are only people in this world. All the rest - all the nations, all the religions, all the creeds, all the cultures, all the castes and classes, all the other alienating divisions we live and set store by - is made up. Time to live and let live.

[spikesbimbo]

Drunk in Love

Summary:  Getting drunk and confessing your love for your “boy” friend and fucking him was most definitely not what you expected to go down on the usual night.

Pairing: Issei Matusukawa x Reader

Tags: Timeskip!Tattoed Mattsun, softdom!issei Hurt/comfort, friends to lovers, smut, fluff, virgin!reader, Unptrotected sex, non-penetrative sex, fingering, oral, pussy/thigh job, clit slapping, sweet dirty talk, praise, drunk sex

Word count: 7.2k

A/N: I heard pussy job and I wrote a whole ass novel

18+ Minors DNI

You run your finger over the condensation of your empty drink, drawing shapes (or what you thought to be shapes, you couldn’t tell at this point) waiting for your dear friend, Makki to bring you a refill of your cocktail.  

“Here ya go.” Makki said as he returned with your beloved Malibu Sunset. The smooth coconut rum bringing you back to your first and favorite drink that you ever got drunk on in high school. You smiling at the memory

“Thanks.” you say. Your reply being mumbled by the liquid already in your mouth.

This all started with Iwaizumi calling Mattsun up, you and Makki hearing “You wanna get wasted?” on the other side of the phone. And with pleasure, you two were already packing your stuff up, shoving yalls “pregame” bottles back in the bag. The three of you made your happy way there climbing through the fence of the abandoned skate park you were in. Needles to say it was abandoned for a reason, but what’s life without a little danger.

You three and the rest of the third years have been friends since high school, meeting in freshman year, and now including Oikawa’s girlfriend. You actually didn’t like Oikawa at first, his “pretty boy” demeanor making you internally cringe. But his personality grew quickly on you, being the perfect target to tease you and Iwa clowning him over everything.

Now back to you on your nth drink, complaining about your previous job that fired you because u got injured, even though you know you wouldn’t have lasted long there anyways because you weren’t that academically inclined. Bright? Whatever you wanted to call it.

And as-usual it wasn’t long before your crybaby ass immediately called Makki and Issei and “tried” your best to tell them what happed with your dramatic self-induced tears running down you race, while Makki urged to you to try to calm down and Issei straight up laughing at the state your were in, snot running out of your nose. You recoiling at the thought, hoping they forgot. (Spoiler, they didn’t)

But now you nanny for a rich couple and you get payed good to play with cute babies all day, sounds good to you! Luckily, you had the week off due to them going on a vacation, you think it was France, no, the south of France. Must be nice.

Cue to now, Mattsun chuckling and leaning on you and Iwaizumi; both of you, especially Iwa, being visibly done with his shit. Him reminding you about the times you bought him some random shit, which you went out of your way for since he always payed for you, like that chopper keychain because you said it reminder you of him.

He didn’t know what compelled you to say his 6’2, tattooed built self looked like a tiny reindeer but okay. It still meant a lot to him, hooking it onto his motorcycle keys. But you knew he appreciated it, despite his appearance he’s a softie.

“You wanna try this’” He says gaining his composure offering you one of the shots he got.

You took one of the mini glasses, not being the type to back down and promptly swung the drink to the back of your mouth, quickly coughing before it even reached your throat.

“This shit is fucking gross.” You coughed out bringing the glass down from your lips.

  “Imagine being sober. Can’t relate.” He said taking another shot.

  “I guess I should do that but ive passed the point of giving a fuck” You said sending yall into a giggling fit while somehow Makki was thrown in to support yall from falling over. You two carry on laughing ignoring everyone’s stares at you thinking about how much yall fit perfectly together.  

   Makki rearranges himself to sit back in his chair, far away, from the both of you, whispering “Damn. I’m really third wheeling.” under his breath. Getting a snicker out of Oikawa sitting next to him.

   “When your best friends are ignoring you. Sad times.” He continues bringing his bottle to his mouth getting no response.

  Issei chuckles and gets up shoving his hands in his pocket reaching for the cigarettes. Pulling them out while failing to find his lighter

  “Fuck.” He muttered

  “Any’all got a light?”

  No one responds so you sacrifice yourself “Yeah” you say reaching into your pocket grabbing out your prized possession of a hot pink, bedazzled lighter that you did yourself, reaching out to hand it to him.

  “Don’t lose it” you stated seriously trying not to break a smile.

  “K’ sweet cheeks.” He said smirking into the butt between his lips as he walked away. Your face now burning up, hoping that everyone would think it was because of the alcohol.

  You mind wanders, thinking about the “dates” you two go on, from watching shows you “forcing” him to watch some romantic anime, to going to the skatepark, to playing video games with the rest of the 3rd years (which you don’t really like but you’ll play for him) and him surprising you with takeout, you bringing out candles trying your best to make it cute with him telling u everything you everything about his day.

  And you always tried to remain calm, even though sometimes he deserved to get his ass beat, like that one time he broke one of your favorite pair of heels. It honestly hurt him even more, he wanted you to get mad at him but no, you just acted like nothing happened. Making the guilt rise in him. Let’s just say didn’t have to lift a finger for the next few weeks.

You basically babied him, taking care of all his “chores”, mainly making him food when you were at his place knowing he hated doing it. Makki teasing you for acting like his housewife, leading to you slapping the shit outta him while trying to cover your now red cheeks.

You’ve never been so grateful for your attire at the moment, blessing yourself for not wearing your usual outfits of short skirts and cute tops, defending yourself saying what housewife dresses in beat up vans and baggy clothes. You definitely not imaging yourself in that position for the rest of the day.

 You expressed that you just liked to take care of people, which was true. You always looked out for them, bringing an extra umbrella, to bringing cookies you made at 2 in the morning to school, always carrying band-aids (yes, the paw patrol ones you took from the kids you babysit).

You checked the time on your phone seeing it was late since the sun at last went down, your lock screen being your dogs to their complaint since they have a group photos of you all from high school as theirs. To which you replied “They’re my babies” getting a groan and huff out of them.

  Seeing the notifications of your group chat you grinned at the contact name you and Issei gave each other; yall jokingly call each other pet names, his contact being honeybun and yours being pumpkin, even including Makki in your contacts as pudding bc then it wasn’t weird, right? no.

  “What’re you smiling at y/n?” Oikawa cheekily asks teasing you. You turn to him giving him a dirty look, not having enough energy to deal him right now.

  “Don’t listen to his bullshit.” Oikawa’s girlfriend says. You’re thankful for her. She was always on your side, being the only other girl in your friend group. To be honest you just wanted her and you to hang out most of the time, but of course to your disapproval her boyfriend and his friends had to join in.

  “Fuck this. Fuck you. I’m sleeping.” You say getting up to her objection, the only thing on your mind wanting to retire for the night.

  “You sure you’ll be fine? Let us at least walk you home.” She said already grabbing her boyfriend’s arm.

  “Nah, im good. I live right down the road.” You try to say not slurring. The last thing you want is him teasing you even more, especially in this state, knowing you, you’d probably start crying at the slightest irritation when youre this drunk.

    You started to “walk” towards your house resting  your hand against the brick walls to not lose your balance, leading you to run into Issei. You stopped to watch him lean against the alley holding a cigarette between his index and middle finger.

  “I’m hiding like a bitch” He says noticing you, resting his weight against the wall.

 “Wanna be a bitch with me? He grinned  blowing out the smoke out with his words.

You didn’t reply, just walking over to him, just being around him made you feel warm.

"Fuck its windy.” He says trying to light a new cig.

“C’you make me a house?” He asks.

You go up and put your hands around his cigarette, this not being your first time. Your hands wrap a little tighter to prevent the wind from burning out his flame. He joins you with his free hand helping, finally getting his cig to light.

 “Thanks doll” He smirks.

“No problem princess.” You reply earning a laugh out of him.

He takes his first hit with his and your hands still wrapped around it. He gets an up-close look at your hands, noticing how tiny they were, seeing all the scars that he never noticed, making a mental note to ask you how you got them later.

His head gets close to yours for the first time in a while due to his height. You glance at his face, noticing his features seeing some stubble growing on his face.

“You ain’t shave?” You ask, never seeing it in the past, while he was moving back up, blowing the smoke away from you.

“What, you don’t like my majestic beard? “He jokes. Making you giggle almost losing your balance before catching yourself on the wall.

  “s’too much work.” He starts. “You wanna shave it for me?” he says slightly leaning towards you. Handing you back your lighter knowing you didn’t need him to carry it because your pants actually had pockets in them for once.

You let out a soft laugh not responding again. He catches on, you got quiet when you were tired and he made out that you were walking towards your house.

“You going home?” he asks already knowing the answer.

“Yeah.” You respond more than happy to have him walk you back, him already moving to walk next to you.

He walks you home, you two talking about random shit, both of you forgetting about your skateboards leaving Makki to deal with them. And even though you’re drunk as fuck you’re still in the right state of mind, carrying a normal conversation with him. But just because you’ve built a tolerance doesn’t mean you can do basic tasks, like walk correctly.

When he reaches your house, he types in the keycode, your first dogs birthday, being glad that you, him and Makki have each other’s memorized.

He leads you into you house setting you on the couch, petting your dogs that ran up to him.

“Mommy’s not feeling too good” He said giving them the affection they deserved.

“Yes I am.” You slurred getting them attention on you now.

He walked over to your counter putting on the playlist that you two made together on shuffle, High fashion being the first to play. You didn’t like when it was quiet because too many thoughts would run though your head. You were in no way sad, singing the lyrics while you were laughing barely being able to hold yourself up as proof.

Remembering you were tired, he takes you off the couch and borderline carries you to your room, , setting you on your plush blankets that you had so many of because it was warm and comfy.

 “Easy, there. Try to sit up.”He said, trying to ask you what draws your pj’s were in because he didn’t want to snoop around; neither of you being bothered that you were half naked, what’s the difference between panties and a bikini, he thought remembering the times you’ve been to the beach together.  

Well it was maybe the fact that you were clinging onto him because u stumbled into him and he was closest stable thing around and you wouldn’t let go because it was cold and you couldn’t stop shaking.

 He ignores his thoughts and grabs the shirt he got out figuring you don’t need to change your bra because you told him and Makki that it was normal to keep it on for a few days after they were in awe as you were explaining how expensive they were. You calling Oikawa’s girlfriend to prove your point as she immediately agreed with you…Sometimes you might have got a little too comfortable with them.

You hear the song in the background change to Love Songs, you humming along, “Hope you smile when you listen.”

You were still holding on to him, your boobs squeezing against him, him only being able to put a t-shirt on you, while you looked up at him with your red glossy eyes making him burn up.  

You fidget timidly with your face now in his chest while gripping his sweater. Trying to build up the little courage you had. He tilts your head up making you look at him, wondering what you were thinking about.

  You try to express yourself, but you can’t get the words out him having no idea what is going on in your head at the moment.

“It’s okay to be nervous sometimes. Tell me” He gently says reading your body language. He was intuitive, so there was no way you could hide your feelings from him.

But you knew you could trust him, him having full self-control, always staying collected and following through on what he said he’d do.  He went out of his way to avoid any friction coming between you two, him never raising his voice or starting an argument.

“We need to talk.” You started. “About something important.”

“Ok…What is it?” He questioned rubbing his hands on your back. You were so nervous, were you really about to say this? Confess your feelings that you’ve pushed to the back of your heart for so long?

“I… I l… I love your face. And the stuff in it. and around it.” You spoke, being surprised you did it stutter.

He stood there, hands stopped moving trying to process what you just said.

“Just you, in general…”  You finally confess trying to state three things at once barely getting your words out.

But he understood exactly what you meant, or maybe he was warping what you said to fit what he wanted.

  "I don’t even know when I started liking you, but this shit won't go away." You restated

  Nope. He clearly just heard you say that.

  He doesn’t understand what’s so different about today. Yall have been in this scenario multiple times taking care of each other, sometimes including another into the mix.  

You didn’t understand either. You just felt like the time was right, even though you know it wasn’t the best idea to confess while you were drunk off your ass.

But you couldn’t help it, your feelings overflowing, which you never until this day let get the best of you, being vulnerable and trusting is not your usual . Youve never even had a crush on anyone, him being to only in your whole life to make you blush.

  Who you been vibin' wit and why I can't make you mine?

  You should have seen the signs that you feel for him when he helped that lady that lives down the street from him set up her Christmas lights or when he first met your dog that wasn’t fond of men, but it instantly liked him. And you loved his selflessness it was something you admired and applauded.

  “y/n” He tries talking you down, making sure you weren’t just saying this because of alcohol, deep down knowing he felt the same, you always being in the back of his mind.

You were generous with your time too, always being there for him. You knew he was softer than he appeared, he was tender, sensitive and vulnerable. He tried his hardest to not get into situations where anyone would get hurt, like breakups, arguments, and so on.

Which is why he won’t make the first move. He pushes his feelings to the back of his head. He values your friendship more than anything, but he can see what develops. If love is meant to be, it will happen.

I told you I am down for the worse or the better. But I keep sticking to you cause them four stupid letters

    “You make me so happy. And I’ll always care about you. Okay? He says breaking the silence, trying to reassure you.  

  “You mean so much to me—something I can’t even put into words because nothing can compare- I’ve wanted you since that day you tripped and bust your ass in the school hallway I still want you even though you drive me insane.”

  “Iss-“ You tried to get out only to have him continue talking over you.

