#and the last one i read when i was several years out of college and working front-desk at a hotel right across from the public library
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scribefindegil · 2 years ago
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My beloved tattered copies of my Artemis Fowl books that I got from library sales are the love of my life. I’m 90% sure I’m so snarky in my writing because of these books. Artemis and his relationships with everyone are so well done. The eye swap thing still gets me. What a duo. What a series. God do the last three really….. do things. I am still mad about Artemis losing his magic immediately yes. And for them making a character so powerful they have to keep making excuses why he’s not around. And… well. You know. But goddamn if I didn’t consume them like 800 times as a kid and goddamn if I’m not so sorely tempted to reread them now that you’ve reminded me (and maybe finally actually read fowl twins)
Listen, the last few books sure made . . . . Choices. AND YET. Even when they were bad (and sometimes they were very bad!), they never did it in a way that made me want to stop reading, which is honestly very impressive! The characters remain recognizable and entertaining and their relationships are compelling even as the situations they're in become increasing Like That, and the characters are what I'm here for.
They're not books that I would necessarily recommend to people who didn't grow up with them but man. I love them so much. Artemis' character development is so good. Every single thing about Holly Short is so good. The whole weird messy found family of it all is so good. The way the later books veer from heist narratives into fairy-tale structure is . . . like, objectively bad, but man does it manage to hit me where it hurts thematically.
Don't even get me started on the eye swap; I'm obsessed with the ongoing progression of how these characters look at each other, because with the magic of control so closely tied to eye contact at the beginning there's always something in the way--mirrors and shields and helmet visors--and it's a huge display of trust to actually meet eyes without any sort of intervention, and the swap ties into this and takes it to the next level and! UGH! (Was literally ANY of this intentional? Knowing Colfer, probably not! Doesn't stop me from losing my mind about it though!)
(I have not read Fowl Twins. I have not even read their cover blurbs despite staring at the audiobook versions every day when I worked at the bookstore. Has anyone read Fowl Twins? And can you tell me if Holly's in them? If not I do not care.)
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bunnis-monsters · 1 month ago
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🕸️Legend of the Drider🕸️
Bunni’s Monstertober Event(Oct1)
Male!Drider x Fem!Reader
Oct2
warnings: light web bondage, breeding, oviposition, possessive behavior, reader is a bit insecure about her body, body worship and praise
summary: You go on a trip, hoping to build your confidence before you go back to college. When you get trapped on a mountain during a storm, you realize a legend about spider people may be real when you encounter a horny one for yourself.
A/N: I don’t know much about college so don’t kill me if things are inaccurate 💗 also don’t expect all of the halloween posts to be this long, some will be short and some on the longer side >< also guess the inspo for this story in the comments…
my ko-fi if you’re feeling generous~
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If you had known how your trip up a nearby mountain would end with you in the clutches of the spider creature you’d only heard of in legends, you would have stayed home that October day.
But you were bored, wanting to find some fun stuff to film and meet a cute stranger while you were at it. That’s why you packed your bag and left for the nearby tourist attractions.
First you walked through a big pumpkin patch, taking pictures with a 50 pound pumpkin. It wasn’t as impressive as some you had seen online, and you knew that wearing a burnt orange sweater while posing next to it would only bring on ridicule.
You weren’t thin, and if someone from your college saw that picture, you were sure they’d compare you to the pumpkin, saying it was your twin.
Well… you had never even really talked to a single in any of your classes. You weren’t the type that liked to socialize. Too many times had you been burned, finding out they were being your friends for a prank or had been talking about your body behind closed doors.
Part of you knew it wasn’t right to judge others before even meeting them. After all, it happened to you more times than you could count… but you were still too shy and insecure to take that first step into making new friends.
That’s why you took a bit of time off of college to try and build up your confidence. It was important to you, learning how to love yourself so you could truly love others.
Ever since you went through puberty you had been aching for someone to love you, to adore you with their entire being…
How would you even be able to believe them if you didn’t love yourself first?
So you laughed at the picture of you next to a pumpkin and placed it into your scrap book before packing it away in your backpack.
You repeated this at several tourist attractions, even finding the courage to speak to a few attractive men and women. It wasn’t as scary as you thought, they didn’t look at you with disgust or say anything mean. They simply spoke with you before giving a smile and going about their day.
‘Maybe there really isn’t anything to be afraid of after all?’
The last stop on your list was the Arachne Mountains, named after a certain legend surrounding the area.
“Huh… spider people have been sighted several times over the year, and there’s a reward for anyone that can catch them on camera…”
You squinted at the pamphlet in your hands, trying to read the small print at the bottom. “What does that say? It’s so small…”
With a shrug, you stuffed the pamphlet into your bag, pulling out the bug spray instead and spraying every bit of bare skin. Mosquitos just loved you, and you didn’t want to be itching the whole bus ride home.
As you walked up the mountain trail, you took many pictures, but mostly of the gorgeous scenery.
A vast forestry landscape spread out beneath you, and the mountain path winded through the forest. As you continued walking, the path worn down by several years of hikers began to become more overgrown and less accessible.
“Huh… doesn’t seem like anyone’s been this far up in a while…”
When you thought about it, the stand with all the pamphlets was abandoned and dusty, the window broken. You just assumed they didn’t have the budget to fix it… but now you were second guessing yourself.
And that’s when a storm hit. Earlier that day you had heard something about a thunderstorm on the radio, but it was supposed to be that night, not now!
“Shit!”
You ran through the rain, slipping on mud and losing your way. The rain was so thick you could barely see in front of you. Tree branches scraped against your sides and caught on your clothes, ripping your sweater and scraping you up.
By the time you were finally able to take shelter in a nearby cave, you were absolutely drenched and covered in scratches and scrapes.
You slid down to the ground, panting and taking off your sweater, now heavy with water. It plopped against the ground, and you reached into your backpack.
“Fuck…”
Your phone had no signal, and you wouldn’t be able to go down the mountain to call anyone until the storm died down.
You yelped, jumping up from your seat and backing away from the entrance to the cave when lightning struck close by.
This sent you further into the cave, nearly tripping on the uneven, rocky ground.
Most would expect a cave out in the middle of nowhere to be cold and damp, and smell of moss and dust. Surprisingly, the further you traveled inside, the more… “cozy” it seemed.
It smelled almost like cinnamon and felt pleasantly warm. This made your shivering die down, your soaked clothes forgotten at the entrance of the cave.
Little did you know, you were slowly being lured in deeper by the inviting warmth and pleasant smell…
The first sign that something was wrong was a skittering that could be heard further into the cave. The hair on your neck stood up, but you tried your best to reason with yourself.
‘It’s probably just some rat or bug…’
But as your phone battery went out and darkness enveloped you without your only source of light, the noise got louder as whatever was making it approached.
You yelped when something brushed against you, and tried to scream, but your mouth was covered and something sunk into your neck…
Darkness.
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When you awoke, you felt something warm yet sticky enveloping you, keeping you from freezing while trapping you in place.
You were barely awake when you heard a purr like sound coming from the dark corner of the cave. A man’s face was barely visible within the shadows.
He was handsome, his eyes a dark red and hair a soft blonde, almost platinum color. It seemed he had been the one to trap you there.
“Hello, my dear. You’re finally awake…”
As soon as you were fully conscious, you began to struggle against your bonds, finally looking down to see what was keeping you from breaking free.
“Are those… webs..?”
You felt almost faint, staring down at the whitish, substance wrapped around you. It looked like thick, velvety ropes, but they were so sticky that you knew that they couldn’t be.
“Indeed.”
The man began to move forward, the same skittering sound appearing once more. You looked on in horror as his lower half was revealed.
Below his torso was not a set of legs like a normal, no, it was the abdomen of a spider.
‘The legend… is true?’
You had been captured by one of the spider people of myth…
“You must be scared… you’re just a human girl after all, and I’ve taken you away.”
He reached out, caressing your soft cheek with his hand. “But do not fear, I’m not planning on eating you, little one.”
His hand traveled down your face to your shoulder, his fingers playing with one of your bra straps.
“Far from it…”
Your cheeks heated up as he easily cut through your bra, his eyes on your now bare breasts.
“I’m in need of a mate to carry my eggs… and you’re the only woman that’s traveled to this mountain in ages…”
He breathed against your neck, licking the bite mark he left there earlier. “God, I could hardly hold myself back the moment I saw you. Such a plump, perfect woman, you’ll carry my eggs well…”
You whines as his lower half creates more webs, keeping you suspended in air, but freeing your soft cunt.
Quickly, he tore off your panties as well, growling lowly at the sight of your pretty, fat pussy. “Oh, my little mate, already this wet? Perhaps this was fate, for me to be sent this angel from above…”
He plunged a finger into you, pressing against your gummy walls and stretching you out as one of his spider legs nudged against your sensitive clit, just enough to stimulate you and get you to cum all over his fingers.
“There we go… such a good girl…” he purred into your ear, beginning to stroke his monstrous cock. He drew out several orgasms from you, prepping your virgin hole for him.
Within seconds, you were lowered down, your hips hovering over his as he nudged the head of his cock against you.
“Gods, you’re so soft…”
He kneaded your fat belly and thighs, purring in delight. “You’ll make such a good mother… you’ve got child bearing hips, like you were just meant to carry my eggs…”
Soft nips and nibbles were left on your neck and breasts.
“Every ten years, us driders go out to find a mate that’s suitable for us. I am the last of our kind, so there are no females left for me…”
He smiled, beginning to push in.
“But you… are not just going to be the woman that carries my eggs. You’ll be my mate, and I’ll cherish you.”
It was uncomfortable and painful, the way his cock stretched you out. You gritted your teeth and he cooed, but wouldn’t allow you to close your legs, two of his spider legs kept your thighs apart so he could sink deeper into your fat cunt.
“Shh, shh… it’ll feel good soon, my love…”
And he was right, his cock stretched you in such a delicious way, hitting all the right spots and making you cry out in pleasure.
He mounted you, fucking into your needy cunt as he groaned into your ear. “Gonna take my eggs, okay? My sweet girl, you’ll be such a good mommy won’t you?”
Suddenly you felt something push into you. Was that…
He was cumming, eggs filling up your pussy and settling into your womb. Soon your belly would swell as the eggs grew and developed, but for now, you were tired…
He kissed along your shoulders and neck, nuzzling into. Slowly, he lowered you down from the webs, curling up with you in a dark corner of the cave.
“You’ll be pampered, well taken care of… never again will you worry about a single thing…”
As you began to drift off to sleep, you realized that this creature truly thought you were beautiful… it made you happy.
So you snuggled into him, too full of cum and eggs to really even try escaping. Why would you?
You were loved… you felt truly beautiful for the first time in your life.
“I’ll prepare a cabin soon, there’s plenty of abandoned ones nearby. Wouldn’t want my mate to be uncomfortable.”
The way he nuzzled into you was filled with such love and care. He must have been lonely, being the last of his species.
So you decided to stay… at least for now…
Want a part 2? Send me a kofi and ask for it~
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NSFW TAGLIST: @sunset-214 @strawberrypoundtown @avalordream @icommitwarcrimes @bazpire @im-eating-rn @anglingforlevels @kinshenewa @pasteldaze @unforgettablewhvre @yoongiigolden @peachesdabunny @murder-hobo @leiselotte @misswonderfrojustice @dij-ology @i8kaeya @lollboogurl @h3110-dar1in9 @keikokashi @aliceattheart @mssmil3y @spicyspicyliving @namjoons-t1ddies @izarosf1833 @healanette @lem-hhn @spufflepuff @honey-crypt @karljra @zyettemoon1800 @exodiam @vexillum-moeru @imperfectlyperfectprincess1 @binnieonabike @enchantedsylveon @mysticranger575 @readeryn68 @danielle143 @kittenlover614 @filthybunny420 @annavittoria-mm @makimamybelovedwife @blubearxy @omglovelylaila @toocollectionchaos-universe-blog @fruk-you-usuk-fans @wil10wthetree @hammerhead96-blog @slightlyusedfloormat
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vnti-vntiety-recs · 7 months ago
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GUARDIAN GLOVES (M)
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★  PAIRING: Boxer! Jeno x Reader 
☆ WORD COUNT: 12k
★ GENRE(S): Brother’s Bestfriend AU, Childhood Friend AU?, Smut
☆ SUMMARY:  No matter how badly you want to start over, your rebellious past follows you to college, and you can't run from it forever Your brother Jaemin was your rock growing up, but now that he has left for an out-of-state university, he can no longer save you. You do not want to burden your brother's best friend, but he might be the only one who can save you from the person of your past who refuses to let you go.
★ ☆ WARNINGS: Unprotected sex, sexual intercourse, fighting, harassment, and stalking, mentions of violence, guns and drugs, abusive relationships.
☆★ NOTES: Read with caution, please; some scenes can be intense. Leave nice comments, please <3 
It was a mistake; you knew it was a mistake; your brother and friends both told you so. Now, due to the enormous amounts of red flags you have ignored, you have found yourself in some hot water. What can you say? Love makes you blind.
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“You cant keep putting up with this! We need to do something,” your friend Ryujin stressed “This has been going on for too long; im scared something serious might happen” You were worried that wrinkles might form from how much shes been furrowing her brow.
“Im fine! Its not even that serious, ok? Just drop it,” you say, sitting on your bed with your head buried in your hands as your roommate paced the dorm room. You had never seen her so upset. 
“No! I will not sit here while my best friend gets harassed! We need to report this!”
“We are NOT reporting this ryu; that will only make things worse.” you sigh before sitting back to look your friend dead in the eyes
“He pushed you down the stairs!?” 
“It was a mistake!”
You met Yuta during your junior year of high school. He was your typical run-of-the mill bad boy; he skipped classes, hung out late, and got high. You knew he was trouble, but that was what you wanted. You grew up rebellious; you were young and dumb. You just wanted attention, and hanging with the wrong crowd got you plenty. You felt unstoppable when you were with Yuta and his crew. When Yuta would parade you around school in your too-short skirt and pretty long legs, you felt special; you felt wanted. Your friends hated him, and they hated what you became. You didn’t listen to their warnings, and you stuck around. 
You stuck around even when skipped classes turned into stolen cars and the weed highs turned into selling. You were stupid to think you could keep up with his lifestyle. You just wanted to piss your family off. You were used to bad boys, but Yuta was something else. 
She takes a deep breath, trying to calm herself “Look, he's clearly getting bold; I'm afraid he’ll seriously hurt you!” 
“Please, drop it,” you beg in exhaustion. Its been a long day. You had classes all day, and with your yuta problem, you found yourself getting tired a lot faster. You had to turn in his class work on top of yours, which resulted in more time spent in the library. You had been getting home later and later. 
“What about Jaemin? Have you told him? You know he would do anything for you.”
Your brother left for college the year before you. You couldn't ask him to fight your battles  anymore. He got a full ride and was off in another state, living his life, while you were at home bawling your eyes out over the fact that the heartbreaking bad boy broke your heart. 
You had finally broken up with Yuta when you realized he was cheating on you. You should have seen it coming, honestly, The day you checked his phone and found the messages, he didnt even try to pretend like he cared. He had been talking to several other girls while he was with you. You felt so stupid, and that was your last straw. Let us just say he was not happy about it, and he and his friends have been harassing you since.
“That's exactly why I can't tell him; I don't need him flying out just to take care of my issues; I can handle them on my own. He's got his own life; he can't afford any more distractions.”
Your brother was practically your hero growing up. Whenever you were in trouble, he was by your side to protect you. Even though he was really only your stepbrother, he didn’t love you any less. You would always be his little sister.
 Jaemin had been in and out of the boxing ring for years. Bad boyfriends weren't anything new to you or him; he was the one who typically kept them in check. You were the main reason he picked up fighting; he knew, as your older brother, it was his job to protect you, and he would do it to his last breath. He tried to warn you about Yuta, but you didn't listen. You knew he would drop anything if it meant coming to your aid, but you couldn't ask that of him. 
You also know he would never let you live it down. 
You thought once high school was over, you would finally be able to escape Yuta’s torment, but he followed you to your new school. Your brother warned you about him, and now he's not here to protect you anymore. 
"Ok, what about Jeno?” She states hesitantly,
“Absolutely NOT!” you scowl, throwing yourself back into the sheets to hide under the covers
“Yes! Jaemin literally told you to go to him if you need anything! He probably knew you would be too proud to contact him if you were in trouble.”
You sit back up and throw the covers off of you. “It’s not his problem! I got myself into this mess. I'll get myself out, ok?” you state firmly
"Fine, you know what fine, its getting late I’m heading to bed…but I swear if he—”
"Ok, Ryujin, thanks really,” you say sincerely. You could never be mad at Ryujin; she was only looking out for you, and you knew she meant well. For all that it was worth, you knew she would always have your back. She would run head-first into battle for you.
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You could definitely be mad at Ryujin. In fact, you've been upset for the last hour.
She promised a surprise for you; she said she wanted to take you somewhere to take your mind off of the whole Y*ta situation. Honestly, you were grateful to be getting out of the house; you had been limiting yourself to only going to classes. You were trying your hardest to not run into him. 
You make sure to dress prettily. You were just too excited to finally have a reason to dress up again. You were so excited, you didn't even blink at the all-too-familiar signs and buildings as Ryujin pulled into the parking lot of a run-down boxing gym.
It's not until you have walked into the threshold and over to the rusty sideline benches that you feel overdressed and out of place. Your eyes scan the room, and everything feels so familiar yet out of place that you feel stupid for not realizing sooner.
As your eyes take in the old tattered banners and boxing ring, you realize you were walked blind into your brother's old gym. He and Jeno used to come here all the time to spar and train. This place used to run official matches and business, but it went bankrupt and had to close. Now it was just a place that hosted underground fighting. 
You knew what this was about, and you were upset that Ryujin fooled you into coming. You crossed your arms protectively over your chest, and you had hungry eyes staring at you from each angle.
“You...are... insane,” you hissed at her in anger after you two got settled in your seats. 
“And you are a coward. I'm sorry I lied Ok, but we need his help,” she contests
“You just walked me into a den full of hungry wolves. We're gonna need a lot more than help now!” You whisper harshly.
"Oh, come on, you know jeno’s not gonna let anything happen to you”
It was as if saying his name aloud summoned him; the next thing you know, he is in the ring.
You can't help but hold your breath at the sight. He had grown since the last time you saw him, and you didn't even think that was possible. His face was more refined and sculpted, and his arms were toned with muscles. His shoulders would have had you drooling if it weren’t for the perdicament you were in. They were broad and covered in cuts and bruises, much like the rest of his body. His body relaxes as he shakes away his nerves. He was standing in one corner of the ring, while his opponent stood menacingly at the other end. You think you hear the announcer call out his name—was it Jaehyung? Jaehyoon? Something like that.
You try to duck your head, not wanting to be seen, but you stand out like a sore thumb. As Jeno finished up his quick stretches, his eyes somehow wandered to you. First comes shock, then confusion, and as he rakes his eyes over your outfit, he’s overcome with anger.
Tonight was going to be a long night.
You could hear the scolding now…
”it's too cold to be wearing that”
“it's too dangerous for you to be here”
“This isn't some show; don't bring your friends here”
It wasn't even your fault you were here! You already knew he was not going to hear any of that, though.
He fixes you with a stare that says, “We’ll talk later,” and you groan in annoyance.
Before you can even open your mouth to give Ryujin another piece of your mind, the match begins and draws your attention back to the ring.
Jeno sizes up his opponent as they circle each other, looking for openings. His opponent, Jae Something, was twice his size, and honestly, you were a little afraid for Jenos sake. Jae was inpatient and struck first. Jenos weaves left and holds his guard strong. Jeno played the defense; he was patient, and you find that his fighting style was the mirror opposite of his personality. Even though Jeno had a tendency to lose his temper, it was fascinating to watch him change when he stepped into the ring. He moved with poise and thoughtfulness at every turn. 
Jenos patience rewarded him and he saw an opening In his opponents gaurd. He struck Jae, causing him to stumble back on unsecure footing. This allowed jeno to push his opponent back and switch to offense. Jae was already worn out, and Jeno used this to his advantage, knocking him down and out after hounding him with jabs and hooks.
Jeno was an endurance fighter; his goal wasn't to win through brutality but by outlasting his opponent in a fight.
You were amazed at how far he had come. He was a skilled fighter, as he always had been, but now, after years of honing his craft, you could see he was nothing like the boy you knew before.
The match was over and you were brought back to reality as you realized just what kind of scene you were in. This was an illegal boxing match, and now that it was over, the illegal part really started to stand out. Bets had been placed on the matches before hand and were now being fulfilled. Money was being passed around, and some exchanges even turned aggressive. You knew Jeno had probably wanted you to stick around for your lashings, but this was your queue to get the fuck out of there. You grab Ryujin's hand and try to lead her away from the ever-increasingly aggravated crowd. You navigate through groups of people as you hurry towards the exit. 
On your way, you trip over your stupid heels that Ryujin convinced you to wear and accidentally bump shoulders with someone. You find your footing and apologize. You try to walk away, pulling Ryujin behind you, but feel a rough hand on your shoulder pulling you back.
“Where do you think your going?” a gravelly voice calls out.
“I already apologized; let me go,” you grit out, trying to pull away from the man. He was a little bit taller than you and was twice your age. You noticed the wad of cash in one of his hands and the sickishly sweet smile on his face, and you figured he must have placed a winning bet.
“Don't be like that; how about I take you and your friend here out and we go somewhere private” he says while flashing his money. “Of course you'll have to work for it if you want a tip,” he says repulsively.
From the corner of your eye, you see Jeno pushing through the crowd. The look on his face gives you the chills. 
“Don’t be scared, baby; I don't bite,” the man says. 
Oh, you’re not scared of him; your scared for him.
You know what's coming before it happens, and the man is on the ground in seconds. His money flits through the air before joining him on the ground. The man is clutching his face, and before Jeno can get his hands on him again, men dressed in all black pull the man to his feet and drag him out. You figured they must have been something like security. 
Everything happens so fast, but all you know is that you and Ryujin are both being pulled by an angry Jeno deeper into the building into some back room. Ryujin looks a bit shaken, but you assure her everything is okay now.
 It was dark and chilly in the room. The cement walls offered no warmth as you stood in the middle of what you assumed to be an old locker room. The back of the building was really coming apart; water leaked from the ceiling, and it smelled like mildew. No one really occupies the space anymore. 
Now occupying the space were Jeno,currently trying to reel in his nerves as he drags a hand down his face; Ryujin, shifting from one foot to another awkwardly; and you, who crossed your arms definitely over your chest as you waited for Jeno’s reprimanding.
“You know what I'm going to say,” he huffs.
“I'm sorry, it's really not her fault I'm the one who drug her here; I didn't realize how dangerous it would be” Ryujin tried to defend you, but she didn't know Jeno like you did. He wasnt one for excuses.
“Who are you?” He asks dismissively.  
Jeno had never met Ryujin before. Ryujin had only heard about him through the stories you would tell her about growing up with him and your brother.
“Im a friend; we didn’t come here without a reason we wanted to—” She says but doesnt get to finish
"Jeno, dont be rude. She was only trying to help.” You interrupt. You could not have her bring that up now; you needed his attention back on you. 
“I'm sorry, Ryujin. Can you give us a moment?” He sighs in apology.
Ryujin gives you a look but takes the hint and doesn't push the topic again. She reluctantly walks to the door and waits outside the room. 
Once the door shuts behind her, Jeno wastes no time telling you off. “I dont know why your here or whats going on but you need to leave. You know better than this,” he scolds
You wanted to jump off a cliff. This is absolutely not how you wanted to meet him again. You had imagined this meeting a thousand times in your head. When you finally reconnected, you were supposed to show him how mature you had gotten. This whole fiasco definitely sets you back 10 steps. 
“I wouldn't be here …I wouldn't be dressed like this if I had known we would end up here. It was a mistake. We'll leave, ok?" You say arms crossed and closed off as you dig your heel into the ground.
Even after all this time, he still had a soft spot for you. No matter how hard he tried to be stern with you, one look at the pout on your face made him feel bad. He walks over and closes the small distance between you two. He engulfs you in a hug, and you’re reminded of home. He reminds you so much of your past that it makes you nostalgic. He kisses the top of your head affectionately and lets go, and you’re reminded just how smelly and musty he is as his sticky skin peels from yours.
“Gross,” you grumble
“I think you'll live,” he jokes with a smile. He's a lot calmer now. He leans down to meet your gaze “I'm sorry for being hard on you; I was just worried. You popped up out of nowhere after all this time.
It was so easy to fall back in step with him. You want to tell him everything; all you want is for him to fix everything, but you are no longer that little girl, and you are determined to prove it. 
You’re deep in thought when he asks, “Is everything OK, Storm?”
Your heart skips a beat at the nickname; you haven't heard that in awhile. He's always called you that; when you asked him why, he told you it was because you would stir up so much trouble wherever you went, growing up like a storm. It may have sounded negative, but he didn’t mean it like that. He always said it affectionately. 
“I'm fine; Ryujin brought me here because I said I missed home. She wanted to take me around to some familiar places. I guess she didn't know what really went down at this place” You try to cover up the truth.
Your campus wasn't too far from your hometown, and you go home almost every weekend, but hopefully Jeno doesn’t know that and buys the story. 
He looks a bit sceptical. "Lately, its been hard to come by you,” he says “Are you sure your not in any trouble?”
"I've just been busy with school; its nothing really,” you explain.
He just nods, and you know he does not believe it, but he doesn’t pry either. “Lets get you home; it's getting late” 
When you open the door, Ryujin falls forward, clearly listening in and she gives you a sheepish smile. You grab her arm and pull her along as jeno personally escorts you out and to ryujin's car.
He holds your door open for you and watches as you clamber inside before buckling your seat belt and closing your door for you. You internally groan in annoyance. He was never going to see you as anything but the 7th grade version of you that he first met. The girl needed her brother to save her from herself. 
You are grown now!
He can practically see the words printed on your forehead as he huckles to himself. He didn’t care; he would always take care of you, no matter how much you hated him for it.
 He motions for you to roll down the window before leaning into the car and caressing your face affectionately with his rough, bruised hand. You decide right then that you would never let him get hurt for your sake. He’s fought enough.
 “If you need anything, call, ok?” He says this before drawing his hand back. You don't respond, and he quirks an eyebrow.
"Ok,” You grumble 
“You have my number, right?”
“Yes!” You say a bit louder in annoyance.
"Ok, ok, I'm just checking, you never reach out, I just want to make sure your okay,” he continues 
“Actually, can I take your number? I'm practically her guardian now. I'll make sure to keep you updated if she needs anything” Your friend butts in with a smile.
Jeno happily gives her his number, and you just sit in the passenger seat like a child, watching as your parents fuss over you.
You are grown now!
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Mondays are the worst days of the week, not because you have to go back to classes. You loved class, you loved learning and you loved your teachers. It wasn’t until college that you found out that you really enjoyed learning. Yuta would have definitely laughed at you if you told him that in high school. 
Yuta was the reason you hated Mondays. Mondays were the worst because they meant no more hiding. You couldn't stay in all day; you had to go to class, and that meant running into the devil. You were lucky enough to only have one class with Yuta, and that class only met on Mondays. 
You find your way to your seat at the back of the class, hoping to hide away from him, but you know he will find you. You felt his presence as he slipped into the seat next to you. 
“Morning doll, did you get my text?” 
You hated when he texted you; it was always a disturbing photo. Last time you opened a text from him, it was a video of him fucking some girl in a dark alleyway. In the video, he made the girl drop to her knees and open her mouth. He pressed the barrel of his gun into her mouth and made her suck it off. ‘Wish this was you’ was the text he sent after the video.
Since then, you have made it a point not to open his texts, but it seems like he wasn't going to let this one go.
“I’ve been busy; i hadnt had the chance to”
"Well, that's no good doll; why don't you open it now?” he smirks wickedly.
“I dont think—”
“Open it,” The playfulness slips off of his face and replaced with seriousness 
You never noticed it before, but Yuta could be terrifying. He never showed this side to you before, but your certain this was the side everyone else saw. He made a promise to follow you to the end of the earth, and so far he has kept true to it. 
He had gone from being your high school’s bad boy to the campus’s star athlete. Yuta had completely rebranded himself after graduation, and it made it even harder to report him. No one would believe you. He would just spin the story and make you out to be some bitter ex, making up lies to try to ruin his college career.
With shaky hands, you unlock your phone and go to your messages, clicking on the conversation with the unsaved number attached to it. There, you find a video waiting for you. You turn your volume all the way down and hit play. This time, it was a video of you a few nights ago, exiting the gym with Ryujin and Jeno. The camera work was shaky, and it seemed to have been taken from behind a car or a bushr? You couldnt tell but your heart was beating outside your chest.
Your eyes are glued to the screen as you feel a firm hand caress your tense shoulder until it grips the back of your neck. "Now why does it look like my doll is cheating” You freeze in place as your mouth hangs open. “Who is that?” he asks.
You had no idea he was following you. How long had he been following you? The grip on your neck tightens.
“Answer me,” he whispers cruelly, his eyes darkening with rage.
“He’s no one” tears well up in your eyes. Ryujin was right; this was getting out of hand.
“Let me catch you with him again; I'll make you regret it,” he whispers. He kisses the side of your head and breathes in the scent of your shampoo. He releases you, and you release the breath you had been holding. 
You can barely pay attention to anything your professor is saying; you just stare blankly at the front of the room.
