#because she cancelled all her classes for this week so like why would she stick around when she knew she was gonna be here last week | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

watermelonsugarsigh · 2 years ago

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fraction of your heart ~ part four

summary: Y/N’s math skills aren’t the best, but she thinks she has a pretty good judgement of character - and Peter Parker does not pass the test. Find the masterlist here!

warnings: swearing, alcohol, drunk antics, mention of drink spiking but no actual drugs, sad drunk flirty y/n yes this chapter is a self insert of how i act when i'm at parties, mildly suggestive language/content if you squint

word count: 4k

A/N: There's a reason I never posted a schedule because I was never going to stick to it also sorry not sorry for certain character introductions in this chapter? you'll know who I mean when you get there lmao. Unedited as always

Y/N woke to a text from Peter Saturday morning.

Hi, I can’t make it today. Something came up and I can’t get out of it. Sorry. See you in class :)

Y/N wasn’t surprised, in fact she was expecting it. After last week, where she had basically said she hated him straight to his face, she couldn’t even get mad about it; after all, she was actually to blame for his behaviour. What she wasn’t expecting, however, was the sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach, her throat tightening to the point where she struggled to swallow. It irked her that she wasn’t going to see him today, and she didn’t understand why.

Lauren noticed Y/N’s grumpy mood as soon as she walked out of her room.

“What’s gotten into you, pouty?” Y/N rolled her eyes as Lauren turned on the espresso machine. It was a luxury item in their bare-bones college apartment, but with the amount they were spending on lattes at the campus café, they decided that the expense was worth it.

“Nothing,” she lied. After turning her head to see Lauren’s unamused and expectant expression, she elaborated. “Peter’s still avoiding me. He cancelled this morning.” He’d been avoiding her all week. Each time she saw him in class she attempted to talk to him, only to find he had vanished at the exact moment she found an opportunity. It was almost as if he could sense when she was approaching, and found an exit strategy every time. She had no clue how he was managing to step away from her so quickly.

“I thought you didn’t want him helping you,” Lauren opened the fridge and pulled out the carton of milk, checking the expiration date before placing it on the kitchen counter.

“I didn’t,” Y/N started. “But I also didn’t want him to avoid me more than he already did.”

“I mean, you did basically say you hated him to his face,” Lauren replied. “That’s gonna be a tough one to bounce back from.” Y/N put her forehead in her hands.

“Ugh, I know.”

“Look,” Lauren put the milk back into the fridge before coming to sit next to Y/N with two mugs of coffee. Y/N gratefully accepted the mug being handed to her and took a sip, the warm liquid coating her throat and landing in her stomach. “There’s not much you can do about it right now. Peter’s a good guy, he’ll listen eventually, but he has the right to be pissed off at the moment.”

Y/N nodded.

“I’m going shopping for something to wear to Flash’s party tonight,” Lauren placed her already half-empty mug on the coffee table in front of her. How she drank coffee so quickly, Y/N would never understand. “Come with me! Nothing like a bit of retail therapy to make you feel better.”

“Alright, but I need a shower first.”

“I agree. Respectfully, you smell.”

…

Flash Thompson’s party was in full swing by the time Y/N and Lauren arrived. Red cups were strewn all over the floor, and the music was loud enough to be heard from the street. Upon entering the house, Y/N made a beeline to the kitchen, shouting greetings to a few faces she recognised in the midst of the dimmed fluorescents and vape residue.

She was glad she didn’t dress warm tonight. The goosebumps that had littered her skin in the walk from the car to the front door vanished as soon as Y/N stepped inside. She felt as if she had stepped into a sauna; the humidity was making it moderately difficult to breathe. She could feel her hair threatening to frizz from the sheer moisture in the air. So much for the hour that she had spent trying to tame it, she thought as she concocted a drink from the wide variety of spirits and mixers available on the kitchen bench.

“Fuck me,” Lauren caught up to Y/N after being held back by one of her classmates, “It’s like a goddamn festival in here.” Y/N handed her the drink she had just made and found another cup, mixing a second one for herself.

“I know,” Y/N scanned the room, trying to find a familiar face. Her heart lurched when she spotted Tara, laughing at something from across the room. Under the dim but warm lights her ochre skin glimmered. Y/N didn’t know whether she wanted to press her lips to Tara’s exposed collarbone or ask her for her skincare routine. She downed her drink as she continued to study her, knowing she would need a lot more alcohol in her system if she wanted to survive the night knowing she was here, looking like that. Her jet black curls were thrown up in a carefully structured mess, further elongating her bare neck and making her lemon coloured bustier stand out from the crowd. Simply put, she was irresistible.

A tap on her shoulder pulled her away from the fantasy she was concocting in her head.

“Hey, Y/N.”

She turned to meet a pair of sky blue eyes accompanying a devilish smirk. Blonde, tousled hair framed his round face. She couldn’t deny it; Harry Osborn was attractive, but as she flicked her gaze back to Tara one more time, she came to the conclusion that brunettes were more her type.

“Hi Harry,” Y/N shifted her attention back to the boy standing in front of her, who was currently holding a cup in each hand. She tried not to think about the way his slender fingers wrapped almost entirely around the circumference of the drink as he gently offered the signature red plastic to her. Her eyes narrowed, lips slighting upwards at the corners. “I was always told never to accept a cup from a stranger at a party.”

“We’re not really strangers though, are we?” He shuffled closer, voice dropping so Y/N needed to lean in to hear him. She chuckled. While she wasn’t exactly the type of person that garnered a lot of attention from potential romantic interests, she wasn’t oblivious to the tricks someone like Harry pulled when he was looking for fun. “We have chemistry.”

Y/N rolled her eyes at the entendre.

“First of all,” she glared at Harry, taking the cup from his hand and making a beeline back toward the kitchen. He followed her like a lost puppy, which sent a small swarm of butterflies to Y/N’s stomach. Since when did she have this much of an effect on someone? “I don’t take chemistry. We’re in Comparative Politics together.”

“So you have noticed me.”

“Secondly,” she continued, ignoring his retort. She poured the liquid down the sink and threw away the cup, instead filling her own back up with the closest unopened can she could find. Harry scoffed and put his hand over his heart, feigning offense at her actions. “Drink spiking is more likely to happen from someone you know, because you trust them more.” Y/N took a sip of her new, verifiably untouched drink. “Unfortunately for you, I’m smarter than that.”

“Okay,” Harry put his hands up in the air in mock surrender. “Even though there was nothing in that cup except a shot of vodka, I’ll concede. But,” he inched closer. For the first time all evening, he couldn’t make eye contact with her, instead staring at his shoes. “I could make it up to you. Buy you a drink?”

Her eyebrow quirked. “It’s an open bar, Harry. Nobody’s buying drinks.”

“I meant,” he said, looking back up at her. His expression had drastically changed from the perpetual confident smirk he seemed to always have painted on. His pupils had dilated; Y/N couldn’t tell whether it’s because the lights were dimmed or if it had to do with how he was pulling his bottom lip between his teeth as he stared at hers. “Maybe I could take you out. To dinner, or something.”

Oh.

She didn’t think he was into her like that. With the attention he was giving her, she was expecting a distraction, some fun for a night, or maybe a friends with benefits proposal. Harry was notorious for keeping things light, in fact, she didn’t think she had ever heard of him asking someone out before. A buzz ran up her spine; the two drinks she had finished must have started taking effect.

Harry’s face deflated at her extended silence.

“Or not,” he stepped back. “It’s fine either way.” He went to walk away, but Y/N surprised the both of them by taking hold of his wrist and shifting his weight back toward her.

“I didn’t say no.”

“You didn’t say yes either.” A small flicker of hope danced across his features; his charming essence that she was used to threatening to emerge from the cheeky glint in his eye. Y/N bit her lip, causing his blown out pupils to dilate further. Okay, she thought. So it wasn’t just the lights.

She had to confess that she was enjoying the attention. To put it lightly, getting blipped off the face of the earth didn’t do wonders for her romantic life. Everyone she was interested in before were either five years older than her now, or processing the fact that they had disappeared into thin air for a significant amount of time. She took a moment to look at Harry. He wasn’t her type, not by any means, but she couldn’t help but let her mind wander. It had been a while since she had put herself out there. Maybe this was something she needed, especially to take her mind off of Tara. The hand that was still attached to his wrist fell lower to his fingertips. He manipulated her fingers until they were interlocked with his, the back of her hand pressed against his palm, calloused thumb tracing small circles over her knuckle. Her heart skipped a beat.

“Let me think about it,” she replied after a beat. “I can’t say yes right now, but I’m not saying no.”

Harry smiled. Not a smirk, but an actual, genuine smile. Y/N couldn’t think of a time she had seen him do that, not since last year when his father passed away. She knew he had a lot of responsibility, practically inheriting an entire company with little interest in the business operations of it. He was only taking PoliSci classes to understand the international market more, but she had heard through the rumour mill that he was closer to the likes of a scientific genius.

“Give me your phone,” he demanded softly, in a tone that she wouldn’t mind hearing again in a much more intimate situation. His fingers untangled from hers and he waited, palm outstretched for her to fish her phone out from her jeans pocket. Once she had unlocked it, he swiftly made quick work of typing his phone number under a new contact. “Here,” Harry handed her phone back, his number listed under ‘H’. She didn’t miss the way his fingertips brushed hers as he let her go. “This way you can let me know your answer when you’re ready.”

…

Two hours and eight (or was it nine?) drinks later, Y/N was past sufficiently inebriated. Lauren had forced her to take a shot of vodka as she grilled her about her conversation with Harry, which had then led to a very intense game of beer pong, which Y/N proceeded to lose abysmally. She had ended up leaning against a wall, participating in her favourite pastime - staring at Tara.

She truly couldn’t understand how someone could be so gorgeous. She was so animated when she spoke; her full lips framing her perfect smile every time she laughed. God, she would kill to make her laugh like that.

Y/N tore her eyes away from the dimple in Tara’s cheek and glided across to follow her line of sight. Her throat tightened at the sight of Peter, gesturing wildly with his hands as he tried to explain something. His head was tilted toward the floor, and Y/N watched as he looked up at Tara from under his eyelashes, both pausing for an extended moment to smile at each other.

She couldn’t blame Peter for the blush that creeped onto his cheeks, ears turning red as Tara responded to his rambling with just as much enthusiasm. Her fingertips brushed the outside of his still extended forearm and his jaw dropped slightly, lips parting as his gaze followed her movements. Her grip tightened slightly, and she gently pulled him closer, his hand finding purchase on her waist.

Y/N couldn’t watch anymore. She pushed through the crowd, finding the sliding doors that led to the backyard. Unfortunately that meant she had to pass the couple she was directly trying to avoid, and her shoulder bumped against Peter’s on her way through. She mumbled an apology as he whipped his head around to look at her for the first time in over a week. She refused to let him see the tears welling in her eyes, threatening to spill over at any moment. Coughing slightly at the cloud of cigarette smoke as she opened the back door and almost tripping over the small hinge that allowed the door to slide open and close, Y/N found her way to a secluded corner of the backyard, practically falling onto the floor. She had found her way behind a bush, secluded from sight of the rest of the party guests. She leant her head up to the sky and blinked rapidly, willing herself to contain the tears. It didn’t work. They spilled over and began running down her cheeks, an exasperated sob managing to sneak its way through the barrier Y/N tried to keep closed in her throat. Y/N didn’t know whether it was the alcohol or her feelings, but she felt like she was going to pass out. It was a few minutes before she was able to compose herself to a point where she could breathe at a steady pace again.

“Uh,” Y/N looked up to find the one person she didn’t want to see. Peter had a hand stretched out halfway toward her, as if he wasn’t sure whether tapping on the shoulder would cause her to shatter completely. Wiping under her eyes to try and conceal any sign of crying, she sniffed. “Are you okay?”

“Like you care,” she bit back, wincing at the way her voice cracked. She was expecting Peter to leave, but he did the exact opposite, crawling into the confined space next to her. She could feel his body heat radiating to subside the goosebumps that were littering her upper arm. “Just go back to living your perfect little life with your perfect girlfriend.”

“What?”

“You and Tara. Obviously there’s something going on between the two of you.” Y/N shot daggers in his direction.

“Who, T?” Y/N rolled her eyes at the nickname. “No - there’s nothing between us. We went on one date last year and it was a disaster, we’re just friends.”

“Didn’t look like you were just friends in there.”

“She’s a very flirty drunk. I was just trying to make sure she didn’t go home with someone in that state. She’s really shy and has trouble with conflict, I didn’t want anyone to take advantage of that.”

They sat in silence for a moment.

“Do you-” Peter whispered, then paused, mulling over his choice of words. “Do you like her?” Y/N barked out a laugh.

“How could you not?” A tear dropped from the inner corner of her eye and fell onto her lap, leaving a small dark patch on the denim covering her inner thigh. “She’s smart, beautiful, nice, like I couldn’t imagine someone more perfect. Honestly, I can't believe she went on a date with you.”

“I didn’t know you were into girls,” Peter muttered, mainly to himself, choosing to ignore her last comment. Noticing Y/N’s incredulous expression, he smacked his hand onto his forehead. “Shit, I said that out loud, didn’t I?”

Y/N giggled, earning a shy smile from Peter.

“I’m bisexual,” she said. “People are pretty.”

“Ah, so you were flirting with Osborn earlier,” he joked. There was something dark in his eyes, like he was waiting for confirmation. When she nodded, he turned his body so he was directly facing her. “It’s none of my business, and I know you hate me, but just be careful with him, okay?”

“I know,” she said. “He has a reputation.”

“Yeah, but that’s not what I meant. Forget it,” he shook his head, as if he was trying to shake a memory out of his brain. “As I said, none of my business.”

Another moment of silence passed.

“I don’t hate you.”

“You don’t?”

“No.” Y/N was definitely drunk. She couldn’t stop words tumbling out of her mouth. “You’re just, so frustratingly good at everything. And everyone seems to love you, so I guess I just didn’t like you out of spite? It’s stupid, I know. And then you always seem to avoid me in class, I thought you hated me so I decided to hate you.”

Peter chuckled.

“What?”

“I thought the same thing about you. I only avoided you to stay out of your way so you wouldn't hate me more.” He laughed again, harder this time. Y/N processed Peter’s words, and soon the two of them were laughing together. The giggles subsided, and they sat, knees brushing, lazy smiles mirroring each other. Y/N cleared her throat.

“Can we start again?”

Peter’s smile grew wider.

“I’d like that.” He stood up, and held a hand out to her. She took it, willing herself to ignore the thought in the back of her mind that compared Peter’s rough hands to Harry’s. While they were both physically fit, she didn’t pick either of them to be the type to work out enough to have so much texture hardening their fingertips. Peter’s were worse than Harry’s, and his grip was stronger, yet more gentle, as if he was acutely aware of his own strength and was ensuring he wasn’t hurting her. He pulled her up like she was weightless, feet lifting slightly off the floor, to the point where she overbalanced into Peter’s chest. He was quick to steady her, hands wrapping around her biceps as hers met his sternum. Even in her inebriated state she noticed the defined muscle under his T-shirt. Y/N looked up at him, but he wasn’t staring back. His eyes grazed over her limbs, studying her to ensure she was steady on her feet before letting her go. She felt the breeze against her arms in the absence of Peter’s touch and she shivered.

“I'd offer you a jacket, but-" He gestured vaguely to himself and the lack of outerwear on his person. "Do you have a ride home?” Peter cocked his head to the side. She shook hers in response.

“My roommate and I were going to get an Uber or something, but I have no clue where she is now.”

“Let me drive you, I have my car. The heaters work pretty well. Do you have a house key?”

“Yeah. Haven’t you been drinking though?”

“Yes, but not enough to affect me at all.” She narrowed her eyes, distinctly remembering seeing him around the beer pong table an hour ago. “I promise. I was driving myself anyway so I barely drank anything, and I have an extremely fast metabolism so I'm probably 100% sober by now.”

“Okay,” she said. While she normally would be more concerned, the way he steadied her only seconds ago made her feel pretty comfortable that he was telling the truth. Still, it didn't stop her from scrutinizing him the entire way to his car, to make sure he didn't trip or stumble, even a little.

The drive home was quiet. Apart from the radio humming at a low volume and Y/N’s occasional directions, there was no sound. It was a comfortable silence, no tension charging between the two upon their confession that they were both a little envious of each other. Y/N’s drunk mouth spoke before her brain could catch up.

“Where do you live?”

“Uh,” Peter said, startled at the break of silence. “A couple of blocks from here. I live by myself, I didn’t really know anybody when I moved.”

“What about home then? Where did you grow up?”

If she was sober she would have noticed the crease forming between his eyebrows; how his shoulder blades tightened and lips pursed at her question. But the alcohol, while waning slightly, was still in effect, so she couldn’t hear the gravel in his voice as he spoke.

“New York. Queens. My parents passed away when I was a kid so I lived with my aunt and uncle.”

“Oh, I didn’t know. Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” he mumbled, and it sounded like he meant it. “I was young, so I don’t really remember much. Ben and May were basically my parents. I was really lucky to have them.”

“Was?”

“They, uh,” Peter’s voice cracked, and even Y/N could notice the shift in his demeanour. “They also died.”

“Oh my god.” Y/N’s jaw dropped. She didn’t know any of this before tonight. Thinking back to what he had said about Tony Stark, she realised just how many ghosts haunted his past. How did he go on? “This isn’t any of my business, but are you seeing anyone? That’s a lot of weight on your shoulders.”

He scoffed and shook his head.

“I don’t think anybody could really understand. There’s-” he paused for a moment. “There’s a lot about my life I find really hard to share, and I don’t really let people in.”

“Why are you telling me then?” He pondered the question, mulling it over in his head.

“I don’t know. Probably because it’s been a rough week. And you’re drunk, so you probably won’t remember much of this tomorrow.”

“I’m not that drunk.”

“Tell that to your mascara," he retorted. Her hands came up to wipe under her eyes, praying that she didn't look completely like a raccoon. Peter snickered. "And the wicked hangover you’re going to have tomorrow.” She hadn’t noticed, but her directions were clear enough that he had made the last couple of turns to her apartment unprompted. Peter shut off the engine and opened his door, walking around the front of the car to open the passenger side door. He held out his hand to help her out. She stepped out of the car moderately more gracefully than when he picked her up before, but still stumbled as the heel of her foot missed the curb. Once again, Peter managed to grab her, this time wrapping an arm around her waist and pulling her flush to his chest. He shut the door with his other hand, keeping her put. She chanced the moment to look up at him. Under the streetlight she could barely see the mess of freckles that littered across the bridge of his nose. His eyelashes were impossibly long, and she cursed whatever god decided that men were to be blessed with such pretty eyelashes. He glanced down at her, their eyes meeting for a brief moment before her slowly sobering mind remembered that staring at someone was not usually socially acceptable.

“Thanks. Again.” She cleared her throat. “I feel like you’re always catching me.”

“Must have really good reflexes,” Peter whispered, finally letting her go. It was as if the two of them were scared to talk too loud, even though nobody else would be able to hear them at a regular volume. Y/N stepped to the side, careful to look first to where her feet would land, lest she toppled over again. "Or you're constantly tripping, so I'm always on guard."

“Thanks too, for bringing me home.”

“Anytime. Please drink some water before you get some sleep.”

“I will. Bye.” She raised a hand at a half-assed attempt at a wave, but every movement she made felt awkward.

“Bye.” Peter lent on the door of his car and watched as Y/N found her apartment key and let herself inside. Something compelled her to look out the window once she made her way to her room. Peter was still in the same spot as he was before she went inside, eyes glazed over seemingly staring at nothing. After a few seconds, he shook himself out of his haze and swiftly got back in his car, driving off almost as soon as the lights turned on.

She didn’t know what it was about that picture, but it made her completely sure about what she was about to do.

Hey Harry, it’s Y/N. I’m free next Saturday night if you are.

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imagineddworld · 3 years ago

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FBI training (Part 1)

Pairing: Stiles Stilinski x Reader

Summary: The reader is the child of the two most skilled FBI agents of the States. At the FBI training she is paired up with a very determent young man who always finds a way to trouble her.

Author’s note: I tried to make it as genderneutral as possible. But at some point there is a small implication that the reader could be female and their roommate could be male. But further than that, there is no specifications of gender.

This is going to be a multiple part fic. The first part already took me way too long to write. So I apologize in advance if the next parts will take long to write too. I will try to finish them as quickly as I can.

Words: 3k (3084)

On the most important day of your life, running late was not one of the things you had planned for. But seen how impulsive your roommate could be, it wasn’t out of the ordinary for them to mess up your schedule. They had stolen all your alarm clocks at night for some stupid experiment. Yes, you owned multiple. Normally you used your phone as an alarm. But after a couple mishaps caused by your roommate, you couldn’t put all your trust entirely on electronic devises. So you had bought an old-fashioned alarm clock that still ran on batteries, just in case something were to happen to your phone. But even that clock had been ruined many times. So from that moment on you always had some spare clocks hidden in your room, just in case.

That they had found all your spare clocks wasn’t too surprising, seen that they weren’t hidden very well. What did shock you was that they hadn’t woken you up by their wild scavenger hunt. You were a light sleeper, even the smallest of noises could shake you out of your deep rest. That’s why you wore earbuds to bed, including that particular night. They often didn’t muffle the sounds enough, surely not during an experiment. Your roommate tend to forget about their surroundings as they start one, getting lost in their passion. You had awoken countless of times to the sound of falling objects, happy laughter, mumbles of rambling thoughts, excited jumping, soft sobbing and frequently a loud whine or groan. By now it was a normal occurrence. But of course, on that night the earbuds had done their job, cancelling out all the noise from the nightly events.

The evening before, everything had gone smoothly. Too smoothly. You were supposed to suspect something, but your intuition had failed you due to the overwhelming amounts of emotions that threw you out of balance. There always had to be a bump in the road. Nothing ever went entirely good. You had excitedly packed your backpack, leaving out a book to read before you went to bed. Next you picked out your outfit for the morning, neatly placing it on top of your wooden desk. Making that decision the day before took away a part of the unwanted stress to your already overflowing anxiety-filled body. Not that picking an outfit for the FBI Academy would be hard. They had a strict dress code. Everyone had to wear a white button up, tie being an optional choice. What you wore as bottoms also was a free choice, but they had to be formal and needed to show off professionalism.

Before you had changed into a big T-shirt and some sleeping shorts, you checked over your backpack and outfit; making sure you hadn’t forgotten anything. After double checking 3 times, you continued your night ‘routine’. (Your days never looked the same, so you couldn’t really call it a routine.) You washed your face and brushed your teeth, bidding your roommate goodnight as you passed by their room. Once in your room again, you placed your phone on the nightstand, making sure it’s charging for the night. Next you grabbed your earbuds, securing them in your ears before climbing into bed. While you sank into the pile of soft pillows, a mixture of emotions overwhelmed you. Excitement and anxiety had boiled up in your body throughout the whole week. But only now did they leave a tight, crushing feeling in your chest. None the less, sleep soon overtook your senses, greeting you with a peaceful night full of dreams.

As soon as your eyes closed, your luck decided to no longer be on your side. A default in your roommate’s experiment had caused a huge black-out in your building. The electricity had been out all night, resulting in your phone being dead as you awoke the next morning. Usually you could have trusted on your spare alarms, but those were also destroyed in the process of the experiment. That left you with no alarms to wake up to , therefore ending up being late.

What actually had woken you up was the harsh light shining through your thin drapes. It immediately triggered a huge wave of panic to drown, stealing all the air from your longes. Your eyes shot to the analogue clock that hung on your wall, cursing loudly as you read the time. You quickly jumped out of bed, stumbling through your room in a hurried state. At a rapid speed you pulled your clothes on, washed your face, brushed your teeth, tamed your wild bed-hair and desperately tried to make yourself look presentable in the little time you had. You ran back to your room to grab your backpack and the book you were supposed to read last night. Next you made your way over to the small kitchen, taking an apple from the fruit bowl. As you stuffed it into your backpack, you placed your book onto the table. While doing so, your eyes caught sight of your roommate sleeping with their head onto the cold surface. They were surrounded by your broken alarm clocks, pieces scattered everywhere. You couldn’t resist the urge to hit them against the head with your book. Not too hard of course, but hard enough to make any impact. They jumped awake, nearly falling off their chair. ‘Next time wake me up’, you said referring to their failed experiment, ‘Surely when you steal all my alarm clocks.’ You continued rushing to the front door, shoving your book in your backpack as well. They mumbled a small apology. ‘Usually you wake up way before your alarm’, their voice was groggy and quiet. While putting on your shoes you shouted your reply: ‘Not when I haven’t slept less than 6 hours in the past 5 days.’ Another apology followed, but you payed no mind to it. You shut the door behind you with a rather loud thud. You deeply breathed in and out before starting your run towards campus. The interaction hadn’t been in a mean manner or a sign of anyone being upset at the other. It was just your panicked, anxiety filled state being in need to rush, while they had their brain still filled with the morning fog.

The reason why you barely had closed your eyes in the past 5 days, was because you were helping your parents who had stumbled upon a cruel twist in their rather difficult case. You couldn’t stand to just watch them suffer, so you pulled a few all-nighters with them until you solved most of the hard parts. The feeling of being able to solve such a thing, made it all worth it. None the less, it still had left you exhausted and drained.

---

To your surprise you had made it in time. You had ran your way to campus, underestimating how far the distance actually was. You tried to catch your breath as you quickly checked your watch. You had 8 minutes till your class started. It was a little late for your liking, knowing how important punctuality is to them, but it would do. You lightly jogged through the halls as you looked at the map of the building that was supposed to guide you through the maze like structure. Even if you had been there plenty of times before in your life, it still was a confusing structure that didn’t want to stick in your head.

Your mind was too occupied with other things, completely forgetting about your surroundings. So, it was only logical for you to run into a person. The impact of bumping into their harsh chest made you stumble back the slightest bit, but you were able to quickly steady yourself like nothing had happened. Before you could look at the damage you had done, a high pitched voice cracked out a long ‘noo’. In front of you stood a tall, raven-haired man with warm brown eyes. He was looking at the huge coffee stain on his white button while holding his empty coffee cup in his other hand. In the mean while you had gotten distracted by his beauty. You noticed small birthmarks littering his pale skin, resembling little constellations being spread out in the night sky.

The string of curse words leaving his lips pulled you out of your fazed out state. You had accidentally been checking out this exceptionally beautiful man, who hopefully hadn’t noticed anything of it. It would be highly inappropriate and quite uncomfortable. Luckily for you his eyes were still on the huge coffee stain. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry’, you stammered out, immediately moving into action. You swung you backpack to the front, rumbling through your stuff in order to find the spare shirt you had stolen from your roommate. They didn’t mind. You were clumsy by nature and had to lend their clothes on plenty occasions. Neither was it your first time to ever ruin someone’s clothes, so you always tried to be prepared for moments like this.

The man continued to angrily mumble to himself, clearly stressing out. He failed to notice the shirt you had offered to him, until you spoke up. ‘Here’, you offered him a polite smile as his head shot up at a fast pace. You were met with a confused look being plastered over his face. Assuming what his next statement would be, you answered before he could open his mouth. ‘It’s a men’s medium.’ As his facial expression didn’t change, you huffed out an annoyed sigh. He seemed to have trouble connecting the dots. He just had to accept the shirt, that’s all. You couldn’t lose any more time, surely not by a stupid encounter. ‘Take it or go in with a huge stain, it’s your choice’, you stated with annoyance clearly noticeable in your voice, while trying to continue your kind demeanor. You dropped the shirt into his hands. ‘If I were you I would change quickly’, you said over your shoulder before turning the corner that lead you to your final destination.

You had made it just in time. The classroom already filled with students. You quickly sat down at one of the tables that still had an empty spot. On your left sat a nice looking girl with her hair tied up in a tight ponytail. She offered you a kind smile that faded into a mean scowl only seconds later. Would she have recognized you? Did she knew who you were?

You were the child of two of the most skilled FBI agents of the States. They were top of their field and greatly respected by most people. Seen you family (who all worked in similar fields) were so well known, it was only logical that you also would gain the attention from outsiders. But that also caused them to make wrong assumptions about you. They were often too stubborn to see the truth or didn’t even want to take the chance to get to know you. They just thought you were an arrogant, ego-centric, selfish child who was spoiled to dead and never had to work a day in their life. They thought you were in dire need to constantly get all the attention. They expected you to think highly about yourself while looking down on others, therefore also expecting you to be condescending towards them. Your parents had tried to prepare you for this. Not everyone is going to like you or take their time to get to know you before voicing their opinions about you. In this field, and similar fields, professional jealousy was very common. It made people act in vile ways. You feared this was going to happen in your training.

