#and possibly burning bridges that I want to keep)

[wormchaser]

you are complaining about complaining too much while complaining about the fact that maybe people dont like you because you complain too much while complaining about being alone. just stop complaining and do something about it. talk to people. reach out. dont just wait for someone to come to you first.

i have tried reaching out to different people in the past year or so but it never works. i understand its my own fault for letting relationships decay because of my own insecurities and issues but that doesn't mean i can just will myself to think or believe different things about myself. it's a self fulfilling prophecy ; i think people don't like me so i don't reach out so people don't like me etc . i am sure you do not want to hear me list all the things i want to say in response so i will put them in the tags.

[literalgrill]

Do NOT Support Hard Drive On Patreon

You might see friends today suggesting you support Hard Drive on Patreon today. You know, the funny video games version of The Onion? As a journalist, I will firmly tell you DO NOT GIVE THEM A DIME.

The CEO has pushed out all former staff that have built the site up to its current greatness and has been pushing the use of AI. The staff begged to have a Patreon before basically all being pushed out, but the idea was refused until now, when it will only line the pockets of a single person instead of hard working writers.

I know they might have provided laughs before, but Hard Drive is a shell of what it was once. Let it die and support the people who actually made those moments of joy possible. Don't believe me? Check out what former employees are saying below:

Kevin Podas: Okay you know what, I would feel bad saying nothing about this, so here goes:🚨SAVE YOUR MONEY🚨

We passionately advocated for a Patreon at Hard Drive & were aggressively shot down. The talent & people who built the site were pushed out. To see this now is beyond upsetting. For the past few years or so I put a lot of myself into this website. I pitched a ton of jokes, got over 120 articles published, & met a lot of great people. I'm sure if you've been following me for some time you could easily see this.

However, there is a lot of misinformation. I was eventually promoted to Managing Editor of the site & was ecstatic. Grateful for the opportunity. Felt like all of my hard work in the comedy mines was finally paying off. But things took a turn for the worst, & each day there were new surprises that affected our livelihoods. These were all very avoidable surprises, mind you.

A patreon was going to be our hail mary, but alas, for some reason, the power that be did not want it. Causing us to leave a dream job behind. "At least we did all we could," we consoled ourselves afterwards. I put a lot of myself into this project. I pitched all sorts of ideas that could have helped-- we all did. Merch collaborations, Patreon-integrated YouTube content, so much more. And most of them were shot down out of sheer stubbornness and nothing more. To see lie after lie spread, and multiple big publications and YouTubers that I am a fan of promote this Patreon under these pretenses is incredibly upsetting. There are so many receipts.

Please share this and consider pulling out if you've already put money into this. On Hard Drive using AI, also from Kevin Podas: I can't personally confirm that part aside from some of the recent header images for articles on both Hard Drive and Hard Times are being made with AI. As far as writing, it's been mentioned in the past, but I personally do not know. Maybe others do, maybe not. MORE From Kevin Podas suggesting the owner denying a Patreon being set up earlier cost an artist a job that was replaced by AI: We had a social media person who was awesome! He made the images until this AI implementation. He had to leave because ad revenue was low and a Patreon was aggressively refused.

Luca Fisher: at the risk of burning some bridges, i have to back up kevin here. i've only been part-time, in-and-out of hard drive since i got in last year, but i can corroborate that management doubled and tripled down about not hosting a patreon/crowdfunding and that many other suggestions and ideas, including mine (and ones much smarter than mine!), were shot down in really long, apocalyptic threads of everyone left on deck desperately trying to come up with ways to keep the lights on. managerially it has been messy and sad

i've written for multiple publications that have long since died, ones that were in the process of dying, and ones that, in this case, are soon to be put in the ground. it is sad and sucks every time. i don't know what could have been done differently, but i do know that a lot of great writers and content creators were left shorthanded and unhappy by the way things have gone. and it is sort of puzzling to see the sudden championing of patreon after we were all told plenty of times that it couldn't work and we should move on also, just to add my own personal two cents here, i was really disappointed by the shuttering of many different article sections on the site over the past 6-8 months. i understand cutting corners in a deficit, and i know it had to be done. that said…

all in all, i'm really sad to see this all happen. i don't fault anyone, if only because i don't really know enough about how this all can happen to make sense of it. games journalism is in a sad, sorry state, and will likely no longer be a thing in the next decade

VideoSealMan: I'm gonna say this because I think I deserve to. For months, MONTHS on end I was bugging Hard Drive management about a Patreon. Often I got ignored for a week+, but when I actually got a response I was encouraged to - of all things, write up a Google Doc pitching the concept I did it regardless. I wasn't the only one trying to sway management on a Patreon, but so fiercely was I fighting for it that last night, I was accused of making this comment directly by the CEO! With no evidence whatsoever! After I'd been gone for over a month.

I vouched so hard for Patreon because I wanted all the writers and creatives working with Hard Drive including myself to get paid better. When I actually got a response, the idea was often shut down. Eventually due to the state of my company, my pay was cut for a second time I confronted management alongside a couple other important figureheads at the org and told them that if we couldn't do a Patreon - I could no longer financially justify staying there. The answer was still no, so I left. Baffled at the decision, but whatever.

It is unendingly frustrating to know that myself and many other people who put their soul into Hard Drive LEFT because of management's absolute refusal to compromise on a Patreon, to then see them launch one anyway a month later and get over 1000 people pledging money. I'm seeing a lot of things float around about greed and people being fired. No one was fired. Everyone who left, left because they were sick of management's decision-making. And honestly, management is a lot of things but I would not call them greedy. (From my experience.) They did genuinely make an effort to pay people as much as possible. I found the pay very fair for a while. I am not disputing that I was paid what I was owed - yet management frequently feels the need to remind critics of that. Lmao, yes. I was paid what I was owed. No one is disputing payment. You did the bare minimum a business owner should do and paid everyone their due, very well done. I make no allegations of greed, cheating or foul play. I make allegations of poor management and incompetence that has fucked over other people.

Basically the only people left at Hard Drive have been there for about 2 months. They will reap the rewards of this successful Patreon I and so many others passionately fought for for so long. We will not see a dime.

I do not know the new people at Hard Drive, But I feel bad for them. They were haphazardly thrust into Hard Drive's workplace with little to no explanation on how anything works, or given any context on the state of the place. Even now managements feeds them half-truths and misinformation about other people's grievances. I am broke and have been for a while. I had to move out of my flat in Reading and back with my family because of how little money I was making. This has basically doomed my flatmate to moving back in with abusive parents, which is something I feel guilty about every day. If we had gone with the Patreon I worked myself hoarse over back then, this could have been avoided. Some of my other good pals could also not have been fucked over.

It was a bad judgment call, but it's not a crime. It's just management getting it wrong.

So should you give to the Hard Drive Patreon? I don't know! I don't think any of the new people working there to patch up the holes left by the recent mass exodus have any bad intentions. Maybe they deserve it! But it is not the same site you knew a year ago, or even a month ago. Myself and many people who were there far longer than me and did far more for it than I did are all gone now because we could not deal with management's terrible decision-making and dogass communication any longer. That's what you should know, imo

I had an agreement in place with management that I would receive the next 8 months of revenue from the Hard Drive YT channel from my leaving in November. This was a deal I appreciated, and thought was very fair on management's behalf. So far, the deal has been honoured for 2 months. However as of last night I was removed from the Hard Drive Slack without warning, and as an editor for the YouTube channel. This means I no longer have any way of verifying how much I am owed, I just have to take their word for it. I'm sure management will make their own statements full of half-truths and weird language on the many cases being brought against them - I'd take everything they say with a pinch of salt if some of the screenshots I've seen of them talking about me are any indication lol

To management; I do not want to talk to you. I want you to DM me a screenshot of how much I'm owed every month and then send me the money per our agreement until June, then we can go our separate ways. Do that and admit to your mistakes, and maybe you can recover your reputation! That's it from me, lol. If they pull out of the deal and fuck me over I'll have more to say, but most of what I know is other people's stories of incompetence and poor decision-making, lol. I genuinely get no pleasure out of doing this; I do not think management is evil - I just think they're really bad at what they do and it's cost other, more talented people, lol. You should believe the writers imo

One last thing I wanna say btw, management did often stress that no one should try to make Hard Drive a full time thing. They were transparent about that, and that is fair. I was working on it because at a few points, I was lead to believe we actually were doing a Patreon. Many other ppl have similar stories of being strung along by management changing their minds and stop-starting shit every 2 weeks. We all made the fatal mistake of overestimating our manager - who would tell you one thing one day and something totally opposite the next week lol

Hunter R. Thompson:

I'm not your dad, but speaking as a Hard Drive writer, I don't know that funding Hard Drive on Patreon is worth it

The driving talent on the back end—behind the kickass site I joined in 2019—have peaced out over the years as the site's been (in our view) increasingly mismanaged. Mismanagement like, not setting up crowdfunding before the ship sank and all its best crew failed; or publishing a screenshot of Andy Ngo pedojacketing a trans writer, complete with her deadname; or a disgruntled ex-writer getting falsely accused of shit-talk, by actual staff. I'm grateful for the writing I've gotten to produce for HD (and will forever be kicking myself for not writing even more, in the four years I've had to do it!! i'm a dumbass!!!) but it is very much no longer the site I signed up for.

I don't want to resign as a contributor altogether, because I'm open to the idea of the site recovering and bad practices being retired as finances level out-- it would just be dishonest for potential backers to not be Aware Of The Circumstances, I think.

Jeremy Kaplowitz: i truly don't want to start shit, but feel compelled to say: i want to see Hard Drive succeed w/o resorting to throwing former writers & editors, myself included, under the bus. surely there's a way to save the site without building it over the corpses of those who left. my $0.02 i don't blame anyone who wants to sign up for the HD patreon and i support the website, but that includes those who worked on it for years, have complaints, and don't deserve to be treated like bitter assholes like this kind of stuff is just objectively true, meanwhile there's these new writers who joined the site after i left (meaning, in the last ~3 months) claiming people are liars. decide for yourself if you care, but this is what happened! [Quotes this Tweet]

Seth Finkelstein: Writing for Hard Drive has been a privilege the past few years, and it makes me so angry to see people I looked up to get jerked around behind the scenes. The amount of grenades the editors jumped on our behalf is immense, and I don't think the way they're being treated is right.

Other Bits On AI: We do know for sure however that AI art has been used by the site. Its fucking owner confirms it here:https://twitter.com/MattSaincome/status/1743040541603123622. Seems the owner pushed AI written articles as well! TayFabe: My vaguetweet is making the rounds & these made me apoplectic. - owner regularly lobbied using ai. Once he tested it & said ai was writing better satire than 25% of the HT/HD writers. - ai images were used on the site & socials w/o consulting the team or disclosing it publicly I found the ai bit relevant to include bc 1) it illuminates a stark change in HD's current direction & leadership, 2) ai images have previously been used on the site and (since deleted) ig posts, 3) ai content fucking sucks, and repeatedly pushing to use it is a telling quality The "handful of writers who chose to leave" includes 2 editors-in-chief (both cofounders who wrote a combined total of >1,000 articles & defined the voice of HD), & at least 3 other editors. These guys put in WORK since 2017, so cool to be corrected by ppl who joined in Nov 2023 [Link to mentioned vague tweet from post.] More from TayFabe: owner continuously lobbied for using ai in every possible way. No one else wanted to do it, but he kept on, saying ai was writing better satire than 25% of the HT/HD writers. Also, ai images were used on the site & socials without public disclosure or consulting the team.

The owner has responded now multiple times in a private discord... Thank you for people sharing screenshots! First Screenshot:

Kevin's Response: He banned me from the server for speaking out, so no, I didn't see it. And he gave no indication of a timeline, it was just "we'll do one when *I* say so" and gave every inclination he was totally against it. It bred an environment that pushed our hands to have to leave. Screenshot Round Two:

Kevin's Response: "Starting one in 3 months" is an absolute lie. He denied it, I have screenshots and others who can confirm. No timeline was given. Just "this is what it is now" and like, I couldn't live off of that. I wanted to do more but he was allergic to good ideas from others around him.

Matt, owner of Hard Drive, responds publicly on Twitter.

Matt: Kevin, the patreon launch was delayed because I didn't think it would work. Everyone is happy that it did work. Everyone who left the site because we didn't have money to pay for creative content which didn't revenue is welcome to return home. But unclear why the hostility.

Hard Drive paid out literally every dollar it had, then a bunch more, to creative people who worked on the site. When we ran out of money, we couldn't pay anymore. We did our best.

Kevin: Right, and my point of this thread was that it was completely and totally avoidable. This is reasonable to be upset about. How could I have been any more clear?

Matt: If we knew with 100% certainly that the community would have supported us via patreon, we would have done that. We didn't know. We had tried 4 years ago and got no support. We were wrong this time. We did our best to figure it out. We paid all the money we could.

Kevin: So you knew with 100% certainty this time? Or you took a leap of faith?

Matt: It was a last gasp panic effort after ad rates got cut in half on january 1st due to seasonal spending changes. We didn't know it would work. We were embarrassed to ask for support. We wanted to figure it out.

Kevin: Every site has a Patreon. Every YouTuber, comedy group, etc. But you insisted that nobody cared about Hard Drive. Which is wildly untrue. I know you see that now, but again, I think you can see why I and many others are pretty upset. A last ditch panic effort was long overdue. A couple more things from Matt:

It was about the size of the hole we needed plugged budget wise, the time I had left of personal resources, and the past data I had about us trying a patreon (which turned out to be a bad indicator). I didn't think the Patreon would help us fast enough. I made a bad estimation

aka "if we make $1000 more dollars a month via patreon, which would be 10x what we got last time, we will not solve any of our problems. If instead we try to plow down path B, we might make it out in time." That was the thinking. I chose the wrong path, but didn't mean to Kevin also retweeted this comment from the user Matt was responding to: So you're saying that you're bad at running the business, didn't listen to any of your employees until after they were forced to leave their jobs, and now you're going to get more of the money from the Patreon that was their idea in the first place? Matt's Response: Respectfully, I made a mistake delaying the patreon decision. But keeping a comedy site alive for 9 years is not easy, there are lots of potential ideas, and think overall we've done a good and honorable job. Will leave this thread in peace now to allow people their space.

Sorry for linking to Elon's hellsite (derogatory), but sources need links so...

[n0tamused]

'Please cannot fix'

Content: angst, character death, gn reader, possible grammar mistakes

Words: 1167

A/N: to that one person said I wouldn't do it - here you go. Suffer with me now.

Once mighty and flamboyant  Galaxy Ranger, now nothing but a desperate pile in the mud. The rain hails down onto him like acid, unrelenting as it bashes his back and makes him sink further into the ground. BootHill’s breath is heavy and ragged as he has long lost his voice, crying out to you to keep awake, to hold on until you’re both back at the base, he has already contacted a doctor through a built in radio - why didn’t you listen?

Leftover footprints had long since been washed away, eradicating the proof of his attempts at keeping you alive, as if he never tried.

You had pleaded with him to slow down, he was jostling you too much, doing too much, and you never saw him this panicked. His eyes could barely handle looking at the red gushing out of your wounds and onto the cold iron of his body. He didn’t listen, and kept going, his feet leaping and swallowing the ground under him with sloppy expertise, kicking up rocks and mud before it could stick to him. One of his hands mussed up your nape, patting the skin and pushing your head closer against him until he could feel your breath on his actual skin - on what little he had to feel with.  “Just a little more, sugar-” he’d say, turn after turn, thunder growling behind him. Moments feel like minutes, and he swears he can run faster, but he can’t -

“BootHill, stop-!” he froze, his eyes escaping whatever daze his mind spun him into, darting to look at your begging ones. Tears or rain, it made your nose red and your lips quivered with the weight of your words. “Let me go..”  You breathed it out, cupping his cheek and turning him to face you, forcing him to feel the fleeting warmth of your palm, it prevented him from running. However, he doesn’t stop moving, he consciously, simply cannot, and for once his artificial body agrees with his organic one; and neither listens to your wishes for him to stop carrying you. “I-I can’t- are you crazy?!” he blurts out sharply, but his face betrays the anger of his tone, his eyes, as wide as yours, show the man crazed with fear of losing something precious beyond life itself. 

“No, no, move yer hands away, I can’t see” he grumbles with a tangible tension in his jaw, shaking his head, flicking raindrops from the tips of his hair. 

“Please..BootHill..I don’t want this sight to be my last-! Please, put me down” you argued, lungs feeling heavy and full of holes that let the rain in. They burned for life, for air, they sought to be engulfed in warmth of the space ship once more, to breathe in the metallic scent that fill the room as BootHill cleaned his iron from the rain. Just once more. But you knew such a future was only a dream behind your heavy lidded eyes that were harder to pry apart every blink.  “Please..just hold me..” you muttered with defeat in your tone, and perhaps it was that which stopped BootHill at long last, or the sight of the bridge that had been split and broken before him, with the raging wide river threatening to swallow the earth itself around it.

He slowly lowered himself to the ground, you in his lap, and his eyes bubbling up with what you could call tears. Translucent blue in color and greasy in texture, his tears fell for you. One metal and freezing hand goes on top of the biggest wound on your torso, pushing down to stop the bleeding. 

BootHill never felt more hopeless and useless than he did now. He tried and failed. And most heartbreaking of all, he didn’t protect you when he needed to. When he should have.

The rain fell harder after that. Your body absorbede the cold of it and grew heavier in his lap.

The wind howled over his head and went right through him too.

…..

Your face was the palest he had ever seen.

Your lips blue.

Eyes shut.

Hair slicked back with how many times he ran his fingers through it, keeping it from your face. Keeping you tidy.

You were limp and heavy, and you were still.. whole, as whole as you could be. He had cried all the tears he had within him, and he struggled to breathe for even longer. Feeling raw and more human than he did even before being turned into this walking machinery. 

You had held his face, and you apologized to him, and asked him to smile, you asked him to deliver you one more charming line - and he failed you in that too.

….

The silence was unbearable, and the cacophony even worse. Now, in the confined space of his ship, he cracked his voice raw open as he glared at the little hologram of the doctor that turned him into this walking tin can.

BootHill couldn’t stand the sound of his own voice that fluctuated higher with the flare of his anger, every sentence more distraught than the last. It got to the point the Doctor on the receiving end had gone silent as a grave, realizing the futility of trying to speak over BootHill. 

‘Bring them back’, he pleaded, hovering over the hologram, making himself feel greater, stronger, and more in control. 

‘If you could turn me into this with just ma head alone, you can help them as well!’ he argued, teeth grit together and showing off their points. Like a cornered dog he clawed and bit and held the last pieces of hope in his maw. ‘They’re whole, jus’ a few scratches-’ he added in haste, and the doctor began shaking his head.

‘Please, Doctor, you’ve gotta’ he stared at the flickering hologram, feeling something akin to acid rise in his throat, sick at the thought of denial. No, he wouldn’t give up on you. ‘Why not?! Because they’re not as loud as I am?! What is the reason?!’. He tried to argue and reason with the other man, and when he ran out of reasons he began to repeat the ones he already mentioned.

‘WHY NOT YOU IDIOT?!’ he shouted, now on his knees before the system table in front of him, the hologram now looking much larger than his own figure. His elbows still rested on the table and he felt like strangling the man in front of him through the hologram itself.

He could see the Doctor’s face fall, disappointed at best. And he heard him sigh. 

“BootHill. I can’t do it, and I won’t try it.”

The hologram flickered, and then went out, allowing the dark of the spaceship to swallow him whole. Trickles of oil began to seep through cracks in his metalwork, and more of his tears began to bubble up in his eyes. Like claws, his hands fell over his face, muffling a choked cry of anguish.

Ⓒ n0tamused. Do not repost, translate, edit, and/or copy any of my works. Likes, comments, and reblogs are appreciated.

-Tags: @prettyliliy @nvuy @lofasofabread @teanypaws @molotto

(I just tagged everyone who showed interest when I talked about this idea, pls lemme know if you don't want the tag/want to be removed from the post <3)

[kingkatsuki]

No idea where I was going with this but he makes it difficult for me to think.

More Dragon King Bakugou thoughts.

Tw: he calls us “little girl”, if that gives you the ick I’m soz.

It’s difficult for Dragon King Bakugou to treat your body with care. A man who was raised of violence and barbarity, intended from birth to be a vengeful successor who would pillage and rule over Kingdoms with his dragon by his side. The comforting embrace of his mothers hold long forgotten as he seeks pleasure in the death and destruction that follows him.

And although he may seem callous and cold, he’s wholly perceptive of the way you cower from him. Flinching as he moves to hold your arms or cup your face— as though you’re a frightened doe startled by the sudden snap of a twig. For the first time in his life he doesn’t want to be this brute of a man, the bloodthirsty King of Dragons that’s revered around the Country.

You don’t expect him to be soft. Your body already trembles as he steps inside the tent, pulling his thick cloak of furs from around his shoulders as he’s illuminated from the embers of the fire still burning outside. Throwing it down onto your makeshift bed as he tries to make it as comfortable as possible for you, a futile peace offering after stealing you from everything you once knew.

It’s difficult laying beside a man you barely know, even though you’ve been together months now. And you hate the way your body betrays you, turning towards the warmth that exudes from him.

An arm is usually strewn across you throughout the night— whether it’s to keep you from escaping or to keep you safe you’re never certain. But you always find yourself yearning for his touch, desperate to feel comfort from a man you once swore you despised.

His hands are rough, toughened by the harsh elements and fierce battles waged upon nations. The first rough grip of his hand against your hip has your stomach lurching, petrified of how he may handle you like the kill he brings home from hunting, a dead carcas that doesn’t require any sympathy. For Dragon King Bakugou refuses to mourn for the dead. But he fills you with bewilderment as rough callouses catch against your soft skin as he runs them along your body with surprising care.

Bakugou’s warm breath fans your cheek, chapped lips barely hover against your skin as he lingers. The faintest butterfly of a kiss pecks at the corner of your mouth as he lets you decide— for he knows once he starts he will not be able to stop. And you don’t want him to, bridging the gap as you pull him into a gentle kiss.

It’s nothing like you imagined it to be the nights you lay beside him. Allowing your mind to wonder as you pictured him capturing your lips in a bruising kiss, holding you tight and bending you over to claim you as his own.

You can tell he’s holding back, his soft touch nothing like you’ve seen before as he brushes his tongue against your lips. Exploring more unmarked territory as you feel yourself melting into him, finally allowing him to explore new lands as he chances an uncharacteristically gentle grope to your soft breast.

Dragon King Bakugou may be a ruthless, sadistic beast of a man— but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t want to handle his most prized possession with docious care.

And whilst you indulge in his touches, they’re not enough to satiate the burning hunger that swirls inside you like a molten volcano. The throb between your thighs incessant as you silently beg for him to touch you, to take you— to finally claim you as his own. And you can tell that he’s holding back, because he doesn’t want to hurt you.

Because he knows exactly what he’s capable of.

“There’s no need to be so gentle, my King.”

The words have the blood rushing directly to his cock, pulling the most depraved, sinful growl from deep in his throat as he bares his sharp teeth. As if trying to hold back the final fine threads of resolve that are holding him together— the rope that’s been wearing thin since the first moment he received you.

“I can take it.”

The words leave your lips, but you’re not sure you can. Not now this hulking brute of a man is hovering over you on sturdy knees, crimson eyes darken as he surveys his prey like a predatory wolf. Reaching down to wrap a large palm around the bare column of your neck as he follows the motion, leaning over you to press his lips against the shell of your ear.

“I’m not sure you can, little girl.”

[taexual]

sleepwalking ● 19 | jjk

pairing: jungkook x fem!reader

summary: due to unfortunate circumstances, you ended up managing your ex-boyfriend’s band. you thought you’ve both made peace with it, but suddenly he’s very eager to prove to you that first love never dies.

genre: rockstar!jungkook / exes to lovers

warnings: explicit language, ANGST & FLUFF (i mean it, watch out), SLOW BURN

words: 14.5k

read from the beginning ○ masterlist

chapter 19 ► so dig two graves, ‘cause when you die, i swear i’ll be leaving by your side

When the tour bus arrived in Glasgow, you realised that you had slept perhaps a quarter of an hour in total tonight. Discomfort and Regret had become unwelcome companions that kept you up.

Last night, you had planned to talk to Jungkook, but he flipped the script and did all the talking instead. And if you had to describe your choices from then on, you’d have to accept that, essentially, you had run away without saying anything.

You realised now, through tossing and turning in your bunk the whole bus journey, that this was your recurring pattern.

When you and Jungkook first broke up, you’d barricaded yourself in your apartment and only ventured outside when it was unavoidable, like to go to work. Or when your friends forced you out of bed. They tolerated your need for silence in moderation—a few days of self-imposed isolation were okay. But two consecutive weeks was a little excessive.

In Stockholm, the impulse to run away had gripped you right after your conversation on the bridge sank abruptly in the waters below. In Oslo, you had actually run away after you’d almost kissed. You could still feel the shivers on your skin from the cold night air on the rooftop terrace. And, of course, you’d also planned to avoid him when you arrived in Manchester.

It was a pattern that was doomed to end in failure every time, yet you stubbornly refused to give it up.

You wanted to escape the feelings that frightened you, but they only ran faster. They chased after you like daunting shadows. They caught up with you. They engulfed you.

This perpetual cycle wasn’t just futile, it was also unfair—to you and to Jungkook. And to Rated Riot, too.

It had gone on for too long.

You were determined to redeem that today.

While Jungkook and the boys were doing an interview on a local radio station after the soundcheck, you chose to stay at the venue to work. Initially, you only intended to answer internal company emails and update the label executives, but unsurprisingly, that morphed into more tasks that needed your immediate attention.

Seated at your laptop in the band’s dressing room, you spent a good couple of hours finalising Rated Riot’s schedule for the rest of the week, emailing back journalists and verifying their credentials before issuing backstage passes for upcoming interviews, and humming along to a tune playing in your headphones.

It was then—during the chorus of an old Bad Omens song that was loud and messy enough to keep your mind alert and focused—that Seokjin decided to tap you on the back.

You jumped up as high as it was humanly possible and pushed your laptop away as if to protect it from intruders—which was what your mind assumed Seokjin to be, apparently. He took a step back, shocked and very entertained by your violent startle.

“Shit, sorry,” he said, attempting to suppress a smile. “You’ve been—you’ve been working here by yourself for hours. I’m taking a coffee break. Want to join me?”

With one hand pressed to your chest, you slid your headphones off and checked the time on the corner of your laptop screen. “Uh, sure. Coffee sounds nice.”

The two of you found a quaint café a few blocks from Barrowland where Rated Riot would be playing later that evening. But despite the cosy setting, you chose to grab your coffee to-go. It was a warm, sunny day outside. Seokjin thought you could use some fresh air.

“So,” he said eagerly, as soon as the café bell tinkled, announcing your exit, “what’s on your mind?”

You met his question with surprise. “What do you mean?”

He maintained an air of nonchalance, sipping his Americano and observing casually, “your pupils are massive. You look like you’re planning a revolution. Or a massacre.”

You took a sip of your drink and regretted not stirring the caramel in better. You wondered what it would be by the end of tonight: revolution or massacre.

“I was—well, it’s nothing much,” you said. “I was just thinking that things might be different when we got home.”

“How so?”

The two of you crossed the street towards a small, vibrant green space—not quite a park—with a tree-lined pathway in the middle and an old blue police box nearby, reminiscent of Doctor Who.

“Well,” you said, “I hear Brazil is really nice that time of year.”

“You’re thinking of going on holiday?” Seokjin asked, surprised. He’s known you since you joined the company, even before you started to manage Rated Riot, and he was well aware of your lack of holidays. The HR department, however, remained blissfully ignorant about it.

You shrugged. “For starters.”

“And then?”

“And then we’ll see.”

The ambiguity in your response wasn’t worrying in itself, but combined with your reluctance to meet his gaze and the intense concentration on your coffee—even though you winced every time you took a sip—it was certainly alarming.

“You’re not… going to quit, are you?” he asked hesitantly. “I’ve heard about Reconnaissance.”

Of course, he’d heard. At this point, enough people knew about it for the news to have a ripple effect and circulate backstage.

“No,” you said, trying to dispel the tension with an airy laugh. “Of course not.”

He nodded. “Okay.”

“I’d find a replacement first.”

Seokjin’s casual stride came to an abrupt halt. A few steps ahead, you realised he’d stopped and turned around.

“No,” he said.

His firm declaration made you stutter. “Th-that—that wasn’t a question.”

“And that’s not an option,” he argued. “You can’t quit.”

“I’m not saying I’m leaving for sure. I’m just saying that if I did leave, you wouldn’t even notice the difference,” you said. “I’m a very good teacher.”

With that, you started to walk away, leaving him little choice but to catch up.

