#and no one will see this bc it’s nearly 2am when im posting this LOLOL

[darby-rowe]

cw/tags. STEPCEST, suggestive

inspired by @spideyhexx ‘s stepbro!coryo posts 🫶

when you noticed that you accidentally pavlov’d yourself into getting weak in the knees every time your stepbrother walked within proximity of you, your stomach churned. and suddenly, the minty toothpaste coating your teeth tasted like bile.

you spat messily into your shiny, porcelain sink and quickly rinsed away the foamy, sudsy paste down the drain. the sounds of the birds singing their morning song are muffled outside your bathroom window, and for a moment, that’s all you had the energy to focus on as you stared at yourself in the mirror. you wipe away a rogue toothpaste stain on your oversized t-shirt.

“safety pin?”

coriolanus’s voice brings you back down to earth as you deeply inhale through your nose. “what?” you ask, tiredly rubbing at your eyes with the back of your hands. “safety pin? for what?”

“for my shirt. it looks too large on my body,” coriolanus answers, and for the first time that morning you two make eye contact.

something about the look on coriolanus’s face makes you wonder if he’s hoping you’d turn your back to him so he can sneak a peek at your body.

“you have your own bathroom,” you tell him, leaning against the doorway and crossing your arms. “or call your cousin tigris. i’m sure she has a shit-ton of safety pins that she’d be more than happy to let you use,”

“or i could come and ask you since you’re right here,”

you press your lips together tightly, feeling your cheeks burn deeply as your eyes wander coriolanus’s disheveled form of being halfway dressed: untucked shirt, dress pants with no belt…

you hug your arms closer to your body as coriolanus’s eyes also wandered your body.

“i don’t have any safety pins, coryo,” you say, trying to act nonchalant as you force yourself to look away. “sorry. wish i could be of better assistance this morning, but it appears that i am useless,”

coriolanus’s eyes squint at your odd humor, and you can’t bring yourself to look back at him. not even when he squeezes past you to enter your bathroom. and before you could protest, he’s searching through the medicine cabinet and pulling out a lone safety pin.

the feeling of his hand on the small of your back as he exits nearly makes you faint.

“guess you aren’t as useless as you make yourself out to be,” he says as he finally walks away. you feel the sound of his shoes on the hardwood floor deep your chest.

you wonder if coriolanus also gets weak in the knees when you enter the room.