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You sent Ryujin a text to meet you in the library. You hated to dump all of this on her but you had to talk to someone. You could already tell she was frustrated with you about the situation, but she was the only one you could confide in. With her around, you didn't feel so alone in this. 
“He did what?!”
“Its ok, if I do what he says, everything will be fine; i have it under control,” you reply sheepishly
“No! You need to report his creepy ass to the cops!” she yells in disbelief.
“Keep it down; we’re in a library,” you remind her
“Dont try to change the subject,” she whispers 
“I'll figure this out” 
“We will figure this out.” she says, grabbing your hand and giving it a supportive squeeze.
When she lets go of your hand, hers slip under the table. You don't see it, but she’s texting someone, typing furiously before hitting send.
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You try not to be mad at Ryujin, but you can't believe she went behind your back and snitched. Now, here in front of you, sits the last man on earth that you want to worry. Ryujin mouths a sorry and sends you an apologetic look. Jeno had arrived about ten minutes earlier, and he looked to be trying to keep his calm before confronting the matter.
“Is this some intervention?” you joke to lighten the mood. 
“Ryujin told me everything; do you think this is a joke?” He questioned, trying to stay patient with you. “Why didnt you tell me sooner”
You sigh, feeling ashamed. Everything was always so tense between you two. You had grown apart over the years, and it was difficult to think he was once like a second brother to you. But time was not the only factor to blame; high school also played a part. Puberty changed everything. It changed you, it changed jeno, and it definitely changed how you felt towards him. You had such a massive crush on him in high school that even your brother found it hard to ignore. You made Jaemin swear to secrecy and never tell a soul. If you had known Ryujin was going to call Jeno, you would have sucked it up and reached out to your brother.
You didn’t want Jeno to get involved. You kept telling yourself you didn't want him to get hurt, but you had to be honest with yourself. There was another reason you didn't want to ask for his help, and it was because you were still embarrassed. Anything was better than sitting in front of the man who rejected you. 
Summer freshman year of highschool
You thought you had finally grown up in his eyes; you thought your newfound curves were enough to make him see you as more than “Jaem’s little sister.” You thought you could fool yourself into believing you had a chance. 
It wasnt abnormal for jeno to sleep over at your place during highschool. He would crash in Jaemin’s room and eat breakfast with your family, like he lived there. One night, you catch him alone and tell him how you feel. You waited for him outside the bathroom. He was showering, and you were certain your brother was too engulfed in his game to interrupt you. Jeno had exited the bathroom wearing sweats and a tanktop, drying his hair with a towel. He had almost walked right by, not noticing you. You stood in front of him wearing a similar white tanktop and sleeping shorts, your nipples poking through the fabric of your shirt. You were so sure you would have his attention, but he just tentatively acknowledged you.
“Im sorry, was i taking too long?” he asked apologetically
"No, i actually wanted to talk to you about something”
He just nods his head and waits for you to continue
“I really like you, and I was hoping I could spend more time with you... just uh… the two of us,” you said shyly, unable to find the right words.
You couldnt meet his eye and stare at a random spot on the carpet
You felt a gentle hand stroke your head affectionately. You look up, hopefully but your world comes crashing down with his next few words
“Your like a sister to me; of course we can hang out more,” he smiles brightly, unknowingly ripping your heart out
Ever since that night, you have avoided him like the plague.
‘I just didn't want to worry you or jaem.” you say, ashamed.
“I won't tell him but if you think I'm going to sit back and let this happen, your wrong”
“I didn’t think it was that much of an issue yet.” you say, picking at your sleeves.
Jenos eyes harden with disbelief  “Are you serious? Not much of an issue?” he grits “Hes threatening you”
"Ok, ok, your right; I shouldn't be taking this lightly” You try to soothe things over with a weak smile.
“Give me your phone,” he says, holding out his hand
You unlock it and hand it to him, unsure of what he's going to do. After messing around with it, he hands it back. “I blocked him; dont even think about texting him again.” he warns
“Jeno! I have to; hes going to be pissed!” You take your phone back, looking through your messages, but you’re unable to find the conversation again. You didn't realize how much control he had over you. You thought all you had to do was follow his orders, and you would be alright; one day he would just get bored of you and stop. 
“Don't you hear yourself? Your scared!” he yells. He hated seeing you like this. He promised Jaemin that he would watch after you, but here he was, blind to the cruelty that you had endured. “Once this is all over, I'm telling Jaem.” 
(¬_¬) snitch 
He gets up, preparing to leave, while both you and Ryujin stare at each other. Well, you glare at her while she communicates a response with her eyes in return. He doesn’t turn to leave before saying one last thing: “Keep your phone on you at all times, and I'll be walking you from your classes from here on out,” he states sternly. 
“I dont know if that’s a good idea; he told me not—”
“Are you more afraid of him or me?” he asks you
Point taken.
You wait until Jeno is out of earshot before you whisper yell at your friend, “I told you not to tell him!”
“I had to! I was worried”
"Well, great, now he's worried and probably thinks I'm an irresponsible idiot!”
"Well, you are,” she counters, “whats your deal anyway? You seriously think Yuta is just going to leave you alone? He's gonna end up killing you!” she scolds.
You take a moment to process her words. She had a point, but she didn't know Yuta like you did; neither of them did. He was dangerous. You just wanted to keep your friends safe, but you might have gotten in over your head.
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You finally make it to your destination; you drove to the old gym, hoping to find Jeno. You could have called or texted him, but you knew it would be easier to get your point across in person. You had at least wanted to let him know what he was getting himself into. Yuta was dangerous, and no matter how strong Jeno was, he wasn't bulletproof.
You park your cute little beetle and cringe; you definitely didn't belong in this scene, and everyone around was going to know it. A sticker-bombed Volkswagen Beetle in the middle of the parking lot of a broken-down and shady gym? Perfect combo!
Luckily, there were only a few cars tonight. You figured it must not be fight night, and you prayed that you found Jeno inside. You gather up your courage and march inside. You make your way down a narrow hallway that opens up into the main gym, and that's where you find him. There were a few other fighters occupying the space, but they seemed to be wrapping up. Jeno must not be the only one who comes here to let off steam, you assume. 
"Oh, who's this cute thing?” one of the guys says as you catch his eye on his way out.
“I wouldn't do that if I were you Haechan; thats Jenos Girl,” another voice says, coming up behind him before slinging an arm over his shoulder. “Excuse him,” he says politely before pulling Haechan away and scolding him.
The one that wasn’t Haechan was there the night Jeno punched that weirdo out. Apparently the whole gym knew you as Jeno’s girl, according to his rambling. Their arguing fades away and the last thing you hear before complete silence is “Get off me Renjun your musty”
You laugh to yourself before scanning the room, and you bring your eyes back to the man nestled in the corner. He's facing a punching bag with his hands tightly wrapped and his headphones secure on his head. He wasn't still for a second, staying light on his feet as he threw a few hooks at the bag. 
You were almost afraid to accidentally sneak up on him because that would not end well. You stay cautious and keep a safe distance, choosing to call his name a few times to get his attention. Your practically screaming, but he can't hear you. You wonder what brand of headphones he had because that noise cancellation was crazy! You choose a different approach and spot a disregarded boxing glove on a side table. You walk the short distance, grab the item and chunk it at the back of Jeno’s head. 
Now clearly, you weren’t trying to poke a bear. You were aiming more towards his broad shoulders, given that was a better target, but your aim was off, and you almost knocked the expensive-looking headphone off his head.
Jeno whips around angrily, opening his mouth to curse, but stops himself short once he notices you. He settles for a deep, exasperated sigh and a sharp glare. He must have been at it for awhile because he was drenched in sweat, and his bangs hung messily in his eyes and were dripping sweat. He pushed the wet hair back from his eyes, showing his forehead. He looked so good when he was angry; his eyes were narrowed dangerously, and his chest heaved heavily.
“Why are you fucking with me?” He says this, coldly pulling his headphones off his ears and letting them hang around his neck "You better have a good reason for being here when there is a psycho after you. I clearly remember telling you to stay away from this place?” 
Oh yeah, you definitely poked the bear. Hes pissed.
“Are you sure you want to get involved?” You try to find your words. “Yuta isnt like the little boys you and jaemin used to beat up in highschool”
“You could never keep yourself out of trouble, huh?”
“I'm not asking for your help!”
“Drop the act for once, would you? Your not tough so stop acting like it!”
“I’m not being tough; I just don't want to be a bother! I'm not the same kid! When I’m falling, you always save me, and I'm sick of it. I'm sick of being weak. I don't need your help, so why don’t you drop the older brother act? Your barely even older than me!” You pitch back
“Jaemin told me to look out for you so thats what im doing,” he huffs 
“And that's your only reason, right? Your just looking out for me because my brother said so” you scoff, trying to keep the hurt out of your voice. " How about this? I take you in the ring and show you what I got. Let me show you I can take care of myself” You cross your arms and send him a defiant look.
“Are you seriously—” he cuts himself off, shaking his head in disbelief “You know what fine. Show me what you got”
You smile in triumph and walk over to the center of the gym, where the ring sits. You take off your shoes and crawl inside. The mat felt cool under your feet; it was a grounding sensation, and just once you understood why Jeno loved standing in it, even if it meant fighting. You scan the gym, and memories fill in all the rust, broken pipes and holes in the wall as you remember what the gym used to be. Your stuck in a trance until you feel something soft but firm hit you in the head, knocking you from your daydream.
“That was payback…. but you also need to be mindful of your surroundings. Not starting off so well, angel,” Jeno says, shaking his head as he adjusts the punching mitts over his hands. 
You’re brought back to the present and finally notice the boxing gloves at your feet. You get the memo and put them on. 
“This can't be too hard,” you mutter to yourself.
Your both centered in the ring and you focus on jenos movements. You grew up being dragged to almost all of your brother's matches; you figured you had watched long enough to catch on to some moves. You throw a punch at Jenos mitt, and he cushions the blow. He lets you get comfortable throwing a few punches before he counters. He makes his movements very big and obvious; you can see his strike from a mile away. You weave under it and throw a punch at his gaurding mitt. 
Hes going easy on you
You continue to spar, and Jeno is in full coach mode. He's guiding you in the correct stance and helping you learn what to look for when someone strikes. You've been at it for about 30 minutes now, and you've gotten faster at dodging and reading his movements. He’s still going extremely easy on you, but upping the ante just a little. You were completely absorbed in the lesson.
“Nice hook, put you jab lacks power,” he instructs.
You were good at putting your body into your hooks, but you just couldn't build enough momentum for a strong jab. You try again, but it falls flat, and Jeno shakes his head. 
“Follow through; come on, try it again,” he encourages you. You take a breath and send a jab into his mitt. Still not enough. 
Jeno takes off the mitts and moves in closer towards you.
"Here, watch me,” he says, raising his gaurd and striking the air. “You want to step into it, see?” He shows you again, a little bit slower.
You give a determined hum and copy his movement, but you can tell by Jeno’s face that you're missing the mark. 
"Ok, come here; let me show you” Jeno moves in behind you and grabs your arms. He helps you fix your posture and you instantly heat up at the contact. You try to keep it together, but the way his chest was pressed up against your back and the way he was breathing heavily in your ear had you reeling. "Ok, now focus, step into it and jab.” 
He moves one hand down to your waist and pushes you forward, guiding your step, while the other helps you jab. He was so close. You wanted to blame the sudden weakness in your limbs on the endless training he has you doing, but you know its from the heat of his body.
“Are you okay? That one was really weak. Are you shaking?” Jeno looks at you from over your shoulder, worried. 
You meet his gaze and nod silently. He's so close. His lips are a breath away, and all you have to do is turn your head to meet his lips. The hand holding your waist travels up your side and grabs your chin. He tilts your head up a little, and his lips are meeting yours. You turn in his grasp and kiss him back. His lips are so soft, and when you pull away, you immediately miss the feeling of his lips on yours. 
“I'm sorry; I shouldn't have done that,” he says softly.
Before you can protest, he pulls away from you, cleans up the equipment you two used, and calls it a night. You let him walk you to your car, and you say nothing before you drive away. If it wasn't awkward before, it definitely would be now.
How could he kiss you and then pretend like nothing happened? You’re too embarrassed to bring it up again. Does this count as being rejected for a second time? Nah, he kissed you; you're not taking another L. 
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It had been a week so far, and Jeno had shown up promptly to all your classes. He shouldered your bags and carried your books as you both walked across campus. Neither of you brought up the kiss, but fortunately, it wasn't awkward anymore. He had started teaching you to defend yourself at the gym sometimes after class. Those moments felt the most intimate. You could feel his passion when he taught you, and it warmed you in all the right places. You two talked about everything in these moments. You shared embarrassing memories from high school, and he told you stories about Jaemin that you would never let your brother live down. You talked about everything but the kiss. You wonder if he regretted it?
The funny thing about college was that the classrooms were so big and there were so many students that it was hard to keep track of who was who. That's how Jeno ended up in you’re lecture every Monday. It was the only class you had with Yuta, and Jeno wasn’t taking any chances. You told him it wasn't a good idea, and the eyes burning into the back of your head were proof of that. Jeno was by your side the entire period, and to onlookers, you two probably looked like a couple. He had scooted your chair directly next to him and was practically shoulder to shoulder with you. 
“Back up; I can feel you breathing down my neck” 
“I want to see what your doing”
Jeno didn't go to college. He mainly just worked during the day and fought on the weekends for extra cash. His parents were absent for the most part, and he kind of took care of himself growing up. He didn't really have a support system growing up, and that was one of the main reasons he found himself at your house. The only other place he felt safe was the gym. You could only imagine how devastated he was when it shut down. You can understand why he decided to stick around when things turned shady. Jeno earned enough money to support himself, so he never felt the need to go to college, which is why Jaemin didn't feel to bad about dumping you off on his shoulder.
“I can't concentrate Jen,” you scold.
He spends half the class peaking over your shoulder as you work and the other half asleep on the desk. Some guard dog he was.
Yuta didn't bother you during class anymore, and you were grateful. You could finally focus on bringing your grades back up, but you couldn't shake the feeling that he was plotting against you the entire time. After class, he would hang out in the library or, if you had a long day, the gym before returning to pick you up.
Later that day, Jeno was supposed to meet you after your econ class, which was your last class of the day, but you were surprised to not see him silently leaning up against the wall opposite the door. You try your best to calm your nerves as you try to decide if you should wait for him or not. You tried not to freak out; he was probably fine. Maybe he thought you could handle walking yourself home for once; you couldn't expect him to be there all the time. Not to mention you hadn't run into Yuta anywhere other than class.  
Your last class ends late, and the sun has already gone down, so you were really reluctant to leave without Jeno. You try your best to channel the old you, the one that ran with bad crowds, the one who feared no one and nothing, and the newer you, who had trained with Jeno and learned how to protect yourself. You put on your best face and begin trekking home.
As you walked, you realized It wasn't so bad; you had honestly forgotten how nice it felt to just walk around by yourself and clear your head. You were enjoying your walk home, and you were about two blocks from your dorm when you felt something in the air shift. Suddenly, you didn't feel so alone. You try to pick up your pace as subtly as possible and pull your phone from your bag. You dial Jeno’s number with quickness and wait for him to pick it up. You can feel the person behind you’s steps quicken. 
Come on, please
You beg internally as you break out into a small jog. Screw being subtle; someone was clearly following you. You didn’t dare chance a look over your shoulder as you cut across a lawn; his phone went to voicemail, and you dialed again. The person behind you is right on your heels and you drop your phone as a firm hand grabs your arm. Your first reflex is to scream, but you remember Jenos teachings: you jab your elbow as hard as you can into the attacker's ribs. Your about to break his grip when you hear a familiar groan. You turn around to look at your attacker, and you notice its just Jeno.
He's looking at you with a worried expression, like he didn't just chase you for a full block.
“What are you doing!?” 
“I was trying to catch up to you!” He lets you go and holds his ribs, groaning in pain.
“Why didn't you pick up weirdo? I thought someone was going to get me!”
“I was running late and left my phone at home; I thought you would at least wait for me,” he states
You calm your nerves and sign in relief. You shake off your backpack and shove it into his chest.
“Dont be late again; what if something had happened”
“You know I would never let anything happen to you, right?” His eyebrows furrow, and he looks into your eyes. He needs you to know that he would throw down everything to make sure you were okay.
“I know that” Your heart skips a beat, and he grabs your hand reassuringly. You were grateful for the night sky because you could feel your face heating up.
"Good,” 
You finally arrive at your off-campus dorm and make your way inside. Your roommate didn't seem to be home yet; typically, she came home late because she had to work late at her job so you were grateful for the time you had alone with jeno. 
It isn't until he sets your things down and you flick on a few lights that you see a few bruises and cuts on his face. It was not surprising to see Jeno bruised up, given his fighting background, but these appeared to be from a recent fight. When he notices your gaze, he turns to hide his face and begins unpacking your bag and arranging your study materials.
Jeno had insisted a few days ago that he stick around a little after he drops you off. He insisted it was for your protection so you guys started studying together. Well, you started studying; Jeno just watched you or took a nap next to you on the sofa. 
“We should start soon; it's getting late,” he says, trying to redirect your attention.
You refuse to let it go though and move in closer to get a better look. “Who did this?” you say as you gently caress his face, moving it around to examine the damage
“I had a match the other—”
“Don't lie to me,” you urge
“He sent some guys after me,” jeno confesses
Your heart drops. This is exactly why you didn’t want him to get involved. Its like he can read your thoughts because he immediately tries to ease your worry.
“Calm down; this is nothing. You know me, I can hold my own,” he says
You didn't respond.
“I took care of them; you dont have to worry”
You stare at him incredulously “Is that why you were late today?” 
"Maybe,” he winces
“Jeno!” you scold. “Was Yuta there?”
“I tried to look for him after, but apparently he had an away game tonight,” he answers. 
“Let me clean you up” 
Jeno wasn't that much taller than you, probably just a few inches, but you found it easier to work on the cuts on his face by sitting on the counter. You already had your materials prepped; you kept a first aid kit on hand at all times; it was a habit you couldn't shake. This wasn't the first time you found yourself in this position with Jeno; you had always cleaned him and your brother up during childhood. You felt terrible; you worked in a silence that Jeno kept trying to break. Anytime he would open his mouth to speak, you would dab at his lip with more ointment to shut him up until he got the memo. He kept trying to cheer you up and you werent in the mood
He winces at your touch, and you immediately let up and give a short apology. You go back in with a lighter hand and add a bandage. As many punches as he takes, you would think a little peroxide wouldn't hurt. You were done fixing him up, and you busy yourself with putting your kit back together, ignoring the eyes that bore into you. You wanted to leave and put some distance between you but he wouldnt step from between your legs. 
“Hey, look at me.” he calls out to you. 
You could not bring yourself to look at him; each scar on his face reminded you that it was your fault that he was hurt. 
“Its not your fault” its like he was reading your mind.
"Yes, it is! I shouldnt have gotten you involved! I should have just called Jaem.”
“You would rather see Jaemin beat up?” He jokes, trying to lighten the mood.
“He would have at least deserved it,” you say, rolling your eyes and thinking of all the times he tormented you growing up.
A comfortable silence falls between you two after sharing a laugh. He was so close, but you reached out like he was going to disappear. You tentatively caress his bruised cheek; he leans into your touch, and the look he gives you gives you butterflies. He looked at you like you were the most precious thing in the world. 
“I like being near you;  don’t push me away again”
"Jeno,” you say, shocked by his confession
“I dont want us to go back to the way things were I—
You push him away before jumping down from the counter; you don't want to hear anymore. You had a feeling you knew what he was getting at. After all this time and all the hurt, now he likes you!?
“You were the one who made it like this! Made US like this. I told you how I felt all those years ago, and you rejected me!” you argue
“What are you talking—”
“Drop it,” you demand, trying to leave the bathroom, but he stands in the doorway, blocking your path.
“What did you mean? When did I ever reject you?” Jeno tries, but you ignore his gaze until he grips your chin and forces you to look at him.
“Stop being like that and answer me.” he says.
You were tired of holding your tongue; you might as well get it over with. “Do you remember that time during highschool? When you stayed with us the whole summer?” you worry your lip. “I told you I liked you and you said I was like a sister to you,” you heave out in one big breathe
Jeno takes a moment to process your words, and he finally says, “I had no idea that was what you meant back then. I thought you hated me since I was always over. I thought the ‘I like you’ was more of an ‘I like you around’,” Jeno explains.
“Why would I hate you?” You ask in shock
“Jaemin used to always drag me around to scare off your boyfriends; I thought you might have hated me for that. You never really went out of your way to speak to me, I guess? I asked Jaemin if you hated me that same night, and he told me no. Then I ran into you in the hallway, and you suddenly told me you liked me, so I figured he told you to set things straight?” 
He wasn't wrong; back then, you kept to yourself and watched from afar. You hoped you could make him come to you. You were too scared to approach him, so you did everything you could to get his attention. You got into trouble, so he and Jaemin would have to come to your rescue. You dated all those guys to make him jealous. This whole time, you thought he couldn't care less about you, but it seems the whole time he was worried you hated him. 
"Well, that doesnt change the fact that you only see me like a little sister” 
“I kind of did, at first. You were my best friend, little sister, and I had to see you that way. Jaemin would kill me if I didn't. But I can't, not anymore. Truthfully, I never had.” He caressed your face and pressed his forehead against yours “I'm sorry if this is all confusing for you. I know it has been for me, but can we just try something?” He holds your eye contact, and your faces are so close that you can feel his breath. He smelled so good; the minty scent of his tooth paste mixed with the natural musk of his skin was driving you crazy. You had waited for a moment like this for almost forever.
“Anything; I'll do anything with you,” you say, almost forgetting to breathe.
He pushes you back and sets you on the counter again as he leans in and caresses your lips softly with his, teasing you like he has been doing for the past few years. You cannot take it anymore; you cannot wait anymore, so you take the dive. You press your lips fervently against his, causing him to hiss slightly from the sting, but when you try to pull back to apologize, he grips the back of your neck and reconnects your lips again. He moans into your mouth as you lick the cut on his lip, which will undoubtedly scar apologetically. You try to kiss him more gently but when he feels your hesitance, he pulls away just for a second to whisper, “don’t hold back”
Your hands find their way into his hair and his find their way under your thighs, hiking them up and around his waist. Things were getting heated fast, and you could hardly breathe. Everything you ever wanted was coming to fruition right in front of your eyes. When he finally pulls away to catch his breath, he does not waste any time kissing your neck. The force of his kisses makes you weak, and you have to lean against the mirror behind you to stay upright. 
You could hardly keep up; your limbs felt like they weighed a ton, and you could hardly hold your head up. The way he was rolling his hips into yours made your breath start to make condensation on the mirror as you laid your face on the cool glass. Jeno eventually found your lips again after his short exploration and claimed them hungrily.
“What's gotten into my baby? You can't handle it?” he teases
This was the first time he’s called you that, and it was driving your heart beat up dangerously.
“Don't worry, I'll take care of you, like I always do,” he murmurs against your lips before leaving you with a peck. 
He pulls you off the counter as he leads you to your bed. You were in a daze; your brain was running hot, and you couldn't even think of anything but the feeling of his hands caressing your sides from under your shirt. 
“Tell me you want it” Your eyes flutter a bit at his tone. He sounded so good. You needed him inside of you; that was the only thing you could think of.
“I need you inside,” you moan with a roll of your hips
“Gotta get you ready for that first,” he says as he begins to strip you of your clothes before he follows with his own.
You definitely had brain fog but the sight infront of you cleared it up. He looked so good, you had to bite your tongue before you let out an embarrassing sound. His broad shoulders and slim waist hovered over you tauntingly, like his body was begging you to mark it. His length stood proud against his abdomen, and you had to will yourself to meet his dark graze again. When he licks his lips, you pout and give him a "hurry up" look.
 He wastes no time and starts stretching you out over his fingers. You return every kiss and nip he gave you earlier and more. You mark up his neck with kisses and bites and leave pretty claw marks down his back  and chest as he works his fingers in and out of you skillfully. He had to bite back the groans that threatened to leave his mouth as you gushed all over his fingers. He couldnt wait to feel you around his cock. You feel yourself getting so close. You roll your hips as he scissors you open. He senses how close you are and hooks his fingers as they drag deliciously against your walls. You finish all over his fingers.
“You must have been so pent-up, baby; that didn't take long at all?” he coos teasingly
You shoot him a glare and retaliate by wrapping your legs around his waist, locking him into place. You grab his length and stroke it. You give him a few sensual pumps before you crack. You wanted to tease him like he's been torturing you, but you couldn't keep waiting; you needed him inside so you slipped him in. He chuckles softly at your failed attempt to get back at him and pecks your lips affectionately. You shudder at the feeling, and your walls are squeezing him so tight that the soft patterns he was drawing on your skin turn into harsh grasps of your hips while his soft chuckling turns into a surprised gasp. He moans softly as he tries to ground himself.
“You want it bad, huh?” he tries to get you to beg but it comes out more whiney than domineering 
“No more waiting; if you wont do anything, I'll do it myself,” you threaten. 
He finds your threat cute and has decided to take mercy on you. He strokes slowly at first, making sure you’re not hurting or uncomfortable. You loved this man, and you loved how much he cared for you, but right now you didn't want that. Despite his constant nagging, he has always been nothing but gentle with you for as long as you can remember. You don't want that side of him. You want it rough.
“Dont hold back,” you mirror his words from earlier “you wont break me,” you reassure him when you see worry settle into his features
“What if I do?”
“I want you to,” you whisper back 
That seems to do the trick because now he was hoisting your hips up, tilting them to fuck into you as deep as he could. Your lower half is lifted from the mattress and all you can do is hold on to the sheets. He was thrusting in deep, craving as much contact as possible. 
You try to match his pace and fuck back on him, but you grow tired and just settle for taking everything he gives you.
He sets your hips back down before yanking one of your legs over his shoulder. He starts back  up again, and you can see the way his veins strain against his arms at the force he's using to fuck you. You were sure to have pretty bruises in the shape of his hands in the morning. The bed creaked loudly as he pounded you into the mattress, and you prayed that Ryujin wasn’t home yet. 
It was like he couldn't keep his hands off of you; they were never still on your body. First they were grasping your hips, holding you steady as he drilled you, then they were grasping at your breasts, and finally one of them took a purchase wrapped around the base of your neck. He wasn’t applying much pressure; he was just holding it there.
Your walls flutter around his cock and hw tightens his grip around your neck at the feeling. He can tell you’re about to cum and when you do, he has to hold you down with his other hand. The lack of air triggers your survival responses and heightened senses, making you feel everything tenfold. The burn against your throat hurts, but the pain mixes with the pleasure to give you a beautiful ending. You can tell by the sticky warmth that fills you and the groan that follows that Jeno wasn't far behind at all. He rolls off of you and plops down on the space beside you to catch his breath. You pull yourself up and start to get out of bed before he grabs your arm.
“Where are you going?” He asks as hurt crosses his features.
“I need the bathroom,” you explain, sleepy “This is my house anyway; you thought I was going to leave?” You joke with a laugh
Jeno visibly relaxes for a second before he too gets out of bed. He makes his way over to you and helps you to the bathroom. You go to the bathroom, and he runs a bath, and you realize how much more domestic your relationship has become in the last few weeks, to the point where it feels natural.
He helps you into the bath and slips in behind. You two talk more in the bath as he pampers you. You have never felt more at home than when you were wrapped in Jeno’s arms. When you get out, he lays you back on the bed before cuddling up beside you. You study his face, and for the first time in awhile, you take a good, long look. If you looked close enough, you could still see traces of the boy you knew all those years ago under the man that stared back at you. For some reason, that made everything hurt. You knew Jeno would do anything to protect you, but who would protect him? With Jaemin gone, all he had was you. You shut your eyes at the thought.
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You don't know what your thinking; you just knew you had to be strong and that you were going to put an end to this tonight. You didn’t have his number anymore, but you always knew where to find him. 
It was getting late, and instead of heading to the gym for your weekly training with Jeno, you were on the other side of town. You hug your jacket tighter to your chest, bracing yourself against the cold winds of the night. When you turn a corner, the flashing neon lights almost blind you.
찬스노래방
Chance Karoake
You open the door to the front of the building and make your way in. You put on your brave face before trekking over to the back of the shady building. Room 0824 was your destination. 
This was the building Yuta ran most of his deals out of. Karaoke rooms are a known hotspot for drug deals and other illegal trades. It was rare to see Yuta here now due to the fact that he had to keep his image clean but you knew his schedule and you knew when he would pop in. Dont get him wrong; yuta wasnt some big-shot crime boss, he was just some kid who dealt in shady business. 
You knock on the door and wait. When the door swings open, a cloud of smoke hits you in the face. The room stinks of weed and disposables, the smoke burning your eyes as you try to focus on the figure in front of you. 
Cheshire grin meets an apprehensive frown as you stand face-to-face with Yuta.
“Welcome home, doll”
You feel the adrenaline coursing through your veins at the man standing in front of you, the source of so much trouble in your life. The atmosphere is tense, filled with the lingering smell of drugs and the weight of unspoken threats. You knew this was your chance to finally confront him and put an end to this dangerous game you've been forced to play. With a steely glance, you lock eyes with Yuta and prepare yourself for the confrontation that will determine the course of your future.
“Don't call me that” You push past him and enter the room. There is plenty of sitting room on the couch, but you’re too anxious, so you decide to stand. A few of his friends occupy the room, and he doesn't have to tell them twice to leave the two of you alone.
Even after all this time and all your history together, you cannot bring yourself to look him in the eyes. Jeno was right; he terrified you. You could pretend to be brave all you wanted, but the truth was, you were just a scared little girl inside. 