  "I love that you can’t leave the house without a jacket. I love the wrinkles that appear on your forehead after you call me crazy. I love that it takes you hours to get ready. I love that you always know how to make me feel better. I love that even when you don’t agree with my decisions you always trust me to make them.  I love that when I spend a day with you, I can still smell you on my clothes; and I love that you are the last person I think of  before I go to sleep at night."

  You stood there awestruck for what feels like eternity until you mustered the bravery to speak “I didn’t expect you to feel the same way-” You said, being dumbfounded because from what you’ve seen treats everyone “nice”, were you really getting special treatment?

  He tilts your chin up, locking his dark eyes with yours. “Baby I don’t know if your notice but you and Makki are my only people that aren’t my family that call me my first name.”

He has a point. You think pushing yourself more into him, trying to fuse your bodies together to hide, not relaxing what you were doing to him. He tries to nudge your legs to the side but you won’t let go still clinging onto him.

“fuck” He groans. You pulling back wondering why until you looked down and noticed. A smirk appeared on your face as you reattached your self to him like velcro. You were feeling bold, the liquid courage still in your system driving you to slide your fingers down his chest, looking him in the eyes before stopping at his waistband.  

He knows what you’re doing, him being in this position multiple times. Does he really want to ruin your friendship like this? He hasn’t even asked you to be his girlfriend. He tries to push you off him already knowing you were gonna complain. But what he didn’t expect was for you to whimper out his name in that pretty voice of yours.

 He tried to keep his calm, blood already rushing down. “You know what you’re doing”

“yeah” You start.

“y’don’t want me?” Giving him your pouty face that you know he’s weak for, hoping that’ll work, insecurity piling up. Was it because your boobs weren’t that big or that fact that you were dressed like man? Was he not attracted to you right now, only liking you when you were dolled up?

“Fuck” You think. You should have worn something cute instead of dressing like a whole ass man even with your makeup fully done. Its not like you were supposed to know you were gonna get fucked today.

His were burning holes into you now, thinking of how to say “No, I would be more that happy to fuck you!” to his best friend, soon regaining his consciousness finally speaking.

“Fuck no doll, ive wanted you for a minute. You know me better than I know myself. How did you not notice my feelings?”

 You got me singing love songs, love songs, love songs

“You’re really hard to read” You replied trying to maintain your seductive act, resting your hands back on his chest.

“So are you.” He said lowering his head, you still looking up at him, taking in your gleaming eyes.

Sex ain't the only thing that's on my mind But you get me so excited, whoa

Your heart was beating so wildly that you could only take little sips of breath. His hands running down your waist stopping at your hips.

“Can I kiss you?" He asks "...yeah” you attempted to say as confidently as you could, nodding your head along with it.

His face bent down, hot mouth breathing over you. His lips slowly moved, brushing over yours, the liquor on his lips that you hated; only choosing fruity drinks even though you got relentlessly teased you for it.  You pushed further into the kiss desperately wanting more. Your teeth clicking his from being impatient, wanting to suck him in. Your hands sliding under his shirt subconscious desires reaching out.

Irreplaceable Tattoos from your neck that drop down to your ankles

“You’re drunk…” he says snapping you out of your trance.

“So are you.”

He dove in for another kiss much more passionate than the previous one, arguably needy, pusing you on the bed to which you more than happily comply. He tugs back not letting his mind get the best of him, disconnecting your spit trial leaving you panting. “You sure this alright?” He says deep down hoping you still say yes.

  You pull him back for your answer, your grabby little hands working their way back up his shirt. He gets the hint and pauses your lips rendezvous, taking off the turtleneck that he looked oh so good in, before seeing his unclothed body.  You’re admiring his body in a new way, before just complimenting him whenever he got a new tattoo, now up under him tracing them like a lovestruck teenager.

“When did you get this one?” You quietly ask, his ears closer to you than they’ve ever been.

“I got it that day you faked sick”

“What! You said were gonna take me!” You sulked, turning your head away from his as much as you could, crossing your arms.

He let out a slight laugh before gently taking your face in his hands, guiding you back into the kiss.

This is not really what he imagined for your first time. He’s an old-fashioned romantic who likes to take one step at a time. But then again nothing was ever normal with you. That said, when he falls in love, he falls deep.

“You’ve done this before?” You uttered.

“Hmm?” He mumbles, unmoving his lips from you kissing you, moving towards your neck.

“You still with that other girl?”

“No. I broke it off her, everything that came out of her mouth was bullshit, and no she wasn’t my girlfriend.”

“You didn’t trust her? You added. Trying to distract him until you could think of a way you could say “hey in my 21 years of life I’ve never got passed kissing a guy.”

“Our relationship was purely built on lies, I’d second guess everything she said. He replied, wondering if you were interrogating him.

“Why’d you wanna know?” He asked bringing his face up from your skin.

“…No one’s ever touched me like this, fuck.” You bashfully admitted, thoughts racing through your head that he didn’t want you anymore because you weren’t experienced.

But he knew what was running through that pretty head of yours, his fingers reaching out to with your hair trying to comfort you.

“You’re a virgin?” He curiously asked dragging his hand to your cheek, you leaning into it.

“y-yeah” you muttered trying to move your eyes away from his looking down at his body.

“I thought you had a boyfriend before” he said, softly turning your jaw to make you look at him. Your eyes diverted from his arms back to his eyes.

“We weren’t actually dating” You quickly say trying to clear up the misunderstanding. “He was my friend and seatmate that pretended to be my fake boyfriend to get me out of some trouble” you spewed out “and I guess I forgot to tell everyone that it was fake.”

“Even if we were that doesn’t mean we fucked.” You sheepishly replied.

“So… what trouble did your fake boyfriend get you out of.” He questioned knowing how much trouble it must have been for you, miss independent, to go to such lengths.

“Umm, well…this guy wouldn’t stop flirting with me even after I told him I don’t like him, even following me to my other classes.”

He wasn’t surprised, you were definitely a sight for sore eyes, in fact the prettiest thing he’s laid his eyes on, your beaming eyes, your dimple when you smiled, your pretty face, your “ugly” laugh, he could go on for days.

“Why are we talking about this” You whined, reaching your hand back out to him.

He took a hint and continued kissing you, bringing you closer to him while you attempted to take you shirt off. His hands helping you seeing as that you were struggling, being lost in his touch, finishing by moving you up more on you bed, pushing your plushies out of the way, to your protested because “they had feelings too.”

He ignored you, bending down to pull your panties off stopping once he saw the slick coming through them.

“Fuck baby you’re wet” He breathed dragging his fingers across your clothed slit earing a whimper from you, leaving his fingers drenched.

 Shawty, you wanna feel good, I wanna feel good too Don't I make you feel good?

“M’always wet.” you responded.

From what? He questions taking off your soaked cotton panties, tossing them to the side.

“From me?” He smirks bringing his hand back towards your heat. You not even comprehending what he just said, just knowing that you’re ashamed of how worked up you were getting.

You were in awe. You’ve always known his hands were big, but in this situation your mind wondered. His fingers were so much bigger than yours knowing you can barely fit two inside your with out it hurting, and not in a good way.

“Do you know how pretty you are? It’s honestly distracting.”. He says kissing down your whole body, stopping at your breasts, licking lazily around and coming back to the nub. The attention on your nipples making you squirm and he finally lets go, you grateful that he stopped or you would have almost cum, how embarrassing.

“I thought you said were gonna get them pierced” He remembered, you going on a whole rant about how cute they were.

“You said u were gnna get em with me” You looked back on, reminding yourself making him promise to get them with you because you were too scared of the pain.

“That was the same day you played sick and I got that tattoo.” He stated lightening the mood, hoping you can calm yourself down before you actually embarrass yourself.

He picks back up and continues kissing all the way down your body, you playing with his hair while biting your lip to muffle your moans and whine until he reaches your entrance.

He parted your legs, your pussy laid out before him, believing you no have reason to be shy about it either. He paused, admiring your swollen cunt and puffy clit, you were beautiful.

The feeling that he didn't want anyone else ever in his position overtook him. He let out a little breath on your clit and you thrashed around. He wasn't going to play. “I’ll take care of you.”

His lips travel over your skin, light and heated before settling himself between your legs, grabbing you by your thighs and dragging you closer. “That tickles.” you giggle, nerves making you kick your legs, almost hitting him in the face before he grabs them. He puts them down locking your legs with his arms, lowering himself until he’s on the ground facing you.

“Does it make you nervous when I stare?” he teases while your covering your face trying to hide the blush he caused.  He puts his mouth on you, quickly gripping your thighs, his hands leaving imprints in your skin dragging you even more into him, deprived kisses taking over your body. 

“yer so pretty” You purred seeing the sight of his big build between your legs, your fingers grabbing onto his curly dark locks, tugging them.

  Issei moans, his voice radiating through your body, forcing out a cry, blessing him with your pretty voice. “I-Issei!” You cry, never feeling like this before, your vibrator and hands doing it no justice.

“Shh, just look at me, doll.”

You can barely make out what he says, so drunk on pleasure. You try your best, doing anything to see the pretty man beneath you. But you get interrupted by your pleasure, your back arching not being able to control your body, grinding down to meet his lips, heat rising in you.

He kisses through your wetness playing with your bud. You choking on your spit, back arching again your body tensing up. “Issei,” You beg, grabbing him knowing what you want but not being able to express it. Luckily he can read you like an open book, knowing what you want, driving you over the edge as he makes you see stars. “Good girl,” he sighs when he feels you let go of his wrist letting him bring you your first orgasm.

“Look at your thighs shaking so much.” He teasingly cooed, wrapping his hands around them, bringing you out of your daze.

Shawty, your body is so exciting

Arching your back into the blankets, letting out a whine “Want your fingers.”.

He lets out a condescending laugh. “You need to learn to be patient. You just came and you’re already so eager for more?”

But by the time he finished your body went limp, you were totally weak, body loose-limbed and pliant. Your mind clouded by lust and deep in your own world. You gasped out a little sob, unable to comprehend anything beyond the discomfort and the need to have it gone. You can’t think straight all you can do is take action, grabbing his arm him easing his fingers into to you.

It’s not too tight, is it?” you ask clenching around his fingers.

 “Just relax… let yourself feel it” He says barely being able to move in you. Fuck so were so tight.

“I love the way you look with my fingers inside you.” He added starting to thrust them inside you, making you let out a string of moans.

“Look how good you take it.”  

“Fuck, you’re so messy.” He groaned feeling the slick running down his hands, before taking them out.

“Issei-i,” You cried when he pulled away, pleasure leaving you, tears coming back.

  He shushes you easily, his fingers wiping your tears. You were so precious to him, your moans music to his ears.  He slows down repositioning his fingers, making you let out a whimper squeezing around them. Your brains so crowded you can’t focus, can’t gather the strength to speak when he thrust them faster inside you.

  Your eyes rolled to the back of your head as you fell back, fingers curling inside you, chanting his name over and over, incoherent words coming out of your mouth begging for more. 

You pussy tightens as you cum, unable to breath, letting out gasps and whines. Him still fucking you, fingers not stopping, pushing them in and out relentlessly feeling both pain and pleasure. You lay there, wet in your own cum not giving yourself a break before you went and got what you really wanted, his cock.

His eyes followed the movement of your hands as they pushed down his boxers, revealing the length of his cock, that jutted proudly from his hips. He was so pretty, so virile and handsome. Wondering how lucky you were to be in such a position with him.

You pushed away those thoughts and focused on him, pulling him forward gently, but he followed his encouragement. One of his hands tilted his cock down toward your lips. “Open your mouth for me, baby.”

You parted them instantly, tongue sliding slightly outward, and then you whimpered as the warm weight of his cock slid into your mouth. You let your eyes flutter closed and swirled your tongue around the tip of his cock not knowing exactly what you were doing, but it was working, tasting the salty tang of the precum that wept from his leaking slit. You moved your tongue as the he put his hand into your hair, gripping the strands and pushing deeper into his mouth.

“You look so good on your knees like that. “He says meeting your eyes once again, almost cumming from the picture below him.

“Slowly, baby, I’m not going anywhere.” He says slowing you down by grabbing your hair, making a pace that you follow.

“Yeah, that’s it, baby, just like that.” Seeing that sinful look in your eyes with your redden swollen lips.

You moan feeling yourself drip down your thighs, getting even wetter giving him head. Trying to ease the discomfort by closing your legs, griding them together, trying to find some friction. Your ears hearing “That’s so fucking hot.” watching the scene unfold beneath him.

Your jaw hurts, trying got make him cum faster using your hands and lips together hollowing your cheeks. “Oh fuck, oh, Jesus, fuck yes, there, just like that, fucking Christ" he groans out, his voice sounded beautiful to your ears, knowing he was about to cum.

He finally lets go cumming in your mouth, you swallowing it all, trying not to wince at the taste. “Did I do good” You ask waiting for his reply. Your doll eyes, so red and worn out looking up at him for approval. Fuck he was whipped.

“Yeah…fuck baby”

I love when you get on top and you ride it

You get back under him, his cock resting on you, drenched and clenching around nothing, resting in your cum. You working yourself up against him.

“What makes you think I’m going to fuck you?” He says to your complaint.

“You’re not ready yet.” he mumbles against your whining. Spreading your legs, slapping your clit a few times before letting his cock rest on your folds. Finally getting “seated” he picks up your legs and puts them both on one of his shoulders your thighs warming his cock, your knees touching his cheek not moving, getting a kick out of how desperate your were for him.

“s-stop being mean” You cried reaching out for him to come closer, needing affection after all you’ve been though.

“Aww, poor baby, you want me to take care of it for you? He says leaning into you, reaching your kiss, tasting the remnants of the cum in your mouth.