You sat in your chair with a scared heart while anxiously tapping your pencil against the desk. The supervisor was reading names of a list, but your mind drowned his voice out due to your excessive worrying. It all went smoothly, until he tumbled over a particular hard name. ‘Mie-Mic...’, the poor man looked questionably at his paper, desperate to pronounce the name correctly. As on cue the boy from earlier came to stand into the doorframe. His stained shirt was replaced by yours, fitting him just a tad bit too tightly. It showed off his muscular body even more. ‘Miecsyslaw Stilinski, sir... But most people call me Stiles.’ His voice was lower this time, but still clearly with with raging anxiety. Hearing his name roll of his tongue so smoothly made an alarm go off in your head. It sounded oddly familiar. Surely the nickname ‘Stiles’ had triggered a vague memory to resurface in your head. You just couldn’t figure out any of the details. It was like an itch you couldn’t scratch.

The supervisor looked sternly at the new boy with an unimpressed look on his face. His eyes examined him, clearly judging his appearance. ‘Ah, I see. Well, next time be on time .. and dress appropriately. You don’t need to try showing off your pretentious muscles, it doesn’t suit you.’ That comment made you feel even more guilty. It was your fault he was late and had to dress in a too tight shirt. He apologized with his eyes faintly focusing on something behind the supervisor, before they quickly went to you in order to shoot you a nasty glare. You returned an apologetic smile that didn’t help much with the current situation. He continued to hold eye contact with you until the man’s voice filled the room again. ‘Now take a seat will you’, the annoyance was clear as day. His eyes left yours for a split second as he came to action, stumbling his way towards the empty chair that just happened to be to your right. As he passed by, still holding intense eye contact with you, his faint but sweet cologne filled your nose. A scent that later on would distractingly infiltrate your nose, no matter how much you tried to focus on something else.

You were pulled out of your trance again when an excited voice filled your ears. ‘(Y/N)(Y/L/N), what a surprise to see you here. What could we possibly teach you? You already know everything and are following your parents footsteps flawlessly.’ Your cheeks reddened at his praising comment. The other students immediately glared at you, envying how sweet he acted towards you. Towards the others he had been cold and distant, whereas now he was talking highly about you. A big difference that everyone easily noticed. The room immediately was filled with a strong uncomfortable tension that reeked of jealousy.

The main reason for his kind demeanor towards you was because you already knew each other. Your parents often visited the Academy, helping with the development of new tasks or other improvements. Other times he visited you at home. He had seen you grow into the person you are today. His bond with you could be considered as a familiar one, or at least close to. So that explained. his fondness of you. The other reason for his praising was the status of your parents. It would be a shame on him and the Academy to talk down on or disrespect your family or you in any way. Besides the great help they provided for the Academy, they also were one of their sponsors. You just hoped that they wouldn’t use this to your advantage by treating you differently and more highly. You wanted to be given a fair chance. If they were going to train you without fairly criticizing you out of fear of disrespecting your family’s name, then this whole thing would be a waste of time.

‘Well, everyone is equal to the law. It’s one of the requirements we all need to go through to become an FBI agent. No matter how experienced or inexperienced we are, we all deserve to be treated equally’, you said timidly, trying not to sound overly confident or condescending towards others. You gave the supervisor a timid but kind smile while trying to avoid the burning glares. You didn’t want to go any deeper into the subject.

Seen that you were a child of the two top FBI agents of the states, meant that you had been trained to follow their footsteps from a very young age. As a baby you were given a lot of puzzles and stimulants to train your senses. At the age of 3 the tasks started to be more difficult and challenging. At your 5 the training started to become serious. When you were 12 you already were allowed to help with smaller cases. At 16 you were actively helping them with all types of cases. Both your parents had gone through the same training, seen that their fathers also had been top FBI agents. At this point the training had become some sort of tradition in your family. Most of the people in your family had underwent similar trainings, as they all worked in similar fields. They varied from FBI agents, cops, sherifs, detectives to medical helpers such as nurses, doctors, firemen,...

The supervisor laughed at your comment. ‘I’m sure you’ll graduate without any trouble. It’ll be an easy game for you. Even in your sleep you’ll still be top of the class.’ Again, you shoot him an awkward but polite smile, being uncomfortable by the amount of praising he has done. It was overwhelming and placing you in a hard position. ‘That depends on how hard you make the tasks’, your timid voice became even more quiet as the mean glares had intensified. ‘Always so humble. Just like your parents.’ With that statement he ended his long praising session.

As he continued his speech of the importance of this training, you let out a deep sigh. You had turned impossibly bright, your face burning from embarrassment. Without intending to, he had put you as a target for everyone to hate on. He made you seem like the enemy that everyone had to fear. He had thrown tons of gasoline on the burning fire of jealousy. Your future colleagues saw you as the one thing that would stand in their way of becoming a FBI agent, something that would withhold them from their dream. If there wasn’t going to be rough play already, there sure would be now. This was going to be a rougher year than you had anticipated. You were already dreading the next day to come.

-To be continued-

#stiles stilinski #stiles stilinksi imagine #stiles stilinski x reader #stiles x reader #teenwolf imagine #teenwolf #teen wolf #teen wolf imagine #stiles teen wolf #stiles imagine #stiles stilinski fluff #stiles fluff #teenwolf fluff #teen wolf fluff

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bubbleteaimagines · 4 years ago

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One-shot: Y/n Is Spiderman(Andrew Garfield Version) and goes to Forks High School, and Is a loner, and orphan. The Cullens are curious, about him, because Edward can't read his mind because of his Spider-Sense, and Alice can't see his future. Also because his blood, and scent acts as an anchor to The Cullens to control their bloodlust which makes them appreciate him more, and're always near him in school so Jasper doesn't go outta control.

the amazing spider-man

twilight one shot

twilight & spider man crossover, male!reader x the cullens

no warnings really

your senses were in overdrive as you entered the small cafeteria. not just because you were now surrounded by hundreds of chatty teenagers, but because they were there.

the cullens has been on your radar for quite a long time. having fought vampires before, it was your nature to inspect them before they became a threat.

you had known that the cullen’s were a ‘special’ breed of vampires, choosing to only feed on animals than humans.

it was nobel act but still, you had to be cautious.

you took a seat at an empty table and gently set your lunch down. after months of attending forks high school, you still hadn’t made very many friends. instead, you preferred the silence of being alone.

you took a bite out of your sandwich and just as you did, you smelled them.

looking up, you saw the five unnatural creatures walking into the cafeteria like they owned the place. the blonde, rosalie, was scowling at all the people that gawked at her. the burly brunette, emmett, had an arm around her protectivly. jasper, the one you knew had the most trouble controlling himself, was being reassured by his mate alice. and edward...well...he looked the most normal as he wore an expression that was downright miserable.

you noticed them the second they entered the cafeteria. your senses tingled, warning you of danger. but they didn’t seem to notice you though, at least not yet. it would be a couple seconds before edward realized that he couldn’t read your mind, and that your blood was calling out to them in a way different than everybody else’s.

you slumped back into your seat as the curious vampires turned to you. with your hearing, you knew that they were talking about you.

“do you guys smell that?” emmett asked his siblings, nodding his head in your general direction so fast you almost missed it.

“it’s coming him,” edward hissed, motioning towards you. “i can’t read his mind.”

“and i can’t see his future, either,” alice said worriedly.

“do you suppose he’s something supernatural, too?” jasper asked.

“not likely. just a really rare human,” rosalie said.

you almost smirked. oh, if only they knew.

shaking your head, you leaned back into your seat. you had biology with edward and jasper next. you’d learn more about them there, but for now, you enjoyed your lunch and let them speculate over who exactly you were.

the classroom filled up quickly.

and you were late, no thanks to flash thompson, a boy that seemed to have it out for you ever since you arrived.

he had tripped you in the hallway, and because of this you weren’t able to get a good seat.

you were hoping to be somewhere near the cullens, but by the time you had arrived they had already stolen your table in the back.

you scowled as you had to sit in a middle row, next to a clumsy girl named bella. you hated that you were so exposed, but luckily bella was just as antisocial as you were.

she made no move to talk or even want to acknowledge your presence during the whole class. the only time she had to speak to you was during the lab you guys were working on, and it was because she asked for a bandaid.

“papercut,” she whispered, her cheeks turning red at your expression.

you looked horrified, but it wasn’t because of her.

it was because you currently had two vampires behind you, knowing that at least one of them could barley control themselves.

you froze up, your instincts kicking in just in case you needed to stop them.

but...you dared to take a peak back at the cullens.

you didn’t know what you expected — maybe them staring at bella with dark eyes with their fangs bared or something — but in reality, it was none of that.

both edward and jasper seemed to be in complete control, not even phased by the human girl’s blood. in fact, as far as you could see their eyes were still as gold as honey.

they weren’t even looking at bella.

but that was because they had their attention on someone else.

someone who’s scent seemed to cancel out everything else in the room.

you.

the confrontation came shortly after school that day.

because you were an orphan and lived by yourself, you had the pleasure of walking yourself home.

only, that’s not quite what happened.

for some reason, you decided to walk through the forest that day and use your webs to swing around. it was honestly your favorite thing to do. there was nothing more liberating than swinging above the tallest trees, and saying hi to the birds that flew in the sky.

you had just made your way past a river and was pertched in a tree when you saw them.

or rather, your senses alerted you of their presence and a second later, they were there.

all seven cullens seemed to be gathered at the base of your tree. it shocked you, and you began wondering why in the hell they were there. you tried to hide but you knew it was no use, they could smell you.

“hello there! do you mind coming down? my family and i would like to talk to you,” carlisle, the leader of the group who you knew to be a doctor and had the most control, spoke.

his golden eyes held kindness and he held his hands up to show he wasn’t a threat. the others simply stared at you curiously.

“and how do i know you’re not being genuine?” you called back down to them, hanging onto the tree. “i’ve met your kind before. most if not all want to kill me.”

“we’re different,” a woman, esme, spoke up. “but i’m sure you already know that. because you’re different, too, right? you’re not human.”

“partially,” you found yourself correcting. “i had an...accident a few years ago. now i am what i am.”

“please, just come down. we can talk about this in a more comfortable setting,” carlisle said.

you found yourself hesitant for a moment. sure, their eyes were golden but they were still vampires, right?

but then again...if they wanted to kill you they wouldn’t have entertained you for that long. despite living forever, vampires had no patience when it came to a meal.

“...fine...,” you reluctantly agreed and got your webs ready, “i’m coming down.”

the forks breeze whipped at your face as you latched your webs onto a tree and swung down. the cullens looked absolutely amazed as you landed in front of them, unharmed.

“how did you do that?” emmett wasted no time in asking. he sounded beyond excited.

you almost smiled. “long story. i was bitten by a spider and now i have all the capabilities except i’m human,” you explained.

“fascinating,” edward whispered. “is that why i can’t read your mind?”

“or why i can’t see your future?” alice piped up.

“probably,” you merely shrugged. “but i can’t be for sure. i don’t really know much on vampires, except how to kill them.”

the family looked stunned at your revelation.

“why are you here?” rosalie asked cautiously, her body language changing to protect her family. “what do you want with us?”

“what i want with all vampires,” you told them. “i don’t wanna hurt you but i will if you hurt any humans.”

“jasper told us that you prevented that, though,” carlisle spoke up. “around your blood...he wasn’t even phased.”

“it was like everything else cancelled out,” jasper confessed. “this girl...she had a paper cut but it didn’t even bother me.”

“and it was because of him?” rosalie asked astonished.

you blushed slightly as they all turned to you.

“didn’t know i had that effect,” you muttered.

“would you be willing to talk more?” carlisle asked. “my family and i, we live not too far from here. perhaps we can talk more and see if maybe, you could help us.”

“help you? you mean like with your thirst?” you asked.

“precisely. if you can stop jasper...” edward shook his head. “i heard his thoughts. isabella is alive because of you. if we can find out more, then maybe...”

“maybe we could have a real shot at not thirsting for human blood anymore,” rosalie said.

the meeting with cullens had been strange, to say the least. but it was also nothing short of fascinating.

it took you a while to open up, but after discovering that your blood was somewhat of an anchor to them you found yourself actually wanting to help the cullens.

they weren’t bad people. and if they all had a choice, they wouldn’t be what they were.

you knew jasper especially had regrets about being a vampire. he had a hard time controlling himself around humans after decades of drinking their blood.

but now, you had decided to come to an agreement with them.

if they helped you hunt rouge vampires that were feeding on humans, then you’d stick around and help them control their thirst.

that was precisely why, a week later, the whole cafeteria stared as you walked in with them side-by-side.

for once, jasper didn’t look tortured as he walked passed the array of humans. alice didn’t have to search the future constantly wondering if he’d hurt anybody.

rosalie and emmett were over the moon at the possibly that you could help them adopt a baby since their thirst was under control.

and edward...well...

he still looked miserable, but you supposed you couldn’t help everyone. besides, it wasn’t because he had to endure thoughts coming from a room full of teenagers.

it was because, for some reason, he still thirsted for isabella swan.

but that was a story for another day.

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mintugiyuu · 4 years ago

Text

> here’s the final part of your request @kyojoroo ! I’m so sorry it’s in two different parts, but I learned for the first time that these text boxes have a limit lmao, again I hope you enjoy and have a great day/night! <3

༄ we have to stop meeting like this - continued

sfw one-shot

➥ pairing || rengoku kyojurou x reader

➥ au || modern day; college

➥ warnings || cheesy, tooth-rotting fluff with extra cheese

➥ synopsis || the reader keeps bumping into the one and only rengoku kyojurou; only instead of just casually seeing him over and over again, they quite literally bump into him in the most inconvenient ways possible. (cont.)

➥ part one || click here!

༄ the mediterranean sea collection - masterlist

Today had to be one of the worst days in your life. Freezing, drenched, and newly homeless, you tucked yourself onto the bus stop bench. Lucky you, this one didn't even have an awning to protect you from the elements.

The rain had no pity for your predicament as it pelted your body, the light clothing doing close to nothing for you. Summer had just come, yet the night rainfall seemed to have brought an unexpected chill.

Not to mention the suitcase and duffle bag you had with you were now also getting soaked.

You could only hope nothing was too waterlogged.

Your hand did little to protect your dying phone from getting wet as you tried to search for the nearest place to stay. Motel, hotel, air B'N'B; anything in range to get you off the streets for the night.

You had a feeling this would happen, and boy were kicking yourself for not seeing the red flags and preparing sooner.

Not having enough savings for a dorm, you had signed a contract with the residents of an apartment to rent out one of the rooms for cheap.

The agreement only lasted for two semesters, but they had promised that you'd be able to renew it once summer rolled around.

"Promise my ass." You grumbled, remembering how the original owner had gotten a partner. In return, they refused to let you sign another contract so they would have space for the "love of their life".

You saw the signs; you saw how their stuff slowly moved into the apartment and all the time they were spending there.

You just didn't think they'd be shitty enough people to kick you out the moment your contract ended.

A gust of icy wind rolled through, causing another shudder to rack your body. The closest place wasn't in walking distance, and it was far to late for the buses to be running. Sighing, you shut off your phone and closed your eyes.

You had resigned yourself to walk the several blocks to the nearest 24/7 fast food place to at least get out of the rain.

That was until the rain fall suddenly stopped beating down on you. The rain couldn't have stopped though, you could still hear it. You blinked your eyes open and looked up, surprised to what - or more accurately, who - you saw.

"...Kyojurou?"

Standing there in all his warmth and glory, Kyojurou looked down at you with concern, holding a bright red umbrella over your soaked form.

He couldn't seem to help the small smile that graced his lips at the sound of his first name.

"I'd be happier that you finally used my name if you didn't look so sad and drenched."

A humorless snort escaped your lips as you hugged yourself, shivering slightly. "Timing always has my side doesn't it? I'm just about to head to the closest food place to get out of the rain, so don't worry about it."

"Why?"

"I got kicked out," you shrugged, looking to the ground.

"This late at night?"

"It surprised me too. They found a new roommate and wouldn't let me renew my contract for the next school year, and it just so happens it ended tonight." There was a hint of bitterness in your tone, one that was completely understandable.

Kyojurou's brows furrowed. "They didn't give you a heads up? A two week notice?"

"I'm just lucky they let me pack all of my stuff before I had to leave." You continued to look down at the ground, not seeing the way Kyojurou's face contorted ever so slightly.

He didn't get mad often, but whoever your old roommates are were now on his shit list

"Well that's a shitty thing to do," he stated bluntly, causing you to sputter and blink dumbly at him.

It's been almost a year since you've met the blonde, and in all that time you never once heard him say a single bad word.

"Did you just curse??"

He pretended not to hear, pulling out his own phone to see the time as you mulled over the fact that this sweet ray of sunshine just called someone shitty.

Expression neutralizing as he schemed, he turned back to you. "You don't have to stay in a fast food place for the night."

"Huh?? Are you suggesting I sleep in a box?"

The man smiled, resting a reassuring hand on top of your shoulder, frustration forgotten for now. "You can stay with me!"

"What now?"

Chuckling, he passed the umbrella off to you to hold, beginning to slip his arms out of the jacket he wore. "You can stay with me for the time being until you get back on your feet! Well, us. If you wanted to of course! Sanemi just moved out, so we're looking for a new one regardless."

Baffled at the sudden offer, you started to shake your head, forming the words to decline him. It was too big of a favor, how could you accept that?

He was one step ahead of you, as he always is.

"Before you say anything, no, it would not be any trouble, you're a joy to have around! We can settle the nitty gritty later, let's just get you out of the cold."

"Wait, Kyojurou," you were silenced by a heavy warmth that suddenly engulfed your upper body, including your sight. Moving the fabric from your eyes, you realized it was his jacket.

His once dry clothes was slowly becoming just as soaked as you were as he took back the umbrella, insistently keeping it solely above you.

The gentle way he smiled in combination with the light post that shined behind his head had you convinced he was your guardian angel in disguise.

You hesitantly pulled the jacket closer to your body, not being able to deny how relieving the warmth felt. "But, won't you be cold?"

"My insides are practically pocket heaters, it takes a lot for me to be cold. A little wind and rain won't do anything to me, I promise! Now come on, before you get sick," he insisted as he grabbed your bag, throwing them over his shoulder.

"Little" was an understatement, but you didn't have the energy to argue. It was the middle of the night and you could feel your eyes starting to droop.

Grabbing your luggage to role behind, you let the other wrap his free arm around your form, hand resting on your arm. "Thank you, truly I don't know where to start showing how grateful I am. I owe you big time."

"Never refer to me as Rengoku-san again and I'll call it even!"

A wobbly smile tugged at your lips as you leaned into his side, letting him guide you down the route to his apartment. "You have a deal then, Kyojurou."

The weather broadcasters warned everyone about heavy snowfall, but you couldn’t help but think they could’ve prepared everyone a bit more as you stared out your window and could only see the shadow of snow.

Thank the gods above it was winter break or they’d have to cancel classes, which would just be tuition money flushed down the shitter.

Your train of thought was interrupted by a knock at the door of the bedroom you were in, which was odd because the door was open.

Low and behold, it was your sweetheart of a boyfriend, holding two mugs and using his foot to knock. “I brought hot coco!”

"You don't have to knock, this is your room you dork."

"Our room technically, my dear." He responded smoothly, shutting the door with his foot behind him as he made his way to you.

"Careful not to spill it," he winked, laughing slightly as he handed you your mug.

"Just for that I should," you scoffed playfully, sticking your tongue out at him as you took the drink. The smile on his face was nothing but adoring, finding you to be adorable. You had to look away to dismiss the butterflies that swarmed in your tummy. “Looks like we’re snowed in for a bit. The snow is above the windows.”

Kyojurou hummed in agreement. “I still don’t understand how tiny snowflakes can become so damaging so fast!”

“You’re funny,” you chuckled, taking a sip of the hot beverage. Kyojurou always made the best hot chocolate.

“... UME! I’m glad I can be amusing!” You couldn't hold down the snort at the realization that he wasn't joking, swallowing and shaking your head. You granted him mercy and switched the subject.

“What are the others up to?”

Kyojurou leaned against the sill next to you, shoulder bumping yours affectionately. “Tengen is in the living room playing video games with his girlfriends, Mitsuri is watching a movie in her room and Obanai is watching with her. I think she's also painting his nails from the conversation I overheard while passing by."

“I see.”

The both of you were leaning against the window sill, basking in the comfortable silence. It wasn't common in an apartment full of unique roommates.

Even now you both could hear the loud victory cheer of Suma as Tengen groaned in defeat.

Taking another sip of your drink, you hummed, lifting your head to face Kyojurou. You were going to say something, but that was forgotten as you covered your mouth with your fingers as to not laugh suddenly.

"Hm? Is something wrong?" Your poor oblivious lover had a whipped cream mustache. He tilted his head at you - not unlike an owl - seemingly confused to your sudden shift in expression. You swallowed your laughter down as you placed your drink onto the sill, stepping closer to the blonde.

"No, nothing's wrong. You just have a little something rigghtt..." you reached out to grip his chin gently, swiping your thumb across his top lip to collect the whipped cream. "-there, all gone!"

A pretty, bright red color spread across Kyojurou’s face, wide eyes blinking owlishly at you with his mouth slightly agape. Laughing quietly at his reaction, you licked the cream off your thumb, patting the side of his cheek teasingly.

"You'll catch flies, hun." A click of teeth could be heard as he closed his mouth.

"RIGHT!" He stopped himself to clear his throat, turning to face the window as his usual smile reappeared, though a bit wobbly. "Thank you!"

All you did was hum, a slight mischievous smirk settling onto your face. You were set to happily go back to your drink when you shivered, the chill of the room finally reaching you through your clothes.

Kyojurou caught it from the corner of his eye, turning back to you. “Are you cold?”

You waved him off, shaking your head. It wasn't an uncommon occurrence, you'll just get another sweatshirt.

“I’ll be ok. The hot coco will warm me up in- WOAH!” That plan was thrown out the window when he suddenly scooped you up into his broad arms, smiling determinedly.

"You're not allowed to just continue on being cold, not if I can help it!" The firey man plopped you down onto your shared bed, quickly gathering the collection of fluffy blankets you have accumulated over time.

In the blink of an eye, you were neatly swaddled in said blankets and being held gently to your boyfriend's warm chest. He settled underneath the main blanket, wrapping his strong arms around your body.

“Is that better?” He beamed at you, looking oh so proud of himself.

What did you do to deserve him?

"Much," you all but groaned, snuggling your face into the warmth of his chest. It was like cuddling a big warm marshmallow. “I still can’t understand how you’re so warm.”

“I’m a living-breathing heater, my dear. I’ve explained this before, I’m sure of it.”

You snorted, leaning into his hand as he began to run his fingers through your hair. “I’m not complaining, you’re good to keep around for whenever my hands freeze.”

“I wouldn’t mind one bit," his voice came out softly, planting a warm kiss to onto your forehead. This in turn caused you to melt even further into him, burying your face into his shirt.

Kyojurou laughed with amusement as he turned on the television, looking for something for the two of you to watch for the rest of the evening. You eventually peaked your head out to look at him, wrapping your arms around his middle.

“Hey, Kyojurou?”

“Yes?”

All of his attention was on you. Even in these small moments he looks at you as though you're the most precious human being in the world. And to him, you were.

You hummed, placing a kiss onto his chin. “I’m happy I spilled my drink all over you.”

The small peck had similar effects from the whipped cream incident earlier, though he seemed to snap out of it quicker this time. He smiled brighter, cupping your cheek with his large, warm hand.

“That's an odd way of saying I love you."

This made you pause, the 'L-word' not being used between the two of you yet. “Wait, what?"

He gave you no time to question further as he placed a kiss onto your lips in return, his other hand finding the small of your back to pull you closer.

The initial shock of being kissed faded quickly, your arms finding their way around his neck as you pulled yourself closer. The kiss was short and sweet, yet the passion that Kyojurou lived by was always present.

The kiss came to a pause with you laying on top of his chest, remote forgotten and blankets wrapped around you as you steadied your breathing.

Kyojurou's eyes crinkled slightly with his smile, brushing the back of his hand across your cheek.

"I love you too."

#🎣.requests #sfw #one shot #kny #demon slayer #kimetsu no yaiba #kny x reader #demon slayer x reader #kimetsu no yaiba x reader #kny reader insert #demon slayer reader insert #kimetsu no yaiba reader insert #kny one shot #demon slayer one shot #kimetsu no yaiba one shot #rengoku kyojurou #rengoku x reader #rengoku kyojurou x reader

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lightsovermonaco · 4 years ago

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His Good Sweater: Chapter 9

Masterlist

As always thank you to my beautiful bestie @acollectionofficsandshit you can also thank her for all the Max content in this chapter. Its a long one, enjoy!

Word Count: 9.6k

Recommended song: “Hate the way” by G-Easy and blackbear

The one thing that never failed to lift your spirits was your dad's homemade blueberry chocolate chip pancakes. Whenever you were upset as a kid, whether it be your team losing a sporting event, your high-school boyfriend dumping you for the head cheerleader, or getting rejected from an ivy league college you never expected to get into in the first place, his pancakes had been there to cushion the fall. Clever as he was, he always messed them up in some insignificant way like leaving off the whipped cream and hiding the container so you were forced to talk to him in order to remedy it. Then he would crack some stupid joke or cheesy pun that would just barely have the ghost of a smile curling your lips.

Blueberry chocolate chip pancakes were no match for the heartbreak of losing your best friend.

The morning after, you only trudge to the kitchen when your stomach's demands to be fed become too loud to ignore. A steaming pile of fluffy pancakes sits at your usual spot, no syrup in sight. You don't have the energy to find your dad and ask where he's hidden it, instead picking at them. You knew the flavor should be fruity and sweet but every bite tastes like ash. One pancake is all you can manage before nausea roils, threatening to make your meager brunch resurface.

"Some is better than none," Ben murmurs behind you and you drop your chin in the barest of nods. "We can save the rest and you can warm them up later."

"Thanks," you mumble when he takes your plate. You pull your blanket tight around your shoulders as your gaze turns to the window while your brother washes your dishes, wishing for all the world that you could make your uncooperative limbs move and help him but the mental effort it requires is too taxing. Instead you stay curled up on the chair, the noises of the house waking up around you a dull buzz in your ears. At some point your mother kisses your head and hustles out the door to work, her husband close behind. Ben is the last to leave and is reluctant to do so.

"Promise you'll text me if you need me," he says. "Mom already gave me permission to cut class after trigonometry."

"Sure." You both know it's a lie and a bad one at that. Your voice is dull and flat, completely void of emotion.

"Mom said she's coming home early anyway,” he tries. “Something about overstaffing at the greenhouse."

"Okay."

The mechanical spooling of the garage door tells you he's finally gone. Your elbows slide forward until your head rests on the table, unable to hold it up any longer.

Every fiber of your being yearns for him, to hear the distinct r's and flowery lilt of his accent as he comforts you through the heartbreak, always knowing exactly what to say. It was second nature to call one another when either of you had had a bad day or a good day or just a normal day - you'd talked so often that last year you had convinced your parents to add international minutes to your phone plan.

Your fingers itch to dial the number you had long since memorized, knowing it would ring no more than twice before he picked up. He never let it go to voicemail unless he absolutely couldn't avoid it and you had a hunch he was waiting for your call.

Despite knowing better, you scroll through the messages on your phone. Love was evident in each witty remark and wish goodnight, pulling at your heartstrings. Your finger hovers over the delete conversation button, and after a minute of debate, you can't bring yourself to do it. You would allow yourself one reprieve to look back on and remember the good.

It would be so much easier if he had given you a reason to hate him. If he'd cheated or intentionally led the media to your house, hating him would be easy. You wouldn't have to admit that you still loved him because his betrayal would have yanked out the newly blooming bud of love you nurtured and crushed the fragile petals. Instead, you were left knowing that it had been your choice to inflict damage in him. You had no right to seek comfort in his arms or even ask how he was doing. You deserved to be miserable for causing him to feel the same way.

Yuki is the first to check in on you. You don’t know what he expects; you lie through your teeth when you tell him you were fine.

The press is asking me for my thoughts. No idea why. I told them not to stick their noses where they don't belong.

At least someone had the guts to stand up to those bloodsuckers. Yuki was the last person you'd suspect to do so, but the scrappy twenty-something continued to surprise you.

Thanks, you type back. How is he?

You hesitate. You didn't really want to know the answer. Pierre was devastated and just as broken as you are. You delete the last part and opt to refrain from subjecting yourself to biting off more than you could chew.

I'm here if you need me, is Yuki's reply.

Charles, Daniel, and his newly promoted girlfriend were the next ones to text you, all offering varying degrees of support. Daniel's friend was the one that offered to sucker punch anyone that came near you without your permission, and actually dragged a single huff of laughter from your aching lungs.