“And I love all of you guys,” you continued while Seokjin grunted next to you. “I wouldn’t leave you with someone I didn’t personally trust to take care of you and the band.”

He shook his head, his determination unwavering. If he had known about the band members’ conviction that no one would blame you if you left Rated Riot due to the alluring offer from Reconnaissance, Seokjin might have been tempted to express his disagreement with his fists.

Of course, people would blame you—Seokjin was the people in question.

You belonged here. You were an essential part of the team.

He was convinced of this, and he was going to be annoying about it.

“Okay, I appreciate that,” he said, his tone tinged with incredulity. “Except, what the fuck are you thinking? Of course, we’d notice the difference! You’re you. We love you.”

“That means a lot—”

“But not enough?”

You hesitated, caught off guard by the intensity of his anger. “No, it’s—”

“Alright, look.” He stopped walking again, the paper cup of coffee in his hand more of an accessory than a beverage. “Is this about Jungkook?”

An unexpected heat surged through you and a cascade of excuses immediately raced through your mind. You scanned the pathway, reading the names of the bands imprinted into the pavement with colourful stripes—artists who’d performed at Barrowland before, you assumed—so you wouldn’t have to look at him.

But this was Seokjin. If there was anyone who knew everything that was going on in the band, it was him. You didn’t want to give him pretend reasons.

“In part,” you admitted.

“Well, if that’s the case, then it’s an even more definite no,” he asserted, his resolve unyielding.

You sighed and attempted to smile, but there was a hint of awkwardness in your expression. “I’m not taking votes, Jin. I’ll talk to Jungkook about this, and—”

“You can talk to anyone you like. All the gods you can find, even,” he interrupted. “But you’re not leaving.”

“Jin—”

“Look, when you accepted this job, the fact that you and Jungkook used to know each other didn’t matter,” he stated, tactfully omitting the word ‘relationship’—a nuance you appreciated. “What difference does it make now?”

As you bit your lip and lowered your eyes, Seokjin sensed that there was a difference, after all. It occurred to him that perhaps he wasn’t entirely up to speed on everything that was happening on the tour, after all.

“Okay, you don’t want to talk about it, and I’m not asking you to,” he said, his words gentle, but his tone strict. “What I’m saying is that nobody cares. You can date, you can break up, you can—I don’t know. You can pretty much do anything as long as you don’t kill each other. No one cares.”

“The label cares,” you blurted, the words unpolished and agitated. “I care.”

He waved his free hand dismissively. “The label cares about profit. We’re making a profit from you both. Maybe even more when you’re together because you’re both less annoying that way.”

Your eyebrows furrowed. “How are we annoying?”

“Are you kidding? All mopey and sulky?” He stuck his tongue out and pretended to gag. “You make me sick and miserable.”

You snickered softly at the dramatic display. “Fair. Sorry. But fact is, it’s still a good opportunity.”

“Well, sure,” he conceded. “But is that really the reason you want to leave? Or is it because you think that what you’re doing with Jungkook is wrong? You think others will disapprove or think less of you. You think this is highly unprofessional, and it would make more sense to work elsewhere.”

It felt oddly incongruous to hear him articulate—so easily, without a moment’s hesitation—everything that you had been thinking.

“Well, that’s a factor, too, of course…” you said, your voice faltering.

“I think that’s the main factor.”

Taking a sip of your coffee, you mumbled, “I think you think too much.”

“I think you don’t think enough,” he countered. “You can’t leave, not even for Reconnaissance. You’re part of the team, our team. We all are.”

You looked at him, and he raised his eyebrows expectantly—waiting, clearly, for you to admit defeat.

While you didn’t technically need his consent to quit, the sheer determination in his stance made you feel as though his approval was, indeed, a prerequisite for anyone choosing to leave.

“Now you’re making me feel guilty,” you said.

“As you should!” he said—nearly bellowing in his frustration. “But you should feel guilty about mistakenly thinking that you should leave. Not about being in love with him.”

His words struck a deep chord and your heart began to rattle violently in your chest. “I’m—right. Yeah. I need to talk to him about—about everything.”

His tone softened at your reaction.

“I think you should sit down for ten minutes and gather your thoughts before you do that,” he advised. “You should sit and accept that we don’t care if you go out with Jungkook. Whatever you decide, we’re all cool with it. As long as you are, too.”

Afraid that your eyes would betray your thoughts, you shifted your gaze to the silver barks of the graceful birch trees around you. “Do you know about the bet?”

Seokjin took a slow sip of his coffee to allow more time between these overlapping conversations.

“Yeah,” he said. “Is that... uh, have you two worked it out?”

“We’ve—I think we have. I think the bet wasn’t even the main issue, actually, it just—it sort of highlighted all our problems,” you admitted. “We—we’ll have to work through the rest.”

“Right. Okay,” he said. The sun rolled out from behind the buildings, casting a golden glow on the trees and the empty path ahead of you. He squinted and took a sip of his coffee before speaking. “Well, then I can safely tell you that everyone backstage knows about it.”

The disappointment on your face was absolute. “Oh. That—that’s lovely.”

He smiled sympathetically as the two of you continued down the faintly coloured path. Despite the sunshine, the cool breeze toyed relentlessly with the edges of your jackets.

“Don’t worry about it too much, though,” he said. “It’s nothing more than a silly joke backstage. We’re not judging either of you.”

You did worry about it. “What… do you mean by ‘silly joke,’ exactly?”

The two of you arrived at a large sycamore tree with leaves that glimmered in emerald hues under the sun, and Seokjin stopped, grateful for the shade.

“One of the roadies started it,” he explained. “It was just a game. A bet, actually! Funny.” He chuckled at the irony, but stopped himself when he noticed your stoic expression. “Anyway. Someone suggested that Jungkook’s friends were trying to sabotage your relationship by making this bet with him. So, we bet on Jungkook fighting his friends for you. Which—that cost me money, actually. When he showed up at the airport in Cologne with a black eye, I lost fifty euros.”

It took you a minute to process this, and you felt so uncomfortable that your fists itched with an urge to fight someone, too.

“You—so, you bet that he wouldn’t fight his friends?” you clarified, almost hopeful.

“No. I bet that he would,” he said. “But I got too big-headed and bragged about how he wouldn’t miss a single punch. So, everyone claimed that I lost and took my money. Really, I thought he knew how to fight. And he was doing it for a noble cause.” A dramatic pause ensued, and then Seokjin smirked. “I mean you, by the way.”

“No, yeah, I got that,” you said bitterly. “But you didn’t even know the actual—everyone just assumed he had a black eye because of me?”

He pulled his lips together to stifle a chuckle as he moved his cup of coffee away.

“Can you blame us?” he asked with a leisurely shrug. “He’s in love with you, and his friends are complete idiots. And then he shows up with a black eye! The dots connected themselves. Although, personally, I thought Luna or Maggie could have socked him in the eye, too. You three are very protective of each other.”

You tilted your head, your posture a warning. “I see. So, we’re a telenovela to you. Did you bet that I would knock someone out if I found out what you were up to?”

“Not yet,” he said, clearly delighted by the prospect of this happening in the future.

“Did you get your money back at least?”

“Yeah. But then I lost it again.”

The leaves of the sycamore tree rustled impatiently as you groaned. “How?”

“Another bet,” he said. “Some people—including Jimin, by the way—thought that Jungkook’s friends would never come to another Rated Riot show. In the UK specifically. We were very specific about the details in this bet.”

“Right, of course.”

He smirked, unapologetic about the amusement he derived from this. There were all sorts of games happening backstage at any given point in the tour; nearly everything became a joke here. And Seokjin hoped to show you that yes, people did know about you and Jungkook. But unless they could find ways to make it funny, they didn’t care.

He could tell that the more he talked to you about this, the more you started to recognise the absurdity of it all, too.

“Right. Well, Jimin won that round. I actually—I thought Jungkook would change his mind and bring his friends back,” Seokjin confessed. “Serves me right. I should have trusted him more.”

You raised your cup in his direction.

“Yeah,” you said. “Serves you right for making bets about this. He blacklisted Sid.”

“He—oh!” Seokjin seemed very pleased to hear this. “Well, that was worth my money, then.”

“Hmm.”

He grinned, the mischief still lingering in his eyes.

“We have another bet going on,” he said.

“Anoth—well, of course.” Your teeth dug into the coffee lid as you tried to take a sip, but reconsidered. “So, what? Who’s getting a black eye this time?”

“It’s whether you’ll get back together.”

Your irritation wavered in surprise. A rustling stirred inside you as though you had swallowed the wind and carried it within.

“Well,” you said. “Where’d you place your bets?”

“Drink your coffee,” he said. You did. It had cooled and turned unpleasantly sweet as the caramel settled. “I haven’t bet on that yet. But if you told me if you’re considering going back to him, I could win my money back.”

You made sure to swallow before looking up.

“That’s not solely up to me, though,” you said, sensing an obvious defensive undertone in your own voice. You didn’t make much effort to conceal it; he would have read right through you anyway. “A relationship typically involves two people. I can’t force him to be in it.”

Seokjin offered a patient smile.

“Please,” he said. “Everyone knows he’d burn down half of Europe for you.”

You swallowed again.

It was just you. The only one still fighting it.

“Well, in any case—” Seokjin said, distracted, suddenly, by a particularly cheeky pigeon that kept flying up to your ankles, then to your knees. “That bird is going to steal your coffee.”

You glanced down, and the shift in your position frightened the pigeon into flying a few metres away. Seokjin nodded in approval.

“Anyway,” he said. “What I meant to say is that I don’t know how much my opinion is worth, but if the only reason you’re considering quitting is because of this, then that’s nothing. You sit down, you work through your problems, you get back together, and you’re good to go. Well, good to stay. It’s up to you. No one else cares.”

You raised your eyebrows. “Everyone’s talking. They’re making bets about us. We—we’re a joke backstage. And yet you think we should get back together?”

“Yeah.” He shrugged his shoulders. “Give us something else to bet on.”

Exasperation flashed across your face. “I’m thinking I’d like to sic that pigeon on you a little bit.”

“Oh, but what would you do without me?” He was grinning in a manner so endearing and genuine that you felt your lips stretch into a defeated smile as well. “You know we’re family. That is what we do. And you said it yourself – everyone’s already talking. And no one’s truly bothered by it. You might as well do what you want.”

You took a big gulp of your coffee to finish it.

Some of the humour faded from his eyes while he watched you. He looked around—to make sure the pigeon hadn’t returned and to gather his thoughts.

“Just think about it, okay?” he said. “You know how they say ‘measure twice, cut once’? Why don’t you measure three times? Four, even. Five. Or, I don’t know, as many times as it takes until you realise that there’s no need to cut anything. Everything’s great as it is.”

Your face felt warm. “That’s very profound.”

“It is.” He nodded, his exaggerated confidence faltering a little when he saw the gratitude in your eyes and suddenly found himself timid. “I’ve also got a few carpentry jokes if you’re in the mood for those.”

Laughing finally, you shook your head. “Maybe later. But thank you for this.”

“You’re welcome,” he said. “And notice how I’m not saying ‘anytime’? Because there can’t be another time that this happens. In fact, the next time I see you, it’ll be as if we never had this conversation.”

Still smiling despite his threatening tone, you put your palm to your forehead and extended your fingers in a salute. “Sir, yes, sir.”

He nodded, content with your response.

“Now go back to that café and bring me a scone,” he ordered, his expression bright again. “I got distracted by your misery and forgot to buy one.”

You snorted and nodded—you did owe him a scone, at the very least. Seokjin stepped deeper into the shade by the tree and waited while you jogged back towards the café. He looked up to see your lighthearted expression reflected in the window across the street and felt himself exhale in relief.

He’d done his job—you knew everyone needed you here.

You returned to the venue with enough scones for the whole staff, and as you passed them out, almost everyone on the team regarded you with a mix of curiosity and anticipation. It was a nice change from their earlier concerns about your health, but you still felt uncomfortable.

There was an obvious reason you enjoyed working backstage: here, you successfully evaded the spotlight. You did your work quietly and got to spend time with your friends.

But lately, you’d been feeling everyone’s eyes on you and, naturally, your instinctive reaction was to flee. Really, this had to be inherent; you wondered if your brother shared a similar flight-or-flight-never-fight response when confronted with an uncomfortable situation.

And still, you forced yourself to wait.

Following your conversation with Seokjin, you decided on the key points that you needed to discuss with Jungkook. And they were simple: share your thoughts with him and make a decision together.

You’ve never really tried this with him before; open communication was a recent development for the two of you. But you meant what you told Seokjin: a relationship involved two people. And regardless of what -ship you and Jungkook were currently in, your decisions still influenced his, and his influenced yours.

You had hoped to speak to him after he returned from his interview, but it was almost funny how time worked against you today.

After the band returned, you went to help Jungkook with his bandages, and the company executives decided to respond to your email with a phone call. And so, you were forced to stay on the phone with the label the whole time before Rated Riot went on stage.

That was okay. You figured you would talk to Jungkook later.

But later just wouldn’t come.

After the concert, you waited for the band to finish taking pictures with their fans before you took them to another interview with several more radio hosts. And when you returned to the bus, the curtains on Jungkook’s bunk were drawn. You didn’t want to wake him in case he was asleep.

The only time you finally had direct contact with Jungkook was on the plane to London. He surprised you by approaching you from behind and casually lifting your carry-on to the overhead compartment. Then, as though he hadn’t done anything out of the ordinary, he turned around to return to his seat.

“Wait,” you called out. “Can I—can we talk? Yoongi said he’d switch seats with me.”

Jungkook stopped, his stomach sinking. He was the undefeated champion of misinterpreting situations—he hadn’t forgotten how your conversation had ended last night, but he still thought this was about Sid.

Because while you were beating yourself up about your avoidant tendencies, Jungkook was grappling with a different problem.

Since this morning, he had been bombarded with incessant text messages from an unknown number that ranged from vaguely bothersome (“UR SO DUMB LMSAO”) to genuinely threatening (“DNOT THINK THS IS OVER YOU FUCKVING CUNT”). All texts contained a certain distinctiveness: full capitalisation, typos, and a disturbing scent of wounded ego.

It was Sid, Jungkook was absolutely sure of it.

He seemed to be in a white powder induced frenzy, which wasn’t particularly unusual—Jungkook didn’t think he could remember the last time Sid had been completely sober—but the frequency of the texts was a little unsettling. Jungkook thought the bet was over now, even if Sid wasn’t satisfied. But clearly, Sid was craving something more.

Jungkook wasn’t sure how you would know about this or why you would bring it up now, but he felt his phone vibrating in his pocket again, and he thought this had to be the reason why.

“Sure,” he said, trying to mask his apprehension. He turned on airplane mode on his phone and looked up. “What’s, uh—what’s going on?”

You gestured at his seat. He sat down with bated breath—as if his life was about to change and he needed to brace for it—and waited for you to settle beside him.

“I wanted to, uh, explain myself,” you began as the plane filled. The rhythmic sound of people shuffling across the aisle was oddly soothing. Jungkook, however, appeared perplexed. “And to thank you, actually. For being there when I—well, when all of that happened. I’m sorry I caused—”

“You’ve already thanked me,” he interjected. “And you better not tell me that you’re apologising for fainting right now.”

“I’m—well, I’m just saying, you were right,” you said, disheartened by the disbelief in his eyes. You placed your water bottle on the fold-out tray and shifted in your seat. “I should have known better. Rested more. I guess what I’m saying is that I’m sorry I didn’t listen, and it all led to... that.”

He sighed. This wasn’t about Sid; this was about something worse.

“That’s who you are, though,” he said. He should have known this would be something you would blame yourself for once you recovered. “You always have to get everything done, or you—you can’t sleep. You need to, uh, work on that, but you don’t need to apologise for it.”

You looked down, tracing a shaky finger over the armrest between your seats.

“And,” he added before you could speak, “to be fair, a lot of things that happened on tour were actually out of your control. You had no choice but to put in extra time and effort, I guess. The stage constructions collapsed, the venue was flooded—”

“Right, but these—well, anyway,” you cut yourself off, reverting to your original train of thought. “I’m sorry you had to drop everything a-and worry about me. Well, not just you; the whole thing ended up being a big scene that disrupted everyone. But I—I wanted to say this to you, first of all.”

He observed you for a long moment. Between the truce you’ve decided on in your hotel room, the conversation he’d overheard about your meeting with Nick, and the disturbing messages from an unknown number, Jungkook was having a hard time comprehending what he’d done to warrant an apology from you right now.

Then, a troubling thought occurred to him: what if this was your way of saying goodbye?

He had let you go last night. What if you had decided to leave, and this was the prelude to the end of your time together?

“I’m—I didn’t have to do it,” he said. “I did it because I—well, I mean, you were passed out. Of course, I wanted to make sure you were okay.” He leaned forward in his seat. “It kind of sounds like you’re forgetting that you’re not just the manager here. You’re also my—uh, y-you’re our friend. We all would have acted the same way if it had been anyone else. It’s an ‘all for one, and one for all’ situation with us. You know that.”

He was right; your team had grown so close that none of you would have hesitated to help each other. Your unease simply stemmed from the fact that you were the one receiving help this time.

You swallowed. You thought you owed him an explanation about everything, but you haven’t even really gotten to it yet.

“Thank you,” you said. “For what you said and—and for what you did. I’ll make sure it doesn’t happen again.”

He gave you a hesitant smile. “Was I really so terrible at taking care of you that it made you change your workaholic ways?”

You raised your eyebrows, surprised by the gentle teasing in his words.

“No, you di—you were great. Except for the fact that you didn’t need to do that,” you said, shooting him a look that he promptly rolled his eyes at. You added, “I say that with gratitude, of course. But, um, I felt very uncomfortable just lying there while everyone else—well, can’t let that happen again. Anyway, this isn’t—”

“I hope it won’t happen again,” he interrupted. “But it’s—well, you’ve spent your whole life taking care of... everything. Your brother, your mum, uh, e-even me. It’s second nature to you, I don’t know how else to—you can’t help but actively try to fix things. So, I-I don’t mind being the person who reminds you to take it easy sometimes. I just want you to listen.”

He’d said something very similar to you last night and you dug your teeth into your lower lip so you wouldn’t argue.

You thought you weren’t doing a very good job of fixing things—nevermind that you’ve subconsciously turned absolutely everything around you into your personal responsibility, and it was simply unrealistic to take care of it all.

“Thank you,” you chose to say. “I just, um—I don’t want you to think I’m talking to you so you’d make me feel better. You don’t need to do that. And it’s my turn to expla—”

He whipped his head to look at you so suddenly—an almost offended expression on his face—that the rest of your sentence got caught in your throat.

“Wh—why do you always think that?” he asked. “That I do something for you because I feel like I have to?”

“I don’t—I know you’re not—ah.” Leaning back in your seat, you attempted to rearrange your thoughts as if you were shuffling stubborn cards in a deck—trying to find the one you needed to win a game against yourself. “That’s not even the main thing I wanted to talk to you about.”

“Okay,” he said, a little worried. “What is the main thing?”

It took you a moment to find your breath.

“The conversation that we had last night—well, not just last night, actually, it’s been happening for a while. But, uh, last night specifically—it wasn’t supposed to end like that,” you said. He lowered his eyes. “That’s what I wanted to, um—to bring up. Because we’re not talking again, you know? I mean—okay. That’s not true. You are talking. But I’m not. I-I think it’s still new to me that we’re—that we’re actually talking about things. About everything. I’m sorry I haven’t said much to you in return.”

You exhaled when you finished speaking—finished stammering, really—but you didn’t feel relieved. There was a lot more you had to say.

Jungkook, on the other hand, felt his thoughts drift back to Amsterdam once again, when he had entered your hotel room to apologise, and you told him you forgave him and apologised in return. He remembered the pained, laboured beating of his heart as he listened to you—thinking, all the while, that he had no right to want you all for himself.

Now, he had some additional time to think about how to respond, because the flight attendant started the safety demonstration at the front of the plane, preparing for take-off.

He fastened his seatbelt, relieved by the silence on his phone—but the quiet pause between you as the plane lifted off the runway felt very loud in his head.

“You know,” he said after a few minutes, “you find the weirdest things to feel guilty about.”

You furrowed your brows while Jungkook idly twirled the onyx signet ring on his index finger.

“You’re never obligated to respond to what I tell you,” he said. “I didn’t say any of those things to you in Manchester in exchange for your immediate forgiveness, or for some similar stories, or for—anything, really. You don’t owe me anything. I just wanted to tell you everything, and that’s it.”

“I-I get that,” you shifted in your seat, restricted by the seatbelt, “but I’m your manager. And I-I left you in a confusing, stressful situation by yourself when I refused to talk to you right away. That was—it was unprofessional at best, and cruel at—”

“You’re more than that to me, though,” he cut in. You gripped the armrest tighter. “You know that. And you didn’t… leave me in that situation as my manager. You left me there as my ex-girlfriend. You have that right. You were confused and stressed, too.”

Your gaze slid over his black and grey flannel and the t-shirt with a Rated Riot logo underneath. The plane cruised at the designated altitude, but you still felt pushed into your seat like you had during take-off.

“I don’t—I’m not sure those two roles can be separated any longer,” you admitted.

Oh, whispered an alarmed pang of his heart. And, oh? echoed the multitude of shivers rippling underneath his skin.

“What are you saying?” he asked.

You drew in a breath. You didn’t want to start from the beginning because you had a feeling that he might not let you get to the end, so you decided to start from the explanation—the one that you’d come here to give him, but kept getting sidetracked as he responded to you in ways you weren’t anticipating.

“People on tour,” you began, “are very invested in our, uh—situation.”

Jungkook arched an eyebrow. “They’re invested?”

“Apparently, we’re a popular topic backstage.”

Quickly enough, he thought he figured out your implication: if he hadn’t played along with Sid, the staff on this tour might have been having very different conversations.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“No, that’s not—well, it’s not just your fault,” you replied. “It takes two, right?”

“Right, but I was the one who made the bet.”

“You—okay. But this isn’t about the bet—” you paused. Reconsidered. “Well, alright, the bet sort of kick-started a lot of things, but it’s not—that’s not the problem from my point of view right now.”

Oh, once more. And then, ah.

You were talking, he realised, about the things you didn’t want to talk about in your hotel room in Manchester. The things you’ve affectionately labelled as “a confusing, stressful situation.” The things you were supposed to discuss later, when the time was right. Except he had succumbed to the terminal case of nothing-matters-anymore-if-you’re-leaving-the-band and got drunk instead.

“Okay,” he said. “That’s… fine with me.”

“Alright,” you said. “So, here’s our problem: I’m your manager.”

Jungkook raised his eyebrows and pulled his chin back.

“If that’s our only problem,” he said, “we are very lucky people.”

A brief smile flickered on your face.

“It’s our biggest problem,” you clarified. “But we definitely are lucky.”

Encouraged by the amusement in your eyes, he grinned. “Because we have each other?”

Your smile grew and even the plane itself seemed to shake a little when his heart rate accelerated at the sight of it.

“Because we can solve this problem,” you said.

His face fell. He thought he could guess where you were going with this.

“How do you mean?” he still asked, his voice a low murmur.

You thought you could have used some of the whiskey that Jungkook had sought out last night.

With a measured breath, you said, “I leave the band, and—”

“Wait,” he cut you off. “Is that supposed to be—”

“Hear me out first—”

“No, listen—if the problem is that you’re my manager,” he said, “then you leaving Rated Riot is not the solution.”

Jungkook sounded a little like Seokjin had earlier—a stark contrast from the way he’d spoken to you last night by the bus.

“Are you suggesting that because people are talking about us backstage?” he pressed.

You turned away. “It’s not just that. I mean, they’re already talking and that’s—well, it’s not great. But we can’t stop the wheel from turning now, or however that saying goes. What we can do, however, is stop it before it gets worse. And by that I mean, you know—we need to decide what the hell we’re doing.”

That was what he wanted, he thought. But now he was confused.

You seemed to want to make a decision about your relationship together. Yet you also seemed to believe that leaving Rated Riot was the best option. He failed to see how both of these things were possible at the same time.

“So, you’ve made up your mind, then?” he asked. “About leaving?”

“That’s what I want to talk to you about,” you said. “I don’t want to leave the band, but—”

“Well, that’s the thing, then,” he said sharply, unfastening his seatbelt. Turning to face you, he stumbled over his own confusion, “I’m—I don’t want to hold you back. I told you. But I thought you—I thought it would be—I thought you wanted to leave. I thought—but you want to stay. So, stay.”

Stay.

It was very simple, really, very concise. But it carried a lot more weight than his words last night when he had caught you off guard. When he had let you go.

You wanted to stay. You just didn’t think you should.

Your response wasn’t particularly verbal. “Hmm.”

“Is it me?” Jungkook asked. “Am I the only reason you’re thinking of leaving?”

He didn’t sound accusatory, even though you were prepared for it. He sounded apologetic instead—almost guilty—and you were completely unprepared for that as a million tiny needles pricked at your heart.

“You’re not the only reason,” you replied. “You’re part of it. And I don’t—look, I-I don’t want to leave. But that sounds reasonable when you look at where we are right now.”

He heard nothing of what you’d said.

“That’s not reasonable in the slightest,” he insisted.

“Jungkook—”

“You have to stay. If you—”

“But if that’s the choice that would make more sense for us,” you interjected, exasperated, “then I don’t mind leaving. If—if we weren’t working together anymore, then maybe we could try to finally figure our shit out.”

Now he heard it.

He had a vague awareness that the other passengers behind you had turned off their screens and removed their headphones, choosing to listen to your conversation instead. But he was too stunned by the look in your eyes to care.

So, that was what you were trying to say: you were prepared to leave Rated Riot to fix your relationship.

He opened his mouth to speak, but it took another minute for coherent words to come to him.

“We can—we can figure our shit out while working together,” he said. “Why do you have to leave?”

“It’s—you have to understand,” you said, “that I don’t know what I’m doing. I’m pretty sure neither do you, but that’s how you usually function.” Jungkook sobered up enough to offer a noncommittal shrug. You continued, “but for me—this is freaking me out. I don’t—I don’t know what’s going to happen and what we should do, and—leaving the band sounds—it seems reasonable. It seems safe. Smart. And that’s what I’m clinging to.”

He swallowed, not trusting himself to move. “But that’s—”

“Please, it’s—this is what I wanted to say to you—what I should have said to you last night.” There was a pleading tone in your voice. He nodded, quiet while you continued. “If I stay with Rated Riot, and we try to solve our problems… there are only two ways that can go, right? We both know as much. Either we get back together, or we don’t.”

Jungkook was mesmerised by how glaringly simple this was, in principle: either you used a label on your relationship, or you didn’t.

He knew he was going to love you either way, but he couldn’t breathe, suddenly, at the thought of this other choice in this dilemma—the choice where you didn’t get back together, and he spent the rest of his life deliberately going crazy, so he could return—at least in his mind—to that day seven years ago when he first met you.

“Well, uh, yeah,” he managed to say. “That’s pretty much the choices that we’ve got.”

You reclined in your seat, lifting your gaze to the light control buttons overhead.

“If we get back together…” you began, exhaling. “Then, we might have to face a lot of problems from the label. But we might be alright in the end. I don’t know.”

Jungkook tightened his jaw. He attempted to formulate a response that would be logical and appropriate in this situation. But really, his head felt too small for his thoughts and his tongue too big for his mouth.

“That’s… that’s good to know,” he eventually said.

“Mhmm,” you replied distractedly. “But see, what if we don’t get back together? Or we do, but it doesn’t work out?”

That was what worried him, too—but for different reasons.

He knew that you were looking at this from a pragmatic perspective. A logical, what-would-make-more-sense perspective.

He didn’t think he’d ever looked at it this way. For him, this was simple: he loved you and wanted to be with you. He didn’t care how inconvenient and illogical it might seem to those around him, and he refused to think about what would happen if this love didn’t work out. It would have to. How could it not?

But he recognised his privileges; he knew he didn’t have as many responsibilities as you did. And, alright, fine, he thought about it—realistically, if you broke up again, he’d probably drink until he turned into a puddle of whiskey, while you’d flee across the globe to get away from it all.

And yet—was that all there was to this? Just rationality and calculated decisions?

Jungkook cleared his throat and asked the question that he believed really mattered here.

“Do you love me?”

Someone on the plane gulped audibly and held their breath. He wondered if it was him.

The colour of your eyes deepened, then blurred. “I-I—that’s—that’s not—”

“Answer me,” he whispered.

You tried, but no words came out. This moment resembled the nightmares that haunted you lately: you opened your mouth to scream, but silence stifled every sound you tried to make.

