#and this fucking bitch decided to SCREAM at the freshman when they said hey what if we did that every time we swept! because it was fun to

[lighthouseas]

on another note i fucking hate my theater director. lol

.

[nightowlfandom]

Billy Loomis and Stu Macher x Reader- 27 (Part 2)

Hey beautiful people! SOOOO I got a comment on my last Scream imagine and they said...

ok but like a part 2 where we go picking them all off one by one and tell them what happened to (y/n) before we end them? and the revenge on the parents for it too? make them feel sorry for what they did and expose them to everyone. I mean not forcing but lightly tapping an idea

and....I AM IN LOVE...SO I GOT YOU BRAH 

READ PART 1?

CHECK OUT MY MASTERLIST HERE!

Okay so you know the drill, I will let you know when to proceed with caution.

LEGGO!

... (Picking up directly after the events of part 1)

“...My parents weren’t the most loving people around.” you stared down at your fingertips. “They were overbearing...very controlling...loved to gaslight me from time to time.” you felt a lump form in your throat. “After the Hanna thing, they tried to sent me to boarding school.”

You three sat in Stu’s basement. You sat cross-legged on the floor and Stu and Billy cleaned up the dead body. Stu had given you a rag to wipe the blood off your face and hands. 

“A while back before we all met...my parents weren’t too bad. Then Hanna came along and decided to ruin that for me too. She and her friends dragged me into the woods and beat me up...I was bleeding out everywhere...she told my parents I attacked her...she told them that I-..That I tried to kill her.” you shook your head. “My parents never looked at me the same...like they disowned me without saying they did.” you sniffed.

“What about the others?” Billy ceased his activities to stare at you. He was impressed how well you seemed to be taking everything. 

“ Dylan leaked my friend’s nudes, Jennifer is Hanna’s slave...she was Hanna Number 2 when she couldn’t torture anyone else. Rachel....I just hate Rachel, and Cameron...is my ex.” you explained. “There are others...many others.” you seethed. 

“And we’ll get to all of them.” Stu finished his job of tying Hanna’s legs together. “But first...how do you feel?”

“Like I just killed someone.” you half-joked, bringing your knees to your chest. “Why didn’t you guys tell me?”

“We didn’t want to scare you.” Billy reminded you. “We know how you are Y/N.”

“Still.” you pouted. “It would have been nice to know that you two were behind all this.” you stared at the floor. “Why didn’t you guys...y’know-”

“We wanted to...” Billy dusted himself off. “We tried...then you just had to charm us with that smile of yours.” he bit his lip as he smiled at the thought. “You just had to go and be adorable.”

There he was, standing with Stu hunched over a notebook of possible victims. They had agreed you’d be next, they really did. They had introduced themselves to you and gained your trust, but along the way, your kindness, your willingness to be so vulnerable around then...accepting them (especially Billy) for their flaws, they couldn’t...they wouldn’t.

“Can I help with anything?” you asked, standing to your feet. 

“Not unless you know a place to dump this body.” Billy replied. 

“There’s a lake behind Hanna’s house...” you recalled. “I saw it when my parents used to go over there for dinner.”

“Great!” Stu skipped over and took you in a hug. “So who do you wanna get first?”

“Me? You’re letting me choose?” you stared up at Stu who swore up and down you looked the most adorable you ever have, if that was even possible. 

“This is your list, isn’t it?” Billy casually strode over. He tilted your chin up at him. “Just let us take care of it.”

“...Dylan first.” you concluded. “It’s for my friend...he has to go.” you asserted. 

“As you wish princess.” 

...(The Next Day)

   You trudged away from your parent’s car, doing your usual habits of ignoring them as they saw you off. You saw Billy and Stu waiting for you on some benches. They glared behind you, obviously getting a good look of your parents. 

“Hey cutie.” Stu threw himself at you, hugging you super tight. “How’d you sleep?”

“Shitty...” you mumbled. “Guess who just caught word of Hannas’s...untimely demise.”

“Serves the bitch right.” Billy flicked his middle finger at your parents as they drove off. Out of the corner of your eye, you saw Dylan throwing around a football with his friends. His gaze darted in your direction. He looked surprised to see you and Stu so close, so much so that he hesitated to throw the ball back to his friends. “Hey asshole, you got your turn. Hand her over.” Billy flicked Stu on the head as he pulled your out of Stu’s embrace.

“Oh you’re no fun.” Stu laughed, waving him off. Billy wrapped his arms around your waist, pulling you to his chest and gingerly trailing his fingers down your back. 

“Hey Y/N...” 

You paused your momentary happy moment when Dylan came jogging up. You pulled away from Billy and faced your friend’s ex-boyfriend. “What?”

“Um...Hey.” he did that douche-bag hair flip. “What’s up?”

“I’m just spectacular.” you grimaced. He was really talking to you like he wasn’t the reason your only other friend switched schools. “Need something?”

“Yeah. I wanted to invite you to my party tonight.”

‘I’d rather-” you began, only to realize the mega opportunity you’d receive. 

“Are your other friends coming?” you shifted all your weight to one side and pretended to absentmindedly twirl your hair. 

“Um...Y-yeah.” he nodded.

“Can my friends come?” you acted oblivious and dumb, the only language he and his friends seemed to understand when it came to women.

“Sure. They can come join the fun.” he winked. “Tonight, 8:00 o’clock.”

“Splendid, you winked. I’ll be there.” 

As Dylan returned to his friends, all of them laughing about the joke they thought you didn’t understand, Billy and Stu stood at your sides.

“You’re killer is showing, love.” Stu kissed the side of your head. “Easy now.” he laughed, even though he knew he was talking complete bullshit.

“I’m gonna have so much fun slitting that one’s throat.” Billy pointed to Rachel. “This is gonna be awesome.”

...(That Night)

You had managed to make it a few hours. Without completely losing your mind. Billy had taken it upon himself to put up him brooding angst-filled sadboi attitude and Stu showed up in his honorary pimp robe. 

Now you all were sitting in a circle, playing stupid games.

“Y/N...truth or dare?” Jennifer called on you next, noticing how quiet you had been.

“Kiss, Fuck, Or Kill. Stu Macher, Cameron Kent, and Dylan Bayle.”

With a bored grin, you looked her right in the eye. She dared you to say you would fuck her boyfriend, little does she know...

“I guess I’d have to kiss Cameron...” you began warmly, recalling how you two used to date. Gross... “And as much as I love pissing you off...I wouldn’t touch Dylan with a ten foot pole...so I’d have sex with Stu.”

A few wolf whistles from the guy chorused around the circle as a few guys pat Stu on the back. Your eyes looked over at Stu whose cheeks were tinted pink. He shot you a smile and a quick wink.

“And you know what that leaves?...I’d kill Dylan.” you smirked, only to put on a front again. Before anyone could say anything else, you all heard a phone ring. Coincidentally, the phone was right next to you. 

“Y/N, get that will you. Put it on speaker.”

“I got you.” you grabbed the phone. “Hello?”

“What number is this?”

“What number are you trying to reach?” you replied.

“I dunno...”

“Sure buddy.” you rolled your eyes as you hung up.

“Okay! Dylan!” Rachel drunkenly asked. “Truth or Dare!”

“Dare baby!” Dylan laughed.

“I dare you to go into the bedroom with Y/N and do something with her!” she laughed. “You can’t leave until you do something!”

“Did anyone ask my opinion on this?” you felt disgusted as the words left your mouth. How much longer were you gonna have to put up with this? “Stu, help me out!” 

“A dare’s a dare, babe.” he laughed as he took another swig of whatever. 

“Ugh!!” you grimaced as you stood up and followed Dylan. You made sure to lightly bump your shoulder against Stu’s as you walked. You two looked eyes momentarily, sharing a discrete smirk between eachother.

The door closed behind you. (PROCEED WITH CAUTION! READ MORE BELOW THE LINE BREAK)

...

You stood there, playing with your fingers as Dylan came up to you.

“You know Y/N...I’ve always liked you.”

“Oh really?” you asked shyly. “W-well why didn’t you tell me?” you half giggled half gagged.

“I couldn’t find the right words.” he reached out to touch your cheek.

Meanwhile downstairs, everyone laughed at the hidden camera footage they were watching. They couldn’t wait to post this to the school’s website. 

“Oh my god!” you screamed at you pointed behind Dylan. Everyone watched as a dark hooded figure creeped up behind Dylan and grabbed him buy the back of his head, digging a knife into his shoulder. Then he charged for you, stabbing you in the stomach...slowly but surely he creeped up to the camera, looking directly at it. “Nuh uh uh~” he sang before he punched the camera, causing the signal to break.

This caused everyone to scream bloody murder and attempted to scream.

Back in the bedroom, you had managed to hear the screaming. “Can I get up now?” you rolled over. “Pretending to die is so weird.”

“Allow me.” Billy walked over and helped you to your feet, ridding himself of his Ghostface mask. “You look good covered in fake blood.”

“Do I?” you fake pouted. Billy didn’t answer and instead kissed you. He held your face in his hands, gently moving his soft lips against yours. He would have went crazy is Dylan managed to get that far. He was glad that he could finally show how he felt about you in a personal way. 

“You do.” he bit his lip as he pulled away.

“W-what the fuck?!” Dylan, who was very much alive looked between you two. “You’re in on this.”

“Oh shut up!” you grabbed Billy’s knife and walked up to him. “Kyla Grayson, who is she?”

“Kyla Grayson?”

“ARE YOU AN ECHO?” you snapped. “Who is she?”

“I don’t know! I swear!” he tried to cower away from you.

“You don’t remember showing private pictures of a young impressionable freshman to your fucking friends?” you glared. “She trusted you...she liked you a lot...and because of you she had to move to a different county.” you raised the knife over your head. “Any last words?”

“SURPRISE!” Stu burst through the door, also dawning a Ghostface getup, only without the voice changer. He was dragging Jennifer and Rachel by the hair.

“You’re just in time for the show.” you said, not looking up from Dylan. 

“Y/N...y-you’re-”

“Don’t talk.” you kept your eyes on Dylan. “I’ll get to you soon.”

(Part 3 will be revenge against your parents)

[sortavibing]

saline solution I suna rintarou

yuhhh we coming back with a part two😩 part one linked here

One, two, three and four

suna stared at his phone, counting the days since he sent that message. he sighed, knowing that there was no chance that those stupid texts would ever make you forgive him. he slouched (even more) in his seat on the subway and put his head in his hands, muttering curses at how stupid he was.

why the fuck did i have to do that?

the ping of his phone woke him up from his angry trance. he slowly looked up and saw an Instagram notification from your account.

i'm surprised they haven't blocked me yet

he muttered, opening his phone to check your post. once he saw it, he audibly said "FUCK" attracting the attention of the other people on the subway. he didn't notice, too busy looking at your post, over and over and over again. you had a new boyfriend. you were smiling brighter than he had seen you smiling for 6 months, clinging onto a new person, who looked equally happy to be in your embrace. the deal was sealed. you were never coming back. the train stopped, and suna got out, almost in a trance, trying to process what he just saw, what he is feeling, and most importantly, how to fix things between you two. biting his lip, he decided to send you another text, praying that you would see it, and at least acknowledge his existence.

see you never

see you never

see you never

your last words to him, still repeating in his head, get louder and louder, until he wants to scream, to let out his anger at his actions, his reaction, and just his fucking personality.

i think i've lost my mind

he thought to himself, as he briskly kept on walking through the city, filled with people rushing around, too caught up in their own lives and problems to see the pure anger on suna's face. he wanted to do something, anything just to distract himself from you. after a few seconds, he turned around, and started walking towards an address that he knew way to well. after a few minutes, he was at the door of osamu's house. the place where he crashed after every drunken night, the place where he spent most of his freshman year of college days, laughing and reminiscing on highschool. it's been a while since he's been here, but it still feels like a second home. he unlocks the door with the key hidden in the plant at the doorstep, and walks in, shedding his jacket and walking to the kitchen, after hearing the sounds of cooking.

"hey."

suna says. osamu turns around, frying pan still in hand, as he stirs one of his newest dishes.

"hey! long time no see. you look like absolute shit. oh, i saw y/n's post. you really fucked up this time didn't you?"

suna fell into a chair at the island, groaning.

"no shit osamu. i fucked up really bad and i don't know what to fucking do. i'm blurring the fact and the fictions, while simultaneously fixing myself up with them. i haven't thought about anything else for 2 fucking weeks and every day just gets shitter and shitter."

"wow, angsty much? i saw how you treated them. there's no way you are getting them back."

"thanks for making me feel sooo much better. that really helps me out."

"hey, i'm just telling you the truth."

"whatever you asshat. coming here was a bad idea. go back to your fucking cooking you shitty friend."

"mhm whatever, i'm the shitty friend, believe what you want to believe suna, sit secluded in hatred, pretend you're the victim, but once you get your head out of your narcissistic bastard ass, come back and chat"

"go fuck yourself"

"same for you"

suna stormed out of osamu's house, and slammed the door. osaumu rolled his eyes, and went back to cooking. outside his door, suna was seething with so many emotions, none of them good. he wanted to break something, hurt someone, just do anything to get these boiling feelings out, threating to tip over the edge. he picked up his phone again, quickly opening it and calling you, not caring if you picked up or not. when the call went to voicemail he let loose, angrily saying everything that he wanted to say, spitting insults and hate, not thinking about the repercussions, not caring about the concerned passerby, not caring at all.

"you know what you stupid cunt?! fuck you. fuck you and your fucking boyfriend. your fucking smile, your fucking everything. you are going to blame me for our shitty relationship when you clearly moved on way too fast. i said i'm sorry ok! what else does your melodramatic fucking brain need to even acknowledge me?! i think you are just a crybaby bitch who is too afraid of forgiveness. just like you always were. thank you y/n. thank you for this. thank you for helping me fucking realize that i shouldn't be missing you and your petty fucking personality. you said goodbye first, but you always know i get the last word. fuck you. and in your words, see you never."

he ended the call, and just stood there, in the middle of the street, coming to terms to what he just said. it was officially over. and there was no chance of it ever going back to what it was. he sighed. turning off his phone as he started walking back to his apartment.

fuck

i hope you enjoyed!

[willowbird]

can we get an Aaron POV of him beating the abuslute shit out of Jack in the locker room. i’m talking about slamming this boys head into the locker beating, he need kevin, matt and nicky to get aaron to stop and even then he still struggling to get more in till andrew comes into his vision. show me that same aaron from that secne in thanksgiving!!!

I am so SO sorry it's taken me so long to answer this!! Work was getting hectic and I was working on something else BUT now I'm for sure gonna get through the rest of these asks ^.^

Aaron losing his shit on Jack, huh? Well, we can sure do that ^.^ 

I changed a few things from your prompt just because as I was sitting down to write it made the most sense to me that if Aaron was gonna go after Jack it probably wouldn’t be about Andrew or Neil. Neil and Andrew take care of themselves, more or less, and if they can’t then they’ve got each other. Not that Aaron wouldn’t beat the ever-living shit out of Jack for doing or saying something to Andrew, but he just probably wouldn’t have to -- if only because Andrew doesn’t care enough about Jack to be affected by him. 

Nicky on the other hand...? Well, I’m a bit soft for the twins being protective of Nicky.

Warning for violence, depression, mentions of suicidal thoughts, triggering language. Take care of  yourselves.

----

“Jesus fucking Christ. That was the most pathetic excuse of teamwork I’ve ever seen in my goddamn life, and this is my sixth year coaching this fucks-forsaken team.” Coach Wymack had just spent the last twenty minutes ripping all of them brand new assholes. They were all tired, they were all angry, and they were all ready for this day to be fucking over, but it wasn’t over until the Coach had had his say, so here they were -- sitting in the locker room, getting chewed out again. 

Not that they didn’t deserve it. Aaron knew they did.

It had been a brutal fucking loss. The Foxes trashed by some half-cocked team from Alabama. Even with Andrew actively trying to block the goal, there was only so much he could do when the other team’s offense kept breaking through their defensive line to swarm the goal. Matt was off the court with an injury, which meant the only backliners they had were Aaron, Nicky, and Keith -- the freshman backliner who still couldn’t figure out how to fucking pass to a moving target. 

Aaron cared less about the loss than he did about the cause for it, and not for the same reasons as half the rest of the team. 

Nicky had been all thumbs and no energy tonight, but that hadn’t been a surprise -- not to Aaron or any of the rest of the monsters. Nicky had been off for a few days, his usual chatty, chipper demeanor whittled down to strained smiles and shrugs in a way that the rest of the team had never seen before. Well, most of the rest of the team. Aaron had seen this before. Andrew had too. Neil and Kevin hadn’t witnessed it directly, but by now the other two “monsters” knew Nicky well enough to know this other side of him existed even if they hadn’t seen it. 

So yeah, he’d gone into this game knowing it was going to suck -- knowing that they might lose. Maybe that had been their mistake. He, Andrew, Kevin, and Neil had been distracted -- torn between concern for Nicky and the need to cover for him. The freshmen had been a nightmare about it and what the fuck even was teamwork. At halftime, the commentators had called it one of the worst performances by the Foxes in three years. 

Yeah.

But at least it was fucking over, right?

“Now get showered up and get the fuck outta my sight. I don’t want to see a single one of you fuckers until tomorrow -- yeah, that’s right, we’re having Saturday fucking practice thanks to that sorry excuse of a game you pissed all over tonight.” Coach glared at all of them in turn. “By tomorrow I expect Nolan and Fisk to get their heads out of each other’s ass and Hemmick?” The big man’s gaze landed on Aaron’s cousin and he felt himself go stiff. Out of the corner of his eye he saw Andrew stand up from where he was leaning against the lockers. 

“Learn how to be a little less fucking useless. I don’t know what the fuck has been up with you the past few days but get it figure the fuck out. You hear me?”

The first pulse of genuine rage ignited in Aaron’s veins. His hands curled into fists and his vision narrowed. Nicky’s quiet, tightly muttered, “Yes Coach,” was partially drowned out by the dull roar in his ears. 

Anything he might have said or done was stymied, however, by Andrew, who slammed his fist against the lockers, drawing everyone’s attention away from Nicky and onto him. 

“Coach, I think we need to chat.” By whatever magic Andrew had over everyone that made everyone automatically take him more seriously than anyone else, he had Coach’s attention, just like that. The man snorted then jerked his head toward the door.

“Fine, but make it quick. I need to try and block out what just happened.”

Coach and Andrew left the room. For a minute, there was a tense, weighty silence, then someone whined and someone else bitched and normalcy returned -- well, normal for a really shitty fucking day anyway. The women split off to their changing room to shower and get ready, and several of the guys did the same. 

Nicky remained seated, staring blankly down at his hands, shoulders slumped in utter defeat. That anger curled in Aaron again -- not at Nicky and not at the fucking game, but at Coach and the team for being so fucking stupid, and at himself for not knowing what the fuck to do about any of it. Nicky’s depression was an open secret among their group. It was something they all knew of but never talked about. This was probably the worst episode he’d had in years and Aaron just felt... fucking powerless. 

When they’d noticed it, they’d closed ranks around Nicky as a group and shut out the rest of the team in a way they hadn’t done since the cousins’ freshman year. None of them were soft enough to take care of Nicky in the way he probably needed, but Andrew drove Nicky to Reddin Thursday morning and Aaron and Neil joined forces in helping Kevin hold his fucking tongue during practices when Nicky struggled to keep up with the rest of them. 

It was not gentle support, but it was all they had to offer.

It just... wasn’t fucking enough. 

“Jesus, Hemmick, are you fucking crying?” Aaron jerked out of his thoughts at the sound of Jack Nolan’s sharp, mocking voice. It was edged with a cruelty that went beyond the typical assholishness of the Foxes. 

“What, forgot how to fucking talk too? Wow, you really are useless aren’t you?” Jack continued when Nicky only flinched at his ridicule and didn’t rebuke him like he usually would.

“Hey, Jack, leave him the fuck alone. You didn’t do so great out there yourself tonight so why don’t you worry about yourself,” Matt barked from where he’d been sitting through Coach’s dress-down. He was wearing his jersey but since he hadn’t played tonight there was no need for him to have to peel gear off or shower. 

“Whatever.” Jack rolled his eyes like a petulant fucking teenager, but the look he shot Nicky was all cold predator. “Why don’t you do us all a favor and just go kill yourself?”

Even over the exclamation of Matt’s reprimand, Aaron still heard Nicky’s breath hitch. He remembered, vividly, the night two years ago when he and Nicky had been drinking and he’d asked him ‘How the fuck did make it through? We were fucking assholes, we are assholes, and you still stayed.’ He remembered not expecting the answer he got. He remembered Nicky looking down into his drink and saying, ‘I almost didn’t. Probably the only reason I didn’t try to off myself again was knowing that if I did, you two would go to my parents and I... I couldn’t let that happen. Didn’t care about me, but I could care about you. Caring about you guys kept me alive.’

He remembered the sick feeling in his stomach and the way that knowledge cut through his buzz, striking him sober with one fucking word: again.

Aaron did not make the decision to grab Jack, or if he did it was overwhelmed by the roar of the monster under his skin as it surged suddenly up from whatever dark place it had been lurking since that violent, bloody night last November. All he knew was that one moment he was standing there, and the next he had his hands on something that needed to shut the fuck up. 

He only vaguely registered the shouts around him as he dug his fingers into Jack’s shirt and whirled him around. Then the only thing that existed was the feeling of flesh and bone and the slick of blood against his knuckles as he drove his fists into every soft part of the body in front of him as hard as he fucking could. Jacks hands scrabbled ineffectually at Aaron’s shoulders, then his face, trying to hit him or grab his hair or push him off, but for all that Aaron was a small man he was a fucking backliner for a reason and he threw every single ounce of his muscle into shoving Jack into the lockers. 

A second later he was on him again, taking a fistful of his hair so he could slam his head into the lockers until the fucker’s knees buckled and he went down. 

All he could hear was the rumble of rage in his veins. There was no thought, no goal, no understanding -- not of anything but the raw, unfiltered hate pouring out of him as he followed Jack to the ground. Distantly, he knew there was shouting or screaming -- that there were words being thrown at him and hands desperately trying to haul him back. He felt the fingers curling around his biceps and tugging on his shoulders. But his wrath was far too powerful and each time someone got a grip he was able to wrench free and use that momentum to land another hit. 

At one point a solid arm wound around his waist and hauled him up and away. A sound like a feral animal ripped from his throat as Aaron thrashed wildly, trying to throw himself back onto Jack. The man had stopped moving at this point but there was a wet, raspy sound coming from him that still spoke of life and maybe Aaron hadn’t consciously decided to keep going until it stopped, but the drive was there all the same. 

The rest of the room was hazy around the edges, people were blurs of sound and color. The only thing in focus was the wheezing form of Jack fucking Nolan on the floor, and Aaron fought viciously to get back to him, jerking at the arms holding him back, kicking and trying to lash out with all his strength. 

Until something blocked his view. And it took a minute for Aaron to recognize what it was. To recognize who it was. 

“A-Aaron. Aaron. Stop. Please. It’s o-okay. It’s okay. I’m okay. S-stop...” 

The rest of the world snapped back into focus at the sound of Nicky’s gasped, broken words. Aaron stopped fighting so suddenly that he and everyone trying to hold him back stumbled. There were three of them, he realized -- Matt, Kevin, and Dan. Neil and Andrew were flanking Nicky, the three of them blocking his view of Jack’s prone, gasping form but not actually trying to stop him from killing him. 

Nicky was crying, his eyes wide and his hands trembling as he held them out in front of Aaron, pleading him to stop. 

Aaron took a few more heavy breaths and realized he’d been panting. He looked from Nicky to Andrew’s cool, appraising stare, then to Neil’s similar expression before finally glancing beyond them to the mess that might have once been Jack Nolan. When he dragged his gaze back to Nicky, all he said was, “He shouldn’t have opened his fucking mouth.”

Nicky made a strangled sound, something between a sob and a laugh. Then he did something he almost never did and launched forward, wrapping his arms around Aaron in a tight hug. In a reflex that Aaron didn’t even know he had, his arms snapped around his cousin and he hugged him back just as fiercely. 

As Nicky sobbed onto his shoulder, Aaron looked over his hunched form and met his brother’s gaze. There weren’t words that could translate the look they shared just then, but if he had to label it, it might have been something like understanding. 

[alinastracker]

hello my dear bonnie, if you're still taking prompts, can i suggest #47 👀 ?

LOVE THIS PROMPT!!! here you go my love<3

prompt: you’re casually seeing my roommate and think they’re in the shower when you strip down to join me and we end up screaming and my roommate thinks it’s the funniest thing and tries to set us up on a date

yikes at this going from a quick lil ficlet to 6.7k oof

would it be okay if i came home to you (explicit) (ao3)

Alina steps into the shower, wondering how the hell she ended up rooming with Zoya to begin with.

Don't get her wrong, she loves Zoya. But her raven-haired friend can be difficult, and she was supposed to have buffer. Originally, it was going to be her, Zoya, and Genya living together, until Genya backed out last minute to move in with her boyfriend David instead.

"I'm so sorry, but it just makes sense," Genya said to them over lunch one afternoon. "Besides, if things go how I think they will, you two will be on the same path that I'm on soon enough."

