#and the fear i felt when i woke up and read the decision

[actual-sleeping-beauty]

sorry but it's just like. exceedingly fucking clear to me that republican controlled state legislatures across the country are testing how far they can go right now. bills like tennessee house bill 0009, kentucky house bill 173, and kentucky senate bill 150 are intended to see how far the current political and judicial climate will allow them to restrict the rights of queer people. republicans did this for a little over a decade before they got roe overturned. (source: the first heartbeat bill was filed in ohio in 2011.)

they are setting up to challenge obergefell and lawrence v. texas. the majority opinion of roe cites the due process clause of the fourteenth amendement, arguing that abortion bans violate a right to privacy. obergefell guarantees the right of same-sex couples to marry through the due process clause and the equal protection clause of the fourteenth amendment. the majority opinion argues that marriage is a private decision the state cannot intrude on, citing loving v. virginia (also based on the due process and equal protection clauses of the fourteenth amendment). the equal protection clause protects same-sex couples from being barred from marrying while their opposite-sex peers can marry freely. the majority opinion of lawrence v. texas cites the due process clause as granting same-sex couples a "protected liberty interest" to have private sexual relations. in a concurrence, justice sandra day o'connor cites the equal protection clause as the reason gay sex should be decriminalized. (note: in some states only same sex intercourse between men was criminalized. in others same sex intercourse between women was also criminalized. in still others anal sex was criminalized regardless of whether the participants were of the same or opposite sex. the texas law being challenged in lawrence criminalized anal and oral sex between men only. the lawrence case made it legal for same-sex couple to have sex for the first time in FOURTEEN STATES. that's 28% of the country.)

bills like tn hb 0009 (which would criminalize "male or female impersonators" (i.e. drag performers) from performing in public; a second offense would be a FELONY), ky hb 173 (a don't say gay bill that would "establish limitations on school personnel related to instruction and discussion on sexual orientation, sexual preference, or gender expression," among other fucked up things), and ky sb 150 (which would force schools to out trans and nonbinary kids to their parents and prohibit schools from making teachers use kids' preferred pronouns) are clearly pushing at the limits of legality. they are trying to get the supreme court to uphold these laws when they are challenged so the conservative supreme court can say that according to historical precedent (cited in overturning roe) and publicly agreed upon morality (cited in bowers v. hardwick, a case that upheld georgia's sodomy law in 1986, which also cited historical precedent). whether publicly agreed upon morality actually condemns queer people is unlikely to matter, given the current leanings of the court.

this is all to say: we have to start paying very close attention. a felony charge means you can't vote. they are trying to make sure we can't vote. we have to start calling our legislators. we have to start engaging our politically unengaged friends. we have to. they are coming for us. they are playing the long game. we need to too.

i spent multiple hours researching this and i would appreciate reblogs. it feels like we have come to this crisis point so quickly. obergefell isn't even a decade old. we cannot be comfortable and we must act.

[ladybyakuya]

| ALL I WANTED + GOJO SATORU .

+cw. — female!wife!reader x clan-head!husband!(sub)!gojo satoru, arrange marriage, hurt, angst, canon typical elements, smut, f!masturbation + m!masturbation & orgasm interruption.

+wc. — 2.3k

+syn.— satoru comes home from a bunch of missions only to find his wife in their shared bedroom not wanting him, or waiting for him but busy seeking pleasure that was his share to pour into you.

+notes. — special thanks to @gojoest for hyping me up with this idea. & thanks to @sugurouge for beta reading otherwise this never get posted lol | redirect to blog navigation.

The current head of the clan you belong to, your father stands facing his back to you. He is now the housemaster, not your father. “You’re going to be married,” said he, as his palms remained tightly clasped at his back while he looked out through the window. What you once called home became a distant memory in an instant. “You’re going to be married—” as his face turned towards you, “to Gojo Satoru.” you could figure out why he was looking away. “That monster!” he screams tears streaming down his face as his lips tremble in rage and disbelief; how of all people did the marriage broker who has been his friend for a long time have even agreed with such a decision? The thought of him suggesting the idea to the council does not even cross your father’s mind. How utterly naive! a low grunt followed as your father swatted away his chair knocking it down to the ground before killing every bit of hope you had despite the rumors. “This marriage. . . it is nothing but a hopeless dream. ”

Yes! You knew that already. The housemaids and staff just love to gossip about the doom of their sole source of bread and butter. The moment your father summoned you into his study room and told you the news while staring at the greenery of the garden of this mansion you knew your life was going to turn upside down and it did, just like you expected yet you were still disappointed, frustrated even when you came back to your room. 

Satoru Gojo is the strongest jujutsu sorcerer in history ever known since Sukuna Ryomen was sealed. No other name has ever made it to the pages of jujutsu history. He is at the top of the jujutsu society regarding status, power, fame, and money. So, what do you do with the strongest of all? worship them out of devotion? subdue them with offerings lest it might lash out? swearing loyalty out of fear? Those were the thoughts that stemmed at the back of your mind when you first came to know about the fact that you were going to be the wife of the Gojo Satoru from a maid whose life never even crossed the threshold of your home. Her world was limited to the mossy parts of the mansion you resided in. Still, she could tell what kind of marriage you would be walking into.

Nothing shocking happened even on the night of your wedding. It was just as you anticipated. Two different futons were kept side by side. There was no sharing of words, glances, or kakebuton . Just both of your backs faced each other. At dawn, you woke up with your wedding kimono intact, a stainless white futon, and an empty room without Gojo. 

The maids here knew better than to talk about it, even behind your back. They were aware of the power and status you held and that made everything a lot worse than you expected it to be. You had access to a lot of things, the family history archives, the financial sources, his previous missions— everything tied to him. Your husband, Gojo Satoru, was the clan head as well as the master of this mansion so there were no elderly people pushing responsibilities onto your shoulders like back at home. There was a sense of serenity in the air but how could you breathe it in for the rest of your life? 

Satoru Gojo was the kind of man whom one could easily desire. Despite being his wife and the future mother of his children, trying to love him felt like a cyanide for you. You wanted your husband, not some Satoru Gojo oozing with knowledge and power. You wanted to look him in the eye, not just his back which you barely get a glimpse of at the crack of dawn as he occupies the sad side of the bed under a separate duvet. In earlier stages of this marriage, there was no curtain separating you and your husband’s side of the bed but after a month of utter silence and stealing glances, the first thing he installed was a curtain in the shared canopy bed. If he needed some privacy he could easily ask you to shift into another room but he bothered to talk one of those clan servants to install a fucking curtain as if the silence was not enough of a gulf in between you two. 

Sometimes you thought that he was cheating on you but you always pushed it under the rug telling yourself, “You’re the wife of Satoru Gojo. No one can take that from you unless you walk out of this marriage. Not your father. Not that marriage broker —”

— Not even Gojo Satoru himself because he only married you to silence those nosy elders of his clan who pretend to be oh-so-worried for him. You were not foreign to that concept, after all, you are wrapped in the same shroud for all your life.

“You’re the wife of Gojo Satoru . . .No one . . .” 

“You’re the wife of Gojo Satoru . . .” 

“You’re the wife . . .”

“You’re . . .”

But the thought of getting his dick sucked by some other woman or man, or him putting his dick into someone — it filled you with too much anger to sleep in bed that night. For the first time, you miss home because there you are free to go anywhere even at night. 

Satoru came home early that night, which was odd for his schedule, and was greeted with an empty bed after a long while. The sky is yet to be cracked open by sunlight. It is still too dark to be wandering around. Where could his wife have been gone to at this hour? He takes a spoonful of strawberry ice cream from the giant tub he held in his other hand before starting to look for you. But where should he look first? He does not know anything except the fact that he had put veils in different places of his house just to keep this house free of low-energy cursed spirits. Those veils sure did their job well but sometimes they would keep out non-sorcerers, people like you. His heart rejoices at the thought that he has to look for you in places only he is aware of, which means this is going to take a little less time, and he will find you much faster. Come to think of it, he has not been in the library section for a while but it is still as spotless as the first day he came here. Have you been visiting? Man! That sure worries him.

The pink layer of the tub has come down to half along with its skin being wet while the spoon is still experiencing the fierce appetite that Satoru had for anything sweet. He stands at the entrance of a long hallway before checking, thinking that this is the last place he has to look for but could it be possible that you were embarrassed enough to go back to your home?

Ahh…ahhh!

The spoon hits the wooden floor with a dull clatter as a wretched realization comes crashing down through his veins. Have you been cheating on him all this time? In his house? With some lowly servant ? Well, that sure makes it easier to end this sham of a marriage. He opens the door of a certain archive room as swiftly as possible trying to minimize the sound of his presence, making sure he does not shock you awake from your rendezvous. He is determined to catch you red-handed but when he opens the door he witnesses something that could have knocked the lights off his brain if he were not one of the greatest sorcerers of his time. The sight was not something of a fair appetite for ordinary people yet you sat by the marble slab of the giant window, with one of your arms nuked under your sapphire jinbei in between your legs as your skin glowed under that pale moonlight as if diamonds and pearls were embedded on your skin. 

You were sweating, arching your body, moaning and all your husband could do was watch in awe. Your free hand travels from the bottom of your cleavage and up to the apex of your nape as you turn your head opening your eyes for a brief moment. You see the world so blurred that it spikes your approaching high, but as you open your eyes for the second time your high is gone like it never existed. Your husband, Gojo Satoru stood before you like an ivory statue of certain abandoned ruined cathedrals. The dress covers most of your body so a wave of relief washes over him despite realizing how dangerous the spot you chose . . .to . . .umh. . . pleasure yourself . 

How long? How long was he watching you ? You shift your body to face him, and your hand slowly emerges from the warmth between your thighs. Satoru tries to ignore but traces of your arousal and his yearning are flourishing like fluorescence on your fingers as it rests on your thigh. You watch him gulp. Suddenly, Gojo Satoru is out of words. Teacher to his students of Jujutsu High, the strongest sorcerer, Nanami’s certified yapper is suddenly out of words. The slight slice of your boobs visible through your robe does not help either in the coherency of his thoughts. He had plans. He had plans to walk out of this marriage without being tainted as a “cheater” because the jujutsu society is so fucked up that they will not stop until they found this particular person that had made this marriage impossible to work on so that you, the wife, had to walk out it and dear God, they certainly are not fond of obstructions.

“What a nice place you chose to—” he finally looks away to keep the tub of semi-molten room-temperature strawberry ice cream on some bookshelf but before he could shift back his gaze on you again you were gone like a storm. The sound of your footsteps echoed in his ear till it stopped before he heard the click of a door. He does not understand if you are just too dumb or too brave to act the way you are acting right now. He follows you as a grunt of dismissal escapes from his chest. As he stands in front of the bathroom door he drowns yet again in utmost disbelief. He can still hear your shrill gasp of pleasure and he is not liking how his cock is responsive to it. At first, he hesitates to touch himself but the faint sound of your moans, the wet squelching sounds of your fingers moving in and out of your damp folds despite the door of the bathroom being locked buzzes in his ears like bees out in the hunt of honey. 

Satoru gave up . You hear a thud as you continue to finger yourself knowing full well that your husband must have followed you all the way here after witnessing you in such a state. Indeed, you could have been accused of cheating on him without him checking the door and it would have been much worse. He sits against the bathroom door unfurling the black ribbon with a swish to take his cock out of his baggy white pants. The tip is already leaking. His cock is throbbing in his palm as he encapsulates his fingers around it, moving his fingers up and down slowly. On the other side of the door, as you could finally feel the pinnacle of your high you heard a soft groan; a pain, that seemed familiar, was palpable underneath that shrill cry of pleasure. Still when your fingers touched the part inside you that almost felt like unknotting something from inside you, at the basal of your navel Satoru’s hand moved faster to chase the similar high that had started to bubble in his body under the influence of your ripples of pleasure. You heard your husband moan as tears rolled down your cheeks when you closed your eyes feeling the knot finally unwinding.

Perhaps, both of you came simultaneously. Perhaps not, because you immediately opened the door after you had calmed from your high, only to be greeted with Satoru sitting right at the opposite wall of the bathroom door, legs folded in L-manner so that he could keep his hand over his knee. His cock is still visible through his white pants and it is still so hard. One of your eyebrows raises in silent reply . Satoru notices that. He looks at you and then looks away. You extend your hand towards his face, gaining his stern azure pair of eyes shining against whatever dim light the crack of the bathroom door could allow. There was no sign of resistance in him so as your palm touched his cheeks, you waited and gave him time to protest. yet none ever followed,  instead, he surrendered to your touch, and your fingers curled under his chin as you ran your thumb over his lips. Satoru coiled against your touch imbibing as much as he could like a tide being high enough to touch the moon . . .a familiar voice shocked both of you awake.

“Lady Gojo. . .” 

[sylusjinwoon]

{ 133 }

season's call.

jinwoo sung x fem.reader

{ my beloved season calls me | because i always feel you in me. }

most people would cower in fear at the thought of walking alone in the middle of the night-

yet you could say with confidence that you were not one of those people.

despite being a young woman living in the midst of the big city like seoul, you found a strange safety while walking within the darkness of the night-

a comfort, even.

with your job requiring you to work many hours, it came as no surprise when you came home most days feeling completely drained. the exhaustion seeming to seep within your very bones as your drooping eyes could barely stay open the moment you came back to your apartment.

sometimes, your boyfriend was around, but most times, he would often be working. taking on his duties as the latest s-rank hunter and dominating various gates that appear across the city. but you would never worry too long about him, simply falling back in bed while re-reading his last message that was sent to you until your eyes could barely remain open.

my monarch 👑 [ you just go home and focus on resting. i'll be home soon, i love you. oh, and please, do dream of me. ]

those were the last words you recall reading until your cellphone slipped from your fingertips, ready to land against the hardwood floorings of your shared bedroom had it not been for a certain shadow gently catching it before placing the device on your nightstand.

it wasn't until several hours later that you finally woke up from your nap, which was what lead you to your current predicament.

being well past midnight, you felt groggy from your nap and became aware of the lack of sustenance felt within your system. after freshening up within your bathroom, you allow your eyes to stare blearily at your reflection. your hand touches at your cheeks, noticing the dark circles as you sigh and began to wash your face once more.

"my queen... are you alright?"

as you dry your face with the plush towel, you trail your eyes down towards your shadow, seeing several, glowing purple eyes looking back at you. normally, such a frightening sight would be enough to cause someone to feel an immense fear-

but not to you.

"i'm fine. since there's not much to eat here, i plan to buy something to eat for me and jinwoo at the convenience store. do you mind accompanying me?"

"of course, my queen. our king will be delighted with your decision."

with a smile painting your lips, you nod before grabbing your phone and bag, extracting your keys as you decided to explore the city and buy a late dinner for you and jinwoo to enjoy later on once he comes home. the city was bustling with activity, and you allow the sensation of the wind to course through you, humming a favorite tune as you walked with confidence across the sidewalks.

as you enjoy the sights of the city, you felt danger quickly approaching you. goosebumps were felt erupting all across the expanse of your arm as a low whistle was heard trailing from close behind you. you stiffen momentarily, but ultimately decide to stop walking.

you allow your eyes to follow the voice, seeing a man sneering at you as he came out from a random alleyway. your heart was felt racing slightly, summoning your flight or fight response-

yet your fear was short lived when several, tiny whispers were heard coming from your shadow.

"hey hey hey, what's the rush babygirl? you're lookin' a little lost."

the faint scent of alcohol was evident when you felt the man's calloused hands grabbing on to you. you had to fight back the repulsion that threatens to course through you, mustering the coldest look you could manage when you stiffly tell the drunkard, "i'm taken. my boyfriend will be livid if he sees you forcing yourself onto me."

he gives you a smirk now, his piercings glinting from beneath the moonlight while his hold on you seemed to tighten when he tells you.

"aw, don't be like that, babe. heheh, i bet you're just stiff because you need a good fuckin' to help with loosening you up, that's all."

he was about to get closer to you when he saw the wisps of shadows surrounding you. you close your eyes, already basking in amusement when you saw the panicked look within the bastard's eyes.

"w-what the hell? you a fucking hunter?"

no, but my boyfriend is one.

you keep your thoughts to yourself, allowing the cold shadows to surround you as you briefly wondered what shadow soldier would appear, ready to defend you with their life.

would it be igris? or beru?

"you." within mere seconds, you found your answer, gasping when jinwoo himself appears in front of you.

your knees were weak, feeling your heart began to pound when you were met with jinwoo's broad back. he keeps a powerful hand behind you, using his body as a shield between you and the poor bastard who dared to hit on you.

"a-a-ah..."

you hear the shakiness in his voice when jinwoo grabs a hold of his shirt, slamming the bastard against the harsh, brick wall of the alleyway with a click of his tongue. the bastard never stood a chance, losing his consciousness immediately as he slumps against the concrete.

jinwoo was breathing heavily when he finally faces you, eyes still glowing a bright purple when his shaky hands gently frame at your face.

"are you alright, sarang?" his voice was shaky, still assessing your features for any trace of fear or discomfort. "i'm sorry if i was a little late, but... when i saw that bastard coming on to you-"

he trembles, letting out a shaky sigh when you felt his hands clutching at your shoulders in a tighter manner. "i nearly lost myself to my rage, ready to rip that bastard into shreds if i had to."

finally snapping out of your reveries, you sigh and wrap your arms around jinwoo's neck, your embrace and the way your warmth seemed to surround him being enough to calm him down.

"i'm alright, jinwoo... i'm just so happy to see you again."

you laugh before pressing gentle kisses against his jawline, slowly calming down your beloved boyfriend as he basks in your presence. he lets out a sigh of your name before wrapping his arms around your back, resting his head against your shoulder while gently holding you in his arms.

"did you just finish your raid?"

you look at him with amusement in your eyes when he gives you a gentle nod against your shoulder.

"yeah, i'm done."

"then, let's get some dinner together, shall we?"

you feel jinwoo place a lingering kiss against your shoulders before moving away from you, the rage in his eyes finally dying down into a gentle simmer as you could see the clarity of his grey eyes once more.

