#anything outside of my normal routine of doing absolutely nothing Will give me an anxiety attack | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

kaistarus · 4 years ago

Text

Just A Line Without A Hook

Pairing: Hinata X Reader

Words: 5.9K

Summary: You and Hinata share your point-of-views during important milestones throughout your relationship.

A/N: This is a full relationship development and I’m very proud lol hopefully you can find some joy in it :3

Masterlist // Ko-Fi

Hinata was weird.

That lurked in your mind as you leaned on a conspicuously sticky bar table listening to him tell you his entire life’s story. Your original intent for the night had been to quickly pop into Yachi’s birthday party since you worked at the butt crack of dawn. Give her the present and maybe have a drink. Whatever you did it was meant to be fast.

Too bad you had never been good at sticking to plans.

“I moved to Brazil right after high school to learn beach volleyball,” Hinata said, his smile soft as he looked longingly in the distance. “But I didn’t explore as much as I should have. I really want to go back.”

“Out of high school?” You cocked your head to the side, “that’s wild. I moved to Tokyo and still felt completely out of place.”

“Well, it didn’t go too hot at first.” He scratched his cheek. “I actually got my wallet stolen my first week there…”

You fought to keep lips from pulling into a smile.

There was something in the carefree way he carried himself that made it hard to turn away. The moment Yachi introduced you there was an odd sense of comfort that washed over you. Which made no sense because you had known absolutely nothing about the guy-aside from him being a professional volleyball player and attending high school with Yachi.

Still, it was no reason to let your guard down.

“Sounds like they took advantage of the clueless foreigner,” you teased, curious butterflies tickling your abdomen when he pouted. “I’ve always thought Italy looked cool. If I could travel somewhere.”

Hinata’s lips mindlessly curved into a relaxed smile as you spoke, as if that was their default expression when not preoccupied. And it made conversation with him easy. It dissipated your usual anxieties about overthinking every action or word. You truly felt like you could be yourself and just exist within his presence.

“I have a friend in Italy!” Hinata said, elation lighting up his amber eyes. He began drawing circles in the condensation of his glass with an awkward laugh. “I think anyway. He travels all over the place, but he was in Italy last I knew.”

“That’s so cool,” your jaw went a little slack. You didn’t know people actually did stuff like that.

“Yeah Noya’s the best,” Hinata nodded resolutely. “He visited me for a while in Brazil. I taught him some Portugese and we played beach volleyball. He was so jealous everyone called me Ninja Shoyo. It was awesome.”

Hinata could speak Portugese? Ninja Shoyo?

So many questions…

“What’s a Ninja Sho-” You began until your phone lit up after receiving a message and you realized just how late it was. “Oh my god, I have to go.”

“Wait,” Hinata interrupted you mid-frantic scrabble to zip your jacket. You furrowed your brow at the smartphone he placed unlocked on the table between you. “Could I-uh-you know… talk to you again sometime?”

You blinked a few times before swiping the device off the bar’s gross table. “Yeah,” you said, a warmth you didn’t recognize filling your chest as you created your contact. “I’d like that.”

An absentminded smile painted Hinata’s face after you waved good-bye and when you stepped outside beneath the light snowfall you realized your lips were curved to match. But there was still too wide a gap between how little you knew about Hinata and how much you desired to be close to him. That new part of you burned too bright in your chest to be ignored.

And you would simply have to change that.

*******************************************************************************************

Hinata huddled in the corner of the gymnasium over his duffle bag, staring at his cellphone in case he received a last second message. His eyes flickered between the ticking clock above the bleachers and his phone’s black screen, stomach sinking as the seconds passed. He anxiously unlocked his phone to scroll through and analyze his last conversation.

Had he said something wrong? He supposed he’d never actively tried to flirt before, so it wasn’t unlikely he offended you somehow. He furrowed his brow and chewed on his thumbnail, rereading his last message. Maybe he overdid it with the emojis?

Wait, were you at work? You could also just be busy. Maybe he was just overthinking everything…

“Why are you crouched in the corner like a creep?” Atsumu crept up behind him, eyeing him suspiciously.

Hinata jumped, shoving his phone back into his duffle bag. “Nothing.”

“Bull shit. You’ve been acting off for weeks,” Atsumu squatted to Hinata’s eye-level and leaned forward with a sly grin. “Someone’s keeping secrets.”

A warmth rushed to Hinata’s face. He was a terrible liar if questioned directly. “I wouldn’t keep secrets from you guys. I mean, we’re practically family now.” he chuckled unconvincingly.

“Right,” Atsumu gave him a once-over before standing. Hinata let out a relieved sigh that he’d been spared for now.

“What’s happening over here?” Bakuto boisterously called out while skipping over to the boys. Sakusa trailed behind him with his hands shoved deep into his sweatpant’s pockets.

“Hinata’s lying out his ass.”

Hinata whipped around toward Atsumu with his jaw slack. The audacity of this guy. “I am not!”

“The guy’s zoning out at practice, making heart eyes at his phone, and fucking notre daming over his duffle?” Atsume raised his brows at Hinata. “Either he’s getting scouted for a different team or he’s dating someone.”

“You’re leaving the team?” Sakusa asked monotone, as if he couldn’t care either way. If Hinata wasn’t used to the constant monotone he’d be offended.

“No,” he denied, qualming Bokuto’s prepared puppy-dog eyes. “And I’m not dating anyone.”

Which wasn’t a lie. You were nothing more than a friend at this point. Even if his heart ignited a flame anytime your name crossed his mind.

“A crush then,” Atsumu waved him off. “Either way a massive Hinata life development you lied to us about.”

“I didn’t lie, I just,” Hinata wrinkled his nose while thinking of ways out of the predicament. “I think Shugo is calling to start practice. We should probably-”

“You’ve got a crush?” Bokuto’s eyes appeared to sparkle when he flung an arm around Hinata’s shoulder. “Who is it? Do we know them? You don’t need to sweat Hinata I’m an excellent wingman.”

Hinata waved his hands in front of him. “You don’t know them and it’s okay. You really don’t have to-”

“Oh, don’t be so considerate. We’re offering our services Hinata.” Atsumu said smugly while Bokuto nodded excitedly.

Hinata forced a half-smile. This had been exactly what he wanted to avoid. If his feelings were just a measly crush he would have gladly brought them up to the guys, but they were way more extreme then that.

“I’m not offering anything,” Sakusa raised his brows slightly in Hinata’s direction before walking off. “Good luck.”

“Buzz kill.” Atsumu pouted.

“Look, this is more complicated than you guys realize,” Hinata brushed Bokuto’s arm off his shoulders. “I can’t really explain it, but I don’t think you guys can help me.”

“Hinata, it’s okay. We all have our faults. Some more than others, but we’re here for you.” Atsumu patted his shoulder understandably and Hinata shot him a glare.

“Akaashi always tells me to ‘just be yourself’.” Bokuto nodded proudly, clasping his fist with determination. “Then you’ll attract the people who are meant to be in your life.”

Hinata blinked a few times. That… was really good advice.

“That’s stupid,” Atsumu scoffed. “You gotta stalk them on all social media. Analyze their personality and figure out exactly what they're into. Learn their ins and outs and become their type.”

That… was the dumbest thing he had ever heard.

“I don’t know Atsumu, that sounds kind of wrong,” Bokuto tapped his chin and Atsumu pinched the bridge of his nose, sighed deeply.

“Okay, but numbers don’t lie and I have the highest success rate.”

Bokuto and Hinata tilted their heads mulling that one over. No. It still seemed dumb.

Hinata zoned off as Bokuto and Atsumu began debating the morals of online stalking and the value of Akaashi’s opinions. He already knew that if he wanted real help picking apart the fire in his chest he’d have to talk to someone who’d take him seriously like Yamaguchi. Then he’d actually get to dissect the confusing emotions in his heart-look at them from all angles.

Learn to understand them and tend to them properly. Help them grow.

He watched Atsumu chase a cackling Bokuto around the gym until their captain Shugo scolded them. Hinata smirked. Even if they weren’t the most helpful he still appreciated knowing he had people willing to help him... in their own way.

*******************************************************************************************

You and Hinata spent the majority of your free time together, but even after several months it was nothing more than two friends placing comfort in each other’s company. Most Thursdays it was normal to find Hinata lounging on your living room sofa. He watched some volleyball commentary video on his cellphone, legs propped lazily on the armrest, while you answered work emails at your coffee table.

On a normal Thursday night you would continue whatever show you’d been watching-currently Fullmetal Alchemist Brotherhood-but tonight you were stuck finishing last minute work. You heaved a sigh and glanced over your shoulder at Hinata, his breathing relaxed while his eyes flickered across his phone’s screen.

You weren’t oblivious to your feelings. Maybe at first you were able to brush them off as excitement about a new friend, but they had shifted into something intense. Always festering in the forefront of your mind throughout your daily routine.

It became obvious when you noticed you spent more time counting the freckles scattered across the bridge of his nose than focusing on conversations. When you realized you spent more time at work trying to pin-point the exact shade to call his hair than getting actual work done. Even more so when your heart would do acrobatics at the sound of his voice whenever you talked on the phone.

No matter how you looked at it, it became impossible to deny.

“Hey, are you okay?”

You looked back again and Hinata’s eyebrows were furrowed with concern, his earbuds pulled out and phone placed on his stomach.

“Yeah,” you half-smiled and he raised his brows to show he clearly didn’t believe you. You let out a breathy laugh, breaking the eye-contact to lean back against the couch and place your head on his bicep. “I’m just thinking.”

“Don’t hurt yourself,” he teased, a hand gently placed on the crown of your head.

“Shut up,” you said with no bite behind your words.

He snorted, rubbing his thumb against the top of your head. “...what if I was also thinking?”

“That’s probably more dangerous than me thinking,” you laughed, rubbing your socked toes together with a soft smile. When he didn’t respond you twisted around to check on him, but he wouldn’t meet your eyes. “Hinata?”

“Nevermind.”

You gripped the couch cushion for support as you leaned in slightly. There was no way for you to be sure, but you could have sworn Hinata was blushing.

“What were you thinking about?” You questioned. Your heart was beating a million times a second in your chest and there was something akin to hope burning beside it.

Hinata looked in your eyes challengingly, “what were you thinking about?”

“You.”

He seemed taken aback by your bluntness, but brushed it off quickly. “I want to kiss you.”

Your eyes widened. It felt like all the air had been sucked from the room as you stared into his hopeful amber eyes.

“Well, do it then.” You responded, barely above a whisper. Hinata took a while to process, but once he had his face lit up crimson.

His hand cradled the side of your face and you watched him carefully, allowing him to make the moves. You kept your mind blank so as not to overthink the situation, but you hoped at least one brain cell was functioning enough to get you through it.

The kiss Hinata pressed against your lips was a little too hesitant, too off-center, and too brief. Yet the beaming smile he gave you afterward sent your heart into a frenzy unlike anything you’d ever experienced. The dopey smile on your lips felt too embarrassing and you buried your face against Hinata’s chest.

After a little coaxing with promises of television and snacks you peeked back up, happily met with Hinata’s dazed smile. The rest of the night was spent wrapped in each other’s arms and supplying random kisses because ‘they definitely needed practice’; ending with Hinata falling asleep in your bed for the first, but definitely not last, time.

*******************************************************************************************

Hinata hated being sick.

He hated fighting through a thick fog to collect words when stringing together sentences was usually effortless. He hated the pounding headaches following any light reaching his unfocused eyes. And Hinata especially hated his fit lungs struggling through breaths that came out raspy and weak through his aching throat.

Nothing good came from being sick. It was a lesson he learned long ago.

“You need to sleep,” you whispered against the crown of his head, your fingers carding gently through his sweaty locks. He nuzzled the tip of his nose against the cool skin at your collarbone while gripping your shirt at your shoulder.

Unfortunately, you were making it really hard for him to hate anything anymore.

“You’re going to get sick,” he pointed out, voice scratchy from his throat’s soreness.

You hummed dismissively, planting a small kiss on the top of his head. “My immune system’s pretty strong.”

Hinata knew it didn’t work that way, but was too selfish to argue your flawed logic. The bare skin of your neck helped chill his overheated forehead and he cuddled ever closer into you, twining your legs together. He wrinkled his nose when he realized how gross his fever was probably making him.

He’d have to wash your sheets and stuff when he was feeling better.

“I wish I could kiss you,” he pouted.

“That one’s gonna have to wait,” you chuckled lightly, beginning to rub soothing circles into his lower back. The vibrations from your voice sent a pleasant shiver down Hinata’s spine and the corners of his lips lifted. “You know, you’ll get better faster if you sleep.”

“But I wanna stay awake with you,” Hinata whined, lazily beginning to trace designs on your shoulder. The world was so cruel.

“I’ll be here when you wake up,” you said, barely above a whisper. Hinata grumbled a nonsense of a response and you chuckled lightly. You fell silent for a long enough period that Hinata began believing you fell asleep before him until you asked, “can I tell you a secret?”

“Yeah,” Hinata yawned, snuggling against your chest. “I love secrets.”

Silence enveloped his apartment again and Hinata almost dozed off.

“I think I’m in love with you.”

He blinked himself back to consciousness while the words rolled over in his mind. He froze. The fast paced rhythm of your heart was the only source available to keep him grounded as his foggy brain worked to unpack your words.

Love?

He glanced up to meet your nervous eyes paired with flushed cheeks. He stared in disbelief while you continued to patiently wait for his reaction. This better not be some sort of fever induced hallucination.

“No one’s ever said that to me before,” he said, eyebrows creased. Aside from his mom and Natsu, obviously, but he figured you’d know what he meant.

The corner of your mouth lifted into a hopeful half-smile. “Well, I’m honored.” Your touch was gentle as you brushed the hair back from his forehead. He subconsciously leaned into your touch with a wondrous stare and his eyes scoured your face for his answer.

Except you were the answer.

“I’ve never been in love before, but…” He struggled for the right words-any words-settling on what he could piece together at the moment. “I feel like things are better when you’re here. Like, I can do anything I hope to and more. I just feel happier when I’m with you and it’s easier and everything makes sense…” He wrinkled his nose. “Is… is that love?”

You cradled his fevered cheeks tenderly. “I think that’s for you to decide Hinata.”

He nodded to himself. “Okay,” he said determinedly. “Then yeah. It is, I love you, (Y/N).”

“I’m glad,” you smiled, looking at him with an affectionate stare that set his heart ablaze. He took a deep breath before disappointedly letting his forehead drop to your chest.

“Fuck, I want to kiss you so bad.”

You let out a bubble of laughter, rubbing your thumbs tenderly against his cheeks. “We’ll make up for it plenty when you’re feeling better.”

He tried to hold back a smirk, but failed. “Fine.”

“Now go to sleep,” You ordered, planting a quick peck to the top of his head.

He grumbled half-assed as he situated himself more comfortably, but Hinata was all talk at this point. His eyelids were heavy with sleep and his heart hummed with contentment. He was in love. A smile dusted his lips as he began drifting off.

Maybe being sick wasn’t so bad after all.

*******************************************************************************************

You narrowed your eyes suspiciously at your boyfriend across the couch chowing down on take-out sushi. Hinata’s eyes were glued to the television’s screen, his hand alternating between shoveling food into his mouth and rubbing mindless circles on your shin across his lap. Things were comfortable, easy, perfect some might even say.

Too perfect.

“Why aren’t we fighting?”

Hinata turned, cheeks stuffed with food and eyebrows raised with surprise. Under normal circumstances you’d consider it adorable, but you wanted to be serious.

He swallowed with a wince before raising an eyebrow. “Did something happen?”

“No, but we’ve been dating for a while and we haven’t had the big fight.”

“We fight all the time,” he placed his plate on the coffee table with a roll of his eyes. You huffed because he clearly wasn’t on the same page. “Just yesterday I was pissed because you left an empty container of milk in my fridge.”

“It wasn’t empty.”

“There was a dribble. That’s not enough for-” He put up a hand and took a breath. “Not the point. Point is: we fought right?”

“That was hardly a discussion.” You waved him off. He had angrily brought it up, you kissed him sorry, and he forgave you. Hinata didn’t know how to hold a grudge and all you had to do was buy him more milk.

“Okay, a few weeks ago then. You fell in the toilet because I forgot to put the seat down.” He nodded confidently. “You woke me up in the middle of the night for that one.”

You shuddered at the memory of being shocked into full consciousness by falling into a pool of your own piss. In your shocked state you may have chosen violence and decided to pick a fight with Hinata at three in the morning, but it was well deserved.

“Okay, but that’s not what I mean.”

“Are you sure?” He raised a brow. “Waking up with my girlfriend on top of me and slowly realizing she’s threatening to end my bloodline kind of feels like a fight.”

“Okay, that’s-” You pinched the bridge of your nose and ignored his amused smirk. “I’m talking about relationship ruining fights.”

He tilted his head, clearly not following you.

“Like, you insult me using some secret I’ve only divulged to you and I leave crying with no self-esteem.” You explained with exaggerated hand gestures and his nose wrinkled. “Or I walk in on you having an explicit affair with Kageyama, or maybe you get drunk and I over hear you talking with-”

He put both his hands up, “back it up. What the hell was that last one?”

“An explicit affair?” You blinked a few times and cocked your head to the side. “With… Kageyama?”

“Yeah that’s what I-we’re gonna unpack that later.” He palmed his eyes and took a deep breath. “Anyway, why would any of this happen?”

“Because that’s what always happens.” You answered honestly. Maybe you sounded like a pessimist, but that was just the reality of the world. At least, you had never seen it work any other way. “So just… tell me how it’s going to happen.”

Hinata looked crestfallen at your statement and the dejected look in his eyes made your heart sink to your stomach. You closed your eyes, waiting for him to question your sanity, but was taken back when he crawled forward to rest his head on your chest.

“If I ever hurt you like that,” he mouthed against your collarbone. “I would never forgive myself.”

Your heart raced and you brought a hand to card through his unruly locks, nodding to acknowledge his words.

“Don’t overthink,” he said, kissing your neck softly. “If we’re good then we’re good. Maybe that’s just how it’s meant to be.”

Your lips curved into a small smile and you nodded again. You let yourselves just exist with him for a while. Heart’s beating in unison while you twirled tufts of autumn through your fingers. His lips dusting across your neck as he whispered loving affirmations against you. And maybe he was right.

Maybe it was just meant to be.

*******************************************************************************************

Hinata moved expertly around his kitchen preparing breakfast, sneaking glancing at you perched drowsily beside the stove adorning one of his larger shirts. Obviously it wasn’t the first time he’d seen you like that-hair mussed, eyes heavy with sleep, in only his clothes-but it still warmed his heart when you existed so casually in space. Like you belonged there.

His lips curved into a smile as he cracked several eggs into a heated frying pan. The dull thudding of your heels hitting a cupboard mixed with the sizzling on the pan for the background of your comfortable silence. Even without conversation his life felt brighter in your presence and he was thankful his apartment was such a convenient location for the both of you.

You yawned deeply, rubbing the sleep from your eyes and finally focusing on him. Hinata selfishly wished you could be with him more often. The days he woke up without you were the coldest.

“What are you staring at?” You slurred with another yawn.

Hinata shot you a lopsided grin, “my beautiful girlfriend.��

You side-eyed him with an amused smirk, “kiss ass.”

Hinata slid the eggs onto a couple plates before going to stand in front of you. You raised a curious brow, but weren’t given enough time to voice a question before he pressed his lips to yours. His mouth curved into a smile against yours-another reason he loved you being here so often was it meant more of this.

Your hands cradled his face as he appreciated that you still tasted like mint from his borrowed toothpaste this morning. Another subtle way he’d nudged himself into your life he realized, toying with the bottom of his shirt you were wearing.

“What’s this for?” You asked, sliding your hands over his shoulders and hooking them behind his neck.

“I just love you,” he replied earnestly. Your fingers laid a scorching touch as they teased the baby hairs on his neck, sending a shiver down his spine. Hinata took his time with languid kisses-he could kiss you a million times and the hunger for more would always linger.

Your breaths were heavy when you pulled back to place your forehead against his, eyeing him with pure affection that set his heart ablaze. “I love you too, Shoyo.”

He trailed his knuckles down your cheek and relished in the way you leaned into his touch. How had he gotten this luck? Hinata placed a tender kiss on your forehead, temple, cheekbone, tip of your nose, and finally on your lips.

“You should move in.”

Hinata’s eyes widened in shock at his own question because that had been the last thing he’d planned on doing this morning. Well, the suggestion was out there and it’s not like he wanted to take it back...

You blinked several times as you processed. “With you?”

“Ideally.”

You furrowed your brow while mulling it over and Hinata counted his heartbeats to stay grounded. Worst case scenario you say no and things are awkward for a bit. Best case scenario he takes a large step forward with the love of his life.

Oh god, he should’ve planned this better.

“Okay.”

“I understand,” Hinata sighed. “It was totally random and I shouldn’t have expected-did you say yes?”

“Yeah,” your cheeks flushed and you bit your bottom lip to fight down a smile. “I mean, I’m here most of the time anyway, right?”

Hinata nodded mindlessly before a face splitting grin covered his features and he scooped you off the corner. You squealed while he spun you around with a bright laugh, interrupting any of your comments with a passionate kiss. While you were busy tangling your fingers into his unruly hair he glanced toward his bedroom’s door.

There was probably enough time to celebrate.

*******************************************************************************************

“She’s beautiful,” you said in awe, cradling the swaddled newborn in your arms. She was sleeping soundly, tiny breaths leaving her partly open mouth. The baby looked too fragile for this world, features too small and delicate to be realistic.

She was amazing.

“Well, she’s our daughter,” Tanaka’s chest puffed up proudly. He sat beside Shimizu on her hospital bed with an arm hung loosely around her. “Obviously she’s going to be perfect.”

You wouldn’t fight his dramatics; he deserved to be happy today.

“What’s her name?” Hinata breathed. Seated beside you he leaned heavily against your side to observe the baby.

“Sayori,” Shimizu yawned. She and Tanaka had deep bruises under their eyes, and you smirked knowingly down at the sleeping demon in disguise.

Hinata hesitantly moved his hand toward Sayori before planting it back on his lap. You raised a brow, reaching over with the hand not helping cradle Sayori’s head and grabbed his forefinger. Hinata looked at you panicked, but relaxed as you guided him toward Sayori’s small fist that pressed gently against her pink cheeks.

When she instinctively wrapped her fingers around his forefinger his eyes widened and he whipped his gaze to you. “She grabbed my finger,” he whispered.

“They do that,” you smirked, a frenzy of butterflies attacking your stomach as he stared at Sayori wondrously.

“That’s amazing.”

“Okay, stop using my kid as a way to feed your baby fever.” Tanaka huffed. Shimizu elbowed him in the stomach and a warmth trickled up your face when his words hit you.

“What’s a baby fever?” Hinata asked, raising an eyebrow at you. “Is it dangerous?”

“No,” you stumbled over a reply that wouldn’t make the situation incredibly awkward. “It’s when you, uh, want kids.”

“Oh,” Hinata shrugged, bouncing his finger to play with Sayori’s hand. “What’s wrong with eventually wanting kids?”

“That’s not-”

“No, it means you want a kid now.” Tanaka emphasized by smacking the hospital bed. “Like, go home immediately and make a baby level now.”

Hinata blinked a few times before his face lit up red, “oh.”

You nodded awkwardly and both of you remained quiet while Shimizu chastised Tanaka in the background. One of you should probably deny the baby fever thing… right? You glanced over to Hinata, but his eyebrows were furrowed as he stared intently at Sayori.

“Okay, Sayori needs to eat soon, so I’m kicking Hinata out.” Tanaka announced.

Hinata didn’t put up any fights and you passed Sayori back to Shimizu, making plans to see each other again soon. You offered your services for future babysitting with Hinata’s vigorous agreeing behind you and they were more than grateful for it. Regardless Tanaka shooed you out when Sayori began wriggling in Shimizu’s arms.

As you and Hinata made your way to the metro that would bring you to your apartment complex the air between you was heavy. An obvious awkwardness that was harder to ignore the longer you walked together.