Zoya scoffed. "What's that supposed to mean?"

Alina had the same question, considering both of them were hopelessly single.

Genya just sipped her tea and said in a sing-song voice, "You'll see."

At first, living with Zoya was fine. They agreed easily on most apartment related things; splitting up chores, rules about not touching each other's food, a timely heads up before having friends or potential sexual partners over. Zoya could get nit picky about a few things, like the lecture she'd given her on the proper position of the toilet paper roll. It goes over, Starkov, understand? Under is for heathens and natural selection is coming for them. But otherwise, things had been fine.

Until Mal.

He was a part of the friend circle she had surrounded herself with since freshman year. But there was something about Mal that had drawn her to him in a way that was different from the rest of the group — different from anyone else she had ever met. He was like a drug, a magnet, the missing link that had her saying, where have you been my whole life, when you're meant to be here beside me? So quickly he had become her closet friend, and as much as their group liked to tease them, they both denied feeling anything beyond fierce friendship.

But Alina was such a liar.

Which makes it her own fault, really, for ending up in this situation. Zoya could, quite frankly, be a bitch — but she wouldn't have gone after Mal if Alina had just owned up to her feelings.

Though she really could have told her about it sooner.

Alina had been studying in the living room one night when a knock at the door startled her. Zoya hadn't mentioned having company, and neither of them had ordered food. Hesitantly, she rose and stood on her tiptoes to peek through the peephole. Then her face lit up, and she swung the door open. "Mal!"

Saints, he looked good. He appeared freshly showered, dressed in a silky green shirt and dark jeans. He had actually put effort into his hair for once, and he had a small gold hoop earring in his left ear.

"Hey, Lina," he said, something a little off with the smile he gave her. As he passed by to come inside, she could smell expensive cologne.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, butterflies in her stomach. Her head was already filling with wild fantasies. He wanted to surprise her, so he showed up without notice. He put effort into how he looked, because he wanted to impress her. He was going to reveal his true feelings for her, and she would revel in the fact that he wanted her as much as she wanted him.

Instead, Zoya entered the room and said, "He's here for me."

Mal had the decency to flush and offer a sheepish shrug. "I'm gonna grab some water," he said, and scuttled off to the kitchen. Of course, Mal had been here plenty of times before. He knew where everything was.

Alina had barely heard him though, Zoya's words repeating on a loop in her head. He's here for me. She knew what this meant, even as her mind tried to deny it. The room was spinning and she couldn't quite steady herself, like something had broken inside of her.

She swallowed, and as calmly as possible, said, "What happened to the heads up rule?"

Zoya arched a brow. "I texted you two hours ago."

Alina frowned and pulled out her phone. Sure enough, there was a text from Zoya. Got a guy coming over in a couple hours. She must have missed it, lost in her studies. But still, something in the text ignited anger in her chest.

"You could have said the guy was Mal."

Zoya shrugged, so frustratingly nonchalant. "What does it matter?"

It matters because I am so hopelessly in love with him, and you're supposed to be my friend, and now I have to blast music so I don't hear the sounds of you two fucking, she thought.

"He's my best friend," she said. "It's just a little weird, I guess."

"Don't worry, Starkov," Zoya said, turning toward the kitchen, probably to grab Mal so they could get the night started. "It won't affect anything between you two."

Alina waited until the two of them were tucked away in Zoya's room. Then she pulled on her old running shoes and slipped out — there was just no way she could be here, knowing what was happening in the room across from her own.

She ran with no destination in mind, pumping her little legs as hard as they could go, music pounding from her headphones. When she became too tired to go further, she checked her surroundings and sighed. Of course, her feet took her to one of her favorite places in the city.

It's not anything, really. A quiet street with an old abandoned building at the end of it. But on the building's brick wall is one of her favorite pieces of art. A mural of the sun, complex in its simplicity, using colors she had never seen used to express the sun before, yet perfectly capturing the feeling of a warm sunny day.

Alina leaned against the wall, slid down until she was sitting on the old, cracked sidewalk. Only then did she realize that she was crying. Turning off her music, she called Genya, and told her everything.

"You have to talk to Zoya," Genya said.

"No!" she said quickly. "I don't want her to feel bad. It's not her fault. And if Mal likes her — well, it's not like he's shown any interest in me. I'm not going to get in their way."

"Alina," Genya sighed.

"It's fine," she promised. "I just—" A sob escaped her throat, the pain overshadowing any coherent thought. It was not fine.

"Send me your location," Genya said, and Alina did.

She spent the night at Genya and David's that night, David promising he was more than okay with taking the couch so her and Genya could have the bed. Which was needed, because Alina had a lot more crying to do.

"Just don't tell Zoya," she said.

"Alina, I don't know."

"Promise, Genya. Please."

Finally, Genya sighed. "All right."

That was four months ago. Zoya had told her it wouldn't affect her close bond with Mal, but it had. Alina never invites Mal over anymore, too afraid that he'll come to watch a movie, sit on the couch beside her — much closer than most friends sit. They would point out everything terrible about it, because they loved to watch bad films together as they stuffed their faces with popcorn. Then the movie would end and Mal would say goodnight, but instead of leaving, he'd go to Zoya's room, and the popcorn they ate would sour in her stomach.

There were so many little changes, too. Like when they hung out as a group, and suddenly Alina was questioning every move she made around him. Was it still okay to playfully ruffle his hair, to sit close enough that their shoulders pressed together, to look at him like he personally hung the sun and the moon in the sky, all while Zoya was there to see? Was it wrong to look at his lips and fantasize about how they would feel against her own, pressed to her collarbone, sucking her most sensitive spots? Zoya and Mal were a casual thing, they had both said so. But still, the natural intimacy her friendship with Mal had built for the past two years suddenly felt wrong, and she hated it.

Needless to say, Alina has been looking into new rooming possibilities for next year. She can't do this anymore. Every time Mal comes over, she waits for them to lock themselves away in Zoya's room, and then she leaves. She runs to her sun, sometimes just sitting and letting her sad song playlist make her sadder, sometimes bringing her sketchbook to at least make art out of the pain.

But tonight she has a very rare opportunity — the apartment to herself. Only for a couple hours, but still. She has spent most of the time so far blaring music, and her neighbors probably hate her, but damn it, they can deal with it for a night.

She lets the music play as she takes a much needed shower. Sure, she could have gone the bath route, but she doesn't want to waste all her time getting clean. Alina has decided her hours alone should end with a much needed date with her vibrator and an Owen Gray video that she's going to watch without headphones.

Olivia Rodrigo's Brutal is pounding from her speaker, and though Alina's twenty-one, not seventeen, the lyrics hit all the same. She's so into the music, thinking about her life for the past four months, thinking about moving as soon as she possibly can, thinking yeah, it really is fucking brutal out here, that she does not notice the telltale signs of someone entering her apartment, and even more worrisome, someone entering the bathroom. Not until it's too late.

"Thought you were too cool for Olivia Rodrigo," a very male voice says, and then the shower curtain opens.

Screams fill the air from both of them. Alina's already holding her conditioner bottle, and on instinct, hurls it at the man's chest while her other hand reaches for her razor.

"Oi!"

Only then does her mind register that it's not a strange man come to sexually assault her, it's Mal. Her best friend. Her roommate's casual lover slash fuck buddy slash whatever. It's Mal, completely naked before her. She gets a quick glimpse of his cock, half-hard, before he curses and turns around.

It doesn't help that his backside is just as nice to look at. He's well toned, muscles flexing as he reaches to grab the clothes he must have just discarded. He bends, giving her the most sinful view of his ass, and Saints, her mind goes wild. She pictures him turning back around and pushing her against the wall, slamming inside of her. As he fucks her, she would reach around and grab that delicious ass of his, dig her fingers into the plump skin, and leave little half-moon indents.

Mal is apologizing over and over again — "I thought you were Zoya!" — as he gathers up his clothes and makes a beeline for the door. Alina finally snaps out of her filthy fantasy and slides the shower curtain closed with a shaky hand. She leans back against the tiled wall, breathing hard. Her heart is pounding like never before.

The song is winding down. Olivia is crooning, God I don't even know where to start.

Neither does Alina.

~

By the time she musters the courage to finish her shower and leave the bathroom, her robe clutched tightly around her, there’s no sign of Mal in the apartment. Zoya isn’t back yet, either.

With a sigh of relief, she flops onto her bed. Her previous plans were out the window now. Taking a breath, she goes over the facts in her head. 

One: Mal has now seen her completely naked. 

Two: she has now seen Mal completely naked. 

It was the wrong thing to think about, because now she’s picturing the smooth expanse of his skin, his perfectly tight ass, and the quick glimpse she had gotten of his—

Heat pools between her thighs. She’s positively aching, when she should be feeling horrified. She should absolutely not be reaching for her vibrator as she lets the images of Mal’s naked body settle in her mind. It’s wrong, because Mal is, at least somewhat, Zoya’s, and Zoya is her friend. Besides, it was Zoya that he had come looking for, Zoya that he wanted to fuck against the shower wall. 

But Alina does grab her vibrator, and as it buzzes her to multiple releases, she imagines Mal shoving her against the wall, pressing kisses to her neck, fucking her like it’s his sole reason for existing. Fucking her like she’s his, and he’s hers.

~

She doesn’t see Zoya until the next morning, passing out sometime after orgasm number three. Saints, if the memory of Mal’s bare skin had been enough to keep her going for three rounds, she wasn’t sure she could even handle actually being with him. 

When she walks into the kitchen, Zoya is sitting at their tiny excuse for a table. “Good morning,” Alina says as naturally as possible. 

Zoya only says, “Sit down, Starkov.”

It’s unnerving, how quickly can could take over her entire body. Saying nothing, still going for casual, Alina sits across from her. “What’s up?”

“That’s my question, actually.” Zoya arches a brow. “What happened with you and Mal last night?”

Shit, shit, shit. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“Oh, I think you do. I know he stopped by before I got home. When I asked why he left, he got all weird and said something came up with Dubrov. But I know that’s a lie, because Dubrov was happily posting drunken stories last night. So obviously something happened when he was over.” Zoya sits back in her chair and stares her down, making her insides twist. “And since I don’t live with him, the only person I have to grill is you. So get talking.”

Alina sighs, knowing she isn’t strong enough to deny Zoya when she’s like this, and babbles out the story. Really, it wasn’t her fault. Mal was the one that walked in on her. It was just incredibly embarrassing for both of them. 

When she finishes, Zoya lets the information sink in, and then she laughs, harder than Alina has ever seen her laugh.

“Well I’m so glad this is funny to you,” she huffs, arms crossed over her chest.

“It is! I can only imagine your faces, shit.” Zoya wipes at her eyes. “Too bad you already know each other, that would make for one hell of a meet cute.” She pauses and says, “Well, it still could be your origin.”

Alina frowns. “Our origin?”

“You know, if you guys dated.”

She momentarily loses her breath. “What? No, you guys are a thing.”

Zoya rolls her eyes. “We’re fucking, Alina, that’s it. And actually, I was planning on cutting it off after last night.” She stands and pours herself what is at least her second up of coffee. “There’s someone else I’m interested in.”

“Someone else? Who?” Zoya says nothing. Alina pops up as it comes to her. “Oh! It’s that rich blond guy from the bar, isn’t it? The one that transferred here this semester. Nikolai or something, right?”

The tiniest blush spreads on Zoya’s face, and Alina squeals. “It is him! Saints, he’s attractive.”

“Yes, he is,” Zoya snaps. “And not bad for conversation, either.”

“Conversation?” She grins. “Why, Miss Nazyalensky, do you actually have feelings for this guy?”

Zoya scowls. “Shut it, Starkov.”

“Oh, you totally have feelings for him!”

“Keep it up and you will pay for this. I’m devising a plan as we speak.”

Alina just laughs. “Okay, Mrs. Whatever Nikolai’s Last Name Is.”

Under her breath, Zoya mutters, “Lantsov,” and stalks off with her coffee as Alina laughs harder. 

~

Zoya, apparently, hadn’t been kidding when she said she was devising a plan. 

When the weekend rolls around once again and Zoya texts the group chat they have with Genya about getting lunch, Alina jumps at the idea. She missed Genya, and it had been a hell of a week between juggling exams and thinking about her encounter with Mal. They haven’t spoken at all, and she had used her classes as an excuse to get out of any hang outs where he might show up. 

Zoya’s words from the morning after had been on her mind a lot, too. It still could be your origin. Could it? Was Mal even interested in her — and would he even want to try, after he’d had something with Zoya, or would it just be inevitably awkward?

Alina approaches the restaurant and sucks in a breath. She’s decided to finally tell Zoya about how she’s had feelings for Mal all this time, and maybe with her and Genya, the three of them can come up with what the hell Alina should do next. 

Zoya had texted five minutes ago saying she grabbed them a table in the restaurant’s outdoor patio, so she makes her way there. Only it’s not Zoya or even Genya waiting for her.

It’s Mal. 

He looks just as surprised to see her as she is to see him, and for a moment, she believes it really is some crazy coincidence. 

“Alina,” he says, standing. Neither of them can quite meet the other’s eye. “What are you doing here?”

Her hand is doing some nervous twitchy thing at her side, so she shoves it into the pocket of her dress. “I’m supposed to be meeting Zoya and Genya.”

Mal curses under his breath. “I’m supposed to be meeting Zoya, too.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

Shaking her head and feeling incredibly stupid, Alina takes out her phone and fires off a text to Zoya, WHAT THE HELL????

The next message she receives comes from Zoya — only not in the text chat between the two of them, but rather a newly created group chat with the two of them and Mal. 

consider this the official end to our fuck-mance, oretsev. yalls little bathroom flash show was the perfect opportunity for a new beginning, because yes, i see the doe eyes you give alina when she’s not looking. you too, starkov. i’m sorry for getting in the way for so long. have a good date, no throwing bottles at each other xoxo

They finish reading at the same time, looking up from their phones, eyes meeting before flickering away again. 

Mal sighs. “I think I hate her.”

“I think I hate her, too.”

He scratches the back of his neck. “We don’t have to do this if you don’t want to.”

Alina bites her lip. Because he doesn’t want to do this, she thinks. “Oh, well, I guess—”

Mal cuts her off. “But it might be a nice chance for us to talk.” Her head snaps up, and this time when their eyes meet, neither of them look away. He smiles shyly. “I missed you this week, Lina.”

Her smile matches his. “I missed you, too.” 

They sit, and after the waiter takes their order for drinks and an appetizer for them to share — a sample platter, both of them too indecisive for any singular thing — Mal starts to stutter out an apology. Alina stops him with a hand on his arm. He looks down at where her fingers brush against bare skin, and she wonders if he’s thinking about all the skin they’ve bared to each other now. She certainly is.

“You don’t need to apologize, Mal,” she promises. “It was an accident.”

He shakes his head. “Still, I can’t imagine how terrifying that was for you.”

“Well, it was,” she admits, then adds, “at first.”

“At first?”

She shrugs, but says nothing, thankful for their drinks arriving to save her from answering. Because the truth was she had been scared for maybe three seconds. Once she had realized it was Mal, she’d only felt desire.

With their awkward shower encounter out of the way, they fall into fairly easy conversation, complaining about exams and projects, annoying classmates and neighbors. Soon enough, they’re back to being themselves. Alina pulls out her phone to show Mal all the memes and TikToks she had wanted to send him this week, and he does the same. Hours fly by without their notice, and now the dinner crowd is filing in. 

“Oi, I think our waiter is silently praying for us to leave.”

She laughs, pulling out her wallet. “Definitely.”

Mal waves her off. “Let me get it,” he says, taking his own wallet out. “I mean, since this is apparently a date and all.”

Alina hesitates, a little flutter in her chest even though he’d said it teasingly. “Okay, fine. But I’ll get the tip.”

“Deal.”

When everything is paid for, they stand. Going home is the last thing she wants right now, and not just because Zoya will be there. 

Mal looks ready to pull her into one of their standard hugs, but pauses. “Do you want to come over? We can find something shitty to watch. Mikhael and Dubrov will be around, but I just really don’t want to see Zoya right now.”

Alina smiles, the flutter in her chest returning with vigor. “Yeah, okay.”

~

At Mal’s flat, they settle onto the sofa together, close enough that their shoulders brush. Mikhael and Dubrov tease them about looking like lovebirds, but otherwise surprisingly leave them be. She doesn’t mind their company — but admittedly, she was glad they stayed to their respective rooms tonight. Mal puts on an indie horror flick that’s so bad it’s good, and they laugh and joke with each other throughout, per usual. 

About halfway through the film, they share a knowingly look — their that foreshadowing is so obvious, RIP to that character in twenty minutes look — and sport matching grins. But when the moment passes, neither of them looks away. 

“Alina,” Mal says softly, and her breath hitches. Has he ever said her name with such longing before?

His eyes flicker down — to her lips. She thinks of Zoya’s text then, basically calling both of them out for having feelings for each other. And while neither of them had confirmed it, they hadn’t denied it either.

Her heart is beating so fast. She gives him the tiniest nod.

Mal understands, he always does, and then he’s leaning in. Their noses brush before their lips do, and it could be silly or awkward, but instead it’s a different kind of intimacy she hadn’t known she wanted.

“Alina,” he breathes once more, and then he kisses her, so softly at first, it’s barely anything. Her stomach is doing cartwheels regardless. She takes initiative, kissing him back. Still soft, still careful, afraid that whatever this is between them is something fragile, something that needs delicacy. In some ways, it is. Her closest friendship, blossoming into something more. 

Mal lets out the softest moan, and it snaps something between them. 

He pulls her closer, his hand on the back of her neck, and now Alina is the one moaning, fervor replacing the softness, the delicacy. It’s the kind of kiss she’s been fantasizing about, made even better from how obvious it is that they’ve both wanted this for a long time. A desperate kiss bursting with desire. 

Alina shifts closer until she’s practically straddling his lap. Mal brings one hand to rest on her lower back, the other curling into her hair. His lips move to her neck, trailing down until he reaches her collarbone, where he nips and sucks, undoubtedly leaving a mark. 

“Mal,” she sighs, her head tipped back from the feeling as her hips roll against his. He curses against her skin. Her hands move to the hem of his shirt, ready to pull it off. 

All of a sudden, Mal pulls away, stopping her hands with his own. “Alina, don’t.”

She blinks her eyes open. “Do you want to move to your room?”

Mal bites his lip and shakes his head.

Alina frowns, any warmth in her chest turning cold. She quickly returns to her own side of the couch. “I don’t understand. I thought you wanted this.” Wanted me, she thinks but doesn’t say. Because he certainly had no issues with Zoya.

“I do!” he says quickly, taking her hand again and trying to pull her back. She holds her ground, pulls her hand out of his. “I do want this, Alina. Saints, I do. But this is technically our first date, right? I don’t want to do first date sex, not with you.”

Alina rolls her eyes, looking down and tugging at a loose thread on her dress. “Is this where you say something you think sounds respectful but really just puts down all the girls you have had first date sex with?”

“Alina, please look at me.”

Grudgingly, she does. 

“You’re different because you’re my best friend, and because I’ve been hooking up with our mutual friend.” She flinches, but Mal continues. “I don’t want you to think we have to have sex because of that. What I had with Zoya — it was good, and I care about Zoya, but it didn’t go beyond the physical. That’s all we wanted from each other. But that’s not all I want with you.”

Mal closes his eyes. Alina’s unconsciously holding her breath. He exhales and opens his eyes again, holding her gaze. “I want everything with you, Alina. I want your highs and your lows. I want to take you against the wall as much as I want to hold your hand.” He does so now, both of his hands around one of hers, and this time she doesn’t pull away. “And if you didn’t want to be physical? I’d still want you. I don’t want you to think there’s anything we have to do. That’s why I want to wait — even if I also want to take you to my room and pin you against my bed, too.”

“Oh,” she says, barely audible. Alina shakes her head, a little speechless. “I don’t know what to say.”

The corner of his mouth tugs up. “Was that too rom-com confessional?”

The tension breaks. She laughs and climbs onto his lap again, wrapping her arms around his neck. “You’re such a dork, but you’re the perfect dork. So we’ll wait.” She pauses and looks up at him with innocent eyes. “But will you kiss me again?”

Mal grins, pushes her down against the couch, and does just that. 

~

When she gets home, Zoya is waiting in the living room, reading a smutty romance book Genya had recommended. “Hey, how’d it go?” she asks, too casually to actually be casual. 

Alina ignores her and walks straight to her room. She’s decided to let Zoya sweat it out a bit for the weekend after her little stunt, even if it was successful. 

Though really, she didn’t think it would bother Zoya that much. Hard as steel Zoya, who never let anything get to her. But on Sunday, she bursts into Alina’s room, interrupting her studying. 

“Okay, I know you hate me now or whatever, but at least let me tell you that I’m sorry. I didn’t know how much you liked him, Alina. Not until Genya told me.”

Alina closes her book, frowning. “Genya told you?”

Zoya nods and sits at the end of her bed. “Recently, when I told her about Nikolai and that I was thinking about cutting things off with Mal. Don’t be mad at her, just be mad at me.” 

“Well—” she starts, but Zoya cuts her off. 

“And honestly? The worst part is, part of me did know. I saw the looks you gave each other, but I brushed them off because I was selfish and enjoying myself. I was a really, really shit friend to you, and I’m so sorry, Alina. You don’t have to forgive me, but I just—

Zoya stops mid-sentence, cut off by the laughter bubbling out of Alina. 

“Saints, I never thought I’d see the day that Zoya Nazyalensky grovels.” She shoots her a grin. “I accept your apology. And as much as I want to hate you for your meddling stunt, it worked, because we definitely spent the night making out. I just did the whole silent treatment to make you suffer a little.”

A moment passes — Zoya is completely still, too still — and then she grabs one of Alina’s pillows and smacks her with it. “You little rat!”

Alina only laughs harder, fighting off Zoya’s pillow attack with her hands. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard you say sorry non-sarcastically! You did so well, Nazyalensky!”

“And you’ll never hear it again! You’ve lost apology privileges! 

Eventually, Alina moves into the living room to study, and Zoya joins her. When their brains need a break, Alina tells her about her date with Mal, and Zoya tells her about her own with Nikolai. If this is their new normal, Alina finds that she really likes it. 

~

The next week is outstandingly better than the previous. She’s back to talking to Mal each day, even more than before. Halfway through the week, he sends her a song with the message, This song made me think of you the first time I heard it, still does every time. It has her heart beating extra fast as she listens on her walk to class, not only because it’s incredibly sweet, but because Mal has played this song for her before, months and months ago, which means he’s felt this way the whole time. 

Early Saturday evening, Zoya announces that she’s spending the night at Nikolai’s. “He has his own apartment, so it just makes sense. I’ll be home in the morning, probably.”

Thank the Saints for rich boys. 

She texts Mal, and Zoya’s barely gone for ten minutes before he’s there. They make dinner together — well, Alina sits on the counter while Mal does the actual cooking, but he spends any down time kissing her, so she likes to think she was the moral support. They eat on the couch, watching their favorite trashy reality television, and play a few rounds of Mario Kart afterwards. Really, it’s just like how things were when they were simply best friends, except now Alina drapes her body over his as they watch their show, Mal’s thumb moving in slow circles on her ankle, and instead of talking or playing on their phones during ad breaks, they pick up where they left off in the kitchen, their lips pressed together in a blissful ease. 

They’re on their fifth game of Mario Kart, Alina in the lead, as she has been every round. She’s bragging about how she’s going to beat him again when suddenly her vision is blocked as Mal presses his lips to hers. 

Her surprise doesn’t stop her from dropping her controller and kissing back. She’s just getting into the kiss when Mal pulls away as quickly as he had started the kiss. He stands, and only then does she see he never dropped his controller. Picking up right where he left off, he steers Luigi towards the finish line. (“Who the hell picks Luigi?” Alina had asked him once. To which Mal responded, “It’s not fair people only care about his brother when he probably works just as hard at their plumbing business. It’s just like people only knowing Adam Levine and ignoring the rest of Maroon 5—” which led to a very cute rant that Alina spent less time listening to and more time staring at his lips while he was distracted.)

Alina fumbles for her controller, but it’s too late. Mal hasn’t come in first — some of the computers still beat him. But he’s beat her, which by the smirk on his face, was his only goal.

“You’re such a cheater!”

“It’s not cheating, it’s strategy.”

“I suppose you need your strategy, since you don’t have any skills.”

Mal raises a brow, a devious look in his eyes. “Is that so? Perhaps I should show you my skills, then.” He moves in front of her and kneels on the couch, a leg on either side of her body, essentially pinning her there, and kisses her again. 

Immediately, she can feel the difference from the strategy kiss and even the ones from earlier that night. He’s kissing with purpose, cradling her face with one hand, the other on her waist, and Alina is melting against him. She is putty in Mal’s hands, his to mold how he pleases. 

He’s holding himself so that his weight isn’t pressing down on her, but that’s exactly what she wants. Her hips buck up against his, and Mal pulls back to moan, “Fuck, Alina,” so she does it again.

“Please tell me we can have second date sex.”

Mal chuckles. “Are we even going to bother with the dating process?”

“I don’t know, are we?”