I'm good thanks. But if I need a bodyguard you'll be first on the list.

Just because Daniel can lift me with one arm doesn't mean I'm not punchy!

I believe you.

Spent, you set your phone down and retreat under the down comforter. The bright pink clashed with your earthy decor, but at least the old blanket didn't smell like Pierre. Your mother had taken it upon herself to erase all trace of him from your room when she had managed to coax you into a shower, and the half hour you had spent letting the scalding water run over your skin had given her plenty of time to do so. The absence of him hurts almost as much as the trace of cedar you know you're imagining when you breathe deep.

It has to be impossible for so much agony to be contained in your body. No matter how much you try, the tears won't stop flowing because Pierre's crushed expression had taken up residence at the forefront of your consciousness.

It didn't help that so many of your recent memories were touched by his presence. Getting into university served to remind you of the ecstatic call you'd gotten after his race that Sunday, voice strained with a mix of excitement for you and the disappointment of his race ending crash on the opening lap. Even something as simple as staring at the saggy bean bag chair in the corner brought back the memory of the countless times he had lounged there, sprawled out like he owned it.

Max's text brings you briefly back to reality.

You doing okay? Dan told me what happened.

No, was all you say back. Within a minute, Max's face occupies your screen. You sigh but accept the call, laying the phone on the pillow.

"I don't feel like talking, Max."

"That bad huh?" He asks, concern lacing his usually chipper voice.

"Yeah. That bad." As if that summed up getting your heart torn to shreds.

He's uncharacteristically quiet for a beat. "Wanna hear about Vic's day? She had some crazy clients at her salon- it'll take your mind off it."

"I guess," you say, utterly nonplussed. You could care less if he kept talking or not, you wouldn't be paying attention. He prattles on for a few minutes, seemingly unaffected by your silence as his words pass through one ear and out the other.

"Told you it was crazy," he says finally, your cue to respond. You hum noncommittally and Max just sighs.

"Look, I don't know how I can help you unless you come here. I know you have a flight booked- do you still wanna come to the gala? My date's been stolen so I'm in need of one."

"Who stole your-"

The realization hits you before you can finish. Pierre. Pierre stole Max's sister and left him without a date. Something about his willingness to replace you so quickly rubs you the wrong way. It shouldn't have been so easy for him to find someone new; he should be hurting just as much as you. Fundamentally, you knew nothing would happen between Pierre and Victoria. She wouldn't go for him out of respect for both of you and you were thankful in the knowledge that it was completely platonic. Still, it was like rubbing salt in a wound.

"You know what? I'll go." It was the most you'd said all day, your throat scratchy with disuse. Max whoops on the other line and you could almost see him punching the air in victory.

"Great! When's your flight get in? I'll bring the Acura and pick you up."

You put him on speaker and login to the airlines website to punch in the flight number. Last night you'd debated canceling the flight that Pierre had paid for, determined to stay home and be miserable. Looking back you were glad you'd trusted your gut and left the reservation untouched. If he could find someone else to attend the gala with, so could you. "I land in Nice at noon on Friday. It'll be a short flight, I can text you when we take off."

"Sounds good. I'll set up the spare room for you. Victoria is staying here too, I'm sure she would love to help you get ready and do whatever it is girls do before fancy events."

"Hey, Max?"

"Whats up?"

You trace patterns through the condensation left by the glass on your nightstand. "Thank you. For understanding."

"That's what friends are for," he assures you. "Is there anything you wanna talk about now? Or are you planning to wait until you're here?"

"Ben's been keeping an eye on me. I'm okay for now." Better now that you had something to look forward to.

"All you have to do is call," he promises. "I'll listen, I don't have anything going on this week besides streaming."

You latch on to the small redirection and run with it. "You and the twitch quartet?"

"They've been kind enough to allow me to join them on the sim this week, yeah."

"I'll try to catch a race. No promises though."

"See you Friday. Try to contain your excitement."

Your lips twitch upward. "Bye Max."

**********

The rest of the week was more of the same. You stayed home and your family dealt with the swarms of people that still gathered on the lawn each morning not so patiently waiting for you to tell your side of the story. You had decided that the best course of action was to keep your mouth shut and let them figure out for themselves that there was no longer a story to report thanks to the wedge they had driven in your relationship.

By the time Ben drives you to the airport Friday the buzz has died down. You hug your brother tight before checking in for the flight and texting Max. His response is immediate, letting you know he's excited to see you.

You wish you could return the sentiment. You wanted to see your friend, sure, but you were beginning to dread the upcoming gala. Max would be your crutch and you knew he was okay with that, but it still felt wrong.

Unlike your brother, Max was waiting at the curb when you arrived in Nice. A nondescript cap was perched on his head, the oversized sunglasses he wore hiding his eyes from passersby. His gleaming orange peel of a car attracted more attention than he did for once, people stopping to ogle the Acura as they came and went.

"Hey you," Max greets, a broad grin causing his trademark dimple to appear as he wraps you in a rare hug. You cling to him, throat going tight at the intimacy of it. Max wasn't a physical person by any stretch; if he was hugging you this tightly it meant he knew how broken you were.

He waited for you to break contact first, giving you all the time you need. You sniff and wipe the single tear that had somehow escaped and laugh lightly.

"Hey," you say, voice scratchy. "Thanks for picking me up."

He waves a hand, brushing it off. "Vic wanted to come but she changed her mind when I told her I was driving."

"Probably a smart choice," you observe, letting him pop the trunk- which was in the front of the car, since the Acura NSX was a mid-engined beast of a Japanese supercar- "and considering your choice of car, she wouldn't have fit anyway."

"This is true." He starts the engine, the roar of which makes a poor old woman a few yards away drop her purse.

The drive back is near silent, broken only by Max's occasional quips about a landmark or an observation about someone's driving. It was impossible for any driver to turn off the analytical part of their brain, their Formula 1 habits crossing into their daily lives.

When Max parks at the curb outside his apartment, you move to open the door but he hits the lock button. You glance over your shoulder at him and quirk a brow.

"Am I your prisoner?"

"Are you gonna talk about what happened?"

Sighing, you sink back into the seat. The way the bolstering hugs your sides almost makes you believe you could fade into it if you try hard enough. "I wasn't really planning on it."

It had only been a handful of days since you had broken it off, the wound still leaking fresh blood when you poked at it. It refused to scab over or give you any kind of reprieve from the torture.

"You know you'll have to face him tomorrow at some point. He'll want to talk to you."

"That's why I'm going with you. You won't have a problem telling him to leave me alone."

Max sighs. "Yeah, I suppose. If that's what you think is best."

The trudge up the stairs and subsequent silent elevator ride allows your thoughts to wander to Victoria. It wasn't her fault that Pierre had asked her to come with him after you'd canceled, after all she was already planning on going and the late notice meant it was likely no one else could make it, but it didn't stop the pang of jealousy that rocketed through you each time you ruminate on it.

It didn't help when she wrapped you in a hug the moment she saw you and whispered an apology in your ear, like she knew she'd done something wrong. Tears spring to your eyes again and Victoria shoots Max a leave us alone look.

"Uh, I'm gonna hop on the sim. Help yourself to whatever is in the fridge if you're hungry."

"Thanks Max." Your eyes are pinned to a smudge of dirt on the wood floor, safely out of range of anything triggering. Keeping it together was more of a struggle than you'd expected.

"I hope you don't hate me," Victoria starts genuine concern lacing the words. "It was just easiest-"

"I know," you cut in. "And I don't." Your smile is tight, not quite hitting home as she returns it.

"Well then. Let's figure out how we're gonna do your hair tomorrow, shall we?"

**********

The dress was a single, simple piece of fabric, spun of sunset orange and free of any bells or whistles. The feather light chiffon hugged every supple curve through your hips until flaring out slightly at the bottom just enough to allow you range of motion. The deep vee of the neckline prominently displayed your cleavage, toeing the line between attention grabbing and scandal starting and leaving little to the imagination. The back dropped low, leaving the elegant curve of your spine free to be kissed by the salty Mediterranean breeze.

The dress is nothing special compared to the thousand dollar pieces that the other boy's dates would be wearing, but you didn't have the money- or the will- to find something new. It by no means broke the bank when you picked it up from the second hand store last year, but it looked the part. It had been a showstopper at the spring formal you'd originally worn it to and judging by Max's reaction, it still was.

He let out a low whistle when you stepped into the living room. "I'm sorry, did you pick that out with me in mind?" He laughs and despite yourself, heat rises to your cheeks. You hated being the center of attention, even among friends. "It's the perfect shade of orange to match my tie. I swear I didn't plan it that way!"

"I know you didn't." You give him a forced smile, praying he doesn't call you out on it. The dress you wore hadn't been your first choice. The one you originally planned to wear still sat in your closet at home collecting dust. It had been the perfect shade of blue to compliment Pierre's sky eyes, but it didn't match Max's deeper ocean blue. So at home it had stayed, and you had chosen the orange one because it made the necklace at your throat pop.

Your fingers engulf the stone before you can stop yourself, as they always do when your thoughts wander to him. Him, because you could scarcely think his name before your heart wretches at the reminder of what you'd lost. Flashes of bright smiles and soft kisses filter through your mind, making you lock up. You swear you can feel the ghost of plush lips to your throat and the scrape of callouses over the curve of your spine. Your eyes fall shut, desperate to get lost in the idea of him like you used to.

"You good?"

Max's quiet words startle you back into the present. No, you were in no way shape or form good, but you had no choice to fall back on the familiar mask of humor to cover up your inner turmoil.

"The real question is are you?" You smirk and look him over. The Red Bull navy suit strains over his broad shoulders, suggesting he had put on muscle since the last time he'd been forced into it. "You look stiff as a board in that tux."

"I feel so awkward." He straightens the suit coat and absentmindedly lifts a hand to tousle his hair. You grab his wrist just in time to keep him from ruining his sister's hard work and shoot him a chiding look. He grins sheepishly and lowers his hand.

"Vic would kill me if you got to the gala looking like you got run over."

"That's a good point." He offers you his arm and you accept the lifeline he unwittingly offers you. "But I refuse to leave the windows up on this beautiful night, so we'll test how well it'll hold."

You quirk an eyebrow at him. "You're driving us there?"

"Well duh. I always drive when I'm at home."

You glance sidelong at the glaringly orange Acura parked at the curb a few floors below. Your dress would blend right in with the paint, but perhaps that was a good thing. It would provide that much more of a shock factor when you arrived and stepped out.

"Just don't crash out on the hairpin," you tease half heartedly.

He rolls his eyes. "At least it's just the two of us so I don't have to call an uber. Vic's getting picked up by-'' Max cuts himself off and gives you an apologetic smile.

"You can say his name," you whisper, eyes trained on the tile of the hallway as you walk. "It's not like he's gone."

"Getting picked up by... Pierre," Max tries, carefully monitoring his neutral tone. God, you thought you could handle it but you can't, stumbling over your own feet with only Max's grip on your arm to catch you.

He'd dance with Vic tonight, and probably countless other women, his hands drifting over their bodies like they'd done on yours only days ago. You'd be forced to watch from the sidelines and make small talk that no one would remember come morning, utterly unable to do anything about it. At least Daniel’s girlfriend would be there to be the voice of reason, if you could peel her away from Daniel long enough to speak with her for any length of time.

Max was uncharacteristically quiet on the ride to the venue, leaving you to study the city as he drove. Few yachts were left in the harbor as the sun was swallowed by the sea, the owners undoubtedly set sail for a weekend getaway. Your gaze involuntarily searched for the slip that held Charles' Ferrari red speedboat that you'd visited countless times with Pierre. The eyesore was hard to miss when surrounded by its monotone brethren, memories flooding back in droves at the sight of it.

Sighing, you turn away to glimpse what you can of the city through the ridiculously tiny sliver of windshield. How anyone could confidently drive the Acura while having so little field of vision was beyond you. It was probably second nature to Max, who weaves through the narrow streets with practiced ease and barely lets off the gas through the corners.

The city of Monaco rarely slept, and tonight was no different. Soft yellow fluorescent glow seeps from high rise balconies, the occupants soaking up the last dregs of sunlight before heading out to the casinos and clubs. People spilled out of cafes onto the sidewalks, their laughter lingering on the breeze as you speed past.

The list of people you trust enough to get in the car with and let them drive with such intensity is short: Max and Pierre. Not even Daniel made the final cut, not when his then not-girlfriend had recounted the tale of him losing the rear of his McLaren 570s at a track day and nearly sending them into the wall. According to her, he'd been too busy ogling her to keep his full attention on the road, but it was enough for you to question his judgement at times.

If you close your eyes, you could pretend it was someone else next to you, cutting through the gears like a hot knife through butter and coaxing every inch of performance out of the car that he could with the light traffic. You draw a surf-scented breath deep, lungs aching with the effort.

Max joins the queue of cars waiting to park outside the venue, your attention trained on the guests stepping out of cars and climbing the wide set of marble steps leading to the sleek glass building. The modern structure is slightly out of place among the Roman-esque buildings surrounding it but the air of importance it exudes overrules any who dare say it doesn't belong.

"I can't tell you how glad I am that there's an open bar," Max remarks, hanging his head out the window to wave at someone. "It makes these events so much easier."

"You're telling me," you mumble, searching involuntarily for a familiar head of dusty blond hair in the droves of people arriving. Instead of sight, it's the unforgettable rumble of his Civic Type R's exhaust that alerts you to his arrival. Your head whips around, eyes eating up the pearl white paint of Pierre's favored car as it slides in behind you. You silently thank whatever deity is listening that his windshield is tinted, protecting you from seeing the smirk you are certain is playing on his lips.

Once upon a time, the cockpit of that car had been your favorite place in the world. You'd spent countless hours inside it eating shitty gas station cuisine and singing along to the radio at the top of your lungs as Pierre drove you to whatever adventure he had planned for the day.

Max waves at your- his friend, you remind yourself sharply- and revs his Acura in response. He leaves the keys with the valet, picking up on the tension in your shoulders as the white car parks behind you. Max tugs your arm in attempt to turn you away, but your feet are rooted to the spot.

“I see you found another date-” The flash of a grin on Pierre's face as he steps out is immediately dashed when he notices you on Max's arm.

If looks could kill, Max would keel over then and there. A muscle in Pierre's jaw flutters as he takes in the sight of the two of you together, your hand on the Dutchman's forearm and your matching attire looking for all the world as if it was purposefully coordinated.

Max lifts his chin, spine going straight under Pierre's threatening glare. “Her airfare was already paid for and she already had the dress. Someone had to take her.”

Your stomach sinks; the last thing you wanted to do was become a point of contention between the two boys, but you refused to apologize for at least attempting to enjoy yourself.

Pierre doesn't speak again, only nods to Max and pointedly avoids your stare. He tosses the keys to the smart-dressed kid serving as his valet, coming around to open Victoria's door. With his back turned to you, you take a moment to study the crisp white suit he's chosen for tonight. You had always told him black wasn't his color and he seemed to have taken it to heart. White was what you loved seeing him in, and the tight cut brought back memories of a different type of suit in an entirely different city only a few weeks ago. You'd peeled him out of that Alpha Tauri race suit the moment he made it to the trailer, eager to worship him after his podium. You'd be lying if you said it hasn't been the best sex of your life.

"Come on," Max urges, placing a chaste hand on your upper back and turning you around. He leads you up the stairs, his comforting touch never leaving your skin for a moment. The callouses were all wrong, the fingers too broad to be who you wanted it to be, and yet you couldn't help but imagine it was Pierre leading you up, stopping to smile for the few cameras scattered around.

Flashes spot your vision as you pull your face into an expression of excitement. Max murmurs something in your ear that you think is encouragement but the din of reporters is too deafening to be sure.

"How come you aren't with Pierre?"

The shouted question comes from an unknown assailant but it strikes you like a physical blow. You freeze, mouth going dry as you search for a suitable excuse. Max grants you the space of a single heartbeat to respond before he does so on your behalf.

"How about you mind your own damn business and worry about your cheating wife?"

The man who had bombarded you goes slack jawed, Max's wild guess clearly somehow hitting him just as hard as he had hit you.

"Keep walking," he urges you, leading you through the blinding sea of flashing lights. When you hear the same question directed at Pierre, his flippant laugh grates on your nerves.

You don't have it in you to appreciate the grand architecture of the entrance hall, too busy trying to keep your breathing in check. Max steers you off to the side and places his hands on your shoulders.

"Look at me," he demands, and you drag your eyes up to his face. "Breathe. He's hurting just as bad as you, only difference is he's better at hiding it. Just enjoy the night okay? I'll grab you a drink and we can find Daniel and his friend and you two can catch up."

You nod, placing a hand on your throat. The delicate chain of the necklace is a vice around your neck, the reminder of him pulling it tight. Your pulse hammers beneath your fingers and you focus on it until it slows. "Get me whatever you're having."

Max disappears in the crowd, and you take a seat at the bench tucked in the corner. No one pays you any heed as they walk past, entranced by the elegant decor and fragrant florals. Your head falls forward to rest in your hands and you struggle to take deep, calming breaths.

Pierre was here. Inhale.

He looked happy. Exhale.

He was getting by. Inhale.

You could get by, too. Exhale.

Renewed, you glance up in time to find Max standing before you with a drink of dark liquid adorned with maraschino cherries in each hand. He extends one glass to you and you don't bother to question what it is before swallowing half in one go. "Better?"

"Much." You stand and brush out the wrinkles in your dress. "Where are we sitting?"

"Er, about that," Max starts, rubbing his neck sheepishly. "They put two teams at each table. We're at the Red Bull Alpha Tauri table."

"I see." You take another deep, steadying breath, letting the anxiety ebbing in your veins fade out with the exhale. It was times like this that you channeled Daniel a bit. It sounded silly and you would never admit it, but the slogans on his helmets worked if you focused on them hard enough. All good, all ways.

If Pierre could get through tonight, so could you.

“I can try to see if I can switch tables-”

"It's fine," you say and down the rest of the drink. “I can handle it.”

Max shifts on his feet, his discomfort something you rarely see from him. He usually excelled at keeping a straight face in uncomfortable situations but it seems that your unease rubbed off on him. “We should get going then, dinner will be served any minute.”

You once again take the arm he offers you, the liquor in your veins already granting you false courage. “We would have time to mingle if you hadn’t taken the scenic route.”

“It was nice out,” he protests, and pulls you to a halt when he spots Daniel across the hall. His girlfriend waves at you with a sad smile. She gestures between the two of you to indicate that you’ll talk later before Daniel pulls her towards the McLaren table. That boy was punctual to a fault and would be caught dead before he was late to anything.

Thankfully, the two of you arrive before Victoria and her date and are able to secure seats that ensure there’s a buffer between you. By some small miracle Christian Horner and his wife were absent and instead a few engineers and their significant others sat at the packed table. Max greets Gianpiero while you take your seat, happy to observe.

“Hey!”

You twist in time to see Yuki’s short frame emerge from the crowd and point to the empty seat to your right. “This one taken?”

You shake your head, standing to give him a quick hug. “How are you doing? Where’s your date?”

“Ah, she couldn’t make it. Had some family stuff to take care of. You look great, by the way.”

You dip your chin in thanks, unsure how else to respond. He was in a white suit that you were sure would wind up stained five minutes into dinner. “Did they mandate that you wear white?”

He shakes his head with a rueful smile. “Honestly, it’s the only one I own. I haven't been to enough events to build up my closet yet."

"Well I think it's…"

You spot Pierre before he sees you. His brow is slightly creased as he hunts for the correct table using the same focused determination as when driving his Alpha. For a split second, he meets your gaze. The cacophony of the event fades to background noise and suddenly it's just the two of you and you damn near lift your hand in a wave. You're positive he can see your heart beating out of your chest like in an old cartoon as you curl your fingers into a fist in your lap. Your restraint proves fatal, the floor falling out from beneath your feet when he drops your stare. This was your new normal, you remind yourself. Stolen glances were all you would get.

"I can move," Yuki says, starting to rise. You grip his wrist, holding him in place.

"Please don't." The only other open seats were across the table, and at least then you didn't have to worry about brushing elbows with him all night long.

Yuki nods, slowly settling back in. Max finally takes his seat after giving your shoulder a supportive squeeze.

"You don't have to say anything to him," he reminds you, barely audible over the scrape of chairs and various chatter.

You find anywhere else to look as Pierre pulls out Vic's chair for her and makes his rounds to greet everyone. Daniel and his girlfriend are seated a few tables away and you distract yourself by attempting to read their lips. You manage a few minutes of tenuous peace, catching snippets of Daniel's cheesy jokes and her disapproving, yet flirty, responses.

"Damn, we clean up well, huh?"

You squeeze your eyes shut at the sound of home. His words are honey and you lap them up like you'd never tasted anything sweeter. They weren't even directed at you and yet somehow you twist them to fit your narrative.

Pierre stands at the bottom of the stairs like a chaste high school prom date patiently waiting for your grand entrance. He checks his watch and rakes a hand through his messy hair. You stifle your laugh with a hand, amused by his unnecessary nervous energy.

Taking mercy on him, you clear your throat. His gaze snaps up to you, mouth falling open. You take your time gathering the orange fabric of your dress and descending the stairs, savoring the way he eats you up. He was resplendent in his crisp white tuxedo and you had half a mind to make him late for the gala and strip him out of it then and there and devour him.

Your heels clack on the marble floor of his entirely too fancy apartment and you pause to do a little spin for him, earning you an appreciative whistle for your trouble. A laugh bubbles out of you and you place your hands on his shoulders. His own settle on your waist to pull you flush against him, his body heat soaking through the thin fabric of your dress to warm your core.

"Damn, we clean up well, huh?"

You start when knuckles graze the back of your bare neck. The touch is there and gone but you know immediately that it's Pierre. It's slight enough to be brushed off as accidental to anyone else, but nothing was accidental with Pierre. The barely there contact conveys more than any words ever could.

He still loved you. You looked stunning. He wishes you were still his so he could prove it to you. All this and so much more contained in a half second brush of his skin to yours.

It all comes back to you in a rush, the emotion you'd so carefully tucked away in a locked box in the back of your mind finally set free. His touch ignites any other thought in your mind that isn't him, burning it away until it's ashes on the wind.

Despite your better judgement, you lean into him, giving him permission to unravel you. This time you sigh when his fingers ghost over your skin, electricity sparking in their wake. You didn't care who might be watching; the tiny touches were slowly repairing your shattered heart. Your traitorous mind replaces his fingers with the brush of his lips to your nape, imagining the heat as he slides the strap of your dress off your shoulder, lips moving to follow.

You bite your lip to stifle a groan when his heat is withdrawn, leaving you feeling inexplicably naked. You open your eyes to find Victoria's pitying stare paired with an apologetic smile. Max nudges you with his elbow, and you realize someone has addressed you.

"Um, what?"

"I said I like how you guys coordinated outfits," Pierre repeats and openly prods your shoulder. "Obviously Max chose the color."

His tone is playful, but his words are clipped in a way only you understand. Craning your neck, you twist to look up at him. His eyes are cloudy and his smile doesn't reach them, more for show than anything else. "It was an accident."

"Doesn't look that way."

Your retort is ready on your tongue but he doesn't give you a chance to reply before retreating to his seat. His ability to act as if nothing has changed astounds you, as your head is still reeling from the pinpricks of his skin on yours. Instead of being rendered speechless, he strikes up a conversation with Yuki about the Alpha's performance, leaving out the confidential details but giving enough away that it surprises you.

The sheer fact that he can so easily switch off whatever feelings he harbors is unfair. The sensation of his fingers on your neck still lingers and it's all you can do to keep from stepping around the table and slotting yourself between his legs like you had in that bar in London. Your nails bite into your palms, listening in if only for his voice to wash over you and calm your racing heart.

When he mentions the rake angle, you know it's just to mislead anyone who might be eavesdropping. He'd told you the exact angle in the past, and it certainly was not one degree, and it did not cause the level of understeer he was describing.

"The understeer comes from improper tire selection," you blurt. "And driver error."

All eyes turn to you and you straighten. You knew enough about the construction of a Formula 1 car to be positive your assessment was correct. You were almost as certain that he'd said it to force you into speaking to him whether you liked it or not.

"What was that?"

If Pierre could torment you with his subtle touches, you could do the same and call him out when he was wrong.

"Driver error caused the rear end to slide out around that turn in Japan, not the rake angle. That's got nothing to do with it. Your tires were blistered because of you taking an imperfect racing line and they were old. You miscalculated the level of traction they'd give you."

Why no one else had pointed it out was beyond you.

"So you're an engineer now?" Pierre challenges, crossing his arms. Something about the arrogance radiating from him rubbed you the wrong way. You let all the emotion of the past few days surface and add fuel to the fire.

"No, but I've learned enough to see through the bullshit drivers spin to mislead other teams."

Max murmurs your name in warning but your frustration is boiling over. He replaced you tonight, didn't even pause to consider going alone and instead choosing to take Victoria. Sure, it had been your fault that he was dateless, but that didn't give him the right to hurt you too. He knew it would destroy you to see him with anyone else even if it was completely platonic, but he did it anyway.

"Why don't you tell me where I should brake on turn ten since you're an expert all of a sudden?" Victoria lays a hand on his arm but he yanks it out of her grip. "What crack in the pavement? Or is it a mark on the barrier? Drive one lap in my car and then you can tell me how to drive."

It wasn't your analysis that had upset him. You'd done so plenty of times and he had always taken your criticism with an open mind, using it to tweak his driving style to improve his lap time or turn it into a teaching experience so you could learn. No, judging by the way his eyes are lined with silver that he fights to blink away, it's your betrayal that upsets him and rightfully so. You glance around the table but no one is willing to meet your eyes save for Max, who angles his head as if to say fight for it.

But you can't. It's monumentally easier to let Pierre win and sweep it under the rug than to address the deeper issue. "I was trying to help," you say lamely, picking at the salad in front of you.

"You don't get to do that anymore."

The venomous words hit like knives, knocking the breath out of you. Your mouth hangs open like a fish gasping for air but any reply you think up dies on your tongue.

As the music fades out and a man climbs up onto the stage, Pierre gets up and leaves. You track his progress as he weaves through tables, noting Daniel reaching for him as he passes. You flinch when the balcony door slams behind him, an astonished murmur rocking through the crowd.

"You should probably talk to him," Max whispers.

You shake your head, not trusting yourself to speak. You had no idea what you would say. 'Sorry' was insignificant and 'I love you' would be cruel when the barest of thought regarding how the media treated you made your stomach churn.

Max pulls his phone out under the table and you think you see Charles' name on the screen. Good; someone had to make sure Pierre didn't do anything he would regret in the morning and if it wasn't you, Charles was the next best chaperone. A minute later, the Ferrari driver leaves his seat too, exiting the same way as Pierre.

Focusing on what's said on stage proves fruitless. Try as you might, your attention is trained on the side door Pierre had disappeared through, praying he returns despite knowing it would mean more barbed words hurled at you. Neither he nor Charles return at any point during the presentation. His absence was quickly becoming a gaping black hole, swallowing up any semblance of sanity you had managed to gather in preparation for tonight.

"Try to have some fun," Max says, nudging you with an elbow. "As soon as this guy shuts up I’ll get us some more drinks and then we can eat and get out on the dance floor and forget about everything, yeah?"

You nod. You already feel the buzz of the first drink, and one or two more would push you thoroughly over the edge into blissful forgetfulness. "I don't wanna be sad anymore."

**********

He didn't know where he was going. All he knew was that he had to get away from you before he said something that would tear whatever hope he held of repairing what was between you to ribbons. He registers Daniel's low, "Gas, you good?" as he breezes past, but doesn't pause to answer. His sights are locked on the wide, carved oak doors that lead to fresh air.

The breath whooshes out of him when he flings open the balcony doors. They slam behind him and he winces. Chalk that up as something else for Helmut to pick him apart for on Monday.

Pierre rakes a trembling hand through his hair and rests his elbows on the railing, sucking in lungfuls of air like he'd just surfaced from a dive in the harbor.

When you'd agreed to come to the gala with him, he had been overjoyed. You hadn't made it to the winter gala earlier this year due to a last minute exam and he had sulked the entire night. He still had the place card embossed with your name in the fishbowl by his door, the sizable container nearly overflowing with memories of you. Everything from forgotten earrings to plastic hotel key cards filled the bowl and it was a bright reminder of your adventures together. His plan had been to add another place card to the mix after tonight but after what he'd just said to you, he'd rather forget today ever happened.

He fucking hurt. Everything just hurt, from the shirt collar scratching at his neck to the bone deep ache that had started when he laid eyes on you on those steps, arm locked with Max's. You'd stolen the words from his mouth, the jab he'd planned to toss at Max dying at the sight of you.