He plundered your mouth and slowly teased his cock over your entrance, catching it against your clit and making you whimper into the kiss, clearly wanting to be fucked. Your kiss turned you sucking on Issei’s tongue and lips, biting the swollen pout until his lips were red and puffy. He pulled back and looked down at you, a beautiful mess under him.

His fat cock head pushed between your folds. The moan escaping both of your lips was primal. You were turned on beyond imagination and the way he was thrusting forward, spreading his leaking precum on your wet clit was almost too much. He quickly picked up his pace fucking your folds, his warm head brushing against your clit with every movement, but your greedy self wanted more.

The fact that he made you cum so easily made you proud. Just because you’ve never gone this far with someone else doesn’t mean you’ve never cum, you’ve had a lot of practice over the years, being insatiable, the sheets soaked underneath you from your previous orgasms being proof.

“Keep your eyes open, look at me, baby.” He moans getting your attention him.

You tried, you really tried, but the way he was stroking you, imagining what it’d be like to actually sit on his cock, the lewd sounds echoing in the background leaving you unable to focus.

He taps on your cheek eventually getting you look at him, keeping your mind on him by placing his fingers in your mouth you letting him, hazily sucking on them, not being able to close your mouth.

“Oh, baby, you’re drooling everywhere.” He grumbles. Your spit dripping onto his fingers, the friction of your thighs making him feral, moving at an even faster pace. Your body bouncing with every thrust.

“You gonna cum after I cum on your little clit? Come one more time for me, I know you’ve got it in you.” You sob feeling the puddle beneath you, time slowing, fire pooling in your tummy.  Listening to his words you let yourself go. You come with a silent scream as the pleasure ripped through your body, your nails scratching his soft skin. Your vison fading to black feeling him lose his rhythm and moaning a mixture of curse words along with your name, feeling him cum on your tummy before resting his head in your neck while letting your legs go.

“So good for me, look at how much you came.” He says breaking the static. You whining into his shoulder, emotions high, never doing this before.

“I know, baby, I know. I’m right here, just breathe.” He says. You two laying in silence for an unclear amount of time, him rubbing your back while you rest in his chest almost dozing off.

“Are we still…friends?” You croak out trying to hold back your sobs already knowing the answer that you two were defiantly not friends now and never would be just friends again.

“Friends don’t do this type of shit” He maintained grabbing your shoulders to sit you and him up. You were worried, did he only do this with you because he was drunk? You were anxious that you scared him away because you just poured your heart out to him and pushed yourself on him. You left your head down, tears already coming out to your dismay. You moved your hand up to wipe them but he beat you to it.

“Look at me… I love you.” He says holding your cheeks in his palm. You in awe, hoping that you weren’t imagining it, that this was real life.

“R-really” You question making him worry too, preferring to forgive and forget rather than letting this a divide between the two of you in case you went back on your feelings. You were so overwhelmed, never feeling love until this moment, so happy that the person you longed for liked you back. Yours tears running once again.

 “Shh, shh, it’s alright...Don’t cry.”

You don’t even know why you were crying, the hangover already getting to you making you get a headache. You groaning in his arms complaining that your head and throat hurt.

“Ill be back” he says detaching himself from you, letting you know he was coming right back.

He walks to your fridge opening it to see every drink but water, having too dig through all of them, especially the absurd amount of apple juice guessing it was your “once a year craving for it”. He finally got you some cold water, putting It in a cup and waked back to your room.

  “Issei” you whined not picking your head up from the pillow.

  “Shh baby im right here.”

  He sat down beside you on your bed lifting your head up. “Here drink this” he reassured, to which you ignored not wanting anything to go in your mouth, just wanting the day, or night as it was now, to end.

  “It’s just water, honey, look.” You sat yourself up with his help seeing him in just his boxers, you remembering your still naked, not caring enough to cover yourself. He held to glass to your mouth, babying you, tilting it far back enough to where you could drink it. The water hit the back of your mouth feeling like a shot making you cough.

“I know, it hurts. I’m sorry but we have to” He stated. You continued to drink it, feeling the stinging in the back of your throat, him comforting you, calling you “good girl” which was unsurprisingly working.

  He put the cup on your dresser when you finished, climbing back into bed with you leaning your body into his. “Have you ever thought about...us? Y’know, as an...item?” he said causing you to look at him with wide eyes.

 “Call me selfish, but I don’t ever want anyone else to touch you.” He insisted making you cheeks flush. You try to think of a way to respond, not wanting to keep him waiting.

“You’re the best thing that has, and ever will, happen to me. Not only am I deeply in love with you, you’re my best friend.” You stammer out, your shaky hands somehow made there way to his neck, letting them fall slowly before he grabs them dragging you in for a kiss before you got to even see his face.

“Everybody has always thought we’re a couple.” He continued taking his time kissing you all over your face. “Then I guess we should be.” You retort, kissing him back before you could see his reaction, not wanted to be embarrassed anymore today. But he caught you, holding you still “Really “y/n? Like deadass?” He asked.

  “Yes dummy, I want to be your girlfriend” You say causing him to grin swearing you’ve never seen him smile that big, before he gives you one last kiss.

  “I always kiss you on the cheek, why are you blushing now? He teases laying back down, you following along. You just snuggle into him mumbling something along the lines of “m’tired”, he understanding and speaking to you in a soft, gentle voice while helping you to bed, so he doesn’t make it harder for you to sleep by being loud. “I’m here love, I’m not going anywhere.” He whispers into your ear mkanig your heart swoon one last time before you pass out.

  “I l-love you issei.” You sleepily mumble.

“Tell me this when you’re sober.” He says stroking your head.

“Just relax, close your eyes...”He murmurs, your heart beating slower every second. Both of you together, lazy, slow presses. Limbs pressed together, chests heaving, fingers trailing down backs, tracing lazy patterns.

  “Oh!…” He remembers. “If you really wanna get them pierced, we could get matching ones.”

© all content belongs to spikesbimbo. do not alter or repost .

[patchworkpuzzle]

~Rainbow Anon.

Henlo, hope things are aight! I just woke up to some more Puppygirl thoughts and wanted to request a Katsuki, Mirio, and whoever as your third (separate) having a s/o that's a Puppygirl that hasn't been praised by her ex at all, and they're MadTM about it, because how can anybody /not/ praise her? She's perfect and deserves all of the praise!

Oh. My. Goodness. YES I CAN WRITE THIS FOR YOU!!! I made Kirishima the third person..... cause reasons.... 😖

MINORS DNI 18+

Word count: 1.6k

Paring(s): Bakugou, Mirio, Kirishima x F!Reader

Warnings: puppy play kink, squirting, dirty talk, oral (both male and female receiving), loooottttss of praise.

Authors Note: so because this is dealing with reader having praise issues, that can be somewhat triggering to some, though I don’t go into detail about it I still just wanna put that out there! Also... I hope this is good enough for you, Rainbow Anon!

When you first brought it up, he was confused. You wanted to be treated like a puppy? Wear a muzzle? Bark? All that stuff?

You had to calm him down. Telling him it doesn’t and didn’t have to be that extreme. Just wearing the ears, tail, and collar, and being told what to do was really all you wanted.

Well that certainly got his attention.

Needless to say, it didn’t take him long to get into it.

That’s how you ended up on your knees, settling comfortably between his spread-out legs, sucking him off. The sounds of your collar jingling, ringing faster the more adamant you work, and his groans were filling the air around you.

Every now and then he would talk to you, saying absolute FILTH as he tugs on your hair to take ‘deeper, all the way in, yeah just like that. Good, good girl.’

The praise, whenever he gave it, was making you shift uncomfortably, not the “I want to touch myself’ uncomfortable, and letting out small whines of displeasure

You’ve now done it a few times and he’s had enough.

After the last whine hums around him, he pulls your hair to take you off him. Bluntly asking you what the hell was wrong.

You couldn’t keep his intense gaze, instead shifting your eyes to the floor as you state that you’re not used to the praise. That your ‘ex wasn’t exactly keen on giving it to me, so now when it happens I get a little uncomfortable’

Your apology after you explain makes him scoff, he’s not mad at you though. He makes it clear when he tells you not to apologize for something like that.

Internally he is pissed, absolutely irate over the fact that your scumbag of an ex wouldn’t give you any semblance of praise, that you so clearly deserve to have. I mean look at you! You deserve to be told just how amazing you are, and what a fantastic job you’re doing!

But he doesn’t let it show. Externally he just puts on an evil smirk and picks you up from the floor, throwing you over his shoulder as he carries you to your bedroom. Ignoring you squirming and questioning until he throws you onto the mattress.

Before you had the chance to get up he slaps your ass, pinning your shoulders down as he pulls your hips up. Growling in your ear, he tells you he’s ‘gonna give you all the praise you deserve’

You cry out, cumming yet again, your release gushing out of you and onto the sheets as he gives you a groan over it, slapping your clit to make more gush out. Your body becomes sore at the position he has you pinned in; refusing to let you move an inch.

You whimper at his touch, and whine when his pace is still unrelenting as his hips snap into your backside.

“Fuck yeah, puppy. Look at you gushing around me like a dumb bitch in heat. You like that huh? Like how your perfect cunt keeps squeezing me…. So tight!”

He leans his head down, biting your shoulder as he growls yet again at how you clench around him, clearly enjoying what he’s saying.

“Yeah just like. Such a good puppy slut, making me feel so good. Gonna cum deep into you, and you’re gonna take it all. Like the good girl you are, right? Like the perfect puppy you are.”

You cry out a yes, unable to tell him different, unable to find any fault in his praise when he fucks so good.

He was into it the moment you brought it up when your relationship first started getting sexual. Of course, you could be his good girl! He would want nothing more!

Now, you’re in his lap. It started innocent enough, just wanting to cuddle you close as you watch some TV, but it didn’t take long for it to end up with you humping his thigh.

His grip on your hips is tight, as he guides you up and down the expanse of his thighs, flexing his muscles to get you panting all pretty for him. Enjoying how you mewl a little when your clit makes contact every now and then.

He’s telling you how pretty you look, and what a good job you’re doing, and how good of a girl you are at listening to him while getting off on his thigh.

You tried to keep your voice down, but a sad whimper comes out anyway after his praise washes over you. You’re hoping he doesn’t notice, but of course he does.

He halts all movement, bringing his hands up to cup your face. A look of worry on his face as he asks you what’s wrong.

You bury your head in the crook of his neck, sniffling as you tell him it's not true; that you’re not a good girl. Your ex never told you before so what he’s saying right now must not be true

Mirio is totally devastated by your answer, but still tries to brighten the mood and make you feel better. He reassures you, telling you that all he said is true and how perfect you are for him as he plants so many kisses all over you as he holds you close.

He says sweet truths about you, and telling you because you’re so wonderful is the reason why he says them all the time cause they’re true and he’s just gotta tell you

He’ll remind you as often as he can now at just how perfect you are.

“That’s it, just like that. Look at you! You’re doing so good, puppy!”

You let out a mewl that is almost a sob as you slowly, inch by inch, seat yourself down on his cock. The girth stretching your walls almost painfully as you try to take all of him in. Curling in on yourself as you hide your face into his neck, allowing him to finish slowly pushing you down all the way.

“Good girl” He groans when he finally bottoms out, slowly raising your hips up and down to help adjust you to his size “Taking me so well in this perfect pussy of yours. Feels so good, puppy, no one but you can make me feel this way.”

You whine at his, trying to lift your hips to go faster. In an attempt to get him to stop praising you or to cum faster, you wouldn’t know. But what you do know is that you let out a sob when he slows you down, grinding you slowly on top of him.

“Ah ah, puppy. Slow down. Can’t go too fast, I want to savor every last perfect inch of you, okay?”

And well, you’re his good little girl so you let him do as he wants.

When you told him that you wanted to try something different, he didn’t know what to expect but was excited, nonetheless.

When he came home the next day to find you sitting on your knees waiting for him at the front door, lingerie, tail, ears, and collar on. Well, this man became beet RED.

He doesn’t stay flustered for long though, quickly picking you up and running to your bedroom to get things going. You giggle at his excitement and enthusiasm as he quickly sheds you both of your clothing, making sure to keep your accessories one cause god damn

Before long you’re in a mating press, unable to stop wailing and crying out as he pounds harshly into your drooling cunt.

He’s way more into it than you both thought as he leans himself further onto you to whisper some dirty praise into your ear. Telling you that ‘you’re taking my cock so well, aren’t you? Atta girl, yeah, keep squeezing me like that with your perfect cunt. You’re my perfect puppy, aren’t you?’

 His praise was making you feel dizzy, but not in the happy high feeling. More like you’re falling in your dreams, that weird twist in your gut that was one out of pleasure was turning into one of guilt.

You whimper out a quiet ‘no’ and that immediately made his hips stuttered to a stop. It was so out of character for you, in this moment and ones previously, that he couldn’t help but nervously ask what was wrong.

You tell about the praise he just gave you. How, due to previous partners (mainly your most recent ex), that you aren’t used to it. That it makes you feel guilty for him to tell you those things.

He responds by immediately putting your legs down and pulling you upright to sit in his lap, holding you close. Petting your hair, he tells you that your ex was wrong. Dumb and downright stupid for not thinking you anything less then the perfect girl you are.

In fact, why doesn’t he try and make you believe it right now?

“P-please!” You blubber out, trying to pull his head from away from your cunt as your nth orgasm was approaching. The feeling almost painful now, as the pleasure was too intense. “No more!”

“Not yet, puppy.” He chuckled at your feeble attempt “You weren’t being too nice to yourself earlier, so now you gotta take you punishment.”