“I don’t know. Do I need to ask you to be my girlfriend?”

Alina grins. “I wouldn’t mind hearing it.

“All right. Alina, my beauty, my beloved, will you bless me with the honor of calling you my girlfriend?”

Her grin widens, and giddy butterflies dance inside her chest. No, not butterflies — fireflies. She can feel their warmth and wouldn’t be surprised if she was glowing from their light. “Oh, I suppose.”

Mal laughs. “I can’t stand you,” he says, and kisses her again.

Alina returns the kiss for a moment before murmuring against his lips, “You don’t have to stand me, but now that you’re my boyfriend, can you fuck me?”

He practically growls as he says, “Saints, yes,” standing and lifting her with him. Mal brings them to her room, kissing her the whole way. He unceremoniously shoves her school books off of her bed, laying her down and crawling over her. “You don’t know how often I’ve imagined this,” he murmurs, lips on her throat. 

“Tell me,” she gasps.

“Every time I came over, Alina. Every time.”

A shiver runs down her spine. “Even when you were here to—”

“Especially then.”

She has no idea what to do with this information. Her head is empty of thought save for the screaming need for more of him, so she pulls his shirt over his head. This time, Mal doesn’t stop her. Her hands roam over all the places she’s been dying to touch; down his back, tracing along his spine, up over his stomach, fingers running along the muscles of his chest, brushing over a few scars he’s accumulated through the years.

“You’re so perfect,” she whispers. Smooth in some places, rougher in others, but so incredibly warm everywhere.

Mal tips her chin up, kisses her lips once, hard, and then another to her jaw, down her neck, her collarbone. Then he’s the one tossing her shirt aside, his lips continuing their decent. He’s pressing soft words into her skin as he kisses her — beauty, beloved, cherished, my heart —murmuring his love for her even as he brings her nipple between his teeth.

“Shit, Mal,” Alina breathes. Her hips keep bucking, far beyond her control. He chuckles, murmurs something along the lines of no patience, and quickens his pace. Soon enough, he’s got her undressed completely — which isn’t too unnerving after the shower incident. Any lingering nerves flee once his head is between her thighs. She’s suddenly very thankful Zoya isn’t home, because even though it’s never been a problem during sex before, she absolutely cannot control the noises she’s making — and she’s loud.

Mal returns to her with glistening lips. She kisses him and tastes herself, a thrill better than any rollercoaster. Her hands move to the waistband of his pants, giving a half-hearted tug. “Off.”

“So lazy,” he teases, unclasping the button on his jeans, tugging down the zipper. “I could always make you work for it.”

“Have mercy on me, Oretsev. I’m still recovering from the pleasures of your cocky mouth.”

He looks so proud of himself, she wants to kiss him just to wipe the smirk off of his face. “If you enjoyed my cocky mouth, just wait until you feel my—

“Do not finish that sentence.”

But then he’s pushing down his boxers, and all Alina can do is stare as the cock in question springs free. He’s fully hard this time around, and her thighs squeeze together at the sight. He watches her as she practically drools over his dick, his smirk becoming even, well, smirkier. She reaches out and curls her fingers around his length, giving him two quick strokes — both to clear the smirk from his face and because she so very much wants to touch him. 

“Fuck, Alina,” he hisses. He’s reaching for his jeans, probably to grab a condom from his pocket, but she grabs his hand.

“I’m on the pill, and I’ve been tested recently.” Of course, there’s still a slight risk. But it’s Mal — finally Mal — and she wants to feel every inch of him.

He pauses, then nods. “Okay.” Crawling over her, he takes one of her hands and intertwines their fingers. With his other hand, he grips his cock and drags the tip through her folds like the damn tease he is, eliciting needy mewling from her that he seems to enjoy. In her ear, he murmurs, “How do you want this, Alina?”

“I don’t want to be able to walk tomorrow.”

Mal chuckles softly, but the sound so close to her ear sends more shivers down her spine. “As you wish, moya solnishka.” My little sun.

She has only a brief moment to bask in the sweetness of his words before he’s slamming into her all in one go, anything sweet flying out the window. Mal keeps a steady rhythm while sucking on her neck, which is good, because all Alina can do is moan incoherently as her nails leave scratches down his back.

When he senses her getting close, Mal brings his finger to her clit, circling just right. “Saints!” she cries, and comes undone beneath him once again. But this time, she gets to watch him fall over the edge with her, his eyes so incredibly dark as he moans his release. He’s the only man she’s ever let come inside of her, and it feels very right that it’s Mal — she doesn’t want anyone else filling her like this, marking her in a sense as his spend drips down her thighs.

They stay like that for a while, foreheads pressed together, sweaty and sticky, but blissfully so. 

“So, is the sex still good on this side of the apartment?”

In answer, he dips his head and bites down on one of her tits.

“Shit, Malyen!”

“Ridiculous questions get ridiculous responses,” he teases, then wraps his arms around her, tucking his face into the crook of her shoulder. “You’re all I’ve wanted for two years, Alina, and this still beat my expectations.”

Smiling, she rests her chin against the top of his head. “Good. I would hate to have to start fucking in Zoya’s bed just because you like the airflow better there.”

“Smart ass,” Mal mutters, but he’s smiling. Then he says, "You know, this may not be my first time fucking in this apartment, but I’m still checking off a first tonight — of many, I hope.”

Alina rolls her eyes. “Yes, I’m aware this is your first time fucking me in this apartment, dumb ass.”

"That’s not what I meant, rude ass.”

She frowns. “Then what did you mean?”

He squeezes her hip. “It’s my first time spending the night.”

Her heart does a little jump in her chest, and she doesn’t even have it in her to tease that she hasn’t actually asked him to stay yet. But stay he does, though he gets her off a few more times before they pass out for the night — definitely beating her vibrator. One time it’s with his fingers, so incredibly long that she knows all her fantasies will involve the slender digits now. Another is after Alina murmurs about how filthy she is and that she really ought to take a shower. 

Mal waits long enough to join her that she starts to worry he hadn’t understood her intent. But then she hears his footsteps, and the shower curtain opens. There’s no bottle throwing this time, though she can’t say the same for the screaming. He steps into the shower, kisses her slowly, sensually, then pushes her back until she shivers from the feeling of cold tile against her bare skin.

“I meant to ask, you do know you have mirrors in here, right?” Mal murmurs huskily into her ear. She’s too disoriented with want to understand until he says, “I saw you staring at my ass last time.”

Then he slams into her, and Alina no longer has to imagine how it feels to be fucked against the shower wall.

[youralternantpersonality]

Hello My Dear Friend

Warning: Talking about Texas (I'm from here, chill bro lol), panic attacks, Phonophobia: the fear of loud sounds.

A/n: Hello! How have yall been? I hope you are okay and are taking self of yourself. I'll be 100% with yall, I guess I just had to get out what was wrong with me because out of nowhere (with the help of medication) I had a need to start writing.

Also, I DID NOT KNOW MY LINKS WERE NOT WORKING! I’m so sorry. I realized the best way to get to my masters list is to go to my description bar. I don't know why it isn't. if you know how to fix it, please let me know!

Anyways, I never put summaries, but here's a little snip—Y/n is best friends (100% platonic) with Jared and will be with Embry. The end. Enjoy!

***

Y/n POV

Finally! I'm finally coming back to the place I grew up at and loved. The place where nature is at every corner. I never thought I would miss the muggy and rainy state. I miss my friends on the Res and the few friends I had in Forks. I especially miss my little brother-from-another-mother, Jared.

Jared and I grew up together on the Reservation. We befriended each other instantly in second grade after making a bet that one of us could eat our rainbow popsicle faster than the other. The winner gets the strawberry scented eraser and a mechanical pencil that the other grabbed from a 3rd grader. Needless to say, I won. Granted, I had a brain freeze, but it was 100% worth it. But now I was on my way back to La Push to finish my Junior year with my friends after leaving in Freshman year.

Pulling up to the house I grew up with, I was welcomed by my grandparents and my aunt Lydia. My grandmother and aunt were already outside washing what looks like something green; I'm assuming she's making collard greens tonight. My grandfather just came from around the side of the house with some more logs to make a fire. As soon as the car is parked, they look up with smiles on their faces, and I jump out to embrace my family.

"Nana, Papa, Aunty!" I say as I run up to them as they get ready for me to embrace them. After Nana had a minor heart attack, Aunt Lydia came to La Push from California to assist her since she was a nurse for the elderly. She eventually moved in with them after she divorced her bastard of a husband. Their marriage is an example of what happens when you don't communicate well with your partner beforehand. Aunt Lydia never wanted kids—she liked them, but she also liked giving them back to their parents. Her ex-husband, Justin, wanted kids. He's always wanted kids, and knowing that she never wanted them, he still tried to sabotage any way for them to get one. Hiding her birth control, poking a hole in the condom, arguing that she'd change her mind eventually. Not understanding that she did not want one. At some point, he claimed he was okay with it, but as soon as they got married, I guess he figured she'd change her mind.

Three years later, she filed for divorce. Not long afterward, she moved back up here; then, when Nana had a heart attack, she moved in with them. It's been a year since all of that happened. She is now dating a man in Forks who already has kids and doesn't want anymore. The kids are in fifth, seventh, and ninth grade, so she's content and happy. They all love her, and she loves them equally, if not more.

"Hey, baby! How's my Ladybug." Nana asked. Ever since I was little, she gave me that name. I was adopted by the Nomalose at two, and the second my Nana came up to me in her kitchen, somehow a Ladybug flew in and landed on my shoulder. Thus, granted me the name Ladybug.

"I'm good, Nana. How are you feeling?" I asked, hugging her as she continued to sit in her chair then moving to my aunt.

"Oh, baby, I'm fine. Always am, and always will be." She says with a smile. So optimistic as always. After greeting everyone as we moved inside, we all sat around to catch up on what has happened since we were gone. Dad had a job transfer in Texas, so we had to pack up and head out. At first, leaving La Push and moving to Dallas was (obviously) terrifying, but I was repulsed by the thought of it. But after a while, it wasn’t too bad. I mean, yes, it's hot as hell, some people are questionable, the pollen is horrific, and the redlining system is as evident as can be. However, I grew to love the heat and get a tan, made some friends, and the food…. oh, the food. What kind of threw me off is that they have to state the Texas flag pledge in class every day. What the absolute fuck.

After finishing up, we head back to the car and head to our home. Grabbing our stuff and unpacking it before the rest of our furniture arrives tomorrow. It's only mid-July (imagine moving in the middle of the summer from Texas to Washington. It was absolute hell), so I take this time to explore the area I once knew and get acquainted with. I plan on calling up some friends before I see my A1, the Jelly time to my Peanut butter, the Tom to my Jerry, the Magenta to my Blue, Jared Cameron. We kind of fell off within the last couple of months, but a little show-and-tell never hurt anyone.

I text some of my old friends I kept in contact with, and we decided to meet up at the beach. I put on my shorts, grab my beach gear, and head out.

"Be back before the streetlights-" mom started,

"-Come on. I know, I know. I'll text you when I'm on my way home." I finished. I kiss my parents and jump in the car to head to First beach. When I arrived, I see my sister-from-another-mister, LaCienega.

"Y/n/n!" She screams, running to me.

"Cien!" I scream back. We hug each other as tightly as possible before laughing like a bunch of crazy women.

"So, you're just going to forget all about us? Well, bitch, fuck you too." I look behind Cien and see her twin brother Javier and our other two friends, Leilani and Damion. I go up to them and hug the absolute shit out of them, and we all head towards the beach. We spent the day laughing, crying, playing soccer, and playing chicken before calling it.  I planned on seeing Jared tomorrow but was warned by Leilani.

"Jared isn't Jared anymore, Y/n/n," she says, looking down at her hands with a deflated expression.

"What do you mean?" I asked, looking at everyone else too.

"Did Jared stop talking to you recently?" Javier asked. I nod my head slowly. They looked at one another, and he continued. "He did the same to us too. He randomly disappeared one day, and the next thing we know, he grew a whole foot and a half, gained muscle, got a tattoo, and just ignored us. He started to hand it out with Sam Uley. Now when we see him, he just ignores us and moves on like we are nothing to him." I shake my head. That can't be right; Jared wouldn't be like that—he can hardly ignore starting random shit with people, especially if there's money involved.

"I mean, yeah, he did fall off the face of the earth, but…no. I'm going over there tomorrow. I'll talk to him to see what's up. That just doesn't sound like the Jared I know." I say, packing up.

"Well, if you can get him to talk, ask him for that $20 he owes me. Bastard never paid me back after winning a bet that I could out eat an XL pizza against him." Damion laughs. I nod my head and head to my car. On the way home, I think about what they said. I just can't fathom that Jared would be like that to anyone. It just doesn't sound like him at all.

~~~

The next day, I text the crew that I was on my way to talk to Jared. I decided to surprise him, and because I knew he didn't live too far, I decided to get my steps in and just walk to his place. Once I was there, I knocked on the door, and his mom answered.

"Oh my…Y/n? Is that really you?!" she exclaims with a smile on her face. She instantly pulls me into a hug, and tears swell in her eyes.

"Hi, Mrs. Olivia," I say back as I hug her. She invites me in, and we talk until Jared's sister and dad walk through the door.

"Y/n!" Kaylee, Jared's sister, screams and runs to me. I hug the now 12-year-old girl.

"Hey hon, hi, Mr. Kevin," I say, giving a wave across the room.

"Hey Y/n, how have you been? When did you get in?" he asked.

"I’ve been good. Just settling in. We came in yesterday morning. I came by to see you guys, and I was wondering where Jared was.” His demeanor changed. He cleared his throat and said Jared is with some friends and now isn’t a good time seeing him. He basically rushed me out of the house after that. As I was walking home, I thought it was strange, but I didn’t want to question it…for now.

It was only one in the afternoon, so I decided to walk to the diner not far from his house. I go up to the counter to order something to-go and sit on the barstool. Taking out my phone, I text Cien and Leilani what happened. They found it strange, but they weren’t too shocked by it. When I looked around the small diner, my eye caught a pair of familiar eyes.

“Kim?” she looks at me, and her eyes widen instantly. She gets up from her table and walks over to me and hugs me.

“Holy shit! Y/n?! What are you doing here? When did you get in?” she asked. Kim and I weren’t necessarily “besties,” but we were friends. More like the type to hang out around school, but not so much outside of it.

“Hey! I moved back. Came in yesterday. How have you been?” I asked. Before she could say anything, my food comes out, and she offers a ride to drive me home.

“Oh, you don’t have to. I don’t mind walking.” She looks at me hesitantly,

“Come on, we can talk on the way. Plus, daylight or not, you never know what's lurking.” She says.

“What do you mean?” I ask. She grabs her stuff from the table she was sitting at alone, and we walk towards the door.

“Well, lately, there has been a lot of bear sightings in the area. People coming up missing or dead. And, I just don’t want you to be the next victim.” She says as we head towards my place.

“Damn, so, let me guess, no hiking?” she nods her head.

“Please, please, please! Do. Not. Go. Into. The. Woods. Especially by yourself. The last thing we need is someone going missing again.” She emphasizes. I look at her with shock and just nod my head. At the light, she turns to me. “I’m serious Y/n. I know you have a habit of being a daredevil and taking risks. Don’t do it.” I look back at her with a shocked expression and just nod my head.

“Yeah, okay. I promise.” I say being serious. She nods her head, and we continue onward in silence. When we get home, I tell her bye and head inside. I now want to know what the fuck is going on, and what did I miss?

~~~

The next morning, I try calling up Jared, but I got no response. As I headed to the kitchen, I could hear Mr. Kevin’s voice laughing and talking to my dad in the living room. Heading in that direction, I welcome him then head into the kitchen to make myself some food. Once I was done, I head back to my room and get ready to head to the beach. I overheard Mr. Kevin saying that Jared and “the guys” would be at first beach. So, why not take a trip there for the fuck of it?

I tell my parental guiders that I will with some friends and head to my car. I text Leilani and Cien to meet me up at the beach for a little girl's day out. As I’m setting up, I run into Jacob Black, Embry Call, and Quil Ateara.

“Holy shit! Y/n!?” I turn to see Jake, and I smile at them and wave. We were classmates up until I left. I look at them, and I still see Quil looks like a baby, and Embry has gotten a little cuter, yet awkward and shy, but cute as can be.

“Hey, guys! How are you?!” I say, hugging them. Maybe hugging Embry, a little longer than I probably should’ve. They were a grade younger than me, but I still would hang with them when they were around.

“Not too bad, can’t complain. How about you?” Quil exclaims. Embry just looking at me and giving me butterflies in my damn stomach.

“I’m good. You know, just moving back, living life, trying to not get killed in the process. The usual.” I say, smiling. We talk until the girls come up. I tell them to text me some time—mainly hinting at Embry—and we parted ways. A couple of hours later, the girls head home, and I stay for a little while longer while La Push is still welcoming the sun. Not long afterward, I’m cut from my daydream with loud hoots and hollers. I turn to see who it was, and I can only make out a few of them. One of the girls turns to me and waves at me. I look behind me to see no one, and I slightly wave back, having no idea who she is. She runs up to me, and I see it's Kim.

“Oh, shit. Kim, hey. Sorry, I can't see shit.” She smiles and laughs but brushes it off. She invites me over to play soccer with her friends, and I politely decline. I suck being around new people. She smiles and encourages me, but I hear the voice I’ve been looking for before I could say anything.

“Y/n?” I look up to see Jared. But not the Jared that I remember; this Jared is entirely different. Someone I have never met before in my life. This Jared looks like he belongs on WWE or some shit.

“Jared? Holy shit! You’re fucking huge!” I say, walking towards him. But before I could do anything, he cuts the reunion short.

“What the fuck are you doing here?” Hold on. Pause. What the fuck?

“Um, I live here. What’s wrong? Is that a bad thing?” he rolls his eyes and crosses his arms.

“No, I meant here. On the beach. I thought me not replying meant not to contact me or follow me.” I looked at him, shocked. Kim steps in the middle.

“Woah, babe, chill. You guys cool?” I nod my head.

“Yeah, we’re friends.”

“Was.” What the…

“Woah, what the hell J. Did I do something? What the fuck is your problem? Last time I checked, this was a free beach.” What the hell was his problem? Who is this? This, this is…They were right, Jared has changed.

“Y/n, you shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t have come back!”

“Jared, what the hell!?” I walk up to him, confused. I look behind him and see 2 more guys and a female.

“Leave Y/n. Just to make everything clear to you and to all of your friends, leave me alone. Don’t talk to me, don’t text me, don’t contact me. Don’t come to my house to bother my family, and don’t bother my girlfriend. Come on, Kim.” I stood there in shock. Kim looked as puzzled as I did but looked back at me and walked off. I stood there until I felt something fall on my face—a tear. Before I could react cognitively, I go back to my stuff and head home. I honestly felt like my heart has been ripped to pieces.

As I pull up to the house, I run inside and go straight to my room. I sit on my bed and text everyone in the group text what happened and just shower and lay in my bed again. It wasn’t until later that evening that I came out of my room for dinner at my grandparents’ house that I communicated with everyone. Why would Jared act like that? Did he do that with everyone? Is this what everyone was talking about? Something is up. I’m not going to say it's ‘roid-rage, but… I can’t pass up the thought that it might be drugs.

The following week I keep myself busy doing little things and going out with my friends, hanging out with Jake, Quil, and Embry. Mainly attempting to not be bothered about my last interaction with Jared. Coming home from Port Angeles with everyone that evening, my parents are arguing again. I retreat my stuff upstairs and try to silence them out. Ever since I can remember, I’ve always had a horrible reaction when it comes to people screaming at me or arguing with or in front of me. I eventually narrowed it down to a time where I don’t remember before I was adopted. It didn’t help that my parents did it frequently as I grew up. It was worse when I was a kid. Before I would be able to leave and go to Jared’s house, he would calm me down. Now? I have no one. I can't necessarily go to my other friends because they don’t really get how bad it is. Jared is the only one who knows and who has seen the horror.

As much as I try to block it out, nothing is working. I grab my speaker and head to the bathroom to shower, trying to calm my nerves and tune them out. Hoping that they would stop by the time I get out. But I was wrong. It seemed like it has only gotten worse. And when I listened in, it was my fault.

“If you weren’t fucking yelling, she wouldn’t need to hide and turn up the music to block us out!” mom said.

“Why is it MY fault? Like EVERYTHING ELSE! Jesus! I told you to stop when the car pulled up! BUT NO! YOU ALWAYS HAVE TO HAVE THE LAST FUCKING WORD!” Dad said. And it was just like that back and forth. I slide down the back of my door and put in my headphones while trying to even my breath. Attempting to not have a panic attack. But it seemed as if the more I try, the louder they got. The louder they got, the more I cried. I couldn’t take it. I threw my headphones on the bed, grabbed my coat, put on my sneakers, and ran past my parents and out of the house. Even as I’m running away, I can hear them yelling about how I’m now leaving. It’s times like these that make me wonder why I can’t be normal.

Not realizing where I’m going, I just run. No stopping, no looking back, not thinking, just running. I don’t come back to the realization until I am in front of Jared’s driveway. I stop, thinking back on his hurtful words that I start panicking and running away from his home. Mindlessly running away, I trip and fall from a tree root sticking out of the ground. I look at my surroundings and notice that I somehow ended up in the forest. Confused and unsure, I look for a sign of familiarity, and I can’t find anything. Trying to not put myself in an even more state of panic, I take multiple deep breaths and calmly walk back into the opposite direction I tripped. But after a little while later, I notice I was lost even more. The sun is setting quickly, and I have no idea where I’m at.

Panic starts rising as I try to calmly and carefully walk out of the woods. I reach for my phone only to discover that I don’t have it. I either left it at home or dropped it when I fell. I stop by a nearby tree and just try to relax. But of course, life likes to go against me and scare the shit out of me. It wasn’t a second later that I heard the crunching of leaves and a branch snapping. I looked around me and didn’t see anyone. The rustling of the branches above me had me look up and saw nothing. But it was the figure in front of me that scared the living shit out of me. 

In front of me stood an average height woman with chopped short black hair; she was skinny, pale skin, and beautiful. But what was creepy was the red eyes. I was so shocked by her appearance that I didn’t notice the man next to me. He towered over me. He looked six-feet, with silver blond hair, pale as the woman, and blood-red eyes.

“Well, well, well, look what we have here, Vanity. A little pet, I see.” The man says, stepping towards me.

“I see. Awe, she looks so adorable! I just want to eat her up! Can we keep her Leo!?” the female, Vanity, said. She gets a disapproving look from Leo, who turns to me, and the next thing I know, I’m up against the tree with this hand around my neck. This, by no means, is helping with my anxiety. I froze, unsure what to do.

“This is interesting, no fight back.” Leo says, “Well, where’s the fun in that?” he snarls. He throws me across the forest. I land on my shoulder and scream out in pain. “Run.” Is all he says before I get up and take off. I run as fast as I could while screaming for help. Hoping anyone is out there and available to rescue me from this hell.

“SOMEONE, PLEASE! HELP ME! HELP!” I yell, running as fast as my legs could carry me. If there's one thing I’m grateful for, it's being thankful for having the gift of balance. Without it, I would have tripped and fallen by now. I hear laughter above me, and as I look up, I see Vanity and Leo jumping from tree to tree, terrorizing me more. Nightfall has hit, and I can't see shit. I turn in another direction to get away from them, only to enter into an open field. I run across this little open area only to be cut off by Vanity on one side and Leo on the other.

“Now! We’re having fun. Right baby!?” Leo screams to her.

“Son of a bitch! What are you guys!? Please don’t hurt me!” I say, tears coming from my eyes.

“Well, since you asked so nicely. We’ll make it quick, hon.” Vanity says. She shoves me to the ground and moves my head to the side, but I hear a growl from across the field before she could do anything else. We all turn to look, and I see wolves. Giant wolves. What the living fuck is going on? A more enormous black wolf is leading two more of them, looking at us.

“Well, well, well. Look what we have here. I thought you guys died off.” Vanity says, turning to Leo, “The game just got interesting.”

“Game? What game? I don’t want to play.” I said in a quivering voice. One of the wolves looked at me; the one next to him stares back at him, then at me.

“Seems to me that one of them recognizes our little friend here, Leo.” The bitch pops my shoulder out of place, making me scream out in pain, begging them to let me go. The wolves growl and take a step closer.

“Gotta catch us to get her,” Leo says. Next thing I know, I’m tossed over his shoulder, and we’re taking off into the deep dark forest. Before I can react, I find myself moving at an inhuman speed. My mind catches up with my voice, and all I can do is scream.

“Let me go!” I yell to someone. I look up to see the wolves right on their tail. A second later, I'm being tossed in the air, and I was caught by Vanity.

“What the fuck! Please! Don’t kill me! Please!” they ignore my plea, and she starts jumping up from tree to tree along with Leo. She tosses me again, and I barely land in Leo’s arms. At this point, I'm crying. I have no idea what’s going on technically. Wolves are chasing us. I feel sick to my stomach. I just want to go home. I turn to look behind Leo and see a wolf right upon him. He senses it and tosses me to Vanity. She catches me, and I look ahead. We are coming up on a clearing, I recognize. It’s the cliff.