“I’m not surprised their baby ended up looking so cute,” you laughed, filling the space with nervous chatter. “Shimizu is really pretty.”

He nodded, looking up at the cloudless sky thoughtfully. “Do you think our baby would be cute?”

Your heart rate quickened at the idea. It wasn’t like you’d never thought of it, but talking about it outloud was a completely different monster. “I think it would have pretty great genes.”

He nodded, furrowing his brow at the sidewalk ahead.

Hinata wasn’t an idiot. Neither of you were ready for something like that. Several nights ago you’d decided to get drunk and attempt making meat buns-you’d nearly set the kitchen on fire. That doesn’t scream parent material.

On a larger scale, Hinata had just been selected for Japan’s Olympic team. There just wasn’t time for something like that. No, a baby wasn’t realistic.

However...

“What’s our apartment’s pet policy?”

He turned to you with a raised brow, “probably an extra fee and a weight limit. Why?”

You smirked mischievously at him, “want to get a dog?”

His jaw dropped. “Oh my fu-can I name it?”

“Only if I get to pick the breed.”

“Well then, what are you waiting for?” Hinata grasped your hand and yanked you toward the closest metro station. “Look up the closest pet store and let’s go!”

You chuckled, allowing him to pull you toward a random station that probably wouldn’t lead you where you needed. It would work out in the end. Things always seemed to fall perfectly into place with HInata.

*******************************************************************************************

Hinata glared across the roll of wrapping paper at the small puppy crushing the end of the tube, tearing edges of red and white striped paper with its sharp teeth. Hinata tugged it out of the pup’s mouth, but that only encouraged the behavior as it leapt forward to chew with more vigor.

“Can you grab your son?” Hinata waved the roll around, letting the Shiba Inu chase the end that Hinata held just out of reach. “He’s making this more difficult than it needs to be.”

You paused your typing at the dining table and giggled at Hinata’s antics. After closing the laptop you jogged over to scoop the puppy up, flipping him over in your arms to rub its belly. The puppy let its tongue hang out and wagged its tail vigorously at the attention.

“Oh, Deku, are you giving your dad a hard time,” you cooed down at the puppy, lifting him to look him in the eyes with a furrowed brow. “That’s not very nice.”

Hinata rolled his eyes fondly at your pathetic attempt of scolding while Deku licked you on the nose. Just several months old and he already knew how to manipulate people with his cuteness.

“I bought our bullet train tickets,” you said while nudging him the roll of tape he’d started looking around for. “Natsu called me earlier. We decided that you and I should get there around 3.”

Hinata tore a piece of tape off with his teeth while he held the wrapping paper still around the boxed pair of rollerskates with his foot.

“We have to stop by Tanaka’s place before we head out,” Hinata wrinkled his nose at his poor wrapping job. “Noya’s visiting for a while and he wants to meet Deku.”

“Of course,” you smiled as you held a chew toy above Deku’s face so he could nibble on it in your lap. “We have some presents for Sayori, anyway.”

Oh yeah. You had split the present wrapping in terms of difficulty, so you had the pleasure of wrapping weirdly shaped toys while he was left with boxes. Somehow, his still turned out to be a disaster.

He could hear Natsu’s complaints already.

“The train doesn’t leave till one, so we should have plenty of time.” You stated once Hinata taped the final present, completing his small present tower. Deku wriggled himself free from your grip and immediately attacked the empty wrapping paper roll.

Hinata smiled absentmindedly as he watched Deku hold the tube still with his small paws as he gnawed the cardboard. He felt you crawl over, lying your head onto his lap as your eyes followed his to watch your dog-son together. He felt at peace, running his fingers through your hair while Deku wreaked mischief nearby.

He felt like he could never get happier than this, and he never wanted it to end.

“He really is a troublemaker,” you snorted as Deku dragged the tube across the living room proudly. “Gets it from you.”

Hinata rolled his eyes and pinched your cheek. “It’s because you let him do whatever he wants.”

“Do not!”

He chuckled, taking his time tracing your features. The curve of your cheekbones, the dip of your lips, the bridge of your nose-everything he’d kissed into his memory by now but still couldn’t get enough of.

Hinata’s heart burned bright as he ran his knuckles along your cheek, “I love you.”

“I love you, too.” You smiled softly, leaning subconsciously into his touch.

“I mean… I really love you, (Y/N).” Hinata grabbed your hand and brought it to his lips. “I think this is it.”

You met his stare for several moments before your cheeks reddened. “Oh.”

Hinata nodded, pressing a loving kiss to the back of your hand. “I just-I always want you with me and if it’s not you in the end then… then what’s the point?”

Your mouth fell slightly open and he felt your hand flex in his grasp. He assumed he made a mistake-said too much too fast-but his chest was so warm and full and it was hard to reign in his emotions when he got that way.

A smile blossomed across your face and it eased his anxieties when you held his cheek. “You’re it for me too, Sho.”

He blinked several times as the words rolled over in his mind. “Wha-really?” He twisted himself so he could look you in the eyes, begging for you to be telling the truth.

You nodded shyly, your face crimson. “Yeah. You have been. I’m not… I don’t think I’d be able to love anyone else ever again.”

It felt like he’d been hit by a train at your confession and he pressed his mouth against yours before he’d even processed the statement. Your content hum against his lips was enough to drive him insane.

“Well, I’m going to love you forever.” Hinata promised with a dopey smile. “So don’t even think about that.”

You snorted, but nodded anyway. Hinata glanced down at your lips again with hooded eyes and started leaning forward, but was rudely interrupted by a damp cardboard tube hitting his forehead.

He glanced up exhaustedly at the Shiba Inu puppy panting obliviously at the both of you, waiting patiently for the love and attention he knew he deserved. You pushed Hinata off to grab Deku, but he jumped into a play bow and jolted back when you reached for him.

Hinata smiled dazedly as you chased Deku around the apartment, juking around furniture to attempt to throw the puppy off-course. He had never felt so complete than he had in that moment because he realized that this was it for him.

It was you. It was him. It was a troublemaker dog. And it was a promise that you’d be together forever.

And that was pretty damn perfect.

#hinata shouyo #hinata shoyo #hinata shouyou #hinata shouyou x reader #hinata shoyo x reader #hinata shoyo x y/n #hinata shoyo headcanons #hinata shoyo fluff #haikyuu!!#haikyuu #msby black jackal #msby sakusa #miya atsumu #bokuto #kiyoko #tanaka ryuunosuke #haikyuu x reader

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winter-soldier-vibes · 4 years ago

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You just have to keep trying (Sebastian Stan x reader)

You just have to keep trying

Sebastian Stan x reader

Warnings: eating disorder(various behaviors and ‘mantras’), negative self talk/worthlessness, panic attacks/anxiety

Word count: 4268

Summary: Sebastian and Reader are dating, and while Sebastian is away filming, some comments get to you. You start developing eating disorder behaviors, and a concerned friend reaches out to Sebastianw.

A/N: Sorry this took so long, it was really hard for me to write and I had to take a few days for myself before I could finish it. This one is really personal for me to write, and I don’t mean to be insensitive towards anyone. This is just written based on my personal experience and what I think would help me. If any of you are struggling with anything mentioned here and you need someone to talk to, relate to, or rant to, I’m all ears. This isn’t something to go through alone. Also I know this may seem like an unrealistic solution and it’s not always this easy, but this is fanfiction and I used some phrases that helped me. It’s often never as easy as reassurance, but it does help. Again, I’m sorry if this is triggering or insensitive to anyone out there, I just really enjoyed writing it and imagining someone caring as much as I wrote here. Stay safe.

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It wasn’t easy dating an actor.

There was media attention, often unwanted, in every corner of your life. Interpretations of everything you did, said, and posted. Comments of your relationship, what you say, what you wear, what you also don’t say. Assumptions were made about your entire life and you just wanted to scream at them to shut up. They didn’t really know you, and they’d do anything for a headline.

But it was all worth it to you. You loved Sebastian very much, and wouldn’t trade what the two of you had for the world. He was everything you wanted. But the goddamn media were ruthless.

He told you to ignore it. And you tried and were successful for a while. But eventually hearing the same shit over and over again just ate away at you. Now it was easier to believe them than it was to believe yourself.

Somethings were less bothersome than others. You knew your love for Sebastian was real, and no headline ever made you doubt that. It was the critiques on you, and everything you did and said, that really got to you. Specifically when it was targeting your appearances.

You never had a problem with your confidence. It never really occurred to you that your appearances mattered or would matter, so you didn’t really focus on it. But it was different now. Suddenly everyone cares and is saying that you should look different, that you don’t deserve him, that you weren’t good enough. And on top of that there were the comments of everyone reading these articles and posts.

Currently you were scrolling through Instagram. Sebastian was God knows where shooting for a new movie. He had been gone for a few weeks and you weren’t sure when he was coming back. You were scrolling through a bunch of old photos of the two of you together. You loved all of these when they were taken and posted, but now was a completely different story.

More than half of the comments were negative, and 75% of those were directed towards you. You didn’t think it would bother you like it was, and you intended to only read a few before moving on. But it was a wormhole - as much as you wanted to stop reading you couldn’t bring yourself to look away.

There were tears in your eyes but you didn’t really care. You wanted the honest truth of what people thought about you. Sebastian told you their opinions didn’t mean anything, but after a while you thought he was just being nice.

What does he even see in her?

What makes her so special?

God she’s disgusting

He could have anyone, why her?

Anyone else hate this chick as much as I do?

The last one had over 300 likes.

You finally put your phone down and got up, making your way into the bathroom. You studied yourself in the mirror, looking for every possible flaw that was there. And you found a lot of them. It hurt, but you needed to do this if things were going to get any better.

Your hips were too wide, waist not pulled taut enough, a bit of flab here, too thin there… everything seemed out of proportion to you. Your skin was a mess, your hair was flat and dull, it just seemed like everything was wrong. No wonder people were tearing you apart and saying you weren’t good enough. They were right.

This was the start of something very new for you. You decided to take things into your own hands, make yourself better. You had heard how celebrities went on crazy diets to lose weight for a role, and you wound up pulling inspiration from them. It started fairly small and almost harmless. You were counting calories and doing more cardio. It was fine.

But then it wasn’t.

It became much too addicting, much too fast. It started slowly. There was one day where you had an extremely busy schedule and you ended up forgetting to eat and before you knew it, it was 9 pm. You really did intend to eat something, but then it occurred to you that you could just...go to bed.

You started skipping meals, loving the way that hunger made you feel. You felt more focused, more alert, just overall stronger. You kept telling yourself that hunger makes you stronger, and that eating was for the weak. And you wanted to prove everyone wrong, and if denying some hunger was the way to do that then so be it.

Sometimes you would indulge in your body’s cries for help, eating anything you could. But as soon as you realized what you were doing, panic would overtake you. The first time you frantically tried to find an option, which eventually led you to the bathroom hunched over the toilet. After that you threw up anything you ended up eating, no matter how small.

You took weight loss inspiration quotes to a dangerous level. Anytime you would walk to the fridge you would tell yourself that ‘fat lasts longer than flavor,’ or ‘minutes on the lips forever on the hips’. After that it wasn’t that hard to walk away.

You were working out a lot more too, and found that addicting. You pushed yourself until you basically fell over from exhaustion. Then you would give yourself a break. But absolutely no rest days. You didn’t deserve them. Not yet, at least.

You stopped going out with your friends. They would invite you to a bar or dinner but you would always decline. It was easier that way. You were losing weight of course, and rapidly at that. You didn’t see it, you saw things that still needed work. But your hair was beginning to fall out, you were always tired, and just generally felt like shit. You were never overweight in the first place, so your ribs were beginning to just out, and you could see your hip bones for the first time in your life. But this only egged you on. It should have scared you, but you liked it. You thought it was progress.

You hadn’t seen anyone in weeks, and you had been doing this to yourself for months. You would still talk to Sebastian on the phone most days, and text on the days you didn’t. You didn’t dare tell him about any of this for fear he would try to stop you. You weren’t good enough yet. That was all that you really wanted. You would give everything you had just to feel like you were good enough.

Eventually, your friends started getting really concerned. Denying a girl’s night here and there was nothing to worry about, but weeks of near radio silence prompted them to come and check on you. One day they knocked on your door, and you padded over to it, still in your workout gear.

They nearly passed out when they saw you.

You were gaunt, dark circles under your eyes, pale, and just...smaller than you were. You weren’t hiding behind your usual baggy clothes that kept you warm, exposing how much weight you had lost. You thought everything was normal, but they were absolutely freaking out. This wasn’t you.

“Are you okay?” y/b/f/n asked after a few moments of stunned silence.

You shrugged. “Yeah. why wouldn’t I be?”

They swallowed. “Y/n, you look...sick.”

You rolled your eyes, frustrated. “Gee, thanks.” That did absolutely nothing for your self esteem. “Look, I’m fine and I have work to do. So thank you, but please just leave.” You shut the door on them.

They stood there stunned for a few minutes outside the door, worried as hell about you. Eventually they decided to leave, but they couldn’t stop thinking about you. They sat in their car, trying to think of what to do. But then they remembered something.

A few years ago when the two of you were getting serious, Sebastian had given them his phone number in case something happened to you while he was away. They had never had to use it before, but now seemed like an appropriate time. They scrolled through their contacts until they found him, and started typing.

‘Hey this is y/b/f/n. Something’s wrong with y/n.’

Within a couple of minutes, he called back.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, worry filling his voice.

They sighed. “I’m not sure. I hadn’t heard or seen her in a few weeks and I went to check on her today and she’s just…” they shook their head. “She’s lost a lot of weight. She looks sick, Sebastian. I don’t know what’s going on but I barely recognized her when she opened that door.”

On the other side of the line, Sebastian was freaking out. He was in between takes on set, but he walked off to a more private place to have this conversation. “Did you try to talk to her?”

“She said she was fine and shut the door.”

He rubbed a hand over his face. Sighing, he said “Alright. I’ll tell the director something came up. I’ll be there tomorrow. Thank you, y/b/f/n.”

“Thank you.”

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

The day continued normally for you. You worked out some more, busied yourself with different things around the house, avoided eating like it was poison. Your usual routine. You hated what you were doing to yourself. You wanted to stop but you just didn’t think that was an option yet. You thought you had to get to a certain image, a certain weight, or just reach some kind of destination before you tried to change. But you weren’t there yet.

You tried to sleep, couldn’t sleep, tried again, and then eventually gave up and settled for the 1 hour you were able to get. You got ready for your day as normal: workout gear and to the gym. When you came home, you showered and went to lie down again. You were so exhausted but you didn’t feel like there was anything you could do.

You don’t know how long you were there, but the sound of a door closing brought you back into awareness. You sat up, confused as to who was here. Sebastian always told you when he was coming home.

“Y/n?”

You perked up, knowing it was Sebastian’s voice. You practically ran into the main room to hug him. He smiled and wrapped his arms around you, immediately stiffening. “Oh my God,” he whispered. Underneath your sweater he could feel your bones jutting out and you were smaller than he remembered. He had only been gone for about 2 months, what the hell had happened?

He pulled back a lot sooner than you would have liked. But when you looked at his face, you were surprised to see him looking at you extremely concerned. “What’s wrong Seb?”

He looked you up and down and shook his head a little “What happened to you?”

You smiled a little, oblivious. “What do you mean?”

“You - you’ve lost so much weight. You look sick, yn, just - what the hell happened?”

You looked away for a second, stepping back and crossing your arms. You didn't know what to say. Sebastian stepped forward and grabbed both your shoulders, forcing you to look at him. Gently but firmly, he asked again “Y/n, tell me what happened.”

You shifted your gaze away from him. “I just wanted to be better.”

Sebastian felt his body go cold. “When was the last time you ate?” You shrugged your shoulders and shook your head, not knowing what to tell him. You didn’t even know the answer yourself. He sighed. “This isn’t because of some stupid reporter, is it?”

Your lack of words and the tensing of your body was enough of an answer for him. “You know that they are trained to rip people apart? They don’t know what it’s making you feel. Why are you doing this to yourself?”

“Because I don’t fucking deserve you! You could literally have anyone you wanted, I just don’t understand why you chose me! I don’t understand why you’d want me, just….” you shook your head. “I’m not good enough.”

He stayed silent for a few moments, not knowing what you meant. He had no idea you felt this down on yourself. “What do you mean?”

You looked away from him again. “Sometimes I just don’t understand. You’re absolutely perfect in every single way and then I'm just here. I don’t get why or how you could love me.”

He closed the space between the two of you and hugged you again, firmly but not as tightly as usual. He was afraid he would hurt you. He felt tears pricking his eyes as well. His girl, his y/n, was wasting away because she didn’t feel good enough for him, when usually he thought it was the opposite. It broke his heart knowing that you had done this to yourself for him or some ignorant reporter. You were crying because you thought this would be the end of it. You didn’t think it was possible for him to love you after something like this.

“Babe, listen to me. I need you to hear me out here. I love you so much. I love you for who you are, who you were, and everything you could be. And nothing would ever change that. You are absolutely perfect to me no matter what. And because of that it breaks my heart to know what you’ve been doing to yourself. You don’t have to change, especially not for me. Hurting yourself like this cannot be an option, okay?”

Tears had begun to fall from his eyes and you were shaking in his embrace. “I’m sorry,” you choked out. You felt him shake his head before he said “You don’t have to be sorry. You just have to trust me. Can you do that?”

Your heart was melting. “Why are you so nice to me?” you asked quietly.

He let out a shaky breath, trying his best to hold it together for you. “Because I love you more than anything. And I’ll be damned if I let anything happen to you.”

You buried your face further into his chest, letting out another sob. He tightened his grip on you and kissed the top off your head, scared you would disappear at any second. He swallowed back his own tears, knowing he needed to be the strong one here.

“Please, y/n, let me help you.”

You nodded into his chest, feeling a sickening sense of relief and terror. To be honest you were mostly petrified as to what was to come. You had spent months telling yourself you deserve to starve, and you still believed most of it. You knew deep down it was a problem and you wanted to let Sebastian help you, but you were so scared of disappointing him or yourself.

By this point, it was early afternoon. The two of you spent a few hours on the couch, you curled up to him and his arms protectively around you. He kept telling you how much he loved you and how you were beautiful, and you would do your best to believe him and ignore the voice in your head telling you it was all a lie. In all honesty you got more distracted as time went on. You knew he would want to make you dinner and you couldn’t ignore the anxiety growing more as the time went on.

You weren’t going to bring it up, and you were just waiting for him to. He was nervous to bring it up too. He didn’t want you to be uncomfortable or trigger you, but there was no way that he could let you skip another meal. You had already gone far too long without eating anything. He shifted in his seat and tensed a little, and you sighed, knowing what was coming.

“So...uh..”

“I don’t know,” you finished for him. You looked up to meet his eyes. “I’m not sure what I’d want or even could eat. It’s so stupid trying to explain it to someone else…” you shook your head and closed your eyes. “It makes sense in my head but it doesn’t when I say it out loud.”

He sighed a little, brushing your hair with one of his hands. “It can be something small,” he said gently. “I’ll be here the whole time.”

You felt tears in your eyes again as you brought your hand to your stomach, running it down your ribcage, feeling the divots. It was a nervous habit you had developed whenever you thought about eating, and you cursed yourself for doing it now. “It’s embarrassing Seb.” you said quietly.

Sebastian didn’t stop his movements, looking down at you. “What can I do to make it better?” he asked, feeling so helpless in this situation. He wanted to take all of your pain away but there isn’t a quick way to heal the mind. He had learned that himself a long time ago. You shrugged, not knowing the answer yourself.

You took a deep breath. “Nothing’s going to be easy Seb. I think it’d just be easier if you chose something and then just sit with me or something. I don’t know… God I feel like an idiot right now -”

“Hey,” Sebastian stopped you, pressing a kiss to your forehead. “Whatever you need babe.” He gave you a smile before he stood up, and you curled into the corner of the couch, bringing your knees to your chest. Your heart was pounding and your mind was racing. You had no idea how you were going to be able to do this, you could barely eat on your own out of shame, how were you expecting to eat in front of the man you loved?

Meanwhile, Sebastian was trying to think of something that would be easiest for you to eat while still providing sustenance. He didn’t want you to be uncomfortable, but he also didn’t want to enable you.

Eventually he came back out with two plates of food, one holding less than the other. (Insert whatever you want here for the meal). He gave the smaller portion to you with a small smile and you were trying your best to hide the trembling of your hand as you took it from him. You ended up counting the calories with the blink of an eye before you could stop yourself, and cursed your mind because you didn’t think that there was a way that you could eat that much. Even if you knew logically you burned more calories in your workout that morning.

You begna bouncing your leg up and down, tears building once again. You didn’t want to disappoint him, but you couldn't stop the anxiety building inside you. “I’m sorry,” you said shaking your head and covering your mouth. Your breathing was becoming uneven, and your heart rate was increasing as well. Which only made you more anxious.

Sebastian moved both plates out of the way before wrapping his arms around you again. You were so embarrassed, having an anxiety attack around something as stupid as food. You felt so weak and stupid. Your leg was moving uncontrollably at this point, and you barely had any control over your breathing anymore. Your hands balled into fists and you buried your head into his chest out of shame.

You kept trying to spit out apologies but you couldn’t catch your breath long enough to do so. He just tightened his arms around you, hushing you whenever you tried to speak. “Y/n I need you to try to breathe with me, can you try that? Just try to match mine.” He started taking deep breaths, chest rising and falling slowly and you tried your best to match his. It took a few minutes but eventually your breathing evened out. Once the panic had washed away you started crying harder, more out of shame and embarrassment than anything else.

“I’m sorry, I know it’s so stupid -”

“It’s not stupid y/n.” he said gently but firmly. “It’s okay to be anxious.”

You shook your head against his chest. “Not when it’s about something as silly as food.”

“Hey, it’s not stupid. Thoughts don’t make sense all the time, but that doesn’t make them fact. You’re just having a rough time right now, but beating yourself up over it is only going to make it harder.”

God, you love this man.

The two of you stayed like that for a few minutes, him rubbing a hand through your hair gently like before. He knew you had always liked that. You closed your eyes, wanting this moment to go on forever, but knowing you would have to eat something at some point.

“Do you think you could try to eat something? Please?”

You took a deep breath before nodding again, pulling away from him. You grabbed your plate and played around with it for a minute or so before you began eating. You wanted to make Sebastian happy, but you were terrified as well. You didn’t exactly know why, logically speaking. You had thoughts running through your mind of weight gain, but you also knew logically that one meal wouldn’t cause it, and that you were too skinny anyways.

You knew that logically. But your mind wasn’t exactly a logical place to be right now.

You weren’t able to eat everything, but you ate more than you thought you would be able. To. you apologized for the nth time that night, and Sebastian stopped you before you could finish. “Don’t be. I’m proud of you.” he said with a smile as he brought the plates to the kitchen. He was nervous to say the least. You hadn’t eaten much, but again, it was a start. Everyone needs to start somewhere.

He hadn’t told you that he had come home in the middle of shooting to check on you. He didn’t tell you that he had initially said he’d be gone for a week before pushing it back even further, realizing you needed him at the moment. You were more important to him, and he honestly didn’t care if he got fired. He’d find another job at some point.

He stayed with you for the next few weeks, helping you in every aspect. He made sure you deleted all social media apps on your phone, so you weren’t inclined to look at toxic comments. He helped you tone down your time in the gym and take rest days. He made sure you ate something at each meal. It started out small, and gradually he helped you to eat more. He sat with you through all the panic attacks and tears, and the times you would lash out at him. He never took it personally.

There were slip ups. Times where you snuck out at night to go for a run, or when you would find yourself throwing up after the anxiety got to be too much. He wouldn’t get angry with you, just offer you a sad smile and hug you. You would apologize and he would assure you it wasn’t your fault. “It’s not going to be perfect, you just have to keep trying.”

He would never stop telling you that you were beautiful and how much he loved you. You couldn’t help but feel like a burden to him at first, but as time went on you began to believe him more and more.