“Don't push me, doll,” he warns before wrapping slender fingers around your jaw and forcing you to look at him. “Where's your little boyfriend? Not here to save you?” he taunts
“I want you to leave him alone,” you grit out. You had to be brave.
“You think you can just walk in here and give me orders? You forget who you belong to?” He shakes your face in his grasp.
You rip his hand from your face and twist. No, you would not let him control you any longer. This had all gone too far. Despite feeling intimidated, you refuse to submit to his control any longer.
All you could think about was Jeno; you couldn't let him get hurt anymore because of you. You loved him more than you feared Yuta. You refuse to let him own you.
With the grasp that you have on his arm, you twist his wrist farther until hes crippling down onto his knees. As he winced in agony, you could see the fear etched on his face. With a steely resolve, you pressed harder. His cries echoed in the empty room as you held him in place, making sure he felt every ounce of pain he had caused. Your grip tightened, a silent promise that this would be the last time he hurt anyone.
“If you want to continue playing and keep your scholarship, I suggest you leave me the hell alone. Next time you harass me, I'll break it,” you spit.
With a final, warning glare, you released your grip on his wrist. His body crumpled to the floor, gasping for breath as he clutched his throbbing wrist. You had made it clear that harassment would not be tolerated, and the threat of losing his scholarship hung heavy in the air. 
The weight that had been dragging you down for so long began to lift, replaced by a newfound sense of confidence and self-worth. With your head held high, you strode forward. Although you know for certain that Jeno would kill you if he ever found out, you think deep down he would be proud; after all, he created this monster.
When you get home, Ryujin’s on your ass for being out so late. When she had called Jeno and he hadn't seen you either, she thought the worst had happened. You check your phone and find 10 missed calls and even more frantic text messages from Jeno. 
You apologize for causing worry to Ryujin and explain that you lost track of time while out. You decide to quickly call Jeno back to assure him your okay. 
You wait as the phone rings, but there is no answer. You call again, and he still doesn't pick up. Something didn't feel right, and you grabbed your keys, rushing out of the house.
“You just got here; where are you going?” a stern Ryujin calls.
“Gotta find Jeno!” you call back before hopping back into your car.
For as long as you’ve known him, you knew Jeno could be a hothead sometimes. You knew the moment he heard you were missing, he went out himself to go looking for you. You drove to his house to find him. When you pull into his driveway, it's empty. You park and rush up the stairs to his apartment. You bang on the door until someone answers. You almost sigh in relief until you realize its not Jeno. The person on the other side of the door looked clearly aggravated. His black hair was messily strewn on his head, and his shirt hung off his frame like he just threw it on. 
“Can I help you? A raspy voice calls
“Uh, im looking for Jeno,” you ask the man
“He left like an hour ago,” he yawns lazily, leaning against the door frame like he could barely stay awake. “Its almost one in the morning. Whats going on?” 
“Its nothing; can you call me if he shows back up” you ask frantically.  If Jeno had left an hour ago, who knows where he could be now? You give him your number, and he tells you his name is Mark. You thank him and rush back to your car. Your about to pull out when your phone lights up. Jeno was calling you back.
“Hello? Jeno where have you been?” You feel a weight lift off your shoulder as you take your keys out of the ignition and slump back into your seat. 
“”I found Yuta”
“Jeno…What did you do to him?”
“I beat his ass,” he says, “and then I made him tell me where you were”
“Jen—”
“Why did you think it was a good idea to go and threaten him on your own?”
“I had too. I had to do it for me”
“Where are you”
“At your apartment”
“Stay there”
You get out of your car and lean up against the hood, and you wait to see his car roll down the street. 
You breathe in the cold, crisp night air and let it soothe your nerves. You did not want to argue with Jeno, not right now. Headlights blind you as a car pulls up behind yours. You hear the engine cut off and the car door slam. As Jeno quickly approaches, you prepare yourself for the confrontation. The tension hangs heavy between you, but you take a deep breath and gather your thoughts before engaging in what could be a difficult conversation. 
"Jeno, can we talk about this—” You're left speechless as his lips meet yours in an unexpected kiss.
Confusion and conflicting emotions swirl within you as you reluctantly allow yourself to be swept up in the moment, momentarily forgetting all of your worries.
He pulls away and rests his forehead on yours “Don't scare me like that” His hands caress your face like he can't believe your standing in front of him, like he's making sure he's not dreaming. His frame is shaking, and you’re not sure if it was the cool night air or the light rain that chose this moment to fall, making him shiver.
He pulls you in for a tight hug, and your heart twists, your throat closes up, and you cry. You cry because you never want him to pull away; you cry because you realize how much he loves you; and you cry because you’re both safe.
“Im sorry Jen i didnt mean to—”
“No excuses,” he says, shaking his head “promise”
You hug him back tight and bury your head in his shoulder. “I promise I wont do anything like that again” 
He pulls away from you and you notice hes soaked to his bones. The rain had picked up and was now pouring down over you two; you could only imagine your clothes were in the same state. You laugh and push his wet hair out of his face.
“Mark is going to kill us if we soak the carpet.”
“I think he's already upset; I woke him up earlier. Come on, lets get you out of the rain”
He leads you inside by the hand, and you kick off your wet shoes and socks. You try your best to make your way to the bathroom to change. Jeno brings you some dry clothes, and he closes the door and changes alongside you into something more warm.
You follow him to his room with light steps, afraid of waking Mark up for a second time. You lay down next to Jeno in his bed, and you tangle your feet with his seeking warmth.
“I feel like my heart starts beating again when our hands hold each other,” he whispers
“Back then, when we drifted apart, every day felt like I was drowning. Now because you are here, I'm breathing,” you confess
He hugs you tighter and kisses the top of your head “im not going anywhere”
And you believe him, because somehow you had always known he was your guardian angel. You close your eyes, feeling the warmth of his embrace and the reassurance in his words. In that moment, you know that no matter what challenges may come, you both can face them together. With his arms around you and his promise to stay by your side, you finally feel at peace, knowing that you have found your way back to each other.
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misctf · 20 days ago
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The Haunted House II
Back with another Halloween themed story to celebrate the month! This is an indirect sequel to The Haunted House. Enjoy!
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“You’ll wanna use these for pie and those for eatin’” Cal says with a warm smile. And just like several customers before, she thanks him for his kindness, “Aw shucks, jus’ glad to be here.” Each word rich with his country accent.
Today was the local college’s annual Autumn Festival. Cal’s father would have him man their stand. It was something the young farmer enjoyed each year and the locals always looked forward to seeing him. But once a year was good enough for him. He never went to college, but didn’t feel he was missing out. He loved the countryside and his life on the farm.
“Besides,” He thinks eying a group of college guys, “They’re all a bit backwards ‘round here.”
The group of bros were talking about a Halloween party that night. Their obnoxious laughter filling the air as they discussed ‘future conquests’. Their vocabulary rich with words like “rizz”, “bro”, and “lit.” Cal couldn’t wrap his head around it. Outside of being from the countryside, he figured being 30 years old contributed. To him, they all seemed immature and rude. A stark contrast to the values instilled in him by his god-fearing parents.
“Well, that was the last of it. Guess I should pack up.” After finishing, he looks down at his watch, “Well I’ll be, there’s still time before supper. Might as well explore.” He figures he might find a gift for his parents and girlfriend, Anna.
Cal walks pass various stands and attractions- enjoying the sense of community and the cool autumn breeze. And as he reached the end of the festival, he saw it- a large, wooden, and derelict house.
“That wasn’t here last year.” He mumbles, walking over to the plaque near the entrance, “Scariest experience you’ll ever have.” He reads. He scratches the hairs on his chin and grins, “A haunted house, huh?”
His neighbors would turn their farmhouse into a haunted house. And it was scary. Cal remembered the first time he took Anna. He damn well near pissed himself. If he wasn’t trying to impress her, he actually might’ve.
“Scariest, huh? I’ll be the judge of that.” He chuckles.
Without another thought, he enters. The inside was dark, illuminated by a few candles. The musty smell of mothballs and mildew invaded his nose, but he reassured himself it was nothing compared to the cows on a hot summer day. Eventually, he found himself standing in front of a large mirror.
“I see.” He smiles, “It’s one of them fun mirror houses.”
He feels somewhat relieved. This was nothing compared to his neighbor’s haunted house. He follows a creaky flight of stairs, until arriving at a somewhat familiar looking door.
“Well I’ll be.” He raises an eyebrow.
From what he could tell, it was a replica of the door to his room back home. He opens it slowly, his eyes widening as he enters what appeared to be a total copy of his bedroom.
“There’s no way.” He whispers, only to jump as the door slammed shut behind him.
He looks around finding his neatly made bed, his desk littered with equipment manuals, a pair of his work boots, and pictures of animals and the outdoors. Even his fishing gear sits nicely in the corner of the room. The only difference being the large mirror propped against the wall. Cal took an apprehensive step forward.
“Call me crazy...” He mutters, approaching his desk.
And as he picks up one of the manuals, he feels a shock. He watches closely as the manual starts to shift and change. The cover now showing off a nude man, flexing his muscles. Cal gasps and drops it as the remaining manuals reform into all kinds of lewd magazines. And he watches as a laptop materializes on his desk, immediately opening to gay porn- the sounds echoing loudly.
“What on Earth?” Cal gasps, feeling his cock tenting in his jeans, “Naw, this ain’t...”
He backs away, falling onto his bed. And when he does, images flash through his mind. He can hear his neighbor Billy. He’s moaning, begging for more. And Cal grunts from a sudden warmth around his cock.
“This don’t make sense.” Cal huffs, holding back a moan as he bucks his hips.
Billy was never near his room. Cal’s parents warned him about Billy’s sexual preferences. Yet he could hear Billy’s voice now, clear as day. His moans a symphony in Cal’s head as he absentmindedly massages his tented cock.
“Wasn’t that a good fuck?” A voice said.
“Fuckin’ was.” Cal slurred, recalling Billy’s firm ass.
He shakes his head and leaps from the bed, sweat trickling down his face. He never... not with a guy. Not even with Anna. He was waiting until marriage.
“Huhuh remember Anna’s face when she caught you?”
A new unwanted memory appears. The day Anna walked in on him and Billy. Her look of disgust. How his parents didn’t even know what to say, just going on about how disappointed they were.
“Whatever...” The voice continued, “At least we got bragging rights.” Cal groans as he remembered telling his friends about banging an older woman. But wasn’t he the same age as Anna?
“Nah fam, you’re 21.”
Before Cal could respond, he caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror. He couldn’t explain it, but he looked younger. He runs a hand along his smoother skin and watches with amazement as his facial hair falls to the floor. He moans as rush of hormones and energy fill his body.
“No, this isn’t right...” Cal’s eyes widened, “My voice... what...?” His country accent gone- now more akin to the bros from outside earlier.
He retreats from the mirror, awkwardly tripping over his work boots and falling into his closet. He looks up at his flannels and denim hanging neatly. And before his eyes, they morph. His clothes shifting into oversized hoodies, joggers, and tank-tops. He even catches a glimpse of his work boots as they become slides.
“Bruh, that drip ain’t hittin’ right.” The voice said, “Gotta ditch that fit.”
“What are you even...” Cal stops, hating how similar their voices sound.
But he quickly finds out what the voice meant. He yelps as the cool air caresses his now naked form. His rock-hard cock exposed and throbbing from the cool draft.
“But how...?” His eyes inspect his naked form.
He no longer sports a farmer’s tan. Instead, every inch of his skin was sun kissed- a rich bronze. And even his chest and belly hairs fall out. He frowns at the loss of the tokens of his traditional masculinity.
“Fuck this.” He curses, stumbling out of the closet, “Wait, no way.”  
The pictures of animals and nature have been replaced by pictures of half-naked men and women. He groans as memories of jerking off to these pics fill his mind, and he shudders as the moans from his laptop seemingly got louder.
“I gotta bust.” He mumbled, thinking back to Billy’s ass, “But... no, fuck...”
His voice drips with smugness- deep and dull now. And nothing he did could prevent him from sounding like a typical douchebro. Taking a step back, he trips over a dumbbell.
“Bruh, where’s my fishing gear!?”
Instead, there’s a full set of dumbbells and a bench press. And his jaw drops when he caught his reflection again. Gone were his lean muscles. He now sports broad bis and tris. His pecs now a pair of meaty muscle tits. He slowly runs his hand along his six-pack abs, an unwanted pride filling him.
“Being jacked's a vibe, bro, no cap.” The voice said as Cal bounces his pecs.
“Facts bruh, a little extra muscle never hurt nobody.” Cal bites his lip, “No, oh fuck... my head...” Memories of guys and girls drooling over his muscles make his dick twitch. He loves the way those sluts would salivate over him, “Please... no...”
He winces as an intricate forearm tattoo engraves into his skin. And he gasps as a few bracelets materialize on his arm. There was no way... he would never buy shit like this. He was saving his money for more important things, right?
“Bruh, when you’re on OnlyFans, the bag’s there, no cap.”
Cal watches as a ring light and video camera materialize on his desk. Memories of his content flooding his weakened mind. The modest part of him blushing as he recalled the lewd content he created. Cumming on camera, teasing his cock, fucking Billy...  
“They love watchin’ this dick in action.” He smirks, giving his monster a few tugs.
Yet, part of him was terrified- his values and kind-hearted nature resisting the persona that was taking over. And he quickly released his cock and grabbed his head.
“You gotta let that go, fr.” The voice said.
“Deadass, I’m not lettin’ this slide.” Cal shot back.
And as he turns back to the mirror, he saw himself. His real self. Still naked. But a reflection he was more used to- his farmer’s tan, lean muscle, and body hair. Not sporting a tattoo or fake jewelry. The kindness still in his eyes, albeit fearful.
“It’s me...” He whispers.
But when he looks down, all he sees is his newly bronzed skin, two slabs of chest meat, cobblestone abs, and his 12 inch, throbbing cock.
“No... I don’t want this...”
Desperately, he reachs out to the mirror- to his old self. Wanting nothing more than to go back to being himself. But as his hand touches the mirror, it shatters. Cal cries out and tumbles through the opening, falling to the ground just outside the haunted house.
“Oh fuck...” He curses, pushing himself up.
He looks down at his tanned, meaty hand. His tattoo and arms on full display in his tank-top. His pair of joggers doing little to hide his raging boner. In a dazed panic, he grabs his phone and opens snapchat.
“It’s me, bruh. For real.” He keeps staring at the photo, his eyes dulling, “Damn.. I got that rizz today.” He swipes through a few filters and grins, “Lit.” His selfie now framed by the entrance to the haunted house, “Scariest experience you’ll ever have.” He chuckles, “No cap.” He uploads the selfie for his thirsty followers.  
“Bruh, you good?” Cal looks up at the group of guys from earlier.
“Ghost play with your cock, CJ?” One quips, nodding towards the outline of the boner in his pants.
“CJ?” Cal mumbled. Yeah... He likes that... CJ, “Bruh, that house was straight-up bussin’, no cap.” CJ chuckles and readjusts his dick, “Ayo, quit staring unless you're gonna do something about it.” He stands up, “Like, don’t we have a party to hit up?”
Later, CJ stands in his dorm room, flexing after his shower. His dick needed some attention- not like he ever had a problem with that. That’s why he went to fuckin’ college in the first place. His basic ass parents could waste their lives on that farm. Nah fam, CJ had bigger and better things ahead of him- as did whoever guy’s ass he was baggin’ that night. CJ chuckles, already feeling his cock hardening.
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targaryenrealnessdarling · 11 months ago
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Quid Pro Quo | Michael Gavey x fem!reader
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Summary: After being ditched by her friend at the Trinity College Christmas Party, she finds herself enthralled with learning the language of Michael Gavey | Word Count: 3.8k~ | Warnings below the cut!
Part Two: Carpe Diem Part Three: Veni, Vidi, Vici
warnings: virgin michael, semi-public sexual conduct, oral sex (m receiving), heavy petting
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If she has to listen to Professor Wardon swoon over Ancient Greek and how it ‘drove him to pursue his dreams in extending his passion to other students’, she thinks she might actually fall asleep.
She's in a good spot to do so, nestled between two other students, the one on her right seemingly just as bored as her, and conveniently hidden behind a tall, lanky first year, who sits straight, with his head perfectly obscuring hers as he fixes his posture regularly.
Several times throughout, she's checked her watch, and yet the second hand never seems to move an inch.
Professor Wardon is just about to go on a lovesick spiel about Homeric Greek when the lecture concludes with a heaved sigh from every student as they sling their hefty bags over their shoulders.
“Remember I want 2,500 words on Les Liaisons dangereuses in my pigeon hole by next Thursday, before your Christmas parties!” 
“Oh joy,” she sighs with a grin to the girl walking shoulder to shoulder beside her as they leave, feeling noticeably lighter knowing that that's their last lecture before Christmas break.
“Christ, you're telling me. I can't be arsed to even right my own name at the moment, nevermind read 18th century fucking French.”
She gives a snort in reply, “Merry Christmas to us, eh? Should do what the French do and have a revolution or something.”
“Yeah, eat our lecturers or something.”
“Alright, I wouldn't go that far.”
“Anyway, I'm off to T Library, see ya, have a good Christmas and don't do anything I wouldn't!”
She waves her off as her friend disappears, the cold air of the outside nipping at her skin that manages to sneak beneath her coat.
Oxford University is not what she imagined at all. She came here very much feeling like an outsider, like there'd been some sort of paperwork mistake and it was supposed to be someone else in her place. 
The imposter syndrome seemed difficult to shift, but she'd at least managed to make a couple of friends since starting in September.
Languages had always found her well, and seemingly the only thing she managed to actually understand. People were inconsistent, cruel and fickle. Languages, though they shifted and changed, were firmly rooted in reason and understanding. 
As sad as it sounded, conjugating verbs, vowel shifts and rare dialects were the one thing she found herself itching to discover more about. The idea that there was more to uncover seemed exciting and scary at the same time.
And Oxford University was the best place she could be to do that.
All that said, her eagerness to get involved with her studies had left her social life with much to be desired.
In the first two weeks of university alone, she'd gained one friend and lost a boyfriend. And while they were drifting apart anyway, it was still a relatively large blow to her self-esteem and her confidence to actually get out there, socialise and make the most of her first year of freedom.
The only friends she'd made were those on her course. Priya, who'd just abandoned her to stick her nose in books about the Great Vowel Shift, and Anya, who…to be honest, rarely left her room. Seeming more like a ghost than anything else.
It was a wonder she was still a student, with how often she missed classes.
What Anya does do best, is manage to somehow rise out of her pit to drag her to Christmas parties that aren't even run by their college.
Which is why she finds herself somehow at Trinity College campus, where she eyes several scantily clad women wearing revealing Santa costumes adorned with itchy tinsel.
Anya is the sort of girl who, well, every girl kind of wants to be. So much so she sort of wonders why she hangs around with her. She's pretty, fit and fucking clever. Her only downfall is her taste in men, so often being Oxford pretty boys.
So it is absolutely no surprise at all, when two jägerbombs in, Anya has somehow slipped into the arms of one aforementioned Oxford pretty boy, seeming in every way a clone of the previous, with the exception of the way he pairs his Ayia Nappa top with his low rise jeans and the only effort to conform to  theme, is a pair of plastic reindeer antlers on his head bobbling side to side.
She grimaces as she watches them suck each other's faces off in a dark corner of the room, ‘Stay Another Day’ by East 17 blaring with a cheap crackle through the speakers as she makes her way through the bodies to somewhere quiet.
She sighs, nursing the rum and coke Anya had sloppily poured her in one hand as she closes the door behind her, shutting out the drunken squeals and cheers for the peace of a quiet common room.
It's still decorated, she notes, but empty. Maybe she could lurk here until Anya is done, if she ever will be.
The deep clack of a pool ball being sucked into a socket makes her jump, realising perhaps that she was not actually alone, as she'd previously thought.
The cool light hung above the battered pool table illuminates his deep red jumper, and the first thing she sees is the way he leans on one leg, standing straight as if he was imitating the rigid pool cue leant before him. The yellow lined detailing around the cuffs highlights his small wrists and big hands that stretch from it as he rubs blue chalk onto the tip.
Her eyes trail up the back of his neck, past the lazy waves of dark blonde hair, clearly due a trim at some point, and to his face, even from this angle able to see how his features sit. With a sharp nose and jawline, and black skinny glasses perched above his cheekbones.
She almost laughs at the way he's almost as tall as the light that illuminates the table, half-thinking that she might never have seen such a strange and yet interesting looking guy.
“Didn't fancy the party?” she finally says, alerting him to her presence.
She doesn't quite expect the way the light bounces off his sharp features, sinking his blue eyes in shadow as his head turns to her with an expression of boredom.
“Not particularly, no.” 
His voice is lighter than she thought it would be and part of her wonders if he's putting it on. He presses his glasses further up his nose before assessing his next shot, stalking around the table.
“Why's that?”
This time, when he answers, he doesn't look at her. He simply leans down, and aims.
“Not. Fucking. Invited,” he replies bitterly, missing a yellow, “that's why.”
Her fingertips moisten against the glass as the ice begins to melt, but she pays it no mind.
“So you're lurking about in here instead.”
He plays with the cue in one hand, barely sparing a second glance, a bitter, quiet laugh escaping him.
He misses another red before he heaves a sigh, straightening to look at her again.
“You here alone as well?” he asks dispassionately.
She smiles lazily and shrugs.
“My mate is…a bit preoccupied, if you know what I mean,” she replies, taking an awkward sip of the now watered down drink, “like you, I don't really think these are my thing either.”
He seems to consider her statement for a moment.
“Why come then?”
She shrugs again, “trying to be sociable.”
“With those vapid cunts? Good luck getting any intelligent conversation out of them.”
She watches as he picks up the blue chalk again, applying more when he doesn't even need it in sort of a nervous gesture, his blue eyes averted and pretending to assess his next move.
There's something about him. How judgemental he is and how he forms his words. Perhaps she hadn't expected this sort of guy to be so outwardly honest with his opinions, and for the most part, she can't say she disagrees with the message, just the way in which he said it.
“Can I play?” She asks, leaning over to put her drink down.
“What are you reading?” He asks so suddenly, and out of context, that she does a double take.
She raises her eyebrows, smiling, “Does my answer depend on if I get to play or not?”
There's no answer from him. Shocker of the century.
“Modern Languages.”
“Fucking hell,” he groans.
She's a bit too happy and dizzy on rum to get defensive.
“Is that one of those subjects that sounds way less interesting than it actually ends up being?”
She gives a breathy laugh, “just like languages.”
He hums, as if the answer didn't impress him, “more of a science and numbers man myself, obviously.”
For a moment, it's lost on her why it's obvious.
He takes a sip of his, no doubt, stale beer, wetting his lips after, “Your name is?”
She narrows her eyes teasingly, smiling as she leans against the table, “quid pro quo.”
She enjoys the brief confusion on his face, before he realises what she's said.
“Okay, okay, Michael.”
She smiles, “See? You know what that meant. Who says you're not a languages man?”
It's the first time he seems to duck his head, hiding a blush she's barely able to see.
“I don’t think the Ancient Roman idea of fair exchange warrants the title of ‘languages man’.” 
The blue chalk comes off on his hands as he fiddles nervously with it.
“So, am I bestowed the privilege of playing?”
He raises his head, and she can tell he's trying his damndest to not let a little beer-induced smile pass his lips.
“I suppose I could allow you to embarrass yourself in front of me for a bit, if you insist. We'll have to share a cue though.”
She doesn't have the heart to tell him her uncle was a pool player, and so by extension, has played pool for most of her upbringing. Rather, he finds out himself when she pots three yellows in a row.
It's either the alcohol or pity that kicks in when she misses the fourth, holding the cue for him to take.
“You being good at pool wasn't on my bingo card,” he mutters with some nervous teasing in his voice.
They go back and forth for a bit, missing some, potting some, with interspersed conversation between. 
“Thought you might have been a Norman-no -mates, like me,” he says quietly as he watches her assess her next shot. Bending to aim.
“You're not far off,” she replies, “first fortnight I was down a boyfriend. Since then, I've only been up two friends and one of them is in the other room  having ditched me for the shag of a lifetime.”
She doesn't see it until after she takes the shot, the way his eyes flit back to hers quickly as she rights herself to stand.
Was he checking me out?
As if he was lagging, he only laughs now at what she's said.
“What about you?” She asks, “no girls, or boys, on the scene?”
He blushes a lot when she asks that. And she can't help the fluttering in her chest she feels that someone might find her attractive.
“Can’t say there is.”
She stands close, passing the cue to him, electricity warming her fingertips as she grazes his.
“And why not?”
He scoffs bitterly, “have you seen me?” he mutters, wandering around the table, suddenly unable to shake the feeling of her gaze, “Not too many girls out there looking for the stereotypical nerdy math boy, really.”
“Hm,” she hums, “how unfortunate for them.”
He sinks a red, picking at his red jumper.
“Yeah, they're clearly missing out, huh?”
The bitter and self-deprecating tone of his voice makes her heart sink a bit. He's not a bad looking guy, she thinks. His style, glasses, hair, she would almost say look actually quite cute.
Maybe that's the thing he doesn't like.
“No interest? Or is maths the only one for you?”
He misses the next shot and sighs, holding the cue for her to take, “clearly, the only one I need.”
She steps close to retrieve, taking her time, looking up at him as she does. At this proximity, Michael sucks in a breath quietly, his lips, which she can't say she'd noticed until right this moment, parting and his Adam's apple bobbing as his eyes flit rapidly down her.
A warmth swirls in her gut at that.
She circles the table, “what about in the past?” 
He leans against the other side, his hand on the cushion, long fingers splayed on the green fabric. She has to shake her head to break her own trance.
“Can’t say my love life has exactly been a roaring success, honestly.”
The way he says it.
She wouldn't be surprised if he was…
Oh.
“So what? You're focussed on your studies?”
She misses. Too set on the conversation rather than the game.
He gives a mirthless laugh, “Sure.”
She rounds the table, holding the cue for him to take, but when he reaches for it, she pulls back with a smirk.
“So we've established you're not one for languages,” she starts, and Michael furrows his brows in confusion, “have you ever really asked for what you want? Ever?”
He seems to miss what she's trying to say.
“Have you been with a girl?”
At that, his eyes widen slightly, a blush crawling up his neck to the tips of his ears, cheeks near matching his shirt.
She knows she has her answer.
“Well…I…no, I haven't…”
At chest height, she can see the way his breathing elevates.
“And, hypothetically, if a girl expressed interest. What would you say?”
His lips part for a good few seconds before he gives a reply, “I’d…I um…I guess it depends who…”
It's like he's afraid she'll make fun of him for it. 
“What about, if it was me?” She asks, her voice lowering as she reaches out to pick some lint off his jumper, like it's the most normal thing in the world. His body goes all rigid as she does.
This isn't normal in his world.
Michael swallows thickly, “you're not taking the Mick out of me, are you?”
She shakes her head, “I just want you to feel comfortable asking for what you want.”
For someone who had so often thought about it, now when faced with the situation, he feels as if he doesn't know what to do or say.
She's still stood with the cue in one hand, close enough so that when she shifts her weight from foot to foot, her knee grazes his leg. It's interesting to watch him think so deeply about it. Convinced he's probably never thought of anything so much in his life.
“What if what I want is…you?”
The tension deepens like the tone and volume of his voice. And without effort, a smile finds its way to her face when she looks at his expression. He's frozen stiff, for once, not knowing what to say.
So nothing shocks her more when he grabs the pool cue as a means of pulling her to him, and he has to duck considerably to press his lips clumsily to hers. He's eager, that much is true, but it's clear he's inexperienced. But instead of causing discomfort, she thinks it's quite endearing.
The pool cue clangs to the floor as she braces her hands on his shoulders and chest, guiding his lips with her own in a slower, more careful movement. She feels the edge of the pool table bite into her lower back when he presses her against it, clearly excited, if the hardness that's flush to her stomach is anything to go by.
The hands she had been staring at not half an hour ago are bruising as they trace her waist and hips, with a grip tight enough to tell her exactly how much he's enjoying the experience.
For a moment, they're not in a common room alone, against a pool table, with ‘Cheetah-licious Christmas’ playing in the room over, the bass of which rumbles through the floor and into their chests.
The kiss lasts a long while, and she has a feeling he wants to savour it as if it's the last time he will ever be able to do it. 
One of her hands snakes its way to the back of his head, fingers gripping at his hair to pull him closer as either of them tilt to aid more contact between them. And at the little amount of tugging, Michael whines into her mouth, prompting him to pull away.
He looks halfway between mortified and pleased, his glasses having skewed to one side with the eagerness of what they'd done. And she laughs a bit, reaching up to fix them, which seems to make the mortification fade somewhat from his face.
Michael looks down between them, where his obvious erection is pressed to her, and pulls away slightly with a scarlet blush.
“Shit - sorry-”
“It's fine,” she reassures, “no need to be embarrassed.”
The words alone would be enough, if her hand hadn't snaked between their bodies to brush her palm over him. And if it were possible, his flush spreads to his neck, words failing him once more.
Her eyes flicker up to his, their lips all kiss-bruised and swollen.
“If you don't want to-”
“No, no, I want to…” he says, immediately embarrassed about how quick it was.
She smiles, one hand palming him through his jeans and the other trailing up his chest, “Sit down.”
He backs up to sit on a nearby sofa, watching with a kind of adoration as she makes space between his legs, her eyes glimmering at him as she slowly undoes his belt.