"yes, let's go." he nods, with the two of you completely forgetting about the man who was foolish enough to hit on you, leaving his unconscious body near the alleyway he had came from.

and as you continue to explore the city while in the arms of your beloved shadow monarch, you knew that he was the sole reason you had no reason to fear the night-

for sung jinwoo would always be right by your side when danger struck, ready to protect you with all that he had.

a.n. - hhhhhh the jinwoo brainrot is real... please save me jinwoo, my daydreams for you can't seem to stop 🥹

all stories are written by rei; reposts, translations, and plagiarism are not allowed.

[arlestial]

Hey, could you make a part two of how the Blue Lock boys make up for the forgotten date? (Nagi,Isagi,Bachira) 🌷

❝if you'd have been the one❞

synopsis : Life is sometimes difficult, keeping them busy and away from you; until it turned to take you away from them.

pairing : Isagi Yoichi, Nagi Seishiro, Bachira Meguru x genderneutral!reader •— Blue Lock

tw : Alternative endings (angst or fluff/comfort)

word count : 4300~ words

author-note : Hi !! I’m so happy y’all liked this, so I decided to write a part II. Some wanted angst, others comfort, so I did both in order to please everyone :) The part I is here ! Thanks for all your kindness, I’m overjoyed to see so much attention on my writings 😭 I hope you’ll like it !! take care of yourself ♡

tag-list : @cecee77, @mandapanda16, @mariyumemi, @someonethatisnobody, @erintaro, @missalienqueen, @8-xnny, @miyanosm, @neuvilletteismybby

ISAGI YOICHI’s eyes widened when he saw your text, after the game. He knew he fucked-up the instant he stepped inside the soccer field, already regretting his decision. He won, but the stadium applause sounded like an awful ringtone that woke him up to reality, a shrill noise crashing his organs and piercing his ears. His heart was racing; not because of the victory, but because of the apprehension. The fear. The panic, that perhaps, he had lost you. But you wouldn’t leave him, right ? Everybody make errors. You would forgive him, no need to stress. At least, that’s what he was trying to convince himself. But in the depths of his own mind, he wasn’t this confident. He took his phone, excusing himself from his teammates that were celebrating, and isolated himself in the corridor. He tried to call, but you refused it twice. He groaned, his hands shaking, trying to tap a text quickly.

22:49p.m. | y/n ♡ : guess you made your choice then.

- read at 00:24a.m.

00:24a.m. | yoichi ♡ : honey please just accept the call

i know I fucked up, I’m sorry

i shouldn’t have done that

- read at 00:33a.m.

00:34a.m. | yoichi ♡ : i know you don’t want to talk to me right now

I’m coming over

- read at 00:38a.m.

00:39a.m. | y/n ♡ : gosh, how savvy and perspicacious of you.

- read at 00:39a.m.

00:40a.m. | yoichi ♡ : here in two minutes

- read at 00:41a.m.

You turned off your phone, completely mad. You clearly didn’t want to talk to him right now, especially this late. He couldn’t care less about you when he was playing on the field; and now, surprisingly, he knew that he fucked up and he regretted it ? Please. You decided to spend the night elsewhere, at your parents, since they were the only ones responding in the middle of the night - they were probably watching a movie at home and were a bit surprised to see you texting them a "hey, can I come over ? got an issue at home" text out-of-the-blue. As you exited your bedroom with a bag filled with spare clothes, you’re met by a raven-haired man, panting, still in his blue jersey, preventing you from leaving the house. He grabbed your waist when you tried to walk past him.

"Isagi, let me go."

"Love, listen. What I did was selfish, I know, it was a terrible mistake."

"So tell me, Isagi, when did you feel regret ? When you stood me up or when I texted you back, making it clear that I was upset ?"

"Actually, from the very first moment my foot landed on the field. But that doesn’t change anything, it’s still shitty of me, and i-"

"But it changes everything, in fact. So, you could’ve turned around. You could’ve joined me at this restaurant, like you promised me, no ? But you didn’t. So you just lied right in front of my face. How bold of you."

He felt like suffocating. You were right. He should’ve refused to play the match, even if there were the most talented players in the world; because you were his lover, goddamnit. He knew you were insecure, because he was rather absent, and he should’ve came to the date he promised to take you to. He was busy with Blue Lock, neglecting you in the process and not setting aside enough time to reassure you like he was supposed to. He wanted you to slap him, to punch him, as hard as you could; he wanted to suffer physically. It was easier to bear physical pain than to handle the mental distress he was in.

"But no, my sweet boyfriend Isagi Yoichi decided to stood me up to play some random game as if he’s not always away from me all the damn time."

"I don’t know why I did that, honestly. It was stupid, and I’m deeply sorry. You know that I love you a lot, right ? You’re the most important thing in my life, and I don’t want to loose you because I’m too immature to think before I-"

"Am I even enough for you ?"

You were losing patience, your tone now sharp, trying to bite away the tears from falling.

"Obviously you are, darling. You are more than enough, and you deserve so much better than me."

He hurried to say, his hands coming to your cheeks, gently stroking them with his thumbs. The concerned look on his face grew rapidly in a desperate, frightened one.

"That doesn’t feel like it. If it was the case, you’d have turned around. Soccer had always been your main interest, and I’ve always been the second. I don’t want to be with a guy that prefers a sport to his own partner."

ISAGI YOICHI had never experienced so much fear in a lapse of time this short. His heart skipped multiple beats - maybe it stopped completely, heavy. He heard the blood rushing in his veins, in his ears, as if the pulsations were the applause of a whole stadium; it was deafening. His breath hitched, goosebumps painting themselves on his clothed arms. Don’t go.

The choice was all yours, now.

↳ Your mind kept telling you that he wasn’t feeling any regret, that he wasn’t really sorry. If this situation presented itself again, he would pick the same decision, leaving you alone, completely by yourself in this stupid restaurant, below the pitiful looks of the waiters, probably whispering at each other who could even stood you up like that. He put distance in your relationship since weeks, months even, ghosting you when he was too tired to send you at least one text to let you know that he loved you still. Regardless of his lack of attention towards you, he wasn’t even capable of respecting his own promises, as he might prefer to play soccer with his friends as usual. And you were just there, always waiting for him, in every situation, waiting for him to come home with a warm smile and a good dinner, sharing kisses, hugs and cuddles on the couch, disappointed when he was reminding you that he’d be gone again in two or three days to return to Blue Lock. You were tired of it. It wasn’t even a relationship at this point.

"I’m not a toy you can play with for some time and then abandon like it’s nothing. My patience is not infinite."

"I never said that. It was an opportunity I couldn’t miss, and I wasn’t enough thoughtful to realize about the consequences of my actions. I just hope you can forgive me for it."

You pushed his wrists away from your face, glaring at him coldly, not wanting to cry for him. You took your bag and walked past him successfully this time, opening the door without giving him a single glance; just stopping in your tracks as you reached the doorknob.

"Goodbye, Isagi. I hope you’ll become the player you desired to be for so long."

You were his motivation, the person he wanted to make proud, the person he wanted to impress when showing his new capacities and his strength. The person he wanted to come home to, everyday, as lovesick as the day before. But now, the tears were flowing silently on his cheeks, as he couldn’t process what he saw. You, closing the door behind yourself, leaving him without any chance of coming back. Because you sincerely realize how much you love someone when you actually lose them.

↳ You tried to push him away, in a faint attempt to show how much you hated him right now. But he just stared at you, his gaze never fading, and he tilted your chin up with his hand. The other went straight to your waist, pressing you against him. Your eyes and his met; and you swore you’ve never saw a fonder look in your entire life. Orbs filled with pure love and softness, enamoured unpronounceable words, a silent plea begging your forgiveness. He leaned and kissed you gently, carefully. When he finally broke the kiss, he took your hand in his and intertwined your fingers together, pressing multiple kisses on the back of your hand without breaking the eye contact you both were sharing.

"You deserve someone better, honey. And I want- no, I will become this someone, that will love you properly. I promise you this - and if I break this promise, I swear, you can kill me however you like, it’s up to you."

You bit back a chuckle, amused by his words; but on the depths of your heart, you were fully aware that he was genuine.

"I’ll never disappoint you again. You’re the love of my life, I couldn’t handle loosing you. I’m sorry for what I did, again. I’m an asshole. Really."

He kissed your forehead with so much tenderness, a tenderness you missed during his long absence. He peppered kisses on your face, his grip on your waist tightening, as if you were going to slip away from him. He whispered something else, not daring to break the eye-contact,

"I’d rather watch the whole world burn and experience an endless suffering that having you leaving me for good."

NAGI SEISHIRO tried everything. After multiple unanswered calls and messages left on “seen”, he noticed that you’ve blocked him. He sighed, staring at his ceiling. Was it the end ? He tried to forget you, he really did. He tried to convince himself that you weren’t this important. He tried to wake-up each morning without searching for you underneath the sheets, only to find a cold bed next to him. Occupying his thoughts with games, movies, series, even soccer, wasn’t enough anymore. He needed you in his arms, and he was willing to do every single thing imaginable to get you back.

You were at one of your friend’s apartment, enjoying some time with her watching your favorite series. She left the couch to get you a drink, mumbling a quick "pause the episode, I don’t wanna miss it" before hurrying to the kitchen. You smiled, and did as she asked; until you heard a knock on the door. You frowned.

"You ordered take-out ?", you called your friend from the couch, questionably.

"Nah, I didn’t. Told you we were going to one of my friends’ restaurant this evening."

She came back from the kitchen, two glasses filled in her hands, her brows furrowed. She put them on the table, glancing at the door.

"Who is it then ?"

"Don’t know. Wait, be right back.", she quickly turned around, walking towards the door, and opening it slightly. Her face went blank in approximately 2 seconds, and she gulped.

"Um.. Well, that’s awkward."

You couldn’t hear correctly what your friend said to the stranger; you could only hear a low voice, that sounded awfully familiar. So, you decided to get up, trying to get a peek of the tall figure standing in the corridor.

Your eyes widened.

The series was long forgotten on the screen, the voices echoing between the walls, as you stared, dumbfounded, at him.

Seishiro.

Your friend shifted uncomfortably, deciding to leave you both alone for some privacy as she promptly went to her room. You didn’t know what to say. What to think. But the dark bags under his eyes, that looked stern and empty, his hair even more messy than before, gave you relatively an idea of how the two passed weeks had been for him.

"What are you even doing here, Nagi ?"

Ouch. The use of his name instead of his first name was abysmal; but a relieved sigh escaped from his lips. Finally. Your voice. It sounded so much better than your voicemail, that he had listened every night after you left him in your shared apartment.

"I’m sorry. I- I’m really, fucking sorry for what I did. I miss you, Y/N. I can’t-"

"Nagi, stop. I can’t do this right now."

You cut him instantly, trying to close the door. Well, trying, because he refrained you from doing so, laying his whole strength on the door to keep you from leaving him again.

"Please, Y/N, at least, hear me out."

His voice was pleading, begging even; as much as your heart broke with his wobbly words, you didn’t know what to think, what to say. You bit your inside cheek, wondering what to do, now that he was so close to you, after all this time.

NAGI SEISHIRO looked at you dead in the eye, his own blackish orbs watering at the sight of your frame standing in front of him. His hand wandered to your cheek, his fingertips almost grazing your smooth skin that he missed so bad, as if you were made of real porcelain. Porcelain that he’d break with only one feather touch. So he held back.

"I missed you so much," his voice broke, approaching you hesitantly. "So fucking much. I’m sorry for neglecting you and taking you for granted all the time, I’m sorry I didn’t give you the attention you deserved, the attention you needed. I need you to come back to me. I can’t live without you, baby."

Forgiving him was a tough choice. Your heart was aching at the sight of tears rolling down his cheeks. You’ve never seen Nagi cry before, at least, not cries of pain. But he hurt you, he really did. These two weeks were just obnoxious to him, but they were worse to you. Seeing his texts, his calls, deciding to block him anyway - it was laborious, to say the least, because your feelings for him were still there, haunting your mind constantly, day and night.

The choice was all yours, now.

↳ How could you just forgive him like that ? After all he did ? Sure, you meant a lot to him, but did you mean more than anything else ? You were always second, never the first, and it became clearer each day that passed that you weren’t as important as you thought you would be for him. He didn’t even made time for you in his oh-so-important schedule, focusing on soccer and his fucking games, hanging out with his friends who knows where, instead of you. He chose it. It wasn’t random. You weren’t his priority at all. Sitting patiently on the couch, staring at the door with this constant lovesick gaze, waiting for him to return to finally go on your well promised date. But he never returned. And you weren’t going to return either. It was enough.

"You know what ? You were the first thing in my mind, everyday. You always have been the first person I was thinking of in whatever situation I was in. The only voice I wanted to hear, the only person I wanted to see, the only gaze I wanted to get lost in - now don’t tell me you feel the same."

"I do-", but you immediately cut him off, anger taking the best of you.

"You’re a freaking liar. What’s the next step, uh ? You’re going to promise me you’ve changed ? You think I’m stupid or something ? I’m not naive, Nagi, I’ve never been your priority and I’ll never be."

"You don’t understand, Y/N. I’ve been busy, you’re right, but give me a second chance. I promi- I’ll not make the same mistake again, that’s for sure. I realized that you were extremely important to me, more important that I’d like to admit actually, I can’t bear seeing you without me at your side, it just hurts too much. I’m just asking for a second chance."

"As much as it hurts to say, it’s over. I’m not going to give you a second chance when I knew damn well that it’ll not change anything. If you needed time to process your love for me, I’m definitely going to give you time to process it even more."

His eyes widened when he saw you slowly closing the door, in a faint attempt of ending the discussion.

"No, wait, I beg-"

"Move on. It won’t be so difficult anyway, spend some time with your friends and your games, you’ll soon forget about me."

He was now staring at the wooden door of the apartment, tears streaming down his features. He lost you for good this time. And he finally understood how it felt to receive the same treatment that he gave you; to be abandoned by your lover when you needed them the most.

↳ Seeing him in tears didn’t really help your case. Your heart burnt, and you soon felt yourself tearing up, your vision blurred. You let out a broken sob, to which he responded with a call of your name - desperate, probably as broken as your cries - and he embraced you tightly, his nose nuzzling on your neck, sighing when he finally touched you, melting in the loveable hold he wished to feel again. He kept repeating the same apologies, the same confessions of love, hoping it’d soothe your tears.

"I don’t want to hurt you ever again," he mumbled, stroking the back of your hair gently, "I’ll never hurt you ever again.", he assured with a shaky voice.

He kissed your temple softly, still holding you close to him, your head resting on his chest.

"It’ll be the last time I’ll ever put something above you. You’re the most important thing to me - I can’t live without your presence near me all the time. I’m sorry I just realized that I needed to tell you this now. I should’ve known you deserved to hear it properly,"

"You’ll be my highest priority from now on, as it should’ve been from the very beginning, angel."

BACHIRA MEGURU was anxious. At first, he decided to give you space. He hated arguments with you, always trying to avoid them, and he thought that distancing himself might help the situation. Spoiler alert, it didn’t. Sweaty palms grabbing his phone, and immediately turning it off, utterly incompetent. He didn’t want to argue, to entertain a conflict with you; he prefered your smiles and your soft giggles in tickle fights. He missed them. The sound of your hard laughs, the look of your teasing grins. However, he couldn’t bring himself to text you, nor to call you, afraid that you’d pronounce a dry "it’s over". He couldn’t handle the pain, and avoiding it wasn’t the best idea to fix the issue. Meanwhile, it had been 3 weeks, you were now nearly convinced that your relationship with him had come to an end. No texts, no calls, no attempts to see you, you founded it weird, but you didn’t question it. It worried you a bit, yeah, but you weren’t going to chase after him if he didn’t want to talk about it. You were more hurt than worried; after all your moments together, the shared memories and the heavy feelings, he just moved on this easily ? Even though it was totally his fault ? You just scoffed when your friends asked about him, hiding your devasted state behind a mocking tone, saying it was probably over now. You waited for a message all the time, staring at the screen, angry fat tears rolling down your cheeks in frustration. What an asshole.

"You never texted them ? Bachira, are you crazy ?"

Isagi exclaimed, in utter shock. They were in his bedroom, Isagi was sitting on his bed, unable to process what Bachira just told him. The usually joyful man paced around, his face in his hands.

"I- I didn’t know what to say ! I fucked up really bad this time, I was scared of losing them."

"Man, you definitely lost them now. It’s been 3 weeks, you should’ve said something earlier !", Isagi replied, nearly strangling himself in desbelief.

"I know. What should I do ?"

"Bachira..", he sighed, biting his lip in despair, "it’s probably too late now. They’re most likely thinking that you don’t love them anymore or that you moved on."

"But I didn’t ?", Bachira whined when Isagi stood up and smacked his head, annoyed. Isagi mumbled something inaudible, probably about his naivety or his stupidness, again.

"But that’s what it looks like, bro. You stood them up, and they got no news from you, don’t be stupid. Everyone would think the same thing."

Bachira gulped. He was right. And without hesitation, he ran away from his home, heading towards your place, in hope you would accept his apologies. He never sprinted this fast in his entire life, his muscles burning, his ankles aching from the impact of his feet against the stiff concrete of the streets he was running in. The road seemed even longer than usual, and when he finally arrived on your doorstep, he was panting, his hands shaking as he hesitantly knocked. He felt nauseous. Emotions overwhelmed him when he finally saw your form opening the door with a worried look.

"Meguru ? What are you even doing here ?"

He immediately took you in his arms, his head buried in the crook of your neck, breathing-in your comfortable scent, relieved. You yelped in surprise, not reciprocating the hug.

"I missed you so much."

He muttered, still trying to catch his breath. You frowned, surprised by his presence.

"It had been 3 weeks, Meguru. It’s a bit late to come here."

"I know. I should’ve come earlier. I’m so sorry, Y/N. Please, forgive me ? I promise I won’t do it again !"