Months later and it was still a daily struggle. You had bad days, slip ups, and days where you just wanted to quit. But Sebastian never left your side through all of it, and eventually you were able to pull yourself out of your own darkness. You were able to catch yourself in your negative thoughts before you descended too far down the wormhole. You were starting to feel happy again, more like who you had been.

The two of you were watching a movie, laughing over some funny line that had been said. There was popcorn in between the two of you and you just felt happy. After a few moments, you looked up at him and smiled. “Thank you.”

He smiled back down at you. “For what?”

“Helping me believe in myself again.”

#sebastian stan #sebastian stan x reader #sebastian stan imagine #sebastian x reader #comfort #eatingdisordercomfort #tw eating disorder #tw panic attack #tw anxiety #tw anorexia #tw self hate #sebastian stan comfort #fluff #imagine

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smmahamazing · 4 years ago

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Rounding out your Valentine’s Day with one last fic for the @inudayoflove2021 !!!

Summary: It’s White Day. Inuyasha and Kagome have been dating for a month, and Inuyasha has planned a nice evening for the two of them. Except Inuyasha has something a little sweet prepared for Kagome in hopes of getting a little steamy with her. What happens when Kagome has a similar idea? Set in the Cowboy Blues Universe. Rated E for smut.

Let me tell you, this chapter has truly taken it out of me. This is my first foray into writing smut, and y’all that is hard. But in the end, it’s been worth all the trouble in the world. Next month exactly will be ONE YEAR since I started writing. And that’s kind of crazy to me. I have six posted stories with an entire google drive of wips that scream at me day in and day out LOL. All because of a little White Day one shot that grew into a 23k story, with another 8k of one-shots, all set in the same universe. I couldn’t think of a better way to celebrate than with Inukag’s first time! Thank you so much to @clementinesgulag , who has also drawn a very sweet 😏😏😏piece of artwork for this chapter, and I’m so excited for y’all to see it!!! If you haven’t already, check out all the different fics with the Day of Love Collection on AO3!

Anyways, I’m dedicating this chapter to all you guys out there. This fandom has been an amazing part of my life this past year, and I’m so happy to be involved with such a great group of people. This past year has been crazy, but you guys have been worth it. I hope you all enjoy!!!

A special shoutout to @underwater0phelia for helping me with a few trouble sections! You're the greatest darling❤❤❤

Inuyasha loved routine. More specifically, he loved routine whenever his brain started to think too much about certain subjects.

Today was Mr. Tanaka's quarterly oil change. Mr. Tanaka had been a loyal customer dating back to the first week he had officially opened his doors for business. He told Inuyasha that he reminded him of a younger version of himself, and that he was happy to see a young man such as himself take a risk into opening his own business. Mr. Tanaka's kind words had really helped motivate Inuyasha through the good times and the bad times that first year, and so to thank him, Inuyasha gave the older gentleman a fair discount on any and all services, and let no one else service the vehicle.

Over the years, Inuyasha gained enough employees that he really didn't need to service any of the vehicles that came into the shop. He dealt with enough paperwork and general bureaucratic shit that, most days, he willingly let the boys take care of the line up.

But days like today were nice. Fantastic, really. Loud, heavy alternative rock blared through the speakers of a giant stereo as Inuyasha made quick work of the tiny honda. It was easy for Inuyasha to get all wrapped up in the monotony of his work. Today, Inuyasha had been more anxious than usual, so he decided to go ahead and perform a full diagnostic package on Mr. Tanaka's car. The extra work would help keep Inuyasha's mind focused.

The problem was that White Day was next week, and Inuyasha had absolutely no idea what to get Kagome. They had only been dating for about a month and Inuyasha was struggling with the decision of how grand of a gesture he wanted to make.

When he was growing up, the giving norm was usually either chocolate or candy, and sometimes flowers depending on the relationship of the giver towards the recipient. Given the short amount of time they had been together, chocolate seemed like a good direction to head towards, but Inuyasha had been overanalyzing the entire situation for several days now.

The main reason for his anxiety came from his already deep feelings for a girl he's only known for a month. Inuyasha truly enjoyed talking to and spending time with Kagome. They were constantly texting each other; asking a variety of questions about their lives and the things that they thought defined them. Random pictures broke up the mass of their text bubbles. Kagome had been given leeway from her boss to experiment with all different kinds of cakes, so practically everyday was an image of a new cake, decorated all cutesy for the romantic holiday.

The rational part of his brain told him to just get her a nice box of chocolates and flowers and enjoy a nice evening together. But Kagome deserved more effort than just purchasing a random box of chocolates. An ideal gift would be to make her something - she seemed like the type of girl to love homemade gifts - but to Inuyasha, the idea was….daunting, and a little embarrassing. Inuyasha knew enough about cooking and baking to just get him by, but he didn’t feel confident enough to make something for a woman whose career was based on cooking and baking. Not like Kagome would laugh at him or make fun of anything he made, but it was an insecurity Inuyasha couldn't seem to shake when put in front of his professional girlfriend.

It didn't help that the irrational part of his brain wanted to give her something more than just chocolate.

Despite being together for about a month, they hadn't had sex yet. Not because neither of them didn't want to, they just …never brought the subject up. The more they talked, the more Inuyasha began to realize how much he liked her, and he didn't want to do anything that would jeopardize the easy going relationship they had now.

In reality, he just didn't want to scare her off by demanding sex. Nor did he want to demand sex from her, he just wanted things to happen naturally. Before he knew it, a month had flown by.

Several hours passed before Inuyasha finally decided he couldn’t keep Mr. Tanaka's car in the shop any longer. He dragged his feet to the hand washing sink, taking his time to scrub the grease from his hands and the dirt off his forearms.

Mr. Tanaka always came first thing in the morning before most people were functioning enough to stop by, so the waiting room had several more people in it then when he started working on the car.

"Mr. Tanaka," Inuyasha announced, grabbing a free computer at the front desk to pull up the service information. Mr. Tanaka stood with a smile on his face and walked up to him.

"She's all good I assume?"

"Yup, fit as a fiddle. Gave her a good once over, which is why it took a little longer than normal. On the house."

"Ahh, Inuyasha my boy, you're too good to me."

Inuyasha chuckled as the computer calculated the total, and he prompted Mr. Tanaka to insert his credit card into the card reader.

"So, what are your plans for the rest of the day?" Inuyasha asked.

"Oh, I'm going to spend the afternoon with the grandchildren, maybe go out for a stroll and a banana split at the nice ice cream joint not far from my house. How about yourself?"

"Just take out for me and my girl tonight, nothing exciting,"

"Oh, I wouldn't say that, " Mr. Tanaka said with a glint in his eyes. "Every evening with your woman is special. "

Inuyasha snorted at his statement, grabbing the receipt that just finished printing and giving it to the older man. "Alright old man, I'll see you in another three months."

"Alright then, Inuyasha. Don't work too hard now!" Mr. Tanaka says with a sly look on his face. Inuyasha merely rolled his eyes at the joke the older gentleman made every time he brought his car in. Inuyasha always thought him a strange man; despite doing good business, not everyone wanted to stay and chat with a hanyou, but Inuyasha tried not to think about it too much. If his mother was alive, she'd say something about how "people can always surprise you" or "there's still good in the world, Inuyasha". He tried to think about those theoretical statements when he was faced with an actual nice person.

With Mr. Tanaka's car finished, Inuyasha walked back out to the garage to finish cleaning up his station. There was some paperwork to be done, but he was hoping today would be busy enough to justify him working on the floor instead.

'Maybe a little snack first,' Inuyasha thought as he held his hand up to his rumbling stomach. Now the only question was, sweet or savory? Mr. Tanaka and his grandkids were still on the edge of his brain, thinking maybe Kagome would be up for getting a carton of rocky road tonight to share.

That was when the idea hit him. It came in small bursts, just split second images his brain conjured up to give him an idea of what it would look like. It was something Inuyasha had never done before. Kikyo kept their sex life pretty...vanilla. Not that this idea was all that out there, but the whole thing would definitely feel a little odd to someone who really only used the missionary position in his last relationship.

It was definitely something Inuyasha would probably like - just the thought of it was already starting to wake up his lower brain - but would Kagome? Would she misconstrue the situation somehow? Would she be into that kind of thing?