“NO! NO! NO! I CAN'T SWIM! I CAN'T SWIM! HELP! HELP!” Those were my last words before I’m thrown over the cliff and into the pacific. Everything slowed down at that point. I looked back and saw Vanity diving after me, and behind her, I saw one of the wolves looking at me, and before I hit the water, it howled, and I blacked out.

Part 1: Hello My Dear Friend

Part 2: Goodbye My Dear Friend

Part 3: Welcome My Dear Friend

Part 4: Why My Dear Friend

Part 5: End My Dear Friend

Request Open!

[thephantomofthe-internet]

My Best Friend’s Wedding

Billy Hargrove x Reader, Steve Harrington x Reader (One Sided), Robin Buckley x OC

Word Count: 7,363

Warnings: Crying, heartbreak, true love!!!!!

Author’s Note: Um...hi. So, I’m back. It’s been awhile. How are you? I’m okay, little nervous to post since my last story flopped really badly, but again I’m confident in this one and that you’ll like this story. I sure do! As always, leave some comments if you like it and criticism if you don’t I like both! I love hearing what you think!

Tag List: @hotstuffhargrove @moonstruckbucky @thechickvic @alex--awesome--22 @lilmissperfectlyimperfect @so-not-hotmess @hawkeyeharrington @sunflowercandie @kaliforniacoastalteens @songforhema @spidey-pal @mickmoon @buckybarneshairpullingkink @baebee35 @myrealloveissleep @allfandomxreader

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

Steve Harrington was getting married. What a douchebag thing to do. Marrying the first girl to say that she loved him. You’d been doing that for twenty-one years. And he decided to marry a girl that he hadn’t even introduced to you yet. You’d been his best friend since birth. You couldn’t believe it.

He told you on your winter break. Both of you had only been home for a few days. Steve had gone to Gary to train at their police academy and you’d gone to Indianapolis for college. You both returned home for winter break. You were hoping to enjoy a couple weeks back with your best friend. You’d planned your whole break around it. But you couldn’t even get him to leave the house for ten minutes the first week home. You hadn’t met her yet, but you’d heard her voice when you called. Steve said her name was Cathy. She sounded like she was fifteen. She literally answered the phone by saying ‘yellow?’ like a damn character in Valley Girl. What a fucking joke.

To say you were jealous was an understatement. Steve was your guy. Your best friend. Your one true love. He didn’t know that part yet, but it was obvious. You had the chemistry, you had the mutual attraction, and you had the spark, that bit of electricity Steve had been in search of since you were thirteen. You were it. But there Steve was with Cathy. He brought her to dinner. She was a freshman at Ivy Tech. She was studying nursing. She had mousy brown hair and high cheekbones. She looked like Nancy Wheeler, but with a sweeter, easier going personality. She didn’t know that Steve pissed his pants after seeing Poltergeist. She was everything Steve thought he wanted. He’d be bored of her in five years.

You pouted through that dinner and the rest of the break. Steve barely paid you any mind, he was too busy flashing his hot new soon to be trophy wife around. Her round cut diamond ring on its ugly notched yellow gold band flashing in the sunlight on her pale, milky skin making your blood boil. You just knew he bought her a new ring, his grandmother’s engagement ring was much smaller and classier than what she had on. She made him buy her a new ring. God, what a fucking bitch.

You went back to Indianapolis enraged. You flew through the small towns in your crappy car to get back home. Your roommate, Robin, made it back to your tiny apartment before you did, which meant that Billy Hargrove had his feet up on your coffee table. You let out a beleaguered sigh when you saw the soles of his dirty white tube socks waving to you from atop your psychology textbooks.

“Hargrove, feet off the books. They cost more than you do.” You groaned, dropping your army style duffle bag by your door. Billy chuckled, doing as you asked. You felt his eyes run over you, which you didn’t entirely get the point of. You looked the same, although slightly greasier from your long drive home.

“You don’t know my rates, kid.” He replied, wiggling his eyebrows at you. You rolled your eyes, waving a polite hello to Robin, who was watching the scene with a bemused look from the kitchen. You headed to your bedroom without another word, hoping for solace in the solitude of your private space. You felt like dying the second your knees hit the mattress. He was leaving you.  He was leaving you for a boring brunette named Cathy. He was leaving you for someone who didn’t even laugh at his jokes. The love of your life was marrying someone else. It hit you like running full force into a brick wall. Your brain felt like it was shaking in your skull, your nose crushed into your face as tears began to carve burning streams down your face and your nose turned red and stuffy. You were very aware of the fact that people were in your apartment, that if Robin was home then she’d call Beth and the three of them would probably spark up and would coming knocking on your door soon. But in that moment, you needed to cry. You needed to let go of every ill feeling that had been clogging your chest since Steve had told you of his plan.

You didn’t know how long you’d been in there for, your only sense of time being the markers of when the stereo turned on and off. When you heard a knock on your door, you didn’t move. Whoever was on the other side would just invite themselves in anyway.

“Hey, we’re going to get some food, you coming or-” Billy’s sentence came to an abrupt end when you lifted your face from the pillow, mascara streaking your cheeks. “Oh shit.” He shut the door fast. You both heard Robin yelling from behind the door for him to hurry up, but neither of you moved. Billy didn’t seem quite sure of himself, as if he didn’t know what to do now that he’d closed the door.

“I’m good, go on Hargrove.” You sighed, wiping hard at your damp and warm skin.

Billy didn’t move. “Are you gonna be okay?” he asked quietly.

“Does it look like I’m okay?” you bit back bitterly. You wished he would leave you be. Billy was the last person you wanted to see you cry, much less to be there to comfort you. He wasn’t your damn friend, you hardly knew him. He was just the guy who hung out in your living room and ate your food. He was Robin’s friend, not yours.

“What happened?” he asked, venturing closer to you.

You let out a sigh. Well, at least he wouldn’t tell Steve about this. “Harrington’s getting married.” You replied, your voice cracking. You needed a drink of water or something, crying had truly drained you.

“Isn’t he your age? You can barely drink.” He scoffed. It was almost refreshing. He seemed to not believe it as much as you did.

“Yeah, he is and he’s marrying a near stranger. They’ve only been together like eight months.” Your mouth turned up in a nauseated scowl. Billy watched your lips as they curled up in disgust. He smirked, trying to hold back a bubble of laughter. You looked so genuinely turned off by the thought, it was funny.

“So he’s an idiot. Why cry over him?” Billy asked, sitting down carefully on your bed. You pulled your legs up to your knees, wrapping your arms around them, tucking your chin behind them.

“Because he’s my idiot…” you muttered softly. Billy raised an eyebrow, egging you on. “I love him. I’ve loved him since I was ten years old…”

“Damn…” Billy breathed out.

“I know…” you replied, wiping your eyes on your long grey sleeves.

“You have awful taste.” He said. You gasped, throwing a pillow at his head. It hit with a smack, sending him falling back a bit, his big callused hands sliding back to support himself. You burst out laughing as it hit, you usually had pretty bad aim so you were shocked when it hit. You clasped a hand over your mouth, your eyes crinkling as you tried to hide your glee. Billy rolled his eyes, but his infamous smirk pulled at his lips.

“You don’t know Steve like I do!” you giggled, dodging the pillow as it came back at your head.

“And you don’t know him like I do.” Billy replied. He didn’t actually aim the pillow near your head, he knew he’d hit you square in the head and he didn’t want to hurt you. Your bedroom door flew open and Robin stood in the doorway, adjusting her leather jacket around her shoulders, the hood of her bright red hoodie poking out of the back and over the collar.

“Nerds are you coming with or are you having a sleepover? Beth and I are starving.” She asked, crossing her arms over her chest with a stern expression.   You could see Beth pulling up her long brown hair behind Robin, her emerald green fitted coat buttoned up as high as it would go and her burgundy scarf tucked into it. The weather must have turned on them, the temperature dropping again.

“Geez, yeah gimme a second.” You grabbed your lavender coloured cardigan from its place on the bed next to you and pulling it around yourself as you climbed out of bed. Billy followed behind you, shrugging as Robin raised an eyebrow at him.

From that point on, Billy became your wedding confidant. As the date was set and began to loom closer and closer, he stood by you, listening to you rant about Cathy and Steve and their fucking bliss. You were going to be a bridesmaid, Cathy asked you since Steve’s mother wouldn’t let him make you a groomsman. They were having a June wedding. It was going to happen in Carmel, in the same hall his parents had gotten married in. Steve’s parents were paying for everything, including your awful magenta taffeta nightmare. Billy listened to everything you could come up with, every awful insult you’ve come up with for Cathy. He watched you laugh, you cry, you scream at the sky. For the first time in knowing you, he genuinely felt for you.

In March, you got your invitation to the wedding, along with a note from Cathy. Apparently, all her other bridesmaids had dates and that you should bring a date too, so you wouldn’t be awkward. You wanted to strangle the girl. Billy was sitting on your couch when you walked into your apartment, dropping your heavy book bag on the floor, invitation still held in hand and mouth agape.

“Hey, what’s up?” Billy asked, flicking his gaze away from the magazine in his hands.

You looked up briefly “Shouldn’t you be in class?” Billy was in trade school. He was supposed to be learning to be an electrician. Instead, he had his dirty feet on your coffee table.

“I don’t feel ready yet. What’s that?” he pointed to the eggshell coloured expensive paper in your hands.

“Oh, just my invitation to the Harrington-Bray wedding and a lovely note from the bride herself.” You smirked, kicking off your tennis shoes before joining Billy on the couch. He immediately wrapped an arm around your shoulders and you leaned into him, resting your head on his shoulder.

“What’s she bugging you about now?” he asked, unable to hide the small, satisfied grin that pulled at his lips as you snuggled into him. He was glad that your attention was still on the invitation.

Yeah, he was utterly fucked over you. He wasn’t ashamed to admit it to himself. He would never admit it to anyone else, but he wasn’t going to pretend that he didn’t have feelings for you. He did. Sometime between finding you crying in your bedroom and now, he’d fallen head over feet into a pit of mushy gushy feelings that he hadn’t had to tackle before and he couldn’t escape. Before you, women fell into about three categories: old ladies in charge, women he could fuck, and women he wouldn’t fuck. But you didn’t fit into any category. Well, I mean you fit very neatly into the women he’d fuck category, but you were more than that. He wanted to make you happy, to help you when you’re upset and to harm anyone who hurt you, and to protect you from harm’s way. You felt precious and special to him, something he didn’t quite know how to tackle. So, he ignored it. He hoped you couldn’t feel the way his heart pounded in his chest as he looked over the invitation you held loosely in your right hand.

“Well, Cathy has informed me that all her other bridesmaids have dates and that, to not stand out, I should bring one too. Because wouldn’t it be fucking loopy if I didn’t have a damn date.” You huffed out a breath, crossing your arms over your chest.

Billy paused for a moment. Then, squeezing his eyes shut, he took a risk, his first in months. “I’ll go with you if you need a date.” He said.

You furrowed your brow “Why would you want to go? You hate Steve.” You asked.

“Well, for one thing watching Harrington make the biggest mistake of his life in a monkey suit will be pretty funny.” He said, earning a smack in the chest from you. “And for another, I want to help you out. You need a date, I’m there.”

You picked up your invitation, looking it over sceptically. “Are you sure? I mean it’s in the beginning of June, I don’t want to drag you away from your finals or anything, I don’t know when you’re done school for the year…”

“Yeah, it’s not a big deal, my exams are in a couple weeks anyway.” Billy replied with a shrug. Even if his finals were during that week, he would’ve skipped them to go with you. He wanted, no he needed to be there with you. He didn’t give two shits about Harrington, he could make mistakes whenever, but he had to be there to hold your hand when you needed him to.

“You’re gonna have to wear a monkey suit too you know.” You said with a small smirk.

“Its fine, I think mine still fits from my dad’s funeral.” He replied. You sat up, pulling a pen from the spirals of one of your forgotten notebooks and checked off the ‘plus one’ option on your invitation.

“Chicken or Steak?” you asked, checking off the chicken option for yourself. “Oh and also? You can’t laugh at me in my dumb dress. I got sent pictures of it and it’s bad. It’s really bad.”

“Steak and I won’t. I’ll be too busy laughing at everything else.” He chuckled, earning another smack in the chest from you before you checked off the plus one card Cathy’s expensive invitations had provided.

For the next two months, you did everything you could to ignore Cathy’s calls. She invited you to the bridal shower and the bachelorette party, both of which you refused with the same excuse. Steve called you twice to bitch you out. The third time he called to complain, you actually fought back.

“Y/N, can you please try with Cathy? She’s trying to be nice.” Steve groaned. You were sat on the couch, having forced Robin to turn down the radio so you could actually hear Steve on the other end. She and Beth were just making out anyway; they didn’t need to have it up so loud anyway. Hearing Debbie Gibson on top volume didn’t make anything more romantic.

“I am trying; I’m in her bridal party aren’t I? I’m coming up three days before the wedding to help her get ready. Isn’t that enough?” you tried, twirling the phone cord around your fingers.

“She was really upset that you didn’t come up for her bridal shower or her Bachelorette party.” Steve replied.

“I had exams during her bridal shower and I couldn’t afford to take the time off work for the party. I’m not rich like your families are Steve. I have rent to pay and classes to pass. If I fail, I don’t have a soft place to land like you do Steve.” That wasn’t exactly the kindest thing to say in the moment, but you were tired of this conversation. You felt like you’d been having it for weeks.

“That’s not fair, Y/N, you know that’s not how my life is.” Steve said.

“Oh really? Then why are your parents paying for your whole wedding? Why is your dad holding a job for you at his company? Why is Cathy already invited to the country club with full membership? Why does she spend her breaks at her family’s ski lodge in Aspen? Steve, you’re not as put upon as you like to act. I’m doing everything in my power to be there for you and Cathy, but my life and experiences are different than yours.”

Steve hung up without a reply, effectively ending the conversation there. You hung up the phone with a slam, crossing your arms over your chest. What a fucking jerk! He didn’t have the right to treat you like shit, especially over damn Cathy. You’d been his best friend for over a decade and you’d been trumped by a little skinny Minnie with no tits. A rich bitch with a collection of tennis skirts and preppy pastel blazers to rival Princess Diana herself. She wasn’t supposed to be his best friend, his choice for the rest of his life. That was supposed to be your job. You were supposed to be the person who made him happy, not some country clubber. And yet your place was glowing in the horizon. Behind the holy Cathy, your spotlight dimmed and left behind to wail your song alone under the ghost light. Except your song was bursting from your broken heart.

You wouldn’t stand for being left behind for some bitch named Cathy.

There was only thing to do. It was something you were avoiding doing since you were twelve years old.

Billy came to pick you up for the long journey to Carmel even though he didn’t have to be there until the sixth. You both refused to stay in Hawkins, too many bad memories there. He was staying in the same hotel as you. You were going a couple days early for your dress fitting and to tote Cathy around. But that wasn’t the reason you were nervous sitting in Billy’s leather seats. You had to find Steve once you got there.

Of course, Billy was nervous too. This trip was going to end in heartbreak. You were going to watch the love of your life marry someone else. And Billy was going to watch you cry knowing that he would never hurt you like this. He would sit there and try to not let it show how much it hurt to watch you be in pain. The ride to Hawkins was tense and silent, safe for Billy’s static filled radio switching between talk radio and the hits of the day, depending on what frequency it picked up. Neither of you try to fix it. You both were too anxious to bother.

When you arrived in Carmel, Mrs. Harrington and sweet little Cathy were at your hotel. You were whisked off to your fitting and then lunch in Carmel. You left Billy in the dust that day, forced to grapple with the town that tried to kill him twice and almost succeeded. He spent the day in his hotel room and you spent your day trying to get to Steve.

Day two was a free day, safe for the rehearsal dinner that night, beginning at the church. You were told implicitly to bring your date to the dinner, as Cathy had laid out a spot for you both at the wedding table. There you met her three other bridesmaids, her sister Jessica, her cousin Ellen, and her best friend Kelly. All three of them looked nearly identical, with matching shoulder length hair cuts and pristine white pleated tennis skirts. All their boyfriends looked the same too, with their pastel polos and white padded blazers. They all shook Billy’s hand as if it was dirty. The girls looked at the pair of you like you were white trash.

You didn’t find Steve first, Billy did. The meeting didn’t exactly go well. You’d gone to the bathroom and when you returned Billy and Steve were staring each other down with the same intensity that they did in high school. You parted them quickly, smiling at Steve sympathetically.

“What is he doing here, Y/N?” Steve asked through gritted teeth.

“He’s my date, Steve, he’s a friend of mine.” You replied simply, pushing Billy away as he tried to come back into the situation. Steve scoffed loudly, but turned away without another word. You turned to Billy quickly. “What the hell was that, dude?”

“I just came over to say hello and he got in my face!” Billy cried, pointing at his back as Steve stalked away.

“Can you just keep your chill for a day? Please? For me?” you whispered, squeezing his hand gently.

Billy’s expression softened instantly and he nodded, swallowing hard. “I’ll try.” He said.

“Thank you,” you said “I’m going to try to talk to Steve, hang tight okay?”

Billy nodded and you headed towards where you saw Steve go. He had headed out the main entrance, to where Cathy would be sent when they were ready to begin the rehearsal. You wiped your sweating palms on your royal blue skirt. You took in a deep breath through your nose and pushed open the heavy wooden doors, to find Steve Harrington practically ripping out his hair.

“Steve?” you asked quietly. He turned to look at you, his expression not changing when he saw you.

“You couldn’t have brought anyone else, could you?” he bit out, pulling his hands through his hair one more time before crossing his arms over his chest.

“He asked, I agreed. He’s not the same guy he was here.” You replied, adjusting your purse strap.

“Bullshit,” he chuckled coldly “He’s still the same douche he was a couple years ago. Nobody changes that much.”

“You did.”  Steve went to retort you, but closed his mouth without speaking a word. You pressed on “Robin trusts him, they’re pretty much best friends, and I trust him. He’s been really good to me these past few months. Been my friend while my best friend was missing in action.”

Steve was silent for a moment. “I’ve been busy, Y/N, I had to help plan a wedding.” He muttered.

“And I’m supposed to be my best friend. That doesn’t change when you get a girlfriend. You promised me that, remember? After Wheeler that was our deal. And you broke that with her.” You replied.

“Don’t call Cathy ‘her’. She’s not just some girl.” Steve snapped.

“Why didn’t you introduce me before you got engaged? You had the time, it wasn’t like you just met her. I didn’t even know that you were even seeing anyone seriously.” You replied, matching his tone.

“Because, sometimes a man likes to have his secrets! What, Hargrove over there not keeping anything from you?” Steve cried. The large church doors opened again and revealed Cathy, shuffling in her Mary-Jane’s with a shy expression.

“Honey?” she asked, drawing Steve’s attention and softening his expression instantly “We’re ready to start if you are.”

“Just, give me one second, okay sweetie?” he said, his tone softer and kinder with her. He turned to you with a less than kind expression, nodding for you to head to your group. When you didn’t move, he spoke “You should go with Cathy, go learn your job.”

You left without a word. The rest of the rehearsal went by in a blur. You were put second in line to enter the church, supposedly and were given the role of train fixer before Cathy walked into the church. You were given specific instructions on how to hold your bouquet of yellow roses and baby’s breath in front of you. You went through the walk in and then listened to the pair go over the ceremony with the pastor in charge of marrying them. Supposedly they’d written their own vows. You looked to Billy, who looked utterly bored with the other boyfriends. When the rehearsal ended, you were all told to join the Harrington’s at their home for dinner.

Steve grabbed your arm as you were leaving the church. You hung back without a word as he told Cathy to go on without him. “Look,” he began once his fiancé had passed “I’m sorry I got mad at you. I was out of line. I was just surprised when I saw you and Hargrove together. It weirded me out. But I’m okay now.”

“Look, it’s whatever, you don’t like him and that’s fine. I’m a bit tired, will you apologize to your mom to me? I’m gonna bail on the dinner.” You replied with a small shrug, wrapping your arms around yourself. It was seventy-five degrees outside but you were freezing.

“Are you sure? I don’t think it will be a big deal…” Steve said, his warm hands coming to your bare shoulder, warming your skin and melting your heart.

“Nah,” you chuckled “Besides, you don’t really want Hargrove in your house anyway, right? Just tell your mom we went home.”

Steve laughed “That’s fair,” he released your arm “I’ll see you tomorrow, right?”

“Duh, I wouldn’t miss it for the world.” You elbowed him in the arm before heading off. Billy was watching from the sidewalk, hands shoved in his pockets, eyes trained on the ground. You ran up and wrapped an arm around his shoulders.

“Let’s blow this pop stand.” You said with a cheeky grin.

“Where’re we going, princess?” he smirked, wrapping an arm around your waist. He usually wouldn’t do that, but then again you didn’t usually wrap yourself around him in public. He took the chance on you pulling away for a moment to hold you.

“Benny’s? If it’s still open, I guess.” You replied. The idea of Benny’s not being open anymore hit you like a truck. How much had Hawkins changed since you left?

Evidently, not that much. The Harrington’s still lived on Pine Street and Benny’s was still open, its owner having been dead for almost seven years. You found yourself in its yellowed dining room, eating greasy burgers and fries while discussing the old days here. You weren’t friends with Billy in high school and you hardly paid him much mind, so all his stories were fresh to you. He told you all about his whoring days and his wild child moments. How he broke into the library to screw around with Diana Krass and denied breaking a window when the police came around. He was the reason the library got security cameras. You nearly died when he told you about catching Melissa Rankers and Caroline Spears writing out someone’s phone number in the boy’s locker room. A ‘For a good time call’ situation. You made him laugh his ass of when you told him it was yours and all the crazy calls you got that year from desperate boys looking for phone sex. He couldn’t top your story about how Tommy Hanson called you after his breakup with Carol and would not believe that you weren’t a phone sex operator. The fact that you knew what his sex noises were disturbed you both. You spent your evening laughing and joking with Billy.

It felt like you were hanging out with Steve. But different. You closed down Benny’s and drove around till almost five in the morning. You barely made it to bed.

You were woken up at ten by your hotel room phone ringing off the hook. Mrs. Harrington, Cathy, Ellen, Jessica, and Kelly were all here in room two thirteen. You had to join them to start getting ready. Apparently, there were mimosas. The call made you feel more exhausted than you felt when you woke up. But you went, grabbing your makeup and the robe the hotel provided, padding over to their room.

The group was rowdy. You were introduced to Cathy’s mother, who hugged you like she meant it. She seemed to have already indulged in a few mimosas before you’d even arrived. You spent your morning mostly drinking and waiting around. They only had one makeup artist and one hair stylist who were styling everyone and no one had decided on how you should look. You ended up looking like a clown, your hair too big and blown out for your face and your makeup hair too bright. And your dress was worse in person. You’d tried it on in the shop, but in natural lighting you got the full picture. Horrid satin and taffeta all the same shade of sickly magenta, with a tulle filled a-line skirt and scratchy puff sleeves and a square neckline. This dress did nothing for your chest and hips, not that your hair and makeup was helping. You pulled a bit of baby’s breath out of your bouquet and tucked it into your up-do. Apparently, you were supposed to bring your own jewellery and hair accessories, so the bit of greenery would have to suffice. You tucked your feet into the matching heels and smoothed your skirt, looking over the other bridesmaids. Jessica looked alright in the dress, but overall all four of you looked a bit like clowns.

And then, Cathy appeared. And she looked just as bad! She seemed thoroughly disappointed, but trying to hide it with a tight lipped smile. Her dress seemed to be modeled on Princess Diana’s, with its off the shoulder cream puff sleeves and sweetheart neckline, but where on Princess Diana it looked royal on Cathy it looked cheap. Her skirt seemed a bit too big to move in and the big bow on the small of her back seemed silly. She didn’t look happy with her dress, but she simply adjusted her veil and fixed her cherry red lipstick, nodding at her reflection. Her mother appeared behind her in a bright purple sparkly number with a matching jacket, complete with shoulder pads. Her eyes were misty. Clearly, this was the most beautiful sight in the world.

Your little group headed downstairs to your town cars and you headed to the church. You hoped Billy had made it to the church on time. You hoped Robin and Beth had made it into town and that no one had stopped them or shunned them for being gay. Most of all, you hoped you could hold it together through this thing.

The ceremony took a long time to start. You contemplated going to find Steve. To tell him how you feel, to convince him to run away. But something kept you right where you stood in the church’s entrance way. You couldn’t do it. You couldn’t ruin his happy day. Steve loved Cathy today. Maybe he wouldn’t tomorrow, in six months, in a year or twenty-but today he loved her. And you wanted him to be happy. So you’d shut your mouth and let him have this. But as the ceremony started and you began your walk up to him at the altar, your heart shattered. In another life, that would be you he was waiting for. But it was Cathy. You couldn’t watch them during the ceremony. You kept your eyes on Billy, who was only watching you. His steely blue eyes on yours kept you calm as tears bubbled in your eyes and emotion clogged your throat.

When it all ended, you rushed to get out of the church. Billy’s arm came around you the second he found you. He let you cry into his white dress shirt and ruin it with your makeup filled tears. He held you till your breathing evened out, then he wiped your cheeks and led you to his car.

