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clairewritesandrambles · 18 days ago

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In the Middle of the Night - Scott Miller

Summary: After a close encounter with a tornado, Scott comforts you through a nightmare.

Pairing: Scott Miller x F!Reader

Word Count: 2.7k

Warnings: Near-death experience, car accident (flashbacks, briefly explained), nightmare, mention of reckless driving

A/N: This might be the nicest I've ever written Scott. Hopefully you all still like him, even if it's a bit further from what we saw in the movie! Thank you to @famfan-1034 and @seeyalaterinnovator for beta reading this story.

The world was thundering around you as you desperately tried to will the truck to drive faster. Despite your foot being pressed flat against the floor, it was as if the vehicle was stuck in an inescapable loop. No matter what you did you could hear the rumbling of the tornado gaining on you, the noise reverberating in your chest.

"Come on, you've got to go faster," Scott yelled at you from the passenger seat.

You glanced over at him, seeing him twist around in his seat to watch the black funnel barreling behind you. You noticed that he didn't have his seat belt on as your foot desperately ground the pedal into the floor, having no effect on the speed of the vehicle. You needed to tell him to put his seat belt on, but it felt as though there was a physical barrier in your throat that prevented sound when you tried to open your mouth.

As the tornado gained on you, you felt as though you were back in your childhood. Standing too close to the train tracks, the freight train overwhelmed every sense. The sound deafened you as everything in your vicinity shook violently, vibrations numbing the feeling of the steering wheel in your hands. The swirling black wedge was all that was visible in your mirrors now, appearing as though to engulf all the light left in the world.

The frame of the truck groaned as you realized that your momentum had slowed even more, beginning to be slowly pulled back towards the spiral behind you. You grabbed at your seat belt in desperation, tugging on it uselessly as it jammed in its buckle. With wide eyes, you looked up at Scott, who was strangely calm. The words in your throat clawed at their cage, seeking any sort of escape.

You tried to get the truck back under control, despite the futility of the attempt, finally giving up just before you heard the crunch of metal. The roof crumpled violently, the frame snapping as the windows imploded. Your hands flew up to protect your face, not even taking notice of the possibility of pain as you wildly looked around.

Scott held your gaze for a brief moment, time seeming to bend around you, before being forcefully pulled from his seat. You were moving in slow motion again as you leaned forward in a desperate attempt to grab him, swearing you could feel the brush of his hand as your seatbelt choked you back in your seat and Scott was ripped from view. You were finally able to gather words from your throat, screaming his name in anguish as the truck's metal continued to collapse around you.

Just before you were crushed by the ever-shrinking vehicle, you bolted up in the pitch black. You looked around in terror for a few moments, eyes taking a few moments to adjust to the dimness. Slowly, you remembered where you were. The thin sheets of the motel scratched annoyingly at your skin, giving you a slight grip on reality. Jagged, acidic breaths burned your lungs, the feeling of fear continuing to crush your chest despite waking up.

You swung your legs over the side, relishing the rough feel of the motel carpet grounding you as you held your head. You fought the tears bubbling in your chest, a mix of slow and broken breaths escaping you.

After the events of the day, you supposed you shouldn't be surprised by the dream. Your encounter with the tornado hadn't been nearly as violent, though the terror in both scenarios had gripped you just the same.

Years of working with storms and you had never feared one, instead finding the thrill of their ferocity captivating, but now you questioned your place amongst them.

Your chasing partner, Jason, and you had been leading the charge in Lion, driving into the path of the tornado to drop your radar. Part of the reason for his assignment to Lion was that his driving allowed him to get ahead of tornadoes easily, though his love of adrenaline had often led him to poor choices.

This time, you had been caught up in it and the results had left the truck mangled and you and Jason barely surviving.

You massaged the stone of anxiety sinking deep into your chest as your body could still feel the reality of hiding in that culvert as the tornado passed nearby, rumbling everything around you like a runaway freight train. You had laid there curled into a ball and struggled to breathe until you heard the rushing sounds of vehicles quickly followed by your co-workers' voices calling your names.

The ringing in your ears had prevented you from hearing most of what went on, though you remember seeing the anxiety bleed out of Javi and Scott when they saw you climbing out of the ditch. Your body evidently had the same reaction to seeing the safety of your team, collapsing into the dirt as you came down from the adrenaline high.

You barely heard the soft knock at the door over your slowly steadying breathing. You steel yourself as you open the door, though there are immediate cracks in that resolve when you see who it is.

Scott stood outside your door with dark hair standing at odd angles, bare chest contrasting with the black sweats hanging low on his hips. He was a mess, by his standards, yet you couldn't help but admire him.

"Are you okay?" He asked, thick brows knitting together in concern. His voice was scratchy, sounding as though he had been in a deep sleep.

Your cheeks heated as you realized that he must have heard your nightmare from his room next to yours, the thin walls of the motel not doing much for privacy. You looked down slightly in a small bubble of embarrassment, noticing that the heels of his shoes were bent down as though he had felt that putting them on properly would slow him too much.

"Yeah," you confirmed, "sorry for bothering you."

This was the part of Scott that was often reserved for you, the part that had drawn you to him in the first place. Yours and Scott's attraction to each other was an open secret amongst the company, resulting in endless teasing after the night a few weeks ago when you two had stumbled into his room after too many drinks at the bar.

You knew that Scott had that meaner side, and had seen just how far he could go when he had practically shoved Jason against Scarecrow after the accident. You hadn't caught his words, the combination of ringing ears and Javi's fretting capturing most of your attention before Javi helped you to your feet. Then you looked at Scott and, noticing that he looked seconds away from punching Jason, called out to him.

The other employees had wondered how you, someone who was known for avoiding conflict at all costs, had captured and returned the attention of your hardass boss. The truth was simply that Scott was different around you, especially when it would just be the two of you working late. Underneath his rough exterior, Scott cared deeply for those close to him, though he hid it from them, and the reason for his demeanor was due to a difficult past with relationships that prevented him from easily trusting. He had confessed this to you one particularly late night at the bar when you two were inebriated to the point of senseless rambling, apologizing for all of the sarcastic jokes he had thrown since you entered the business.

Truth be told, that sarcasm was one of your favourite things about him.

Unfortunately, you had a similar past and this is what led to the stalemate in your relationship, as you both hesitated at the thought of the commitment and vulnerability of a relationship.

Scott nodded sharply, taking a small step back. "Well, if you want me... I'm there."

You were shocked at your body's reaction to his words, a lump forming slightly in your throat. Turns out that near-death experiences really do change you. Your hand moved to close the door, though your body pauses mid-motion. Your gaze returned to Scott, focusing on the earnest look in those blue eyes.

Fuck it.

"Scott, wait," you called as he started turning back to his own room. "Will you stay with me?"

Scott's lips quirked up in a small smile despite himself, nodding as he stepped into your room. You wordlessly shut the door, hearing him kick his shoes off behind you. You leaned back against it when you turned around, second-guessing your decision to invite him for a split second.

But then you turn around and see him standing there looking at you, the soft look in his eyes bringing you back to that night together when you had believed, for however brief of a second, that you could find a way to bypass your hesitations for him.

Before you can hesitate further you step into him, Scott immediately wrapping his strong arms around you without a second thought. His chin rested on the top of your head as you both stood there, a thumb rubbing soothingly at your hip as you relished in his heat.

Your breath shuddered at the gesture, still unused to allowing yourself to be held in this way again. You almost change your mind about letting him in, but then he's pulling you tighter into his body and you close your eyes and let your mind go blank.

You melted further into him, feeling his grip on you tighten in response. Being this close to him, all you could smell was him. All you could feel was the softness of his skin as he held you, patiently waiting for what you decided would be the next move. For the first time since you had gotten into the truck that morning, you felt the anxiety in you begin to dissipate. Your senses were enveloped by him, slowly backing you from the ledge of panic you had been balancing on.

Scott didn't loosen his grip on you until you leaned back in his arms to look up at him. "Thank you for checking on me."

He smiled at you softly, cupping your jaw as he pressed a feather-light kiss to your forehead. Despite your glimpses of the softer parts of himself that Scott kept hidden from the world, you were surprised at the gesture. It was so unlike him, outwardly showing as gentle an emotion as this, yet the affection that soared through your body for him rivaled that of the night that he had kissed you against his motel room door.

"C'mon," he whispered into your hair, "let's get you back to bed."

The last of the residual panic from your nightmare seeped away as you curled into Scott's body, the steady beat of his heart settling yours. "You're unnaturally warm."

Scott let out a short laugh at your comment, his hand cascading down the small of your back and over your curves to hook your knee over his hip. "Maybe you're just weirdly cold."

You hummed in response, pretending to consider that possibility for a moment. You looked up at him, the soft look in his eyes taking you aback. You had refused to ask him earlier, but the look in his eyes now compelled you to bring it up.

"Did you fire him?" You asked, looking down as you began tracing swirls into the soft skin of his chest.

"Of course," he answered, beginning to move his thumb in comforting circles on your hip. "I should have fired him sooner."

"Scott," you said, "there's no way you could have known what was going to happen."

"I did know, though." He interjected, the abruptness of his answer stalling your movement. "Javi and I had considered firing him a few weeks ago, but I fought for him to stay because he's the fastest driver on the team. I knew it was a ticking time bomb for him to cause an accident."

"If we..." Scott trailed off, swallowing nervously before he continued. "If I had lost you because I chose efficiency over safety, I don't think I could live with myself. Hearing the truck flip and not being able to do anything for you... All I could think of was all the wrong choices I'd made. Especially with you, I should have never let you walk out of my room after that night."

You slowly raised your head to look back at him. His blue eyes were steady in their gaze, showing no trace of deception behind his words as he finished. "I need you to know how much you mean to me."

Tears stung your eyes at his words, the years of not receiving this type of care and attention from other men catching up with you. You cupped the back of his head as you pulled him down to your lips, losing yourself in the taste of him. Your fingers curled in his hair as you both desperately grasped at each other, trying to get impossibly closer.

You let out a shaky breath when you finally separated. "You were in my dream." You said before you could lose your nerve. "I couldn't outrun the tornado and save you. That's what woke me up."

Scott grabbed your hand, placing it on top of his heart so you could feel the beat in his chest. "I'm right here, with you... I've got you, baby," he said, a small smile on his face. "Now that I've got you, you'd have to actually sacrifice me to a tornado to get rid of me."

You let out a soft laugh at his words, finally feeling your exhaustion catching up with you again. "I'll keep that in mind if you ever start annoying me." You told him, readjusting yourself to lay against his chest.

"You're riding with me if you want to come back, by the way. At least until we find someone I know I can trust with you." You smiled at him, placing a light kiss on his chest as you finally let peaceful sleep overtake you again.

#twisters #scott twisters #scott twisters x reader #scott miller #scott miller x reader #one-shot

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sohnric · 1 year ago

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sweet like candy – e. sohn

pairing: eric sohn x fem! reader

genre: summer au, strangers to something more ?? fluff, suggestive. very much stargazing by the neighbourgood and fantasize by the boyz capsuled into a fic. eric is a simp and a hopeless romantic because i said so. a girl romanticizes sharing a lollipop (its me im girl)

warnings: alcohol, maybe some minimal swearing, a heated make out session that hints onto a hookup (no smut mentioned!). the use of a cheesy nickname babydoll (dont @ me or i will deactivate), reader has hair long enough for a claw clip

word count: 6.9k

a/n: almost cried while trying to name this fic somebody send help. Also this doesn't feel like my best work its kinda rushed imo but 🤠 yolo

part of the @deoboyznet summer on you event! cant believe i made it on time

a summer tradition of renting out a cabin every year invented by a couple of friends takes a turn for eric when a new addition to the circle brings him to his knees - in other words, he never knew tequila could taste so sweet.

If anyone ever asked Eric Sohn if he believed in love at first sight, he would, without a doubt, say yes.

What was the proof he had? Well, absolutely nothing. All he ever knew about love at first sight was from romance movies he watched during lonely nights with his roommate Juyeon, never having the experience of the whole world stopping and zooming in on one particular person, taking his breath away– but to put it simply, Eric Sohn is a true romantic. Call him cheesy if you want– he wouldn’t like it, but he also wouldn’t disagree.

On one summer afternoon, though, his world tilts in its axis– the moment comes, and he is finally able to test out his theory.

You walk out of the passenger’s side of a red 2008 Toyota Auris, hair put up into a claw clip, jean shorts showing off your long legs and a pearl white button-up opened and lazily thrown over your outfit, and suddenly, Eric Sohn finds his knees buckling and his palms sweating with affection. He was aware that Juyeon’s girlfriend was bringing her best friend to tag along to their little summer retreat (more like a trip to a cabin in the middle of the woods), but he sure as hell didn’t expect the stranger to make him feel this type of way.

Sure, it might just be him being incredibly attracted to you. But with how fast his heart was beating when you smiled at everyone after introducing yourself to the group, he was sure he was slowly, but surely falling for you. And he was falling hard.

He feels like the world is moving in slow motion as he watches the group go and unload the car– you and your best friend Yeri were the last ones to arrive– and what wakes him up from the haze is when he watches you struggle to carry a cooler out of the trunk into the cabin, his legs dragging him closer to the vehicle and near to your body.

Now is his time to shine. “Let me help!” he hurries out, sneakers crunching on the gravel. His hands firmly grab onto the handle of the blue cooler, muscles flexing under the weight (making him wonder why you would willingly want to carry the thing and not ask him or any of the guys for help in the first place), and when your eyes look up at come in contact with his, he presses a smile to his lips. “I’m Eric, by the way.”

“Ah,” you gasp, a grateful expression breezing over your features, “thanks. I’m Y/N, nice to meet you.”

“Likewise,” Eric hums, watching your every move. Your figure walks over to the front of the car, your head popping in close to the window to look inside, and when a satisfied look overtakes your features, Eric finds himself asking. “Is that everything?”

“Yeah,” you nod, “we can head inside, I think.”

The boy tries hard to keep his cool, he really does. But with how he’s trailing behind you like a lost puppy, attempting to find a topic that would engage him in a conversation with you, he feels like a boy that is just experiencing a crush for the first time in his life. Everything about you is enchanting– and sure, you could say he was just painfully attracted to you and this had nothing to do with love– but he was also convinced that if you asked him to jump off the Empire State Building, he would do it without giving it a second thought (which is kind of worrying, but again– it says a lot).

You open the door to the cabin for him, and he finds himself speechless at the action. Once your eyes meet again and you offer him another subtle smile, he finds himself gasping at the sentence that comes out of your mouth.

“Hey! We’re matching, kinda,” you note, pointing towards his outfit.

And you’re right– Eric didn’t even notice at first, too enchanted with your sheer existence– but you two were indeed wearing the same thing. Jean shorts, and a white button-up– in your case, thrown over a white tank top, in Eric’s, closed (although he did leave it a bit open at the top, revealing his tanned skin). Suddenly, the boy is glad he’s wearing a red cap to cover up his hair, since he foolishly thinks the hat provides him enough shade in the face to not reveal his burning cheeks as he utters out a weak response.

“It looks so much better on you, though.”

With that, he walks into the cabin– escaping the situation, not really paying a single thought to chivalry and letting you go through the door first– and as he reaches the crowd of people in the kitchen, he prays for all high sources to find him, get to him and wipe his brain clean of all thoughts, because

even though you are basically matching (and he does think you look so much better in the outfit than he does), all he can think about is just how much more he’d like your outfit if the white button-up enveloping your body was the one he’s wearing right now instead.

The next time Eric finds courage to talk to you is when it seems like you’re not finding it to talk to anyone else yourself– the big group is currently sitting around a fire, marshmallows and sausages slowly burning in the blazing flames– and while everyone around was either talking to each other or singing along to the songs Jacob was playing on the guitar, you were sitting alone in the middle of two commotions: Chanhee and Changmin arguing about something seemingly important, and Yeri and Juyeon making out right in front of everyone’s eyes.

And Eric was supposed to listen to Sunwoo talk about his latest heartbreak– how the man still gets no girls despite having such an objectively handsome face, Eric truly doesn’t know– but the topic of the conversation was too boring for him to engage with it. That, and he was also painfully aware of your every move– you didn’t even move much– and word– you weren’t talking to anybody– and that was slowly driving him insane.

You looked a little out of place. Eric supposes it was because you didn’t really know anyone here– except from your best friend and her awfully sappy boyfriend– but even though it was logical and a little expected for you to be a bit excluded in such a foreign circle, the man took it as his mission to make you feel as welcome and as included as he physically could.

Completely ignoring Sunwoo’s blabbering (like he was doing for the last few minutes anyway), Eric confidently (and a bit shakily– hands sweating and breath hitching in his throat) walks to the other side of the bonfire, from where he’s been watching your stone expression through the flames, and sits down in the small place between you and Changmin. Changmin wasn’t even facing you, too engrossed in the debate he was having with Chanhee, and so it was Eric’s job to wobble his bottom into the place, efficiently making the older boy move away with a light elbow jab sent into his lower back.

“Hi,” he clears his throat, “are you having fun?” he asks, but mentally curses at himself right as the question escapes his mouth– does she look like she's having fun? Of course she doesn't, you stupid idiot.

You smile at the question, though, nodding. “Yeah,” you hum, “having lots of fun listening to your friends argue and my friends making out next to my ear.”

“You seemed like it too, y’know,” Eric laughs, “they’re always like this, by the way. They’ll forget about the fight in the morning.”

“Oh, that could never be me,” you sigh, shaking your head at the sentiment.

“No?”

“No,” you shrug, “I get too petty. If we have a fight, I’m not speaking to you for at least two weeks.”

Eric finds himself laughing at your comment. “I’ll remember that for future reference.”

Straightening your back and looking at your companion– as if you were going to call him out on his subtle hint of there being any future meeting between the two of you– you suddenly gasp and swiftly turn towards the bonfire, an honest mourn escaping your lips.

“Oh fuck!” you curse under your breath as your hand reaches towards a stick that’s had its end in the flame, the device efficiently resting against a rock in a position where you didn’t have to pay any attention to the snack you were cooking– more like burning– for yourself. With a quick move for the stick, you pull the tip of it out of the scorching red of the bonfire and look at it in an examining way, as if the result would be different and the marshmallow would unburn itself if you stared at it long enough. “I completely forgot about this!”

Eric takes a glance at the burnt piece of fluff, letting out a laugh at the black marshmallow in front of your face. “That’s not how you make a good s’more,” he notes, poking fun at your annoyed face.

“Oh, no shit, Sherlock…” you mutter under your breath, but your face looks a bit sad to see the piece go to waste. “I don’t know why I even tried, I’m bad at this stuff.”

There comes his moment, Eric thinks. “Well, you’re lucky, ‘cause you just met an expert at making s’mores.”

“Does a thing like that even exist?” you chuckle, rolling your eyes at the male in disbelief.

“Of course it does! You’re looking at one now,” he grins, leaning over you to take a brand new marshmallow out of the bag to your right– sandwiched between your thigh and the couple in love– before he reaches over to your hand and takes the roasting stick out of your hand, slides the white fluffy cloud through the sharp tip and hovers it above the flame.

“The key is to hold it above the flame, and not in the flame,” Eric chuckles as he looks at you from the corner of his eye, watching your expression change.

“Oh, but I thought the key is to burn the thing,” you ironically gasp, shaking your head at his teasing. “Where did you even learn all of this?”

“I grew up in the States,” Eric hums, “they would deport me if I didn’t know how to make s’mores.”

The comment gets a giggle out of you– a sound Eric almost folds at and falls into the open fire (thankfully, he held his composure– he doesn’t think 3rd degree burns would suit his look) – and it takes everything in him to not scream like a teenage girl at the thought of making you laugh. Yes, that’s how down bad you managed to get the male.

“Do you have a special recipe?”

“Just the basic one,” he shrugs, turning the skewer in his hand to make the marshmallow equally glazed on each side, “I will make it extra good for you, though.”

“I thought a master always does their best?” you tease, watching as the boy crumbles under your gaze.

“Not always. I don’t like to put effort into things that aren’t worth it,” Eric hums as he takes the marshmallow out of the burning fire, examining it, and after deeming it worthy, taking the skewer and holding it up in between his knees. The male takes a graham cracker and tears it in half, before adding chocolate to one of the sides. After he’s done, he carefully places the golden fluff ball onto the cracker and closes it, offering the sweet sandwich to you with a subtle smile.