He hadn't expected you to come tonight. Despite anyone's objections, he'd been fully prepared to get completely shit faced to the point that the ghost of your skin no longer haunted his fingertips and your voice no longer sang in his head. But seeing your damned face had shattered the false reality he had constructed, the one where you never broke him and left him scrambling to piece himself back together.

The universe had dealt him another low blow when he discovered Red Bull and Alpha Tauri would be at the same table and he'd be forced to endure your presence at arms length, close enough to touch but absolutely not allowed to do so. It was his own personal hell, constructed solely to punish him for whatever transgressions he'd made in his life.

And that fucking dress.

The orange painted the aquamarine charm at the hollow of your throat in sharp relief, showing it off like he somehow still owned you. If you had arrived with him, he would have already led you back to the Civic and bunched that damned dress up past your hips to drag his favorite sounds from you with his tongue. If he could just get you alone, he's sure it wouldn't take more than a single touch to have you crashing into him and begging for more.

Seeing you with Max tonight paints an entirely different picture.

It's Max he sees tearing off the dress at the end of the night when you get back to his apartment. Max's hands slide over your hips and you laugh, walking back so you can keep your lips on his as he slams the door shut behind you. You dip your head back when he presses you to the wall, Max unfaltering as his lips and teeth trace the curve of your exposed throat and he slips the straps of the matching dress of your shoulders to let it pool at your feet. Max's name breezes past your lips on a shaky exhale as you become putty beneath his fingers.

No matter how loud Pierre calls your name, you don't hear him, instead cupping the back of the Dutchman's head and pulling him in for a heated kiss. When you do finally notice him observing from afar, agony wracking his body, all you do is grin. It feels real, even though Pierre is certain it's a crazed fever dream, his mind spinning his worst fear to life: you seeking comfort in the company of someone that wasn't him.

Pierre starts when the door squeaks open, the nightmare thankfully dissolving. Charles steps out clad head to toe in blazing Ferrari red and instantly he knows who sent him. The thought alone stokes rage in his chest, the image of your lips on Max's still fresh.

"Not as easy as you expected it to be, is it?" He asks, stuffing his hands in his pockets.

"Fuck off," Pierre growls and immediately regrets it. Beyond you, Charles was his closest friend. They had known each other for ages. It wasn’t a friendship he was willing to sacrifice just because he felt like shit. Pierre sighs and throws him an apologetic glance. "No it's not."

"Why don't you talk to her?"

"She doesn't want to fucking talk, Charles. Take one look at her, she's hanging on Max like she can't get enough of him." Pierre hangs his head in his hands, emotions shifting faster than he did on race day. "I can't go back in there and watch her choose him over me."

"You don't really believe that bullshit, do you?" Charles asks, joining him at the railing.

Not entirely, but he still struggled to understand your thought process. He thought he knew you, but you being here tonight when he had been certain you wouldn't be proved he didn't.

"I don't know what to believe anymore. I thought it would be forever, that I'd finally found someone who didn't mind my lifestyle and accepted it for what it was, who loved me unconditionally. I thought she was my forever."

"You think she's done with you just because some assholes invaded her privacy?" Charles shakes his head. "She's loved you for a long time, years even. You haven't seen the looks she gives you, but the rest of us have. You hung the moon in her sky, Pierre. That kind of thing doesn't just get swept away by the breeze."

His shoulders curl inward in an attempt to hide the frustrated tear that escapes him. "What am I supposed to do?"

Charles shrugs. "I don't think there's a right answer to that. Try giving her some space. She didn't grow up in the spotlight like we did. It's not an easy adjustment for some people, mate. And blowing up on her when she tries to make conversation doesn't help anything," he says gently. "Let her figure it out and come to you when she's ready."

The concept of letting you go even temporarily was terrifying to him. Waiting on you to make the first move was even worse because he was setting his fate in your hands.

"I miss her," he murmurs, turning his face to his friend.

"I know." Charles throws an arm around the taller man's shoulders and follows his gaze out over the tiered streets of Monaco's city center. "My suggestion is to throw yourself into the season. Show her you know how to fight, y'know?"

Pierre nods. He could do that. It was how he normally handled his problems anyway; let the track wick away whatever was on his mind and force him to hone in on the details surrounding him in each moment.

"You ready to head inside?" Charles asks.

"I don't think I can go back just yet."

"Want me to hang out here with you?"

"No. I'll be back eventually."

Charles' hand falls from his shoulder after a short squeeze, the sound of a tinny voice over the speakers temporarily flooding the balcony as Charles returns to the banquet. Pierre allows himself a few more moments of reprieve before slipping back inside just as the applause starts. Rather than returning to the delicately portioned meal that sat cooling before his empty chair, he orders a drink. Whiskey on the rocks, his go to in times of crisis. He takes one sip before the reminder of you ordering it for him in London makes holding the glass of caramel liquid unbearable and he downs it in a single swallow, going back to order a beer instead.

He nurses the green bottle of Heineken as he leans against the wall until the meal is finished and the chit chat starts. You stand with Max, practically pressed against him as you snatch a flute of champagne from a passing server. You search the crowd, brows drawing together when you don't locate your quarry. Pierre had made sure that he was tucked out of the low lighting, unsure if he could survive you stealing worried glances at him all night.

Charles winds his way over to pass off a roll he snagged from dinner, practically forcing the Frenchman to eat it before returning to his date. He nibbles at it absentmindedly, entirely too focused on you to divert an ounce of focus elsewhere.

Your dress is a glowing sun in a sea of earth tone garments, drawing his eye as you pull Max out onto the wood platform serving as the dance floor before the tables are fully cleared. The flush in your cheeks tells him you're deeper in your cups than you should be; Max didn't know your limit as well as he did. Three drinks was all you could manage before you got tipsy, five if you wanted to be completely blitzed.

The lights dim and his hiding spot is no longer quite as good as the party lights sweep over him from time to time. Max places one hand on your hip and you place one on his shoulder and grin up at him. Judging by the fit of giggles that requires you to lean into Max for support, you were teetering dangerously on the edge of being wholly drunk. You throw your head back and laugh at whatever Max says in response to your fit, Pierre straining to hear the musical sound over the band.

"Hey," Victoria says, breaking his concentration. "You wanna get out there?"

Pierre grimaces. He had managed to completely forget about her, too stuck in his own head. "Sorry, Vic. I don't think I'd be a very good partner tonight."

"No worries," she says, a soft, understanding smile on her lips. "I can keep myself busy."

Pierre nods his thanks, his attention immediately returning to the dance floor. Daniel and his girlfriend steal the show, both laughing as he dips and twirls her across the floor.

Being together was so fucking easy for them, effortless in a way it wasn't for you and Pierre. They never once paid any heed to the photographers that swarmed them or the headlines printed about them, they just laughed the rumors off and carried on. No one could question their love for each other because they were vocal about it- sometimes annoyingly so- and Daniel was rarely seen in public without her at his side. They were always touching, holding hands or stealing kisses or even the near scandal of his hand blatantly on her ass at the podium a few races back, and neither of them cared.

Their love was all that mattered. They didn't care who knew it.

But you and Pierre were far too private to be like that, at least not when you were still trying to figure things out yourself. The first sign of outside pressure had you cracking, and he wouldn't stand for knowing he was the source of your pain.

He tries and fails to convince himself he isn't jealous of the way Dan's hand so easily glides under the navy blue silk of her dress to caress her back without a second thought, wishing he could do the same to you. If he's being honest, he's living vicariously through Daniel for the next few songs, pretending he was someone else observing you and himself on the dance floor instead. It almost works; the way she shudders when his lips graze her ear is strikingly similar to how you'd react. The smile she flashes up at him is agonizingly close to your own wicked grin.

When her mouth finds his, Pierre gathers his wits and turns away. Their blatant public affection flipped a switch inside him, disgust rocking through him for a split second before he pushed it away.

He was happy for them. He knew what a long, rocky road it had been for them to become lovers instead of friends, had firsthand knowledge of the stress they'd gone through before they'd finally admitted their feelings to each other, put their pride aside and got together. Pierre had been the one to offer her advice on a night not much different than this one months ago, helping repair the damage Daniel's idiotic, thoughtless words had caused.

But Pierre had since become the person who was sickened at the sight of others in love. It reminded him that part of himself was missing and he hated it.

No matter how hard he tried, he couldn't keep his eyes from wandering back to you. You still occasionally scan the room as Max struggles to lead you through a dance. By some stroke of bad luck your gaze snags on him just as a spotlight illuminates his face and he grimaces. A slow blink is the only surprise you let show before laying your head on Max's shoulder. Jealousy spikes through him like wildfire, igniting his blood and tinging his vision with red.

He wants to march over and rip you off Max. He wants you tucked safely against him as his thumb rubs circles on the bare skin of the small of your back. He wants, more than anything, to take you to his apartment and half carry you up the stairs, having to shush you because you're giggling loud enough to wake the dead, and lay you down in his bed. He wants to help you out of that stunning dress and into a pair of his sweats and curl up against you, letting you sleep off your hangover until noon.

He'd fucked up that chance though, hadn't he? He had slipped up and driven you straight into your friend's arms, who he trusted not to make a move on you but not enough to negate the jealousy coursing through him.

In that moment, he hates you. He hates the hold you have on him, the way a simple gesture between half-drunk friends could send him into a spiral so steep he didn't recognize himself. He hates that he can't keep his eyes off you, your gravity too strong for him to resist.

Most of all, he hates that he doesn’t know how to quit you.

@seasidetom @flashcal @limp-wrist-max @sunshinesewis @lifeofzoemichael @ninuffi @perfectfantasies22 @lamboleglerg @ladyperceval

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charming-mage · 4 years ago

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The Search For Marinette Dupain-Cheng

This is my take on my prompt The Search For Marinette Dupain-Cheng.

You know, I always wondered about Marinette taking care of Akumas while overseas. If she takes too long, she’ll scare her loved ones half to death. Can’t rush too much or else she risks losing her miraculous because of it. Since no one is aware of her identity, she doesn’t have anyone to cover for her. Friends who are unaware of the truth will cover her for so long before they have to fess up.

In salt fics, the class usually doesn’t care where Marinette is on Gotham trips. Here, they give a shit.

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In which Lila messes with some signs and Marinette gets lost when she comes back late (via Kaalki) after dealing with an Akuma attack in France.

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The two week school field trip in Tokyo was supposed to be an enjoyable experience. There’s booked reservations at classy restaurants, a fancy hotel with a big pool, shows, and tours throughout Tokyo. Lila is most looking forward to the fashion expo. If she doesn’t do something soon, it looks like she’ll miss out on that too. Marinette been missing for two days and Lila is already sick of it.

All because she miscalculated in a spur of the moment plan.

“Marinetteeee! Where are you,” shouts a crying Alya. The girl spots a few tourists and shoves a flier in their faces. Nino joins in with his own fliers. “Have you seen my friend Marinette Dupain-Cheng? Cutest French girl you’ve ever seen with a heart of gold. So kind she’d innocently help a stranger, unaware they’re a bad guy.” The tourists each give a half hearted ‘no’ before speed walking away.

“Walk faster Lila! Marinette can be anywhere.”

Lila puts on a concerned mask. “Of course.”

All this time wasted just because she moved some signs.

She hadn’t meant for Marinette to go missing. Only to buy some time so she can guilt trip Adrien to be her partner for the fashion expo.

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The day before, the class went to a big nature park. It’s notable for its many trails. The deeper you went into the park, the denser the trees are. They all partnered up and to her dismay she got Nathaniel instead of Adrien. The best thing about the artist is that he gets so into drawing the sights he doesn’t notice when she wanders off. It gave her more time to plot how to switch partners with the least amount of fuss.

During one of her secret plotting sessions, she heard a very loud conversation farther down the trail she’s on. Rose shouts for Marinette to not split up, and Marinette screams back a blatant lie about wanting to see a moose in the Relaxation Trial. Also to not expect her for forty minutes. Total hypocrite this girl is. ‘We can only be friends if you stop lying.’ Sure, and it’s okay for only Marinette to lie. Everyone else who does so is bad. Can’t even tell Rose you honestly want to ditch her.

When Lila noticed the Relaxation Trail sign nearby, an idea formed in her head. She ducked into a bush to hide. When Marinette ran into the trail and her map fell out of her bag Lila burst into action.

It took a little adjustment to the multiple sign post. It wasn’t too hard as the signs on the pole were already a little loose. Just needed to switch the sign that led back to the meetup with the Reflection Trial sign. According to the map, the Reflection one is a winding trial leading to a dead end. Marinette would be forced to walk all the back as the park employees told them it’s easy to get lost if you go off the trial. Aside from putting some sticks on the map, it was left mostly alone as she wanted her rival to use it to get back to base. She may not have liked Marinette, but she didn’t want anything horrible to happen to her.

By the time it got dark, Marinette still hadn’t gotten back to the meetup point. Forty minutes had already flown by. Lila hadn’t noticed as she was trying to convince Adrien to switch partners and tell everyone it was his idea. If Marinette was here the noisy girl would have interfered.

Rose’s cry of alarm got the others to find out Marinette was missing. The goodie two shoes wasn’t answering Rose’s calls. A quick check near the Relaxation Trial sign revealed Marinette’s map had flown into a bush.

The field trip went downhill from there.

The police were called. Afterwards, it’s discovered the cameras in that area were down much to Lila’s relief. Even though she feels a bit responsible, she’s not admitting to anything. Even if she did confess, it’s not like it’ll help the police. Doing so will get her in huge trouble and gain scrutiny in her actions from then on. How will telling what she did help find Marinette? It’d be for nothing.

When it comes down to it, Lila’s self preservation is above Marinette’s well being.

Some good fun will keep her mind from unpleasant things. Too bad no one besides Lila is interested in the scheduled events. This is a vacation, so going to a few events is a must. The class just want to spend time searching for Marinette. The transfer student wouldn’t have minded hanging up missing posters or spreading the word. This class takes it to another level.

Every waking moment is spent looking for Marinette. Breaks become a treasured time. They walk many miles each day. Max posts missing posters in Japanese forums. Alya bothers the police for updates. Adrien even got Chole (who stayed in Paris) to pull some strings to get more attention in the local news.

Because of Marinette’s disappearance, they have to stay in groups of at least three. No exceptions. So if Lila wants to do anything, she needs to convince any group she’s in to go with her.

It’s more challenging than expected.

Day 5

"Hey guys, why don’t we take our break inside the museum we were supposed to go to? It has air conditioning and we can look at some stuff for a bit while we’re sitting down.”

“Sorry Lila, I’m not in the mood to admire art.”

“I agree with Nathaniel. Just doesn’t feel right.”

Day 8

“Let’s go on the sightseeing tour. We can look for Marinette while we’re on it.”

“No thanks.”

“Nah, a taxi is better as we can choose where to drive.”

Day 10

“.....my leg injury is acting up. It’s okay to leave me here. I don’t mind.”

“No way Lila. We’re not leaving you alone on a bench outside Universal Studios. What if we lose you too?”

“.............”

Day 11

Lila has had it with these people. Reservations and events have been canceled. Solemn, awkward moping. Refusal to do anything but looking for Marinette. The only event left is the one she’s been most looking forward to: the fashion expo. Through some maneuvering and sneakiness, no one remembered to cancel the expo tickets.

There’s no way in hell she wants to miss this event: a lecture by Edna Mode herself. There’s rumors circling the fashion industry the famous designer is going to explore a new clothing line. Along with finding a muse for it.

The previous class activities can be let go without much struggle. Not this one, though. This could be the golden ticket to a very prestigious job. Even more than being a Gabriel model.

There’s a chance things might go right this time. The group is filled by pushovers Adrien, Rose, and Juleka. As long as she stays firm, they’ll go along with her plan.

With the directions in mind, Lila manages to slyly maneuver the group to walk outside Tokyo Big Sight. The sight of the Edna Mode banners hanging outside the arena fills her with excitement.

Lila coughs for their attention. “Guys, it’s time for our lunch break. We need the energy to keep this up.”

Rose reluctantly says, “Oh you’re right Lila. Can you pass out our lunches please?”

“Sure thing.” She reaches into the bag and whoops. There’s conveniently no lunch bags in there. “Oh no guys, there’s only water bottles in here.”

“It’s okay Lila, we can buy some food nearby.” Rose digs out her phone. “Hmm... I think there’s a cheap fast food place nearby.”

“There’s no need to look far. We can just go into the expo. They have to have some food near the entrance.”

There’s silence at her words.

Juleka narrows her eyes. “Why do I feel you just want to go to the expo?”

Lila is surprised Juleka of all people is calling her out. “No, no. It’s just, why walk more when there’s food right here.”

“Lila, do you not care about finding Marinette?,” a sad Rose asks.

“How could you say that? Of course I do! We worked so hard and we deserve a break. Marinette would understand.”

Rose snaps. “Understand? Every minute counts! We might never see Marinette ever again. She could be injured and alone, kidnapped, or worse! If one of us was missing, she wouldn’t give up.”

The fire in Rose’s eyes startles Lila. Never thought she’d see the bubbly girl break her happy persona.

“No one said anything about giving up. Besides, the police are looking-”

“That doesn’t mean we should sit by and do nothing.” Rose tears up. “It’s my fault Marinette is gone. If I didn’t let her run off on her own, she would still be here.”

Juleka gives a comforting hug to Rose.

Adrien speaks up. “I know you don’t like Marinette, but I never thought you would sink so low. It’s one thing if you’re not interested in helping. It’s another to actively interfere in something our friends care about.”

“I d-d-o care. We can pick up search after we eat.” It’s not like Lila wanted to prevent them from searching for Marinette. Ms. Bustier has forbidden anyone from being on their own. So she needed someone to be with her in order to do something.

Lila spent so much time reassuring them, they missed the lecture.

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“---Breaking News! A French teenager stopped a missile launch by terrorists. Marinette Dupain-Cheng went missing during her class’ field trip. Miraculously, she disabled their base of operations, rescued a Princess, fought against pirates, escaped on the back of a deer, got their leader to surrender to the authorities-”

“That’s our every day Ladybug.” Alya hugs the TV with tears of joy. “Obviously she’d save the day while missing.” The reporter actually hissed when a stranger tried to tell her to stop hogging the TV. No one attempted removing her after that.

Since Ms. Bustier is currently with the police to bring Marinette back, there’s no one to reign in the partying classmates. Alix somehow convinced the hotel to give them a big complementary celebration cake.

The only person not celebrating is an angry Lila. Glaring at her phone, the headlines riles her up every time she sees it.

Edna Mode’s First Baby Fashion Line

The Inspiration Behind the New Designs

“My godson is my inspiration-”

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Jack-Jack is Edna’s muse. Lol.

To save you a google search, this park mentioned in this fic is made up. It’s based on a bunch nature parks I’ve been to before. Tokyo does have parks and nature trials, though. In case you missed it, an attack happened in the late afternoon and Marinette got back at night (when it got dark) in Japan Standard Time. Keep in mind there is a 8 hour difference between these countries.

With this completed, I can finish chapter two of Dupont’s Worst Nightmare. :)

#lila salt #lila rossi #miraculous ladybug #answeredprompt #marinette dupain cheng #adrien agreste #thesearchformarinettedupaincheng

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edendaphne · 4 years ago

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“Discordant Sonata” Chapter 19

>>Click here to read on Ao3<<

>>Click here to read on Wattpad<<

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CHAPTER 19: ATTACCA

Music glossary: Attacca - "To attack at once"; used as a direction in music at the end of a movement to begin the next without pause

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(Mood music: "The Conversation" - Pearl Django)

Being mere months away from graduating lycée meant that their group of friends didn’t have as many classes together, due to their diverse individual interests and talents. However, they always made sure to make time to hang out after school before their extracurricular activities began.

And thus, Adrien, Nino, and Alya made their way to the classroom where the art club gathered to meet up with Marinette. From there, Adrien would make his way to either fencing lessons or Chinese, depending on the day of the week. Marinette would join him on days when he had Chinese (as she’d become determined to master the language ever since her uncle visited from Shanghai a few years back), Alya would go to her journalism club, and Nino would travel to his part-time internship at the local recording studio.

“–and the backlogs just keep piling up!” Alya spoke as they walked, voice full of vigor and excitement. “I’ve had to recruit yet another mod to help me keep order in the forums! Especially since the Ladyblog has started going international and we’ve had to organize servers in different languages. You wouldn’t believe how crazy it’s gotten in there recently!”

“Dang, babe,” Nino interjected. “Sounds like things are super rough for you right now.”

“Not really, more busy than anything. Especially because I have that big research article due next week, there’s just not enough hours in the day to try to read everything that goes on in there. But I have my mods report to me daily, ‘cause I always like to stay on top of everything that goes on in the chats!”

“What’s gotten everyone so riled up in the Ladyblog lately?” Adrien chimed in. “I don’t recall it being nearly this busy last year.”

The trio entered the art club’s classroom and settled down at the table where Marinette sat, getting her various sketches organized. The art teacher was quite easy going, so they didn’t have to talk in hushed whispers and could come and go as they pleased.

“Well, to be honest, it’s because of Chat Noir,” Alya replied.

Adrien tried to contain his surprise. “R-really? What– uhhh, what do people have to say about him?”

He winced inwardly. He knew he shouldn’t ask. But curiosity got the better of him today. Maybe learning the news through the filter or Alya’s paraphrasing instead of reading the negative comments firsthand would lessen the sting of what people said about him.

Marinette whipped her head around at the mention of his alter ego. “Wait, what about Chat Noir?” she inquired.

“Girl,” Alya replied, her voice filled with renewed exuberance. “You would not believe how much we’ve had to censor and moderate all the inappropriate things people have been saying!”

Adrien flinched in his seat. “Wow… do people really hate him that much?” he asked, trying to conceal the dejection in his voice.

Alya busted out into loud guffaws. “Hate?! Dude, most people don’t hate him; they LOVE him! By ‘inappropriate’ comments, I mean the kinda stuff you wouldn’t want your grandma to catch you reading! There’s a whole giant section dedicated to his new fan club!” she said as she removed her glasses so she could wipe away the tears of laughter.

“WHAT?!” Adrien squawked in confusion, his face feeling hotter than the ovens back at the bakery. “A fan club??”

Marinette burst into uncontrollable snickering. “Has it really gotten that bad?!”

Nino joined in, “Bro! Adrien, I can’t believe you haven’t heard Alya rant about these rabid fans before! They call themselves the ‘Noir Nation’, and the kind of things they’ve been writing would make adult romance authors blush like schoolgirls!”

Alya nodded, thoroughly amused. “And that’s not including all the fanfiction people have been writing.”

“Wait– the WHAT?! There’s fanfiction?!!” Marinette gaped in shock, as if she’d been hit in the face with an enormous pie. “Alya, how come I never knew about this?!”

“Why? You wanna read em? Girl, you’ll get no judgment from me. If you wanna check ‘em out for yourself, just go check under the hashtag ‘Ladynoir’.”

Marinette stammered as her arms flailed in her bewilderment, accidentally knocking her phone off the table and onto the floor, her eyes bigger and rounder than Adrien had ever seen them. “They have a ship name?!” she screeched.

“Just mind the ratings though,” Alya advised. “Some of them can get pretty steamy. You wouldn’t want someone to catch you reading those in public,” she added with a wink.

Marinette continued to sputter incoherently. “NO, I am NOT gonna read it!! It would be different if they were fictional characters, but I could never read fanfiction about real people!”

Alya raised a skeptical eyebrow at her. “Mm-hmm… Sure.”

Marinette’s hands flew to her face, trying to hide how red her entire face had gotten, and released a long squeak that resembled a hamster on helium. As shocked as Adrien was about these rather unexpected news, seeing Marinette’s over-the-top reaction brought a wide grin to his face and he busted out laughing.

He bent over to retrieve Marinette’s phone, since she was too busy being mortified to notice it had fallen to the floor. As he was about to hand it back, the screen lit up and Adrien saw the lockscreen wallpaper: it was the same photo of Ladybug and Chat Noir that he himself had saved earlier that day. He smiled, not exactly sure what to make of it, but finding it adorable that she’d liked the photo enough to set it as her lockscreen.

He tapped her shoulder, waiting for her to respond. She emerged from behind her impromptu hand shield and turned her head, then her eyes widened once again as soon as she saw what Adrien was showing her. She jolted straight up, stiff as a board, and her eyes met his, cheeks turning tomato red. He winked at her, amused about this little secret between them, and handed back her phone without a word.

Marinette accepted it with a meek-sounding, “Thanks,” looking like she wanted to explain the photo, but not able to do so unless she wanted Alya and Nino to find out that she was potentially a… ahem– “Ladynoir” shipper.

Switching the conversation to something else (which Marinette seemed to be eternally grateful for), the group chatted until it became time for them to scatter to their next destinations.

With a wave, Adrien exited the classroom and headed towards fencing practice, one of the few activities he decided to stick with despite not being forced to participate. Fencing, along with Chinese lessons, were not only enjoyable, but were also quite useful. Sadly, he didn’t have access to a piano anymore, so he wasn’t able to pursue that hobby for the time being. Hopefully later down the line, when things had settled down and he’d found his own place to live, he’d be able to finance one.

Thinking about the future had become an exciting pastime instead of an anxiety-inducing one, and it was all thanks to his friends and those he cared about. He smiled as he reached the door to the locker rooms, continuing to daydream of what was to come.

(Mood music: "Recollection 3" - Shirō Sagisu (BLEACH OST, "The Diamond Dust Rebellion")

Adrien finished getting dressed for fencing, his head still blissfully floating in the clouds. He stored his belongings into his assigned locker, shutting it with a loud clang, which echoed through the empty room.

Huh...? Empty?

He swiveled his head around, surprised that there was no one beside him. He stood up and began walking down the large room, peeking down the other locker rows looking for his classmates; but there was nobody.

Where was everyone? There’s no way that every single one of them was running late. Had his lessons been cancelled and he’d somehow missed a text message or email? He began heading back towards his locker to check his phone for any schedule changes.

Before he reached his destination, however, heavy thudding footsteps broke the eerie silence. Adrien whipped his body around to greet whoever they belonged to.

The owner of those footsteps was one of the last people Adrien expected to meet here.

“Gaspard?!”

Adrien stood agape, face to face with his old bodyguard, whom he hadn’t seen in a couple of years; not since he’d resigned and moved out of the country. Nathalie had mentioned that in his resignation letter, Gaspard said that he’d become involved in an overseas business venture involving the market of rare action figures. Nevertheless, Adrien couldn’t help but suspect that his father’s ill temper and poor treatment of their employees was the true reason for his departure.

Adrien’s first reaction was surprise and joy, and he rushed forward to greet and embrace him. However, as he approached and got a better look at the man’s face, Adrien’s mood instantly morphed into confusion and apprehension. There was something odd about his eyes.

Something wasn’t right. Why was Gaspard here? And why now?

He came to a halt about a meter before reaching him. An oppressive weight seemed to press in all around him, and he had to suppress a shiver. “Wait. Gaspard, did–” he gulped, “–did my father send you?”

His old bodyguard did not reply, but took a heavy step towards him. Adrien stepped back.

“Please… I can’t go back. I live somewhere else now, and I’m very happy there. Whatever he told you about the situation, it’s a lie.”

His bodyguard continued to approach him, his stare vacant and unsettling.

Fighting the urge to panic, he pleaded, “You don’t have to do this. If he’s offered you compensation, I can match it; it’ll just take me a bit of time. But we can work something out, right?? For old time’s sake?”

He continued walking backwards until he bumped into something firm, but it wasn’t a wall; it was another person. Before he could turn around, they grabbed him by the shoulders, detaining him and preventing him from running away.

He was about to shout for help when something sharp jabbed him on the side of the neck, injecting a cold liquid. Adrien’s eyes grew wide in terror.

Shit.

Adrien swore as he jerked away, elbowing whoever was behind him and managing to break free. Rubbing at the spot where the syringe had stabbed him, he glanced back to take a look at his other assailant, only to see... another Gaspard?

Why are there two of him??

This was wrong. Gaspard didn’t have a twin; he knew that for a fact. He’d worked for the Agrestes ever since Adrien was a toddler and was too young to even pronounce his name correctly (hence the nickname “Gorille”, which stuck around for years afterwards). Additionally, there was something uncanny, otherworldly, even, about the way these two men looked and moved.

He shook himself out of his stupor. He didn’t have time to contemplate any possible explanations. He had to get out of there fast.

He sprinted towards the exit, but only managed to travel a few paces before he lost his footing and tripped. He fell to the ground hard, almost hitting his head on a nearby bench. As he struggled to get up, he realized that his fingers and toes had already gone numb.

Not good.

Time was running out. Adrenaline coursed through him and, with a grunt, he hefted himself to his feet and scrambled towards the exit, as fast as he could despite a heavy limp. Though his heart was hammering and his legs felt like they were filled with sand, he pushed himself, concentrating on reaching the door.