“T-that’s—” you began and stopped yourself before you could stutter any further. You took a breath. “That’s not important right now—”

“How can it not be—”

“Because I do love you,” you said quickly—the words slurred into one desperate Idoloveyou, a hopeless Idoloveyou, a how-can-you-possibly-expect-me-not-to Idoloveyou. “But I don’t think I should. I don’t think you should, either. We’re a—we’re a fucking mess.”

Visibly frozen, Jungkook found himself thinking that if this was the sixteenth century, and the two of you just happened to have this conversation in some public square, the townsfolk would have surely accused you of witchcraft.

It was uncanny, the way you cast a spell on him with just four words—all four of which he heard with perfect clarity: I do love you. Granted, he wasn’t sure if he heard the rest. He felt like he was already burning in your place.

“Right,” he thought he said. He couldn’t feel his face. “But we’ve always—”

“I’m—I have to—I do owe you,” you said. He watched you, his expression oscillating between mild confusion and outright bewilderment. “You said I don’t, but I do. I could have told you what was going on in my head like you told me. Honestly, all this time, whenever I talked to people, they all told me to speak to you. To talk it out. And I closed up in my head instead. If I don’t talk about it, I don’t have to deal with it. You know?”

He blinked, finally. “That’s—”

“I’ll explain it, though, okay?” you said. “Please?”

You gave him too much power—as if he could ever say no to you. As if he could stop listening. As if every fibre of his being didn’t ache to stay close to you.

Warm—so unbearably warm that it felt like he was in the middle of exploring the landscapes Dante depicted in Inferno—Jungkook wiped off the sweat from his palms on his dark jeans.

“Yeah,” he said. “Yeah, okay.”

“It won’t take long,” you assured. “Really, I don’t even have much to say. I’m fucking scared. That’s all there is to it.”

Jungkook seemed to be practising the lost art of swallowing his tongue. He wanted you to continue and you were biting your lip in a way that suggested that this was not all there was to it. You only wished it was.

You took a trembling breath, and your lungs followed—quivering, it seemed, as they tried to provide you with the oxygen necessary for all that you were about to say.

“I spent the first fifteen years of my life watching my parents break up and get back together again,” you began. “And do you know what I felt every single time they broke up? Actual rage.” You laughed wryly here like this reaction was absurd. “But when they got back together, I was fucking—I was hopeful. I refused to speak to them, of course—I was a teenager—but I was… Inside, just like my mum, I also hoped that this would work. That this time would be the one.”

You swallowed and lapsed into a silence so long and heavy that Jungkook worried you might never speak again.

Fifteen years, he thought. And all this time, he’d assumed that your dad left for the final time when you were twelve. That was already bad enough, of course, but Jungkook hadn’t realised that the back-and-forth between your parents that you’d mentioned back in Tilburg had taken place after that. He hadn’t realised that you and your brother had gone through three years of almost having a father—and your mum through almost having a partner.

“I knew they were a tragedy together,” you continued. Jungkook didn’t know how to raise his eyes to look at you. “It was obvious that it wouldn’t last. I always knew it, and I always said that to my mum. But deep down, I still fucking hoped that they’d get together and it would work.”

You shook your head with a cold, unforgiving smile.

“How fucking stupid,” you concluded. “All hope does is bring misery and disappointment.”

“You were a child,” he said, his brows drawn together—sad and a little scared for your younger self. “You just wanted your parents to be together. You wanted a family.”

“Yeah,” you said with a sigh. Then again, “yeah.”

A minute passed without either of you speaking. Flight attendants crossed the aisles, offering complimentary snacks, but missing you—either by mistake or because there was no one in your seats on the plane. The two of you were somewhere else.

“I think,” you said once the commotion around you quieted, “that I wasn’t just angry at my mum for trying again and again, even though it never worked. Or for never losing hope that maybe they could be happy together. I think I was also angry at myself. Because I never truly lost hope, either.”

Jungkook hung his head, his lips tight in silent contemplation.

“So that’s what I’m afraid of,” you said. “I’m scared that this—us—will turn out to be like that. I’m scared that we’ll let wishful thinking take over, and we’ll get back together even though we shouldn’t. Even though it’s obvious that we won’t last.”

Right away, he wanted to insist that you would defy those odds. That there was nothing obvious about the two of you whatsoever. He wanted to promise all that and more, but it wasn’t right—not after you endured fifteen years of broken promises between two of the most important people in your life.

“You, um—” he started to say and coughed suddenly, caught off guard by his dry throat, “—you told me before that you admired your mum’s courage. F-for trying again.”

You handed him the overpriced airport water bottle that you had bought earlier. Jungkook nodded in gratitude.

“I did,” you confirmed. “And I do admire that about her. But I don’t have any of her courage.” You brought a shaky finger over your forehead, not quite scratching it. “I always say that I don’t believe in second chances, but the truth is, I think I do believe in them. I’m just debilitated by my fear that these second chances might not work out.”

Jungkook lowered the bottle. He’d emptied almost half of it in a single gulp, but an anxious undercurrent inside of him had absorbed it before he could feel any relief.

“Is that, um,” he tried to ask, “is that something you feel in general or—or because it’s us?”

You thought about that for half a second and shook your head.

“I don’t think I’ve ever been in a situation where a second chance held so much significance,” you said. “This isn’t a mistake that you can fix. It’s not a human error. It’s you and me. And it’s so—it’s final. There won’t be another chance for us, it’s now or never. And what if it’s never?”

You lowered your gaze, your fingers restless as they toyed with the sleeves of your black shirt. Every now and then, you’d lift your hand to your bare neck—you still hadn’t found any of your necklaces—as if seeking a distraction from the weight of the moment.

“Y-you are—you’re my—” you tried and couldn’t. Finally, you looked at him, and the words you couldn’t voice were right there, shimmering uncertainly in his dark eyes. “You’re my first thought in the morning and the last one at night. I don’t think my heart could take it if I started to have hope for us again, but we didn’t work out in the end.”

Jungkook felt his heart trip over several beats—

Stumble down his ribs—

Crash into his stomach—

Roll around the hollow cavities somewhere at the very bottom—

Rise suddenly, all the way back to his chest—

Expand—

Expand—

Expand—

And explode, it seemed. In a flash of light so vivid and intense that for a minute or two, his blood stopped running and he survived on nothing but the words you’d just said.

“And so that’s what I meant,” you finished, and he struggled to hear your next words over the loud pounding in his chest. “If I stay here and we don’t get back together—or we do, but not for long—then what? We see each other every day, we try to act like nothing’s wrong, we learn how to go back to being professional, and then four years later, you make another bet?”

Jungkook found the end of your sentence so utterly unexpected that he wasn’t sure if he had even heard you correctly. His response was half of a gasp and a fractured “I—” before you cut him off.

“I’m joking,” you said with a gentle smile—one that managed to feel both, very fitting and completely out of place in this situation. “That’s—well, that is why I think it’d be more reasonable for me to leave. That way, I think, we could figure it out without some dramatic, tragic consequences in case it, uh—in case something goes wrong.”

“R-right,” he said. A warm haze settled on his face in a delicate shade of pink. It appeared almost soft to the touch. “I… I understand. I-I don’t—I don’t know if there’s anything I can say that would take that away. All of your fear.”

You swallowed and nodded. “Yeah. There might not be anything to say at all.”

Jungkook hurriedly ran his tongue over his lips. He wasn’t thinking about you leaving right now. He was thinking about you staying and fighting through it.

He wanted to say something more, but he didn’t think he could mend these particular wounds in your heart. They ran deeper than his love could reach.

It wasn’t him that you should have talked to about this. It wasn’t him that could help you reach an agreement—or, at least, an understanding—with your own self.

“You should talk to your mum,” he said.

You looked up from the floor of the plane, surprised. “What?”

“Talk to her,” he repeated. “Just to hear what she thinks about everything. To hear her reasoning. To understand why she made the choices that she did. I think that would be good for you both.”

Your surprise deepened and gained an edge. You looked alarmed, as if the notion that a caregiver could ease your hurt rather than deepen it was new and foreign.

“I’ve—we’ve never—my mum and I have only talked about her relationship with my dad maybe once in our whole lives,” you said. “I have never even talked to her about my own relationship. You know I haven’t.”

He nodded solemnly. “I have, though.”

“What?” you asked. There was a ringing in your ears. “You have—you’ve talked to—to my mum? About—”

“I’m sure she’ll tell you everything.”

For a good minute, you watched him with an expression that held more questions than possible ways of asking them.

“I—I’m very confused right now,” you managed.

He nodded again, understanding, but still not offering any explanations.

He’d told you most of everything, really—he’d called those bits of the story “Haunting” and “Cursed.” But the rest of it had to be something you pieced together on your own.

For a long time, he had imagined this to be something that would hit you years later, perhaps when you would accidentally hear an old Rated Riot song. You’d think no, it can’t be, and you’d rush home. You’d pull out the albums, the track lists, and the lyrics.

And you’d know.

These conversations with your mum were his far side of the moon—invisible, but still present, still heavy.

These conversations were his thoughts and hopes and countless fears.

They were everything he brought to Rated Riot and everything he expressed in the recording booth, in Namjoon’s studio, and on stage.

They were his past and his present, and someone else’s future.

They were him without you, but still searching for you every morning when he woke up.

They were you, you, you.

Everything he’d ever talked to your mum about had been his songs. And all his songs had always been a tale about you—in every banal, every impossible narrative he could find within himself.

They were about seeing you and growing wings.

About kissing you and coming home.

About losing you and bleeding out.

About forever and five minutes that don’t mean anything once they’re over.

“I’m sorry,” he said, not capable of much else. “I needed her help with something. I didn’t really tell her anything, uh, directly, so to speak. But she—she knows. She’ll tell you everything. It’s just, um—you have to talk to her, too. You have to tell her what you told me.”

Airplanes, you realised suddenly, made it very easy to force yourself to stop running away. There was nowhere to escape—you could see the clouds reflected in his eyes and you were already falling in them anyway.

“I’ll talk to her,” you said.

Jungkook gave you a small nod and scratched his knee absentmindedly.

“I want you to stay,” he stated. “With the band. It’s—it’s selfish, but it’s the truth. I’ve always tried to encourage you to stop thinking so much a-and just do what you wanted, and this—this is what you want, despite your fear. You want to stay.”

You looked at him with a forlorn expression and he felt his hands twitch at his sides.

“But what will we do?” you asked.

“We’ll figure it out,” he promised. “I mean, we’ve gotten this far, right? So, give us a chance. We’re not completely hopeless. We can... talk our way through it all, step by step.”

You’ve talked your way through a lot and you have gotten this far, that was true. Even if the journey hadn’t been pleasant.

Seokjin had told you earlier today that as long as you stayed with the band, no one would care about what happened next. And, really, no matter how you looked at it, this was what it all boiled down to: it was just you.

Only you—afraid of what others will say, afraid of getting hurt and hurting him again, afraid of doing too much, and afraid of not doing enough.

“I’m—” you tried, “w-we don’t know what will happen. That’s why I’m—”

“I know,” he said. “And you’re right. We don’t know what will happen. That’s fucking terrifying. I’m scared, too.”

He did look a little scared, but he licked his lips and successfully collected himself.

The two of you were so close to meeting in the middle and taking that first step together—just a little more strain between your shaking, outstretched hands.

“And I-I know that the bet is another thing that—that might make it harder for you to believe that we can—that we can work it out,” he added, spinning his ring around his finger twice more. “But I want you to know that it—the bet was a fucked up thing to do. But it gave me a reason to talk to you about everything that I already wanted to talk to you about. I’m—even without the bet, I would have approached you, eventually. It just—I was fucking scared, so it might have taken me longer.”

It wasn’t just you.

Fear was in the epicentre of everything you were saying to each other. It was like the wind in every city you visited on this tour—inescapable, uncontrollable, persistent.

He was afraid, too—of trying and failing. Afraid of getting his heart broken and breaking yours. Afraid of never finding the forever that he desperately wanted with you.

“My point is,” Jungkook finished, “I think this is inevitable, because—well, let’s be honest,” he chuckled softly, trying to lessen the gravity of his confession, “all I’d ever wanted in my entire fucked-up life was you.”

Your breath trembled.

Something very deep inside of you wanted you to believe that inevitability was meant for the two of you, too.

“It’s been four years, though,” you said with a faint shake of your head. “What if it takes us another four to find a way to make this work?”

“It—well, I don’t really care how long it takes, to be honest,” he said. “I’m going to die yours.”

He said that and your heart stopped beating for a moment to listen.

To wait.

To make one thing very clear for you: you would never survive losing him again.

And you were scared—completely petrified—to find yourself in a situation where losing him was possible. Where it was likely.

Jungkook saw it on your face. He saw everything—the anguish, the pain, the doubt, the fear.

But he felt a little exhilarated to find the fight in your eyes, too. This fight was the reason you were talking to him about things that you’ve never talked about. It was the reason you were here.

“We’ll decide everything else when the idea of—of trying again doesn’t scare you so much anymore,” he said, keeping his voice steady. “When you hear your mum’s point of view, and you can make a, uh—an informed decision.”

He noted that there was something softer in your eyes when you looked at him again, but he could still discern the lingering edges of doubt.

“You think that’ll help me make an informed decision?” you asked, touched by his choice of words.

“I hope it will,” he replied. “But we can work it all out, either way. I just think you need to talk to her. It’s been so long.”

“Right. It has been.” You clasped your hands around your neck and tucked your chin between your palms. “It—it probably won’t be an easy conversation, though.”

“Nor will it be short, I imagine.”

“Hmm. Probably not.”

He sensed the growing distance between you as your eyes ran over the back of the seat in front of you. He knew you well enough to understand what you were doing: you were mapping out the rest of your story in your head.

He didn’t like that. Your stories rarely had happy endings.

“You don’t—don’t start planning it ahead, though,” he said hastily—before you reached the unhappily ever after in your mind. “It’ll be late when we land in London. You need to sleep. Talk to her after that. When you—when you’re not working. We can wait. We have time.”

Finally, you allowed your gazes to meet again—and to linger a little longer this time.

You took a moment to note that, despite knowing Jungkook for so long, every time you looked at him, you still needed a minute to will yourself to keep breathing. You remembered thinking, after your first few dates, if that would ever go away—logically, it should have.

But you watched him now, seven years since you’ve met, and the beating of your heart still felt backwards.

I’m going to die yours

I’m going to die yours

I’m going to die—

“Okay,” you finally said. “I’ll call her as soon as possible.”

He nodded twice and closed his eyes for a brief respite—but hesitated, suddenly, before opening them again.

He wondered, for a suspended moment, what it would mean for you—this ‘as soon as possible.’

Then he looked at you and decided to tell you what he wanted it to mean.

“Before that happens, though—before you talk to her, I mean—I-I want to still be able to see you,” he said and did so assertively, using the phrase I want, but really meaning, I must. “I don’t want to not talk to you.”

You felt your frosty expression crumble effortlessly into a soft smile.

“We’ve agreed to a truce, right?” you said easily. Lightly.

His heart soared.

He was smiling, too, but with caution—his lips were pressed together as he bit into his lip ring to contain his smile to a level that he thought appropriate.

His shining eyes gave him away, however, and you wondered—the thought sudden and overwhelming—if there was a point in your life when you weren’t in love with him when he smiled.

“Let’s try a friendship,” he proposed.

“Oh—” Your smile abruptly turned into laughter as you remembered trying this once before. It had lasted for about two days. “You know we can’t be friends. We don’t know how.”

The gentle cadence of your laughter made him weightless.

“What are you talking about?” he teased—so high that he was certain the flight attendants were going to ask him to take it down a notch because it was dangerous to float on the ceiling in the middle of a flight. “We can be whatever the fuck we want to be.”

Your laughter grew bolder, strengthened by the relief that you’ve had this conversation, that you’ve decided on your next steps, however uncertain they were—and his smile spread.

You could see him beaming through your half-closed eyes, and there was absolutely nothing—no matter how big or small, significant or not at all—that you wouldn’t have done for him when he looked like that, and no amount of fear could have stopped you.

He'd burn down half of Europe for you, Seokjin had said.

You were worried you’d burn all of it for him.

“Honestly,” you said, “we’re such a mess that I have nothing else to say. Sure. Let’s try being friends again. Why not?”

“For the time being?” Jungkook asked. There was a tentative glint in his eyes. “Until we figure out if—until we decide what we’re going to do with us?”

It was very considerate of him to say ‘we’ here, when you knew that you were the one who needed to get it together in the end.

“For the time being,” you confirmed.

“And you’ll stay?” he asked once more. “With Rated Riot?”

Last night, he had told you he was letting you go, and you needed to hear it—not just to see how much he’s grown, but to fully understand yourself. To stop jumping from possibility to possibility. To accept that it was okay to do what you wanted sometimes.

The past few days were like flipping a coin and realising, while it was mid-air, which side you were hoping it would land on.

“I’ll stay.”

Jungkook thought that this flight was going to be the most thrilling part of his day. But a miracle happened as soon as the plane touched down in London.

His grandmother called him.

It wasn’t an accident like he had initially assumed when he saw her name on his phone. She called because she missed her favourite grandson and wanted to wish him good luck at his concert (and chastise him a little for not wearing “enough clothing” on stage).

Jungkook wasn’t sure if the tears in his eyes were because she’d remembered who he was, remembered what he did for a living, because she’d called, or because she’d confirmed his long-held suspicion that he was her favourite grandson.

Perhaps, and most likely, it was all of these things.

He was so excited that he stared at his phone even after the call had ended, ignoring the influx of more unintelligible, frantic messages from the same unknown number. He probably would have spent the rest of the night fixated on the screen if his battery hadn’t run out by the time everyone settled in the hotel.

At that point, there was nothing Jungkook wanted more than to tell you about the fifteen-minute phone call. However, he couldn’t call or text with his phone off—and waiting for ten minutes until he found the charger in his suitcase seemed like half of an eternity.

Unaware of the lateness of the hour, he lingered outside the hotel, thinking of a plan.

In the end, he decided he didn’t want to draw more attention to your friendship—he hiccupped on the word even in his thoughts—and approached the decorative garden at the front entrance. Ficus plants (artificial, as it turned out) rested in a bed of pebbles (real, for some reason) and Jungkook grabbed a handful of those before heading back to the south wing of the hotel.

He counted down the windows until he identified yours, then took half a dozen steps back from the wall and tossed a pebble at your window. It hit the glass with a gentle thud and dropped onto the grass four floors below.

Jungkook waited for a minute—or what felt like a minute—and tossed another one, making this one bounce against your windowsill before it slipped into your room through the crack of the open window.

He waited again and, finally, your curtains fluttered. A moment later, he saw your puzzled face as you opened the window and covered your squinting eyes with your hand, peering down into the darkness.

“Jungkook?” you called out. “What—what the fuck are you doing?”

“Trying to get your attention!” he shouted with an elated lilt in his voice.

You picked up the pebble from the windowsill and lifted it. He couldn’t see it very well from the ground, but he could see your confused expression.

“By throwing rocks at my window?”

“Yeah!”

“How—are you—for what—”

You stopped. There wasn’t a singular question you wanted to ask, because nothing about what he was doing made any sense whatsoever.

You leaned over the windowsill to get a better look at him, but it didn’t help much. The light from your hotel room made it difficult to discern his expression in the pitch-black night. And the garden lights adorning the exterior of the hotel only highlighted his white sneakers.

“I’m sure there were a lot of steps you could have taken before you had to resort to this,” you shouted into the night. “Most people text. Or knock on the door.”

“My phone’s dead,” he explained, lifting a black block that you assumed was the dead phone. “And I didn’t want anyone to see me going into your room. Can you come down here?”

“Wh—hold on a second.” You retreated into the room to put on a robe over the t-shirt you had worn to bed. The night wind felt a little less frigid when you leaned out of the window again. “Can you just come up here? It’s nearly six in the morning, no one will see—”

“Come on, we finally have a few days off!” he shouted, implying, clearly, that you’d have time to catch up on sleep later. After days of him forcing you to rest, this was very unusual—but, really, quite welcome.

You realised that something important must have happened for him to do this. However, his buoyant voice—and this whole situation in general—also made you wonder if he was drunk.

“I meant that it’s cold outside,” you said. “Wouldn’t it be warmer to—”

“I can—it’s not that bad,” he ended up saying after quickly surmising that his offer to warm you might lead to you throwing that same pebble right at his forehead. “Please?”

You were well aware that this could go on for a while, and it probably wouldn’t be long before your Romeo-and-Juliet-esque conversation attracted the attention of the hotel staff, who would politely ask you to find a different accommodation. The manager already didn’t seem especially pleased when he found out that a rock band would be staying at his hotel.

“Alright. I’m coming down,” you said. “Put the rocks back where you found them.”

He snickered and watched you close the window, disappearing inside of your room.

By the time he returned the remaining pebbles back to the garden, the sky was already beginning to paint itself red. The clouds obscured the rising sun, but Jungkook turned his head just in time to see you walk through the hotel door, and he felt like it was the middle of the day already.

“What’s going on?” you asked, a little concerned about the size of the grin on his face.

“My grandma called me,” he said. “She’s having a good day. She remembered me.”

“Oh, my God!” you gasped. All of your irritation about leaving your warm hotel room at this hour vanished in an instant. “That’s great news! Did you talk to her?”

“Yeah!” He nodded, nearly laughing in pure, beautiful euphoria. “The whole call, she was okay. Even scolded me for breaking the glass on her favourite picture frame when I came to say goodbye to her on the last night before the tour.”

You laughed, infected with his bright mood. “Jungkook, that’s—that’s fantastic. I’m so—”

Instinctively, he pulled you to him by wrapping his arms around your waist. For just a moment, he tightened his embrace and lifted you up slightly, laughing breathlessly when you gasped in surprise.

“I know,” he murmured into your neck as he lowered you to the ground. “I still can’t believe she really called.”

He held you close to him with one hand around your waist, and another one on the back of your neck—and you were stunned for a split-second. Then finally, muscle memory roused you, and you wrapped your arms around his neck, resting the side of your head against his.

“I’m—I’m so happy to hear that,” you whispered, feeling his breath on your shoulder and the goosebumps that rose on your skin as a result.

“I am, too.” He slowly pulled his head back to look at you, and the sight of the smile on his face was enough to pierce your heart with something that you could never remove. “You’re the first person I wanted to tell this to.”

Wordlessly, you pulled him back into a hug. You could feel the stretch of his cheeks against yours as his smile widened, and you realised you’d never want to run away from this. You’d always want to stay.

You were going to stay.

No. That wasn’t right.

You wouldn’t just stay with Rated Riot, determined to destroy every ounce of your fear for him. You’d have mopped up whole oceans for him. Captured shooting stars and stuffed them into jars. Flooded the entire world with an endless sea.

You’d have done anything to have him here like this: smiling so much that he could barely speak while his chest thud-thud-thudded against yours.

You felt so much of it—this vast love that refused to die no matter how much it was beaten—that you didn’t know what to do with it all.

A minute later, you pulled back slightly—a little dizzy from the intense whirlwinds inside your chest.

“T-thank you,” you stammered. “For telling me. I’m really—I’m so happy for you.”

His hands lingered on your waist, extending the moment to the very end.

“Thank you,” he replied, taking a reluctant step back. “She, um—she asked me to say hi to you. You know, from her.”

You were surprised that she remembered you—and brought you up!—and your smile returned, encouraged by the bashful look in his eyes when he said this.

“Give her my best the next time you talk to her,” you said.

“I will.” He nodded eagerly, then slowed down. “Although, I, uh—well—I don’t know when that’ll be.”

“That’s okay,” you replied quickly, not wanting to lose the lightness of the moment so soon. “The important thing is that she’s having a good day today. And she called you!”

You raised your voice at the end of the sentence, and it was enough to rekindle his excitement.

“She did!” he sang. “She said I was her favourite grandson, by the way. So I was right.”

“Oh—hmm.” You remembered pretending to argue with him about this in Stockholm and couldn’t help yourself. “Well, alright. I guess that makes sense. Remember that stray orange cat that she used to feed every night? Reginald?”

“Reggie,” he said, grinning. The cat was one of the first things his grandmother mentioned when she called tonight; it had stopped coming to see her, but continued to take up a large place in her heart. “What’s he got to do with this?”

“Well, I mean, she loved him so much, even though he scratched her every time she got too close,” you explained. “Clearly, she always had a soft spot for troublemakers.”

“Okay, now,”—he clicked his tongue—“my grandma did actually love that cat a lot, so I’ll take that as a compliment.”

You snickered and he laughed, too, and for a moment, he thought his chest might have exploded if he felt any happier than he did right now.

Then he noticed you clutching your robe closer to your body. Whatever you’d worn underneath wasn’t enough to keep you warm now that the initial excitement slowly began to fade.

“Do you, uh… want to go back inside?” he asked, gesturing at the exposed skin of your wrists. “You’re shivering.”

You looked down at your hands. “I’m okay. But maybe we could sit?”

You turned to look around. There was a bench right at the edge of the garden, next to a bronze-coloured flowerpot that was placed in the pebbles Jungkook had used to “get your attention”.

“Yeah,” he agreed.

You shivered all over again when he sat down next to you, and the bench turned out to be smaller than it had appeared. You could feel every bounce of his restless legs.

“So,” you said, “what did you two talk about?”

He brightened at your question, and suddenly, you didn’t think he was anywhere near close enough.

“Oh, so many things,” he said. “She told me she’d like to see us perform. Can we make that happen when we go back?”

“Absolutely,” you promised.

“Yeah?” His smile widened and his bouncing increased. “She’ll probably hate it. Mosh pits aren’t her thing.”

“We’ll put her in the balcony seats,” you suggested. This conversation felt so ordinary that it was hard to imagine you could be talking to him about anything else. “She’ll love every second of watching you on stage.”

“She said she saw pictures from the tour,” he added, giddy. “My cousins showed her Maggie’s Instagram profile.”

“Did she see your pirate cosplay?”

Jungkook displayed a remarkable resilience to the pirate jokes after that first concert—you and Jimin suspected that the response from the audience played a big part in his newfound immunity—and he chuckled at it now.

“She did,” he said. “She said I reminded her of Kurt Russell in Escape from New York.”

You pulled back a little to get a better look at him, even though he no longer needed to wear the eye patch. Most of the discolouration around his eye had already faded and you’d managed to cover up the scratches with a few smaller, skin-coloured adhesive pads.

“Well, shit,” you said. “Maybe I do kind of see the resemblance. You’ve got the hair.”

“I don’t know who that is,” he admitted.

You widened your eyes. “Jungkook. You don’t know Snake Plissken?”

“No, but my grandma said all her friends had a crush on him after the film came out,” he said. “Except for my grandma, of course. She insists she only ever had eyes for my grandpa.”

You both chuckled at this with a childlike glee—the thought of a love that spanned decades felt exhilarating and very possible as the sky awakened above you.

“My mum liked Kurt Russell, too, after the film,” you said. “And she was nine at the time. She snuck into the theatre with her brother and his friends.”

Jungkook inclined his head thoughtfully. “Maybe that guy’s not so bad, then.”

“He’s a classic,” you corrected. “But your taste in films isn’t.”

“That’s actually exactly what my grandma said,” he remembered. “She told me not to come home until I watched it.”

You could hear his grandmother saying this exact thing to him and felt yourself smile again.

“I think you’d love it if you watched it,” you said. “So, it’s not much of a threat.”

“Really?” He looked at you, but only for a fraction of a moment. “Would you—I mean, it’d be cool if we could—”

You knew what he was asking. And your response—like most of everything else tonight—came as a reflex. “I’m sure we can rent it on Amazon.”

“Okay,” he said, his shoulders slumping against yours in visible relief. “That—I’d like that.”

Unwelcome, the raw breeze of the late hour caught up with you, and you felt your body shudder involuntarily once more. Determined to ignore the chill, you opened your mouth to continue the conversation, but Jungkook suddenly leaned forwards.

“Here,” he said, slipping out of his dark flannel. “Put this on. It’s not much, but—”

“No, no—” you tried, but he drew closer to drape the flannel over your shoulders. “You’ll catch a cold.”

“I’ll be fine,” he insisted, pulling back. To further reduce the significance of the gesture, he added, “it’s what friends do. And I’m warm anyway.”

You clutched the collar of the flannel tighter to prevent it from sliding off. Or just to have something to do with your hands. “Well—thanks, friend.”

A powerful waft of his cologne permeated your senses, and you closed your eyes, preserving the refreshing blend of woody and citrus notes that already took up a significant amount of space in your memory.

Every time you inhaled, his scent mixed with a different moment from your life—and it all flooded your mind in an unstoppable sequence.

Meeting Jungkook—

Kissing him for the first time on that rainy night in the park—

Hugging him hello every morning before class—

Borrowing his clothes when you stayed at his dorm—

Losing your mind when you found yourself alone and his scent returned to you, uninvited.