BACHIRA MEGURU didn’t want to let go of you, choosing to hold you even tighter, letting his tears soak your shirt. He couldn’t care less about crashing your bones with just arms; if it was possible, he’d live in your skin. That seemed creepy, to say the least, but he enjoyed over-proximity with you, and he couldn’t bear to be apart from you anymore.

The choice was all yours, now.

↳ After 3 weeks, seriously ? You pushed him off of you, clearly not amused by his whines. You just felt anger, disappointment, embarrassment.

"Meguru, you left me alone for 3 weeks straight, and now you’re coming unannounced as if it was actually common ?"

"You don’t understand, Y/N !! I was too anxious of your reaction after our argument. I didn’t know how to deal with the guilt I felt, I didn’t know how to apologize properly.."

"No, you don’t understand. You really think that ghosting and ignoring people as if they never existed was a solution ? I should be the one to do that, not you. You’re always avoiding conflict and I’m so sick of it."

"I know-"

"No, you don’t !", you sneered, taking a long breath to soothe your nerves, "You never did. You haven’t remembered our anniversary - and it’s not the only thing you’ve forgotten along the way. You never took our conversations seriously, you never put any attention in our memories and our celebrations for them. I don’t want to be with someone who’s not even capable of being mindful of our important moments together and of our special dates. If it’s not important to you, alas, it is for me. I won’t give up another thing, especially if it’s something that is dear to me."

"It’s important for me, I swear. I just don’t know how to show it correctly."

"Then learn. But you can count me out."

You opened the door, leaving a broken Bachira behind, reaching after you. But you turned to stop him, giving him a quick nod, a silent no. The weak smile on your face shushed the golden-eyed boy. And he understood.

"I wish you the best, Meguru."

↳ You bit your inside cheek. Always giving promises he couldn’t keep, with a beam and butterfly kisses. And as much as you loved him, you didn’t know if you could tolerate it again, if your heart could handle another betrayal.

"You’re always promising the same things, but you’re never actually changing.", you argued.

"I can. I know I disappointed you, and you have every right to be upset. I’m trying my best, learning to manage my feelings and my habits is hard and tough, but I’ll do it for you. I’m really trying, Y/N,", he said, his voice breaking slightly, "I’m not used to this. It’s- you’re my first love, and I really hope you’ll be my last. I don’t have any experience in terms of relationships. If dates are important to you, I’ll make all the efforts in the world to make them special and memorable. I want to grow old with you, so please, give me one last chance to prove you that I’m worth it."

You hesitated for some seconds. He wasn’t the type to lie, and right now, he sounded strangely serious. It felt out-of-character, but you needed it to actually make up a decision.

"Fine. But it’s your last chance.", you finally whispered,

"Yes ma’am. Trust me on this one, I’ll make you proud of my work."

He sighed, relieved, immediately peppering your face with kisses. You giggled, trying to push him away.

"Gosh, I missed this sound. Oh- and I’m taking you on a date after; that’s the least I can do. I love you to the moon and to saturn, Y/N. Thank you for everything."

[stxrvel]

tis the damn season

a season of sadness wanted to come to an end. 'tis the damn season and you thought maybe you could go home and live with your mate the way it was meant to be…

pairing: azriel x f!reader

wc: +3.5k

warnings: pure angst, cuss words and slight (or light? soft?) unprotected (wrap it up) smut. no happy ending, sorry

note: hi guys! :)- i wrote and published this one some time ago, but i deleted it because it was poorly received and that disappointed me a bit. but now that i was able to read it again, i feel it's a good job and that should be enough for me. i hope you guys like it :). see u next time!

Azriel was your mate. You had known for a couple of months. He knew it long before that, too. The bond snapped first for him, but he never tried to get close to you. You didn't know if it was out of fear or if he never agreed with what was chosen for the two of you by the Cauldron. 

Likewise, you never had time to ask. The battle against the King of Hybern almost cost you your life. You didn't know what things had been done outside of your consciousness to keep you alive, you didn't know what boundaries Rhysand had crossed to bring you back to life, and you never wanted to ask either. You never asked anything, living in that ignorance gave you a sense of peace you didn't want to get rid of. 

But things were never the same after that. From the day you woke up, everything felt different. During that time, you didn't allow yourself much time to delve into what the recent bond between you and Azriel meant, and he always agreed to give you your time. 

However, one day, out of nowhere, it all became too overwhelming. And you decided to run away.

You never said anything to anyone, and you closed the door so Azriel couldn't feel you. You knew it must've been painful for everyone, especially your mate, but being with all of them after everything that had happened was unbearable. You lived under a constant reminder of suffering, violence and blood. You couldn't stop seeing your hands full of blood every time you closed your eyes, guilty for the lives they had taken as if you had had any right to do so, but having to know daily that it was all justified. Velaris and the permanence of the rest of Prythian justified it.

So, you went far away, to the other side of the world, to the east. To the Continent. 

And life was not easy at all. You knew Azriel wasn't having a good time. After a while, the wall you both had built around the bond was beginning to crack and his emotions were seeping through those tiny cracks. You could sometimes feel his sadness, his pain… his anger. After a couple of minutes of heartbreaking grief, the pangs of anger would appear. You could tell what he was going through and, selflessly, you tried to think that your decision was for the best. 

Rhysand wrote to you almost daily. Paper with his handwriting constantly appeared around you and, although you never answered him, he always made it a point to let you know everything that was going on in Velaris. 

The first few days were the hardest. 

There was a heavy snowfall on the Continent when you arrived, something that had never been more than a welcome, tearing at your skin. The cold was so deadly and the gales so lethal that you couldn't leave the apartment you were renting for a whole week. Apparently, at that time, that was normal. The cold that fogged up the windows, that froze your limbs, and that made all signs of life disappear. 

Where are you? Azriel is very worried

Please, answer me 

Y/N 

WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU???? 

Cassian and Azriel are flying over Velaris. Can you just tell me, please? 

Y/N, we are very worried. Please.

Please.

You had a lot of tugging on your bond from Azriel. You could feel his desperation even through the walls of silence. Those were difficult days. The cold days were not comforting at all. 

However, as the months passed, with the cultural difference and the harshness of reality outside of the family you had known for as long as you had memories, so many hundreds of years ago, you gave in to Rhysand's wishes to return to Velaris on the night of the Starfall.

And that night… well, you hadn't told anyone you were going. 

But as you expected, Azriel was the first to know you were there. 

You heard the flutter of his wings before you saw him, towering in the moonlight against the dim lighting in the city in anticipation of the biggest celebration of the year. He stumbled as he fell, being one of the few times you had seen him unable to control his strength, staggering with his feet and hands to get to a safe distance from you. His breathing was rapid, almost erratic and his eyes were bright, crystallized. The stirring movement in your chest brought tears to your eyes. 

Azriel was there in front of you from the moment he had the slight feeling, because he knew the bond wasn't wrong. And his gaze reflected everything. Everything he wanted to say and everything he preferred to keep silent. You had never felt so strongly the need to be close to him; you hadn't even accepted the bond, but you felt as if you had just done it. His eyes roamed the features of your face, his expression contracting as if he was slowly processing that you were really there in front of him. 

You saw him raise one of his hands, the hands that had so often held you in the darkness and through the sadness. If you focused really well, you could almost notice how his body trembled at the closeness, with anticipation, just as your body shuddered at his presence. 

The effects of the bond were powerful. But that hadn't been what made you fall in love with him. 

Azriel took a tentative step forward, reaching out his hands as if in a trance, seeking to touch you to make sure it was really you in front of him and not some kind of hallucination. Your voice stopped him on his feet. 

“Hello, Azriel,” you could barely speak, that suffocating feeling of being close tightening your throat. His eyes moved quickly back to yours and watered once more, his breathing quickening again. You didn't know what you had awakened in him just by speaking to him once more after so long without seeing him, but it must've been the same thing that ignited in your body when he spoke. 

“Y/N,” he elongated your name, like a plea or a prayer, you weren't sure. Electricity coursed through your body in a matter of seconds and you felt your feet move before you could stop them. The emotion rising in your chest matched your mate's expression, nostalgic because it had been so many months since you had last been so close and yet more pained and suffering because you had been the reason all that pain now surrounded you both. 

You stopped just inches away from him, your hands itching with the need to touch him, to feel him close, to once again have that warmth that would warm and thaw your soul. His huge, beautiful wings were taut behind him, being that all his attention was focused on your every move. You saw him hold his breath as you approached, struggling hard to hold back the tears that welled up in his eyes. 

“Are you okay?” you whispered the question, the air stealing your confidence, perhaps feeling a little silly and embarrassed about it. Suddenly, you felt too small under his gaze. 

“Okay?” the change in his voice was hardly imperceptible, sending shivers throughout your body, the panic of fear making its way into your chest, the bond tightening as if both ends were being pulled at the same time. “You left for a year without telling anyone. We went months without knowing if you were okay. I couldn't… I couldn't… feel you.” 

His voice became shaky, each word brimming with a tinge of suppressed anger. 

“Do you think I'm anything close to okay?” 

Yes, it was a stupid question. The knot in your chest grew rapidly, the back of your throat burning with pent-up tears. 

“I can't even enjoy the relief of seeing you now because… I'm so angry.” 

“I know…” you barely mumbled, lowering your head. How could you look him in the eye? Why did you think you had the right to go back as if nothing had happened? It was clear that things weren't going to be like they were before. You weren't sure about the others, but it seemed you had taken some of Azriel with you by disappearing like that. Proud you weren't of your actions, but you didn't know how to explain to his shattered features and cheeks wet with tears that, at that moment, you believed it was the right thing to do. 

The tears in his eyes prompted your own and you sobbed unable to contain the feeling. You tried to regain your composure, because you had no right to show such sadness when you had created it all. But Azriel was faster and you didn't even manage to put your hands under your eyes when his arms wrapped around your shoulders tightly. His wings also surrounded you and, although you had hardly noticed it because of the darkness, you felt his shadows dance around your feet. 

The warmth of his body was automatically welcome. How many times had you imagined that scene in your cold bed on the Continent, all alone and devastated from time to time, with memories invading your mind. Not many times did you regret your decision, except when you thought of Azriel. 

He sobbed too, his hands tightening on your arms, as if he was afraid to let you go again. He probably was. 

“I don't understand what made you think you'd be better off away from us… away from me, but I'm sorry.” 

His words surprised you, but a flood of feelings greeted you from the other end of the bond as Azriel let go and you couldn't think too hard. Crying swirled in the back of your throat. The level of pain and sadness that your mate was handling and had hidden from you for so long was so uncontainable that you almost doubled over, leaning over Azriel's body as you felt it rushing through you. 

“I thought you needed space. I know what happened with Hybern was too much for you and I didn't want to overwhelm you. But if I had known that decision would've made you decide you'd be better off away from me…” Azriel gulped, his voice full of feeling breaking off between words. “If I had known I promise you it would've been different.” 

You couldn't believe Azriel was telling you that. And the feelings coming from his end through the bond confirmed it to you. Azriel felt guilty about your departure. From moment one, when the panic and fear dissipated, Azriel never stopped feeling that it had been his responsibility that you decided to leave. And he couldn't have been more wrong. You loved him, had loved him long before the bond appeared, but the things that happened after Hybern, that affected you, had nothing to do with him. 

“Azriel…” 

“I'm supposed to be your mate. I'm supposed to support you, help you when you're down. I don't understand how I could fail at that. I'm sorry,” his voice was muffled as he spoke with his face hidden in your neck. At no time did he let go of you and his wings kept you warm. At that moment, that was home. 

“I promise it's not your fault,” you managed to speak, your face pressed against his chest. 

“I was supposed to be with you, accompanying you, but I-” 

“Azriel, you didn't do anything wrong,” you fought against his tight grip so you could look him in the eyes and the tears running down his cheeks broke your heart once again. 

“Then why did you leave?” 

You didn't have an answer for that and Azriel realized it when your lips pursed. He sighed, as best he could, and drew you back into his arms. Maybe he didn't need an answer at that moment, just having you by his side was more than enough. 

With the others it wasn't much easier. 

Rhysand and Feyre almost wept at your feet. Cassian, on the other hand, didn't hide it and deliberately filled your shoulder with tears and saliva. Mor lifted you into the air and almost didn't let you escape when Azriel started begging her to let you go already. Everyone cried. Possibly even Feyre's sisters shed a tear or two. 

You felt calm for a while. Complete, as if you were back in that house, in that home, before Amarantha and Hybern destroyed everything for you. 

But things couldn't be perfect. After the Starfall, you began to feel that anxiety again. Azriel could only tell by your body language, because you still kept your end of the bond completely closed to him and he couldn't feel the swirl of emotions coursing through your body. You had barely had time to get used to the familiarity of the situation when all the memories came flooding back. Perhaps you had blocked them out during your absence living on the Continent, you weren't sure, but the cries of war began to haunt you from the back of your mind. 

Azriel's shadows were also restless and that was another way he could tell something was going on. He was almost glued to your side all night, watching you out of the corner of his eye when you stepped away to talk to some friends. He never let you out of his sight. You knew where this behavior was coming from, but it never occurred to you to comment on it at any time. 

So, by that time, Azriel knew what was going on and you were sure you couldn't escape him. When he approached you and extended his hand in silent invitation, with the sound of conversations and drinks in the back of your head, you almost didn't hesitate to take it. His darkness enveloped you and, within seconds, you appeared in your room at the Town House. The party was now an imperceptible murmur. 

“Would you like to rest?” Azriel spoke, after spending several seconds standing facing each other. One of his hands ran over your face barely perfunctorily, but the warm sensation ignited too many things in your body. He arranged the strands of your hair that hid your face behind your ears with delicate, almost invisible movements. 

You only moved your head in response, up and down, under his watchful gaze. 

He almost crawled away, moving to your old bed that didn't have the same sheets as when you left. In fact, when you took a quick glance around the room, it looked too neat considering the amount of time that, presumably, no one used it. 

You shrunk at the thought of Azriel coming in regularly to clean it. 

With crystallized eyes you watched him move the comforter to make way for the clean white sheets waiting to be used once again after so long. 

Azriel turned to look at you, expectant. You didn't know if he was waiting for you to move to lie down or to ask him to leave so you could change into comfortable pajamas, but you did neither. Not when the emotions in your chest moved you, when they were more uncontainable now that you shared your mate's. Not when he opened up to you in such a vulnerable way, when he let you know that which for so long he kept to himself. Not when he gave you to understand that he was always waiting for you, even though it hurt him terribly that you had decided to spend all that time alone. 

So, for some reason, whether it was feelings or rationality, you approached him. You let yourself be carried away by nostalgia, by the silent desires of your heart, and you approached your mate with long strides. 

His expression went from neutral to confused as you got closer and you only remembered seeing it turn to surprise when you cradled his face in your hands and kissed him. 

It was rough and awkward at first, because your mate was completely transfixed for a few seconds. Maybe out of anxiety you counted ten. But, whether he was born from the same place as you or not, Azriel melted under your touch and as soon as he came to his senses he was kissing you back. It was just the kiss of an unaccepted bond, of a separated couple who held too many melancholy memories in their chests to bear on their own. 

Azriel wrapped his strong arms around your waist and bent his head to kiss you more deeply. You could feel the desperation and desire hovering tentatively in his demeanor, but he held back to give you a sweet, soft kiss; a kiss that said welcome, a kiss that urged you to stay by your side and never be separated from him again, a kiss that made you wonder why you had left in the first place. 

The softness of his movements were a direct contrast to your own. You cradled his face tightly, moving your lips over his as if second nature. Then you circled his neck, pressing him against you as if somehow you could hold him that much closer. You wanted him closer. 

But Azriel broke away, breathing in and out between gasps, and looked up at you with dark, glowing eyes. 

“Do you want this?” 

His hands on your skin burned. 

“Yes,” you answered quickly and tried to move closer again to kiss him, but he broke away again. 

“And are you going to stay after this?” 

Your eyes met his worried expression, thinly disguised. Ever since he'd opened his end of the bond for you, shedding any obstacle on his part that wouldn't allow him to feel you, everything you'd seen from him had been genuine. So you knew that concern was genuine and the mere conception generated pain in your heart. 

“I will stay,” you assured him, forcing your lips into a tight smile. 

Azriel studied your face trying to convince himself of your words, for he was an expert at knowing your body language, and you had no idea what he saw that convinced him and led him to pounce on your mouth once more. 

When the lightness settled into the bond, you were thankful you had never lowered your wall. Guilt suffocated you. 

But you kissed him back and followed your heart's desires, if only for one night. 

Azriel moved his hands along every curve of your body before removing your dress. If you hadn't stopped his movements, he would've surely ripped it off. His eyes followed every part his hands had explored and then his lips were on every inch of skin. Against the soft mattress and with your wrists held by his hands, you could only sigh and moan slightly at the way he explored your body. And yes, Azriel took his time. 

Before long there wasn't a single cloth separating the two of you and your mate simply couldn't keep his hands and lips still. Not that he wanted to, either. You moved your hands along his back, trying to avoid his wings, and moving your lips down his neck when he would let you because it seemed like all he wanted to do was eat you up with kisses. 

It wasn't long before he had you panting against him, with the sound of bodies colliding being the only thing your head could process at that moment. The tingling that coursed through your body was like no other you had ever felt; the wonders Azriel was doing with your body were unparalleled. He was panting too and every time he met your eyes it seemed to you that they were darker than the last time, but he never stopped holding you at any moment, never stopped hugging you as if his whole life depended on it. Maybe it did. 

The feel of his body against yours was indescribable, the movement and rhythm almost unbearable. You had never felt pleasure even remotely close to what he was making you feel at that moment. 

“Azriel…” you moaned his name, gripping his shoulders tightly, burying your nails as if it were your only stability. 

He cursed between gasps, increasing the pace and the force with which he held your waist. 

You were never going to get to touch the sky like you did that night, that much was clear. Even though your head was split in two, you looked into his eyes as you went through the most shattering, sweeping orgasm you'd ever had, reveling in the sounds that came from his mouth as he followed you to paradise. 