“Did Robin make it okay?” you asked, your voice hoarse as you adjusted your skirts. Billy stood holding your door, waiting to shut you into the car. He narrowed his eyes, looking you over the same way he did when he first found you crying over Steve all those months ago.

“Is that really what you’re worried about right now?” he asked.

You smiled, your expression still watery. “No, but it’s what I’d rather think about.” You said. Billy frowned, shutting the door and walking to his own, popping it open and climbing in.

“Yeah, they made it in fine. They sat in the back and, according to Beth, they spent the whole time making fun of Cathy’s butt bow. And your dress.” He explained, turning on the engine.

“I look awful, don’t I?” you asked. You weren’t sure whether to laugh or cry, your mind was all over the place.

“No!” Billy corrected, looking into the rear view as he backed out of his spot before turning out of the parking lot. “You look like a beautiful Kool-Aid man.” You smacked him hard in the shoulder, gasping loudly. Billy laughed at this, looking you over. You really did look beautiful, despite the awful dress. Nothing could muffle your beauty.

“Your makeup…um…it ran a little bit. There are some tissues in the glove compartment…” he added, looking away. You flipped down the mirror to look yourself over. Your tears had carved black stripes down your cheeks, washing away your foundation and destroying your blush and eyeliner. You sighed, popping open the glove compartment and pulled out a handful of tissues, wetting them with your own spit and wiping away the makeup as best you could.

“Oh god, I look awful. I can’t believe I walked around like this.” You groaned, rubbing at the garish pink blush painted like rosacea on your cheeks. That makeup artist had something against you.

“You look fine, don’t worry about it. Cathy looked worse than you, her hair looked like it hurt.” Billy replied as you wiped away the bubblegum pink lipstick from your lips. Billy tried not to watch you and your puffy lips, focusing hard on the road ahead.

“I look better, now that I’m getting this shit off my face.” You replied, focusing on getting the shit brown eye shadow off your lids. Once you toned it down, you felt a bit better. They’d already taken all the pictures they needed outside the church, you didn’t need to keep up appearances now.

Billy pulled into the parking lot of the reception hall and let you out quickly. He offered you his hand before you walked in and you didn’t let it go until dinner was served. Throughout the couples making the rounds to the tables during cocktail hour and the speeches before the meal was served, you squeezed his hand whenever you felt yourself getting emotional, grounding yourself to him and to something safe. You made your rounds to Robin and Beth, who looked much better than you. They laughed at your little ensemble and made you do a full spin to really show off the skirt. They laughed far too hard at you, but Billy didn’t even chuckle. As soon as you were done, his arm came right back around you. Robin and Beth exchanged a look that you couldn’t quite interpret. You returned to your seat when dinner was served and sat through a nauseating round of the newlywed game while they served dessert. Billy made sure to distract you when the questions got too lovey-dovey, cracking jokes in your ear and, when in doubt, covering your ears.

But he couldn’t protect you from the first dance. As it turns out, Jessica fancied herself a singer and was tasked with performing the couple’s song. Steve and Cathy went to the dance floor as the slow piano intro to Elvis Presley’s I Can’t Help Falling in Love with You began to flow through the room. Jessica’s nasal voice took the lead vocals, crooning out the opening lines “Wise men say, only fools rush in. But I can’t help falling in love  with you…” the song was so cliché for the wedding. You tried to mock it to keep away the emotion, but it was all too much. The tears began to fall as Cathy’s head came to Steve’s shoulder.

“Like a river flows, surely to the sea, darling so it goes; something’s were meant to be…”

Billy’s hand squeezed yours. His heart was breaking, watching you try to hold back tears as Steve and Cathy danced in their own blissful bubble. As the chorus came around again, you broke away, rushing to the nearest exit. You both knew that you couldn’t take anymore. Billy followed behind you without a second’s hesitation.

He found you in the lobby, hands crushed to your face. He wrapped his arms around your neck, pulling your back to him. “Oh, please, leave me alone Bill. I need to be alone…” you sobbed.

“I won’t leave out here to cry alone, Y/N, you’re not alone.” He replied, holding you tighter.

“I love him, Billy…” you cried, turning in his arms to press your face into his chest “Why doesn’t he love me?”

“Because…because he’s an idiot, Y/N, any man would be lucky to have you love him.” He replied, petting your hair softly. It felt stiff from hairspray, but he didn’t care. As selfish as it was, this was the best part of his day. Having you hold him like you loved him.

“What does she have that I don’t have? I’ve been there for him his whole life. And suddenly this girl is his whole world. I’ve spent so long trying to maintain a place in his life and this girl can just show up and get a spot without question.” You muttered. That felt selfish to say, but you felt as though you earned a bit of selfish thinking.

“Because Steve lives in his own world. And we just orbit it. But you? You deserve to be someone’s whole world. You deserve to be the first person someone thinks of in the morning and the last thing they think of at night. You deserve all that cheesy shit because you’re worth it.” He said quickly, pulling you away from his chest to look you in the eye. You looked so small and vulnerable in his arms.

“Why am I always trying to love someone who doesn’t give a damn about me?” you chuckled sadly, running your hands up and down the smooth material of Billy’s suit jacket.

In this moment, Billy had a choice. He could go the easy way or the hard way. Billy chose the easy way most of the time, he coasted through life without trying very often for anything. If it didn’t come easy, then he wasn’t going to work to have it. But today, for the first time since he came back the second time, he chose the hard choice.

“Y/N, watching you moon over Harrington is the single hardest thing I have done in my life, that man is an idiot,” Billy said firmly, squeezing your waist slightly to ground himself to the moment.

“I’m sorry I didn’t mean to burden you with all of this, I-”

“He’s an idiot for not loving you.” Billy cut you off, silencing you with a look. He looked anxious. You’d never seen him anxious before.

“He’s an idiot because you’re so easy to love. I fell in love with you two weeks after I found out about Harrington and I don’t love girls. I don’t. I didn’t think it was in my damn DNA but here you are, with your pretty eyes and your jokes and your smile and I fell for you so fast. And watching you chase after Harrington, cry over Harrington, rant and rave about that damn asshole killed me! Because he’s not worth it! Look, I don’t care if you don’t love me back, you probably don’t, but please move on from him. You deserve the world, not a stupid spot in someone else’s.”

Billy was out of breath when he finished his little speech, staring into your eyes as your tears dried and your mouth fell open.

“Your…you’re in love with me?” you asked slowly. Your mouth felt dry and arid, your heart was pounding loudly in your ears.

“Yeah, shocking I know.” Billy chuckled, rubbing the back of his neck. He tried to pull away from you, but you refused to let go. Your hands came up to his cheek, stroking the skin there briefly before placing a feather light kiss on his lips, tentative and slow. You were unsure of yourself, unsure if you were even in the right mind to make this kind of choice, but all your worries melted away when your lips touched. It wasn’t the fireworks Steve had been describing for your entire adolescence, it was safe and comforting. Your heart filled with joy, you worries fell away. Suddenly, without warning, you were home. You were home in his arms and you were home on his lips. You hadn’t felt at home since Steve hugged you goodbye when you made the trek to college. But home wasn’t with Steve anymore, he had his own home with Cathy now. But home could be with Billy.

He pulled away first, pushing you back by your shoulders. “You don’t have to do this, Y/N, it’s okay I understand-”

“Billy,” you silenced him instantly “I don’t kiss anyone unless I want to. I wanted to kiss you. I want to kiss you. Look,” you sighed, scuffing the toe of your ugly wedding shoes  on the linoleum, looking up at him through your lashes. “I don’t know how I feel about anything right now, I’m not certain, but I feel safe with you. I like you. Platonically and romantically.  And all I want is to feel safe with someone. So, can we try?”

Billy looked your face over, his big callused hand coming to your cheek, wiping a stray teardrop from your lower lashes. You nuzzled into the warmth of his palm. He moved his hand to under your chin, pulling your lips to his, kissing you harder and deeper than before, wrapping his free arm around your waist, pulling you flush with him.

This was all he wanted. The moment he dreamed of. Thinking about you made him feel weak, like a pathetic child. But having you in his arms, it made him feel like it was okay to be weak. That he didn’t have to be strong all the time. You made him feel strong, even when he was acting weak and vulnerable. He felt secure with you. That wasn’t a luxury he took for granted.

The kiss awoke the last bit of feeling you were missing with him. Billy was golden haloed, bright like the sun and shining. He was solid and present, a lighthouse in a storm. He was your rock. You hadn’t realized that you’d been clinging to him until he almost disappeared. He didn’t know you like Steve, but that wasn’t a bad thing.

When Billy let you go, the smile that spread across your face was impossible to hide. Billy’s expression matched yours, a genuine smile from a guy who rarely did more than smirk. The look melted your heart even more, turning goo into pure liquid.

“Are you sure?” he asked softly.

“Are you sure? You don’t exactly do this every day.” You countered, smacking him in the chest lightly.

Billy rolled his eyes “Oh shut up, I’m trying here.” You smiled, pressing a chaste kiss to his cheek.

“Come on, let’s go back in before people start asking questions. I don’t want Cathy in my business, she’s so nosey.” You grabbed his hand, squeezing it in yours.

“Oh, total Carol? I heard her and Tommy talking shit in the back about your dress. Want me to beat him up?” Billy replied, following you back into the hall.

You gasped “No!” Billy laughed loudly, shaking his head. The band had started up again and the leader asked for all the lovers in the room to join the bride and groom on the floor. “I just want to dance, alright?” Billy nodded and let you lead him onto the floor. You wrapped yourself in his arms again, placing your head on his chest and listened to his heart beat.

The day wasn’t perfect, and it certainly didn’t end the way you expected it to, but in Billy’s arms, you felt okay with how it went. You weren’t with Steve Harrington, but that wasn’t something to cry over anymore. Billy Hargrove was here to make you feel invincible again.

[nanasarea]

First Love I Na Jaemin

Genre: angst (or fluff, depending on which ending you prefer)

Pairing: genderneutral!reader (I think?) x Na Jaemin

Prompt: Na Jaemin being the it boy as he always is, and you being whipped, like i know you are

your first year in high school seemed chill

relaxed

stress free

until Na Jaemin appeared

you never believed in love at first sight

Mainly bc “you can’t fall in love with someone based on their looks”

Now I’m not saying that changed when you saw him

But when you saw him

Something clicked in you

Something happened

You didn’t know what exactly

it was weird

and pleasant

but also awkward

You knew you would end up liking him

if you liked it or not

You tried not to stare at him

to distract yourself

which was hard considering everyone was talking about him

Your friends? yes

Teachers? yes

Classmates? yes

Students in other years? yes

Even your parents? SOMEHOW YES

No one could escape Na Jaemin

he was nice

a good student

good looking

talented

charismatic

perfect

loved by all

what was the worst part was 

he was so nice

he would come off as flirty

which made everyone attracted to males die

He was almost everyone’s first love

that’s why you didn’t put much thought into it

you avoided him as much as possible

which as I said, was hard

you signed up for some clubs to get your mind off of him

you signed up for poetry

He was there

“I wanted to improve my skills”

You cursing at him bc like

yOu ArE tRyInG tO aVoIdE hIm

every girl then joining bc Jaemin

you end up writing a poem about him

but no one notices it’s about him

but him

so one day when they’re given some time to write things down

so he sits next to you at the beginning of class

“Is this seat taken?”

“No, go ahead”

You trying not to die there and then

Jaemin looking at you

you trying to ignore him

until

“What is it?”

you put your notebook and pencil down and look at him

“I was just wondering”

“About?”

“Was the poem you told yesterday about someone?”

“Almost every poem is about someone”

You taking your pencil again

Trying to avoid him

Because the blush on your face was becoming harder and harder to hide

He takes your pencil and places it down far from your reach

“Who was it about?”

“Give me back my pencil”

“a name for a pencil”

Jaemin smirking

You cursing at both of you

“Just give me the pencil”

“May I guess?”

“Sure why not?”

Jaemin looks at you and then scans the room

his eyes land on Jeno

“how about Jeno? He’s a good looking guy, smart, nice. Wouldn’t be surprised”

Yes yes he would

Because he knew the poem was about him

he just knew

“It’s not about Jeno”

shocker

“Could it possibly be about me?”

the smirk on his face said it all

“No.”

You quickly replied and took your pencil

you continued writing

even more shy and awkward as before

That was a clear yes

which made Jaemin cheer a bit

“I knew it”

He said continuing with his work

“You knew nothing”

the bell rings as you quickly put away your things and sprint out of the classroom

As soon as you got home

You phoned your friend Samuel

you were too shy to do it on the way home so you waited

“…he’s just so good looking and when he smiled…ugh…Samuel kill me now and kill me please….”

“y/n, I love you, but you know every girl is crushing on him. I don’t mean to sound mean, but it’s for your best to just ignore him and try to get over him as best as possible”

“You’re right”

for the longest time

you didn’t meet

yes you stole a lot of glances at him

but they didn’t interact

You skipped poetry because you told them you had another club outside of school during that time

all just bc you were avoiding Jaemin

one day,

when you were walking home

you saw Jaemin with some girl

who looked like a sophomore

you overheard them

Jaemin was flirting as he does with everyone

“So any girl you’re interested? I saw you talking to that one freshman girl in poetry club”

“Nah, they are just another person with a crush on me. It’s quite cute how easy they have fallen for me so quickly. They all get so flustered and all I have to do is smile”

that moment

You didn’t go home

ouy turned around and decided to walk towards Samuel’s house

“Samuel, I need a hug”

crying

so much crying

half an hour went by and you were still crying into Samuel’s shoulder

“Next time, listen to me. I don’t want you to get this hurt again, I knew you really liked him”

“Samuel, I really did and he called me just another person with a crush on me…he knew”

next time you saw him

He walked up to you

you walked the other direction

he called your name

you kept walking until he stopped you

“I know you heard me call your name and I know you heard me talking to Mina about you on your way home, I didn’t mean it like that”

“Why do you care?”

“Because I’m a nice person”

“I get it, I’m just another annoying ‘fan’…I’ll stop liking you if it’s that much of a problem…I doubt it since you probably love it way more than you should and I doubt it’s even noticeable if I stop since the whole school is basically a Na Jaemin fanclub”

Jaemin being taken back

“I just wanted to apologize if I hurt your feelings, no need to be a bitch about it. It’s not like your love for me would ever matter, as if I’d date you”

Jaemin almost scoffed but was cut off by your hand hitting his cheek

“Truth hurts, y/n, you can’t just hit it if you don’t like it”

That day you went home

threw every poem away

or burned it

cried

and cried

you locked yourself in your room

cursing at yourself for being so stupid

BONUS ENDING(if angst ending isn’t your thing lol)

You decided on a whole new approach

next time you came to the poetry club

you came with a new notebook

new pen

new attitude

you got over Jaemin as best as you could

which was almost nothing

but hey

you were trying

“You’re back”

Jaemin said, seeing you walk into the classroom

“Get away from my seat”

you replied, not taking any of his bullshit

“Damn, no need to be like that, you gonna slap me again?”

he asked teasingly before moving to a spot next to Jeno

a few days passed

You became one of the popular kids at school

meaning you became friends with Jisung and Chenle

who were friends with Jeno and Haechan and Renjun

….and Jaemin

which also meant sleepovers and parties w all of them

and you becoming close with them

Jaemin kept sending death glares whenever they hung out

“I can’t believe you had a crush on Jaemin”

Jisung laughed

“Hey, I had bad taste at the time, don’t.”

You laughed back, sending Jaemin a glare

“At the time being yesterday”

Jaemin being shady af

“Oh hon, that’s sweet, I really do admire your confidence even if it’s on something worthless like this”

Your sass towards Jaemin became Haechan and Chenle’s fave thing

the others left you and Jaemin alone in the room

to go get snacks from the store nearby

after Haechan yelled “Don’t kill each other”

“No promises!” you yelled back

Jaemin decided to speak out

“Why do you act like you hate me?”

“You really wanna go there?”

“Neither of us are gonna be at peace until we heard the whole story from both point of views”

they began fighting

You felt a lump in your throat while screaming at him

tears coming from both of them

“Y/N I TOLD YOU I DON’T LIKE YOU BECAUSE I’M A STUBBORN FUCK WHO CAN’T CONTOL HIS EMOTIONS”

“what”

Jaemin explaining that he was in denial of liking you

since he doesn’t know how to properly deal with his emotions

so he pushed his feelings aside

and thought talking and seeing as just another fan would help

“When I said, as if I’d date you, I didn’t mean it. I mean, in a way it’s true, I could never date you. You’re too good for me, you were nothing but nice until I fucked everything up.”

“I cried so much just because you were stubborn?”

“I’m a leo! You know how we are!”

Talking it out

“Y/N, I love you”

Jaemin chocked out from the tears

“I hate you…but I also hate me for what I’m about to do”

as you quickly stood up and took Jaemin’s face into your hands

you pulled his face towards you until you kissed

he wrapped his arms around your waist

your hands moved to his hair

you melted into each other

this is what both of you have been wanting for so long

you couldn’t believe it was actually happening

Jaemin pushed you against the wall

and as if on cue

Haechan opened the door

and all of their eyes widened as Jaemin and you pulled away from each other

“Wow, you really still do have bad taste”

Jisung commented as the red faced couple giggled to themselves

A/N: I’m a hoe for Jaemin and angst and the enemies to lovers au so i tried combining it, kinda. But all jokes aside, I hope you enjoyed :)

[sterlynwrites]

July 16 Riot

Title: One Man Riot 

Series: All For The Game 

Pairing: Andrew Minyard / Neil Josten 

Neil Josten was an absolute menace. 

That was about the only thing that Andrew’s brain could agree with itself on any time Neil was involved in anything. He was a menace whose good intentions either ended in a self martyrdom, or ended with the people around him having to dodge things that may or may not be life threatening. 

Even after Riko’s death, this didn’t change. 

Neil was a passable vice captain and Andrew would stand by that silent approval, but there were some days that Neil could be described as a one man riot. 

It almost always involved Sheena and Jack, neither of which had learned to keep their goddamn mouths shut. In fact, Jack had been on it, again, all practice. Andrew was in goal and he couldn’t be bothered to really care about what was going on out on the field most of the time, but today was definitely different. 

What was the difference you might ask? 

The play had paused just long enough for Jack to pass Neil and say something. Andrew knew that he needed to stay out of this dick measuring because Neil could handle his own fucking dick, but Jack must have caught Neil just right on his raw nerves. The freshman didn’t understand or want to understand what the others had gone through, so everyone stopped when Neil dropped his stick and called out, “Hey. Jack!” 

Jack turned and Neil punched his square in the nose. 

“JOSTEN HAVE YOU LOST YOUR MIND?!” Wymack screamed from the sidelines. 

Everyone froze. 

Then all hell broke loose.

Jack was on his back, the redhead on top of him, both hands fisted into his shirt. His face was close to Jack’s and he couldn’t see either expression, but the hard lines of Neil’s body spoke volumes. 

Don’t interfere. 

“MINYARD GO GRAB JOSTEN.” Wymack growled at him waving in the direction of his just-slightly-something. 

Andrew shrugged and dropped his stick, his gloves and wandered over. 

Before he got there Sheena decided to be a stupid bitch and get herself involved. Her hands pushed at Neil’s shoulders and Andrew quickened his steps because two on one? Really? 

That won’t do. 

Before he reached them, Sheena ended up on her butt Allison standing between her and Neil, “Back off.” 

Smart. 

Anyone who touched Neil would be punished. The upperclassmen knew that rule, and it was one that the freshman were still learning. 

Matt had stepped forward and he hand his hands on Neil’s shoulders, “Neil, buddy, you need to let him go.” 

“Why?” Neil gritted out through clenched teeth. 

“Because we like you and you can’t play exy in prison.” 

“Not true. I played in juvie.” Andrew called out. 

Matt turned and looked at Andrew, “You aren’t helping.” 

No. He wasn’t. But if Neil was an instigator, then Andrew would fan the flames just a little bit. After all, he was still interested to see what would happen if Neil decided to end Jack. 

“Am I supposed to?” Andrew gave Matt a flat look.

“Yes!” Nicky stood to the side, fingers flexing as he tried to figure out where to pry Neil off of Jack. 

“Fucking Asshole as soon as I’m up-” Jack snarled. 

“You’ll what? Don’t even think about it.” Dan snapped. 

Again, one man riot Neil Josten. Already the others were dividing and it was clear. Not one was on Jack’s side. 

Andrew rolled his eyes and changed to German: “What did he say to piss you off?”

Neil’s fingers loosened and he flicked his eyes over towards Andrew: “He said something about you.” 

Leave it to Neil to have a short fuse when it came to him. He still didn’t understand it, but it made his chest clench and something warm flood it. 

“Leave him. He is not worth it.” 

“I kind of think it’s worth it.” 

“Well I don’t. You do not need to defend me.” 

“I actually think he should hit him again.” Aaron volunteered. 

“Yeah, what could another punch hurt? He’s already down.” Nicky added. 

“No one asked you.” Andrew shrugged and stepped forward, putting his hand on Neil’s shoulder. 

“JOSTEN GET OFF HIM UNLESS YOU WANT TO RUN A MARATHON!!” 

Wymack growled and added, “Jack maybe keep your mouth shut huh?!”

“Come on junkie, let’s go get Abby to look at your hand.” Andrew switched back to English again. 

It wasn’t a request. 

Neil relaxed under his hand, and let Jack’s shirt go standing up.

Everyone let out a collective sigh of relief.

As Abby fussed over and bandaged Neil’s busted knuckles, Andrew settled next to him as things slowly got back to normal. When she was done she headed up into the stands to tend to Jack’s, bloody nose and split lip. 

“Was it worth it?” Andrew asked. 

Neil nodded, “To me it was.” 

Note: If you don’t know these awesome characters, click here for some art.

@jennoasis @furokuro @thefirstknightofren 

[bangcrizpychan]

Tainted Daisies | iii. Click!

Chapters: | prologue | i | ii | iii  | iv | v | vi | vii | viii | ix | x | xi | epilogue |

Genre:  psychological thriller, angst, mystery, crime, rich kid!stray kids au, college!au, slow burn

Word count: 2.5k

Ratings: 16+

⚠WARNINGS: graphic gore, violence, blood, character death, mentions of drug usage, swear words

Note: Flashbacks are in italics. Also thank you @mikoto-ica-fics​ for letting me add you in this story as a character, wuv u <3

Tainted Daisies Masterlist

Tag list: @nightshade-minho @mikoto-ica-fics  @momochiiiiiiii@nowimyourdaisies @ravenlilshots @channiesmixtape @skzmnho​ @yutacchin​ @minnieflowers​ @xxbluestrifexx​ @mxxndreams​ @hshhj0620​ @kpopwritist​ (If you want to be added to or removed from the tag list, please let me know).  

You woke up in cold sweat, thirst burned your throat as you hurried towards the refrigerator, knees feeling like jelly. You gulped down the entire glass pitcher as you slowly slid down with your back against the fridge.

Everything seemed like a blur to you, confusion filled your mind as you finally realized that you were back home. You looked at the clock and it read '15:05'.

'Was that all just a dream last night?' You thought.

Your eyes traveled down to your wrists and they widened in horror, red marks that were clearly caused by friction were etched on them. You clutched your head as small pieces of memory started to form in your brain.

----

The feeling of nausea flooded you as you slowly opened your eyes, you wanted to hold your head but your hands seemed to be restricted. You waited for your visions to clear up and you saw that you were at an unfamiliar place, there was a raggedy old bed in the corner, a table next to it, a small television, and a pile of clothes by the door that was ajar. The place was small and the only source of light was the lamp hanging above you.

"You're awake," a raspy voice came from the door and you blinked many times to focus your visions.

A man emerged from the shadows and you felt like a bucket of cold water was poured over you. The clothes he was wearing was the same as the one you glimpsed at yesterday on the busy street, you felt tears trickle down your face as he walked closer, taunting you with every step.

He stepped into the light and you finally saw his face, it had a huge burn mark on the right side, he was smiling at you but he had a missing tooth on the front, although it was his eyes that sent shivers down your spine. It was empty, cold, but most of all, it had  a deranged look in it.

"Why are you crying? You knew that I will be coming for you," he said as he reached out his slender hand and touched your face.

"Please, why are you doing this?" You choked, tears streamed down your face as fear finally took control of your body.

"Oh, you are getting good at this," he said and released a maniacally laugh that echoed all throughout the room.

"Y/n!" your train of thoughts abruptly stopped when you heard your name, you looked at the distance and saw Seungmin, with Jeongin by his side walking towards your way. You quickly turned on your heel and scurried away from them, you thanked the crowd of students that drowned you. It was Saturday but you were required to come back to school for the freshmen orientation and introduction of different clubs and orientation, which made you wonder why they were even here in the first place.

You did not pay any attention to the orientation at all because you mostly found these kind of things tedious, when the president of the university finished giving off his closing remarks, you were instructed to go to the lobby and were encouraged to join clubs and organizations. You have decided to stay for a little while and tried to avoid your friends as much as possible.

As you were strolling around the lobby, taking a look behind you once in awhile, you suddenly bumped into someone and a sound books hitting the floor rang in your ears, you rubbed your head and looked at who you just hit.