You just sob at his comment, knowing you are unable to deter him from doing as he pleased. Shaking violently and screaming out into your bedroom when you cum over his face yet again, no longer embarrassed but the sucking and slurping sounds that come from him as he slurps up your release like a man starved.

“God, you taste so sweet puppy. Look at how pretty your pussy is” He rubs at your clit once more, making you keen loudly “Being such a good girl for making such a mess for me, for gushing for me…”

He takes a lick up your folds once again, smirking at your twitching legs.

“Now come one, be a good girl for your master and come one more time?”

[zhuhongs]

Ever since I watched Your Name Engraved Herein two weeks ago, I have wanted to talk about Jiahan as whole but in particular this scene right here that starts around the 40 minute mark. 

CW’s: discussion of religion, internalized homophobia, violent homophobia, choking, and lack of consent. Generally, the same cws as in the movie. 

Read more bc it’s uh.. 2.7k

all images are described in alt text

As soon as I watched this scene I just knew it had to be really significant and now rewatching YNEH, I realize that this is a major ideological turning point for Jiahan as a character. From this point on he slowly begins to accept that he’s gay and starts to consciously act on his feelings for Birdy. However, I must first add some context and insights on Jiahan’s prior behavior before I dive into this scene as a whole. At the beginning of the movie, we see that while Jiahan feels different from the rest of his roomates, he still sneaks out with them when they go hook up with girls, despite not showing any interest in the girl he’s with. He feels very different from the rest of his friends, but still goes along with them due to peer pressure. Later, he tries to dissuade them from violently hazing the gay student, Xie Zhenhong, (his name is never said in the film but it says so on his uniform shirt, and that what I’ll refer to him as for the rest of the post) but is reluctantly influenced to gang up on the student as well. He closes his eyes while he’s about to strike the bat down on the student, until Birdy rescues the student-- and Jiahan in a way-- from what is about to play out. After this, his friends accuse him of being in the same stall as Birdy (which he was) but he denies it, not wanting to explain why he was there and the ensuing taunting from his friends.

 While its obvious that Jiahan has feelings for Birdy, he isn’t confident enough to pursue them outright. Birdy is the more confident one in both their friendship and in his sexuality, not caring about how anyone perceives him and does what he wants regardless of the consequences. Jiahan is the one worried about societal stigma and goes along with things he doesn’t want to do. However after this encounter with the gay underclassman pictured above, Jiahan become more brave and honest about his feelings towards Birdy. Interestingly enough in the scene directly after this, Birdy begins to conceal his true feelings for Jiahan and pursue a straight relationship with Banban. He doesn’t do this hurt Jiahan, as he does reciprocate Jiahan’s feelings, but to discourage him from coming out and becoming a social pariah for being gay. Birdy himself doesn’t mind being an outcast, but he does not want to see the same thing happen to the one he loves. So instead of letting Jiahan do that, he tries to discourage Jiahan from ever pursuing him by getting a girlfriend and suggest Jiahan does the same. In the same day, both Jiahan and Birdy come to opposite realizations about their feelings for the other, thereby changing their dynamic for the course of the movie. Someone else has picked apart Birdy’s scene in their own post. If you haven’t read that analysis, please go read it, because its really good at explaining Birdy’s character since most of his story isn’t directly revealed to us. We must read inbetween the lines and piece it together, which can be confusing on a first watch.

Anyways, now we can focus on Jiahan. At this point in the movie, Jiahan is trying to understand why he’s upset that Birdy is showing interest in a girl in their band while dealing with his own internalized homophobia and denial over his sexuality. He then turns to the only out gay person he knows -- Xie Zhenhong, who he sees in the cafeteria with new bruises on his face. He looks at Jiahan with a smile. This makes me feel like Zhenhong probably picked up on Jiahan and Birdy’s feelings for each other since last year, when he saw them exit the same stall in the bathroom. Having been the Distinguished Out Person in a group before, I can definitely relate to the way Zhenhong reacts to Jiahan. It the typical “oh honey, you don’t realize it yet, but I know you’re gay” reaction. 

 Jiahan waits outside the cafeteria and calls out to out him from behind. At first Zhenhong ignores him as we can see that he smirks a bit when he first speaks. He definitely heard Jiahan but doesn’t answer him until he repeats himself a few times. Zhenhong purposely stops when the two are in front of the stained glass window, away from others. Jiahan’s word choice towards Zhenhong is also interesting as he addresses him as “學弟” which is a term for an underclassman. To my understanding, it’s not overly formal nor is it overly familiar, however it is the nicest way that anyone has addressed him all movie. Jiahan than asks him who gave him those bruises, showing concern for his well being. He then reveals why he stopped Zhenhong saying “Actually I want to ask you, when did you start liking boys?” This really seals the deal to Zhenhong that Jiahan is talking to him to try and sort out his own feelings towards Birdy. While his suggestion that Zhenhong perhaps “see a doctor” or “consider getting a girlfriend” read as a microaggression to most viewers, Zhenhong himself can tell that Jiahan is asking him this in good faith. And perhaps, this might be the most understanding anyone has been towards him since Birdy helped him out prior. Before he responds, he looks up at Jiahan and fixes his bangs. This all stumps Jiahan whose eyes dart around, speechless. Zhenhong then circles his arms around Jiahan’s neck, a very intimate gesture, and studies him for a moment. We cannot see Jiahan’s face at this moment but he does shuffle slightly, his body language nervous and confused, but not upset. After looking at him, Zhenhong then goes in closer, assumedly to kiss him. At this point, Jiahan physically stops him and grabs him by the throat. However, Jiahan’s face doesn’t seem to be angry, if anything, his face looks more scared and confused-- akin to a ‘what are you doing?’ moment.

Initially Zhenhong’s choice to kiss Jiahan read very...strangely to me. Why would the screenwriter, as a gay man that grew up in the 80’s, choose to include this? What was there to gain? To me it seemed like it was reinforcing the stereotype of gay men being overly flirtacious and viewed as predators. Why show a nonconsentual attempted kiss at all? I thought about it a lot, both for this scene and the following one with the old man and later between Jiahan and Birdy because it seemed?? Odd to me?? Isn’t that a disservice in representing gay men? I don’t fully have the right answer but I feel like by writing the scene like this, it goes to demonstrate how Jiahan still isn’t fully comfortable with being gay. And also that lgbt people, especially teens, aren’t always going to be good rep. Liu Kuang-hui wasn’t writing the movie to be an perfect, morally uplifting, santized gay narritive. He was writing something that spoke to his real life experience as a gay man in 1980’s Taiwan. In real life, people do questionable things and good narratives are supposed to make you question characters and their actions and judge for yourself whether what they did was right or wrong. The narrative isn’t looking to condemn Xie Zhenhong for doing this. Xie Zhenhong is ultimately a victim of violent homophobia, that will not hide himself or his sexuality despite the violence he faces. He isn’t perfect, nor is Jiahan, nor is Birdy, nor is anyone in the film. 

Although now having rewatched this scene upwards of eight times in writing this, it feels like Zhenhong didn’t assume this action to be without consent. Of course, no words were explicitly exchanged about kissing, and I’m not trying to make the case that it’s okay to kiss someone without their consent, that’s harassment. However, Zhenhong did gave Jiahan time to express his discomfort before proceeding. Zhenhong first got close to Jiahan by brushing his bangs, Jiahan did not say anything or look visibly uncomfortable. He then put his arms around Jiahan’s neck, and stared at him for a good ten seconds. At this point, Jiahan had time to say he was uncomfortable. As we know it, consent does indeed entail a verbal, understood yes from both parties. However given the context, I can understand why Zhenhong thought that Jiahan was consenting at that moment. However the moment Jiahan revoked his consent Zhenhong stopped trying to kiss him. Zhenhong shouldn’t have gone in without getting verbal consent, and Jiahan could’ve done something other than grabbing him by the throat. They were both in the wrong. Violence shouldn’t have been the reaction, nor should’ve kissing someone without their verbal consent. The lines were very blurred, and proper communication could’ve resulted in a better interaction but like I mentioned above, I don’t think the writers wanted to portray the scene in that way. The intent was not to say that Zhenhong’s actions were romantic or something to emulate. It was very purposeful in showing to interplay of homophobia, gay desire, and religion.

The scene is set up like a religious confession. Zhenhong purposefully leads Jiahan to the stained glass, a metaphor for his religious guilt. He doesn’t look Zhenhong in the eyes, his voice is hushed, and body language nervous, and troubled-- it communicates to Zhenhong that he thinks he may be gay and wants either reassurance that he isn’t or acceptance that is. Regardless, it’s a very vulnerable and intimate moment. Jiahan is facing him like ‘hey, I know my friends were bullying you and I wanted to save you but was too much of a coward and almost took part in harming you. I’m sorry. I know you saw that me and Birdy were in the same stall together, and that you saw me just telling him not to talk to the girls, and neither of those are heterosexual things to do. Please, help me.’ He’s asking Zhenhong to pass judgement on him, is he gay or not? By virtue of even asking that question, they both know the answer -- Jiahan is in love with Birdy, but whether Jiahan can accept that or not is up to him. In a way, Zhenhong is testing Jiahan to see how honest he can be with himself. By approaching him like that, he’s testing to see whether Jiahan can accept being intimate with a man or not. It’s not a good or ethical test, but it sure is effective. Because in his head, Jiahan is coming to realize that he doesn’t mind a man being close to him in a romantic way. Although, he isn’t fully there yet. He still grabs Zhenhong. But as Zhenhong stares at him despite the hand around his throat, Jiahan really has to think about his actions. Is that what he really wants to do, or is that what he’s been taught to do? It illustrates his internalized homophobia perfectly. Jiahan is literally staring gay desire in the face, rejecting it, while in front of his religion. Zhenhong finally answers Jiahan that “he has always loved boys since he was little, it’s never changed.” Upon hearing that his grip loosens and he pulls away. And the fact that we can hear him well means that Jiahan was never choking him, his hand was there, but not gripping. Zhenhong pulls him in closer and tilts his head, and says “and it never will.”  Zhenhong’s words are very deliberate. It’s as if he anticipated this might happen and knew exactly what to say. He wants to carve it in Jiahan’s brain that no one chooses to be gay. They always are and no amount of denial, like the kind Jiahan is showing, will change that. He then finally lets go of Jiahan, who is speechless, he thanks him, and leaves. Jiahan, however, stays there for a second, processing everything that has happened, and breathes heavily before the scene cuts to later that day.

Finally, I would like to examine exactly what Zhenhong’s “thanks” even means. Why would Zhenhong be thanking Jiahan? On the surface, it lookslike Jiahan waited for this guy to finish eating, then asked him invasive questions about his sexuality and suggest he should get help and then almost choked him. This should count as a microagression at best and an attempted hate crime at worst. But, as I just dived into, this wasn’t a bad faith jeer by Jiahan in order to bully Zhenhong, this was a genuine cry for help made by a deeply confused teenager. I feel like the “thanks.” at the end of the scene was perhaps just as puzzling to me as when I thought about why the staff would have that scene play out like that in the first place? I think his thanks is conveying many things. Firstly, thanking him for not actually hurting him and allowing him to have a semi normal interaction with a student of the same gender. As far as we know, many,  MANY different students have tried to hurt him in the new semester alone. Hell, we literally do not even know his name as everyone refers to him by the q slur or some other derogatory term, which speaks a lot to how he is treated. He also may be saying thanks for actually asking him about his sexuality. While Jiahan still followed it up with a suggestion he see a doctor, he still genuinely wanted to know why rather fully assume he has something wrong with him. Also, I feel like he might be thanking Jiahan for being brave enough to actually confront his sexualtiy and ask Zhenhong for help in the first place. Zhenhong really seems to be alone as the only gay student at the school but now knowing that Jiahan is realizing thathe’s gay as well, might make him be hopeful that things may slowly begin to change. Sadly, this interaction is the last time we see Xie Zhenhong all film which sucks because I really liked him. And I feel like it would’ve been really nice to see him after the time skip or at least have Jiahan mention him because this moment was one of the things that really made Jiahan start to accept his sexuality. A cut scene with Father Oliver also contributed, but I really wish Xie Zhenhong got more narrative than being the only out student that was then violently bullied. But, I acknowledge that MANY scenes were cut from the film for length so I can’t complain to much.

Oh god, that was a lot to say about a scene that was literally a minute and thirty seconds long. In conclusion!! I just had a lot of things to say about this scene and the scenes surrounding it. I think Jiahan is just a very painfully relatable character for many LGBT viewers and he was incredibly relatable for me which is why I felt the need to spend my day off writing this as opposed to doing homework. This scene is incredibly rich on many levels and I really appreciate YNEH as a whole for not spoonfeeding the viewer information and letting us interpret and question the scenes on our own and come to our own conclusions about the characters and yea. There’s so much going on and a lot of nuance and idk how to properly convey a lot of my thoughts but I tried really hard bc i really do love this movie. I really was puzzled by this scene at first, but now having examined it, it is my favorite scene in the movie. If this scene was changed in any way to make it more palatable, it would’ve been nearly as impactful which was a hard decision to come to, but I stand by it. I don’t know if I feel the same about other scenes but I will be reviewing YNEH as a whole in a different post. I have much more to say but my thoughts on this scene were far too long to not make it a separate post of its own. In essence, YNEH is about growing up and accepting yourself in all ways. Not all of those things are pleasant but if you cannot accept those things about yourself, you’re doomed to be miserable until you can live life unburdened by your own and societies limitations. Goodnight, my fingers hurt.