Jungkook appeared to be sharing your memories in real time as he inhaled sharply and tapped his fingers against his shaky thighs.

“Friends,” he said, swallowing, “probably don’t kiss each other.”

His words ignited a fire in the pit of your stomach without any matches.

You glanced at him from the corner of your eye. “Yeah, uh—t-they probably don’t.”

“Hmm. Right.”

“As your friend,” you said, sitting up straighter and letting his flannel settle around your shoulders while you lowered your hands to the wooden bench underneath you, “I’m pointing out that you’re on a high because your grandma called. That’s why you’re thinking about—”

“I’m on a high because I’m with you,” he stated. “My friend.”

The fire inside you spread rapidly, wildly, uncontrollably.

The way you were starting to lose feeling in your fingers from gripping the bench so tightly, yet you refused to let go of it, should have probably been studied scientifically.

“Well, then,” you said, “let’s look at it this way: have you ever kissed friends before? Sid maybe?”

Jungkook snorted. “God forbid.”

“Minjun, then?”

“No,” he said. “Do you think I should?”

You snickered. “No. But if we’re friends, too, then we probably shouldn’t do that, either.”

He looked at you, his lips puckered in thought. Unconsciously, you had started to scrape at the dark paint of the bench.

You hadn’t meant a word of what you’d said. He suspected as much.

“Probably not,” he agreed. “But we’re such a mess, though, right?”

The echo of your own words on the plane brought a smile to your face again—a reaction more rooted in easing the sudden surge of anticipation rather than genuine amusement.

“Yeah,” you said quietly. “We’re such a mess.”

Jungkook felt a little afraid, which was something that he always felt when the world around him blurred, and he found himself incapable of looking away from your lips.

It was dangerous, this tunnel vision. This singular focus. This impossible, magnetic pull that defied all reason, that made the whole universe tremble with a silent—

He leaned closer.

For a fleeting moment, the space between you was filled with nothing but your echoing heartbeats and silent memories.

For a fleeting moment, time itself held its breath.

You remembered Oslo and the way Jungkook had pulled away. You remembered how worried you were, how horrified—he was drunk, and he’d pulled away. He’d done the rational thing.

Funny thing, rationality.

You thought you were perfectly rational when you closed the remaining distance and your lips brushed against his—hesitant, uncertain, tender. A permission, a question, and his unequivocal death, all in one.

Jungkook inhaled—as if checking if he was alive or just pretending to be—and reached up to touch your cheek. He pulled you closer and stole the remnants of your breath with his kiss.

It was fair, he thought. You had stolen his entire soul.

The touch of your lips lasted for less than a minute—not nearly enough time for the trees around you to exhale in clandestine relief—but the softness of his mouth, the slow, intoxicating smacking of your lips against his, and the faint notes of mint on his tongue did irreparable damage to your pulse.

He stole that too, he supposed, because when he pulled away, his heart seemed to beat with enough strength to support the lives of half the population.

“Do friends discuss what it means if they kiss?” he asked, winded. His chest touched yours every time it rose in an attempt to recover.

Your laughter was breathless, too. “I’m thinking no.”

“I like what you’re thinking.”

Something very tranquil and very happy was inscribed into the contours of your features.

Soft red feathers spread across the sky above you as the city slowly stirred awake.

For the first time in a long time, everything felt like it was supposed to.

“I have a free day tomorrow,” you said. “Well, today.”

Jungkook was a bit puzzled by the shift in conversation but went along with it nonetheless. “Yeah?”

“Mhmm. The girls and I made plans, but I’m, uh—I’m going to call my mum before I go. I set an alarm for it and everything,” you said with a self-conscious chuckle. “I’m going to talk to her.”

“Oh.” He was shaking a little, he realised. He hoped you wouldn’t notice it and decide to give him his flannel back. “Well, that—that’s good. You should do that.”

You nodded, lowering your gaze to the grass and the pebbles below. “Yeah.”

“I’m going to kiss you again,” he decided. “For good luck.”

Your surprised smile overshadowed everything else he wanted to tell you.

“Oh,” you said. “Is that what friends do?”

“Yes,” he replied. “You didn’t know? It can’t be just one kiss, that’s bad luck.”

“Actually, I heard even numbers are bad luck.”

He gasped theatrically. “Oh, but that’s terrible! I’ll have to kiss you three times, then. To be safe.”

You smiled and shook your head. He died a little then, because everything was here, just like in his worst nightmares and his favourite daydreams: your scent, your eyes, your smile. All of you.

“You’re always such an idiot,” you said with so much affection that the wind crept away miserably, defeated by the warmth in Jungkook’s gaze when he looked at you. When he felt your hand on the side of his face—gentle and careful so as not to touch the healing bruises on his cheek.

“Hmm.” He wasn’t sure if he’d ever remember how to breathe again. “You said you love me, though.”

“I do,” you said, beaming, as you ran the tips of your fingers over the edges of his wolf cut. “It’s a burden I have to live with.”

He shivered from your touch and leaned in—impatient, all of a sudden. His lips met yours with a soft, rehearsed touch, and he thought he died all over again when you pulled him closer.

Your heart brought back the memories of sensations that you’ve tried to bury; it revived them and set them loose in your chest when you kissed him back and felt the smile on his lips.

Your heart threatened to quit it, to burst into flames and take you down with it when you felt his tongue slowly glide over your lower lip.

Your heart settled right against his when you parted your lips. When you felt his warm breath mingle with yours. When you held onto him with everything you were feeling, and he held onto you.

He kissed you in every way that a friend wasn’t supposed to, and groaned softly when he touched the back of your neck and felt the relentless roughness of goosebumps under his fingertips. Your body reflected everything he was feeling.

Every time your lips met—gentle and feverish—every time he pulled you closer—frantic and heated—every time you inhaled when he exhaled—sharp and eager—you were setting fire to something that once was and building something new in its place.

There seemed to be small fragments of a foreign nature inside of you both—fragments that had danced with each other long before your first kiss and would continue the lively, eternal swaying for years and years after your last.

Maybe it was dust from two neighbouring stars, drawn together by a force stronger than them, but forced to crash somewhere on earth and settle and quiver and wake up inside of you both.

Or maybe it was something less grand. Maybe it was just luck. Just coincidence.

“See,” you whispered, pulling back. “I told you we don’t know how to be friends.”

“I don’t know what you mean,” he replied, kissing the corner of your lips. The sparks inside him were fierce and relentless when you smiled in response. “I think friends can decide what sort of friends they want to be.”

“What sort of friends are we going to be, then?”

“This sort.”

You could see the northern lights and the tails of comets in his eyes before he leaned in to kiss you again. You could taste the longing for the Milky Way and the whispers of timeless meteors on his tongue.

And it all solidified this for you: the two of you were not luck and not coincidence.

You were something much more.

chapter title credits: bring me the horizon, “follow you”

prev ○ next

[kadwrites]

young love | T.S

previous part | next part

or check out the series masterlist

summary ; a person from your past makes an appearance.

warnings ; arranged marriage!trope , fem!reader , idk what the hell is happening , SLOW burn

a/n ; i promise that i have a plot but i keep getting side tracked????

-

"what the fuck are ya doing here?" you pull the front door shut

"hello to ya too."

you look at him again , brows raised "what brought ya here hmm?"

"ya didn't even invite me to your engagement party." he looks down at you, his voice teasing

"oh i'm sorry" you let out a small outraged laugh "i didn't know that inviting your ex boyfriend was an engagement tradition."

"aren't ya glad to see me?" he gives you a sly smile

"what brought ya here?" you grit your teeth , looking up at him

"i came here for ya."

"for me?"

"to save ya."

"from what?" your patience is thinning

"well i couldn't let ya get married to someone like 'im could i?" he chuckles "not after the love we had for eachother."

"jeremy." you pinch the bridge of your nose "that was years ago," you try to not raise your voice "do ya even know who i'm marrying?"

"oh i do."

"ya do?" you laugh "and ya thought trying to convince his fiancée to run away is a good idea?"

"you're making a mistake."

you just look up at him, laughing. "jeremy, ya slept with your sister in law, i don't think you're qualified to give me any kind of guidance."

"i'm a changed man" he leans down to whisper to you

"no you're not!" you let out an angry breath , trying to compose yourself "what do ya think tommy shelby would do if he found out you're here? hmm?" you hiss at him

"i love ya." he looks at you, his eyes bore into yours , inching closer

"oh my god" you put a hand over your face, turning,

"i do, i can't let ya go" he hand touches your arm

"oh my fucking god!" your voice becomes high pitched , your eyes opened wide "why are ya still talking? do ya want to get killed?" you whisper angrily, keeping your voice down

"i can't let ya do this" he begs , he pleads

"yes ya can, ya just walk away" your hands wave at the door

"did ya not hear what 'appened to his first wife?" his nostrils flare in frustration

your jaw slacks , you feel as if your eyes would bulge out of their sockets

"do ya know what would 'appen to ya if he heard ya say this?" your voice is low.

he closes his eyes, licking his lips before speaking "look..."

"no" you raise a hand , stopping him before he could get another word in "i don't particularly like ya, but i'm telling ya this as a favor for old times sake" you point at the door "leave , and never come back"

"i'm not leaving ya."

"this isn't a joke, jeremy" you can't help the angry chuckles that keep coming out of you "this is probably the stupidest decision you've ever made."

"do ya want to marry 'im?" his eyes scan your face, studying you

"this is none of your concern." infuriated wouldn't even begin to describe what you felt, "what i do with my life is none of your fucking concern"

"i know ya , this is not something ya would do."

"ya said it yourself, you're a changed man now" you try to explain, "we're different, ya and i are so different now, we are not the same kids we used to be. this isn't what it used to be."

he doesn't say anything else in return, he walks out, shutting the door loudly behind him

you have a hand over your forehead , pacing around the living room, renee is still in her place, watching.

"you brought him here didn't you?" your mother stood in the living room with her hand on her hips, looking you up and down

"mum ... please stop." you stop in your tracks , frustrated "how would i bring 'im here? with telekinesis? i didn't even know he still lives in birmingham for fuck's sake."

she comes closer , gabbing your shoulders "we need to forget this, never speak of it in front of tommy"

"what if he comes back again?" you start to panic "what if he does something worse than this?"

she closes her eyes at the possibility, she doesn't answer.

"this is just what i fucking needed" you turn, plopping down on the sofa

"jeremy is a sweet boy... he wouldn't do anything, would he?" your mum picks at her cuticles nervously ,

you look up with a raised brow "he fucked his brother's wife while we were dating, his brother who by the way raised 'im." you rub at your temple "his moral compass is as useless as that brain of his."

"god, now i know why i always hated him."

"and yet ya wanted us to get married at 17."

"well i didn't want him to knock you up."

"so ya tried to talk me into marrying 'im?" your mother's logic made your head spin faster than it already was "ya know what, forget i asked that" you wave a hand

"what are ya going to do now?" renee finally speaks,

you and your mother look at each other, before looking at renee

"i don't know.." you mumble "i 'ave to go see 'im today, to talk about the wedding venues" you groan, the stress of it all comes back to her

"okay" renee gets up, and sits next to you "ya just act normal, ya get this done, ya forget about it for today and then tomorrow ya try thinking about solutions."

you smile when you step into his office, your hands clasped in front of you, and he's on his chair, a cigarette dangling from his lips.

"why do ya look like that?"

"like what?"

"ya're too happy to see me."

you raise a brow "ya don't want me smiling at ya?"

"ya look possessed." he deadpanned, exhaling a cloud of smoke, his thumb scratching lightly at his lips, hiding his smile

you kiss your teeth, "i hope ya choke in your sleep." you walk up the chair and sit down

he chuckles, looking at you with his head tilted slightly "you'll miss me?"

"believe me , i won't."

"what's wrong?"

your brows pinch together "nothing is wrong"

"really?"

"yes."

"you're a very bad liar."

"i'm just ... tired" you shrugged, your voice squeaked

it's not that you're not used to lying, it's that you have a hard time lying to him

"how's your mum?"

a genuine amused smile pains over your lips, "she's good"

"who told ya?" he nods at you

"who told me what?"

"that i talked with your mother" he continues "was it your two nosy friends?"

"hey hey hey" you put a hand up "don't insult my friends"

"they are nosy, it's the truth"

-

taglist ; @tardisloverz , @optimisticsandwichgladiator , @theshelbyslimited , @illuminwtesz, @goldensunflowe-r , @gruffle1 , @warrior-of-justice , @mgdixon , @babayaga67 , @goblinjnr, @justaproudslytherpuff , @budugu , @twlegit , @amberpanda99 , @aesthetic0cherryblossom , @capswife , @lets-turn-and-burn , @affabletimelady , @edencherries , @globetrotter28 , @eg-dr3amer3 , @sadroses98 , @fairytale07 , @hakudaru , @swordofawriter , @esposadomd , @blogforficslol ، @bearchermer , @n1c0t1n4, @dreamy-caramel , @dragonsondragons , @charli123456789 ، @bunny24sstuff ، @butterfly-lover , @my-tin-can-mans , @powellssaturn , @vlryexsworld , @h0neylemon

[delulujuls]

build bridges, not walls | house of the dragon

hi, after few requests here comes the second part for so cold. i dedicate this to those who, like me, wish the targaryens some peace, happiness and love but did not get it from mr martin and hbo. enjoy!

summary: what if the greatest war in the history of westeros was a dance of dragons observed only as they played in the sky, rather than the greatest slaughter to befall the targaryen family?

warnings: incest, not very intensively described sex scene, mourning for a child, memories of a murder

pairing: sister!targaryen reader x aegon targaryen (ft. rhaenyra the kind and daemon the best-uncle-ever)

taglist: @tabalugax @hummusxx @dacreshoney

In the middle of the children’s chamber sat a figure, kneeling by a small table. The person was turning carefully cast bronze figurines in their hands, examining them with unprecedented attention. The figure put down a small horse and reached for a dragon figurine, lifting and slowly turning it in their fingers. After a moment, the silence was broken by a sob, and the dragon disappeared into the folds of a dress, pressed tightly to the chest.

The young queen was struggling with grief over her son. Even if she managed to keep her emotions in check throughout the day, she spent her evenings crying. She could not come to terms with the loss, and the pain was tearing her heart apart.

Her husband was also engulfed in despair, but his grief was unlike that of his wife. The girl was consumed by sadness, sorrow, and despair, without any anger. Aegon, however, was driven by unimaginable rage. The anger burned him from the inside, and the young king tried to drown it in alcohol. As one might guess, it was in vain.

It had only been a few days since prince Jaehaerys was brutally murdered. The funeral took place three days after that terrible night when the guards were notified of the crime. For a week, the young couple had not spoken a word to each other, letting grief consume them individually. Yet no one understood them as they did each other.

Last night, when the princess found Aegon crying, a breakthrough occurred. The boy pulled her to himself and hugged her tightly, letting all his accumulated sorrow out. For the first time in what seemed like ages, they showed each other a bit of warmth, forced by the death of their son.

Aegon was on his way to a small council meeting. His fists were clenched, and his gaze was fixed blankly ahead. The path he always took led past the children’s playroom. He used to joyfully peek through the doors and greet the children, finding a moment to talk to them and see how they were. Now, however, he would gladly have the doors to the chamber sealed up or better yet, burn the entire wing of the castle down.

He quickened his pace, wanting to pass the room as quickly as possible. The doors were open, and unsettling sounds were coming from inside. Aegon stopped, his breath nervously catching in his throat. He hesitated for a moment but ultimately decided to push the heavy doors and enter. He found his sister sitting at a small table with toys. The queen was alone, with no guards at the entrance. She did not want anyone to witness her breakdown. The boy heard her crying.

Aegon did not think long. He cared little about the council meeting, where they would likely fare better without him. Without a word, he stepped inside and quietly closed the door behind him. He approached the girl uncertainly, just as she had approached him the night before when he cried alone. Aegon did not know if he was welcome or if his wife preferred to be alone. He decided to take the risk and, after a moment’s hesitation, sat behind her, wrapping his arms around her waist and holding her close.

He pressed his lips to her shoulder, watching the dragon she held in her trembling hands.

They sat in silence and stillness for a while, the only sound being the uneven breath of the queen trying to stifle her sobs. Aegon reached for a swan figurine, smiling slightly.

“He always gave you this one to play with,” he said quietly, looking at the figurine. His other arm still held his wife. “Of all the animals, he thought you resembled a swan the most.”

The girl smiled sadly as her eyes caught sight of a donkey figurine. “Do you remember when he gave you the donkey?”

Aegon chuckled softly, putting down the swan and picking up the donkey figurine. “I wanted to be a dragon, and he gave me a lesson in humility.”

The girl wiped her wet cheeks, looking around the empty room. She sighed heavily, trying to push away another wave of despair that washed over her.

“I miss him so much,” she whispered with difficulty, sinking back into tears.

“Come here,” he said, holding her tightly when she turned towards him and snuggled into him. Aegon rested his chin on her head, holding her firmly in his arms. He was also struggling with unimaginable pain, but he was not struggling alone. There was someone else, his sister, his wife, and the mother of his children, who suffered just as much, if not more. One night, Aegon heard her cursing the Seven, condemning the world, and blaming herself for not saving their son. He heard her crying, saying that she should have been the one to die.

“This has to end, Aegon,” she whispered after a moment, pressing her head to his chest. “This has all gone too far.”

“It will end soon, I promise,” he assured her, kissing her hair. “I’ll burn down the Dragonstone and wipe out that nest of vipers.”

“No, no,” the girl quickly shook her head, looking up at his face. “Enough death, there’s been far too much already.”

Aegon smiled, cupping her cheek and wiping away her tears with his thumb.

“No, there hasn’t. There will be more if I don’t destroy Rhaenyra and her band of bastards.”

“We are family,” she tightened her grip on his wrist but did not push his hand away. “There is nothing worse than war among family members, especially when dragons fight each other.”

The king’s smile faded, and his eyes nervously scanned his wife’s face. He wanted to pull his hand away, but she wouldn’t let him.

“Please, Aegon,” she touched his cheek. “Don’t go down that path, I beg you.”

“That bitch murdered my son, and what, I should just accept it?” he asked angrily, pushing her hand away.

“Not only your son but mine too,” she replied, tears still streaming down her cheeks. “But I don’t want to process my grief with revenge.”

The boy was about to respond when the frown between his brows began to soften. His gaze cooled and gentled entirely when he looked at his wife’s face again. He saw in front of him his complete opposite, despite being like two drops of water. The same hair color, the same eyes, the identical skin tone, the same blood running through their veins. But Aegon’s blood pumped a heart filled with sorrow and hatred, while the young queen’s heart was torn and filled with sadness. Despite the pain that connected them, they were experiencing grief entirely differently.

The girl touched his cheek after a moment. “Let’s not solve this with war.”

Aegon sighed and closed his eyes, feeling her thumb slowly slide across his skin.

“What do you propose then?” he asked, his eyes still closed.

“A reconciliation of the warring sides,” she said. She noticed his eyelid twitch nervously, but he remained composed and silent. “Rhaenyra will recognize your rule and bend the knee, Aemond will express remorse for the death of Lucerys, and Daemon for that mistake—”

When the girl realized she had said too much, it was already too late. The air in the room thickened instantly, and a pair of violet eyes pierced her like a dagger.

“Daemon?” he asked, barely spitting out the name of his uncle. “And what, fucking, mistake?”

The young queen wanted to get up from the floor, to be as far away from the ticking bomb ready to explode, but Aegon grabbed her by the hips and pushed her down. He sat on her and immobilized her wrists.

The girl tried to push him off her, but he tightened his grip and shook her violently.

“Speak!”

“It was supposed to be Aemond!” she cried, turning her head away from his furious face. “A son for a son!”

“For fucks sake!” Aegon roared, standing up and kicking the table. The toys scattered on the ground. “How did they mistake a five-year-old for a grown man without an eye?!”

The girl sat up, curling her legs and quickly moving as far away as possible, but her back soon met the hard wood of the wardrobe. She knew Aegon was furious and it was freezing her blood.

“How do you know this?” he asked, turning towards her. She looked up at him from below, terrified and unable to utter a word.

The boy took a deep breath, closing his eyes and tilting his head back.

“I asked,” he began slowly, forcing himself to stay calm. “How do you know this?”

“I flew to Dragonstone,” she said, hugging herself with her arms. “I had to do it, I had to talk to her—”

“They could have killed you!” he shouted, losing all the composure he had tried to maintain. “They could have dealt me the hardest blow, the last one they had left!”

Aegon began to pace nervously around the room. He didn’t even notice when he started to cry himself.

The young queen covered her mouth with her hands, trying to stifle her sobs. Aegon’s fury frightened her more than the specter of war.

The boy knew he had overstepped. She was not to blame, and there was no reason to raise his voice or, worse, his hand at her. He looked at his sister, who sat huddled like a frightened animal. Aegon sighed and approached her. He knelt, taking her face in his hands.

“They could have taken you from me, you understand?” he whispered, tears rolling down his cheeks. “They could have taken the last meaning of life I had left.”

"Rhaenyra doesn't want war," she replied equally softly, her voice trembling. "And no one wanted to hurt me."

Aegon silently looked at her face, his gaze moving across her features. Her swollen, tear-filled eyes, wet, flushed cheeks, and chapped lips. She had beautiful lips, he thought. She was beautiful all over.

The young king ran his thumb over her lower lip, and the last tear he had under his eyelids trickled down his cheek.

"I love you," he said, shifting his gaze back to her eyes. "I love you unimaginably."

The girl was about to say something, but he leaned in and kissed her deeply. He pressed her firmly against him, making the wood of the wardrobe she was leaning against creak.

The young queen returned the kiss, hesitantly placing her hands on his shoulders. Her brother's mood swings had terrified her even before they were married. As if sensing her uncertainty, Aegon took her hands and kissed each of them.

"I'm sorry, my love," he whispered, pressing her hands to his cheeks. "I'm sorry."

In response, she lifted his face and kissed him again. Aegon straightened her legs, wrapping them around his waist. The young queen understood him without words, wrapping her legs around his hips. Without breaking their kisses, Aegon grabbed her firmly and pulled her close, making her the one pressing him to the ground, sitting on him.

"Make love with me," he whispered, pulling away from her lips. "Please."

The girl kissed him again, wrapping her arms around his neck, silently agreeing to his request. She wrapped her arms around his neck, and he embraced her waist, kissing her tenderly. Their tongues did not battle but performed a dance of love. Their hungry lips could not tear themselves away from each other for even a moment.

Aegon lifted the folds of her dress, sliding his hands under it. He squeezed her bare thighs, making her sigh into his mouth. They both needed a bit of warmth.

"Not here," she whispered into his mouth after a moment. "I don't want—"

"I understand," he replied, easily reading her thoughts. This room was more sacred than the Great Sept of Baelor.

Soon, they found themselves in their shared chamber, which they had only used twice before. They had only been together in their marital bed during the bedding ceremony; every other night, they spent alone. But this night was not one of those.

Naked bodies were entwined, and soft moans and prolonged sighs filled the walls, warming them more than the fire dancing in the fireplace.

"You are so beautiful," Aegon whispered as her lips parted at the sudden, intense feeling. "So beautiful."

He pulled out of her as slowly as he had entered her a moment earlier. Their sweaty foreheads rested against each other, and their hands, thirsty for contact, grasped every piece of skin.

"Please," she moaned softly, gripping his hips with her fingers. She tried to pull him closer to her. Aegon braced his elbows on either side of her head and entwined his fingers in her hair, lying on her with his full weight. The girl let out a soft moan; it was a sweet weight. She wrapped her legs around his hips, and he kissed her deeply. Without breaking the dance of their tongues, he slowly began to move within her hot, tight interior. Soft moans and sighs escaped the young queen's lips, which Aegon drank as if they were sweet nectar.

"I love you," she whispered when he pulled away to admire her blissful face. "I love you, my dearest."

Aegon's cheeks were flushed, his light hair disheveled. His eyes gleamed, not with tears this time, but with desire. He held his sister in his arms, the closest person to him, blood of his blood. His wife, the mother of his children. The young queen who was willing to risk her life to protect the realm from disaster. For the first time, Aegon sincerely and deeply understood that he loved her. And it was an unimaginable love.

"I would die for you," he touched her cheek. "What is the killing of a million, two million, the whole world? I would give my life for you."

The girl breathed shallowly, her heart pounding wildly. Aegon had never confessed his love to her, certainly never in this way. She saw the fire of emotions in his eyes, saw the love with which he looked at her. For the first time, she felt she did not have a stranger beside her but someone who was closest to her.

She gently touched his cheek and ran her thumb over it, and Aegon joined their lips again after a moment. That night, one of the chambers in the Red Keep was filled with unimaginable love, and the castle walls had never heard so many tender words before.

Jaehaerys' death was an unimaginable tragedy, but the boy did not die in vain. His death united two people in love. Not the forced marriage or even the birth of two children did that, no. To feel love, the young couple first had to experience unimaginable grief.

Aegon, in the eyes of the family, lords, and servants, was considered irresponsible and impulsive. He was often insolent and cruel, and in anger, terrifying and unpredictable. His sister, now his wife and the young queen, was no exception. As a child, she did not like her eldest brother, who often teased her and pulled her hair. In later years, she avoided him like the plague because it seemed best for her. By avoiding him, she did not have to endure his difficult character. When the old king died and Aegon ascended the throne, his temper cooled somewhat. He still sought amusement in wine and pleasures, but sometimes he remembered he was a king and had duties to fulfill. Often, when in a good mood, he enthusiastically participated in meetings with commoners, listening to their complaints, requests, and grievances.

During one audience, his wife accompanied him, sitting on a soft seat right by his knees. When one of the peasants asked for the return of his sheep, which had been sent as food for the dragons, Aegon was genuinely concerned. He wanted to help the commoner and even offered to return the sheep. The young queen could not believe her ears; she had to discreetly turn around to see if the same boy she had known since childhood was sitting next to her. Aegon's concerned gaze rested on his sister's face before returning to the worried peasant. Aegon was concerned and wanted to solve this problem, much to the probable surprise of everyone, in favor of the farmer. The young, cruel king felt responsible for his people for the first time and wanted to help as best as he could.

However, his anger remained terrible and showed its destructive power. When he learned of his son's death, he demolished their father's chamber, destroying everything in his path. The hands that had clutched a sword so tightly then gently held a soft body now. The lips that had shouted and uttered death threats now whispered tenderly, bestowing sweet kisses. The gaze, so often indifferent and cold, now looked with love. At that moment, he was not Aegon the Ruthless.

"Aegon the Tender," the girl said softly as they lay cuddled together. "Aegon of House Targaryen, second of his name, King of the Andals, the Rhoynar, and the First Men, Lord of the Seven Kingdoms and Protector of the Realm. But simply, Aegon the Tender."

The boy smiled at her words. His sister lay snuggled against him, resting her cheek on his chest, gently sliding her fingers over it.

"Aegon the Tender?" he asked, glancing at her. "That's the nickname you'd give me?"

The young queen nodded without moving away from him. It was pleasant to feel his fingers tracing patterns on her bare back.

"King of Soft Kisses, Sweet Words, and Lord of Pleasure," she added, smiling as his chest trembled. The boy laughed at her words.

"I'll gladly present this idea to the council."

They lay cuddled in silence, their steady breaths finding a common rhythm. After a while, though, the girl propped herself up on her elbow and looked at his face.

"I believe, I deeply believe, that you are not cruel," she began, looking into his violet eyes. "I sincerely hope that you do not want war either."

Aegon lowered his gaze. The girl continued, touching his cheek.

"Please, make peace with Rhaenyra. Please."

The young king sighed but returned his gaze to his sister's still-blushed face.

"So, what do you think I should do?"

"Just allow it," she ran her thumb over his cheek. "I will make sure Rhaenyra accepts you as king. Aemond will express remorse for Lucerys' death, and Daemon—"

"Let it be so," he did not let her finish, but he looked up at her, wanting to reassure her with his words. "But I don't want them in the palace. After everything, let them stay on Dragonstone."

The young queen smiled, leaning in to kiss him on the forehead.

"Every day, you are becoming a better ruler, my sweet king,"

Aegon pulled her close again, enclosing her in a strong embrace.

"Let's keep this between us, alright?" she requested, pressing her cheek against his chest once more. "I'll handle this myself, without the help of Mother and the Hand. They've done enough."

The next evening, the young queen was preparing once again to visit Dragonstone. Clad in a cloak and cape, she was about to leave her chamber when one of the maids appeared in the doorway, holding a tearful Jaehaera in her arms.

"Your Grace," the maid began worriedly before the queen could ask what had happened. She rocked the girl on her hip, whose cheeks were streaked with tears. "The princess doesn’t want to sleep. She’s been calling for you the entire time."

The girl took her daughter, who immediately clung tightly to her.