“For you,” he winks as he turns back towards the fire, putting another marshmallow onto the stick to make himself a s’more as well (and also mentally kicking himself at the sudden burst of courage). He hears you take a bite out of the snack, his knee bouncing up and down nervously as he awaits the verdict.

“Man,” you hum, “this is so good.”

“Told you,” he says, “if there’s something I’m confident in, it’s making s’mores.”

“That’s a very unuseful skill to have,” you note, but continue to eat. The comment has him chuckle and shrug.

“Well, I used it now, so I’d argue it’s actually very useful.”

A hum cuts out of your throat at this, finishing the s’more he made for you with a satisfied sigh. “Is this how you got girls back in the States?” you ask, making the male choke on his spit.

Eric was too young to get girls when he learned how to make the greatest s’mores. He went camping with his dad and his older sister and he burned a couple before he got it right. He was in middle school and before what the kids call a glow-up these days (back in the days, you just called it overcoming puberty), but still– he decides to test the waters with another lazy, half-assed flirty comment. “Only the pretty ones.”

He hears a chuckle out of you– a reaction he decides to not pay much attention to or overthink, for he doesn’t really remember what a good reaction to flirting is anymore– but then, you sigh and nod. “Well, I give your s’more a 5 star review, so I’d find that believable.”

The comment has Eric press his tongue into the inside of his cheek, battling a victorious smile that wants to oh so desperately appear on his lips. Turning his attention fully to you, he looks at you with confidence coating his insides– it only grows when he notices you staring at the side of his face, the flame of the fire twinkling in your eye and making your features sharper and twice as attractive to the poor boy.

His eyes scan you over for a few seconds before he notices a glimmer of something on the side of your lip– a chocolate stain that has him cautiously lean in and swipe a thumb over the sweetness, not even thinking twice before smoothing his finger over your skin.

“You had a little… something there,” he hums as he licks the chocolate off his thumb. Your eyes still trained on him force him to avert his gaze back to the fire– for it was unbearable, as if sparks were flying and burning his skin, everything about the interaction making goosebumps appear over his body; even though he felt hot in his cheeks and not at all cold– when the sight of his marshmallow in flames suddenly comes to him, startling him awake.

Hurriedly dragging out the burnt snack out of the fire, he hears you chuckle at him from the side– so much for not ruining the moment. (It’s okay, though. As long as you’re entertained.)

“I thought you were a master at s’mores,” you poke fun at him, “got distracted?”

Meeting eyes with you, Eric shrugs, a lazy grin settling to his lips. “I guess you could say that.”

The night progresses quickly– with Sunwoo getting so drunk he borrows Jacob’s guitar and clumsily strums the strings, freestyle rapping about the most random topics with flushed cheeks and eyes dramatically glued to the fire; Hyunjae wanting to have a competition of who can jump over the flames and Sangyeon having to stop his drunk friend with the force of his own body– and Eric finds his eyes lacking the candy he’s been occupying himself with the whole evening. You disappeared somewhere into the house a few minutes ago, and although he didn’t want to be clingy, he walked up to the cabin with a nervous pep in his step– that’s it, he just wanted to make sure you were okay.

Eric walks through the doorway, having his body immediately be met with the joined common room slash kitchen area. The cabin is kind of small (too small for the amount of people currently occupying it) and kind of old, but it’s a tradition to rent it every year during the summer, so no one ever questioned the decision or made the move to rent out a bigger one, no matter the growing friend group.

Your figure finally appears in the dimly lit kitchen area, your back turned to the doorway. Standing at the kitchen sink, it seems like you were doing the dishes– tons of plates used to carry grilled meat and sausages dumped carelessly into the sink, forgotten in a minute and leaving the last remains of food dry up on them and get hard to scrape off, a couple of glasses and mugs with their ears broken off from their age waiting with coffee stains at the bottom– and Eric immediately feels his heart fall down to his stomach, because why would one do the dishes in the middle of the night? Those usually get left there until the morning, when the least hungover person will take mercy on the rest and take care of them. Were you feeling excluded from the conversation? Did you feel bored?

“What are you doing here so alone?” he asks, making you turn your head over your shoulder and smile at him– a stone falling off his heart at the action– before you shrug at him.

“Washing the dishes,” you say, as if it wasn’t clear already.

“I see that,” Eric chuckles, “what I meant to say was, why are you washing the dishes in the first place?”

“Well, somebody’s gotta do it.”

Eric huffs– and he doesn’t even know why he’s so defensive about it. “That someone didn’t have to be you, y’know.”

He’s standing next to you now– your eyes meeting as you stare at the boy for a heartbeat– a smile spreading on your face at his furrowed brows. The action has him visibly relax, watching as you shrug and get back to the dish washing. “I just wanted some alone time for a bit,” you muse, “outside was getting too loud for a second, I’m not used to crowds.”

“Ah… once Sunwoo drinks, he can’t shut up, so I kinda get that it was starting to feel insufferable,” Eric notes, nodding at you in acknowledgement before the realization hits him. “Wait– you said you wanted to be alone, so I should probably-”

You halt him with a soft laugh– the one Eric finds his heart liking a little too much, with how it jumps up and down and makes all of him feel warm inside– a soapy hand reaching out in his direction. “It’s okay, you can stay,” you muse, “I enjoy your company.”

“O-okay,” Eric stutters– so much for the smooth lines he had prepared in his head before coming in here, all of them flying out of his head straight out of the window– and to not seem so silly, he gets his hands occupied and reaches for the clean dishes you started stacking on the counter next to the sink, deciding to dry them and put them away. The kitchen falls into a comfortable silence that only gets broken by an occasional scream landing through the walls from outside, and Eric can’t help but indulge himself in the domesticity of the act.

He can almost imagine you two washing the dishes like this in your shared apartment after you two cook dinner together and eat it in your cozy living room. That scenario sounds almost too good for the boy, having warmth slowly ooze into his cheeks, and that, he finds to be the hint that he should probably stop thinking about you in that way now or else he’ll get too distracted and break the glasses he is currently putting away. (God forbid– there were not enough of them for the entire friend group in the first place.)

“Are you having a good time, though?” Eric finds himself asking through his weird delirium.

You smile– oh god you smile, you should stop doing that if you want him to survive the night– and nod at the boy, calmness overtaking your aura and slipping into his cracks as well. “I am. It’s nice meeting new people and everyone’s very nice,” you say.

“That’s good to hear. How long have you and Yeri been friends?”

“A couple of years,” you note, “we met during high school. We always dreamt of moving away to college and living together at dorms or something, so it’s… it’s nice that it worked out for us,” you say, having Eric nod at your words with a sweet smile.

“That’s great to hear,” he muses, “I met Juyeon and Sunwoo in my freshman year of college, and the rest just… came along after a while.”

“Your friend group is pretty big,” you point out, having the boy shrug.

“I guess so,” Eric mumbles, never really thinking of it this way– in his eyes, this was normal. This was how he operated, how he lived. A lot of people around him, always close– one would think such a large friend group wouldn’t be as close with each other, but it’s quite the opposite in his case, he thinks. Maybe he was just blessed.

“How do you do that?” you sigh, shaking your head in disbelief.

“I dunno,” he snickers, “guess you could say I’m quite the social butterfly.”

“I can see that,” you laugh. Eric watches you, his hands now empty of any dish– he’s been drying them quicker than you manage to clean (and rightfully so, the food is stuck on there) – he starts noticing the details of your sheer presence. How you have a slight smile playing with your lips even when your eyes are glued to the sink, how your hair slightly slips out of the claw clip and frames your face, how close you’re standing– his eyes slip towards your hands, noticing the water running down your forearms and dangerously close to the sleeves of your shirt.

Acting on reflex, mostly, the boy reaches towards your sleeves and gently tugs them up, the contact of your skin that he initiates and should realistically be prepared for making the tips of his fingers tingle, the action having you stop in your movements and glance up at him through your eyelashes– a sight he wishes he could engrave into the back of his eyelids so he could stare at it forever and always.

“Thank you,” you hum, voice barely louder than a whisper when he retracts away from you, taking his previous stance against the kitchen counter.

Eric hangs his head low for a second, clearing his throat to ease his own tension. Now is your turn to start up the conversation, a casual question falling off your lips as you get back to washing the last remains of dishes. “Yeri said you come here often?”

The boy nods enthusiastically to your sentence. “We do. We started in freshman year, because Juyeon was going to this exchange program to Paris for a couple of months, so we threw him a goodbye party. Then he came back, so we threw a welcome back party here. And then we celebrated Younghoon hyung’s birthday here, and it kind of stuck, I guess? We go here at least once a year during summer.”

“That’s a nice tradition to have,” you sigh, turning the faucet off as you finish rinsing off the last dish– a big bowl that Sangyeon used to marinate the meat a few hours ago.

“It is,” Eric nods, smiling fondly at the sentiment. He reaches for the bowl and dries it with the now damp rag (there were a lot of dishes to dry, after all), and moves to put it back to its place under the sink. With your figure still in its previous spot, the boy puts away the towel onto the kitchen counter and gently grabs your waist with his free hand, moving you away a few inches to the left. He crouches and opens the cabinet under the sink and puts the bowl into the pyramid of other ones, straightening his back when he goes back into a standing position, catching you staring at him from above, watching his every move. Your body is leaning against the counter, having Eric mirror your stance only a few inches away from you before speaking up again.

“You’re welcome to join us when we come back next time.”

The time reads 3AM– or at least that’s what his circadian rhythm tells him, because he doesn't bother to check as he twists and turns in the bed, too hot and too alert to fall asleep– when Eric decides to walk down the steep stairs and try to get some fresh air. The cabin is hot inside, but he still takes his lost button-up that he had thrown over one of the kitchen chairs and puts it on before he makes his way outside, knowing that the forest will make his bones get cold with the crisp breeze.

He opens the door and moves to sit on the little patio– the silence of outside is overwhelming even after the cabin has quieted down and everyone has gone to sleep (each one on a different level of tipsy ranging from completely chill Sangyeon to doesn’t know where he is Sunwoo– with Eric somewhere in the middle of the spectrum). His legs drag a little tiredly as he scans his surroundings– god forbid there’s a bear out waiting for him– when the sight of a figure sitting on the floor takes him by surprise, their head already turned to him after hearing the sound of the door opening.

“What are you doing here?” he asks as he walks over to you, noticing your frame dressed in a tank top and sweatpants, hinting that you at least tried to get some sleep before coming out here, just like he has.

“Couldn’t sleep,” you shrug, confirming his suspicions.

“Same here,” the man sighs, “mind if I sit with you?”

“You’re welcome to join me,” you smile at him, patting the floor next to you and watching as Eric crouches down before taking a seat on the wood, ignoring the sunbeds and old rattan chairs situated all over the patio. (If you’re on the floor, he’s on the floor– it’s as simple as that.)

You’re holding a lollipop in between your fingers, your other hand occupied with a half-empty bottle of tequila that was previously passed around the circle at the bonfire. Eric raises his brows at the sight, having you shamefully avert your gaze from him.

“I thought it would be a waste to not finish this,” you say, snickering, “and I also… kind of hoped that it would put me to sleep…”

“Desperate times call for desperate measures?”

“I guess you could say that,” you laugh. Taking a sip from the bottle, you gulp the alcohol down before putting the lollipop inside of your mouth, sucking on it and licking your lips after. This is not the way you’re supposed to drink tequila, but Eric figures that gathering salt and a lime would be too much work anyways.

“Are you really using that lollipop as a chaser?” he giggles, making you hum.

“Yeah,” you stare at him, a grin overtaking your features, “this girl taught me to do that at a party last year. It’s not as good as literally anything else, but it gets the job done. Wanna try?” you ask, offering him the sweetness on the stick and the bottle.

The truth is, you were only a bit tipsy when the group slowly started to scatter into their beds. Eric didn’t drink as much either– only enough to make him laugh at everything that was said and make his staring at you twice as obvious as it was before– so he thinks he can take some more. As you said, it would be a shame if the bottle went to waste– and also, something about the idea of drinking with you alone on the patio was making his hopeless heart hammer against his chest in dangerous measures.

“Sure,” he agrees, taking the bottle first. The boy takes a sip, feeling the alcohol burn down his throat, and when he moves the dark brown glass away from his lips, he is met with the image of you leaning closer to him, offering him the lollipop. His hand instinctively grabs the plastic stick, thinking you’re letting go of it, when he’s met with the feeling of your flesh under his fingertips. You put the lollipop against his lips, making him open up on instinct and suck on the strawberry flavored candy, a million different sensations (all unrelated to the alcohol) swimming through his brain– you’re so close, you smell so good, he’s holding your hand, he’s sucking on the lollipop you previously had in between your lips and it’s driving him crazy– before you take the candy out from between his lips and put it back into your mouth, tongue swirling around the sweet ball.

The lollipop had an aftertaste of tequila on it, but it was enough to chase down the faint bitterness– Eric finds himself wanting to taste more of the sweet strawberry, but foolishly desiring to get the sensation off your lips instead. His eyes stay locked with yours throughout the whole exchange, sparks flying in between the two of you even though the bonfire has long gone out, his fingers lazily dropping from the candy.

“How was it?” you ask, voice barely louder than a whisper– goosebumps appearing all over Eric’s skin when he swears your eyes flicker to his lips for a split second.

“Good,” he admits. It’s silly how he feels so breathless at the action.

The sound of the wind playing with the leaves of the forest is the only thing accompanying you two. It’s as if you two were thinking of the same thing when you pull out the lollipop out of your mouth and offer it back to Eric, watching with utmost interest as the boy leans closer to capture it in between his lips, never breaking eye contact. The action feels a little too electrifying to him, a little too intimate, but he can't stop– can't even imagine wanting to.

Taking a sip of the tequila, but not chasing it down with the candy, you speak up again, lazy eyes practically glued to him. “This would be a perfect moment for a kiss…” you mumble, licking your bottom lip for a split second before biting down on it.

“Are you flirting with me?” Eric foolishly asks, tone of voice a bit weak, a little unsure, the candy still in his mouth, making his words come out a little jambled.

“Mhm,” you nod, grinning to yourself– Eric wonders how much of your behavior and how much of his raging heartbeat is due to the effect of alcohol in both of your veins.

His fingers pull at yours as he takes the candy out of his mouth, voice dropping as he answers you. “Then we probably shouldn’t waste the moment.”

Even though the intentions are clear, the boy can’t bring himself to make the first move– he’s completely enchanted with your presence, staring at you with tension in his shoulders and eyes trained onto your face, watching and examining it for any shift or change. Focused on the way you move, he thinks you must have realized you were going to have to be the one to take the first step– your lazily smile before you lean closer, impossibly close– making Eric’s eyes flutter shut with anticipation, your breath fanning his face making goosebumps appear all over his body.

When your lips finally touch his, he feels like he’s being kissed for the first time again, with the amount of fuzziness in his stomach and buzzing in his ears. He regains his composure quite quickly, though, as he positions his head in a way that makes you two even closer to each other, lips pressing firmer against yours now. His hand instinctively reaches out to hold your jaw, fingertips glazing the soft skin under them, your lips retracting only to go in for more.

Blindly placing the bottle onto the floor next to your bodies, you peck his lips and sigh into the kiss. “Damn, you’re good at this…”

“We’re only getting started,” he muses, making you chuckle.

“Oh yeah?”

“Mhm,” he nods, watching as you once again lean in and suck on his upper lip, making his eyes flutter close again. A weight appears over him as you shift in your place and move to straddle his lap, your hand moving to cup his cheek and tilt him upwards, everything about the kisses getting more hurried– less gentle, less hesitant– when you tug on his bottom lip with your teeth and grant your tongue entry into his mouth.

Sweetness mixes in between you, your hands moving around his neck, heavy breaths shared across the patio. Eric feels like he’s levitating, his body having an out of body experience, yet being awfully present– every little shift pushing him to overdrive, the slightest touch making his skin burn and heart drum against his ribcage.

You shift in his lap, making him huff under the pressure, his lips trailing wet kisses down the side of your neck. Teeth glazing the jointure of your shoulder, kitten licking the place and sucking in a bruise that will eventually be visible to everyone when you two wake up in the morning, Eric feels your hands tugging down the sleeves of his shirt, fingers feeling up his biceps. The action makes him chuckle into your neck, but the smile fades quickly as he feels your nails scratching gently at his flaming skin.

“Take this off,” you mutter, and Eric finds it endearing– helping you take him out of the button-up, sitting under you in just a white tank top and black basketball shorts.

“Why?”

“Your arms looked good in this,” you hiss before you hide your face into his neck, leaning down to give him your fair share of kisses and love bites, having the male teasingly joke as his hands run up under your tank top, painfully aware of the fact that you weren’t wearing a bra anymore.

He moves his head to the side to give you more access before speaking out, tone of voice husky and coated in lust. “What if I get cold now?”

“Then I’m more than happy to move this to your room,” you purr into his ear.

Eric sighs, fingers playing with the hem of your top before he lets his palms drift towards your exposed stomach, roaming across naked skin. Goosebumps appear all over your body at the action, making the boy victoriously grin. “It looks like you’re the one that's cold, though, babydoll.”

Rolling your eyes at the male, you shut him up by latching yourself onto his lips before you speak against his mouth. “I’ll take that as an invitation, then?”

“Wake up Eric! The girls are leaving, you should at least go say goodbye!” Sangyeon roars into the boy's room, making the male turn over in the bed and huff out in frustration. He drags his arm up to shield his eyes from the sunlight hitting his face, the intention of just rolling over and sleeping more written very clearly in his face.

“Come on man, we’re leaving in an hour too, so you should go send them off and then pack your shit so we can load the cars,” Sangyeon says when he gets no reaction from the youngest. It’s to no use, apparently, and so as the oldest and most observant out of the group, Sangyeon decides to use physical force– he knows Eric would hate to have you go without saying goodbye. He’s not stupid. Or blind.

A strong hold on his calves drags Eric out of the bed and makes his half-naked body fall to the floor, a yelp coming out of his throat finally making Eric’s body fully alert and awake.

“Yo! What the fuck–”

“Put a shirt on and go say goodbye to Y/N before she goes, would you, sleeping beauty?” Sangyeon huffs before rolling his eyes at his younger friend, escaping the room and shutting the door close after himself with a loud thud (to add more effect to the scolding, Eric thinks).

The mention of your name has Eric quickly scrambling out of the bed. His heart hammers at the adrenaline rush, pulling a clean shirt out of his bag and dragging it over his head, the basketball shorts from yesterday’s night found on the floor being pulled over his lower frame in approximately 0.5 seconds. Eric takes the stairs 3 at a time– with how steep they are, he questions how exactly does he not trip and break his spine on his way down– and puts on a pair of slippers he finds at the door (that are not his, or his size, for the matter, making his heels comically stick out from the back).

Without checking his appearance in the mirror anywhere, he swings the door open and walks out of the cabin, watching as the group settles in a half-circle around your car, Yeri loading the trunk with her duffle bag before she closes it shut and smiles at her boyfriend Juyeon on the side. Eric joins the crowd, clearing his throat when his eyes fall onto your figure, the sight in front of him freezing him in his spot.

You’re standing there, in your jean shorts from the day before, an oversized white button-up enveloping your frame. A clueless stranger might not tell the difference, but he does– you put the shirt onto your bare skin and buttoned it just enough to reveal a bit of your cleavage– and it’s so similar to the outfit you had on yesterday, just with one difference.

You’re wearing Eric’s shirt. You’re wearing his shirt and your neck is scattered with red and purple-ish bruises, and no, Eric wasn’t that drunk and he remembers everything, but the events of last night suddenly play out right in front of his eyes like a movie, still nailing him to his spot and wiping out all of his vocabulary.

The boy feels hot in his cheeks as he watches you and your best friend pay your goodbyes to the rest of the boys, the men pulling you into side-hugs and fist bumps, shared ‘It was nice meeting you’s and ‘You should come by next time too’s resonating through the place. Soon enough, you reach the end of the make-shift half circle and lock your eyes with Eric, a playful smile softly appearing on your face.

“It was nice meeting you, Eric,” you hum, “I had fun,” you note, shooting him a knowing look.

“Me too,” he nods, nervously chewing on his bottom lip. He doesn’t know where the confidence of last night went, but he suddenly feels unarmed and lost. What does one do now?

The sight of you in his shirt makes him feel like his biggest (wet) dream has come true– call him cheesy, but it also wakes up a sense of déja vu in him from the day before– you with sunlight in your eyes, hair messed up in a claw clip. He feels like he just fell in love at first sight again. Is that even possible?