One thing was for certain; Inuyasha needed to continue this line of thought in his private office, not amongst all his employees. He found his assistant manager and confirmed their current appointments for the next several hours before locking himself in the office to come up with ways to make this little "idea" of his work.

~~~

It was just starting to get dark when Kagome pulled up to her normal spot at Inuyasha's apartment. She killed the engine as soon as she put the car in park, but didn't make a move yet to open the door and make her way over to his apartment. This way, Kagome wouldn't be able to chicken out or drive away. Eventually, the cooler air outside would make its way in and lower the temperature in the car, prompting her that her time to sit around has come to an end.

Kagome didn't even know what she was so nervous about anyway. It was going to be just another date night with Inuyasha, perfectly normal and entertaining.

‘Oh yeah, because showing up at your boyfriend’’s house in nothing but lingerie is definitely normal,’ Kagome thought, shifting around in her seat a little and making herself much more aware of exactly what she was wearing and why.

She had been dating Inuyasha for just about a month now, and they had yet to “do the deed”. Which, if she was honest, Kagome wasn’t sure if that was odd or normal for a relationship. Her past relationships had been so varied, ranging from sex on the first date to no sex at all, or even pretty much only sex with little to no substance.

Kagome didn’t think it was because he didn’t want to. They had been texting back and forth practically everyday since their first date at that ramen shop. Inuyasha even made it a point to come to the diner for lunch just so they could see each other - which totally didn’t make her heart flutter, no siree. They just hadn’t really had the...opportunity to express their interest for each other in that way yet.

The plan for tonight was to just have a simple dinner at Inuyasha’s, and maybe pop in a movie during dessert. Very relaxed and extremely intimate. It was actually Kagome’s idea of a perfect date. Sure, going out to eat together is always nice, and spending the day out and about can create a lot of great memories, but she craved the closeness one could get when you were comfortable in your own home.

Kagome had some slight alterations to go with their evening plans It was simple: walk inside, seduce her hot boyfriend, and fuck him into next week. She still wasn’t sure where dinner and a movie fell between it all; she was just going to have to wing it. Earlier in the week, Kagome had made a stop at the mall and purchased a most alluring piece of lingerie.

It was a fairly simple garment, which was good because Kagome couldn’t even begin to wonder how she’d get into some of the lingerie she looked at. She was pretty sure some of them could double as their own sex toys. In the end, she chose two different colors of a two piece bra and panty set - one in red, which she was currently wearing, and one in green, her favorite color. It was made from a soft silk with floral lace borders around the edges of the cup of the bra and the elastic of the panties. Overall, it was a very comfortable fit, which is what greatly prompted Kagome to purchase two.

However, the real stars of the show were the crotchless panties and the cupless bra.

Despite its simplicity, it was the raunchiest piece of lingerie that Kagome had ever purchased.

It was still chilly outside, requiring her to wear her purple peacoat to and from the car, but the only other piece of clothing Kagome wore was a random slip dress she found buried deep in one of her dresser drawers. She was actually pretty sure it was meant to go over your bathing suit when visiting the local swimming pool or beach, but with only three buttons and a waist tie, the garment was perfect for easy removal. She rounded out the whole outfit with the most expensive pair of black stiletto heels she owned, and hoped that Inuyasha didn't question its...quirkiness.

Well, she was wearing an old pair of boyshorts over the crotchless panties, but Kagome just felt too awkward driving without a proper pair of underwear on.

'Alright Kagome, time to get your butt in gear,' she thought, giving her cheeks a few good slaps to motivate her. With a deep inhale, she carefully shimmied out of the boyshorts and tossed them into the backseat before grabbing her purse and stepping out of the car to walk towards Inuyasha's apartment.

She knocked on the door, running her hands through her hair to fix any errant strands the wind may have moved. After about thirty seconds, she could hear Inuyasha's muffled reply to ‘come on in’, like he was on the opposite side of the apartment. It was unusual of him - he never failed to greet her at the door the few times she had been over - but she reminded herself they had only been dating for a month. Plus, he was probably still getting things ready. No big deal.

He must have anticipated not being quite ready for her arrival, seeing as the door was already unlocked. She quickly stepped in and locked the door behind her, taking off her coat and hanging it, along with her purse, on one of the hooks beside the door. She forewent taking her shoes off though, since they were a part of the whole 'fuck me' look she was attempting to pull off.

Looking into the living room, there were a few extra blankets and pillows stacked on the ottoman, but nothing looked particularly different. The apartment was always pretty clean due to Inuyasha's sensitive nose - he had a hard time dealing with dust - although it looked like he did a quick wipe down throughout the room not that long ago.

Inuyasha didn't have a space set up for a dining table since he normally ate by himself , but he had taken the time to set up a couple of placemats for them at the bar that separated the kitchen and living room. Each spot had its own dinner plate, salad bowl, utensils, and wine glass all ready to be filled. Placed on either side of them and in front of them were three long candlesticks in their own respective holder.

The whole scene put a soft smile on her face as she tenderly touched each piece. She had yet to see Inuyasha, but tonight was already turning out to be the perfect date. It was obvious to see the work he put into making this dinner special for them. The plates looked like they came from his own cupboard, but she was pretty sure he went out to buy candles to set the mood.

Kagome was beginning to get a little anxious to find Inuyasha, but the smells coming from the kitchen were strong enough to tear her away from her search. There were a couple of pots on the stove over a low flame. Nothing smelled like it was burning, but what kind of cook would Kagome be if she didn't take a quick peek at some unattended pots?

That's what she told herself, anyways, as she slowly lifted the lid to the pot on the right hand burner. The pleasant aroma of tomatoes and garlic filled the immediate area, and Kagome inhaled it deeply. Inside the pot was what looked to be meatballs, simmering in a homemade tomato sauce. Kagome took hold of the spoon being used to stir the sauce and snuck a quick taste.

She closed her eyes, groaning slightly in satisfaction. The sauce was tangy and savory, a hint of sweetness found in the aftertaste. Kagome might have been the professional chef between them, but Inuyasha never gave himself enough credit when it came to his own cooking. Growing up as a hanyou, he always had to be careful with foods that could possibly be too spicy or over seasoned, and he learned that it was sometimes better to just cook your own food.

Not to mention the fact that there were few things more attractive than your boyfriend cooking a meal for you.

Kagome set the lid back on the pot to go looking for the hanyou in question. She hadn't seen Inuyasha since she came in, and a quick peek behind the balcony curtains told her he wasn't outside either, which left the bathroom and bedroom.

There were three doors down in the back hallway. The first door on the left - which was left open and clearly empty - was the bathroom, with a small storage closet directly across from it. Kagome walked right past both doors in favor of the closed bedroom door; the storage closet was small and cramped, not big enough to fit even the small built Kagome inside with the door closed, and so, inconsequential to Kagome's mind.

She stood in front of the bedroom door, suddenly nervous now that the sight of cooked food couldn't distract her. She still had no idea how tonight was going to pan out, or how Inuyasha would react to her advances. Kagome took another deep breath to relax her shoulders, making herself stand just a little bit taller.

She was a Higurashi after all, dammit! Known for their stubbornness and determination, there was no obstacle they couldn't climb. In fact, there was nothing for her to be nervous about at all. She was an attractive woman, he was an attractive man. This was just the natural next step that many people took in their relationships, and damn it all, she was gonna seduce the hell out of him.

Yet, she wasn't expecting the sight that laid before her as she opened the door. At all.

Her breath hitched as wide eyes landed on Inuyasha sprawled out on the bed.

Completely naked.

Well, was he considered completely naked if his dick was just barely covered? It was an errant thought that crossed her mind, despite how unnecessary it was at the moment.

Kagome didn't think she'd ever seen a sight as glorious as Inuyasha, propped up by a couple of pillows, one arm bent behind his head, the other laying across his stomach. She had yet to see Inuyasha without a shirt on, and found she couldn't tear her eyes away from the bulging muscles in his arms, or the rippling six-pack he sported. He looked like he could have been carved by Michaelangelo himself, an Adonis covered in whipped cream, chocolate sauce, and caramel, topped with a bright red maraschino cherry on top.

Kagome was sure she was about to develop a sweet tooth of her own.

She took a quick second to notice the overall look of the room. He had the same long stemmed candles placed strategically around the room, offering the only source of light. Beside him on the bedside table was all the fixings - the chocolate sauce, caramel, whipped cream, even a jar of strawberry jam.

'Oh my God, is this what he meant by having banana splits for dessert?' she thought, remembering the text conversation they had as she was getting ready earlier. Inuyasha hadn't told her what he was making for dinner, but he had asked her if she liked banana splits. Which she had replied to him that of course she did, who didn't?

Well, one thing for sure was that she'd never look at a banana split the same way again.

Neither of them knew how long she had been standing there for, but Inuyasha was getting more nervous by the second. She hadn't said anything when she entered the room, just stood there staring at him with this weird look in her eyes.

The last five minutes had been stressful for him, to say the least. Inuyasha hadn't wanted to put the whipped cream on too soon and have it start melting on him, so he waited until he could hear her soft knocking at the front door before getting himself all set up.

He had no idea how long it would take Kagome to make her way to the bedroom. She was far too curious for her own good to just sit out there waiting for him, but how many things would distract her on her way to the bedroom was the real question. Still, as soon as he heard the front door close, he got to work, covering his very erect penis with the whipped cream - just the thought of what her mouth would be doing to him soon was enough to get him going - and using deft hands to flourish it with the chocolate and caramel. He saved the cherry for the moment right before she opened the door, not wanting it to slide off and ruin the masterpiece he had concocted.

Surprisingly, he wasn't all that nervous as he was getting ready. It was when she finally came in and just stared that set his nerves on fire. What was she thinking? Did she like the view or was she trying to figure out how to get out of the situation entirely? He didn't really know what her scent smelled of when she was aroused, so he felt like he was walking into the fire blind.

He couldn't take it anymore. The silence was killing him, he was sure of it. He didn't know what he was going to say to her, but anything was better than nothing.

"Kagome,"

Hearing her name must have startled her from her own thoughts. She looked at him now - really looked at him - and what he saw in her eyes was pure determination.

Inuyasha didn't think he had ever been so terrified in his life. It was at this moment he realized that he really didn't know all that much about Kagome. Sure, they had been talking back and forth, constantly texting about their favorite movies or the places they like to frequent or comparing allergies, but that was just the small stuff. He had no idea what this look in her eyes meant.

And then, she showed him.

If he was worried about what she thought about his "gift" to her, her next actions put those thoughts to bed.

She slowly unbuttoned the dress she was wearing, sensually untying the waist tie until it opened and floated to the floor, bearing herself to him.

Inuyasha had to stifle the urge to whine. He had never seen a sight as alluring as Kagome, standing before him with her hair down over her shoulders in a bright red lingerie set. This wasn't like any lingerie set Inuyasha had ever seen. The cups to the bra covered the tops of her breasts more than most bras might, but he had a clear view of her dusky pink nipples poking through a set of holes in each cup.

The candlelight put the most tantalizing shadows against the muscles in her arms down to her toned calves, which was exaggerated even more by the black high heels she wore. And as his eyes wandered up and down her body, he was pretty sure they were crotchless, judging by the shape of the panties.

His first thought was that she looked like a snack, but he'd be lying - she was a whole goddamn meal.

"Is this for me?" she asked, walking up to the end of the bed, jutting her hips out with each step.

It sort of felt like an out of body experience, like she had control of her body but also not at the same time? Every step to the bed was fueled by a slowly rising arousal. Her mouth was beginning to water; she hadn't expected to do dessert before dinner, but she supposed she could break the rules just this once. After all, it would be rude to not immediately accept this most generous...gift.

"Ye - yeah," Inuyasha answered, trying to sound suave instead of like some virginal teenager. He wasn't so sure he was succeeding, but Kagome didn't seem to mind as she continued to get closer to him, bending down to lean her hands against the bed, giving him a fantastic view of her chest.

He couldn't control the twitch in his cock as she began to fully lift herself onto the bed. Kagome didn't miss it either, giving him a devilish smirk as she crawled her way to him. It made him feel like prey being stalked by a predator, which was a weird change in his bedroom dynamics. He had always been the more dominant party when he was with Kikyo, but he was finding that he didn't mind the change all that much.

Not when a beautiful woman like Kagome was looking like she was going to devour him.

And that was exactly what she planned to do.

Kagome gingerly put her hands on his calves, causing Inuyasha to take in a sharp inhale. He hadn't been expecting her touch, and it made him take in a sharp inhale. He expected her to dive straight in, but she leaned over to the right side of the bed instead, bringing her bare nipples dangerously close to his face.

Inuyasha turned his head away slightly and closed his eyes, not sure if he could stand to look at her much longer before losing his patience and having his way with her. The bed shifted back to normal a second later, and Inuyasha opened his eyes to find she had grabbed the chocolate sauce and the jar of caramel.

Kagome desperately wanted a taste of him, but she also wanted to make this whole experience last. She wanted to tease and torture him until he couldn't take it anymore and took her instead.

"Do you mind getting a little sticky?"

Inuyasha's eyes started to darken as her plans for him slowly became clear. So she wanted to tease him a little, huh? That was fine by him. He was sure he'd let her do whatever she wanted.

"I'm your blank canvas Kagome,"

'Smooth'

Inuyasha watched her face flush at his words and he subconsciously opened his chest up in pride at being the one to cause it. She looked so cute flustered, and he couldn't wait to see it again when she was underneath him.

Kagome took his words to heart and opened the top to the chocolate sauce. Moving over to his left side for a better angle, she started at his face, taking the bottle and carefully squeezing it over his skin - over his lips, on the apple of his cheeks, on his nose, sculpting the jaw.

And then she started moving downward, dotting all down his neck, not wanting it to run too much given the angle. When she reached his chest, she began drawing intricate lace designs over his pecs. Inuyasha could see the absolute focus in her eyes as she drew, almost as if she had done this before. She worked in a restaurant, and Inuyasha was pretty sure he remembered her saying she even did some baking, so she most likely had done this before. On a cake at least.

When she was done with the chocolate, she grabbed the jar of caramel and began painting him with that as well. Inuyasha had taken the honey dipper from his mother's old honey jar to make it easier to decorate with, and Kagome used it to accent the major chocolate work on his skin. She took extra care covering his nipples and belly button.

Kagome was about to get to work when she looked up and realized she had forgotten to take the strawberry jam. She went all out on covering his chest, so that was a no go. She scrunched her face up a little, thinking about what she could do with it, when suddenly the idea hit her.

"Hand me the strawberry jam?" she asked, innocently batting her eyelashes at him.

He did as she asked, going as far as opening the jar before handing it to her. She tossed him a sweet smile before taking hold of his left hand and dipping each finger into the jam. She gestured for him to take the jar back, watching him grab it with his free hand. She wanted until right before the jar was going to hit the table, and took his thumb into her mouth.

Just as she thought would happen, the jar clattered onto the table, the strange sensation of Kagome sucking on his fingers taking away all brain functions.

Inuyasha had never had someone suck on his fingers before, and if you had asked him prior to tonight if that was something he'd be into, Inuyasha would have probably answered with a scrunched face and a "hard no". Now though? He could see the pros.

She thoroughly cleaned his fingers, wrapping her tongue languidly around each digit and sucking hard enough to feel the blood flow temporarily stop. Inuyasha couldn't keep in the low moan as he imagined her using that tongue in the same way on his cock.

She gave him a break by starting with the chocolate on his face next. She pressed the flat of her tongue against each cheek, using the tip to sensually lick the chocolate off his nose and along his jaw, ending her explorations of his face with a sweet kiss. It was slow and wistful, sweet from of the chocolate.

Inuyasha parted his mouth to let her tongue in when she began licking across the seam. He used his right hand to thread through her hair, deepening the kiss. Gods, did she taste absolutely fucking divine, like chocolate covered cherries.

Far too soon, she pulled away from him, nipping his bottom lip for attempting to pull her back in. Kagome used her own hand to run through his hair, tipping his head back enough so she could run her tongue up and down the skin, licking up all the chocolate dots she had placed there.

Her tongue was so warm, and soft. It left him in a daze as she moved lower to tackle his chest. From the way she licked, starting from one side to the other and slowly making her way south, she must have drawn an elaborate maze. Her tongue deftly moved with precision; she knew exactly where to go.

Inuyasha moaned, his eyes half mast in pleasure, as Kagome sucked at his nipples. She took her time there, giving each one an equal amount of attention, erasing all signs of the caramel that covered them before moving on.

It was the most pleasurable torture Inuyasha had ever endured. She was getting closer and closer to the whipped cream tower that covered him, but it was obvious that Kagome was going to savor the taste of him before digging in. No amount of skin was forgotten as she traced lines of fire down his chest, dipping her tongue into his caramel filled belly button. Sometime during her travels downward, Inuyasha had grabbed a hold of her hair, helping keep it pinned back so she didn't get any chocolate or whipped cream in it. It was also an exercise in control, being careful that he didn't pull her hair too hard to cause her any pain.

Truth be told, Kagome was excited to get to the whipped cream portion of her dessert hanyou, although not entirely for what lay underneath. She had been eyeing that cherry since she walked in on him. It was the best part of a dessert after all.

She licked a line from the base of the tower to the tip, careful to not get too close to the skin of his shaft, picking up the cherry with the tip of her tongue and placing it between her teeth with the stem pointing out toward Inuyasha. Her gut reaction was to bite into the cherry and satiate her desire for the small fruit, but looking up at Inuyasha she had a better idea.

Leaning in towards him, she stuck out the stem towards his lips, offering him one last taste of her before she finally got a taste of him. Inuyasha greedily took the stem in his mouth, moving his lips generously over hers as she bit into the cherry, sharing the juice between the two of them for a moment before pulling apart.

Inuyasha wished he knew how to tie cherry stems with his tongue. He wanted to show her just what he could do with that tongue of his. Instead, he spit it out over the edge of the bed, far more concerned with what Kagome was about to do next.

Kagome had already moved to nestle herself between his legs, laying on her chest with her legs propped up at the knees, ankles crossed. Every time Kagome moved to another position, Inuyasha didn't think she could get any sexier, only to be proven wrong just a moment later. She gave him one last sultry look, placing her hands on his thighs to gently massage them, before taking the flat of her tongue from the base of his balls to the tip of his dick, all the way down to the skin.

Inuyasha pulled a low growl from deep in his chest at the feel of her tongue running up and down his hardened length. She felt even more amazing than he imagined she would, and he wasn't sure whether it was because he had been dry for so long or because Kagome just had a lot of practice.

They had been honest with each other from the beginning about their past sexual experiences. While Inuyasha wasn't a stranger to the act, Kagome had been with far more partners than himself, and with the way she licked his dick like her favourite ice cream cone was proof of that. Gods, when was the last time he received a blowjob anyways? Not since Kikyo, and that was years ago.

He played with the idea of threading his hand through her hair again, wanting to constantly be touching her, to feel her shiver as his claws lightly grazed her scalp. But as she finished licking off all the whipped cream, she fully engulfed his dick in her mouth, relaxing her jaw to fit as much of him in as she could. Inuyasha put holes into the bedsheets from gripping them so hard, and he was grateful he had stayed his hand from her head.

Inuyasha's head was spinning at the wet sounds of Kagome's mouth salivating around his dick. He didn't know how much more of this he could take before blowing his load early, and he much rather preferred the thought of cumming inside her undoubtedly wet pussy instead of her mouth.

"K-Kagome,"

She didn't slow down, didn't even look up at him as the hand that was squeezing towards the base tightened and the movements of her mouth went a little faster and deeper.

"Nng….Kags…."

Kagome could feel his balls tighten and knew he couldn't hold it much longer. The act of licking food off Inuyasha's body aroused her far more than she would have expected, and there was one aspect of the "banana split" that Inuyasha was missing: the garnish of chopped nuts. The chocolate and caramel she poured all over him and the whipped cream left her with a wonderfully sweet taste in her mouth, but she wanted to know how the salty taste of his cum would mix with it.

She ran a finger from her other hand along his perineum and moaned as she gave him one last hard suck. The vibrations from the skin to skin contact of her lips caused Inuyasha to let out a pitched whine as he filled her mouth with his cum. She held him fast in her mouth, keeping some controlled movement of her hand on his shaft as she swallowed every last drop of him.

Salty and sweet. Kagome was sure this was the ultimate way to give a blowjob, and she hoped by the panting she could hear from Inuyasha that he'd let her do it again sometime.

After cleaning up every last drop of his cum, she gave one last, chaste kiss to the tip of his cock and started lifting herself up by the arms when she was suddenly grabbed by the forearms and hauled up towards his face. He smashed his lips against her, clinking their teeth together as he pushed his tongue into her mouth, groaning at the taste of himself on her. He wanted to tell her how much he enjoyed what she gave him, but words seemed immaterial and not enough, so he decided to show her instead.

In fact, he loved it so much, he knew he had to return the favor. Besides, Kagome got to have her fun, so it was only fair that Inuyasha should as well.

He wrapped his arms around Kagome and flipped them so he was top, not once severing their connection at the lips. Kagome didn't seem to mind the change as her hands roamed his body, tracing the muscles up his arms and in his shoulders. When the need for air became too great, Inuyasha moved down to line open mouthed kisses to the pulsepoint in her neck, nipping the jaw on his way there.

It took a considerable amount of restraint to not move himself even lower. She looked absolutely delectable laying under him, her nipples already pebbled and hard from her aroused state. She had a soft expression in her eyes, but there was still a light held in there that waited for Inuyasha's next move.

Just as she had done, he reached over her to grab the chocolate sauce and caramel and carefully spread it all over the tops of her breasts and stomach, saving the caramel for her exposed nipples. It was not nearly as intricate as Kagome's designs had been; despite his desire to give back the love she gave him, he was slowly becoming impatient. It had been so long since he made love to a woman, and the imagined feeling of her warm heat clutching him as he pumped into her made him grow harder by the second.

He also didn't have nearly as much space as she did. Inuyasha didn't want to get chocolate syrup on her lingerie, which he guessed probably cost a good deal.

Inuyasha set the toppings down on the nightstand, bringing his nose to the silk material of her bra and gently rubbed his nose against it. The silk was so soft against his skin and smelled strongly of her natural scent, intoxicating him.

His original plan was to slowly work his way down her body, but he couldn't fight the instinct to lay his tongue flat against her right nipple, licking up all the caramel in one swoop. Her body twitched, not quite anticipating his touch there yet, and she let out a sharp gasp as he curled his tongue around her nipple and completely enveloped it into his mouth.

Kagome's body was already beginning to tremble, not used to the feeling of someone's hot breath against her skin. She arched her chest upwards towards his face, desperate to keep that connection intact. Every lick and suck was sending jolts of pleasure down to her core, setting her body ablaze in passion. When he started nibbling with his teeth, Kagome trailed her hands up around his head, gently grasping the base of his ears and massaging them.

Inuyasha growled at the sensation, her soft touch sending shivers down his spine. Despite how good it felt, Inuyasha let her nipple go with a loud pop! and with almost lightening speed, grabbed her wrists and trapped them together above her head. This time was for Kagome; Inuyasha was determined to make her feel just as good as he did - if not more - and currently, that didn't include him. Not in the same way.

Until he could bury himself in her, the only thing he wanted from her was to hear her moaning in pleasure.

"Ah ah, no touching yet baby," he told her, keeping himself lifted off her just enough to take her in. Kagome moaned at the absence of his lips, arching her back just a little bit more to tempt him to come back for more. Inuyasha wished he could keep her in this position. He loved the way her chest opened up to him from this angle, but he fully planned on giving both nipples this undivided attention. Unfortunately he couldn't grow a third arm.

"Tell you what," he said, placing open mouth kisses down her neck. "If you can keep your hands up here, I'll make it worth your while,"

Kagome rolled her hands into fists, trying her hardest to break free as he gently pulled on her earlobe, snaking his tongue up the sides. She wasn't sure she could keep still while he lapped at her skin. She wanted something to do with her hands, and his ears were a perfect distraction.

But he was giving her a challenge, and Kagome had no plans to back down anytime soon.

"Then show me what you got," she replied, relaxing her hands and lowered her body back down into the bed.

Inuyasha released her wrists slowly, making sure they stayed where he put them. His hand slowly lowered down, caressing her cheek and trailing a line down her neck straight to her breast. He cupped the underside of her left breast, lifting it right to his mouth.

Kagome sighed as his other hand came up to the other breast, pulling and twisting the nipple. She managed to keep her wrists where they were, but couldn't help flexing her hands.

When he was convinced her breasts had been worshipped long enough, he slowly worked his way down her body, licking the chocolate off as he went. Her skin was soft, arguably softer than even the lingerie she wore. Inuyasha had to control himself from marking her all over her stomach, settling for quick nips that only turned the skin red for a few moments.

Inuyasha couldn't wait any longer. He was so close to getting to taste her, and he was salivating at the prospect. Her belly button was the last place he focused on - swirling his tongue around it - before gripping her left thigh in his hand and lifting it so it sat on his shoulder. He used his other hand to spread her right leg, opening herself up to him fully.

Without thinking about it, he brought his nose against her dark curls and inhaled, letting out a deep groan. She smelled absolutely exquisite, a spicy scent reminiscent of ginger surrounding him. The image of her panting underneath him, pussy already glistening from how wet she was for him, was more perfect than he could have ever imagined.

He dove in, licking a long swipe from slit to clit. She was sweet and salty at the same time, something uniquely Kagome, and he’d never get enough. He worked his tongue in overtime, starting at the ever quickly hardening nub. He flicked his tongue back and forth, bracing his hands against her thighs as she twitched with each flick, before moving down a little lower. He used his right hand to gently push apart her folds, each swipe of the tongue imitating a soft caress to her sensitive nerves.

Kagome moaned at the feeling, jolts of pleasure shooting through her body like electricity. She had given up on his challenge, moving her hands down from above her head and threading her fingers through his hair, gently scraping his scalp with her nails.

She could feel her eyes roll towards the back of her head as he plunged his tongue inside her. There was something about receiving oral that just sent her over the edge. The feel of his tongue swirling inside her, hitting her innermost walls as she tried to keep him in, had her gasping and squirming.

Despite the overwhelming feeling, she made sure to keep her hands clear of his ears, not wanting to accidentally pull or pinch them. She tried lifting her pelvis off the bed, but her trembling body was no match for the pure strength of his arms as he held her down. Instead, she pushed his head further forward, making his nose bump her clit, sending jolts of pleasure straight to her core.

Inuyasha had to grind his pelvis into the bed to find a bit of relief from the sensory overload. He was drunk on the taste of her, but his impatience was beginning to get the best of him. He wanted to know how she felt wrapped around his dick, sucking him in and milking him dry.