"There, there, darling," she whispered, kissing her hair. She began to gently rock the girl in her arms.

"Are you going somewhere, my lady?" the maid asked uncertainly, seeing that the queen was dressed to go out. "It’s terribly late."

"You know I sleep poorly," she replied, pressing her cheek to her daughter’s head. "Without a walk before bed, I can't shut my eyes."

"Your insomnia likely affects the princess as well, Your Grace," the maid smiled sadly.

The girl kissed her daughter again.

"You may leave," she glanced at the woman. "Jaehaera will sleep with me tonight."

The maid quickly bowed and obediently left the chamber, quietly closing the door behind her. The young queen rocked her daughter in her arms. However, it was clear the girl wouldn't fall asleep.

"How about we take a flight on the dragon before bed?" she asked. The girl wiped her tears with her small hand and nodded. The mother kissed her on the forehead, got her ready for the journey, and then, under the cover of night, they left the castle together. Jaehaera stopped crying as soon as she snuggled into her mother. The calm emanating from her mother soothed the girl, and she wasn’t frightened by the darkness of the Dragonpit. The dragons sensed the child's presence and remained peaceful. They didn't make their usual noise but lay quietly, watching as the woman with the child approached Vermithor, who awoke as soon as they left the castle.

"Big," Jaehaera smiled, pointing at the bronze giant whose snout lay flat on the ground. The dragon gently observed the mother and daughter, clearly pleased by their presence.

"Yes, Vermithor is very big," the girl smiled. "Would you like to ride such a big dragon?"

The girl nodded happily, stretching her small hand forward. The young queen approached the dragon, allowing her daughter to stroke its scales. The last thing on little Jaehaera’s mind was sleep.

They sat on the dragon's back, and the mother positioned her daughter in front of her, wrapping her in her cloak. She kissed her hooded head and commanded Vermithor to head to Dragonstone. She didn’t need to say more; the dragon knew exactly where to go.

Only when Vermithor took to the air, and the girl heard her daughter’s excited squeal, did she realize it was the first time Jaehaera had ridden a dragon. It was their first time doing something together without a crowd of servants and a dozen guards. It was just the two of them. Mother and daughter. The young queen smiled at the sudden warmth in her heart. She hugged the girl tighter.

They reached Dragonstone without any issues. Jaehaera sat quietly the entire way, occasionally muttering words of approval towards Vermithor.

When they stood before the castle gates, the woman removed the hood from her own head and her daughter’s. The guards were genuinely surprised to see the unexpected guests.

"Your Grace, princess," they greeted, straightening up. They didn’t have time to ask what brought them to the castle at such an hour, as the gate opened and Jacaerys appeared outside. Despite the darkness, the young prince must have noticed the dragon. He smiled at the sight of his aunt and cousin.

"Your Grace-," he couldn’t finish, as the girl approached and hugged him tightly. She hadn’t seen her nephew in a long time.

"Jace," Jaehaera said, pointing at her cousin. The boy smiled emotionally, kissing her on the forehead.

"It's so good to see you," he said, gesturing for them to come inside. "Come, princess has been expecting you."

Indeed, Rhaenyra awaited her sister in the main hall. It was clear she had been woken from sleep; this time, however, she had managed to put on a robe. She was surprised to see her niece. Smiling, her eyes filled with tears as she quickly approached and hugged her sister, kissing the girl she held in her arms on the forehead.

"You have no idea how much joy you've brought me," she said, caressing the little girl’s cheek.

"And I’ll bring you even more joy," she added, smiling. Rhaenyra looked into her eyes. She saw that her sister wasn’t carrying bad news.

Jaehaera played with Jacaerys by the fireplace as the two women sat at the table.

Rhaenyra didn’t have a chance to speak as her sister immediately started.

"Aegon doesn't want war," she said, feeling as if she were lifting a great burden off her shoulders with those words. "He has no intention of starting a bloodshed."

Rhaenyra smiled, tears welling up in her eyes. She felt as if a great weight had been lifted from her shoulders as well.

"What are his demands?"

"He wants you to acknowledge him as king," she replied, looking at her sister’s face. "And he expects Daemon to apologize."

The princess took a deep breath, leaning back and resting against the chair. To be honest, she had heard exactly what she expected.

"What about Aemond?"

"He will express his regret for Lucerys’ death," she assured.

"And Dragonstone?" she looked at her sister.

"He has no intention of expelling you. He would be genuinely happy if you stayed here."

Rhaenyra remained silent for a moment but eventually nodded. She knew there was no other way. One of the dragons had to yield, and fortunately, it didn’t come to a clash between two males.

"Let it be so," she smiled. "Let peace finally reign."

The young queen returned her smile and hugged her tightly.

Moments later, Daemon entered the chamber, and the atmosphere seemed to instantly thicken. Jaehaera, sitting by the fireplace, pointed at her uncle and smiled innocently. She had no idea it was because of him that her brother had died.

"And who do we have here," Daemon smiled, approaching her. Jacaerys nervously glanced at his mother and aunt, but they didn’t move an inch. The young queen felt a tight knot form in her throat.

Daemon picked up the girl and kissed her cheek.

"Did you fly on a dragon for the first time today?" he asked, to which she nodded. "Really? You weren’t scared?"

Jaehaera shook her head, gesturing with her hand to show how big the dragon she had ridden with her mother was.

"The courage of the Targaryen women never ceases to amaze me," he said, this time directing his words to the women sitting nearby. The young queen exhaled, trying to relax. If peace was to prevail, they would all have to learn to trust each other again. Everyone, without exception.

"Aegon expects an apology," Rhaenyra announced, looking at her husband. He didn’t look at her, being occupied with showing the girl the dragon brooch on his robe.

"I am aware of that," he replied. "I will apologize if Aemond does the same."

"He will also apologize," the young queen interjected, looking at her uncle. "I will ensure it."

"Then we will all be a family again," Daemon smiled at Jaehaera, each word accompanied by his fingers tickling the girl’s belly, making her laugh.

The women looked at each other, and Rhaenyra simply nodded, squeezing her sister's hand reassuringly. Storm clouds began to disperse over the dragon's house.

[look-at-the-soul]

Every little thing you do- Part 8

Tommy Shelby x reader

Master list

A/N: another part, another thank you for reading and following this series! I had the initial idea for this chapter for Tommy and Y/N to witness something that brings them closer, then I realized it got longer than I expected 🫢 so I’ll have to hold the introduction of another character for the upcoming part 🤭 bare with me in this ride! And enjoy the slow burn 🥰

Word count: 3,595

Gypsy poem mentioned

“Mr. Benston, what do I owe the pleasure of your call?” Tommy held the receiver against his ear.

“Mr. Shelby I hope you’re doing well.”

Tommy rolled his eyes at the fake sentiment, he wanted to end the call as soon as possible.

“There’s really no other way to tell you this, but here it goes…” Tommy heard him sigh at the other end. “Rumors are spread easily and unfortunately, people believe it wherever it’s true or not.”

“I’m not following you.” Tommy stated, getting annoyed by the minute, he wanted everything done right and fast. “Where do you want to go with this Mr. Benston?”

“Mrs. Benston overheard our maids talking about the woman in charge of the charity, I know she’s close to your family and I’m not judging you, to be honest. But if I’m donating money I don’t want it to be involved in gossip and rumors.”

Leaning on his desk, Tommy looked at the ceiling and felt his jaw clenching. “What rumors are you talking about?”

“The maid assured my wife, this woman in charge…”

“YL/N. It’s Miss YL/N.” Tommy corrected him.

“Miss YL/N doesn’t know who the father of her child is. At some point she even mentioned the child is yours therefore why you put her in charge of the charity.”

The last thing Tommy wanted for Y/N was this exactly, having her rolling from mouth to mouth, people taking about her, walking over her reputation. The realization hit him hard and he pinched the bridge of his nose in a attempt to remain under control.

“There are morals and values we still swear by Mr. Shelby… and you can have as many children outside marriage as you please, but the charity needs a woman who’s at certain level, a match for our society.”

“Mr. Benston so your main concern is Y/N’s reputation because she’s not married.” He swore under his breath. “Or because you’re unsure if I’m that baby’s father.”

“That’s correct.”

“With all due respect, it’s a personal matter so that’s none of your business in the first place.” Tommy took a deep breath. “Secondly, how would it make you look in front of your beloved society if people knew about the affair you had with your maid, which led her to get pregnant with your child and since your wife wasn’t able to carry one, you stole that baby from the mother and locked her in a mental hospital?”

A heavy silence set between them.

Tommy knew a lot of dirty secrets and a bunch of respectable people who were everything but respectable.

“Hmm?” He added more pressure to the wound. “Mrs. Benston has been doing a wonderful joy raising a boy that isn’t hers by blood, a Benston heir right?”

Again, silence at the other side.

“Maids are a wonderful thing huh? They know a lot of dirty little secrets…”

Y/N strolled through the Shelby Company Ltd. under the curious eyes and glances of the secretaries, she definitely noticed the way they stared at her from head to toe, stopping an uncomfortable amount of time in her belly.

What were they looking at?

Why would they turn around and start mouthing to the closest secretary something she couldn’t understand?

Fixing her eyes on the floor, she decided to keep walking, this would happen sooner or later, she just needed to create an armor around her, a strong shell to protect her and her baby from judging glances and people with bad blood.

Knocking softly on Tommy’s door, she opened it and poking her head she found him inviting her in, but she got the hint to remain quiet while he was on the phone, so she took seat in one of the couches, her legs were on fire, she wanted to take a long bath.

“So I think from now on, you’ll double your generous donation Mr. Benston correct? Did I hear you right?”

Throwing a quick glance in Y/N’s direction, he winked at her. The phone call turned around quickly and ended with Mr. Benston being backfired,

“Yes, the Shelby Institute feels so thankful for your selflessness. Bye.” Hanging up, Tommy turned around to place the phone in its place.

Y/N raised her eyebrows. “What was that?”

Tommy cleared his throat and went on to pour himself a glass of whiskey. “Just a really wealthy man willing to donate the institution a generous amount each month.” He explained with a wicked smile.

Tommy felt bad for lying to her, but he couldn’t bare to hurt her. He just hoped the word wouldn’t spread like gunpowder around.

“Oh… well I just came to show you the numbers Michael did, considering what we already raised,” she sighed loudly.

“What is it?” Tommy eyed her from the corner of his eye.

“I don’t know what’s going on outside but all your secretaries were giving me strange glances, as if they’ve never seen a pregnant woman before.” She chuckled.

Tommy’s head snapped in Y/N’s direction, her words caught his attention, he was always a step ahead of everyone and everything, how could he didn’t see this coming?

Something made click in his mind instantly. Someone must’ve spread the word around, therefore the sudden call he got and what Y/N just mentioned. Feeling a sudden urge to protect Y/N, Tommy decided to do something to distract her, he didn’t want her to suffer and pay for something that wasn’t her fault.

“Come with me.”

And Y/N did, she followed him because she knew there was no way to say no to him. She waved at Esme goodbye on their way out, a few days ago she announced her pregnancy with barely a bump, and now Esme was showing almost as her.

“May I ask how is the business doing?” Y/N asked in a low tone, wondering if she was interrupting his thoughts. Shuddering in the process, that business was almost a secret, the Shelby brothers were communicating through glances when anyone else was around.

“No.” Tommy answered in a serious tone but then wrinkles appeared around the corner of his eyes when he smiled. “Don’t be noisy.”

“I’m not noisy.” Y/N pouted.

“Yeah sure.” He was back into his usual self teasing and joking with her. “Do you know Russian?” Y/N shook her head. “Then you can’t help.”

“Ah come on, you don’t speak Russian either.”

Squinting his eyes, Tommy started speaking.

“save ami se

hi slobuzenja

ami jaul

o lungo drom”

It took Y/N several seconds to catch his words, but her mind suddenly remembered.

“You’re a bad liar.” She immediately went back in time, an ancient Romani poem he showed her years ago, but he was making a Russian accent. “in the forests

we respect

animals flowers trees

when we build our fire

we always clean up after us.” She continued the translated version.

Tommy gave her then a surprised look. “You still remember it?”

“Proud gypsy.” Y/N nodded.

How could she ever forget? How couldn’t she go back in time to that day when she went to play outside and meet a boy that was pretending to ride a caravan -a made shift with a sheet and pulled by a horse. He was shy and reserved at first, but she was fascinated by the endless stories he told her about his gypsy roots and tales on the road.

She spent hours listening to him speaking roca -with the proper translation of course-, and eventually he found the poem in his mother’s notebook.

“Even then, you were always worried about everyone.” She noted.

He had always been protective over those who he loved.

“Bad habits die hard.” Tommy chuckled, his childhood wasn’t always easy, but she definitely made it better.

Y/N wondered how different he would be if things happened differently, if his mother was still alive, if they didn’t have to go to the war… if she didn’t thought Scott was a good distraction. But she was forced to put her thoughts aside, as she felt urgency to pee. “Can you stop the car?”

“Why? What happened?”

“Just stop it… I need to take a wee.” She explained embarrassed.

Tommy looked around, they were in the middle of nowhere. “Let me get closer to those trees.”

She bit her lower lip, pray he’d hurry up. “Are you sure an animal won’t bite me here?”

“If something bites you it doesn’t matter, just spit in the wound.”

“That’s gross!” She defended.

Tommy gave her an amused look. “You don’t know right? Pregnant women salive is full of properties that cuts off the venom of snakes.”

The surprised look Y/N gave him assured Tommy that she didn’t know.

“How do you know that?”

“A snake bit me back in the day, my Mum was pregnant with Ada she used her spit and covered the wound with a clean cloth and here I am, strong as a horse.”

“Do you always have to refer to an animal? What’s wrong with you?”

His chuckle resonated into the deepest parts of her soul as she climbed out of the car to find a safe place to take a wee -as safest as the trees could be of course-.

Tommy took a cigarette, he was aching for a smoke. The road was practically deserted, but still he was always looking around, keeping an eye just in case. Anything could happen in a blink and he needed to be alert.

“Are you done?!” He shouted over his shoulder, just to piss her off.

“Would ya give me a fucking minute?!” Y/N shouted back mortified.

This wasn’t practical at all, she felt like an animal in the wild, but this was all she got for now and she needed to stick to it. Besides it wasn’t like she could hold it for so long.

Cleaning herself she tried to rush back to the car, huffing from the effort. “Sorry about that, can’t control it.” She apologized getting in the car again.

Tommy held the passenger door open for her while blowing the smoke in the opposite direction.

“It’s alright, needed to stretch a bit anyways.” He grinned. Who would’ve told him he’d stoping his car in the middle of nowhere for a pregnant woman to pee. “So… did Polly tell you already?” Tommy asked giving her a side glance.

Y/N couldn’t help to smile big. “I asked her to not tell me. Did she tell you?”

Tommy started rubbing his chin, a soft smile decorating his lips as he kept his eyes on the road again.

“Don’t tell me, I just want this baby to be healthy.”

“I really don’t understand how she knows, but she got Ada’s right and I remember she did the same with my Mother when she was pregnant with Finn.”

“She could use her talent and charge for it.” Y/N joked about Polly’s gift to predict the baby’s sex.

“See, that’s a brilliant mind, always sell your abilities.” Tommy encouraged. “Alright, this is it.”

Y/N noticed Tommy took a right and entered a different road. The property was as big as his own house. She could only think how tired she’d be to have to go from one room to another, poor maids who had to clean everything.

The gardener tipped his head towards Tommy knowledging him, while he moved as if he owned the place. Y/N following his steps, feeling like she really didn’t belong there.

“Need to have some rest? It’s a long way.” Tommy looked over his shoulder to make sure she was doing okay.

“No, I’m fine.” Her eyes stopped at the pond, it had fishes.

“Gold fish keeps the worms away from the horses.” Tommy explained, reading her mind.

Y/N gave him a doubtful look. “Are you messing with me?”

But Tommy shook his head. “Never, I swear it’s true. It helps to keep the water clean.” He crouched down, inviting her to do the same. “Go on, you can touch them.”

To show her it was alright, Tommy tipped his hand inside, making a circle with his finger.

When she was about to dip her finger too, Tommy spoke again.

“Careful, they can bite your hand off.”

Y/N gasped in shock at first, then when she realized he was only joking, she laughed. It was a strange sensation, the skin felt flaky against her touch made her giggle.

“I hope the horses won’t eat the fishies.” She added and then saw Tommy rolling his eyes. “Oh what? You’re the only one allowed to make jokes?”

Y/N shook her hand towards him, making a few drops land on his suit and vest.

Tommy clicked his tongue and pretended as if he would throw water at her. Y/N squealed giving her back at him, feeling like they were teenagers again playing by the river.

“Follow me, I want you to meet Apollo.”

“Your horse has a name?” Y/N asked perplexed.

“Of course, they all do.” He pointed at the floor for her to be careful with the hay. “This good boy is going to win the next Derby.”

Y/N saw Tommy stood in front of the box and gently caressed the animal, taking his time to ask how he was doing, check behind his ears and take a look at the mare’s body. He had always been a horse’s man, the amount of time he spent brushing that white horse his mother gave him, no one knew where it came from, but Tommy assured her it was a fine horse, he had magic in his eyes and now she was witnessing the way the horse followed Tommy’s steps like he was kind of under a spell.

Y/N noticed the way Tommy’s energy changed, it was indescribable but he turned into someone completely different. They were in a bubble, in their own little world, like they were one soul divided in two bodies.

And it almost made Y/N feel jealous of the closeness and complicity between Tommy and his horse, she could hear him whispering sweet little nothings and the way the horse made little sounds in response.

Then the horse stared at her and started moving slowly, tipping his head down. At first Y/N was shocked to feel the moose against her stomach, but Tommy told her it was alright, his horse wouldn’t hurt her.

“It’s like he knows I’m pregnant?”

“Oh he does,” Tommy nodded, “I just told him.”

“Is this another of your jokes?” She laughed nervously as the horse breathed against her baby bump.

“I never joke about horses, Y/N. He knows there’s a life growing inside you, they understand more than we do.”

There was something in his blue eyes that she couldn’t name, something that was making her hold his gaze. Something so profound she never experienced before. It was both terrifying and calming at the same time.

And then, as if the moment wasn’t intense enough, she felt her baby wriggling inside her for the first time.

“What is it?” Tommy asked with concern in his voice.

“The baby… is moving.” She explained.

Grabbing his hand in a blunt movement, she placed it on top of her blouse, giving him a few seconds to feel the movement against her side.

“Oh wow.” Tommy finally managed to feel a small but determined movement against his palm.

“Over here.” She changed his hand in another direction. Her hand covering his, she could feel Tommy holding his breath as his eyes shot up to find hers, surprise written all over them, this was something he had never felt before.

“Is this something good?” He asked in a whisper.

“I think the baby started moving when the horse was close, like the baby feels the horse around.”

Was this what a new life felt like? The miracle of a tiny human growing inside her?

Tommy could feel his heart about to explode, to be able to experiment something so personal, so profound, something that wasn’t meant to be his.

He, the ruthless leader of a gang, the heartless Small Heath Devil, there he was with tears blurring his vision and emotions making him feel things he had never felt before.

This baby wasn’t born yet and it was already his weakness.

The only time she had seen Tommy cry was when his mother passed away. He rarely allowed his emotions to the surface and Y/N knew too well this meant to him so much more than he could than he could actually put into words. Her unborn child somehow managed to get under his skin, past the high wall Thomas Shelby had built around him.

And now she was emotional too.

Tommy had been nothing but a gentleman to her, looking after her every need and wish during the hardest time of her life. And instead of pointing a finger and judging her actions, he welcomed her under his wing to protect her from the cruel world outside.

Without a doubt, Tommy was the best man she knew.

“It feels like a huge butterfly’s wings fluttering.” She explained.

Tommy felt lost for words, there was nothing he could say that could match what he felt.

A part of him felt guilty for stealing the baby’s father place and get the chance to experience all of this, but the other part told him he wasn’t doing anything wrong, because the baby’s father actually chose not to be involved. And in that moment, he made a silent promise to look after that child as his own.

Someone clearing his throat interrupted them. “I’m going to clean the barn, and the smell can be a bit strong for the lady.”

“Yeah, sure.” Tommy muttered, still altered by his feelings, so he turned around and walked his horse into the box, then he guided Y/N outside.

And then he did the only thing he knew when he wasn’t sure how to deal with his feelings. “I think it was the way your baby is telling you about his or hers future horse.”

Y/N gave him a shocked glance. “No, no way. Tommy you can’t buy my child a horse!”

“Who’s gonna stop me? You?” He scoffed. “Besides, I‘m that baby’s godfather remember?” Tommy announced proudly.

She groaned. “Don’t make me regret it.” As they started walking towards his vehicle, Curiosity won her over. “Who lives here?”

“My horses’ trainer.”

“No way, really?”

“Her husband passed away so she took over his business and with her family’s wealthy, well she became filthy wealthy.”

“So the horse training is just a hobby?”

Tommy shuddered not wanting to get too deep into that conversation. “Probably, once you have money you always want more and more.”

Y/N took his hand when he approached the other side of the vehicle.

The weight of his words sinking in her mind.

“That’s how it works? That’s what you want? More money?”

Tommy swallowed hard, Y/N always knew what to say to get his attention, the truth -he sometimes didn’t want to hear-, always hanging from her lips.

“That’s just how the world works, Y/N.” He replied instead. “Money can buy anything.”

He was right, he was just proving that by recently buying a mansion, he already had three cars parked in his garage, eight horses plus the ones under training, he paid for a staff at his house, paid the cops, he was also paying the remodeling of the building they’d use for the Shelby Institute and everything that was needed. And last but not least, he was paying her salary and a monthly amount of money for her baby already, the sapphire he recently gifted her and endless other things.

The echo of his words silenced her own.

Y/N decided then to turn her head away from him to look outside on the road they were leaving behind.

But you can’t buy love. Can’t buy happiness either. So… is it really worth it? She wanted to say, but instead the words kept playing in the back of her mind.

“Before I forget…a man came looking for you at the Institution.” Y/N explained shaking her head a bit, her mind felt funny at times and she forgot things.

“Who? When?”

She saw the frown in Tommy’s face. “A few days ago, he seemed strange if you ask me, wearing clothes as a priest, said he’d supervise th-”

“Fucking Hughes, why didn’t you tell me sooner?” He demanded frustrated.

“Calm down, I-I forgot.”

“This is important and delicate, Y/N you can’t simply forget those things.” Tommy snapped not aware he was hurting her feelings.

Until a little sob escaped her lips and Tommy felt like a piece of shit.

“No, Y/N I’m sorry shouldn’t have talked to you like that.” He didn’t want to upset her. “Sorry I’m just trying to keep you safe, away from this…”

“I should‘ve told you sooner.” Y/N took a deep breath. She didn’t know what’s gotten into her, that reaction wasn’t like her. “I didn’t like him, but I thought he was related to the operation.”

“If you see him again, don’t tell him anything.” Tommy held the steering wheel so hard that his knuckles turned white. “I’m going to place some blinders guarding the Institute.”

Y/N turned to look at Tommy and by the tone in his voice, she felt worried.

Next part

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[mrcowboydeanwinchester]

women in horror

wanted a sapphicnatural anthem so i wrote one <3

this is dedicated to all the women of supernatural, and especially to the people in the fandom who bring them back to life to give them their sapphic happy endings. happy @sapphicnaturalrights sapphicnatural week !!! i tried to hit as many of the prompts as possible in one go <3

lyrics under the cut!

VERSE home alone late at night cold open in the dark light bubble bath, spilling red wine her scream cues the title card

guest appearance, aren't you lucky exposition, keep it clunky mystery isn't the only thing she makes hard

PRE-CHORUS tiny top, thick makeup white and lacy linen lipstick pop, DD cup bloody in your visions oh, she's a woman in horror come and tell me you want her handcuff torn, baby born losing is a given monster turn, crash and burn i know why you're driven oh, she's a woman in horror come and

CHORUS bury your girls bury your gays you like pretty women (yum) but you love your cliches she's coming back wrong i'm making it right once i get my shovel we'll keep you up at night (oh?) we'll keep you up at night (okay)

([british accent] so basically, she- am i american or not? i can't remember. oh. um. [american accent] is this accent okay?)

VERSE bloodthirsty kiss and chase through hell's fire and heaven's grace slow panning shots up to her face (that's hot) that's a wrap on her screentime

credits rolling, she's the last name find a plot hole, give her the blame she's a hot one but it's a shame about her crimes (ew)

PRE-CHORUS tiny top, thick makeup white and lacy linen lipstick pop, DD cup bloody in your visions oh, she's a woman in horror come and tell me you want her handcuff torn, baby born losing is a given (yeah) monster turn, crash and burn i know why you're driven oh, in a fatal genre she's dead cos you (laughter into manic shriek)

CHORUS bury your girls bury your gays you like pretty women but you love your cliches she's coming back wrong i'm making it right (yeah) since i've got my shovel we'll keep you up at night we'll keep you up at night

([american accent] so his girlfriend burns to death, so he wants revenge, but then she comes back to life, like - nonono, his mom comes back to life, because she also burned to death-)

BRIDGE me and bloody mary are getting off in the back of your daddy's car stole your silver bullets, the witches and i making magic, we go so far for women in white for mothers and wives for demons and daughters resurrection time the write to survive she's coming alive for women in horror resurrection time !!!

CHORUS you bury your girls you bury your gays i love all your women and i hate your cliches she's coming back strong i'm making it right now i've got my shovel we'll bury you deep at night we bury you deep at night

[rosetowers]

I think Dev was supposed to be an easy first job for Peri.

Think about the last rich kid with a godparent we saw: Remy.

Juandissimo's job was essentially to provide companionship to Remy, as is parents were basically unaware of his existence, most of his material needs being met already.

Dev was seemingly in a similar position: he wasn't going to have to make a lot of actual wishes since he could get most of what he wanted with money easily. This was supposed to take some of the pressure off Peri. Peri was even in the unique position of having grown up on the job, with a neglected boy.

What Jorgen hadn't taken into account was that what little attention Dev had received had been in the form of morally screwed up business practices, and said attention was only given when Dev obeyed his father. As such, Dec is has learnt to make use of "assets" as much as possible. For example, asking Peri to make him a cupcake of all things, and refuse to specify what kind he wanted.

Dev also tends to latch onto anyone who gives him positive attention, and is just as willing to burn bridges when they disappoint him. Unfortunately, Peri showed up just as Dev's new friendship with Hazel hit its first problem, and he wasn't in the right state of mind to accept the comfort Peri was supposed to offer.

Dev sees Peri as something who should give him whatever he wants, rather than a companion and a positive male role model.

Peri is left exhausted and scrambling to keep up and is unable to connect with Dev as easily as he was expecting to, leaving him frustrated. While he had grown up with a human child, said child was older than him and thus had to be the mature one in the relationship. Peri is struggling to do this, which makes it difficult to connect with Dev or handle the situation in a mature manner, as he is now the older person in the situation.

[gonnalosemydougdimmadomedamnmind]

Literally I am so sick of whore dick grayson, himbo dick grayson, fandom bicycle dick grayson, like yall really saw that dick is the canonical pretty boy with the nice ass and then proceeded to give him 'bottom' as a personality and just ran away with that. Dick is not a pretty idiot that loves having sex and only cares about his appearance, for fucks sake. He doesnt need to be rescued by jason todd of all people, who literally willingly burned all his bridges and can't even save himself, or wally west, frankly, who is one of his best friends but not the one he gets emotionally vulnerable with.

He doesn't do casual sex, at all. He needs an emotional connection first, is it so hard to believe that an attractive person actually wants to connect to someone instead of fucking them? Or fucking their problems away? Is it really so hard to believe that an attractive person can also be intelligent? Can also be kind? Can also be selfless? Can also take care of themself? Can also be a functioning adult? Can also be mature? Can also be damn fucking good at their job? Have yall ever met a real person before?

Dick is Romani and one of the most well known stereotypes about the Romani people are that they are like magically alluring people that can't keep their hands to themselves or that they're like thieving, dumb, dirty animals and what did yall reduce Dick down to? An overly emotional, stupid, pretty slut that acts without thinking.

You know just because something is racist in canon doesn't mean you have to take that and amplify it by 100 in fanon, right? Like the shit I have seen on this website alone, the takes that just won't stop, are literally so much more racist than anything you would ever find in canon. And good God, it's not like you have to make his race the forefront of his character! It's not! No one's is, that would be bad characterization. But should his being Romani affect the way you portray him? Should there be certain things you can be considerate about? Should being Romani be part of his identity? Uh, yeah.

And also. Should you maybe consider what he's actually like in canon to characterize him within fandom spaces? Uh, YEAH.

