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LOCKED IN | ARTHUR FREDERICK

chapter three is here! i'm so sorry about the wait but i'm hoping to become a lot more regular with my schedule and posting this story. thanks for all the love so far! feedback is always welcomed and my inbox is always open so please, please, please don’t hesitate to let me know your thoughts on the story. enjoy! <33

MASTERLIST

- C H A P T E R T H R E E -

“YN, to the Store Room.”

“Are you really going to make me get out of bed to come for a brief chat, Sugarlips?” YN groaned, letting out a disgruntled sound as she rolled over and planted her face into her pillow. She felt Steph rub her shoulder from above the duvet, having perched on the edge of YN’s bed as they said their good morning’s to each other. “I’m so cold. Don’t make me go.”

“Maybe it’s another secret challenge…” Steph wondered, standing from her place and grabbing fistfuls of the duvet with both of her fists, “come on, lazy bones. Up you get.”

“I’m cold,” she reiterated, feeling the chill of the bedroom air hit at her exposed legs, “please. Do not make me get up.”

Her socks felt twisted and uncomfortable on her feet and she guessed it was a good enough reason to sit up on the mattress because she couldn’t stop thinking about the feeling below her ankles. The sleeves of her jumper had risen to her elbows, the cuffs feeling tight around her arm and left crease marks in her skin, which she would use as knowledge that she had slept brilliantly through the night. 

Because she was finding it much easier. 

Everyone was pretty relaxed around one another now and everyone had adjusted to routines and little habits that needed to be done before ending their day. Snoring became a sound that soothed her to sleep rather than woke her from her slumber. The background chat that came in the mornings became her alarm clock and she didn’t mind waking up to join in with whatever topic they were talking about. Everyone’s mess became everyone’s mess around the house and she found herself busying her mind by tidying the different rooms in the house every so often. Because once she picked a t-shirt up or put a pair of shoes away at the end of someone’s bed, she had to pick the rest up. Time was still a struggle and she was finding it hard to go about her day without reaching for her phone or her laptop, needing some kind of escape from the small bubble, for just a moment but it was a detox that she’d be thankful for once she left the house and went back to the normality of her day-to-day life in London.

She slipped her feet into her slippers, a big and yellow smiley face adorned on the front in a carpet-like material, and scuffed down the alley of the beds and into the hidden room round the corner, opening the door and closing it behind her.

“Good morning, YN.”

“Sugarlips,” she greeted with a soft smile, sitting down and crossing her legs like she was back in a school assembly, hands holding her ankles to keep them in place, “what information can I grace you with this morning? Since you woke me up and had me leave the warmth of my bed.”

“How did you sleep last night?”

YN smiled a genuine smile at the camera.

“I slept brilliantly, thank you,” she nodded, sticking her two thumbs up, “I really did, honestly. It’s becoming so much easier to just fall asleep as soon as your head hits the pillow. No snoring keeps me awake now.”

“That’s good for a light sleeper.”

“I am not a light sleeper, let me tell you, Sugarlips. I just struggle to get to sleep, especially in a place where I’m surrounded by strangers who might look at me weirdly in my sleep,” she took a second to clear her throat into her fist before she continued, “once I’m snoozing and I’m all comfortable and warm, I’m out for the count.”

It sounded like heaven.

Most people could only dream of falling asleep as soon as they clambered under their bedsheets and and as soon as their heads hit the pillow behind them. As soon as their eyes closed and as soon as their brain switched off from the day, into a state where nothing was able to distract them from a much needed slumber after a busy day of working. 

YN saw it as a curse.

Where she loved being able to nap anywhere she wanted, loved being able to have a quick ten minute shuteye session on the train or in the back of a taxi cab, there had been many times where she would curse herself for being such a deep sleeper. Many a time where she’d slept through an alarm and had been late for work or for a meeting or for something as important as a video shoot for a channel she had been asked to be a guest on, many a time where she had overslept on a day off and wasted half of her day in bed because she was far too sleepy and far too comfortable to move elsewhere in her house (and why would she need to move if she had no plans?), and there had been many a time where she had overstayed her welcome in hotels because she would work hard for the event she had been invited to and really reap the benefits of being in a five-star bed in a five-star hotel building in a location that she could only dream of working in. 

In a house full of people who slept so differently, she felt it was more a blessing than a curse, at that very moment. 

“Who do you think is the loudest in the house?”

“Oh god, in what way?” YN sat herself up a little straighter in the chair and clasped her hands together in an excitable way, “because if we’re talking in general, I’d have to say Spuddz. He’s such a loud character who gets passionate and really excited about things that happened in here.”

YN had become used to his antics now.

Spuddz was the prankster of the house who liked to play jokes when there was a tiny lull of boredom; he’d hide and jump out at people when they walked passed him, he’d take away something they would use quite often and pretend he had no idea what they were talking about to only place it somewhere so inconspicuous that they wouldn’t even think to check there, he would jump on someone if they were snoozing under the covers in the bedroom, and he’d tell the wackiest jokes that you’d just have to laugh at because it was his delivery rather than the punchline that made it. 

He brought a bit of chaos to the place and he was entertaining, to say the least.

“But if we’re talking about snoring, god, then it has to be Jokeman. Without a doubt. I feel bad for Arthur having to sleep next to him,” YN admitted and shook her head in amusement; there were many times when a group of them would giggle amongst themselves at the sounds escaping his nose and throat, “I think I’ve just learnt to drown everything out now. It’s become such common knowledge in the house that you just learn to live with it, almost like it’s background noise.”

“And who do you think is the messiest in the house?”

“The messiest? Oh god,” she cackled softly and rubbed her eyes with the tips of her fingers, holding them there for a brief moment as she tried to recount everything from the last two days of being in the Locked In house. Her mind raced between everybody; their beds in the bedroom, their section of the bathroom, who left their shoes out and about and how they were when it came to cooking and cleaning after themselves. Including herself in the mix because she knew she wasn’t the cleanest person that entered the house. “I honestly, honestly couldn’t tell you. I feel like we’re all incredibly messy. My clothes are always all over the place. Spuddz always chucks his clothes out of the bathroom when he’s getting ready. All of us girls leave make-up everywhere when we’re getting ready in the mornings,” she tapped her chin in thought, “everyone contributes to the mess without really thinking about it.”

“Everyone?”

“Well, apart from Arthur, I guess. He might leave the odd bowl out from breakfast but he’s pretty neat with everything. His bed is always so pristine in the mornings,” she smiled softly, “he’s a neat freak, I think they call them.”

She remembered just what his bed looked like when she woke up that morning. Not a single trace of him left behind; no dip in the mattress where his body had situated through the night, no dip in his pillow from where he’d laid his head, no crease or lump to signify he was still there. He’d seemingly woken up before everyone that morning, she assumed, because his duvet was pulled up and his pillows were neatly placed at the head of the bed like he was done with it for the day, and YN wondered where he’d gone before Steph had made her way to her bed and flopped herself down. 

“I need him to start making mine, I think. Nothing is allowed to touch that bed from the moment it’s made, till the moment he gets in it at nighttime. He hates it.”

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The kitchen, just after lunchtime, was the perfect level of quiet. 

With the humming of the kitchen fridge and the whirring of the extractor fan above the oven and the trickling sounds coming from the tap once everything had been washed and left to dry on the drying board, it held a sense of silence that was the complete opposite to how it was just a mere half an hour ago; lunchtime being the time when everyone congregates in the kitchen to decide who wanted what for lunch with the limited items they had left from their big shop down just over two days ago. Shouting over each other as they let everyone know their orders on fried eggs opposed to scrambled, ketchup instead of baked beans and who wanted nuggets instead of sausages. All whilst other conversations were happening between he housemates. 

Chaos.

A lovely chaos but pure chaos, none-the-less.

“So, Youtube chat.”

“Yes,” YN grinned, taking her seat on the stool beside the brunette dressed in her peach tracksuit, “the one you wanted to have earlier?”

Anastasia nodded softly, watching as YN opened the pack of digestive biscuits and set them between the two of them.

“Now, I’d say we’re quite similar in what we do on Youtube, wouldn’t you think? I think we’d both fall into the subtopic of Lifestyle,” Anastasia stated, reaching for another chocolate biscuit from the pack that YN had placed on the kitchen island not too long before, pairing nicely with the two cups of tea she had made when Anastasia had asked her if she fancied going for a private chat somewhere - so they could get to know each other in a little bit more of a deeper level than just leaving it at a minor introduction, “I do a little bit of everything and I find I can’t stick to one topic in life. Where most of these guys have make-up or football, I feel like I dabble in a bit of every kind of thing you can show on Youtube.”

“Quite similar? I’d say very similar in terms of what we post,” YN laughed softly, “I just sit and chat. Almost like a vlog-style but not in the format of a vlog. I’m also yet to introduce my family onto my channel, like my parents and my grandparents and whatnot, and I want to make sure they’re comfortable before I bombard them with a camera in their face,” she took a sip from the mug of tea in her hands, “I have no siblings so it’s just me doing my own content. With the occasional pop up from a friend.”

“Do you have a boyfriend? Girlfriend?”

“I don’t,” she shook her head, placing the mug back down on the island top and pulling the sleeves of her jumper over her hands, “no boyfriends for me currently. I’ve been so thrown into this Youtube thing over the last twelve months that I just don’t find myself looking.”

“Not even just swiping Tinder or?”

YN shakes her head.

Sure, she had the dating apps downloaded on her phone; Tinder, Hinge and Bumble. 

But they were only there because her friends had encouraged her to put herself out there in the world of dating and had practically downloaded them to her phone themselves one night when they were together. Insisting that she had something good going for her and that people needed to see the true her and not the girl she portrays herself as online and in her Youtube videos. She found herself using them a couple of times, when curiosity got the better of her and she was in the mood to be nosey, when she was at home by herself and trying to find something to cure her boredom… yet nothing ever came out of swiping right or agreeing to a conversation that would become the driest chat she’d ever had.

“I feel like boyfriends, in this line of work, are something hard to find.”

Boyfriends would come and go in her life. 

Where she would love to have someone to settle down with, go on late-night drives with and take romantic walks through London with, her job came first. With her schedule being something that would almost look crazy busy to someone with a normal 9-5 office job and with her job being something out of the ordinary and not a sit-down job, it was something she thought would scare people off; who would want cameras in their face all day? Who would want their life to be broadcast for millions of followers to see? It would be somewhat of a dealbreaker between her and someone she liked to be around so she saved herself the heartache.

“Yeah, I find that everyone feels intimidated by it when I say I’ve got 1.3 million subs. The look of overwhelm on their faces just says it all really.” 

“Not that I’m holding back on relationships but,” YN sighed heavily and the feeling of dejection ran through her body, “I guess I’m just waiting for someone worth it. I don’t want to go through heartache after heartache, dealing with break-ups, when I could have saved myself from it from the very start.”

“Youtube is tough of the private life sometimes,” Anastasia agreed, nodding softly and she chewed upon a bite of a digestive biscuit held in her hand, chocolate coating her fingertips, “but once you find someone who loves you for you, who supports you and becomes your number one fan, who cheers you on and agrees to do things you want them to do for content, yeah… it’s the best feeling in the world.”