[mercurial-madhouse]

Trigger Warning: Healing is painful, but there’s so much light on the other side if we’re strong enough to walk through the dark.

My hope in sharing my story is to help anyone who reads it find peace or healing, just as I always aim with my fiction. If it feels right to you to do so, I encourage you to reblog this. It is highly personal, but I choose to share it publicly.

************

This past Sunday, I received an email responding to my desire to withdraw from a fic fest. Instead of the simple “You have been removed from the fest” that I’d been expecting through an official channel from mods to a participant, this is the response I received. Please be aware, the following is painful.

***

We've removed you from the fest and will mark you down as not being welcome to participate in future fests. We show a great deal of compassion toward our writers, which is why we send reminders, answer any and all questions, and provide extensions when requested. There's a reason why our fest has one of the highest numbers of fics of any fest/challenge in the fandom - it's because we support our participating writers and do everything possible to assist them as they complete their fics.

However, once a writer has repeatedly failed to communicate and missed both a deadline and an extended deadline, it's clear that they do not have any respect for the fest, the mods, our time, or our own unique situations, as we don't have endless extra hours to track down participants in a fic fest. Several reminders on three different platforms, an extension, and requests for writers to simply let us know if they need more time does not demonstrate a lack of compassion in any capacity. We also showed a great deal of compassion by welcoming you with open arms into the [redacted] after you insulted the fest, insulted [redacted] fics, and made writers uncomfortable last year after signing up to beta their fics, all while pretending to support and uplift writers in the fandom just as you did in your email here.

Have a great week!

- [redacted] Mods

***

This email arrived right at the end of the night, just as I was lying down to sleep. I couldn’t read it all the way through. It elicited a trauma response in me. My heart started racing, my palms were sweaty, I was shaking, I felt sick to my stomach.

I went into fight/flight/freeze/fawn mode. My first response was to freeze. In order to escape the barrage of pain bombarding me, I simply dissociated and disconnected from my body. It allowed me to sleep, but barely. I deleted the email in a desperate attempt to pretend it didn’t exist.

The pain caught up with me twenty-four hours later. I couldn’t breathe, my lungs shrunk in around my heart. My whole body locked up. I couldn’t move. I knew that if I spoke, even to say ‘hello’ to someone, I’d start crying.

The moment I was alone in my room the tears came. The pain came, bursting through me. I sobbed uncontrollably, curled into myself on my bed, begging for the pain to stop, begging for a miracle, screaming internally for relief and to understand what I’d done to deserve this because I didn’t have the air for more than broken whispers.

I fell asleep whispering ‘I need a miracle’ over and over. The mantra blocked out all the disgusting thoughts that wanted to keep swirling through my head. This is it. This is the final proof that you don’t belong here. You never have. You never will. Run away, M. It’s over. You tried, you failed. You always do. You always will.

I fell asleep out of sheer exhaustion.

Grief is intense. These are the moments where we don’t think we’ll survive what we’re feeling. My love, whoever you are, if you are reading this, hear from me. The agony passed. I needed to feel that agony, to allow it to move through me and to give myself the space to feel it. Without diving off the deep end into what hurts, I wouldn’t have been able to find the inner peace to keep healing, to start to understand.

The residual pain is still there, even as I write this post. But it no longer overwhelms my senses. And by Tuesday morning, I’d been given insight into what was happening.

I experienced a trauma response because it mirrored mistreatment I first received in childhood from family and classmates alike and continued into my adult life. In full view of others, it was acknowledged as cruel even by my mother, who struggles with her own guilt because she never stood up for me. No one did.

So I internalized the mistreatment. I must deserve it if everyone else around me is ok with me being singled out like this? At first I spoke up for myself. But in the end I stopped speaking up for myself too. I had never healed this pain and here it was, coming back around again, forcing me to face it, to heal it once and for all.

I still do not know what exactly I may have said to cause these accusations that you see in the email. **I do not and will not deny them.** Even if my words were taken in a way I did not consciously intend, to deny that I said anything that caused someone else pain is to deny my own power AND to deny that everyone’s emotions are valid and worth digging into.

I have the power to inflict pain, just as I have the power to spread and share love and joy.

Whatever I said came from a place of pain, of believing I did not belong in this community. That I am not good enough or worthy enough to be here. A series of unfortunate but necessary events when I first entered this fandom completely disintegrated my core beliefs in my abilities as a writer, something I have always kept so close to my heart, and my belief that I had a place in this fandom.

I expect, as I look into my past patterns, that what I did was try to logic why I wasn’t allowed to belong. At the time, this fest was the only subset of the fandom I knew, I was so brand new. So I looked through all the prompts in the fest. I brought a scientific method view to answering the question: “What is it about the fics people write in this fandom am I unable/incapable of doing?”

This process allowed me to generalize everything I saw that I perceived as ‘I can’t do that, this is why I don’t belong here’. Consumed in my own doubt that I could measure up and write something worth reading, I dropped from the fest last year too. If I can’t contribute writing that’s worth reading, I could at least stick with what I do best, which is helping others be their best selves. I had signed up to beta, and I chose to cling to the only grasp of belonging I had, which was through beta’ing. I ended up beta’ing four fics last year for the fest. And, of course, each of them were (and still are) incredible fics. At the time, it was further proof to me of exactly what I can’t accomplish.

In all likelihood, these generalizations, stemming from a place of pain and jealousy because I wanted to write good fics too, came out in a personal conversation with someone, which they translated as a personal attack. It is valid. Whoever you are, your emotions are valid. It does not matter how I meant whatever I said, pain is what you felt. This person did not feel comfortable sharing that pain with me, so instead they turned to others and shared. My moment of vulnerability and pain then spread more pain.

Pain only comes from pain.

The response was to shadow ban me. In fact, I was never meant to find out about any of this. The pain this person shared was simply taken at face value and that was that.

So on my end, this decision showed up in the physical world this way: Suddenly all my asks went unanswered, people I tagged to share snippets and last lines and get to know more through ‘about me’ posts or who had once talked to me through DMs simply stopped speaking to me in a way that is only noticeable to the person being ignored. I thought I was going crazy. But there it was, right in front of me: absolute proof that I wasn’t good enough to be a part of this fandom.

Is anyone else beginning to see the cycle of pain?

I expect I continued this cycle right back, because the pain turned to bitterness. I’d been doing everything I could to support every author the best way I knew how, and this was what I got? The exact opposite?

I found out about this shadow ban and actual blocking around June of this year. An ask sent in by a friend for me, inquiring why I couldn’t reblog a post that’d been sent to me by someone else, finally gave me the answer that I’d been banned for the accusations you saw above.

Horrified, hurt, and unable to comprehend any of this except to know that I support every author no matter what they write, I sent an apology to the mods, trying to end this cycle the best I could without knowing any of the details of what had happened. There was nothing more I could do.

They thanked me for the apology, though as you can see from the email, it was never accepted. I do not say that as a judgement call, but simply as a statement of what happened. Everyone is entitled to accept or not accept in their own time and their own ways.

I have been healing so much since everything that occurred last year. And the more I dig in to this cycle, the more my heart goes out to the drafters of this email, to the person I hurt with my words who then turned to share it out of context with others, and to the people who shadow banned me in connection with this situation.

We attract to us what resonates with us. Like attracts like. Which means just as I’ve attracted the greatest friends to me, I have also attracted this pain, and conversely, these mods and that person attracted me to them.

Deep down, on some level we share the same core wounds. And the person who can really understand just how painful those wounds can be is someone who feels them too.

So this is my message to the mods of the above email, to those who have shadow banned me and want nothing to do with me, and to the original person I hurt with my words:

I am sorry for my part in this pain. I am sorry for causing pain and I apologize for it. You are loved. You are enough. You are doing a fantastic job. Your feelings are valid. Your hurt is valid. I don’t know what occurred that hurt you before I entered the fandom, but after finding out from others that an email like the one you sent above is ‘Oh that’s just how they are’ tells me something else happened to hurt you before I even arrived.

Your hurt then is valid too. Allow yourself to feel it and process it. Don’t let it consume you. Don’t let that hurt and fear of it happening again or believing that that’s how everyone is push away from you people who in fact love just what you love. If someone has a different belief from yours, don’t let it invalidate what is true for you. Believing internalized lies about myself only caused me pain. And we spread and create what we believe to be true, whether we consciously realize it or not.

So here, now, is my truth:

I choose to perpetuate love. I choose to spread love. I choose to understand my pain and the pain of others, to transmute it, and to heal it, instead of passing that pain on.

I choose compassion. Compassion for myself in making these mistakes, and compassion for those who have hurt me. I do not condone the email that was sent to me. No one deserves to be treated that way. I choose to focus beneath the visceral anger and lashing out, to focus on the agony beneath the words, and stop this cycle of pain.

I choose to belong in this fandom. I choose to support every author in this fandom and ensure no one ever feels not good enough. I choose to own my past mistakes and learn from them.

I choose trust. To trust that those who I truly hope will see this, will see it. I have no expectations of responses or outcomes or reactions. My only hope is that whoever will benefit from seeing this post will see it.

This is not a matter of right or wrong, bad or good, just or unjust. It is a situation of two parties in pain, triggered by the same triggers.

Looking back on that email, I’ve come to realize that half of the pain I felt when I received it was not my own. I felt the pain of the attack, sure, but I also felt the immense pain beneath those words. And I wish I could hug you. I acknowledge your pain and I acknowledge how painful it is because I know that pain myself. I also know that this pain isn’t you and it isn’t who you are.

So I choose to remember the mods I first met around this same time last year in this same email chain. Mods who were so kind and offered advice to a brand new writer even when she sent an email that had nothing to do with the fest and was still struggling to find her place in the fandom. I choose to remember how beautiful that kindness felt. I choose to remember how I was so grateful for that kindness that I shared my gratitude for these same mods in an email with with another fandom friend at the time. I am still grateful for you.

You are so loved. You are loved for being exactly who you are. This fandom is built upon love. A shared love of five incredibly talented lads who have brought so much joy and light when each and every one of us has needed it the most. Shine your light through the dark and believe with all your heart that you are not alone. You have support. I support you. Shine on. Don’t let anyone dim it.

[voiceless-terror]

Jon plays the piano. That’s it, that’s the fic.

At first, he thinks it’s the radio. It’s not uncommon for these stores to play classical music, trying to add an air of sophistication in what’s otherwise a dark room of dusty knicknacks. But when he walks towards the noise, he instead finds Jon sitting at the bench of an old wooden upright, his posture straighter than Tim’s ever seen it, hands moving slowly but deftly across the keys as he leans into each note.

It’s mesmerizing.

Jon must hear his footsteps as he doesn’t startle when Tim sits beside him. “You never told me you could play,” Tim says, too enthralled to be truly annoyed by it. Jon gives him a self-deprecating smile, though his eyes don’t leave the keys.

“I can’t, not anymore,” he responds in complete defiance of his actions. Tim’s always loved Jon’s hands, delicate and slender and naturally elegant in all of their movements; even the most awkward of gestures made with a sort of grace. He shouldn’t be surprised that he plays so wonderfully. But Jon’s always been protective of his interests, careful not to volunteer too much information lest he be laughed at or scorned. Sometimes, when it’s only the two of them, and occasionally Sasha, he’ll let his guard down and his enthusiasm for even the most mundane of subjects is surprisingly contagious.

“Well, seeing as how I can only do Hot Cross Buns, I think you can, actually.”

“Middle C is flat,” Jon continues as if Tim hadn’t spoken, his brow furrowing in annoyance. He taps at the key a few times, but Tim’s never had a good ear for that sort of thing, so he’ll have to take Jon’s word for it. “They should really keep this in better condition, it’s a shame.” He stops his tapping but his hands still flutter over the keys as if they itch to play more. Tim would gladly sit here all day and listen.

“What was that?” He nudges Jon’s shoulder, pleased when Jon leans further into his side. 

“Satie. From his Trois Gymnopedies.” 

“Ooh, nice accent,” he teases, though he does indeed love it. “Someone passed their French A-level.”

“Shut up,” Jon butts his head affectionately against his shoulder, his face flushing. “You’re just as bad with your insufferable Italian.”

“Alright, alright,” Tim lets out a small laugh. “It’s just, you never said. Seems like you enjoy it.”

“I did,” Jon replies, his eyes going distant. He gets like that, when he talks about his past. Tim knows very little of it, though Jon insists there’s ‘nothing to know.’ Jon’s told him about what brought him to the institute in a rare moment of vulnerability, but other than that, he knows the bare minimum. “I still do, I suppose. You know, my Gran was the one who actually pushed me into the lessons.”

Jon doesn’t talk much about his grandmother. He remembers back when he first started, Jon disappeared for a week and Sasha kept checking her phone anxiously. Tim later found out that his grandmother had died, that Jon was the only one left to take care of such things. That Jon was an orphan. That Jon came back with that stiff upper lip even though he looked like shit, and promptly crumbled when Tim gave him an awkward, one-armed condolence hug. 

From what Tim knows, she wasn’t the greatest guardian. Far from it in his opinion. But she was all Jon had.

Not anymore.

“Said I needed something to distract me from- from-'' his voice stutters out and Tim wraps his arm around Jon’s waist- he knows. He doesn’t need the explanation. “Well, she wasn’t the type of person to recommend therapy. It was her way of showing that she cared.” Or just wanted you dealt with, Tim doesn’t voice.

“Did it work?” He knows the answer.

“Not at all,” Jon smirks and his hands abruptly fly across the keys in a lively, fast tune. Jon isn’t just good, he’s excellent. The way his eyes brighten and his face lights up - the man’s in his element. “Still enjoyed it, though. And I was pretty good at it, entered a few competitions.” Pretty good is more than an understatement, but Jon’s never been one to brag over things that truly matter.