"Oh, you're Rei, right?" you said at the girl, as you remmbered her as the one Seungmin mentioned yesterday.

"Um, yeah, and you're the new girl," Rei said, biting her lip and tucking a strand of her brown hair behind her ear.

"You're classmates with Sengmin, right? So that means you're not a freshman," you said as you helped her pick up her books.

"Yeah, we're in charge of the photography club so," she said, looking down, and you noticed that her shy demeanor was the sign that she no longer wanted to have a conversation with you.

You decided to not pry anymore and let her go as you handed her the rest of her books, she trotted away and you thought about checking out some of the other clubs. You felt an arm grab yours which caused you to release a yelp and follow your instincts by pushing the person away.

"Woah, it's just me," Chan raised his hands up in surrender and gave you a toothy grin that showed his dimple. You muttered an apology and took a deep breath to steady yourself.

"Are you avoiding someone?" Chan asked out of the blue which caught you off guard.

"No, why would you say that?"

"You have that look of paranoia written all over your face," he said and you couldn't help but release a laugh because you felt that you really were bad at pretending.

"Chocolate?" Chan offered you a piece and you gladly took it, you looked at Chan and the world seemed to stop around you, the shuffling of people were blurred and your focus was only on Chan.

You realized that you did not really take a good look at him during your conversation with him at Felix's party yesterday, but with him standing only a meter away from you, it was his eyes that caught yours. It was dark, cold, and mysterious, but it only made you crave to know him even more. You caught yourself thinking about how his eyes would ravish you and your cheeks turned crimson red.

"Your face is red, do you have a fever?" Chan asked as he raised his right hand to touch your forehead. You backed away and played with the hem of your shirt while biting your lower lip, you opened your mouth to say something but Jeongin's voice cut you off.

"Hey, Y/n," you looked behind you and immediately looked down, ashamed of what he would probably think because you avoided him and Seungmin the whole afternoon.

"I know you're avoiding us, if we ever did something wrong, I'm sorry for that," Jeongin said and guilt pervaded you.

"No, you didn't--"

"If you're ready to talk, just call us," he continued and showed you that cute smile you like so much. Jeongin was like a baby brother that you never had and hurting him in any way pains you as well.

"I'm sorry, I promise I'll explain it," you said and rubbed his arm as a sign of comfort, he nodded in response. You looked through the glass walls of the university and you noticed that it was already dark.

"Are you heading home?" You asked Jeongin just before he was about to turn his back from you.

"No, Seungmin and I are going with Rei to meet a reporter, she have to describe what she saw that night."

"Oh, I bumped into her earlier, I guess I'll see you on Monday," you said and the both of you bid each other goodbye.

"If only I know where to find her though," Jeongin whispered to himself as he continued his search for his friend.

"Why are you avoiding them?" Chan's question surprised you, you have forgotten he was there with you.

"I am going to kill you, Y/n, but not now. I still need you to restore everything that I have lost," your captor said.

"I-I don't know w-what you're t-talking about," you cried, struggling to get out of the ropes that were tied around your wrists.

"Don't even fucking try, you bitch! It's all your fault! It's all your fault!" He bellowed and threw a bottle against the wall which earned a shriek from you.

Your captor grabbed a knife from the nearby table and brought it over your face, the cold metal touching your cheek, he slid it down, and stopping at the crook of your neck.

"I am going to kill you in the most horrendous way possible," he taunted, pushing the knife a little deeper in your skin, nipping it. A thick red fluid flowed out from the new formed wound, making you hiss.

"And I will start by destroying those you hold dear," your captor finished before releasing a baleful laugh.

"Oh, it's nothing," you said, shaking off the memory and taking the last piece of chocolate from Chan. The both of you decided to call it a night and went on your separate ways.

---------

A cold breeze made Tanaka Rei shiver as she pulled her sweater closer in hopes of it keeping her body warm. Wisps of of silver grey smoke curled their way through the hazy air as it escaped the mouth of the young woman. Rei released a chuckle, imagining what everyone would think if they found out that the quiet girl in class smokes the hell out of her lungs.

She watched the city lights blare like fireflies, being on the rooftop at the extension building offered her some sort of comfort that she never found in anyone else. Rei dropped the remains of her cigarette and crushed it beneath her foot, smiling to herself before deciding to meet with Seungmin and Jeongin.

She turned away from the railings and was met with a pair of eyes, before she could react, Rei felt her body being thrown to the side. Blood spurted out her elbow as the skin scraped off as she hit the ground; she hissed as she held her elbow to her chest, checking her wound.

"Why the fuck would you do that?!" She screamed at the figure in front of her, the moon was the only source of light and no matter how hard she squinted, she could not figure out who her attacker was.

The attacker slipped their glove-covered hands to their bag, pulled out a razor-sharp knife, and walked towards Rei's defeated state with a cackle.

"No!! Please... I don't want to die," Rei pleaded as her attacker mounted themselves on top of her.

The knife plunged into her chest, causing her to scream out in pain as she tried to pry the attacker off of her. The sharp instrument met Rei's soft and pudgy flesh, again and again, making a satisfying squish as the knife went deeper into her skin. Thick blood flowed freely from her gaping holes, her whole body trembled, blood coming out of her mouth as tears streamed down her pale face. She saw what the secretary had seen that night; the same bloodlust filled eyes before her chest became as still as a monument and met her own demise.

"Hey! you have reached Rei, I'm busy at the moment so please leave a message after the tone," a beep followed the recorded message, causing Seungmin to grunt.

"Where are you? The reporter is waiting for us at the cafe, call me back." Seungmin slipped the phone back into his pocket and  started playing with his camera.

Seungmin sent Jeongin first to the cafe so he can entertain the reporter. The presidents of each club were almost finished packing their stuff which made Seungmin realize that it was already late. An empty can rolled to his feet and he quickly picked it up, he held it and went to give it to the janitor when a thought popped into his head.

"The extension building!" Seungmin said, dropping the can into the trolley, before sprinting his way towards the said building.

When he reached the door to the rooftop, his chest was heaving up and down from being out of breath. He swung the door open and was about to call out his friend's name when he saw something moving in a distance. Darkness filled the place and the moonlight did not really help his sense of vision, he walked closely towards it and the sounds of squishing filled his ears. As he got nearer to the object, the sound became louder and he could finally make out that the thing were two persons. His shaking hands reached to the camera that was hung around his neck, he pulled it up and snapped a picture.

*Click*

A flash filled the empty rooftop and the lifeless body of his friend was on the cold floor, her own blood making a puddle around her. 

*Click*

His eyes shifted the person who had their back against him, who had stopped with their bloody activity and slowly stood up to face Seungmin.

A series of clicks and flashes emitted from his camera as he backed away when he saw the attacker's face. Seungmin turned his heel and prepared himself to sprint for his life when a sharp metal jerked all the way into his back, he dropped to the ground, face first, and screamed in pain as the attacker pulled out the knife. He took this chance to kick the murderer which caused them to stumble backwards.

Seungmin fumbled with his camera and before he could stand up, the assailant grabbed his leg and he fell again, hitting his nose against the floor, the tang of his own blood filled his nostrils. He turned around and the attacker immediately straddled him, with knife raised to the air, ready to strike.

"Please, stop..." Seungmin pleaded as his eyes became blurry from his own tears.

He let out a guttural chokes mixed with an agonized cry as the razor teared his skin, he could see the shiny metal disappeared inside him and the black handle pushed against his broken skin. He felt the attacker's gloved hands grab his head and banged it against the ground while they released an animalistic roar that became muffled sounds to Seungmin as his  head was being repeatedly thudded on the cold stone.  

The banging stopped and all he heard was the sound of his camera hitting the ground,and its pieces scattering all over the place. Seungmin felt his consciousness slip in and out, the last thing he heard were the sound of sirens before darkness took over him.

-------

"Two people were stabbed at the rooftop of Yellow Wood University! And one of them was our key witness!" The chief of police yelled, sat down, and rubbed his temple.

"This damn serial killer is on the loose and we still don't have a single lead!" He continued as the young cadet, Changbin, stirred the cup of coffee and laid it down on the chief's desk.

"I'm sure we'll get something soon, Chief," Changbin said, fixing his uniform.

"One of the victims had a camera with him, I already had it sent to the forensics team," a woman's voice drew the attention of the officers.

She had her dark brown hair on a tight bun that showed off her physical features well, most importantly; her striking blue eyes.

"There you are, Mica!" Changbin said, giving the woman’s huge smile.

"That's Detective Lee to you, Cadet Seo," she said while rolling her eyes at the young man.

"Well, at least there's good news, thank you, Detective," the chief said and took a sip from his coffee.

"Just doing my job, Chief Wang,"

"Would you like a cup of coffee?" Changbin offered to which the detective politely declined. The YWPD became busier as the night progressed, trying to figure out who is behind of all of these manslaughter.

A person took off their bloody garments and gloves, leaving them naked and covered with blood that had become brown and dry. They put it inside a bag to which they intend to burn later, and stared at the mirror with a menacing grin etched on their face.

"It has begun."

[angelliev]

Lover Boy - JJ Maybank x OC - Part Thirteen - Falling

Word Count: 2.5K

Summary: Aria comes back home to deal with the backlash of her relationship with her lover, JJ becomes interested in finding someone, and Aria scares the Pogues. 

Warnings: Kissing, cursing, blood, fainting, hospitals and Sarah Cameron being a savage.

A/N: Not much for this one. Looking forward to the next part. (Not my GIF. Credits to the owner. I don’t own any of the characters or the show.)

Lover Boy Series Masterlist

Miami has its perks, but nothing beats being back home in the outer banks. We’ve been back for several days now, hanging out, going to school, the usual. I wish spring break could last forever. Coming back to school was not something anyone was looking forward to. Thankfully, it was the last period of the day. I can’t wait to get out of this uniform and school. Ever since people found out about my relationship with JJ, people have been talking about me. Sometimes someone will mutter ‘pogue slut’ when they’re passing by me in the halls. I can really give less than two shits about what other people think, but it’s still pretty annoying. I’m just thankful I have Kiara, Sarah and Charis with me.

“So, Aria is it true?” An annoying voice snapped me out of my thoughts. I huff before looking up at Courtney, my classmate and unfortunately Samantha’s sister. She also used to live in Chapel Hill, then she moved to figure eight, like me. We used to be friends back in middle school, until I broke things off with her, due to her bullying others. I refused to be associated with a bully.

“Is what true Courtney?” I asked uninterested. “Is it true that you’re going out with JJ Maybank?” The question wanted to make me scream out of frustration. “Yes, why do care?” “Well, I was just curious, is he like your boyfriend or just a booty call?” I rolled my eyes at the question. “I’ve heard from a lot of tourons that he’s great in bed. Is that true?” Fuck yea it is. She asked with a devilish smile printed on her face. That’s when Sarah stepped in.

“Gee Courtney, you’re always into everyone’s business. Just like your boyfriend is into all the freshman girls’ skirts because he just can’t seem to get it up when he’s with you.” Que the scene from ‘Friday’ when they say DAMN! Courtney stomps away while glaring at the two of us. “Fucking bitch.” Sarah mutters. “Calm down Boo. Her words mean nothing to me. She’s just trying to get under my skin. It’s not worth the fight.” I chuckle, trying to calm her down. “I don’t care. No one talks to my splinter bean like that.” She boops my nose. “You’re adorable. You still coming to the chateau later on today?” I asked. We can’t really hangout together, due to the feud between our families. Everyone has been talking about it on the island. The two most powerful and richest families on the island fighting, all because of Rafe Cameron. Of course, Sarah and I didn’t let this affect our friendship. We’re still two peas in a pod, like always.

“Yep. Kiara and I are planning on volunteering at the turtle exhibit before we head over there. You want to tag along?” She offered. “I’d love to, but I’m helping JJ study for his test.” Lately, I’ve been tutoring JJ and making sure he’s going to school. I want to make sure he graduates, plus I don’t want him getting in more trouble with his dad. So far, it’s paying off. His grades have gone up and he’ll be walking for graduation.

“Studying or fucking?” Sarah smirks mischievously. “Studying! Get your head out of the gutter!” The two of us laugh together as we walk outside, where JJ and his bike are parked. I peck his lips, despite receiving disgusted glares. “I’ll catch up with you two later. Have fun ‘studying’.” She winks, making us laugh. “How was your day?” He asked. I answered by kissing him sweetly. “Does that answer your question?” He licks his lips. “Don’t know. Might have to try again.” He says before planting another one on me. I can feel the burning gazes of my peers on us. “Jay, people are staring.” I giggle. “Let em. They need to know not to mess with my girl. C’mon.” He puts on my helmet before I hop on his back. The engine roars to life, only gaining more attention from my classmates. JJ notices and decides to flip them off before yelling, “Later losers!” I giggle as we drive off towards the cut.

The two of us sit and munch on our food as we continue to study at The Wreck. It’s pretty cute watching JJ do his homework. He always has his eyebrows knitted and his eyes are so concentrated. His blonde hair occasionally falls in front of his eyes. “You’re staring again baby.” He smirks. “I can’t help it. You’re just so handsome.” I play with the loose strand of his hair, making him blush. “Awe, am I making you blush?” I tease. “I don’t blush.” He denies with a playful serious face. “Yeah sure, let’s see your work.” I take the paper into my hands scanning the answers.

“Hey babe guess what.” He starts. “Oh, dear god. What is it?” I joked earning an eye roll from him. “So, you know that broken-down Chevy Camaro I have?” He asked. “Yeah, what about it?” I asked, while continuing to check his paper. “I’ve saved enough money to fix it up completely. John B and I even towed it to the chateau, since my dad wants nothing to do with it. Now, all I need to do is fix it up.” I look up, my eyes are filled with excitement. “Babe, that’s amazing! I’m so proud of you! You can finally have your own car!” He smiles cheek to cheek. “I know, but I don’t know if I want to spend the money on it.” This makes my smile falter a bit.

“What do you mean? You’ve been talking about fixing it up forever. It’s always been your dream car. You’ve been saving up to fix it since freshman year.” He just sighs. “I know, but I think I want to spend the money on something else.” He says. “Like what?” He stays silent for a moment. “I think I want to hire someone to find my mom.” He speaks softly. His words take me by surprise for a moment. “I thought about what you said about your dad hiring someone to find your sister. I thought maybe I could hire someone like that to find my mom. I know it’s stupid.” He fiddles with his pencil; I quickly take his hand in mine. “It’s not stupid to want to find out what happened to your mom. I think it’s a great idea to hire someone to find her. Hell, I’ll pay for the private investigator.” I suggest.

“No, I can’t ask you to do that.” He immediately protests. “You don’t have to. JJ, I want to do this. You deserve to know. Plus, I’d love to meet the woman who gifted me with such an amazing boyfriend.” This seems to make him crack a smile, but only for a second. “But what if she doesn’t want to see me?” His question broke my heart. “It’s worth a shot. The worst that can happen is that she doesn’t want to see you, which I doubt will happen. Based on everything you told me about her, she really loves you.” I try to reassure him. “If she really loves me, then why did she leave?” He mutters. I just sigh. “Some people make terrible mistakes. But that doesn’t mean they can’t learn from them. Maybe you can give her the chance to redeem herself.” He just sighs. “I still can’t ask you to pay for a P.I., they’re expensive, aren’t they?” He asked. “Yeah, but in the end it’ll be worth it. Please let me do this for you JJ. That way you can use the money to fix the car and see your mom. Trust me, it’ll all be worth it in the end. I love you, so let me do this for you.” I plead.

“Fine. At least let me pay for the meal this time though.” He gives in. “Deal! Pleasure doing business with you Mr. Maybank.” I say in a stern voice, earning a chuckle from him. “Come on silly goose. The Pogues are probably waiting for us. I don’t need them scolding us for being late.” He pays the bill in cash before walking me out and onto the bike.

We reach the chateau, where we see everyone hanging out on the porch. When we reach them, I notice that they’re looking through these photos. “What are you guys up to?” I asked curiously. “Just looking at some adorable pictures of us when we were kids. Look at the boys.” Kie lifts up a picture of younger Pope, JJ and John B at the beach. “Aw! You guys look so cute!” I exclaim holding the picture. “What can I say, I’ve always been quite the eye candy.” JJ smirks, earning a glare from me. “So, how did you guys meet?” I point between the boys. The three of them share a laugh. John B speaks up. “JJ and I met in the third grade. This kleptomaniac here stole one of my toy cars, so I chased him all over the cut until I finally caught him. This dumbass had climbed to the top of this tree and couldn’t get down, cause his foot was stuck. I offered to help him down, only if he’d give me back the car. He said yes and we’ve been best friends ever since. Pope here, we met him in the sixth grade. JJ would always cheat off of Pope, which always made the poor boy mad. Then one day at lunch, these eighth graders had ganged up on him. We noticed and started a food fight to help Pope. The three of us got detention. The rest I history.” John B and the boys smile at the fond memories.

“That’s cute.” I chuckle. Part of me wishes I got to know them when I was younger. I guess they’ve always been troublemakers. They’re pretty close knitted, making their bond unbreakable. “Alright guys. Are we fishing or what?” Asked JJ. As we make our way to the HMS Pogue, I start to feel slightly dizzy. “You good babe?” JJ asked concerned. “Yeah, my head just hurts a little. Probably dehydrated.” I shrug my shoulders, not thinking anything of it. “Here, have some water.” He hands me one out of the cooler. “You’re starting to sound like my mom.” I chuckle. “Hey, I like your mom. She’s pretty cool. Always makes lunch when for Pope and I when we deliver groceries. Tips me nicely too. Wish all kooks were like that.” JJ smiles to himself. “Damn, I need to start delivering groceries to your house.” Says John B. “You should man. She always has lunch packed for us on standby. She makes the best sandwiches. Usually she’ll have some strawberries, carrots and chips on the side. Sometimes, she’ll put a cookie in there too.” JJ rambles on about my mom. “She likes you to you know? She thinks you’re pretty handsome.” I mock my mom. “What can I say? Moms love me.” He smiles cheek to the cheek, making me roll my eyes.

So far, we were all having fun on the boat laughing, talking, etc. Everything was going perfectly normal until my headache started getting worse and worse. I continue to down my water, thinking I’m still dehydrated. Perhaps I’m just stressed from school? It doesn’t explain the sweating though. It was only a nice seventy degrees out, with a beautiful breeze, and I was just wearing a swimsuit. We stopped for a moment to take a dip in the water. It still didn’t help however. My head was still pounding and I was still sweating afterwards.

“Aria!” The sound of Pope’s voice snapped me out of my thoughts. “Huh?” I look over at the Pogues who looked at me with concerning faces. “I was asking if you were okay. You look a little pale.” He pointed out. Great. “Yeah I’m fine. Just dehydrated. I’ll grab another water.” I shake it off, thinking it was nothing. I was wrong though. I shouldn’t have thought it was nothing. The second I got up, I started to notice these peculiar spots in front of my eyes. I also couldn’t help but notice my shortness of breath as I made my way to the cooler. I had to stop walking for a moment just to catch my breath. “You alright babe?” JJ’s voice sounded faint. My vision began to go blurry as I stared at the water. “JJ, I don’t feel good. I think there’s something…” I didn’t get to finish my sentence before my vision goes completely dark and my body goes light.

Her body shuts down and falls to the ground. Her head thumps hard against the surface. The Pogues jump and gasp when they see their dear friend collapse. “Aria!” JJ shouts, rushing towards her unresponsive body. John B doesn’t think twice before racing the HMS Pogue back towards the chateau. “Aria! Baby! Hey! Wake up!” She doesn’t respond to his frantic yelling. That’s when he notices the blood on his hand coming from the gaping wound on her hand. “Oh shit! Fuck! Guys she’s bleeding!” JJ can feel the panic and fear finally setting in. His heart beating a thousand times faster.

Sarah comes running with a clean cloth and first aid kit in hand. Tears settle in her eyes and her hands shake as she applies it to the cut. “Okay. Okay. She gonna need stitches. We need to get her to the hospital. John B faster!” That’s what she said. Sorry. JB goes races through the marsh. “What the hell happened?” Kie asked. “I don’t know! She’s was fine all day until we got on the boat!” JJ exclaimed. The Pogues near the chateau. “John B! Help me get her to the van!” JJ demands. The two boys grab a hold of her body and carry her to the van. Kie jumps into the driver seat, with Pope in the front, and Sarah opens the side door. Once everyone is situated, Kie hits the gas, making her way to the hospital.

“Just hang on baby. We’ll be there soon I promise.” JJ’s voice and hands shook. The minutes felt agonizingly long as they raced to the hospital. A sigh of relief leaves the group of teenagers lips, when they finally reach their destination. The boys quickly grab a hold of Aria rushing her into the ER. Their desperate pleads can be heard throughout the ER, gaining everyone’s attention. A familiar face spots the two boys carrying the limp girl.

“Aria!” Elaine yelps and makes her way towards them, a gurney following behind. “What happened?!” She asked frantically as her daughter was placed on the journey and rushed through the halls. “We were hanging out, then all of the sudden she fainted and hit her head.” JJ explained, following them, until he was cut off by a few doctors. “You’ll have to wait out here son.” “No! That’s my girlfriend in there! I can’t leave her!” JJ ignores their orders, tears welling in his eyes. John B grabs a hold of his close friend. “JJ! She’s in good hands. She’s with her mom. She’ll be okay. I promise. Just breathe man.” JJ listens to his friend, finally catching his breath, yet he couldn’t help but worry over the love of his life as he stood there without her.

[renaerys]

20. “Have you slept?” (Brick/Blossom)

{{Original posting unfortunately deleted. Reposted here.}}

February Fic Prompt #20 originally requested by the lovely philosophicwax. 

Summary: It's finals week at college, and Brick has hardly slept in two days while studying. A weird monster attacks because of course it does, and he has to team up with Blossom to bring it down while all he really wants to do is take a nap. 

xxx

The great thing about college was that Brick was on his own, living his life, nine months out of the year completely on his terms. No brothers nagging him for shit, no cleaning up after anyone but himself, and no disruptions during study time. His life, his rules, quiet and tranquil.

Except for the giant, sentient hairball currently terrorizing north campus that some poor asshole (Brick) would have to deal with.

Because the worst thing about college was that he was on his own, living his life, nine months out of the year without his brothers around to follow his lead without question.

“Evacuate to Prospect Avenue!” Blossom’s clear, commanding voice rang out over the shouts and screams of fleeing students.

Which, cool. Drunk, sleep-deprived twenty-year-olds in their pajamas at three in the morning were totally going to listen to the imperious Super flying above them in her pink camisole and Ivy University logo sweatpants.

Spoiler: they didn’t, and Brick was forced to abandon his warm, solitary room and his physics textbook in only a pair of old basketball shorts and his favorite red T-shirt in favor of saving a hysterical Freshman from split ends that would have literally split her end to end.

Crimson afterglow marked Brick’s path and singed the sentient tresses that crawled like tentacles after the panicking Freshman. Pudgy and cute and in the throes of a panic attack, she clung to Brick’s shirt even after he set her down a safe distance from the monstrous hairball.

“Please don’t leave me!” she sobbed.

Brick pushed her off him. “Get a grip, you’re not dead.”

She reached for him again, frightened and unable to defend herself against the supernatural monster and yes, okay, logically he knew it wasn’t her fault but fuuuuuuuuck what a pain in the ass this was.

He sidestepped her and she stumbled, almost falling, until he caught her by the elbow so she wouldn’t break her nose on the concrete. “Jesus fucking Christ.”

“Please,” she sobbed, genuinely frightened.

Brick winced. “Just get to Prospect Avenue. It’s that way.”

And with that, he left her to follow the screams of her fellow fleeing students because she was not his problem. If Blossom had already decided on a proper evacuation plan, then that meant less work for him. Lord knew he was too tired for this shit running on three hours of sleep in the last 50 hours courtesy of two finals in as many days back to back. He had four left. He did not have time for whatever the hell was going on tonight.

Crack!

Blossom crash-landed in the green not four feet from where Brick stood. Her sweatpants were streaked in grass stains and her mane of wild, red hair was swept up in a very messy bun.

“Brick,” she said, a bit breathless, a bit pissed off.

“Blossom,” he returned.

Their passive-aggressive greeting was cut short when a lash of prehensile hair came slamming down on top of them. They bolted in opposite directions, nothing but pink and red vapor, and reconvened high up in the air. Brick got an eyeful of the creature steamrolling through campus and wondered why, even so far from Townsville, he still had to deal with this weird crap.

Talk about a bad hair day, Boomer would have said if he was here. He wasn’t, and Brick just scowled.

“It’s growing,” Blossom said grimly.

Son of a bitch, she was right. The thing was sprouting more arms to help it crawl overland and tangling around the gothic architecture like the ivy this elite college was named for. It slithered through windows and drain pipes, as though searching for life hiding inside.

“Cool,” Brick said.

He was so tired.

“Can you try—”

“Not unless you want me to burn down all of Balin Hall in the process,” he interrupted her, already knowing what she’d ask. Ignoring her frown he said, “What about your—”

“Same problem, opposite outcome. These old buildings will crumble if I freeze them,” she said.

Brick matched her frown. “Fine. Then we split up.”

She looked at him far too gravely for three in the goddamn morning. “That’s not a plan.”