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“When was the first Nike Air Force 1 first released?” 

Johnny turned from the screen he read the question from and looked to face his team; Jemel, Jamie, Anastasia and YN, all of them looking at the four answers with puzzled looks on their faces as they thought long and hard about what the correct answer could be. Throwing around different ideas, conferring as a team, looking frantically at the brand-new white shoes on YN’s feet as they searched for any kind of clue that could give away what the answer could be.

“Does it say anything? At all?” Jemel questioned, looking over YN’s shoulder and shaking her head, “nothing at all.”

“Just split the items across the board. At least we win something, if not nothing,” YN suggested, “but put more on what we think may be the correct answer. If we win then there’s a lot of our items to have and, if we lose, then there’s a small minority of our items. A win-win either way.”

Johnny split the luxury items according to how YN stated, confirming with his team what number they were going for, dividing everything up and placing them on the dropboards before him.

“Lock in number 4. 1991,” Johnny confirmed, standing back from the table, “fuck.”

Number 2 dropped before them.

Number 3 dropped before them.

“Look me in the eye,” Johnny stated confidently as he made eye contact with the four players of his team, “this isn’t going anywhere. This,” he waved around the pile of items on number 4’s dropboard, “this isn’t going anywhere. Just look me in the eye and trust me.”

Trusting him is what they did…

… and trusting him is what they wish they didn’t do.

Number 4 dropped before them and they watched as the majority of their luxury items disappeared beneath the table. Sounds of complete shock filled the challenge room as they watched the events happen before them, leaving one tiny luxury left behind on number 1’s dropboard. YN frowned as she watched the collection of Cadbury’s Caramel chocolate bars disappear, her heart instantly dropping with them, and her face dropped to her hands. 

“You’re joking,” Jemel groaned behind his hands, hiding his face and dragging his palms down his cheeks, “we were certain.”

“Johnny, we’re not listening to you again,” YN frowned playfully at him as he paced the floor in front of the table, “you were so confident.”

“We’re a team, we all went for it. If you thought differently, you should’ve said,” he bit back in a tone that sent an ache through her chest. Making YN’s fake frown turn into a real frown. The creases on her forehead became more prominent, her eyebrows furrowed closer together, her eyes held a dark look behind them and she chewed her tongue in order not to fight back with him - it was a game after all. “Next question, next question.”

Cashews were on the line.

And the question was to do with the population of London, with answers varying between 2 million and 13 million, yet YN chose to keep herself from inputting an answer, staying put and staying silent. 

She watched as they dropped into the table and Johnny slammed his palm upon the tabletop, jumping in her place on the bench beside Anastasia, her cheeks going bright red and she could feel the two men behind her as they hunched over and groaned into their hands, crouching towards the floor. 

“They were cashews, the least they owed us was cashews,” Johnny hurled the words into the room, “cashews.”

The blue team thought they’d done the worst out of both teams partaking in the challenge… until the red team took their turn. 

As quick as the new piles of luxury items had been placed on the four dropboards, they had quickly disappeared after they gave the wrong answer to their first question. A question on Chunkz and his music. With a musically-inclined person in their team. 

The irony couldn’t have been any better.

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“Which one of you is doing the secret hiding challenge thing?”

Arthur broke the silence that had fallen amongst the group, all eyes focusing on him as he stood before the group, asking the question that had been brewing in his mind for the most of the afternoon once he realised a piece from his chess set had gone missing. Knowing that Jokeman wouldn’t have done it and that YN wouldn’t have taken it from him because she hadn’t had a reason to mess with him like that, and he hoped she didn’t take his accusation personally, but he had his suspicions on who it could be. 

“It’s not me,” he pointed to himself, “and it’s not you,” he pointed to Anastasia, “so who is it? Someone’s taken the rook from the chess set.”

YN gripped hold of the edge of the make-up table with her fingertips and leant back upon the yellow stool she was perched upon and tilted her head back to look at him, genuine concern on his face as he looked around the room and made eye contact to see if anyone was lying to him. His eyes holding more on those he thought could be the culprits. 

“It’s not me, I promise,” YN smiled softly, “I’ve barely been down there all day.”

Arthur looked down and nodded, “I know it’s not you.”

“How?” Johnny asked, “it could have been? Just because you fancy her, it doesn’t mean she couldn’t have stolen it as a joke or something.”

YN rolled her eyes.

She wasn’t entirely sure what she’d done to annoy Johnny and it hurt her brain to think about anything she could have said to him, in the three days they’d been there and in the very few conversations they’d had, that would have upset him or given him a reason to treat her poorly with his words. 

The words twanged at her insides and she frowned, eyebrows pinching together and her eyes went darker than usual, and she busied herself by cleaning up the make-up table in front of her and organising things into a more structured layout. 

And it wasn’t just YN who was upset by his words.

Arthur wanted to bite back. He wanted to defend her but it wasn’t worth the hassle because he would have fought in a game that would have had dangerous consequences on the outside world; he wasn’t a fighter, he wasn’t one for confrontation and he didn’t need to argue back in front of cameras that would have picked up the entire thing. He watched her, eyes flickering back to her every now and then, and he could see YN’s mind thinking the same thing with the way her eyes were dark yet still holding a touch of her usual spark when she made eye contact with him. 

“Bold on that one, Arthur,” Jokeman laughed from next to him, in an attempt to lift the mood and nudged him in the arm with his elbow, “although, YN’s far too sweet to even think about making someone so paranoid. This man is going through it right now. Look at him.”

Arthur’s cheeks flushed a bright pink.

“I just, I’ve been down playing chess for most of the day and I haven’t really seen YN all day so I didn’t think she’d do it,” he explained, “she might have done it behind my back or when I disappeared for a moment but I don’t think she would have done me over like that. She knows that chess is one massive love of mine.”

YN’s cheeks mirrored Arthur’s and she felt the heat creeping up her neck. 

He disappeared from behind her and into the bedroom where she could hear him asking Anisa, Jamie and Spuddz on whether they had taken the rook to his chess set and, once they swore to him that they didn’t, whether they knew who did take it from the board because he was determined to find the one who had done it.

“I think it’s you,” he stated, looking at Steph as she feigned shock, a hand placed over her heart and her eyes widening, “it has to be you. I’ve asked everyone else.”

“It’s not me,” Steph argued, shaking her head and placing her hands on her hips, “Arthur, it’s not me. I didn’t do it.”

“We’ve been upstairs,” Anastasia chimed in, “she wouldn’t have done it. She couldn’t have done it. She’s been with me.”

“I’ve managed to cross everyone else off the list. It’s you,” he frowned, “it has to be you. I’ve asked everyone else and they’ve all got pretty good alibi’s.”

He stood and waited for a reply. His eyes darted between the two girls before him. 

“Well, it’s not me,” Steph said, “it’s not, I promise you.”

Getting nowhere close to finding out who took the chess piece, Arthur gave up. 

A permanent frown etched on his face for the entire early evening and annoyance written across his body, his body language changing from his usual bouncy self to a more constricted self, because he was being kept away from doing something he enjoyed doing. Something that helped pass the time. Where others had the art of coming up with conversations to help them through the lingering hours, Arthur didn’t and he didn’t excel in conversations with people as well as everyone else so chess was his solace.

Minutes passed by, that turned into hours passing by, and by then, they’d all disappeared and dispersed into another room. YN found comfort on a beanbag with a blanket wrapped around her, to the back of the room where everyone had seemingly congregated so she could still listen to what was going on and she could still be a part of conversations that were happening, and it was the one thing she was thankful people understood about her; how she liked to be by herself, with her own thoughts, without forcing her to do things she didn’t want to do.

And her moment was torn from her when she watched Steph take Arthur aside.

She wasn’t staring, she wasn’t really interested in what they were saying and she didn’t really care for them being sat together and having a chat in the corner, but what seemingly bothered her was how she pulled him into a hug and kept him close, arms wrapping around his neck as his snaked around her waist. And she felt a pang of… dare she say it… she felt a pang of jealousy surge through her chest and she found it hard to take her eyes away from what was happening. She knew the cameras were on her and she knew they were watching her every move, as they were with Arthur and Steph, and deep down she knew she needed to stop feeling that way… yet she couldn’t stop herself.

“I did take your chess piece,” she announced proudly, “it was me. I’ve hidden it in one of the kitchen cupboards.”

And YN was torn from her distant gaze as he let out a blaring ‘I knew it’ into the quiet room and shot up from his seat, chasing Steph from room to room and ending out on the patio of the house where, just for a tiny second and through the gap between the doorframe and stairs, YN saw a second hug happen.

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‘Steph, your Shrimp 🍤 crew is absolutely here 💯 goooooo Steeeph 🤩’

“Shrimp crew?” YN laughed and looked across to Steph, “what’s that about?”

“It’s because my posture is always like this,” she hunched over in demonstration and brought her chest to her knees, letting her posture drop compared to the straight back she was sitting with prior and YN cackled softly, “it’s so bad so I just call my little following the Shrimp crew.”

“Do you know that girl?” Arthur questioned and looked at her and everyone snickered around them, even YN had a small smile tickle at the corner of her lips as she looked at his flushing cheeks and clueless look behind his eyes, “what?”

“It’s a comment, bro,” Johnny teased, pushing Arthur’s shoulder in amusement, “just a comment.”

‘Here we go!!!’

“Saffron,” Steph cooed, “that’s so cute.”

“That’s my best friend,” Anastasia grinned, pointing her fingers at the camera and smiling wide, “that’s my best friend. Love you Saff!”

‘I can’t wait, rooting for Jamie!! (LDN movements)’

“Jamie!” 

Everyone cried out his name once they read the comment on the screen and he stood to his feet, a bashful look on his face and he played shy for the group and for the cameras, clasping his hands before him and doing a tiny twirl before he sat back down on the sofa.

‘Arthur is too sweet. What a winner’

Everyone clapped for the comment and Arthur blushed a bright pink, Jokeman clapping him on the shoulders and giving him a gentle shake, cheering behind him. 

YN blushed when he looked at her after the noise and the commotion had died down, giving him the softest thumbs up and the cheesiest grin she could muster, and he shot her a wink before he turned back around and looked back at the screen. 

‘YN all the way! Love you girl! Smash it in there!’

“Yes, girly,” Anisa grinned and wrapped her arm around YN’s shoulder, pulling her into a hug as gave cheers of agreement with the comment before them, “guys, this is my winner right here. Along with me, of course. We can split the prize money.”

Arthur gave her the cheesiest grin he could muster and threw her a thumbs up, in the same fashion that she had done to him, and she giggled to herself and looked to her hands. 

The cutest, she thought to herself, absolutely adorable.

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The house had finally settled.

And, for YN, it was the first real moment of solitude that she’d felt that day. Night time seemed to be the first time, that day, where she managed to find time to herself, and it was like a breath of fresh air after another day spent navigating through people, friendships, challenges and tasks to win points throughout the show. She didn’t have to convene with anyone, no conversation was needed and she could finally be at peace with her thoughts as she reminisced on what was happening around her.