You thought it was going to be hard afterwards, but you fell asleep almost instantly. 

When you opened your eyes again, your mate's arms and legs were wrapped around your body and one of his wings was covering your nakedness and keeping you warm. You were facing him, chest to chest, and just looking at his peaceful sleeping face made you want to cry. Life was here, next to him, why couldn't you accept that? 

Getting out of bed without waking him up was quite a battle. Not as much as it was to sit at the foot of the bed, watching him rest, completely unaware of what would await him when he woke up. This time you were being selfish, you knew it, it was too cruel. But in your head there was nothing but disaster, pain disguised as stability. You couldn't have a good life with Azriel now and you didn't know if you could bear to see him to tell him after you promised to stay. You shouldn't have told him that, but how could you tell him otherwise? Maybe if he woke up at that moment you would stay… maybe that's why you sat there for so long. 

But finally you left, just like last time, in the middle of the silence, with his shadows following your feet and trying to keep you company. You felt a deja-vu as you stood in front of the door, thinking about how on both occasions you were thinking about what would happen if someone showed up to stop you. 

It didn't, in either case, and you knew the next day the exact moment when Azriel realized you had done it once again. He didn't try to hide his pain, he didn't have to, you deserved to know how you had made him feel. 

On the ship, on the way to the Continent, you fell to your knees as his pain stole your breath. 

[creedslove]

TAKING CARE OF JOEL WHEN HE'S SICK 🩺 - HEADCANONS

No outbreak!Joel Miller x f!reader

A/N: I'm sick and tired of being the patient and being sick, I can't wait to finally become myself again, and in the meantime, I decided to flip the cards on the table and make Joel the sick one hehehe

• Joel is a very tough man and quite stubborn if we're gonna be honest here, so if he admits he's sick and/or in pain, it's because that man IS sick and in A LOT of pain and that's quite concerning

• Joel's strong and rough, so it's pretty rare for him to become sick in the first place, of course there's still occasional colds here and there, perhaps a sore throat and some stomach problems due to the amount of coffee and beer that man drinks and also the stress, but when he began complaining about a certain pain in right side of his back and that his pee was kind of funny + he didn't know exactly how to describe it, but you knew that meant trouble

• going to the hospital was the logical decision, if Joel wasn't so stubborn all the time, and assured you he would be fine and he would just need some time resting, a nap and he would be brand as new

• which obviously wasn't the case, since not only was he in pain the moment he woke up, but he was also soaked with sweat, checking up his temperature, you realized he was feverish and when you offered him some water and something to eat as he hadn't had anything in a while, he was also nauseous

• Joel had never felt that way and he was scared if he was going to be honest, even if he didn't want to admit it, he was shitting himself out of fear, what was up with him? What was he supposed to do with you and Sarah and Tommy and the company? He was so scared and nervous, his mind going crazy as he thought of many ways that situation could go on and his anxiety made him even worse

• as you drove him to the ER and waited with him, you grabbed his hand, caressing it gently and looking into his eyes, it broke your heart. Your big, strong boyfriend, always so ready to take care of all the problems in the world so you wouldn't have a single worry suddenly looked so small, scared and in pain, and the worst part of it, was that you couldn't do anything to help him, so you just pecked his cheek and assured him it would be over soon

• your heart also shattered when the doctor called Joel's name and your boyfriend looked so scared; you held his hand and assured him once more, as you tried not letting anxiety take over you while he was being seen by the doctor. The appointment felt like it took hours, and once Joel exited the room holding a bunch of papers and looking like a kicked puppy, your heart shattered again

"It's kidney stones"

• he said in a small voice and you wished you could take all of his pain away, but unfortunately, you couldn't, so you promised yourself you'd do your best to nurse him back into health

• you grabbed the papers, reading the exams results, the doctor's prescription and all the meds he would have to take, you grabbed him by the hand and drove back to the drugstore, buying Joel everything he needed and then headed home

• you made sure to buy him the best painkillers there were available as well as everything the doctor said Joel needed to take and the first thing you did as you got home, was making him take his meds

• you let Joel take a much needed nap, as you went to prepare him some food, always checking up the list the doctor made, since he needed to have a special diet for a few days

• you knew it was quite the suffering until he could finally pee the stone out, so you made sure to take care of your man: giving him lots of water and other liquids, making him soft and light foods without salt or anything else, giving him the painkillers whenever he needed to and checked him up for fever

• Joel was brave but you felt so upset each time you heard him groan in pain; however, you still felt proud of how strong he was

• when Joel finally felt the stone come out, you two celebrated! You kissed him and wiped the sweat and tears from his eyes, knowing he still needed some days of recovery since he was still hurt on the inside due to the stone's path

• but overall, he already felt and looked much better, and that cheered you up, always spending some time on the couch, where he could find a nice position and snuggled him, massaging his back and kissing his forehead

• as soon as he started recovering, you also began making his favorite food and favorite dessert, you knew it wasn't actually a good idea, but he'd suffered so much, he deserved treats and some spoiling

• it still took him a couple of weeks to become completely healed, and once he did, he made sure to take you out on a date, fancy steakhouse and all - steakhouse because that's Joel we're talking about - and made love to you, knowing he was in good hands to have you taking care of him that way 💞

____

[mostlysignssomeportents]

The enshittification of garage-door openers reveals a vast and deadly rot

I'll be at the Studio City branch of the LA Public Library on Monday, November 13 at 1830hPT to launch my new novel, The Lost Cause. There'll be a reading, a talk, a surprise guest (!!) and a signing, with books on sale. Tell your friends! Come on down!

How could this happen? Owners of Chamberlain MyQ automatic garage door openers just woke up to discover that the company had confiscated valuable features overnight, and that there was nothing they could do about it.

Oh, we know what happened, technically speaking. Chamberlain shut off the API for its garage-door openers, which breaks their integration with home automation systems like Home Assistant. The company even announced that it was doing this, calling the integration an "unauthorized usage" of its products, though the "unauthorized" parties in this case are the people who own Chamberlain products:

https://chamberlaingroup.com/press/a-message-about-our-decision-to-prevent-unauthorized-usage-of-myq

We even know why Chamberlain did this. As Ars Technica's Ron Amadeo points out, shutting off the API is a way for Chamberlain to force its customers to use its ad-beshitted, worst-of-breed app, so that it can make a few pennies by nonconsensually monetizing its customers' eyeballs:

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2023/11/chamberlain-blocks-smart-garage-door-opener-from-working-with-smart-homes/

But how did this happen? How did a giant company like Chamberlain come to this enshittening juncture, in which it felt empowered to sabotage the products it had already sold to its customers? How can this be legal? How can it be good for business? How can the people who made this decision even look themselves in the mirror?

To answer these questions, we must first consider the forces that discipline companies, acting against the impulse to enshittify their products and services. There are four constraints on corporate conduct:

I. Competition. The fear of losing your business to a rival can stay even the most sociopathic corporate executive's hand.

II. Regulation. The fear of being fined, criminally sanctioned, or banned from doing business can check the greediest of leaders.

III. Capability. Corporate executives can dream up all kinds of awful ways to shift value from your side of the ledger to their own, but they can only do the things that are technically feasible.

IV. Self-help. The possibility of customers modifying, reconfiguring or altering their products to restore lost functionality or neutralize antifeatures carries an implied threat to vendors. If a printer company's anti-generic-ink measures drives a customer to jailbreak their printers, the original manufacturer's connection to that customer is permanently severed, as the customer creates a durable digital connection to a rival.

When companies act in obnoxious, dishonest, shitty ways, they aren't merely yielding to temptation – they are evading these disciplining forces. Thus, the Great Enshittening we are living through doesn't reflect an increase in the wickedness of corporate leadership. Rather, it represents a moment in which each of these disciplining factors have been gutted by specific policies.

This is good news, actually. We used to put down rat poison and we didn't have a rat problem. Then we stopped putting down rat poison and rats are eating us alive. That's not a nice feeling, but at least we know at least one way of addressing it – we can start putting down poison again. That is, we can start enforcing the rules that we stopped enforcing, in living memory. Having a terrible problem is no fun, but the best kind of terrible problem to have is one that you know a solution to.

As it happens, Chamberlain is a neat microcosm for all the bad policy choices that created the Era of Enshittification. Let's go through them:

Competition: Chamberlain doesn't have to worry about competition, because it is owned by a private equity fund that "rolled up" all of Chamberlain's major competitors into a single, giant firm. Most garage-door opener brands are actually Chamberlain, including "LiftMaster, Chamberlain, Merlin, and Grifco":

https://www.lakewoodgaragedoor.biz/blog/the-history-of-garage-door-openers

This is a pretty typical PE rollup, and it exploits a bug in US competition law called "Antitrust's Twilight Zone":

https://pluralistic.net/2022/12/16/schumpeterian-terrorism/#deliberately-broken

When companies buy each other, they are subject to "merger scrutiny," a set of guidelines that the FTC and DoJ Antitrust Division use to determine whether the outcome is likely to be bad for competition. These rules have been pretty lax since the Reagan administration, but they've currently being revised to make them substantially more strict:

https://www.justice.gov/opa/pr/justice-department-and-ftc-seek-comment-draft-merger-guidelines

One of the blind spots in these merger guidelines is an exemption for mergers valued at less than $101m. Under the Hart-Scott-Rodino Act, these fly under the radar, evading merger scrutiny. That means that canny PE companies can roll up dozens and dozens of standalone businesses, like funeral homes, hospital beds, magic mushrooms, youth addiction treatment centers, mobile home parks, nursing homes, physicians’ practices, local newspapers, or e-commerce sellers:

http://www.economicliberties.us/wp-content/uploads/2022/12/Serial-Acquisitions-Working-Paper-R4-2.pdf

By titrating the purchase prices, PE companies – like Blackstone, owners of Chamberlain and all the other garage-door makers – can acquire a monopoly without ever raising a regulatory red flag.

But antitrust enforcers aren't helpless. Under (the long dormant) Section 7 of the Clayton Act, competition regulators can block mergers that lead to "incipient monopolization." The incipiency standard prevented monopolies from forming from 1914, when the Clayton Act passed, until the Reagan administration. We used to put down rat poison, and we didn't have rats. We stopped, and rats are gnawing our faces off. We still know where the rat poison is – maybe we should start putting it down again.

On to regulation. How is it possible for Chamberlain to sell you a garage-door opener that has an API and works with your chosen home automation system, and then unilaterally confiscate that valuable feature? Shouldn't regulation protect you from this kind of ripoff?

It should, but it doesn't. Instead, we have a bunch of regulations that protect Chamberlain from you. Think of binding arbitration, which allows Chamberlain to force you to click through an "agreement" that takes away your right to sue them or join a class-action suit:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/20/benevolent-dictators/#felony-contempt-of-business-model

But regulation could protect you from Chamberlain. Section 5 of the Federal Trade Commission Act allows the FTC to ban any "unfair and deceptive" conduct. This law has been on the books since 1914, but Section 5 has been dormant, forgotten and unused, for decades. The FTC's new dynamo chair, Lina Khan, has revived it, and is use it like a can-opener to free Americans who've been trapped by abusive conduct:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/01/10/the-courage-to-govern/#whos-in-charge

Khan's used Section 5 powers to challenge privacy invasions, noncompete clauses, and other corporate abuses – the bait-and-switch tactics of Chamberlain are ripe for a Section 5 case. If you buy a gadget because it has five features and then the vendor takes two of them away, they are clearly engaged in "unfair and deceptive" conduct.

On to capability. Since time immemorial, corporate leaders have fetishized "flexibility" in their business arrangements – like the ability to do "dynamic pricing" that changes how much you pay for something based on their guess about how much you are willing to pay. But this impulse to play shell games runs up against the hard limits of physical reality: grocers just can't send an army of rollerskated teenagers around the store to reprice everything as soon as a wealthy or desperate-looking customer comes through the door. They're stuck with crude tactics like doubling the price of a flight that doesn't include a Saturday stay as a way of gouging business travelers on an expense account.

With any shell-game, the quickness of the hand deceives the eye. Corporate crooks armed with computers aren't smarter or more wicked than their analog forebears, but they are faster. Digital tools allow companies to alter the "business logic" of their services from instant to instant, in highly automated ways:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/19/twiddler/

The monopoly coalition has successfully argued that this endless "twiddling" should not be constrained by privacy, labor or consumer protection law. Without these constraints, corporate twiddlers can engage in all kinds of ripoffs, like wage theft and algorithmic wage discrimination:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/04/12/algorithmic-wage-discrimination/#fishers-of-men

Twiddling is key to the Darth Vader MBA ("I am altering the deal. Pray I don't alter it further"), in which features are confiscated from moment to moment, without warning or recourse:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/26/hit-with-a-brick/#graceful-failure

There's no reason to accept the premise that violating your privacy, labor rights or consumer rights with a computer is so different from analog ripoffs that existing laws don't apply. The unconstrained twiddling of digital ripoff artists is a plague on billions of peoples' lives, and any enforcer who sticks up for our rights will have an army of supporters behind them.

Finally, there's the fear of self-help measures. All the digital flexibility that tech companies use to take value away can be used to take it back, too. The whole modern history of digital computers is the history of "adversarial interoperability," in which the sleazy antifeatures of established companies are banished through reverse-engineering, scraping, bots and other forms of technological guerrilla warfare:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/10/adversarial-interoperability

Adversarial interoperability represents a serious threat to established business. If you're a printer company gouging on toner, your customers might defect to a rival that jailbreaks your security measures. That's what happened to Lexmark, who lost a case against the toner-refilling company Static Controls, which went on to buy Lexmark:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/felony-contempt-business-model-lexmarks-anti-competitive-legacy

Sure, your customers are busy and inattentive and you can degrade the quality of your product a lot before they start looking for ways out. But once they cross that threshold, you can lose them forever. That's what happened to Microsoft: the company made the tactical decision to produce a substandard version of Office for the Mac in a drive to get Mac users to switch to Windows. Instead, Apple made Iwork (Pages, Numbers and Keynote), which could read and write every Office file, and Mac users threw away Office, the only Microsoft product they owned, permanently severing their relationship to the company:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2019/06/adversarial-interoperability-reviving-elegant-weapon-more-civilized-age-slay

Today, companies can operate without worrying about this kind of self-help measure. There' a whole slew of IP rights that Chamberlain can enforce against you if you try to fix your garage-door opener yourself, or look to a competitor to sell you a product that restores the feature they took away:

https://locusmag.com/2020/09/cory-doctorow-ip/

Jailbreaking your Chamberlain gadget in order to make it answer to a rival's app involves bypassing a digital lock. Trafficking in a tool to break a digital lock is a felony under Section 1201 of the Digital Millennium Copyright, carrying a five-year prison sentence and a $500,000 fine.

In other words, it's not just that tech isn't regulated, allowing for endless twiddling against your privacy, consumer rights and labor rights. It's that tech is badly regulated, to permit unlimited twiddling by tech companies to take away your rightsand to prohibit any twiddling by you to take them back. The US government thumbs the scales against you, creating a regime that Jay Freeman aptly dubbed "felony contempt of business model":

https://pluralistic.net/2022/10/23/how-to-fix-cars-by-breaking-felony-contempt-of-business-model/

All kinds of companies have availed themselves of this government-backed superpower. There's DRM – digital locks, covered by DMCA 1201 – in powered wheelchairs:

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2022/06/when-drm-comes-your-wheelchair

In dishwashers:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/05/03/cassette-rewinder/#disher-bob

In treadmills:

https://pluralistic.net/2021/06/22/vapescreen/#jane-get-me-off-this-crazy-thing

In tractors:

https://pluralistic.net/2022/05/08/about-those-kill-switched-ukrainian-tractors/

It should come as no surprise to learn that Chamberlain has used DMCA 1201 to block interoperable garage door opener components:

https://scholarship.law.marquette.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1233&context=iplr

That's how we arrived at this juncture, where a company like Chamberlain can break functionality its customers value highly, solely to eke out a minuscule new line of revenue by selling ads on their own app.

Chamberlain bought all its competitors.

Chamberlain operates in a regulatory environment that is extremely tolerant of unfair and deceptive practices. Worse: they can unilaterally take away your right to sue them, which means that if regulators don't bestir themselves to police Chamberlain, you are shit out of luck.

Chamberlain has endless flexibility to unilaterally alter its products' functionality, in fine-grained ways, even after you've purchased them.

Chamberlain can sue you if you try to exercise some of that same flexibility to protect yourself from their bad practices.

Combine all four of those factors, and of course Chamberlain is going to enshittify its products. Every company has had that one weaselly asshole at the product-planning table who suggests a petty grift like breaking every one of the company's customers' property to sell a few ads. But historically, the weasel lost the argument to others, who argued that making every existing customer furious would affect the company's bottom line, costing it sales and/or fines, and prompting customers to permanently sever their relationship with the company by seeking out and installing alternative software. Take away all the constraints on a corporation's worst impulses, and this kind of conduct is inevitable:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/28/microincentives-and-enshittification/

This isn't limited to Chamberlain. Without the discipline of competition, regulation, self-help measures or technological limitations, every industry in undergoing wholesale enshittification. It's not a coincidence that Chamberlain's grift involves a push to move users into its app. Because apps can't be reverse-engineered and modified without risking DMCA 1201 prosecution, forcing a user into an app is a tidy and reliable way to take away that user's rights.