He relished in the small whines Kagome made as he nuzzled his nose against her nub. He could feel her legs begin to shake as he slowly made his way upward, taking his time to generously lick around her folds before turning his tongue's attention to her swollen pearl.

It felt like the breath was being squeezed from Kagome's chest. Every inhale was followed by a shallow, barely present exhale. His tongue was working in overdrive. Every flick, every swirl had her entire body trembling under the force of her well awaited orgasm just starting to break over the horizon.

Inuyasha, in an effort to end their collective misery, took her swollen nub between his lips and sucked, letting out a contented growl, the vibrations finally sending her over the edge. Kagome let out an almost shrill whine and arched her back, her thighs tense with the desire to capture Inuyasha's head between them. Her eyes clouded, unable to focus on anything but the explosive orgasm running throughout body.

Inuyasha stayed right where he was, lapping up every drop of her essence that spilled from her. His ears stood at attention as he listened to her mewling, a soft rumbling spreading throughout his chest at the thought that he made her feel this way.

Inuyasha kept at her folds, slowly licking her clean, until the tremors stopped racing through her body. He pushed himself up so he could get a better image of the woman under him. Her face was flushed red, small tendrils of hair already beginning to stick to her neck, and her chest was heaving, taking in large gulps of air. When her breath was starting to go back to normal, she finally focused her gaze on Inuyasha, eyes filled with lust.

Inuyasha found it difficult to keep her strong gaze, his confidence from before slowly wavering now that there was nothing to distract either of them. Inuyasha wiped his chin on his upper arm, suddenly embarrassed about the mess he had made despite his best attempt at licking her clean.

Kagome let out a short puff of air, not wanting to fully chuckle at the man on top of her. She wasn't trying to laugh at him, he just looked so adorable. His eyes tried not to land on her face, but he didn't shy away from running them up and down her body. He was looking at her with what Kagome could only describe as reverence, yet just a tinge of uncertainty lingered.

Kagome leaned up, tugging one of his forelocks gently to bring his face to hers so they could share a kiss. It was slow and determined all at the same time; Kagome tried to pour her heart into it, to try and let him know that it was okay. They were okay, and Kagome wanted nothing more than to be with him like this for the rest of the night.

Kagome could taste herself on his tongue, and it only helped fuel the fire that had settled slightly after her body wracking orgasm. She wound her hands behind his neck, grazing the back of his neck with her fingernails, causing a deep groan to emit from Inuyasha's chest.

"Inuyasha, I want you," Kagome purred, running a finger lightly over the outlines of his ears while the other hand ran lines up and down his chest.

"Kagome…"

Inuyasha tried to keep his actions calm and smooth - leaning over to the bedside table to grab a condom from the drawer - a feat that proved to be difficult as Kagome continued to run her hands across whatever body part of his she could reach. His hands shook as he slowly rolled it onto his dick. When he was ready, he lowered himself down to lay on top of her, being careful not to put his weight on her, and instead into his arms that framed her face. She opened herself up to him, allowing him to nestle his stiff erection in between her legs.

"Kagome," he whispered, nuzzling his nose against her skin, starting from one cheek to the next. "Are you sure?"

Kagome brought her lips up against his one more time, teasing him with her tongue, swiping it along his lips, lightly caressing his own tongue in the process. She gently nipped his bottom lip when pulling back for air. She leaned up towards the top of his head, her breath ghosting the fine hairs of his ears.

"Take me, Inuyasha,"

Inuyasha had never heard words so sweet.

He slowly sank into her, nearly wincing at the pressure he felt. God she was tight! Already her walls were clenching and pulsing around his cock, her warmth seeping into him all the way up to his chest. Kagome moaned when Inuyasha was buried in her as far as he could be, basking in the fullness of having him inside her. For a minute, neither of them moved, each of them getting used to being so intimately joined.

Inuyasha kissed all along her jaw and neck - internally rejoicing when Kagome tilted her head back enough to bare more of her neck to him, a sign of submission to an Inu youkai.

Once Kagome was used to the added girth inside her, she rocked her hips up, letting him know she was ready for him to start moving.

He started slow, pulling out till just the tip remained before sliding back in. Inuyasha was the one to moan this time, Kagome letting out an erotic sigh as her body shivered under his touch. Every thrust sent a wave of pleasure through his body, the smell of their activities slowly beginning to permeate the air around them, creating a natural musk that was absolutely intoxicating.

Inuyasha raised himself up onto his arms just enough to look at her face as he continued to thrust into her. Kagome’s eyes were only halfway open, seeing but not seeing as she let her body be taken over by the pleasure of having him be not just inside of her, but to actively give her what her body desired. Her mouth was parted open, and Inuyasha could hear every little breathy moan she made as he tilted his hips back and forth, torturing her slowly.

Kagome hooked her ankles behind his legs in an effort to keep him as deep inside her as possible. One hand was gripping his bicep, the other was sinking into the supple flesh of one of his buttcheeks.

“Inuyasha....I….I need…”

“What do you need, baby?”

“I need more,”

“More of what?” he teased, slowing down his thrusts so he could circle his hips into her. Kagome let out a small cry at the sensation.

“I need it harder….faster…”

Inuyasha let out a low growl, and, with the precision only one with youkai ancestry could pull off, he fully raised himself up onto his knees, keeping himself inside of her. He grabbed both of her legs, hooking her ankles behind his head and gave her exactly what she asked for.

He began pounding into her with the fervor of a crazed man. Kagome became far more vocal, gasping and moaning at the force and speed with which he was fucking her with. Her head tilted back into the pillow, forcing her chest open to his eyed. Her breasts were bouncing violently against his movements.

“Touch yourself, Kagome,” he ordered, his tone leaving no room for disobeyment. She instantly grabbed her breasts, molding each of them to her hands before pinching and rolling her nipples between deft fingers.

Kagome was on fire, the heat radiating from her core and spreading all over her body. Once again, the ability to exhale was quickly becoming lost to her, the holding of her breath only making the heat in her groin feel more pronounced. Her legs were beginning to ache, but she could barely feel the tension as he continued to pound into her, using the force and dexterity only a youkai could give her.

Inuyasha could feel he was close to the end, the feel of her wet pussy clenching around his hardened length bringing him closer and closer. He could hear every gasp and hitch of her breath, knowing that she was getting close herself. He wanted to give her one more orgasm before his own. Being mindful of his claws, he snaked his right hand down and began rubbing her clit, his rough, calloused fingers inducing the right amount of friction for Kagome’s legs to tremble.

“Nn..ahhh...Inuyasha...”

“Come on baby. Cum for me, Kagome,”

All it took were those four words to send Kagome over the edge. She let out a high pitched whine, white spots blurred her vision as a tidal wave of pleasure crashed over her body. Inuyasha let out his own yelp, unprepared for the pressure that came when her walls clenched around his cock, feeling as if she was cutting off blood flow. He erratically drove into her a couple more times before shooting his seed into the condom he wore.

Inuyasha slowly lowered Kagome’s legs to the bed before falling forward, catching himself on his arms so he wouldn’t crush her. He nuzzled his face into the crook of her neck as Kagome wrapped her arms around his shoulders, absentmindedly grazing her fingers on the nape of his neck. They simply laid there, basking in the glowing aftermath of their orgasm, as they took a few deep breaths.

Inuyasha could have laid there all night, taking in the sweet scent of sex and sweat that had spread throughout the room. There was absolutely no way he was washing these sheets anytime soon. In fact, he might have to research how to bottle this scent, maybe put it in a candle, so that he could relive this moment at any time.

Of course, given the soft humming coming from the woman underneath him, he might be able to reenact this night in the very near future.

Not wanting to crush her any longer, Inuyasha finally pulled out - Kagome letting out a small grunt at the loss of him inside her - carefully taking hold of the now filled condom, tying up the end and throwing it in the small trash can beside his bed.

"I'll be right back," he told her, giving her a quick kiss before walking out of the room towards the bathroom, not giving a damn that he was walking around completely naked. He was still high on all that is Kagome to care about something as silly as that. He came back barely a minute later, after quickly wiping himself clean, with a warm, damp washcloth for Kagome.

He chuckled at the sight before him. Kagome had already cocooned herself under the sheets, a warm smile on her face as she brought the pillow she was holding up towards her face and took a deep breath. She looked so happy, and content, and satisfied. The youkai that slept deep within Inuyasha rumbled with joy at the thought that he was the one to make her feel that way.

She opened her eyes as soon as he reached the bed, her smile brightening just a bit more at the sight of him. Maybe it had just been a while, but Kagome was pretty sure that was some of the best sex she's ever had. Her heart melted a little at seeing the washcloth in his hands. She had always took care of her own needs afterwards, having never really stayed the night at a man's house after sex before. She had to admit, it was….nice, and made her feel more loved than even during the act itself.

She thanked him with another kiss, finding that it was hard to keep her hands off him for more than a minute. He must have felt the same, running his tapered claws through her mussed up hair as she took care of cleaning herself. The feel of the warm washcloth along her thighs mixed with his soft touches could have put her to sleep.

When she was finished, he took the washcloth from her and threw it in the corner of the room where his laundry basket sat. He grabbed the sheets to cover them with, wrapping his arms around her body, pulling her close to him so that her back was flush with his chest

"You know what the best thing about being an adult is?" Kagome asked. Inuyasha gave her an unintelligible reply, muffled by her own hair that he had buried his face into. She giggled from the hair that tickled her neck because of his breath.

"I don't know, you tell me" He repeated, now resting his head on her shoulder.

"Well, we were able to choose to eat dessert before dinner," she said with a laugh.

Inuyasha chuckled at her joke. "Dessert before dinner, that’s the dream,"

"Well, dessert has made me hungry for dinner," she said, playfully pushing him off her. She could feel that delicious ache between her thighs as she stood up, faltering a little on her first step. Inuyasha was ready to jump up if she fell, but Kagome shooed him away and walked to his closet to pull out a shirt of his to wear.

Inuyasha didn't think Kagome could be any more perfect than in that moment, wearing one of his favorite black long sleeved shirts. She looked beautiful when she dressed up in one of her floral dresses or high waisted skirts, and if all her lingerie looked like tonight's, then Inuyasha could count himself a lucky man. But there was something about seeing her in his clothes that riled up something primal in him.

Inuyasha had never really shown his more youkai tendencies to Kikyo when they were together. He had never suppressed them for her, but Kikyo generally ignored the topic, while Inuyasha's youkai side laid dormant and unimpressed with the woman Inuyasha had loved for so long.

Inuyasha had never experienced his youkai instincts feeling so active before. There was something about Kagome that fueled every fiber of his being, which was a little terrifying. He had only known Kagome for a month, how could he feel this strongly about her already? He certainly didn't want to scare her away because of it.

"Dinner can wait a few minutes, come back to bed," he said, rubbing the empty side of the bed

"Inuyasha, you can't let your apartment burn down because of unattended food! You promised me dinner and a movie. Besides," She exclaimed, a grin lighting up her face. “Who said we were done for the night,”

Kagome shot him a sly wink before stepping out of the room to go check on their dinner. The last thing Inuyasha wanted to do was get up after the mind blowing sex they just had - in fact, Inuyasha could fall asleep right where he laid - but a sudden gurgle of his stomach put thoughts of slumber on the back burner as hunger crept to the forefront. Another plus side to getting up was watching Kagome work in his kitchen, in nothing but his shirt.

Inuyasha thought there could be worse things to happen.

And so he flipped over the sheets, sauntering out into the kitchen, not bothering to cover himself. He would let her fiddle with his marinara sauce, and woo her with the fancy bottle of wine he bought for her to go with the meal. They’d then snuggle up together on the couch and put in a movie. The genre wasn’t important, it wasn’t as if they were going to watch it.

Like Kagome said, they weren’t done for the night, and he was looking forward to claiming her in every room of that damn apartment.

#day of love #one big bang #2 x 14 #inuyasha fanfiction #artist author collaborations #inukag

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thanatophobia-thoughts · 4 years ago

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Moving on from Routine, let’s look at Emotional Self-Care. This is Self-Care that you use to improve your emotional stability. This is what Emotional Self-Care can take the form of (though I do not use all of these; I will talk more about the ones I use):

Comfort Food

Taking a “mental health day”

Napping and/or Sleeping In

Binge-Watching Comfort Shows/Reading a Comfort Book/Listening to a Comfort Podcast/Comfort Music/Comfort Video Games/Etc.

Long Baths

Venting

Reflecting on the Good

Meditation

Taking a Walk Outside or Hitting a Treadmill

Turning away from Social Media

Lighting a scented candle

Giving Gifts

Crying/Screaming/Emotional Outburst

Breaking Breakables

Playing with and/or Petting a Pet or Animal

Telling Other People You Don’t Want To Interact With Them (Right Now)/Boundary Setting

Taking care of Plants

Journaling

Cleaning

Treating Yourself (non-food)

Every time I googled “emotional self-care”, I got some things like “set boundaries”, “learn to say no”, and “create a support system” – all of which are very good things, but they don’t really fit the quick regulation criteria that I’m going for here.

So, which of these do I personally use? Comfort Food, Mental Health Days, Sleeping In, Comfort Media, Venting, Reflecting on the Good, Meditation, Hitting a Treadmill, Scented Candle, Giving Gifts, Crying, Animals, Boundary Setting, Cleaning, and Treating Myself.

I’d take care of plants but right now I don’t have a good space for plants.

I’ll look at comfort food last, because I have a list of food.

Mental Health Days, I usually try to schedule ahead of time, around days or times I know are going to be hectic. I know that after a convention, for example, I need “cooldown days”, so usually I will take the following Monday-Wednesday off from work to cooldown from the convention.

If I don’t know ahead of time, I do feel comfortable enough to call in sick, but I vastly prefer being able to plan it, simply because of who I am as a person. It is sometimes a necessity. Sometimes there is just too much going on, and I need to step away from everything. Usually on these days, I will sleep in, or sleep for most of the day, with the promise to go back to normal tomorrow – and that is how it should be.

These are tricks to put you back in line in caring for yourself! To get you back to normal!

Now, most weekends I do sleep in a little. I wake up every day at 6am, so on weekends, I will absolutely let myself sleep in to like, 9-11. It’s a good thing I have this blog on a schedule.

Binge-Consuming Comfort Media: I do not consider this the same as observing New Media, because often for me that is a Personal Self Care, and not necessarily Emotional Self Care. It can be, but more often than not, it gets my thinking fired up and engages me in a wholly different fashion. For example, I consider playing Final Fantasy XII to be a “comfort game”, but I will not consider playing Elden Ring for the first time to be “comfort”, so much as Personal, because the former I have already done, while the latter is something new and is creating new experiences for me. One regulates my emotions, the other does not do so in a foreseeable fashion. In new games, I do not know the experiences I will have, whereas with old games, I can predict them.

I will usually use Binge-Consuming Media in downtime that I have nothing else to fill, but do not have the energy to try something new right then (usually with the promise that I will return to new things in the near future, usually the following day when this happens on a weekend, or the next weekend if this happens on Sunday). Binge-Consuming Media also tends to occur normally on Weekday Evenings, as I tend to lack any desire for new media after work. It thus helps me to stay in a calm mood throughout the night, and prepares me for the next day of work by maintaining mood, rather than changing it.

Venting has to be done with care; I have friends I can vent to, but the vast majority of them only end up aggravating me more when I vent to them. Venting is something I tend to reserve for after I’ve figured out what I’m going to do, and I just need someone else to know my pain, because very rarely are people actually able to give me decent advice. Yet, venting is still useful because it lets me finally express it, and lets other people into my life, which is healing, and allows me to move forward without feeling like I’m keeping a secret.

Akin to that, reflecting on the good is a bit more of a solitary action, but it’s useful to remember that a “bad day” isn’t a bad life. To think of the people who love me, to think of the good things that did happen, even amidst the bad, and to remember there are more good things to come. After a particularly bad day at work, remembering good things, good phone calls with customers, and just good people, is always helpful, and can prepare me to continue through the rest of the day.

Meditation is something I try to do every day, and I do feel that it helps me focus on the moment, as well as helps me work through my thoughts when I’m not meditating.

Back when gyms were safe, hitting the treadmill was great for days I just couldn’t fucking convince myself to do my weight training. It still got me in the gym, it still got me exercising, and it helped me beat out the anger while listening to a podcast or music. I felt like I could breathe. I miss this, a lot, and I look forward to being able to return to this, or getting the “Just Dance” games for my home so I can do a similar thing, without going to the gym. I was then usually able to resume weight lifting the next day – and it kept me from breaking my streak of going to the gym, back in the day.

Aromatherapy is just a thing. I enjoy it, it helps me, and I love candles, haha.

Giving Gifts is also something I like to do. Making other people happy, makes me happy, and this is often a surefire way to do that. It can be as simple as a bit of chocolate, it doesn’t have to be anything extravagant. Of course, I have to make sure I am financial stable enough to do that.

Crying – when I need to. Sometimes I will have to kind of force it, by putting on a movie I know will make me cry, because just bursting into tears from stress without additional stimuli can be hard, but once it’s done, it is so relieving, and it allows my brain to start to function again without feeling as much in a daze.

It’s true I do have pets, and they’re kind of around me everyday, so this is more of a routine one – the animals are a constant source of comfort, but if you don’t have pets, visiting a pet store may be beneficial to give their animals a bit of affection, or going to an animal shelter. Or perhaps watching cute animal videos if those aren’t options.

Boundary Setting is also important. While sometimes, it can be good to help others when you’re going through a thing – I find it helpful sometimes – at other times it is just too much. Being clear on that, and also giving your friend some idea of when to “check in”, is good. It also lets your friend know a bit of a time period, so they know it isn’t a permanent block on conversing. Being open and clear about your situation can only do you good when it comes to your friends – and checking in with them when you’re ready!

Cleaning is oddly enough something I do when I’m preparing for something that is Good. I feel like I must cleanse the area in preparation of the New Good Thing. I will do this when I buy a new gaming console, or a long-awaited game, for instance. It makes things feel fresh and rejuvenated. It lets me walk into the New Thing as if it is a New Thing, and it starts it off on good footing. Some of the anxiety and anticipation of it, is quelled.

Treating Myself, when it’s non-food items, is usually things like clothing for me, or new PJs lately. I will also invest in books I plan to read, one day, eventually, cute Star Wars things, shows and/or movies to watch that are new, or things that generally speaking bring joy into my life. Sometimes emotional regulation, is also about reward. If you’re doing good in your life, you absolutely SHOULD be rewarded for it! Otherwise, why bother with balance and moderation? Why not live a hedonistic lifestyle? That would be far more pleasant if balance and moderation don’t have rewards. Not all emotional regulation is just to stop being sad, it’s also to be vindicated and celebrate good events. Celebrating IS regulating, when it calls for it, obviously. So I’m not encouraging here spending your money on whims because you are sad, but spending it more when you’re happy, and doing good.

And then we get to Comfort Foods. What do I use for comfort foods?

Chipotle Gouda Pasta Salad

Lime-Chipotle Pasta Salad

“Chicken” Fried Steak (Scare quotes because I’m a vegetarian so it’s fake meat)

“Tuna” Salad

Cheesecake, particularly raspberry white chocolate, or turtle.

Ice cream, particularly from Cold Stone, but usually either Rocky Road or Raspberry with Chocolate Chunks. There’s also Love Potion #9 which I have to drive a significant distance for….

Extra Lattes (note the extra – I already have these planned in with my meal plans).

Hot Chocoalte

Potatoes O’Brien and Gravy

The idea behind Comfort Food: Eating tasty food often restores a mood, or at least puts us in a better mindset. They aren’t always the healthiest things, though they aren’t necessarily unhealthy. They have to be done in moderation, as you see I indicate with lattes it’s “extra” lattes that go on the comfort food side. I usually have two decaf lattes a week, one on Wednesday, and one on Friday.

Comfort Foods are for a “limited time”. An extra latte means I don’t get one the following day, or I don’t get one every single day of the week. I take the comfort it offers when it’s needed, and resume my usual drinking habits.

Things like Pasta Salad are for weeks when I need a bit of help, or when I’ve done good, because they’re multiple serving things. So like, my birthday week, eating a pasta is good. Or a week where everything went to hell, and I can’t focus on making something “new” and I just need to eat – but then it’s right back to normality after that week. This is not have pasta for an entire month, this is a way to set intentions, and work on orienting myself back to normal with food I love, and food I can make with my eyes closed.

Single-serving things, like cheesecake or hot chocolate, are usually Reward self-care. Like fuck yeah, I did great, I should give myself a little treat. It encourages my good behavior, and does not become an indulgence. It also ends up “planned”, and so the rest of the meals work around that indulgence so I don’t go overboard with it, either.

Knowing what foods, and what I use them for, helps me to use them when they will be most beneficial for me. Things like “extra lattes” also makes me think: Do I really want to do this now, or wait until the day I’m going to have it? Is there a reason I need it now? What will I do after I have it? How does this impact everything else in the balance?

So these are kind of the “quick trick” emotional self-care tools I use. Obviously, you should try to have a steady way of regulating your emotions, but shit happens. Cars break down, work days suck, friends are angry, people die…we need to have tools to get “back to normal”, or close enough to normal.

And you should also, absolutely, take time to treat yourself in self-care! If you don’t reward yourself, what’s the point in being “balanced”, and not just living a hedonistic lifestyle? That’s why comfort food as rewards is a thing! It’s why you can use these as rewards, if it helps, for doing good!

These are just what I do, and what I suggest. These are ideas to get you thinking about what you could put on a list, and how that could help you. If these same ideas work for you, great! If not, you just have to feel out yourself to determine what will help you! Brainstorm with your loved ones!

#self care #self-care #emotional self care #emotional self-care #self-care list #death anxiety help #death anxiety #existentialism help #existentialism #self-care ideas #self care ideas #self care list #emotional regulation #emotions

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sleepymccoy · 5 years ago

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sleepy’s fic masterlist

Doing this cos I wanted to! And I can’t find the short things I’ve written on tumblr half the time, so i wanted a place to go to find them. I’ll edit this whenever I post something new and give it a quick reblog when I do <3

Tumblr shorts

Inventions and Ice-cream

A chererful conversation between Crowley and Aziraphale about their favourite invention humans have come up with. Also read for hand holding, ice-cream, and macking out against the Bentley door. Goes hard on the hand holding stuff

1600-ish words

What kind of lover are you?

Filled a prompt, wing grooming by South Downs. It turned into something very soft, very loving, with some acknowledgement of the aftereffects of trauma and constant threat and the anxiety that would be on you from that. Also, some nice massaging and snark from the main two. I feel like I’m getting a hug when I read this, thb

1200-ish words

Chamomille

Aziraphale notices Crowley getting tired and swings into action with a prepared bedtime routine. Crowley is not consulted. Very short and sweet

350-ish words

Monsieur and Difficult Topics

Crowley and Aziraphale are having a meal together after the apocalypse. Crowley says they're not friends and a very challenging conversation follows as Aziraphale tries to correct this. This is a pre romance thing, so they finish having had a worthwhile conversation, not leaping into dating

2000-ish words

Burnt Coffee and Crosswords

Crowley stumbles out of bed and finds that Aziraphale has, yet again, snuck into his flat while he was asleep. Fluff and fondness ensue

1000-ish words

Absolutely Adorably Nauseating

Outsider POV of Aziraphale and Crowley having very dramatic public fights. Three different stories. Mainly meant to be funny, but has some nice fluff in it

2000-ish words

How can someone as clever as you be so handsome?

Aziraphale remembers Crowley calling him clever in an angry moment and fondly teases him for it. Very fluffy.

1000-ish words

Gifts

Through the years Crowley has been giving Aziraphale gifts that are, overwhelmingly, in poor taste. Fluffy and silly, has pictures

2000-ish words

An Unpleasant Suprise

A butteromens effort. The similar fics were Aziraphale saving Crowley from Gabriel, I wanted to do a twist that had Crowley more engaged in the fight. Turns into an awful lot of flirting and the like at the end, it’s a fun read. Quick warning for a brief decrip of gore from being burnt, but I move on pretty fast

3500-ish words

A New Eden

Filled a prompt; “I’m going to need you to put some underwear on before you say anything else.” It’s not sexy, but by the virtue of the prompt there is dick. Mostly speechless Crowley, though.

1200-ish words

Entirely Unapologetic

Filled a prompt; “so why did I have to punch that guy?” Features protective Crowley and blustering Aziraphale

500-ish words

Be Unashamed With Me

Crowley’s waiting for Aziraphale to leave a church and as he waits he gets a bit sad about his demon-hood and remembers how hopeless he was before he and Aziraphale got together. When Aziraphale joins him a lot of fluff and compliments follow to cheer Crowley up. Which works. Gets a bit flirty.

1500-ish words

Climb Every Mountain

In the biblical narrative, God tells Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac, on Moriah. Abraham begins to comply, when a messenger from God interrupts him. Abraham then sees a ram and sacrifices it instead. In the me narrative, Crowley does a favour for Aziraphale then swiftly changes his mind and doesn’t let the kid be killed.

1200-ish words

How Many Ways Can I Say...

A very short form fic, more a casual tumblr post, but it has some cute descriptions of different ways Aziraphale can sat I love you to Crowley

500-ish words

AO3 links

If You Like

link to tumblr promo post

link to some relevant art

a take on the few days between apocalypse and the body switch, cos Aziraphale goes from surprised at Crowley offering to let him crash at his apartment, to swapping bodies and letting Crowley risk himself. So it’s following Aziraphale’s trauma and consideration. Lots of bed sharing and a very fluffy body-positivity ending with Aziraphale’s golden stretch marks.

10,000-ish words

Nothing’s Changed

link to tumblr promo post

A week into July and Crowley has finished sleeping in. He gives Aziraphale a ring and receives a very frosty reception. Although Aziraphale insists nothing has changed, Crowley suspects otherwise. Fic includes Aziraphale pinching Crowley to prove he’s not dreaming

2000-ish words

Slipped My Mind

link to tumblr promo post

Crowley and Aziraphale are so used to not being in a relationship that its quite easy to slip into old habits and forget that they’re allowed to touch now. A bit of angst, but mostly fluffy as they get used to this new normal.

6000-ish words

Requisite Lockdown Fic

link to tumblr promo post

This was actually a tumblr short fic I wrote, but it got crazy out of hand and the format is much easier on ao3 so I’m linking it here. Told entirely through phone calls in the same format as the lockdown youtube special. Crowley is setting boundaries for the first time and Aziraphale is struggling to adjust to these new rules. But it goes well

4000-ish words

To Seduce, Beguile, and Entice

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Crowley isn’t any good at seduction temptations. This comes up one night and Aziraphale is concerned because he’s seduced in Crowley’s name before. All part of the Arrangement. So, of course, the only solution is for Aziraphale to teach Crowley how to seduce. It gets out of hand quickly. The last chapter is post apocalypse and Crowley tries his hand at seducing Aziraphale in a very intentionally referential way, as a kind of method to express that he’s actually interested in a relationship.

10,000-ish words

Still Waking Up

link to some relevant art

link to tumblr promo post

Follows the pair for about two years after the apocalypse as Crowley is behaving oddly and Aziraphale is figuring everything out. This is your trauma recovery fic! Crowley has nightmares and a fear of fire and some abandonment. Aziraphale is lonely and feels deeply incompetent and lost, as well as having not fully resolved some of his issues with Heaven. They learn how to be on their own side together rather than keeping it all separate and protective. Also, bed sharing.

30,000-ish words

Not Quite Human