As her housemates retreated upstairs, either already asleep or engaged in the familiar ritual of preparing themselves for bed, she found herself drawn to the sanctuary of the lounge. She’d said goodnight to everyone as they made their way into the bedroom as she collected her lounge clothes and slippers so she could chill out in the living room, dragging the duvet down the stairs behind her, and saying goodnight to the last few housemates who were trudging themselves up the stairs.

“I feel like I haven’t seen you all day,” Arthur hummed quietly, taking the seat beside her on the sofa and pulling some of the blanket from her legs so he could cover his own from the chill in the air, “I definitely haven’t spoken to you all day, I don’t think.”

She smiled softly and shrugged gently, cosying back into the sofa and pulling her legs up to her chest.

“Are you okay?” 

He gazed at her face as he waited for an answer, whether it be a change in emotion or verbal, yet nothing seemed to make it obvious to him. 

“I’m fine, I’m just…” she watched as Spuddz and Jamie walked through the lounge area and towards the kitchen, saying their goodnights as they were the last two to disappear upstairs and get ready for bed, “I’m fine.”

“You don’t seem fine,” he pointed out, watching as the features of her face contorted into a look that seemingly made her look like she was about to cry, “did I say something?”

“No,” she frowned and she refused to let the tears that had been stinging at her eyelids come to bay, “I’m fine, honestly. I think I’m just overtired and now I’m struggling to feel tired enough to lay down and go to sleep so I just feel all-”

“Emotional?” 

She nodded and giggled softly, pulling the blanket up to her chin and focusing her attention on the soft fabric between her fingertips.

“You weren’t upset about what happened earlier, were you?”

He didn’t need to remind her; the situation had sat at the front of her brain for the majority of the evening. 

“Not really, it just annoys me that they insinuate things after everything we do together or whenever one of us defends the other,” she admitted, shrugging her shoulders and the stinging of tears seemed to subside a little as she spoke about what she had bottled up all day, “I think I just need to stop letting words affect me and grow up a little, I guess.”

“I think it was a valid reason to be upset,” Arthur said, “there’s a lot of loud voices in here that it’s hard not to feel upset when something is said with a little vigour and brashness. If it helps, I was going to bite back but I didn’t think it was worth it… he has a lot more fans than I do. I think, publicly, I’d have been torn to pieces.”

YN smiled softly at him and shook her head, “I think you’d have a lot of defence behind you. I’d be your number one defender, for sure.”

“Likewise,” he jabbed his elbow into her side, “we make a great team.”

[live-laugh-lenney]

any george or arthur angst 🙏

a little inspiration from the new platform roulette...

hurt.

that's how she felt whenever she heard arthur deny the relationship that they had been settled into for the last seven months. with every joke about being single and every joke about being with a woman alongside every laugh he let out when one of his friends made a joke about his dating life and his one-liners in an attempt to pick up women, it tore into her and broke her just a little more each time.

at first, it was something she was really thankful for. he wanted their relationship to be taken slowly, at a pace she was comfortable with, so she wasn't scared off by the way her whole life would become a whirlwind of chaos once his fans knew who she was. from the way her social media would have taken off to the way she'd have been a name they searched for online alongside his own to the way her name would have been in tweets and comments on his instagram, in both nice ways and hated ways. and, he wanted to protect her from the nonsense that she would have been flooded with.

but now?

now she wanted to show him off. she wanted to be shown off. she wanted to live their life together in public and not have to feel like she was being hidden away anymore. she wanted to be taken on dates, double dates, she wanted to share their relationship online with their little milestones, and she wanted to partake in the videos their friends post online without being kept in the background.

she didn't want to hide away anymore.

"people speculate about us anyway so would it be such a problem if we told them what they wanted to hear?"

what had started out as a peaceful night at home, waiting for the long-awaited release of arthur's appearance in platform roulette, had soon turned into a night full of anger and upset. their dinner getting forgotten about, the bottle of wine on the table being ignored and the tv had been paused on a moment that yn couldn't just let slide.

"you might be ready but," he runs his hands through his hair and tugs on the strands that his fingers managed to catch in his fists, "i might not be as ready as you. i don't want to rush things."

"oh, come on, arthur," she scoffs heavily and places her hands on her hips, "we've been together for seven months, can't you see where i'm coming from? or are you that blindsided and scared that you'll lose your fanbase because you won't be the cute, single man in videos anymore?"

the silence that soon followed was deafening.

and thick.

suffocating her with regret because she knew she spoke the words before she could think about how she wanted to get her point across to him. her heart dropped in her chest, almost the pit of her stomach, and she couldn't bring herself to look at him because she knows he'll pull a face that would break her into bits.

"you think i care more about the numbers on my socials than you?"

"that's how i'm feeling right now, arthur."

"do you know how stupid you sound right now?" his voice was thick and laced with anger, the words rolling off his tongue with a hiss, and it dawned on her that, maybe, there was a better way to have brought the topic up and not to cause a fight, "because you sound absolutely ridiculous."

"how would you feel if i went online and started acting exactly how you do in these youtube videos? pretending to be single with such a terrible dating life?"

his silence was just the answer she needed.

"exactly."

all yn could do was busy herself as she collected their dirty plates, food having gone stone-cold and wasted, trying her best to ignore how she was feeling deep down. she hated arguing with him, and the feeling was mutual from arthur, because she hadn't brought up her thoughts with the intentions of picking a fight.

"what do you want me to do, yn?"

"i want to feel like you care about me. i want to feel like you love me enough to show off how happy you are," she glances at him and he stands in the middle of the room like a lost puppy, completely unaware of what to do in that moment, "are you embarrassed of me?"

"embarrassed?"

"it's not a trick question, arthur," she grumbles lowly, scraping off the food from the plates and placing them in the kitchen sink, "are you or aren't you?"

"why would i be embarrassed of you? i have no reason to feel like that towards you, at all," his voice gets louder and she soon realises he's in the kitchen with her, his presence filling the room and she hears the wine glasses, that were in his hands, being set down on the side unit, "i'm far from embarrassed of you."

"then why won't you make us public?"

he gulps back the lump in his throat and leans against the counter, bending his elbows and resting his hands on the edge to keep his body propped up, and it's the first time where they're looking at each other without darkness taking over.

"i'm scared for you," he admits softly, "i want nothing more than to be able to talk about you, about us, with my friends in the videos we film out and about. but i know how brutal people can be and i don't want you to be a victim of social hatred because of who you're with."

"you can't just assume that, though."

"i've seen it happen to my friends, yn," he says; because he had. he'd heard stories about how chip's girlfriend struggled to adapt to his life as a youtuber, how theo's partner would read about herself online to see what people were talking about, how shannon felt when she was with chris. he'd heard it all and seen it all happen. "i didn't want you to tear yourself apart, to become a shell of yourself, because of some of the bullshit people write online."

the words wants to come out but she couldd't speak.

she'd overreacted and it definitely dawned on her, in that moment, that it was something that didn't need to be argued over.

"i just want to keep you safe, yn. that's all."

[live-laugh-lenney]

LOCKED IN | ARTHUR FREDERICK

a whole year and it's finally with you! thank you for all your patience and all your lovely messages and comments about this new chaptered fic; i'm so incredibly excited (and incredibly nervous) to share it with you and show you the project i've been working on these last twelve months. i wanted it to be absolutely perfect before you got your hands on it. feedback is always welcomed and my inbox is always open so please, please, please don't hesitate to let me know your thoughts on the story. enjoy! <33

- C H A P T E R O N E -

“I’m actually terrified.”

The black car, donned with the FootAsylum logo that had been printed on the back passenger doors, rolled up the gravel driveway and stopped before a modern-looking home hidden deep in the countryside of a place she could tell was hours from home. With her phone being taken away and with nothing to keep her occupied, except picking at her nails nervously or chewing on the inside of her mouth, she couldn’t keep track of the hours she’d been sat in the car… but given the numb bum and the sickly feeling from the rumble of the car and having nothing to eat due to her nerves, she would have guessed her travel time had been, at least, two hours. Studio lights littered around to keep the grounds lit so everyone knew where they were going, the house being illuminated and almost in a spotlight to give it a real studio vibe, and it had finally set in her mind rather quickly that this was her reality for the next two weeks. The nerves that she tried to hide, swallowing back every lump in her throat and ignoring every bad thought that crossed her mind, were slowly coming back to haunt her and her knees couldn’t stop bouncing in the footwell in the back seat. 

“This is terrifying.”

Once the car came to a stop at the end of the driveway, she took a moment to herself.

The driver sat in the front, plugging in a destination into his built-in sat-nav that would either be taking him home or back to a building where the producers and the directors of the show were all huddled inside, yet she couldn’t bring herself to be nosey. And as her hand came to clasp around the handle of the backdoor, she could see her hand shuddering with uncertainty. There was no chance she was backing out of this opportunity now; it was the first day and she wanted to prove to people she could do this. That she was worthy of a place in the house. Having been on the Youtube scene for just over 12 months, she never thought her first year would end in her being part of a reality show centred around those with huge followings and a name for themselves and she wanted to show how serious she was about taking any given opportunity in her grasp and enjoying every moment life had to offer her.

Once she saw who she was going to be locked into a home with for two weeks, she did some digging on just who they were, putting a face to a name and googling them in hopes to find their social media accounts. Gaining the basic information and following their Instagrams and subscribing to their Youtube channels so she could scope out everyone as to not seem so clueless once she walked into the house. 

So she knew of a few of them.

It was nerve-wrackingly brand-new for her and it was something she never imagined herself doing when she posted her very first Youtube video just a short twelve months ago; being pushed into a house with nine other Youtubers who were practically strangers to her and, in that moment and before she met then, it was something she considered to be almost as bad as a worst nightmare.

The gravel rocks and the tiny stones of the pathway crunched beneath her trainers as she neared where she assumed the front door to the house was. Her eyes scanned across the wooden panelling of the front and she truly felt like an idiot, even more so because of the cameras hidden in every nook and cranny around her that would pick up her dumbfounded moments, as she tried to find a door handle or a doorbell that would somehow get her into the warmth of the house. The black bag on her shoulder which she, and the entire cast of the second season, had been asked to advertise as they walked up the entrance, kept slipping down to her elbow and eventually she gave up adjusting it and just let it swing to and fro as she questioned everything happening before her.

“How the hell do I get in? Is this a challenge or something? I feel like I’m being punked here.”

There was a gentle change in the way the wall was built and she pushed a panel to make the front door more noticeable, revealing the entrance hallway of the place that was going to be her new home for the next fortnight. Light strips coloured with neon green lighting her way, stuck to the walls and almost guided her in the right direction of where everyone else seemed to have congregated, fitting the whole aesthetic and colour theme of how the show was advertised and promoted on the outside world. Lots of monochrome, blacks and whites, with a burst of colour that surrounded her. The heat of the inside immediately hit her as she stepped foot into the hallway and let the door close behind her with a whoosh, shutting by itself once it hit the frame of the doorway. The lights were bright, as opposed to the scenery of the sun setting upon her arrival, and she could hear the chaos of everyone already enjoying themselves and introducing themselves further to each other - and she secretly prayed that she wasn’t the last one to enter the house. 