Think about ad-blocking. One in four web users has installed an ad-blockers ("the biggest boycott in world history" -Doc Searls). Zero app users have installed app-blockers, because they don't exist, because making one is a felony. An app is just a web-page wrapped in enough IP to make it a crime to defend yourself against corporate predation:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/27/an-audacious-plan-to-halt-the-internets-enshittification-and-throw-it-into-reverse/

The temptation to enshitiffy isn't new, but the ability to do so without consequence is a modern phenomenon, the intersection of weak policy enforcement and powerful technology. Your car is autoenshittified, a rolling rent-seeking platform that spies on you and price-gouges you:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/07/24/rent-to-pwn/#kitt-is-a-demon

Cars are in an uncontrolled skid over Enshittification Cliff. Honda, Toyota, VW and GM all sell cars with infotainment systems that harvest your connected phone's text-messages and send them to the corporation for data-mining. What's more, a judge in Washington state just ruled that this is legal:

https://therecord.media/class-action-lawsuit-cars-text-messages-privacy

While there's no excuse for this kind of sleazy conduct, we can reasonably anticipate that if our courts would punish companies for engaging in it, they might be able to resist the temptation. No wonder Mozilla's latest Privacy Not Included research report called cars "the worst product category we have ever reviewed":

https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/articles/its-official-cars-are-the-worst-product-category-we-have-ever-reviewed-for-privacy/

I mean, Nissan tries to infer facts about your sex life and sells those inferences to marketing companies:

https://foundation.mozilla.org/en/privacynotincluded/nissan/

But the OG digital companies are the masters of enshittification. Microsoft has been at this game for longer than anyone, and every day brings a fresh way that Microsoft has worsened its products without fear of consequence. The latest? You can't delete your OneDrive account until you provide an acceptable explanation for your disloyalty:

https://www.theverge.com/2023/11/8/23952878/microsoft-onedrive-windows-close-app-notification

It's tempting to think that the cruelty is the point, but it isn't. It's almost never the point. The point is power and money. Unscrupulous businesses have found ways to make money by making their products worse since the industrial revolution. Here's Jules Dupuis, writing about 19th century French railroads:

It is not because of the few thousand francs which would have to be spent to put a roof over the third-class carriages or to upholster the third-class seats that some company or other has open carriages with wooden benches. What the company is trying to do is to prevent the passengers who can pay the second class fare from traveling third class; it hits the poor, not because it wants to hurt them, but to frighten the rich. And it is again for the same reason that the companies, having proved almost cruel to the third-class passengers and mean to the second-class ones, become lavish in dealing with first-class passengers. Having refused the poor what is necessary, they give the rich what is superfluous.

https://www.tumblr.com/mostlysignssomeportents/731357317521719296/having-refused-the-poor-what-is-necessary-they

But as bad as all this is, let me remind you about the good part: we know how to stop companies from enshittifying their products. We know what disciplines their conduct: competition, regulation, capability and self-help measures. Yes, rats are gnawing our eyeballs, but we know which rat-poison to use, and where to put it to control those rats.

Competition, regulation, constraint and self-help measures all backstop one another, and while one or a few can make a difference, they are most powerful when they're all mobilized in concert. Think of the failure of the EU's landmark privacy law, the GDPR. While the GDPR proved very effective against bottom-feeding smaller ad-tech companies, the worse offenders, Meta and Google, have thumbed their noses at it.

This was enabled in part by the companies' flying an Irish flag of convenience, maintaining the pretense that they have to be regulated in a notorious corporate crime-haven:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/05/15/finnegans-snooze/#dirty-old-town

That let them get away with all kinds of shenanigans, like ignoring the GDPR's requirement that you should be able to easily opt out of data-collection without having to go through cumbersome "cookie consent" dialogs or losing access to the service as punishment for declining to be tracked.

As the noose has tightened around these surveillance giants, they're continuing to play games. Meta now says that the only way to opt out of data-collection in the EU is to pay for the service:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/30/markets-remaining-irrational/#steins-law

This is facially illegal under the GDPR. Not only are they prohibited from punishing you for opting out of collection, but the whole scheme ignores the nature of private data collection. If Facebook collects the fact that you and I are friends, but I never opted into data-collection, they have violated the GDPR, even if you were coerced into granting consent:

https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2023/11/the-pay-or-consent-challenge-for-platform-regulators.html

The GDPR has been around since 2016 and Google and Meta are still invading 500 million Europeans' privacy. This latest delaying tactic could add years to their crime-spree before they are brought to justice.

But most of this surveillance is only possible because so much of how you interact with Google and Meta is via an app, and an app is just a web-page that's a felony to make an ad-blocker for. If the EU were to legalize breaking DRM – repealing Article 6 of the 2001 Copyright Directive – then we wouldn't have to wait for the European Commission to finally wrestle these two giant companies to the ground. Instead, EU companies could make alternative clients for all of Google and Meta's services that don't spy on you, without suffering the fate of OG App, which tried this last winter and was shut down by "felony contempt of business model":

https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/05/battery-vampire/#drained

Enshittification is demoralizing. To quote @wilwheaton, every update to the services we use inspires "dread of 'How will this complicate things as I try to maintain privacy and sanity in a world that demands I have this thing to operate?'"

https://wilwheaton.tumblr.com/post/698603648058556416/cory-doctorow-if-you-see-this-and-have-thoughts

But there are huge natural constituencies for the four disciplining forces that keep enshittification at bay.

Remember, Antitrust's Twilight Zone doesn't just allow rollups of garage-door opener companies – it's also poison for funeral homes, hospital beds, magic mushrooms, youth addiction treatment centers, mobile home parks, nursing homes, physicians’ practices, local newspapers, or e-commerce sellers.

The Binding Arbitration scam that stops Chamberlain customers from suing the company also stops Uber drivers from suing over stolen wages, Turbotax customers from suing over fraud, and many other victims of corporate crime from getting a day in court.

The failure to constrain twiddling to protect privacy, labor rights and consumer rights enables a host of abuses, from stalking, doxing and SWATting to wage theft and price gouging:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/06/attention-rents/#consumer-welfare-queens

And Felony Contempt of Business Model is used to screw you over every time you refill your printer, run your dishwasher, or get your Iphone's screen replaced.

The actions needed to halt and reverse this enshittification are well understood, and the partisans for taking those actions are too numerous to count. It's taken a long time for all those individuals suffering under corporate abuses to crystallize into a movement, but at long last, it's happening.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2023/11/09/lead-me-not-into-temptation/#chamberlain

Image: Cryteria (modified) https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:HAL9000.svg

CC BY 3.0 https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0/deed.en

[throneofsapphics]

stay in the moment with me

young!Rhys x Reader

Summary: "I don’t want to be alone tonight," with Rhys

Warnings: none

A/N: for this! I couldn't resist so its technically a continuation of the other side, and you don't have to read that first but it might add more context!

“Stay,” he mumbled, arm reaching out towards you, his body sprawled over the couch. 

“It’s my apartment,” you rolled your eyes, “I can’t leave.” 

From the corner of your eye, you watched him shuffle himself up to sit, and motion towards the space he’d cleared. “Then sit with me.” 

A huff, and you stalked towards the kitchen, ignoring his discontented grumble, and returning with a full glass of water. 

You held it out to him, other hand propped on your hip. “Drink it all.” 

“Are you poisoning me, darling?” He asked, but tipped the glass back before you could answer. 

“If you’re going to be this obnoxious, I'll stay somewhere else tonight,” you said half heartedly, like hell you’d actually leave. 

Faster than you thought he’d be able to, consider he was still drunk off his ass, he reached out and caught your hand. “I don’t want to be alone tonight.” 

It sounded as close to begging as you figured the future High Lord would ever get, and you took pity, staying with him until drunk snores started leaving his lips.  

-

The tossing and turning, and thump of a body hitting the floor had woken you. The small tang of fear is what had you moving. Nightmare. You knew those all too well, well enough you couldn’t stomach not at least checking on him. 

Two feet planted on the cold floor, footsteps - you froze - Rhysand’s footsteps, heading to your room, and a second later a small knock. 

“Come in,” you called, voice still rough with sleep.

He looked pitiful. Dark hair mussed, a haunted look in the violet eyes, face paler than usual. 

His eyes trailed to the empty spot next to you, and you saved him the need to ask, motioning towards it with one hand, and an exaggerated sigh. Hearing his low chuckle, you quickly shuffled back under, pulled the covers tightly over you, and faced the wall - away from him. To seek comfort from you, of all people, he must be desperate. 

The bed shifted, and you felt surprisingly … relaxed. Your breaths began evening out, and you were thankful for the extra warmth, considering how cold it had been. At least males were good for that.

“You’re thinking loudly,” he cautioned. 

You were grateful he couldn’t actually see you because your cheeks flushed and you slammed your mental shields closed tightly enough that pressure ricocheted through your skull, and you had to take a second to re-focus on the present. 

His low laugh drew a warning snarl from you, and he quieted. 

“Go to sleep, Rhys,” you sighed. 

“That’s the first time you’ve called me that.” 

You ignored him. 

Maybe an hour or so later, you felt his arm wrap around your waist, tugging you flush against his chest, and decided you were too damn tired to fight him on it. It was cold, after all. 

You didn’t remember that decision when you woke in the morning, his legs tangled with yours, arm holding you tight to him, like you were some kind of gods-damned lifeline. Based on his light breathing, he was awake, and knew exactly what was going on. That infuriated you, slightly.  

“Didn’t take you for the cuddly type,” you commented, your morning voice more of a croak.

“And here we are,” he sighed - but didn’t move. Maybe he was as touch-starved as you were. Could it be platonic affection if you didn’t actually like each other, couldn’t stand each other? 

It felt nice, and you found yourself not hating his touch, so you didn’t move. He’d started it, and he could end it whenever he wanted to - later on, you’d blame it on being tired and cold. 

[witchywithwhiskey]

Only one bed professor Steve 😳

ohhhh ok so only one bed professor steve rogers was actually a fic i started for a challenge way back in February, based almost entirely on the cevans look in the above gif. i knew about halfway through writing it that it was going to be too long for the challenge's word limit, so i rushed the ending and shelved it.

the set up is basically that steve and reader are both professors in the writing department of the same university, but while steve is a world-renowned literary novelist, reader is a romance novelist who writes under a pen name for fear of losing her position with the university (because she writes erotica basically) so reader HATES steve because he has more prestige recognition whereas she has to hide her success. so it's enemies to lovers + only one bed 😈

but the story starts when they're both attending the same academic/literary conference and because they're going as representatives of their university, they're put up in the same hotel room—buth there's only one bed. and throughout the weekend, reader starts to realize steve isn't as bad as she thought...

i really really really love this fic idea, but the first draft is a mess and i know it's going to take a lot of effort to edit so i just haven't gone back to it, but i will!!!

anyway, here's a little snippet from the first morning after sharing a bed together 🤭

You weren’t sure if it was a conscious decision on Steve’s part, but your colleague didn’t return to the room by the time you were ready to go to bed. You took advantage of having the room to yourself, taking your time as you went through all the steps of your skincare routine. If Steve was going to make you scowl and grimace so much, it was more important than ever. 

When you were done, you changed into a silky nightdress and set about building a wall of pillows in the center of the bed. It occurred to you that Steve might need more room, considering he was bigger and broader than you, but it secretly delighted you to have plenty of room to stretch out on your side of the bed while he might be a little cramped. Once you were done, you slipped beneath the blankets, read for a little while, then finally turned out the light and went to sleep.

You woke in the morning a little while before your alarm, feeling like you’d had the most restful sleep outside your own bed. Maybe even in your own bed. As your surroundings slowly came back to you, you felt a warm, heavy weight shift around your waist. 

You were clinging to a pillow, your body wrapped around the plush softness, your arms cradling it against your chest. Another pillow was wedged between your thighs, pressed tightly against your core through your panties. Your fingers brushed against something warm and hard, and when you opened your eyes, you realized Steve was wrapped around you and the pillow you hugged from the other side of the divider you’d constructed the night before. 

A giggle caught in your throat at the perfectly imperfect sight of Steve sleeping. His mouth was open, rumbling snores spilling from it freely, and a little trail of drool dripped from the corner of his lips to the pillow beneath his head. Your body shook from the effort it took to hold back your laughter, and the weight on your hip shifted again. Suddenly, your laughter evaporated as you realized it was his arm, slung around your waist in his sleep.

thanks for playing my WIPs ask game!!

[sweetcarrotsandroses97]

~ As Sweet As Sugar | JJK

Pairing: CEO!husband!Jungkook x writer!fem!wife!Reader

Warnings: fluff, angst, the in-laws (again), talks of marriage, mentions of divorce, business talks, mentions of large inheritance, love confessions, sweet Kook, enamoured Kook, this is a pretty soft chapter tbh, Jimin and Namjoon feature in a scene (we love these two), implied smut at the end, OC is wiped by JK, (let me know if I missed anything!)

Summary: Jungkook makes a decision that would change his life forever but he can't regret it when he know he'll have you in the end. Promises are made, love gets sealed, because a caramel isn't always as sour as it seems.

Word Count: 4k

A/N: Hello, darlings! Welcome to the final chapter of "Sweet Marriage"! I hope you are excited to see how (y/n) and Jungkook will solve their marital issues O.O

Drabbles for this AU! are open, sweet ones! My inbox is open to all of you who'd like to request a continuation or would like to see in-betweens of this story. Now, without further adieu, happy reading, darlings!

☕Caffeinate me so I can keep on writing! ☕

What kind of caramel has a sour exterior yet a sweet centre? Is it worth the experience?

You sat in the passenger's seat while Jungkook drove to his parent's house. You were tense, he could sense it as well. From the begining you had tried to get along with your in-laws, something he thought was going pretty smoothly to be honest until Jungkook's mother crossed the line.

A silent gasp left your lips when Jungkook's hand rested atop your own. You looked at him only to marvel in his side profile.

"You are tense."

Your gaze lowered at his acknowledgement, you didn't want to speak just how much it bothered you had to go to his parent's residence in fear of making him angry or worse, to see you in a bad light you certainly weren't in.

His hand squeezed yours and you looked up at him only to meet his dark eyes for a second before his gaze returned to the front.

"I promise this is the last time we are going to my parent's house. I just need to sign some documents."

You leaned back on your seat, your eyes focused on the road as you let your mind wander around what had happened five days ago. You felt stupid to some point for doing Mrs. Jeon's will without consulting your husband. Not that you needed some kind of permission from him to do anything you pleased but more so as to include him in a decision that was going to affect the both of you as a married couple.

"I know, Kook."

You replied back in a soft voice, mind already lost in memories from that day and the following day you had lived next to your husband. The next morning after you told him your secret, Jungkook wasn't by your side and you felt how the world fell over you.

Fear took hold of you that moment, you could still remember how scared your had been when he wasn't in the bed, his side was also cold to the touch. You remember standing up in a rush, nearly tripping down with the sheets tangled in your body before you bolted out of the bedroom.

Jungkook was in the living room, his eyes lost in the horizon as the sun was painting the sky in beautiful hues of orange, pink and blue. He turned to look at you, his heart trembling at the distress drowning your (e/c) pools before he stood up and was quick to approach you.

You were in his arms the next second. Your face buried in his chest as you blinked back tears you didn't know had gathered in your waterline. Jungkook didn't say anything, he simply held you tighter when he felt you relax in his hold.

"You weren't in bed."

You said, matter-of-factly and he sighed, resting his chin at the top of your head.

"I woke up early, I didn't get much sleep."

You took a deep breath, inhaling in his scent, taking in his presence.

"I thought you had left."

The sound of your voice so fragile pulled at his heartstrings that a lump began forming in his throat. He pulled back only for one of his hands to cradle your cheek in his large palm while his eyes gazed into your own with countless emotions.

"Never. I could never leave your side."

You blinked and the memory dissipated from your mind like fog when the sun came out. You sighed, silently playing with Jungkook's fingers that were still in your hold, completely unaware of his soft smile upon your gentle touch.

"We are here."

His deep voice snapped you out of your little paradise where only you and your husband existed. He turned to look at you with gentle eyes that nearly melted you in your place. He smiled as if to comfort you; which it did.

"This won't take long, I promise."

You nodded before his hand left your own as he exited the car, making a sudden coldness invaded your body. You couldn't fully describe it but it felt as if your heart was enveloped around ice when you weren't near Jungkook, however the slightest touch or simple glance from him were enough to set you aflame.

He opened the door for you and you stepped out of the vehicle. His hand found home in between your fingers as he led you silently toward the front door.

"Young master, welcome."

Spoke the maid at the entrance. She bowed at Jungkook and you with stiff movements that made you take a deep breath. This is it. You thought to yourself as Jungkook gave the maid a simple nod before asking in his professional voice. He was here to deal business, nothing more, nothing less.

"Is my father in his study?"

"Yes, young master. He's waiting for you. Mrs. Jeon, would you like me to take your coat?"

You turned to look at the elegant maid with kind eyes yet your voice came firm as you spoke your next words.

"It's alright. We won't be here long anyway, but thank you."

The maid bowed down to both of you as Jungkook led you through the house and up the large staircase toward his father's study. His steps were determined, strong and confident. You followed next to him, your hand still clasped in his.

Jungkook had you as his equal in this situation were his future was on the line while you had him as support to the thorns that wanted to hurt your marriage with your sweet husband whom you loved so very much you feared your heart would explode with the amount of love you held for the man walking next to you.

The double doors were opened by two maids and you and Jungkook entered your father-in-law's studio hand in hand. Tension immediately rose in the room. You practically could cut it with a knife. Mr. Jeon stood up from his chair, a shiver ran down your spine but if it was due to the chilly room or the coldness of his eyes, you couldn't exactly tell.

"Welcome. This will be short, I only need you, Jungkook, to sign some papers and then this scandalous situation will be over."

You felt Jungkook's hand tighten around yours, his father's words spurring emotions in his heart he rather kept hidden. You squeezed his hand back in silent reassurance which made him physically relax a bit yet not completely.

"Where do I sign?"

Asked your husband in a detached voice. He was here for an entirely business deal. No emotion was carried by his voice and the tension rose once more in the room, like icicles trying to break the peace that surrounded your marriage with Jungkook.

Mr. Jeon sighed before his eyes lowered, his hands opened a file only for then to turn it upside down so that Jungkook was able to read it properly, he put an expensive black pen next to it and the coldness once more invaded the place.

Your husband let go of your hand as he walked toward the mahogany desk. His steps were large and precise, without hesitation. You found yourself admiring the control he had over his emotions, of his actions. Of how people viewed him. Even when he was in the presence of his own parents.