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Omnipotent POV (but not god) that sorta swaps between them. It’s just a simple 18 hours or so in the shop on afternoon as they’ve begun to get more physically affectionate. This is a decent mutual pining fic. I tried to lean into the real not-human stuff they’ve both got going on. It’s your classic admission of love fic with plenty of panicking Crowley. Features some smut with a sex-positive, asexual Aziraphale and a sex-neutral, demisexual Crowley.

10,000-ish words

the kind of thing one says easily

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This is my silly take on an au. Everything is exactly the same but they actually communicate honestly occasionally. Wild, I know. We follow Crowley and Aziraphale through moments of time in their history (some canon friendly, like follow ons from scenes in the tv show, some made up) as Crowley quite simply tells Aziraphale that he loves him. And Aziraphale gets used to it and learns to be honest in return. Things really come to a head as the apocalypse approaches. The last chapter is a sex scene, but it’s very very loving rather than smutty.

15,000-ish words

Soft.

link to tumblr promo post

This is a very fluffy fic. Crowley tells Aziraphale he has a nice body and it dredges up Aziraphale’s residual concerns over what Gabriel said and in the panic-fueled conversation that follows as Crowley tries to right his wrong they slowly step in sync into discussing their feelings and wants. This fic is the big three, communication, consent, and soft. (gets a bit sexy too, but it’s pretty tame)

10,000-ish words

Is It Worth It Yet

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Around abouts the 1000AD mark, in what would become Turkey a few hundred years later, Crowley sat down, took a breath, and told Aziraphale how he feels in a total trainwreck of a conversation. Chapter 1, that conversation. Of course, Aziraphale would then expect Crowley to bring it all up again after the apocalypse, and when he doesn't he decides to take matters into his own hands and broach the topic himself. It doesn't go as well as he'd hoped. Good ending tho, don't worry guys. If you need an overload of angst then a big old hug to pull you up again, this is a good one.

10,000-ish words

Summoned

link to relevant (lemon) art

link to tumblr promo post

Post apocalypse, timeline unspecified. Heaven and Hell refangle the way humans summonings work so it only applies to Aziraphale and Crowley. This means Crowley finds himself summoned an awful lot more than usual. We see their relationship readjust after the apocalypse in snippets of moments as Crowley’s been summoned. It’s mostly fairly light hearted, but there’s a couple chapters of pretty good angst and one very sexy chapter at the end! Just straight up smut, of the light d/s variety

13,000-ish words

Try Some Pride On For A Day

link to some relevant art

link to tumblr promo post

Shortly after the apocalypse, Aziraphale set a challenge down. Sin vs virtue. Each chapter shows an attempt from Crowley to get Aziraphale to succumb to sin, and Aziraphale tricking Crowley into performing a virtue. Some attempts are easier than others, some are impossible. They learn a lot about each other and slip into some unexpectedly honest moments. This one gets sexy but not out of hand. Aziraphale is pretty explicitly asexual.

20,000-ish words

Needed a break, gone to France x

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A few weeks after the apocalypse and Crowley goes to visit Aziraphale to find a note taped to his door. Panic, anxiety, and general sadness over being so broken up with ensue. This is a miscommunication fic with a writing style that leans toward humour rather than angst and has a nice fluffy ending with good asexual overtones

9000-ish words

Heresy

link to tumblr promo post

Set 3000 years after the apocalypse. Crowley and Aziraphale live together and are romantic. They have been left not entirely alone by their old colleagues, but they are unthreatened so it’s all okay. Until one day Beelzebub and Gabriel drop by to visit in the most surprising way. This fic is my first and was written before the discussion of Beelzebubs pronouns kicked off, so I used the actresses pronouns (she/her) instead of they/them which I’ve used since when referring to Beelzebub

2500-ish words

#sleepy writes #good omens fic #good omens fic rec #ineffable husbands #i enjoyed going over some old fics!#imma read summoned tonight i like that one a lot #and maybe is it worth it #that still upsets me #altho i have an angsty wip im theoretically working on #so maybe ill dive into that #we'll see #edit #ive added links to tumblr posts #i cant believe i found them all #that was some trawling through old posts

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danideservedbetter · 4 years ago

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Alright so, here’s how things are gonna work.

First off, welcome to this side blog. Since it won’t be jolly fun fandom content and will be a little more personal I decided to separate my health and writing journey from my fandom stuff, although all my fandom content will still be linked on my main blog here.

(I write Izuocha/bnha content which isn’t super popular so if you’re not here for that then yeah, I don’t blame you. But if you are I have a link to our discord and community content pinned so def check it out if you’re interested.)

Secondly, you guys will hear details about stuff relating to my health like what kinds of things affect my disorder based on the tests some doctors are ordering, how I’m trying to improve my diet and activity, and routines and goals I’m attempting for myself. I am underweight, and that’s something I’m going to be talking a bit about, so if that’s triggering following this blog might not be the best thing for you. Details under the cut.

So, what kind of disorder do I have and why did I decide to make a health journey blog? My disorder is called idiopathic hypersomnia. Basically what that means is that when my disorder is acting up (based on factors like stress especially or my generalized anxiety rearing its ugly head) I have the capacity to sleep. And sleep and sleep and sleep and sleep. My longest recorded uninterrupted “sleep-attack” was 26 hours long and ever since I caught Covid in January, my body had been slowly growing weaker to the point I was starting to develop atrophy. I’ve had this ten years and my neurologist suspects inactive cells from mononucleosis I caught at 14 was the cause, because other IH patients have linked their sleeping problems to a case of mono or have had it at some point in their lives.

This disease stole many years and many things I’ve looked forward to from me. I lost friends and experiences and failed so many college classes I had to drop out.

I’ve decided I’m taking them back.

It’s not going to be easy. Just as it took ten years to convince myself that my tiredness was something I chose to give into, it took several extra years and many fights with my family to convince them that I had a real actual neurological disorder and that I need help sometimes. My parents and grandmother finally understand that I have to finish college and find a very special boss willing to work around my erratic progress on projects, but the outsiders they married are not as convinced. My grandmother’s husband kicked me out of their house because he wants to be the center of attention and doesn’t like that some days I’m so weak that I needed my grandmother’s help, and my father’s wife thinks I’m a lazy and ungrateful leech who “gets anxiety just being around” me. Both told my father I’ll never be happy so why even bother with me, but my dad is actually striving to understand his own recently-diagnosed PTSD so while we still butt heads he’s understanding that I have to take things day by day because every tiny circumstance affects my disorder.

Now, why did I decide to air all this out? Well, being open about my disorder and how it affects me has helped at least two people that I know of find out that the tiredness they experience isn’t the typical “American work force exhaustion” they were trained to believe is normal. So if I can help even one more, I’ll gladly talk about what this entails and how I deal with it day to day. Another reason is that I’m also one of those big advocates who believes talking candidly about mental health destigmatizes it and sharing ideas can help us grow as people and maybe make it a little easier to deal with.

So now that you know a little bit about me and my disorder, here are my big goals for the next three months provided my university takes pity on me and actually lets me go back.

First up: create routines to train my body to get used to living a full day fully awake. This includes waking up at the same time and going to sleep at the same time. It means getting dressed and going out and doing things, even little things— which I’ll get to in a sec.

Second: I write. I have a novel in limbo and I write fanfics. Writing is a big part of who I am and I’ve written one thing this year, which for a whole six-month stretch is upsetting and disappointing. Today is my reset. In the next 569 days I want to to finish the six stories I have in limbo (except the larger one) and finally reach my goal of posting 200k words in a single year. I wont be hard on myself if I can’t accomplish this because honestly finishing anything in the chaos of my life is going to be a miracle but. There ya go.

Third: go back to freakin college. I don’t care what it takes. Sit down with every official, every lawyer, and every professor it takes to get me back enrolled in classes in the fall.

Fourth: I have several smaller things I have to do, short term goals, stuff like that. I’m gonna create a to do list each day of small tasks I want to get done and while some of these things will be part of my daily routine I am throwing in like one or two things a day that just need to be done. My writing goal will change daily and I’ll keep y’all updated on that with every post I make.

Now, I know what you’re thinking. Dani! That’s so much!! Well, a few months ago I remembered hey!! I basically have a computer in my hand, why make it hard on myself. So I downloaded certain apps to help me out. This isn’t me saying “hey go subscribe to these apps because I said so” it’s just that through a lot of trial and error I’ve come to find that these certain apps work for me and I’ve yet to come across one that has the functionality of everything I need.

Tiimo — so this is an app I found developed by people with autism for people with autism to help them develop good habits and routines. It has preset daily schedules (things like morning routines or nightly routines or work routines) and an internal alarm to let you know when to move on to the next task. I myself have extremely low-level aspergers (to the point where my doctor won’t give me an official diagnosis because I didn’t want people think that *it’s* the reason I have issues with school), so moving from task to task can be difficult sometimes and I also deal with getting distracted. This widget also appears on my home screen so I know what I have to do at a glance. You can program in weekly and daily tasks to fully customize your schedule, which is fantastic for someone like me who wants to for example rotate chores. This is hopefully going to help me get my body in the habit of adjusting to routines and transitioning from one task to another, as well as getting important things done responsibly.

Promptly Journals — I’ve been told for a while that journaling is helpful mentally to kind of recenter yourself, so a bit ago I downloaded several journal apps to add to my morning routine. Now some will prefer more creatively free journals, but I prefer this one that gives me small prompts I can do in a short amount of time that just allows me to get my thoughts down. I can even add pictures at the bottom that go with the theme! I’m scared I’ll run out of prompts eventually lol but until then this app works very well for my needs.

Stretchingexercise — Now idk if it’s from lack of sleep from my disorder, the position I sleep in when I do sleep, all the physical labor I’ve had to do in the past couple weeks, my medicine, or w h a t but I suffer from body aches like no one would believe. I know stretching is supposed to help with that, so I downloaded this app to help me do non-demanding physical activity that wakes me up in the mornings and helps relieve pain so I don’t keep having to take pain relievers. This one has different plans for things like muscle tension, back pain, warm ups— and it also gives you rudimentary weight updates (I’m underweight lololol so we’re looking to fix that) or plan updates. It’s worked really well for me so far and gives you animations and descriptions of the workouts (some taken from yoga) as well as timed breaks and a narrated guide. It’s been pretty helpful in temporary relief and if nothing else gets my blood flowing in the mornings.

Widgetsmith Step counter — in addition to the stretching thing one thing my doctor and I discussed that helps with the sedentary lifestyle is simply walking. I’ve needed so bad to relieve my stamina and reverse the atrophy, and walks have been stellar for that. Now I live in the New Orleans area so humidity and heat force me to go at the crack of Dawn, but honestly my weenie dachshund Charlie really enjoys our time out so he goes with me! The CDC recommends 10,000 steps a day which seems like a lot and it is if you don’t get out much. But this gives me an excuse to get dressed and do the hygienic thing and help Charlie be healthy too, as well as give me time for brainstorming because we walk in a truly beautiful area. I’m sure everyone installed widgetsmith with the last iOS update (Apple users anyway) and while at first the step counter was just interesting I’ve since come to rely on it! We do our 5000 in the morning, which of course is half, and I find that other things I do throughout the day typically drive the counter higher. Anything leftover can easily be accomplished by an evening walk in our neighborhood. Now the caveat is that I have to remote have my phone in my pocket because I don’t own a watch or anything fancy lol, but honestly I need to keep it on me anyway so that serves as a good reminder.

Todoist — this one is my FAVORITE. Ever since I’ve decided that I have trouble keeping track of things I need to do and small stuff I need to keep in mind and appointments, etc, I decided to find a list app. This is the one I found that absolutely helps me for everything from my list of room supplies I need to buy, to my reading list, to general tasks I have coming up I need to complete. And its widget functionality keeps it right on my Home Screen! More organized individuals can just use tiimo, but I’m definitely not one of those individuals so this app is sorely needed and appreciated.

And of course, I know building habits the first few weeks is HARD. So for days my body doesn’t respond to my alarms, I have a checklist of the key things I have to do to keep my life as functional as possible.

So that’s that on that. I’m going to try to keep writing updates and my daily goals in a post in the morning, and reblog what I accomplished in the evening. It’s gonna be tough. But I’m thinking if I can start small I’ll be able to build my stamina enough to return to college and be successful when I do. I hope that anyone watching this journey draws some kind of meaning or inspiration from it. And you guys can even follow along if y’all want! Especially for writers or people trying to get healthier. I can’t promise what works for me will work for you (and honestly I expect things to change especially if I get accepted into college again) but hey, I figure it’s worth a shot.

I hope you guys enjoy watching this journey, if nothing else I hope it’s entertaining. And maybe it’ll be successful. I do know that I’m just gonna try for it, and hope it works out.

First daily update to follow

Xoxo

Dani

#idiopathic hypersomnia #health and wellness #writing challenge

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flockofdoves · 3 years ago

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i feel really really weird this week. trying to figure out what the fuck is going on. like its certainly not the first time i’ve felt like this in my life but ive just not had my emotions so . not numbed? in so long or felt like crying totally unprompted or felt vaguely angry at random shit in a certain sort of way (which for something new then makes me feel super guilty because i used to be bad with how i went about anger and i guess i never really fully learned how to practice being normal about it i just started constantly suppressing it along with every other emotion so seeing myself angry about inconsequential shit even if im not acting on it makes me feel awful like people are potentially seeing my reaction to them when its not a justified thing even if i dont think i’m doing anything). like sure those were super normal in past parts of my life. maybe even in the context of my job which i guess i only quit just like 7 months ago now even if i otherwise felt numb through the year before that too. and not something surprising to emerge again bc it has in the past year too but just maybe not so much at once but on top of that just feel a bit paranoid about stuff like people reading my mind or bugs crawling on me (or imagining sensations like that or seeing that or w/e)

i guess in typing all this out when i think about it the one time i felt like this this past half year that i can think of (or at least pretty similar and notable in the way i felt weird minus the anger. actually i didnt feel angry til the past few days so i think thats just at like. being around someone whos made vaguely bigoted comments that i’m affected by but then feeling guilty for reading the worst into unrelated shit bc of that making me feel unsafe) is when my brothers girlfriend visited. and now this past couple weeks she visited and then my uncle visited and then my moms friend visited and in general just theres more invitations to see other people even not staying w us bc everyones vaccinated.

so i guess the biggest factor throughout all of that is like. having to get used to interacting with people that i havent interacted with much in this past over 2 years of being isolated while also simultaneously having my daily routines disrupted by that a bit?? which feels absolutely insane to me that that would have That disproportional of an effect and be something i really did not even know how to attribute at all until typing this out right now. like i really appreciate and have fun with a lot of those people its not bc i dislike them or literally anything like that i think this is just a bit of a deranged unexpected side effect of whatever fucking stage of isolation i’m at where instead of just feeling really stilted in conversation or feeling like i dont know how to normally talk to people or accidentally crying while talking to people or oversharing and being awkward like i have at various times throughout my 2 years and 4 months of isolation when i had brief periods of interacting with people i cared about and/or people around my age again, while sure a lot of that is still somewhat happening (but not the crying in conversation, that was once when i got to see friends from college once literally right before i really realized the pandemic was starting and i couldnt keep visiting after not seeing them for a year before then. i just havent seen any of those friends since) i think its like. not knowing at all how to act normally around people but also not being as used to the people i am newly interacting with while my routines interrupted so whether i want to make a good impression around them in spite of that or am trying to be normal about feeling upset about shit people i dont know well but cant just not be around say or whatever ig it just like. flares up my anxieties about what can tell from what i say or how theey take me and all that leads to intrusive thoughts and paranoia about not just giving off the wrong conversational things but literally people reading my mind and judging me for intrusive thoughts recursive cycle etc and all that just makes me feel exhausted and unsafe and useless and whatever etc and maybe subconsciously is bringing up a lot of reocurring emotional shit i’ve dwelled on but not cried about much at all this past half year idk. plus i’m just stressed about how much i really want to get done before starting to move and go back to school.

makes sense in explaining most of it in typing it out right now but nonetheless dont like that. isolation has had a lot of awful effects on me (literally i know i’m talking to so many other people in the world now with that its nothing special lol. ‘i was doing this for a year prepandemic’ is a stupid thing to emphasize 1 year is horrible enough and it just blends together) and i’ve long been terrified thinking about how it could be affecting me in more unforeseen and/or longterm ways but i think i was thinking i had a general sense of how my trouble with interacting with people again would manifest and i really dont like seeing that like. i literally did not fucking know how to connect my emotions and other shit recently to that til right now. better than not connecting it at all of course but i dont like it feeling so unconnected. in general have been very disconnected from emotions even outside of social interaction type stuff so of course thats something to work on too but idk just scary to realize maybe i dont even know the general shape of how my trouble “reintegrating into society” is gonna look like lol. and while i’m hoping it will feel better (but honestly probably a lot more intense emotions even if positive) with realizing this know i really even more cannot even begin to imagine how seeing people ive been close to in the past again will end up going when i get to that

#cpost

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creek-cryptid-deluxe · 5 years ago

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I see a lot of stuff floating around the net about people taking the whole isolation/quarantine thing really hard. They are really struggling with just chilling at home. So I've come to you with...

✧*。Dr Morrissey's Tips & Tricks for Not Losing Your Mind While Stuck Inside™ ✧*。

✧*。TIP #1: have supplies for multiple hobbies that you can do solo & indoors. There's endless possibilities in the crafting & art realms, video games, adult coloring books, baking, reading, & writing just to name a few. Rotate through them throughout the day so you don't get burned out.

✧*。TIP #2: ever wanted to learn a new skill, craft, or language? Is there a makeup or hair technique you want to try but were afraid of sucking & looking ridiculous? Is there a dish you've been dying to learn to cook? Candies you've wanted to learn to bake? Now's the time! You have loads of time to spare & most can me done online.

✧*。TIP #3: throw some cleaning into the mix. That chore you've been putting off due to lack of time or energy? Get it done! Make those small home repairs or improvements!

✧*。TIP #4: you absolutely will get sick of streaming shows & movies. Mix it up with music, podcasts, or audiobooks while you do stuff.

✧*。TIP #5: it's important to stay active & not get deconditioned. Normally go to the gym or go for a run? Modify your workout so it can be done at home. There are loads of instructional videos on YouTube. It may not be the workout you're used to, but it's definitely better than nothing.

✧*。TIP #6: now if you aren't deeply introverted, you might be losing your shit due to lack of social interaction. Good news! We are quarantined with the best technology humanity has every gotten its fleshy hands on! There are loads of video chat apps & programs that you can use to make a group chat with your friends & family. Facetime & skype are the most obvious. Get creative with it! Host a dinner party. Finally get that dnd campaign started. (your group now definitely has the time!) Play online party games like Jackbox. Introverts, reach out to your more social friends & family. They might be struggling with this in a way you're not.

✧*。TIP #7: even though you aren't going anywhere & nobody will see you, maintain your daily hygiene & dressing routine. It will make you feel good.

✧*。TIP #8: taking that a step further, while you may be tempted to absolutely nuke your sleep schedule & do fuckall, routine is important for your mental health. Still try to have a routine bedtime & time to wake up. Can you adjust them so they are more reasonable? Absolutely! But you should still have a routine.

✧*。TIP #9: get outside in the sun for at least an hour a day, even if it's just on a porch, balcony, or backyard. If you do decide to venture into a park or some wilderness, make sure you still practice social distancing. Be safe & responsible about it.

✧*。TIP #10: if you start to feel alone or isolated, reach out to someone. Even if it's just someone online. Hell, my inbox is always open.

✧*。TIP #11: if you start to feel overwhelmed by the news, you're starting to feel that the horror outweighs the number of helpers (because Mr. Rodgers always taught us to look for the helpers in times of crisis) there's absolutely NO SHAME in stepping away to get some distance & perspective. Turn off the news, step away from websites that vomit more news stories than anything (looking at you Facebook). While it is important to be informed, that doesn't mean you have to watch or read about it 24/7. You need to protect your mental & emotional health first. Should you find yourself overwhelmed, I recommend guided meditation, specifically for anxiety. There are loads of YouTube videos & mobile apps for that. My personal favorite app is Stop, Breathe, & Think. It's free & asks you some questions to assess your mental & emotional state, then gives you a selection of guided medications based on that. SIDE NOTE: don't believe everything you hear or read as "news". There's a lot of misinformation floating around. Always fact check.

Remember, we are all in this together. Be safe, be kind (not just to others but to yourself), and remember you're not alone. ♡

#disabilties #crafts #disability #chronically ill #coronavirus #corvid19 #chronic illness #ehlers danlos syndrome #vascular ehlers danlos syndrome #creative #creativity #be kind

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cherry3point14 · 5 years ago

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Stranger Than Fanfiction: Ch 8

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Dean x Reader Warnings: Insulting a bald man. Word count: 4,137. Chapter Summary: You’re only allowed to do this one thing and then you’re out of the game. Somehow the case isn’t your top priority though. A/N: This chapter has been the bane of my existence but I HAVE to write it to get to the last two, so, yeah. Enjoy.

Ao3 if you prefer

The knock at your door interrupts your hand as you apply a muted lipstick. In the office, you’re a lip balm kind of woman but going to the bank today is an outing you put in a little more effort for. Your skirt and blouse are your normal work attire but there’s extra makeup, hair falling over your shoulders instead of wrapped up on your head, and your heels are half an inch higher. This is not new behavior. Going anywhere on company business always gets this kind of effort, in the same way that you’d dress up if you were going out for the evening. The result gets you a little more kindness in the world outside of your office walls.

The effort has absolutely nothing to do with the man on the other side of your front door.

“Y/N? You in there?” The knock comes again while you’re dabbing at the smudge from his first interruption.

“Yes! One second.”

Dean had insisted on coming with you, the trip is completely routine you’re glad to have him. You’re not paranoid, it’s not like the shifter has magic powers to know what you’re going to do, it can’t pop out of the woodwork at the bank to get you. You’re ninety-nine percent sure anyway. It will still be nice to have backup as if you’re doing something important. Even if you’re not, even if you’re doing your job and nothing more.

Dean has returned to his car when you step outside, he’s propped against it and from where he is he looks you up and down while you lock up.

“Well, don’t you look nice for a visit to the bank?” He asks once you’re approaching him.

It’s pointless to try and hide the blush but you look down at the ground anyway, in an attempt to. "I'm going on behalf of work, so, you know?"

He pushes himself up from the Impala and winks, “you sure you haven’t got a will they won’t they thing with some nerdy teller?”

“Why does he have to be nerdy?” you play mock offended.

“Because I bet all the nerds like you.”

You purse your lips. “Whatever, nerd.”

Y/N had worried about many things since opening her eyes that morning. Where was her lost shoe? Why didn't she have milk in the fridge? How long would it take to find the shifter? All of these paled in comparison to the concern she had over how easy things had become with Dean. This man—impossible as he and his brother were—was supposed to be, well, an inconvenience. Or she was supposed to be his inconvenience. Her blood should boil when she spoke to him and at best they were supposed to work together begrudgingly. Perhaps with Sam wedged between them to referee.

That's how it had started and that's how she had expected their relationship to stay. In that reluctant space between enemies and acquaintances. Yet she slipped into the front seat of his car, a figurative piece of him, and sunk into the soft leather. It wasn’t her first time inside his Baby and that was only further proof that things had become too good. Much better than they should have been. She was comfortable.

Comfortable was not a safe place to be with Dean Winchester. Comfortable led to preposterous behavior like flirting, and flirting begets terrible decisions. For Y/N those end results were, admittedly, looking better and better with each passing minute.

You hate her sometimes. Maybe all the time. She’s trying to kill you after all.

If you weren’t so afraid of 'it' then your biggest worry wouldn’t be flirting with Dean. It would be the death hanging over your head. Unfortunately, it’s all too easy to put that in the back of your mind. Most people don’t think about death on a daily basis, that’s kind of the human condition. Knowing that it’s coming but ignoring it till the bitter end. So, Dean, the shifter, what shade of lipstick you’re going to wear—you make them all so much more urgent than they are.

The writer helps with finding distractions in things. You’re still allowed to hate her. You can hate that she knows you so well and that you don’t know if it’s because she created you, or you’re just unlucky. You can hate that she still hasn‘t told you how you’re going to die.

You’re also pretty sure that you hate her for the slow descent into liking Dean. It’s bad enough in your head. In the story online, it’s an actual love affair. And you still don’t know if it’s you or her that made the choice about him. Does she write it because you feel it, or do you feel it because you hear her? Or both?

“You're quiet over there.”

You’re looking out of the window, seeing the world through Winchester eyes. “Sorry," you grin to yourself, "didn’t realize you were a chatty Kathy while you're on a case.”

He chuckles, “didn’t realize you weren’t.”

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw it. Dean glancing in her direction. Glance might be too much of a word for the half a second he takes his eyes off of the road. It would hardly warrant a thought were it not for his shoulders tensing when he’d faced forward again. Quiet anxiety settled over him, which doesn't suit him.

Y/N ignored it, wrapped up in her own murky thoughts. She lightly tapped her foot but the sound sinks into the floor mat of the Impala. She couldn’t show Dean that the closer they get to their destination the less at ease she felt. Nerves she hadn’t thought she had. It had been her idea, her assurances to Dean that all she would do was go to the bank and leave. Nothing else to do with the case. Still, she was a civilian and even this much involvement was causing her fingers to tremble against her leg. Out of sight, of course, she wouldn’t want him to know. Dean would pull the rug out from under her if he suspected she might not be able to handle it.

You could handle it fine. You were the queen of handling it. You squeeze your hand into a fist anyway to stop your nervous habit in its tracks.

With the bank finally in sight she resolved herself to take control of the situation. Dean was her backup, not the other way around. This was another Thursday morning visit to an establishment she had been time and again. She would walk into the white stone building and do the same thing she has a hundred times before. And then Dean—plus Sam who is at the motel in case something comes up—would stay. Y/N had already wrestled with the idea that her actions might also cause the shifter to stay, but that felt like a necessary evil. If they killed the shifter now then she was saving a life down the road. Which in her more selfless moments was the motivation that she clung to desperately. In her own infinitesimal way, she was helping to save someone. The path that had brought her here, to this new version of herself, was one that ultimately made her braver. If only at the very last minute.