She took the chance to have a quiet glance around at where she was before she made her way into the centre of the house, cautious as she looked around to make sure no one was hiding and ready to jump out and make her jump, because that was the one thing she absolutely hated and she definitely would have held a grudge, mentally planning the next move in an unproposed prank war between herself and the housemates. 

“There’s someone coming.”

“Guys, someone’s here!”

“Someone new!”

“Finally!”

“That makes ten of us. I reckon that’s all of us here.”

YN stood still on the spot, taking in the deepest intake of breath to prepare herself before she exhaled slowly through puckered lips, trying to rid herself of the nerves that were sitting low in her stomach and making her feel sick, to keep her heart from racing and thumping rapidly in her chest.

When she was first asked to be one of the housemates for that year, she thought it looked fun and she was always up for trying new things and stepping out of her comfort zone. She was the biggest advocate for telling people, through her Youtube videos, that they should try out new things because they’ll never know how they feel unless they gave it a go. She shook her limbs to rid the nerves making her shake and she rolled her neck, giving herself the quickest pep-talk in her mind, and she took the last few steps from the room she was standing in and into, what she could only guess was, their kitchen and dining area together.

“Hi!”

“Oh my god, hi!”

“Hello!”

She was overwhelmed with the greetings, dropping her plastic FootAsylum bag to the floor and feeling the warm embrace of someone instantly wrapping their arms around her, a sweet and floral smell of someone’s perfume filling her nose as she reciprocated the hug, long hair tickling at her nose. Her eyes darted from face to face, slightly overwhelmed yet the feeling had slowly felt less suffocating and she took the chance to bolden her demeanour. The males taking their time to come forward and introduce themselves yet the females wasted no time in wanting to get to know her, patiently waiting for their time to bring her into a hug and find out more about her.

“I’m Anastasia,” the girl introduced herself and YN introduced herself in response, and she gave YN one final squeeze before pulling away, stepping aside for someone else to take her place. YN had seen Anastasia on her Youtube recommendations, at a time when she started gaining inspiration on how she wanted to run her channel and a long while back when it was just a mere thought, and it was nice to be given the chance to meet her on a more personal level than just what she showed for the cameras and for her vlogs. “It’s so good to finally meet you!”

A short queue-like crowd of eight other people had formed around her and the nerves that had been sitting in her belly had almost disappeared once she realised they were all in the same boat - no one really knew anyone in this place, they were all there to get to know one another and they were all there to fight for the winning place. They were all there for the same reasons, all going through the same thing, feeling the same feelings and experiencing the experience together so it made everything feel much less intimidating.

She hugged everyone around her, introducing herself as they introduced themselves, and they seemed like a truly good bunch of people to spend the next fourteen days with and she was excited to form special friendships with the whole lot of them. 

One guy hung behind from the introductions, waiting incredibly patiently, dressed in all black with the sleeves of his hoodie hiding his hands as his fingers played with the hem in a nervous manner. Brown hair upon his head, tousled and messy, and the most engaging brown eyes that didn’t seem to leave her face as he drank in everything about her. Every inch of his face was beautiful looking, sculpted perfectly, with the curve of the tip of his nose looking soft and the stretch of skin across his cheeks looking rosy and pink. She felt a connection to him, she felt easy around him without even knowing his name, and it was a feeling she couldn’t get rid of as if there was something that intrigued her about him that she was desperate to figure out.

“I’m Arthur. ArthurTV,” he grinned, almost hesitating as he went in to give her a hug, but barely resisting when she wrapped her arms around his neck and initiated the greeting between the two of them, forearms resting on his shoulders as her hands joined at the back of his neck, “it’s so lovely to meet you.”

“I’m YN,” she smiled softly to herself, reading off her Youtube name in a similar fashion to how he had introduced himself and he snickered softly as she pulled away from him and broadened the gap between their two bodies, “it’s lovely to meet you, too, Arthur.”

“Did you struggle as much as me to find the entrance to this place? Because I must have looked like a massive tit to the cameras when I walked straight past the entrance and round the corner in hopes I’d find a backdoor or something,” he admitted, a laugh following in suit as she giggled and shook her head, “honestly, I just hope everyone else did the same.”

“It took me ages to find the door. I didn’t walk past it but I just stood there, staring at it, trying to figure out what the hell was happening. Thought that if I stared long enough, I’d see into a void and it would just appear,” she admitted and shook her head at how silly she was going to look in the eyes of those watching when it went live over on Youtube, “we can both look like tits together, I guess. Great first impressions to the public and all.”

“I do say that we make quite the perfect pair,” he joked, internally wanting to crawl into a hole and disappear at how corny he must have sounded, except she laughed at his attempt at humour and he swore he felt butterflies in his belly, “come and get to know everyone properly. We think you were the last person to join us now there’s ten of us standing here.”

So she was the last.

She knew it.

✦•······················•✦•······················•✦ ✦•······················•✦•······················•✦

It was Spuddz’s idea.

“Hot Seat! Let’s do Hot Seat.”

And YN couldn’t lie, the volume at which he suggested it had woken her up a little from her daze. 

Her eyelids felt really heavy and her eyes were stinging, almost screaming at her to give in to the temptation of snoozing and go to nap, and that was probably due to the lack of sleep she’d gotten the night before her arrival into the house. Because all night, all she could think about was the worst of what was about to happen. In a situation unknown to her, with people she didn’t know well enough, all she could think about was how she’d be an outcast compared to everyone else. 

She didn’t want to be the first one to announce her departure from the room, disappearing and missing out on the rest of the evening, just because she needed an hour's shuteye to feel a little more refreshed. But the warmth between the arm of the sofa and having Arthur seated beside her was enough to lull her into a state of complete peace and relaxation, almost completely at ease with everyone, listening to everything that was happening around her and chiming in with her own questions whenever she was prompted with something when they spoke about something that piqued her interest in the matter. 

Arthur had been her saviour in the first few hours of being in the Locked In house.

She hadn’t been glued to his hip for the entirety of the evening… although she thought she had been. Since their first hello’s were shared just a few hours prior, she felt magnetised towards him. She wasn’t sure what it was about him but she felt like she could be herself around him… maybe it was because he had taken time to greet her and introduce himself, maybe it was because they had common traits that made them feel comfortable with each other, maybe it was because she found him attractive and wanted to get to know him more. She couldn’t put her finger on anything definite but he made her feel a sense of confidence within herself. Like she could do anything that FootAsylum threw at her.

She had taken time to pop over to the girls of the house and have a chat with them so she could understand who they were and what their personalities were like. And she had been indulged in a joke war with SomeJokeman when he broke their awkward silence by cracking out a ‘Knock Knock’ joke for her to answer. But she always found herself always gravitating back towards the brown-haired, brown-eyed man who kept himself to himself and let others involve him rather than forcing himself in conversations happening around him. He was the one who had shown her around the house, the one who let her know what bed was free and who had claimed certain spots to be theirs and he was the one who let her take in the surroundings on her own accord.

The late afternoon hours had passed by, although they had no idea on what the time was, and it felt like they’d known each other for longer than a mere few hours. Where everyone was bouncing off questions and getting to know one another in a setting that was getting quite loud and confusing, the suggestion of getting to know one another at the pace of one at a time was something they could all agree upon. 

“We’re gonna put Jamie in the hot seat first,” Spuddz informed, letting the lad stand up from his place on the sofa and in front of everyone, “please, young man, state your name for the audience.”

“My name’s Jamie, otherwise known as LDN Movements,” he started off, clapping his hands and clasping them together in front of him in a nervous way, “is this how we do this? You ask me questions and I just answer them?”

“Yeah, yeah,” Spuddz nodded, “like an interrogation.”

And it began from there. 

Question after question came out, and she couldn’t fault him and everyone else with how they dealt with the quickfire questions being thrown at them from all areas of the lounge room. Answering with detail and speaking with gusto and enthusiasm as they all took the chance to get to know one another; finding out what they were like as a person, what their Youtube careers was based upon, what they did when they weren’t filming and what their hobbies and passions in life were.

“YN! Our last little newcomer,” Steph grinned at her from the sofa on the right, wiggling her fingers in an attempt to get her to stand to her feet and take her place before everyone, “it’s your turn, darling.”

She sighed in feigned dramatics, rolling her head back against the sofa before smirking and standing to her feet, much to Arthur’s dismay as he felt the cold air take over where her warmth had once been.

“I’m YN, as you already know,” she smiled, drawing out a long curtsey before everyone, “I don’t really do very much, to be honest. I started out on Instagram, gained myself a good following of young people who were interested in reviews of different daily products and skincare routines and such, and I went from there. I’m a lifestyle Youtuber, I guess. Moved my content into a much longer form instead of small Instagram videos and stories.” 

“What is a ‘lifestyle Youtuber’?” Johnny asked, leaning forward and placing his elbows on his knees, resting his chin on the palms of his hands, “I’ve never really heard of that.”

“I basically just vlog about my life? I don’t know how to explain it,” she felt her cheeks getting hot under Johnny’s gaze and she stared at the floor beneath the lightened oak coffee table in the centre of the room, “I film bits of my day, what I do, I never understand why people enjoy watching videos about my life but… they got me here. Which, of course, I’m so thankful for. So many opportunities have come my way since then and it’s all because of them.”

When she posted her first video, a ‘get to know me’ post that consisted of a compilation of frequently asked questions from her Instagram page that people wanted to know about her, she had no idea that she would be where she is now. A video where she opened up and shared more about herself and her personal life - from the quick and easy questions about her relationship status and her family life and where she grew up and what she studied in school to what she wants out of life and where she sees herself in five years time and what she thinks is the biggest issue in the world as we know it - had gotten her onto a pedestaled platform where, for the year, she had been able to share her tips and her tricks in how to get by in certain scenarios. 

She vlogged her daily life, from the moment she woke up in the morning to the moment she laid her head down on her pillow at night, and people loved to see what she got up to. Her friends became constant guests in her videos, partaking in small challenges and Q and A’s that were topical to whoever she had on screen, and her fans loved to see her in her social group where she let her true enjoyment and her true self be seen. 

She loved what she did.

She was lucky to be where she was.

She had a supportive following who loved her, supported her, made sure to help boost her name into the general public and she repaid them back by giving them back the amount of love that they gave to her.

And she wouldn’t change any of it for the world.

“Here, here,” Jamie cheered, “very lucky to have people watch us and support whatever we choose to do.”

“I don’t think any of us would be here,” YN pointed to the exact spot she was standing in with both of her pointer fingers, “without our subscribers and our followers. I thank my lucky stars every single day that I am where I am.”

Steph cooed softly at the words YN let slip off her tongue and she suddenly felt very open and vulnerable.

“Do you just post videos about a day in your life? Do you do challenge videos or react videos or anything like that?” Arthur asked, also following in suit of Johnny and leaning forward, placing his elbows on his knees and cupping his own face with his palms and as similarly as they were sat, she could look into Arthur’s eyes and speak to him, “do you just do reviews or?”