How sad it must have been for him to wear that mask required by society in front of his parents as well. It must have been tiring. The thought crossed your head before you could stop however, you came to notice how relaxed he was in his home with you. How domestic he appeared in your eyes. Then again, who said you weren't also wearing such a disguise?

You made eye contact with your father-in-law as the shuffling of paper echoed around the walls. You could read in his dark eyes the challenge he carried within him, the arrogance. The slight disappointment he had in Jungkook when he didn't divorce you. The frustration cursing through his veins was obvious to your eyes that only held love and support toward the man who had married you.

"So, according to this, I will no longer be the heir of the company?"

His father nodded, his hands clasped in front of him before he spoke in a monotonous tone.

"Yes, Jeon Enterprises will pass to your Cousin Marlene, I believe she is now in the States. She's already been notified of this."

Silence stretched in the room once more as your eyes focused on your husband. Your heart thumped in your chest ever so quickly you were scared the two men in the study could hear its frantic beating.

"You'll keep your current position but you'll work for us. Are you sure you want to do this, Jungkook?"

But your husband paid him no mind. He wasn't going to be controlled like a puppet. Not anymore. Not when his future, you, were on the line. Never. Jungkook signed the documents, the scraping of the pen over the paper reached your ears and your heart fluttered at his actions.

Jungkook put the pen aside and straightened back to his full height. His eyes pierced those of his father with no emotion at all.

"If that is all then we'll be on our way. My wife and I already have plans."

The older man let out a deep sigh, looking at his son with melancholy or disappointment, you really couldn't tell. Butterflies flew in your stomach when Jungkook called you like that. "My wife." His. You were his just as he was yours. Tangled with the ribbon of fate and tied with a knot of love.

"I'll let you know if there's anything more but for now, that is all."

Jungkook nodded, turning around and when his back was towards his father, he offered you a soft smile. Kind in its nature. Happy in its existence. You smiled back as he walked to you and his hand found home around yours.

"Let's go."

And with that, he led you outside of the study and through the hallway. Mr. Jeon was left in his expensive and luxurious study, pondering if what he had done had been the right decision. It wasn't his fault Jungkook had fallen in love with you and it wasn't your fault that you were sterile. Was it really worth it to discard the company from his son's rightful heritage only for a drama his wife made?

But there was no turning back. There was nothing to be done if he were to feel guilty about his choice. Because as the owner of Jeon Enterprises, Jungkook's father had in him the power to leave the company to whoever he pleased. Was it really worth it?

"Jungkook."

Mrs. Jeon spoke as she stood next to the large staircase. Her piercing eyes went from Jungkook to you and back to him. You squeezed your husband's hand in reassurance. You were next to him, just like every future time he'll have to face anything, you'll stand next to him as his wife.

"Mother."

You felt how the tension rose once more between mother and son and you straightened your back before saying in a steady voice.

"If you'll excuse us, Mrs. Jeon, there's an appointment we need to attend to. I hope we'll meet again under better circumstances."

She eyes you up and down and you feel how she scrutinised you with her gaze alone. But you weren't going to back down. You had your husband next to you and he had you as well. You sent her a polite smile and she nodded in a stiff manner before you turned to the staircase and pulled on your joined hands with Jungkook before he followed you down the marble stairs with his mother's eyes piercing the top of your head as if she could burn you with her anger cursing through her veins.

"You will regret this, Jungkook! You'll regret it for the rest of your life!"

But her words fell on deaf ears. Jungkook didn't need their fame, he didn't need their support anymore and there was no point in keeping a relationship with the people who brought him to this world if it was going to be so toxic he felt like he couldn't breathe anymore.

He had you know. Your presence, your existence was like a new and fresh breeze on a spring day. You brought him hope, you gave him your heart and with it, your love. Your trust. Your life was in his hands. Just as he had given you his heart ever so willingly; without an ounce of hesitation in his actions, in his words, in his thoughts about you. His lover. His wife. His (y/n).

You stood in the lift as it went up to your shared apartment. Your hand was held in Jungkook's larger palm as his thumb ran delicate circles over your knuckles.

You still were surprised at how easily he had given up on his inheritance because of you. Because he loved you. Because he wanted you. He cherished you and gave you your place as his wife. You didn't doubt you would have done the same had you been in his shoes.

The feeling of your heart thumping against your chest for the man you had married made you smile softly. At him. At his love. At what had been built between you both where nothing existed, not a castle stood. A castle of love.

The elevator dinged and the doors opened. Jungkook's hand squeezed yours in an involuntary way but it made your cheeks heat as butterflies fluttered in your stomach. The both of you walked out of the lift hand in hand and down the large corridor that led to your shared apartment.

When you two rounded a corner, you had to suppress a gasp as you nearly collided with two other men who were walking at a fast pace from the other end of the corridor. You recognised them vaguely, as if you had seen them before but couldn't quite place where. Unbeknownst to you, Jungkook tensed ever so slightly at the sight of his friends and coworkers.

"Jimin, Namjoon. What are you both doing here?"

Now you knew where you had seen them. Both Jimin and Namjoon had attended the small wedding ceremony between you and Jungkook nearly a year ago.

"I... well, you see-"

"We visited a friend, Kook. I'm glad to see you, you haven't been at the company for some time now."

The shorter one spoke. Jimin, you remembered his name was Jimin. The man had a pleasing smile over his plump lips and you also noticed he had recently dyed his hair a sandy shade of blond that suited him perfectly.

Jungkook nodded, eyes going from Namjoon to Jimin and then back again.

"How are you, Mrs. Jeon? We haven't seen you since forever."

Spoke Namjoon and you smiled. Reminiscing how you both had shared talks about different books and art, you being a writer yourself he valued your opinion greatly.

"I've been fine, Namjoon. Thanks for asking, I hope everything's going well at the company?"

Your question made them nod and Jungkook bit his lip, this interaction was lasting more than it should have. To begin with, it shouldn't have occurred in the first place. This could totally ruin Jungkook's plans to spend the evening with you.

"Oh, yes. Please don't worry about that but do tell Jungkook here to stop pestering us about the monthly reports already! We have a big loan already!"

You couldn't help but laugh at Jimin's comment, the sound resonating across the walls. Jungkook sighed loudly, visibly irritated by his friends who teased him in front of you.

"Yeah well, keep going like this and there'll be no salary increase for you both."

Jungkook began walking once more, tugging on your joined hands as you laughed out loud at the scared face Namjoon made and the eye roll from Jimin.

"See you guys around!"

You were able to say that before Jungkook dragged you into the apartment and closed the door behind him leaving Jimin and Namjoon standing in the middle of the corridor.

"Do you think he'll do it?"

Asked the taller man as they both began walking down the hall and towards the lifts. His hands shoved into his trouser pockets and a relaxed expression over his face.

"He better do it."

Jimin pressed the button to go to the ground floor, a hand running over his hair as he frowned slightly.

"He better do it, hyung, or I swear I'll kill him."

Namjoon laughed and the elevator's doors closed. Leaving behind nothing but silence in the empty hallway.

Jungkook had taken your coat from you before he had disappeared into the kitchen saying he was thirsty. You sighed in content as you took off your shoes and placed your purse on the entrance table before you walked away from the door wearing your comfortable slippers.

"Kook?"

You asked, but he wasn't in the kitchen and you frowned at his absence. Silence engulfed the flat and you walked to the living room and the dining room but he wasn't there.

"He couldn't have just disappeared into thin air, now can he?!

You muttered to yourself as your feet carried you to your shared bedroom. The door was slightly ajar so you pushed it with your palm and gasped at what you saw inside.

"I thought it would take you longer to come here."

Jungkook said and you stepped forward, eyes roaming around the bedroom. The curtains were pulled to the sides, the mesmerising sunset painting the sky tinted the room in a soft orange hue it warmed your heart instantly.

There were red rose petals on the ground, and the bed was dressed in black sheets with white petals on it. Transparent balloons filled the ceiling as they floated up and you couldn't help the smile that graced your lips.

"Kook, what's this?"

He walked over to you, standing at arm's length as his eyes lost themselves in your own. His heart was beating wildly in his chest; he feared you could hear it. His hands were behind his back as he looked down at you.

"Jimin and Namjoon took longer than anticipated."

You laughed, so that was why Namjoon seemed so nervous at the beginning. The sound of your laughter made butterflies swirl in his stomach, the sight of you, bathed in the golden light of the sun, smiling up at him was enough to send him to heaven.

"(y/n),"

How delicious it was to hear your name coming out of his lips. You looked at him with a soft gaze he thought he'd melt right then and there.

"my beautiful wife."

You blushed at the compliment, breaking eye contact as you looked down in a futile attempt at hiding your flustered state. He chuckled, finding the situation so beautiful in its own existence. Wishing he could frame this precise moment and look at it forever.

His hands untangled themselves from behind his back, one was shoved into his trouser pocket while the other lifted your chin with the tips of his fingers. The moment your eyes met his once more, you felt like melting against him. It was perfect.

"I love you so much, sweet one. So, so much."

You swallowed, feeling his words through your heart as it skipped a beat.

"I love you as well, Jungkook. With all my heart."

He smiled. the bunny smile you loved so much. That smile that was the source of your happiness. That smile that was only his.

"We have faced so many things together."

His hand moved and cradled your cheek, the touch burning you while freezing you in your spot at the same time. You wanted him. In every sense of the word. He did things to you that you had never felt before. He made you feel loved like no-one else had done, he made you feel cherished, wanted, needed. And you could only hope he felt the same way. Because you loved him, you cherished him, you wanted him and needed him just as much.

"I wish we had met under different circumstances but that doesn't mean I am not grateful for what he has grown to be as a couple."

Your hand came up and covered the once that cradled your cheek, your hand over his sending tingles all over his arm and to his body he felt fuzzy, happy to just be with you. To just have you in this moment, exactly like this.

"I have grown to care for you like I have never cared for another woman in my life, (y/n). You are everything to me. Everything, sweetheart. I cannot imagine my life without you."

Your eyes began to water at the sweet words dripping from his lips. Coated in sugar, meant to wash away the sour taste left behind by life itself.

He sighed and took a step back, his hand left your cheek and you instantly felt cold at the loss of his touch. Jungkook looked at you with soft brown and big eyes before he knelt down on one knee. His right hand picked up a small box from his trouser's pocket and you nearly gasped when he opened it.

"We are already married and the promises I made to you on our wedding day are still fresh on my mind. I will fulfil them as my duty to you as a husband but this ring, love, this ring is a promise to you as your lover."

You bit your bottom lip, trying to stop it from trembling as a little tear rolled down your cheek at his words.

"I promise to love you until my last breath. I promise to cherish you as my wife. You will never need anything, your desires are my commands, (y/n). You rule my heart like a Queen rules her kingdom. Now, I ask you with all the sincerity in this world: will you love me as well?"

A sob escaped your lips before your hands went up to cover your mouth. You nodded fiercely as you tried to wipe your tears away. He smiled, standing up and taking the ring out of the small velvety box. His larger hand took your left one and he slid the ring on top of your wedding band. A seal to his love. The two rings even matched.

"Yes. A million times yes. I love you, Jungkook. I love you with all I have in me, with everything. Forever."

The next moment, his lips were on yours. Your hands rested on his shoulders as he cradled your face, his lips dancing with yours in the steps of love.

The kiss was sweet. As sweet as sugar. You poured all the love, all the longing, all the desire into that kiss while Jungkook let his emotions flow into that single act of love. He allowed you to feel how his heart beat for you, how his mind wouldn't stop thinking about you and how his hand itched to touch you.

Your hands ran to the back of his neck before they were running through his dark locks. A soft groan escaped his throat when you tugged on his hair slightly. You moaned as his hands slid down your cheek and towards your waist, pressing you against him.

Passion bloomed in that moment. Starting with a sweet kiss and ending with the promise of eternal love.

Jungkook guided you to the bed, the back of your knees hit the bed and he pushed you down on the mattress gently, hovering over you without breaking the kiss.

Perhaps sour caramels do have sweet centres after all.

As sweet as sugar. As sweet as love. As sweet as life.

Combined into a sweet marriage of eternal devotion and beautiful love. 

~Masterpost

March/03/2024

☕Caffeinate me so I can keep on writing! ☕

Drabbles are open for this AU!

[whimsicalwritingsandmore]

Want You Back | ateez x reader

Pairing: werewolf!ot8!ateez x werewolf!reader

Genre: fluff mostly, romance, poly, a little angst?

Warnings for this chapter: another mention of a sharp object

Word Count: 2073 words

a/n: there will be an epilogue. :) not gonna lie, I'm a little more nervous for this chapter. let me know your thoughts! happy (heh) reading!

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

Chapter 11

And when you thought about it, you didn’t think it would end up like this.

You had no clue where you were going. As much as you tried initiating your bond with Hongjoong, he did not respond to your calls. You were relying on your dazy memory of your dream and muscle power, and also a silent prayer in your mind to the Moon Goddess to protect Hongjoong and assist you in finding him.

Wandering around Seoul in your condition was the worst and in the back of your head, you could practically hear Seonghwa reprimanding and reproaching you for your decision. But you were not going to turn back, as much as you were unsure about Hongjoong as a mate at the moment, you feared your dream coming true. 

You were not going to let it happen.

Please show me the way. Like a mantra, you called on the Moon Goddess for assistance as you paced forward. Suddenly, effortlessly, you felt yourself being guided. You weren’t sure where you were going but you trusted the feeling inside you and continued down the path.

After a long trail, you found yourself outside an abandoned building. And abruptly you felt Hongjoong’s bond; he was inside. Without much thought, you raced inside despite every aching part of your body begging you to slow down. But you were resolute and had to find Hongjoong before it was too late.

Thankfully, Hongjoong was alone, hovering over a table.

“KIM HONGJOONG!” you bellowed.

Hongjoong thought he was hearing things but when he turned and saw you in the flesh, either he was finally losing it or it was really you in front of him. When you grabbed him and shook him around, then he realised it was really you.

“Y/N!? What- what are you doing here!? You were unconscious!? How are you -”

“I woke up and we need to leave now!” you stressed.

“What? No I can’t and you shouldn’t be here! You still need to recover!”

“Kim Hongjoong, we will deal with that later, right now we need to get somewhere safe.”

“Why? Wait, Y/N, I-” Hongjoong paused as he tried to pull himself together. 

Here you were in front of him, looking at him with concern and worry, and pulling him with you. He looked at you with tears in his eyes. 

Still, despite what he did, you cared.

“W-Why are you doing this?” he whispered.

“What?”

“After everything, why do you still care about me?”

You softened at Hongjoong’s broken look. The light that once shone so brightly in his eyes dimmed to flicker behind his tears and his expression resembled one like a wilting flower. Why did you care? You had more than enough good reasons not to. Loving him had hurt so much, and left you with a broken heart, that weighed so heavily when you thought about it, you could barely make yourself move, much less feel. If you could even feel anything, you felt the sadness and grief bleeding every time you thought about it. The intensity was agonising and the weight of the despair felt soul-crushing.

But seeing Hongjoong in your dream sent shockwaves throughout you. Despite the turmoil that swirled inside you, Hongjoong is your first love and you needed to save him. You will protect the leader of the strongest pack and your mate, no matter what it took.

“Because I love you,” you answered, “Because…despite all your stupidity and foolishness, I love you Hongjoong, I did then and I still do. And I don’t know what that makes me, a fool I guess, but that’s okay. Because you mean a lot to me no matter how much I might try to convince myself otherwise.”

Honjoong gazed at you tenderly as the tears stung like shards of glass. You were always going to be the best decision he ever made. Cautiously, he reached for your hand to hold in his, and traced along your knuckles in a silent confession. He loves you too. Your love story is a winding path with so many unexpected twists and turns but somehow, you always end up right back to one another. 

Gazing at Hongjoong, you decided to do something risky. You hesitated, your eyes flickered to lips before meeting his eyes. His eyes drooped to your linked hands, and so, drawing in silent and shaky breath, you used your free hand to lift Hongjoong’s face and tilted your head slightly as you connected your lips to his. His lips were still soft like you remembered.

Meanwhile, Hongjoong felt a spark of electricity travelling throughout his veins. His eyes widened but he dared not ruin the moment. He kissed you back with just as much tenderness and sweetness, cupping your face to pull you in closer. 

As the two of you parted, a flurry of emotions raced through each of you but before either of you could speak, the sound of a door being broken down interrupted you. It sent you right back to remembering your dream. Your heart began to pound furiously and each beat echoed the growing fear as each crash was a flashback to your dream. The fear felt unshakeable and magnified the panic that was beginning to take over you.

Hongjoong drew you near and wrapped his arms around your waist. His hand behind your back was a comforting attempt as he slowly rubbed soothing circles. He stood straight as his eyes flashed to his werewolf gold, ready to protect you. The similar feeling of uncertainty surfaced and you gripped Hongjoong’s shirt, signalling that you felt something wasn’t right. 

“Joong…”

“No matter what happens, you will always be the one, in this life and the next and forever.” he said.

And with that, he pulled you as close as he could to him, as everything exploded around you.

On the other side, the other boys were restless. Seonghwa gripped his hands in his hair furiously as he tried to process everything that was happening. Currently, they were with Chan and his soulmates, trying to decipher where you were. The hospital camera caught you leaving the premises, but where you headed after turning the corner was a mystery. 

When Yunho retold them everything Hongjoong had said, Seonghwa wanted to do nothing more than barge into the mansion and end Mrs Kim right then and there. But before he and the boys could even think about that, you snuck out and Hongjoong was somewhere in this big city. 

Chan had a bad feeling. He felt it the day he met you. It was a feeling that wouldn’t go away, and as he researched and studied, he realised someone was out to get you, someone wanted you gone and wanted to take away everything you had. You didn’t deserve that, he could see it in your stars, that you deserved a beautiful life of prosperity, love and success. But there was an evil eye that envied you and didn’t want you to live that life. Chan promised himself to protect you and he could tell the other boys also did so secretly. 

But Chan was only a wizard and could not control fate.