After taking a few steps, however, he realized that even if he did manage to exit the locker room, the area beyond was an open courtyard. Meaning he wasn’t going to be able to reach someplace safe before getting caught. He had no choice but to transform into Chat Noir, and hopefully Plagg’s powers and strength could help him escape and find somewhere to hide.

He’d scarcely uttered the first syllable in the transformation phrase when he was tackled to the ground. A giant hand swiftly covered his mouth and Adrien felt his hands get bound together with thick zip ties behind his back. A muffled scream of writhing frustration made its way up his throat as his limbs became more and more useless by the second.

No… This can’t be happening! Please, this can’t be how it all ends!

Just when his life had finally gained a semblance of normalcy and he’d found happiness again, it would get ripped away and he would disappear without a trace, leaving everyone to wonder what had happened to him. Leaving his friends to think that Gabriel had pulled him from school and they would never see him again. Leaving Ladybug to wonder if Chat had abandoned her forever. Leaving her to fight Hawkmoth alone. Again.

He couldn’t let that happen. He thrashed and struggled as furiously as he could, fighting the feelings of overwhelming helplessness that threatened to consume him. Nearing despair, he was too distracted to notice Plagg phrasing through the wall, away from the skirmish, in search of the only person who could save him.

(Mood music: "Run" - Ludovico Einaudi)

Marinette fidgeted with her pencil, her feet wiggled and bounced under her desk. She didn’t understand; when she’d arrived at the art club, her head had been filled with inspiration and ideas that she’d been excited to draw and execute. However, at the moment, her mind was filled with noise and disquietude.

Having had enough, she excused herself to visit the restroom. Once she’d walked far enough from the classroom, she opened her purse to talk to Tikki about her current dilemma.

“It’s the same feeling as last night, Tikki! Except that would mean one of three possibilities. Option A.) It’s nothing and I’m going crazy. And— don’t give me that look, Tikki! I can see what you’re thinking and I don’t have time for your cheeky sass right now!” The kwami snickered while Marinette cleared her throat and continued, “Option B.) that Chat is here, at this school, which is impossible because his school’s on the other side of the city, that’s why he always leaves the house super early for his long commute.”

Tikki opened her mouth and looked like she was about to say something, but then didn’t (...or couldn’t?).

Marinette resumed, “Or, C.) that my–– what do I even call it? My ‘Spidey sense’??–– that it’s got a long distance mode, and Chat is all the way across Paris and he’s in trouble! But what am I supposed to do about that from here?! I wouldn’t even know where to begin looking!”

Tikki shrugged. “Follow your instincts, Marinette. There’s no harm in taking a quick look around the school, right?”

Marinette groaned. “UGH! It doesn’t make sense!! Am I going to get interrupted like this all the time from now on?” She shook her head resolutely. “No. I can’t just go off on random field trips every single time I feel a random fit of anxiety. I’m sure it’s just leftover jitters from last night. I’m supposed to call Master Fu after school anyway; he can help me figure everything out. I’m just gonna go back to class and forget about it.”

Tikki frowned, not quite convinced, but deciding not to press further.

Marinette made her way back to the classroom in a frustrated huff. But as her hand reached to turn the handle, the feelings of danger and urgency multiplied tenfold. Without a word, she sprinted away in the opposite direction, not even knowing where she was running to, only knowing she had to get there immediately.

She reached the large common area of the school downstairs. Her head whipped around, frantically searching for something, anything. In her haste, she didn’t notice a small black creature zoom into her open purse.

A few moments later, she felt a frantic tugging at her shirt from below.

“Marinette!! Over there! Check the locker room, quick!!!” Tikki whisper-screamed as she peeked outside the purse, her tone uncharacteristically frantic.

Marinette nodded, then sprinted to the locker room.

“Wait! You should transform first!” Tikki added.

No time!

“Marinette, wait!!”

Despite Tikki’s protests, Marinette raced towards the double doors, tackling them open.

Three sets of eyes landed on her as she skidded to a halt, but only one pair consumed her entire attention. She gasped in horror, hands flying to her face as she stared at what was occurring in front of her. Adrien let out a desperate, muffled scream urging her to run.

His panicked voice snapped her out of her dazed shock; but instead of running, she stood her ground, eyes darting back and forth across the area searching for something useful. The room was remarkably barren except for a lone broom a short distance away from her. She grabbed it and leaped towards the closest attacker (the one holding Adrien down), swinging it like a baseball bat.

The man didn’t even try to avoid the hit; the broomstick merely bounced off the side of his face where Marinette had hit him. She frowned in confusion, then tried hitting him again, bringing the stick down on the top of his head like an axe.

SNAP.

The end of the broom flew off, and Marinette stared in shock at the broken broomstick.

“What the hell are you?!” Marinette exclaimed, shifting her grip on the shortened wooden stub.

She pounced at the second bodyguard, bringing her weapon down in a stabbing motion; but he swatted at her hand, disarming her. She yelped in pain, leaping backwards to get some distance between them.

She was outmatched. The only strategy available was to use their own size against them. With a feint to the side, she shot at his legs for a takedown, hoping to catch him off balance. He called her bluff and shoved her backwards with his giant palm, then kneed her in the stomach.

Winded from the impact, Marinette doubled over with a gasping wheeze, fighting with all her might to keep herself from collapsing onto the ground. She forced herself upright and attacked again. With a clumsy jerk, she lunged forward, swinging wild punches at her opponent. The shots connected but his expression barely changed; it was like beating a breathing punching bag.

The bodyguard backhanded Marinette across the face. Pain shooting across her cheek, she staggered, almost losing her balance. In her daze, she watched helplessly as the man reared his arm back. There was no chance to dodge. His fist connected with her abdomen, delivering a liver shot that shut down her entire body. She crumpled to the floor as if boneless. She tried to call out Adrien’s name, but her mouth merely opened in a silent scream.

Marinette could hear Adrien’s distressed screaming, but it sounded distant, like they were underwater. The edges of her vision grew black and fuzzy, the entire room dissolving around her. She had to consciously force her lungs to inhale, but couldn’t fill them all the way, as if a boulder had been placed on top of her chest.

Faintly, she felt herself getting picked up off the ground and carried away over someone’s shoulder. Disoriented and semi-blinded, the sudden movement and rough jostling made her head spin and gave her vertigo. She gritted her teeth and squeezed her eyes shut, trying to block it all out.

A few moments later, they stopped moving, and she heard a door burst open. Where were they? Before she could gather her senses, she was in the air, thrown several meters away, landing with a hard thud. A sharp pain traveled down her body as she rolled into the wall across them. The shriek that tried to escape her throat emerged as a strained, shallow whine.

The man stomped out, leaving her alone in the room. “Stop…!” she rasped out, managing to tilt her neck upwards, head pounding.

The bodyguard slammed the door shut, followed by a bang and a clattering sound that could only mean he’d broken the doorknob of whatever room she was in.

Marinette's vision became more and more blurred. At the verge of losing consciousness, she fought to keep her eyes open as tears pricked at the corners of her eyes.

No, she couldn’t pass out! She had to save Adrien! Stay awake, Marinette, stay awake!!

She bit down on her lip hard, focusing on the sharp sting, on the swelling that was already forming around her right eye, forcing herself to feel the pain her body was in. At this moment, feeling pain was better than falling unconscious. She concentrated on her breathing, slowly regaining her senses.

She reached down to open her purse and get Tikki’s help… only to be met with emptiness. Panic settled in her gut as she realized that sometime during the skirmish, the purse had slipped off her shoulder. She sat up, slowly, so she wouldn’t risk feeling faint again from the change in positions.

She squinted, adjusting her eyesight to the darkness of the room. It seemed to be some sort of supply closet. After a failed few attempts to stand, she crawled towards the door instead, careful not to bump into the crates and shelves that filled the area.

The girl eyed the broken doorknob wearily. She was pretty proficient at lockpicking and breaking into things, but not as good at breaking out. Her only hope was that Tikki would be able to find her… if she was even nearby.

She swore to herself. Why had she rushed in and attacked two grown ass men (who, incidentally, may or may not be supernatural to boot!) instead of hiding and creating a strategy?! Now she was useless, Tikki was gone, and Adrien was surely on his way to get auctioned to the highest bidder in the criminal black market and ransomed off for an enormous sum. Great job, Marinette. Adrien’s been abducted and it’s all your fault.

Gathering all the determination she could muster, she tried to call out for help. But her voice was still too hoarse, and only a weak croak came out. She clenched her fists, grumbling irritably. Time for a different approach. Somehow, she needed to make noise.

After a brief search, she found a hard, metallic object that she could use to hammer on the door. She tested it out; it was surprisingly effective. She doubled her efforts, making as big a racket as possible. Hopefully, it would only be a matter of time before somebody heard her, let her out, and she could go find Adrien.

She couldn’t let anything else happen to another loved one. Not again.

–––––

I'M REEEAAAAALLY SORRY FOR THAT CLIFFHANGER JSHDKFJHSKDF ᕕ(╯°д°)ᕗ I tried splitting up the sections differently but it didn't really flow as well.

But the next chapter is almost done, so I'll have it ready by next weekend!!

#Miraculous Ladybug #Ladynoir #Enemies AU #enemies to lovers #Marinette Dupain Cheng #Adrien Agreste #Chat Noir #Ladybug #fanfiction #Discordant Sonata #ML AU #aged up #Eden writes

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dibs4ever · 3 years ago

Text

Young Barbara’s Crush

13-year-old Dick Grayson happily followed behind his Best friend Barbara Gordon as they made their way through her apartment toward her bedroom so they could have a homework session.

He’d been so busy lately with Robin duties he’d hardly gotten to see her. To top it off he had to keep Robin a secret from her which made things even harder to do when he’d unexpectedly cancel on her or made excuses not to hang out after school.

“I’m glad we get to do this.” Dick smiled

Barbara nodded “I know it’s been forever. I swear you have either the stupid ballroom dance classes Bruce is making you take or the Chess team practice every day.”

Dick chuckled “Yeah chess.”

She looked over her shoulder at him oddly but didn’t question anything.

Dick knew Barbara was smart and often wondered if she doubted he had those extracurriculars.

She opened her bedroom door and Dick paused at what was staring back at him from across the room

“Is that-do you have a large poster of Robin on your wall?” He questioned

Barbara flashed him an embarrassed smile “Well I mean it’s not the best picture of him cause he’s in action and it was taken while he was in a mid-fight by a newspaper reporter. That’s what I admire about Batman and Robin yeah know. They fight and leave, they are doing it for the good of the people cause they don’t stick around and talk to the press and do photo ops. Therefore no decent photos of him exist”

Dick nodded “ Why no poster of Batman then?” He asked stepping further into her room. Had it been so long that he’d been to her place that she’d gotten a huge poster of well HIM plastered on her wall above her desk?

Barbara shrugged “Cause I didn’t want Batman.”

He furrowed his eyebrows “Oh...”

She looked up at the poster, it featured Robin doing a high kick in the street of Gotham. An intimidating look on his face. His cape blowing flawlessly, his hair tousled with some strands in his face. It didn’t show who he was fighting and honestly, Dick couldn’t didn't know himself. He fought so.many thugs a week it could be anyone.

She looked over her shoulder at him “Remember when I told you I met them once?”

Dick smiled nodding, remembering that night and how he was so nervous seeing her as Robin. Jim got the wrong idea from his awkward stare and said “Not on your life Boy Wonder” after she had left. Then the next day at school Barbara practically tackled him in the hall with excitement clenching his sore bicep as she told him all about meeting Batman and Robin. She was the one everyone wanted to talk to at school for the next week because so few had seen -let alone gotten a ‘private meeting’ with the duo.

She looked back at the photo and smiled “He has the cutest butt.”

Dick’s eyes widened “What!”

Barbara bit her lip “Okay hear me out I know it sounds weird but I don’t know.” She sighed sitting in her chair

“Babs, I’m your best friend but-“ Dick began

She shook her head “I know -I know I mean maybe it was all these puberty hormones or maybe it was the tights but like when I met him his butt was where my eyes went it’s so....perky. And his swept hair and his eyes-“

Dick chucked “You couldn’t see his eyes”

Barbara rolled her eyes “Touché- I don’t know what it is. Maybe it’s cause he’s a bad boy...I mean he’s the opposite of a bad boy cause he fights bad guys but at the same time he’s doing it illegally, then again my dad allows him to....idk he’s got this intimidating, strong, daring level to him.”

Everything she was saying was rushing to Dick “Babs are you- are you saying you have a crush on Robin.”

Barbara smirked “Gee thought I made it pretty clear when I said I was checking out his butt the night I met him”

Dick swallowed -his best friend was checking out his butt....well technically she didn’t know she was but still.

“He’s not that great.” Dick tried to brush off

She smiled “You’re one of a few who think so. Half the school has a crush on him”

Dick coughed “Half?”

She tilted her head from side to side “Well maybe not half. Take the number of people who are attracted to males, that’s about 50%, and then probably about 35 to 40% of them have a crush on Robin,so maybe 35% in all.”

Dick sat on the edge of her bed “Still doesn’t mean he’s that great. I could run circles around him given the chance.”

She laughed “Please, Dick you’re great and all but a Mathlete, chess-playing, ballroom dancing, ward to a billionaire. Vs a Daring, strong, intimidating, though and handsome Vigilante.....pretty obvious Robin is kicking your ass.” Barbara pointed

Dick rose an eyebrow “Believe what you want but one day I’ll prove you wrong Ms.Gordon”

She smirked “Oh yeah? And how do you intend to square up with Robin, Mr.Grayson?”

He shrugged “I have my resources “

“Oh yes and next you’re going to tell me you bench 150lbs “ she stuck her tongue out

Dick chuckled “Actually it’s 135, I’m working my way up to 150” he stuck his tongue back out at her. Acting like he was joking when he was indeed telling the truth. Considering the average bench pressing weight for someone their age was 75lbs his little ‘joke’sounded just like that....a joke. Even though it was the truth. The day Barbara eagerly clung onto his bicep as she eagerly told him about her meeting with Batman and Robin. He not only tried to act shocked but also prayed she wouldn’t notice the large amount of muscles he had

She laughed lightly “come on let’s get to work, our parental’s won’t be too pleased if they come back to find we just joked around instead of doing homework again”

He nodded thankful they conversation was ending “Yeah let’s start with Science.” He reached for his school tablet, as he did couldn’t but help but think - How fun would it be to talk to Barbara about Batman stuff if she knew he was Robin?

#dickbabs #dick grayson #barbara gordon #nightwing #batgirl #batfam headcanons

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welllpthisishappening · 3 years ago

Text

It all kind of happens in slow motion.

One second, Emma hears the crack of the bat and the requisite roar of the crowd, and the next her eyes have widened to a size most scientists would likely advise against. Because, standing at home plate, that same home plate multiple baseball players are sprinting toward, is her kid. More or less waiting to be run over. That is, of course, until Killian Jones.

———

Word Count: 4.1K Rating: Flufffy fluff fluff of the fluffiest variety AN: Writing has been something of a legitimate challenge for me in the last few weeks, but earlier this week @ohmightydevviepuu sent a link to this tweet, tagged me, and said what I basically took as an unspoken prompt. Like, you’re going to send me video of a bat boy getting scooped up at home by a player in the middle of the game and then think I won’t write about it? Not possible. Even with the aforementioned writing challenges. Nothing stands a chance against my love of baseball. Here’s hoping the Yankees turn it around in the second half. Neither Aaron Judge or I deserve the season we’ve had so far.

———

Biologically speaking, Emma Swan is perfectly aware that the current positioning of her heart is more or less impossible.

Stuck somewhere between the back of her throat and the pit of her stomach, it makes her all too aware of the now-empty chasm in her chest, stretching out toward her arms and threatening the structural integrity of her lungs, neither of which appear all that intent on working properly. Oxygen is a luxury not currently afforded to her capillaries. Instead, nerves mix with anxiety and the telltale flush of adrenaline that probably also makes her look relatively crazy because her pupils are definitely dilated and she does not know nearly enough about science to be making any of these claims.

Whatever, really.

It feels like that ooze from that movie. FernGully, Emma thinks. With the fairies. She thinks they were fairies. She’s not entirely certain they were fairies.

And the ooze was definitely oil, obviously. There was a message involved in that movie. Not one that she appreciated when she was seven and Tim Curry’s animated-oil voice sort of freaked her out. But, like, she gets it now. The environment, and everything. With or without fairies. With Robin Williams, though.

She’s positive about that, at least.

Robin Williams was definitely in that movie.

Less positive about the ability of her heart to actually split itself in half, as it seems wont to do at the moment. So, as to make it easier when it inevitably soars out of her mouth and falls onto the scuffed-up clubhouse floor beneath her feet. Naturally, this will happen simultaneously. For maximum effect.

Much like the fireworks currently exploding over the left-field bleachers.

She’s not sure if fireworks do explode, actually. That seems dangerous. Likely to lead to injuries and sounds that don’t resemble the oohs and ahhs a ballpark generally inspires. Explode probably isn’t the right word. Maybe something more like…detonate.

No, that’s worse. Way worse. She’s got to learn more words. Find a thesaurus or a dictionary or—a fireworks expert would be ideal, honestly.

Someone who could give her a detailed description of the inner-workings of a Yankee Stadium pyrotechnics display on a Tuesday in July, enough words that Emma’s mind would still for a few moments, allowing her to catch her breath and reestablish a consistent heart rate, and both of those problems could also likely be solved by sitting down, but the chair to her left looks a little wobbly, and her legs appear to have minds of their own because science is rather quickly becoming a lie and—

“Is he alright?” She spins. Nearly falls over. Her knees are also awfully wobbly, that’s why.

Despite all of that, and the overall circumference of her pupils, the voice doesn’t retreat. Doesn’t even flinch. Shows absolutely no signs of imminent stumbling. And that’s probably because the voice is a man, one who is in possession of world-class instinctual reactions, and his hair is still damp from his post-game shower and it absolutely makes her something of an atrocious mother to acknowledge that last thing as quickly as she does.

His shirt sleeves are noticeably sticking to his biceps, so that helps too.

Opening her mouth, Emma is going to say words that are both vaguely intelligent and passably accurate, absolving this Major League Baseball player of any of the guilt he so obviously feels. Which is just patently stupid, really. None of this was his fault. None of it was anyone’s fault, really.

Except maybe the idiot who left his bat at that particular angle across home plate, but Emma’s an adrenaline expert these days and walk-offs are understandably exciting. First walk-offs more so.

She’s happy for Scarlet, really.

They won the game.

Everything is fine. Great, even. She nearly jumps twenty-six feet in the air at the next boom of fireworks.

The pinch between the Major League Baseball player’s eyebrows gets—

Pinchier.

The little roll of skin draws Emma’s attention, effectively robbing her of the ability to respond like an almost-sane person, but she’s also still trying to rationalize why she can remember the words to several FernGully songs while also being unable to recall what flavor PopTart she had for breakfast earlier this week and she figures watching her kid nearly get run over by professional athletes approximately forty-two minutes before gives her a fairly reasonable excuse.

For opening and closing her mouth no less than eight consecutive times.

Like a goddamn fish. There were no fish in FernGully. Least not so far as she remembers.

It’s entirely possible she squeaks on attempt number five.

The Major League Baseball player’s eyebrows do not move. It’s equal parts frustrating and incredible to behold.

“I should probably thank you, right?” Emma asks, not quite regretting the words immediately, but it’s awfully close. That gets her some movement. Of the eyebrow variety. One eyebrow, specifically. Arching up, it somehow still manages to pull her attention directly toward eyes that should be the star of their own marketing campaign. Not quite Yankee blue, but distractingly blue, and it takes everything in her not to huff as dramatically as she wants to. Once the athletic trainer is done with Henry, Emma is going to make him examine her lungs. Rationality rules the day.

Major League Baseball player shakes his head. It’s dumb to call him that. She knows his name. Knows at least some of his history. Is still staring obnoxiously at his freakishly attractive face.

Freakishly is kind of mean, too. As far as descriptions go.

“Unnecessary,” he says, an undercurrent of worry still clear in the letters. Ducking his head, he takes a cautious step forward, almost as if he’s wary of what Emma will do, and she supposes that’s fair. What with the impressive vertical she’s in possession of these days. “Anyone would do that.” “I’m not sure they could, actually.”

At some point in this otherwise shitty experience of a night, Emma is vaguely confident something will go the way she wants it to. Aside from winning. She’s glad they won. Seriously.

“No?” “No,” she echoes, and it’s not like she can feel him. A few feet of space separates them, so whatever heat appears to be wafting off the Major League Baseball player in front of her, with his damp hair, and stupid, stupid, stupid eyes is as impossible as any of the various impossibilities currently taking place within her person.

And yet.

He sticks his hand out.

It’s disarmingly earnest.

��Killian Jones,” he says, confidence replacing the nerves, and Emma begins to see why there are so many stories. And Twitter threads. Regarding his face and the potential for that face to date a variety of other attractive faces across at least four of the five boroughs. Somehow Emma doesn’t think Killian Jones, New York Yankees third baseman, is schlepping out to Staten Island for a date.

Nor does she believe that Killian Jones, New York Yankees third baseman, has ever once let the word schlep pass through his conscious mind.

She takes his hand.

It is—

Surprisingly warm. And...not quite soft, that’d be impossible with the job he performs almost nightly. But the calluses on the pads of his fingers aren’t as rough as Emma expects, which also suggests she’s managed to ponder the overall texture of Killian Jones’s fingers in the last twelve point six seconds, and that’s not entirely true. What is true is that Ruby thinks Killian Jones is real good-looking and has determined that the phrase quite a catch is the pinnacle of humor, so, sure, Emma has possibly considered the possibility of paths crossing and intersecting, and her hand looks minuscule wrapped up in his. So, that’s something to think about later.

Their arms move. Bob up and down as society dictates they should, and he’s smiling at her, and she’s trying not to look like a serial killer, straining to hear the voices behind the door, and it does not work.

“Why do you think people are so consistently fascinated by fireworks?” If he’s surprised by her absolutely inane question, he doesn’t show it. That’s points. For what, Emma hasn’t totally decided yet, but it’s something, and it’s probably good, and they’re going to play that clip on loop for weeks. Longer, probably.

Every goddamn day if the Yankees make the postseason.

When the Yankees make the postseason.

Her dad wouldn’t appreciate the buffer. Leaves room for loss, and that is not the Nolan way. Not when there are championships to win, and this was supposed to be the best possible time. Smack dab in the middle of the season, with the All-Star break looming, Henry would get to suit up as batboy for one game that didn’t mean much and wouldn’t draw too strong of a spotlight, no murmurs about nepotism by internet trolls who couldn’t possibly define the word with any sort of accuracy, but also like to shout about canceling and culture with an almost alarming sense of self-righteousness, so, of course, the whole thing was now blowing up in their face.

Much like the goddamn fireworks.

It wasn’t Will Scarlet’s fault.

Wasn’t Henry’s fault, either.

His job was to get the bats out of the field of play. Doing it while the field of play was still active was a mistake any kid could have made. Just so happens that it’s Emma’s kid, and the grandkid of the Yankees’ hitting coach, and that means something to the New York media and the New York fans, and if Killian Jones, New York Yankees third baseman with an arm that can make cross-field throws with ease, wasn’t also so quick-thinking and sure-footed, scooping Henry up as he crossed home plate and avoiding the ensuing swarm of players at home plate, all intent on celebrating Will Scarlet’s first-ever career walk-off, Emma can only imagine what would have happened.

Trampled. Stepped on. Broken bones. Concussions.

They’re checking Henry for a concussion now. He absolutely does not have a concussion. He was laughing while he was carried off the field. Like he hit the walk-off.

Front office is absolutely petrified she’s going to sue them.

The thought hadn’t even once crossed Emma’s mind. Plus, she’s sort of busy. Holding Killian Jones’s hand. His stupid, warm hand.

“Bright colors,” he says, responding to a question Emma’s nearly forgotten about. Jumping is more challenging when his fingers tighten ever so slightly. “Flash, boom. Taps into baser instincts, I think.” “You think people’s base instinct is to enjoy explosions.” “Phrasing that as a statement makes me think you don’t agree with me.” “You didn’t want me to thank you,” Emma points out.

“Well, no,” he says, and the precise way his eyes drop does something specific to all of her instincts. Leaves her flush with a heat that reminds her of Fourth of July sparklers rather than any sort of massive explosion, and that’s not bad, per se, although it’s admittedly a little surprising. As is the slight uptick of precisely one side of his mouth. It takes her a moment to realize he’s smirking at her. And another for her subconscious to admit that it’s working as intended. Her shoulders drop half an inch. While Emma pulls her hand back to her side. “Thanking me suggests I did anything to warrant the thanks.” “Big words.” “For a dumb athlete, you mean.” “That wasn’t a question, either.” “No,” Killian repeats, “it wasn’t.” “I’d really like to thank you. I—Dad told him when to come out of the dugout, so he definitely knew the rules, but I think he was super worried about you tripping over the bat.”

The smirk becomes a full-blown smile. Which is no less than forty-seven thousand times more powerful. Equivalent to staring directly into a solar eclipse or gazing upon the dark side of the moon, and Emma should at least do some research before coming up with these internal examples. Basic Google searches would provide her with the necessary information.

“That’s more or less what he told me, yeah.” Emma’s nose creases. “Talked your ear off after your daring rescue, huh?” “Keep complimenting me like this, and my ego won’t know what to do with it.”

She hopes she’s not blushing as much as it feels like she is. The state of Killian’s eyebrows and the precise curl of his lips make that seem unlikely. “Your reflexes are unparalleled.” “Something about big bucks and why I get paid them.” “Oh,” Emma laughs, unable to stop herself, and she doesn’t remember deciding to stop pacing, only that her knees appreciate it once she has, “you think you’re real funny, don’t you?” “I think I’m moderately funny, not the hero you’re suggesting I am—” “Oh, I never used the word hero.” “—And you never actually told me your name.”

“Because you don’t know who I am.” It’s not a question, either. Neither one of them mention that.

“I do,” Killian concedes, “Henry was also fairly quick to mention exactly who he was and where his mother was sitting.” Emma’s nose is going to freeze in this position. “But I gave you my name, which makes it only fair that we’re all square and whatnot.” “Whatnot, huh?” “Yup.” He pops his lips on the letter. Which is also unfair. In, like, the grand scheme of the world. The black ooze that is not actually oil when used in this particular metaphor recedes. Leaves Emma with a chest cavity that is partially full of butterfly wings and the growing sense of anticipation that isn’t quite as nerve-wracking as it should be. Like she’s about to step into the batter’s box with two outs and runners in scoring position. She’s totally going to hit against the shift. Fluttering her fingers at her side, Emma doesn’t lift her hand. It doesn’t matter.

Killian’s eyes drop. To the movement. And her. And part of her shies away from that because part of her has spent a lifetime tucked into a shadow that didn’t belong to her and doesn’t belong to Henry, but now there’s some joke about Peter Pan to be made because they live in an internet-age and Killian Jones has a very good face. So. Viral video, enter stage right. Starring Henry Swan, Killian Jones, and the inevitably uneven pitter-patter of Emma’s traitorous heart.

“Emma Swan.” “I think you should sit down.”

“Why is that, exactly?” “I’m worried about your legs.”

Whatever noise she makes can’t quite be classified as a scoff. It hurts her throat too much. And it’s not a laugh, either. Even as the butterflies threaten to rise up in mutiny of Emma’s more rational feelings, and she gets the distinct impression that Killian is reading her mind. Trying very hard, at least.

“Sounds like a line.” “Might be a line,” he admits, which draws another wholly inhuman sound out of Emma’s barely-functioning lungs.

“Did he kick you on the lift?” Killian hums. “You’d kick too if you were just hauled off your feet, so I understand the reaction. What I’m more worried about is the inevitable bruise on my foot from the bat landing there.” “Ah shit, really?” “I’ve had worse.” “But not in 4K video that people will play on loop for the rest of the news cycle. If not longer.” Narrowing his eyes, Killian doesn’t immediately respond. Mind reading requires a modicum of focus, Emma assumes. Instead, he rests a hand on her shoulder, directing her toward the chair and ignoring the soft crack her left knee as it bends. “That’s what you’re worried about.” “Stop sounding so confident.” “I can only sound how I am, Swan.” “Oh, I’m not sure we’ve reached nickname status yet,” she mumbles, pushing down the soft rush of metaphorical insects doing their beset to soar out of her barely-parted lips. “But, yeah, I—I mean, don’t get me wrong, I was totally terrified in the moment.”