Dick Grayson is a romantic at heart, is extremely private, and cherishes the emotional connections he has with people. He is a good person because he chooses to do good things. He wants to help people! He's literally a genius, I mean this in every possible sense, academically, physically, emotionally, strategically, picking up and mastering skills with ease, being a detective... that doesn't mean he doesn't have problems. He's an extreme workaholic. He will never talk about his own problems to his friends or family, just the occasional therapist. He's so good with people, he knows exactly how to manipulate situations into his favor, to his own detriment. He will never give up on you, to his own detriment. He bottles up his emotions deeply, and yes, occasionally he does explode. He has a guilt complex the size of the sun. Everything is his fault in his head, Everything. He will accept the blame for anything, for his own rape even, because he's Dick Grayson and hey, he should've known, he should've been able to tell. (This is specifically talking about Miriam).

Everyone puts him on a pedastal because he's the guy that can actually pull off the impossible and no one but him realizes just how high that pedastal is. Bruce wants to be him, thinks there is literally no one better than him, no one who could soar higher than him, the ideal hero. His hero.

Goddamn Superman thinks he's the one person in the universe that will almost always do the right thing at the right time across every universe. And I don't mean that he will BE the right person at the right time, I mean he will DO the right thing at the right time, because Dick believes in the power of choices! Of free will! He could do bad things just as easily as the people around him, he could choose to be cruel because that is literally so. much. easier.

But he doesn't.

Almost ever.

In nearly every universe.

Do you know how much pressure that is? He drowns under the weight of his own perfection, truly. He can't fail.

He can't fail.

Isn't that so unbearably sad? You spend your whole life reassuring other people that everyone gets second chances, and that you are not your worst moment, and that you deserve compassion even at your most despicable, and that everyone makes mistakes, and sometimes things are inevitable, and sometimes all you can give is your best.

You are the only person. Who does not receive that same mercy.

He can't fail.

His family treats him as an emotional punching bag, sometimes a physical punching bag. Occasionally, so will his friends. It's hard to see the person behind the legend. And Dick's legend is truly titanic in proportions... the first child hero. No one could've done it, if he hadnt done it first. If he hadnt done it so exceedingly well. And then he had his own hero team. And then he became his own hero, again. And then he had his own city. He did it all first. The literal trailblazer, lighting the way for everyone else, not letting anyone stop him. Not waiting for anything. A force of nature.

Everyone wants to be him, be liked by him, be acknowledged by him. They all rely on him, the linchpin of a universe. Dick really is like the sun. Warm, encouraging, revitalizing. He is the light in the dark, illuminating and intense. Focused. Powerful. And they are all caught in his gravitational field.

Dick is so much more interesting than anything fandom will spare him. God, what I would give for fandom to give even a 10th of actual attention and critical thought to him or any other poc character in this franchise, that fandom gives to the white characters. I mean, we've all seen it. The narrative fabricated through lies that 95% of fandom takes as gospel because they refuse to engage with canon or simply don't care because it favors their favorite characters. In case you don't know, I am in fact talking about fanon jason todd- aka meaner Dick Grayson with Helena Bertinelli's lifestyle and fanon tim drake- aka less athletic, more victimized Dick Grayson. The white fandom darlings, extremely woobified, you know how it is. Sigh.

[thebiscuitlabryinth]

[prev]

Nowadays, Pure Vanilla has gotten used to his sleep fluctuating wildly between turbulent dreams and sleep like the void itself has swallowed him whole. It seems like a game of chance whenever he rests his head down, and neither option leaves him any less tired the next morning.

Today, his dreams are absurd, swirling and spilling into each other, and vividly upsetting in a way he can't identify. He shut his eyes tight, but that doesn't block out the rest of his senses. He can hear begging, crying, shouting, and the scent of something burning and wilted lilies clashes in the air, creating a suffocating smell that winds around him slow. It is awful, but it is slightly less so, now that he knows how to recognise when he is in a dream. More importantly, he has a question, and he is more than aware of Shadow Milk's lingering presence.

"You founded the study of Dark Moon Magic, didn't you?"

It is a soft question, but one that is sure of itself. Instantly, the sounds and smells and sensations that had been plaguing Pure Vanilla disappear. Pure Vanilla keeps both his eyes closed for the time being, just in case. Tonight, his staff is absent like a missing leg, and he misses the added security of being able to look through it.

"Oh, come on! Don't interrupt the scene, we were just getting to the good part!" Shadow Milk's voice responds with frustration, the sound coming from all sides. It is precisely because it comes from all sides that Pure Vanilla keeps his eyes closed, not quite trusting that the shards of his nightmares have been fully swept away. He doesn't want to find out what Shadow Milk could possibly consider to be 'the good part' amidst the sounds of suffering and anguish.

Instead, Pure Vanilla sighs. "It was your choice to stop everything when I asked that, wasn't it? You can't blame me for that."

"Bzzt! Wrong! I can blame you because you did interrupt. It doesn't matter what I did in response, a disruption is a disruption." Shadow Milk declares loudly, voice a little rougher, as if he was daring Pure Vanilla to argue back. But his voice is now only coming from one source, right in front of him, so Pure Vanilla cautiously opens his eyes to check the surroundings.

He finds himself in the library of Blueberry Yogurt Academy, and nostalgia eagerly rears its head within him, somewhat surprised. He's stood beside a littered table, surrounded by the deep blue bookshelves of his youth and the comforting smell of aged paper. The details blur a little past that, some of the shelves lighter, more like the bookshelves in his chambers in the Vanilla Kingdom, leaving it less like a perfect replica and more like a collage made out of bits and pieces of his lifetimes' worth of memories, but it is mostly the Blueberry Yogurt library.

Shadow Milk is across the table from him, tutting when Pure Vanilla takes too long to reply. He leans his elbows on the table, propping his chin on the bridge of his linked fingers. "Sneaky, silly-Vanilly, trying to use me to get out of your funny little nightmares. Very, very sneaky."

"It worked, didn't it?" Pure Vanilla says, a bit stiffly, because that had never been his main intention, mostly because Shadow Milk isn't nice enough for him to think it would work. No, his main intention is genuine curiosity, and that is exactly why he continues to prod. "...You didn't answer my question."

"Because it's a stupid one." Shadow Milk hums back, tilting his head to the side. He tilts it far enough that his cheek is now resting against his hands instead of his chin. "You should be able to figure that out yourself. Didn't I already tell you where my home is?"

Pure Vanilla doesn't answer for a moment, laying a tentative hand on the edge of the table as he tries to squint at the papers across its surface in the dim lamplight. It takes him a second to realise that they're all forbidden texts on Dark Moon Magic, and when he does, he murmurs back. "It's better to clarify than assume, isn't it?"

This time, Shadow Milk is the one who doesn't answer for a moment, instead staring at him with those piercing eyes. Pure Vanilla can feel more around him, behind him, lurking in the shadows pooling in the nooks and crevices and he can't help it – he shivers slightly.

That reaction must be enough for Shadow Milk, because he snorts, and pushes off the table to lean back, kicking his feet up onto the table and right on top of texts, which is already enough to make Pure Vanilla wince. Poor library etiquette aside, the movement is horribly uncanny to watch, partly because he is leaning back onto thin air instead of a chair, partly because he moves so quickly it's like his limbs snap into place, and partly because his smile is stretched far too thin as he does so.

"Of course I did. I'm very talented, you know." Shadow Milk announces smugly, his eyes never leaving him. They narrow slightly, all of them in suspicious synchronisation, and he raises his eyebrows expectantly. "But I must admit, I am crumbling to know why you brought it up."

Whys are always difficult to answer, especially for something as difficult as motives, which can morph and change over time. Pure Vanilla hates lying, but he hates lying in front of Shadow Milk even more, because he seems to recognise every single one and Pure Vanilla doesn't want to give him the satisfaction.

But he really can't admit the core of the matter to his face. He can't admit that ever since he glimpsed the ghost of Shadow Milk's past, he hasn't been able to stop thinking about it. He can't admit that he is actively trying to glimpse it again, and what better way to try and draw it out than with any scholar's pride and joy – their work?

"It's impressive. I, myself, have mastered White Magic over the years, and I certainly contributed to its development, but I cannot claim that I created it as a school of magic." Pure Vanilla explains instead, and it isn't a lie either, just lacking all the details. He fidgets a bit, tugging at his own sleeves, adding quieter. "Dark Moon Magic is forbidden too, so there aren't many detailed sources left on it. I want to know more about its founding."

I want to know more about you.

There is another lapse of silence, and Pure Vanilla is tense with tentative hope. After all, if Shadow Milk was really against the topic altogether, he wouldn't have gone through the trouble of plucking him out of his nightmares.

Shadow Milk's smile is sharp like a knife, clashing with the casual way he folds his arms behind his head, almost languid as he finally muses. "Oh, really? That doesn't sound right. I'm sure there's enough details lying around to get the gist of it. After all, you've used Dark Moon Magic before, so you must know something about it already."

Pure Vanilla flinches back, and it isn't a surprise that he knows about that too, not anymore, but it still leaves him with unstable footing. Regardless, he doesn't let that scare him off the topic, which he suspects is exactly why Shadow Milk said it. "...I've only really used it once, and I don't remember much about what happened. So I may know something, but that something is rather little."

It's a confession, and the truth. His brief tangle with Dark Moon Magic is a complete blur in his own mind, watered down to blinding sensations and a heartache so intense he had felt like he was crumbling. Theoretically, he knows enough about Dark Moon Magic to hold a conversation, but he remembers nothing about it in practise.

"You know who could help you with that?" Shadow Milk asks, seemingly unbothered, but the words curl with open mockery and a smirk. He tilts his head back slightly so he can look down on Pure Vanilla and throws his arms out dramatically. "Our beloved, newly coronated Guardian! She has plenty of experience with–"

Pure Vanilla's heart lurches painfully.

"Don't talk about her!" He interrupts, voice bursting out louder than he expected and panic fluttery in his chest. He doesn't want to hear him tear at her old wounds, even if she can't hear it herself. He knows how vulnerable that cry makes him seem though, and he fumbles to lower his voice to something softer, less shaky. "Don't– please, I'm asking you for a reason."

Shadow Milk giggles, a strange grating sound that climbs higher with each breath, until he is laughing in earnest. He curls into himself, arms wrapped around his middle, and the position looks painful with his feet still planted on the table. Pure Vanilla watches him warily, a little shaken by the mention of White Lily, and wonders if maybe, he was wrong about what he thought he saw in Shadow Milk. He has been seeing more things that aren't there, recently.

His laughter stops abruptly. The stillness that follows is jarring, but doesn't last long.

Slowly – so slowly that it is unnerving, for someone who typically moves as erratically as him – Shadow Milk reaches forward with one hand and plucks a scroll up from the table. He unrolls it with a lazy flick of his wrist, the other end tumbling away over the edge of the table and across the floor. It is a smooth movement, Pure Vanilla notes through the pounding of his heart and his scrambled nerves, a practised motion that speaks of thousands of opened scrolls.

Shadow Milk peers over at the contents of the scroll with an empty, disinterested expression, his legs melting through the table until he appears to be sitting somewhat politely again. The sudden switch to this from his near hysterical laughter leaves Pure Vanilla disturbed, unsure if this is progress or not.

"I wanted to strike a balance between Black and White Magic." Shadow Milk says, his voice a disconcertingly low murmur, almost monotone. While his main eyes remain steadily on the scroll, the rest are eagerly burrowing into Pure Vanilla from all sides. "Black Magic draws from the void, making it unpredictable and destructive by nature, but full of potential. White Magic draws from the moon, primarily, and other celestial sources, making it safer and easier to use, but limited in its purity. If I could find the middle ground, I could harness magic with more flexibility and power but less unpredictability."

Shadow Milk pauses then, his eyes sliding up to stare right at Pure Vanilla, and his lips quirk upwards. When he speaks again, his voice gains a little more character but remains mainly flat, like a poorly-delivered theatrical monologue. "The dark side of the moon was the obvious choice for a source of that kind of power, because it's the natural overlap between the moon and the void. Once you figure out a source for magic, it's simple to find a way to draw from it, and to make it simpler, I had access to the knowledge of the Witches at my fingertips. All I had to do was write everything down, and the school of Dark Moon Magic was born. Easy-peasy!"

Shadow Milk throws the scroll to the side with little fanfare, not even sparing a glance at those ancient texts as they land in a heap of old paper on the floor, uncaring of if they damage or rip. And why would he? They both know this is a dream, and even if it wasn't, he had written that scroll himself.

Pure Vanilla would have cared, dream or not, if he wasn't wholly distracted, reduced to only a wide-eyed blink.

Because Shadow Milk may feign a bored face and voice, as if reading off a report or a particularly uninspiring script, but when their gazes meet, his eyes glitter like shooting stars, sparking with pride and passion and something else.

It captivates Pure Vanilla, the very same shine that comes with a breakthrough for every researcher. It is exactly what he had been hoping to see again, but the sight still leaves him feeling unmoored, even if pleasantly. Intruige and hope swirl within him, and he suddenly finds himself desperate to hold onto this ghost of the past, to make it stay longer and help it spill into the present.

"What does it feel like?" The question comes out before Pure Vanilla can think it through, focused on continuing the conversation before Shadow Milk can pick up his showmanship again in full. "Dark Moon Magic, I mean."

Shadow Milk huffs, a playful grin settling on his face again, and a sickening mix of dread and disappointment trickles through Pure Vanilla as he watches him lean over, crushing more texts beneath his palms. For a scary moment, he expects him to make another quip towards his previous use of the magic, or worse, bring up White Lily again.

He doesn't. Shadow Milk kicks his legs up behind him, so that he is laying on his stomach in mid-air, and cheerfully asks, "How about I show you?"

He doesn't wait for Pure Vanilla to process what he said, let alone reply. He reaches out and ensnares Pure Vanilla's hand, the one normally occupied with his staff, and laces their fingers together. Pure Vanilla doesn't reciprocate the hold, surprised, but only tries a small unsuccessful tug in response.

Shadow Milk's grip is an oppressive pressure, tight but not quite painful. He presses their palms together firmly, and Pure Vanilla gasps.

Magic bursts through the contact, rushing through his jam in a dizzying, warm flood. It is thicker, heavier than the magic Pure Vanilla is used to, thrumming and twisting as if it has a mind of its own, almost scratching at his dough as if trying to consume him, and he can't even concentrate on it because– because–

He can see everything.

Pure Vanilla really, truly can. He can see Shadow Milk's curling smile in front of him, he can see the Faeries having a feast, he can see Black Raisin greeting the moon from one of the Vanilla Castle's towers, he can see Dark Cacao striding through the citadel, he can see White Lily going through her morning routine, he can see his own sleeping body, and places and Cookies he doesn't have the presence of mind to recognise, all simultaneously. He doesn't know what to focus on, doesn't even know how to focus on anything, and his head hurts like it is falling apart.

This is how Shadow Milk has been watching me, he thinks deliriously, the only thought he can manage as he drowns in his sights.

And then, in a snap, he is back in the library with only one scene to see. His vision swims a little at the edges as if it didn't get the message, and he wobbles in place.

Shadow Milk is still holding his hand, but the grip is slightly looser, and the stream of his Dark Moon Magic is gone like a whisper. His grin is sinister and too big for his face, but his eyes still burn like stars.

"Fun, isn't it?" Shadow Milk coos, giddy like it is a shared secret, lifting Pure Vanilla's trembling hand and brushing a kiss to the back that buzzes with Dark Moon Magic. "My very first masterpiece."

Pure Vanilla wakes up disoriented, with a ringing headache and an itch in the back of his hand. White Lily notices his poor state almost immediately when she sees him – wonderful as she is – and she asks if he had a nightmare with that gentle, concerned slope to her brows.

Pure Vanilla adjusts his grip on his staff, leaning against it more than usual.

"No." He assures her lightly, not quite the truth and not quite a lie.

[next]

[topguncortez]

Speak Now ~ J. Seresin

Hangman Masterlist | Main Masterlist

synopsis: Jake gets a wedding invite from the girl he's still in love with. Based off of Speak Now (TV) by Taylor Swift

word count: 4.1k

warnings: cursing, break-ups, runaway bride, miscommunication

Jake knew you probably hated the invites. You had told him over and over that you never wanted a big wedding, you wanted something small. You had agreed with your mom to not just go to the courthouse, but would at least do something a little bigger. Jake ran his fingers over the pale pink paper that was decorated with flowers and had your name and your fiancé’s name written in gold cursive letters. He knew you were somewhere screaming and pulling your hair out.

‘PLEASE JOIN US FOR THE CEREMONY OF MATRIMONY OF Y/N M/N AND BILLY “FRITZ” AVALON’

“Yeah, I just got it,” Jake said to Coyote. He had called his best friend the moment he saw the light pink envelope in his mailbox, “I looked up the address, it’s a church. She always said she wouldn’t get married in a church, she was worried it would burn down around her,”

“I don’t think that’s possible,” Javy said, “She must be a different person now, when was the last time you talked to her?”

“I don’t know 2-3 years ago. I heard Bob ask Nat if she had figured out a bridesmaid dress yet,” Jake sighed and pinched the bridge of his nose, “I guess it was for this.”

“Did you expect anything less? They’re best friends.”

Jake shrugged knowing his friend couldn’t see him, “I don’t think I’m gonna go,”

“You can’t do that!”

“Why would I go? To submit myself to the torture of watching her marry someone else? Watching someone else give her the life I couldn’t give her?” Jake said angrily, the images of their last fight filled his mind. He looked over to the front door from his kitchen, the replay of you walking out the door, with your bags packed and tears in your eyes was forever burned into his mind.

“You pushed her away, Jacob. You can only blame yourself for that,” Javy scolded and Jake sighed.

“I thought I was doing the right thing,” Jake mumbled.

“Well do the true right thing, and go to the wedding, for her. It’ll make her happy to see you there,” Javy said and Jake told him he’d think about it.

Jake sat down on his couch and closed his eyes. Ever since that fateful day, he let you go, he couldn’t fathom thinking about you with someone else. He knew though, he knew you had met someone else, but didn’t know it was Fritz until about a month ago. The two of you waltzed into the Hard Deck, hand-in-hand, smiles on your face. Jake couldn’t stand the sight of it. It made him physically ill to stand there and keep a smile on his face. You had caught only a glimpse of him as he walked out the door. 

Jake pushed himself off of his spot and walked to his room. He pulled down the box that sat on the top shelf of his closet and opened the lid. Pictures, concert tickets, notes, mixed CDs, random t-shirts, and postcards were all packed away in the box. Jake dug to the bottom of the box and pulled out the tiny light blue ring box and opened it. The pear-shaped diamond ring glared up at him in mockery.

———————————————

“Have you ever thought about the future?” You asked him, as you were both relaxing in the bathtub. Jake had a stressful day at work and just wanted to relax. You had made him something to eat and draw a bath.

“Of course,” Jake said, kissing your bare shoulder, “I think about it a lot, what I’m doing next week, or next month, or even next year,”

“Do you ever think of our future?” You asked softly.

“I-I uh, yeah sometimes. But I like where we are,” Jake said and you frowned slightly. You had been with Jake since freshman year of high school, right by his side through it all. From giving up your dream of going to UT, and moving to Maryland while he went to the academy, to waiting with other partners and spouses for him to come off the carrier after a deployment.  You loved Jake, you really did, but you were hoping for more, you wanted more.

“I think about getting married,” You said and sighed into Jake, “Something small, probably in my parents’ backyard on a beautiful summer night. I want that perfect day, where you just wake up and say, ‘Let’s get married’, nothing too crazy. I told my mom I won’t just go to the courthouse.”

“Yeah,” was all Jake could say.

“What?” You asked, turning your head to look at him, “You don’t… you don’t see that?”

“It’s not that I don’t see it, it’s that I don’t want it.”

“Oh,” You nodded. There was a beat of silence, until you pushed yourself up from Jake’s embrace.

“Wait, Y/N,” Jake said reaching out to you as you grabbed your towel.

“The water is getting cold,” You said and dried yourself off, before heading into the bathroom.

Jake cursed himself and got out of the bathtub, grabbing his towel and following you. You sat on the bed and looked at Jake with tears in your eyes. You had this sinking feeling for a while. Like things were bound to break between you. You loved Jake, you really did, and every day it felt like you were falling more in love with him. He always did something new to make you fall in love. Whether it was surprising you with some new recipe, bringing you home your favorite flowers, to sending you postcards from where ever he was in the world. But lately, all that had seemed to stop. You had slowly wondered if maybe, just maybe, Jake wasn’t in love with you anymore.

“Y/N…” Jake said your name softly.

“When did you fall out of love?”

“What-“

“Jake, please,” You asked him, tears now running down your face.

“I love you, Y/N, I really do. But I- My career is just starting to take off. I. . .,” Jake sighed, “I- I don’t want to be holding you back from everything that you want.”

“You don’t want to hold me back, or you don’t want me holding YOU back?”

Jake sighed and looked down at his feet. Truth was, he didn’t want to hold you back. He could see the small changes in you. You had decided to change your major from education to business, something that you insisted was what you wanted. He noticed that your grades had slipped, your GPA the lowest it had ever been. You had spent more time at home, next to him, than hanging out with your friends. Jake didn’t want to hurt you, but he wanted you to follow your dreams, even if that meant having to break his and your heart. Jake took a deep breath and grabbed your hands.

“I’m breaking up with you,” He said and bit the bullet. You closed your eyes and Jake was fighting the urge to wipe the tears from your eyes. A sob left your pink lips and you pulled your hands from his, “I’m sorry-“

“Just shut up, Jake,” You said and pushed yourself up from the bed. You walked into the bathroom and slammed it shut, locking the door behind you. You gripped the sides of the sink and sobbed. Jake listened on the other side of the door as you threw everything off the counter, and could hear the breaking of the mirror as you threw a hairbrush at it. Jake changed into his pajamas and then set some out for you. He wrote a note that he was going to stay at Josh’s for the night.

The next morning you woke up to a cold bed and a pounding headache. You looked around the empty room and sighed. You began with the closet, dumping all your clothes into your suitcase, leaving behind the stuff that Jake had either bought you or gifted you. You packed away all your underwear, socks, and makeup. The apartment slowly became bare as you packed your little trinkets and decorations away. You had hoped to get most of it done before Jake came back, but you weren’t that lucky.

“Where are you going?” Jake asked, walking into the apartment and seeing your bags by the front door.

“My sister’s house,” You said and Jake looked at you confused. This was the first time you had mentioned a sister, and he had been dating you for over 5 years, “You don’t know her, she’s a half-sister,”

“Okay… this is really it?”

“Yeah,” You said softly as you looked down at the item in your hand, a picture from your first date, taken when you were both 13. Your parents wouldn’t let you go alone, so Jake’s older sister and her boyfriend at the time had to tag along. She took the picture and Jake gave it to you as a gift on your first anniversary, “Here,” You handed Jake the picture.

“No, no, keep it.”

“I can’t,” You said, your voice breaking. You placed your hand on Jake’s cheek, and kissed his lips softly, one last time, “Goodbye, Jake. Be good to yourself, okay?”

“I will, Y/N. I love you,”

You couldn’t bring yourself to say it back, as you grabbed your bags and walked out the front door. Jake bit his lip as he watched you walk out the door and out of his life.

———————————-

You looked half dead, as you sat in the makeup chair, bright and early on your wedding day. You had tried to go to sleep, but you tossed and turned the whole night. You had thought about running away, getting your car, and driving off to god knows where, but you couldn’t bring yourself to do it. Instead, you took some melatonin and slept for about 4 hours, until Natasha burst through your door with her unusually high amount of energy. You were just happy she brought you red bull and donuts.

“You look like shit?” Natasha said as she poured you a mimosa.

“I feel like it,” you reached your hand out for the glass.

“Oh my god,” She said and pulled the glass back, “Are you pregnant?!”

“No!” You yelled, “Give me the damn drink,”

“Fiesty,” She laughed and handed you the glass, “I steamed your dress, it’s hanging up in the bathroom,”

“Thank you,” You answered, “The boys?”

“I talked to Billy’s brother, Steven, he said they are up and moving. But, if you were wondering Rooster said that they are ALL on their way,”

“He’s coming?”

Natasha gave you a small smile and nodded, before going over to where the rest of your bridesmaids were. You looked up at your makeup artist and smiled as she placed false eyelashes on your eyes. You had tried to keep yourself from shaking with anxiety over seeing Jake, but you couldn’t help it. You had brushed it off as wedding day jitters. For the rest of the morning, you and your bridesmaids drank and ate a light breakfast that your parents had provided. You had a photographer taking pictures of you guys as you got ready. The bridesmaid dresses you had picked were emerald green, and you let them pick their own design. You sucked in a breath, as Natasha zipped the back of your dress. You stared at yourself in the mirror, and could hardly recognize the person in the mirror. The dress you and Billy had picked out was a classic style dress, with a deep v-cut, lace sleeves that went down to your wrists, and an open back. Billy said you looked like Princess Kate, but you felt more like Princess Di.

“Absolutely breathtaking,” Natasha said and You smiled, trying to make yourself feel better, “They want a first look. You okay with that?”

“I mean, Billy picked the dress out, so why not,”

Natasha smiled and walked out of the bedroom. You blinked and stared up at the ceiling, trying not to cry. You took a deep breath and then headed out of the bathroom. You looked up from your shoes to be shocked by the 3 men standing in front of you, one noticeably missing.

“Well god damn, Y/N, you can clean up nicely,” Javy said You laughed and walked over and hugged him.

“Like our very own princess,” Bob said.

“Thank you,” You said looking at all of them. You could feel a certain pair of blue eyes burning into you, “I can’t believe you guys actually came!”

“Well, my girlfriend is your maid of honor,” Javy said, putting his arm around Natasha’s waist.

“She’s the best maid of honor I could ask for,” You smiled at her.

“Speaking of which, we gotta get going. Can’t be late for your own wedding,” Natasha said and your face faltered.

“Yeah,” You said hoping none of them noticed the change in your demeanor, of course the oldest twin did.

“Alright, let’s get going okay,” Natasha said and the boys nodded, following her out of the room, all except Bob who hung back a second.

“You look amazing,” Bob said, “He would be here, but he just couldn’t see you quite yet.”

“Thank you, Bob,” You said honestly. He kissed your cheek and then left your room.

“You ready?” Natasha asked, coming back into the room. You nodded and grabbed the champagne bottle that was next to you. Natasha watched with wide eyes as you downed the rest of the bottle, “Liquid courage?”

“If I do something dumb, you promise to support me?”

Natasha squinted her eyes at you, “Depends on what dumb thing you’re thinking about doing.”

“We’ll have to see,”

The church was decorated beautifully, white roses and emerald green flowers were mixed in and decorated the altar. Javy sat on Jake’s right and Rooster on the left. Jake’s eyes were locked on his shoes as Billy and his parents made their way down the aisle. Rooster nudged him as your mom and brother made their way down the aisle. Your mom sent Jake a warm smile, making his heart beat faster in his chest. The look in her eyes was one that Jake had seen far too often. 

‘That should be you.’

“What if I stop the wedding?” Jake asked Javy.

“Don’t even think about it Jacob,” Javy whispered harshly.

“You saw how unhappy she is!” 

“She’s nervous, it’s her damn wedding day!” Javy snapped. 

“Stop, Natasha is walking down,” Bob said noticing his WSO walking down with your fiancé’s brother. Natasha winked at the boys, as she took her spot right next to wear you would stand at the alter. 

Jake’s heart fell to his ass as he heard that oh-so-familiar wedding march and everyone stood up, to look to the back of the church. The doors opened Jake’s breath caught in his throat. You were breathtaking, the dress hugging your body perfectly. Jake couldn’t help but wish that was for him. Your eyes were locked on Billy, as tears left his eyes. You had tried to dig deep in your heart and remember why you were going to marry him, but everything was drawing up a blank. The aisle felt like it was miles long, and you hated everyone’s eyes on you. When you got to the end of the aisle, Billy stepped down to take you from your father.

“Who gives this woman, to this man?” The priest asked.

“Her mother, and I,” Your dad said. He turned to you and hugged you, “Jake is here,” You went to move your head to look for him but your dad kept you from moving, “Make the right choice,” You nodded and kissed his cheek before pulling back and stepping up on the altar.

“Ladies and gentlemen, you maybe be seated,” The priest said and You handed Natasha your bouquet, your eyes searching the crowd of people, and finally landing on those familiar brown eyes, “Welcome, we are gathered here today to witness the symbolic ceremony of love between these two young people, Y/N M/N L/N and Billy Fritz Avalon. Is there anybody who believes that these two shouldn’t be married, speak now or forever hold your peace,”

Y/N closed her eyes and waited for someone to say something. Jake was about to stand before Javy grabbed his arm and held him down. He looked at his wingman with wide eyes, but the boy just shook his head and pointed toward you. Jake looked at you and locked eyes with him, as the priest was reading some passage about marriage and what it means in the Bible. Jake could read it in your eyes, you were really going through with this. Jake saw his window of opportunity finally close and the stages of grief started settling in his chest. He leaned back against the pew and tried to keep from crying.