It’s good you have a sense in you that makes you take the initiative and be in charge when you see him faltering. A giggle cuts out of your throat as you lean in and hug the boy around his neck, your lips dangerously close to his ear as you speak in a hushed whisper, not wanting to be heard by the men around you.

“I stole your shirt from you, by the way. You should text me if you want it back, so we can meet up, or something,” you mouth, lips gently glazing the sensitive skin of Eric’s ear, and god does he feel like he's going to suffocate from the lack of oxygen this causes in his lungs.

“You look amazing in my clothes, so I won’t ask for it back,” Eric hums, “but I’ll text you just in case you ever wanna bless my eyes with the sight again.”

“Deal. I’ll make Juyeon text me your number,” you say before you pull away from him, shooting him a wink that almost has his knees buckling like a school boy in love for the first time.

You walk backwards and wave at the group, sending Eric one last look before you join the passenger’s side and close the car door behind you, the sound of Yeri starting the engine resonating through the quiet forest. The men wave at you until the Toyota disappears out of sight, only scattering inside when it does to gather their things and load up their cars as well.

Eric is woken up from his trance by a teasing whistle coming out of Sunwoo’s mouth and a father-like slap to his back from Sangyeon.

He wonders if he’s truly being so obvious. (He's unaware of the fact that you two had very visible matching love bites on your necks. It doesn’t take much effort to put two and two together– don't tell him that, though.)

Still, Eric shrugs and goes inside with a different kind of pep to his step.

When he licks his lips, he swears he can still taste the strawberries.

#dbn: summer on you #deoboyznet #the boyz #eric sohn #tbz #eric sohn x reader #eric sohn fluff #eric sohn angst #eric sohn scenario #eric fluff #eric angst #sohn youngjae #tbz fic #tbz x reader #tbz fluff #the boyz x reader #the boyz fluff

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luxaofhesperides · 1 year ago

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"I see you, and I love you" + hurt/comfort ; requested by @oops-i-dropped-the-galaxy!

Danny can handle being a halfa. He’s had years to get used to it, switching between dead and alive, living boy and ghost, always living in flux. He’s settled into his identity as one of the few halfas in existence, navigating the living world and the Infinite Realms with ease after years of practice.

What he can’t handle is becoming an Ancient.

Apparently, while most Ancients are born into the role, ruling over their domain, some can grow into it. It’s rare, practically unheard of, but not impossible.

Danny is growing into the Ancient of Stars, changed from the inside out by his love of space.

He would be happy if it didn’t hurt so much.

Danny can’t sleep at night anymore. When the stars are out, he can hear them singing, each windchime voice echoing through his ears. Though he can’t see them from beneath Gotham’s cloud cover, he can feel them shining brightly far above him.

He lays in bed with Duke, curled up in his side, trying to muffle his whimpers as his bones creak and hollow, his soul growing too large for his body to handle. He is space contained in a human body. It wants to be free, to stretch from its suffocating confines and fill every dark space with cold light. His skin feels too tight and his teeth ache.

All Danny can do is clench his jaw, wrap his arms around his stomach as tightly as he can, and try to weather through the pain of changing.

The agony of it comes in waves. He doesn’t know how long it takes until it recedes enough for him to feel like he can breathe again, trying to suck air in as his lungs are crushed by his ribcage. Slowly, Danny pushes himself up, taking care not to wake Duke, and stumbles out of bed. His throat is dry and feels as if its been scraped raw by sandpaper, and all he wants is water.

He gets halfway down the hall when the next wave hits.

Danny collapses, gasping for breath, and can only watch through tear-filled eyes as his fingers go dark, the same black as deep space. His body shifts, bones cracking and muscles stretching like taffy, and suddenly he’s big larger than life a galaxy a black hole there is darkness everywhere it is alive it is full of stars the stars are singing the stars are singing the stars are si

“Danny? Hey, sweetheart, are you okay?”

That’s Duke’s voice. He’d recognize it anywhere, even from miles away, even when he’s sure he doesn’t have ears anymore. It takes all his effort to pull himself back to Earth, back into their apartment, blinking up at Duke as the stars in his eyes fade away.

Duke kneels before him, concern clear on his face, gentle hands reaching out to hold Danny steady. The feel of his warmth grounds him, keeps him more securely in his body. The pull of space is still there, tugging at him, trying to pull him out of humanity and into the form of an Ancient, but Danny can resist it so long as Duke keeps him tethered to the ground.

“It hurts,” he croaks, shivering.

“Shh, I know, baby. How can I help? What do you need?”

Danny leans forward, burying his face in Duke’s chest as tears slip out of his eyes. “It hurts,” he says again, voice shaking. “I keep changing and growing and my entire body is being torn apart and—” he gasps, cutting himself off. “I keep disappearing. I don’t want to disappear. I want to stay here but it takes me away and then I’m too big and no one can see me and I’m alone—”

“You’re not alone, Danny,” Duke says, holding him tightly as if his arms will be enough to keep Danny from breaking out of his own body, ridding himself of a mortal vessel, his only remaining tie to this world. “I see you, and I love you. Even if you have to change and go far away to be happy, I’ll find a way to follow you there, okay? I’m with you for as long as you want me.”

“I don’t want to hurt so much,” Danny whimpers, black fingers speckled with stardust clawing at Duke’s arms.

“Just breathe through it, sweetheart, you can do it. Let it pass through you. I got you, okay? Just let the pain pass and you’ll be fine.”

He wants to snap at Duke that it’s not fine, that the pain will be forever, it’ll linger in every one of his joints, that he can’t just stop fighting it because it’ll hurt even worse then. But his jaws are aching, his teeth sharpening, and there’s a black hole in his throat that he refuses to let loose. He lets out another pained whine, shivering, and in his chest a star is formed, burning bright and angry.

“Breathe, Danny, breathe,” Duke soothes, rubbing a hand up and down Danny’s back.

It’s habit to relax into his touch. They’ve spent so many nights working through night terrors and injuries, comforting each other through gentle touches. The pain eases a bit, and Danny sighs, frost on his breath.

“There we go, sweetheart, that’s it. You’re doing just fine.”

Another tear slips down his face, but the ache in his entire body as his growing ghost form tries to escape begins to fade.

He’s spent so many nights in pain, waiting for the sun to rise to muffle the singing of the stars. If he can get any relief, he’ll take it, even if it means losing his human form.

Danny stops fighting. His resistance to this change falls away. There’s a moment where the pain disappears entirely, the world going still, but before he can let out a relieved sigh, the change hits him like an asteroid, sudden and instant and inevitable.

A cry is ripped from his throat, but it doesn’t sound like him. It echoes, deep and inhuman, and suddenly Danny is every dark space surrounding the stars, the arms of every galaxy, suns burning bright and dying, supernova, cold and ice and the slow drifting of planets in orbit. His body grows, expands, no longer a ghost but an Ancient, body curling into itself to stay within the walls of the too small apartment, large hands cupped around Duke to keep him safe.

He can feel the cold of space. Orbits dance in his mind. Meteorites and asteroids drift without pattern across his chest. Danny can see everything with too many eyes, and he can cup planets in his palms, so much larger than possibility. His chest opens and expands and his body can curl around Earth and keep it safe.

He feels settled in this new body, senses stretched in every direction and the universe is so much lovelier than he could have ever experienced it in a halfa’s body.

Danny, Ancient of the Stars, hums and the universe shivers, singing back to him.

The pain is gone completely. He wonders why he resisted so hard; this is what he’s meant to be. He’s never felt so right before.

“Danny?”

Duke’s voice is small, but only because he is small when compared to Danny in his Ancient form.

Duke, he tries to say but his vocal chords have changed. Instead of words, a deep hum erupts from his throat, similar to the purr of a particularly large cat.

“Hey, sweetheart. Feeling better?”

Danny nods, pulling himself back together to feel his body more keenly, no longer stretched across the universe, cradling every star in his reach. Duke reaches a hand up and Danny reaches back, folding himself back into his body. His human eyes return and he realizes the apartment is completely covered in darkness with stars sparkling all around them. It recedes as he fits himself back into his body, the black on his fingers fading away until his hand is indistinguishable from a normal human’s.

He takes hold of Duke’s hand and tries to stand. His legs are weak and unsteady and he falls onto Duke, who catches him with ease and sweeps him up into a princess carry.

“There you are, honey,” Duke says, voice warm and relieved. “You alright?”

“Yeah. Yeah, I feel a lot better.”

“Good. Do you need anything? Hot chocolate, heating pad, sleep?”

Danny thinks for a moment, then says, “Hot chocolate.”

“You got it. Let me just set you on the couch and I’ll have it out in a minute.”

He carefully sets Danny onto the couch, then tucks the blanket they keep folded over the back around him. Once he’s satisfied Danny is comfortable, Duke heads to the kitchen, flicking on the light as he does.

Danny sinks into the couch cushions, carefully moving all his fingers and toes to make sure they’re fine. He’s a little sore, as if all his bones where put through the ringer, but it doesn’t feel any different from when he has a particularly rough training day.

What’s more important that his physical body is the fact that he can feel his core, settled deep in his chest. It’s no longer the cold of ice, but it burns coldness, a white star embodying his soul, a changed core to reflect his transformation into an Ancient.

A baby Ancient, technically. He still has some growing to do, but the rest should be easier and, hopefully, less painful.

He closes his eyes and begins to drift off when he hears Duke return. It takes some effort to open his eyes, and his smiles softly and sleepily when he sees Duke set down two steaming mugs of hot chocolate on the coffee table.

“Love you,” he mumbles, freeing a hand from the blanket to try to pull Duke down to join him.

Duke goes to him easily, sitting next to him and pulling Danny in to cuddle against him. It’s been so long since he last felt so comfortable at night, not writhing in pain and biting through his lip to keep quiet, that he can’t help but sink into it. A purr starts up in his chest, and Duke startles.

“Sweetheart, are you purring?”

Danny flushes and tries to hide his face. The purr doesn’t stop. He’s always been able to purr after becoming a halfa, though purr is just an easier way to describe it. It’s less of his vocal chords vibrating and more of his core rumbling in contentment. Usually, it’s unnoticeable, barely able to be felt let alone heard. Apparently, becoming an Ancient and therefore a much stronger ghost means his purrs are also stronger and louder.

“You’re so cute,” Duke says, pressing a kiss against Danny’s forehead. “Drink your hot chocolate, and then we can go back to sleep.”

He makes grabby hands at his mug, and Duke laughs and picks it up for him.

“Love you,” Danny repeats, voice less muffled.

“Love you, too,” Duke says. “I’m glad you’re feeling better.”

“I’m glad you were there to help me. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

“It’s a good thing you’ll never have to find out. I’ve got you, sweetheart, always.”

Believing him is the easiest thing Danny has ever done. If Duke says he’ll be there for, then he will.

Always, always, always.

. . .

[send me ghostlights prompts!]

#ghostlights #dc x dp #dp x dc #dcxdp #dpxdc #dc x dp fic #prompt fill #my writing #you ever think about how painful transformation must be? especially for eldritch danny turning into something human into something not?#yeah :) hurt and comfort!!#duke best boyfriend of the year tbh we all need a man like him in our lives #imagine the next time duke is in danger and danny comes to help and this human guy suddenly GROWS and his body unfolds and a mass of stars #and space comes out demanding in a voice that makes ears bleed that they leave signal alone or face the consequences #anyways after that gotham knows that the signal is loved by some monster/god so they try not to piss him off too much #this is all good and fine until goons and criminals make danny shrines and leave gifts and snacks on it so he'll show them mercy #and duke has to scold danny about not eating suspicious shrine snacks #thanks for the prompt!!

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strangetheedreamer · 1 year ago

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beneath the willow tree

pairing: jake kiszka x gn! reader

summary: you’ve been in love with Jake Kiszka for as long as you can remember, the only question is: does he feel the same?

a/n: this is a short lil blurb based off of a real dream that i had, if you find it as devastating as I did- well blame my subconscious not me :)

there are no warnings for this lil

blurb, it’s actually all fluff!

Some would ask how long you have been in love with Jake Kiszka.

You would argue that the easier question to answer would be was there ever a time that you weren’t? Because the answer to that question is simple: no.

You met Jake Kiszka when you were nine and he was eleven at the neighborhood playground. Specifically? It was a hot summer afternoon in August and you were with your friend Maddie trying to see who could jump the farthest off the swings. A dangerous game, but you were old enough to be without parental supervision and drunk with the power of it. It was the most fun you’d had all summer until you landed too hard off a jump and your ankle rolled painfully as soon as you hit the mulch. You had cried out and fallen to the ground, clutching your wounded ankle and trying to blink back the tears that were blurring your vision.

Then, an angel appeared.

You had looked up at the sound of your name from your slowly swelling ankle to meet warm brown eyes and though you were arguably too young for love at first sight or to even know anything about it, your heart had plummeted into your stomach the moment you met those eyes and the boy attached to them. He’d asked if you were okay and all you could manage in return was a wordless sob, your ankle pulsing with pain now. That fateful afternoon, Jake Kiszka had slung your arm around his skinny shoulders and helped you limp the two blocks home while his brother wheeled your bike behind you.

You were hopelessly gone from that afternoon onward.

The strings of your fates seemed to be irreversibly tangled. Small neighborhoods are just like that perhaps, the community close knit enough that it would make sense for you to be at the same summer barbeques and new years parties as you got older. But the hopeless romantic in you dreamed that it was because Jake Kiszka was your destiny. It was the worst of schoolchildren crushes. You doodled yours and Jake’s names in hearts in all your school notebooks in middle school. And in high school you could be found hiding under the bleachers at every soccer game or gazing across the chemistry lab, moony eyed, at who you were sure was your future husband.

The crush inevitably faded to background noise when you both graduated and left your hometown, him to follow his dreams of being a rockstar and you to attend college. But, you never quite got over him. It seemed you couldn’t help but compare every boy you let take you out to him. Sure, maybe the boy bought you a nice dinner or an ice cream, but did he dissect the frog in Biology so you didn’t have to? Sure the boy had pretty eyes or soft lips, but could they even compare to the ones you’d dreamed of for so long? It was torture, honestly. And very annoying.

It didn’t help that Jake’s dreams had come true. You would never forget the moment you were perusing the magazines at a bookstore and saw him on the cover of a guitar mag, looking just as beautiful as you remembered- maybe even more so. It filled your heart up to the brim that it had worked out for him, but a certain sadness clawed at your chest too. At that point, you were just a waitress in Nashville working two jobs to try and afford graduate school. Maybe your fates were so tangled together after all.

Then, Josh Kiszka sat down at the cafe you served at in the mornings and your whole world turned on its axis. He’d recognized you immediately, crowing your name and leaping up from his chair to embrace you. God, he hadn’t changed a bit. He still radiated warmth and kindness and pure, unadulterated joy. Josh had always been the sun to Jake’s moon. And it seemed they hadn’t grown out of that comparison.

“Hey! It’s my birthday this Saturday, I’m having a little celebration! You should come, I think the other guys would love to see you. Sam always had a bit of a crush on you, you know.” He’d left you those words, a kiss on the cheek, and with his address scribbled onto a napkin and pressed into your palm.

You debated all week if you should go. Josh had seemed so happy to see you, had told you that you were like a little slice of home. But you were nervous. You hadn’t seen Jake not on your phone or laptop screen in years. What if he didn’t remember you? Or worse: what if he didn’t care to?

In the end, you decided to go. And you walked up to Josh’s house out in the country with as few expectations as possible.

Nothing could have prepared you to see Jake in person again. He did a double take across the backyard when Josh led you out to it and from the moment your eyes met his again for the first time in what felt like eons, you audibly let out an “Oh no.” Because his eyes were the same. Even after all these years and all this time, those brown eyes were still the same. And you felt your heart plummet into your stomach again- just like it had when you were nine.

You were twenty five years old. And in a heartbeat, you were nine again.

And that’s how it felt every time you saw Jake after that. Like you were a moonstruck child who didn’t even know what love was yet.

Josh and Sam and Danny invited you into their lives like it was nothing and you found that each of them had grown into kind, lovely young men. But with Jake? Oh, it was perfect. He was everything you ever wanted. When you went out to dinner together and it began to rain, he’d give you his jacket to hold over your head while he brought the car around to you. He made you a playlist full of songs that reminded him of you or that he thought you’d like. You cooked together, giggling and dancing around one of your kitchens. He calls you “Bugs”, just like he did in high school after you saved a lady bug from a cruel classmate’s shoe. All of this and yet…

It was starting to break your heart. Eventually, you decided it was time.

Sitting in your best dress in Josh’s lovely backyard at his beautiful outdoor wedding, looking at Jake in his suit with his hair actually brushed you decided it was time.

The reception was small and lovely, but it still felt suffocating as you watched Jake twirl a girl around the makeshift dance floor. You felt a presence next to you and when you glanced over you found it was Josh, “I’m really glad you came,” he tells you, nudging your shoulder with his and you smile at him.

“Thank you for inviting me. What a beautiful night for this.” You try, but you can’t keep the melancholy out of your voice and you can’t pull your gaze from where Jake dips the girl down toward the floor and she throws back her head and laughs.

“You look lovely.” Josh’s words barely resonate and you shrug, shaking your head listlessly. Not to the only one that matters. Josh nudges you again, gently, his words just as soft, “He thinks so too.”

You grit your teeth, irritation and frustration bubbling in your stomach, and you shake your head again, “Don’t do that. Don’t say that.”

“You know, I always say that where this is love we must live on,” Josh ventures softly and you smile at the words, remembering watching the performance where he said them on your laptop in your college dorm room, desperate for even the slightest tidbit of Jake.

“And where this is not love, we must provide it,” You finish and you see him smile out of the corner of your eye. You’re a little confused as to the direction of this conversation and you’re about to ask what he’s talking about when he speaks again.

“Luckily, there is already love here.” And when you pivot to face him fully, he’s gone, leaving you with his confusing words.

Needing a moment to yourself, you retreat to your favorite piece of Josh’s property. A spot with a massive, beautiful weeping willow tree and a tire swing slung on one of the low branches. You’re sitting on the swing, staring at your hands when a branch breaks and a voice pulls your attention away from your hangnail.

“Thought I’d find you here.” Jake comes to a stop a few feet in front of you and stuffs his hands in his pockets, smiles softly. You can’t return his smile though and his brows furrow, he takes another step toward you. “What is it, bugs? Where’s that pretty smile I love so much?”

You know he doesn’t mean to make you cry, but tears well up at the corners of your downturned eyes anyway. How can he say everything right and it still not be enough? “Just needed a minute, I guess.” Your words are a whisper and even you can hear them break in the middle. You let the tire swing turn so you’re not facing him, not wanting him to see the tears that have begun to streak down your face.

He doesn’t give that easily unfortunately, you hear the leaves and the twigs crunch under his feet as he comes around so you’re facing each other again, this time kneeling in front of you and taking your hands in his. “Why the tears, bugs? What happened?”

You shake your head, but the words come out before you can stop them, “Do you remember when we were little and I rolled my ankle? And you walked me home?” You glance up at him after they’ve come out and his brows furrow in confusion, his lips parting.

“Do I remember when we met? Of course I do, bugs. You were trying not to cry just like you are right now. Tell me what’s wrong, please. Tell me so I can fix it.” His words only make it worse and you try to spin away from him again, but he holds the tire in his hand to stop the movement. You can feel his searching gaze on yours, hear the soft desperation in his voice when he whispers, “Bugs?”

“I have loved you ever since I’ve known you, Jake. Loved you so much it hurts. And I just don’t think I can do it anymore.” Your words are barely a whisper again, but you’re proud to hear that they don’t tremble or shake. They’re strong. And now they’re out there, with nothing for you to do but wait.

Jake is silent for several moments, long enough that you chance a glance up at him. His hands stay wrapped around yours and he’s watching you like he’s seeing you for the first time, “Oh bugs…” You turn your head, desperately afraid that he’s about to split your heart right down the middle when he speaks again, his words soft but full of feeling, “I’ve loved you from the moment you wouldn’t let James Booker crush that ladybug. I loved you then and every moment since. And I love you right now, sitting on this swing in front of me with tears in your eyes because you’re afraid I don’t feel for you exactly what you feel for me.”

You gasp softly, your head swinging back to face him. You search his eyes, desperate to see if he’s messing with you. Then you sob once and throw your arms around him, falling from the swing to kneel in front of him just as he had kneeled to confess to you. You hear him whisper your name, your real name, into your hair and you pull back just enough to press your lips to his, kissing him after more than fifteen years of loving him.