“It’s the best you’re getting from me right now, so stop complaining.”

That earned him a scathing glare. “Brick—”

But she didn’t get her chance to chastise him because a massive hair tentacle shot toward them with deadly accuracy and exploded into nine smaller tentacles when it was upon them. Brick darted away from the mutant tresses, but he wasn’t quick enough. Thick, black hair wrapped around his ankle and yanked him down hard enough to send his jaw rattling.

The stone shingles of a Sophomore dorm building came rushing close. He twisted, tried to get away before impact, but the thing was fast and strong and those shingles couldn’t break him but hell if they didn’t hurt on impact. Brick grunted as he gasped for breath. His back roared with pain, but the Chemical X bonded to his bones was quick to mitigate the damage, leaving him breathless with the brief, phantom memory of it. He gathered scarlet energy in his palms and blasted the hair tentacle shackling him, but the damn thing only quivered like water wherever his energy blasts hit it.

He felt it before he saw it, a cold so unnatural it grabbed him like a vice and squeezed until he nearly choked. Ice crystals bloomed upon the hair, slowing and freezing it until it lost all sentience and cracked like dry pasta under Brick’s immense strength. He blasted out of there and pulled up alongside his savior.

“You said you weren’t going to use your ice breath,” he snapped.

“Thanks for your help, Blossom, I really appreciate it,” she said, flying alongside him in a swoop back around toward north campus.

Brick rolled his eyes and immediately regretted it. Exhausted and severely sleep-deprived, he briefly saw double and faltered. A warm hand steadied his arm.

“Hey, are you okay?” Her voice lacked the smarmy edge this time and she looked at him with a measure of concern.

Brick was about to tell her to focus on the monster instead of him, but he didn’t get the chance when more hair lashes shot after them with the persistence and speed of homing missiles. Brick grabbed Blossom and flew, but he didn’t make it ten feet with her in his arms before a mass of writhing hair surrounded them and constricted.

Blossom gasped for air as she tried in vain to extricate herself, but between Brick’s ironclad hold around her and the hair shackling them together, neither of them could move. The hair squeezed tighter, and Brick gagged.

“B-Brick,” she said, her voice raspy against his neck. Her hands were flat against his chest and they were pressed so tightly together that he could hear his own heartbeat thundering under her fingertips. Even now, he could feel her trembling as they slowly, painfully suffocated.

And now he was good and furious.

Acrid, black smoke swirled in his lungs, hot and building. As little as he could move, he fisted the back of Blossom’s camisole in a silent plea. But three months and change here without either of their siblings around gave them ample time to learn each other free of distraction, and words were hardly necessary anymore. She ducked her head against his shoulder as close as she could get, and he turned his head as far from hers as he could manage before opening his mouth and releasing a concentrated inferno upon the hair binding them.

The effects were instantaneous. The fire gorged on the evil strands with abandon and drew a chilling scream from deep within them. Soon Brick and Blossom were suffocating from the smoke and heat rather than constriction. But it lasted only a moment; the second he felt the pressure around them slacken, he took off as fast as he could before the fire could consume them too.

So much for not burning down north campus, he thought, resigned.

Blossom coughed against him, and he realized he was still holding on to her. Rose met red as she looked up at him. “Thank you,” she said.

He as so tired that all he could do was stare at her for a minute. He was pretty sure she’d never looked at him like that before, without a trace of suspicion or superiority, genuinely happy to have him there.

The hair shrieked again, and both of them looked down on the burning mass below. Except, it wasn’t burning much anymore. The hairball somehow managed to sever the huge chunk lost to Brick’s fire and save itself from burning up entirely. The melted mass stank and smoked and made Brick’s bloodshot eyes water as he watched it turn to ash in mere seconds. Unfortunately, the rest of the hair that had escaped the conflagration was resilient and began to gather and engorge as it angled for Brick and Blossom, like it knew they were a threat it needed to eliminate.

“That hair is psychotic,” Blossom said with such gravitas that under different circumstances, he probably would have laughed at the lunacy of it all.

“Yeah,” he said. There wasn’t much else to say.

She’d pulled away as they hovered, sharp eyes narrowed in thought. Brick, head buzzing with adrenaline keeping him excruciatingly awake, also racked his brain for something that might help him. It came to him like lightning, and Blossom glanced at him in the same moment with the same conclusion.

“What if we led it—” she began.

“—to Tower Lake?” he finished.

She smirked. “Genius.”

“Efficient,” he agreed, managing a tired but determined grin of his own.

The great thing about college was that Brick was on his own, living his life, nine months out of the year with the only person on the planet who was sharp enough to understand him and his thought processes without the added annoyance of explanation.

She took off in a burst of pink, and he flew in the opposite direction, knowing he could trust her to move and adapt with him without the extra guidance their siblings often required.

Her laser eye beams drew the hair monster’s attention eastward, and it roiled like a thundercloud as it scrambled up the side of Balin Hall and launched into the air after her. But Brick was there and ready to blast it with his own laser eye beams, enabling Blossom to slip away from the grabby tentacles. Something within the tangled mass roared, animalistic, and soon it was tearing after him.

Just as it was about to grab him, there was Blossom with a burst of icy wind. They tag teamed the monster, leading it ever closer to the lake where the rowing team practiced, remote and clear of students at this hour. Enraged, the hairball clambered after them, determined to swat them out of the sky until they rebuffed it with fire or ice, only to draw it in again with their lasers.

The giant hairball was not smart, to the surprise of absolutely no one, and when it reached the shore it went tumbling into the dark water, unable to slow its momentum. Screeching, the mass writhed and tried to backtrack to save itself, but the water sapped it of its supernatural strength and the tentacles fell limp and lifeless the wetter they got, until it was nothing but a normal, extremely disgusting hairball.

Brick and Blossom stood an arm’s length apart on the shore watching the mass slowly sink to the bottom. It was an oddly hypnotic sight, and he couldn’t look away even as his eyes began to droop.

“Well. We’re going to need a lot of Draino to clear this out,” Blossom quipped.

Brick, half aware of his bare toes sinking into the damp soft sand, laughed at that one. And then he fell.

“Brick!” she shouted, far away.

He blacked out for all of three seconds, just long enough for her to grab him before he could lose what was left of his dignity by falling flat on his ass. Sluggish, he was slow to react to her looping his arm over her shoulders so she could bear his weight and fly them back toward campus.

“Have you slept?” she demanded in that snobbish way she had.

“Think I just did,” he said, barely able to stay awake despite the ignominy of being half carried like an invalid. That thought ignited something in him and he jerked, making them swerve.

“Watch it! Oh, for heaven’s sake.”

He rubbed his stinging eyes and didn’t really fight her as she led him back through the window to his single dorm room. Luckily, the hair monster hadn’t infiltrated his building, so his room was in the same state as he’d left it.

She let go of him and he landed on his twin bed against the wall. And then he realized what had just happened.

“What the fuck, Blossom?” he growled and staggered to his feet.

He didn’t take even a step from his bed before she pushed him back down with her strength.

“Have you slept?” she asked him again, but it came out sounding more like a threat this time.

“I’m vaguely familiar with the concept,” he snapped and tried to get up again.

She pushed him down again and pressed her hands down on his shoulder so he couldn’t get up again. Red eyes glared up at her, seething, but she matched his venom with her own, and the sight made him falter.

“They say sarcasm is the lowest form of humor. You need to sleep.”

“I need to study.”

Her hands squeezed his shoulders, and her expression softened. “Is that why you’re so tired?”

“No, I’m always tired after dealing with you.” Absurd, every minute of this. He couldn’t even stand up with her weighing him down and blocking him.

Her hands sparked with her power, pissed off at him as usual. Brick wasn’t one to believe in fate or some higher plan, but it was times like this that he seriously suspected the universe was fucking with him by giving him a literal perfect match with the most annoying personality he had ever encountered.

He sighed and rested his weight on his hands on the bed. The power she channeled to her fingers had a lovely, soporific effect as it danced over his neck and shoulders, though he would never, ever admit this to her. “What are you even doing here?”

Her fingers clenched and slackened, like she couldn’t decide, and he bit his lip to stifle a groan. God, that felt good.

“Rest,” she said, much closer than she’d been before.

Her tempting fingers moved from his shoulders along his neck and threaded through his short, red hair. Her nails were clipped but not so short that he couldn’t feel them scrape pleasantly along his scalp.

Sleep-deprived going on his third all-nighter and utterly drained after the adrenaline burst of having to fight a monster tonight in the midst of finals season, Brick finally gave up and leaned into her touch with a needy sigh.

“Blossom,” he mumbled. She smelled faintly of smoke and of him, and the heady scent made him smile to himself. His hand found the hem of her camisole and clenched it gently, a silent, delirious plea to bring her closer.

So smoothly he barely even realized it was happening, she laid him down on the bed, her hands heavy on his chest as if to push him down deep enough for the covers to swallow him whole. Her hair fell around his face, slipped free from its precarious bun, and he breathed her in.

“Rest now,” she whispered, those magical hands still dowsing him in her cool, calming power like waves over his skin.

Unable to resist her, he finally nodded off into a deep, dreamless slumber and didn’t wake again for another twelve hours.

The worst thing about college was that he was on his own, living his life, nine months out of the year with the one girl he could never seem to escape, and whom he’d never managed to keep.

xxx

Blossom gently played with his hair as he lulled to sleep at last, the last vestiges of his controlled resistance finally spent. His fingers remained curled around the hem of her shirt, warm against her waist. Sitting next to him on his bed, she watched his face slacken, at peace as his breathing evened out.

“Why are you so stubborn?” she murmured, running her fingers over his freckled cheek.

He had the determination and purpose of an avalanche, inevitable and absolutely crushing. It had given him the power to catch up to her in school as kids, to challenge her at every turn like no one else could, and to motivate her to try harder, to be better, to give him a challenge worth rising to. She couldn’t say when her feelings had changed. There was not a day, or a moment, or even a sudden epiphany that revealed her deep and tranquil affection for him.

It was as gradual as the changing tides, deep waters hiding truths that had always been there, quietly waiting. She’d been accepted Early Admission to Ivy University, the culmination of her high school efforts, and he wasn’t even sold on college when they went their separate ways for the holiday break. And then, in passing, he mentioned the pre-Frosh weekend in April for new admits; he’d be going, and could he borrow her notes for missed classes since she probably wasn’t?

She couldn’t pinpoint when or how, but maybe that was why. As much as he preferred to remain ineffable and unknowable, he had failed with her. Rather spectacularly, though she would never expose him like that. Not until he was ready.

Carefully so as not to disturb him, Blossom leaned close and kissed his forehead. Ice crystals melted upon his skin, and his fingers unconsciously closed tighter around her shirt.

Stupid, stubborn boy.

But there was time.

The best thing about college was that she was on her own, living her life, nine months out of the year with the boy she’d never been able to leave behind, and never would.

[royisms]

annekane asked: false god by taylor swift

so here’s a long ass thing i did that deiniftely doesn’t answer the question and nobody asked for but did that stop me? no.

Harvard University: Government Major

     -- Dated for five months in freshman year. Jason was in her Economy class and they didn’t talk until after the term was over. They met met at a bar near campus and it took her exactly those five months to realize that they wanted opposite things. He was looking for a long term girlfriend, and Amanda was already not about that life. She took the end of the year as an excuse and ended things before moving back home for the summer.

     -- Hookup in freshman year. Some guy on the debate team that beat her on the last round. It didn’t last long (in more than one way), but there was something about competition that was so exciting already. 

     -- Dated? in sophomore year: it’s been over twenty years and Amanda’s still utterly confused about this guy. She was certain they were only sleeping together, he apparently was sure that they were an item. It didn’t end well. Someone saw her flirting with some other guy and Bruno god stupid angry and it kind of looked like a scene out of a comedy series. They were having totally different conversations, but bottom line was she broke his heart.

     -- Hookup during the summer between sophomore and junior years: Amanda was as  vanilla as it got because she never ever had sex ed in school (shocking) and she hadn’t had enough partners and enough confidence to try things out. Xavier was her first experience with an older guy (she was 20, he was 28) and he taught her things about herself. They didn’t talk too much, he picked her up and dropped her off just around the corner of her house so her parents wouldn’t ask whose car it was. He was an incredible kisser and the fact that he paid her any attention at all made her feel all the more mature. He even paid for the morning after pill that one time. So sweet.

     -- Hookup in junior year: at that one party, her roommate and her were dared to kiss and Amanda was That Girl and was also way past tipsy and it kinda seemed like a good idea. Callie and her were in the same classes, too, and they both pretended it had never happened. To be fair, Amanda couldn’t even recall if the kiss had been good the next morning.

     -- Dated for four months: Phil. Kinda lame, but had an okay sense of humour and he sat through extremely lengthy conversations with her and Oliver about the undoubtable and unavoidable demise of humanity. Evidently, he did it because he thought she owed her after, and she wasn’t informed enough to know she didn’t, so she lay down for two and a half minutes, cleaned up after and said she was tired and she’d see him the next day because he was really weird to share a bed with. After using all the clichés she knew to say she didn’t want to see him anymore, he decided to ignore her not very subtle hints and kept calling and showing up with take out. Phil really is a boring name for a boring man who needed a smack on the head and a book on women’s rights. Also: https://royisms.tumblr.com/post/621230604961333248/i-wish-i-missed-my-ex-mahalia

      -- Fell for Marcus in junior year: this time, it was the other way around. She was completely enamoured by him (looking back, it was the fact that he had a full academic scholarship he didn’t need and him being a guy her age who wasn’t a complete waste of space). There were rumours but she decided to ignore them and they came back to bite her in the ass. If she remembers correctly, that was the first time Oliver held back an “I told you”, but maybe she just didn’t hear him because she was sobbing into her pillow and screaming about how men were all the same and how could she have been so stupid. Not only a borken heart, but Marcus also gave her an STD! Thanks babe!

Georgetown University: Masters in Public Policy 

     -- Hooked up with her first Grad professor: because she’s a dumb bitch who doesn’t learn. He was only five years older but being in a position where he was way more powerful gave her such a rush. They wouldn’t talk in class, but she’d look at him from across the room and give him a look because it earned her some rough loving when they were finally behind closed doors. He eventually stopped calling her when she passed his class and he found another student to sleep with. Anyway... That’s systemic misogyny for you.

     -- Dated for eight months in 2003 - 2004: Joshua. Maybe the first relationship she’d consider serious. She had her own room for the first time in years and so did he, and they spent most nights together. With working on top of studying and her lack of time-management skills, she didn’t spend too much time with friends and, instead, they became each other’s support system. In the end, they liked each other because they didn’t have others who’d stand by them while they got consumed in their textbooks and not because they had too much in common. He’s now probably a Republican mayor in some town and he’s balding so she calls this one a win for sure.

Started to work for her father’s consultancy to dip her toe into electoral strategy.

     -- Hooked up with: Frank. A lawyer who’d just joined the consultancy business. She met him at an event she was assisting in. He was also struggling to pay rent but he was much better at hiding it and his neat hair and grey tux (and her lack of human touch in months) earned him a willing young blonde eager to get out of her heels and into his bed. They were done by 12:13am and he kicked her out, didn’t even call her a cab. Definitely not what she’d pictured for her first month as an official adult.

Didn’t date anyone, finally decided to officially put her career first and not focus on men. Also, started going to a therapist for the first time! This was great. We love mental health. Started to think about leaving her dad’s business and work on something else. Consultancy was okay but she really wanted to make an impact on the world, have a legacy... Yada yada.  

     -- Hooked up with: Luke. Her friend stood her up at the bar because she met some dude and Amanda was forcefully introduced to the beauty of drinking alone. This guy used the classic ‘pretending to be your boyfriend when a stranger is hitting on you to get them off but then I ask for your number so you’re uncomfortable again but I win so who cares’ move. She was tipsy enough that she didn’t care he didn’t have a condom. Unfortunately, her bank account disagreed when she withdrew the cash necessary for Planned Parenthood. You know what, fuck you Luke.

She took on more responsibilities at the office and eventually gathered enough to have her own clients. Granted, she still worked for an office, but her dad was close to retiring and she was proud of her own accomplishments. People actually called in and requested her by this point! Amazing progress. She was never working on campaigns alone because Youth and also men were still in charge lmao let’s not forget!! But hey. It’s something.

     -- Hooked up with: Samuel. He wasn’t a client anymore and he was a little younger than her, actually. He was also a Republican. Something about him winning the election with her help and her getting praise over the work she’d done by her peers made her reach out in 2010. One glass of wine became two and three. She kicked him out in the morning, and as far as she’s concerned his wife never found out.

     --  Dated (on and off) for one year and a half 2011 - 2012: Doh. He was a rising journalist, he’d written a big piece on something sketchy that had happened in Congress and he’d scored an important job, and he still wasn’t as busy as Amanda made herself. It was one year full of half-fights because, as if on cue, her phone would always start ringing and she’d pick it up without hesitation. In the end, he was too tired to explain, and she didn’t really want to hear it. By this point, she’d already started shooting people an annoyed look when they asked when she’d finally have children.

Her dad retired and his partner bought his half of the business. Amanda decided to leave the company; with the connections she’d secured during her many years as an assistant, she was finally able to consult on her own. 

     -- Hooked up with: Paarush. What was supposed to be a night of unwinding and letting herself go ended in too tight of a grip and some deep bruises on her neck. She had to wear a scarf for days to avoid any inappropriate questions.

     -- Dated for two years: Peter. Professionally, she was getting places she’d never even dreamed of and, as it had happened before, she was putting her career before anything else. She started seeing Peter after a friend of a friend introduced them and he was sweet. He was an economist and he wasn’t as busy as her, but he seemed to understand. The first few months, he’d call her at night and listen to her rant about her day, he’d check in on the weekends and wouldn’t get mad when she forgot to return his call. A few months in, he asked for the spare key to her place and it made sense, because he’d get there so much earlier than her. She’d arrive and he would have made dinner because he knew she’d forget to eat otherwise. It started small: something about the clients she was working for, how she should just stay home, comments about how good of a mother she’d be even though she’d made it very clear she had no intention in having children. By the end, it was about her beliefs and her impossibility to be empathetic with him. Most of all, he repeated over and over how she was so innocent to believe she could make a change in the world. It was hard to part ways because it was so comfortable -- they’d fallen into a routine that had taken a lot of weight off her shoulders for a while, but when she changed the lock of her apartment and refused to talk to him, she really believed she was better off without him.

     -- Hooked up with: Hans. As far as she’s concerned, he definitely wasn’t the worst man she’d slept with. Need I say more?

Started working for Oliver as his Chief of Staff. A new job, new staff, new line of work altogether, it was… Big. Not too much time for dating but she deprived herself of sleep. 

     -- Hooked up with: Javier. Not a Republican, but a conservative Democrat. He was on his way to become Mayor of Louisville (thanks to her, mostly). Again, winning is exciting, and she’s a simple woman with needs.

     -- Dated for nine months: Charlie. They matched on Tinder and Amanda messaged them with a line she thought was funny and cheeky, it probably wasn’t but for whatever reason, Charlie messaged her back. They met at a bar and hit it off almost immediately, and - wow, sleeping with someone she didn’t hate was a welcomed change. They were the first (and, so far, only) person she dated who wasn’t a man. It was a little scary at first, to be honest -- she’s a feminist, she’s liberal, she’s progressive, and she’s nice, but it was a new experience and she didn’t want to say the wrong thing. In the end, they were both too busy to keep up with a relationship. Fun fact: they both decided to break up on the same night so they were dumper and dumpee all the same. Amanda was not amused at the time, she hadn’t been dumped in so long, but hey… They didn’t talk for a while, but then ran into each other at some event or the other, one thing led to another… They definitely hooked up a few times after breaking up, but both made sure there weren’t any romantic feelings left there. That would’ve been Awkward.

Election season started and, with that, her new position as Campaign Manager for Zafar 2020. Later, she’d become Deputy Campaign Manager for Berkeley-Zafar 2020. She’s working way more hours and definitely doesn’t have time for men. Or does she! You know what I’m talking about.

     -- Did not date for nine months: Silas. There are many things she could say about him, but she won’t because it never happened. Outside of her bedroom, and his (and… His office, and the restroom at that one bar), this never happened. She never sent him flowers, he never put on his cat to meow through the phone to her, they never shared a lazy Sunday morning with coffee in bed and books unrelated to work. And he’s definitely not the man who “I can't talk to you when you're like this, staring out the window like I'm not your favorite town” was written about.

[destiel-love-forever]

Angels Are Watching Over You

I decided to write a fluffy, happy, domestic au to combat the terrible feelings that promo gave me ( ** NO SPOILERS I PROMISE**)

Here’s the link for it on my archive if you’d rather read it there : Angels Are Watching Over You AO3

2:07 AM

“Babe.”

Nothing.

“Baabbbee.”

Nothing.

“Babe,” Castiel growls, sticking his head up off the pillow and glaring daggers at the peacefully sleeping man beside him.

With a not so gentle kick to his shin, Castiel finally gets the reaction he was looking for. Dean startles, then grumbles and rubs a fist at his eye. “Whaa-?”

“Your turn.”

“Huh?”

Castiel stabs a finger in the direction of the bedroom door and spits out, “Your. Turn. Go.”

His husband looks where he’s pointing, propping himself up on an elbow and scrubbing at his face with a hand. He yawns and then sits up fully. “Time‘s ‘it?”

“Two in the fucking morning. And it’s your turn! I did the last three.” Castiel puts both hands on his husband’s back and shoves him off the bed.

Grumbling about crabby ass husbands being lucky that they’re cute, Dean stumbles out of the room and down the hall to the last door on the left. He’s not as good at this as Castiel is. He takes forever before he wakes up to the crying and he never understands what each cry means. He doesn’t know the difference between gas or over tired or hungry or just plain unhappy.

He should have remembered to ask Castiel which one it is right now, but he was too busy dealing with the cruel ejection from their nice warm bed.

“Okaay, okay, I’m here,” he coos, padding softly into the nursery. The annoyed, over tired dad in him disappears when he stands at the edge of the crib and peers down at the beautiful baby boy. His tiny fists are tight balls and his little chubby legs are kicking angrily as he wails. “Hey now, Jack. None of that. Daddy’s here.”

Reaching over the railing, Dean picks the infant up and places him against his bare chest, gently rocking and bouncing him as he starts to pace around the room. “What’s wrong little guy? Huh? Tell daddy.”

The baby wiggles in his arms and he feels the weight of his full diaper. Excited that he figured out the problem, but feeling like an idiot for not checking the diaper first thing, he walks over to the changing table and places the baby on it. He pulls out a new diaper and a pack of wipes.

Jack kicks him when he tries putting the new diaper on. “Hey, now. That’s not very polite. I’m just trying to help you feel clean, buddy.”

The little one squawks at him but doesn’t kick him anymore. Just waves his scrunched up fists and gurgles. When the dry diaper is secured and his footie pajamas are buttoned back up, Dean takes him in his arms again and heads back to the crib.

“There we go. Daddy’s getting the hang of this, hey? All better.”

He places Jack in the center of the mattress and brushes a finger down the baby’s soft, chubby cheek. Then he turns on his fluffy white angel mobile that has little angels flying among the stars and watches him coo at it for a few seconds as it slowly twirls, a classical music piece playing.

“Sleep tight, Jack,” Dean whispers. “Angels are watchin’ over you.”

2:49 AM

Jack’s sharp cries wake Castiel up with a start. He sits up and cradles his head in his hands, telling himself to just breathe. They’ve had the infant for eight days now. Eight days of no sleep. Eight days of walking around like a zombie. Eight days of bickering with Dean. Eight days without sex.

He just wants to fucking sleep.

Throwing the blankets off, he slides out of the bed and hurries down the hall, knowing that the faster he soothes Jack to sleep, the faster he can get back to bed himself.

“Alright buddy. We’re okay. It’s okay.” He checks his diaper, noticing that it’s dry, then grabs the pacifier that was tossed to the side and places it in his mouth. The baby rudely spits it out at him and begins to screech again. His angry fists and feet kick out like he’s trying to fight Castiel off. Despite the sleep deprivation and terrible mood, Castiel finds himself smiling. “You’ve got your daddy in you, little guy. I think I’m gonna regret that decision.”

It’s a lie, of course. It took Dean and Castiel three months of fighting to decide who got to be the biological father for their surrogate. Dean was dead set against it being him. He didn’t want the poor kid to be riddled with the alcoholism gene. He was paranoid enough about being a shitty dad, he didn’t want the boy to be lonely and sad and fucked up from the very start. Castiel said that was all bullshit. That Dean would be a great father, and that their son or daughter would never be lonely or sad. He also assured him that he was not fucked up from the start. Hell, he was never fucked up, even at the end. Dean Winchester has always been perfect.

Castiel was dead set on being the father because he was just really looking forward to a little one that looked like Dean. Big green eyes and goofy grin and freckles. So many freckles. Castiel may have been the nerd in high school, and graduated with honors in college, but Dean was the social one. The funny one. The adventurous, brave, happy, beautiful one. Castiel wasn’t worried like Dean was. He had good genes. Good parents. Good siblings. Okay, well, mostly good siblings. He wouldn’t be thrilled with his kid getting Gabriel’s genes.