“If at any time, you need to stop, tell me.”
He gives a nervous laugh, his stomach muscles tightening, wondering probably if this is really happening to him, “Not sure I will want to…”
She smiles reassuringly, watching as his lips part as she palms him through his boxers, trying to suppress how impressed she is with his size.
It's always the skinny white guys.
“Well, the offer's there.” She smirks, pulling him from his boxers, Michael gives a suffered breath, feeling her touch on him and also her breath so close. He almost feels dizzy. The thought of this happening in this situation, with a party going on next door, is dangerous and exciting in equal measure.
She knows he has very limited experience, so decides not to tease him too much.
Michael gasps softly as she licks at the base of him, drawing a wet line with her tongue along the vein underneath, all the way to the tip. She concentrates her efforts slightly on the sensitive spot there before closing her mouth over the head of his cock, sucking gently.
She feels the way his thighs tense, and the blue disappearing as he closes his eyes. His fists are tight beside him, knuckles white, like he doesn't know if he should touch her or not. All he knows right now is that this feeling is brand new, and the sensation is so much already.
She pulls herself from him to run her tongue over his length, one hand moving to his hand, to encourage him. His blue eyes crack open just a bit, to understand what she's trying to tell him.
And she fights the urge to smile as his longer fingers swipe across her temple into her hair, his touch tender, soft and unsure as he holds her by it. 
Her lips wrap around him once more, pushing him further into her mouth, taking him steadily and slowly at first. Michael's hips move barely, chasing the friction that he's getting on his cock when she bobs her head on him and hollows her cheeks.
He watches with parted lips and warm cheeks, moving her hair away so he can watch himself disappear into her mouth over and over. Her hand massages the rest of him, giving him two unique sensations in one, something that earns her a deep, throaty moan.
When her eyes open to look at him, he thinks his heart stops in his chest for a split second. He closes his eyes, not able to bear the way she looks with his cock in her mouth if she looks right at him, feeling that if he did any longer he wouldn't last.
The sounds he emits don't stop there as she increases her pace on him, pressing her tongue to the underside of him and taking him deeper into her throat, humming around him at the heady scent of his skin.
It's only when she takes him as far as he will go, working hard to control her gag reflex that he gives the first genuine buck of his hips, tightening in her hair and a far-too-loud moan. If anyone in the next room were quiet and paying attention, they'd likely know exactly what was going on.
“Fuck-”
It only serves to spur her on as she pulls back, moving in a more steady, quick rhythm, that she is sure Michael is loving judging by the rate of his moans and the way he chokes out his words.
His stomach clenches and unclenches, his high creeping up on him as her mouth tightens around his length. 
“Shit - you need to - I'm gonna -” he chokes, weakly tugging her hair in an effort to pull her mouth off him before he cums.
If she didn't have his cock in her mouth she'd smile.
Her hand squeezes the base of him, and Michael throws his head back slightly, a long shuddered and choked moan reverberating through his chest. She swears she feels his thighs shake as she stills, warm ropes of his cum taste musky at the back of her throat.
His loud moan is followed quickly by more softer ones as her throat contracts to swallow as much as she can, briefly increasing the tension and friction around his sensitive length.
When she pulls off him with a pleased sigh, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, Michael sits up slightly, having to gather his breath.
“Fucking hell…”
She takes it as a compliment and rises to her feet, her hands smoothing her skirt back down.
And she squeaks in delight as Michael quickly tucks himself away, barely doing up his jeans buttons before backing her up to the pool table again, kissing her fervently.
“What about you…do I…” he starts when he breaks away, panting softly. She smiles at the notion but shakes her head. This experience was for him alone.
“Not right now, don't feel inclined to,” she reassured, her hands on his chest, feeling the way his heart is beating rapidly beneath it.
“Right now?” he asks with a quiet, unsure tone, “does that mean…there's gonna be a next time?”
His tone is careful, and yet, she is able to detect something like desire there. An excitement for more, without seeming too eager so that he's not let down if she says no. Something that makes it clear he is 100% on board.
She bites back a grin.
“Quid Pro Quo, Michael.”
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pellucid-constellations · 2 years ago
Text
My Everyday
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Pairing: College Athlete!Bucky x Reader
Summary: Bucky Barnes was aggressive, annoying, and—worst of all—a hockey player. Not your type. At all. But, unfortunately, your roommate. 
Word count: 5.5k
Warnings: Minor injury, idiots in love <3, some angst, pining
a/n: My first fic in a century!! Thank you so much for reading if you’re still here. Depending on how this does I hope I’ll have motivation to write more! College athlete Bucky never fails to get me inspired :)
Masterlist
~~
“What’s this punks name again?” 
The breath you let out was long and excruciating. “I am not repeating myself.” 
“C’mon, y/n,” Bucky whined, knocking his head back on the couch. He watched you bustle around the kitchen from his inverted vantage point. “How the hell am I supposed to swoop in and save the day if I don’t even know the kid’s name?” 
“Okay, well, first of all—” the fridge door clicked shut with a swift motion of your hips “—he’s not a ‘kid’. I’m pretty sure he’s a few months older than you.” 
“Semantics.” 
“And second of all,” you stressed, pointing a butter knife in his direction. “There will be no ‘swooping in’. I’m going to have a nice date and you are going to go hang out with your puck rabbits or whatever they're called. There will be no thinking about me and no swooping in my vicinity.” 
Bucky rolled his eyes, kicking up from the couch and rounding the kitchen counter to pick at your sandwich. You knocked his hand away several times, but you both knew it was futile. In the months you’d been living with the hockey player—who was far too big for the small, shoebox of an apartment you leased—you’d learned that food was non-negotiable for Bucky Barnes. 
There were many other things you’d learned about him as well. He sang in the shower, but only when he thought you weren’t home. He had an annoying penchant for using your $30 lotion—again, when he thought you weren’t home. And he loved to throw his massive, smelly gear just about anywhere it would land right when he got home from every practice. 
He didn’t really care if you were home for that last one. 
Bucky was the last person you thought you would be rooming with when you posted that ad last summer. A small, quaint room previously occupied by your now engaged (and traitorous) best friend, you assumed someone like-minded to yourself would have taken you up on your offer. The price point wasn’t egregious and the building was relatively close to campus. 
But weeks ticked by, and you started getting desperate. Your landlord wasn’t a nice lady, something you were positive she took pride in, and she decided that a rent increase was the perfect way to ring in the new school year. You were on the verge of destitution, and as it so happened, the only other person as desperate as you was the starting center for your college’s hockey team. 
You hardly got along. It had taken weeks for your eye to stop twitching every time he tumbled through the front door at three in the morning, and even longer for you not to feel an infuriating aggravation at his random, nighttime smoothies. You supposed he probably felt the same about your cleanliness rules and your incessant reminders about trash days. Because Bucky was in charge of bringing the trash down those long, apartment steps. Not you. 
But you’d be lying if you said things hadn’t gotten easier as of late. Conversation flowed more smoothly, things that made you seethe before were only mildly annoying, and Bucky was being… considerate? You weren’t quite sure what to call the random cups of coffee he brought home on occasion. Or his sudden urge to warm up your car when he had a morning class before yours. 
There was also the case of that party last weekend. A frat party with far too many drunk men and not enough common sense, you had had the urge to leave the second you got there. But Wanda had dragged you along for the sole purpose of driving her home after she got hammered, so you were essentially stuck. 
It was fine at first. Hot and crowded and loud, but fine. You kept a general eye on Wanda and scrolled aimlessly on your phone in the armchair you claimed. And then it wasn’t fine, because a man twice your size was encroaching on your space and unrelenting. 
“What kinda girl comes to a party and doesn’t even wanna talk to anyone?” 
“You want to come up to my room and watch a movie or something?” 
“Hey, I’m talking to you, bitch.” 
You weren’t even aware that Bucky had been at that party. It wasn’t surprising—the line between fraternities and sports was blurred at your college—but the space he took up as he intercepted the man in front of you was.
~~
“There a problem here?” Bucky posed, crossing his arms over his chest, his presence looming above your seated position. His weight shifted to his toes.
The man didn’t miss a beat. “Yeah, you. Move.” 
“Wanna fucking tell me what to do again?” 
“Fuck you, man.” 
A harsh shove to Bucky’s chest was all it took for a right hook to echo in the living room of the frat house. There was chaos. Grunts and screams from the drunk people surrounding the unnecessary fight created a cacophony of unpleasant sounds that seemed to get the attention of someone in charge. The man—Brian, you had now learned based on screams—was pulled back from Bucky and getting chewed out by some president or manager of something. 
And Bucky was seething, chest rising and falling laboriously as he wiped at the new bruise forming on his face.
Fights were not uncommon. But this one had been about you. For you.
“Bucky?” you asked when the crowd calmed and Brian was no longer in the room. 
You watched his back release its tight coil. He turned. “Are you okay?” 
The words were almost lost in the noise of the crowd, but he was close enough that they created a tactile vibration across your skin. His pupils were dilated and he looked so disheveled it would have been charming if there wasn’t also a cut forming on his brow. 
“Y/n.” 
It took you a moment to realize that you hadn’t answered him. Your response fell out of you as if you’d been shoved. “I’m—I’m fine.” 
He grunted, but it was more of a puff of air. “The fuck was that guy?” 
“I don’t know,” you replied, realizing by the way you swayed that you had stood up at some point. “He just—” 
“We’re going home.” 
“What? I can’t, I’m here with Wanda. I’m driving her, Bucky, I can’t just leave.” 
He grabbed your wrist, the grip achingly soft compared to the blows he was landing minutes before. “She left with that British guy she’s been on and off with. Asked me to tell you.” 
That explained his random appearance. Your brows pinched as you took in the information, eyes cast down to the angry red marks marring Bucky’s knuckles. He’d been in fights before. So many fights. On the ice. 
This was different. 
“I haven’t been drinking—I can drive myself home. You don’t have to leave,” you shouted over the music now bumping in the room. 
He didn’t respond, not verbally. He pulled you to his front instead, leading you through the impossible crowd until cool night air began melting into your skin. His silence was strange. Bucky’s favorite activity was talking your ear off until you told him to shut up, but right now… nothing. Even his earlier words had been clipped. 
You felt responsible for easing the tension in the air as Bucky continued to guide you to your car. You hadn’t told him where you parked, but he seemed to know the exact location anyways.
“You really don’t have to leave with me,” you mumbled. “It wasn’t a big deal or anything.” 
“It was a big deal.” 
~~
The drive home had been silent. The walk to the door had been as well. Bucky spent a few minutes appraising you in the overhead light of the living room when you got inside, but after that there was nothing. He went to his room and you went to yours. 
There was no discussion about it the morning after, either. Bucky apparently wanted to pretend nothing ever happened, so you respected that. Even now, you ignored the fading cuts on his hands as he shoveled food into his mouth.
Bucky’s next words were muffled by a mouthful of bread. “Well where’s this dude taking you at least?”
“Ice skating.”
The cough and sudden exasperation was very expected out of the man next to you, Bucky’s next words hardly containing syllables. “Huh?” 
“We’re going ice skating,” you reiterated. You picked up your lunch and headed for the living room, ignoring the slightly heaviness in your chest. “It’s winter and ice skating is festive. The rink on campus has decorations.” 
“Without me? Y/n, you’re gonna let some guy who probably doesn’t even know how to skate—” 
“Bucky—” you attempted to interrupt. 
“—drag you around the rink like a rag doll?” he continued, holding his hand up to mute your incoming speech. “I’ve asked you to come by the rink, like, a ton of times. You’ve never shown any interest.” 
You rolled your eyes and shot him a cross look as he picked your feet up from where they rested on the couch and dropped them into his lap. He went on with his rant for a little while longer, knocking his head back against cushions and accusing you of being a bad roommate. You had a few rebuttals of your own, but there was a reason you had never accompanied him to the rink. 
A good reason. 
You didn’t date athletes. 
It was true that simply going to visit Bucky at a practice, or letting him be the one to drag you around the ice like a rag doll, wouldn’t mean you were in a relationship by any means. But it would be an extra step. And if you were being honest with yourself, it would only take a few of those extra steps for the irritation you felt towards Bucky to melt into something else. 
And you didn’t date athletes. 
You did not. 
You didn’t have the time, nor the patience, to put up with the cheating, the anger issues, or the crazy schedules. And there wasn’t a single athlete you’d met at your sport-centered university that was willing to compromise on any of those subjects. Especially the cheating. You’d learned that the hard way after dating a lacrosse player for approximately one month before receiving the dreaded DM from a girl you had never met. 
The man hadn’t even given you the courtesy of pretending he didn’t know what she was talking about. He just admitted to his wrong-doing and shrugged. Shrugged. 
So athletes were not exactly in your good graces when it came to dating. 
“Are you even listening to me?” Bucky cut through your thoughts, patting your shin in impatience. 
You blinked and reoriented yourself, focusing on the hairs that fanned across Bucky’s face. “Of course I am,” you lied. “But my answer is still the same. I’m going on my date and you are not going on my date.” 
He groaned, apparently giving up as he cradled your legs closer to him to lean over and grab the remote from the coffee table. He flipped the channel to ESPN—typical—and you ate your sandwich, silently cursing him. He had a TV in his room. 
“When is it?” he suddenly asked, breaking the silence that had knitted itself into a comfortable blanket over the room. 
“Tonight,” you answered plainly. 
The arms atop your legs tensed. 
~~
The dichotomy of the man sitting beside you was impressive. On one hand, he was so full of himself that he had missed almost all of your conversation starters due to being so transfixed by his reflection in the rink’s glass. He had yet to ask you a single question about yourself and had insisted that the four other girls skating tonight were in love with him. 
On the other hand, he was, quite possibly, the most uninteresting person you had ever met. You were usually very quick to laugh, but every word out of his mouth was almost painful. He wouldn’t stop talking about his ex-girlfriend, gave you one word answers about anything other than baseball, and was honestly really terribly at ice skating. You were no pro either, but you found yourself on your back every time he tried holding your hand.
The tumble five minutes ago had you seeking out the penalty box on the side of the rink. You needed a break, you had told him, hoping he would continue on making a fool of himself and give you a moment alone. But he followed you instead, and was now sitting beside you, talking about baseball.
You supposed that was better than making you fall while talking about baseball.
“I bet we could do that,” he remarked, pointing out onto the ice and catching your attention. A couple who clearly had more experience than you was twirling each other around. “We definitely could. I pick up good speed.” You cringed. “I really don’t think we should try, Sean. My tailbone is already pretty bruised.” 
“Oh, c’mon! I won’t try the throwing part, just the twisty stuff.” 
“We are literally on rental skates. You will kill me,” you deadpanned. You were tired at this point and seriously questioning why you thought ice skating was a good first date idea. 
Well, there actually was an answer for that. But you were not going to think about the hockey player that popped into your head when Sean asked you on a date in the dining hall last week. 
Definitely not. 
“I’m not going to let my date think I’m boring,” Sean groaned, yanking you up from your seat. 
You gave a few tugs and words of resistance but they were ultimately useless. You figured it would be just as useless to tell the guy you already thought he was boring. He probably wouldn’t even hear you. 
On unsteady skates, Sean guided you to a mostly cleared corner of the rink and gripped your forearms. He squinted as he surveyed the area, the corner of his mouth turning up in a way that made your stomach roll. This entire date had been a bad idea.
“Maybe we should just watch them do it,” you tried, words wavering. 
“No!” he grinned. “No, we got this. It’s gonna look so cool.” 
And then you were spinning. You’d never been spun against your will before, but it sucked. Your skates kept getting stuck in the divots in the ice and the grip on your forearms was close to bruising. You were starting to get dizzy and Sean showed no signs of caring. God, he really was dragging you around the rink like a rag doll. Bucky was going to get a kick out of this.
“Okay, ready?” Sean called, an unwarranted jubilation in his tone. 
“What?” you yelled. 
He didn’t answer you. Instead, he let go, and you went flying in another direction without a clear path. It only lasted a moment, but the sound of your head smacking onto the ice signified the end of that movement. You landed on your arm next, and then your back. Again. 
This time felt different though. Your head was spinning and there were muted pinpricks trailing up to your wrist. The ache there was dulled compared to the biting iciness in your back, but as soon as you tried leaning on it to get up, it became sharp.
“Oh shit!” came Sean’s laughter-filled gasp. “My bad. I really didn’t mean to let go.” 
You blinked a few times to clear the blurriness from your vision but it proved unhelpful. “I think… I think my arm’s broken.” 
“Wait, seriously?” he asked, wobbling down to a seat beside you. 
“Yeah, it’s—”
“Everything okay over here?” a voice interrupted. You tried blinking again to take in the man that towered over the two of you, but the lights overhead washed him out. 
You recognized him…maybe? You felt like you were going to throw up. 
Sean answered for you. “Yeah, man, we’re fine. She just fell.” 
“Y/n, are you okay?” the man asked, ignoring your date completely.
“Do I know you?” you slurred.
You thought you heard a curse. “What made you think throwing her around was a good idea?” 
“Dude, it wasn’t even that fast. Or my fault. She just couldn’t keep her feet under her.” 
“Well, dude, maybe you should go home.” 
Sean scoffed. “Right, and who’s going to take this one home?” 
Your head was starting to hurt with all of the back and forth. The man that just joined, the taller one, kneeled down beside you. His blonde hair cast a harsh glare that had you squinting again. 
“You want me to call Bucky?” he asked.
Bucky? How would he know Bucky? Blonde hair began morphing into a man in your memory, and you reached for the material of his shirt, looping it between your fingers.
“Steve Rogers?” you mumbled. 
The man, now identified as Steve, sighed. “I’m calling him. Go home, Sean. Her roommate is coming to get her.” 
There was more discussion, something about Steve having the authority to kick him out and Sean not understanding what all of the fuss was about. Steve warned him about something and Sean scoffed as if the situation was beneath him. And then he left. 
Steve was then in your line of sight again, brows pinched together and a bright orange vest covering his shoulders. His hands hovered in front of you as if you’d break if he touched you and you almost found it funny. Steve was a huge guy with a lot of authority on Bucky’s team, but right now he looked like a scared animal. 
“Why are you dressed like a construction worker?” you asked. 
A small smile graced his face. “I’m working at the rink today. Everyone on the team has to take shifts during the holidays.” 
“Hmm,” you hummed. “I think my arm is broken.” 
“I know. I’m pretty sure you have a concussion too. Let’s get you off the ice, yeah?” 
You tried to nod, but that hurt too much so you let Steve assist you in shakily standing up. He guided you to the seats by the rental skate counter with a soft but sure hand on your back, asking some guy named Antonio for an ice pack. Everything around you felt like a fever dream. 
Gentle touches rolled the sleeve of your sweater back to reveal a swollen wrist that Steve immediately covered with an ice pack. 
He cursed again. “Well he’s gonna be pissed.” 
“Who?” Your head swayed with the question. 
Steve looked up to meet your gaze, lips parting to answer, when he was replaced by a different face. Your brain was having trouble keeping up with everything, obviously, because Bucky was in front of you now. He was kneeling between your legs with his hands on your face and you had no idea where Steve went. 
“What the fuck?” you blurted out. 
“Hey, y/n.” Bucky spoke your name low and soothing, his fingers moving to your eyes where he pried them open one at a time and looked for something you couldn’t see. His next words were directed over his shoulder. “Maybe a concussion. Tell me what happened again?” 
“Sean Marcus was being an ass. Flung her all over the place,” Steve replied. 
“Why are you here?” you interjected, trying to focus on one thing at a time. “I told you not to come on my date.” 
Bucky moved his assessment to your arm next, shifting the ice pack. “Never really agreed to those terms.” 
He turned back to Steve after that, having another discussion that you barely understood. Bucky absentmindedly fiddled with the material of your jeans as he spoke, and you put all of your energy into not face planting on the ground. This past week had truly been a series of terrible events with terrible men. 
After some amount of time elapsed, you were walking to the parking lot with a jacket thrown over your shoulders and Bucky continuously jutting a hand out each time you took a step. He was very well versed in concussions, apparently. 
“Okay, in you go, killer,” Bucky prompted, opening the passenger door. 
You eyed the front seat, scrunching your face up. “My arm hurts.” 
The man in front of you seemed to soften, his shoulders dropping on a long exhale. “I know, sweetheart. But we gotta go to the hospital to fix that. I’ll make sure it doesn’t hurt anymore.”
“I should just call Wanda. Or Nat. You don’t have to be the one to take me.” 
“I can take you just fine.”
“Why do you want to you? Aren’t you busy?” 
Another long sigh, this one accompanied by hands on your shoulders, fingers at the base of your neck. “Get in the car.”
His eyes were boring into yours, searching for something, or maybe already finding it there. You still had your arm cradled to your chest and you titled your head to the side as you observed him. There was something else to his gaze that you couldn’t quite describe. It reminded you of his expression after he came home from a rough game. Angry. Discontent. 
“You’re being weird,” you commented, breaking the silence you had created. 
“You broke your arm and smacked your head on the ice,” he simply replied, as if the statement was an explanation. 
“Yeah, but—” 
“And then that douchebag did nothing about it,” Bucky interrupted. “So please, y/n, get in the car so I can help you before I find him and kick his ass. Because you know I’m not above fighting people.” 
You blinked, and then slid into the front seat. 
The drive was quiet. You’d never been in Bucky’s car before, but the spinning in your head didn’t give you much space to inspect it too closely. You caught hockey gear in the back, a keycard to the rink dangling off the rearview mirror, and a small collection of hair ties in one of the cupholders. One caught your attention.
“Hey, this one’s mine.” You picked up the purple band and rolled it between your fingers. “Thief.” 
Bucky snatched it back. “Mine now.” 
He made a sharp turn that had you sucking air between your teeth and repositioning your arm. Bucky sent you a quick, achingly apologetic look. 
“Sorry, almost there.” A long beat of silence and then a mumbled, “I should keep your hair tie. You won’t be able to do your hair alone with a broken arm anyway.” 
~~
Your wrist was fractured, not broken. You also only had a minor concussion. This was all great news to you, especially since they told you after administering a hefty amount pain reliever. To Bucky, this was apparently terrible, life-altering news. 
After practically body slamming into the front door of your apartment, he chucked his wallet and keys down on the kitchen counter and began grumbling to himself as he opened and closed kitchen cabinets. You watched from a distance, half amused, half concerned for the rusting hinges. He finally found what he was looking for—a cup—and continued to mutter to himself as he filled it with gatorade. 
“Are you… okay?” you asked tentatively. 
Bucky ripped the freezer open and manhandled three to four ice cubes. “I’m fine. You are not.” 
“I’m okay now,” you assured. Bucky stalked over to you anyways, pressing the sports drink into your hand that was not wrapped in a cast.
You looked down at the glass and sent him a baffled look. He nodded at it and raised his brows, a silent demand for you to drink. 
“Okay. And why do I need to drink gatorade?” Your words were slow. 
“You were just on the ice and haven’t had any water for at least three hours.” 
“Bucky,” you began. “I was ice skating recreationally for about thirty minutes. I don’t need to replenish my electrolytes.” 
“Will you just… will you just drink the damn drink?” he groaned, gesturing to it with a firm hand. “Jesus, I can’t take care of you when you go and get yourself hurt by idiots. So just let me do what I know I can do, alright?” 
“You don’t have to take care of me.” You were beginning to raise your voice, matching some of the frustration in the room. 
Bucky threw his hands in the air, tugging at his roots on the way down. He moved further into the kitchen and leaned against the counter with stiff, rod-like arms propping him up. And then he sighed, long and profound as if this was the hardest conversation he’d had all year. His head hung heavy between stiff shoulders and you felt the environment shift. 
You almost wanted to intervene on his thoughts again, to make some comment about the dishes in the dishwasher or pretend you were going to go take a nap. But he had something to say, something you needed to hear, and so you stayed. You blinked and clenched your fist in the uncomfortable silence, but you stayed. 
“Y/n, I want to take care of you,” Bucky breathed out, words still directed toward the floor, almost too low to make out. “I’ve been tryna get you to see that for weeks now, but you’ve either got no clue or you want absolutely nothing to do with me.” 
You stopped blinking, stopped fidgeting, stopped breathing altogether. You watched as Bucky drummed his fingers against the counter and still refused to look up. You swallowed hard because you weren’t clueless, but also because you wanted everything to do with Bucky Barnes. 
And nothing at the same time. 
“Bucky…” you began, with a tone of surprise you weren’t sure was believable.
“Don’t do it yet,” he stopped you. “Don’t…don’t tell me no yet. I’m still pissed as hell that you got hurt and you shouldn’t be alone with a concussion. I don’t need you avoiding me when you can’t even drive a car.” 
“You’re being presumptuous.” 
He snapped his head up, his eyes rushing back and forth between your own. The drumming on the counter ceased, instead replaced by balled up fists turning white under days old cuts and fading bruises. He didn’t say anything. You searched the empty air for a reply. 
“I wouldn’t avoid you. I don’t know if I could avoid you—not anymore. You’re sort of a big part of my life now.” A good start, you thought. Not a real answer, but not a rejection. 
Bucky bit the inside of his cheek and eyed the drink still perspiring in your hand. You set it down at his observance, moving closer to his slumped posture in the kitchen. 
But Bucky stood up straight at your movement, becoming guarded, stiff. “I shouldn’t have said anything. Bad timing, just forget it. You should try and get some sleep.” 
“I don’t want to forget it,” you softly spoke, shaking your head.
He clenched his jaw. “And I don’t want to hear that you don’t feel the same way about me that I feel about you. Not right now. I feel like I’m going insane, watching you go out on dates and having my best friend tell me that my girl—that’s not really my girl—is all banged up on the ice because of some asshole.” 
You opened your mouth to speak, but Bucky kept going, now pacing in the kitchen. “I mean, y/n, you’re my everyday. I wake up and you’re making coffee. You text me in class to ask what I need at the grocery store and then I call you after practice to make sure you got back to the apartment. I think about you so god damn much and I can’t believe there was a time in my life that I didn’t get to end my day in a home that has you. And you’re just my roommate. You want nothing to do with athletes, I get it—” he added, catching your eye in the middle of his rant, “—but, shit, I haven’t even looked at another girl since… well it doesn’t even matter.”
“Tell me,” you whispered. There were a million other things you could’ve said, a million explanations that would have made sense. But the two soft words stopped Bucky from tracking holes in the ground. They shoved him from his shallow breaths and made him look at you. 
And, god, did he look at you. You must have been worse for wear. A hospital visit mixed with one too many tumbles onto solid ice probably had your hair in disarray and your face pressed with exhaustion, but his gaze was revering. Candy-coated red with soft blues melting below brows that fluxed with the movement of his lips; Bucky was beautiful, and he was looking at you as if you matched.
His tone confirmed as much, light and saccharin as he said, “That dumb movie a few weeks ago, the one about the superheroes. Your friends wouldn’t watch it with you so you made me. You were so excited even though it was awful and you were out like a light within the first hour. You rolled over onto me and I wasn’t gonna wake you up so I sorta just held you.” 
He paused, trailing his eyes up to the light fixtures. “At the risk of sounding pathetic, it felt like I had you, you know? Like we were going through all our usual motions, but after I annoyed the hell out of you and you told me off, you were mine. I can’t… I can’t really picture that with another girl.” 
There were very few times you had considered yourself speechless. But with Bucky Barnes standing in front of you, red-faced and vulnerable and still wearing the stupid hospital nametag they made him put on in the waiting room, you had no words. There was none of the arrogance you usually associated with him, no short-temper or pestering taunts. It was just Bucky, and he was pouring his heart onto the kitchen floor. For you. 
“You get why you can’t tell me no just yet?” he asked, trying to get something out of you. Anything. “You can break my heart, but let me just make sure you’re okay first. And I can’t beat the shit out of Sean if we aren’t on speaking terms.” 
The laugh that left you was one of disbelief, but the breathiness and accompanying tears fit the heaviness of the room. Your glossy eyes met Bucky’s and something flashed on his face, but it was soon out of your line of sight because you were kissing him. You were kissing him hard and your bodies were too close for the cast between you but it didn’t matter. 
He didn’t respond at first, hand hovering at your back. But then he did and the cold linoleum of the kitchen floor was gone from your bare feet. He sat you on the counter, so gently, as if you were glass, and you let your hand brush against the cracks and divots of your home. The one that Bucky came back to every night to see you. 
The one that had housed so many nights of confusion and longing and denial.
The one that had Bucky kissing the life out of you on the kitchen counter. 
He pulled away first, forehead pressed to yours. “Didn’t think I’d ever get to do that.” 
“You can do it again.” 
“Oh, I will, baby.” 
Laughter met in the air between you—sweet, short, intertwined. There was so much you wanted to tell him, so many instances like the one he shared before where you were left questioning boundaries and feelings and lines. But, you figured, there would be so many opportunities to tell him. So much time together. 
“I texted Wanda that night,” you shared, interrupting the kisses he was pressing to your cheek. “After I woke up and you had taken me back to my room.” 
He smiled against your skin. “What’d you say?” 
“I told her I was an idiot—that I was falling for the enemy.” 
Bucky ran a soft hand along the back of your head, a smirk lighting up his face. He was slotted between your legs and kept his other hand firmly pressed onto the kitchen counter, caging you in, making sure your arm didn’t hit the cabinets. 
“And is that true?” 
“I don’t know,” you hummed, connecting your foreheads once again, wanting to stay impossibly close. “Try to cure my broken bone with gatorade again and we’ll see.”