“What’s this one called?”

“Rondo alla ingharese quasi un capriccio,” Jon rolls out in an over-exaggerated Italian accent. “More commonly known as Rage Over a Lost Penny.”

“You could’ve just said that.”

“I could’ve, yes,” he replies playfully, the lilting tones of the music perfectly matching his little smile. He’s an infuriating little bastard. Tim loves it.

“You didn’t want to go professional? Hit the big time?”

“Hardly,” Jon snorts in derision, his hands stilling again. “Gran was right, it wasn’t practical. No use paying for a degree in music when so few people make it.” The music, still lively, goes a bit softer. “Didn’t stop me from auditioning, though.”

“Really?” He tries to imagine a young Jon in front of a panel of judges. “Must have been nerve-wracking.”

“Indeed.” Jon says stiffly, his hands abruptly stopping as they hit a sour note. “I had a panic attack before my hands hit the keys.”

Tim winces in sympathy. “Oh, Jon…”

“And I haven’t played since.” Tim reaches out to take Jon’s hands in his own, although the man avoids his eyes. Jon puts up a hard exterior, but he’s very easily wounded. One wrong word, one bad experience- it’s internalized, played over and over in his head. People don’t realize that about him, but Tim knows better than others that the mind keeps score. “I think a part of me knew she was right. Shouldn’t have bothered.”

“That’s a pity,” Tim once again wishes Jon had one person he could’ve relied on as a child. One adult he could confide in or get encouragement from. He thinks about young Jon, tiny and traumatized and alone, and his chest aches with it. “I think you could’ve made it.”

“Sweet of you.” Jon leans against his side and closes his eyes. “But there’s no need to flatter.”

“It’s not flattery if it’s true,” Tim insists. And yeah, maybe he’s not well-versed in music, but he knows talent and passion when he sees it. He used to see it in his brother all the time. And it’s sad that Jon doubts himself so much. He should be able to at least enjoy his hobby without being reminded of the guilt and what-could’ve-beens.

“Always wanted to learn an instrument,” he begins carefully, letting go of one of Jon’s hands to tinker at the keys. “Maybe I’ll get a keyboard, you can show me the ropes.”

The hand still in his twitches, and he turns to see the small beginnings of a shy smile. Jon’s a good teacher, patient and kind when someone shows a genuine interest in what he has to say. And Tim would do anything to see that easy, boyish smile again, see those fingers flying across the keys with such enjoyment.

“Not sure if you can afford my rates, Stoker.”

“Hey-!”

A cough cuts into his argument. It’s the old woman who sat behind the counter as they arrived, and she’s looking at a spot somewhere above Tim’s ahead. He turns around.

DO NOT TOUCH.

“Sorry ‘bout that,” he drags Jon up from the seat, ignoring his squeak. “We’ll just be going now!”

They sprint out of the store, giggling like naughty school children the entire way. Jon’s genuine laughter is rare, and something to be treasured - nothing like the sarcastic snorts he usually prefers. 

“Damn!” Jon swears as he checks his watch, smile still lingering on his face despite the furrow in his brow. “We were supposed to interview that witness at noon, it’s already half past.”

“Don’t worry, this was a necessary detour,” Tim assures him. And for him, it was. “Piano could’ve been haunted, after all.”

Jon rolls his eyes as he barks out a laugh. “Haunted. Yes, of course.”

On the train, Tim googles how much a keyboard costs. He’s thinking he might take it up after all.  

ao3: https://archiveofourown.org/works/31219403

[forehead-enthusiast]

Checkmate

Pairing: Haechan x Reader

Genre: enemies to lovers, fluff but it gets slightly steamy at one point (still totally sfw)

Word Count: 6k

Summary: You and Haechan get engaged, because anything is better than the process of trying to get engaged. That being said, having a fiancé you hate isn’t that much better.

Author’s notes: remember me???????? I’m alive, yeah. I’m super proud of this fic, I think it’s my best ever, so please give it a read!!

.

Haechan inhaled the overwhelming scent of floral perfume, and barely managed to stifle a gag. His father arranged for him to meet more and more foreign princesses every week, and he wondered where the man even kept finding them. Were there even this many countries? The prince’s surroundings were beginning to blend into a blur of painted smiles and emotionless eyes. He cursed that stubborn old man in his mind, and questioned furiously why it was even so important that he find a bride any time soon. Still, no matter how much he despised it, he knew his father wouldn’t accept anything less. 

He looked into the sea of lace gowns and resigned himself.

Maybe he’d just choose someone. Anyone. He smiled morosely, knowing all the women there were only after their shot at the throne anyway. They were here to use him, why shouldn’t he use them too? The apathetic thought left a bad taste on his tongue. Still, in his exhaustion at his circumstances, it seemed more and more reasonable the longer he considered it.

He searched throughout the crowd of giggling princesses, unable to distinguish between their faces. 

One after another, they approached him, with candied smiles and words that were far too practiced. One after another, they convinced him a loveless marriage with someone half-decent was far preferable to enduring this a moment longer. One after another, they revealed themselves to be absolutely unbearable, and Haechan grew more and more desperate to find someone that didn’t make him want to throw himself off a balcony after three sentences.

You stood at the back of the crowd, prodded by impatient elbows and sneered at by women hiding their smirks behind fans. You rolled your eyes, unable to understand this need, this hunger to marry someone they’d never met. That was your problem, according to your parents. And your advisors. And your tutors. According to everyone, really. You’d been to so many different kingdoms, trying to seduce unfamiliar princes, but could never bring yourself to actually put any effort into it. The carriage that shipped you to each one was beginning to feel more like home than the castle you’d left.

You watched girl after girl leave the ballroom, looking thoroughly dejected. It was hard not to relish in their failure just a bit, but you dreaded whatever high standards this prince was going to judge you with. You had little to offer. Your background, your kingdom, your land- none could remotely compare to his. Your parents were completely insane to even think you had anything that would make you lucrative as a bride to him.

Maybe they’re hoping he’ll behead me. You chuckled.

Still, the crowd continued to thin, and you couldn’t put off meeting him forever. A few of the weaker-hearted girls nudged you forward, suddenly less eager to meet the sharp-tongued prince. 

You sighed, and decided to get it over with.

.

Haechan rubbed at his temples, barely even looking at the girl who approached him now. He’d made up his mind to find a bride today, but his prospects weren’t looking so good. His eyes caught the hem of this princess’s dress. It was unadorned. He’d go so far as to call it plain. Many princesses were after his riches, but he’d never seen one that was so blatantly poor. Most at least tried to disguise their lack of wealth, so as to make them more desirable in terms of growing power. He half-chuckled, half-sighed. His gaze traced upward lazily, until it came across the first unsmiling face he’d seen all day. It shocked him so much that his hand dropped from his face, and he stood up instinctively.

“Your highness, thank you for allowing me to meet with you today-”

It was the most monotonous, disinterested introduction he’d ever heard, and his heart soared. You hadn’t even noticed he’d stood up. Incredible.

“Let’s get married.”

“I hope- excuse me?”

“Let’s get married. Can we go right now?” The question was directed to the attendant beside him, who sputtered at the prince’s sudden enthusiasm. No one, however, was more surprised at him than you. Your skirts were still clutched in your fists, your knees still bent in a curtsy. You couldn’t even manage to feel happy that he’d chosen you.

If anything, you felt angry.

He was rattling off instructions to his attendant about the wedding he’d already begun to plan, completely ignoring you. You hadn’t even responded to his proposal, if you could call his demand that. You tried to get in a polite word in time and time again, only for him to not even acknowledge you, until you got so sick of him talking you couldn’t stand it anymore.

“No!”

Finally, he turned to you.

“No?”

“I don’t want to marry you.” You ignored the consequences of your words, and avoided thinking about the awaiting rage of your parents.

The prince blinked. 

Then he scoffed.

“Of course you do.”

You cocked an eyebrow, your expression not betraying how absolutely pissed those four words had made you. Instead, the first smile you’d shown him spread on your face. It was chillingly false, your eyes boring deep holes into his face as you sweetly replied:

“I’d burn down this castle before I married you, your highness. Good day.”

And with that, you turned and left the ballroom.

Haechan didn’t move for a few moments as he watched you stalk away, a picture of grace even in your anger. The women who remained and witnessed began to whisper, snapping him out of his shock. His head flicked around the room, trying to comprehend what had just happened. Then, just as you vanished around a corner, he took off after you.

He’d been turned down. How? Why? He was rich. He was influential. You were neither. He felt a nagging pang of guilt, but suppressed it. You were poor. His proposal was a generous offer, for you and your kingdom. You were the one losing out by rejecting him. So why? Why was he the one chasing after you? He cursed under his breath as he caught sight of your back.

“You! Wait up!”

You heard him calling, but only sped up. 

“I will call the guards if you don’t stop this instant! I-I command you to stop!”

You did. Then you turned on your heel, with a glare that would send armies fleeing, and stomped towards him much faster than he knew a princess could. He flinched as you were suddenly toe to toe with him, taller than he expected. You seemed smaller when he was sitting on his throne. You sneered at his reaction.

“Do you need your guards just to take care of one woman, little prince?”

He flushed, but you didn’t let him respond.

“You don’t even know my name. I’m not, ‘you.’ I don’t know why you want to marry me, but if you want me to agree, maybe learn that first.”

“You-” Haechan fumbled, unused to someone being blunt with him. He flared up, unable to think straight.

“You’re lucky to get an offer like this, you know.”

He saw the way your eyes widened in indignation, but kept digging his own grave as if he’d find treasure eventually.

“You won’t get an opportunity like this again. And, for your information, I only want to get married so I can finally be done with all,” he gestured towards the direction of the ballroom you’d both just left, “this.”

Despite your anger, his reason struck a chord within you. Not that that made your tone any less cutting.

“So I’m supposed to be grateful that you’re using me?”

“We’re royalty. We’re all getting used by someone, aren’t we?”

You bit the inside of your cheek, and he could tell you didn’t find the idea all so repulsive. He pressed forward.

“You’re tired of it all too, aren’t you? Or do you want to keep getting shoved at princes? We’d both get our parents off our backs. It’s a good deal.”

It was frustrating, but your desire to stop meeting spoiled princes was beginning to outweigh your immense dislike of this one. And as much as you hated it, he was right when he said you wouldn’t get an offer as good as this one ever again. Maybe that’s why he chose you, you supposed. He knew you couldn’t afford to say no. (Not that that had stopped you.) It just angered you that he saw you as someone so desperate, so needy, so pitiful. 

“...Fine.” You stuck out your hand in impersonal assent. “But. I don’t want to marry you.”

“Yeah, me neither.”

“I’m not done, little prince.” He restrained his scowl and motioned for you to continue. “Let’s just get engaged. That’s enough reason to end all the marriage meetings, and then if it turns out I really just cannot stand you, we’ll call it off. Fine?”

“Fine.”

He shook your hand firmly.

Despite the way you both glared at each other, neither of you could deny how pleased you were with this arrangement. 

While you sent word to your family, he went directly to his, who were thoroughly, almost obnoxiously happy that he’d found someone. He forced a grin and made up some lies about how he’d fallen for you at first sight. They weren’t exactly excited about your less than impressive background, but weren’t about to reject the only girl who’d managed to catch their discerning son’s eye.

Within a day, it was announced throughout all your fiancé’s kingdom that he’d found a woman to wed. You managed to laugh about how all the other princesses must be incredibly jealous of you at this moment, but couldn’t quite get over the fact that you were one foot into a lifelong commitment with the rudest man you’d ever had the displeasure of meeting. It was a troubling internal conflict. On one hand, he was the worst. On the other, the same could be said for just about every other prince you’d ever met. So really, it was an overall win that this one didn’t expect you to love or fawn over him.

At least, that’s what you repeated to yourself as you received the list of engagement events you were expected to attend alongside him.

.

“Do we really have to do this?” You groaned.

“Just shut up and smile, they’re about to see us.”

You reluctantly did as he said, forcing an exuberant grin onto an unwilling face. Your carriage turned into the courtyard, and crowds cheered wildly, as if they actually cared about your wellbeing in some way. You waved gently, relieved your upbringing was so ingrained within you that you could play your role without ceasing your fantasies of punching your fiancé in the face. As you reached your places of honor, Haechan offered a gallant hand to help you down, and you almost admired how well he played the part of a loving gentleman.

It was such a truly lovely banquet being thrown for you, it almost made you feel bad for lying. Haechan seemed to be thinking similarly, and, forgetting to be vindictive, leaned over to whisper jokingly in your ear.

“Poor fools actually think we’re in love.”

You laughed brightly without thinking. Both of you then remembered you hated each other, and stared at each other in shock before looking away sharply. You waved again, happy to be doing something that made sense to you. The hordes of celebrating nobles clapped and called out their congratulations again as soon as they saw you move, not wanting to get on the bad side of what they assumed was their future queen. That was a pretty nice feeling, and you accidentally smiled sincerely.

Haechan, still stunned by the sound of your real laugh, wasn’t prepared to see your real smile. His eyes widened. It was more beautiful than he expected, and didn’t threaten him with cavities the way every woman in his life’s did. If they were processed white sugar, you were honey with all the real sweetness in the world on your face. He hazily tried to remember when he last smiled genuinely. You turned to him with a gleam in your eye, and he took your hand before rationality could persuade him otherwise.

The smile dropped off your face, and your gaze flicked to your intertwined fingers, then to his expression, which seemed even more confused than yours somehow. He looked boyish and bashful, and you wondered if your haughty fiancé had a far more charming twin.