And finally, when the time comes, your notebook doodles and your teenage dreams come true. Jake Kiszka is yours, til death do you part.

#jake kiszka #jake gvf #jake kiska fic #jake kiszka x y/n #jake kiszka x reader #jake kiszka x you #greta van fleet #gvf #greta van fic #buffy tries writing

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cherubiyeon · 1 year ago

Text

the kids aren't alright | le sserafim huh yunjin x female reader

it's your best friend's birthday, though your dad doesn't allow you to go out tonight. no worries though, your best friend seems to just have a plan b, it seems.

✩ warnings. non!idol au, high school!au, best friend! yunjin, hurt comfort, slight angst at start, your dad's shit, mention of food, one-sided love, dialogue heavy

✩ word count. ~3.7k words

✩ playing. the kids aren't alright [fall out boy]

"dad, i really need to go to yunjin's birthday party tonight!"

in the dimly lit living room, a single lamp cast elongated, eerie shadows that seemed to encroach upon them. y/n felt the intensity of her father's anger emanating from him, making the room feel even more oppressive.

summoning her courage, she took a deep breath and persisted, "i understand your concerns, but yunjin is my best friend. this party means the world to her, and i can't imagine not being there."

her father's response was stern and unyielding, his voice laced with frustration. "i've already said no, y/n! you're staying home tonight, and you'll be studying."

downstairs, her father's voice roared like an impending storm, an avalanche of anger and disappointment crashing upon her. y/n's pulse quickened with every word, each syllable a verbal assault on her resolve. his rage clawed at the edges of her sanctuary, a relentless force determined to breach the haven she had painstakingly built.

"dad, please, just listen—" y/n implored, her voice a trembling mix of desperation and hope.

but her father's anger remained unyielding, a relentless tempest that refused to be tamed. "you're not leaving this house tonight, y/n! you hear me?"

tears welled up in y/n's eyes as the crushing weight of her dreams clashed with the unrelenting aggression of her father. with a heavy heart, she turned away, ascending the creaking wooden staircase. each step felt like a reluctant retreat, a painful acknowledgment of the battle she faced, yet her spirit remained unbroken, determined to find a way to break free.

minutes stretched like hours, and just as y/n felt her world closing in, she knew she needed a breath of fresh air. she wiped her tears, her resolve steadying as she walked upstairs to her room. each step was heavy with a mix of frustration and determination.

the memory of her father's voice still lingered as she entered her room, the remnants of his anger casting a shadow over her. the evening sun had now completely disappeared, and the room was enveloped in the soft, cool glow of the moonlight. she sat on the edge of her bed, her heart still racing, her mind a whirlwind of conflicting emotions.

battling the sting of tears, she squeezed her eyes shut, her heart hammering in her chest in sync with the storm that raged outside her room. the silence that followed was deafening, an eerie hush that hung in the air like an unspoken verdict after the tempestuous trial that had just taken place.

as the echoes of her father's rage slowly faded, a muffled tap on her windowpane sliced through the heavy silence, making her jump. her heart raced, the fear of facing another confrontation gripping her. with hesitant steps, y/n approached the window, her breath held in a mixture of trepidation and intrigue.

hesitatingly, she pulled back the curtain, her eyes widening in surprise. "... yunjin?" she breathed, her voice a fragile mix of astonishment and relief as she opened the window.

outside, yunjin's presence was a burst of energy against the encroaching night, her hazel-brown hair adorned with leaves and twigs, an unexpected consequence of her journey to reach y/n. despite the makeshift forest crown, her grin was wide, bordering on awkward, as if she had been caught in the act of some secret adventure.

"hey there," yunjin greeted, her voice carrying a blend of mischief. she swiped at a stray leaf clinging to her hair, her eyes shining with anticipation as she climbed up to the room.

y/n's surprise melted into a mixture of confusion and amusement. "you're... you're at my window?" she stammered, disbelief coloring her words.

yunjin's grin widened, unabashed. "who needs doors when you've got windows, right?" she quipped, her eyes sparkling with a playful glint.

y/n laughed, the tension from earlier melting away with each chuckle. "you're something else, yunjin," she teased, her heart warming at the sight of her friend as she closed the window.

"how else would i make a grand entrance?" yunjin joked, her tone light.

the absurdity of the situation broke the tension that had enveloped the room, a laughter-inducing rupture in the gravity of the moment. y/n found herself chuckling despite herself, a warm sense of familiarity settling in.

"but seriously, how did you even get up here?" y/n asked, her curiosity piqued by the daring feat.

yunjin shrugged, her grin now tinged with a touch of sheepishness. "let's just say i navigated a few trees, a couple of branches, and maybe stumbled a bit. but here i am, unscathed." she brushed a few lingering leaves from her hair, a playful glint in her eyes.

"you're unbelievable, you know that?" y/n sighed, her voice laced with affection. she watched as yunjin patted off the small leaves on her clothes.

yunjin feigned offense, placing a hand over her heart dramatically. "unbelievably charming? i know."

y/n's laughter subsided, her gaze meeting yunjin's in a moment of unspoken connection. "maybe," she replied, a mixture of earnestness and fondness coloring her words.

the room seemed to hold its breath after their laughter subsided, an electric current of emotion buzzing between y/n and yunjin. yunjin's eyes, warm and perceptive, noticed the redness and puffiness of y/n's eyes, the traces of a struggle that was all too familiar.

"hey," yunjin began, her voice gentle, "are you okay? what happened?"

y/n swallowed hard, struggling to find the right words. she hadn't meant for yunjin to see her like this, to witness the cracks in the facade she so often wore. "it's just... family stuff," she mumbled, avoiding yunjin's gaze.

yunjin's expression transformed from concern to something more complex, a mix of emotions that flickered across her face like shadows. "y/n, you can't keep brushing things off like this. if something's wrong, you can talk to me."

y/n's heart ached at the sincerity in yunjin's words. she wished she could share everything, but the weight of her struggles felt too heavy to burden her friend with.

"i know, yunjin," y/n replied softly, her voice tinged with gratitude. "i'm just... dealing with things."

yunjin's eyes bore into y/n's, a silent plea for honesty. "is it because of your dad?"

y/n looked away, her throat tightening. "yeah," she admitted, her voice barely above a whisper.

a sudden fire ignited in yunjin's eyes, her fists clenching in a mixture of anger and protectiveness. "y/n, no one should make you feel like this. if he's hurting you, i swear i'll—"

y/n's heart swelled at yunjin's fierce loyalty, but she couldn't let her friend bear the burden of her battles. "no, yunjin, it's not like that. i promise."

yunjin's anger faded, replaced by a soft determination. "well, you don't have to go through this alone."

y/n managed a small smile through the tears. "you really care about me, huh?"

yunjin's grin was bittersweet, as if happiness and sadness were warring for dominance on her face. "of course i do, y/n. you mean everything to me."

y/n's heart skipped a beat at yunjin's heartfelt words. there was an intensity in her friend's gaze, a depth of emotion that y/n couldn't quite put her finger on. she felt a rush of warmth, a sense of being cherished that went beyond their usual friendship. but y/n quickly brushed aside the thought, unsure if she was just reading too much into things. after all, yunjin was her best friend, and their connection had always been strong.

"yeah, you're pretty amazing too," y/n replied, a genuine smile tugging at her lips.

yunjin's gaze held a thousand unspoken words as she pulled y/n into a tight embrace. y/n felt the warmth of yunjin's body, the comfort of her presence, and for a moment, everything else faded away. it was as if the world had stopped spinning just for them.

"i'm lucky to have you as my best friend," y/n said, her voice muffled against yunjin's shoulder.

yunjin held her even tighter, her embrace a mixture of happiness and aching sadness that y/n couldn't quite decipher. in that moment, y/n felt the depth of their connection, the way yunjin had been a constant in her life, a source of unwavering strength and comfort.

but as they clung to each other, yunjin's heart carried an unspoken burden. she couldn't help but wonder if y/n would ever truly understand the depth of her feelings, the silent longing she had harbored for so long. in that embrace, yunjin found both solace and a bittersweet ache, a love that remained unvoiced, an unfulfilled wish that danced in the shadow of their friendship.

though, y/n suddenly realized that something important was happening today— it was yunjin's birthday. a mixture of guilt and excitement surged within her, and she gently pulled away from their hug, a small smile playing on her lips.

"wait, yunjin," y/n said softly, her eyes lighting up with realization. she reached under her bed and retrieved a carefully wrapped package, her fingers trembling with a blend of nervousness and anticipation. "...i have something for you."

yunjin's eyes widened with surprise, a delighted curiosity dancing in her gaze. "for me?" she asked, her voice filled with genuine surprise.

y/n nodded, a shy smile gracing her lips as she extended the gift toward yunjin. "yeah. happy birthday, yunjin."

yunjin accepted the gift with a mixture of excitement and gratitude, her fingers carefully unwrapping the paper to reveal a small box beneath. her heart fluttered with a sense of anticipation, and she looked up at y/n with an affectionate smile. "you didn't have to get me anything, you know."

y/n's smile widened, but a hint of mischief danced in her eyes. "oh, but i did. you see, i spent my allowance for the month at that festival we went to last week." she chuckled, her tone light and playful.

yunjin's eyes lit up with understanding and fondness. "ah, so that's why you were so eager to try all those different foods and play all those games."

y/n's cheeks flushed with a sheepish grin. "yeah, guilty as charged. but i wanted to make your birthday special."

with a gentle laugh, yunjin opened the small box to find a delicate crochet pattern inside. her eyes widened in surprise, and she looked at y/n in awe. "is this...?"

y/n nodded, her heart racing with a blend of nervous anticipation and hope. "it's a.... i don't know, crochet guitar keychain. i mean, you love to play guitar and if i had more money i would have bought you a real one but uh... i put it together myself, though it's not flawless, but..."

yunjin's eyes brightened with a mixture of surprise and amusement. "a crochet guitar pattern? that's so uniquely thoughtful, y/n." she chuckled softly, a playful glint in her eyes. "and here i was thinking you were giving me a crash course in musical instruments."

y/n's cheeks flushed with a mixture of embarrassment and amusement. "oh gosh, no. i know you're the one with the guitar skills. i can barely strum a chord."

yunjin's laughter was warm and genuine, a melody that resonated in the room. "well, i appreciate the sentiment, really. i promise i won't hold it against you if my guitar sounds a bit... thread-like."

y/n chuckled and rolled her eyes at the pun, the tension from earlier melting away in the comfort of their easy banter. "i'm just glad you like it. i wanted to give you something meaningful."

yunjin's gaze held a soft intensity as she met y/n's eyes. "you always know how to make things meaningful, y/n. that's one of the things i admire about you."

a flush of warmth spread across y/n's cheeks, her heart fluttering at yunjin's words. "you're making me blush, yunjin."

yunjin's grin was infectious as she reached out to playfully nudge y/n's shoulder. "well, get used to it, because i'll keep saying it if i have to."

y/n rolled her eyes in mock exasperation, though her heart danced with happiness. "you're impossible."

yunjin's laughter filled the room once more, a sound that felt like a soothing melody in the midst of the night. "and you're amazing."

as their laughter subsided, a comfortable silence settled between them, punctuated by the soft rustling of leaves outside the window. y/n glanced at the crochet pattern in yunjin's hands, yunjin's fingers tracing the delicate lines.

"it's not much, yunjin," y/n said, her voice tinged with a mixture of humility and hope. "but i really hoped you'd like it."

yunjin's gaze softened as she looked at y/n. "you have no idea how much this means to me, y/n. it's not about what it is, but about the thought and effort you put into it."

y/n's smile was genuine, a reflection of the warmth she felt inside. "well, then i'm glad i put in the effort."

without warning, yunjin enveloped y/n in a tight hug, a gesture that spoke volumes about her gratitude and affection. "you're the best, you know that?"

y/n's arms instinctively wrapped around yunjin, a rush of contentment flooding her senses. "i'm just happy to see you happy, yunjin."

yunjin's heart swelled with affection as she looked at y/n, her best friend who always managed to surprise her with her thoughtfulness. "it's more than special, y/n. it's perfect."

y/n's cheeks flushed with a mixture of happiness and relief. "you really think so?"

yunjin's response was immediate and sincere. "absolutely. and you know what? i don't need anything else. this is the best birthday gift i've ever received." before y/n could say anything more, yunjin enveloped her in a tight, heartfelt hug. "thank you, y/n. i really, truly love it."

y/n's arms wrapped around yunjin, and she felt a sense of contentment settle within her. "i'm so glad you like it, yunjin."

as the moon's glow continued to weave a tapestry of light and shadows in y/n's room, yunjin's eyes sparkled with a mix of fondness and mischief. "you know, i wish i could stay over, but my parents would probably have a search party out for me by morning."

y/n laughed, the sound a melody that filled the air with a sense of ease. "yeah, you disappearing would probably cause quite a commotion."

yunjin's grin widened. "oh, definitely. i can already imagine the headlines: 'local teen vanishes, blame falls on sneaky friend.'"

y/n playfully rolled her eyes. "and who's the sneaky friend in that scenario?"

yunjin winked. "obviously, it's you. you're the one luring innocent teens into your little lair."

they shared a laugh, the familiarity of their banter a comforting embrace in itself. "well, i promise i won't keep you hostage in my lair," y/n teased. "but before you go, you better promise to bring me some of the amazing food from your birthday party tomorrow."

yunjin's expression turned thoughtful for a moment before she grinned mischievously. "deal. i'll be the delivery girl, and we can have a mini feast at lunch."

y/n's eyes lit up at the idea. "perfect. you know the way to my heart is through food."

yunjin chuckled. "noted. food it is."

y/n's smile turned soft, a mixture of warmth and affection as she looked at her friend. "yunjin, thank you for coming tonight. you made a not-so-great day so much better."

yunjin's eyes gleamed with a warmth that matched y/n's. "and thanks for best birthday gift, seriously."

their smiles held a shared understanding, a testament to the support they offered each other through life's ups and downs. "have a good night, yunjin," y/n said, her voice gentle. y/n's eyes glimmered as she met yunjin's gaze, a touch of sentiment in her smile. "and a final happy birthday, yunjin."

yunjin's heart swelled with gratitude, her emotions bubbling to the surface. "good night, y/n. and remember, if your dad is acting up again..."

yunjin's brow furrowed in concern, but before she could finish her sentence, y/n leaned in and placed a gentle kiss on her cheek. yunjin froze, her eyes widening in surprise, her cheeks turning a shade of pink that was illuminated by the moonlight filtering through the window.

y/n pulled back with a playful grin, her heart racing but her expression casual. "well, you'll know what to do."

yunjin's lips parted as if she wanted to say something, but no words came out. y/n's grin only widened, and she winked before turning to open back te window again, allowing the night breeze to flow into the room.

yunjin's voice was a mixture of flustered and amused as she finally found her words. "you... you're something else, y/n."

y/n laughed softly, her heart dancing with both nerves and satisfaction. "i'll take that as a compliment."

yunjin's gaze held a mix of emotions – surprise, happiness, and a touch of something more. "thank you for tonight, y/n. and for the unexpected second birthday gift."

as y/n watched yunjin prepare to leave through the window, she felt a sense of contentment settle within her. "anytime, yunjin. have a great night, and remember, i'll be eagerly waiting for the food tomorrow."

yunjin's smile was a luminous beam in the moonlight. "you got it. and, y/n..."

y/n raised an eyebrow, her curiosity piqued. "yes?"

yunjin hesitated for a brief moment before her smile returned, brighter than ever. "this little keychain might just be the best birthday gift i've received in my whole life."

y/n's heart skipped a beat at yunjin's words, her mind racing with a mixture of excitement and curiosity. "i'm glad you liked it," she replied, her voice soft.

yunjin's expression held a touch of playfulness as she leaned against the window frame. "oh, trust me, i loved it. though you might have caught me a bit off-guard with that kiss."

a flush of embarrassment warmed y/n's cheeks, but her grin was unapologetic. "consider it a spontaneous bonus."

yunjin's laughter was a music that danced through the night air, and her eyes held a mixture of amusement and affection as she met y/n's gaze. "you're really weird, you know that?"

y/n's grin became a bit mischievous as she gazed at yunjin. "you know, sometimes a bit of spur-of-the-moment action adds some excitement, doesn't it?"

yunjin's smile softened, her gaze holding a lingering warmth. "definitely not."

as they stood by the window, a comfortable silence settled between them, the moonlight casting a gentle glow over their faces. yunjin's mind, though still a bit flustered from the unexpected kiss, was filled with a newfound sense of determination. she couldn't ignore the fluttering feeling in her chest, the way her heart raced in y/n's presence.

she promised herself that in the near future, she would make her own move. she had cherished their friendship for so long, and now, with the added realization of her deeper feelings, yunjin knew it was time to be brave. she would let y/n know, in her own way, that the bond they shared meant more.

as their quiet moment lingered, yunjin finally spoke, her voice a blend of sincerity and anticipation. "y/n, have a wonderful night. and just so you know, if your dad gives you any trouble, don't hesitate to call me."

y/n's gaze held a soft appreciation, her heart warmed by yunjin's unwavering support. "thank you, yunjin. you're the coolest but also the weirdest friend."

before either of them could say more, y/n leaned in and planted a gentle kiss on yunjin's cheek once more. this time, yunjin didn't freeze – she felt a warmth spread from the point of contact, a sensation that lingered even after y/n pulled away.

y/n's grin was playful, her eyes dancing with mischief. "just returning the favor."

yunjin's lips parted as if she wanted to say something, but instead, she found herself lost in the moment, a blend of emotions swirling within her. she finally managed to regain her composure, her voice soft but genuine. "good night, y/n. and thank you, again, for everything."

y/n's smile was a final farewell, a promise of another day to come. "sleep well, yunjin. and happy birthday, once more."

as yunjin disappeared from the windowpane, her heart was a whirlwind of emotions – flustered from the unexpectedness of the evening, but also filled with a hopeful anticipation of what the future might hold. the small, spontaneous kiss might have been an unplanned gift, but it had ignited a spark within her.

with a contented sigh, yunjin carried the memory of that night with her, knowing that her feelings for y/n were something to be cherished and explored, even if it meant stepping into uncharted territory. and as she made her way home, the stars overhead seemed to twinkle with their own sense of excitement, as if the universe itself was rooting for them.

as yunjin walked away from y/n's house, her heart was all over the place. she couldn't help but replay the whole evening in her head like a movie – the surprise kiss, y/n's eyes, and their silly banter. it was like a rom-com but with her and y/n as the lead character.

"i mean, seriously," she mumbled to herself, "who would've thought a little cheek kiss could send my heart into overdrive like this?"

she kicked a pebble along the path, trying to sort out her jumbled thoughts. her feelings for y/n were a mess, like a puzzle missing a few pieces. okay, maybe a lot of pieces. and she had no clue how to put them together.

"love? seriously, yunjin?" she shook her head, feeling a mixture of excitement and anxiety. "you're like the cheesy protagonist in one of those teen dramas, pining after your best friend. classic."

staring up at the stars, yunjin couldn't help but chuckle. "and now i'm having a heart-to-heart with the universe. great, just great."

but as the stars twinkled above, a strange sense of comfort washed over her. it was like they were in on the secret, like they knew something she didn't. or maybe she was just imagining things. who knew?

with a determined grin, she straightened her posture. "well, universe, i guess i'm ready for this mess. whatever it is."

walking home, she couldn't shake the dorky smile that tugged at her lips. she might not have all the answers, but she was ready to figure them out – even if it meant stumbling through a few more awkward moments and heartfelt confessions. after all, that was the messy beauty of falling in love, right?

#fanfic #kpop fanfic #kpop gg #kpop gg x reader #kpop x reader #kpop #kpop x female reader #wlw fanfic #huh yunjin #huh yunjin x reader #huh yunjin x female reader #le sserafim #le sserafim x reader

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oneshotnewbie · 1 year ago

Note

what about an Alt oneshot where the reader really struggles with Elliot leaving? Because Elliot was like a father to her so when she finds out hes gone she breaks down crying in Liv's arms. Liv has to have her in therapy because she struggles with feelings of abandonment and being unwanted like she becomes depressed?

ᕚ---ᕘ

The sound of dripping water echoed in the bathroom. Darkness surrounded you and only a single, lonely candle stood on the edge of the bathtub. Its flame flickered in the gentle breeze that rushed through the tilted window, throwing dark, scurrying shadows on the bare white tires.