It’s rare that the voice says exactly what you need to hear. Although in the grand scheme of things the voice has only been around for a few weeks. It just feels longer because you’re not supposed to hear a voice in your head at all. On this occasion though she’s helpful. You step out of the car with a renewed sense of purpose. Once you start going through the motions, that begin with walking the steps up to the entrance, you really did calm down. This is the same old song and dance. And even if it wasn’t, you're brave now, because she'd said so.

The bank is familiar territory. You’ve come here before to stop payments for legitimate reasons, you’ve been here to authorize money orders and verify paperwork. Sometimes you’re here for your personal banking too. It’s like Cheers if the show was about a financial institution; everyone knows your name.

Dean stays hot on your heels but doesn’t say anything at first. He’s silent as he holds the door open for you. Then as you’re walking towards the first teller he bumps your shoulder and nods at the man standing a few desks over, finally breaking the silence, “that your boyfriend?”

You stop dead and turn to him. Shocked by his audacity. Not only because he made a joke while your back is tense and your jaw firm, but for making you smile despite your resistance. Oh and there’s the fact that the teller he’s motioning at is a fifty-nine-year-old man with the largest bald spot you’ve ever seen, short of being actually bald.

“You’d make a cute couple.” He adds with a shrug, somehow resisting grinning, which might add insult to injury.

You feel your shoulders sink, the tension rolling away, and you try to bite back your laughter, and fail. “I’m not his type, but hey, you might be. Go and introduce yourself.”

“I would but I’ve got to stay here and keep an eye on you.”

She doesn’t miss the emphasis, exactly as she hadn’t missed the way he’d complimented her when he picked her up. Or the way he’s looking at her now. As if they’re not in the middle of a bank, in the middle of the day, but in a bar somewhere about to make some bad decisions. She found it easy to push away her own feelings and refocus when there’s work to be done. However it was becoming more difficult to ignore Dean’s potential feelings. Not only did she not know if she was misreading the situation, but even if she wasn’t; what could she possibly do about it now?

“Next.” The sandy-haired woman you haven’t seen before calls, making it easy to ignore him, and the voice.

“Hi. I’ve got an appointment with Mr. Jones to submit some financial reports on behalf of First National.”

She nods, “his receptionist is out sick today. Give me a second and I’ll go check if he’s ready to see you yet.”

She wanders off and you turn to Dean and the curiosity he's wearing on his face. He leans in closer than he needs to and whispers to you, “we have an appointment?”

“Yeah, in real life you usually need an appointment for these kinds of things. Plus I told my boss I was coming so he asked me to bring in last month's report backups to save someone else a trip.”

He ignores your reference to real-life versus his life as if he's not standing there; existing. “You told your boss?”

They get away with so much in the books that clearly they have no idea how things work for normal people. “I told you this needed approval, I made up some anomaly and he signed it off.”

Dean looks at you like he’s thinking the exact same thing you were. That life is much simpler when you lie through your teeth.

The teller that you don’t know returns and he steps back freeing up your personal space. Truthfully you hadn't realized he was still that close. She leads you to a small office with ‘Mr. Jones’ painted on the door before knocking and leaving.

“Y/N, always a pleasure to see you. Sorry about the wait.” Ben beams as he opens the office door, hiding his surprise to see Dean trailing behind you. “You haven’t been by in a while?”

You shake the hand he’s offering you with a smile, “they've been keeping me busy. Luckily I had something I needed to be rushed through so I jumped on the opportunity to come by.”

Dean closes the office door behind him and clears his throat.

“Oh, sorry. Ben, this is my colleague Dean.” You only comprehend that you’re supposed to use an alias for him after his name slips out. It’s only a first name though, that doesn’t count, hopefully. You tuck your hair behind your ear in an attempt to throw him a quick, apologetic look. “He’s new. I’m showing him the ropes.”

Ben shakes Dean's hand and does an excellent job hiding how tight Dean’s grip is. Something you see evidence in when his knuckles pop white.

You all take a seat and then everything becomes simple, routine. You hand over the financial reports and Ben takes a cursory look at them. He promises to dedicate proper time to them later. There’s small talk over mutual acquaintances from your office and some disputes from the month before last. This is something many of your colleagues have done before you. Someone always has business here and paper backups need to be brought in. So, over the years, it became a standing catch-all appointment. Reports and insurance and some chit chat. Nothing out of the ordinary.

“There is one more thing.” You begin in a charming tone.

Ben lets out a small business like chuckle from behind his desk, “of course there is. Otherwise, I wouldn’t be talking to you.”

You pull out a few sheets of stapled forms that Mark signed off yesterday afternoon. “It’s nothing really. We submitted this claim for payment but have since found some irregularities. I was hoping you could stop the transfer until we straighten everything out.”

“You wouldn’t ask unless we still had time, so I don’t see why not.” He takes the papers and checks if everything is in order before he starts typing on the screen in front of him.

For the first time since you walked into the office, your attention isn’t required on the banker in front of you, so you check in on Dean. He’s staring intently at Ben, hard eyes that are trying to bore a hole in the man’s skull. It's a good thing Ben has been focused on you and not noticed.

“All done. Don’t tell me that’s all you came in for?” Ben calls your attention back.

You shrug, “you know me. I like to do these things myself.”

He nods, understanding, and stands up at the same time you do. He holds out his hand again, bending towards you a little as he takes yours, “that’s because you’re nothing if not thorough.”

There’s a scoff from behind you that you ignore because you are indeed thorough, and whatever Dean wants to say can wait until you’re outside.

“I could say the same for you. Thanks for your help, Ben.”

You make a hasty exit and get halfway across the tiled floors outside of Ben's office before Dean speaks again. “That’s the guy then, huh? Think you'd do better with Danny DeVito over there.”

There’s none of his playfulness this time. Nothing inappropriate or light about his mood. Even with his callback to something that had been a joke earlier, his words are as steely and hard as he’d been staring at Ben.

Something familiar brews in your gut. It’s stormy and turbulent. It’s the hint of an argument on the tip of your tongue. Dean has turned serious for some reason and he's sending you hurtling towards angry.

“Not that it’s any of your business,” you’re grinding the words out through your teeth at a volume only he will hear, “but no. Ben is married. Besides you’re the one who started this joke, I never said anything about having a boyfriend.” You’re storming towards the doors because you’re not prone to making a scene and you don't intend to start now.

Infuriatingly he says nothing. No smart-mouthed comeback that forces her to be equal parts furious and infatuated, which means that each step until she hits the fresh air outside is like another twist on a wind-up toy. Eventually, she’s going to snap.

Y/N hadn’t felt like this since they’d broken into her office. She’d found herself falling in other ways since then, but the anger had dissipated since that night until it faded away altogether. In an instant, his irrational reaction has sparked the flame again. She had done exactly what she was supposed to have done, and she had done it well. No suspicion or fumbling over her words. Before he’d opened his mouth she might have even been proud of herself.

You had indeed been proud of yourself. Ben had no clue and he’dstopped the payment like needed him to do. You pace on the sidewalk. A few steps on the spot wondering what in the hell is going on. He is supposed to be giving you a ride home so you can work. Both the Winchesters insisted that the office might not be safe until the shifter was dead. Since all roads lead back to you and all google searches lead back to your office building.

That all would be well and good if you weren't so livid you can’t even see straight. Worse than that, you have no idea why you're quite as angry as you are.

She'd left him standing inside, feet planted in the same spot he'd been in when she told him off. She'd gone without him or his permission to leave, and she hoped her act of defiance annoyed him half as much as she was. Y/N considered walking away, there was a bus stop around the corner and she could get most of the way home. Public transport would give her a chance to rest outside of his car that smells of worn leather mingled with his scent. She inhales until fresh air fills her stomach, then her chest and then she holds it. A borrowed breathing technique from the week of yoga she took years ago. Her lips shake with her exhale and it helps. Not to explain anything, not his reaction nor hers, but her heart rate steadies. She'd be mad about calming herself down so immediately if she hadn't just calmed herself down.

You don't turn around when you hear his footsteps catching up behind you however you do stop pacing. You're a fair woman and you'll give him the chance to apologize.

"Get in, I'll take you home."

His hand is on the Impala when you spin to face him, he's about to get in and expects you to follow him. He tosses his head in the direction of the car telling you as much.

"No."

"Y/N, get in." One foot moves in your direction and before he can take a full step you tell him again.

"Didn't you hear the first time? No."

In that crystalizing moment, Y/N decided that she did, in fact...

"Oh, you can shut up too!" You spit out, eyes flicking to the sky because, where else do you look when you're shouting at a writer's voice in your head?

You're not concerned about your outburst towards the voice in front of Dean. Instead of worrying you turn before he can stop you, and you know immediately that you are making the right decision. How? Because the voice does shut up, which meant whatever she wanted involved you staying there and talking to Dean, not striding away to the bus stop.

You can see the bus shelter in a few minutes. There's a woman there, along with her son, waiting not so patiently. It's surprising to see anybody there in the middle of the day. The bus stop hadn't been far from the bank but you suppose it took him a moment to get in his car and debate leaving you, so that's why you make it this far before you hear him pull up.

He slows to a crawl in the road beside you, engine low but still rumbling away and burning fuel. "Would you stop being so stubborn and let me take you home?"

That doesn't sound like much of an apology. Or any apology at all.

"Come on sweetheart, please? I need to get you safe."

If he wasn't Dean Winchester then that line would sound like macho bullshit. Except, he is Dean Winchester. It had only been an hour ago you were scared to even go to the bank. And he might not have said sorry but he did, at long last, say please.

You're not giving up, you're heels are a little higher than normal is all and a ride home would save your feet.

You don't say anything as you step to the passenger side door, he doesn't say anything as he stops the car completely. You're both good at that. Silence.

The seat is as soft as it had been at the start of her day. The music is at the same volume he'd set it at when he realized she wasn't looking for a conversation. The difference was, she wasn't tapping her foot to fight the nerves now. Y/N was too busy cycling through the last hour of her life like each minute was an index card in a library catalog. Or, say, a folder in an insurance filing cabinet. She was, mostly, confused. Everything had been smooth sailing, in a way her life hadn't been since she found out that monsters existed. And then things changed. Flip flopped. Again. Until she's back in his car, unable to escape him. Realizing that she never had a chance to.

You sigh. It was your own fault for thinking you could step off of this insane rollercoaster that was your life. The voice was never going to leave, Dean would, and in a year's time you'd be rocking yourself to sleep inside the asylum you'll be living in by then. Assuming you weren't dead.

When he pulls up outside your house you're up and out before Baby has stopped, "bye Dean."

You don't dream that he's going to follow you.

You don't imagine he's going to walk you to your door and stop the key in the lock with his hand on his shoulder.

You don't ever expect him to kiss you.

Dean has a hundred rules, though he only ever cites one or two at a time. One he's quoted time and again to Sam, "you don't kiss the girl till the fat lady sings." Or till the monster is dead, as the case may be. He has broken this rule a hundred times before, since a rolling Dean gathers no moss.

Y/N doesn't know that, even if she did, she wouldn't care. She has her hand wrapped around his tie, using it to pull him closer, tasting him and moaning into his mouth. Grateful for the extra height of her heels today. Thankful for a chance to feel his full lips against her own. She kisses him back until she's lightheaded and a little longer still. Y/N had found the new life that was worth dying for and it resided in the space between their mouths, it was wrapped up in kissing him.

You laugh breathlessly as he pulls back, "so, I did a good job today?"

Dean hooks a finger under your chin and presses another chaste, brief kiss to your bruised lips. "Such a good job, sweetheart."

And then he says his goodbyes because he has a job to do and it’s still the middle of the day. He leaves you after making you promise to stay at home and safe. He tells you he's going to call when everything has 'blown over'.

You're still giddy when you get inside and lock the door. Smiling as you start up your work laptop and turn on your tea kettle. Cheeks flushed pink when you hear the ping of new emails on your computer.

Hi Y/N,

I'd say sorry that this took so long except you said it yourself, you didn't have a lot to go on. Guess you're lucky that I'm the best. The names Emma Eiffel. Couldn't get you a phone number but I did manage to get you an address out in Des Moines. Details below.

Normal fees are fine.

Stan

Continue to Chapter 9.

5eva tags: @divadinag @darthdeziewok @fluentinfiction @witch-of-letters @supernatural-teamfreewill-blog @magnitude101999 @alexwinchester23 @jesseswartzwelder Dean babes: @thewinchesterchronicles @akshi8278 @bloodydaydreamer StrangerThanFiction tags: @jaylarkson @starsandmidnightblue @ceisbill

#dean x reader #supernatural fanfiction #spn x reader #dean winchester x reader #spn fanfiction #supernatural #spn #spn fanfic #supernatural fanfic #dean winchester #dean winchester x you #dean x you #dean x y/n #dean dean the soft lil bean

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myaekingheart · 4 years ago

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108. Starstruck

read the scarecrow and the bell on ao3 index | from the beginning | < previous | next >

Konoha was abuzz with excitement as genin teams hung banners and balloons throughout the village. Truthfully, Rei found it rather ironic that they were assigned such a task. After all, the celebrity they were welcoming was not exactly child-friendly.

Apparently Konoha’s financial situation had dipped during this time of routine and calm. As such, Lady Tsunade had invented the wonderful idea that perhaps the village should pour more of their efforts into promoting tourism. Rei was not brave enough to note how dangerous this might be with the Akatsuki a quietly approaching threat. Before she could say anything, Shizune cringed and swiped her finger across her neck, a warning. Tsunade had clearly been stressed. Protesting her plans would likely only anger the beast.

The best way to attract visitors to Konoha, it seemed, was to piggyback on the village’s merit of being the birthplace of the great sannin, Jiraiya. There was nothing noble or respectable about this idea, however. He was not to be revered by tourists for his innate abilities but rather for his dirty books. Icha Icha was a hit the world over and so there was truly no better way to sell Konoha than to bring that fact to the fore.

Clearly, they could not use Jiraiya himself as the poster boy. Tsunade had written him a letter mapping out her idea, to which he replied emphatically but apologized for not being able to partake himself. He mentioned that Naruto was progressing wonderfully with his training and they could not afford to stop for anything, but that they hoped Konoha would welcome them both back in a year with open arms. Regarding the tourism plan, however, Jiraiya instead suggested one of the actors from the film adaptation. After all, they were on the cusp of shooting Icha Icha Violence so a press tour was only natural. Promote the film while also promoting the village. There was no way Tsunade could say no.

The first person she contacted, of course, was Koyuki Kazahana. Known by her stage name Yukie Fujikaze, she was the stunning lead actress and therefore was certain to garner lots of positive attention. However, Koyuki was not just an actress but also the princess of the Land of Snow. When she wasn’t acting, she was pouring her heart into her country. Her assistant, Sandayu, returned their correspondence with an “I regret to inform you…” and that was the end of that.

The only other option, and the one that eventually stuck, was the leading man. Keihaku Goman was charming and appealing with a lithe figure and a sparkling smile. Young adult magazines paid special attention to “eyes like pools of water” and “hair like sunshine.” He was, for all intents and purposes, a heartthrob. When it was announced that he was visiting Konoha, all the women went insane. Hair salons saw a significant increase in appointments and cute dresses flew off the racks of fashionable clothing stores. Anything to capture the attention of a sexy movie star.

“I can’t believe how everyone is freaking out” Kakashi mentioned as he and Rei weaved through the mess. “I never expected everyone in the village to be so head over heels for some actor.”

“Well, for what it’s worth” Rei replied, “he’s technically not just some actor. He’s an actor who just so happens to have a full-frontal nudity scene in a racy blockbuster. You’d be surprised what desperate women would do for dick.”

Kakashi chuckled and shook his head. As big a fan as he was of the Icha Icha series, he just couldn’t wrap his brain around the absolute chaos erupting from this man’s visit. “At least you have a level head” he replied, wrapping an arm around his fiancée. Rei gave a definitive nod, rubbing the back of her neck and looking the other way. Her silence was enough to warrant suspicion. “You do have a level head, right…?” he asked slowly.

“Hmm? Oh, yeah! Yeah! Of course!” Rei replied. She pasted a huge grin on her face and swatted at the air dismissively. Kakashi was not convinced. He stared her down for a long, silent moment before finally breaking.

“Rei, please don’t tell me you’re googly-eyed for him, too” Kakashi complained.

“I’m not!” Rei exclaimed. She rubbed her forearms and muttered, “I only like him a normal amount.”

“God dammit, Rei” Kakashi whined, tossing his head back and groaning. And here he thought she wasn’t like other girls.

“I’m sorry!” Rei replied. “It’s not like I’m going to lose my shit over this guy, I just think he’s kind of, I don’t know, aesthetically pleasing. You know, in that glittery film actor sort of way. That’s all it is! Come on, Kakashi. It’s really not that big of a deal.”

Pouting, Kakashi muttered a halfhearted, “Alright” but it was clear he was bothered by this. And if he was bothered, then Rei was bothered. She stopped him dead in the middle of the street, taking his forearm to pull him closer to her. He watched as she cupped his face in her hands, stared him in the eyes.

“Kakashi, believe me when I say this is not a big deal” she said. “I love you more than words can ever describe. There is no one else I would rather spend my future with.” She held up her left hand, her engagement ring glittering in the sunlight. “This should be proof enough of that.”

Kakashi stared at her for a moment, searching her gaze for any hint of dishonesty. When he found none, his expression quickly shifted from anxiety to amusement. A satisfied smile spread across his masked face as he lyrically teased, “You have a crush on Keihaku.”

Rei’s face immediately turned bright red. She removed her hands from his face and slapped him on the arm, turning away from him to hide her embarrassment. “Shut up! I already told you I do not!” she insisted.

“Okay…” Kakashi chuckled, delightfully unconvinced. He plunged his hands into his pockets and began strolling back toward their apartment, humming to himself.

“Kakashi, get back here!” Rei shouted, chasing after him. “I told you, it’s not like that! I don’t have a crush on this guy! Kakashi!”

Keihaku Goman arrived in the Hidden Leaf a few days after, welcomed by a large crowd and sweeping processional. Women screamed and fainted at the sight of him—to think, a movie star here, in Konoha, in the flesh. They would give anything to earn so much as a glance or a wink from him. A team of ANBU escorted him to the hokage’s office where he was to meet with Tsunade about his itinerary. Among his bodyguards was Rei.

In true movie star fashion, Keihaku hammed it up for the crowd as he ventured down the street, winking and waving at swooning women. Rei watched as she followed close behind and wondered how a human being could possibly be so charismatic. Every move seemed carefully choreographed and yet totally effortless. Was he playing a part, or was he truly this princely? She couldn’t tell. The longer she pondered it, however, the redder her face grew and she forced herself to remain focused. She could not let herself get distracted. She had a duty to fulfill.

Once they had reached the hokage’s office, Tsunade welcomed him warmly. At least she seemed completely unaffected by his charm. Rather, she remained polite and diplomatic just as the hokage should be. Shizune, on the other hand, was forced to muster all of her strength in order to remain standing. From the other side of the room, a group of jonin—Kakashi included—tuned in for the briefing.

Rei and Kakashi locked eyes with one another as Tsunade explained Keihaku’s tasks. He had a busy schedule ahead of him including photoshoots and even a commercial. Anything to amp up Konoha’s tourism. Meanwhile, Kakashi made discrete hand gestures to his fiancée—an overflow from his ANBU days—to communicate to her what he was thinking. And what he was thinking was that he was going to milk every ounce of her embarrassment. Her face turned bright red and she swatted at the air in a silent attempt to shut him up. Kakashi quickly dropped his eyes and stifled his laughter as Tsunade paused mid-sentence.

“Is something the matter?” she asked harshly, glaring at Rei.

Clearing her throat, Rei steadied herself and croaked, “N-no, Lady Tsunade. Just, uh…just a fly.”

Tsunade narrowed her eyes and pursed her lips, completely unconvinced. She slowly turned her attention back to Keihaku’s itinerary but Rei could feel a scolding waiting for her after Tsunade was done. Once her and Keihaku were yet again occupied with his obligations, Rei shot Kakashi a sharp warning glare. Even with her mask on, he could tell her expression was something fierce.

Kakashi thumbed through Makeout Paradise as he waited outside the ANBU headquarters. It was that strange liminal period of dusk when the sky was growing too dark to read under and yet not dark enough to turn the streetlights on. And then there was a heavy shove of the door and Rei trudged out into the night air, fraught and fatigued. Kakashi tucked his book into his back pouch and waved with a grin, striding toward her. Rei knew just by the look on his face that she was in for a ration of shit. He was far too perky to not be suspicious. “So, how did your first day as Keihaku’s bodyguard go?” he asked, lacing his fingers with hers as they walked home.

“It was fine” Rei replied bluntly. “Nothing to write home about.”

Kakashi was silent for a moment before teasing, “He tried to touch your butt, didn’t he?”

“Kakashi! No! What the fuck?!” Rei exclaimed, swatting him on the arm. “Stop that! I already told you, it’s not like that!”

“I’ll believe it when I see it” Kakashi sighed sleepily. He was so nonchalant, so unaffected, it made Rei’s blood boil. Grumbling, she quickened her pace with arms folded across her chest to further enforce her displeasure. They walked along in silence for a few moments more before Kakashi went in for the kill again. “So are you going to ask him on a date?”

“What the fuck? No! Of course not!” Rei shouted. She shoved her left hand in his face. “Does this mean nothing to you, Kakashi?”

“I don’t know” Kakashi joked. “Keihaku does have a lot more money than I do. Are you sure he wouldn’t be able to buy you something nicer?”

Rei rolled her eyes and huffed her bangs out of her face. “Even if he did, I wouldn’t want it” she insisted. “It wouldn’t mean as much.”

He had to admit, hearing her get so heated about this was kind of affirming for him. He loved knowing that she was so defensively in love with him, that the thought of even considering another man made her furious. But at the same time, watching her get flustered about finding someone else attractive was far too fun. Besides, it was clear to him that he had nothing to worry about in terms of her faithfulness. He could tease her to his heart’s content and it wouldn’t mean a single thing.

“So you’re saying that if Keihaku burst out of that window right there, with confetti and trumpets blaring, and got down on one knee and asked you to go on a date with him, that you would say no?” he asked, suppressing laughter. She glared up at him, tiny but lethal. Poking her puffed out cheek, he added, “Because that is a very tempting offer!”

Rei swatted his hand away and shouted, “Maybe you should go on a date with him then, Kakashi!”

Kakashi couldn’t help but laugh. “You know, if he ever did somehow ask you on a date, I think you should go for it.” It was that statement that firmly stopped Rei in her tracks. What was he insinuating here? First of all: if he somehow asked her on a date? Was he trying to say she would be undesirable to someone like Keihaku? Not that it mattered. She didn’t care either way. But was he trying to say she wasn’t fit to be seen with a celebrity? And more importantly, I think you should go for it?! Was her fiancé really suggesting she cheat on him? Her disgust and confusion were almost palpable. Kakashi, however, was completely unphased. Of all the women in Konoha, he doubted Keihaku would ever ask Rei out. It wasn’t that he considered her undesirable in the least sense—she was the most intelligent, beautiful, and talented woman he knew. And that was exactly the problem. Men like Keihaku had no interest in women of substance. All they cared about were breast implants and sex appeal. Women with lips soaked in gloss and hair permed to perfection and fake tans to rival the gods. Keihaku would never go for someone like Rei. Truthfully, Kakashi took comfort in that. If, for whatever reason, he did ask for a date with his fiancée, however, Kakashi was not going to protest. He wasn’t giving her up in the slightest. He knew even one dinner would never lead to anything serious. Celebrities were far too shallow for that sort of thing—Keihaku could never dream of having a relationship with as much depth and integrity as that of Kakashi and Rei. Rather, Kakashi’s reasoning was much more darkly funny: he would’ve killed to see Rei make a fool of herself in front of a famous movie star. He loved her more than life itself but he knew she was far too crass and clumsy for the likes of Keihaku. The two of them in a room together, candlelight and smooth jazz, was a recipe for disaster and Kakashi was far too curious for his own good. He only regretted not having popcorn.

Rei’s glare hardened as she considered the situation. Finally, she blurted, “Then fine. Maybe I will go on a date with him then!”

“Okay” Kakashi chuckled. He patted her head as they walked along, flattening the fluff of her ponytail in the process. Rei slapped his hand away and grumbled, pouting the entire way home.

That night, she tossed and turned, restless. Thoughts of Keihaku swirled relentlessly through her head—a subject she did not want to think about. She was not interested in him. He was not going to ask her out. She was not imagining him asking her out. She was definitely not envisioning them sitting across a fancy table looking into each other’s eyes and having an incredibly in-depth and profound conversation with one another. No, Keihaku was useless. He was as profound as a cardboard cutout. She refused.

The following day, Kakashi was lounging on the couch with a book when Rei returned home. Something was off about her, however. Somehow, her bangs seemed to hide more of her face than usual. What he could see of it was beet red. Sitting up abruptly, Kakashi asked, “How was work?”

“It was…fine” Rei replied, voice restrained and cracking. Toshio picked his head up, ears perking at the squeak in her voice. Her tone was far too high-pitched to be normal. Something was wrong, Kakashi was sure of it.

“Did anything happen today…?” he asked slowly. Rei kicked her shoes off at the front door, skirted around the kitchen table. She dropped to her knees on the living room floor so as to snuggle Toshio. Anything to keep herself preoccupied.

“Um, well, I mean…” she stammered. “Kind of?”

“Kind of?” Kakashi repeated. He leaned forward, resting his forearms on his knees. “Like what?”

Rei wiped her nose with the back of her hand, covered her mouth so that her voice was muffled. “You’re never going to believe this, but…” she started. The suspense was killing him. Kakashi didn’t think he could handle it. What the hell was she hiding? And then, unable to restrain laughter any longer, she said it. “Keihaku literally asked me the fuck out.”

By the time the words spilled from her lips, she had fallen back onto the floor covering her face and laughing hysterically. Kakashi couldn’t tell if she was delighted with the prospect or merely thought it was so ridiculously stupid, she was reduced to deliria. All he knew for certain was that it very quickly felt as if someone had ripped his spine right out of his body and now here he was, hollow and unstructured. Suddenly the whole idea wasn’t so funny anymore.

“He…he asked you out?” Kakashi repeated slowly, voice quiet and numb. Then, voice rising slightly in horror, he asked, “W-Well what did you say?! You didn’t agree, did you?!”

Rei rolled her eyes and repositioned herself on the floor, fixing a wedgie and smoothing her dress down over her stomach. “What do you take me for, Kakashi? A whore?” she asked. Folding her arms back behind her head then, she added, “Of course I said yes.”

The entire room was spinning. Kakashi couldn’t take this. He felt like he was going to be sick. He never should’ve teased her about this. He never should’ve encouraged her. Now he just felt like an idiot. The sickening realization made him uneasy and shaky: oh god, he was going to lose her. “I-is he blind?” Kakashi erupted. “Did he not see the ring on your finger? Does commitment mean nothing to him? To you?”

Finally understanding the gravity of his response, Rei sat up and frowned. “Calm down, Kakashi, fuck” she groaned. “Were you not the one who told me to go for it if he ever asked?”

“Yes, but I never thought he’d actually do it!” Kakashi exclaimed. “I don’t want anyone else to think you’re available, or that you don’t respect our commitment to each other. We made a promise, Rei. Does it mean nothing to you?”

Rei narrowed her eyes, brows knitting in offense. “Of course, Kakashi” she said, her voice stone cold. “More than you even know.” She pressed her hand to her stomach, filing through all the thoughts she had been having the past few weeks. Of taking his last name, of becoming his wife, of wanting to conceive a child with him. He had no idea the things she had been considering, of how deeply and passionately she had been imagining their future together. Rising to her feet, she approached Kakashi and situated herself between his legs, holding his face firm in her hands. “Nothing is going to happen, I promise” she insisted. “The only reason I agreed to this is because this is a once in a lifetime opportunity and I have terrible ideas. Is that clear?”