“Understandable. Grown men barrelling down the third-base line at your kid are a lot to take in.” She snorts. It’s not cute. Not dignified. Killian smirks. “Should you be concerned that the Scarlet was making such solid headway behind you? Are you exceedingly slow?” “I am league average.” “How fast can you get out of the box to first?” “I’ve never timed it.” “Liar, liar.” “Please don’t make a crack about my pants,” Killian says, “I won’t be able to cope.”

“Oh God, you think you’re charming, too.” “I’ve had no complaints.” “To your face, at least.”

Throwing his head back, the laugh that erupts out of him is not of volcano proportions. Of which there was also one in FernGully if Emma’s memory is to be trusted. An arm circles his middle, stretching muscle and ensuring that Emma notices just how corded that same muscle is, the slight bend of his wrist leaving her off-kilter. When he meets her gaze, she swears his eyes are brighter. “Yeah, yeah, that’s true,” Killian concedes, “no one has flat out told me I was lacking charm to my face.” “This thanking you thing is going great.” “And I continue to not need thanks. Why are you worried about the video getting out there? Filmed in 4K like you suggest, at least we’ll all look great. Sharp pixels and whatnot.” “What do you know about pixels?” “You basically heard the extent just now.”

She’s getting better at laughing. The ooze has almost all but disappeared, Emma twirling a strand of hair around fingers that are intent on moving, and it’s an old habit. One Killian’s gaze catches on. Immediately. Quickly. Seriously, Emma needs a thesaurus. “Baseball’s always been my dad,” she says. “And that’s—well, we’ve lived this game, me and my mom, weekend series and West Coast swings, waiting up for him to get home because the flight got delayed, but Henry’s just a kid, getting thrown into this world because of his last name and who his family is? That sucks. Nothing was supposed to happen tonight.” “Nothing did happen.” “Because of you.” “I’d like to believe Scarlet, ridiculously fast as he might be, would not run over a small child,” Killian says. “And, uh, for the record and all that, I got a bad jump off first because I didn’t know if they were going to catch it in left. No one wants to get caught on the base paths.” “Yeah, that’d be embarrassing.”

He must hear the hitch in her voice because the next thing Emma realizes, her fingers are twisted back up in Killian’s, and she’s warm and falling and flying, and it’s good and weird, and the door swings open.

They both jump.

So, that’s something.

Rushing out quickly enough that he nearly trips over his own feet, Henry’s head leads the way and finds Emma’s stomach, a tangle of limbs, and overly-excited words, all of which rival the now-finished fireworks display in volume.

It takes Henry about five and a half run-on sentences to notice Killian standing there.

His eyes widen. His mouth drops. Killian grins. Emma tries very hard not to die. It only sort of works.

She blames the faulty body parts she’s in possession of.

“Killian,” Henry exclaims, clamoring back to his feet and nearly falling again in the process. Hands that belong to both Emma and Killian dart out, steadying Henry while their eyes meet over the top of his head. Killian winks. He tries. It’s more like a blink than anything. “Hi, hi! You did so good tonight! And we won, and I got to go on the field and—and, it was so,” Henry heaves a deep breath, “we were so good.”

Collective pronouns do something to Emma’s entire state of being.

Flips it on an axis she hadn’t been aware previously existed until it almost feels as if this was the path they’d been directing themselves toward from the start. Her eyes flit toward Killian. Who is already watching her.

“We did,” he nods, “maybe next time, though, you wait one extra second to grab Scarlet’s bat, ok?” Seeing her own nose scrunch reflected back on her kid is not the worst thing that’s ever happened to Emma. The vibrating phone in her back pocket, might be.

It’s one-hundred percent, Ruby.

“That’s what grandpa said too,” Henry grumbles, digging a toe of the cleats Emma’s mother bought him last week into the ground, “but I wanted to make sure you didn’t fall.”

Definitely dying, then. A systematic shut down of all necessary internal organs. It’s not as bad as Emma would have expected.

Neither one of Killian’s knees crack when he bends. That seems heavy-handed.

“And I don’t want you to fall either,” he says, “so we agree, right here, right now, not to let the other one fall, huh?” Emma holds her breath. Ignores the pinch in her lungs and the clearly unstable nature of both her mind and her heart, digging her nails into her palms. To ensure she isn’t tempted to haul Henry back toward her. Or push that one strand of hair away from Killian’s forehead.

Henry nods. “Deal.”

They hook their pinkies together.

It’s adorable and as endearingly charming as everything else Killian Jones, New York Yankees third baseman, has done since he walked into that hallway. Less so when her dad emerges from the office, the athletic trainer on his heels to not-so-quietly inform Killian that he can’t just blow off post-game like that, and the second wink is as bad as the first.

She does her very best to memorize the movement.

And the joy on Henry’s face the next morning when a box arrives on their doorstep, a genuine, game-worn Killian Jones jersey inside. She doesn’t notice the note at first, tucked between the cardboard and the tissue paper someone must have bought for him. He can’t have bought that tissue paper himself. He just—it’s unfathomable.

Emma knows he bought the tissue paper himself.

As clearly as she knows that those numbers in that particular order will lead to Killian Jones answering his phone and that her voice likely won’t shake when she replies to the question written in surprisingly loopy script. Which is why, Emma will argue, she does reply. In the affirmative. To several questions over the course of the remaining season, and they don’t star in any more viral videos, but there are a few pictures once they clinch the division.

Drops of champagne cling to the tips of Emma’s eyelashes and the ends of Killian’s hair, hands on her waist that blaze a quick path up her back and around her middle, and she has to tilt her head up to get the right angles. Of lips. While they kiss in the middle of the clubhouse, the hat someone forced onto Emma’s head falling and it’s impossible to hear over the sound of celebratory fireworks, but she can somehow still hear Henry’s laugh ringing out from the general area near Scarlet’s locker, and his jersey collection is growing at an impressive rate.

No one can withstand the overall cuteness of him.

Emma included. Emma, especially.

Sometimes she worries she’s so happy she’ll burst, unable to contain the sort of emotion her body is still acclimating itself to. But then she realizes just how dumb that is and happiness cannot possibly be quantified, and her head is buzzing enough from champagne that she nearly misses Killian when he says, “people love the bright spots, Swan.” It’s not the most romantic thing he’s told her. Doesn’t crack the top five, quite frankly. She swoons all the same. With her kid laughing and her team winning and that’s about all the sentiment she’s willing to acknowledge before her tongue is in Killian’s mouth. He groans. She grins.

And he’d been right about the video. It wasn’t the embarrassment Emma worried it could be. Was mostly relegated to the corners of the internet set aside for formerly popular content as soon as the season ended, spoken about only in fond recollection as the other seasons went on and the wins kept coming and all three of them stand on a parade float with the World Series trophy a few dozen feet away, several Novembers after that first game.

It’s a Thursday afternoon, then.

And yet Emma never entirely forgets. What the video meant and what it did and she’s not remotely surprised when it finds its way back to the forefront of the sports zeitgeist on a Wednesday in July. Most mentions come with similar taglines and messages. Something about feeling our age and wanna feel old because that bot boy, David Nolan’s grandson, Killian Jones’s stepson, he’s getting drafted now.

Got drafted, technically.

Third round, video of the soon-to-be third baseman for the San Diego Padres makes the internet circuits and garners plenty of interest. It’s not the most exciting video, though. Henry just hugs his family. Who hug tightly back.

What is more exciting is the box that arrives on Emma and Killian’s doorstep. With a note that eventually earns a frame next to the last one and a wholly official, game-worn jersey that has a noticeable streak of dirt across the left sleeve. From sliding head-first into home plate.

#cs ff #captain swan #captain swan ff #cs fic #captain swan fic #do not ask me why this is so full of ferngully references #i do not have an answer for you #the google doc title for this was: BaseballCuresWritersBlock #thanks baseball

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anagentinwriting · 4 years ago

Text

Lifeline - Part 5

Summary: (First Responders!AU) Moving to Los Angeles and living with your brother, Thor, was never part of your plan nor was being a 9-1-1 dispatcher, but plans change when you are faced with your own emergencies. In your case, it was leaving behind a relationship that wasn’t as perfect as it seemed. Will this be the fresh start you were hoping for or will your past find a way to catch up with you?

Pairing: Steve Rogers x Odinson!Sister Reader

Word Count: 4500+

Warnings: Language, drinking, angst, fluff

Lifeline Masterlist / Main Masterlist

After a week of taking call after call, it was nice to get together with the girls. It wasn’t going to be a late-night, but after last weeks rough call, you just wanted to get out of your head and blow off some steam with Nat and Carol at Happy’s Hydrant.

The Hydrant was the place to be tonight. You couldn't remember it ever being this busy, but it was a Friday night. There were always women hoping to get with a man in uniform and men hoping to get lucky with a badass woman first responder. For some, it worked like a charm, but for others, while they had to work a little harder to get some action.

You leaned against your pool cue, watching Nat lineup her stick to the corner pocket with Carol observing from the side, sipping on her beer. Nat took the shot but missed the pocket, forcing a smirk across your lips. Nat stood up straight, rolling her eyes at you.

“Can’t win them all,” you teased, eyeing the table to find your next shot.

Billards was your bar game. When you were attending New York University, you worked at a bar and hustled to make a few extra bucks. Guys would often undermine you at first, but you weren’t afraid to show them what you could do.

“Hey, sweet thing, you like playing pool,” a guy said behind you as you leaned over to take a shot.

“It seems that way, doesn’t it,” you replied, rolling your eyes. He placed a hand on your lower back, making you tense up and let out a sharp breath. You stood up straight and turned around to face him. He was standing closer to you than you expected, and you could smell the overconsumption of alcohol on his breath.

“I’ll bring the balls if you bring your rack.” He bit his lip, his eyes drifting to your chest.

“You sure you have the balls to handle me because that line was fucking terrible.”

“Do you want to find out?”

“No.”

“Come on, girl.” He stepped even closer to you, making the back of your thighs hit the pool table. He placed his hands on your hips, and you froze in place. Your heart pounded, feeling every nerve in your body firing, telling you to run, but your mind filled with fear. You squeezed your eyes shut, trying to get away from those thoughts, but deep down, you knew one wrong move or smartass remark would make things worse.

“Can you...Can you please get your hands off of me,” you gulped, letting out a shaky breath.

“What’s that sweetheart?”

“Get your hands off of her asshole. She’s not interested,” Nat's voice hit your ears, and you felt the weight in front of you disappear.

“Yeah, take a walk prick,” Carol shouted beside you. You opened your eyes to see the asshole retreating away, letting out a relieved breath. “How you holding up, girl?”

You shrugged. “I’ll be fine. Sorry, I kind of froze up there.”

“Don’t apologize, dude was an asshole. You’re still trying to find yourself and get your confidence back,” Carol replied, patting you on the shoulder. “You’ll find it, and when you do, we’ll be right there with you.” You nodded, crossing your arms across your chest. “If you’re interested, Val teaches a self-defense class, well it’s more of a boxing class at Jabari Tribe Training Center. We could even go with you,” Carol offered, earning a nod from Nat.

“I’ll think about it.” You shrugged, staring at the floor.

“You know what, girls, this calls for shots,” Nat commented. “I’ll be back.” She disappeared to the bar, being greeted by a few guys offering to buy her the shots.

“Hey, YN.” You peeked up at Carol before your eyes drifted back to the floor. “Promise me you won’t let that asshole ruin your night.”

“I promise.”

“Good. And not all guys are like him; some are just drunk assholes who think just because they wear a uniform, every woman wants to sleep with them when really they aren’t interested,” She sighed, staring at you. “How about we start another game then?”

“Um...yeah, let’s do it.”

______

“YN, why can’t you let me win for once?” Carol whined, leaning against her pool cue.

“Practice more, and then maybe you'll have a chance,” you smirked, feeling better after a couple of shots and another beer later.

You lined up to sink the number 8 ball in the corner pocket when someone out of the corner of your eye caught your attention. You gulped, turning your head in their direction to find Fireman Rogers. “You’re sort of ruining my concentration with your staring.”

“Didn’t know I had that effect on you.”

You scoffed, taking the shot and missing the pocket. “That’s on you.” You didn’t miss the slight nod from him and the ever-growing grin appearing on Carol’s face, watching the two of you interact.

“Ouch!” He held a hand over his heart, smirking at you.

You watched Carol sink one of her three remaining stripes into the pocket but failed to get the other two in. You nodded to yourself, setting yourself up to get the number 8 ball in the same corner pocket. Shooting a quick glare towards Steve, he held up his hands, trying to hide his smile by taking a sip of his beer. You hit the white ball, sending it right towards the number 8 ball, sinking it into the corner pocket.

“Well...that’s game. Rogers, you’re up. Time for you to take on the champ.” Carol walked over to him, forcing the pool cue to his chest until he grabbed it, and she shot you a quick wink over her shoulder before disappearing into the crowd.

“Smooth,” you whispered under your breath.

“What was that?” Steve questioned, leaning a little closer to you.

“Bring it, Rogers.”

_______

With one last hit, the number 8 ball sunk into the center pocket. “And with that, the champ remains the champ. Good game though, you weren’t...bad.”

“Not bad, huh? Maybe you caught me on an off day.”

“Will save the rematch for another day then.” You put the pool cue back on the wall and went to your usual table, taking a seat on one of the high stools. You take a sip of your beer, noticing Steve taking the chair across from you.

“How did you get so good at pool?”

“I worked at a bar in college and got really good at it. Even hustled a few people to get some extra cash.”

“Did they deserve it?” He asked with a chuckle.

“Of course,” you smirked, taking a sip of your drink. Your eyes traveled around the bar, spotting your brother with a group of ladies. It still baffled you how he could finagle himself into any group, whether it was to make friends or take someone home. In this incident, it looked to be taking someone home. Thor wrapped his arm around one of the ladies and headed out the door. “Well, I’m in no rush to get home now.”

“Why is that?”

“My brother just walked out the door with his latest conquest.” His eyes traveled to the door. “Now in the morning, I will have to make small talk with her, and poor Darryl is gonna have to hear them…” you shake your head, not finishing the sentence. “Good thing I got him noise-canceling headphones.”

“Good thing.”

“How are you liking the 107 so far?”

“It’s...” Steve started only to be interrupted by Sam.

“Okay, so Thor just left with the woman I was hitting on all night. Can’t your brother give another brother a chance,” Sam added, taking a swig of his beer.

“That’s my brother for…”

“Steve, I heard you just got your ass handed to you in pool. Way to go, girl.” Bucky held up his hand, and you high-fived him. “Steve’s good. He always kicks my ass.”

“Well, that’s because you suck at it,” Sam added.

“Well, at least I can get a woman to go home with me.”

“That’s cold.”

“You can’t get every woman to go with you,” Nat added, taking the stool next to yours.

“Wanna bet.” Bucky licked his lips, earning a scoff from Nat. “Listen here, everyone. I am about to share Mr. Barnes Fling Tips 401. That’s right, this is senior college level, no freshman 101.” He takes a drink of his beer. “First: Get the lovely woman’s attention; catch her eye at the bar, smile at her, send her a drink, whatever you need to do to get her to notice you. Number two: once she notices you, disappear for a little while to see if she looks for you. Then, when she least expects it, go over to her and introduce yourself. Then, this is where the real flirting happens; smirk at her, put a hand on her thigh, bite your lip, any of the telltale signs you’re interested. Then finally, she will take your hand, and that’s when you take her home. We both have meaningless sex and then move on. We both get exactly what we wanted.”

“You’re terrible.” Nat rolled her eyes, crossing her arms across her chest.

“Says the female version of me,” he smirked.

“You wish, because then maybe, just maybe, I would give you the time of day and sleep with you. But, you’re not worth it. I don’t think I could ever sink low enough to sleep with you.”

“Ouch, doll, ouch.” He held his hand over his heart, feigning hurt in his eyes.

“I would feel bad, but we both know you don’t have a heart when it comes to women.”

“One right after another. You’re on fire, Red.”

“I don’t have time for this. Come on, YN, let's go get another drink.” Nat grabbed your hand and pulled you to the bar with her.

“Is it just me, or was that a whole lotta sexual tension right there?” Sam asked Steve as soon as Bucky stormed off.

“I would say so,” Steve nodded in agreement.

________

You classified yourself as a people watcher, and you always found it interesting to watch people interact with one another. You'd often see the people looking to hookup. A bachelorette party with an overly flirty bride to be who may or may not make a mistake tonight. Those people who came out to drink for fun; those that drink because they have a problem; the new parents that needed to get out of the house, or the couple still getting to know one another. You never met any of these people in your life, but you couldn’t help but create their life story.

It was like the couple sitting close together in the booth to your right. They were falling for each, whether they planned it or not. It was easy to tell with the way they looked at each other. You felt that way once, too. The feeling that you and him were the only two in a crowded room. You thought it was love, but looking back, maybe it was something different. Something toxic, like a poisonous gas entering the air without you knowing, and sooner or later, you're gasping, trying to find the last bit of oxygen. But, it’s no use because you’re trapped, and every breath you take only makes you weaker and unable to move, and eventually, it ends up taking everything from you.

“Hi, again.” Steve takes a seat on the stool next to you at the bar, pulling you out of your head. “Everyone keeps leaving me, and I didn’t want to look like that loser in the bar sitting by himself.”

“So you came over to join me? Who was sitting by herself looking like a loser?”

“Yeah, but now we can be losers together,” he chuckled, making you smirk.

“Speak for yourself,” you chuckled, picking at the label on the beer bottle.“You and Bucky became fast friends.”

“Yeah, well, we have known each other since we were kids.”

“Wait, you grew up here?” You turned your heads towards him, narrowing your eyes at him.

“No in Brooklyn. Brooklyn, New York.”

“Get out--” you hit him on the arm “--I used to live in Brooklyn.”

“Really? Small world,” he smiled, leaning in a little closer to you to hear you better over the music playing on the jukebox. “What made you move out here?”

“Story for another time,” you pointed the tip of your beer bottle at him.

He nodded, “So why a 9-1-1 dispatcher?”

“You’re full of questions, aren’t you, Steve?”

He shrugged with a small chuckle. “A few.”

“Did you get dragged out tonight, too?” You asked, taking a sip of your beer.

“What makes you think that?”

“Think it was so our friends could get a little action.” Your eyes traveled around the bar to see Bucky leaving with a redhead, and Nat had her hand on a guy's bicep with a flirty expression on her face. You had no idea where Carol went, and Sam must’ve left after realizing his luck ran out. Poor guy.

“So it would seem,” he smirked, glancing around the room.

You felt your phone vibrate, and you glanced down, seeing a message from Nat.

Nat: Heading out! Hope you can find a way home ;)

YN: Yeah, it’s called an Uber

Nat: (rolling eyes emoji)

“And with that, my ride just left.” You locked your phone, sliding it back into your pocket.

“Yeah, my ride left about five minutes ago.” Steve sighed, staring at his beer bottle. “What do you say about getting out of here?”

You glanced at him underneath your eyelashes. “I hope you know you're not getting in my pants.”

“Oh, I know, I didn’t mean it like that, but maybe another time,” he winked, forcing you to crack a smile.

“Smooth, Rogers. Smooth,” you commented. “And here I thought you were a goody-to-shoes.”

“Most people do, but I am far from it.”

“I am seeing that now,” you chuckled, swallowing the little bit left in your drink. He nodded, glancing around the bar. “Are you ready?”

“For what?”

“To get out of here?”

“I didn’t mean…” His head snapped to you with raised eyebrows.

“I know, another time,” you teased, seeing the corner of his mouth turn up. “Are you coming because your half-full beer says otherwise?”

He looked at it, then back over at you. Something in his blue eyes shifted from playful to curious in a matter of seconds. “Let's blow this popsicle stand,” Steve smirked, downing the rest of his drink.

“Easy there, don’t want to have to carry you out of here,” you commented as he reached behind him and slipped on his jacket.

“Haha.”

You felt the chill in the air as soon as you walked out the front door of the bar. It felt like fall was just around the corner, and it only brought goosebumps to your skin.

“How far is home?” Steve asked.

“About thirty blocks north, but you don’t have to walk with me. I just figured you didn’t want to look like a loser sitting at the bar by yourself.”

“Thanks, I appreciate your concern, but I don’t mind. I have nothing waiting for me at home, and this way, you have some company.”

“Or do you just not want me to get mugged or something?”

“Maybe that too,” he chuckled, slipping his hands into his jacket pockets. “So you live with your brother? Why don’t you have your own place?”

“I’ve been looking, and I did find one I love. The only problem is I don’t know what to say to Thor.”

“I’m sure he’ll understand.” He added. “It will probably be hard for him at first, but it’s always hard to start over,” Steve mumbled like he knew from his own experience.

“Yeah, but you haven’t experienced softie Thor.”

“Softie Thor?”

“Don’t tell anyone I told you this, but he still sleeps with his baby blanket. He calls it Mjolnir, and it has all kinds of different hammers and tools on it. He says he doesn’t have it anymore, but the last time I saw it, it was hiding under his pillow.”

“Really?” he smiled, shaking his head. “The big guy. Yay, tall--” he gestured with his hand “--blonde hair, god-like deep voice girls fall for, and he still sleeps with a blankety?” You nodded. “Yeah, I can say I have never seen that side of him.” He chuckled, shaking his head.

You rubbed your upper arms, hoping to keep the chill at bay but having little to no success. You always seemed to forget to grab a jacket before going out. “Why did you transfer to LA from Brooklyn?”

“Now, look who is full of questions?”

“Call me curious.” You shrugged, catching his eye before his return back to the ground.

“Fine, but then you have to answer one of my questions.” You nodded. “Okay, well, I transferred because I needed a new start after some bad stuff went down.”

“Why, what happened?”

“Trying to pull a fast one on me. I like it, but my turn.” You let out an annoyed sigh. “What did you do when you lived in Brooklyn?”

“Fair question." You nodded. "I was an ER nurse. It was both stressful and satisfying at the same time. On the one hand, I didn’t know what was going to come through the doors, but on the other hand, bringing someone back on the brink of dying gave me a rush. I can’t even explain the feeling; I loved my job.”

“Then, why leave?”

“I needed a fresh start.” You glanced over at him, and he nodded, biting his lip. “Looks like we left for the same reason.”

“Maybe this is fate's way of telling us we both deserve a second chance.”

“If you believe in that sort of thing,” You shivered, running your hands over your arms to get them to warm up.

“Here.” Steve started pulling off his worn-out brown leather jacket and offering it to you.

“No, you keep it. I don’t want you to get cold.”

“Don’t worry about me? I’m like a body heater.”

“Fine, but if you get cold, you better tell me.” You slipped it on, feeling the warmth envelop you. His scent on his jacket made your insides twist. You pulled it tight around you, feeling your body warm up in an instant.

“I will,” he smiled, putting his hands in his pants pockets, shrugging.

You walked in silence for a block or so when you stopped at the crosswalk, waiting for the walking figure to appear. “What was it like growing up in Brooklyn with Bucky?”

He chuckled. “Well, it’s a funny story actually because it all started in grade school.” He glanced at you as if asking if he wanted to hear it. “I was drawing on the playground one day at recess. And at the time, I was a sickly little kid, and my mom told me I couldn’t play sports because I had a lot of health problems when I was younger before I became this.” He gestured to himself, making you roll your eyes. “Anyways, I was drawing, and these bullies came over and stood in my light and poured water over my notebook…”

“Those assholes.”

“Yeah, right,” he chuckled, scratching the back of his head. The crosswalk person appeared, and they started walking again. “I was never one to back down from a fight, so I stood up to him. He pushed me, and I fell, but I got back up and tried to push him, but ended up getting pushed down again, this time landing in a mud puddle. Then, Bucky came over, and straight-up punched this dude in the face. I think we were six at the time.”

“Oh my god, are you kidding?” Your mouth dropped over, and you covered it with your hand.

“Wish I was. Bucky told him to pick on someone his own size and sent him crying. After that, we became pretty good friends.”

“Do you still have the never run from a fight mentality?” You eyed him over and noticed him keeping a close eye on you.

“Yeah, I just don’t like bullies.” He shrugged as comfortable silence fell between the two of you once again. “You said you needed a fresh start. What were you running from?” You stared hard at the ground, biting your lip, not sure if you wanted to lay it all out for him. “Question for another time. How about a counter-question,” he hummed, thinking it over as you watched him mull over what to ask next. “How was it growing up with Thor?”

“Thor and I were never close growing up, which is crazy considering I live with him now. He was my older brother, he had his friends he always hung out with, and I was the younger sister. What older sibling wants to hang out with their younger sibling unless their parents ask them to? We got along, but I grew up being close with our adopted brother Loki. When Thor graduated from high school, he tried college but found it wasn’t for him, and then one day decided to move to LA and become a firefighter. After he moved, I didn’t talk to him much. Loki and I stayed in Brooklyn, I got my nursing degree, and he went into Broadway production. We were a scattered out set of siblings, living on two different coasts.”

“If you and Thor were never close, why move here and live with him?”

“I knew he would help me find myself again.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“Thor was the brother that wasn’t afraid to make a fool of himself to get me to laugh or feel better. He could get things off my mind when I needed to, plus he’s easy to talk to. Loki’s more of the conservative brother that has a plan and can be a diva at times. I love them both, but I knew starting here would be the fresh start I needed.” You shrugged in his jacket. “I think you owe me at least three extra questions.”

“Depends what you qualify as a question.”

“Oh, is that how it’s gonna be, wise guy.” You pushed him on the arm. “My turn to ask, let’s see, hmmm.” You tapped your chin with your finger. “How did you and my brother bond so fast?”

“I don’t know. It’s what you have to do in this job, trust your team. Besides, like you said, your brother is easy to get along with after you get past his ego.”

“He does have a big ego,” you nodded with a chuckle.

“What’s the hardest part about being a 911 dispatcher?”

“Really? Already asking a question. I think you still owe me a couple, but I’ll oblige.” You took in a deep breath and let it out, thinking it over. “When the caller hangs up, and you never know what the outcome is. Like, am I making a difference, am I helping? Being a nurse, I knew the outcome because I was there for everything, but here, all you can do is send help. I could look at the records and see what happened, but what if it’s not the outcome I hoped for.” You stared at the ground in front of you. “It’s almost like never finding out an ending to a movie or a book. I want to know what happened, but maybe it’s better left not knowing. After they hang up, sometimes you don’t get time to process it because there is another caller with another emergency.”

“I get it. Sometimes what we do can be a horror movie. It can give us nightmares if you can’t save someone or can’t get there in time,” Steve’s voice drifted off. “You can play it over in your head to figure out what you could’ve done differently, but sometimes the ending you wanted to happen was never going to happen.” He stared wide-eyed at the ground before glancing your way. There was something different in his eyes, like a nightmare he never quite escaped. “And you’re right, it’s one call after another with little to no recovery time in between.”

“But, then you get those calls where everything goes right, and it makes everything you’re doing worth it.” You shot him a warm smile, earning a nod from him.

“Have to say I agree with that.”

Both of you remained silent for a couple of blocks. These careers were tough to talk about. Everyone called you heroes, but sometimes it was hard to feel like a hero.

“Why did you want to be a fireman?”

“Simple, I like helping people, but like any job, it takes a toll.” He shrugged, glancing at you. “When your adrenaline is pumping, and every nerve in your body is firing. There is pressure put on us, and we never know how things will turn out, but we have to assure those we are trying to save that they are going to be okay. It’s like in a moment's notice we have to drop everything because we are the only help that is coming, and we have to try and save them from what could be the worst moment in their life.”

“It’s almost like you rehearsed that. Did you...did you rehearse that?” You joked, forcing him to crack a smile.

“Shut up, so what if I did.” He nudged your side, making you laugh out loud. It was a real laugh, the kind you haven’t had in a long time. It wasn’t a simple chuckle or a forced giggle, but for the first time in a long time, it sounded happy. Maybe, this is what Bruce was talking about when he told you to talk to someone. Weirdly enough, you did feel lighter, like some of the weight was lifted off your shoulders with this one conversation.

You came to a stop in front of a cozy little townhouse Thor and Darryl rented. It wasn’t huge. It was a two-bedroom home that an elderly couple raised their little girl, Hope, in. You only met Hank Pym and Janet van Dyne a few times, but they were a lovely couple that decided to rent out that home and retire next to the ocean.

“This is me.” You waved your hand at the house and started pulling off Steve’s jacket when he stopped you.

“Hold on to it for me. I’m sure I’ll see you again.”

“Awful sure of yourself, what makes you think I want to see you again?”

“A guy can hope, can’t he. If it helps, my jacket looks a hell of a lot better on you.”

“It’s helping,” you breathed a smirk, pulling the jacket around you. “Goodnight, Steve. Thanks for the talk and the walk home.”

“Glad I could help. Have a nice night, YN,” he waved, watching you walk up the steps and use your keys to unlock the door. You opened the door and turned around to find him waiting for you to safely get inside.