Lucky for Haechan, the crowd cheered yet louder at the sight of your supposed affection, and he tilted his head towards them as if to say, See, that's why. Normally, you wouldn't have believed it was part of his plan, but it was easier that way. You let him lift your entwined hands in some playfully bragging way, and rolled your eyes.

.

“Alright, so I get the bed.”

“That’s funny. No, I get the bed. It’s my kingdom!”

“You are not being very gentlemanly right now.”

“And you didn’t seem like the kind of girl who’d enforce those kinds of antiquities.”

You scowled, and Haechan looked smug, which only intensified your frustration.

“Fine. Then let’s decide fairly, little prince.” You loved to call him that, just to see him pretend it didn’t irk him. “If I beat you in chess, I get the bed. And vice versa.”

“...Fine, small princ- annoying- um- pret- dum-”

You couldn’t help but grin at his attempts. “Nice try, but I’m not immature enough to be annoyed by a silly nickname.”

Your fiancé grimaced and got out the chess board.

.

Hours later, you were still playing the first game of chess.

“Y/n… Can we… Can we…” Haechan yawned enormously, which of course prompted you to as well. “Can we maybe… call a truce for tonight? It’s a big bed. We have to be up early for a garden party.”

You wanted to rejoice in his surrender, but your eyes were teary with exhaustion. Instead of the easy win you expected, you’d been in the longest game of your life. It seemed like you two were well matched for one another.

As opponents, of course.

“Fine… But just- just for tonight. We’ll play again tomorrow.”

And with that, you both crawled into the truly extravagant bed, falling asleep before your heads hit the pillows. 

Many nights passed, with an unfinished chess game at the end of each. It grew into something of a habit, a nightly chess game, always accompanied by bickering, of course. Neither of you ever managed to truly best the other, with every game ending the way the first did. As they continued, the bickering smoothed into mocking conversations, and sometimes you weren’t even mocking each other, but a common enemy. You would never admit it, but the pair of you started laughing together more often than you did at each other these days.

On some fateful Tuesday, for the first time ever, you saw a clear move to checkmate. The king was unguarded. For the first time, he was vulnerable. It was glaringly obvious, and you snuck a glance at your opponent’s face to see if it was a trap, but were taken aback when you found him already staring at you. He didn’t look triumphant or concerned, but he somehow looked… nervous. Or maybe expectant? And then you realized. He was far too good a player to make an error like this one. He was offering you a choice, from one royal with too much pride to admit they enjoyed the other’s company to another. It would be easy to end this game right now, and banish him to the floor.

You chose another move, and the game continued.

.

“So what’s on the agenda tomorrow?” You asked, with a tone more befitting of a business partner than a fiancé. The two of you had gotten pretty used to the whole routine of feigning adoration, and typically planned cute moments to perform in advance. 

Haechan looked over at you and sighed in a way that might have been more amused than exasperated. 

“Would it kill you to sit like a lady?”

You looked down at yourself, eating a biscuit you’d pocketed from today’s lavish banquet, with your legs criss-crossed as you lounged on the bed in your nightgown. The white fabric was hiked up above your knees to accommodate the posture, and catching all the crumbs that fell.

“Aren’t I?”

Haechan couldn’t mask his amiable laugh at that. You felt strangely proud when you made him truly laugh. It was one of the few times his shoulders really relaxed, and he looked like the cheerful boy he might’ve been without the pressure of royalty on his back.

“So… what’s on the agenda?”

Haechan didn’t answer right away. He was still looking your direction but seemed zoned out. 

“Haechan?”

He flinched, always shocked when you used his real name instead of a mocking nickname.

“W-what? Oh, we’ve got a ball.”

“Ugh… Boring. You better not leave me alone with all the gossiping hags.” 

“Yeah, sure. Uh, for real, could you sit properly?”

“Whaaat, I’m comfy.”

“Seriously.”

That irked you. You were just sitting, and while you hadn’t fully realized it, Haechan was someone you'd grown comfortable being yourself around. You didn’t need another person in your life telling you the way you behaved was wrong, and against your will, you had begun to expect more from him. You felt something too close to heartbreak as you wondered if he was just another person who disapproved of you.

“No, I don’t want to.”

“It’s not a big deal, why can’t you?”

“Because you’re right. It’s not a big deal, so why do you seem to care so much?”

“Can you just do it?!”

“No! Didn’t you get on me for- for ‘enforcing those antiquities’ or whatever? Now you’ve got a problem with the way I sit or how I dress-”

“It’s not- it’s not like that!”

“Then what?!” You flared up at him further, as did he, but he seemed less angry and more... agitated. You laughed mockingly. “Whaaaat are you shy seeing my legs or something-”

“YES! They’re- they’re. Um. Well…” He looked at the floor, and you could’ve sworn you heard him whisper, “pretty,” before he flicked his head back up and stammered the marginally less embarrassing, “distracting.”

Your anger instantly dissolved when he confessed that, and you flushed in a way you didn’t know you could. You stared at the ground, tugging your nightgown gently down. You’d always hated being treated like a lady, but you’d never been treated like a woman, and you found you didn’t hate it quite as much. This might’ve been the first time in either of your lives that the two of you were ever actually lost for words. Neither could formulate some witty remark or snide comment, and you just boiled in the unfamiliar atmosphere neither of you sought to create.

“Uh,” Haechan broke the silence masterfully. “I-I think I’m going to turn in early.”

“Yes. Goodnight.”

“Goodnight.”

.

You might have climbed in bed early- no chess game for the first time in ages- but you both woke up exhausted. Four feet apart, two fiancés had stayed up late replaying the night in their minds and subsequently panicking.

“G-good morning.”

“Good morning.”

The day whirled by, with most of it being spent simply getting dressed for the evening ball. You spent most of the day slapping your face and reminding yourself of how you used to act around him, and when you heard a knock at your door, you were ready.

He told himself he was, but he wasn’t. 

Haechan took a deep breath and let his gaze trail up from your skirt to your face, and he stiffened. He’d grown used to his fiancé looking beautiful in the luxurious dresses she wore daily- even though it stunned him more than he’d admit the first time. This dress was no different, no more extravagant, no, but the pink tinge on your cheeks was a beauty he couldn’t have imagined.

“You look… decent.”

He celebrated internally for managing to say something an unflustered him might have said, although some tiny part of himself wished he could pay you a compliment normally.

Your sigh slid into a laugh, and you found your rhythm in your rapport again.

“And you look just adorable, little prince.”

He glared, but was relieved to hear the dig. He offered you the crook of his elbow, and you clapped your hands to your cheeks once more before taking it. He flinched at the sharp sound, and observed your cheeks grow red again from the impact.

“Youch.”

“It’s not that bad, honestly. I’ve been doing it all day to wake myself up.”

Haechan hummed a response. He couldn’t form words; all his brainpower was focused on figuring out why that statement had just disappointed him so. As he rounded the corner towards the ballroom, though, he shook it from his mind.

You entered the ballroom to the usual thunderous applause. Haechan led you down the immaculate gold staircase, and you clung to his arm, the perfect image of a lovestruck princess. No one noticed you holding on a little tighter than usual tonight. The band struck up a song, and you took the hands of possibly the only person you'd ever considered a friend. He led you to the center of the floor and began to waltz. It was always a satisfying feeling to watch the crowds make way for you. You looked everywhere but at your partner, and aimlessly wondered if you’d even been in this ballroom before. Just when you thought you’d seen every room in the massive castle, you’d be led to a wing you didn’t even know existed. The idle thoughts occupied you, which was probably for the best, since it meant you didn’t notice the way Haechan was looking at you.

The dance ended, and you went separate ways to entertain people who made you feel like your brains were melting. Seriously, one day your mind was just going to leak out your ears and spill onto the polished floors. It was amazing how you could spend hours talking to one person night after night, but half an evening with these sycophants made you contemplate faking your own death.

Finally, your reprieve came in the form of an attendant, whispering in your ear that the crown prince was requesting your presence.

“So sorry ladies, my future husband and I are just inseparable.”

They gave you condescendingly knowing looks, their eyes practically screaming, Just wait a few more years, child, you’ll tire of each other. You had to turn away quickly so they didn’t catch you sneering at them. Whatever. You wouldn’t be with him in a few years anyway, you would have gone your separate ways by then.

Right?

Something about that thought didn’t feel right. Not even sad, just… not right. You thought rapidly as you let your attendant guide you. What was your original agreement? If I realize I… Wait… If I end up still hating him, then the engagement’s off? Those were the terms. Which meant, if you didn’t hate him, then inevitably you’d end up mar-

“Y/n!”

You looked up sharply, not realizing you’d crossed the ballroom already. However, even when looking forward, you didn’t see the person who’d just called your name. Your eyes flitted about, searching for the familiar face. You took a few steps in no particular direction, massively confused, and then suddenly terrified when a hand reached out from behind a curtain and pulled you to join its owner. Not the type to lose composure and scream, you clenched your jaw so tight it almost broke until you saw your fiancé's face shrouded in the shadows of the velvet drapes. 

“What took you so long?”

His question wasn’t at all rude, as it once might’ve been. It was one of genuine relief to see you, as if you were his solace amongst all the fools at the ball. You met his eyes for maybe the first time this evening, and they were bright and warm and looked at you the way no one ever did. Like you mattered. Like he wanted you there. Not the facade you put on for everyone, he wanted the real you. 

Oh God, I don’t hate him at all.

“Earth to y/n?” He chuckled as you snapped to attention. “Finally, you’re here. Is this the worst ball yet or what?”

“Yes! It’s seriously unbearable.”

“I knew you’d agree. By the way, have you still been slapping your face? You shouldn’t in front of guests, they’ll think you’re crazy.” He teased you over your red flush without giving it a second thought. You hadn’t touched your cheeks in hours. The realization only made you blush even more. He leaned in close, and you stood stock-still with surprise.

“Do you want to vanish for a while?”

“What?” The absurdity of the idea finally overwhelmed all other distractions from your mind. “How can we leave, we’re the guests of honor?”

“Please, nobody cares. They’re all busy trying to climb the social ladder anyway. Besides, we’ve got this great hiding spot.”

You stifled a laugh. “Yeah, squeezing between a window and some drapes is what I call ideal.”

“Hey, it’s got, like, enough room for us!”

That was a bit of hyperbole on Haechan’s part. You both barely fit in the narrow space, and you thanked the stars you hadn’t worn a larger hoop skirt tonight. Suddenly you were back to evading making eye contact again. A hush fell over you as you thought about how incorrect his statement just was, and you both grew acutely aware of how you couldn’t position yourselves in any way that would allow you to put some distance between your bodies. You cursed yourself for not postponing your life-shattering revelation about the man before you until after this little endeavor. Haechan’s mind raced as he saw the red on your skin remain even in the dim light.

You could only avoid each other’s gazes for so long. 

He locked eyes with you, and you envisioned pieces moving across a board, your king running out of ways to escape its fate. There was only one end, and you were starting to love the idea of surrendering. You whispered harshly in the sarcastic way that felt comfortable to you, still too prideful to admit your defeat.

“So are you going to kiss me, or am I going to kiss you?”

Haechan answered by pressing a palm to the back of your neck and pulling you towards him perhaps too eagerly. A second later, you’d both pulled away, frantically looking around to see if anyone was peering in on you both. You relaxed when you confirmed no one has discovered you.

“This isn’t... a good time, Haechan.”

“I could not agree more. Way too risky.”

Neither of you waited a moment more to lunge towards each other again. His lips found yours roughly, his breath already ragged with overworked patience. You grabbed his lapels, no less desperate for this moment, your lipstick smearing onto him. Your fists crushed his boutonniere, and his fingers wove into your hair and ruined the curls. There was no party beyond the curtain. You and him were alone, both desperate to memorize the taste of each other, and nothing else mattered but that. His lips parted, and yours followed suit. His tongue just brushed your lower lip, and you felt a thrill run down your spine. Your arms wrapped around his neck unconsciously, trying to get closer to him than was possible, but nothing could stop you from trying. You caught his lip between your teeth, your instincts running wild, and you wondered how either of you had endured up until this point. Now that you’d gotten a taste of each other, it seemed almost impossible not to get addicted. He gripped your hair, his other arm wrapping around your waist and not letting go. It slid down to grab your thigh and wrap it around him, your dress’s layers barely inhibiting him. Every inch of you was so aware of where it made contact with him, and you hungered for more. All facades were shed. You were both just heat and teeth and desire, without a shred of nobility between the two of you. You’d never experienced anything so perfect.

The two of you finally parted, your lips wet and the rest of you looking disastrous. He pressed his lips to your cheek, getting your own lipstick on your face, and you pulled his palm up to kiss it over and over again. Too breathless to continue and too worked up to just stop, you let the clock tick by as you left soft kisses all over each other.

“What are we going to do?” You whispered, half concerned but half amused. Between sentences, you still found places on his face yet unkissed, and remedied them. “We can’t go back out looking like this.”

“What are you talking about? I look great.” You were both too elated to remember you should be worried about your predicament, but he did seem genuinely proud of the pink smears adorning his face and neck, the teeth marks framing his lips, the fierce creases in his lapels. He brushed his fingers on your cheekbones, and looked even prouder of the mess he’d made of you. It felt like a dream to be touching you like this. Even more unreal to know that he was the cause of your disheveled hair and your chapped lips. He may or may not have imagined a moment like this before, late at night when he couldn’t stop his mind from wandering, but it was buried in the back of his mind and nowhere near as euphoric as this reality.

“No, but seriously, we can’t go out like this.”