“Billy, do you take Y/N, to have and to hold, to honor and treasure, to be at her side in sorrow and in joy, in the good times and bad, in sickness and health, for rich or for poor, to love and cherish her always until the moment of your last breath?”

“I do,” Billy said giving your hand a squeeze.

“Y/N,” The priest said, basically startling you, “Do you take Billy, to have and to hold, to honor and treasure, to be at his side in sorrow and in joy, in the good times and bad, in sickness and death, for rich or for poor, to love and cherish him always until the moment of your last breath?”

You looked at the priest and then at Billy, “I…,” You quickly glanced over to Jake, whose green eyes were locked on you. You swallowed and looked back at Billy, “I-” 

“No,” A voice from the crowd spoke. You snapped your head towards the audience, seeing Jake standing up and the look of shock on everyone’s face. 

“Hangman, what the,” Billy asked, dropping your hands and turning towards him.

“You never wanted to get married in a Church,” Jake said, pushing past Rooster and Bob, to stand in the middle of the aisle, “You said the church of Elvis was fine, but nothing like. . . this,” Jake gestured around, “You want the wedding where you wake up and say ‘let’s get married’. You want to eat hot dogs and mac’n’cheese in your parents’ backyard and light off fireworks.” 

Tears gathered in your eyes as Jake stepped closer to you, and you took a step down from the altar. 

“You want to jump off the dock at the lake house in your wedding dress because the lake has good luck in it and you believe in that stuff,” Jake licked his lips, “This isn’t you. . .” You nodded and Jake wiped away a stray tear with his thumb, “What do you say? Wanna get out of here?” 

“Yes please,” You said, as you grabbed Jake’s hand. The church erupted in chaos as the two of you ran towards the doors. 

“The hell did you say to her!?” Your mom asked your father, hitting him lightly on the chest.

“I just told her to make the right choice,” Your dad said smugly, “Never liked Buster anyway.”

“It’s Billy!”

You and Jake were bursting with laughter as you sprinted to his car. Jake had helped gather your dress in the car, before shutting the door carefully and jumping into the driver’s seat. Neither of you guys said anything as you drove away from the church. You weren’t sure where you were driving to, and it honestly didn’t matter. You looked over at Jake, who had a smile on his face as he grabbed your hand, and kissed your knuckles. 

But suddenly, the fate of the decision hit you like a ton of bricks. 

“Stop the car,” You said. 

Jake looked over at you, “What?” 

“Stop the damn car!” You yelled. Jake complied and pulled the car over, putting it in park. You got out instantly, running towards the woodline, the soft rain falling on you. Jake watched as you tried to catch your breath. He walked to the other side of his BMW, and leaned against the passenger door as you paced. 

“I ran away,” You said eyes wide. You turned to face him, “I just ran away from the altar!”

“Yes, you did,” Jake nodded. 

“A-and because of you!” You yelled.

“I’m sorry,” Jake said, honestly. Guilt was swimming in his green eyes as you looked at him. He looked as bad as you felt. His suit was wrinkled, his hair slightly a mess from running his hands through it, his five o’clock shadow settling on his face. 

“Why? Why did it take you so long?” You asked and Jake looked at you. 

“I was scared,” He admitted, “I was scared of coming back and ruining what you had built. You went back to education, got your degree, you’re living your dream, and I…. I didn’t want to get in the way again.” 

You shook your head and walked up to him. You grabbed his hand, “Dance with me,”

Jake nodded and turned up the car radio. The sweet sound of Aretha Franklin’s Natural Woman’ filled your eardrums. Jake grabbed you softly and pulled you into him as he swayed with you in the moonlight. You guys lost track of time, as one song faded into the other, and you were both soaked, your dress was ruined.

“Your dress,” Jake said, looking at the dirty train, “I’m sorry, I’ll pay,”

“No, don’t worry about it,” You said and placed your hands on Jake’s face.

Jake’s rough hands carefully gripped the side of your face and pulled his lips against yours. For the first time in nearly 2 years, you were feeling his lips on yours again. You pulled him against you, wanting him to never let you go. He pulled back and rested his forehead against yours. You two didn’t say anything, but you didn’t have to. It was clear, you had made the right choice.

“Marry me,” Jake said and you looked up at him. He reached into his wet suit jacket and pulled out the blue box, “I don’t know what the hell I was thinking, I had this stashed away for the perfect moment but I just got scared. I didn’t want you to put your dreams on the back burner for me, so I let you go.”

“Jake, you dumbass,” You said, “You are my dream.”

“You’re mine too, I can’t believe I almost lost you to-”

“Shh, you have me now.”

“Marry me, please?” Jake asked getting down on one knee. You smiled and tackled him to the ground. He landed with a thud and laughed as he kissed you passionately. You pulled back and slid the ring that was already on your finger, and replaced it with the one Jake had for you, “Looks better.”

“Much better.” You said kissing him again.

3 weeks later, you woke up one morning to a cold bed, but the covers messed up. You looked out the window, seeing the sun shining and making everything glow warmly. You stretched and headed down to your kitchen, where Jake was already making dinner. You greeted him with a kiss and sat down at the table to eat the vegan pancakes he had made.

“We should get married today,” Jake suggested, “Javy got ordained online a couple of months ago and has been itching to use it.”

“My dad’s got a new dinner recipe he wants to try.” You said sipping your orange juice.

“Then it’s settled,” Jake smiled, “Let’s get married today,”

And that’s exactly what you two did. You sent out a text message for everyone to be at your house by 6 for your wedding. Nobody questioned It, knowing this was exactly what you and Jake wanted. Everyone gathered in your backyard, dressed causally for a summer backyard wedding. Jake stood barefoot in the grass as he waited for you to walk out of the house, in a simple white maxi sun dress. Javy was living for this moment to be the official of a wedding, and what better than to be one at his best friend’s wedding?

“Now, we can actually do this right this time,” Javy said winking at you.

“Jake, do you take Y/N-“

“Yes,” Jake said interrupting his brother.

“I have to say the speech, Jacobl,” Javy scolded and everyone chuckled, “Y/N, do you take Jake-“

“I do!” You answered by doing the same.

“You guys are so impatient,” Javy smiled, “Well, by the power vested in me by some officiating website and the state of California, I now pronounce you husband and wife. Jake, you may now kiss your bride,”

“Don’t gotta tell me twice,”

You giggled as Jake smashed his lips against yours. Cheers were let out from your family as he dipped you and sealed the deal with a kiss. He set you back on your two feet and grabbed your hand, walking you down the makeshift aisle, finally as husband and wife.

taglist: @shanimallina87 @phoenix1388 @desert-fern @mygyn @cherrycola27 @yanna-banana @seitmai @topgun-imagines @bradleybeachbabe @na-ta-sh-aa @startrekfangirl2233 @xoxabs88xox @atarmychick007 @lunamoonbby @sophiaslastbraincell @bradswolfe @fandom-princess-forevermore @thedroneranger @angelbabyange @callsignharper @dempy @lovelywiseprincess @krismdavis @eternallyvenus @dakotakazansky @pono-pura-vida @callsignartemis @starberryhorse @daggersquadphantom @gspenc @toobouquet @dreamgirl3300 @avada-kedavra-bitch-187

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[starillusion13]

Imagine your friends!NCT are secretly mafias, falling in love with you…

[I’m doing with my bias line so if your bias is missing means they are my bias wreckers and as am being ot23(I will always be their supporter so don’t expect I love any of the members less) please read the end note.]

Remember this is my top bias line:

Lee Taeyong

Being the leader of the biggest mafia gang, NCT he is very passionate about his life. Never for once he thought of getting you in his life. An innocent but suicidal girl but also a very daring girl. He is attracted to you because of your multiple personalities and this is the reason he finds you different from other girls. He is good at pretending that he is not getting attracted to you day by day or simply he is deeply in love with you. But what about you? No one knows as you are just friends with him, a very close one. It’s a very simple story. But the problem is that you are only familiar with mafias in story book but you don’t know the dark secrets of your cute and handsome friend, Lee Taeyong.

Kim Doyoung

Your most caring friend who literally takes care of you like an older brother but he has made it clear not to call him your brother. He treats you more than you ever need. He takes you on luxury friendly dates when Taeyong(his bestfriend) is busy or that man would not leave his chance to tag along( you are afterall spending his money even with Doyoung). His gummy smile is everything you need before going to work. Those gummy smiles hide the devilish smirk when he is torturing his victim brutally and his sharp eyes watching the helpless condition of them. But to you, he can heal your every pain as a true friend.

Jung Jaehyun

the most charming guy you have ever met. Anyone would want him as their boyfriend including you but you bet he has girlfriend as you feel he hides things from you and that can be possible if it’s his gf. Once late at night you came across him on the streets and you thought him as any celebrity and that’s how your friendship began. He has the show-off attitude and would always buy you costly dresses, jewelry and other accessories and urge you to wear them on friendly dates and workplace. He has this possessiveness in his every move and words as if he owns you. He is a loyal NCT mafia member who has swear not to get distract by anything but why he is losing his mind for you.

Lee Mark

the sweetest and the most innocent guy. You feel this urge to protect this silly boy from this cruel world. Cruel world? He is a walking devil with a facade of innocence. His silly speech, his innocent heartily laughs and his securing embrace is like alluring you to trust him with your whole. But it’s a trap to keep you close. You don’t know how his awkward behaviors in front of you are just the opposite when he plants bullets in his enemy’s head and throat. His soft big and innocent eyes are the dangerous hell-hole for his victims.

Lee Jeno

well, you doubt him as a gangster sometimes because of his physique and personality. But He can’t be because next moment he is giving off his eye smile melting your heart along with his sweet gestures. A perfect soft boyfriend with some dominating aura. He likes to order you around like those are simple and sweet but somehow he has that controlling attitude. His helpless and worried expression if you are hurt for some reason is just the opposite from the one when he makes sure to burn the victim or bury it 6-feet under and his eyes burning with the rage of revenge, nowhere to be seen those cute eyes looking at you in awe and adoration.

Lee Haechan

a playful menace. You question sometimes why you are being friends with him in first place. His teasings are out of hand and loses your mind but the next moment he is the dearest friend to you. But you have fun with him in sleepovers, sneaking out for late night long drives playing ‘Highway to Heaven’ and he sings along the song’s bridge, his fav part ‘oh she’s so bad, I’ll make it last’ and looks at you in your eyes. Even behind his mischievousness, there is a lover boy. He cuddles you to comfort and a perfect bestfriend and you are thankful for such a nice friend. But you don’t know that the annoying boy with heavenly vocals is a hacker of the ruthless mafia gang, NCT.

Na Jaemin

a total cat person. He even has an insta account for his cats and mentioned himself as their father and you as their mother. A boy with heart on his sleeves and he doesn’t let a moment to fall in vain without making you blush. A family man and not gonna lie you have a little crush on him. His endearments and sweet gestures always make you feel like that you are a couple and sometimes some people even assume it. Even if you deny it, he proudly smiles and agrees with them. But this sweet Angel boy is the devil who can shoot someone and bury them in a stance and then act like he tugged his cats in bed to sleep.

I’m writing such above things just casually because even if it’s late at night yet am not feeling sleepy😭 actually I was preparing a NCT! Mafia draft so felt like sharing some imagines. If you guys need any particular member imagine then you can send me asks(also Yuta Lucas Renjun Ten Yangyang and Kun are also in my bias list tho🥹)

Should I make a NCT! Mafia series with my bias line x reader? Of course after finishing ‘Like We Just Met’?

Perma Taglist: @mymoodwriting @justhere4kpop @anyamaris @yeoobin @icchyi @jwnghyuns @piratequeen-queenofgames @dinonuguaegi @oreharuuu @hwanring @sanwifesstuff @kiwiisnthereoops @kiwiraccoon [open!]

[wolfnight2012]

"We'll be Fine" is the new "Open Arms"

(but I don't think Telemachus will be a Polites-like character, though I do have suspicions that some of his songs/motifs/or at least one scene in the final saga all work as a call-back to Polites/Open Arms)

But anyways!

While I am not claiming a 1:1 comparison, "We'll be Fine" sees Telemachus in a Polites-like role with Athena, who has assumed a post-Troy!Odysseus like role in regards to her guilt over how she ended things with Odysseus in "My Goodbye"

We've got:

an ecstatic declaration of friendship (new vs established)

We've got the positivity/look on the brighter side/things will work out

AND most importantly (imo) we have the Call to Action! The "You have the power to change things/it doesn't have to be this way/life can be better if you work to make it so

Polites gets Odysseus to consider "Open Arms" at the end of his song (though, tragically, he dies before he can teach Odysseus how to effectively implement this belief system & Odysseus then fucks it up during the Ocean Saga)

Telemachus gets Athena to reach out to Odysseus. "Maybe, its time that you lend a hand/I don't think he'll mind"

Athena was not going to reach out on her own. (maybe it was pride, maybe shame, maybe she thought she'd thoroughly burned that bridge & there was no hope for reconciliation) but Telemachus helps her realize that is not true.

On a similar note:

The Wisdom Saga as a whole argues for "Open Arms" over "Ruthlessness is mercy upon ourselves"

(Especially in regards to the saga's main character: Athena)

So! I spoke a bit about how Ruthlessness was not mercy upon Odysseus (or Athena) here, BUT, now that I think about it, it's not so much that the Wisdom Saga isn't about "Ruthlessness is mercy upon ourselves" but rather, that it IS about the sentiments expressed by Polites in "Open Arms"

(I've currently got a breakdown of "Open Arms" half-finished in my drafts, I'll link it here once I finish & post it)

But also!

The Wisdom Saga is the first saga, without a single song promoting Ruthlessness.

The Troy Saga has them using a wooden horse to kill sleeping Trojans & the killing of the infant + Eurylochus suggesting they "Strike first/raid the place"

The Cyclops Saga has Polyphemus trying to lay waste to Odysseus's entire crew + Athena telling Odysseus to finish off the threat

Ocean Saga has Poseidon

Circe Saga has Circe's decision to treat all strangers as possible threats to her nymphs & turning them into pigs

Underworld has Odysseus' decision to become the monster

Thunder Saga is the first saga where every song (except Suffering) explicitly promotes Ruthlessness

The Wisdom Saga breaks this pattern

Legendary:

Even though Telemachus is singing about fighting monsters, it comes across as very idealist. This is not an aggressive song. Telemachus doesn't sound blood-thirsty or vicious. He wants to live up to his father. He wants to be able protect his mom

He dreams of fighting monsters (an intangible threat for a kid who's never left his island) but it's clear he's never so much as been in a fight before (Little Wolf is the first time he tried it)

"So I could bring the world some light" vs "We can light up the world"

Little Wolf:

Once again, this is not an aggressive song (not on Telemachus' part)

Telemachus is being egged on/taunted by Antinous + the suitors on one side & encouraged by Athena on the other (both of whom are more aggressive than Telemachus)

Telemachus is on the defense. He's unsure. He never expresses a desire to kill/destroy Antinous beyond his desire to want to keep his mom safe

Athena comes to help Telemachus without seeking anything in return! She's not seeking a new warrior of the mind/A new kid to mentor (Telemachus shows none of the promise of his father)

She's simply giving her help. ("Why should we take when we could give?")

"Have you forgotten to turn off your heart" vs "One young wolf has a larger heart than all these men combined" she saw Odysseus' heart as a weakness/distraction, while now she realizes it can be Telemachus' greatest strength

Even the suitors!! Antinous just wants to humiliate/agitate Telemachus. He's being cruel, but not ruthless. He lets up as soon as Telemachus is defeated/shown his place. He's a "bully" but not a "monster" (at least, not yet[??])

Then we get to "We'll be Fine" which, as I mentioned above, is essentially the new "Open Arms"

We'll Be Fine:

Athena lowers her guard & essentially bares her heart to Telemachus! She tells him about this mystery friend, about her regrets, the (semi) truth about why she helped him! ("You could show a person that you trust them, when you stop and lower your guard")

Telemachus takes this trust & greets Athena with open arms, offering her his friendship, his comfort & his advice

His positivity echoes Polites' from "Open Arms" as does his belief (despite T. living under the stress of the suitors & P. having lived through a war) that everything will be fine

"Maybe, it's all gonna turn out great I know we'll be fine"

"Whatever we face, we'll be fine if we're leading from the heart"

"I know it's light you'll find"

"No matter the place, we can light up the world"

Tbh, even though it's not a direct lyrical callback, I'd argue Telemachus' advice for Athena to reach out to her friend "Maybe, it's time that you lend a hand, I don't think he'll mind" is a thematic callback either to "Here we have a chance for some adjustment, Give it a try, it's not that hard" (it's not to late to make things better via your own actions/choices) or "Kindness is brave" (you want good things to happen? Take that first leap. Don't react with fear/be paralyzed by regret)

Love in Paradise

Just like Odysseus is convinced to (at least) consider an "Open Arms" approach by Polites, Athena has been convinced by Telemachus to reach out to her friend

God Games

Athena decides she CAN "Replace [her guilt] and light up the world" by helping Odysseus

She leads from the heart with the other gods! ESPECIALLY with Ares & her declaration of Telemachus being her friend!

All 5 of her opponents respond well to Athena's arguments, she's not just using logic, she IS appealing to their heart/sympathy as well, because SHE is doing this from a place of emotion/caring

"He can still build a future with those who miss him" "His son's my friend"

"Never once has he cheated on his wife"

Once she wins, we get Athena "goddess of wisdom/master of war" once more.

She declares herself triumphant in Zeus' game & demands her prize (which sets Zeus off)

But when Zeus strikes her down, Athena humbles herself, she lowers her guard, she leads from the heart, and she doesn't demand. She doesnt even ask. She pleads for Zeus to let Odysseus go. Heart/affection on full display.

Athena gets NOTHING from this. She's no longer demanding for a reward/recognition as the witty winner of Zeus' game, ("I played your game & won" vs "Please, let him go") just asking for Odysseus to receive help

THIS is when Zeus relents. Not when he strikes her down so hard that Ares fears her dead. Not (and I hate using visuals to analyze MUSIC, but I'll give myself an exception) when Athena's armor starts to crumble. Not when she bleeds. Not when she crawls. When Athena pleads for Odysseus, that's when Zeus falters.

And

Don't read past here if you don't want spoilers/titles/speculation for upcoming sagas!

It works.

We KNOW Hermes will be sent to Odysseus to get him off Ogygia.

And, while it seems (at least to me) that in "Wouldn't You Like" Hermes appears to Odysseus of his own accord/for funsies, "You're being given one final option" (from "Dangerous") sounds like this isnt a social visit.

Hermes is here as a messenger. And I doubt the gods are going behind Zeus back for this one.

My guess? Zeus relents. With the caveat that they'll intervene to get Calypso to let Odysseus go BUT, he has to make it off the island/back home by himself.

But still. Athena's heart-felt plea works. Her pride as the clever goddess of wisdom who beat her father's game got her struck down. But leading from the heart & pleading for her friend's release succeeds.

And this is why I think (narratively) we need to close off the themes established in "Open Arms"

At the end of this post here, i talk about how it'd be nice to get some sort of closure for Polites' philosophy. Maybe with Odysseus' final confrontation with Poseidon. Maybe with Telemachus.

But after the Wisdom Saga?

I no longer think it'd simply be nice. I think its necessary for narrative closure.

The Wisdom Saga just showed us Ruthlessness was not mercy for Odysseus, who is tormented by the deaths of his crew & is now suicidal after being trapped on Ogygia for 7 years.

Ruthlessness was not mercy for Athena, who can no longer sleep at night.

Ruthlessness does not get results for any of the main characters featured in the Wisdom Saga

The philosophy Polites describes in "Open Arms" however, DOES get results.

Its what leads Athena to help Telemachus. Its how Telemachus convinces Athena to reach out to her friend. It's how Athena convinces the other gods (possibly even Zeus) to help/release Odysseus.

I now think we need one last callback to those themes. Either by Athena, by admitting she was wrong back in "Warrior of the Mind" and "My Goodbye" to demand Odysseus turn off his heart (she was not able to turn off her own heart!! She can't sleep at night! + heart is how she wins the God Games!)

OR by Telemachus, Odysseus optimistic son, who (as of the Wisdom Saga) has nothing monstrous or ruthless about him.

Maybe Odysseus gets carried away as he kills the suitors, or goes after someone who surrenders & Telemachus steps in to rein him in.

Maybe Telemachus simply reminds Odysseus of Polites.

Idk.

But I can't see "Open Arms" featuring so heavily in the Wisdom Saga's themes/narrative for there to be narrative satisfaction without one final, definitive callback in the Ithaca Saga

[ramblingoak]

The Cardinal's Bride, Chapter 12: Diavolessa

~~ Please visit The Outlaw Brides Masterpost to catch up and read more stories from this world ~~

Thank you to @tasty-ribz for the wanted poster, @ghuleh-recs for the collage and @gothdaddyissues for the dividers!  For some more amazing fanart check out: @missygoesmeow (1 / 2), @snail-shell2335  here, @vahvco here, @ghulehgwen here, @rabidghoul here, @nocterish here, @enjoy-my-swearing​ ( 1 / 2 ), @blacktie-whitenoise (1 /2), @z-xmyers (1/2/3/4), @foxybouquet ( 1 / 2 ), @delulluart here, _simpera_ on instagram and valkyrieinpink on twitter.  Also thank you to @kissingghouls for all her help and emotional support.

Cardinal Copia x Female Reader: Copia is desperate to find you before you end up in Saltarian's clutches.

Warnings: violence (the usual cowboy violence but Reader is put into danger as well and hurt) a lot of angst and smut (apologies for the vagueness but I'm trying to avoid spoiling anything), nsfw 18+ only mdni, 7,900 words

“You look like shit.”

“Grazie, fratello.”

Secondo snorted, shaking his head once before taking a swig of his whiskey.  The two of them were quiet as they sat in his office.  Terzo was dabbing at his face with a wet rag to clean up the blood leftover from Copia beating him when they were out on the road.  He finally gave up, throwing the bloody rag onto the floor and leaning into the back of the couch. 

“You couldn’t keep your mouth shut, could you?”

“Copia’s smarter than you give him credit for.  He already didn’t want to be out there anyway.”

“Usually he can’t wait to get back on the road.”

“Well usually he doesn’t have a pretty girl waiting for him.” 

Secondo groaned, reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose.  

“Think of all you two could accomplish if you thought less with your dicks and more with your brains.”

“Why are you dragging me into this?!  I wasn’t the one that fell in love with Saltarian’s fucking fiancé!”

“You’ve had your own issues with lovers.”  He rubbed his chest idly, stopping when he felt the familiar chain of his grucifix under the fabric.  “I can’t believe you both gave away a family heirloom.”

“For the last time mine was stolen.”

“Then get it back.”

“That was over ten years ago!  Who knows where she is now.”  

“Considering she was able to steal it from under The Morningstar’s nose I’m sure she’s still out there.  Probably robbing banks now.”

Terzo was silent for a moment, a thoughtful look on his face when Secondo glanced at him.  

“I’ve thought about it.  Looking for her.”  Secondo smirked but when Terzo noticed he quickly shook his head.  “Only to get my grucifix back.  Nothing more.”

“Whatever you say, fratellino.”

Quiet once more settled over them both.  The brothers each lost in their own thoughts.  Terzo eventually groaned and sat up, resting his elbows on his knees and turning to look at his brother.  

“Do you believe him?”  When Secondo raised an eyebrow he elaborated.  “Copia.  That he loves her.”

“Sì.  I do.”  

“What are we going to do about it?”

Secondo was quiet again, staring down at the amber liquid in his glass.  He couldn’t get Copia’s face out of his mind.  The last time his brother had looked that determined was when they were all hiding in the woods, the smoke from their burning abbey heavy over their heads.  Secondo knew then that Copia would stop at nothing to protect his princess, to protect the woman he loved. 

He also knew he had a choice to make now, one that would have far reaching consequences for them all.  Was he ready to fight again?  Was he ready to possibly lose more of his family?  This could be their last chance to get their lives back.  Their last chance to get their church back.  

Secondo wasn’t sure if he still believed anymore.  It was hard to after the last decade.  After everything that had happened, things none of them deserved.  He had built a life here for everyone but there had always been something missing.  Something that helped keep them all together has one.  

He knew what he needed to do.  

“We’re going to fight.”  He stood up, pulling his grucifix out from under his shirt and letting it hang out in the open.  “We’re going to kill Saltarian once and for all.”

“Pay up shithead.”

“What the fuck are you on about?”

“Our bet.  I won.”

“There are a lot of bets between us so you need to be more specif—ow!”

“Copia admitted he loved her!  It was amazing, I think Swiss even cried a little.” 

Swiss gamely nodded his head, grinning when Dewdrop turned to glare at him. 

“Well I didn’t hear it so it doesn’t count.”

“The fuck it doesn’t, Swiss and I both heard it.  Even Secondo did!  You can ask him when we get back.”

“Uh, no thanks.  I’m not sure anyone that brings up Copia or Princess around him will survive.”   Dewdrop glanced up towards where Copia and Aether were riding a bit ahead of the group.  “Is he even gonna let us come back?”

“He better, I left my favorite gun there.”   Sunshine and Dew shared a grin before she held her hand out towards him.  “Now pay up.”

“Lucifer’s balls, fine.”  He rummaged in the pockets of his coat before he came up with a crumpled bill, balling it up even more and throwing it at her head.  “Don’t spend it all in one place.”

The three of them quieted down after that, all lost in their own thoughts.  Sunshine kept her eyes on Copia and Aether, watching how Copia kept getting more and more tense the longer it took them to find Princess.  Rain had picked up her trail heading south, but as of yet they hadn’t run into any other signs of her.  Right now Rain and Mountain were scouting ahead, trying to see if she had stayed on the road.

Sunshine was hoping they didn’t find out she was dragged off of it.

“What’s going on now?”

Swiss’s voice snapped Sunshine out of her brooding and she focused on Copia again, noticing that he and Aether had stopped.  They seemed to be having a heated conversation so she spurred her horse and quickly headed their way. 

“I don’t want to talk about this now.”

“Then when?  Look, Boss, I’m not trying to talk you out of anything, I just want to know what you’re thinking.”

“Aether right now there is only one thing going through my mind and that is that I have to find her.” 

“I know, I know.”  Aether caught Sunshine’s eyes and sighed.  “We’re going to find her Boss, I promise.” 

“Then keep moving!  We’re not going to find her standing around arguing.”  

Copia’s shoulders sagged then and Sunshine could see how exhausted he was, how worried.  She moved closer to Copia, wanting to comfort him in some way but a sharp whistle got her attention.  They all looked up the trail to see Rain and Mountain in the distance, both focusing down on the ground. 

“Do you think they found her trail?”

Copia didn’t even bother answering Aether, he snapped Brizio’s reins and took off towards them.  Sunshine glanced towards Rain again and saw him waving his arms, almost like he wanted them to stay away.  Her blood instantly ran cold and she shouted after Copia.

“No!  Copia stay here!”

She groaned when he didn’t stop, instead riding after him as fast as she could.  He had already reached the two Ghouls and she could see Mountain trying in vain to push him away from where Rain was standing. 

It wasn’t until she got there that she realized why. 

She could smell it first, the sharp smell of blood.  As she got closer she could see that the ground was soaked with it.  Copia was taking a few steps forward, his boots sinking into the wet earth.  His hands were shaking, clenched into fists as his eyes stayed on the ground.  Rain walked up to him, a hat in his hand that Sunshine easily recognized.  The same one Princess had been wearing since they left the farmhouse. 

It was stained with blood. 

Copia only had it in his hands for a moment before it slipped from his fingers and he fell to the ground.  Sunshine was rushing over to him in an instant, her hands falling to his shoulders.  The smell was stronger now and the sight of how much blood there was made her feel sick.  She lowered her head, squeezing Copia’s shoulders when she felt him start to tremble. 

“Copia, I-“

“It’s too much.”

“What?”  She crouched down next to him, freezing when she saw the tears running down his cheeks.  “What’s too much?”

“The blood.  She’s lost too much.”

Sunshine stayed silent, not wanting to admit the same out loud.  It was too much, too much for anybody to lose.  She turned to look behind her when she heard footsteps and she watched as Swiss, Aether and Dew stopped a few feet away, their hats in their hands.  When she looked back she noticed Rain walking along the edge of the trail, stopping and kneeling down after a moment.  He turned her way, pointing down at the ground before disappearing into the underbrush. 