“I just do reviews, yeah. I don’t really focus much on the internet world and celebrities but more the real world and I just have a chat with the camera as if I was talking to my followers personally. I talk about topics people are chatting about all the time, what people comment about, and what’s trending. Whenever I get asked to do advertisements and such, I review different make-up products, skin care products, I show off my bedtime routine and my make-up routine and what products I use for skincare. I get sent clothes from various brands and do mini hauls, in the summer and the winter, on what I like and what suits me and what I would wear for specific occasions,” she grinned softly, “I should get you guys on. I think I could definitely use Arthur as a dummy to test out different make-up looks.”

Arthur blushed and shook his head, cackling softly, “I think you’re the more beautiful one out of us. You don’t need me to ruin it.”

“Arthur has rizz, you know!” Jokeman bellowed from beside him, clapping him on the shoulder as he blushed in his seat, “this is like a dating show, I’m telling you. Watch this space! Locked In is the new Love Island.”

There’s a chime that brings the conversation to a halt, saving Arthur from any more embarrassment from what the others had to tease him about, with the screen lighting up on the wall with an announcement, in the form of a tweet from Twitter, appearing on the screen.

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From the moment she arrived, YN had been craving a bed.

As soon as her head hit the plush cushion at the height of the bed, her slippers having been kicked off at the side and her pillows plumped up so she could sleep a little more upright, she could feel her eyes getting heavier and heavier as she got more and more comfortable. Watching as everyone else readied themselves for bed, with make-up free faces and blankets wrapped around their shoulders, dressed in the comfiest of clothing as they went about their nightly routine. Teeth being brushed, faces being washed, clambering into bed before the lights went out.

To one side of her, she had Anastasia.

To the other side, she had Arthur.

A grin on his lips as he made eye contact with her from beneath the duvet that was pulled up to his chest, hair tousled and his fringe sticking to his slightly damp forehead from where he’d washed his face, cheeks red from where he had scrubbed his skin with a cleansing wash. Her cheeks flushing red once she realised he was looking at her and she giggled softly and shook her head at him, pulling her own duvet to her chin and nestling a little further down on the mattress.

A grin on his lips as he made eye contact with her from beneath the duvet that was pulled up to his chest, hair tousled and his fringe sticking to his slightly damp forehead from where he’d washed his face, cheeks red from where he had scrubbed his skin with a cleansing wash. Her cheeks flushing red once she realised he was looking at her and she giggled softly and shook her head at him, pulling her own duvet to her chin and nestling a little further down on the mattress.

“It was good meeting you, YN.”

“You say that like we’re gonna be apart forever after we close our eyes. Like we’re just gonna die and never wake up,” she snorted, rolling onto her side to face him better, “sucks for you that you’re gonna be stuck with me in here for the next two weeks.”

“Doesn’t sound so bad to me,” he hummed, closing his eyes and pretending to fall asleep, leaving her in a slight state of shock as she took in what he had said so nonchalantly.

[live-laugh-lenney]

Can u pls write a smut where Arthur comes home after the worst in class episode in his little green suite, and maybe they roleplay or sumthing more vanilla

i'm telling you... there's something in the air right now because all these british youtubers are going through the peak of their lives right now in terms of how hot they're looking... don't tell me you don't agree. 👀 || WARNING: SMUT.||

"stay right there."

"pardon?"

"i need you to stay right there for a moment. don't move," she insists, holding a finger in his direction to keep him still, occupying the open doorway of arthur's en-suite bathroom and allowing her eyes to take in his appearance by dragging her vision up the figure dressed so elegantly in a suit coloured with a deep green material, "let me look at you for a minute."

"i'm confused," he hums out, hands on his hips and his elbows bent outwards, his eyebrows furrowing on his browline as he felt desperate for an answer, "what is happening?"

"don't be confused, babe," she shakes her head with a smirk on her lips, finally letting her eyes land on his face, "i just, i really like this look right now."

it dawned on him then, in the moment they finally made eye contact, that she was feeling a rather specific way towards him in the outfit he had worn for a video shoot that afternoon, his cheeks flushing a pink colour at how ravenous she seemed to look from where she had been stood in the doorway of his bathroom. her eyes had darkened, pupils large and black and overtaking the colours of her orbs, and she'd pulled her bottom lip between her teeth and she chewed hungrily on the flesh... all whilst refusing to tear her eyes away from his face.

"oh, you do, huh?"

"yeah, i really like it."

he cautiously took a step towards her and he was certain that he saw an intake of breath get caught in her throat, and the way her eyes widened at his movement had the depth of his stomach tingling, an urge to reach her quicker than he was planning to.

"don't take it off," she whispers softly, taking one large step to close the gap between them, his warm breath washing over her face and she felt her knees almost buckle beneath her, "keep it on. please."

his arms wrapped tight around her waist and he pulled her close to his front with her arms, out of pure instinct, joining around his neck, hands connecting at the nape of his neck and her fingers finding refuge in the hair at the back of his head. twisting the tips into the soft strands and pulling ever so gently on the tufts she had a hold of.

"someone's really in the mood today," he admits cheekily and she can't help but gulp thickly to his question, "did you miss me today?"

"miss you all the time you walk out the door," she says in reply, dragging her arms down his shoulders and loosening the tie that was still done to perfection around his neck, "but when you come back looking like this-"

"like what?"

he wanted to hear her say it. he wanted her to use her words. he just wanted to have clarification, to hear her verbally admit to him, that it was a turn-on for her to see him to handsomely dressed.

"arthur, please."

it was whiny, desperate, beautifully implorable and he could feel himself harden up in his boxers at the mere thought of being just brief minutes away from being deep inside her, having her mewl out and moan in pleasure, living a fantasy she'd never thought much into before. his fingers digging into her hips, his heart racing in his chest, tongue licking across his bottom lip at the thought of having her weak and reliant on him as she stood before him.

"tell me," he whispers softly, leaning his head down and much closer to her level, the tip of his nose brushing against her cheek as he spoke gently into her ear, "tell me how turned on you are. tell me how you want me to fuck you right now. tell me how you feel, lovie."

"i need you," her head tilts back and his eyes matched the exact same darkened look that she had in her eyes, moments ago, her hands pulling his head closer to hers and her lips brushed over his, "right now."

"right here?"

she nods quickly in response, "please."

his lips attached themselves to hers in a rough kiss, full of passion and hunger, overwhelmed by the desire to have her where she was so in need of him. his hands gave the tops of her thighs a pat, urging her to pull away from his lips and to jump up for a second, hands ready to catch her as her legs wrap around his waist and her ankles hook at the base of his back. immediately going back to having their lips dancing together with passion.

her back was soon against the mattress, body placed on the edge of the bed as he pulls away from her, standing above her.

"don't you dare take it off," she cries out breathlessly, shaking her head when she saw his fingers touch the buttons of the blazer, "don't, please."

"how am i supposed to-"

"just take your pants off," she digs her toes into the plump flesh of his covered bum and urges him to return to his previous position, "we don't need romance right now, arthur. i just need you. i want you."

the urgency in her voice, dripping with a desperate plea, had him eagerly throbbing behind the material of his trousers. fingers undoing the belt, followed by the button, followed by the zipper as he wiggles out of the waistband and lets the garment drop to his knees. her eyes wandering down his body, settling on his hardened cock hidden by his boxer shorts, pleading with her eyes to release what she was after.

he sprung into action, her head rolling back because she was always in complete awe and astonishment at how lucky she'd gotten to be with someone so incredible as pleasing and satisfying her, knowing she was in for a treat that afternoon. he hoists up the material of her t-shirt and hooks his fingers into her knickers, pulling them away from her core and revealing the wet and glistening folds between her legs.

"you really are desperate for me, hm?"

she nods and her attention reverts back to him when she feels his weight adjust above her, his knees propping her legs open so he had access to tease her entrance with the tip of his cock.

with a deliberate thrust, he sank into her and filled her completely, enticing a stunned gasp from deep within her. pleasure coursing through her as he stretched her in ways she had felt before but would never get over - it was thrilling for her, knowing he had the same effect on her like he did the first time they shared a intimate evening together. they moved together, a rhythm building between them as her hips bucked up every time he gave her a thrust, each one sending waves of ecstasy through her body. toes curling, fingers gripping at the material of his blazer, knees tensing around him in an attempt to have him go deeper.

they were lost in each other. the chaos of london outside his window fading away as they surrendered to the pleasure that had overtaken their bodies as he continued to thrust, each movement sending her closer and closer to the edge.

“don't stop,” she gasps out, her breath coming in quick bursts, "don't you dare."

he responded with fierce intensity, their bodies continuing to move together in perfect harmony, the heat between them becoming thick and palpable, a fire that threatened to consume them both.

and as they reached the peak of their pleasure, she cried out loud, her body quaking in ecstasy as she fell over the edge without a care in the world on who could hear her. the world around her exploding in a blur of sensations, her body arching and trembling as she gave in to the white hot ball of pure electricity that erupted in her belly.

arthur followed closely behind with his own release. his own moans filling the air and mixing with her purrs of pleasure once she'd hit the high, his body falling beside her in the aftermath of their passion. breathless and satisfied.

"that was amazing," she whispers hoarsely, feet flat against the floor as her back stayed flat against the mattress, "i don't know what came over me then, i'm so sor-."

"don't even think about apologising," he turns his head to face her and she can see sweat clinging to his forehead and his eyes watering so slightly at the corners, "that was incredible. i might have to come home wearing suits more often."

"i don't even know if it was the suit, the colour, the fact i missed you a lot today," she shrugs, "whatever it was, i hope it never disappears."

silence swallows the both of them, their heavy breathing being the only sounds to fill the quiet of the room, his fingertips brushing over hers as they laid together on the edge of the bed.

"reckon we should get cleaned up?"

she nods, "can we have a bath though? i don't know if i can stand."

"i did you that good, huh?"

[live-laugh-lenney]

could you do one where r has really bad endometriosis (I struggle myself so bad omg) and Arthur helps her? just fluffy supportive bf and then maybe a feature from the other boys? xx

just want to clarify, i don't suffer with endometriosis so i have no idea if i've done this any justice but i hope you guys enjoy! <33

"lovie, are you okay?"

she hated the concern that dripped heavily from the words rolling off his tongue.

not because she hated how sweet he was being by checking in on her as she sat under the hot water in the bath, letting the shower run over her head and patter loud yet soothingly against the surface level of the bath she'd run to soothe her aches and pains, giving her space and supporting her from afar.

not because he was being the caring boyfriend, making sure she was alright and that he was there if she needed anything, waiting outside the bathroom door with a warm hoodie of his and some comfortable trousers that she could lounge around his house in,

but because she hated how she thought she'd ruined a perfect and beautiful sweet moment between the both of them.

laid upon the sheets of his bed as they gained their breaths back after spending minutes in a mood filled with deepest intimacy, their skin covered in the slightest sheen of sweat, their clothes strewn across the floor, with the room filled with the softest glow emitting from the flickering candle on the shelf in the corner of his bedroom.