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rederiswrites · 28 days ago
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I wrote this out for FB and then thought I might as well share it here as well. So if you have ADHD, are a late-diagnosed adult with ADHD, and most particular if you are a person with a uterus and/or have children, this one might be for you.
...
Last couple of days have been a little...weird. Let's start at the beginning. Buckle up and learn something.
As many of you already know, I have ADHD. It's a condition with a PR problem--a lot of people, often even medical professionals, have a very distorted idea of what it does, and a very limited one. For starters, it's not about parenting, or lead paint, or lack of discipline. It's genetic, *highly* heritable, starts in childhood and persists throughout life, and is a sufficiently severe disability that it comes with a decrease in life expectancy of up to 13 years. It is a visible difference that can be perceived in brain scans. These are all, at this point, well established and thoroughly attested in the scientific literature. ADHD affects up to 5% of the population and appears across cultures. It is very common.
It's not just about lack of attention--in fact, plenty of medical professionals think the name should be changed, as in fact the problem isn't the volume of attention but the way we struggle to direct it. We are motivated by interest, and struggle to properly weight future goals and consequences, specifically because they are in the future. If the robin outside the window is more immediately rewarding to our brain, we will watch that, and not the teacher. Our ability to properly weigh the consequences of that choice is negatively impacted by our own biochemistry.
We struggle with many of what are termed the "executive functions", the self management systems of the brain. Degree and presentation varies from person to person, but initiating tasks, completing tasks, staying ON task, restraining impulses, emotional regulation, and working memory are among the things impacted. My working memory is notoriously horrible. When they send you those activation codes on your phone? I often have to go back and read them out several times to enter a six digit number. I have to stop and remind myself what I'm doing between every step of my morning bathroom routine, or making tacos. Sometimes I take off my glasses to put on my contacts, reset, and reach for my pill bottles while I still can't see. My long-term memory is also affected, with my husband de facto serving as the memory-holder of the family.
Another common symptom I personally experience is "time blindness", which can mean both that you have no "internal clock" that has a clear idea of the passage of time, and that our ability to properly weight the importance of things in the future is impacted. So, for example, I can know intellectually what's coming, but it takes some really complex and exhausting antics to actually focus and work on those things if they're more than a week or sometimes even a couple days away.
Without externally imposed controls, many ADHD people flounder and fail to meet social markers of success. Estimates of how many ADHD people manage to complete college range from 5% to 15%. Again: 5% to 15%! I have failed twice myself. WITH externally imposed controls, ADHD people often have to work far harder to make their brains do what is required, and either fail and develop an image of themselves as failures (usually with plenty of external help), or keep fighting and suffer crippling burnout.
To that point, ADHD is HIGHLY comorbid with a whole range of knock-on conditions, some of which stem from the same brain patterns that give rise to the ADHD itself, and others from the trauma of living with a disability, but they include very high rates of depression, anxiety, fibromyalgia, social isolation, and addiction. I have dealt with depression, anxiety, and fibromyalgia my entire adult life. I have never ended up in the trap of self-medication but let's be real, that's partly about having supports and a healthy social environment. It's not some accomplishment I praise myself for, nor is addiction a sin I shame anyone for.
And anxiety has a very different texture to it when what you're really anxious about is the next time you fail in some catastrophic way. Lock your keys in the car. Completely space on a doctor's appointment. Go to pay for groceries and find that your wallet is next to your computer at home. Because the anxiety is not irrational fear of some generalized bad thing. These things do and will happen, regularly. Sometimes it feels like the only fix is getting good at recovering. Because no matter how many times you manage not to blow it, there's always another chance.
So, the struggle to be a reliable person, to be a consistent parent, to be a dependable life partner, is continuous. And it is so so so hard and it sometimes feels like you're not actually making any progress at all. I have tried therapy. I have tried three (or four??) different non-stimulant medications that sometimes help people. One of them DID help. ALL of them had catastrophic side effects. There were times as I was trialing these medications when I needed to be minded because I wasn't capable of taking care of anything, not even myself. Without Jacob, I don't know where I'd be. Not here. Probably in poverty, which is where he found me.
I have tried probably most organizational tools you know of. I have tried imposing schedules, all of which turned to dust and ash when the next fibromyalgia flareup or the next major life disruption happened. I don't think a new schedule has ever lasted a month before.
I HAVE felt like I'm made progress lately. I learned things that really helped my fibromyalgia, which gave me the space to work on other things--just like getting the borders of a puzzle finished. Enough things were spiraling upwards, and I think I might be cementing some gains. I have felt optimistic.
But in the meantime, I asked my doctor if, now that no less than three cardiologists have insisted my heart is Perfectly Healthy, I could finally try stimulant medications. After decades of use, Adderall, Ritalin, and a couple related stimulant drugs are still the gold standard for ADHD treatment and improve outcomes substantially for many people. And stimulants are in serious international shortage. Have been for many months. The only one she thought she could get me was Adderall. And she didn't dare try anything but the standard 30mg because nonstandard dosages would be even less attainable.
So now I'm taking Adderall. One week on 30mg, which I stopped when it was clear my function was being seriously impaired rather than improved. Reassessed with the doctor, now trying 60mg, because that's two of the pills I've already managed to obtain. It is....too much. And in some ways it fixes problems I wasn't working on, while so far making my executive function, my initiation or even *contemplation* of tasks, virtually nonexistant. Which was, of course, the thing I was trying to fix.
So yeah. When you have the context, I figure you can understand the substance of my frustration yourself. If you have children, I don't think you need my help to imagine what it would be like to know that you are unpredictable, or to see that your children are used to to you undergoing events that make you act strangely and erratically. I think just knowing that often, new medications introduce themselves by giving me a migraine, and I know this is possible when I take that first pill, is fairly self-explanatory. And so I expect you can imagine what it would be like, with all of this as a backdrop, to experience worsening of your symptoms, probably because of age-related hormonal changes. To in desperation try something you'd previously been denied. And to learn that it probably won't help.
In a week, I will either give up on Adderall for now or find a way to make it work. I'll put together the pieces yet again--at this point, possibly my strongest personal skill--and continue that upward climb as far as I can get. I'm incredibly fortunate in that regardless, I will be fed and dry and warm and loved. But right now, I feel justified in some serious dismay.
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crypticreid · 1 year ago
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KINKTOBER DAY ONE
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October 1st -- Praise
happy first day of kinktober 🎃🎃🎃🎃!!!
masterlist
summary: You've been secretly hooking up with your coworker Spencer for two months. He notices something about you and wants to try something new. (I personally imagined circa season 10 Reid, but you do you bestie 😘)
warnings: praise, lots of 'good girls', oral [m/f both receiving and giving], light dom behavior, finger sucking, piv, safe sex practices, and a little bit of begging
word count: 3.1k (this one got away from me a little bit oops)
this is adult content. 18+ plus only. minors do not interact!
You had never wanted to be one of those people, a girl with a huge crush on her coworker, but then you’d meet Spencer Reid. A year ago, you’d waved at him instead of shaking his hand when Hotch had introduced the two of you, and you’d felt the first flutter of butterflies. You had tried desperately to ignore your feelings, but the more you got to know him, the harder you fell. And then, about two months ago, you’d become another cliche. The girl who was sneaking around and secretly hooking up with her coworker. 
Now you were trying to avoid touching your knee against his as you sat on the plane on the way home from a case. The last time you’d simply accidentally brushed your hand against his, it had been like an electrical shock between the two of you. So it is just easier to avoid touching at all costs while in the presence of your other coworkers. 
The words in the book that you’re holding in your hands are absolute gibberish as you can’t focus on anything except the way Spencer’s hands glide over the page of notes he’s re-reading. You've always known he has captivating hands, but now you know intimately just how capable those hands were. This case was long, and before that, Spencer had been at a conference for four days. He hasn’t touched you in almost a week, and you’re becoming impatient. But you both had wisely made the promise that as long as you were on clock, so to say, you were only coworkers and nothing more. 
You look up as you hear him say your name. 
“Would you mind reading over this? I’m not sure it makes any sense.” He hands you his leather bound notebook. You place your book on your lap and look over into his eyes. 
“Me? I really don’t think I’m the person who…” 
Spencer interrupts you, “I trust your opinion.” It’s a simple statement, but it sets your skin aflame all the same. To hide your reaction, you focus on reading Spencer’s notes. 
“I think it’s great, Spencer. But you’re presenting this to college students, so I think it would be beneficial to use examples they may have heard in the news or at least know ‘cause of the insane amount of Netflix documentaries.” You roll your eyes as you mention the oversaturation of true crime television. But then suddenly you feel self-conscious and hand back his notebook. “I mean, I don’t know. It’s just a small idea.” 
“No, it’s insightful. You’re brilliant.” You can feel your skin heat in embarrassment, not comfortable with the compliment. Compliments often make you uneasy and you don’t know why. Well, that’s not entirely true, but you didn’t feel like profiling yourself to better understand this aspect. 
Spencer’s eyes observe you, and you watch as his tongue slips out and wets his bottom lip as he thinks. “I mean it.” He emphasizes. 
“Thank you,” you say quietly.   
“Good girl.” The words glide from Spencer’s mouth almost absent-mindedly and barely audible as he returns to his work. If he notices how much deeper your blush becomes, he doesn’t say anything. And you pretend you didn’t even hear him, or else you might make a fool of yourself.
Several hours later, you’re finally back at your apartment and getting into pajamas. As you pull a tank top over your head, you allow your mind to think about Spencer.
Good girl. 
He said it so flippantly, practically under his breath. Did he even mean for you to hear it? Did he know how it would make your heart hammer? You play it over again and again, letting yourself bask in the feeling. 
There’s a knock on your door, so you quickly pull on an old pair of yoga pants and race to your door. A brisk glance through your peephole causes that all too familiar heart tremor. Dr. Spencer Reid at your door, as though you’d summoned him with your thoughts. 
You swing open the door and let your eyes trail down his body. 
“I meant it.” He says immediately. 
“What do you mean?” You want to reach for him. He’s still dressed for work, and it takes everything in you not to wrap your fingers around his tie and pull him into your apartment. 
“When I called you brilliant.” He replies casually. 
“You came all this way to call me brilliant?” 
He smirks. “No, I came all this way to do this,” as he talks he steps toward you. 
You let a small breath of anticipation escape before he has his hands on either side of your face and is pressing his lips to yours. Your own hands find their way first to grasp at his waist and then around to his back, pulling him impossibly closer to you, desperate for the feel of his body against yours. The harsh sharp lines of him melding into the soft, lush curves of you. 
He moves you further into your apartment, shuts your door, and then pushes you up against the cool wood of the door, all without pulling his lips away from yours. Goosebumps spring to life across your skin as your body tries to process the head spinning sensation of the warmth of his body, combining with the chill of the door against your back. His hands are in your hair, possessive and needy, and you moan into his mouth. 
You feel the puffs of breath against your mouth as he laughs softly and then pulls away, his hands come to rest between your neck and shoulders. “I’ve missed you.” 
A small smile curves your freshly kissed lips. “It’s been like two hours since I saw you.” 
“I’ve missed being able to touch you.” He amends. The thumb of his right hand starts to move up and down the skin of your neck, and you wonder if he can feel how fast your heart is beating. His eyes search your face. “Did you like it when I called you a good girl?” 
Your lips part as if to reply, but no words come out. 
“Answer me.” He demands softly, his words are never harsh, but they still hold a sense of power. 
“Yes. I liked it,” you admit. 
He continues to watch you as his mind works, and then he makes a low sound of approval from his throat. “And would you like me to call you a good girl more often?” 
Need and want pools low in your belly, but you take a second to wet your lips before answering. You want your voice to come across as strong and sure, so there is no question that you want this. “Yes, please.” 
Your head is swimming in the overwhelming sensation of his lips back on yours in a matter of seconds. His hands explore your body, grazing and grasping onto your breasts before settling on your hips. He uses his knee to push your legs apart, and you move without resistance. A guttural moan breaks free from your throat as that same knee connects with the place that has been begging for friction since the moment Spencer put his hands on you. 
Spencer breaks away from the kiss. “You’re so beautiful when you moan like that,” he murmurs against your skin as he kisses, licks, and nips along your jaw and neck. 
Your hips jerk involuntarily, but it instantly causes a wave of pleasure as you slide against him. “Do that again, baby.” You do as you’re told and again and again. His mouth continues across your clavicle, and then lower until his teeth scrape against one of your nipples over the fabric of your tank top. You gasp and push yourself closer to him, but he pulls away. 
He lowers himself to the ground as he works to push down your yoga pants. As soon as you step out of them, the pants are thrown across the room, Spencer not bothering to pay attention. All of his attention is on you. 
“Look at you, pretty girl.” His thumb traces over the damp spot in your underwear while his other hand travels up your leg, sending zaps of pleasure straight to your core. 
“All for me?” His eyes flash up to yours. 
“I’m yours,” you answer. 
“That’s my good girl.” You twist your hands into his hair when his mouth makes contact with your still clothed pussy, his tongue swiping against you. He only teases you for a second before he can’t take it anymore and pulls down your underwear to be able to taste you without a barrier. The room fills with the obscene sounds of him lapping at your core as he lavishes praises on you in between licking and sucking. “So perfect, so goddamn perfect.” 
You throw your head back with a deep moan. 
Spencer continues, undisturbed. “Yes. Keep moaning for me. I want your neighbors to hear how good you are for me.” His tongue circles and caresses your clit. “Do you want my fingers inside of you? Tell me.” 
“Yes, oh god. Fuck. Spencer.” You can’t think straight. The only thing your brain is capable of is focusing on how good you feel. 
Spencer obliges your request and plunges two fingers into you. Your fingers tighten in his hair. “I can’t believe how wet you are. And you’re taking my fingers so good. I bet you’d take my cock even better.” He hooks his fingers and massages against the swollen pressure point inside you. 
You lean forward over him, trying to keep your legs steady. 
“Are you gonna come for me, sweetheart?” You simply nod your head even though he can’t see with his face buried in your pussy. “You’re gonna come all over my face and my fingers because you’re my good girl, aren’t you?” 
Your legs shake, but Spencer uses his free hand to hold onto your hip and hold you steady. 
“It’s okay, you can let go. I’ve got you.” His fingers buried deep within you speed up and he focuses all of his attention on the pattern of his tongue against your clit, ramping up the building pleasure that’s threatening to bubble over. “You’ve made such a mess, a beautiful mess. Look at you, so good. So good.” 
You clench around him. “Yes, that’s it. I want you to come. Just like that.” You jerk against his fingers and jaw as the pressure cascades and overflows inside you. His name is the only thing you can say in between your moans. “I love when you say my name when you come.” His fingers slow their pace, and his mouth becomes less frantic as he guides you through your orgasm and the small after-shocks. 
When he finally pulls away completely, you watch slack-jawed as he takes his two fingers and puts them in his slick mouth, cleaning away traces of you. “Tasting you makes me so hard, I love it.” You lean back against the door with a smile. 
“Do you want me to help with that?” 
He laughs. “I’m not even close to finishing with you, my beautiful girl.” When he starts to reach for you, you grab onto his tie first and pull him closer. You work on his tie as you kiss his mouth, tasting the remnants of yourself.
In a matter of seconds, you have his tie off and thrown into the abyss, your shaking fingers focusing on unbuttoning his shirt. His eyes watch as you strip him of his shirt and then pull on his belt. But he can’t keep his hands off you, and they create a path over your skin. You undo the clasp, the tingling sound of metal like a beckoning call. 
After taking off his belt and letting it drop to the floor, you also head toward the floor onto your knees. Spencer’s hand’s end up in your hair, and your hands travel up his thighs to the noticeable bulge in his pants. “Do you see what you do to me? Only you can make me this hard.” 
You bite your bottom lip and work to take off his pants and underwear as he kicks off his shoes. Your eyes look up to his eyes, and he smiles at you. “Go on, I know you’re desperate for it.” One hand holds onto the base of him as your tongue circles the pink tip. He lets out a sharp breath at the contact. 
You watch his reactions, flicking and teasing his head, gathering the stickiness of his precum on his tongue. Then you circle your lips around him and inch down, your hand sliding up and down on him to meet your mouth. His mouth is wide open as he watches you, the eye contact between the two of you almost overwhelming. Your body doesn’t seem to care that you just had an earth-shattering orgasm because you can feel the steady thrum of need building. 
“Are you getting wet again just from sucking me off?” You nod and take him deeper in your mouth, the hand resting on his thigh feels a muscle twitch. “You have the perfect mouth.” His fingers in your hair pull slightly, not enough to cause pain, but just enough to cause you to moan on his dick. 
“If you keep doing that I’m gonna come down that pretty throat.” You moan again, and he makes a low humming noise. “Is that what you want, sweet girl?” 
You pull off of him, a string of spit following you, “yes.” You take both hands and twist and stroke up and down him with a smile on your messy lips. 
“Open your mouth.” You do as he says, sticking your tongue out flat. He takes his two fingers and sticks them in your mouth, and you instantly start to suck on them, never stopping the motion of your hands. “My perfect, beautiful girl.” He mutters and then pulls his fingers from your mouth. Before you can put your mouth back on him, he’s stepping away and then helping you stand up. 
When you’re on your feet, he kisses you slowly, allowing his tongue to explore your mouth, and you reach down with one hand to continue to stroke him. He breaks the kiss and lightly guides you to turn around and bend over, using your hands to hold yourself up on the door. “You’re so good for me. Stay there.” You look over your shoulder and watch him find his pants to grab a condom. He quickly unwraps it and slides it on before returning to you. 
He glides his hands over the back of your thighs and over your ass appreciatively, then squeezes your ass. “Are you going to take all of me?” The whispers tickling the back of your neck as he leans over you toward your ear, you shiver against him. 
“Yes.” 
He trails a hand down your spine as he pulls away and then helps you to set your legs further apart. You bite your lip, so ready for him, when he squeezes your hips. Both of you moan deeply as he guides himself into you, inching himself in until he’s seated completely. His hands are back on your hips, holding you in place. He leans forward and places a kiss on your back. He whispers in your ear again, “now you’re gonna be a good girl for me, and you’re not gonna come until I tell you you can. Do you understand?” 
You nod swiftly. 
He presses another kiss. “Words please, sweet girl.” 
“I understand.” 
He stands fully and slowly starts to pull himself out of you, dragging against every inch of your core. When he’s out fully, he pushes forward, again at that agonizing slow pace. You squirm against him, needing more. “You think you can take all of it, baby?” 
“Yes. Yes. Please. Please.” 
“You’re so beautiful begging for me.” You think he’s going to continue to tease you, but he doesn't. He starts to move faster and faster, building up a steady rhythm. Your nails scratch against the wood of your door. “That’s it, so good. I only ever feel this good with you. Only you can take my dick like this. You take it so perfect.” He gasps and rambles as he pumps into you. 
The base of your spine zaps pleasure through your body and you shake on him. 
“Don’t come yet, baby. Not yet. I could spend forever inside you.” 
You feel your arms start to get weak, but Spencer holds so tight on you that you know that you’re stable. “I need to –” you gasp and squeeze your eyes shut. 
“I know. I know. But you can wait, I know you can. Do you know how I know you can?” 
You shake your head. 
“Because you’re my good girl.” You press your lips together and moan. “Yeah, and you’re gonna wait until I tell you. And then you’re going to touch that swollen little clit of yours. It’s aching isn’t it.” 
“Yes!” You practically shout. “Spencer, please.” 
“Beg again.” 
“Please. Spencer. Oh god, please. I need it. I need it.” 
“Touch your clit, baby.” You cry out as soon as one of your hands makes contact. “You still can’t come, honey.” 
You whimper, but try so hard not to give yourself over to the pleasure. 
“You’re all mine, aren’t you.” 
“Yes, yours all yours. Only yours forever.” 
He bites out a harsh moan, and you know he’s trying just as hard as you to keep it together. “You look so pretty.” The words are just rambles, almost imperceptible. “Come for me. Come all over me.” 
You do so instantly, Spencer tightens his grip on you to hold you steady as you lose yourself in the feeling. He comes with whimpers and sighs and deep grunts. When he finally stops moving, your legs are gelatinous, so he holds you tight against him, your back against his chest. He pulls out of you and then turns you around in his arms. 
“You’re perfect.” He peppers light kisses across your face and lips and neck. “You did so good.” His hands are wrapped around you, both holding you steady but also keeping close to him. “I’m so proud of you.” 
Your eyes flutter closed, and he kisses your lips fully. When he pulls away, you open your eyes and look up into his eyes. “Are you okay?” He checks in softly. 
“Yes.” 
“Good.” He kisses you again chastely. “That was beautiful. You’re beautiful.” Another kiss and his hands massage down your back and your hips, checking to see if you’re sore. 
“I’m fine.” You answer before he can ask. 
“Did you like that,” he asks earnestly. 
“I loved it.” 
He smiles brightly and you match it. “Are you hungry?” 
“Starving.”
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roosterforme · 1 year ago
Text
Alone With All Your Letters | Hangman x Reader
Summary: You had been with Jake for so long, he could barely remember himself without you. But he was ready for more, and he was tired of waiting for you to catch up to him. With a few ugly words, he broke your heart. And with one handwritten letter, you brought him to his knees. 
Warnings: Angst, smut, age gap, fluff, talk of pregnancy, 18+
Length: 3700
Pairing: Jake "Hangman" Seresin x Female Reader
Seriously, who let Jake on my masterlist!? Banner by @mak-32
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You had been with Jake for a long time. Almost seven years to be exact. And while he loved you and knew he wanted to be with you, sometimes it was hard for him to come to terms with the fact that you and he were still at slightly different places in your lives. 
He'd met you when you were still in college. College. And he had been... a bit removed from school by that point. He had been new to Top Gun and San Diego when you slammed into his life. You were out celebrating your twenty first birthday at the same bar where he was celebrating his thirty third. You were clearly mortified when you ruined his shoes with a pitcher of spilled beer. But when he laughed, you looked so relieved, he let you buy him a drink.
And then you let him buy you several. And then you let him get you an Uber. And then he joined you in the Uber and spent the rest of the weekend at your apartment.
"Jake?" you asked, holding up two dresses next to your shared closet in his house. "Which one for brunch?"
They were both short and would show off your legs. Jake would get looks from other guys his age when he kissed your neck or wrapped his arm around your waist. He would get the occasional, "Nice going, bro." Or even the, "Daaamn." 
You were young. You were hot. But Jake would much rather spend the day at home relaxing with you instead of heading out to a boozy brunch with your friends. Especially the day before an eight week deployment. 
"The blue one, Honey," he told you with a soft smile. As he watched you get changed, he stood and tried to choose a shirt for himself. But he was tired of helping you pick out outfits and trying to coordinate how his shirts looked with your dresses. It didn't matter. It was exhausting. 
And that was the trade-off for being in love with someone twelve years younger. He was in love with a woman who loved him back with every fiber of her being, but he was also in love with a woman who put off the things he wanted to do. He no longer wanted rowdy beach vacations and dancing all night in clubs. He wanted to go to Europe and visit galleries. He no longer wanted to go out to eat every night. He wanted to stay in with you and make a meal together. 
He always felt the clash. Always felt like he was conceding with what he wanted for what you wanted. And it had never been more obvious than when he asked you a few years ago if you ever wanted to have kids. 
"Sure, Jake," you had told him, kissing his cheek. "I love kids. But not yet. In another year or two."
He hated bringing it up, he really did. But your answer was always the same. In another year or two. But it had been three years, going on four. And nothing you were doing was telling him you were getting close to that point yet. 
But he got dressed for this brunch that he didn't want to go to. And he held the door and talked to your friends and drank a mimosa. But he just wanted to be at home, enjoying the last day before he shipped out on an aircraft carrier. 
Later that night, Jake watched you change into some lacy, light pink lingerie that looked delicious on you. And then you made a big production of avoiding his grasp with a laugh. 
"Wait a second," you told him, pushing him playfully away. "I have to put something in your duffle bag." He unbuttoned his shirt as you rooted around in your nightstand drawer and pulled out a stack of envelopes just like you always did. "Make sure you read them in order," you whispered, bending to tuck them into his bag.
"I always do, Honey. Now come here." 
You treated him to your mouth and your hands and your pussy, letting him have whatever he asked for. And he fell asleep wrapped around your body, listening to you say, "I love you, Jake. I'll miss you so much."
But the next morning, he felt anxious in that way where he knew he needed to say something again. He'd be arriving back in port just before his fortieth birthday. He knew he was getting older. He knew what he wanted. But if there was never going to be a compromise with the timeline, then he needed to be the one to make the decision for both of you.
As you stood before him on the dock, tears in your eyes and your arms around his neck, he couldn't hold the words back. "Honey. I love you, but... I don't know if this is working for me anymore."
He watched your face fall and your lips part into a look of shock. Your voice was only a desperate whisper. "Jake?"
This was miserable, but he had to do it. He swallowed his guilt and said, "I don't know what to do here. I don't know if you're even happy with where we are, but I'm struggling. I'm about to be forty. I'm tired of going out all the time. I'm tired of waiting another year and another year and another year to get serious about kids. I love you, and I want to do that with you, but I can't force you. So if we aren't on the same page any longer, then maybe we need to end things."
Your lips were quivering, and your eyes were welling up with even more tears as you let your arms fall away from his body. You stepped backwards, putting some distance between the two of you. Your gaze started to change from one of sadness to one of anger. And Jake regretted it. He regretted everything he just said, but it was too late to take it back. So he stood there in it and let the disgusting feeling of remorse wash over him. 
"Honey-"
But his name was being called now, and you stepped away again when he reached for you. "Goodbye, Jake," you whispered, your voice rough with unshed tears as you swiped at your eyes. 
He turned and walked toward the long, daunting ramp that would take him to his deployment and away from you. Perhaps forever. Every time he turned back to look at you, there were more tears in your eyes, but you hadn't moved an inch. When he made his way onto the carrier deck, he dropped his bag and pulled out his phone. 
Jake called you over and over, watching you standing on the dock as you ignored his calls before tucking your phone away. He called your name, screamed it over the noise from the crowd of people seeing their loved ones off. He hollered until his voice was hoarse. And then he got his phone out again, waiting with shaking hands until he got your voicemail. 
He was looking right at you, and you were looking back at him as he said, "Honey, please. I'm so sorry. Please. I didn't mean any of it. I love you. I need you. I need you to be there when I get home. Please! Fuck! I'm sorry. Please stop ignoring my calls! I love you."
With shaking hands, he ended the call and redialed your number. Once again he watched you ignore the call, so he left you voicemail after voicemail as the aircraft carrier pulled away from the dock. He apologized as many ways as he could until your inbox was full and you were just a speck in the distance. 
Jake collected himself off of the deck and made his way to his tiny bunk where he sank down onto the unmade bed and cried. What was he thinking? If he had to choose between a life with you or one without you, he wanted to choose you. He fucked up, and now there was no way you were going to listen to him. There was no way you'd be there when he got home. 
He just broke your heart and then his own with a handful of idiotic sentences that he said in place of having an actual conversation with you. If he ever accused you of being less mature than he was, well, he was wrong about that, too. This had to be the dumbest thing he had ever done. 
"Fuck," he groaned as he started unpacking his bag. But your letters to him were right there, and he thought he was going to throw up as he untied the stack and took the top envelope in his hands. 
That would be your revenge in a way. He would spend his deployment opening all of your sweet notes to him. You always did this, and he always loved reading them. But now he'd let them hurt. He would let himself feel pain. 
But he was in no way prepared for what he read in that first letter.
Jake,
I miss you already! I'm probably still on the dock waving and crying, watching you sail away. Eight weeks isn't forever, but I know every day is going to feel impossible without you. And I know you'll feel the same way. So let me send you off with a little bit of hope and a promise. When I told you I had a last minute appointment on Wednesday, I had my IUD removed. And I didn't get another one in its place. I'm ready. When you get back in two months, let's go for it. Let's make you a Daddy.
All my love
He folded the note back up as neatly as you had, and then he tucked it back inside the envelope and sprawled across the bed with his forearm over his eyes. And he didn't move for a long time.
---------------------
Jake was basically useless out of the cockpit. He flew his missions, and completed his training exercises, but he had to force himself to eat and go to the gym. There was no outside communication allowed this time around, so he had no way to talk to you, not that you would have answered your phone for him. 
To make things worse, he'd been rationing your letters to him, spreading out the pain, prolonging the agony. Each one was sweeter than the last, and each one made him ache. But he read that first letter every night before he went to sleep. Because, for the briefest point in time, he'd had everything he wanted. And now he had, well, essentially nothing. And because he had nobody to go home to, the weeks were flying by. He was nearing the end now. Nearing his fortieth birthday, and wishing he could just stay for another deployment. 
Silently, he packed his bag that final morning, but he held onto your letters, wanting to feel their weight in his hand. After nearly seven years of having you standing on the dock waiting for him to arrive home, he was going to have to call himself a cab. He'd go home and process things the best he could without you, but first he would stand there and watch everyone else fall into the arms of their loved ones. 
Jake tossed his duffle bag over his shoulder and wound his way down the ramp. He took a deep breath as his boots hit California soil, and he walked slowly into the crowd of people on the dock. The evening sun was still bright and hot as he was jostled around by all of the bodies. Choruses of 'I missed you!' and 'I love you so much!' rang out around him. When he closed his eyes, he could practically hear your voice, that's how well he remembered every single time you collected him here, took him home, and made love to him. 
But when he opened his eyes, he gasped. You were standing off toward the back of the crowd, face expressionless as the setting sun illuminated your features and your yellow sundress. The color of honey. Why were you here? To have your chance at telling him off? Or perhaps... 