“No yeah, for sure, you’re absolutely right.”

.

You managed to escape thanks to the tight-lipped attendant who’d led you to a curtain concealing a prince in the first place, but found yourselves rather tight-lipped too. Once you’d both washed off the lipstick and the teeth marks faded, you didn’t know how to face each other. You just crawled into bed and discreetly squirmed as you thought about all that had happened. What was more embarrassing, that you realized you might, maybe, possibly, have feelings for each other, or that the other person might know about them? It was already late when you turned out the lights, but you both stayed up longer, plagued by worries.

They must be so smug since I was all over them, I’m such an idiot.

God, I can’t believe how intense that was. What if they hated it? What if I was bad at it?

Did they only kiss me ‘cause of how much I was kissing them?

Are we like… friends? They probably don’t hate me, so…

That was really unbelievable.

I think I might really… feel something for them.

I hope they feel the way I do.

The hurricanes of concerns led to a restless night, and a mortifyingly awkward day afterward. You couldn’t even look at each other, let alone speak. Even the servants seemed to notice the tension, and you could hear them giggling when they’d disappear into the corridors. You tried to tell yourself that that was great, that it really sold your act as a couple of lovebirds, but that just embarrassed you all the more. Your fiancé was just as tormented, the blush that was sparking gossip reaching all the way to the tips of his ears.

Eventually, someone had to break the silence. If not with words, then with the slamming of a chess board down on the usual table. And that’s exactly what you did, not that who slept in the bed was something that still concerned either of you. No, now it was just routine, something you enjoyed and shared with each other, and something you were going to use to discuss your current feelings.

“C-come play, little prince.”

Even the nickname didn’t manage to get him to flare up. He walked over, still with the air of importance that was second nature to him, but his pounding heart almost echoed against his ribs. You set up your black pieces and he took the white. He moved a pawn towards you.

“So…”

“Yeah.” You slid a piece across the board. He nodded, his cheeks burning. You both knew what you had to say and what the other person was going to say, but that only made it all the more difficult to verbalize.

“I guess I don’t hate you. As much as I used to.” You said hurriedly, your voice forcibly steadied.

“Oh, what an honor.” Haechan’s snarky response was accompanied by a trembling hand moving a rook. He yelled at himself internally, and attempted to be as honest as he could. “I… suppose you’re not unbearable.” The biting words didn’t sting, nor did they flow the way they once did. It saddened both players, even though it had only been a day since you both had been without the banter of your best friend. Slowly, you started to regret the night before, the ecstatic memories being clouded with the fear that you might lose the most important person to you because of it. 

“I-”

“I-”

“Oh, sorry, you start-”

“No, you-”

“No-”

“Okay, fine!” You huffed, accepting the initiative. You pushed your rook straight forward. “I… have always hated the idea of getting married. Everything about it- the formalities, the responsibilities, the princes, ugh. Awful.”

“Gee, thanks.” 

“I’m not done, okay!” Pieces shuffled around the board as you tried to organize your thoughts. “If I… had to marry someone…” Your sentence trailed off, and Haechan leaned forward, ears itching to hear the conclusion. You stared at the board, and he steeled himself. It would’ve been a blow to his persistent pride if he just waited for you to say everything.

“I’m…” What did he need to say first? His mind blanked, and he just let the words fall from his lips. “I’m sorry.”

Your eyes widened, but remained fixed on the game. “For what?”

“For not listening to you. The first day we met. I didn’t… treat you the way I should’ve. I’m sorry for that. But I’m… also glad it happened. If I’d acted differently then maybe you wouldn’t be in front of me. That would be, uh, not ideal. But I’m sorry.”

“Um. Thanks. I’m glad it happened too. Otherwise we might still be pretending to be well-mannered in front of each other.” Haechan snickered, and you did too. You could feel your shoulders relaxing, and he could feel himself growing bolder. He moved his queen across the board, closing in on his target.

“Man, where would I be without my unladylike, insufferable fiancé?”

“Probably whining like a child to some other pitiful creature who deserves better.”

The clouds in your minds began to clear as you exchanged snarky remarks. It felt right- pretty words didn’t like to be forced from your lips. He smiled. You looked up, your line of sight lingering on the lips you knew well before finding his eyes. You left your king unguarded, ready for it to be captured.

“I guess I wouldn’t mind marrying you, little prince.”

“Do it then.”

You swept the unfinished game off the board, feeling like you’d won, and he met you in the middle. He kissed you, barely more composed than the night before, but you had no problem with that. The two of you smiled against each other’s lips, incredulous that somehow you had found someone to love, something you used to believe was impossible. Little bursts of laughter interrupted the kiss as giddiness took over.

“Didn’t I say something like I’d burn down this castle before I wed you?”

“Just let the wedding planner know,” Haechan sighed with joy as he gave in to the temptation of your lips again.

[secretsickysideblog]

putting it lightly

'“m’not drunk,” abbacchio groans, rolling over.

bucciarati laughs, a bitter sound, and shakes his head in pure exasperation. “yes. alright. i am so glad you did not decide to pursue a career in acting.”'

after a day spent searching for his awol teammate, bucciarati comes home to find that abbacchio had been peacefully asleep on his sofa all along.

(sicktember day 6, alternate prompt: asleep on the couch)

read under the cut!

Bucciarati is, put lightly, seething.

There’s this rage he hasn’t felt in a long time bubbling in the pit of his stomach, and although it’s the type that stems purely from concern, his blood is undeniably boiling. Because upon stepping into the front door of his apartment, Bucciarati is greeted with the sight of a familiar someone asleep on his couch--the same someone who has been AWOL all day, refusing to pick up the phone.

Bucciarati considers himself to be a rather patient man on the best of days and relatively tolerant even on those days that are not so great. And he is--he tries to be--as understanding as possible. So normally, if this were any other day, if he had gotten so much as a text confirming that Abbacchio was alive, Bucciarati would be fine with this. Mildly annoyed, but mostly in the sense of preferring to know when things were wrong with the people he holds dear before the problem rears its ugly head and less from the standpoint of work.

But Leone Abbacchio has been dead on air all day long. Bucciarati had gone through the other man’s apartment twice, and, accompanied by Fugo himself, they’d checked the youngest’s apartment all the same as if Abbacchio would have any reason at all to be there. Internally, Bucciarati slaps himself in the face for not considering that Abbacchio would have wandered here--but really, what reason would Abbacchio have to be here while vehemently ignoring any attempts to get into contact with him?

Bucciarati sucks a long inhale in through his teeth. It won’t do him any good to yell right now; for all he knows, the man passed out before him might be too far gone to comprehend a word he says, and Bucciarati would rather not strain his vocal chords for a reason so pointless as yelling to what may as well be a wall.

“Leone,” he calls, and the man doesn’t stir. He tries again with a little more fervor. No response.

A cold feeling manifests in Bucciarati’s veins as the consideration that, maybe, Abbacchio had trudged his way here to die pops up in his head. Maybe Abbacchio came all the way here because he knew it was the end, or because he had opted for the end, and maybe Bucciarati should be calling an ambulance right about now and he looks awfully similar to--

Bucciarati squeezes his eyes shut and shakes that train of thought away. The only way to know whether or not any of that was true would be to approach him, and if it were, Bucciarati would just have to deal with it. He’s come to be an expert at just dealing with things over the course of his eighteen years and change. With a tumultuous mix of rage and fear turning his stomach, Bucciarati approaches the couch, and he watches for a moment until he spots Abbacchio’s chest rise and fall once.

Good. He’s alive.

And with absolutely no sympathy, Bucciarati gives Abbacchio a firm shake by the shoulder to jostle him out of what Bucciarati assumes to be an alcohol-induced stupor--the flush across his defined cheekbones says all he needs to know. Except when Abbacchio blinks his eyes open with a groan, they’re glazed over and hazy in an unfamiliar way; when that golden gaze locks onto Bucciarati, it appears to lock onto something behind him. Within him, even. Through him.

“What in the hell are you doing here, Abbacchio?”

Abbacchio’s expression turns confused and quickly contorts into something that looks rather pained. Bucciarati keeps himself firm, even though something in him wants to ask ‘what hurts?’ Perhaps it’s a selfish act, to be angry, but Abbacchio has been sober for nearly a month now and Bucciarati sees no good reason to be ruining that. Abbacchio is guilty until proven innocent.

When he speaks, much to Bucciarati’s surprise, his breath smells like mint-- shockingly, mint and a hint of sleep and not at all alcohol. Not even coffee, which has served as Abbacchio’s replacement vice, in a sense. (It gives him something to refine taste in. Something to be picky about, a type of fill-in high.)

“Your door...it was unlocked,” is what Abbacchio says, and it’s slurred, but not in the way that he slurs when he’s wasted. It’s slurred in a manner that’s groggier than anything else.

“It’s always unlocked,” Bucciarati snaps. That was not the answer he was looking for, because that’s common sense. His door is always unlocked for the two subordinates he’s recruited that might need something at an ungodly hour, Abbacchio being a frequent visitor just after midnight.

Abbacchio hums, and his eyes close again as if he’s struggling to keep them open.

“Abbacchio,” Bucciarati gives him a quick pat on the cheek to get his attention back. “Don’t pass out on me again. I want an explanation.”

Dual-colored eyes reappear. Abbacchio says nothing more.

“Leone Abbacchio, why the hell did you decide to fuck up now? It’s been nearly a month and you haven’t come close to a relapse since three weeks ago! Not to mention, you have avoided me all day, only to end up here? What if you had been dying? I thought you had crawled your sorry ass over here to die on my couch,” Bucciarati growls, tone undoubtedly dripping with poison, and yet some aftertaste of it is sweet. Vaguely sweet. Because he isn’t really angry. He’s worried, as is often the case.

“M’not drunk,” Abbacchio groans, rolling over.

Bucciarati laughs, a bitter sound, and shakes his head in pure exasperation. “Yes. Alright. I am so glad you did not decide to pursue a career in acting.”

“I mean it,” Abbacchio’s voice comes out muffled by the navy throw pillow he has his face buried in, and yet there’s a distinctive whining quality to it. He doesn’t sound drunk--he sounds off. It’s disconcerting, because Bucciarati’s only assumption is that he’s more inebriated than he’s ever had the displeasure of seeing him before, and yet that wouldn’t make sense because the first night they met Abbacchio had a foot and a half well in the grave and a heel slipping downward.

Flushed cheeks, glazed-over eyes, and this slurring, whining tone. A clear dislike for the light in his eyes, as shown by the way he’s burying his face in a pillow, and he’d managed to get out of bed and brush his teeth but he’d opted against coffee. Bucciarati looks over his clues, looks over the sight before him, and tries to connect the pictures with a piece of logical twine. All at once, it comes together, and that burning rage within him is ignited by a cold wash of guilt.

He must be sick.

Bucciarati presses the back of his hand to Abbacchio’s cheek, and then to his forehead, and the heat radiating off of his pale face (paler than usual, somehow, and devoid of makeup) confirms it. For the second time in the past ten minutes, Bucciarati mentally slaps himself, and then again for good measure. As ample punishment, he decides to give himself an internal kick to the shin, too.

He exhales a breath he wasn’t aware he’d been holding, the high-strung tension in his body melting into a puddle at his feet. Sick, he can handle. He can handle sickness just fine, actually. He crouches down beside the sofa and nudges Abbacchio’s shoulder with more care this time, gently prodding for his attention for just a moment longer. Bucciarati knows from experience that sleeping on this couch is comfortable, but not nearly as pleasant as a bed, especially not on lead-limbs and fever pains.

“Come on,” all of the venom has drained away from his voice, and so has a good half of the volume, “let’s get you to bed, alright? This couch is cheap. It won’t do any good for your back.”

Abbacchio takes a long while to respond to the suggestion, but eventually, he sits himself upright and manages to force himself up onto his feet. He sways a bit, and Bucciarati prepares himself to catch him if he goes down even if he has more muscle in his left bicep than Bucciarati has in his entire body. Maybe it’s the sentiment--if he goes down, at least he wouldn’t go down alone.

It takes a couple of pauses for Abbacchio to lean against the wall and take a breather (and there’s a moment where even more color drains from his face, and Bucciarati just about unzips a hole in the floor to avoid having to clean vomit off of the hardwood). Ultimately, though, they make it to the bedroom. Bucciarati makes sure Abbacchio is settled. He slips off the other’s shoes, which must have been unpleasant to fall asleep in, and sets them by the bedroom door.

“Do you need anything?” Bucciarati asks, and Abbacchio shakes his head. “Another blanket? I’m getting you water, and that isn’t up for debate.”

His answer comes in the form of complete stillness. Quiet. And Abbacchio, for someone that must have a rather high fever, seems to be at peace. Bucciarati sighs, looks over his form. Now that he’s certain the other is sleeping and not dead, he wonders if he should address the fear he felt at the notion of losing Abbacchio with himself, because it was a different kind of fear. As though losing him would leave not only a gap in his life, in his heart, but in his being entirely.

He slips off to fill a glass of water, sets it on the bedside table. And he settles into bed on the other side of Abbacchio’s sleeping form, carding fingers through his silky hair as though it’s the most natural gesture in the world. He’s gotten far too used to Abbacchio’s presence in the handful of months they’ve known each other. And maybe it could be chalked up to the closeness they’ve been forced into, or up to the reliance Abbacchio has on him and the feeling of being relied on. Maybe it’s the way Abbacchio looks at him when he’s wasted. Maybe it’s the grateful way he looks at him when he starts sobering up later in the night.

Or perhaps, Bucciarati muses, he might be, lightly put, falling in love.