"i'm fine," she croaks back over the sound of the water, tears having subsided and all she could feel was the remnants of pain still holding on to her as she felt the worst of it had passed by, arms cradling her knees to her chest, "i just need to sit here for a bit but i'll be out soon."

"can i-"

he cuts himself off because, as much as he wanted to offer to sit in the bathroom alongside her and hold her hand through the aching of her belly, would she want him there?

"yeah," she mumbles softly, "please."

arthur's hand curled around the door handle and he poked his head into the brightly-lit room, his eyes squinting as they adjusted to the lights above his head, and she couldn't help but to just stare at him as he made himself known in the room. his hair still a mess upon his head, from both the pillow and from her roaming hands, but he'd dressed himself in a baggy hoodie and a pair of boxers that she could just see beneath the bottom of his jumper.

"i'm sorry."

it's the first thing she wanted to say, to clear the air, to make him feel like he understood how she was feeling.

"what for? it's not something you can control so you don't need to feel this way, ever," he leans up to turn off the shower head, stopping the water falling from it, before he crouches down by the edge and rests his elbows on the ceramic tub, letting his hands hang down and dip into the water, "you don't need to apologise for this, okay?"

"but we were having such a perfect night together," she frowns and she can feel the lump forming in her throat, aching and burning and she could sense herself wanting to cry again, "i hate how it ruins the most beautiful moments. because i don't want to stop doing what i enjoy, what makes me feel good, what brings us closer together."

"it didn't," he smiles softly, reaching up a wet hand and cupping her cheek softly, letting his damp thumb run across the skin from her nose to her ear, "i promise you, it's not ruined anything. it won't ever ruin anything between us. i understand you. and i understand your condition."

she tilts her head into his touch and closes her eyes and he watches as her eyelashes flutter against the curve of her cheeks, silence swallowing them up as they sat amongst the presence of each other, no need for words to fall from their lips to soothe the other. his touch was all she longed for in that moment; soft, caring and gentle and a complete contrast to the pains that had engulfed her just moments prior.

"i feel like i've won the lottery," she whispers softly, eyes looking over to him and she feels butterflies flitting around her belly when he looks her dead in the eyes, "i hit the jackpot with you."

"likewise," he grins widely, standing to his feet and offering out his stretched hands, wiggling his fingers in her direction in an attempt to get her to stand up, "c'mon, i've got some fresh clothes waiting for you in the bedroom and a blanket on the sofa that's been warmed in the dryer. ready for us to finish off our night."

"sounds perfect," she hums, taking his hands and reluctantly coming to her feet, the water sloshing around her legs as she stepped over the side of the tub and into the cool air of the bathroom. her body was tired and her limbs ached from exhaustion yet her mind felt so satisfied with the feeling of love that washed over her. "i love you."

"i love you, too."

-

"oi, cheer up, darling."

she's torn from her daze by george's elbow prodding into her side, not quite a harsh jut into her hip but one that was enough to tear her away from her own world and back into the loud and rowdy crowd around them, her attention snapping back as she turned her face and looked at him.

"hmm?"

"you zoned out for a bit there," george claims, setting down his pint glass and leaning a little closer to her, "everything alright?"

she nods softly.

around her, the atmosphere was loud and rowdy and exactly what you would expect on a friday night when sat in a pub in the middle of london, and from where she was sat in the booth, squeezed between george and isaac as arthur sat himself down at the other end of the table, she couldn't do much but sit there and watch her surroundings as people walked in and out of the door.

it wasn't that she was exhausted, because she was... but she just felt drained of all excitement.

her social battery had become empty, like a car running out of petrol on a long drive, and she didn't want to tell arthur that she was ready to go home but she craved the quiet and the comfort of her flat. as much as she loved the boys, catching up on their busy weeks and filling them in on the exciting brand deals and trips that they'd been invited on, that night just felt different to her.

"i think i need to go home," she laughs it off as a joke but george can tell and she knew that he knew it wasn't a joke because of the way his eyes softened at her and by the way his eyes flickered to arthur as he stayed deep in conversation with chris and cal as they laughed about something, "do you think he'll mind?"

george shrugs, "i couldn't tell you, honestly. i don't think he'll be sad."

she finishes off her gin and lemonade and stands to her feet, picking her bag up from the floor and reaching for her coat that was draped behind isaac, catching his attention.

"and where are you going?"

"i need to talk to arthur," she explains softly and he cocks an eyebrow at her in confusion, looking between her face and the coat that was draped over her arm, "and then i need some air."

"are you bailing, missus television?"

she frowns and shakes her head.

"i'm just not feeling it right now," yn says and she really didn't want to dwell on how she was feeling in that moment, "just a bit tired."

george swivelled in his seat, moving his legs so she could shuffle passed him, making sure she collected her things before making her way towards arthur at the end of the table. and, despite his drunken state and the beers that were coursing through him, the look of pure concern pinched his features together once he saw her bag over her shoulder and her coat draped over her arm.

"where are you going?"

"i'm gon'a head off," she admits to him, "i'm not feeling so perky so i think i'll just head back to yours and wait for you to get home."

"are you having a flare up?"

"not so much, i'm just feeling really tired."

arthur stands to his feet, reaching for the jacket that he had hanging on the back of his chair, in an attempt to leave at the same time as her. yet she stopped him, shaking her head with a smile on her lips, pushing him back to his seat so he could continue his night with his friends.

"lovie-"

"i'm not gon'a ruin your night with your friends," she leans down and presses a kiss to his lips, "but i'll see you later, okay?"

"let me walk you back to mine then," he insists, "please?"

"it's a short walk from here, i'll be fine," she smiles down at him and runs her fingers through his hair, "we all know if you come back with me then you'll want to stay home and you deserve this night out with the boys."

"i'll walk her home? i've left my wallet at phone, there's only so much paying with my card i can do before i asks for my pin and i'm too far gone to remember what it is," george suggests, emitting a round of laughter from around the table, "honestly, i don't mind."

once it was agreed and she'd said her goodbyes to everyone, george shrugged on his jacket and followed her out of the pub's front door, into the cold air of london as they set off towards the flat complex. a comfortable silence following the both of them as they passed by drunken groups of friends and people leaving work for the weekend.

"he loves you," george breaks the silence between them and it catches yn off guard, "a lot."

"it goes back the same way," yn grins sweetly, "he's been such a godsend these last few months, too. especially with the doctors appointments and all of the treatments and consultations and home remedies i make him do with me."

"he'd do anything for you," he says, moving behind her on the path so he could allow a couple to walk passed them, "i reckon he'd even take on the uterus just so you could be free of pain."

she rolls her eyes but can't help the smile that tickles at the corners of her mouth.

"you guys are so good together," george admits, "i'm glad he's found someone who understands him and someone he can be his true self around. it's nice to see him so happy now."

"again," yn looks at george, "it goes back the same way."

-

his hands were warm.

as his fingers pushed gently into the skin of her stomach, rubbing soft circles as to relieve to her pain but not cause her injury, she laid in complete contempt upon the bed. the smell of lavender coming from the massage oil coating his fingertips, as he lathered her belly in the liquid, soothed her and made her feel drowsy and like she could fall asleep under his touch.

"i hate that it makes you feel like this," he mumbles softly, "but i love that it gives us moments like this."

and she really did feel like the luckiest woman in the world.

[live-laugh-lenney]

LOCKED IN | ARTHUR FREDERICK

chapter two is all yours! a bit of a messy chapter to squeeze a lot in but i'm happy to get it out! so much love from chapter one and i'm so glad you're enjoying it so far. feedback is always welcomed and my inbox is always open so please, please, please don’t hesitate to let me know your thoughts on the story. enjoy! <33

CHAPTER ONE

- C H A P T E R T W O -

YN was tired.

Oh boy, was she tired.

She knew that being in a bed that wasn’t her own, that didn’t have her knitted blanket or had the indent of her body arching the mattress or her multiple stuffed teddies that all held such sentimental value, was going to be a struggle. And she knew it was going to be tough for the first night, and maybe the second, but it was something she knew that she would overcome as the days went on… she was a grown woman after all. 

As her eyes opened and adjusted to the brightness of the natural light slipping through the gaps in the blinds of the window, she felt the stiffness of her back upon the mattress and the curled up position she’d found herself in clearly hadn’t been the most ideal position to fall asleep in but she felt safe, almost, as she closed her limbs in upon herself and closed herself off to the world. A way to protect herself in a foreign building. 

She craned her neck up and took a glance around the room to see if she was the first one to wake up - but when she met the eyes of Anisa in the far corner of the bedroom, she grinned tiredly and waved half-heartedly, being quiet enough to not wake any of those who were still deep in their slumber. Johnny. Jemel. Jamie. Their bodies still forming human-shaped lumps under their covers, all still upon their mattresses with their eyes closed, breathing slowly as they enjoyed their last few minutes of peaceful sleep before the day tore them away from the comforts of serenity. She panned her vision over the row of beds before her, seeing empty and unmade beds, taking a guess that they had either decided to take a proper look around the house now that it was morning and a brand-new day or had either chosen to get ready for the day. Looking to her left, Anastasia had clearly risen for the day because her bed was empty and made up for when she was ready to clamber back at the end of the day… but to her right, Arthur was in the midst of waking up himself. A tired and crooked smile on his mouth once he made eye contact with YN.

“Good morning,” he greeted her, “did you sleep okay?”

“Eh, so-so,” she hummed, stretching her arms up and curling her fingertips into her palms, feeling the air between her bones crack from movement and, truthfully, she would have been lying if she didn’t find the sound (and the feeling) quite satisfying, “just strange not being in the sanctum of my own bedroom. Being in my own bed. Sharing a space with nine other people is still a bit weird for me.”

“Yeah, it’s a strange concept,” he nodded in agreement, leaning up on the palms of his hands and sitting up, leaning against the headboard and smushing the pillow between his back and the fabric of the headboard behind him; his bare torso which her eyes dropped down to when the duvet had slipped from his upper body, revealing a small indication that he was, in fact, well kept and looked after himself. Cheeks flushing but her vision almost immediately diverted back to his face. “Jokeman snores, too. In fact, so many people snore. More than I thought there would be.”

YN snorted in amusement and propped herself up, a little more upright, against her own headboard. 

The snoring was something she could handle.

Days before she entered the house and moments before she thought too in depth about the possibility of anything bad happening, she’d already guessed at the high likelihood that a handful of those in the group of ten were those that snored in their sleep… or talked in their sleep… it wasn’t going to be smooth-sailing each night with peace and tranquility. She wasn’t that much of a light sleeper so bumps in the night and noises, that could scare anyone awake, never seemed to phase her or rip her from her slumber so she knew she’d have been fine dealing with the sounds that came with nighttime.