"Honey?" he called out, suddenly shoving his way through the crowd. "Honey!" He rushed to you as quickly as he could, but you didn't move an inch. The only thing that changed was your expression, which was turning more apprehensive as he closed in. 
"Jake," you whispered when he was right in front of you. He hated the look you were giving him. There was an awful sensation in the pit of his stomach, a mix of wanting to reach out to hold you, but terrified of the rejection you were probably about to rightfully hit him with. 
"Honey. I fucked up."
You nodded, and the softest smile found its way to your lips. "You really did, Jake."
He dropped his bag to the ground. "Even if you're only here to slap me in the face, will you listen to me for a minute first?" When you nodded, he said, "I was frustrated. I'm getting older. I'm getting old for my career. I'm getting old to have a kid. And I feel at times like I'm too old for you to be satisfied with me."
"Jake, that's not true," you insisted, eyes bright with tears. When he ran his fingers along your jaw you didn't stop him. 
"Whether it's true or not, it's in my head. And I can't get it out," he whispered. "But I love you. I want to be with you. As soon as I told you otherwise, I regretted every single word, Honey. I didn't have to read any of your letters to know I had just made the worst mistake of my life. I didn't even make it all the way onto the carrier before I was calling you."
"I know," you whispered as one stray tear slid down your cheek. "I know you didn't read the note before you called me. I was watching you the whole time."
Jake brushed the tear away, fighting the urge to press his lips to that spot. "Then why didn't you answer me?" he asked softly. 
"Because I was mad. I'm still kind of mad at you. Either I'm enough, or I'm not. What if I can't even have kids? You were just going to leave me?"
"No," he swore, shaking his head. "The fact that you said you were willing to try with me is more than enough. Okay? You're more than enough, Honey. I love you."
You swallowed hard and let out a shaky breath. "I wasn't lying when I told you that I'd catch up to where you were someday. I never lied to you, Jake. So next time don't try to rush me into something, okay?"
He reached for your hand. "Next time?"
You nodded. "Yeah. Don't fuck up again."
"Does that mean you'll stay with me?" he asked, desperation in his voice as he wrapped his arms around your waist. 
"Yes."
Jake pulled you against him, his lips meeting your forehead as he squeezed you. He let himself cry out all of the pain and hopelessness he had contained the best he could for the past eight weeks as you held him.
-------------------------
Today was his birthday. Forty. Jake was pretty sure he was on the verge of needing reading glasses, and sometimes his shoulder hurt when he got out of bed if he slept funny. But last night he slept funny because you were wrapped around him in bed. So it was worth it.
Things had been a little shaky after you picked him up at the end of his deployment a week ago. He'd begged you to stay with him in his house and work through things. You'd been living with him for so long, he honestly couldn't imagine his place without you anymore. You were having open conversations together, and Jake was finally starting to feel like things were getting back to normal. 
But he hadn't asked you once about your IUD, thinking maybe you'd changed your mind when he was deployed, after he word vomited all of his insecurities on you. No, he wasn't going to mention anything about birth control until you brought it up. So quite frankly, he wasn't quite sure if you and he had had sex with or without birth control last night. 
Jake went through his day, hoping that when he got home from work, you'd be there. And that maybe today would be the day you'd make it clear what you wanted now.
"Honey?" he called out after he unlocked his front door. 
"I'm in the bedroom, birthday boy!"
Jake smiled and headed toward your voice, stopping short in the doorway. You were perched on the edge of his desk wearing that light pink lingerie he loved so much. There was a cupcake on a plate next to you, and as he approached, he watched you strike a match and light the candle. Then you pursed your pretty lips to blow out the match, and Jake was right there. He kissed you, raking his fingers along your soft skin, so thankful you were with him. 
"Happy birthday," you managed between kisses.
"You look like my present, wrapped up all pretty."
Your soft laughter filled him up. "I actually got you a watch, but sure, I can be your present." You hopped down from the desk and ran your hands along the front of his uniform before taking his hand. As you led him toward the bed, you looked back at him, your eyes unguarded. "I'm still figuring out my cycles now," you muttered, shrugging nervously, "but I'm pretty sure I'm ovulating today."
"Honey," Jake groaned. "Say it. Please, say it."
But instead of saying anything, you crawled across the bed, letting him see your gorgeous ass. And when you eased yourself down onto your back and spread your legs wide, you asked him, "Don't you want to fuck a baby into me?"
Jake's eyes went wide as he unbuttoned his shirt and tossed it aside along with his undershirt. Then he eased himself down onto the bed, grabbing the backs of your thighs and kissing your core through the lace.
"Say it," he begged, watching you bite your lip and press your head back into the bedding. "Honey."
"I'm ready, Jake. I'm ready to make you a daddy."
With those words, Jake drew your legs back together and gently removed your underwear, letting the lace glide along your soft skin. And when he eased your legs apart again, he groaned. "You're perfect. I can't get enough." He pressed his lips and nose to your pussy, inhaling your sweet scent as he stroked your hips and belly with both hands. 
He could already picture you round and pregnant. He'd been imagining how beautiful you would be as a mom for years and years. When he kissed your belly button, you pushed your fingers through his hair. There was nobody else he'd ever wanted to do this with. 
When he met your eyes, there was a smile playing on your lips as you whispered, "Jake, we're going to have to do this all the time now. You know that, right?"
He groaned softly as he unclasped your bra and let his lips settle on your tits. "Yeah, I know," he told you, running his nose along the undersides of your breasts. "I'll fuck you full of my cum, nice and deep. Keep you full for as long as it takes."
"Oh, fuck," you gasped as he sucked on your nipples and unzipped his uniform pants. And then he was thrusting inside you, and the little sounds you made were the filthiest things he'd ever heard. He went harder, deeper, thinking about how he'd make sure you always had his cum inside you. How you'd smell like him. How he'd be on you all the time. 
"You're gonna look perfect carrying my child," he whispered, and you wrapped your legs around his waist. "Everyone will know what I did to you. Everyone will know how bad I wanted it."
The way you responded to him was too much. Your back was arched, and he could feel you tightening around him. "Everyone will know," you echoed in a moan. "They'll know you fuck me so good, Jake."
His forehead came to rest against yours as he panted. "You ready?" he grunted. "I'll fill you up right now."
"Yes," you whispered, taking his fingers and guiding them to your clit. With a few slow circles, he had you whining and squirming as you started to climax.
"Stay still, Honey," he whispered, his voice rough now. "Keep it all inside."
You were keening from his words and your orgasm as Jake filled you with his cum. "Fuck," you whined, and it was so loud and needy, he rammed his cock deep and held you to him while he pulsed inside you.
"Don't move, don't move," he whispered, kissing and licking your tits as your fingers stroked through his hair. "Don't waste it."
He was in love with you and the feel of your body. You wanted what he wanted. He would make it his mission to get you pregnant. 
"God, Jake." Your voice was raw and harsh as you said, "I'm getting your creampies around the clock now, aren't I?"
He lifted your hips gently off the bed and watched as he slowly withdrew himself from your pretty pussy as you whined softly. And when his cum started to dribble out of you, he gently fucked you with two fingers, pushing it deeper. "Around the clock," he confirmed. "Now let me eat my birthday cupcake and then I'll fill you up again."
You ended up sitting naked on Jake's lap and laughing while you had to pick the melted wax off of the icing. Then you fed him the cupcake, sneaking a bite for yourself as his cum oozed out of you and onto his khaki pants. He'd fuck you full again later. He'd keep doing it as long as it took.
"Happy birthday, Daddy," you whispered.
----------------------
I wrote Jake again? It's becoming a habit now. Thanks for reading this one! And thanks for @mak-32 and @beyondthesefourwalls
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therobotmonster · 4 months ago
Text
The Fae Thought He Had Her, but She's Had Lots of Practice
Actual Title: "On Foreign Soil."
The fae was having a grand old time with his latest toy. Mortals were easily befuddled with the magic of contract-and-courtesy. He'd taken pretty much all he could from the family: several names, the mother's attention, the son's concept of friendship... Even the life of the father.
He'd taken that one taking just the right moment of his time, the one where he moved just out of the oncoming car's path. That also took out the youngest daughter and making a new neverwas to lurk in the pockets of lost time around the home.
The tricks made him strong. The sense of betrayal and regret humans had when they realized how screwed they truly were was like honey: rich, sweet, and immune to spoilage. If anything, in the last sixty-some-odd years he'd been home the humans had gotten more petulant and even easier to trick.
It was a veritable buffet.
So when the eldest daughter returned home from college, he expected her to be easy pickings. The young were always foolish and prideful, and very often rude. They gave him so many opportunities.
So when she threw open the door, and stared at him with cold green eyes, he immediately laughed in delight. His face took on a distinctively 'David Bowiesq' aspect, a trick he found worked well the last time he'd been to the mortal lands.
"Oh, hello. May I have your name, lass?" He cooed in a cocky-yet-soothing voice.
"My name is Alex, and no." She said.
He raised a brow. She was canny, or at least half-canny. She knew enough to object to him taking it. Still, she had answered, and by the laws of the fae, the latter objection did not override the former offer.
So why wasn't he Alex now?
It was odd, but sometimes mortals were a little resistant to magic. He worried for a moment she was a skeptic, but she couldn't be. Her response meant she knew, or at least suspected, what he was. Moreover, he didn't feel the painful chill and sluggishness empiressence caused, nor the crushing weight of the explicable upon his bird-hollow bones.
No, she was just lucky, or was carrying an iron horseshoe, nothing he couldn't handle in his, or someone else's sleep.
"And what the fuck are you calling yourself, asshole?"
He blinked.
The impudence hit him like a slap. She'd just given him the opening to do anything he wanted, but the raw temerity of the insult, it's artless crudeness, it's utter lack of respect stunned him too much to enjoy it. His rage and petulance rushed into the hole left by his shock, and he sputtered.
"You rude little beast, you have no idea what you've brought upon yourself!"
He raised one pale hand, the flesh fading from it to leave nothing but blackened bone, and he pointed the index finger at her in a silent gesture. He let fly his curse. Not just any curse, but his, the one he had made for just such an occasion.
Alex stared at him. Arms crossed. Her hair was the color of the fae's own rage.
"What's the matter, cat got your brain?"
The fae's confidence wavered and the flesh returned to his hand.
"Where are the spiders?" He said. "There... there ought to be spiders! There should be spiders!"
She rolled her eyes.
"You broke the laws of courtesy and decorum! I can do as I please as a wronged noble! You should be spiders!"
"Whose laws?" It was Alex's turn to smile.
"Why, the only ones that matter, the laws of Faerie, as laid down by Oberon and Tita-"
"And Titsforbrains, yeah. I was five once and I can read. I know your dumb politics. Slight problem. Where are you now?"
"The mortal realm?"
"More specifically?"
"The Earth. The United States."
"Exactly." Alex smiled. "And while you might come the land of the platonic ideal of inbred nepobabies, in the United States of America, no law says I can't call a fuckface a fuckface. Fuckface."
The fae tried a different curse, yet Alex was not being twisted into any sort of goat, ironic or otherwise. "But, that doesn't matter! We're a higher form of being, our laws override yours."
"No they don't." Alex said with a confidence reserved for honey badgers and humans of age three. "Now undo all your bullshit and get out of my house."
"Nuh-uh!" The Fae's cocky smirk returned. With a flourish, he pulled out a deed. "It's my house, I got it off your mother, fair-and-square. She traded it for the heart your little brother so foolishly traded me. So you should get out of MY house."
"Contracts signed under duress are non-enforceable." She said in a bored, dismissive tone.
The Fae started to object, but the contract was already crumbling into dried daffodil petals in his hand. He tried to pretend this wasn't terrifying. Inexplicable happenings were supposed to be caused by him, not happen to him. "Are you a wizard?"
"Don't be stupid. I just know my rights." She said. "I'm betting you didn't disclose the full terms of the contracts either?"
The Fae shook his head, more from fear than as a response to the question. Of course he hadn't. If the mortals didn't do their due diligence and couldn't read Linear-B, that wasn't his fau-
The thirty years he stole from the youngest boy ripped themselves out of his body. A half dozen other deals began popping at the seams.
"How are you doing this?" He gasped.
"I'm not doing it. You are. You're idiot who runs on rules and laws who decided to come scam innocent people for your own profit and amusement."
"But it always worked before-" The Fae ran his mind through all his previous romps. Every single human had whined and begged about how unfair things were. Why was this one different?
He ran through those memories again. They were among his favorites so it was easy for him to see every detail. An old man trying to argue Fae law with him. A shepherd girl trying to use her own word games to trap him. A hippie saying almost the exact same words about non-enforceable contracts.
Almost.
He ran through the memories again and again. Always impressed or terrified or blinded by greed, the mortals always argued on his terms, always went back to his wording of the deal or contract, always appealed to the laws of his people and his own noble position.
None of them had ever argued jurisdiction. Once one of them had, it applied, not just now, not just to these toys, but retroactively, and, from how it felt, with interest.
"Oh." Was all the Fae could say.
"Yes. 'Oh.'" Alex smiled like the cat that ate the proverbial canary. "Children can't sign contracts, either, you know."
Everything the Fae had done to the boy snapped back at once. It felt like every seventh tendon in his body had been snipped simultaneously with tiny scissors.
"Nor can someone sign away the right to kill them to someone else, or sell themselves or others into slavery."
Alex's father reappeared in the living room, looking dazed. In his lap was Alex's youngest sister, now remembered by all present as a person that existed. The return of the father's moment was a minor loss, but there was one less neverwas in the Castle of Paradox, and the Baron would blame him for its unmaking.
"Also, names aren't transferable between people, nor are they the whole and sum of a person's identity in this country. The closest thing we have to that is a social security number. And if you steal one of those, well, identity theft is a crime here."
Mr. Baxter, Mrs. Baxter, Julie and Sam's lights all turned on at once, though they were still groggy and half-asleep and would be for hours to come.
A fortune in names, first, middle, last, with nicknames and pet-names and all between, all vanished from the Fae's purse. He could feel its lightness in his pocket.
The Fae turned on his heels. "I fear I must take my leave, so sorry for the inconvenience!"
He was halfway to the door. The impact on the back of his skull knocked him forward off his feet, sending him slamming into the polished wood floor. The projectile that laid him out bounced and landed by his head.
He'd been right about her having an iron horseshoe.
"You don't get to walk away." She said. He felt her steel-toed boot, soles made of entirely synthetic rubber and cleats of cold steel, press against the base of his spine. His hollow, bird-bone spine. "You don't get to fuck with people, say 'my bad' when you get caught, and run."
"Y-your law!" He gasped. He felt his bones cracking. He wanted to turn into something else but he couldn't focus. She was pressing down harder now, because she was half-kneeling. Her hand picked up the fallen horseshoe. "You have to let me go, or arrest me, turn me over to your police, right? You can't just murder me!"
"What are you?"
"I- I'm a Faerie of Arcadia, a sub-Prince of the House of-"
"So not a human. And not an animal." She kept him pinned.
"No!" He growled. Blood the color of an oil slick on the highway began to fill his mouth. The pain made him forget his fear for a moment, and he bared his true face, something between a bug, a wax store mannequin, and a pug-dog. "We-we're a higher form of life! Far beyond anything this miserable pile of dung you call a planet has to offer! You will pay for this impertinence the moment you break the law that holds me!"
"You're a lot of things. A bully, a pest, a liar. But you're not human. And you're not an animal. In fact, as far as the laws of this land are concerned, you aren't real."
Alex lifted her boot to kick him onto his back, then pinned him again.
"Th-then you can't kill me!" He laughs. "You can't kill something that's not real! You've trapped yourself! You'll have to let me go!"
"You haven't been to our 'pile of dung' in some time have you?" Alex asked. She nodded to a strange white book-shaped object that sat unopened, upright, next to the television, next to a pair of white and black crescent-moon shaped objects studded with small white and black buttons.
"What's that supposed to mean?"
--
Six hours later, a notification popped up on Alex's dorm room computer.
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sodapopwrites · 9 days ago
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the first sign of fall chapter five: as sick as it sounds i loved you first
college au, the inner circle boys and the reader are bartenders.
pairings - eris vanserra x reader, a teensy bit of azriel x reader
summary - at the annual hockey party you have two much needed, long time coming, conversations.
word count - 4.2k
a/n - okay okay guys we're on our way to HEALING. this is good. i don't know man. at least they're all finally starting to communicate a little bit. I mean it's mostly her but hey she is drunk word vomiting. they boys don't have much room to talk. also they're stupid men....so.
read the rest of the series here!
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You didn’t want to work. Didn’t want to get out of bed. Didn’t want to do anything. Blankets wrapped around you, cacooning you in a soft straight jacket of warmth. You hadn’t moved in hours despite being awake. Nothing seemed to really matter lately. Your shades were drawn. Darkness shrouding your room. 
Empty. You felt empty. Your apartment a shallow husk of a home. 
You thought of your favorite sweater, still at Eris’ apartment. Your hairbrush and your good pair of sneakers. Plants that had previously sat on the shelves of your room, now resting on the window sill of Eris’ living room. The sleep you had grown accustomed to. Warm and comfortable. His bedsheets cool against your skin and the smell of his cologne drifting through your nose. His fingers combing through your hair. His kisses along your collarbone to wake you up. Wasted. By what? A game you had played along with for traditions sake. For what? 
Eris. The day you had met him. Your freshman year. Two years ago.  In his white cable knit sweater, fraying around the edges. Expensive things he let go into disarray as if he didn’t care. A carefully curated look of dishevelment. His smirk and his glittering eyes. The way you could never get yourself to talk to him. The way his swaggering confidence and sharp remarks scared you shitless. The way his eyes would sometimes meet yours across crowded coffee shops, quiet libraries, or crushingly packed parties. Like he could taste just how much you wanted to talk to him. The way you had fallen in love with him from a distance. 
The clock strikes one and you groan. Pulling your blanket over your head and rolling onto your stomach, before sliding out of your bed. Unwilling and unhappy. Fine. Work it is. You couldn’t call out. Rhys would kill you if Cassian was the only bartender. Nothing seemed to get done when Cassian was the only bartender. 
★ ★ ★
“So let me get this straight.” Cassian set several glasses on the counter top and angled his body towards you, “You think that avoiding both Az and Eris is the best way to go about things?” 
You don’t look at him. Shaking your head you continue washing the bar glasses, “I’m not avoiding Azriel. He isn’t talking to me….Just like last time.” 
“Maybe he’s waiting for you to say something.” 
Cassian moved closer to you. Forcing your attention away from the dishes. You huff a breath of vague annoyance and turn to meet his eyes. 
“What am I supposed to say?” 
He didn’t have an answer for you. He shrugged and pulled the glass out of your hands and nudged you away from the sink. Choosing to take your task instead of answering you. You look past him towards the clock on the wall. 
“I have to go. My shift is over and Az will be here any second.” 
“See. Avoiding.” 
You don’t respond as you take off your apron and tuck it beneath the bar, grabbing your bag, and heading for the door. You’re almost in the clear. Almost. You run directly into Azriel as he slides through the doorway. Muttering an apology you try to push past him, but he grabs your arm. Finally you look up from his chest to those hazel eyes, boring into you, studying your every slight facial expression. He opens his mouth to say something, but closes it before any words manage to escape. 
“Have uh…have a good shift.” 
With that your out the door. The cold fall wind whipping through your hair and stinging your cheeks red. You stand outside the bar. Out of breath from the one brief interaction with Azriel. The look he gave you still seared into your sightline. You look around the street. Empty, the streetlights just flickering on as it hit dusk, leaves no longer that buttery yellow and orange but a burnt red. Fall in full flush. The crisp air felt like an assault on your lungs. 
A ding from your phone snapped you out of the trance the weather had bewitched upon you. Mor. 
Mor: Come to the party with me tonight. 
You sigh. That was the last thing you wanted to do. The hockey team’s halloween party. The last thing you wanted to do. Another ding interrupts your response. 
Mor: I know you don’t want to go. But if I have to get drunk by myself imagine what could happen to me. 
You chuckle at the vague hint towards a catastrophe. You type out a response, 
You: What could possibly happen to you Morrigan?
Mor: Uhm…I have to be sexy by myself. Which is a damn shame. 
You pull your bottom lip between your teeth. Gnawing the already bitten raw flesh. A nervous tick. One that had been rearing it’s ugly head in the last couple weeks. You nod to yourself. Steeling yourself. You could do this. 
You: Fine. 
She didn’t respond. You knew she’d be at your apartment to pick you up in a couple hours anyway. 
★ ★ ★
“Stop fidgeting with your dress. You look good.” Mor hissed at you as you pulled your skirt down for what had to be the fourth time in the last couple minutes. 
The party was loud, the lights were low, and you were already three shots in, and working on your third drink. It was way too strong. One of Mor’s famous concoctions. It seemed the only way to get through this night. Your eyes scanned the room for familiar faces. You knew Azriel would show up. You knew Eris would be there two. Neither of them ever missed this party. You had been constantly scanning the room for Cassian’s towering form, knowing that Az and Rhys wouldn’t be far behind him. Luckily for you they hadn’t shown yet. 
You reached up to rub your neck. There was still a bruise there from where Azriel had sunk his teeth. That light red mark a reminder of the horrible decision you had made. You hadn’t heard from Eris since he told you he was done. You supposed that maybe you should stop expecting to hear from him. But the silence still hurt. It stretched through your mind constantly. That lack of communication. The gravity of the quiet. 
Mor looked you up and down. Her eyes narrowing as she flipped her hair over her shoulder and turned to face you fully, taking the cup out of your hands and pulling your arms lightly. 
“Loosen up. Come on. Let’s dance.” 
You hang your head and try to pull out of her grip, but when she wanted something she got it. So you begrudgingly let her drag you to the dance floor. Letting your body move with hers as the buzz of your drinks settled over you like a warm blanket. For a couple minutes, as the music washed over you, the bass pumping along with your heartbeat, you let yourself forget. About everything. 
But like all peaceful moments it didn’t last long. Out of the corner of your eye, through the flashing neon lights, and the swarm of people, you caught sight of him. Well you caught sight of a flash of auburn hair and a flash of freckles across cream skin. Eris. His face half covered by a golden mask that looked awfully like a fox. His hand on the small of some girls back. The girl wasn’t someone you knew. Another accessory. He had gone back to being exactly what everyone thought he was. 
You allow girls to accompany you to parties. You don’t date. 
Your words to him swam through your ears. A violet wave of memory. Something sour climbed its way up your throat and into your mouth. You pulled out of Mor’s grasp and searched frantically for a bathroom. Spotting it across the room you made straight for the door. Pushing past everyone. The crowd suddenly suffocating. The people bumping into eachother, jumping, huddled together. The music reverberating through the room. All of it overwhelming. All of it too loud. Suffocating. 
Azriel had just walked into the party. Cassian and Rhysand on either side of him. The first thing he saw was you. Booking it to the bathroom. Your eyes frantic and your hand coming to cover your mouth. He made to follow you, knowing exactly what was about to happen. And then he saw it. Eris had clocked you the same second he had. Both men made eye contact. Standing a couple feet away from eachother. Neither moving. Neither following. 
Eris had seen you before you saw him. You looked damn good. He was absolutley sure that Mor had put you in that outfit. The skirt a little too short. Your hair curled the same way Mor’s always was. You skin gleaming from sweat. The heat of the room making your every inch sparkle a little under the lights. Your eyes closed as you danced. Body swaying in time with the beat of the music. You looked too good. His jaw clenched. He was making sure to get closer to the girl he had brought. Making sure to make it very clear that this was his date. He saw the way your expression shifted. Saw the way the panic in you seemd to surface. It was almost like he heard the saw words you did. 
You allow girls to accompany you to parties. You don’t date. 
He hated every second of it. Every second of get back. But if he had to play the part. For you. For your friends he would do it.  Play the asshole. Be whatever it is that they wanted him to be. Over you? Yeah sure he could play pretend for a night. It was nothing right? It was casual. No labels. Just company. 
Eris thought of when he first saw you. His sophomore year. Two years ago. In your leather jacket. Your hair cut short. Your quiet remarks to your friends that always seemed to make them laugh. The blush that would spread across your cheeks when he’d meet your gaze. When he’d notice the way you stared. The way you were always flanked by your guard dogs. Cassian and Azriel. Sometimes Morrigan and Amren. Always too accompanied to approach. Your coy smile and your heavy lashes. A sight for sore eyes at every suffocating party and overly heated coffee shop. An ever present distraction. The way he would laugh louder to see if it would draw your attention, and it always did. The way that he had finally gotten you alone at the start of term party this year. When years of passing interaction, casual hellos, and a warm smile had finally gotten him into your life. 
And then he saw Azriel. Saw how Az noticed you fleeing the dance floor just as he did. Noticed the way that his body was arched into your pursuit the same way his own was. Both feeling that incessant need to make sure you were okay. Their eyes met. Play the part. Let him have it. Be what they want you to be. He broke eye contact with Azriel and bent his head in submission. Go on. The motion seemed to say. You play your part and I’ll play mine. Eris leaned back down to the girl he had brought. Pretending to listen to whatever she was saying as his eyes trailed Azriel to the bathroom. Nodding, not paying attention as he followed shadowsinger across the floor and stood at the closed bathroom door, listening to the conversation held within. 
★ ★ ★
You didn’t want to throw up. You paced the small bathroom clutching your stomach. You were a bartender for fucks sake. If you couldn’t hold your alcohal then what was the point? You clenched your eyes shut and shook your head. Trying not to let anything come up. Slowly you sank to the ground. Letting your head fall against the wall behind you, your hand clutching the rim of the toilet as if in preparation for what was to come. 
The door creaked open and Azriel slid into the room. White t shirt, soaked with blood, clinging to his frame. His hair greased and parted down the middle. A plastic curved knife tucket into the belt loop of his jeans. Billy Loomis. Of course he had dressed up as Billy Loomis. You had watched scream together last year. You vaguely remembered telling him he’d look damn good dressed up like that, before Cassian snorted and said something about it somehow not being emo enough and god forbid Az wear anything but a black shirt. 
He crouched down next to you. Slowly pushing the hair out of your face and moving your body towards the toilet. Holding your hair in one hand and gently brushing a hand over your back as he whispered, 
“Just let it out.” 
You shook your head. Humming your disagreement. But the movement of your body, the small shift in your position, the shake of your head. It sent you over the edge and you lurched over the toilet. Wretching and coughing. Azriel softly shushed you, trying his best to be comforting, trying to be soothing. He had held your hair back while you vomited more times than he could remember. Freshman year was your black out drunk year and he remembered it well. 
Slowly you raised your head, blinking through watery eyes at Azriel. His concerned expression did nothing to calm the storm in your stomach. In your head. You sucked in a shuddering breath and he tilted his head. 
“Why do you only like me when I’m sad?” 
Your question was like a knife to his gut. A sharp, achingly cold, pain twisting it’s way through his organs. He slightly shook his head as if he didn’t understand. You sniffled, hiccuping slightly as you continued, 
“You dont…You only want me when you can’t have me or when I’m so fucking distraught that I can’t think straight.” 
Twisting. Pushing deeper. That knife. Like you wanted his insides to spill out and his blood to drench your hands. 
“Why?” 
A whisper. Small and pleading. He couldn’t think of something to say. His mind completely blank. You push his hands away from you. Off your shoulder and out of your hair. Scrambling away from his contact. 
“I left. That first time. Because I was so fucking scared that when you woke up you’d pretend it didn’t happen. That we’d go back to being friends and act like nothing had changed. I left because I was convinced it didn’t mean anything to you and I just didn’t want to hear you say it. I didn’t want to see the regret on your face if I was still there.” 
You never talked about it. A silent agreement to never talk about what happened two years ago. Your first comment on it brought a horrified look to his face that he couldn’t wipe away fast enough. But he tried. Tried to reknit his brows and close his mouth, 
“You’re drunk” 
You wave your hands and shake your head, “No. No. I didn’t want to just be a pity fuck that you didn’t care about. That you didn’t ever want to talk about. So I left and I hoped you’d prove me wrong and you never did. You stayed silent and we never fucking talked about it again. Because I was right.” 
“You weren’t” 
Azriel wanted to believe it. Wanted to be able to tell you that you were wrong. Wanted to tell you it was more than that. But that knife in his gut. It was all he could focus on. The sharp blade of reality. He wanted you when you were sad. Something to fix. Something he could try to piece back together. But he knew you were never something he could hold together. So he was there when you needed rebuilding. Your voice struck him again, 
“I was. I was right.” 
You rose to your feet now. Pushing past him as he stood to try and block you. Shoving your hands into his chest to get him to move out of your way. 
“You only like me when I’m sad.” 
You clutched the door handle and wiped your face hastily. Trying to rid yourself of any crying evidence. Not wanting to look a mess in front of the people you knew were lined up outside the bathroom door. 
“I had something. Someone. That wanted me when I was whole. When I was happy. Someone who made me happy.” 
He reached for you and you flinched away, “And I let you ruin it because for some reason I kept thinking. How could I deserve it?  And now look at me.” 
You motioned around the bathroom, at yourself. As if you could illustrate the hollow feeling in your gut. In your chest. 
Azriel muttered your name. The only thing he could think to say. You pressed your lips into a tight line and took a deep breath before leaving him to stand alone in the bathroom. 
★ ★ ★
You pushed your way through the sweltering room. The patio. The front steps. It didn’t matter. Outside. You just wanted to be outside. You bump into Rhys before you can get to the door. His hands reaching to clasp your shoulders. His face etched with worry. His eyes scanning your face and one hand smoothing your hair down. 