You had not been this low to the ground in ages but it was only a matter of time before your family broke. Things have not been going well for weeks between Olivia and her partner, who was like a father figure to you.

Quarrels with unrequited feelings and hurtful situation mixed with the incident at the precinct, where he shot a young woman, was the last straw. Elliot was gone. Swallowed up by the earth without saying goodbye. He had simply quit his job and disappeared.

With an idefinable gaze, you looked into the puny candle flame. You drew your knees up and laid your head on them. Sitting there, your arms wrapped tightly around your body. Lonely, lost and abandoned.

Everyone who ever loved you was gone. Only your mother was still here. But she, too, had her own life. Olivia had her new team, her important job and everything started to seem worthless around you. Just a girl who was only almost grown.

You swallowed hard and put your hand on your chest. Firmly, you pressed against your chest and ran your cold fingers over your sternum. Gasping for air, your nails clawed at thin skin, feeling the pain that wrapped itself around your heart and slowly covered it with black spots.

A single tear fell onto your bare knee and slowly ran down your lower leg, disappearing into the sea of water that encased you. Slowly, you lowered yourself into the bathwater until your body and head were completely submerged in the cool wet. The world around you obliberating and dwindling in waves, you lingered further on your thoughts.

This heart. Bruised and a witness to terribly painful losses. If only you could close this heart off, protect it from further pain, then you would finally be free. You would finally be the girl without ballast, finally be able to be able to love again without fear of abandonment.

You felt awful, started hating yourself even though it was the people you should hate for giving you love and stealing it again. For all the broken pieced they left your heart in.

"Y/n!" the matching face suddenly appeared to the muffled voice entering your ears, the expression bearing a worried and anxious grimace. Olivia quickly pushed her hands through the wall of water, grabbing your shoulders before pulling you up with a mighty jerk. "What the hell are you doing?"

You gasped, took a few deep breaths, and refilled your lungs with the oxygen it needed. The darknes had seduced you and made you forget that your body was already screaming for air while you were lost in your mind. "I-I am sorry"

Feeling the cold gradually sifting through your bones, crushing you and eating you from the inside out, you were thankful that your mother immediately grabbed a towel and wrapped it around your shoulders, gently stroking your upper arms.

There was no sound. Even the drops of water that fell from your damp hair seemed afraid to move. The silence between both of you was so stifling, that Olivia held her breath for several secounds before taking a cautious step towards you, sitting on the floor next to the bathtub before leaning against the wall.

"Y/n?" she breathed, listened strenously into the darkness and looking into your pale face, whose color once had a beautiful beige hue. The sight of her daughter was far more painful than she had ever thought possible and she had to restrain herself from letting tears flow.

A thousand small but sharp needles pierced her heart. The woman knew it had something to do with Elliot´s departure, shortly after telling you that you would probably never come back, you had completely changed character and turned distant. Yes, almost depressed. "I want you to see a therapist," she whispered in a trembling voice and reached out a hand that stroked a stray strand of hair from your face.

Your eyes instantly watered as you began to sniffle. "Was I not worth anything to him? Not even a goodbye?" you whimpered softly, ignoring the sentence that just left your mothers mouth. A single tear trickled down your cheeks, mixing with the pearls of bath water that dripped down your chin in unison.

"Why did he leave us?" you sobbed and she leaned forward, dropping her head onto yours. Your voice cracked, fading until your body shook with silent tears in her embrace. "I thought we were family. H-he was like a father to me!"

Olivia´s hand found yours and intertwined with your fingers gently, as if you would break if she made a wrong move. She understood the pain you endured, knew exactly what such an exit without warning could do to a soul. Especially one as young as yours.

That Elliot chose to escape his emotional problems by disappearing was typical for him. Still, she missed her partner. The warmth that surrounded his body. The perfume that gradually faded and was forgotten. The woman missed the stubborn guy with aggression problems. The man who was a friend to her, if not a lot more.

He was the first guy to show her that there could be a relationship between friendship and family. Strong and unique like she had never felt before in her life. They had solved the most diverse and dangerous cases and defeated the worst people.

Elliot was one of the most important people her daughter´s life, along with her and Amanda but now he was gone. Now she had to sweep up the shards he had left behind and glue them together.

She was willing to stand by you and follow in his footsteps to represent both sides of being a parent. It would be difficult, especially at first, but she knew you could both do it together.

Tears rolled freely down her cheeks as she broke out of her painful thoughts while standing up and slowly pulling your petrified and blunted body out of the bathtub. While she dried you off and dressed you, gently combin your wet hair and blow-drying it, you were completely absent to reality, staring blankly at the cold tiles decorating the sink.

Shivering and surrounded by inner coldness, you felt like freezing to death. It was too painful to fight it back. Cold was the pain you felt since he was gone, and you did not know if it would ever fade away.

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tripleglitchwriting · 11 months ago

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Ignition (Part 3)

Gn human reader, Ratchet-centric

We are slowly clawing our way out of the angst, folks.

CW: Miscommunication, mild language, getting burned by water graphically, referring to a person as “it” (unintentionally), injury, anxiety thoughts about awful things happening, a little fearplay

You recounted the last couple hours in your head. Most, if not all of your memories were either fuzzy or painful, and right now you weren’t making many good ones. You’d ended up shrouded in darkness longer than you’d really expected, though to be fair you expected to be dead by now. At some point the giant opened up its hand for a second and grabbed some sort of metal tool before putting it somewhere you couldn’t see, then immediately shut you off from the world again and walked off. At that point you’d been hoping it was just a really vivid nightmare, the world having been dark for so long. Too bad nothing good ever happens to you.

Deeper into the forest you went- you assumed it was still the forest from the sounds of trees being snapped like twigs- and thoughts of horrible things that could happen next latched onto your conscious mind. Getting torn apart limb from limb, getting chopped up, ending up crushed, being played with like a toy, getting eaten? Though, if it wanted to this thing could have done it already… so why was it taking you so far away?

Unfortunately, you got your answer. The next time it removed the hand blocking out the light you were greeted with the sight of a creek. It was quaint and nice, you would have loved to sit there for a while if you weren’t being kidnapped by a giant robot with unknown intentions. It set you down on the forest floor, not noticing your grimace as your leg hit the ground in an awkward way, sending waves of pain up your body. Really, the thing seemed to be ignoring you. For now, at least, as it started doing something near the creek. It knew you couldn’t get away so it just… left you there. Oh how you wished you could prove it wrong.

A sour feeling wormed its way into your gut. You pushed it down in favor of something sweeter. Up above were the extravagant, warm colors of the autumn leaves. It was always a nice season, at least where you were geographically. Now the sun was just dipping down past the horizon, saying it’s goodbye by taking the colors of day with it. You spent a bit watching it, reminiscing on days you couldn’t quite remember and nights spent stargazing rather than sleeping. Unfortunately while you daydreamed something crucial happened, or what you assumed was crucial, because the titian seemed to be building something.

It began to put together what you could only understand as a makeshift container. A bowl or a tub, big enough for both of its hands to fit comfortably in. It welded together metal with a blowtorch, which was absolutely another thing you had to worry about, but what was more terrifying was what it did when it finished the bowl. It filled it up with water. And started a controlled fire to heat it. Like a camper heating up cold food. A shiver ran up your spine as you thought about what the food could be in this situation.

When it turned back to you, you tried to scoot back again, but it was in vain. It used a smaller container, made of the same metal if you had to guess, to take some of the boiling water. Cold, unmoving eyes beamed down on you like headlights. Suddenly, you knew how the deer felt.

You shook and begged for it to stay away, only earning you an insultingly pitying look before emptying the cup over your neck and collarbone. It was searing. You screamed, of course, and kicked and struggled and did everything in your limited power to stop it. To your surprise, after a second it did. You could still feel the heat stabbing into your skin, but no more water came. Instead it made a noise akin to a gasp and hesitantly reached out before retracting its arm and turning away. At that point the curtain of night begun had fall over the forest, the only illumination being the rising moon and your giant captors eyes.

While it was otherwise occupied, the adrenaline started to wear off once again. You were very confused about what just took place and why it wasn’t still happening, but you sure as hell weren’t arguing with it. Pain from your old injury and your new burn took hold, and with the deafening silence of the world around you (save for some mechanical clicks and whirrs from the giant) you could only focus on your body’s demands for comfort. And comfort did come, because your vision began to burr and your mind went blank.

…

You weren’t out for long. Or you assumed as much, as when you woke you were in the same position as before. With one key difference. It was looking right at you. Again you preformed your old routine of screaming and failing to get away, but when you finished you noticed something. You were still in a lot of pain… but you felt lighter.

After a glance down, the realization dawned on you that the dirt and dried blood covering your form was gone. Well, not gone, but at least cleaned. As far as you knew no magical fairy did a mediocre job at fixing you up (not that you would be surprised if it did at this point), so that would leave the giant as the culprit.

Why?

Was it trying to clean you up before it ate you or something? You figured it would have done that already instead of waiting for you to wake up… unless you got really unlucky by getting captured by a sadistic giant robot. Though… this one really didn’t seem the type. It did hurt you with the water, and handled you a bit too rough for your taste, but for something its size the handling seemed like an inevitability rather than an intentional attack. And the water, the burning still hurt like hell but when it saw you in pain it stopped. That cup had more water in it, it could have dumped the whole thing on you- yet it didn’t. And here you were, wounds cleaned up with what could only be water. Cold water. Purposefully cooled water.

You weren’t one to jump to conclusions. Maybe it was just wishful thinking, maybe you were just going insane. You still couldn’t trust it, you still needed to get out.

Yet there was a part of you that wanted to believe the giant was good. It wasn’t the one that broke your leg or made you trip down that cliff. It just found you. And now your life is literally in its hands.

A question formed in the back of your mind. Well, maybe reappeared rather than formed. After the initial shock of seeing it, you’d forgotten all about what you really wanted to know. Above all else, all your other burning inquiries, one made it out of your mouth as you looked into its eyes without fear for the first time.

“What are you?”

————————

What a strange sound. It made rounded and soft noises, a staggering departure from Ratchet’s own language. Whatever it was, this call was distinctly different from the others he’d heard it make before. Earlier they had been shrill and quick, but now it was slow and even… careful. Like a question not expecting an answer.

And the sound happened right after it looked itself over and realized it was clean. Just how sentient was this thing? Thinking about it now, that fabric it wore didn’t seem like the thing grew it itself. It was a covering, a weaving, something taken from another creature and made into cloth.

Memories resurfaced and demanded his attention; memories of its body language, its spoken language, its… no, no not it… they.

Wait, no, that was a wild Leo to conclusions, right? He’d found them- it- severely injured in its own territory, what sentient creature would cause that to happen to themself? Then again, stranger things had happened. He’d seen stranger things happen. Accidents were a factor was well, he would know, and he hadn’t even seen what else was on this planet. Maybe it was more than a random backwater mudball.

Then he remembered something very important. It wasn’t very important at the time he got it, but now it could be the defining factor in interacting with an entirely new species. Wheeljack’s experimental translator. Experimental was a key word in this situation, especially when applied to Wheeljack. He’d claimed it worked perfectly and had no flaws, but he had also claimed the same thing about the “Time Stasis Gun” that almost offlined the entire crew. Hopefully this one didn’t explode… or cause a spacetime anomaly.

It was a program that could be activated whenever, Ratchet just never did because why would he ever trust an untested program designed by Wheeljack. But looking down at this being he’d spontaneously decided to save, it was worth a shot. He sent out the command to turn it on. Now he just had to wait for it to get a grip on the new language.

Unfortunately for him, the little creature hadn’t been very talkative. There wasn’t much he could do about that. He ex-vented and decided to keep doing what he did best: mending the injured. And that limb really needed some straightening out. With the rest of the leftover scrap metal he had he tried to create a splint that would keep the limb secure. He’d seen the self healing capabilities of some organics before and hoped this one had that power too. Luckily, judging by the already scabbing cuts he’d cleaned, he wouldn’t have to worry about that.

“I’m going to have to put this on your broken limb, I promise it won’t hurt you.” He showed off the split in one servo, letting the thing look it over before he approached the injury. The thing made some unintelligible squeaks before bobbing their head up and down hesitantly. He took it as a good sign and began to slowly move toward the break. Still, they hesitated for a second, unwilling to expose such a vulnerable part of themself. He couldn’t blame them. Eventually they moved what they could of the damaged limb toward Ratchet.

He nodded gruffly, a clunky but seemingly appreciated gesture. With the splint in one servo he gently and carefully lifted their limb up. They grimaced and sharply sucked in air- he looked at them in worry, stopping immediately, but they gave him a “go on” motion. So he did, and through this slow and painful process he was able to attach the splint successfully. When he finally finished both parties smiled, the smaller half making little noises of supposed joy.

The translator hadn’t kicked in yet, but Ratchet didn’t get a second to question it because the creature started trying to get up. Obviously he dashed to settle them down, earning him a squeak of disapproval and cursing himself for being so brash. They seemed taken aback, predictably, but when he moved his servos back as fast as he could their face seemed to soften. They even smiled at him. Cute.

Soon they resigned to watching the forest once again, darkness still lapping at all sides. He watched their movements get slower as the time passed. They gave him as assessing look, one he could only describe as scrutinizing, but not long after they glanced at the splint, closed their little optics, and laid down. This nearly sent him into a panic thinking they had suddenly offlined, but calmed down after he remembered organics recharged often. Frankly, it was a relief. Not only were they getting some very needed rest, it seemed they trusted him enough to fall asleep in his presence. Now that’s progress.

In terms of energy, Ratchet was fine. Now that the chaos of the creature had calmed down, though, worry began to tiptoe back in his processor. He knew his friends would be okay, they always have. But that sound he heard before he went into stasis… it wasn’t his pod getting damaged, it was louder than the shots being fired before, it was more reminiscent of a ship being destroyed. Logically it would make sense. The Arc was already damaged and the Deceptions had the advantage, it would be perfectly possible that they… didn’t make it. He hadn’t gotten any signals or recorded any signs of mechanical life. They could be hurt and no one would be there to fix them, they could be gone for all he knew—

But Ratchet hadn’t made it this far in the war by worrying and doubting his friends. They’d made it, of course they did. If Optimus had a plan it must have worked. Still, with limited technology it would take a while to send out a distress signal powerful enough to reach space. For now, he’d just make sure the creature was safe and get back to work. Come next cycle he’d move back to the pod. He had faith his friends could hang on a little while longer.

———————

You weren’t expecting a reply and you didn’t get one. Not a verbal one, anyway. You stared at the thing and it stared back. It stared still for a couple minutes, which was incredibly off putting, but that was better than constantly screaming and shaking with fear. Eventually it breathed out, or something similar, because you really didn’t think breathing was something this thing could do. Suddenly it turned away and began tinkering again, which you found pretty rude, though it’s not like it could really tell you what it was going to do.

After a while it came back with a small gizmo of some sort. Looking closer there was something familiar about its shape, but you were distracted by the sounds of more metal scraping and whirring before you could really process what it was. The robot looked at you expectantly while it held the thing in its hand, this time realizing what it was trying to say. The “gizmo” was a splint. It wanted to put a splint in your leg.

You considered your options: Struggle and refuse to be treated by a giant robot, or let it touch your very broken leg. You didn’t like either option very much, but some treatment was better than none. There wasn’t much you had to lose anyway. You nodded, hoping to convey a “yes” or “okay”, and to your surprise it worked.

When it started to move closer you remembered one key problem you had with this. Broken leg hurts. Giant robot with big hands trying to put on a little thing on broken leg really hurts. Probably. You hesitate on offering your leg to it. However your choices were very limited, so you balled your hands into fists and tried to move your leg into the right position. While you hesitated, it waited patiently, something you were very grateful for. You were also grateful of the fact it was surprisingly gentle with you. It still hurt like a bitch, but the splint was eventually secured to your leg. You cheered when it was all over and smiled as bright as you could, and when you looked at its face, it smiled too.

It was such a relief to have something keeping your leg in place. It made you feel like you could actually get up! Actually, maybe you could! It was an idiotic decision and you knew that, but you did it anyway. Right after attempting to stand, you were greeted with the robot “gasping” (or something) and with lightning speed it pinned you back down. This came as a shock. It really shouldn’t have, but it did. You yelled a bit, obviously, and sat stunned for a second. Sure it shook you up, but apparently not as much as it did the robot. It seemed to take its hand away like it burned its fingers, now looking at you with… fear? Worry? It was kind of endearing.

You tried to comfort it with some soft words, though it didn’t seem to hear you over whatever it might’ve been thinking about. So you sighed and resigned to looking back up at the sky. The stars were on full display now. You liked to think of them as friends. They were always there no matter what, whether you could see them or not. They were beautiful in cosmic glory, yet small and subject to burning out at any moment. It was amazing, really.

Your stargaze was cut short when you were hit with a wave of fatigue, again unconsciousness coming to claim your mind. It was late, you supposed, and it didn’t seem like this thing was going to hurt you. You gave it a look over, but remembered how much it had helped you. So you laid back, using your hands as a pillow and closing your eyes. As much as a nightmare the past day had been, a small voice on the back of your head hoped it wasn’t a dream.

#transformers #tripleglitchwrites #g/t #transformers g/t #gn human reader #gn reader #ratchet #fun fact: I have a lot more planned out for this AU

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msmk11 · 6 months ago

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Too Far Gone, Don’t Send Help

Part 1

Sirius Black x gn!reader

Word count: 2.5k

CW: Cursing, mention of broken bones

Summary: Multi-part fic of reader pining after Sirius Black and remaining stuck in the friend zone

A/n: Hey everyone! This is a new little fic I decided to start writing because I needed an outlet for my own, unfortunate situation of unrequited pining. I guarantee you that most of my content for this fic will be loosely based on my own experiences. That being said, I have not and likely will not experience resolution to my own unrequited feelings so who knows how this fic will end! Would love feedback or suggestions as I write! Hope you enjoy the first chapter :)

It was safe to say that you were completely and totally fucked. Though you’re not sure if you were ever…. unfucked?

So here’s the deal. You have had a MASSIVE crush on Sirius Black for just about a year now, and you barely know him.

Pathetic, right?

What makes it worse is that Sirius knows. Or, well, at least, knew. After one of your silly little friends had let slip about your crush at a Gryffindor party, one the very same Sirius Black was attending, he had acted sort of weird around you for a few weeks.

In the hallways he’d send you winks, across the lawn he’d shout hellos, and in class he’d pass you notes. But that little bout of attention was merely temporary. Within the month, Sirius seemed to have forgotten you entirely, and you were back to not existing in his world.

So when you find out that Sirius Black has joined the Gryffindor Quidditch team as a beater, the same team for which you play as a chaser, your stomach is filled with dread. You guess it’s no surprise that he joined, now that his best friend James Potter is captain. Still, you were hoping Potter would have picked literally anyone else to fulfill the position.

Just your luck.

Though anxiety claws at your stomach before the first practice of the season, you decide to act as normal as possible. For all you know, Sirius has totally forgotten about your little crush from last year- the one you still have, actually- but he doesn’t need to know that.

As the team gathers on the pitch for practice, you notice the typical start-of-the-year tension and awkwardness radiating from newbie players. Black, of course, is the exception as he casually stands with the fanciest broom and jokes with James about Merlin knows what.

You curse yourself internally that your body can’t help but react to how bloody good Sirius looks in his training clothes. The loose muscle tee that hangs off his body shows his deliciously muscled arms that just so happen to be covered in ink. His long black hair is pulled back into a casual bun with small pieces that seem to unintentionally frame his handsome face perfectly. You admire the glint in his gray eyes as he laughs animatedly and you wish you were the cause.

Knowing that Sirius was going to be at practices now, you intentionally avoid getting to the quidditch pitch until the last possible second. Still, Potter is automatically on your ass.

“Oi, glad you finally decided to join us,” he says mockingly.

You scoff and roll your eyes, “okay, so, no. We’re not gonna be doing that actually, this whole ‘telling me what to do thing’. Especially not when I’ve been your equal for years, Potter. Maybe even better.”

He huffs out a laugh, “if you were better, why am I captain then?”

“Cause I told McGonagall no,” you answer with a smirk.

His jaw drops and you start laughing. “So we good, pretty boy?”

The brunette rolls his eyes playfully at you and holds his hands up in surrender, “fine, fine, whatever. Let’s start practice. Three laps around the pitch everyone.”