“I want you to know, I am still holding you to answer one question,” you added, opening the door wider.

“Look forward to answering it,” he smiled as you walked in and shut the door behind you.

______

AN: Thanks for reading Part 5! This is probably a chapter you all have been waiting for...more Steve action! Haha! What did you think of the round of twenty questions?! We got a little bit more backstory on her, and a little more about Steve. He left to get a new start, too, any theories as to why?! I mean, I know, but I'm curious where your heads are at! Also, I don't know much about billiards/pool rules, it's basically what I have learned through watching people play it, so if it’s totally off my bad! Again, thanks for reading, reblogs, likes, and comments always welcome!

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five-rivers · 3 years ago

Text

Long Night in the Valley Chapter 15

It's been a bit, hasn't it?

Toshinori pushed himself up off the ground with trembling arms. Although, by the position of the sun, it hadn’t been for long, he’d blacked out when—

“Oh, no,” said Toshinori. His head throbbed at the sound, making the edges of his vision go dark and fuzzy.

When All for One had broken through into the shared mindscape.

“Oh, no,” he repeated.

Where was Izuku? He had to find—Oh, thank goodness, Izuku was right there. He let out a sigh of relief.

His relief was short-lived. Izuku, to put it lightly, did not look well. His eyes were open, but only glazed slivers. His breath was coming shallow and fast, not quite to the point of hyperventilating, but it was a close thing. His skin was pale, except for deep, bruise-like circles under his eyes. He was sweating more than Toshinori had ever seen him sweat (which was really saying something; Izuku broke out into nervous sweats with some frequency). Perhaps most concerningly, he was shaking like a leaf.

Izuku was, Toshinori realized, still maintaining the effect of Two’s quirk.

He tried to reach inside himself, contact his predecessors, but swiftly pulled his mental fingers back, as if they had been burned. Bad idea.

“Izuku,” he said, “can you hear me?”

Izuku made a small, pained noise that tore at Toshinori’s heart.

“I’m going to pick you up, okay?” he said. Izuku didn’t answer, but then Toshinori didn’t expect him to.

The simple act forced Toshinori to call on the embers of One for All. Not enough to make his muscles swell, but enough to give him the strength of an ordinary, healthy man. His muscles and his remaining intact lung screamed in protest, not to mention his scars. He ignored them.

He stumbled forward, priorities shuffling themselves. They’d been trying to escape, but if Izuku was this ill… he needed a doctor. An exorcist might be a good idea, too, what with All for One running around in their heads.

But to get a doctor, they’d have to put themselves in commission hands, and Toshinori could feel the echoes of Two and Three telling him exactly how stupid that would be.

The commission had sent Hawks after Izuku. Toshinori had no doubt they’d throw him in Tartarus, and the treatment of criminals in Tartarus was one of the few things Toshinori had publicly disagreed with the HPSC on in his hero persona. Not that it had gone anywhere. He simply hadn’t had the time to really push it and the commission had somehow managed to paint him as somehow too good, too forgiving, to be trusted when it came to the disposition of terrible villains.

“’ll be’kay,” mumbled Izuku, the sentiment clearer over their mental link. “N’ospital.”

“Okay,” said Toshinori, slightly breathless. “Let’s—Let’s keep going, then. Find a good place to camp out, far away from Todoroki Touya, here. Yep.” He was aware he was rambling, and needlessly at that, but he couldn’t help it.

One foot in front of the other.

Was that a car running?

Toshinori, keen on getting help and care for Izuku, even if it meant hijacking a car, changed directions slightly. Of course, it would be ideal if there were friendly bystanders who didn’t believe the hero commissions lies and had a medical license and a healing quirk, but Toshinori would be more than happy with—

He stopped. Laughed. Laughed some more, a little hysterically. There, abandoned in a ditch like a beached sailing ship, was Vlad King’s much abused car.

Sure, it would have been reported stolen by now, and the police and heroes would be looking for it, but that was a problem for future-Toshinori. Present-Toshinori, on the other hand, was simply grateful for the windfall, and wary – the presence of the car could indicate the proximity of the League of Villains.

He gently put Izuku down in the passenger seat, turned the car off and made sure it was in the appropriate gear, then walked around to the back of the car and lifted it out of the ditch.

If his muscles had been complaining before—

He staggered back to the driver’s seat, leaning heavily on the side of the car the whole time. Blood dripped from his mouth. “This is nothing, my boy, nothing,” he said in what he hoped was a reassuring tone, as he felt Izuku’s concern press heavily against him. “Used to have worse every day of the week.”

Toshinori got the sense that Izuku was not, in fact, reassured. Nevertheless, he grinned, pouring every drop of his fabled ‘everything will be alright’ smile into the expression. Even if Izuku couldn’t see it, Toshinori needed some of the comfort that came with donning a familiar mask

“Let’s see if we can get to the Wild Wild Pussycats today, after all.”

“Eri-chan,” began Abe, tapping together her papers. She’d drawn the short stick. Ito was interviewing one of the older students, and Abe got the feral child.

“No,” said Eri.

“I didn’t even ask you a question yet.”

“Only people I like get to call me -chan. That’s the rule. Prinzible Nezu said so.”

“Principal,” corrected Nezu, cheerfully, like the unhelpful rodent rat bastard he was. If only she could have gotten him kicked out… but, no, he and Present Mic were both sitting in on the interview.

“PrincipalNezu told me, and he’s in charge.”

“You tell ‘em, Eri-chan!” said Present Mic, just a little more loudly than was comfortable.

Eri nodded to let Present Mic know the noise-cancelling earplugs were working.

“In this situation,” said Abe, sternly, “I am in charge.”

The girl tilted her head, and suddenly her expression went from ‘pouting child’ to ‘superior being contemplating an uppity insect.’

“Eri-san,” began Abe.

“No,” said Eri.

Abe looked up incredulously. What was wrong with -san?

She decided to ignore it. “You spoke with—”

Eri began to scream like a teakettle whistling.

“Can’t you control her?” Abe demanded, turning to Nezu, who chittered.

“This is very good progress!” he said, barely loud enough to hear over the ongoing shriek. “Before now, Eri-chan was too hesitant to act out or misbehave in any way, fearing the punishment that her former and completely unqualified caretakers would inflict upon her.”

Abe didn’t know which was more longwinded, the still-screaming child or the rodent principal. Her body was so tiny, how was she still screaming?

Eri clicked off the Present Mic-themed combo audio recorder and player in her pocket at the same time she shut her mouth. Principal Nezu was right! This was fun! At least, it would be if Deku was here.

“I get to pick what you call me,” said Eri, patiently. Since this person wasn’t smart enough to see that Deku was only the best hero ever and not a bad guy, she’d have to explain slowly.

The person evidently wasn’t even smart enough to breathe, as she was slowly turning purple.

“What,” she said, in stilted tones, “would you like me to call you.”

Eri let the smile Aizawa had taught her spread across her face. “Eri-sama.”

“Is that a joke?”

“It’s very important to respect the boundaries children establish, Abe-san,” said Nezu.

Katsuki blinked. It was about time he woke up. Stupid dream time dilation or whatever. Stupid boring soy sauce face and his stupid boring mindscape dreamscape whatever hellscape. There was a limit to what you could do in a square mile that mostly consisted of a tape-covered jungle gym and a boring apartment building. Katsuki had found it, and, after spending a good period of time being angry about it, had decided to go to sleep.

Dream time dilation or whatever the commission proctor had been going on about after the first billionty-and-one stupid hours, it didn’t matter, Katsuki hated it, it was just taking too damn long. If he didn’t have to do this to keep his provisional license, he’d tell the commission to shove this stupid pointless training up it’s—

About a minute after he should have twigged to something wrong, Katsuki realized the ceiling was too familiar.

He sat up. Why the hell was he in UA’s infirmary?

And not just him, about half the class was here with him.

He scowled. So, something had gone wrong with the test after all, and it looked like Deku wasn’t involved. Stupid nerd would hold it over him.

“Hey!” shouted Katsuki, spotting Recovery Girl. “What the f—”

“Language!” scolded Recovery Girl, shrilly, practically teleporting across the room to jab Katsuki with her cane. “You’re in a school, young man.”

“I know that!” protested Katsuki. “But why the f—” he faltered under the force Recovery Girl’s gaze even as she started to run through the checklist she usually did for people who’d been knocked out like wimps. “Fudge. Am I here.”

“I think the more pertinent question is, how are you awake? There should be at least one more hour, if not two, left to that quirk.”

“I went to sleep,” said Katsuki, attempting to fend her off.

“Well, you wouldn’t be waking up if—”

“No. In the shhhtupid dreamscape thing. I went to sleep.”

Recovery Girl paused for a moment, then sighed. “I don’t suppose you were the one whose mind they were exploring?”

“No. That was soy sauce face. Why are we back here? And where’s the nerd?”

Recovery Girl seemed to droop at his question, and a heaviness filled the air. “That’s a long story.”

“Did we get attacked by Dusty McGee again?”

“No.”

“So, what did happen?” snapped Katsuki. “The nerd break out a new quirk in the middle of the training or something?”

Recovery Girl’s eye twitched, and she sat down on a nearby stool, taking a deep breath.

“The hero commission suspected Midoriya of working with the League of Villains and attempted to use the training to interrogate him. Under the influence of at least one mental quirk, Midoriya fled. At about the same time, All Might left and met up with him, after which the commission accused Midoriya of kidnapping All Might. They haven’t given him an S-Rank villain classification, but I suspect that’s just because the paperwork hasn’t gone through yet.”

All right. Honestly, with his creepy stalker notebooks and obsessive All Might shrine room, Deku probably seemed like a prime kidnapping suspect to an outsider, but considering that Katsuki had witnessed Deku and All Might’s sickeningly sweet interpersonal interactions, somehow managing to be a goddamn third wheel to some sort of surrogate parent-child found family drama nonsense…

“Has anyone told ‘em it’s more likely the other way around? And that if it was, it’d probably be for the nerd’s own good, too?”

Recovery Girl nodded tiredly.

“They hiding out here?”

“Midoriya is a wanted criminal.”

“So what?”

“We’re a school.”

“You’ve lost me.”

Recovery Girl sighed. “No, Midoriya is not here.”

“Well, that’s stupid. What are we doing about it?”

“Right now? You are doing nothing. Commission investigators are in the building, and it would be better if they thought you were still unconscious.”

Katsuki grumbled. “Should go and try to bring him back.”

“What, so he can be arrested?”

“No!” said Katsuki, defensively. “But he’s probably running around out there making everything worse!”

“Bakugo,” said Recovery Girl, patting his leg, “from what I’ve heard, the only thing that could possibly make this worse is being found.”

“Can you describe to me the circumstances under which you lost your quirk?” asked Ito, the other commission investigator.

“Sure!” said Mirio, hoping the man couldn’t detect his discomfort at the subject. Even if he’d made that split second choice to shield Eri with his body with full knowledge of the consequences, to jump in front of Nemoto’s bullet, it was still a traumatic experience. It still hurt, even if he didn’t regret it.

He took a deep breath. “Well, it was during the Shie Hassaikai raid. I had gone ahead to confront Chisaki Kai and rescue Eri. There were a few other yakuza with him, members of the Eight Bullets. Nemoto Shin, Sakaki Deidoro, and, ah, Chrono, I think. I can’t remember his proper name.”

“That’s fine. Please continue.”

“I engaged with Sakaki and Nemoto while Chisaki and Chrono went ahead. I was affected by their quirks, but managed to get by… It was a hard battle!” he interjected, suddenly. He belatedly realized he wanted to draw out this line of questioning, and dove into a supremely detailed description of his fight with Sakaki and Nemoto. It was funny, too, and he saw Ito getting sucked in.

Sir would have been proud.

“And then, I chased after Chrono and Chisaki!” said Mirio, gesticulating wildly to illustrate his movements. He continued narrating the battle, the wild swings of fate, Eri’s hope and fear, the strikes and counterstrikes! Just like when he’d first debriefed after the raid.

Weirdly enough, going through it like this also made him feel better. Less like he was reliving a terrible, painful moment in his life, and more like he was telling a very dramatic story.

“—aaaaaaand,” he wrapped up, “Chisaki tossed the gun with the erasure bullets to Nemoto – I hadn’t realized he was still conscious. I’d been too worried about getting to Eri.” He shrugged. “I got shot.”

“Despite your quirk?”

“I didn’t want Eri to be hit.”

“Even though the loss of her quirk might have been a blessing for her? Considering the difficulty she has using it and the pain it gives her.”

Mirio felt his smile settle into something blander and more dangerous than his usual beaming grins. “Are you suggesting that I should have let a six-year-old be shot?”

“Not at all,” said Ito, making a mark. “Now, where was Midoriya at this time?”

“He hadn’t caught up to us, yet,” said Mirio. “He was with Sir.”

“Who?”

“Sir Nighteye,” clarified Mirio. “Before that, they were with Rock Lock and some of the others, I believe.”

“But you don’t know for sure.”

“I wasn’t there, so… no, not really. But the exact situation should be on file, from our debrief, and Rock Lock can confirm or clarify.”

“Only the parts he saw,” said Ito. “Did you try to use your quirk after that? Or did you simply assume it was gone?”

“Of course, I tried to use it!” said Mirio, feeling somewhat offended. “I’d trained it to be reflexive. Right after, I kept thinking my quirk would protect me, and moving too slow to dodge attacks. I got really beaten up.”

“And was this before or after Midoriya Izuku arrived?”

“Before, mostly,” said Mirio. “It isn’t like the fight stopped the minute he showed up.”

“And you are certain your quirk stopped working before Midoriya arrived.”

“I’m sure.”

“How did you know you were hit by a permanent quirk-erasing bullet?” asked Ito.

“Well, when my quirk didn’t come back we were pretty sure,” said Mirio.

“But you didn’t know beforehand, for certain, that the bullets were permanent.”

Crap. Mirio had screwed up somewhere in there. He could feel it.

“I think Nemoto and Chisaki were shouting at each other about it during the fight,” said Mirio. “They were pretty proud of it.”

“But you did not know, for sure, that your quirk loss was permanent,” insisted Ito. “There was no way for you to know that their claims about the bullets were true.”

“I mean… not really,” said Mirio. “But, again, here I am without a quirk.”

“Yes… but that isn’t the only way a person can lose a quirk, is it?”

“The Scourge of Kamino was already in Tartarus when the Shie Hassaikai raid took place,” said Mirio. “I’m not sure what you’re getting at.”

“Did Midoriya Izuku come into contact with you before the end of the day?”

“We talked, yeah,” said Mirio.

“Physical contact.”

“Actually… no,” said Mirio. “After the fight, we were both whisked off to the hospital, separately. Midoriya came to visit me after we both got patched up, he felt guilty about not getting to me and Eri sooner, and--” Oh, dear, he’d have to think back on that conversation a bit more. Later. He swallowed. “--and… Sir’s death…” He looked down at his hands. “Sir… in retrospect, he didn’t like Midoriya very much, but his death hit Midoriya hard. First death in the line of duty. It… it was the first time I’d seen a hero die, too.”

“You’re quite certain he didn’t touch you? At all?” asked Ito, undeterred by Mirio’s not-at-all-feigned grief.

“Pretty sure, yeah,” said Mirio, now annoyed by the investigator’s callousness.

“I see.”

Ochako rubbed her eyes, but the darkness stayed. “What,” she said out loud, her voice somehow doing the opposite of echoing, “what happened?”

“I don’t know,” said Todoroki. He had positioned himself so as to guard her back.

“There was a bang,” said Iida, “and then…” He trailed off, clearly finding just as much difficulty in describing the event as Ochako did thinking about it.

“They were talking about All for One getting in,” said Ochako. “You don’t think…?”

“Maybe we timed out the quirk and we’re about to wake up,” said Iida, optimistically.

“Where’s Aizawa-sensei?” asked Todoroki.

“I don’t know,” said Ochako. “He was standing with us… I mean, I couldn’t see you guys at first, either.”

“I’m here,” said Aizawa.

Ochako turned to see their teacher methodically scanning their black surroundings, his eyes red. “Do you know what happened?” she asked. “Do you think this is just, I don’t know, a new transition? A memory?”

“I don’t know,” said Aizawa. He blinked, eyes returning to their normal colors.

“It isn’t,” said an unfamiliar voice. The figure of a young man with uncut white hair slowly faded out of the darkness. “Hello.” He raised a hand. “I’m One. Or, I guess, you can call me Kazuki. Sorry about the landscape. Most of our mental resources were just rerouted.”

“Does this have something to do with that vault thing Izuku mentioned?” asked Ochako.

“Yes, sadly,” said One. “My brother’s broken out. Which means you really shouldn’t be here. All our minds are about to become battlefields. I have some techniques that might help you get out, but--”

“Six told me there was something taken from Midoriya that we could get back, if the vault was open. Is that still a thing?”

One raised a fist to his lips, and pressed down. “You understand, don’t you, that to search for this is to go into my brother’s mind?”

“If it’s to help Midoriya,” said Todoroki, stepping forward, “we’ll do anything.”

“That is very admirable of you,” said One. “I do mean that, I really do, and I’ve seen your heroics and spirit through Izuku’s eyes. But I’m not sending children to fight my brother. Eraserhead, you’d be going alone.”

“I can work with that,” said Aizawa.

“But we won’t be in any real danger!” protested Ochako. “The worst that could happen to us is that we’ll run out of time and wake up. Right?”

“Don’t underestimate my brother. Judging from the fight at Kamino, he lost a lot of quirk control and strength after his first fight with Eight, or else he’d never have been captured. But that’s only if we take it at face value. I don’t doubt that he has five or six plans in place to escape Tartarus and steal every interesting quirk in there, thereby increasing his power exponentially, or even healing himself.”

Ochako blinked. How would anyone heal from… Wait. “Overhaul.”

One’s smile was a bitter thing. “I certainly wouldn’t have put the two of them in the same prison.”

The villain at Kamino, already strong enough to go toe to toe with All Might, with Overhaul's power? Ochako shuddered.

"What did he take from Midoriya?" asked Aizawa. "I'm going to need to know before I do this."

"You're sure you want to do this, then?"

"I haven't decided."

One sighed and pushed his hair back, out of his face. Ochako was struck, momentarily, by how the color of his eyes perfectly matched Izuku's.

"My brother took what he always takes," said One. "His quirk."

"But!" protested Ochako. "He has a quirk! He has..." she trailed off as another revelation hit her.

"He…" said Iida, next to her, "has several quirks."

"He has your quirk," said Todoroki with one-hundred-percent unwavering confidence.

"You had a quirk like All for One," said Aizawa. "But considering what we've seen… the quirk to pass on quirks?"

"That's why you call yourselves by numbers! Because that's the order you had the quirk in!" added Ochako.

"I prefer thinking of it as the ability to share quirks," said One, "but since everyone but Eight and Nine is dead, the distinction is academic."

Aizawa sighed and ran a hand over his face. "Okay, let me get this straight. You and... your brother both had meta quirks. He could… give and take quirks. You could just pass your own quirk on. He decided to become a criminal mastermind. You decided to, I don't know, invest your quirk until someone had enough quirks to fight your brother?"

"And they're all related," said Todoroki.

"And you're all related," said Aizawa with an air of suffering.

"It was significantly less intentional and more complicated than that, but, yes, those are the basics."

"And, for some reason, All Might thought that it was a good idea to pick a teenager for the job."

"In his defense, Eight thought my brother was dead. The one you should really be throwing shade at is Seven."

"I have questions."

One tilted his head. "Normally, I would answer them, but we're running out of time."

Aizawa sighed. "Alright. I'll do it."

"We want to help, too!" said Ochako.

"Three will find a way to ghost murder me if I get you involved in a fight with my brother."

"So would I, incidentally," said Aizawa, "and then I'd expel all of them."

Iida cleared his throat. "Is there any way for us to help without coming into contact with All for One?”

“Yes,” said One, clapping his hands together. “Getting out before that Suzuki fellow does and giving Izuku some good publicity.”

One’s image seemed to waver and split, then, as if Ochako had crossed her eyes. She blinked, hard, but after that there were still two of them.

“I’ll lead you to my brother’s mind,” said one of the Ones, waving at Aizawa.

“I’ll stay and try to help the rest of you get out,” said the second One. “We should - Oh.”

“Oh?” repeated Aizawa. “‘Oh,’ what?”

“Oh, we forgot about someone,” said One.

“Oh,” said All for One, catching sight of an anomaly. “Who is this little intruder to our gathering?”

“Just some government lackey,” said Miranda, hands still for now, but in a position where she could likely summon ball lightning in a matter of minutes. “Not someone you can use as a hostage.”

“Actually,” said Ryuji, who, unusually, had yet to disappear from All for One’s senses, “if you could figure out a way to get rid of him, it would be convenient.”

“Two!” snapped Nana.

“Come on, we were all thinking it,” said Ryuji.

“You can’t use a him as a murder weapon,” hissed Nana. “Nine will get in trouble.”

“You’rethe one who repeatedly dropped him from a dozen stories up. And the one who was fantasizing about murdering him in real life.”

“That daydream could have belonged to anyone.”

“It had Gran Torino in it.”

“Eight knows Gran, too!”

All for One coughed, returning the full attention of the vestiges to himself. “Is this a pathetic attempt at a distraction?”

“Do you know any other adjectives?” asked his little brother, who was slouching off to the side with his hands in his pockets.

All for One sneered. “Are you not taking this seriously?”

“Not really, no,” said Kazuki, “and neither are you, or else we’d be fighting already. We both know that what you can affect here is limited.” He started counting off on his fingers. “You can’t bring us back with you, you can’t affect Nine’s morality, you can’t take the stockpile, you--”

“I knew it!” shrieked the little intruder, jabbing a finger at All for One. “I knew it! You’re All for One! Midoriya is working for you!”

“Hey, if you’re going to do the sibling thing and prove me wrong about the whole ‘can’t do anything’ thing, can I suggest you start with him?”

All for One narrowed his eyes and scanned his relatives. There was an uncharacteristic lack of protest.

“Are you briar patching?”

“No,” said Hibiki, “they’re quite serious. I personally would prefer it if you didn’t kill him, but not enough to risk myself.”

He could always trust Hibiki to be blunt and straightforward. He got it from his wonderfully forthright and businesslike mother. He hadn’t loved her like he loved his current, still-living spouse, but she had been refreshing.

“Mood,” said Rokuya.

“I wasn’t going to say anything,” said dear, sweet Izuku, raising a hand, “but I’m not actually comfortable letting All for One kill him in front of us.”

“Don’t try that now! You’ve shown your true colors, traitor!”

“Don’t worry, kid,” said Daigoro, “we’re pretty sure he won’t be able to.”

“Torture, then.”

“Not sure he can do worse than Nana did.”

“All I did was drop him!” protested Nana.

“Repeatedly, from a great height,” Miranda reminded her.

Everyone was much more relaxed, now, and… were they ignoring him? They were!

“Are you all under the effect of a quirk?”

“Yeah,” said Kazuki. “How else do you think this is happening?”

“No, I mean… your personalities… they’re all…” He gestured at the One for All users who had stopped to watch him.

“Niichan, I’ve tried to tell you this before, but at least for me, I’m not all that great a person. You just suck so enormously that I look like a saint in comparison.”

“That’s not true!”

“It is,” said Kazuki. “I mean, think back to our first argument. I was less concerned with your overall morality and more concerned with the fact that the demon king alway loses--”

“Excuse you, but I’ve beaten every one of you.”

“No you haven’t,” said Hibiki. “I, at least, died with no input from you.”

“Killing you is obviously different from beating you,” said All for One.

“I mean, by the time you chucked me in that vault, it had evolved to a moral and ethical complaint,” said Kazuki, his one visible eye unfocused in remembrance. “But it started out with me worried about you getting yourself killed.”

“No it didn’t.”

“It really did. You know, I don’t think I ever told you this, but if you’d been twenty percent more ethical? I would have absolutely been on your side.”

“What.”

“I mean, it was you, the government, and ragtag resistance groups, and the government sucked.”

“I can confirm that,” said Miranda, “and it continues to be disgustingly corrupt. But since you’re also swimming through the human experimentation cesspit, we’re staying where we are. Don’t get any ideas.” She ended the sentence with a hiss and fog started rolling in.

“I agree that if you stayed away from the kidnapping, murder, and cult stuff, I would have probably stayed with you,” said Ryuji. “Except you did do all that stuff… Why are we even talking about this?”

“I would add personal freedom to the list of things I’d want from you in the hypothetical world where we stayed on the same side,” said Hibiki, “but, otherwise, I agree.”

All for One blinked several times, a small part of his mind cherishing the fact that he had eyes. “Do you all feel that way?” he asked, oddly touched but also strangely disturbed.

“No,” said Daigoro, “the rest of us hate you and the government just about equally.”

All for One turned his gaze to the quivering ��government lackey.’ “I see. So, I suppose I have the government to thank for this turn of events. Hm? What did you do to have these soft-hearted fools so upset with you?”

The little man squeaked and jabbed something like an epi-pen into his leg. A second later, he vanished.

“Wait,” said Izuku. “Wait. THAT’S how to get out? That’s so stupid! Can we do that?” The last was said as an aside to Nana.

“Not with him here,” said Miranda. Her voice had dropped back into its more dangerous registers.

“Oh, so we are going to fight after all,” said All for One, clapping his hands and smiling. “What fun.”

“I can’t believe you distracted him and got Suzuki to leave like that,” said Aizawa as they stepped out of the fog.

“Well, my brother always did like to hear the sound of his own voice. And be a jerk, but I’m sure that was obvious,” said One. They came to a stop in front of a normal-looking apartment building. One sighed. “This is where we lived,” he said. “Before…” He sighed again.

Aizawa examined One out of the corner of his eyes. He looked tired.

“How much of what you said back there was true?”

“Huh? Most of it, really. My successors built me up as some kind of big good, but I was never anything but a normal guy with a slightly more functional moral compass than my brother.”

From what Aizawa had seen so far, he suspected One was seriously underselling himself.

“I’m sorry,” said One, “but I’m going to have to leave you here. Nine’s quirk should look like a younger version of himself. He couldn’t have been any older than five when it was taken.”

“Anything else I should know about?”

“Sorry, not really… I’ve not exactly been inside my brother’s head. If you manage to find a switch labeled ‘empathy,’ you might take a second to flip it on. Or not. Could be booby trapped. Wouldn’t put it past him.”

“Great,” said Aizawa.

“Midoriya-san,” said Mr. Compress. “We’ve been searching for quite some time now, I hate to say it, but I rather suspect that your son has thoroughly escaped.”

“Escaped,” repeated Midoriya. “Like a prisoner.”

Mr. Compress coughed into his fist. Tomura glared at him through a fog of exhaustion. He was wearing a mask. Why bother with the fist at all? Sometimes, Tomura felt like the only sane person on a planet of aliens.

“Honestly, we didn’t even know he was in the area, Midoriya-san. But… Perhaps at this point, the best course of action would be to return to our, uh… temporary base so that you can get some clothes. I’m sure Dabi will have something that can fit you.”

“Or maybe,” said Toga, hesitantly, “Magne might have had something?”

“Excellent idea, Himiko! Yes, I’m sure Magne’s clothes will be much more appropriate.”

“I don’t know that dressing her in a dead woman’s clothes is a good idea?” whispered Twice.

“Normally,” said Midoriya Inko, “I would say that the fires of my anger at Hisashi provide me with enough warmth to scorch the ground I walk on but—” she shivered, “—unfortunately you may be right. I’m not a young woman anymore, and Izuku would want me to be safe and healthy. So that I can give Hisashi a… firm talking to.”

Tomura shuddered. The ice in her tone was more frigid than the toilet seat in their stupid unheated bathroom at night.

… He hoped Sensei didn’t get a mind reading quirk in the near future. He definitely didn’t want him to know about that metaphor.

“Machia, will you be a dear and take us back? And Mr. Compress, would you put Dr. Garaki back in one of your marbles? I suspect he’ll be… more comfortable that way.”

At least Tomura wasn’t the doctor.

Machia leaned down and let them all get on, though not before fixing Tomura with a glare and delivering some glitchy threat about the ‘Little Lord’ and ‘playing nice.’ Completely redundant, what with Midoriya Inko’s much more pertinent and detailed threat regarding the same thing.

“Hey,” said Twice. “Do you guys smell--? It’s like a barbecue!”

Himiko sniffed the air. “It does smell kinda smokey, guys. Do you think Dabi got in a fight, too?”

“With who?” asked Tomura.

“Well, Izu-chan has to still be around here somewhere, right?” asked Himiko, putting a finger to her lips.

Machia sped up.

“It’s probably just the wind blowing someone’s bonfire smoke this way,” said Spinner.