“You okay?” 
You could barely hear him over the din of the party. You nod quickly and push his worrying hands away, 
“You got a cigarette?” 
“Uh yeah?” 
He reached into his chest pocket and pulled out a pack, handing you one, and slipping a lighter into your free hand as you tuck the cigarette behind you ear. Pushing past him you head for the door once more. Slipping out. Relishing in the way the cool october air pricked at your exposed skin. The way it burned your nostrils and finally provided a steady gust of air to your lungs. You walk to the curb, sitting down and fumbling with the lighter that Rhys had given you. 
Trying to light the cigarette proved difficult with the halloween wind and the light rain now dripping from the velvet sky. Someone tall moved to stand in front of you, blocking you from the breeze and the drizzle. Finally allowing the lighter to spark to life. You muttered a thank you, taking a long drag, and finally looked up at the figure before you. 
Eris. 
“I thought you didn’t want to talk to me” Smoke flowed past your lips as you said it. He offered a half hearted smile before crouching to sit on the curb next to you. Someone who made me happy. Your words to Azriel echoing in Eris’ ears as he sat. 
“I just wanted a smoke.” 
He pulled the cigarette from your fingers and took a drag. Holding eye contact with you like a challenge. 
“That girl finally bore the shit out of you?” You shouldn’t comment on it. On her. You had no right. You were never really together in the first place and after what you had done. Running to Azriel as soon as Eris said he was done with you. You shouldn’t comment on it. 
He shrugged and tried his best to blow the smoke away from you as he exhaled. He turned back towards you. His eyes wandering across your face, down your neck, across your shoulders, and then suddenly backtracking. Back to the crook of your neck. That ever fading bite mark. That last physical reminder. His eyes stayed there. The deep russet color now smoldering. 
“You finally done with Az? Or is that just getting started?” 
“There’s nothing to start. There never was. I…get that now.” 
He snorted and brought the cigarette back to his lips. You ran your tongue across your teeth. Trying to think of something to say. 
“I’m sorry.” 
“You don’t have anything to be sorry for. You did exactly what you were expected to.” He paused and you spoke again, 
“Is that what you’re doing? Bringing a date here?” 
He shrugged again. Play the part. Eyes still boring their way through your soul. That slight bit of connection. That eye contact. However frustrated, however angry, filling some sort of hole that he had left in you. You sigh deeply and stare at your shoes. Lightly tapping your heels together like maybe the motion would somehow bring you home. Straight back into his arms. But it wouldn’t. 
“You know. We don’t have to stay the way other people see us.” 
Something in his gaze softened. Like your words had cracked through his walls. Built some sort of window that could be opened into a real conversation. So you continued, 
“Something to be fixed or someone to hate. Angry. We don’t have to be angry.” 
“Are you angry?” His voice was cool. Like he didn’t want you to know that he really did wonder if you were angry with him. For pushing you out. For being unwilling to talk after one issue. 
“Not at you. At myself for…” You trailed off. Eyes going distant. Voice growing soft and much much warmer. “Do you remember when we first met? You were wearing that white sweater. The one with the holes in it.” 
He tried not to smile. He didn’t think you remembered that. Didn’t know if you even really bothered to remember anything about him before he had managed to convince you to let him into your life for real. He nodded, looking away from you. 
“You know…When you finally made a move on me a couple months ago. I couldn’t fucking believe it. Eris Vanserra, could have anyone he wants, heir to his fathers company, ever charming, hockey super star, total fucking asshole to everyone….was talking to me like he really cared what I had to say.” 
He still wasn’t looking at you. He had hung his head and closed his eyes. As if remembering that night himself. 
“I don’t know if you were going to say it in the locker room. It seemed like you were. But…” You slump your shoulders before standing up and brushing yourself off. Leaves falling from where they had stuck to your legs. He turned to look at you, his eyes searching, almost pleading. Like he was begging you not to say what you were about to say. 
“As sick as it sounds. I loved you first Eris. I was just waiting for you to notice and then when you did I was so fucking scared that you would do what everyone told me you would do, that you’d fuck me and then leave me like it was nothing.” 
Again it felt like you were going to throw up, “And you proved them wrong. And that was scarier. Because what if I didn’t deserve it.” 
He tried to say something, but you cut him off. “You don’t have to say anything. You don’t have to forgive me. Maybe you shouldn’t. But I just…” 
You shake your head. Almost like you were giving up and started to walk away. You were going to toss one final thing over your shoulder. But you squared your shoulder and looked at him. He was standing now, like he wanted to follow you. Like he wanted to walk you home. Something he had grown so used to doing. But he didn’t budge as you said, 
“I feel empty without you.” 
A small smile spread across his face. A smile he had thrown at you when everything was okay. When you two were good. When you were happy. Mischievous. Fox like and sly. 
“Not like that. Not like in a sexual way. In the like I miss you way. Asshole.” 
A small laugh escaped his lips at that. At your slight teasing tone. You stare at each other for a moment before you say, serious now, 
“I miss you.” 
And with that you turned and started to walk down the street. You had to go home. You didn’t want to talk to any of your friends. Didn’t want to face Azriel again. Didn’t want to drink anymore or dance or act like everything was fine. 
He wanted to say it back. Every bone in his body screaming at him to say it back. To tell you that he missed you too. But he couldn’t. You were too far away. Too drunk. Too sad. 
But that smile he had given you. That teasing tone that you had held for even a split second. A small glimmer of hope. Maybe there was something to salvage there. 
Azriel leaned against the doorframe of the house. He had been watching the conversation you had with Eris. Not able to hear it, but monitoring from afar. He had followed you out. To try and talk. Try and apologize for everything. For how stupid he had been. He didn’t want to lose you…as a friend. Above all else as a friend. As family. That’s what you were supposed to be. You and everyone else in your friend group. Family. Your final words were all he had managed to hear. 
I miss you. 
Something you would have never said to him. Rightly so, Azriel supposed. Eris eventually turned away from your fleeting form and met Azriel’s eyes. Az wondered how long Eris had known he was skulking in the background. He offered Eris a small nod. A small concession. Eris nodded back. 
A brief. Silent. Understanding of sorts maybe. 
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withlovemark · 1 year ago
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all of the moments that led me to you.
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warning: steve's black eye (nothing new), violence, mentions of blood, a fight between steve x billy
pairing: steve x reader, light billy x reader (not really, this isn't a love triangle lol)
words: 4.5k+
summary: the title speaks for itself -- a series of moments with steve harrington
an: i was going to post everything as one fic but i kind of hit writer's block in the middle of year 1985 so i'll post this for now instead and hopefully gain some inspiration to continue :)
-
yr. 1984
i. the first meeting ft. dustin henderson
the words “code red” hitting your ears every five seconds, the stomping of feet running around the house, the back door opening and closing several times - babysitting is weird. not one kid is ever the same, some are easy-going, others can be a real pain in the ass. 
you hoped you got an easy kid today. one that just stays in front of the television, binging on crackers and occasionally asking for your help. obviously, you were wrong. 
if it wasn’t for the fact that it pays well while simultaneously allowing you to do some of your own studies and looking good on your college resume, you wouldn’t even be here.
but you are here. seated inside the henderson household. 
“hey y/n, can you please drive me to my friend mike’s house?,” dustin runs into the living room, an exasperated expression on his face, interrupting your reading. 
“are you okay?” you ask, worried about the kid you just met when his mother called an hour ago trailing on about how she saw your babysitting flyer some time back. and even though she knew that she had to book a date at least two days beforehand, she still asked if you could watch over her son. 
“just for today” she said, as she needed to look for her missing cat. her promise of double pay, convincing you to accept her request. 
“i’m fine, i just really need you to drive me to mike’s,” dustin says hurriedly, eyes hopeful that you wouldn’t ask anymore questions. 
“why?” you ask and the boy’s shoulder slumps, doing his best to not roll his eyes at your persistence. he’s obviously not used to  asking for permission. 
“i uhm forgot my book there and i really, really need it to study for my exam tomorrow,” he sends you a toothy grin, trying to convince you that that was all there is to it. you’re no fool. you notice the slight change in his voice, his fingers anxiously playing with his pockets, right leg slightly bouncing up and down - indications that he’s lying.
“you know your mom’s not paying for my gas, right?” you reason, not wanting to give in to his request and hoping you could just have a calm afternoon.
dustin sighs, his smile disappearing, “fine. i’ll just go behind your back and bike there and if i end up missing or in a ditch somewhere then it’ll be your fault,” he counters, personality quickly switching from the boy who said “please.” 
you sat there, flabbergasted, “are you…blackmailing me right now?” an eyebrow raising, you couldn’t believe how diabolical the curly headed boy is. 
“i’m not blackmailing you. i’m simply telling you what's going to happen if you don’t drive me,” he smiles, an almost devilish smile, tone hardening with every word and you truly do not know whether you’re terrified or impressed. 
letting out a quiet chuckle, you shake your head, “alright, c’mon kid,” you say, grabbing your car keys off the table, “but we’re going back as soon as you get it.”
——
you should’ve known not to trust him, finding yourself hurriedly getting into the back seat of the car of the last person you ever expected to interact with - steve harrington. 
pushing his forgotten red roses towards the other end of the car, you take your seat in the middle. 
“wh-what are you doing?” dustin turns from the passenger seat, facing you as steve takes in your presence, eyes on his rearview mirror, a confused expression evident on his face. 
“y/n l/n?,” he questions, finally remembering where he has seen you before, “you’re in nancy’s grade?,” he asks, more a question for himself than you. 
you nod, “steve harrington,” acknowledging his presence for the first time. 
 “why are you with dustin?” he wonders. he didn’t know much about you. only that you and nancy were sometimes studying in the library together. she’s told him before that you always get the top grades in class and she wanted to be around more motivated people like you. 
“i’m his babysitter and i’m coming with,” you simply answer his question, keeping the explanation short. it’s weird enough that you were inside the car of hawkin high’s famous “king.”
“since when did you have a babysitter dude,” steve reverts his attention back to dustin. 
“i'll explain later,” dustin reassures him quickly before turning back to you,  “and uhm, you don’t have to come, i have steve now,” he points to the guy in the driver seat like you don’t see him. 
from what you’ve heard about steve, you’re not sure you trust leaving the young boy with him. he’s known for being notorious, having bad company and overall, just a guy with the money, the looks and the popularity that somehow has every girl wanting him and every boy wanting to be him. you’re not sure how that guy can be trusted with kids.
subconsciously, you eye steve suspiciously, causing him to put two hands up in surrender “hey, i have no idea what’s happening either,” he defends, shrugging nonchalantly. 
snapping out of your daze, you focused your attention back on dustin, “look dustin, steve isn’t the one being paid to watch you right now,” you start to explain.
“hold on, you’re getting paid for this?” the older boy interrupted.
you ignore him, attention still on dustin, “if something were to happen to you, your mom would be looking for me. i’m responsible for you kid, i-,”
“fine! there’s no time,” he cuts you off, obviously in a rush. 
“you can come, just,” dustin contemplates, already regretting the words that slipped from his lips, “just don’t blame me for getting you into this thing.”
at that, steve snaps back to reality, “wait, wait, wait, if this ‘thing’ is about ‘that’ then she definitely can NOT come,” steve declared, his voice laced with a seriousness you didn’t think he could have. 
“well, are you going to drag her out of the car so she doesn’t find out about this thing?,” the younger boy replies, a sarcastic tone evident on his lips. 
“guys, i can hear you,” you piped in, eyes going back and forth between the two boys, having absolutely no clue what they’re referring to. 
“dustin, im not joking ok!,” steve ignores you, “we can’t tell people about this,” a serious expression appearing on his face, one you’ve never seen on him before, “we’ll get in trouble, you know that. besides, we shouldn’t involve anyone else into this anyway!,” he protested. 
he didn’t sound like the steve you would hear about at school. he sounded responsible, protective. he sounded like…a babysitter. 
“i know that steve, that’s why i told her to leave!,” dustin shouted. 
“well, she’s clearly still sitting in the backseat of my car!,” steve’s voice raises with every syllable. 
“can someone just explain what’s happening?” you try butting in, rolling your eyes, completely fading into the background as they continue their bickering.
“i don’t see YOU trying to do anything about it!,” dustin throws the argument back to steve, his patience on thin ice.
“she’s YOUR babysitter!,” steve points out yet again, ears turning red, veins popping and finally pushing the young boys’ limit. 
“fuCK!, we don’t have time for this steve, we really have to go NOW!” dustin shouts, losing his temper. 
steve, ready to reprimand him, before you decide you’ve had enough.
the series of “thing” and “this” has your mind spinning and your curiosity getting the best of you.  
“SHUT UP!” gaining the two boys’ attention, their bodies turning towards you, “both of you. shut. up.” you enunciate, loud and clear.  
“i promise i won’t blame you…or you,” glancing at the two boys, “for whatever the hell this thing is…just put your seatbelts on and drive,” ending their argument as you sat behind the passenger seat, clicking your own seatbelt into place. 
steve gives up, letting out a sigh, “fuck it,” before finally stepping on the gas. 
ii. the babysitters and an angry billy hargrove
you should have never picked up mrs. henderson’s call and you definitely shouldn’t have agreed to babysitting. what was the point of having your own terms and conditions when you didn’t even follow them yourself?
you should, however, have listened to steve and dustin when they told you to leave.
the day isn’t even over yet and you’re already questioning everything you knew. in a span of a couple of hours, you have been introduced to a world you couldn’t even imagine. having to pinch yourself a couple of times to make sure you weren’t just dreaming. 
everything was strange. 
you’ve spent the whole afternoon dropping meat, trying to bait something called a demogorgon. met steve’s spiked bat. got questioned regarding your relationship with billy hargrove from his very own red headed step-sister. came face to face with the said demogorgon, who, by the way, had demogorgon friends and were actually a pack of demodogs. almost died in a junkyard. walked in the dark woods just to end up in a creepy laboratory. felt the awkward tension between steve, nancy and jonathan. understood why will byers was called the zombie boy. stood behind steve while holding a random kitchen knife you grabbed from the byers’ kitchen — and to top it all off, encountered a little girl who flung the finally, very dead demogorgon through the window then unlocked the front door, all using only her mind. 
in conclusion, monsters and superpowers aren’t just a thing people read in their comic books.
“how are you holding up?” steve breaks you out of your thoughts, your eyes snapping to his voice. 
everyone else has left, leaving you the only two teenagers to act as the adults once again. 
the strangest thing of all of this was somehow, steve harrington went from being the popular jock to a guy whose simple presence can provide you comfort. everything you knew about him has changed. 
it’s amazing what shared trauma could do. 
you shoot him a small smile, “well, i definitely wasn’t expecting all this,” you look around the mess around you, “to be a part of that thing” you refer back to the boys’ banter, trying to keep the energy light despite everything that happened. 
he gives you a sheepish smile,  almost like he was sorry, regretting that he allowed you to be a part of this. 
“it’s not your fault. i chose to come,” you say, reading his thoughts and putting an end to them. 
“where did you put the demogorgon?” you continue, changing the subject, reassuring him that you were ok. at least, as much as anyone could be ok in this situation. 
“we stuffed it in the fridge,” he shakes his head, arms crossing, like he couldn't believe it himself, “‘for science’ dustin said,” steve quotes the younger boy with a grin.  
“right, of course, all the important things,” you chuckled, matching his grin as the two of you continued to clean the broken fragments that have scattered around the house. 
you thought it was over, that you could all just wait for everything else to unfold in peace but after a few minutes of silence, the kids were back on their feet, ready to "get off the bench.” you’re not sure how steve has the energy to continue arguing with them when you’re completely exhausted. 
the sound of an engine brings a silence to the house, max running towards the blinds recognizing the car that has made an appearance in the driveway, “shit, it’s billy, he can’t see me,” she says frantically, eyes meeting yours, a silent call for help. 
“i got it, just hide,” you hushly ordered, quickly making your way to the front porch. steve tried pulling you back but you were out the door before anyone could protest, resulting in him looking through the peephole. 
billy’s momentarily confused expression at your arrival wasn’t lost on you and if you were in his shoes you’d probably have the same one on, “hey sweetheart, what are you doing here?,” his husky voice taking up space in the cold, night air.
standing a couple steps away from him, his hand immediately finds a spot on your waist, pulling you closer. you placed a hand on his chest to keep some distance between the two of you, aware of the audience you have, “i’m babysitting a kid, his friend lives here,” you explain, smiling sweetly at him, hoping that he won’t suspect anything and leave as soon as he came. 
“have you seen my sister?” he asks breathily, face inching closer and closer to yours, a smirk on his lips. if it was any other day, you would have enjoyed his attention, maybe even be up for some fun. right now though, you just want him as far from max as possible. 
“no, why would she be here?,” feigning innocence, you hope he believes your lie. 
“she’s been hanging out with a couple of kids here, a bunch of bad influences,” he huffed, eyes quickly glancing around you before pulling you even closer.
“i haven’t seen her, she’s probably at the arcade, have you checked?,” you hope he doesn’t hear the shakiness in your voice. 
“you know what i like about you sweetheart?,” he muttered, placing a harsh kiss below your ear, his grip on your waist starting to dig into your skin. you know he has caught you. 
“you can’t lie for shit,” pulling you away from him, gaze darkening, he howled with laughter as you followed his line of vision, seeing four kids peeking through the window — one, with very bright red hair. 
frustrated curses slip from your lips as you shoot them an angry glance before billy grabs your wrist, dragging you right behind him as he pounded on the door, coming face to face with steve. 
“harrington, am i dreaming or is that you?,” he mocks, his hold on your wrist tightening. 
“yeah it’s me, don’t cream your pants,” steve rolls his eyes, hands on his hips like a disappointed mother. 
steve notices you wince under billy’s hold, “let her go man,” he orders, taking a step towards the wider boy. 
billy focuses his attention back on you, for a second you see a feeling of betrayal flash through his eyes but that was quickly replaced with a snarled expression, like he was completely disgusted with the thought of you. 
“is there a reason why you both are here alone?” his dark voice causes goosebumps to rise throughout your body. 
you’ve heard of how violent he can be but until right now, he has never shown that side to you. 
“what are you saying?,” you almost couldn’t recognize him anymore, breath hitching in your throat. 
“are you fucking him behind my back, sweetheart?,” billy’s voice grew menacing, “you know i don’t like to share,” he continued accusing you, his free hand coming in contact with your neck, forcing you to look at him. 
“dude, no. we’re babysitting,” steve answers for you and motioning towards the kids like it’s the most obvious answer in the world.  
“you’re hurting her,” he emphasized, “just let her go,” gently stepping closer, steve has his arms slowly reaching for you, hands up, a signal that he comes in peace. 
steve hopes billy will focus his attention on him instead, just wanting to get you out of there. he feels responsible for your safety and well-being. 
“gladly…” billy shot him an evil smirk, “you can’t trust bitches anyways right, harrington?,” he scowled, violently throwing you against the wall. 
your head makes a direct impact with the concrete, causing you to fall to the ground, a whimper slipping through your lips. you hear the kids' screams and a punch being thrown as you feel your vision slipping between darkness and light.  
you make out dustin running towards you and grabbing your hand, trying to get you to sit up. a couple of unsuccessful tries, he pleads “i’ll come back okay, just stay alive,” as he makes his way back to his friends. 
the proceeding events were all a blur and it felt like you were watching it through static television. one moment you can hear victorious cheers. the next moment, you hear something break and steve is suddenly lying on the floor a couple feet away from you, bloody faced and barely breathing. billy continuously throws his punches and the kids scream in fear. you try to get up but your body betrays you, only allowing you to reach out your arm towards the brown haired boy. 
somehow, the sound of the punches halted and billy fell to the ground. a sigh of relief escapes from your lips while the slow rise and fall of steve harrington’s chest becomes the last thing you see as you completely fade into the darkness.
the next time you open your eyes is to another set of screams, waking you up from your much needed slumber, if you can even call it that. you ignore the pounding in your head as you try to regain your vision. the first thing you feel are the strong arms in front of you, acting as your seatbelt, as you try to piece it all together. 
a couple minutes of confusion later, you finally recognize what’s happening, joining steve in full babysitter mode. the yelling of “no’s!,” and “stop the car’s!,” filling the tiny vehicle. 
“great, now they’re both awake!, i told you we should have just left them!,” mike cursed dustin annoyingly. 
“we were not going to leave them there, mike!,” dustin retorted, “c’mon guys i promised you’ll be cool, okay? just calm. down,” he softly ordered, like he was the babysitter and you two were his children. 
you scoff, “dustin, don’t fucking tell me to calm down!,” somehow fearing for your life now more than ever. 
“everyone just shut up, i’m trying to focus!,” max yells as lucas yells the directions in her ear. 
max makes a harsh turn causing a chorus of screams to rise. your hand immediately clutching around steve’s arm, face burrowing in his neck, seeking for protection, afraid of the crash that luckily never came. 
you’re not even too sure what happened the rest of the night but somehow you all made it out unscathed, besides the fact that you and steve are probably suffering matching concussions. 
iii. the heart-to-heart
in the tiny bathroom of the byer’s house, you find yourself standing in between steve harrington’s legs. his body feels familiar now, especially after you seeked comfort in each other in the dark tunnel, the two of you thinking it would be your last breaths. in some way, the miracle happened and the screeching demogorgons ran straight past the two of you, like you weren’t even there. 
you remember looking up at his golden, brown eyes. being that close to him, you noticed how beautiful they actually are and finally understood how he has charmed every girl at school. 
‘i guess it wouldn’t have been too bad dying in steve harrington’s arms.’ you thought to yourself.  
brushing those thoughts away, you bask in the moment of solitude within the commotion that is taking place behind the bathroom door. everyone reunited here, checking up on each other.
“does it hurt?” you ask him as you gently pat the alcohol covered cotton pad around his eye, cleaning up the bits of red that have stained them.
he slightly winces, hoping you didn’t notice, “i’m fine, this isn’t my first rodeo,” he assures, sending you a wink before completely regretting the tiny action, a frown briskly replacing his smile, causing small chuckles to slip between your lips. 
“you know, you should really stop getting into fights, i could’ve sworn you had a black eye just a year ago,” you remember it like it was yesterday - steve harrington walking the halls of hawkins high without his two minions for the first time, looking like he had fallen off his throne as the hushed whispers grew louder until they finally made its way throughout the school in a matter of minutes. 
you could tell he wasn’t at all the person he was trying to be and for a second, you saw yourself in him. you wanted to get to know that steve. the steve that may understand you. but that second didn’t last long. 
“so you were watchin me?” he teases, a smirk on his lips resulting in a playful shove and an eye roll from you.
gently grabbing his chin, you stare straight into his eyes, “of course i was. you’re steve harrington,” you remind him, “everyone watches you,” stating the facts before letting go and going back to removing all the dried up blood from his pretty face. 
he clears his throat, shrugging his shoulders, playing it cool, “yeah, i guess you’re right,” he says dumbfoundedly, making you laugh. 
“you’re ridiculous,” you quietly comment, a smile still on your lips. steve focuses on your light touches, trying not to wince every time you get near his open wounds. you notice his knuckles going white, gripping the toilet seat he was sitting on and ever so gently, hurried your actions. 
“there, all clean,” you softly declare as you slip from his space, turning around and putting all mrs. byer’s first aid kit back into place. he quietly thanks you, leaning his head back a bit to rest, his eyes shutting for a second. 
“thanks, by the way,” you break the silence “for protecting me earlier… with billy and all the upside down things,” you explain, looking at steve through the mirror. he nods, not entirely sure he’s deserving of your gratitude. you protected him as much as he protected you. 
“is he always that violent with you?” steve asks, an eyebrow going up. 
you immediately shake your head,  “no, he’s never laid a hand on me, i don’t know what came over him,” you say honestly. 
“why billy hargrove?” he asks, causing you to pause your actions, paying attention to him.
“what do you mean?” you reply, turning around to face him once again, your back against the tiny kitchen sink. 
“well, you didn’t leave dustin alone even though you just started babysitting him today, you care about having seatbelts on, you immediately covered up for max and just now, you took care of me when you should be taking care of yourself,” he points out, “you’re responsible and kind and you care and, well, billy is just a huge dick,” he finished, a hand flailing in the air as you stare at him, stunned at his observations.
you compose your thoughts for a while, not at all ready to have a heart to heart with steve harrington in a bathroom. 
instead, you throw the question back at him, “why nancy wheeler?” 
“you cannot possibly be comparing billy to nancy,” he replies quickly, a disapproving tone laced in his voice.
“i’m not,” you say defensively, “i’m just saying, she hurt you too but you’re still with her, you-”
“i-i don’t know if we’re actually still together,” he sadly replies, cutting you off, eyes dropping to the floor and you think back to the woods earlier that night — nancy emerging with jonathan right by her side. 
“but you still love her,” you continue, “even though she’s hurt you, you still love her,” you finish, trying to make a point.
“so, you’re in love with billy?” he concludes.
you scoff, wanting to say yes and finally drop the subject but the mere thought of agreeing with that sentence makes you visibly wince. 
“god no, i’ve been on a couple dates with the guy, it’s far from love,” earning an even more confused steve to face you. 
“i don’t know if it’s because i got my brains punched out or i really am just dumb but i completely lost you there,” he admit, a tiny smile on his lips and all you could do is sigh. 
heart to heart talk it is. 
“you’re not dumb, i just-” taking a deep breath, you prepare yourself.
“we all have our own reasons why were with someone,” you begin, “i’m just so tired of the perfect good girl image that has been imposed on me, it's like people just see me as that and nothing else,” as soon as you start, the dam breaks, flowing. 
you find yourself entrusting your deepest thoughts to him, “i can’t be fun because good girls aren’t supposed to be, i go to parties and people are confused that i'm there. you know, i even joined the cheerleading team so people can see me as something more? but all that does is fuel the assumption that i can do everything and still get shit done...that im not capable of mistakes and bad decisions. that i’ll turn out to be something great when really i’m just so damn scared all the time,” your voice breaks but before he could comment, you cleared your throat and continued. 
“i guess being with him makes people finally see me out of my stereotype” you confess, waiting for him to say something. the silence becomes overbearing and you feel completely vulnerable under his gaze. 
“oh,” steve responds, before bursting into laughter and you feel like a complete idiot, eyebrows shifting downward. god, you’re so ready to dramatically walk out of this bathroom and slam the door against his face but before you could do that, he notices.
“hey wait,” he says, gently grabbing your arm, asking you to stay as he arranges his thoughts.
“i’m sorry, i’m just relieved that you’re not actually in love with him because you deserve a lot better than billy hargrove,” he says charmingly, his cool facade still on display. 
“i know,” you agree, stopping yourself from rolling your eyes, “is that all?” you ask, still annoyed. 
“yeah,” steve starts, “i-no,” you give him time. you know that he’s having a war in his mind right now, the same one you just had. 
he avoids your gaze, thinking to himself, until finally, he puts his defenses down, “i understand you,” he confesses. 
“if it makes you feel better, it’s not at all greener on this side, i wished people looked at me less, i wish i didn’t have to go to all these parties just for people to respect me,” steve rattled on, feeling the weight fall off his shoulders with every word that falls off his lips, his facade disappearing bit by bit.
“i completely gave up on school because everyone has already expected me to fail and i started to believe them…it’s tiring having to pretend i’m this ‘king’ steve,” he quotes, “when really i am spiraling and have no fucking clue what i even want in life...i’ll probably just end up having a stupid job i hate and being as bitter as my father,” he sadly chuckles.  
“i’m just as scared as you,” he ends with a small smile, eyes meeting yours. he feels lighter after having said it all out loud for the first time and he can’t quite comprehend how he feels so safe sharing his saddest truths with you. 
but as you cast him a kind smile, the words “fuck stereotypes,” making its way to his ears, he can’t help but be thankful for the spilled truths and ajar doors. 
steve mirrors your expression and you’re glad you finally got to meet him. not “playboy” steve harrington and definitely not steve “the king” harrington. 
just steve. 
-
next: yr. 1985
an: a lil bridgerton reference there hehe ... thank you for reading! let me know if you're interested in reading the other moments i had planned :)
feel free to inspire me by dropping your thoughts, comments, suggestions, etc. here <3
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super-cosmic-library · 4 months ago
Text
staring at you staring at me
written for @steddie-week day 3: mutual pining
wc: 1085 I rating: G I tags: alpha steve harrington, omega eddie munson, courting, happy ending I [ao3]
“If you don’t stop staring at him, I’m going to tell Keith you’ve been slacking on the job.”
“You wouldn’t,” Steve says, turning away from watching Eddie examine every single VHS in the horror section of Family Video.
“No, I wouldn’t,” Robin agrees. “Did you know he tried asking me out again?”
“What the fuck? What’s wrong with him?”
“I could give you a list. First off, he needs a better deodorant, his sense of humor is abysmal, he thinks that women can hold their periods in like pee, he doesn’t know what the Loch Ness Monster is, he . . .”
Steve glances back at Eddie as his best friend continues to prattle on about their manager’s flaws. Eddie’s examining the same copy of Friday the 13th he’d looked at the day before. Steve loves the way the omega’s face scrunches up as he reads the synopsis before putting it back on the shelf and moving on to the next film.
Eddie’s attention flickers over to them, catching the alpha’s eyes. Steve gives him a little finger wave, which has Eddie pulling a chuck of hair in front of his face to hide behind.
“Steve, are you even listening to me?”