“Guys…” Jeongin called from the window.

As Chan approached, he was taken aback at the massive gang of rogues that stood outside. Seonghwa too was surprised - where did so many rogues even come from?

“What are we going to do?” Jongho asked.

“We can take them.” San said resolutely, “Then we will find Hongjoong and Y/N.”

Chan and Seonghwa looked at each other, both silently confirming to the other. They watched their respective soulmate groups, each member ready and prepared to take on whatever happened next.

Chan looked at Jisung who nodded in confirmation to Chan’s telepathic message to him

“Then,” Chan said, “We fight, we fight to the end if we have to because none of us will go to that woman as prisoners.”

“And no matter what happens,” Seonghwa continued, “Remember that we will always find our way back to each other.”

-

“They’re all gone.”

Mrs Kim stood in the middle of the foyer, a sickening smile plastered on her face as she tapped her fingers on her arm. She finally did it, and now, everything would go her way. She turned to her husband who was on his knees as her lover held a gun to his head.

“See? I always get what I want.” she laughed smugly. 

Mr Kim silently wept as he watched the broken picture frame a few metres away. It fell when a sudden gust of wind blew and shattered right by him. It was a picture of all of you, smiling and looking so happy. Mr Kim was bloodied and beaten but the pain was nothing to the profound emptiness that opened up inside of him, threatening to swallow him whole. His family was gone. Everything he worked so hard to build and the family he loved and adored was unfairly taken away from him by no one else but the woman he had married. A dark cloud of grief descended on him with a haunted and hollow look glazed over his eyes.

Lila stood in shock by what she just heard. You were all gone but instead of feeling like she won like Mrs Kim, she felt her spirit sinking like a stone in the water. She was appalled by the cruelty she was witnessing.

The pack that held the highest rank in the entire town no longer existed and was taken out by one of their own.

“Now where is my son?” Mrs Kim said gleefully.

The two rogues who brought the information glanced at each other cautiously.

“Well?”

“He’s gone too ma’am. He looked like he was going to protect the girl to the end. So, we decided to just blow up the building with them in it.”

Mrs Kim was dismayed by what she just heard. No… it was only supposed to be the eight of you, not her son. She blinked in confusion as realisation dawned on her. This wasn’t supposed to happen.

“No…NO NO NO!” she shrieked, “You imbeciles. You were supposed to just take out the girl and the other boys. Not my son!” 

Mrs Kim was flabbergasted by the sudden turn of events. She needed Hongjoong here, he had to lead with her overlooking him. This wasn’t a part of the plan.

Mr Kim, with as much energy as he could muster, looked at the woman with disdain.

“You…” he growled viciously, “You have not won Estelle. You will pay, you will pay for all that you’ve done. My children will come back, they certainly will, and when they do, they will bring you down and drag you to hell right where you belong. You will just watch as you lose everything that never belonged to you in the first place.”

With the little strength he had, he grabbed the gun from Mrs Kim’s lover and shot him in the shoulders. As her lover retaliated, Mr Kim grabbed a glass shard that was close and sliced the man’s face leaving a scar that would never be forgotten. Mr Kim grabbed the picture of all of you and ran as fast he could, barely escaping the two rogues behind him.

Mrs Kim watched in fury and seethed in anger. She didn’t have another plan and it was only a matter of time before people found out.

“What now?” her lover groaned trying to stop the blood that oozed from his face, “He will pay for that.”

“Forget him for now, we need to leave now.”

“And where are we going to go?”

She looked at him sharply before answering, “The human realm.”

-

“THIS CAN’T BE HAPPENING!” 

As the angel wailed and was comforted by his friend, the Moon Goddess watched with folded arms and a stoic expression.

“Calm down Jungwon.” his friend pacified. 

“This can’t be the end for them, Goddess. Please, please don’t let that woman win.” the angel cried.

“It’s not,” the Goddess answered, “Every action has a consequence. The stories of the soulmate groups have not been completed yet. If we leave it, there will be an imbalance.”

“So,” the angel sniffed, “What are you going to do? It’s not the end right?”

Suddenly, a baby’s cry rang through the heavens. The Goddess smiled.

“It’s not the end my dear child, this is only just the beginning.”

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

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[midnight-in-eden]

It’s the two-year anniversary of my official resignation from the Mormon Church! I thought I’d do a little post reviewing the journey.

In 2020, I moved out of my parents’ house to stay with friends who were nonreligious. At the time, I had no idea this would give me a little breathing room from the church to explore myself, especially combined with the pandemic. In fact, at the time, having to attend church via zoom and not having access to the sacrament (because I was assigned female at birth) was painful to me.

But it did give me breathing room. And in 2021, I felt able, for the first time, to come out as gay.

My nonreligious friends’ reaction was loving and accepting.

My parents’ and LDS friends’ reaction was about what you’d expect. Earthly trials, temptations, the “gay lifestyle”, Family Proclamation, law of chastity, etc.

But I loved the church. I clung to it.

Until August 2021, when Jeffrey Holland gave his infamous “musket fire” talk right after a lesbian newly couple was brutally shot and murdered in Utah.

One of the friends I was living with, a kind older woman, listened to me sobbing on her counter about it. She cut through my attempted explanations of how Elder Holland is normally so loving, how he gives talks about mental health, how he cares about people—

She cut through that, looked me in the eye, and said, “That’s hate speech. What he said in that talk is hate speech.”

I realized that I wouldn’t accept that kind of speech from anyone else.

I cried myself to sleep that night and woke up a complete nonbeliever: in Mormonism, in prophets, in priesthood, in Jesus, in God. What a traumatizing earthquake of an experience that was. But it had happened, and I could not undo it.

It took a long time to process everything. I remember crying with shame and nervousness the first time I tried to wear a tank top; I remember feeling so incredibly rebellious the first time I took a sip of coffee. I remember swearing feeling so, so wrong and taboo at first, but then one day I discovered it could feel powerful or cathartic or even playful. I remember being completely mortified by the first (very tame) sex scene I saw in a movie.

I read books on deconstruction, religious trauma, alternative spiritual paths, and practices (like secular meditation) that could fill that gap. I worked to reparent my inner child and undo the shame and fear that had been ground into me. I spent a lot of time in nature. I wrote my thoughts out, deliberately studying people I looked up to—real and fictional—figuring out which of their traits I found so important, what kind of person I wanted to be. I wrote down the values I’d been taught and tried to untangle what I agreed with, what I wanted to discard, and what new ideas I wanted to add. I dipped into church issues, both modern and historical, that had bothered me, and tried to process those issues as well (something I’m still doing, because I’m slow going when it comes to that).

The friend who had told me Holland’s talk was hate speech advised me to wait a year before officially resigning. She said it was best to make decisions like that with a settled mind. I’m glad she told me that, because I think if I’d done it impulsively in a time of high emotions, I might have questioned the decision when looking back.

I waited a year and then began looking into the process, because I was sure. It wasn’t impulsive; it wasn’t emotional; I was sure that the future I wanted was not a future in the Mormon church.

There are several options for resigning, which you can read about in detail on getmeofftherecords.com. I went with the option of sending a notarized letter to church headquarters. I began drafting my letter, starting with a basic template provided on that website. I fiddled around with the draft—I wasn’t completely sure what I wanted to focus on. Around this time, I heard about that horrible child sex abuse case in Arizona, and that clinched it. I don’t know if anyone even really reads these letters. If they do, I hope they thought about mine, even for a few seconds. I hope they thought about the fact they work for a church that spends money on lawyers and court fees to defend its right to hide child rape.

September 13, 2022, I got up early and went to go see the sun rise. (These pictures are from that day!) Then I stopped by the post office and mailed the letter. A few days later, confirmation from church headquarters came in the mail: I was officially no longer a member.

I’m still growing! After more self exploration, I realized I’m nonbinary. I’d consider myself an agnostic atheist but I’ve dipped into secular witchcraft, non-theistic paganism, soft animism, druidry, and other paths I’m curious about. It’s genuinely exciting to realize that my life and beliefs are 100% a choose-your-own-adventure project. I’ll never again be locked onto one path or limited to what someone else tells me to believe. That freedom, most of all, is what has made life outside Mormonism so much better and healthier for me.

[scoonsalicious]

Unwanted: Chapter 25, Unprotected - Pt. 2

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Avenger!Fem!Reader

Summary: When your FWB relationship with your best friend Bucky Barnes turns into something more, you couldn’t be happier. That is, however, until a new Avenger sets her sights on your super soldier and he inadvertently breaks your heart. You take on a mission you might not be prepared for to put some distance between the two of you and open yourself up to past traumas. Too bad the only one who can help you heal is the one person you can no longer trust.

Warnings: (For this part only; see Story Masterlist for general Warnings) Language, WARNING: THIS PART AND THE NEXT HAVE A MAJOR THEME THAT SHOULD HAVE A WARNING, BUT I DO NOT WANT TO SPOIL THE PLOT. THEREFORE, IF THERE IS SOMETHING YOU FEAR YOU MAY NOT BE ABLE TO HANDLE, *PLEASE* DM ME FOR THE WARNING BEFORE READING!

Word Count: 425

Previously On...: Chloe's been murdered. And it's all your fault.

A/N: I think we'll do the rest of Chapter 25 tonight, besties! I'm feeling excited to share this with you!

NOTE! The tag list is a fickle bitch, so I'm not really going to be dealing with it anymore. If you want to be notified when new story parts drop, please follow @scoonsaliciousupdates

Banner By: The absolutely amazing @mrsbuckybarnes1917!

Thank you to all those who have been reading; if you like what you've read, likes, comments, and reblogs give me life, and I truly appreciate them, and you!

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After two weeks of utter self destruction (including Bad Decisions #19-28), you woke up in the middle of the night, still high off of whatever you’d taken earlier, in absolute agony. Your insides felt like they were twisting into knots within your abdomen, and you were terrified, convinced something was horribly wrong. There was no way you could experience a pain this intense and be perfectly fine. You curled up into a fetal position, hoping the compression would alleviate some of the pain, but all the movement did was deposit you in a wet spot on your bed. 

Sitting upright and throwing on the light, you screamed when you saw your bed sheets coated in blood. Had someone from the club discovered who you really were, broke into the apartment, and stabbed you?

But, no— you didn’t feel stabbed. You’d been stabbed before and you remembered what it felt like. There was no burning wound pain this time. 

There was only one clear explanation: You were obviously dying. Maybe Carthage had found a way to get to you, to finish you with the poison you’d been so quick to dismiss when you got sick before the Russia mission.

You shook your head vehemently; you were being ridiculous.  The sudden motion, however, left you feeling woozy, and you wondered how much blood you had lost. You didn’t know what was going on, but you needed help, immediately.

You grabbed your phone to dial 911, but hesitated. Being taken to a civilian hospital would risk blowing your cover, because the doctors would need access to your medical history if they were going to treat you properly, and you’d already done enough to risk the mission. So, you made the executive decision to activate the distress beacon inside your bangle.

The bracelet began emitting a low, pulsing vibration, sending its signal out into the world. You breathed a sigh of relief, knowing that you’d be taken to a SHIELD medical facility, where there would be no need to hide your true identity. Your cover would remain intact, and you’d get the proper care you needed. 

A new, tortuous wave of cramping took over, and you felt the overwhelming urge to go to the bathroom. However, the moment you had both feet firmly planted on the floor, your vision tunneled. There was a rushing in your ears, like the sound of an oncoming tornado, and you barely had time to register the sensation of your body crumpling to the floor before you lost consciousness and the world went black.

<- Previous Part / Next Part ->

[imonlyanangel]

🪷 Manifesting Success 🪷

The most recent thing I manifested was self confidence! In this post I'll go over what worked for me.

I've successfully manifested several things in the past, but not nearly at the speed I would've liked to. There were months and months without success. I started to consider why- was I focusing on the 3D too much?? Was I engaging with negative, doubtful thoughts, or believing negative comments from others? How was my trust in myself?

Sure, sometimes I focus too much on the 3D, but I always catch myself. I've had some doubtful intrusive thoughts, but I always catch myself. I've over consumed at times, but I always catch myself. I'm human, and I'm still fairly new to learning how to manifest. None of these slip ups are a big deal! None of them can really affect my ability to manifest unless I allow them to. Unless I assume that they do.

The real reason I was struggling to manifest was this: I had a fear of being seen. A fear of being myself where others could see. A fear of succeeding in front of others. How can I successfully manifest if I'm afraid of success? How can I bring my reality into light if I only feel safe in the dark?

Self-confidence has been a struggle for me nearly my entire life. I've worked on improving it, but there was little progress over the course of my life. I didn't talk to people, or share my thoughts with family. I couldn't make decisions. I couldn't just be without being scared I was doing it wrong.

When I realized that this pervasive fear was keeping me from manifesting my desires, I made a decision. I wasn't going to work on manifesting anything else until I successfully manifested confidence in myself.

I tore a scrap of paper from my bedside notebook and wrote down an affirmation to stick under my pillow. All I wrote was: I always feel amazing about myself- I am overflowing with confidence. <3 I had read that the pillow method takes 7-10 days at most to manifest your desires. I wrote this down on the other side of the paper, and decided that it wouldn't take me more than a week to manifest it.

Before I fell asleep each night, I recited the affirmation in my mind. Some nights I only did it once, sometimes 2-3x. I imagined feeling like a pillar. Feeling upright, tall, visible, and strong. I imagined the heaviness and tension that came with being seen disappearing. I imagined feeling amazing about myself, or how it would feel to be confident all the time. I did this for 7 days in a row.

It didn't take me 7 days to notice a change!! The first morning I woke up after doing that was different. I was different. I went after what I wanted that day with no regard for whether or not I was being perceived. Since I started I've noticed many changes in behavior that have almost all felt natural to me. Sometimes I got nervous, but I had the confidence in myself to push through it.

Instead of shying away from looking at my face or my body in the mirror, I smile genuinely every time I see myself. Sometimes I catch myself thinking "wow, I am so f*cking pretty!" Now I intentionally make a comment about my confidence or my beauty every time I look in a mirror while washing my hands. I'm so confident. I feel amazing about myself today. I love the way I look. Complimenting myself in the mirror worked wonders and I recommend it 100%!!

Changes since I started manifesting confidence:

Engaged in my hobbies in front of others

Deep cleaned my room

Wore what I wanted

Voiced my opinion in family discussion

Decided to do a social media fast for a week

Made purchases to start a hobby I've always wanted to try (and started said hobby)

Had a difficult conversation with my mom that I was avoiding

Answered a phone call from a girl I've hardly ever spoken to, and we enjoyed talking for over an hour

Started decorating my room

Went out to eat (at a buffet) and chatted with a relative that I am not familiar with

This post! Whether anonymous or public, I've never posted or commented on social media till now, because I was too nervous.

All of these things are huge compared to where I was at two weeks ago. Some, maybe all of these things, would be small to others. But to me, especially with consideration for my neurotype and mental health, these are big steps of progress.

Am I the most confident, outspoken, assertive woman in the world? Not yet. But I improved so much in just a week. My sister noticed I was in a better mood every morning since the day I started. My mom has been complimenting me more often because of the difference in my countenance. My family noticed behavioral changes within 2 days.

I've been happy, and so much more confident. I have had more enthusiasm for life and for growth. And it doesn't take me more than 5 minutes a night. I will continue using this method of manifesting! I've already started a new affirmation.

XOXO,

Evangeline

[poppadom0912]

Passing (Pt3)

Warnings: Medical treatment, fainting, cancer (breast) and all things related.

Summary: In which all the signs pass by you.

A/N: So sorry this took so long but I had a sudden rush and finally got this written in the midst of one of the worst writers block of my life. This is the final part because I can no longer be bothered and this mini-series isn't my best performing.

Part One | Part Two | Part Three

*****

It was a collective agreement that cancer sucked. Like, literally.

Everyday, you felt the life being sucked out of you. Constant chemo being pushed into your body and radiation was slowly draining you.

In the beginning, it was scary as heck and you hadn't actually felt too weak, still being able to work full shifts without a problem. But, the dilemma came around the time of when you finished your first round of treatment and nothing had changed.

Your doses were almost immediately doubled, resulting in your hair falling at twice the rate, your body weight dropping and you were being sick way too often.

You had now resulted to wearing a bandana to keep it hidden from the outside world of your balding. Slowly, your shift hours decreased as you lost all your strength and you could no longer stay on your feet for a prolonged period of time.

Things took the biggest turn when you were suddenly attacked while on a lunch break in between calls.

Poor Sylvie, you scared the life out of her when you didn't get up from being knocked over.

It was an easy decision after that. You were on medical leave until further notice.

You cried like a baby that night, grasping your phone tightly as the sound of the voicemail faded away, your blood family not answering you in your time of desperate need.

But, they were completely irrelevant when your real family came tumbling in to comfort you. Sylvie embracing you in her signature hug that reduce your tears into mere stains on your cheeks.

As the next few months progressed, your condition remained stationary. Everyone at the firehouse took it in shifts to come over to your apartment, cooking, cleaning and keeping you company no matter the occasion.

This wasn't your first birthday you spent in the hospital but it was your first ever time celebrating while hooked up to blood sucking drugs.

You were fed up and on a whim, you and your oncologists scheduled a surgery to remove the cancerous tumours laying within your breasts.

It was a total accident that your family found out. As it turns out, apparently, some of your mail was still delivered to the firehouse for some reason and it was mistaken for a colleagues. Everyone was shocked to say the least when they read the contents of the letter.

Their continuous support brought on the waterworks and just their presence alone made you realised just how lucky you were to know such amazing people.

Surgery was scary to say the least. You were going in alive but you wouldn't know if you'd come back from it, let alone if they got all the cancer removed.

But for once, fate was on your side because as soon as you woke up, groggy yes but the second your oncologists said you were cancer free, it felt like a fever dream.

But it wasn't. You were assured plenty of times that this was indeed reality and that you could go back to the life you loved.

And maybe there could be a day where you wouldn't live in fear, a day when you could be confident and relaxed in your own body.