While everyone else groans, you simply tug off your t-shirt, leaving you in a black tank and black Nike shorts. You look over to Marlene who is retying her laces slowly.

“Come on Marls,” you tsk, “the longer you put it off the more you have to dread it. Let’s just go do it.”

The blonde looks up at you and whines, “ugh, fine. Remind me again why you keep letting me come back to play. I hate running.”

“Cause you love being a chaser with me?”

“Ehhhhh…”

“Cause it makes you look bloody hot for your darling girlfriend.”

“Ah, right,” she says, her face lighting up. “That’s it. Race ya?”

“You’re on, McKinnon.”

The two of us tear off down the field at a fast pace, zooming past many of the other team members who, smartly, are doing a light jog. As we pass Sirius and James, who are running side by side, you hear Potter call out, “that’s right, kick their ass, McKinnon.”

Too focused to snark back, you simply flip him off and keep running as he cackles.

For you, running is a long game. So while Marlene is certainly beating you right now, you know that, ultimately, she will lose. Though you’re still running fast, you’ve decided to save some of your energy for the end of the race. When Marlene starts to tire out, you’ll still have stamina and end up passing her.

True to your goal, two and a half laps later Marlene has begun to significantly slow down. As she huffs and sort of holds her side, you gain speed and pass her. A burst of adrenaline shoots through you as you reach the finish line and cheer.

“Ah ha! Yes! I won!”

Marlene merely groans through pants and collapses onto the grass. “Merlin, I’m out of shape. I think I’m dying.”

You drop to your knees dramatically, “no, Marls, please, don’t die on me. I can’t survive this without you.”

Your other teammates who have begun to join you as they finish their three laps chuckle at your dramatics.

“If you die, I must die with you.” You then imitate stabbing yourself in the heart and collapse to the ground.

As you play dead with your eyes closed, you notice a shift in light behind your eyelids. You open them and squint up. Of course, no one other than Sirius Black is hovering over you.

“My, James never told me we had quite the actor on our team.”

Your heart starts beating faster and you flush a little, realizing you totally just acted a fool in front of your crush. “Yeah, well, everyone has their secrets,” you say softly.

“Such a disgrace to hide your talent from the world,” he answers dramatically.

You smirk a little and roll your eyes at the raven-haired boy, “Yeah well….” You stand up and brush yourself off before placing your hands on your hips and give him an awkward smile.

“So, a beater, huh? I didn’t pin you as the type to play Quidditch.”

“I don’t really, besides for fun. But James needed another player, and I have a lot of anger so….”

You shrug your shoulders, “fair enough.”

James interrupts your conversation, thank god, by announcing that you all are now going to run drills. He decides he wants to catch the new players up so he has Fabian Prewett, the seasoned beater, work with Sirius, Marlene work with the new keeper, some 5th year brunette girl you can’t quite remember the name of, and you with the seeker, a 4th year boy with bright blonde hair and wide eyes named Jackson Creevey.

“Okay Creevey. So we’re gonna work on your maneuvering first. Instead of releasing a snitch, I’m going to pretend to be it. I’ll zoom all around and I wanna see how quickly you adapt to wild turns, dives, etc. James will be watching and is going to give you tips. You ready?”

The eager blonde boy nods and mounts his broom. You both raise high in the air and face each other. “Okay, I get a five second head start. After that, try to tag me.”

With that you zoom off towards the goals on the left as fast as you can, anticipating the boy following you. Surprisingly, Jackson is bloody fast, but also a little more unstable on his broom. You pause as he rushes towards you and then at the last second fly vertically upward and flip around in the other direction. He zooms past where you would have been and has to slow down before turning around to follow. You zigzag across the sky, looping around the stands into the clouds and beneath the rafters below. As he gains on you under the rafters, you dart upwards back onto the field. This time, though, he anticipates it, and remains close behind.

“Good,” James shouts, “keep anticipating their moves.”

As you feign to turn left, you actually turn right and slip out of his close grasp.

Reveling in your victory of outsmarting him, what you don’t see is the bludger heading your way. Just as you hear the yell of “look out,” the ball slams into your shoulder and sends you off balance. You cry out in pain as you hear a crack and wobble on your broom. Luckily you are able to keep enough control to land safely before rolling off. A string of curses leave your mouth as you clutch your arm and writhe in pain on the ground.

“Oh fuck!” James hops off his broom and runs over to you. He kneels down in the grass and looks at your face.

“Hey, hey, are you okay?”

With tears stinging in your eyes you shout, “obviously not! I think my arm is broken!”

“Shit,” he mumbles under his breath. “Okay, let’s take you to the hospital wing. I’m going to help you up, okay?”

You grit your teeth, “my legs aren’t broken I-“

“Just let me help you- please” He begs pleadingly.

“Fine, fine okay.”

Supporting your back and using your other arm, he carefully lifts you to your feet. “Sirius, you grab her broom and meet me in the hospital wing. Everyone else, practice is dismissed.”

You ignore everyone’s concerned faces as you walk towards the castle with James. As much as you hate to admit it, tears are streaming down your face from the pain.

“What the fuck happened?” You mumble.

“I’m not sure, I was watching you and Creevey. But I think Sirius hit a rogue bludger and it slammed into you.”

You want to be mad at Black and curse his name, but between your feelings for him and the fact that you know it’s not his fault, you instead huff and say, “well tell him that he should save his hits for the rival teams, yeah?”

The bespectacled boy beside you lets out a quiet laugh and nods. “I really am sorry by the way. I can’t help but feel it’s my fault you got injured. I mean, it’s my first practice of the season as captain and someone already got hurt.”

At this point we’ve arrived at the castle and James rushes ahead to open the doors for you. You give him a small, watery smile and walk inside. As he trails after you you say, “look, you have nothing to be sorry for James. It’s not your fault. Accidents happen in quidditch all the time. It’s part of the game, I know the risks. I should have just been more careful. And anyways, it’s not like I’ve died, yeah? Just some broken bones. Madame Pomfrey will have me good as new by the end of the weekend.”

He sighs and rubs his face tiredly, “I know, I know, you’re right. I just want to do well.”

I stop and look into his hazel eyes very seriously, “James, you’re going to do amazing as captain. Though I might be a better chaser than you,” I smirk, “I’ve never met anyone more dedicated and passionate. You’re not just a great quidditch player, you’re a great leader.”

He smiles softly, “thanks.”

“What are friends for?”

*****

Once you and Potter had finally arrived to the hospital wing, you were promptly rushed to a bed by Madame Pomfrey as she mumbled about how dangerous quidditch was under her breath. As she looked your arm over she confirmed what you thought- broken bones. Though with the flick of a wand your bones were mended, she still ordered you a night’s rest in the hospital wing so that she could keep an eye on you in case anything went wrong. The pill she gave you to help with the residual pain quickly put you off into a deep sleep.

When you awake it is clear a lot of time has passed. It’s now dark outside and the room is quiet besides the soft snores of someone beside you. You squint at the figure sleeping in the hard chair next to your bed and realize it to be…Sirius.

Your eyebrows shoot up in surprise and you inhale sharply through your nose. It seems this startles him as he jolts awake and gasps a little.

“Oh, hi, you’re awake,” He declares softly, looking at you.

“What…are you doing here?” You ask quietly.

“I just…wanted to check on you.”

Your heart quickens at his seeming concern. “Black, I’m fine, really. My arm is all good to go, I’m just staying overnight cause Pomfrey wants to keep an eye on me.”

He scratches his head awkwardly, “oh, right. Well….I also just, wanted to apologize. It’s entirely my fault that you’re here. If only I’d been more careful…”

You smile a little at his anxious stuttering and thank the gods that he can’t see the heat flushing to your face over his cuteness. “Black, honestly, you’re fine. Shit happens, it’s part of the game. And if you really wanna repay me, help win us some games hmmm?”

He lets out a huff and slumps backwards in his seat, now more relaxed. “Yeah, course. Gryffindor is gonna bring home the cup again this year.”

“Well duh, how could we lose?”

“If our star player has a broken arm?” He teases lightly. “Don’t tell James I said that. He’d be offended.”

You roll your eyes and smirk, “of course not, gotta protect his fragile ego.”

Sirius lets out a loud laugh and you beam, though quickly shush him.

“Be quiet! Pomfrey will kill you for keeping me from my ‘much needed rest’.”

“Nah she won’t. Poppy loveeees me.”

You quirk an eyebrow in disbelief, “yeah, uh-huh, sure. All those gray hairs that have popped up on her head since you’ve been here really prove that.”

“Uhm, actually, that’s called aging,” the boy corrects you dramatically. “I am an angel.”

You snort loudly and cover your giggles behind your hand. Though you hear Sirius scoff in offense, you can faintly make out the smile playing at his soft lips.

“Okay Black, whatever you say.”

He hums softly and silence falls over us for a few minutes. Your mind is racing, feeling the need to say something, anything.

“Uh, you know you don’t have to stay. I’m fine, you know. You can go get some sleep.”

Okay, yes, send him away. Great idea, dumbass.

“No can do. It is my duty to stay here with you until you’re out of the hospital. I won’t feel right otherwise. You can go back to sleep though, I’ll just sit right here.”

“Nah that’s okay,” you say, “I’m not really tired after I just took the longest nap of my life.”

“Right, well, wanna play a game?”

You raise an eyebrow at him, “what sort of game?”

“Twenty questions?”

“Alright, but I ask you questions first.”

#marauders fanfiction #sirius black #sirius black x reader #sirius black x you #remus x sirius #wolfstar

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collaredattachment · 2 years ago

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Classroom Blues

Character: Melissa Schemmenti Word count: 3,310 Warnings: Car accidents, panic attacks, PTSD Genre: Hurt/Comfort Rating: T

Description: Tires screech against pavement, shrill and cruel. Aluminum crunches. Glass shatters. Every single kid stops what they’re doing. --- It’s never been so frightening to look out the window

“That’s looking great, Noah!”

You smile over his shoulder, and he beams back at you before returning to his crayons.

Second graders are so easy to please.

You walk past him to get a look at everybody else’s paper plate dinosaurs. Nathan’s is breathing fire. Tyrone gave his a little princess crown. When you asked, Jamila said hers is ‘a apatopasaurus’ and that she refuses any further comment.

Fantastic work, overall.

It’s looking mighty fine outside too; the day is stretching into afternoon, and the sun blazes into the art room, etching on the walls the shadows of the easter bunnies the first graders had made last week.

The clock is slowly ticking towards two, and you’re only fifteen minutes away from a hot McVegan — no tomato, and two hours of the Good Place. Jamila lifts her hand as high as she can and speaks before you can even get to her.

“I’m all done,” she says. Her apatopasaurus is made of three plates instead of one, and the legs have pink pipe cleaners for both claws and a tongue. There’s a little tear drawn beneath its googly eye.

“Oh, wow.” You turn it around and smile at the glitter glue spots drawn on the other side. “This is really great, Jamila. You wanna help me put it on the—“

Tires screech against pavement, shrill and cruel. Aluminum crunches. Glass shatters.

Every single kid stops what they’re doing.

“Look!” Samantha yells and runs to the window. Half the class follows her, crowding in a line to catch a glimpse. God’s mercy that most of them are too short to see past the supply shelf. It offers you no such protection, though.

Just by the crossing outside, a black car is crushed against a DHL truck. Must have been going way outside the speed limit; you’re barely allowed to hit 40 out there because of the kids. The left side is completely collapsed around the truck’s hood, but you can see the driver just fine from here.

Dead.

He’s dead.

You snap into action.

“Hey, come on,” you say and start herding them away from the windows. “The ambulance guys will handle it, okay? Let’s get back to work.”

Your voice sounds distant to your own ears, like you’re speaking into a bottomless tunnel. The kids don’t seem to hear you either. More likely they’re just not listening because they’re eight-year-olds and most of them haven’t had time to even think about death yet.

They haven’t been to a funeral on a perfectly sunny day, just like this one.

Haven’t hung upside down by their seatbelt in a upended car.

Or seen how broken glass mangles a face.

Stop.

You blink yourself back into the here-and-now. Your knees are already beginning to feel weak, ready to buckle under the slightest strain.

Just breathe. Ten years of practiced technique, honed to perfection. Breathe.

For the kids, if not for yourself.

The minute hand on the clock ticks over to fifty-three. A few kids, the same ones who always put the watercolors back where they belong once they’re done, were kind enough to head back to their seats, but that still leaves you with eight children glued to the glass, watching the driver get dragged out of the car. He’s dropped onto the pavement. Someone’s trying to resuscitate. You can tell from here that it won’t work.

“Okay, I mean it this time.” You try to cover your trembling voice, to apply the gentle authority you’d seen Barbara pull a thousand times. They don’t move an inch. Maybe it’s the gulf of difference in experience, maybe it’s just Barbara being Barbara, or maybe they can tell that you’re afraid.

You sigh and peel the kids off the window one by one and escort them into their seats. Inelegant. Methodical. Your limbs function outside your jurisdiction in a world entirely of their own. When you bring your hand to hover in front of your face, it feels lightyears away, a limb puppeted without its master.

You can still feel crumbled glass embedded between the creases of your palm.

Breathe, damn it.

“Who was that guy?” Jamila asks even after you’ve sat her back down by her dinosaur.

“I don’t know, buddy.” You brush cardboard clippings off her shorts and onto the floor. The fabric is void of feeling under your prickling fingers. “But I’m sure they’ve called an ambulance. They’ll take care of it.”

Sure enough, when you glance at the road, Janine is buzzing around the truck driver, her phone already glued to her ear.

The bell rings at last. The kids yell out in joy and their wave of conversation washes you back ashore for a second. They grab their bags, forget their plates and stickers and markers, and are out the door in record time. They’re so excited.

You can’t tell them to slow down, to stop, even, until the commotion outside is finished. You can’t do anything but stand still and listen as their voices ebb away into just an echo.

Pills. Where are your pills.

You stumble to your bag and search it with trembling, unsure hands, like fingers against a jammed car door, dipping into the seams to tear the whole thing off if you have to. You throw your keys on the table, same as your wallet, your planner, your lighter, and a handful of stray pens; all of them in a heap that slips over the edge and to the floor. You turn the whole bag inside out, but can’t find the pill bottle.

Your chest is getting tighter, heavier, like the spaces between your ribs are stuffed with cotton, like you’re trapped under a ten ton truck careening off the highway uncaring of casualties.

Breathe. Remember to breathe.

You can’t breathe, that’s the whole fucking problem.

The room is empty. Your only companion is the sun, and even she’s about to dip behind the buildings on the other side of the street.

You fall to your knees, grasping at the collar of your shirt, your fingers far too stiff, too jittery to undo one single button. You tear them open anyway. One flies under the shelf, like a body clean through the windshield. He said he didn’t need the seatbelt; it was such a short trip anyway. His legs were bent wrong six times over down in the ditch.

The world becomes muffled, stuffs your ears with ringing to keep you from hearing your own scratchy, frightened heaves for air. To save you the fear. The shame. You claw at your throat, at your chest, hoping you might dig out the chunk obstructing your windpipe.

You want to scream. So much. You’re mentally holding yourself by the shoulders, begging yourself to keep quiet. You’re in a position of authority. A child sees you like this, it’ll go down to the parents and you’re in trouble. Abbott’s in trouble. You can’t afford that.

You remember the mud staining your shirt when you’d crawled out, your leg broken and your face dripping with blood. You still don’t know if it was yours. Sirens, nearby. A broken airbag. A broken neck.

Blood.

You back up against the wall and your head bangs into the bricks with a sudden jerk, though the pain is nothing, nothing compared to—

A hand lands on your shoulder. You jump back in fright, your other arm flying to shield your face. Something hot drips down your cheek, but you can’t bring your fingers up to check, can’t trap yourself in that knowledge.

“Whoa, okay,” someone says. “No sudden touching. Gotcha.” The voice sinks like a rock into deep, dark water, far off and twisted. You can’t move to see who it is, who’s come to watch you in your weakest, most undignified moment.

“I’m gonna take your hand,” they say. “That okay?”

You nod, but the movement is stiff and thick with tension, just like the neckbrace they’d given you, after everything. You had a rash for weeks.

Your hand is enveloped by another, the touch soft, the fingers a little cold. There are rings right above the knuckles: two of them plain bands and one with a big, sharp stone on it. You squeeze the hand hard, hard enough to make the other person groan a thick, hefty ‘ow’.

“Okay. Think you could try and breathe with me? Doesn’t have to be perfect.”

The person doesn’t wait this time. They take a deep breath, exaggerated enough for even you to hear, and then exhale, like wind in the trees on a stormy night when nobody should’ve been driving in the first place.

Your attempt in following them is sad and broken. The air remains trapped in your throat, refusing to flow all the way into your lungs, no matter how you try to wheeze it in or out.

“Good, keep going.”

It’s not even remotely good, not even passable, but you keep it up anyway. In and out, but it’s more like i-i-i-i-in-in-in and ooo-out-o-ooout. This doesn’t deter the person sitting next to you, though. They keep their breathing even and deep, and you follow them, out of pace and rhythm in a one-sided dance where you keep crushing your mystery partner’s toes.

“You’re doin’ real good,” they say, and a thumb is drawn across your knuckles, soft and soothing, free of crusted blood or thick, soupy mud. “Just keep going.

Ain’t no point in rushin’ it, right?”

You do as you’re told. In and out. Your pained attempts slowly start to resemble what the other person is doing, more of a mirror than a reflection in disturbed water. The locked knots in your muscles start unwinding themselves open one by one, and you suddenly find yourself sagging forwards without control.

Arms wrap around your torso and your head knocks into someone’s clavicle instead of the floor. You’re shifted like a living doll into a more comfortable position and your nose buries itself into the nook between the person’s neck and shoulders. You inhale a lungful of syrupy perfume and papaya shampoo.

The clock keeps ticking. The rhythm anchors you, keeps you safely here on the classroom floor where there’s no cars, no highways, no forgotten seatbelts.

“That any better?”

Melissa Schemmenti moves her hand to your back to draw big, smooth circles into your shirt. You manage a dazed, exhausted nod.

The classroom is swimming back into view, bit by bit, color by color. Chairs abandoned where their occupants leapt out of them, craft supplies all over the floor. Tamir forgot his backpack.

“The kids—“

“Are fine,” Melissa says. Her arm slides off your back and around your shoulder instead. She squeezes you tight. “Janine and Gregory were on herding duty.”

“Ok,” you whisper. The clock ticks on, and your stomach dips when you read the face: ten past three.

“You wanna talk about it?” Melissa asks.

The scenery fades in and out, transforms into the woods by the highway and back into an elementary art class in disarray. A mess, both ways. You press your knuckles into your eyes and watch the sparks.

“I’m not sure,” you say.

Melissa nods and clicks open her phone. She shoots someone a text, though you only realize to look away by the time she’s about to write something to Janine.

“Thanks, though” you mumble into the crook of her neck. Your body is dipping straight past relaxed all the way into half-dead. Your fingers feel like spaghetti noodles.

Melissa huffs a laugh. “It’s no trouble.”

You sniff and wipe your cheeks. Apparently you were crying after all.

“How did you find me?”

Melissa puts her phone back in her pocket and you can feel her jaw tighten. She’s thinking.

“I was coming to check on the kids because, well. You know.” She waves her free hand toward the window. “I saw you go down. Fell right off your feet. Scared me to hell, you know.”

You grimace. “Sorry.”

“Pssh,” she says. “Like I said. It’s no trouble.”

You watch the splotch of sunlight, still persistently on the wall. Another hour and it’ll be gone.

You start to peel yourself off of Melissa, pausing mid-movement to wait for the ringing in your ears to ease up, and lean against the wall instead. Melissa, thankfully, keeps her arm around you for support.

“I was in a car accident,” you say.

Melissa’s brow shoots to her hairline when her head whips around.

“It was bad.” You rub your fingers together; a feeble attempt to get some feeling back into them. “I was sitting in the back and my best friend was driving. Her boyfriend was in the passenger seat.”

Deep breaths. In and out.

“They both died.”

“Jesus,” Melissa says, spits the lord’s name in a way that would make Barbara send both of you to sunday school. “I’m sorry.”

“It was a long time ago.”

“Still.”

“Yeah.” You clear your throat, hoping to buy yourself a second of time to stave off any further admission; words you know you can’t keep to yourself right now but ones you’re embarrassed to admit regardless. “I can’t even watch tv shows about that stuff ever since. Of course it would find me in the front yard.” You scoff. “Figures.”