She gave Copia one last squeeze and then stood up, walking over to where he entered,  noticing that the grass was flattened down.  Her stomach turned thinking of Princess’s body being dragged somewhere and left for the vultures.  Tears started to prick at her eyes and she turned back, meeting Copia’s gaze as he watched her from his knees. 

“This is my fault.”

“Copia, no.”

“I got her into this mess, I took her away from the life she was supposed to have.”

“A life she didn’t want!”  Sunshine moved back to his side and knelt in front of him.  “She wanted to be with you.  She loved you.”

“And now she’s dead.”  The words were practically spit from him and he dropped his hands onto the ground, digging his fingers into the bloody soil.  “They killed her.  They took her away from me.”

His voice was seething with rage and she found herself thinking back to that day of the attack, of the fire.  The only other time she had seen him like this.

She opened her mouth to try and reassure him but the sound of someone rushing through the grass stopped her.  Everyone turned to see Rain sprinting onto the trail, his chest heaving and a knife clutched in his hand.

A knife Sunshine recognized.

“It’s not her!”  Rain grinned and stumbled over to Copia, grabbing his arms and yanking him to his feet.  “It’s not her.  She’s alive.”

Your head hurt.

It was hard to keep your eyes open.  Every time you opened them a wave of dizziness hit you.  There was a constant dull throb, an ache that seemed to echo through your whole body.  It hurt, it hurt so much but you were trying to be strong.  You couldn’t give up, you refused to lose hope. 

You didn’t want the bastards to see you cry. 

Their laughter echoed around the small camp.  You weren’t sure exactly how many there were.  At least three of them had met you on the trail but there could have been more waiting further on.  They had rode up right when you had stopped your horse and been about to turn around.  Copia had to have been back by then and all you wanted to do was see him again.  To have him hold you and tell you everything was going to be ok. 

“She awake yet?”

You shivered at the voice nearby.  It was the same man that had knocked you out.  One moment you had been fighting off a man that had gotten behind you on the horse and the next you had turned to see the butt of a rifle descending upon you.  The ground crunched in front of you and you did your best to steady your breathing, trying not to give away that you were awake. 

“Leave her, we’ll deal with her in the morning.” 

“What if I want to deal with her now?”  A shadow fell over your face, blocking the fire.  You could smell his awful stench and it made you nearly gag around the cloth between your teeth.  “I thought Salty was gonna kill her anyway?”

“Who the fuck knows, he changes his damn mind every day.” 

“Wasn’t Goore supposed to nab her before?” 

You felt a hand on your head and fought to stop from jerking away. 

“They were supposed to, yeah.  But The Cardinal kicked his ass.  Took out like twenty guys too.”

“The fucking Cardinal.”  A glob of moisture hit your cheek and you realized the man had spit on you.  “You sweet on him, girl?” 

His fingers suddenly tightened in your hair and you cried out.  You reached up to try to pull him off but he grabbed the rope around your wrists and slammed them back onto the ground.  The man was grinning at you, when you managed to glare at him.  The pain was even more intense with how hard he was pulling on your hair. 

“Hey!  We aren’t supposed to touch her!”

The man holding you was abruptly shoved away and you yelped when he managed one last yank on your hair.  Tears were falling down your face, soaking the rag around your mouth.  You heard them scuffle close by and you pulled away as far as you could, trying to steer clear of them. 

“What does it matter?  We can just say she showed up like that!  Blame it on The Cardinal.”

“Salty ain’t gonna believe that and you know it.  He’s already gonna be pissed about her face.” 

“Well no one else was doing anything!  I wasn’t gonna drag her back to camp kicking and screaming.”  You dared to look over at the men, flinching when you saw their eyes on you.  “We should just kill her and be done with it.”

“I fucking told you Salty wants her alive.  He made some deal with that asshole at the casino.” 

“Fuck.  Fine, whatever.”  He shoved past the man and walked by, kicking dirt on you as he went.  “But if she freaks out again I’m slicing her throat.” 

Things quieted down around you as he walked off so you tried to even your breathing.  The pain wasn’t getting any better but if you wanted to get out of this you’d need to try to fight through it.  You couldn’t help but think of Copia and what he would do when he found your note.  Would he believe the things you said?  Would he even be coming after you? 

“Hey, girl.”  The one who seemed to be the leader crouched down in front of you.  While you were grateful he had gotten the other man to leave you alone there was no kindness in his eyes.  “Do me a favor and stay put, got it?”

You nodded, wincing when your head swam at the motion.  He didn’t move for a moment and you were starting to worry he was gonna hurt you like the other man did but he finally stood up.  His eyes were cold as they looked down at you and you felt like crying again. 

“No one’s gonna save you so you best behave.  We’re getting paid a pretty penny to bring you to Saltarian alive.”  He smirked then, slipping a knife out of a small sheath at his belt and pointing it down at you.  “But we’ll also get paid well even if you’re dead.”

He didn’t wait to see a response, he simply turned and ambled away.  The tension seeped out of you then but you stayed as still as possible.  It was impossible to stop your tears now and they ran down your face freely, pooling in the dirt beneath you.  Silently you begged for help, begged to be rescued and allowed to escape from the fate others had chosen for you. 

You begged to see Copia one last time. 

“There’s ten of them but only three at the camp with her.”

Copia nodded, taking in everything Mountain and Rain had been relaying to him.  The ten men weren’t going to be a problem, Copia knew they could be easily taken care of.  It was the fact that you were there as well, vulnerable, that made things difficult.

“Where’s Princess?”

Sunshine had stayed close to him since they had stumbled upon the blood on the ground.  Acting like an anchor almost.  He appreciated it more than he could say, he appreciated all of his Ghouls right now so much.  They had stuck with him for so long and through so much.  

They deserved an easier life.

“She’s on the ground by the fire.”  Mountain met Copia’s eyes when he glanced up at him.  “We didn’t see her move but she’s tied up pretty good.”

“Probably just sleeping.”  Sunshine fiddled with one of her knives, slipping it into the sleeve of her coat.  “Or unconscious.”  

“We should have Dew and Swiss snipe the lookouts while the rest of us get closer.  Take ‘em by surprise.”

Copia nodded silently, his thoughts still caught up with the image of you hurt and tied up on the ground.  He flinched when a hand brushed his shoulder, turning to meet Sunshine’s eyes.

“They’ll probably leave first thing in the morning, we should hit them right before then.”  Sunshine stood up and slung her rifle over her shoulder.  “Before they’re ready to go.”

“I don’t want to wait any longer, she could be seriously hurt.”

“If she was seriously hurt they just would have killed her.”  Mountain held up his hands when Copia glared at him.  “They wouldn’t waste time bringing her body all the way to Saltarian’s.  They’d just say you killed her and dumped her body somewhere.”

“It doesn’t matter!  She could be hurt and I don’t want her to be alone with them any more than she has to!”

“Damn it Copia, just listen to us!  We don’t want her to be in any danger either but the best way to avoid her getting hurt any more than she might already be is to wait till the right moment.”

Copa turned away from Sunshine and Mountain, his shoulders sagging as their words sunk in.  They were right, he knew they were right but it was killing him to leave you alone there when you were so close.  He sighed and turned back around, ready to accede their point.

“Fine, we’ll wai–”

A sharp yell rang out from the camp and everyone’s eyes whipped in that direction.  Copia took a few steps forward, his legs suddenly shaking from fear.  In front of them the grass started to shake and Dew flung himself into the small clearing everyone had gathered in.

“She’s running!”

Despite his fear Copia couldn’t help but grin, turning towards the rest of his Ghouls and nodding.

“Then let’s find her first.”

Copia would be so mad at you.

Although technically you weren’t running away from him so you supposed it was okay.  You just couldn’t stand to be around those men any longer.  It seemed like they were getting more and more irritated at your presence as the night had worn on.  The man that seemed to be in charge didn’t have as much control over them as you liked and when he had said he was going to sleep for a few hours you had decided that was your best chance.

Running away was much easier without a dress on and you crashed through the vegetation around the camp.  The moon was high enough to help light your way but even then you still had no idea where you were going.  No idea the direction you were stumbling in.  Not that it really mattered, you just needed to get away.  You’d worry about where you were once you were safe.

“Get back here!”

You made the mistake of turning to look behind you, the dark voice startling you.  It was the man that had spit on you earlier and you shuddered, trying to move even faster to get away.  He wasn’t at the camp when you had run and you had hoped he’d be too far away to catch up to you.  

Unfortunately you weren’t that lucky.

He continued to shout after you, promising to make you regret taking off from camp.  The fear started to take a hold of you again and you felt tears prick at your eyes.  No matter how much you begged your legs to move faster it wasn’t enough.  The man was getting closer and closer until finally you felt his hands grab at your arms and yank you back against him.

“Don’t touch me!”  

The man grunted when you kicked back at him, your foot connecting with his knee.  With an angry growl he tried to wrap an arm around your waist but you slammed your head back against his, grinning when you heard the sickening crunch of his nose.  Your glee was short lived and with a curse he shoved you down onto the ground.

“You’re gonna pay for that.”  He reached for the gun at his belt and pulled it out of its holster, pulling the hammer back and pointing it down at you.  “Salty will just have to find another fiancé.”

You squeezed your eyes shut, waiting for the shot.  Pictures of Copia appeared in your mind and you let out a broken sob.  You loved him so much and now you’d never get to tell hi–

A loud shot rang out and your entire body flinched, waiting for the inevitable pain of the bullet.  When seconds passed with nothing you slowly opened your eyes, expecting to see the man still there glaring at you.  Instead you saw him falling to the side, his eyes wide and unseeing.  A figure emerged behind him, stepping into the moonlight and you let out a heavy sob when a familiar set of mismatched eyes became visible.

“What did I say about running away?”

You couldn’t help but let out a laugh but you were quickly overcome with emotion again.  Your hands reached out for him, desperate for his touch.  Desperate to be held by him again.  Copia quickly obliged, dropping to his knees next to you and gathering you up in his arms.  He pressed kisses into your hair as you cried and whispered promise after promise that he’d never let you get hurt again.

The journey back to the casino was mostly quiet.

When you and Copia had gotten back to the camp the sun was starting to rise in the sky.  The Ghouls milling around and cleaning things up.  Sunshine had been the first to rush over, enveloping you and a long hug that brought more tears to your eyes.  When she pulled away she was holding your dagger out to you, the one you had shoved into the first man that had tried to grab you.

“You did what you had to, Princess.”

You nodded, leaning back into the comfort of Copia’s embrace for a moment.  The other Ghouls came up one after the other.  The biggest surprise for you was Dewdrop, he had thrown his arms around both you and Copia with a wide grin on his face.  Copia had to shove him off when he lingered too long but he fell back with a laugh, winking at you before he let Aether take his place.

The calm Ghoul didn’t embrace you, instead he took your hands and started gently unwrapping the rope that was tied tightly around them.  You hissed as they came off, your skin red and raw underneath.  Copia kept an arm around you as Aether rubbed a salve over the skin, quickly wrapping them in some clean cloth with a promise to clean them again when you got back to the casino.

Your other wounds were given a quick check before Aether nodded at Copia and walked away.  Your knuckles were fairly scraped up with a few larger cuts across them.  The wound on your scalp would definitely need to be cleaned but thankfully it didn’t hurt as much anymore.  The throbbing in your skull had faded to a dull ache as well.  You couldn’t wait to get back to the casino and hopefully have a long bath.

You had planned on asking about what had happened with Terzo and what they had done when they’d gotten back to the casino but as soon as you were settled in front of Copia on Brizio you couldn’t keep your eyes open.  The exhaustion of everything that had happened since you had left The Ministry caught up with you and you were asleep in seconds.  You didn’t even fully wake up until you were riding back into town, the casino large and looming in front of you.

Mountain came over, helping you off Brizio easily.  You were turning to wait for Copia but Cumulus was rushing over, Aurora hot on her heels.

“Come on Princess, let’s get you cleaned up.”  

Copia dropped down next to you and prodded you over to the Ghoulettes.

“Go on, let them take care of you.”  He pulled you close for a moment, not seeming to care about all the eyes on the both of you.  “I’ll meet you in my room soon, yeah?”

You nodded and took Cumulus’s hand, letting her pull you towards the Ghoul’s building.  Her and Aurora chatted while they led you to a room full of steaming bathtubs, quickly helping you out of your dirty clothes and into one of the tubs.  You let their words wash over you, too tired to speak much yourself.  In truth your mind was too busy to pay attention anyway.  Thinking about what might happen now with Copia’s brothers, with Saltarian.  About what might happen with Copia himself.

The sun was completely gone when they were done.  Aurora handed you a familiar dark red shirt and you blushed when she grinned at you.  They gave you a robe next and led you up the back set of stairs to avoid the common area.  It wasn’t as loud as you had expected and you imagined that most everyone was probably tired themselves or working in the casino.  The door to Copia’s room was familiar and welcome and you gladly accepted Aurora’s hug when she let you in and left.

You tried not to be disappointed that Copia wasn’t there.

His room was much like it was when you had left it the other night, although it was clear that he had left it in a rush.  You made your way to the bed, dropping the robe on the floor and sitting down.  There was a soft knock on the door and you quickly grabbed a blanket, getting your bare legs covered right as Copia walked in.

“How are you feeling, Principessa?”

“Good.  Better.”  You gave him a soft smile as he walked over, your eyes taking him in.  He was only in his pants and a button up shirt, his suspenders clinging to his shoulders.  “Clean.”

He laughed softly as he knelt at your feet, his eyes roaming over the blanket for a moment before setting a bowl of water and a rag down onto the floor.

“Let’s see those hands, eh?”

Copia was quiet as he cleaned your knuckles.

You stayed quiet too, content to just be close to him.  To be someplace safe with him.  He had scrubbed his face of the grime from the road and the fight so you were able to see him without his paint.  A rare treat that let you see the bags under his eyes, the toll that the life he had been living had taken on him.  You let yourself imagine a different life for him, one that had no battles and no worries.  A peaceful life in the country maybe, on a farm with room for his Ghouls...

And hopefully room for you too.

He pressed his rag into a deeper cut and you hissed, pulling your hand away to cradle it against your chest.

“Mi dispiace, Principessa.  I’m not sure I have the most gentle hands for this.”  He dropped the rag into the bowl of water and sat back on his heels, his hands resting on your blanket covered knees.  “Let me go get Aether.  Or Sunshine?  They’ll do a better job than me.”

“No!”  You dropped your hands over his, covering his own scraped up skin with your own.  “Please, no.  Don’t leave me.”

“I’m not much of a nurse.”

“I don’t need you to be anything, Copia.  I just need you here with me.”

He leaned forward then, moving back onto his knees and dropping his head into your lap.  You felt his lips brush against the backs of your hands, ghosting along the cuts and bruises you had gotten.  His shoulders shook slightly and you couldn’t help but fall forward yourself, burying your nose in his soft hair.

“I’ll never let you get hurt again.”  

Copia leaned back, freeing one of his hands from yours to cup your cheek.  His thumb brushed across your skin briefly before he pulled you close and pressed his lips to yours.  The kiss was one you didn’t think you would ever forget.  It was soft and full of promises, promises neither of you had spoken aloud yet but they were there between you regardless.  All too quickly he pulled away, a soft smile on his face.

It was your favorite smile of his.

“I’m ok, I’m safe.  Thanks to you.”  He ducked his head down like he always did in moments like this but you let him.  Deciding a little teasing would help ease the heavy emotions between you.  “Although I think the Ghouls did most of the work.”

Copia laughed as he took the rag up again, squeezing the excess water out before taking one of your hands once more.

“I don’t know, I think you were doing pretty good on your own.”

You couldn’t help but grin, proud that Copia thought so.  Some of his hair fell across his forehead and you reached out with your other hand to brush it back, letting your fingers linger against his skin a little longer than necessary.  He looked up from cleaning your hand and caught your eyes.  Slowly he turned his head to press a kiss to your palm before looking back down to your hand.

As he worked you let your mind wander, running over every moment you had shared with Copia since you had met.  You had to stifle a laugh at that.  ‘Met’ wasn’t exactly the best way to describe your initial meeting.  The man had kidnapped you after all.  The same man you had spent your nights dreaming about.  An escape from a world of being used as a bargaining chip in your father’s business deals and a future of being something purely ornamental.

But all that changed with a wink and a grin from the man at your feet.

“I’m pretty sure I broke that one guy’s nose.”  Copia chuckled, shaking his head while he muttered something in Italian.  “What was that?”

“Nothing important.”

You poked his leg with your foot, the blanket moving out of the way to expose part of your bare leg.  Copia stopped cleaning your hand when he saw it, not moving at all except for the flexing of his jaw.  

“Tell me.”  He still hadn’t looked away from your leg, like his brain was having trouble processing the knowledge that you were naked save for his borrowed shirt.  You gave him another poke, this time jamming your toes against him a little harder.  “Tell me right now.”

“Have you always been this demanding?”

“Yes.  Now tell me what you said.”  When he remained silent you attempted to poke him again but he grabbed your foot, easily holding onto it when you tried to pull it away.  You shivered when he ran his calloused thumb along the side.  “Copia.”  

“Diavolessa.”

“In English!”

Copia finally looked away from your leg, slowly running his eyes up your body until he was looking right into yours.  His soft smile had now been replaced by that insufferable grin of his and despite how much it annoyed you it was hard not to match it with one of your own.

“Per favore.”

“Per fav–oh!  Copia, no!”  

Your words ended in a shriek as he dug his fingers into the bottom of your foot.  You fell back on your elbows and tried to kick away from him, desperate to escape the tickling sensation.  With a deep laugh he finally relented and let go.  Your back hit the wall beside his bed as you scrambled to get away, the blanket completely falling from your legs and getting pushed to the side with the movement.

He stood up then, his eyes dark as they stayed fixed on you.  Where your boldness came from you weren’t sure but you spread your legs slowly before tucking them under you and rising to your knees.  Copia reached up and shrugged out of his suspenders, his fingers quickly going to work on the buttons of his shirt.

“Come here, she-devil.”

“Per favore.”

His smile was brilliant and it had you moving closer despite him not saying anything.  When you were close enough he quickly reached out and grabbed you around your waist, yanking your body against his.  Your hands landed on his chest to keep yourself steady, your fingers tangling in the dark hair that covered him.  He dipped his head down but you quickly moved yours back, raising your eyebrow when he let out a heavy sigh.

“Please, Principessa.”

You both moved at the same time, your mouths meeting in a desperate kiss.  One of his hands dropped to cover your ass and when his fingers flexed against your flesh you moaned into his mouth.  The noise had him breaking away with a moan of his own but he stayed close, sliding both of his hands down your back until they were gripping the back of your thighs.  

“Copia, wha-”  

He yanked your legs out from under you and when your back hit his bed again you laughed, nearly giddy with happiness.  Copia finished unbuttoning his shirt and pulled it over his head, immediately unbuckling his belt and then working on the buttons of his pants.  In the next moment he was naked in front of you, standing proudly in the moonlight but with fidgeting fingers at his sides.

Copia was breathtaking.  It didn’t matter that you had never seen anyone else like this, Copia was the only one you needed to see this way.  His shoulders and arms were strong, well muscled from years of work.  Your eyes moved down his chest, lingering on his tattoo for a moment before running down to his soft belly and sides.  His thick thighs flexed as he climbed onto the bed, slowly moving between your legs and then reaching out to grip the bottom of his shirt you wore.

When he hesitated you took over and pulled the deep red shirt you loved to steal over your head.  Copia looked you over much like you had done to him, his eyes lingering on the bruises you had received.  He was hesitating again, like he was afraid to move, afraid to touch you.  It was strange not seeing him confident and cocky.  You reached out for his hands, tangling your fingers together and pulling them to cover your heart.

“Principessa…”

“I am here, we are here.  Safe and together.”  You lifted your foot and ran it up and down his thigh.  “Please don’t make me wait anymore.”

“I won’t.  I’ll give you everything.”  He pulled a hand away and slipped his arm around your waist, tugging you across the bed so your head was laying on his pillows.  “Anything you want.”

You reached up to cup his cheek, your fingers brushing against his sideburn.  Copia lowered himself down to settle against you, holding himself up by his elbows.  The moonlight caught his eyes and like always the white one gave that almost otherworldly glow.  You trailed your fingers across his cheek and down to his mouth, running them along his full bottom lip before dropping it down to your chest.  

“I just want you.”

It was like a dam broke between you, Copia swiftly lowered his head to yours and took your mouth in a rough kiss.  Oh you would never tire of this, of the way he seemed to use his entire body to kiss you.  He buried a hand in your hair and tilted your head so he could deepen it.  You opened your mouth under his and his tongue immediately tangled with yours.  

At the same time his hips started grinding down against you, his hard cock brushing across your lower belly.  You could feel him leaking already as the tip moved across your skin, trailing the proof of how turned on he was.  Of how turned on you were making him.  That knowledge had you pressing harder back against him, hooking a leg around the back of his leg to try to get as close as possible.

Copia pulled away, groaning when you ground up towards him again.  He began nipping at your lips, causing little zings of pleasure to shoot through you.  When you tried to capture his lips again he smiled and pulled away just out of reach.

“Patience, Principessa.”  He began to drop kisses down your chin and along your jawline.  His teeth nipped at your earlobe, sucking it between his lips to soothe the hurt with his tongue before letting go.  “I’ve been waiting for this for quite some time.”

“Since wh-oh, since when?”

He didn’t answer at first, content to keep kissing you.  His lips trailed down your neck to your shoulders before moving to your collar bones.  You hissed when he nipped there too but he quickly ran his tongue across the mark, smirking when he looked up to see you watching him.

“Probably since that first day when you busted my nose.”

You snorted, covering your mouth with your hand to try to stifle your laughter.  It didn’t last long though, Copia continued his path down your chest until his mouth was hovering over a breast.  His hot breath had you trembling with anticipation, waiting for him to continue his worship of your body.  It seemed like forever before he peeked his tongue out and flicked it across your nipple, eliciting a sharp gasp from you.

“Copia, don’t tease.  I just…”

His mouth dropped down, pulling the tip of your breast into his mouth and sucking.  Your body bucked off the bed and you buried your hands in his hair to keep him there.  The hot, wet suction of his mouth felt so good and it only amplified when he nipped at your nipple.  You mewled when he pulled off with a pop, your hands trying to keep him close to your chest.

“In my church, Principessa, this is one way we worship.”  He leaned down and pulled your nipple between his lips, hollowing his cheeks and sucking roughly.  Copia slid his free hand up your chest and took hold of your other breast, massaging it between his calloused fingers for a moment before he pulled his mouth away again.  “You are my altar.”  

Your body was trembling in earnest now as he moved lower, his mouth and tongue leaving a trail across your belly button and then stopping right above your cunt.  He pressed his hands against the insides of your thighs, pushing them apart so you were open before him.  You watched Copia lower his head and take a deep breath right over you before he groaned deep in his chest.  

He lowered his head even more until his nose brushed against your clit, teasing around it a few times before sliding his tongue out and across the small nub.  Your hips bucked up immediately, desperate for more contact.  Copia must have been just as desperate as you because he quickly went at it again, tonguing your clit over and over again until it was red and swollen.  

You were a whimpering mess already, your thighs quivering beneath his hands as his mouth worshiped you.  He pulled your clit between his lips, suckling it like he had done your nipple.  The sensation was racing you towards your orgasm and you buried a hand in his hair to try to keep him there.  You wanted to come so badly, you wanted to hit that peak under his mouth.  Copia groaned around your clit when your nails dug into his scalp and after one last hard suck you finally got what you needed, your orgasm tearing through you and making you cry out.

As you laid there panting Copia was still making noises against your cunt, his mouth now lower and his tongue licking long stripes between your lips.  Your hand fell out of his hair and you instead covered one of his hands on your thighs.  You barely had the strength to do anything but watch him, watch as your wetness covered his nose and mouth.  His mustache was soaked and shining in the moonlight as well and it tickled your sensitive skin as he continued to mouth at you.

When he tongued across your trembling entrance you finally moved, your hips jumping up to meet his mouth involuntarily.  Copia chuckled darkly, his eyes finally leaving your wet, pink flesh to catch your gaze.  He didn’t look away as he pressed his tongue against it, his eyes only drifting closed when he was able to push it inside of you and lap at the inside of your walls.  

“Ah!  Copia!”

He kept his mouth on you but you could feel his growl echo into you.  Your cries of his name spurred him on and he lapped roughly at you, closing his lips around your entrance and sucking, like he was desperate for every drop of your previous release.  You didn’t even notice one of his hands leaving your thigh before his mouth pulled away and two fingers prodded at your entrance.  They easily slipped inside and he went to work thrusting them in and out of you, scissoring his fingers off and on to stretch you.

To get you ready for him.

Your blood was so loud in your ears you didn’t even register Copia was speaking at first.  His voice was low as he continued to pump his fingers.

“...mine, Principessa and I will give you everything I can.  Anything in my power.”  

Tears pricked at your eyes as you watched him, as you listened to him.  You were close to another orgasm and you were absolutely desperate for it, your hips moving to meet his thrusting fingers.  Copia pulled his hand off your thigh and gripped the base of his cock, letting out an almost pained groan as he squeezed himself.  The sight of him nearly losing control of himself was all it took for you to hit your peak again and you came with a shuddering cry, your inner walls contracting around his fingers.

You weren’t sure how long you drifted in that zone of pleasure.  The brush of lips across your cheeks finally brought you back to yourself and when you opened your eyes Copia was right there, gazing down at you with such a look of fondness you nearly had to close your eyes again.  He must have wiped his mouth off but his mustache was still in a state and you reached up with a shaking hand to help get it under control, smiling when he rolled his eyes.

“Anything in your power?”

“Sì.”

His cock brushed against you, still hard and leaking.  You spread your legs to try to open yourself up for him again.  Needing to feel him against you.  Needing to feel him in you.

“Only you, Copia.  That’s all.”  He smiled, ducking his head down for a moment to collect himself.  When he raised it up again his smile was wide and you couldn’t help but match it while you brushed his hair off his forehead again.  “At least for right now.”

He dropped his head into the crook of your shoulder, his body quaking with laughter.  You took the opportunity to wrap a leg around his waist and press yourself against his cock.  His laughter turned into a deep groan and he quickly rose up to kiss you roughly.  The taste of yourself on his lips had you whimpering, chasing the taste with your tongue.  You angled your hips so his cock brushed against your cunt and he broke away quickly with a growl.

“Diavolessa.”

You couldn’t find the strength to respond, you had become so desperate for him.  Desperate for him to enter you and make you his.  You continued to rock your hips against him, wanting him so badly you felt delirious with it.  When he began to move back you tightened your leg, worried he was going to move away.  Copia whispered something soft in Italian towards you before dropping another kiss to your lips.

He stayed close, but moved away enough to settle more comfortably between your legs.  You watched with bated breath as he stroked his cock, his eyes briefly falling shut.  Feeling bold you reached out and covered his hand with yours, helping him pleasure himself.  He called you a she-devil again under his breath but you just smiled and continued to touch him.  His cock was hot and throbbing, twitching almost desperately towards you.

“Are you ready, Principessa?”  

You nodded desperately, your mouth falling open when he gently removed your hand from his cock and began to press himself against your entrance.  Your body welcomed him, opening around the head of his cock and stretching as he pushed inside.  You wrapped your arms around his back and clung to him.  Worried that if you let go he would disappear and that this would be a dream.  A sob left you and Copia immediately pulled back so he could see your face.

“I’m sorry, I just…I thought I wouldn’t see you again and now…”

“You’re not going to get rid of me that easily.”  

Copia started to pull out, his cock dragging along your walls slowly for just a moment before he pushed back in.  He continued to move like that until he was finally fully inside of you, his hips flush against yours.  You kept your arms tight around him, holding him close so his face was hovering over yours.

The moonlight still highlighted his face and your eyes traced his freckles as your body adjusted to him being inside of you.  The silver in his hair shone just like his white eye and you couldn’t stop yourself from smiling up at him.  You had to tell him, you couldn’t hold back anymore.

“I love you.”

You weren’t sure what to expect, you weren’t even sure he felt the same but it didn’t matter.  You needed him to know.  Copia let out a breath, lowering his head to kiss you briefly before pulling up with a smile on his face.

“E ti amo.”

He leaned down to kiss you again, over and over along your lips and cheeks and nose.  

“Copia?”

“I love you, Principessa.  More than I can say and more than I have any right to.”  He moved away then, holding himself up by his hands as he stared down at you.  Slowly he began to pull his cock out, stopping when only the tip was inside of you.  “You’re mine.  Forever.”

He pushed back in, slow and steady.  You pressed your head back against the pillow as your body took him, the stretch delicious.  Copia stayed flush against you, watching your face like he was waiting for something.  You let out a breathless laugh as you wrapped both your legs around his waist and kept him close.

“Forever.”

Go to Chapter 13: And You Can Hold Me

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