Maybe it was your fault that all the signs and symptoms passed by you, maybe if you had caught it earlier and been more attentive then perhaps none of this would've happened.

Technically speaking, this entire fiasco could've been prevented had you just looked at the obvious instead of living in denial 24/7.

But for the time being, you'd take what a cancer free life would give you, cherishing everything that came bundle up with the word 'remission' for one day, just the thought sat dangling before you, that this all would be stripped away from you again.

Just the thought of it made you sick. Having cancer, you didn't want to go through it again, you didn't want to subject your family to your endless suffering again.

Re-diagnosis was a thought for another time though. Everyone was going to relish in the now and live in the present because there was time for tomorrow later.

[dwobbitfromtheshire]

Stuck Between a Jock and a Metalhead

Summary: Nancy, on a whim, decides to visit Steve at Scoops Ahoy, which leads to her overhearing confessions from Steve that leads her to think about the decisions she's made. A few days later, she decides to come back. She finds him being hit on by the town freak. What's a girl to do? Oh, get stuck in a freezer with the both of them.

Chapter One - Chapter Two - Chapter Three - Chapter Four - Chapter Five - Chapter Six - Chapter Seven - Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Eddie's POV

Eddie woke up screaming and clutching his sides. He was drenched in sweat and trembling all over. Wayne burst into the room, looking panicked as he dropped to Eddie's side.

"Where does it hurt, son?" Wayne asked. "Does it hurt here?"

"No, it's just a bad dream. Just a bad dream," Eddie whimpered. "I think something bad is going to happen, Uncle Wayne."

"It's okay, son, I've got ya," Wayne said and hugged Eddie tightly as Eddie burst into tears. "I'm here."

Eddie could tell it was early in the morning because it looked like Wayne had just gotten home from work. Eddie sniffled and wiped his face as he pulled away from him.

"I'm good, Uncle Wayne," Eddie said.

"You haven't had a nightmare like that since you were little, and your mama started getting sick," Wayne frowned. "You wanna talk about it, son?"

"No, I just want to forget about it," Eddie said.

He tried to wipe the image of Nancy being cornered by her boss, the fear on her face, and then the image of Steve screaming in pain. . .the image of him lying on the floor covered in his own blood. The dream had ended with Eddie being eaten alive, with Nancy and Steve screaming his name. Eddie refused to go back to sleep and decided to get ready for the day. He settled into distracting himself until it was time to go to the festival. He read Lord of the Rings, worked on his campaign, worked on writing his music, and when Wayne left for work, he settled down in front of the television. The images wouldn't go away, however, and he couldn't get the feeling that something was seriously wrong.

The feeling stayed with him even when he showed up at the festival. It was supposed to be an exciting time, but all Eddie felt was fear. They were going to show up, he told himself as he waited by the entrance. Maybe they showed up before him and went in. Eddie started walking around, trying not to panic and let the fear overcome him. As he was looking for them, he saw a figure slumped over between a couple of booths. Eddie approached the figure slowly and nudged him. He didn't move. There was a bullet hole in his chest. This guy was fucking dead.

"Oh, shit," Eddie said.

Fear shot through him, and he was in full on panic mode. He took off and started running around, calling for Steve and Nancy. When he approached the entrance, he spotted Hopper and Joyce Byers. Eddie watched as Joyce approached the Mayor. . . And slugged him in the face?? Eddie didn't wait and took off after them, heading toward a bright yellow car.

"Hey, Chief!" Eddie yelled.

"What? I don't have time for whatever this is, Munson," Hopper said.

"Well, first off, did you know that there's a dead guy over there?" Eddie asked.

"Yeah, we're dealing with it, kid," Hopper sighed.

"Also, where are Steve and Nancy? They were supposed to meet me here, and I got this weird feeling that something fucked up is going on here," Eddie said.

"Look, we're dealing with that, too. Don't worry about it. We'll let you know when we find them. There's nothing to worry about, kid," Hopper said.

"So, I don't have to worry about Nancy being chased by a flesh monster made from her former boss or Steve being tortured in a Russian underground bunker?" Eddie asked.

Hopper and Joyce stared at him before sharing a look with each other. Yeah, it seems like his dream wasn't so crazy after all.

"We don't have time for this!" A balding man yelled.

"Get in," Hopper finally decided.

Eddie hopped into the car, sitting himself next to the balding man, and then they took off.

"How did you know about the Russians?" Hopper asked Eddie.

"Well, this is going to sound weird, but I kind of had this dream last night," Eddie said. "Nancy was being chased, Steve was being tortured and drugged, then it sort of moved forward. I was in this place that looked a lot like Hawkins, except it was covered in vines, and there was this floating dust or some shit. I was on the ground with vines wrapped around my throat, and then these bat like creatures were eating me alive," Eddie said.

"Jesus," the balding man muttered.

Hopper and Joyce stared at each other again.

"Okay, that dream isn't so crazy?" Eddie asked. "Does that place exist?"

"We call it the Upside Down," Joyce said. "Well, the kids do."

"Steve’s kids? The ones he babysits all the time?" Eddie asked. "He brags about them a lot."

"They're good kids," Joyce said smiling.

"They're shitheads," Hopper said, smiling fondly.

"He calls them that too," Eddie said with a grin. "Affectionately."

"So, have you had dreams like this before?" Joyce asked.

"A few times. Once, when I was six and my mama started getting sick. She wanted to keep it from me, but then I had a dream that she was dying, and then she did," Eddie said softly.

"I'm sorry, that must have been rough," Joyce said sympathetically.

"It was," Eddie said. "A couple of years ago, I dreamed that your son got trapped in the Upside Down. I thought it was just a dream because it was all over the news about him at the time, and then last October, I dreamed that there were these tunnels under Hawkins with fucked up looking dogs who's face opened up."

"You didn't have to go to a bunch of doctors when you were a kid, did you?" Hopper asked.

"Well, there was this experimental program my dad put me through to treat my asthma that I apparently didn't have. Honestly, he was only in it for the money. I did see a bunch of doctors, but they told me I didn't qualify for it, which makes sense because I didn't have asthma," Eddie said, and they shared another look. "What?"

They both proceeded to explain to him about a program called MK Ultra where a man called Dr. Brenner experimented on children, giving them powers.

"It's possible that he didn't think you had any," Joyce said. "Especially if you didn't tell them about the dreams."

"Damn," Eddie muttered. "By the way, who the hell is this guy?"

"Murray Bauman," the balding guy introduced.

"I heard about you," Eddie said, narrowing his eyes at him.

"All good things from Nancy Wheeler, I hope," Murray said sarcastically.

"No, I don't like you," Eddie said and glared at him.

"And what did Nancy say about me?" Murray rolled his eyes.

"Well, I believe a creepy asshole who likes to put his nose where it doesn't belong are the words she used to describe you," Eddie said, and Hopper snorted.

They pulled up to the Starcourt Mall a few minutes later and walked into find quite a scene. Steve and Nancy were surrounded by a bunch of kids. A young girl was in the middle, and something shot out of the open wound in her leg. It landed at Hopper's feet, and he squished the slug like creature under his shoe. Steve and Nancy looked at Eddie in surprise.

"Eddie?!"

He shot forward and pulled them both into a hug. They immediately hugged him back tightly.

"Are you the guy who almost killed Steve and Nancy in the freezer?" A curly haired boy asked, his hands on his hips.

"And this must be Dustin," Eddie grinned as he pulled away from the hug.

"You know about me?" Dustin asked.

"Steve only talks about you all of the time, you and his other precious kiddos," Eddie said teasingly.

"He does?!" Dustin asked and beamed.

"What's this about killing Steve and Nancy in a freezer?" A redheaded girl asked.

"Eddie, what are you doing here?" Nancy asked.

"That's a little bit of a weird story," Eddie said.

He glanced over at Hopper, who was tending to the young girl's leg. Turns out it was his daughter, El. The redheaded girl was Max, the pale gangly boy was Nancy's brother Mike, there was Lucas who was dating Max, and Eddie remembered Will from that time in the music store. Will remembered him, too.

"So, you dreamed about us being in danger?" Nancy asked Eddie.

"Yeah, I suppose it's because you two have become very important to me over the last few weeks," Eddie blushed.

"Aw, Nance, I think he's saying we're his best friends," Steve teased.

"Aww," Nancy cooed and pinched Eddie's cheek.

"Excuse me, that title belongs to Jeff," Eddie said.

"Then what are we to you?" Nancy asked.

"You know, you can have more than one best friend," Dustin said, saving Eddie from answering the question.

It was then that remembered the first aid kit in his pocket. He pulled it out and walked over to Hopper, Joyce, and El. He opened it.

"Do you guys need anything in here?" Eddie asked.

"Oh, yes, thank you," Joyce said, pulling out some ointments and bandages.

"You just had that in your pocket?" Hopper asked.

"I'm a professional klutz," Eddie said seriously, and Hopper snorted. "His name is Princess Nigel."

It was El's turn to laugh, showing her dimples, and Eddie flashed his dimples right back at her. El furrowed her brows at him.

"Are you my brother?" El asked.

"You do sort of look alike," Joyce said in amusement.

"We do!" Eddie laughed. "I mean, I wouldn't be surprised if I did have brothers and sisters out there. My dad used to cheat on my mom all the time, even when she was sick. He wasn't very clever with the names he came up to tell the ladies with either. Overheard my uncle yelling at my dad about it. Al Munster was one of them. Allan Smith. Andrew Rich. He actually used Eddie once! I don't know why he bothered. Everyone knew who Al Munson was."

"Did you say Andrew Rich?" Hopper asked.

"Yeah, why?" Eddie asked.

"Because that's the name of El's father," Hopper said.

Eddie stared at him for a moment before looking back at El. He laughed and slapped his knee.

"Well, it looks like I am your brother, after all," Eddie said with a smile, and El held out her arms, grinning. "Ooh, a hug for big brother Eddie?"

Eddie moved forward and hugged his little sister. His little sister. This is not how he expected this evening to go. As he pulled back from the hug, El played with his vest.

"Bitchin," El muttered.

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

Eddie laughed and ruffled her hair. It seemed like having a sister would be cool. He smiled as he wondered over to take care of Steve.

"I have a sister," Eddie declared as he worked on cleaning Steve’s wounds.

"We heard," Nancy said in amusement.

"So, this is your first time with all of this, too?" Robin asked as she leaned over his shoulder to watch him work.

"Yeah," Eddie said.

"How are you not freaking out?" Robin asked.

"Oh, trust me, sweetheart, I'm freaking out on the inside," Eddie replied.

"Well, you should know that Steve Harrington is actually my new best friend, so you better do a good job, Dr. Munson," Robin said.

"Haha! Dr. Munson! Good one, like that would ever happen," Eddie scoffed.

"Okay, Nurse Munson then," Robin said, and he glared at her. "Candy Striper Munson?"

The best he could do was clean the wounds and spread some antibiotics over them. They would need more tending to later. He hated seeing Steve like this, and judging from the way Nancy was clinging to him, she was worried too. They all gathered around the tables to listen to Hopper go over the plan on how to destroy the machine that was opening a gate to the Upside Down. Of course, Hopper wanted to be the hero and go in there alone. Murray and Joyce wouldn't let him, though. Hopper couldn't navigate his way through without Dustin's help, but he didn't want to put the kid through any more danger. So, Dustin would need to be taken to Mount Weathertop to Cerebro. For a split moment, Eddie thought Lord of the Rings and the X-Men were real, too, until Steve explained that it was a radio thing that Dustin had built. Steve and Robin would be taking him while Eddie went with the others to take El to Murray's bunker.

"This is fucking crazy," Eddie mumbled shakily as he hugged Steve tightly.

"Everything's going to be okay. We'll be right back," Steve muttered softly.

"Don't say that. They sat that in horror films and then they. . . Well, they don't fucking come back," Eddie said.

"That's a horror film, not real life, Eds," Steve snorted softly.

"Well, this fucking feels like a horror film," Eddie said.

He pulled away and looked over to find Nancy hugging Jonathan. He couldn't help the sharp twist of jealousy that fueled his stomach. Jonathan was staying with them, so why was Nancy hugging him? He looked over and saw that Steve looked just as jealous as he was. Steve quickly covered it up when Nancy walked over to them.

"What was that about?" Eddie asked.

"I was thanking him for saving my life," Nancy replied.

"Oh, well, thank God for that, Ace," Eddie said.

"Ace?" Nancy asked.

"Like ace reporter. I thought it would be a cute nickname," Eddie said.

"It is cute," Nancy blushed and then she looked at Steve. "Stay safe."

"You too," Steve said.

Steve and Nancy hugged tightly. Eddie watched with Nancy as Steve walked out of the mall with Robin, Erica, and Dustin. Eddie let El have her moment with her father before approaching them.

"Take care of your sister," Hopper said, nudging his fist against Eddie's shoulder.

"Will do," Eddie said, saluting him and then turning his back to El. "Hop on, no sister of mine is hopping around on that ankle."

El giggled, wrapping her arms and legs around Eddie. He skipped over to Mike and Nancy, El laughing the whole way.

"Mike! I have a brother! This is Eddie," El grinned. "Eddie, this is my boyfriend, Mike."

"We're back together?" Mike asked in confusion.

"Oh. Right. I dumped your ass," El muttered.

"Why did you dump his ass?" Eddie asked.

"He lied about his Nana being sick, but she was not sick at all," El explained.

"Her dad threatened me!" Mike exclaimed.

"It probably had something to do with the fact that you were sticking your tongue down his daughter's throat all the time," Nancy said. "Even I thought it was a bit much."

"Dude, of course, her dad threatened you. That was a test, and you failed. Is she not worth fighting for?" Eddie asked mockingly.

"Yeah, Mike, am I not worth fighting for?" El asked and Mike scowled at Eddie.

"I'm fucking with you, dude, it's none of my business," Eddie said. "Although, I'd rather you actually use your words to get to know my sister."

"You've only known her for like a few minutes," Mike scrunched up his nose.

"And I would throw down my life for her," Eddie said, holding his head held high.

"Do not do that," El said seriously. "Promise?"

"Yeah, kiddo, I promise," Eddie said softly. "After all of this, you can tell me all about being an older sibling, Ace."

"It's annoying mostly," Nancy said teasingly, and Mike scowled at her.

It got kind of scary after that. They tried to escape in Nancy's mom's car, but a part was missing. El tried to flip the destroyed car in the mall to the part they needed, the very car she used as a bowling ball earlier to knock down a bunch of Russians. Eddie's sister was a badass, and she was also exhausted. Of course, that's when mind flayer possessed Billy Hargrove showed up along with the flesh monster. Nancy emptied a gun that she looted from a Russian on Billy's incoming car, which was hot, by the way, but then Steve came out of nowhere in the bright yellow car. He plowed into Billy's blue one, looking just as hot as Nancy did. Once back inside, Eddie did everything he could do to protect the kids from Billy himself while the others worked above them to destroy the Mind Flayer's flesh monster with fireworks. Of course, the other man had supernatural strength and kicked Eddie's ass with each punch. Once Billy got his hands wrapped around his throat, it was lights out for Eddie. Literally. When he woke up, his own blood had pooled into his mouth, and he turned over to cough it up. He saw Max crying over her stepbrother's body, and Eddie cursed. He hated the guy, but that kid shouldn't have had to see that. He felt hands on his back. He turned to find Steve and Nancy looming above him.

"Did we - did the machine get destroyed?" Eddie croaked.

"Yeah," Nancy said sadly, her eyes filled with tears.

"Who - who else died?" Eddie asked as they helped him up.

"Hopper," Steve said, his own eyes filling up with tears.

It was like a punch to the stomach, and suddenly, all of his interactions with Hopper came into focus. One of the rare adults who looked at him and didn't see his old man. The last words he had said to Eddie played over and over again in his mind. Take care of your sister.

"El," Eddie gasped.

He pushed past both of them and past two soldiers, carrying a gurney to wheel Billy's body out. Eddie stumbled into the parking lot filled with large military like vehicles and helicopters. He spotted El clinging to Joyce, and the woman pulled away to point El towards Eddie. She sobbed and started limping towards him. Eddie met her halfway and pulled her into his arms, hugging her tightly. Her body shook with sobs as she cried into his chest, and he couldn't help but think of the day his mother died. It wasn't his father who comforted him but his Uncle Wayne, and he remembered him holding him just like this at Lizzie's funeral. Eddie cupped the back of El's head just like Wayne did for him. Joyce suddenly came up to him.

"Eddie, your uncle is here," Joyce said softly.

Just as she said that, Wayne approached them, looking frantic.

"I was at work, and I had this funny feeling, so I left to check on you. That's when I saw the helicopters heading here. Who the hell did this to you?" Wayne asked.

"That's a long story," Eddie said. "But first. . .El, this is our uncle Wayne. Uncle Wayne, this is my half-sister, El."

"There's no doubt that she is," Wayne said, smiling softly. "Is she okay?"

"Her adopted father, Chief Hopper, he died in the fire trying to get us out," Eddie said.

"You are hurt," El realized, pulling back to look at him. "Hospital."

"No, sweetheart, I think I'm good," Eddie said.

"Yeah, I don't think Nancy or Robin is going to take no for an answer," Steve said, coming up behind him. "The guy up there said not to worry about the hospital bills. Apparently, they've got it covered."

"I go with you," El said firmly.

"Are you sure about that, sweetheart?" Eddie asked.

"Yes," she replied.

"Oh, I got my keys back from the Russians," Steve said, dangling the keys with a smile.

"You got your keys back from the what?" Wayne asked.

"Never mind that, Uncle Wayne!" Eddie exclaimed. "Hospital!"

Wayne, El, and Eddie drove off in Wayne's truck while the others rode in Steve's. As they pulled out of the parking lot, Eddie felt a heavy weight fall upon him as he thought about all that occurred. He never thought that life could get worse than before, but boy, he had sure been wrong. As El fell asleep against his shoulder, he thought how odd it was that life could bring both joy and pain into one's life all at the same time. What was going to happen next?

Chapter Ten