Melissa sighs, soft and smooth, so unlike your own strained, barely calmed breathing. “Shit.”

You can’t help the smile. “Yeah.”

“You feeling any better?” she asks.

You give your neck a little roll, wiggle your fingers and your toes. “I think so. I don’t think I can walk just yet, though.”

“That’s all right. My dinner plans can wait a couple minutes.”

Footsteps draw your attention to the hall. Barbara appears in the doorway in her light brown jacket, her and Melissa’s purses both slung over her shoulder. She takes a quick look at you and then stares meaningfully at Melissa, posing a silent question.

Heat floods into your cheeks, your neck, your ears. It could’ve been Janine, could’ve been Gregory, even Jacob, but of course it has to be Barbara Howard, the singlemost composed person in the whole world, who stumbles in on you crying into Melissa’s shoulder.

Her divorce papers were recently filed, though, so if anything, she’s probably very familiar with the feeling.

Melissa mimes ‘five more minutes’ at Barbara, and there’s a silent battle of wills between them, a conversation you couldn’t even begin to understand, after which Barbara sighs with a smile on her face, bows her head and disappears back into the hall.

“You gonna get home okay?” Melissa asks you when the sound of Barbara’s heels has faded.

“Yeah. Usually I bike, but I think I’ll walk home today. I’ll be fine.” Melissa’s face dips into a frown as she very seriously doubts you. There’s no escaping that look, and it only takes you a second to start sweating. You wonder how people actually trying to fight Melissa Schemmenti aren’t immediately recuded to cinders.

“I swear,” you say, and draw a cross over your heart. Melissa smacks her lips and tilts her head as she assesses your woozy, bulldozed self. Apparently you aren’t shaking that bad, because when she straightens herself, she says, “Okay. But.”

You want to groan. A good sign. Your feet are a little closer to ground again.

“You text both me and Barb when ya get home. Is that clear?”

You lift your hand in a salute. “Crystal.”

Melissa laughs, a smoke-worn, throaty sound that pulls you another inch closer to reality.

“Keep that up and no Schemmenti leftovers for you,” she says. “Cheeky little shit.”

She somehow drags a laugh out of you, short and genuine and good, and it’s not like none of this happened, but it lets you put a band-aid on the wound at least.

“I think I could try getting up now.” You try putting a little pressure on your foot, and though your leg doesn’t immediately smack right back to the floor, it does tremble a significant amount. Heat crawls down your neck again as you ask,

“Could you, uh…”

“’Course.”

Melissa gets to her feet with a strained groan and a ‘fuck my fucking knees’, but manages to get herself standing. She offers you her hand and you take it, keeping your free palm firmly against the wall as she pulls you to your feet. It’s an unsteady operation, one that leaves you dizzy and winded, and nearly back on your ass more than once.

Once you’re safely standing, Melissa gathers up the contents of your bag and hands it to you, but only once she’s made sure that you can actually carry it. She holds you by the shoulders all the way to the hall, and doesn’t let go until the door has safely clicked shut. You still keep your hand by the wall, though. Just in case.

“I’ll have to come in early tomorrow to clean up,” you say with a sigh.

“Don’t even think about it.”

When you look at her, Melissa is staring you down with the intensity of three suns. Whole solar systems, even. You put your hands up in surrender.

“Only if you’re sure,” you say. It is a relief, you have to admit. Especially if you still have to run to the pharmacy to get your prescription refilled.

“Don’t you worry your li’l head about it.”

She walks you all the way to the entrance, where Barbara is still waiting with a paperback book propped on Melissa’s bag.

“All cleared up, then?” she asks.

“Yup,” Melissa says. Short and sweet. Barbara doesn’t ask any further question, though you doubt it’s from lack of interest. At least Melissa has a dinner story to share, if nothing else.

You all slip out the door, but Melissa stops you there. She looks you over, head to toe, her lips pursed and her hands fiddling with the strap of her purse.

“You sure about this?” she asks. “I could give you a ride.”

You fish your keys from your bag and close your fingers around the one meant for the lock on your bike.

“I’ll be okay. And I’ll text you.”

Melissa raises her brow.

“Both of you.”

The idea of sending Barbara Howard a text of any kind outside a professional environment feels like some kind of a breach of protocol, but Barbara herself doesn’t seem phased. Outward, at least.

Janine is going to lose her mind when you tell her about this.

A cool breeze slides under your thin shirt, and your arms erupt in goosebumps.

“I better get going,” you say, but can’t get yourself to walk over to the bike rack just yet. Your fingernail digs into the notches of the key, and you try to figure out something to say, anything that could put into words just how much Melissa has done for you in one afternoon. In the end, you decide to go with something simple.

“Thank you, Melissa.”

She looks amused, truly like she’s done what anybody else would have. Like it’s nothing. You wonder if she’ll ever know how much it means, even if you tried to tell her.

“Eh.” She shrugs. “It was no trouble.”

How perfectly Melissa of her.

“See you tomorrow,” you say, and with one final wave and a smile goodbye, you start heading for home.

Behind you, once you’re definitely out of range, Barbara turns to Melissa.

“What happened?” she asks.

Melissa watches you clear the crosswalk and waits until you disappear behind the Subway.

“I’ll tell you later, hon.” She presses a kiss to Barbara’s cheek. “First we need to eat. I am too fucking hungry to talk.”

“Melissa Ann Schemmenti,” Barbara gasps, “you watch that tongue of yours.”

“Don’t you worry about that, Barb.”

“Incorrigible,” Barbara mutters and heads for the car. Melissa doesn’t miss the smile on her face.

“Love you too.”

#Melissa Schemmenti #Reader #Melissa Schemmenti x Reader #Melissa x Reader #Abbott Elementary #Reader Insert

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kratosnaturals · 5 months ago

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WIP Saturday Thursday #5

Because I am positively on a roll right now. Nick lovers rise up.

“That ash is going to burn your shirt, Nicky,” Hancock mentioned casually with a hint of upturned lips, putting out his own cigarette on the bar’s ashtray. Nick snapped out of his thoughts with a questioning hum. He removed the rolled tobacco from between his lips with the intend of flicking off the burned excess, but when the orange embers landed on his chest he mumbled out an annoyed ‘shit!’ and quickly tried to brush it off of the white fabric. His friend simply gave him an amused ‘told you so.’

“You’re acting odd tonight. Even more than usual,” Hancock breached carefully, following the other man's gaze, “penny for your thoughts?”

Nick stalled. Was he really acting strange? He always thought he’s good at hiding his feelings… or perhaps Hancock was simply teasing him. The mayor did so love riling people up.

“Simply a little worn out after the past few months,” Nick brushed off, focusing his eyes on all the strung up lights around the area now. An understanding hum slipped Hancock’s lips, and the synth assumed their conversation would end there, but his companion had other plans. A toothy grin slowly spread across Hancock’s lips, and those metaphorical cogs in his head started moving. He poured himself another finger or two of whiskey, and slipped just a little closer to Nick.

“So. Are you really going to let mister ‘lasts-a-minute’ and the former tin woman upstage you?” Hancock asked innocently, bumping his hip into Nick’s. The latter looked bewildered now, as much as his synthetic flesh allowed him to grimace his displeasure. A grumble, low and a tinge threatening, “John.”

Jackpot, John thought, that hit a nerve. It was absolutely no surprise, to anyone, really, that the smooth-talking sleuth held a torch for his new co-detective. Those two could be fucking out in the open and it would be less obnoxious than whatever weird game of ‘will-they-won’t they’ those idiots were playing for ages now.

“I’m just sayin’. It’s really obvious,” John tutted, no longer feigning that poor display of innocence. Nick stirred uncomfortably besides him.

“John-”

“Are you going to keep doing this ‘I’m an old synth’ spiel or are you actually going to…” Hancock paused, looking the other man up and down, “steel up and tell the ‘dame’ she gets your coolant pumps workin’ overtime?”

Nick opened his mouth, but Hancock cut him off again with a raised finger as he took a quick sip, “don’t ‘John’ me, sleuth. Now get your rusty ass and loose screws over there and ask her for a dance.”

Another song played on the radio. Rock and roll. The synth nearly crushed the glass he was still holding with his metal hand. His claws scratched the material with a squeak that made him cringe, “I- no. I think you’re misunderstanding something.”

Hancock huffed, “Do I? Because to me it seems like you’re both just dancing around each other. Are you going to keep stalling and watch her get swept up by someone else? Well, she doesn’t seem all too shy, so maybe you could wait. I’m sure she’d come around. No promises, though.”

With a sombre expression Nick went back to watching his frolicking friend among the crowd, still held by Curie. The two swung and tip-toed around to the upbeat music with glee, ignoring the world around them. She danced, and danced, and danced. Much like she did with Preston, and Nate, and Piper, and even Codsworth-

“You know, for the best detective the Commonwealth has to offer, you’re really dense. Even denser than the metal you’re made out of, brother,” said Hancock before finishing his drink in one big gulp, “well, if you’re not planning to go for it, I might as well shoot my shot. Sir ‘short, pale and handsome’ has been touchy with not just you, Nicky.”

She liked being called sir?

That train of thought quickly spiralled off of its rails at the thought of John getting handsy with Eliza; wooing her, seducing her, getting with her-

It made his mechanical insides churn. It made him sick.

#Mine #WIP #Faye WIPs #Faye Writes #Fallout #Fallout 4 #FO4 #Nick Valentine #John Hancock #i am about 5000 words into all of this and i am going insane #i am deeply in love with most of the FO4 companions but i got a soft spot for the dilf robo detective tbh #curies accent is chefs kiss #preston is just a good guy. just a little guy. love him so much #hancock aint the only one with a self picked historical name #eliza may or may not have picked the name after reading pride and prejudice #im having fun :)#woe agender beam be upon all of my ocs #even if do rarely really explore it in detail #alas i will soon :)

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okkotsuus · 2 years ago

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the fall (hyoma c.) !

features: hyoma c.

contents: angst. chigiri backstory spoilers (not manga exclusive). h-hamilton reference (ITS JUST ONE PLEASE IM SORRY). fear of failure. betrayal. i decided to have mercy and leave it shallow so i can make a really long one some other time. 1k words

tagging: @17020 @tim-shii

chigiri was quite confident in himself. if he wanted something he’d fight tooth and nail, usually, not needing that much effort, to get it. but the key word in that statement is "was".

ever since he injured his leg, tearing his acl in the most critical moment, it all changed. that injury broke hyoma chigiri at the very core of his being. no longer did the world know his name, history no longer had its eyes on him.

chigiri was different now, he did everything with a hesitance. hesitance that he could end up getting hurt again. hesitance that the fact he can’t do what he used to would be shoved down his throat again. hesitance that he would fail again.

one thing that hyoma chigiri would be forced to learn the hard way was that the fall from grace is never pretty. it's an ugly, clawing, frenzied crawl that ends in betrayal from those who you expected to help you back up.

he experiences it first with his soccer team. they no longer look at him with such trust and respect. he doesn’t get passed to anymore. his legs are no longer able to send him steamrolling across the field; and it would seem that’s all they thought he was good for.

chigiri experiences it for the second time with himself. his body does not recover as fast as he hoped, and once it does his stamina is so shot that his legs become useless. but the biggest betrayal out of this one comes from his very own mind. that playmaking mind begins to plan on his downfall. chigiri no longer tries anything that he might fail at. to him, failure is worse than not trying at all. failure again would send him reeling back into that that he was in when the doctor told him he would never play soccer again if he injured his leg again.

that ego crush the second fall provided set the stage for all of his suffering. with the deepest shreds of the shell of the old chigiri, he clung to soccer. though, he went from a starting striker to a bench warmer. soccer was the one thing he had left. and the one person he had left was you. again, they key word in that sentence is "had".

hyoma chigiri is a ghost of the boy he once was. anyone could see it just by looking at him. his hair is slowly growing out of his control, his skin is pale and lifeless, but most apparent of all is his dead eyes. that sparkly gaze of his burned to ashes in that doctor’s office. hell, he could trace most of his problems back to that godforsaken office.

but you, sweet you. you never left his side. you became friends with the boy on his first day of high school, ever since he was stuck with you. at first, you were an annoyance, a pesky fly buzzing around his head. but now, you are quite literally all he has left at this school.

fate wasn’t kind to hyoma chigiri during this period of his life. but even fate wouldn’t take you from him too, right?

chigiri notices it first when he sees that pink note fall out of your shoe locker. at that point, a familiar set of dread began to form in his chest, seeping into his bones, contaminating his mind. he feels his world begin to shake around him. he didn’t believe life could be this cruel to him.

life doesn’t like being challenged.

chigiri sees those damned pink letters fall out of your shoe locker every single day after, each one that drops into your waiting hands drives a nail into the coffin of his heart.

but what kills his beaten and bruised heart is the pretty smile and sparkling eyes that display so tenderly across your face. first, he feels that fluttery feeling when he sees it, he was used to seeing you look at him like that. but then that bitter, creeping realization sets in, you weren’t looking at him. his eyes trail over your form to gaze at the opened letter between your fingers. a burning and twisting jealousy sets in, in the back of mind a melancholic realization begins to brew.

it’s not even a week later that life decides to test him again.

he’s waiting by your shoe locker to walk home with you, but you’ve been missing for the past five minutes. no cute little text to tell him where you are. that realization in the back of his psyche begins to grow, like a seed sowed in a self-pitying soil and watered with his tears. it grows, roots growing deep into his mind. finally; it bears a rotten and withered fruit, dangling precariously from it’s twisted branches.

that fruit is the sight of you laughing with someone else, walking towards the gate with them. he sees you slap their arm while you wholeheartedly and boisterously cackle at whatever unfunny joke they made. his fists clenched as he felt that familiar sting behind his eyes that’s been accompanied with a throbbing in his chest as of late.

the third and final time chigiri experiences the fall from grace is with you.

okkotsuus 23

#bllk #bllk x reader #blue lock #blue lock x reader #chigiri #chigiri x reader #hyoma chigiri #hyoma chigiri x reader #blue lock chigiri #bllk chigiri #bllk x you #blue lock x you #chigiri x you #hyoma chigiri x you #chigiri hyoma #chigiri hyoma x reader #chigiri hyoma x you

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justanotherblogger · 8 months ago

Text

A World Without Him

Chapter 8

(TW minor violence against furniture and some self-loathing thoughts)

Tang could hear the voices through the piles of broken bookshelves and ceiling bits. He didn't think they were hallucinations, as they got more frantic near his safe area and how he heard big pieces being carefully dragged outside.

He didn't know what to do. It wasn't like he could move all the layers covering him himself. Maybe if he yelled out, someone could finally hear him.

"H-hello?! Is anyone out there?!" He shouted with a shakey voice. Almost right after, he could hear the talking stop and someone sprinting over the rubble towards his area.

"Hey there; I'm with the Metrapolis first responders! Where are you?!" A woman yelled out into the crash site.

Tang scrambles up to the edge of his collapsed prison. "I'm down here! There's lots of debris covering me, but I'm alright! Please try digging to my left first. My friend is down there, and please hurry!" He yelled with a bit of desperation.

"Ok, stay there and don't move sir! We'll have more people here soon to clear all this out!" She shouted in response, most likely sprinting towards where the ceiling fell...

Tang decided to stop that train of thought. He needed to wait for the backup to arrive; someone to haul him out of here. Like always, he supposes.

So he waits. The unusual silence gives way to the grating of stone, wood, and drywall as he knows they're digging out Allan. He'll be okay. Tang stopped him from running right underneath the collapsed ceiling, so he's still alive. He must be.

Tang also knew when reinforcements arrived. The harsher steps from heavy-duty boots along with the many steps he hears overlap basically gave them away.

He stayed silent, though, so as not to disturb the now very delicate shell of debris surrounding him.

He waited for a while before he could hear a big chunck getting thrown from his left and on top of his area. The added weight caused pieces to break off and his "ceiling" to give way, now with it barely crushing his skull.

He gasped, then coughed from the debris that was shaken loose, covering him in a layer of dust. Pieces of splintered wood and some jagged metal now stick out in the corners.

More yelling started after that. Tang mostly just focused on his breathing again.

When he got back to his senses yet again, he heard picks and gloved hands clawing at his barrier of debris.

He almost cried in relief as the moonlight stone through the new cracks in his dome. He slowly watched as the hole got bigger and bigger, with more and more hands helping to carefully dig him out.

Once the hole was big enough, someone reached their hand down for Tang to grab. He gripped it tightly as he was slowly risen out of his confines.

He blinked at the sudden change in light, still out of it from his time trapped in that place. He was suddenly coerced to an emergency vehicle in the library parking lot, seeing the many paramedics wheeling in people from the library storage area.

He looked at his surroundings as they walked; he could see the ceiling was in total shreds at this point, with the standing walls looking like swiss cheese.

All the people who made it to the storage unit gained only minor injuries, as they all seemed to be walking, talking, and didn't have any blood on them.

As he continued to move towards the emergency vehicle, the ground covered in rubble turned to concrete as they made it to the sidewalk. He could feel his shoulder throbbing with pain as he sat down for the medics on site.

They did everything routinely, giving him a shock blanket, testing his cognitive ability, and so what. "You're all right, sir. Your shoulder just needs padding, and no sudden movements for it to heal up properly. You're very lucky, and you can go back to your residence now."

Tang just nodded in response, seeing them walk back towards another shock patient. He slumped into himself and took off his glasses, rubbing his temple.

Why couldn't I ever do something right, he thought. His thoughts stirred to Allan. Is he really okay? I should've done better. What if he's dead?! He can't be. He'll be okay. He'll be fine. You'll be fine.

He grumbled to himself, stopping his train of thought. He put his glasses back on and stood up, looking out for any free paramedics to ask about Allan.

He had only taken a few steps before a group of paramedics came barreling into the parking lot, rushing past him with many of them hurrying a gurney to the closest ambulance.

Tang could only catch a glimpse of the patient, but he saw their hoodie. Tang almost threw up when he saw him. It was Allan. Allan, who now had a severed leg. The bloody end of his leg dripped red liquid down onto the ground, with the jagged bone jutting out the end.

"Allan!" Tang yelled out, running up to the gurney. He was held back by the other paramedics, their words becoming jumbled as he only focused on Allan.

The rest of him didn't look much better from what Tang could see. Many scrapes and bruises covered his arms and legs, with debris covering his entire body. His eyes were glassed over with his matted hair falling on top of them. But he still had a heartbeat, even if it was a faint one.

Tang could have sworn he saw those eyes look towards him, but then the ambulance doors were closed before he could do anything else, the vehicle speeding off after they backed Tang away from getting hit.

All Tang could do was watch as they drove away, with another paramedic guiding him to a place to sit down. He had asked where the ambulance would drop off Allan so he could see him, but he was denied as he wasn't a guardian or family member.

So he walked away, back through the now dark sidewalk, and on his way home. His steps were sluggish, moving slowly as his mind went blank.

His body moved on its own as he walked into the building, up the many flights of stairs, and took out his keys to unlock his apartment.

He locked the door immeadietly after he got inside, taking off his shoes and throwing them at the wall. His other things got lost in the rubble...

Yeah, go and worry about your precious sketch book and comics as Allan is in the hospital.

Tang grimaced and looked at his apartment, everything tidy and stacked together in organized piles from his morning spree.

You were a hassle yet again. Always being dragged along because of your own incompetence.

Everything in his apartment seemed wrong. Too clean, too tidy, too nice for someone like Tang.

If you weren't there, maybe Allan would have made it to the storage room.

He didn't like the look of the room.

He could have been safe instead of carrying your weak ass around that library.

He walked up his coffee table, a vase with a single flower, and two stacks of books and papers on top of the brittle table.

He might have made it out alive if you didn't have him die-

He violently grabbed the glass vase and threw it against an empty wall.

*CRASH*

Glass scatters everywhere, some of the pieces embedding into his flimsy walls. Some even nicked Tang, but he didn't notice yet. The water from it coated the wall in a dark color.

It's your fault.

His heartbeat pounded through his ears. He took the pile papers next, ripping his useless scribbles up repeatedly until they became only scraps. His shoulder throbs with pain.

He's injured, and it's your fault.

He runs to his books after, taking handfuls and throwing them in every which way. Some hit picture frames, scattering even more glass, while some hit his other piles, causing them to tip and fall over with books, clothes, and other trinkets.

He's dead because of YOU.

"SHUT, UP!" Tang yelled. He swung his hand down onto the coffee table with startling accuracy. A sickening crunch resounded through his apartment. He could feel his tears run hot against his face.