Moments before she lulled off into her sleep, she’d heard footsteps quietly creeping down the alley of the columns of beds. Followed by a few hushed voices, the muffled laughter and then gentle giggles of those who slipped out of the room because they weren’t quite ready to call it a night and didn’t want to keep anyone else from getting some well-earned sleep themselves, and she probably would have joined them if her eyeballs hadn’t felt like they’d been slit with the edges of paper. Aching and almost crying to have a rest, almost watering at the mere temptation of laying down, barely able to open back up once they’d closed for the night. 

“I was exhausted,” she sighed and dug the palms of her hands into her eyes, “once my head hit that pillow and my eyes closed and I fell asleep, there was no way I was waking up. Which is weird because I felt like I was up almost every other hour to change sleeping positions.”

“I’m such a light sleeper so any noise kept me awake,” he frowned, eyebrows furrowing on his browline, “it sucks really. Hoping it gets a bit easier to deal with, to be honest. It’s all brand new when you’ve never really slept in the same room with anyone else for a while.”

“It’s like a huge sleepover,” YN gushed, the smile on her lips widening, “I love sleepovers.”

“We should definitely plan a sleepover outside of this place when it's all over,” he suggested, eyes widening when he’d realised just what he had suggested, stumbling over his words as he tried to find a way to dig himself out of the hole he’d plopped himself into, “obviously, with everyone else. Like a reunion kind of thing once this is all over.”

“That would be amazing,” YN agreed.

“I, too, think that would be amazing,” Jemel chimed in from his bed, having rolled over to see who he had woken up with, “good morning.”

“Good morning.”

“Morning, Jemel.”

Both came out simultaneously, almost drowning the other out, the bedroom falling into a silence that was neither comfortable nor uncomfortable as everyone seemingly kept to themselves as they prepared for the day ahead. Sheets were rustling as others roused from their slumbers, announcing themselves with gentle greetings and waves before rubbing the sleep from their eyes, taking in the room now they’d spent the night there. How clothes had been chucked on the floor, shoes left strewn across the galley between the beds, how people had already made themselves at home. 

“I’m gonna start getting myself ready for the day otherwise I will stay in this bed all day,” YN stated, preparing for the chill in the air to hit at her bare legs showing from the cycling shorts she’d chosen as her sleeping attire for her time in there, “I almost have dread in my stomach for what they have in store for us today.”

She internally groaned as she kicked the duvet from her body and twisted around, swinging her legs over the side of the bed, toes touching the ground as she stood to her feet. 

“Hopefully something fun,” Arthur said, “I can't imagine they’ll be too harsh and throw us in the deep end from the first day.”

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YN nursed the cup of tea in her hands, bringing the rim to her lips and taking a sip of the warm liquid, letting it slide down her throat and feeling it warm her up ever so slightly more than before. Legs swinging from the stool she was perched upon at the island counter in the middle of he room, watching Spuddz and Steph flit around the kitchen as they dried up the dirty plates and cutlery from those that had just eaten breakfast not too long ago; YN being one of those who had scoffed down a plate of scrambled eggs on toast, smothered in tomato ketchup, and covered in salt and pepper. Her favourite way to demolish a meal at breakfast.

She saw a pair of male legs trot down the stairs, bare feet padding down the wooden steps, and she hadn’t a clue who it was until they reached the lower floor of the house, thinking they must have been feeling brave to step foot on the cold kitchen tiles. 

Arthur. 

A white towel wrapped around his sodden lower half and hanging low on his hips, water still trickling down his shoulders and down to his elbows from the wet hair at the nape of his neck, hair swept to the side and showing more of his forehead that he’d keep hidden behind a fringe when it was dry and styled how he liked it to look. 

She wasn’t looking but… she was looking. 

Respectfully.

He hadn’t seen her sat at the kitchen island, briskly walking past in a haste to get somewhere more private to get himself dressed, and she was thankful he didn’t lock eyes and notice her as she watched him walk through the kitchen - she knew the cameras would have picked that up and she knew those at home would have picked up how her demeanour had changed. Maybe not the way her face deadpanned to the naked chest before her. Maybe not the missed breath that caught in her throat and almost caused her to choke on her cup of tea. Maybe not the skip of her heart that she felt happen behind her chest, that she was surprised was still intact after the heavy thumping of her heart muscle. But she knew the cameras would have picked up that moment, itself, and that was enough for people to pick apart. 

She would have wanted the ground to swallow her whole if she made eye contact with his brown eyes… but would she have regretted getting caught? She’d be lying if she said yes. 

“What do you reckon the plans are for the day?”

Steph tore YN from the distant gaze she had fallen into, sitting beside her with her own cup of tea, the stool twirling on its spot as she set her legs beneath the countertop. The sleeves of her long-sleeved bodysuit damp from the water in the kitchen sink but she didn’t seem to care at the uncomfortable feeling it must have emitted. 

“Something fun,” YN hummed, setting her mug down on the coaster before her and clasping her hands together, resting them on her thighs, “given what last year was like, they’re gonna keep us on our toes. For sure.”

“You reckon? I was hoping for a day full of getting to know one another,” Steph laughed into her cup, placing the rim against her bottom lip and taking a good sip of her tea, or coffee; YN couldn’t figure it out, “no, definitely something fun. We’re a fun bunch already, I can tell. So I hope they give us a challenge that gets us all laughing.”

“I guess we’ll just have to wait and see.”

Silence followed.

In the distance, you could hear the chaos unfold from the bellowing laughter and the shouting that bounced around the walls and, usually, she’d had been out of her seat to find out what the commotion was all about… being nosey; a flaw that she’d say she hated about herself but she just couldn’t help wanting to be a part of everything happening around her. Especially if it was something they’d be speaking about throughout the day, referring back to with inside jokes, insisting it was the ‘funniest thing to have witnessed’. 

Except she was content sitting with Steph as she gave an aura that felt comforting, like they could sit together without needing to speak, and they’d still have a lovely time together.

“You’re looking real cute today,” Steph admitted, “that activewear co-ord is a must buy when I’m out of this place.”

“You think so? I figured we never really know what’s gonna happen in this place so it’s always good to go practical but also comfy,” YN stated, looking down at the shorts adorning her legs, enough to show off a little thigh but not too scandalous enough to show anything more, and a matching jumper sitting loose and baggy on her upper body that hid her curves away from the cameras and felt too soft to take off, “comfy and casual.”

“And gorgeous,” she winked, sliding off her chair and holding out her hand in YN’s direction, wiggling her fingers and awaiting the warmth of her hand before pulling her from the stool she was perched upon, “come on, let's go and sit with the others on the sofas. Feel like we’re missing all the good stuff going on in there.”

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Time to herself.

YN found that was something that she was going to lack having in a house full of ten people for the next two weeks. 

She lived alone back in London so she was used to her own company in her own living space, she was used to being alone with her own thoughts, and she was used to talking to herself (and sometimes answering herself), so it felt weird not being able to enter a room and be by herself for just a couple of minutes. She loved being around other people, she loved her friends, and she loved the conversation that came with being around more people but she thrived more by being by herself; she could get more done, she felt productive, she could think about things in more depth and she could enjoy the peace and quiet that she gave herself. She knew she was throwing that away once she agreed to be a part of the show during this season and she thought she’d have been okay… but she was struggling being a people-person when she really wasn’t, not one hundred percent.

Anytime the group came together and she saw it as an open opportunity to dash away and hide, she took it… 

… and right now, that solace space was the make-up area outside the bathroom. 

Where everyone had taken refuge in the downstairs lounge area, she had dipped away and disappeared up the stairs for a moment where she didn’t need to talk about her life or how she expected the rest of her time in the house to go. Using the excuse of needing to use the toilet so no one would follow her, not that it would have bothered her if someone wanted to check on her and make sure she was okay, in hopes she could have a ten minute break to recuperate with herself and herself only. 

“You didn’t do any of that in the bathroom, did you? Did you do your make-up before you went in there?”

“What?”

A weird question, YN thought. Random and completely out of the blue, unsure as to why he’d even need to ask that question as well as to why he did ask the question. And his presence along with the sound of his footsteps jogging up the stairs, her name rolling off his tongue, and the break in the quiet had startled her because he wasn’t the first person on her list that she expected to come and find her. Although, in the pits of her stomach, there was a butterfly that tickled at her insides once she looked at him..

She stopped applying the lipgloss to her lips so she could reply to the question Arthur had shot in her direction, his figure coming to a halt in the open doorway of the bathroom, hands hesitant to touch anything that she may have touched with her fingertips.

“Your make-up. Did you do it before you went into the bathroom?”

“No, I just came out of there. I’m just applying a touch-up now. Why?”

“I’m just, I’m highly allergic to make-up. Something to do with the ingredients. I’m allergic to almost all of it, weirdly. I don’t know what specifically but whenever I’ve been with a girl who was wearing make-up, I would come out in hives and get rashes across my neck so I really don’t want a flare up to happen on camera,” he waffled on, nervously laughing as he lingered in front of the door, “I’m severely allergic.”

“Well, I won’t be giving you a kiss then,” YN teased softly, her face brightening with a deep pink shade that kept creeping across the expanse of her cheeks and across the bridge of her nose, “just in case.”

His own cheeks started heating up. Flirting or… banter? He was unsure, as someone who was terrible at reading social cues, but whatever it was and whatever made them feel so comfortable around each other, he felt okay with whatever was happening. 

“No, seriously, did you apply it just now? Because I’m allergic to so much stuff in it. If I touch it, I’m in need of medical assistance straight away.”

“I’m just using lipgloss, no powders or anything. Just touching up,” she told him, “I promise. I’ve not touched it. You’re safe to go in.”

“You’re serious?”

“I’m a hundred percent serious. I never touched anything but this lipgloss,” YN admitted, holding her hands up in the air, “you can trust me, Arthur. I wouldn’t lie about something this serious. I’d be made a villain if I did that to you.”

He disappeared into the bathroom and she looked at her appearance in the mirror and, through the reflection, her eyes dipped to the cotton-wool pads sitting in a packet on a stool behind her. 

Maybe she could go make-up less for the rest of the day… 

… yet Arthur felt terrible.

With a secret challenge being given to him that morning, of lying to his fellow housemates throughout the day for bonus points, he had dread sitting low in his stomach that made him nervous to think about let alone attempt a little white lie. Given that the majority of the people around him didn’t know much about him privately, he knew that he could spew a lot of make-believe in their direction and insist it was the truth. His only query was whether he was believable enough for them to not question anything about it. 

“Thank you,” his voice echoed from the bathroom, muffled by the closed door that hid away his privacy, and she smiled softly at the sincerity of his voice. A cotton-wool pad soaked in make-up remover collecting the foundation and the concealer that was coating her cheeks, smearing moisture across her skin that she used a dry pad to soak it up, “the last thing I wanted to do was scare you with a reaction on the second day.”

“Yeah, I’d have walked out if that happened,” she admitted, “moved country, changed my name, deleted myself off the internet and gaslighted people into believing I never existed. One mention of myself and I’d deny everything,” she diverted her attention from her reflection in the mirror and to the man standing in the doorway of the bathroom, “seriously.”

“I’d still come and find you.”

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The last hour was playing on her mind.