No, Castiel wasn’t worried about that. He just knew he was the luckiest in the entire world for being the one to have Dean Winchester. He couldn’t think of anything better in his life than having a mini version.

“And you look just like him, Jack,” Castiel whispers to the baby in his arms as he waits for the machine to warm the bottle of formula inside it. “Just like him. All you need is the freckles, but I think those will come. Either way, you’re beautiful. My beautiful boy.”

The baby scrunches his face at him, unimpressed with his sweet words. He just wants his damn bottle of formula. It’s almost like Castiel can hear a tiny little Dean voice bitching at him about being hungry.

The warmer beeps and he grabs the bottle out of it, tilting it for a moment so some formula spills on his wrist. Once he’s checked that it’s warm but not hot, he places the nipple in the baby’s mouth. Jack makes a squeaky little sound of happiness and bats at the bottle with his fists as he sucks his formula down.

“There ya go. That’s it.” Castiel yawns, then cracks one eye open to look at the oven clock. “Now, if you can just let daddy and papa sleep for four more hours, we’ll be so so happy baby boy. Can you do that? Nice dry diaper. Full belly. A good night, yeah? Everyone get some rest and it’ll be better in the morning. We can all cuddle on the couch and watch cartoons. Wouldn’t that be nice?”

Castiel reaches the edge of the crib, the bottle nearly empty now. “Wouldn’t it be nice to get some real sleep, Jack? Papa needs some sleep.”

The baby finishes his formula and almost immediately falls asleep, the nipple slipping from his tiny lips. Castiel places the empty bottle on the top of his dresser and presses a firm kiss to his forehead. “That’s it, baby. Sweet dreams.”

He places the baby down in the middle of the mattress and smiles down at him. “Good night, Jack. Angels are watching over you.”

3:21 AM

Dean trips over Castiel’s briefcase on the way out of the room and kicks it in frustration. “Fucking mess. This house is a mess.”

“Well maybe if you cleaned once in a fucking while!” Castiel yells from the bed where he’s still lying beneath the warm covers.

“Maybe if I could fucking sleep.”

“None of us are sleeping, Dean.”

“Yeah, well, you’re not exactly working are you?” Dean scrunches his eyes up, immediately regretting that. “I’m sorry. That wasn’t - what you’re doing is still working, Cas. I know being home with Jack is important. I’m so thankful for you, baby. Your such a good papa to him.”

Castiel grumbles unintelligibly before throwing a pillow at him. “Just get him to bed so we can cuddle, asshole.”

Desperate to make sure things are okay between them, Dean nearly sprints down the hall and into Jack’s room. He threw the pacifier on the floor. Dean picks it up and slides it into the baby’s screaming mouth. Jack sucks at it like it’s oxygen, head rolling to the side as he falls back to sleep.

Doing a silent fist pump in the air, Dean hurries back to the room. He makes sure to avoid the briefcase and pick up the pillow on his way back to the bed, since it was his. Castiel is half asleep but rolls over so he can bury his face against Dean’s chest.

“I’m sorry,” Dean whispers into his husband’s unruly hair.

“Shhh,” Castiel presses a kiss to his chest and smiles against the bare skin. “Go to sleep, my love.”

4:01 AM

Castiel contemplates leaving the house and never turning back. He could get in the car, find somewhere to park, take a nap, and then drive. Drive far and fast away. No babies crying or crabby, mean husbands making him feel like some useless housewife.

“Come on, Jack,” he grumbles, impatiently rocking back and forth. “You ate. You peed. You pooped. You ate. What else is there?”

Adjusting the baby, he cradles him to his chest and bounces instead of rocks, patting his bum. He hums some song he heard on the radio and mindlessly thinks of Shakespeare quotes and literary analysis, missing his college students. Missing being a professor. Hell, he even misses the monotony of grading the downright terrible freshman english papers, from students who are there for math and science and don’t give two shits about writing essays.

Jack makes a choking sound and Castiel pulls him away, his heart skipping as he wonders if his baby is dying. A second later, the sound comes again, and Jack is projectile vomiting onto his chest.

Well, at least it wasn’t his face.

The baby hums appreciatively, then coos and lets his eyes flutter shut.

“Well,” Castiel whispers, sighing. “At least we solved the problem.”

He places the baby down in the crib, amazed that he doesn’t have any vomit at all on him, and kisses the air with a loud smooching sound. He puts the pacifier in his mouth and stumbles out of the room.

“G’night. Angels watchin’ over ya,” he mumbles, not even finishing the sentence until he’s in his own room again.

It takes an awful lot of strength to move past the bed without getting in it, but he knows he has to clean up. When he gets into their attached bathroom, he squints in the bright light and starts to strip, feeling disgusting and sticky and smelly and fucking exhausted. He climbs into the tub and collapses, reaching over to slap at the faucet until the shower turns on, sending lukewarm water over him. He keeps the drain open and just lies back, using the wall as a pillow and closing his eyes.

Just one minute. Then he’ll towel off and get in bed.

4:12 AM

Knowing it’s his turn, Dean sits up in bed and yawns when he hears Jack the next time. He glances at Castiel’s side of the bed and smiles when he sees his husband already got up. God, he loves that man. He collapses against the pillow and smiles to himself, falling back asleep within seconds.

4:17 AM

“Cas?” Dean mumbles, looking around the room, wondering why his husband still isn’t back. Wondering why the baby is still crying.

He pushes off his blankets, getting tangled up in them and falling onto the floor. With a grunt and a few choice curse words, he kicks them off and gets back to his feet, stumbling down the hall. When he gets to Jack’s room, he notices his husband isn’t in it.

Maybe he’s downstairs warming a bottle.

In the meantime, Dean reaches down and takes Jack into his arms. His diaper needs to be changed again. Like a robot, he removes the soiled diaper, wipes the baby with two wipes, one for his front and one for his back, then secures a new diaper on. He buttons up the pajamas and gives him a pacifier, relaxing when the baby goes back to sleep in his arms.

He places Jack back in the crib and mumbles. “Night. Angel’s watchin’ over ya.”

Dean goes downstairs to let Castiel know the bottle isn’t needed anymore, but he’s not there either. He has to tell his heart to calm the fuck down. Sometimes, in the middle of the night like this, thoughts flash in Dean’s mind. Thoughts of what it was like before Jack. Hell, before Castiel, even. One night stands with no responsibilities. Extra whiskey and beer. Food that was terrible for him, because he didn’t have a husband to bitch at him for being healthy. He wonders what it would be like to leave, but he doesn’t leave. He’s never left. He won’t ever leave.

Castiel didn’t leave.

Castiel wouldn’t leave.

Dean yelled at him and made him feel like he was a fucking freeloader or something. What if he got upset? What if he feels unneeded? What if Dean finally did the thing he knew was coming all along? The thing that would fuck up his one chance at being happy?

“Cas?” Dean whisper shouts in a panic, walking through the house. By the time he reaches their bedroom, the very last place he checks, he’s crying. Fully crying. On the verge of sobbing.

He didn’t even leave a fucking note.

He starts searching for his phone and realizes it’s probably in the pocket of his jeans, which he took off to shower before bed last night. That’s when he steps closer to the bathroom and realizes the water is running.

Carefully, quietly, Dean pushes the bathroom door open. He peeks inside and his heart skips. “Oh, babe,” he whispers, even though Castiel clearly can’t hear him.

Smiling in relief, Dean grabs a towel from the rack and walks up to the tub. He turns the water off and kneels on the bath mat. Castiel is sprawled out and snoring. He’s still wearing one sock.

Dean’s never felt so in love in his entire life.

“Baby, hey.” He reaches over and gently shakes him away. “Baby. Wake up.”

“No. Y’r tur’ ‘n Dee.”

Chuckling, Dean whispers, “Yes, honey. My turn. Aren’t you cold? Let me help you to the bed.”

“Mmm.” Castiel bats his eyes to make the drops of water disappear from his lashes, then squints at Dean. “Cold. Bed.”

“Yeah. Cold. Bed. Come on.” He lifts Castiel, holding him up against him as he pulls him from the tub. He uses the towel to dry him off the best he can and helps him back into the bedroom. When they get to the edge of the mattress, Dean has him sit down and does another once over on his body with the towel, making sure to get his hair. “Jack puked on me.”

“And you needed to shower right at that moment?”

Castiel shrugs a shoulder and mumbles, “Gross.”

“God, I love you.”

“You too.”

Smiling, Dean guides him back until he’s lying down, tucking him in and placing a kiss on his forehead. Then he towels himself off from Castiel making him wet, thankful he wasn’t wearing a shirt, and crawls in beside him. Pulling him in nice and tight, Dean cradles him to his chest and closes his eyes.

4:33 AM

Dean slips out of the bed, doing his best not to wake Castiel up. He storms into the nursery with a new give ‘em hell attitude. “Alright, Jack. Listen here. Last time. I’m going to take care of what’s wrong, I’m going to sing you my favorite song that grandma used to sing to me, and then you’re going to sleep until the sunshine is up. Okay? Not until the sun is up.”

He pauses like Jack can answer him, then nods. “Okay. Good plan.”

Clean diaper. Bottle. Pacifier. Bouncing. Rocking. Singing.

And anytime you feel the pain, hey Jude, refrain

Don't carry the world upon your shoulders

For well you know that it's a fool who plays it cool

By making his world a little colder

Movement catches Dean’s eye. He looks over at the doorway and smiles. His gorgeous husband is leaning a shoulder against the door frame, arms crossed over his chest. Since he fell asleep with damp hair, half of it is sticking in all directions, the other half flattened. He scrunches his nose and winks at Dean when their eyes meet.

I love you, he mouths across the room.

Feeling warmth grow in his chest, Dean mouths back I love you, too.

Castiel joins him beside the crib as Dean gently places the baby down. He puts his pacifier in while Castiel turns the mobile on. Then Castiel wraps his arm around Dean’s waist, leaning into him, pressing a kiss to his temple.

“When you were in the shower, I couldn’t find you,” Dean admits in a hushed whisper.

Castiel looks up at him with a frown. “Dean. Never. I will never leave you two.”

“Just.” Dean’s eyes dart back and forth between Castiel and Jack. When he finally settles back on Castiel, he’s pleading. “Promise?”

“Promise. I love you, Dean Winchester. I’m not going anywhere. Ever.”

“Okay. I knew that, I did. I just - I needed to hear it again.”

“I’ll tell you every single day if you need me to.”

Smiling, they both turn to stare down at their beautiful son.

“Good night, Jack. Sleep well,” Dean whispers.

Castiel leans his head against Dean’s shoulder and adds, “Angels are watching over you.”

8:46 AM

Castiel opens his eyes and yawns, stretching an arm out. He lifts his head and squints at the alarm clock, shocked at the time. Dean is still asleep beside him, which means Jack must still be asleep. The worried papa in him makes him go check just in case. He peeks his head into the nursery and watches for a minute. When Jack’s leg involuntarily moves, meaning he’s still breathing, Castiel practically runs back to bed.

He gets under the covers and curls up to his husband, smiling when Dean wraps around him like a damn spider monkey.

“‘Vrythin’ okay?” Dean slurs.

Castiel squeezes him tight and closes his eyes. “Yeah, babe. Everything’s perfect.”

[youralternantpersonality]

Bet

Embry x Reader: Bet

***

Embry’s POV

Y/n/n and I have been dating since sophomore year and we were tight as ever. When she moved to La Push in middle school, I had the biggest crush on her. She made friends instantly and sometime, her friends would point me out if I was looking for too long. I turn away as fast as I could without getting caught. I couldn’t help myself. I looked at her the same way I have always looked at her…amaze, admiration, stars trucked, as if she was a breath of fresh air and clean untouched water by humans.  

She was slightly competitive (not as bad as Paul, but not as lighthearted as Quil) and tended to say “Bet” when she wanted to prove something; if she was angry, sad, in an actual bet, anything really. I remember the first interaction I had with her. Freshman year, there was a party in Forks and a few kids on the Res decided to crash it. Jake, Quil, and I decided to head over, unknowing to me, so did Y/n and her two friends Natahli and Jerilly. And like most parties, there was games—truth or dare, spin the bottle, beer pong, all of that. And of course, Quil and Jake dragged me into spin the bottle. Which is where I run into Y/n. I could see Quil trying to hold back a laugh, and so was Natahli?

Anyways, we sit and play the game. And like some force or universal divine being, she spun the bottle, and it landed on me. I damn nearly shat in my pants when I saw what was happening.

“What’cha waiting for Em! Kiss! Kiss! Kiss! Kiss!” Jake started as everyone else followed.

“Let’s make it better! Seven Minutes in Heaven!” Jerilly said out loud. Everyone laughed and agreed. Her friends and mine picked us up and rushed us to the closet nearby. A girl who started the game had a timer and we were pushed in.

“So…”

“So…”

“Look, I know this might be weird-” I said.

“You don’t have to do this if-” She said at the same time. We were silent and looked up at each other. A few seconds later a smile was on her face and by instant reaction, it was on mine. Soon followed by a quiet laugh. It was dark, so I couldn’t see her next move, but I heard her take a deep breath and I felt her closer to me. Instantly, as if it was a natural habit, my hands went to her waist to keep her close to me. Both of our breathing was hard and staggering. Normally, I don’t make assumptions, but this time was different. I wanted to take my shot and branch out from the comfort-zone I am used to.

So, I pulled her closer to where our nose was touching. Her arms wrapped around my neck and when she nodded her head, I kissed her. It was soft yet powerful. She kissed me back instantly and we both smiled. I couldn’t say we were full blown making out, but I can say that we both were a more confident kissing and smiling at one another in the closet. And as if everyone thought we were doing something more, the door sprung open and a flash went off.

“Awe…I thought it was something more.” A random girl said. Y/n laughed and hid her face in my neck. Her friends were screaming in excitement and we all walked out. We stayed a little while longer, watching Quil get his first kiss with some girl named Jessica and Jake playing rock paper scissors with a guy he landed on. Who ever won, got a beer and we had to play bets on one of them. The other guy won and after that, we went home. Y/n and I exchanged numbers and I already asked and planned our first date.

“So…” I said,

“So…” she said with a smile,

“Would you like to go out with me? I mean, I know we just, you know, kiss, but I don’t want you to feel like, you know, bad or like you have to. ‘Cause you don’t! You don’t have to! I would like to, but if you want to, which you can choose not to, we can go out sometime? Maybe?” I said all in one breath. She laughed and just nodded her head.

“Yes Embry, I’d love to go out with you.”

“Holy shit, really?”

“Yes!” she laughed, and I could do nothing but smile, pick her up and swing her around. Her laugh grew and like it was a habit I was used to doing, I kissed her again. She kissed me back.

“You know, a girl can get used to this?”

“Well, just wait until I take you out, then you’ll see what you’re in for.” I said, face-palming myself. “That came out weirder than it sounds in my head. I mean you’ll have fun; I promise.” I said smiling.

“Bet.”  

Now…now everything is different. Everything has changed for the worse. I hate it completely and I want her in my life so badly, but I can’t risk it. I can’t risk losing her physically because of my anger. Emily may have made it out alive, but that doesn’t mean Y/n would if something was to ever happen.

Your POV

I was worried sick about Embry. I had called, texted, and showed up at his doorstep to see what was wrong. His mom was just as worried as I was. She knows that if there was anyone who would know where Embry is or what was wrong with him, it would be me. Or, at least, it should have been.

I’ve been in love with him since middle school. And my insecurities always got the best of me; it was exactly this that scared the shit out of me. I told him my worries one night and, like the amazing boyfriend he is, he reassured me that nothing bad was going to happen.

Well, I think he still is my boyfriend. At this point it has been a month and I received no response. I decided that I was going to make one last attempt (and fully follow through with this this time) to reach out to him and if he doesn’t respond, then we’re done. Just the thought of it made me sick to my stomach and made me want to curl up in my bed and cry for days.

After school I told Natahli and Jerilly that I was going to do my last attempt and like the true best friends they are, they gave me the “bitch, do we look stupid to you” face. They supported me always, but they knew how much it means to me. They understood, they were just pissed (if not more) that Embry was doing this to me. Hell, Jerilly was ready to put her softball practice into motion by knocking his knees—if I wasn’t such a hostile person, I’d be up for the game. But now was not the time to be thinking about that. Now is the time to get answers I deserve.

My nervousness showed and Natahli and Jerilly force volunteered to come with. Me in the passenger’s seat praying that we can work this out and attempting to calm my nerves and not burst into tears. As we were on our way to his house, Natahli sees him with a few of the other guys from school walking out towards the forest. As I watched him, I noticed a big change in him. He was shirtless, grew at least a foot taller, chopped off his hair, and got a fucking tattoo. This is the boy who fucking HATES needles and gets a tattoo after puberty hit him like an 18-wheeler. Without a second thought, Natahli and Jerilly pull over and jump out of the car while I am still frozen solid inside.

“Hey ass hat! Mind telling us why suddenly you can’t acknowledge your girlfriend?!” Natahli screams. It instantly gets mine and their attention. They all turn around and I’m shocked even more. Not sure how he became more beautiful, but hot damn, he succeeded at that. I look over and I see Jerilly brought her bat. I jump out and run up to my psychotic friends confused for a second but that turned into anger as soon as I saw Embry as he rolled his eyes and walked away. Fuck this.

“What the fuck Em!? You want to tell me why you turned on me? Why suddenly your backwards ass decided to just leave?!” I yell. He pauses for a second then replies.

“Go home Y/n. and stop calling me. Stop coming over. Stop all of it.” He says in his calm yet pissed voice that he only ever used when he is extremely pissed. Oh. Hell. No.

“Excuse me!” Jerilly said.

“What the fuck you mean go home! Can I at least know WHY you’re not yourself anymore?! Don’t you think I at least deserve that! After all this time we’ve been together!” I yell at the top of my lungs only a few feet away.

“It doesn’t matter. Go. Home. Now.” He says, only this time he growled at me. Paul Lahote stepped up behind him to block me from him. Jerilly had the bat up to his neck.

“Move son of a bitch or I’m playing softball with your head.” I can feel the tears forming in my eyes and as much as I hate to say it, at this point, I’m begging for him to at least look at me.

“Please Embry! Tell me what’s going on! Did I do something!? Say something!? What the hell did I-”

“I don’t love you anymore!” he says with his back still facing me. For a second, my breath stopped, time came to a halt, and I could feel my heart tearing as my throat being squeezed with maximum pressure.

“Wh-what?” I say in a low voice in disbelief.

“I said, I. Don’t. Love. You. Anymore. Go home Y/n and stay the fuck away from me. No one wants you here,” he says and turns around to look at me, “especially me…” he says. Looking dead into my eyes and all I could do was look back at him. In a quick second, I felt a force, as if someone had pushed me. Where normally I would see a bright future together, in an instant second, all of that crumbled. I was confused, yes. But I was pissed.

Embry’s POV

A lie, I thought to myself. All of this was a lie. I had to lie to the one person that will forever hold my heart. It would kill me to hurt her physically and, as shady as this is, if she wasn’t my imprint. I couldn’t risk it; I couldn’t take that chance. If I was to find my imprint while with her, it would kill me even more. I just couldn’t do it. So instead, I lied.

“I don’t love you anymore!” I roared at her. Trying to keep my composure. Although I was the most “sensitive” of the pack, I had the most control of my shifting—faster than the other guys; even Sam.

“Wh-what?” her voice cracked; I could smell saltwater—her tears. This killed me every second, but it was a risk I needed to take. I look up at Sam and he can see the pain on my face as I tried my best to keep my composure and voice from failing me. Apparently, I succeeded…unfortunately.

“I said, I. Don’t. Love. You. Anymore. Go home Y/n and stay the fuck away from me. No one wants you here,” I tell her as I turn around to face her, “especially me…” I finish my sentence off, but regret everything that millisecond afterwards. I looked dead into her eyes and was hit like a wrecking ball. I saw a vision and an explosion of love, happiness, and eternity with this woman. My heart skipped a beat and I felt just as complete, if not more, with her than I did before.

But before I could respond. Before I could even enjoy this feeling. Before I could even acknowledge the fact that she was my imprint, she hit me with reality quickly. Her face said it all. All the pain, tears, agony disappeared, and hate, hurt, and disappointment took its place. I fucked up. Because the last thing she said to me that day, was the day I knew if I don’t win her back it would literally be life or death with me. That day was the day that I have ever felt deep pain, the day I knew I lost my eternity. The day I lost Y/n.

“Bet.” It was then I knew, I would have to work hard to win her back. I wanted to chase after her, but I was stuck and in shock. I could feel the eyes of the pack watching me watch her and her friends walk away from me. When I snapped out of it, I tried running to her, but was stopped by Paul and Sam. I screwed up, but somehow, I was going to fix it.

And I was willing to bet on that.

[standingovertheedge]

The Day I Unblocked My Memory

A few days ago I was reading a Facebook post about a girl who had an emotionally abusive boyfriend during the early years of high school. 

She described the stages she went through: The beginning - thinking it was a phase that would end eventually. The middle - struggling with her own self-worth. The end - her boyfriend threatening to kill her or himself.

I couldn’t help but wonder why her story seemed so familiar. I kept thinking to myself - you’ve never been abused, why is this bothering you?

That’s when I unblocked my memories from high school.

When you’re an awkward 15 year old and you suddenly start receiving attention from a 17 year old, you sort of throw all your morals and self-worth aside. At least that’s how it was for me.

I had just started my sophomore year of high school when a senior boy randomly started taking notice of me. I wish I could go back and tell myself “just because he’s older, doesn’t mean he’s any more mature.”

He would find me when I had after school practice, or over lunch in the halls. He would make me laugh and feel so comfortable that the world around me would start to melt away. And it would just be him, and me.

The abuse started slow. It came with sudden words of jealously or anger, or even “jokingly” calling me names like bitch, slut or whore. One day he even jokingly said to me “I’m going to rape you.” 

I didn’t think anything of it at first. I was so blindsided to have found someone that made me feel comfortable, that I didn’t really care about the other things.

He started pressuring me to have sex. I didn’t want to. I know I didn’t want to. But I really wanted to do anything to make him happy, or just want to be with me. 

I’ll never forget the day I lost my virginity. In a car. With him.

I remember starting to make out with him, and suddenly having my pants ripped off. I kept saying “I don’t want to do this here.” But my words were hitting deaf ears.

I remember immense pain. I remember him telling me that it would “feel good in a minute.” But it never did. It made me cry.

After my tears were dried and our pants were up, he drove me home. 

The next day at school he ignored me; acted like I didn’t exist. 

He had gotten what he wanted, and now he threw me in the trash just like his fucking used condom.

Our conversations stopped that day. But our story didn’t.

Fast forward to two years later - Senior Year. 

I had just broken up with a guy I had been dating for a few months. He was perfect in so many ways, but the spark faded fast. I knew I couldn’t date someone I didn’t have a connection to.

I was waiting outside school one day for a ride from my mom. I looked over and saw the boy who was now a “man,” that had finally disappeared from my memory. He gave me a wink. And later that night I got a text.

“how are u”

I had a brief moment of pause where I debated responding. The flashback to sophomore year and all turmoil he caused me made me hesitate.

This is the moment that I really wish I could have taken back. I had made all these positive moves in my life, and in one moment I took a giant step back.  I caved.

“hey”

And with that message he was back in my life.

It was like nothing had changed, even though it had been 2 years. All those feelings of passion and comfort came rushing back, like a soft weighted blanket. 

I kept my “relationship” with him a secret. I knew no-one would approve, and that should have been my first clue. I had this whole other secret life. My family had no idea the type of emotional trauma I was going through because I never told them. My friends never knew because I never told them. I became his, and he became mine. There were no other people in our bubble.

This closed-off relationship started to wear down on me. I was no longer happy with him, or without him.

I didn’t want to be secretive anymore. I knew this wasn’t the relationship I wanted, but I was too scared to say anything. I didn’t know what he was capable of. 

One night I decided I was going to end it, and never look back. 

He called me, drunk and swearing. I told him “we’re over, I can’t do this anymore.” His response? “Are you fucking kidding me? You can’t do this to me. I swear, I’ll drive and fucking kill myself right now.”

And that’s when I hung up.

He didn’t stop calling that night, but I couldn’t answer. I never answered.

I wish I could say this was my last experience ever hearing from him.

Fast forward to the first few months of my freshman year of college.

I was having fun partying and letting loose with my friends. Escaping the responsibilities of living at home with parents. 

I came back from a party late at night and received an urgent message the next day to see our building director. I went to her office, and as soon as I sat down in a chair she asked me “are you being stalked?” and “are you safe?”

I was shocked, and confused. I didn’t know what she was talking about. She told me that last night an intoxicated man was able to get into our building and find my floor. He ran around banging on all the doors and screaming for me to come out, and saying I had “broke his heart.”

I didn’t even know what to say to her. I was so thankful I was away from campus that night. I didn’t have to face him. And I know if I would have faced him, I would have caved again.

I made a vow to myself to never let that POS back into my life again. And now I’m happily dating a wonderful man who treats me like a princess, and I’m excited to build my future with him.

It’s weird how random things like a Facebook post can unlock trauma that you have buried for years. 

Anyways, thanks for listening.