He gasped.

The coffee table was now split in two, the impact of his hand steaming from small embers on the splintered wood. His eyes widened as he looked to his balled up hand. It had a faint orange hue.

But as Tang blinked, it was gone. Yet, when he looked back at the table, it was still steaming, just now simmering down to a small smoke.

Now, only his labored breathing could be heard as he stood still in the middle of his apartment. He could only stare at the destruction he had caused.

Now this looks perfect.

He smacked his own forehead, dragging his hand down his face. He wiped his eyes as a small breeze blew through the apartment. Maybe one of the windows got dislodged from his episode.

Tang sighed heavily before stepping carefully around the mess he made, flopping onto the ragged couch that somehow survived. His phone jumped up from his added weight before hitting the glass covered floor.

Oh, yeah. I threw it there this morning when it died...

Tang sighed slightly before picking his phone off the floor, dusting off tiny glass shards, and pressing the power button. Nothing came up. He grumbled before trekking over to his bedroom and plugging it into the charger.

He threw his glasses on his bedside table before falling face first onto his bed. The blurred shapes of his room comforted him as he rolled onto his back.

His eyes felt droopy as the colors around blurred even more. They shifted and coerced into a soft sunset orange-

*BANG, BANG, BANG*

"Tang! You better open this door RIGHT NOW!"

Tang sat up quickly, breathing fast as the knocking continued. He scrambled up and out of his bed before running to the front door, careful not to step on anymore scraps on his messy floor.

He opened the door right before his guest could harshly knock yet again. He almost had to dodge the pink fist coming his way before it pulled back suddenly.

Pigsy on all his glory stood outside Tangs door with a very peeved look on his face. Tang doesn't know if he could handle being berated for whatever he had apparently done to Pigsy after everything today.

But to his surprise, Pigsy's expression quickly turned to one of deep concern as he looked Tang up and down. "What is it, Pigsy?" Tang asked in a scratchy voice.

Pigsy didn't respond for a good minute. But when he did, almost nothing could stop that man's wrath as he started to stomp into Tang's apartment. "What the hell happened to you, Tang?! Everyone has been texting and calling you, and you never picked up! And now you look like total shit with your outfit in complete shambles! We couldn't reach you through anything, and I had to come up her myself-"

Tang hurridly pulled Pigsy back from his apartment carpet, with Pigsy now fully aware of the new "decor" he had recently put in.

Pigsy was seemingly about to go on another rant after a brief glance at his apartment, but Tang quickly hushed him. "Please, Pigsy. I don't think I can handle anything else happening today. I feel like absolute shit, I got stuck under a building for hours, and all I want right now is some peace and quiet. I promise to talk to you about this tomorrow, but for now, just give me a day, please."

Pigsy seemed conflicted at this, looking at Tang, and then past him at his apartment a few times. He eventually sighs in defeat but quickly puts up some gusto. "Tomorrow. Come by tomorrow in the morning, and you'll tell me everything. If I don't see you by noon, I'll go here and drag you there myself."

Tang just smiles at Pigsy; it's a bit strained but still genuine. "Thank you." Tang says softly. Pigsy just nodded, looking sadly at Tang as he closed the door.

Tang leaned onto the door, making sure that Pigsy's footsteps were actually leaving before letting out a breath of relief.

When he finally made it back to his bed, Tang was convinced he could drop in a heartbeat if he fell onto his bed right now.

But of course, he never got the chanceas his phone came alight and buzzed like over and over after it finally powered back on. He startled a bit, sighed, and then picked up his phone before sitting at the edge of his bed.

His phone had been blowing up with messages, missed calls, and... ads about textbook sales? Tang quickly saved the ad for later before looking through his call list.

Through his cracked phone screen, he just huffed when he saw about 26 missed calls.

Most of them were from Pigsy, with 6 from Sandy, three from Mei, and one from Mk. He hesitated a second before opening his texts. He winced as he saw there were over 40 unread messages.

Some were from the group chat, most of the first ones being pictures of Mk after the library fight holding up cheese tea a block from the library...

Tang scrolled past the pictures and instead looked for his name in any of the unread texts. He found out he was only mentioned after Mk specified where he had his most recent fight.

🌟 The Gang 🌟

8:08 PM

Mk: Yeah! It wss a HUGE guy witha a weird lookin sword this time

Pigsy: you sure you're doing ok kid?

Mk: yes im fine

Mk: the ppace we fought is in way worse shape thogh

Mei: Mk's right. When I went to pick him up, the place had been rly totaled! With the ceiling completely destroyed 'nd the walls left in complete shambles!

Sandy: Was everyone involved okay???

Mei: don't worry sm Sandy

Mei: Mk saw everyone head to the DA shelter, and they all came out fine afterwards

Mk: yeah at least the guy I fought had some sense not to aim for the flor

Pigsy: they had an entire shelter ready? Where did you even fight, kid?

Mk: it was at the Metrapolis Library

Mk: im so sad too because I can't get anymore comics from that place for awhile

Pigsy: Wait, isn't that where Tang started working a day ago?

Mei: oh yeah! I didn't see him come out of the DA shelter tho

Sandy: has anyone contacted him since yesterday?

8:09 PM

Pigsy: everyone try calling him

8:11 PM

Sandy: Tang hasn't responded to my texts or calls

Mk: i ended up having to call after texting him so many times nd he didn't pick up

Mei: he hasn't responded to me either

Pigsy: I'll keep calling him to see if he'll pick up

8:17 PM

Pigsy: he hasn't responded even once

Mk: does anyone know where he is?

Sandy: maybe someone should go to his apartment?

Mei: he has his own apartment????

Pigsy: I'm going up there to see him. I'll tell you guys if he responds or if he's even there

Tang turned off his phone after reading the last text. He could only sigh at the messages before moving to turn off all his lights, sweep most of the scattered glass to the sides, and close the open window.

When he finally got to fall onto his bed again, all he could think about was Allan. If he was okay, if he was alive, and if he could find a way to find him again.

Well, he should try that tomorrow after Pigsy's. I could try to ask about his name in any of the nearby hospitals... maybe if I... try enough of them...

And then Tang succumbed to his exhaustion, falling into a deep sleep as his world went black.

Previous | Next | Start

#lmk tang #lmk au #lmk #a world without him #tang #tang monkie kid #lego monkie kid #some more angst!#I love having normally calm characters just #SNAP #you know?#but yet again #poor Tang #I am putting this man through the wringer #also #new character introduction!#just very brief #and probably won't be noticed until later chapters

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2nd2ndalto · 1 year ago

Text

Fall Down With You

Chapter 4

(previous chapter)

This has been an easy quest by most standards - they’ve been riding trains, staying in actual hotels some of the time, hostels others. Nico’s got his mysterious Underworld credit card, so they haven’t had to survive on scraps.

Today was hard, though. The battle with Mnemosyne’s minion had shaken Will to his core.

And now, lying here in the darkness, it’s starting to feel crushing - the weight of memories; guilt and sorrow from the past shoved to the forefront of his brain, things he pushes aside far more often than examining them. Will should be enjoying the luxury of a comfortable room, a soft bed, but instead he finds himself shaking, forgetting how to breathe not long after they agree to turn the lights out for the night. He’s beyond exhausted, but the thought of letting his eyes fall shut is terrifying.

It wasn’t easy on Nico, either, Will’s pretty sure. He’s been quiet since they checked into the hotel, but there’s a tension in the other boy’s body that Will had almost forgotten about. It was there all the time, three years ago, when Nico first came to camp.

They haven’t spoken much. They ordered in pizza, which neither of them really ate, watched some stupid reality show that neither could really focus on, and now they’re here, in this darkened room, and Will feels the weight of the world pressing into his chest. There are tears building behind his eyes and a headache creeping into his temples and he suddenly just can’t. He can’t be here.

Will sits up in bed without really knowing what he’s going to do next. Go for a walk? He can’t quite bear the idea of being alone out in the world, either. And he’s tired right down to his bones. So what, then?

There’s a soft shifting in the bed next to his. “Solace?”

“Mmm,” Will responds, his voice catching on the single syllable.

“You okay?” Nico murmurs.

Will takes a deep, shaky breath and lies down again. “Yeah. Fine.”

There’s a long pause, broken only by the sound of a door clicking closed somewhere down the hallway. The sound makes Will jump.

“That was a rough day,” Nico says, finally.

‘Yeah,” Will whispers. He feels a tear slowly track down his cheek. Every time he tries to close his eyes, he sees that fucking bridge, Michael falling, falling. He swallows hard.

“We can talk about it, if you want?” Nico's voice is low and soft.

Will takes in a shaky breath. “No, I don’t - I don’t think I want to. But thanks.”

“Okay.”

But the fear and darkness and grief are clawing their way up his throat, and no, he doesn’t want to talk about it, doesn’t want to draw those memories any closer than they already are, but his heart is pounding and -

“Nico?” His voice in the quiet room sounds cracked, thin.

“Yeah?”

“Could we - would you mind if… Could we sleep… closer?”

Will holds his breath, presses his lips together. It’s not even quite what he meant to say, but as the words piece themselves together he realizes how much comfort it would bring.

“Yeah. Of course.” Nico sits up, gazing at Will across the darkened room. “How much closer? I don’t think we can move these beds.”

Will swallows. “I guess um… as close as you’re comfortable with. I just - sorry,” his voice catches as a gasp tears from his throat, and gods, if he could just fucking breathe.

“Hey, no. It’s okay.” And Nico’s there next to him in the next second, a warm hand on Will’s shoulder, his weight making the mattress dip. He rubs Will’s arm comfortingly, up and down, waits until Will can catch his breath again.

Will’s trembling. He’s dizzy, unanchored. He feels like the smallest movement could carry him away and gods the simple fact of Nico’s hand on his arm is tethering him to his sanity right now, and just the thought of the other boy pulling away makes his chest constrict.

But Nico doesn’t pull away, and after a long moment he eases himself down so he’s lying next to Will, watching him in the dark, his hand still warm on Will’s arm.

“I’m sorry. I don’t want to make you uncomfortable,” Will whispers.

Nico frowns. “You’re not making me uncomfortable. You’re allowed to be a little rattled, Solace. Anyone would be after having that dickhead mess with their memories.”

Will shakes his head. “No, I didn’t mean that. I just - I know you don’t always like… touching,” Will finishes.

Nico blinks, looking momentarily confused. Then he huffs out a soft laugh. “That doesn’t apply to you, idiot,” he says gently.

“It - it doesn’t?”

Doesn’t it?

Nico’s gaze drops. “Hasn’t for a long time. Thought you knew that.” He swallows. Here -”

He releases Will only long enough to climb around to the other side of him, crawling under the covers and curving himself against Will’s back, tucking an arm snug around Will’s waist. Will almost sobs with the relief of it. It’s exactly what he needs, and he melts against Nico, grasping Nico’s hand like he’s drowning. Nico squeezes back.

“Is this okay?” Nico murmurs.

“Very very okay,” Will breathes. “Are you sure it’s okay with you?”

“Positive.”

Nico shifts, tucking his knees up behind Will’s and pulling him in closer still, and then Will can’t hold back the tears any longer. But Nico is right there, holding him, murmuring soothingly against his neck, his thumb softly stroking against the back of Will’s hand. He smells like the bright scent of the hotel soap and something that’s fundamentally, blessedly Nico. The warm scent of the Hades cabin, the same scent left on Will’s borrowed hoodies when Nico finally returns them, a scent that Will presses to his face in the sometimes-quiet of his own cabin.

Gods, he loves this boy.

“I can help you sleep, if you want?” Nico murmurs once the tears have eased.

“No,” Will answers, too fast. He doesn’t want to miss any of this, but he also doesn’t want to say that out loud…

“Just - could we just try this first? I think I can sleep if - if you stay.” He can feel his cheeks warming at the admission, and he immediately wishes he’d found another way to phrase it.

But Nico only squeezes him a little tighter. “I won’t go anywhere. But tell me if you change your mind, okay?”

Will nods. The dark isn’t as oppressive now. A thin line of light coming under the hotel room door silhouettes Nico’s boots and Will’s runners, lined up side by side in the entranceway. Nico’s body molds perfectly against Will’s, knee to hip to shoulder, and the steady rise and fall of Nico’s chest against Will’s back is the sweetest lullaby he could imagine.

And Will can breathe again.

“This is nice,” Nico murmurs, soft as a sigh, maybe ten minutes later. Will’s not even sure he was meant to hear it.

“Yeah,” he answers, just as quiet.

“I mean, not that I want some asshole digging around in your head, but -”

“Yeah,” Will agrees. “But… maybe we should do this more often,” he suggests, his skin tingling with sudden boldness. He holds his breath until Nico says,

“Yeah. Maybe we should.”

Will feels warm all over, and it’s not just from the way Nico wraps around him, like a quilt, like a talisman. Like they’ve always prepared for sleep like this.

This time when he closes his eyes, it’s only warmth, only comfort. Only the soft rush of Nico’s breath on his neck and the warm tangle of their fingers pressed against Will’s stomach.

They wake hours and hours later, to an already-risen sun, Will’s face pressed into Nico’s chest, Will’s arms tight around the other boy’s waist and Nico’s arms tight around Will’s shoulders.

They rarely sleep alone after that.

(next chapter)

___

Notes:

My extremely fluffy fic Whole World Gets So Quiet would slot in after this chapter, if you're keeping track :)

#nico di angelo #will solace #solangelo #my writing #fluff #hurt/comfort #getting together #pjo #there are actually two beds but they're only going to use one #rated g or teen #there's swearing #mentions of hoodie theft

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ghastlybin · 2 years ago

Note

Jihyo hanahaki au?

Masochist #1, you’re up (I’m just joking. Please let me know if any of my humor bothers you!!!) Thank you so much for your request btw!! I really hope I didn’t butcher the concept and I hope it’s decent since it’s my first time writing this!!!

Pairing: Jihyo x GN Reader

Word count: 1,311

Genre/contents: Hanahaki! AU, Angsty. Angsty as f u c k.

TW: One-sided love, blood mention/description(?), vomit, near death, uhhhh I think that’s it? Do let me know if I missed any!!!

Note: I used to think this disease was real LMAOOOO. I was terrified because I used to get crushes easily (until I got humbled) Also, Jihyo is my ult female bias so like… Yeah. I will write smth fluffy for her someday to make up for the angsty stuff I wrote tonight. Anyways, thank you again, Anon!!! 💜 I really REALLY hope you enjoy this given them topic and such. As always, sorry if I got any details inaccurate about the ole hanahaki experience. In that case please let me know.

She’s so fcking gorgeous AND I HOPE SHE KNOWS.

Love is destructive.

It grows and grows until it eats you from the inside out and you’re left with a hollowed-out chest from the thorns tearing you apart.

Every petal, every thorn, you only loved her more and more for it to hurt more and more.

It wasn’t going away, the feelings you had for her.

Jihyo was your light in a dark place. She helped bring you back from the depths of your mind. It was only a matter of time before you had fallen in love with her.

Every word she said, every action she took, everything about her only made your feelings more prominent.

And she loved you too.

Just not in the same way.

“It’s me. Isn’t it?”

Your heart shattering wasn’t a feeling you could heal so easily. The icy, numb feeling ran up and down your spine and through to your fingertips.

“I’m causing you so much pain.”

You wanted so desperately not to blame her. You wanted so desperately to not let her blame herself.

You also wanted so desperately for her to love you back.

Her voice echoed in your mind, aching your chest as your throat was busy being scraped by a rose thorn on its way out of your system in a pool of bile that had risen up your throat.

Every little red petal stained in your blood set as a reminder that you may never experience love.

The fear creeping up inside of you that you’d have to go through this exact pain over and over until finally, someone returns your feelings in a neatly put-together bouquet rather than bits and pieces coming up your throat, slowly killing you.

“I love you.”

You were drowning.

The air was too thick, your ears rang at the highest frequency possible, your heart ached terribly, and you were fighting a battle you knew you could not win.

“Not in the way I love you!”

Jihyo’s shocked expression painted like a picture in your mind. An image that would stick with you.

You confessed your love amid rosy bile painfully clawing its way out of your throat and out on display to tell the world how much of a fool you were for loving a girl that would never love you back.

“Could you ever truly love me?”

“I do love you!” Jihyo insisted.

She insisted, up and down, that she loved you. But if she did, why did you feel this way?

“How do you love me?”

The question you were terrified to ask. The question that ripped your heart apart.

“You’re my friend! I love you because you are my friend.”

You’ve heard of someone with the Hanahaki disease being magically cured because of platonic love.

You wished that would have been enough for you.

That just being her friend was enough to rid you of this disease and you two would go back to normal. She would no longer have to worry about where you are still alive or live with the guilt of being the reason you are in this situation.

You never blamed her, though.

You were the one that fell in love, after all.

It was hard to continue to be friends with the one person you were in love with.

Every tear you cried, every night you lay wide awake wishing you would ‘magically’ fall out of love just as quickly as you fell in love.

That was the thing.

You did not want to forget what it felt like to love her. You dreaded the thought of waking up one day and forgetting how she made you feel, how she treated you, prioritized you when she could, how her voice, smile, laugh, everything about her made your heart pick up as if you’d just ran a marathon and Jihyo was there to cheer you on.

She was your everything.

The thought of her waiting to meet up with you for the day was what got you out of bed most mornings.

Jihyo was all you thought about with minor thoughts in between.

You doubled over the bathroom sink, not making it to the toilet, your throat was on fire with each cough that wracked through your body.

The violent coughing up of a few torn rose petals had quickly turned into acidic bile that came out in the form of thorns, more rose petals, and blood that glued it all together.

You tugged at a thorn that had been stuck, each tug generating more fiery pain.

You knew you needed help. You knew if you went to the hospital, they would have to perform the life-saving surgery.

But you couldn’t bring yourself to go.

You knew you would have to start at square one with Jihyo.

Jihyo’s gasp echoed throughout the bathroom walls when she saw you and the mess you had made from the inside out.

You were in her arms. Finally.

Just not in the way you imagined.

“Hold on, I’m calling for help.” Jihyo tried to remain calm.

You were numb. Way too numb to release how much blood pooled in your mouth from the thorn you tried forcing out.

“Yes? Hello? Please send help! My friend- They have a thorn in their throat!”

You listened in, the ceiling growing fuzzy and your lungs felt constricted.

“It’s the Hanahaki disease. They’ve been vomiting and coughing up roses.”

It was weird how different people had different flowers depending on how strong the love was.

You wished you were stuck with something less violent like daisies or daffodils.

You wished you had never fallen in love.

Even thinking that made you feel guilty. You never regretted loving Jihyo.

You just regretted that fate hadn’t aligned in your favor.

“Please hurry! They are having a hard time breathing!”

A tear leaked out of your eye, knowing you were second from knocking on death’s door.

You didn’t mind it, somehow.

Maybe the afterlife would be easier.

Maybe in the next life, fate will be aligned perfectly and you would get your happily ever after.

“I love you.” Your words came out in a garbled, hoarse speech.

Jihyo still understood you.

No one understood you the way she did.

“I love you too.”

But it wasn’t in the same way.

Jihyo waited the entire night for your emergency surgery to be complete and for you to be ready for visitation. Her mind raced in a million different directions.

She knew the consequences the surgery would bring.

You wouldn’t remember her, let alone love her anymore. She would have to start all over again with you if that meant she would have another day with you.

Not that she minded.

Anything would be better than losing you completely to the curse of a disease.

“They are awake now.”

Jihyo had never felt so relieved before. Her heart raced, preparing herself to meet you again.

“Hello… You don’t remember me, but I’m Jihyo.” She smiled anxiously as you took a moment to respond.

“Jihyo? I’m Y/N.” She was right. You did not recognize her.

She nodded, patiently. Speaking to each other about stuff she already knew about you.

Stuff you swore you never knew about her but felt like you should remember.

Jihyo left when you found yourself getting too tired to stay away. After all, you did almost die at the hands of the infamously cruel heartbreak disease.

Jihyo entered the bathroom as soon as she arrived at her house. Screaming into the void as she broke down in tears.

She sobbed and sobbed until one cough alongside one petal from a violet abruptly stopped her from flooding the bathroom floor in her tears.

She coughed again, dread filling up inside of her as she stared at the violet petals in her hand.

She did love you back.

Just not at the same time.

#twice #twice x reader #twice jihyo #twice jihyo x reader #twice imagines #twice au #twice jihyo imagines #jihyo x reader #jihyo imagines #twice angst

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