Arthur’s admission confused her; she hadn’t felt a lot of them in the house were at the stage where they were sharing facts and secrets so private and so confidential about themselves that no one really needed to know about them. She thought it was sweet, because he felt comfortable enough to tell her bits about his life that he’d never shared with anyone before, but she also thought it to be inessential. 

And in a daze, zoning out and forgetting where she was, with her eyes focusing on the far distance of the garden where the sun kissed the grass where the grass met the fence guarding the perimeter of the house, completely unaware of what was happening around her and how everyone was treating the moment as a karaoke session. The chill in the air was bitter and it covered her exposed skin in goosebumps, her legs still bare as she’d not yet changed from the shorts she’d worn for breakfast that morning, the jumper being the only article of clothing to give her a sense of warmth.

“Grant my last request and just let me hold you..”

She situated herself on the padded garden chair she found herself on, listening to the chorus of voices singing Paolo Nutini before her, all in different pitches and octaves and it sounded like a complete mess yet she couldn’t help but join in.  

“Lay down beside me..”

She found herself swaying beside Johnny with mirrored movements, hands following in suit, and their small chorus came to a quick end once Arthur had stepped foot out the patio doors with a football, gaining interest from the boys who she was sat with, involuntarily positioning themselves in a semi-circle so they could kick and pass the ball amongst themselves.  

“I was saying to these guys here,” Arthur started, looking to his left and indicating to Anisa and Anastasia, juggling the football between his hands as he stood before everyone in the huddle they’d all chosen to stand in, “you know that I do reaction and commentary videos? Well, I actually started on a singing channel-”

There’s a chorus of ‘oooh’s and ‘aaah’s that sounded around the group.

“-and I started off doing covers but… this is actually a bit of a sad story, to be fair,” he took a pause and looked around the group before him. All eyes on him as they awaited to hear the next sentence out of his mouth, “I did it for the longest time but the dislike to like ratio was through the roof. My family were literally just like ‘you’ve got to stop, you’re honestly wasting so much of your time, you’ve got to give it up.’”

A chorus of gentle and sympathetic sounds came from various members of the very few of them listening to him, unknowingly frowning like they were part of this story, and he continued without a query.

“Like, I think my family just thought I was so tone deaf that they were like, ‘if we invested money in singing lessons then it would just-’ like, they didn’t want to entertain the full stream of becoming a singing talent on Youtube,” he feigned a smile and nodded slowly, “it hurt. It crushed me.”

“Did you want to pursue it?” 

“Yeah, of course, but they just drummed into me that it wasn’t worth it so I carried on posting them and hoped that over time I’d just get better and better from practising and I’d progress without the need for lessons and such. No need for a tutor or whatever,” Arthur explained, shrugging nonchalantly and chucking the ball to Jamie, who had silently beckoned for the ball in his hands, “I finally realised that maybe it was just not doing well so I stopped. Deleted the channel. Never spoke of it again… until today and I’m hoping it doesn’t come back to bite me on the arse now I’ve brought it up again.”

“The internet is a cruel place sometimes,” Spuddz stated, hums of agreement following suit, “brutal.”

“That I now know,” Arthur gave a tight-lipped and sympathetic smile, “not that anyone has recognised me for it yet or anything.

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“Arthur and YN to the Store Room.”

As YN stood to her feet, Arthur felt the tug on his wrist from the cold restraint of the handcuffs clipped together, prompting him to stand on his own two feet, following her in suit as they trudged through the bedroom. Their shoes squeaked on the floor beneath them with each step they took, descending the couple of stairs outside the bedroom and entering the store room, closing the door behind them in case Sugarlips went on the topic of gameplans for the challenge they were all partaking in that day.

The handcuffs suddenly felt heavier to her. 

Every so often, throughout the afternoon, YN would forget she was attached to Arthur by their wrists and it would be in moments like that, where they were sitting together and talking about the metal elephants in the room, that she was reminded of the challenge they’d all been set. She enjoyed the feeling of having Arthur close to her side, it gave them more of an opportunity to get to know one another because they had no choice but to talk to each other… and Arthur would very much agree to that. 

“How do you feel having zero points?”

“Sugarlips, I don’t like the assumption in your voice there,” YN playfully frowned at the camera, standing high on the tripod before her and Arthur, “you’re assuming we’re not going to get any points for this challenge.”

“The challenge is almost over. The day, too.”

“We’ve still got time,” Arthur stated, shrugging his shoulders nonchalantly, “have some faith in us. We’re a dream team.”

“A dream team you are,” Sugarlips said, “everyone is loving you two together.”

“It’s because we bring the content,” YN teased the camera, “we might not be winning but we’re having fun and that’s all that matters. Because it’s not all about winning, it’s about the fun times we had and the friends we made along the way.”

“Great friends,” Arthur grinned widely, lifting their locked-up hands up and sticking out his little finger in hopes that YN would latch hers around it. To which she obeyed. And they shook their hands in a polite way, “see?”

“Friends,” Sugarlips reiterated and a smirk appeared on YN’s lips at the insinuation, her eyes diverting from the camera and to her lap, head dipping down to her chest in an attempt to hide to desire in her eyes that she know would never go ignored, “you’re definitely more friendly than everyone else, Footasylum is loving the attention you’re bringing to the brand.”

“Oh, I bet you are,” YN jeered and, beside her, Arthur gave out a snort in the form of a laugh, “we better be getting some proper recognition for this, Footasylum.”

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If there was one thing Arthur found complete comfortability in, it was chess.

Seeing the chessboard in one of the cupboards in the house, he felt a little more at home because it was something he was used to playing on the outside to pass the time or to keep himself busy. 

At home, he had a board set up that he would test out different matches on and play against pretend partners to try and better his approach whenever he did play someone with a good ability to the game. On his phone, he had apps that allowed him to play games against people from all across the globe, some taking their time and allowing him one move a day and some taking just mere minutes before the game was over because it was a challenging game for those who didn’t understand the thought behind each and every move. Whenever he was with his friends, he was testing them on what each piece was and how they could move on the board, explaining what checkmate meant and the easiest ways to win each match they played. It was his hobby outside of work and it brought him immense pleasure in winning every game, an accomplishment in his eyes.

“You’ve been spending a bit of time with YN, haven’t you?” Jemel questioned Arthur, coming to his rest period of his workout and asking almost completely out of the blue, into the silence as Arthur taught Spuddz the rules of chess, “in fact, a lot of time. Not that it’s a bad thing. She’s lovely from what we know of her.”

“It shouldn’t be a bad thing,” Arthur laughed nervously, rubbing the back of his neck as he leant back on the beanbag beneath him and watched as Spuddz thought about his next move on the board in the middle of the table between them, “she’s lovely. She looked a bit nervous walking in yesterday and I was just being a nice person, I guess. That’s who I am.”

Jemel smirked at Arthur's admission and Spuddz cackled before making a move with one of his pawns on the board.

“Just give us a go to get to know her,” Spuddz smacked Arthur on the knee closest to him, heat rising up the back of the boy’s neck, “don’t keep her all to yourself.”

“We’re just becoming friends, that’s all,” Arthur held his hands up in admittance, slight panic coursing his veins because he wasn’t searching for love or treating Locked In like a reality TV show based on finding love within the two weeks, and he didn’t want to seem desperate enough and make it seem he was giving his undivided attention to one person, “she’s easy to talk to. And we’ve only been here less than twenty-four hours.”

“It only takes twenty-four hours, buddy,” Spuddz teased him, standing to his feet and playing on the red blush that covered Arthur’s cheeks, “she’s a lovely girl though. Never really heard of her before her name was mentioned in the line-up. She must be new on the scene outside but she’s got something good going for her.”

“She’ll make it on the outside because of how nice she is and how she gels with everyone so quickly,” Jemel said, wrapping his hands around the bar of the weights he was lifting, flexing his arms as he pulled each one close to his chest before releasing the muscles, “she’s definitely going to become a known person from this, regardless of whether she wins or not. I think she’s a gem.”

“Yeah,” Arthur nodded, eyes still attached to the chequerboard on the table, “me too. Besides, we’ve been handcuffed together all afternoon so of course, we’ve spent a lot of time together today.”

“Yeah, I can imagine,” Jemel said, placing the weights down by his feet and leaning back on the seat of the piece of gym equipment he was perched upon, “to be fair, me and Steph had some in depth conversations today whilst being handcuffed together so I definitely think that challenge was to help us figure out who we’re able to get close to here. Some of us have gelled together really quickly.”

Spuddz and Arthur nodded in agreement, their attention going back to thinking about the moves they could make on the chessboard between them, Arthur’s hand hovering over one of his pieces as he thought carefully about what his next move would allow and whether he could get himself into a position that would give him a pretty good chance at winning.

“It has me excited though,” Spuddz claimed, “like, the next two weeks are going to be great fun getting to know each other and what we’re all truly like.”

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“Why is Arthur on-”

“Arthur, why do you have 4 points?”

“Well,” he laughed and clapped his hands, rubbing them together in a mocking manner, “I was given a secret challenge to do, throughout the day today, where I had to lie to you guys.”

“Lie to us?”

“Arthur-”

“So, I told you guys I started out posting singing covers on a Youtube channel that didn’t take off…” he paused as everyone remembered the conversation from earlier that morning, “yeah, that one was a lie.”

He watched as mouths fell gaped open.

“I also had convinced YN that I was highly allergic to make-up and that I’d swell up really badly if I came in contact with it,” he slowly looked up and made eye contact with YN and she stood there in shock, her eyes widening, “I lied about that. I’m not allergic. If you take a closer look, you’ll see I’ve got a really spotty forehead and I’ve got concealer covering them up…”

“You sneaky git!” She screeched, laughter emitting from the group and she took long strides in his direction and gave his shoulder a smack with her palm, “you really had me worried. I kept thinking I’d accidentally smeared foundation or setting spray on the door handle of the toilet or something and that you were gonna stumble in with a face so swollen up that it could have killed you.”

She frowned and he placed his arm over her shoulder and pulled her into his side, her face disappearing under his arm and into his armpit, hiding the blush that made come over all hot and bothered yet she could feel him laughing, “I’m so sorry.”

“What was the third?” Jemel asked, leaning on the back of the sofa, “you’ve done well so far.”

“So the third was that I had to tell Jamie I was part of an academy as I grew up. I wasn’t. The guy I told you about was just great at football in university, played for the football team, but he didn’t step foot in an academy in Jersey to my knowledge,” he admitted and Jamie just stared at him in shock, “that one wasn’t so difficult to play along with.”

“Nah, but, I actually believed you. I actually believed you,” Jamie stated, “I know you’re from Jersey. I know you play football. I know you’re good at football. I saw you at Clash of Creators, bro.”

“That was the hardest thing I’ve ever done. I thought, for sure, you’d have caught on,” Arthur laughed, his arm squeezing YN tighter to his side as she stood with her arm wrapped around his waist, “but oh my god, that was so fun. And so worth the four points.”

“You’re a bloody good liar, Arthur Television,” Steph cackled, reaching towards him and squeezing his shoulders, “that was scary good.”

“I studied law for good reason,” Arthur smirked, “it can come in handy sometimes.”