Kakashi frowned, trying to make himself believe in her words. Then, looking up at her with eyes soft and pleading, he asked quietly, “What kinds of ideas?”

A sinister grin touched Rei’s lips as she straddled his lap, running her fingers through his hair. “Oh, nothing too serious. I’m just going to milk this for all it’s worth and at the end of the night, probably pull his pants down in front of everyone in the middle of the restaurant.”

Kakashi let out an airy chuckle, shaking his head. “Are you sure that’s not just because you want his dick, too?” he asked.

Rei couldn’t restrain her incredulous laughter. “Absolutely not!” she exclaimed. “No, it’s because I think the whole world deserves to know the truth: that he actually has, and I quote, an ‘immaculately tiny penis’.”

Kakashi’s face burned at the prospect and he struggled to suppress the laughter rising in his throat. “Immaculately tiny?” he repeated. “Where did you hear that?”

Shrugging, Rei replied, “I found it in a pamphlet about the movie’s production.” Leaping to her feet, she then rushed into the kitchen and began rummaging around the junk drawer. “They said it was so unexpected and wrong for the role, that they had to hire a dick double just for the full-frontal nudity” she continued. She exclaimed with pride then as she found the very pamphlet in question crumpled up in the back of the drawer, presenting it to her fiancé with a dramatic flourish. She climbed onto the couch beside him, drawing her legs up to sit cross-legged, as she watched him flip through it, equal parts fascinated and frightened. “You know, for a movie based on a bestselling book, you’d think all of these psychotic women would do a little more reading.”

“I guess this explains his confidence” Kakashi replied. “He must be compensating.”

“I’ll say” Rei agreed.

Kakashi had to admit, Rei’s tone and her casual attitude were reassuring but there was still something nagging in the back of his mind. Something that still bothered him about all of this. He folded the pamphlet back up and placed it on the coffee table, then thought for a moment before turning to her and asking, “Is that a dealbreaker?”

Dumbfounded, Rei blinked despondently. Did Kakashi really think Keihaku’s charisma and wealth alone was enough to make her leave him? A sly smile touched her lips as she reached out and abruptly took hold of Kakashi’s crotch. His entire face turned bright red as he looked back at her, studying the determination and certainty of her gaze. “Nothing can compare to you, Kakashi” she insisted. “As far as dicks go, I’ve won the jackpot. There’s no way in hell I would ever give that up, or more importantly the amazing man it’s attached to.” She could feel him begin to harden from her touch and that gave her all the confidence to know that he understood her perfectly.

Kakashi watched with focused intent as she gathered her hair into the signature ponytail, an elastic around her wrist and a bobby pin cinched between her lips. He only took slight comfort in her rather business-professional outfit: a simple button down, a knee-length skirt. But the way the buttons strained at her breasts, the tight-fitting nature of the skirt…he couldn’t help but shudder. Friday evening had come way too quickly for his taste.

All week, he had debated being upfront and honest, telling her that this was a bad idea and refusing to let her go through with it. But he couldn’t bring himself to do it. Despite everything, he did not own her. If she wanted to do this, then that was her choice and no one else’s. Rei shoved a few bobby pins into the underside of her ponytail, ensuring that the shorter strands would stay put throughout the night, then flipped her head down and and misted the underside with hairspray. Kakashi coughed into the crook of his neck, the cloud of noxious fumes only further enforcing his nausea. Rei turned toward him once she was finished, studying the discomfort on his face. “Are you going to sit around sulking like this all night, Kakashi?” she asked. Kakashi pouted and dropped his gaze. Rei set the bottle of hairspray on the bathroom counter and approached him, tilting his chin up to look her in the eyes. “If you really didn’t want me to do this, all you had to do was speak up, Kakashi.”

“I’m not going to tell you what to do” Kakashi replied, but Rei could tell there was more that he intended to say. After a beat of silence, he cupped her cheek in his hand and firmly added, “I don’t want you to do this.”

Quite frankly, Rei was starting to grow frustrated with his conflicted attitude. Sometimes, he would seem fine. Completely unaffected. As if he knew without a shadow of a doubt that this would amount to nothing, that her faithfulness could not be wavered. Other times, however, he was fussy and distant. Time and time again, Rei had told him that if he was truly against her doing this, then to let her know. And time and time again, he said the same thing: I’m not going to tell you what to do. She understood that this was a sign that he wanted her to drop out without him having to ask, but the truth of the matter was that she could not bring herself to pass up an opportunity like this. She wanted to enjoy the finer things for one night and make a famous man look like an idiot in the process. To absolutely disparage a wealthy heartthrob while sipping fine champagne that tasted like power. If Kakashi didn’t want her to go through with this, she needed to hear it straightforward. And now here he was, fifteen minutes from her restaurant reservation, telling her what he had held back all week.

“Kakashi…” Rei sighed. She pressed her forehead to his chest in defeat and a surge of relief washed over the copy ninja. She was finally giving in. She was going to back out at the last minute and save him from certain destruction. She rested a hand upon his chest, caressed him comfortingly. “You had all week to tell me this. Don’t you think it’s a little late to turn back now?”

Kakashi froze, his heart leaping into his chest. “S-so are you still going to go?” he asked.

Pulling back, Rei looked him in the eyes and sighed, “Yes. Yes, I am still going to go.”

“B-but—” Kakashi stammered. Before he could say anything more, though, Rei had slipped past him to retrieve her purse from the kitchen table. She slipped her shoes on at the door—the strappy sandals she always wore for more formal occasions—before turning to leave. Kakashi could feel his insides twisting and decaying at the sight, panic surging through his veins. He never should’ve egged her on. He never should’ve teased her and encouraged her. Oh god, he was going to lose her. He had felt so secure about their relationship and now he was going to lose her. All he could manage to say to her was a croaked, “When will you be back?”

Rei paused in the doorway, looking up at him, and fed him a sympathetic smile. “I’ll be back before nine. Promise” she said. Then, her sympathy slowly morphed into slyness as she added, “Don’t worry, I have something extra special planned for when I get back.” Her gaze was sultry and tempting as she closed the door behind her and disappeared. Kakashi should’ve felt relieved—after all, she was promising him something supreme upon her return—but if anything, he felt even more defeated. Not only was she off to mingle with a millionaire, but now she was sexually riled up on top of it. Digging the heels of his hands into his eye sockets, Kakashi groaned and fell back onto the couch. It was going to be a long three hours.

He needed to do something, to preoccupy himself. Toshio picked his ears up as he stared back at Kakashi staring into the kitchen. He knew he should eat dinner, but his mood had swiped any hope of hunger from him. Instead, he swung open the refrigerator door and began cleaning out the spoiled food inside. He tossed the stinking plastic containers into the sink, tied up the trash bag and walked it down to the dumpster. Toshio followed, as if in hopes of finding scraps. Upon their return, Kakashi washed out the containers as well as any remaining dirty dishes. He took his time with each, paying no mind to the scalding water on his hands. He dried each one thoroughly and individually and put them away in their respective cabinets. The sun had nearly disappeared, the room growing dark. Kakashi flicked on a light and checked the clock. 6:45pm. This was pointless. Kakashi dropped his head back and sighed.

“Toshio, if we’re lucky” he started, “Maybe she’ll come home early.” Toshio huffed and rested his head on the floor in retaliation. Kakashi nodded, kneeling down to scratch behind the dog’s ear. “Yeah. You and me both.”

By 7 o’clock, it was clear to Kakashi that the only thing he could stand to do was read. If he could get himself right in the proper mood, nestled into the sweet spot of his literary allure, he could lose himself in the words and time would race by. He reached for Makeout Paradise, almost disgustingly satisfied with how clever this plan was meant to be, but quickly found the situation had left him changed. The book no longer brought him the same pleasure as it always had. He focused hard on the sentences in front of him, tried to envision himself and Rei in the title roles, but as luck would have it he landed on a chapter in which the third corner of the love triangle enters the plot. And in that role, all he could see was Keihaku Goman. The dashing Keihaku bursting into the room and professing his love for the heroine, Keihaku kissing her hand and begging her to choose him instead, Keihaku wrapping an arm around her waist as he whisked her into the bedroom and—

Kakashi heard the key turn in the lock and he immediately sat bolt upright. His eyes glanced to the clock. It was 8:30pm. She was home early. A hint of delight hitched in his throat. The date must have gone terribly. Perhaps it was so terrible, in fact, that Rei will never want to look at another man ever again. He hoped that that wouldn’t backfire on him, that she would not denounce all men, himself included. But now he was overthinking things. All he knew was that he needed to see her. One look and he would know exactly how things had gone. One look and it would all be over, for better or for worse.

She stepped inside and his heart surged. There she was. Deep down, a part of him was overjoyed that she had even returned at all. She locked the door behind her silently, kicked her shoes off. “Well?” Kakashi asked. She met his gaze blankly. “How was it?”

“It was fine” she replied, unbuttoning her shirt plainly as she stepped over Toshio and skirted into the living room. “Things went smoothly.”

She was far too calm. This was a bad sign. Either things went too smoothly or not smoothly at all. Kakashi wasn’t sure which he would have preferred. He watched her with laser focus as she knelt down on the floor by Toshio, slipping out of her blouse to reveal the simple white camisole underneath. He wanted to kiss the freckles on her shoulders and the scars on her forearms. The delicate lace trim was so enticing, perfectly accentuating her breasts. Kakashi frowned and wondered if Keihaku had the same thoughts. It was then that he knew there was no way things couldn’t have gone well. Dejected, Kakashi turned away to look out the window. He attempted to sound as nonchalant as possible when he asked, “So are you going to run off with Mr. Billionaire and move into his mansion with his fancy gold couch and tiny penis?” The depression in his voice, however, was far too obvious.

Knitting her brows together, Rei stared at him sharply. “You know I only have eyes for you” she insisted. “I wouldn’t want to spend my future with anyone else.” She finished unfastening the last button on her shirt and slithered out of it then, tossing it toward Kakashi from across the room. “Besides” she sighed rather dramatically, “Keihaku Goman is a total asshole, anyway.”

In retrospect, this was not the least bit surprising but the way she said it, the look on her face as she pouted and tilted her head toward the window, struck something within Kakashi. Something anxious but protective. “Why?” he asked, leaning forward. “What happened? What did he say to you?”

“It’s really nothing” Rei swatted at the air. “He just threw out some pretty petty and underhanded lines about he’s always liked ‘homegrown girls’ and shit.”

“Homegrown girls?” Kakashi repeated. He wasn’t quite sure what that meant.

Rei nodded, drawing her knees up to her chest like a small child. As cavalier as she appeared on the outside, he could tell in her eyes that something had cracked. “Yeah, you know, like local rough-and-tumble girls who live in the middle of nowhere and wrestle alligators and bake pies and shit. Anne and Scout and Jane, all that crap.” Kakashi blinked, trying to remember who, exactly, Anne and Scout and Jane were. Rei continued to speak before he could make the final connection. “Apparently Keihaku thinks that the ugly features like my scar and my crooked teeth and messy hair were ‘alluring’ in, and I quote, ‘a gross, kinky sort of way’.” Here, Rei made a face bordering both disgust and confusion. A casual acceptance of a harsh insult that deep down, she was clearly hurt by. And deep in the pit of Kakashi’s stomach grew a sharp, burning anger.

How could anyone ever say anything so cruel? And to his fiancée of all people? Kakashi sucked in a deep breath and clenched his fists at his sides. Nothing about the date itself or his prior uncertainty mattered anymore. All that was important now was that Keihaku Goman had hurt the love of his life and Kakashi could hardly contain himself. “The audacity…” he muttered through clenched teeth. “I can’t believe he would say something like that.” Rei turned to him and saw the darkness in his eyes, the absolute fury. Her gaze softened, sympathetic and sad. She hated seeing him get so pent up like this. And then Kakashi stood, reaching for his shoes by the front door.

“W-wait, where are you going?” Rei asked, scrambling to her feet.

Kakashi sighed and shook his head. “Someone ought to teach that asshole a lesson.”

Rei rested a gentle hand on his forearm, shook her head. Anyone else likely would’ve been far too intimidated to approach the infamous Copy Ninja in this way, but not Rei. She didn’t care. She knew better than to believe he would ever hurt her. “It’s not worth it” Rei softly insisted. “We’re never going to see him again. It’s fine.”

“But Rei—” Kakashi protested, but she simply shook her head and guided him back to the couch. She sat beside him and rested a hand on his knee. They remained silent for a long while until Kakashi calmed down. When he had, he turned to her and asked quietly, “Are you okay?”

Nodding, Rei replied, “Yeah. Yeah, I’m alright.” There was a sense of restraint in her voice, however, as if she was holding back tears. Kakashi tried to keep his cool. Forcing a laugh, Rei then added, "Honestly, I’ve heard worse from Sekkachi. Keihaku’s words mean nothing to me. He doesn’t know anything about me, so who is he to judge?”

“Rei…” Kakashi murmured. His pain in seeing her not just upset but faking a smile was immeasurable. He reached out to caress her cheek, press his forehead against hers. He closed his eyes and inhaled, drinking in every ounce of her presence. “He doesn’t know a damn thing” he whispered. “Rei, you’re the strongest and most amazing and intelligent and beautiful woman I’ve ever known. I just...I can’t fathom how anyone can be so…just…” He groaned in frustration, struggling to find the proper words.

“It’s okay” Rei assured him, studying his face and running her fingers through his hair. “I know.”

Kakashi grazed the scar across the bridge of her nose with his thumb, combed her hair back and chuckled lightly when his fingers got caught in the tangles. “I just can’t stand anyone hurting you” he finally whispered.

“I know” Rei whispered back, dripping with sympathy. “It’s fine, though. Really” she insisted. Kakashi opened his eyes and leaned back so as to better view her face. He searched her expression for the sadness he was sure he would find, but instead she now seemed at peace. She laughed softly as she added, “I think really, he’s just bitter because they recast his character in the next Makeout film.”

Kakashi blinked in disbelief, trying to digest this new information. “They did…?”

“Mmhmm” Rei replied, and now she was fighting a smile. Kakashi’s heart sang. She toyed with the hem of his shirt as she explained, “Apparently he was a total diva on set and was just an absolute nightmare to work with. I heard Yukie nearly quit on five separate occasions and insisted even she wasn’t this bad when she was a full-time actress. You can use that information however you will—I’m sure you’d know better than I would. But his attitude on top of the dick double debacle basically made for an absolute mess and they fired him two weeks ago right before filming began. I take it he’s milking whatever claim to fame he has left before the news breaks and everyone shifts their adoration to the new guy.”

Kakashi scoffed and nodded. “Good riddance” he sighed. This new information brought with it a welcome sense of relief, something Kakashi had been desperate for all week. “Did you at least humiliate him?” he then asked.

A sly, sickening smile then spread across Rei’s lips. “Maybe…” she said in sing-song. “Let’s just say that if all the swooning women didn’t know about his assets before, they do now.”

“You’re terrible” Kakashi shook his head. He only regretted not being there to see it himself.

“I bet that’s the last time he’ll ever try to mess with a ‘homegrown girl’” Rei replied. It was refreshing to see her use what was once an insult as a term of power and pride now. Keihaku Goman may not have seen the merit in a homegrown girl, but Kakashi certainly did. He wouldn’t have wanted her any other way.

Sighing, Kakashi leaned back against the couch, taking delight in Rei automatically snuggling up against his chest. When she laid beside him like this, everything just felt right. Her head nestled into the dip where his collar met his shoulder, her hand firmly monitoring his heartbeat. Toshio followed suit, leaping onto the open cushion to snuggle up beside them. “So you really wouldn’t leave me for some fancy film actor?” Kakashi asked, toying with Rei’s hair as he held her close.

Rei laughed and shook her head, looking up at him with a glimmer of ingenuity in her eyes. His heart swelled, he loved her so much. “And give up becoming Mrs. Hatake? Wife of the infamous Copy Ninja? I could never.” Toshio barked in stark agreement and Kakashi couldn’t contain himself any longer. He wrapped his arms around her tightly, burying his face in the crook of her neck so as to plant tiny little kisses all along her shoulder and collarbone. She squirmed with uproarious laughter, Toshio barking in amused spectatorship. It was moments like these, snapshots of the little life they had created together, that were all that truly mattered. The simple things. The things that money couldn’t buy. And that was enough. It was more than enough.

#rei natsuki #kakashi hatake #the scarecrow and the bell #naruto #naruto oc #fanfiction

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cutesuki--bakugou · 5 years ago

Text

Always

Main Pairing: Katsuki Bakugou x Koge Naegi (OC)

Story Rating: Explicit

Genre: Fluff / Hurt / Comfort / Romance / Domestic

Story Warnings: Topics of Depression / Anxiety / Body Image / Eating Disorder / Suicide, cursing, sex, alcohol

Chapter 1: Always, I’m Alone

1 | 2 | 3

Chapter Rating: Teen Warnings: Cursing, Children Tantrums, Parental Distress Words: 2,499

Bakugou, even though most people wouldn’t expect it of him, liked routines and consistency in his life. He had a schedule of how and when he did things, and though events could throw it off like an illness or injury, he still stuck to them the best he could. This included things that weren’t necessarily something that could be scheduled, but that he was used to occurring when he did certain things or came to certain areas. When he arrived home after a busy day at work, he was always greeted by his children, who came running up to him the instant they could hear the door opening. Then, a welcome home kiss from his wife before they began to prep dinner and the night would settle on from there.

It was something that he greatly enjoyed, to come home to his family and finally relax after a difficult day. Oftentimes, on days that were horrifically stressful like the one he had today, it was something that he looked forward to, wanting to just cuddle up on the couch for some TV or reading with his family. That is what he expected, what he had planned on happening, but the instant he walked through the front door, he knew that his usual daily comfort was going to be disturbed.

Loud, horrific screaming and crying could be heard through the entire house, and Bakugou was surprised that he hadn’t heard it from outside. From the severity of it, he knew that it was his two-year-old daughter, who had an attitude that could match his and a set of lungs that could break glass. Behind the tantrum that he was familiar with, he could hear the softer crying of his son, and though the four year old was more timid than his sister, he could still throw a fit fiercely enough to even bother his ever patient and calm mother.

At first, Bakugou though that something was wrong, his instinct to run in and protect his family foremost in his mind. That is, until he finally heard his wife, trying to calm the children.

“I know, baby, but we just can’t go today.”

“You promised, you promised!”

“We will have to go a different day, there’s no more time--”

“You’re a liar! Liar!”

Frowning, Bakugou left his belongings at the entrance and was quick to step out of his shoes, ignoring his slippers in favor of reaching the kitchen faster. Even as he entered, his presence was ignored, with his lovers back to him and his tiny daughter still screaming, latched to her legs as she held their son on her hip. Just from his first immediate glance at his wife, he could see that she was a complete mess, her white hair half fallen out of the high bun she usually sported and still in the same pajamas she had woken up in. It seemed as if she hadn’t had a moment to herself the entire day, but this wasn’t the first time he had seen her like this.

Koge took to being a parent faster than Bakugou could have ever hoped to, and though he hadn’t meant for it to happen, much of the responsibility caring for the children had fallen on her. Over and over, she told him that she didn’t mind, that she preferred to stay home with the children and stop working. But lately, there had been a frustration that he could see and feel, just from the way she acted with the children and even with him. They had yet to talk about it, as when he attempted to, she would blow him off and say that nothing was wrong. She would persuade him with a gentle smile and tender touch, claiming that she was just tired, and he would leave it at that.

Maybe that was the problem. Had he been wrong in not pushing the subject, to dig deeper and find out what was causing this change in her attitude? Now, as Koge placed her son onto the counter, reaching up to rub her face with both hands with slumped shoulders, Bakugou knew that he couldn’t keep out of this for another second.

“Natsuki!” Bakugou barked in the authoritative father voice that he had almost perfected. “That’s enough, stop screaming and pulling on your mother’s pants like that!”

Startling the child out of her fit, Natsuki turned her teary gaze up towards him, her cheeks flushed and wet with tears. “D-Da! Mommy lied!” Releasing Koge’s legs, Natsuki quickly dashed over to her father, clutching onto his pant leg instead. “No park!”

“All this screaming is because you didn’t get to go to the park today?” Bakugou squatted down, picking up the toddler before standing. “Your mother did not lie to you, Natsuki--”

“She did!” Natsuki squealed in a high pitched, pained voice that made Bakugou wince. “She promised! She did, did, did!”

“I said that’s enough. You won’t be going to the park at all this week if you keep this up. Utsuro, how long has this been going on?” As he questioned his lover, he came up to stand beside her, a bit shocked at the state of his son. “What the hell happened today?!”

Crying as well, Matsuki sat on the counter as Koge worked to clean a small wound on his forearm. It was a familiar, light burn mark that Bakugou could recognize, as it had come from the child's freshly developed quirk. Although he had at first been very excited that his son ended up with the same quirk as him, the timid nature of the child had caused a lot of problems, as it would go off any time he was upset or nervous. Even now as Koge worked to put ointment on the burn, his palms were crackling and popping. What was worse, was that he was covered head to toe in what looked to be paint, as if it had exploded all over him.

Koge only spared her husband a quick glance, a small shake of her head further displacing her messy hair. “His quirk went off while he was painting, and he panicked… So it just went off more and exploded stuff all over the place. He ended up burning himself on top of that…” As she spoke, her voice began to quiver, and a rare shine of tears appeared in her eyes. “Natsuki’s been screaming like this all day, over every little thing. Neither of them has taken a nap-- Ah, dang it!” As she moved to pick up the box of band aids, she instead knocked it off the counter, sending the contents all over the flooring.

As if that were the final straw, Koge didn’t even bother to bend down and get them, instead hiding her face in both of her hands as she took in a trembling deep breath. Bakugou’s heart ached to see her like this, as she was normally a very composed and emotionally stable person. There was something more bothering her than just a frustrating and bad day, but finding out why would have to wait.

Moving Natsuki over to his opposite hip, Bakugou placed his hand on Koge’s back. “Koge, why don’t you go take a break, I’ll deal with this.”

“I can’t leave all of this to you, Katsuki,” Koge shook her head, wiping her eyes before any tears could fall. “He still needs bathed, and the living room needs cleaned, there’s laundry and I haven’t done anything for dinner--”

“Hey,” Bakugou interrupted her with a soft caressing of her cheek, pulling her eyes off the scattered bandages to instead look up at him. In that moment, he could see how absolutely defeated she was, exhausted and pushed to her limits. With a gentle stroke of his thumb against her flushed cheek, Bakugou kissed her forehead. “I got this. Go upstairs, take a bath, and just relax for a bit, okay? I’ll take care of it.”

After a moment of contemplating, Koge gave a timid nod, looking over her son with obvious worry before she turned to leave. Before Matsuki could get upset, Bakugou stepped to stand in front of him, blocking his view of Koge as she left the kitchen. “Alright, you little squids, you get to deal with me, now.”

“D-D-Daddy,” Matsuki struggled to speak between his sobs, jumping from fright as his quirk went off again. “I-I-I can’t s-stop! M-My arm hurts!”

“I know, squid, it’s okay. Hey, Natsuki,” Squatting down, Bakugou stood his daughter in front of him, glad that she had at least stopped screaming. “Daddy needs your help.”

“I don’t want to!” Natsuki crossed her arms defiantly over her chest. “Meanie!”

“I am not a meanie. You had better stop talking to me like that, your little butt is going to be in time out. You know better than to talk to me and your mother like that. Don’t you want to help me make your brother feel better? He really needs our help right now, Natsu.” Picking up the band aid box beside his feet, he waited as Natsuki glanced up at her brother, shuffling about on her feet.

“He blew himself up.”

“He did. That’s why he really, really needs our help right now. I really need your help, too, because I can’t fix him without you.” Bakugou handed her the band aid box, which she took, holding it up to her face to peer into it.

“Daddy, there’s no band aids!”

“I know! Look, they’re on the floor. Why don’t you help me get them all up while I help Matsu feel better? You’re super-fast, you can do it, right?”

“I can do it! Very fast!” And with that, Natsuki began to pick up the band aids, shoving them haphazardly into the box. Giving a sigh of relief, Bakugou picked one up that was closer to him, wanting to finish helping Matsuki quickly. Still hiccupping with fresh tears running down his cheeks, Matsuki looked up at him, waiting as Bakugou gave his hands a quick wash in the sink beside him.

“D-daddy, my tummy h-hurts…”

“I know, squid. But it’s okay.” After drying his hands, Bakugou used a q-tip to place a little fresh ointment over the wound. “It’s not too bad this time, kiddo. Just a little mark. Were you painting?”

“Yeah… It wasn’t going good, anyways…” Tears no longer falling as the conversation distracted him from the injury, Matsuki reached up to wipe his face with his uninjured hand, though he only spread the still wet paint further across his cheeks. “I had messed it up already before I blew up everything.”

“Let me guess what you were painting… Me?”

Matsuki cracked a small smile, giving a shake of his head. “No.”

“No, not me? Okay…” Grabbing some gauze, Bakugou placed it carefully over the wound, before working to secure it with the bandage he had grabbed. “Then… Mom?”

“I painted her yesterday, Daddy, you remember?”

“Oh, that’s right, that’s right. Natsuki, babygirl, hand me another band aid?” When one was plopped into his hand by the highly focused toddler, he used it to secure the gauze as well. “Okay, if not me and not your mom… Not Natsuki, either?”

“Nope!” Now happily kicking his feet, Matsuki’s smile grew, as if he were just itching to tell what he had been painting. “It’s not a person.”

“Not a person, huh? Oh, I know.” Bakugou gave a sly smile, poking his finger into some of the still wet paint on his son's shirt. “All this blue paint… And some purple. Ah! A whale!” With a light poke, Bakugou plopped the glob of paint onto Matsuki’s nose, making the young boy burst out into giggles.

“Yeah! Daddy, how did you know?” Matsuki carefully slid off the counter with Bakugou’s help. “I didn’t give you any hints.”

“I’m just that smart, kiddo. Why don’t you go upstairs to your bathroom and take these clothes off, okay? Then I can wash the paint off you.” Bakugou gave Matsuki’s fluffy blonde hair a playful ruffle, sending him off.

“Daddy, Daddy!” Natsuki tugged on his hand to get his attention, holding up the box of band aids towards him. “I’m done!” Taking the box from her, Bakugou gave the top of her head a few pats, allowing her to hug his leg while he put away the items for the first aid back into the plastic box. “I’m sorry for yelling, Daddy.”

“Okay, Natsu. But I’m not the one you need to apologize to. When Mom comes out, you apologize to her, too. Promise?”

“I promise, Daddy! I go help Matsuki, okay?”

“Good girl.” As his daughter dashed away, Bakugou let out a heavy sigh, reaching up to pinch the bridge of his nose and rub the corners of his eyes. Although he had promised to take care of everything tonight to let Koge have time to herself, he could stop this constant heavy worry that had settled on his shoulders. He wanted to go comfort her, to find out exactly what was wrong and work out every detail to try and make things better, but for now, all he could do was give her time to recover and take care of the children.

What the hell is wrong with you, Koge… You can’t keep letting everything boil out of control like this and hide when you’re upset. How am I supposed to help you if you don’t tell me this shit?

Resting his elbows on the counter, he took a moment to contemplate his options. He knew that what she needed the most right now was time. Time to think, time to recover, time to herself, and just more time in general to get caught up on things. He felt ashamed with himself for not giving her that time more often, having been focusing so hard on his career lately that he didn’t take more than a day off a week. There were more factors in place besides his own selfishness in wanting to work so much. No, he had to work that much to support them while she was staying home. Yes, it was manageable for him and he didn’t mind it, but it was obvious that his increased hours and workload were taking more of a toll on her.

Still, he felt a sinking in his gut that told him that Koge was being dragged down by something more than just exhaustion. That feeling told him that he needed to be there for her, so pulling out his phone, he began to make his way towards the living room and up the stairs. As the phone began to ring, he held it up to his ear, walking slowly and talking quietly so he wouldn’t be noticed by those upstairs.

“Hey Mom… Yeah, not bad. Yeah. Hey, I need a favor… Can you watch the kids this weekend? Yeah, I’ll bring them tonight… Like two hours…”

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