“Uh, yeah,” he whips around to look back at her, trying to recall the last thing she’d said. “Keith calls mashed avocados guacamole.”
“It’s just avocado, salt, and lime juice, Steve! That’s not guacamole!”
“Yeah, no, totally.” His gaze wanders back to Eddie, who’s now examining Fright Night.
“Just court him already.”
It’s a discussion they’d had repeatedly over the past several months. Steve had come up with excuses to not court the omega every time, ranging from giving him time to heal from his demobat wounds to having to kill Vecna again to Steve just having a bad hair day.
“My hair can’t be a mess if I’m going to start courting someone. It’s my best feature.” Steve had said.
Now, though, after months of excuses, he doesn’t have the energy for anything less than the truth. “What if he doesn’t want me?”
Robin raises an eyebrow at that. “Really? You think that Eddie doesn’t want you?”
“Well, yeah. I’m not exactly the type of alpha a guy like Eddie would go for. I mean, you’ve heard his cafeteria rants. I represent everything Eddie hates in the world.”
“He hates secretly nerdy guys who fight monsters and mother pups that don’t belong to him?”
“Preps,” he gestures to his starched polo and jeans. “He hates preps and rich kids.”
“Well, you’re not exactly rich anymore.”
She’s right. His parents had cut him off back in June when they found out once again that he’d not been accepted into any of the colleges they’d wanted him to apply for. In the year since he had graduated, his parents had expected that he would use the free time to round out his character and develop more “real world” experience to make his college applications more appealing to admissions boards. Unfortunately for them, the colleges they’d demanded he apply to required better greats than the ones he’d eeked by with. So his dad decided to cut him loose. Now, he rents the Henderson’s basement from Claudia, happy to help out around the house and get more time to torment Dustin like a real brother would.
“Come on, Steve. He’s in here practically every day for hours at a time, browsing the same selection of movies and making eyes at you. I mean, have you ever even seen him rent a VHS?”
“That’s because I rent them for him with my employee discount.”
“Does he even watch them?”
“Yeah, we watch them in the trailer for our weekly movie nights. I’ve told you about them, Rob.”
“Uh huh, uh huh,” she nods. “And how, exactly, do you two sit when you ‘watch’ these movies? Opposite ends of the couch? Separate seats entirely? Cause I’m willing to bet that not only do you cuddle during them, but Eddie initiates it.”
She’s right. But friends can cuddle without being romantically interested in each other. He and Robin cuddle sometimes. He and Tommy used to cuddle all the time before they drifted apart. Cuddling doesn’t mean Eddie’s interested in being courted by him.
He repeats the sentiment to her.
“I’m just saying, I think he’d be interested if you court him.”
“She’s right.”
Steve practically jumps out of his skin. He hadn’t heard Eddie approach the circulation counter. Embarrassment floods his cheeks. “Eddie, what–”
“You know I can hear everything you guys say, right? This place isn’t that big, and your voices are loud.”
Steve wants to shrivel up in a hole and die. He’s going to have to change his identity and move to a different state in order to escape his mortification. He’s going to have to–wait. Did he say . . .
“Did you say she was right?”
“Yeah. I feel like I’m going crazy with anticipation for when you start courting me,” Eddie easily admits. “I would have started courting you, but you seem like the kind of guy who’s traditional in that sense.”
Oh, god. He gets to court Eddie. Eddie wants him to court him. This revelation makes him want to sprint home to grab the gifts he’s been accumulating over the past few months and give them all to him at once.
Calm down, tiger. No need to rush it. Eddie deserves a proper courting ritual.
“So, when I ask to court you, you’re going to say yes?” His thoughts are in overdrive. He needs the confirmation before he gets ahead of himself with planning.
“Yes,” Eddie smiles.
Steve takes in a deep breath. “Eddie, sweetie, I’m going to need you to leave.”
The omega’s face falls. “What? Why?”
“Because I’m going to start freaking out in a really embarrassing way, and I don’t want you to see it. And,” he shoots him the signature Harrington smile. “I’ve got to start planning out our first date.”
Eddie pulls his hair in front of his face, swaying on the balls of his feet. “Will I still see you for our movie night tonight?”
“Wouldn’t dream of missing it. You still want Beetlejuice?”
Eddie nods.
“See you at eight, then.” He gives him a wink.
As soon as the shop door closes, Steve turns on Robin, eager to start talking through all his ideas until he comes up with the world’s best and most perfect first date.
The beta slumps against the counter. “Oh, god, what have I done?”
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perlelune · 1 year ago
Text
Tag, You’re It | Ethan Landry | ii.
Tumblr media
Happy, carefree college days meet their abrupt end when every guy who approaches you mysteriously turns up dead.
Warnings: NON-CON, Stalking, Bimbo!Reader, Clueless Reader, Loss of Virginity, Incel Ethan, Cheerleader Reader, Skin Carving (w/knife), Canon Typical Slashing, Voyeurism, Kidnapping
This is a dark story. Heed warnings before reading under the cut.
𝖘𝖊𝖗𝖎𝖊𝖘 𝖒𝖆𝖘𝖙𝖊𝖗𝖑𝖎𝖘𝖙
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The party’s already in full swing when you arrive at the OKB house. While getting ready, you lost track of time. Putting the finishing touches on your hair and nails took longer than you planned. 
You dodge the bodies swaying to the loud music to make your way to your friends through the swirling blue lights. 
Mindy spots you right away and waves at you. 
"Not bad, freshman," she praises as you twirl in front of her and Mindy to show off your nurse costume decorated with splashes of fake blood.  
They’re both sprawled on the couch, limbs twined. Expectedly, only Anika made the effort to don anything resembling a costume, a pumpkin-colored hat with a bloody knife poking out of it sitting atop her head. 
Mindy even bothering to come considering what happened the last time she attended a frat party is already a huge effort on her part. 
You chat for some time, sharing the latest news regarding your friends. 
 You learn that apparently Tara got into it with her sister…again.
A lot of tension has built between the two of them lately, Sam’s protectiveness clashing with Tara’s craving for independence. 
Maybe Sam’s been overdoing…but who can blame her?
Those two have been through hell and back. 
"Have you guys seen Connor?" 
While you attempt to sound casual, even tossing a shrug, Mindy sees right through you and flashes you a teasing grin. 
"One-track minded, huh?"
Your face warms. "Sorry, I just…I really looked forward to seeing him."
Anika gives your hand an encouraging squeeze. 
"It’s okay, babe. To be young and in love."
"And horny," Mindy adds, dragging a quick eye over your outfit as her smile broadens. 
Her comment sparks more heat in your cheeks. Sure, things between you and Connor are growing steamier. But you don’t want to rush anything. You like him, and you want your first time to be special, romantic.
"I’ll see you guys later."
"Have fun," Mindy says, waving her beer bottle at you.
Your search resumes and you grow nervous, pondering if Connor is even in attendance. Maybe you missed him. Downsides of running late. 
Damn you and your tendency to spend hours dolling yourself up. 
 As you wander across the room, you nearly crash into a familiar broad, muscular back.
An easy smile creeps on your face when your friend turns to face you. 
"Hi."
"Hey, looking good."
"You too, cowboy."
You’re pretty certain Chad’s never looked bad a day in his life. There’s a reason why he’s the most popular player on the team, and one of the most sought-after guys at Blackmore. Well…several, starting with the fact that his hotness is only matched by his unwavering kindness to everybody he meets. 
You suppose if you hadn’t known him for so long, you’d harbor a crush on him too. But you’re too familiar with Chad to see him in that light. You still recall when he insisted on wearing a Pokemon onesie for nearly a year. You used to watch cartoons with him and Mindy as children, play together. He’s even tried to get you into Magic: The Gathering at some point but you couldn’t understand how the game works so he gave up. He’s like the brother you never had. 
"So I hear you've met Ethan. He's cool, right?" He throws his muscular arm around Ethan’s neck affectionately. "A whole snack he is. Look at him." An endearing tinge of red decorates Ethan’s cheeks, his gaze fleeing yours. 
It draws a smile from you. You’re glad they’re getting along. 
You tilt your head, gauging his appearance. Confusion fills you.
You’re not exactly sure what Ethan’s costume is supposed to be. A knight perhaps? Either way, it’s original and it suits him.
"Hey again," you greet. 
He lifts two bashful fingers as a response, returning your smile.
"Yeah. I appreciate him helping me out."
Ethan’s chestnut gaze widens at your words. 
College’s busy enough for everyone. It’s incredible of him to offer some of his free time to help you out when it doesn’t benefit him in any way. 
Ethan opens his mouth as if he were about to say something but, before he can speak, someone taps you on the shoulder, beckoning your attention. 
You pivot in your high heels.
Your chest floods with warmth at the sight welcoming you. 
"Hey, gorgeous," Connor hums, giving you an appreciative onceover that turns your legs into jelly. His voice lowers as he approaches you. "I’ve been looking for you all night. Where have you been?"
Your heart skips a beat at his closeness, the scent of his masculine cologne and his mesmerizing blue eyes overwhelming you. 
"Just ran a bit late," you mumble. 
His hooded gaze takes you in as he suggests, "Well, you’re here now. Wanna go hang out in my car?"
Pursing your mouth, you hesitate. 
"I…I don’t know. Is that safe? Mindy says it’s always best to stay in crowded-"
He halts your explanation with a hand under your chin. Bewildered, you gawk at him. 
His pearly whites shimmer in the dusky blue and green hues saturating the room. 
"Do you trust me, gorgeous?"
You blink up at him, dazed and lost in the sea of his gaze. 
"Y-Yes, I do."
"I’ll keep you safe. I promise. Come on."
His hand engulfs yours as Connor begins to drag you toward the exit.
Chad’s deep, concerned voice interrupts the abrupt getaway. 
"Are you sure?" His forehead creases as he inches closer. "You don’t have to do anything you don’t want. You know that, right?" 
At first, you’re a bit confused. 
Then you remind yourself he’s just being protective. Both he and Mindy share that trait. In fact, her attentive eyes carve a searing dent in your skin from the other side of the room. 
Usually, you adore that about them, how caring they are. But right now, you find it a bit much. 
Connor isn’t a threat. He’s just the guy you like, not a serial killer. 
You place a placating hand on Chad’s arm. 
"It’s fine. I trust him. Catch you later, okay?"
He gives a belated nod, his jaw clenching as he stares Connor down, before letting you walk away. 
You wave Ethan goodbye but are somewhat dejected when he stares at you and doesn’t reply, his blank expression unreadable.
Both you and Connor step outside. 
Moonlight bathes the damp pavement in silvery light as you trail behind him. 
He wastes no time once you’ve reached his expensive sports car, pinning you against the hood and kissing you senseless. 
"Fuck, been dying to do this ever since I saw you in that slutty costume," he purrs against your temple. His hands begin to roam over you, impatient fingers fondling your curves. 
When he sneaks under your short dress and tugs at the waistband of your panties, you push against his chest. 
A sudden tide of discomfort swells inside you. 
"Connor…wait. This is going a little fast for me," you giggle.
Ignoring your protests, he keeps kissing you and even turns things up a notch by grabbing a fistful of your ass. You gasp. 
"Just relax. I won’t hurt you, gorgeous."
His weight presses against you, a sizzling cage of need you can’t escape. Tears prick at your eyes. 
"Connor, please…" you whimper.
Annoyance ripples in his tone as the grip on your rear gets firmer. 
"How you’re gonna be a fucking cocktease then give me blue balls, come on, gorgeous."
His tone is light but your chest is heavy. This isn’t how tonight was supposed to go. You hoped Connor would be gentle and nice. 
This isn’t nice. 
And you’re starting to feel a little scared. As the taut bulge in his crotch rubs at your front, your stomach knots.
But things don’t get to wander any further.
In fact, they hit a sudden stop as Connor stills against you. Your brows knit. 
As he chokes on his own breath, blood gushes from his mouth, painting the front of your costume crimson. 
Your eyes widen as his head lolls before he slumps to the pavement with a heavy thud. 
Time stands still when your gaze lifts. 
Your heart slams against your ribcage.
A tall figure clad in black and donning a Ghostface mask is now standing before you.
The blood rushing in your veins makes your ears ring.
The stranger cocks his head, studying you for a few seconds before pouncing on Connor’s prone form like a starved hyena. 
Horror-struck, you gawk as the stranger rains vicious stab after vicious stab upon Connor's writhing body. Each strike draws a shudder from you, more violent than the last and causing scarlet rivers to flow from every part of Connor. 
The world becomes red. 
A scream bubbles in your throat but remains trapped in it, shock striking you mute. 
When Connor's body stops moving, the sickening squish of the blade twisting out of his mangled flesh reaches you. 
With the knife in his hand still dripping blood, its crimson hue catching the moonlight, the killer rises to his feet. 
His focus travels to you. Your insides coil, deadly anticipation gripping you as tight as a fist. 
A gravelly, distorted voice rises beneath the mask. 
"This is the part where you run, princess."
Right…
It’s what happens in those horror movies Mindy had you watch with her, you think. The characters run away, fighting whatever’s chasing them with all their might. 
It’s the sensible thing to do. 
And you want to move. You should move. But you can't. 
Even breathing is toilsome, stilted whimpers and gasps spilling from your chest instead. 
All you can do is peer into the pupil-less gaze of the mask as you crumble into a quivering, sobbing heap onto the pavement. 
The killer inches closer and it's as if your heart jumps out of your chest. 
His blade kisses the trembling flesh of your throat, right above your racing pulse. 
Languid tears roll down your face as he traces your jugular. 
Cool metal slices past your collarbone, to your rapidly heaving chest. 
The song of the night yields to the symphony of fear echoing in your ears. Every scattered heartbeat. Every uneven breath. Every desperate sob.
A sharp stinging blooms in your delicate flesh as he carves oblong patterns on your breast with his knife. 
His motions are slow and focused, as if your skin’s the canvas and his blade the brush. 
Paralyzed, you don’t move. His cloaked figure bends and blurs in your misty vision, more monster than man in the scarce light provided by the street lamps.
He slants his head when he’s done, admiring his handiwork. 
This must be it, you infer, the moment all of it ends. 
Your eyes quake shut as you wait for the inevitable blow. 
You wait… An eternity it seems. 
For the blood. For the agony. For the darkness. 
Yet nothing comes. 
When you open your eyes, Ghostface is gone, the only nightmarish vision before you being that of Connor's body lying unmoving on the pavement. 
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You pay no attention to the chaos around you as you pull the thin blanket closer to your frame.
The lights of the ambulance twinkle in your hazy sight. 
Amidst the chatter of shocked students standing in the street behind the yellow tape, the whispers of reassurance of Mindy and Tara fade to white noise in your ears. 
Numb, you gawk as they drag Connor’s body away on a gurney.
For some silly reason, you keep expecting him to rise again, to not be dead.
Because this cannot be real.
This cannot have happened. 
The police ask you a barrage of questions and you give mechanical answers. None of them help and they grow frustrated with you, sparking a heated argument between your friends and the stubborn cop. 
"I’m just doing my job," he insists, raising his hands when Chad gets in his face.
If it weren’t for Detective Bailey vouching for you, you’re not entirely sure you wouldn’t be sitting in the back of a patrol car right now. 
"Can’t you see the kid’s traumatized. She doesn’t know anything," he berates one his co-worker who seemed unwilling to accept your version of events. 
The one where you froze and Ghostface somehow let you live with only a strangely shaped scar on your chest as a souvenir. The one the medic commented looked a little like a heart. 
Absently, you pat the gauze covering the healing wound. 
It's weird…but it hurts your head to ponder why this occurred. The only emotion you can process is the crippling guilt consuming you. 
You’re alive while Connor's cold body is on its way to the morgue.
Your friends gather around you, their warmth chasing away the night’s chill. While Tara and Mindy sit next to you on the pavement, Chad stands protectively in front of you. 
"I-I didn’t do anything, Tara. I just let him…" Your voice cracks, withering into a sob. 
The arm around your shoulder gets tighter.
"Hey, don’t talk like that. It’s not your fault," she feverishly responds.
You open your mouth to argue but close it once it dawns on you that all the energy’s been drained from your body. There is none left in you.
Still, you can’t help but disagree. If it were Tara, her sister, or even Mindy, you bet they’d have fought tooth and nail instead of shrinking and crying like you did. 
You’re the weak link in your group. Not smart enough, or strong enough. 
The thought makes you sob harder. 
Mindy rubs circles on your back. 
You cast a quick glance around before your tearful gaze finds hers. 
"Where’s Anika?"
"She went home. She’s not great with blood. She sends her love though."
You nod at that. If you could, you’d be home too, hugging your stuffed bear and trying your best to forget this awful night ever happened. 
Chad’s irate tone startles you out of your fog. 
"Speaking of people not being here… where the hell is Ethan?" 
You blink up at him, confused as he and Mindy trade a pointed, heavy look.
You don’t get it. 
Sure, Ethan’s new to the group, and the twins are slow to give their trust. You know that. But Ethan? He’s entirely too sweet and kind to have anything to do with this…Right?
Ethan wouldn’t. You’re sure of it. 
~
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sylusjinwoon · 6 months ago
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{ 160 }
within your embrace.
no curses | college au
megumi fushiguro x fem.reader
when megumi spent the whole day without receiving a single text or call from you-
the young man knew that something was completely amiss within the universe. ever since he began dating you 3 years ago, your presence always remained the one stable part of his life.
sure, megumi would feign annoyance each time you would shoot him a good morning text, but little did you know, his smile would remain so wide and bright each time he looks down at the screen while reading your text over and over again.
and during those long nights where megumi had to pull an all-nighter writing papers, or studying for those last minute exams, he deeply cherished your calls while attempting to keep him company (not even minding when you ended up falling asleep in the process).
so the fact that he had to spend nearly 21 hours without any contact with you-
megumi knew that he had to act fast.
he looks at the time on his phone, with the time nearing 10pm. if he made a run for the closest convenience store, then he would be able to buy all of your favorite snacks and food before heading to your apartment. not wishing to waste even another second, megumi exits his dorm with his wallet and keys in hand.
megumi reaches his car, pulling out his phone from the confines of his jeans, getting into his car while dialing your number. he keeps his phone pressed against his ear even as he drove to the nearest convenience store. and at the tenth ring, your voicemail was heard echoing within his ear.
{ sorry, i can't get to the phone right now. how about you leave a message, and i'll get back to you later? byyyyye! }
"i'm coming over, you better be ready for me." megumi states while clicking his tongue, hanging up the phone while trying to fight back the anxiety that threatens to take over his mind.
please for the love of god, be okay!
megumi tosses aside his phone on his passenger seat, parking haphazardly when he reaches the store and kills his engine. as if he were running on autopilot, he stiffly gets out of the car and heads directly toward the brightly lit building, grabbing a basket while filling it with all of your favorite things.
from snacks, to candies, even ice cream and a variety of sodas-
megumi did not hesitate to buy all of your favorite items in bulk for you, adding your favorite bento boxed meal into the basket before proceeding to pay for it all.
when he dumps all of the food and snacks onto the cash register, the cashier lets out a low whistle while ringing it all up. "what's all this? you got a heavy study session tonight?"
megumi shakes his head while running a hand through his hair. "no, i'm worried about my girlfriend. she hasn't been picking up her phone, and whenever i text her, she leaves me on read."
the cashier hums, now bagging all of the items. "you got into a bad argument with her?"
"hell no. we've been fine. but she did start working recently-"
megumi's eyes widen with realization now. the cashier seems to realize his epiphany while grinning at him, handing him the bags filled with snacks and food. she tells him the total as megumi pays for it all with his card, and after waiting a few seconds for the transaction to go through, he takes out his card from the reader and grabs the bags.
"thanks..."
"go get her, dude!" the cashier calls out to him just as he leaves the convenience store, placing all of the food within the backseat before returning to the driver's seat.
feeling a little more relaxed and confident in your reasoning for not contacting him today, megumi arrives at your apartment and parks in a random corner, taking all of the bags while making his way up to you. he takes the stairs two at a time, all too eager to see you again.
a few minutes later, he stands in front of your door while giving it several loud knocks. "oi, dummy, you better open the door!"
megumi hears what sounds like a gasp coupled along with some shuffling. after waiting a few beats, the door opens, revealing you as you had to be in the most pathetic state of your life.
your eyes were still rimmed red with tears, cheeks appearing damp from the sheer amount of times you had to have cried today. adjusting his hold on the bags, he transfers them all to one hand, using his free hand to bring your body closer to him in an embrace.
megumi softly whispers comforting words to you, brushing his lips against your temple, soothing you for a moment before inviting himself into your apartment.
once he was finally inside, he demands that you relax on your couch as he moved around your kitchen (after handing you the bags of your favorite snacks, first). he opens the bento box and works on heating it up, getting it to the perfect temperature before giving it to you with some utensils.
as you dig into the food, megumi takes sips from one of the bottles of sodas he had purchased, listening to you talk about your first week at work between bites of your food. he allows you to vent about your strict supervisor and almost lazy coworkers, listening to each and every syllable that comes from your mouth.
when you were finished talking about your first week at your new job, megumi flashes you a smirk. "shall i take you to work tomorrow and have a little talk with your coworkers?"
your eyes go wide, and megumi almost chuckled in response to your panicked expression. "no! absolutely NOT, 'gumi! i know you're going to want to threaten or beat them up...!"
megumi raises his eyebrows at you. "well damn, i guess you know me too well after all."
ah, there it was, the smile he had so desperately wanted to see the whole time. you were giggling while playfully hitting at his chest, and megumi couldn't help but feel relieved now. getting a bit emotional, he takes you in his embrace, causing you to stiffen slightly in response.
"you have no idea how worried i was about you... when you didn't send me an annoying good morning text, or even called."
a soft giggle was heard coming from you before you wrapped your arms around megumi, placing your lips against the side of his neck. "sorry, 'gumi... i guess i just needed some time to cool off. i didn't mean to ignore you."
"it's okay, don't apologize." megumi's voice takes on a deeper tone, gently moving your head away from his shoulder. he takes a moment to admire your beauty before placing a hand on your chin. "you're allowed to have all the time in the world you need for yourself... just... just let me know, so i won't have to worry, okay? can you promise to do that for me?"
he watches as you give him a nod, "i promise, megumi."
"good."
satisfied with your answer, megumi leans in forward to capture your lips within his, having every intention of helping you forget about all the stress your job had given you-
and you weren't one to complain as you spent the entire night basking in his kisses.
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a.n. - dedicated to @xbarrjallenx 🥰
all stories are written by rei; reposts, translations, and plagiarism are not allowed.
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ivystoryweaver · 8 months ago
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March the 9th
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Marc Spector x gn!reader 1.4k words, angst, sex is implied, no smut, tw abuse, not beta'd
☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚
Your skin tingles as you struggle you steady your breathing. Pacing the floor for an hour does nothing to calm that fuzzy feeling in the center of you.
He’ll be here soon.
You’ve memorized the pattern on the ceiling over your bed, because you stared at it the entire night, never once slipping into blissful slumber.
Your phone never rings. No emails, no letters, no messages.
But he always shows.
Bouncing on your toes, you smooth your hands down the lines of your body, checking your reflection, which lets you know you look the same as you did five minutes ago.
☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚
The first year...
Your family moved onto the Spectors’ street when you were nine years old. You quickly befriended the Spector boys, often playing with them after school and on weekends.
Then, one day, Randall was gone. You were supposed to play with them that day, but you had the flu.
Marc was never the same and you didn’t see much of him, except at school. The Spectors didn’t throw him a birthday party and he didn’t show up at yours either.
So you created a handmade birthday card for him, making a point to cross his path at school. He was absent.
The next year approached, and you realized the Spectors once again would not be throwing a party, so you gave Marc his birthday card on March 8th. He jerked it out of your hand, eyes downcast, muttering, “thanks,” before shuffling away.
You called his name, scampering after him, but he never looked back. The two of you were in middle school now and Marc didn’t seem to have many friends at all. Hopefully he would read the card, which invited him over to hang out.
He did.
On the night of March 9th, he crawled through your bedroom window for the first time. Tears streaked down his cheeks as his body trembled.
“Can I sleep on your floor?” He brokenly whispered.
You had a queen sized bed, so, of course you didn’t let your clearly devastated friend sleep on the hard floor.
“Don’t tell anyone,” he murmured drowsily, once he slid beneath the covers. “Please, they’ll kill me.”
You didn’t understand and he wouldn’t explain. You were only twelve years old. You squeezed his hand and let him rest.
He talked to you after that, only sometimes.
The next March 9th, you gave him another card, with another invitation to come over. He did. Your fingers tangled with his.
Again at fourteen, when, after swiping the tears from his eyes, he kissed you. He kissed you for a long time and you thought you’d never felt anything so magical.
At fifteen, he kissed and touched you all night long. Your heart was his now.
Still, he kept to himself for most of the other 364 days a year.
At sixteen, he climbed into your bed and the two of you lost your virginity. Neither of you had a clue what you were doing - clumsy and wild and sweet. But he kissed you and held you and he tried. You loved him and you had never felt so close to anyone in your life.
He flinched away from your touch several times, so you thought you must be doing something wrong.
It wasn’t until seventeen that you saw his well-hidden bruises and red welts by your bedside lamplight.
“Who did this to you?” Tears streamed down your face as your fingertips traced lovingly around anger and drunkenness unleashed on his beautiful body.
His eyes met yours and you knew. He came to your bed a lot more after that.
Then came eighteen. Three months before graduation. You asked him all the time where he wanted to go to college - where the two of you could go together, but nothing ever came of it. He only answered, “I have to get out.”
March the 9th of year eighteen was the last you saw of Marc Spector for a long time. He didn’t make it to graduation.
He sent you a letter in year nineteen.
‘I’m sorry,’ was all it said.
Year twenty passed. 21, 22, 23…
You graduated college and met someone. But every March the 9th, your fingers would trace his picture, so your "someone" didn't last.
More than a few March 9ths ago, you somehow wished him right back to you. He knocked on your door, shuffling anxiously from foot to foot, swallowing hard and expecting rejection.
You threw your arms around him. “Happy birthday,” you whispered against his cheek before his mouth found yours.
He took you to bed and you knew then that your heart would only ever be his.
It wasn’t enough though. He granted you a half-hearted explanation about danger and old debts and how he was so messed up - he could never bring it all into your life.
You had enough dignity to refrain from begging him.
The next March the 9th was the same. And the next, and the next.
☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚
This year, you’re resolute. It will be the last. It has to be. You can’t do this anymore. He doesn’t love you - not the way you love him. You’ll wish him happy birthday, take him to your bed, but - never again. It hurts too much.
A sharp knock jolts you out of your reverie, sending all the air rushing out of you. Squeezing your eyes shut, you steady yourself, giving yourself one final moment to prepare for your last night with Marc.
You reach for the door and find him holding flowers. Irises.
“You like these…right?” Dark eyebrows shift hopefully.
You breathe his name, your heart flaming with adoration. You take the bouquet and wrap your arms around his neck like always, whispering, “Happy birthday,” against his cheek as his lips seek out your own. He tastes you slowly…sweetly, his breath mingling with yours.
You lose your grasp on the irises, forgetting to care as they spill to the floor. Strong arms wind around you as his hands spread across your back, pressing you against the solid warmth of his chest. The kiss goes on and on until you’re dizzy and breathless and hot tears wet your eyes at the thought of never tasting him again.
You fight them back as the two of you finally make it through the front door and he kicks it closed. He takes you to bed and you drown in the essence that is Marc - unearthed secrets, soul-crushing burdens, beautiful desperation and a kind of hungry tenderness. You bury your nose in the crook of his neck, comforted and tormented as you inhale the spicy, sun-kissed scent of him, your lips tasting, committing him to memory.
Saltiness seeps into your mouth and you’re not sure if it’s the slight sheen on his skin as he works his way into you, or the tears slipping down your cheeks.
Your fingers twist through his dark curls as you pull your body flush against his - the heat of your tongue - the twist of your body - the scrape of your fingernails desperately attempting to communicate your need for this man.
He’s been your birthday wish most of your life.
He holds you against him until the calendar turns to the 10th. The sun rises and you realize he’s never stayed this long.
Which will make the speech you’ve planned so much harder. You shuffle to the bathroom while he sleeps, steeling yourself for the heartbreak. As you stare into the mirror, tears burn your eyes and you wonder if you can go through with it. The thought of never seeing him again is crushing, but you can’t go on like this.
Finally, you straighten out your appearance and freshen up, fighting like hell to keep your composure.
Marc is awake, sitting on the edge of your bed in only his boxers. You expect him to be dressed and ready to walk out the door, but as his warm, coffee colored eyes find yours…
He gently smiles.
“Marc?” You whisper, slowly approaching him.
“Come here,” he softly instructs, reaching for you. You sink down beside him, your foreheads touching sweetly as he grips your arms.
“Could…do you think I could stay?”
Tears trickle down. Again. “I don’t know,” you whimper. “I-I can’t-"
“I know.,” he nods, pressing an urgent kiss to your mouth. “I’m sorry. I’ll go.”
He’s off the bed and reaching for his clothes before you can blink, but you don’t let him get far. “Stay,” you urgently plead. “Stay with me.”
He freezes, eyes wide and hopeful. “F-for tonight, or…”
“Stay,” you repeat, pressing your palms to the heat of his bare chest. “Stay or go. Just decide.”
☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚
Next March the 9th…
“Happy birthday, baby,” you murmur against his lips as he rolls you underneath him.
“Happy anniversary,” he returns, sealing his mouth to yours.
☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚☾ ⋆*・゚:⋆*・゚
Marc Spector-Centric stories
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