Machia slowed down again.

Tomura frowned. “There shouldn’t be anyone close enough for that,” he said. If Dabi had set the forest on fire and given away their position, he was going to murder him.

Machia sped up again.

They came into sight of their current base and the source of the smoke.

These happened to be the same thing.

“I’m going to kill Dabi,” said Tomura.

“Are we sure it was him?” asked Twice.

“I don’t care.”

#bnha #boku no hero academia #fic #fanfic #long night in the valley

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atlafan · 4 years ago

Text

Office Neighbors - Part Six

a/n: here we are, and it certainly won’t be over after this! didn’t have time to proof read sorry, hope you enjoy! (reblogs and feedback are super helpful!)

warnings: fluff, smut, minor character death

words: 15K

masterpost

The semester was in full swing, and you were counting down the days until Thanksgiving break. It was time you could dedicate to grading, and your brother always cooked this gourmet meal for your family, so all in all, you were just ready to for the little time away. You just needed to get through another two weeks.

It was also time off for Harry. Andy always spent his Thanksgiving break with Paige since Harry got him for Christmas in London. Typically, you ate at Harry’s house for dinner twice a week, and then when Andy was at Paige’s for a weekend, Harry would either sleep at your place, or you would sleep at his. Sometimes you would go to the library together to work. He really helped you find a work-life balance. Now, Harry usually went to Lisa’s for Thanksgiving, but he wasn’t sure if those plans were set to change. He was sort of hoping to go to Boston with you, but he didn’t want to invite himself.

“I think you should just ask her.” Andy says as he helps Harry set the table.

“I don’t want to impose, it’s rude.”

“But you’re her boyfriend, she should want you to spend Thanksgiving with her.”

“It’s a bit more complicated than that.”

“You say that all the time.” He rolls his eyes.

“It is! It’s not just her and I having dinner, I’d be meeting her whole family, that’s a big deal.”

“Why?”

“Because…well…it’s one thing for her to like me, but I’d want her family to like me too.”

“Dad, literally who has ever met you ever likes you. Even Noah’s parents like you.”

“Thanks.” Harry chuckles. The doorbell rings and he smiles. “Go open that for her, will you?”

Andy races over to the door, and opens it for you.

“Hi, Y/N.” He smiles.

“Hi, Andy, how was school?” You smile as you come in and kick your boots off. “Getting cold out there.” You shiver as you take your jacket off.

“School was good.” He shrugs. “My health class just started and it’s really awkward.”

“Oh, I bet.” You walk in with him and the dessert your brought. “I brought cookies, couldn’t help myself.” You say to Harry, kissing his cheek.

“Thank you.” He smiles and takes it to put on the counter. “We’re having chili tonight, thought it would be nice for a cold evening.”

“Definitely, it smells amazing.”

Everyone makes a bowl, and adds what they want. After chatting about something funny one of Harry’s students says, Andy jumps into the conversation.

“Man, I cannot wait for Thanksgiving break. I know it’s only a few days, but I can’t wait.”

Harry slowly turns his head to look at his son, knowing exactly what he was doing.

“Yeah? You go to your mom’s right?” You say.

“Mhm, my grandparents and aunt come, and so does Noah’s family. It’s actually pretty fun. My mum and aunt cook everything together. What do you usually do for Thanksgiving, Y/N?”

“Well, when I was growing up we always hosted at my parent’s house, but my brother tends to host now since he’s the one that does that cooking.”

“He’s a chef, right?”

“A sous chef, but yeah.” You smile. “Although, he doesn’t cook everything. I tend to make the more Jewish dishes, and then he makes the more traditional Thanksgiving things.”

“Noah’s mum makes a brisket, do you guys have that too?”

“Mhm! My brother makes it, although I don’t eat it anymore.” You shrug and take another bite of the chili.

“Dad goes to Auntie Lisa’s.”

“Oh, you do?”

“Yeah…”

“That must be so much fun! Her husband is such a good cook. At the last game night there he made this spinach puff things, and I think I ate the whole tray.” You laugh.

“It’s usually a good time, yeah.”

“I’m surprised you don’t do Thanksgiving at Paige’s.”

“Nah, we tend to keep holidays separate. Her family doesn’t really understand the co-parenting.”

“Gram and Gramp are kind of snooty.” Andy says. “I love them, but I usually cap the convo at five minutes, and then I find an excuse to walk away.”

You burst out laughing and so does Harry, and Andy ends up laughing too. After dinner, and the cookies, Andy goes off to start his homework, which leaves you and Harry to clean up in the kitchen.

“He’s a lot like you, you know? He’s very smooth.”

“What do you mean?”

“Bringing up what we all do for Thanksgiving, almost seemed like he was hinting at something.” You smirk. “It’s cute you talk to him about me, honestly.”

“What…I wasn’t-“

“Did you really think I wasn’t going to invite you?”

“I…well, it’s a couple of weeks away and you haven’t mentioned it, so I just figured you weren’t ready for me to meet your family.” He runs a hand through his hair.

“I was going to run it by you tomorrow…I took me a minute to work up the courage to tell my family I was going to invite you, I’m sorry.”

“No! It’s okay, so, you want me to come?”

“I do, would you?”

“Yes.” He puts his hands on your hips and kisses you. “I’d love to.”

“Great!” You wrap your arms around his neck. “I was thinking we could drive down Thursday, and then spend the night at a hotel in the city, and then Friday we could, like, do a ton of touristy Boston things before driving back up.”

“That sounds amazing. Um, let me pay for the hotel though.”

“Oh, please.” You scoff.

“Come on, it’s gonna be really expensive because of the holiday.”

“Julian, Phil’s partner, manages a hotel in the city, he said he could cut me a deal. It’s really no problem.”

“Oh…well, alright then.” He smiles. “I’m excited.”

“Me too.”

“Do you think they’ll like me?”

“I think so, yeah, but I have to warn you…when I first told you about them they had a lot of concern that I was getting involved with someone who has a kid, so they may ask a lot of personal questions. I told them not to, but they tend not to listen to me.”

“Guess it sort of comes with the territory. Nothing I can’t handle.”

You kiss goodbye before you leave, and Harry nearly squeals. He goes down to Andy’s room.

“Guess who got invited to Thanksgiving?”

“Are you serious?!” Andy stands up and gives Harry a high five. “That’s great! You should bake a pumpkin pie, you make the best pumpkin pie.”

“I do, don’t I?” He smirks. “I’ll ask her what I can bring. We’re gonna be going over night together, wow.”

“Is it that big of a deal? You have sleepovers all the time.”

“Andy…”

“I’m not stupid, Dad, she leaves…girly things here.”

“Okay, so we have sleepovers a lot, but going away with someone overnight is, like, next level.”

“You went camping together before you were even together, and then you went to that conference.”

“We didn’t share a room at the conference. It’s…it’s just different, okay? A good different. It’s gonna be great.”

“How come she doesn’t stay over when I’m here?”

“We haven’t really been together long enough for that. I don’t think she really feels comfortable just yet.”

“Why? You’re just sleeping.”

“Right…”

Andy gives Harry a weird look, and then his eyes widen.

“Oh, Jesus, Dad, don’t be gross!”

“I didn’t say anything!”

“You’re so annoying, get out!”

Harry puts his hands up in defense and walks away. He really didn’t mean anything by his response, but Andy was smart, and sex was still an awkward topic. He wouldn’t even watch a movie with Harry now if there was a kissing scene in it. Things were okay with Brandon, and that was all Harry cared about. He was sort of hoping health class would help.

Andy had a half day at school on Wednesday, so Harry had to pick him up and bring him back to the university. When he was picking him up he noticed him saying goodbye to Brandon. They were hugging…for a while.

“See you Monday, have fun at your mom’s.” Brandon smiles as he lets go of Andy.

“Thanks, have a good time in Connecticut.”

“Text me if you need me…I know it’s a lot for you over there for so long.”

“I will, I’ll probably need to call you Thursday night.”

“Works for me, it’ll give me an excuse to get away from cousins. I really don’t feel like staying up to play Barbie’s with them.” He rolls his eyes.

“You’re the best.” He looks over and sees Harry’s car. “My dad’s here…bye.”

“Bye.”

They hug one more time and then Andy walks over to Harry’s car, getting in the back seat.

“Hey, how was the half day.”

“Good.” Andy shrugs. “We just ate food and watched a movie.”

“Are you still hungry? I brought some extra snacks to my office this morning.”

“Yeah, I’m hungry. Did you bring anything good?”

“Cheese sticks and grapes.”

“Guess that’s fine.”

“You’re gonna eat a lot of junk this weekend, couldn’t letcha eat a bad snack with me before Mum comes to get you.”

When Harry gets back to his office with Andy, he sees you laughing with Andre. Now, Harry knew he had nothing to worry about with Andre, but he was definitely curious to see what was so funny.

“Hi, Y/N!” Andy says, hugging you.

“Oh! Hi, Andy.” You smile and hug him back.

“What’s so funny?” Harry asks coolly.

“Oh, Y/N was just pointing out how students just skip class all week to beat the traffic, but we don’t have that luxury.”

“I mean, I know all classes after three are cancelled, so we can sort of leave early, but come on. At least let me know you’re not gonna be there.” You say. “Whatever, just need to teach one more class.”

“Can I go?” Andy asks.

“Andy…Y/N’s teaching a class about rhetoric, it’s a little high level for you.”

“I don’t have any homework or anything to do, and I don’t feel like just sitting around.”

“He can come if he wants.” You shrug. “Gotta go now though.”

“Okay!” Andy runs into Harry’s office to grab his snack and then joins you.

“He really likes her, huh?” Andre says to Harry.

“Yeah, he does.”

What you were talking about in class was way over Andy’s head, but what he did understand was when you put an episode of The Office. You wanted to show different persuasion tactics used while making a sale, and you thought it would be relatable for the students. Andy thought you were the coolest person in the world for showing it.

“Alright, I hope you all have a great few days off, I’ll see you Monday.” You say at the end of class. Andy gets up from the back of the class and comes towards you. “So, what did you think?”

“I liked the part where you put on The Office.” He giggles.

“I thought so.”

“I didn’t understand a word you said, but I sort of got some of it when you put the show on. It’s sort of cool how, like, a sow you could watch just for fun could have a deeper meaning.”

“It’s very cool.” You smile and walk with him back down to Harry’s office.

You stop short when you see Paige sitting on the edge of his desk.

“Mum?”

“Hi, honey! I came to surprise you. I had a half day today too.” She smiles and hugs him. “Hi, Y/N.”

“Hi, how are you?”

“I’m good, thanks. Dad already helped me put your things in my car, so we’re good to go.”

“Oh…alright.” Andy gives Harry a hug goodbye. “Have in Boston.”

“Thanks, buddy.” Harry stands up and puts his hands in his pockets.

“Boston?” Paige raises an eyebrow with a smile.

“He’s coming home with me.” You say.

“That’s great! Well, safe travels.”

“Bye, Y/N.” Andy hugs you and out the door they go.

“Did you know she was coming here to get him?”

“No, she texted me, like, two seconds after you went to class, sorry.”

“No, it’s fine, I just wasn’t expecting to see her.”

“You know, she mentioned a while back that she’d like to get together with you sometime…I think it might be a good idea for you to get to know her better.”

“Harry, no offense, but I don’t need to be best friends with your ex.”

“I’m not asking you to be, but you’re in Andy’s life, she wants to get to know you better.”

“Just a one on one thing?”

“Yeah.”

“I’ll think about it.” You say and leave his office. He follows you into yours and you sigh.

“Do you have a problem with Paige?”

“No, of course not. I just don’t feel super comfortable getting together with her so she can grill me.”

“That’s not why she wants to meet up with you.”

“So, it wouldn’t be a couple of hours of her asking me a bunch of questions?”

“Well, you’d ask her questions too. I did the same with Noah, and I get along great with him.”

“I get along just fine with her.”

“You’ve been around her, like, four times.”

“And it’s been great every time, why rock the boat?” You shrug.

“Y/N…she’s the mother of my kid, she’s not going anywhere, and it would mean a lot to me if you got to know her better, alright?”

“Alright…maybe once the semester is over she and I could get together for lunch or something.”

He smiles at you and kisses your cheek.

“You’re the best.”

“Someone has to be.” You sigh and it makes him laugh. “Did you want to just stay at my place tonight so we can leave from there tomorrow?”

“Yeah, sounds good. What time do you want me over?”

“Seven?”

“I’ll be there.”

Harry: what should I pack for clothes, how fancy is dinner?

You: I’ll just be in jeans a blouse, wear what makes you comfortable

You thought it was sweet that Harry was a little nervous to meet your family. They weren’t scary people, but you were the baby, and you knew that came with a lot of questions. Harry comes over a little after seven in some joggers and a long sleeve shirt, and a couple of bags.

“Mm, smells good in here.” He says, kissing your cheek.

“I just finished baking what I need to bring.”

“I made a pumpkin pie to bring, could I stick it in the fridge?”

“That’s so sweet! Of course, go right ahead.”

You take his bags and bring them into your disaster of a room. You hadn’t been very good at putting your laundry away once it was folded, nor were you good about getting your dirty laundry in the hamper. You sigh and start running around to tidy it up.

“I thought you did chores once a week?” Harry chuckles as he stands in the doorway.

“I…haven’t been making much time for it with all the work I need to do. And then I come in here and it’s just too overwhelming. Everywhere else is fine though.”

“You know, having a messy room can cause just as much anxiety before you go to bed because you get reminded of the stress-“

“Har?”

“Yeah?”

“Don’t need a lecture from you on my messy bedroom, okay?”

“Wasn’t giving you one.” He raises his hands in defense. “Don’t feel like you need to clean it just because I’m here either.”

“No, I don’t wanna come back to a mess, just…go watch TV until I’m done in here, it’s mostly just laundry.”

“I can help if you want.” You make a face at him. “What? I could throw a load in for you, or help you put things away.”

“You can help by just giving me a minute. I’ve been trying to reconfigure things, I may buy a larger dresser soon.”

“Why? You could just go through get rid of what you don’t need. Perfect time of year to do it.”

“I did that already…” You bite your bottom lip. “I was thinking…well…you come over a lot, and I’ve been trying to clean out a couple of drawers for you so you could just leave some weekend clothes here if you wanted.”

“R-really?” He looks at you like a wide eyed puppy.

“Yeah, we’ve been together five months, I think it makes sense to give you a drawer, I even made room in my bathroom for you, come look.” You tug him into the bathroom “I put up this rack so you could leave some shaving stuff or whatever you usually bring. If you’re comfortable with it.”

“You won’t mind my stuff crowding you?”

“No, if anything it’ll be like you’re here when you’re not here.” You say quietly and look at him. “I leave things at your place, I want you to leave things here.”

Harry tilts your chin up to look at him and he kisses you. He never had a relationship like this before. Well, he sort of did this with Paige, but it was different. He thought it was so sweet that you wanted these pieces of him around, and he knows he should do the same for you.

“Next time you’re at my place, there will be a drawer and some closet space for you.” He smiles. “I’ll go watch some TV while you do your thing.”

“Thanks.”

Around forty-five minutes later you plop down onto the couch next to Harry, and sigh. He throws an arm around you and kisses your temple.

“What are you watching?”

“SNL’s Thanksgiving clip show.”

“Oh fun!”

“What time do we need to be on the road tomorrow?”

“Not terribly early. Today’s the big travel day, I didn’t hit any traffic last year. We can leave around eleven.”

“Amazing. I don’t mind getting up early, but it’s nice to not have to sleep in on our days off.”

“I agree.”

You both shift so you can lay on top of him. He rubs your back, and you both giggle over the funny sketches. You pull a blanket over the two of you, and just get really cozy.

“I’m excited to be going overnight with you in the city. Where are we going Friday?”

“I thought we could take the T to Faneuil Hall and do some shopping, and then we could go to the North End for food.”

“Sounds good to me. Is there anything specific I need to know about your family before I meet them?”

“Not really…my parents can be sort of abrasive, but they mean well. Phil and Julian are pretty chill.”

“How long have they been together for?”

“God, like…six years I think.”

“That’s nice.”

“They’re a great couple. I think everyone will like you, Harry, nothing to worry about.” You lean up and kiss his forehead.

He cups your cheeks and pulls you closer to kiss your lips. You skootch up his body, and his hands slide down to your ass. You bite down on his bottom lip briefly before pulling away.

“Can we be lame and just go get really cozy in bed?” You say.

“Not lame at all, I’m pretty tired from all the grading I did this afternoon.”

You get off him and you both do your nightly routines before getting into bed.

“Y/N?”

“Yeah?”

“Why is your bed so warm already?”

“Oh! I turned my heated blanket on before I came out to watch TV with you. Nice and toasty, right?”

“Very.” He chuckles. “Now turn over so I can have that booty.”

“Harry.” You laugh, but do as he says, and adjust right into him. His leg goes right over your hip like always, and he holds you nice and close.

“I’m so glad you like sleeping like this, I don’t know what I’d do.” He chuckles into the back of your head.

“I know, could you imagine if I wasn’t to feel crushed while I’m sleeping?”

“Y/N.” He laughs.

“For real, I sleep so well with you.”

“Me too.” He nuzzles in closer. “Maybe when I get back from London you could try sleeping over on school nights.” You turn over to face him immediately.

“Are you serious?”

“Yeah…wouldn’t be so weird, would it?”

“How would Andy feel about it?”

“He asks all the time why you don’t just spend the night when you have dinner with us. We could try it out and see how it goes.”

“With you in London for a few weeks, what does he do for school?”

“Oh, Paige just drives him back and forth.”

“That’s not annoying?”

“She really doesn’t mind it, it’s just extra time to spend together. It’s only two weeks for him to deal with it.”

“I could…help with rides if need be…or if he misses the house at all I could always stay over there with him.”

“Oh, so you’ll have sleepover with him without me?”

“I’m just saying, I can be helpful.”

“I appreciate that.” He kisses you. “So, will you try sleeping over some night when I get back?”

“Yeah, as long as he’s okay with it, we can give it a try. I wouldn’t mind carpooling.”

You kiss again, and you turn back over so he can spoon you. Five months together, and things were going so well.

The next morning your alarm goes off at 8:30. You turn it off quickly, and when you try to get up Harry clings to you tighter.

“Harry.” You giggle. “I need to shower.”

“But you’re so cozy.” He groans.

“You know how long it takes me to blow dry and curl my hair, please let me get up.”

“Alright.” He sighs. “But I’m going in there with you.”

“Oh, you are?” You raise an eyebrow at him.

“Mhm, gonna fuck you in there.” He grins at you. “If you want.”

“Hmmm.” You pretend to mull it over, but you grin back at him and nod.

Now, typically, you wouldn’t just let a guy stick it in, and trust his pullout game, but condoms in the shower never felt good, so you and Harry may have agreed that shower sex was the one time he didn’t need a condom. The first time you did it like this, not too long ago, you nearly cried from how good it felt it really feel him inside you.

“Oh, fuck, right there, Harry!” You moan out as he thrusts into you from behind, his skin slapping against yours. You reach back to squeeze at his arm as you come undone, and he pulls out shortly after to come on your ass. You both sigh with relief.

“Feel like horny teenager with you sometimes.” He chuckles as he starts to lather up his body.

“Me too.” You start washing your hair.

“Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“I know you said you got off the pill because it didn’t make you feel good, but…are there other birth controls out there that don’t fuck with you?”

“Yeah, they’re called condoms.” You say as you put some conditioner in.

“Y/N.” He rolls his eyes and steps into the water once you’re done rinsing your hair.

“I mean…I know there’s an IUD that doesn’t mess with your hormones, but the procedure is a tad invasive, and it probably wouldn’t even be in there that long.”

“Why’s that?” He scrubs his own head so he doesn’t see your face flush.

“I just mean, like, I don’t know, what’s wrong with what we’re doing?”

“Nothing…I guess selfishly it would be nice to do it like this all the time, and not have to worry.” He looks at you. “You done?” He asks as he reaches to turn the water off.

“Yeah.” You pull the curtain and get toweled up, and hand him his. “I get where you’re coming from with that…I just…selfishly I don’t wanna compromise on it. If you’re worried about pulling out, then we don’t need to fuck in the shower like this. We can just go back to what we were before.”

“But I like fucking you in the shower like this.” He pouts and puts his hands on your hips. “You won’t even think about going on something?”

“I’m sorry, Harry…I don’t want to.”

“Alright.” He sighs. “I get it, I suppose. Condoms it is.” He kisses your forehead and leaves you to do your hair.

When you finish with your hair, you don’t see Harry in your bedroom. You go into the kitchen and see him fully dressed, getting some peanut butter on toast.

“Here, a light breakfast.” He smiles.

“Thank you.” You kiss his cheek, and take a bite of the toast. “You look handsome.” You smile at him and he smiles back.

“I’m gonna go call Andy while you’re finishing up. Do you mind if I use your office?”

“Not at all! Go right ahead.”

You finish up the toast and then go back into your room to finish getting ready. You put on a pair of black jeans, and a blue long sleeve blouse, and then go into the bathroom to put a little makeup on.

“Y/N?” Harry pops his head into the bathroom.

“Yeah?” You giggle.

“Andy wants to wish you a happy Thanksgiving.”

“Oh!” You reach out for the phone. “Hello?”

“Hi, Y/N!”

“Hi, Andy, happy turkey day.” You smile.

“You too! You and Dad are going to Boston for a couple of days, huh?”

“That’s right! Want us to bring you back anything special?”

“That depends…where are you going?”

“We’re going to be where a ton of Italian restaurants are, which means Italian bakeries. Would you like a fresh cannoli brought back to you?”

“I think I’d like you forever if you did that.” He laughs and so do you.

“Then I think that can be arranged.”

“Okay! Sorry, Mum wants to talk to Dad…”

“Oh! That’s fine, it was nice talking to you.” You hand the phone back to Harry. He was smiling ear to ear.

“Hey, yeah, he is polite isn’t he?” Harry chuckles and steps out of the bathroom. When you come out to the living room he’s sitting on the couch reading.

“All set?”

“Yeah, was just waiting for you. You’re good to go?”

“Mhm, would you carry the food down to the car for me?” You say, putting your jacket on.

“Yup, I’ll grab our bags too.”

“Thank you.” You give him a quick kiss and out the door you go.

You didn’t have an automatic start on your car and you wanted to warm it up a bit. Harry brings everything down to the car, and off you go towards the highway. He keeps a hand on your thigh as his other hand’s fingers drum along to whatever music you’ve put on. You liked that even when you were the one driving he still had a hand on you.

“I can drive us back tomorrow if you’d like.” He speaks up.

“That’s okay, it’s really not that long of a drive. Hour and twenty, max.”

“Takes me two hours to get to Boston…”

“You, my darling, drive like a grandma, that’s why.” You smirk.

“I do not!” He laughs. “I’m careful.”

“You don’t go over seventy…”

“That’s the speed limit! And you know as well as I do the state police up here pull everyone over.”

“You know what’s funny? I got pulled over before I got my NH plates, now I never get pulled over. I do eighty on the highway up here, and that’s perfect.”

“It’s too fast.”

“No, going ninety would be too fast. Just wait until we’re really driving in the city, you’ll be amazed at my swiftness.”

“You mean at your aggressiveness.”

“It’s called being a defensive driver. Maybe when Andy gets older I should be the one to teach him how to drive, or else we’ll have two grannies on our hands.” You throw him a cheeky grin and he just rolls his eyes at you.

“He’s never going driving with you unless I’m there too.”

Harry would never admit it, but he really liked it when you’d drop little hints that you were in this for the long haul. It would be years until Andy would be able to get his permit, and yet, here you are, thinking ahead about it. It was something you did once in a while, even this morning, Harry picked up on it when you mentioned how pointless an IUD would be. It was too soon to talk about kids and stuff, but he knew that was where your head was at, and it made him feel really good.

“You teach him how to park a car, you’re way better at that. I’m such a nervous parker.” You laugh. “One time I had to drive my boss to a conference we were both going to, and I had to park in a garage, and you know how narrow those spots can be. I told him I was nervous at parking, and he covered his eyes so I could park the car. He was such a sweet man, had kids my age at the time.”

“Would you like for me to do that from now on? Cover my eyes so you can park your car?” He chuckles.

“I wouldn’t hate it.”

“Why do you get so nervous?”

“I have my dad to thank for that. He’d watch me back out of the driveway just to make sure I didn’t run over the grass, it was so annoying.”

“Ah, a very dad thing to do. Grass is really important to us, you know? If you’ve got a shitty lawn it reflects poorly on you.” He smirks.

“Oh, shut up.” You roll your eyes. “You both can bond about going to Lowe’s on the weekends and looking at planks of wood.”

Harry bursts out laughing because that is definitely something he’s done before.

“I don’t just look at planks of wood, I also often go and look at the different types of mulch.”

“Do you ever bring a tape measure with you?”

“Keep one in my trunk, actually. Never know when you’ll need to take measurements for something.”

“Jesus.” You laugh and shake your head. “When you become a dad is there like an initiation ceremony where you get a bunch of that stuff?”

“Oh, sure, but it’s top secret. I’ve said too much already.”

You giggle at him. You were happy long car rides were never awkward with Harry. You could joke around, and then also sit in a comfortable silence. Today was going to be a good day.

Phil lived in a really nice condominium in the newly renovated areas of Southie. Harry was impressed that a sous chef could afford such a nice neighborhood.

“It’s kind of sad because this used to be where more of the affordable housing was, and then it got really gentrified. In their spare time, Phil and Julian try to help out and volunteer their time to help the people that got pushed out.”

“Wow, good for them.”

Harry helps carry the food as you key into the building, and lead him towards the elevator. You knock on the door before going in.

“Hello!” You say brightly as you both walk in.

“Hey!” Julian says, giving you a hug and kiss. “Come on in, Phil’s just basting the turkey. Hello.” He smiles at Harry.

“Hi, nice to meet you.” They shake hands, and Julian takes the food from him.

“Oh! A pumpkin pie, just what we needed, thank you.”

“No problem.” Harry smiles. You hook your arm around his waist as you walk further into the home.

“Hey!” Phil says coming over to the two of you. He gives you a hug and shakes Harry’s hand.

“This is Harry.” You say.

“Nice to meet you, man. Heard a lot of good things.” Phil smiles.

“Nice to meet you too. This is a great place.”

“Thanks! Been here for, like, what…three years?” He asks Julian.

“Yup! Almost three and a half. Got for a steal at the time.”

“Are Mum and Dad here?” You ask.

“Yeah, in the living room. Go and get comfortable, everything’s still cooking. They’re watching the parade.”

You nod and lead Harry into the living room.

“Mum, Dad, we’re here.” You say and they both get up to say hello. “Harry, this is my mum, Rebecca, and my dad, Richard.”

“Hi, it’s nice to meet you both.” He shakes both of their hands.

“Finally!” Your mom nearly squeals and throws her arms around Harry, and gives him a nice, wet kiss on the cheek. “It’s so good to meet you, Harry. We were starting to think you were made up!”

“Mum…I’ve shown you pictures.”

“You’re awfully good at that photoshop nonsense, could have just been edited.” She scoffs. “You’re very handsome.”

“Um…thank you.” His cheeks were incredibly red.

“Where’s your son today?” Your dad asks and you want to smack him for diving right in.

“Oh, he’s with his mum and her family today. She’s not from the U.K. like I am, so she actually celebrates Thanksgiving, I just observe.” He jokes, but it doesn’t land, so he clears his throat. “It’s just part of our custody agreement, I get him for Christmas.”

Your parents share a look, and then both smile at Harry.

“Your brother put out some munchies until dinner’s ready.” Your mom says. “Come, sit, I know the drive was long.”

“It wasn’t too bad, not much traffic to complain about.” You say as you stick a carrot into some dip. “Can I get you a drink, Har? Phil’s got beer and wine.”

“Just a beer would be great, thank you.”

You smile and go into the kitchen. He almost wishes he followed you because your parents stay looking at him. He was wearing a nice button up, so his tattoos weren’t overly exposed, so it couldn’t be that.

“So, how old is your son?” Your mom asks.

“Eleven, he’ll be twelve in May. His name is Andy.”

“Is it short for Andrew, or is it just Andy?” Your dad asks.

“It’s short for Andrew.” Harry smiled. “Andrew Jacob Styles.”

“What a lovely name.” You mom smiles. “Is he named after anyone?”

“Um, Jacob is a family name on his mum’s side, and Andrew was just a name with both really liked.” He shrugs. “Nothing more to it than that.”

“You’re still close with her, his mum…” Your dad notes.

“Sort of. We do the co-parenting to the best of our ability. Living close by helps with that.”

“I think it’s nice you can get along so well. We have some friends who have divorced, and they can’t stand each other. I feel terrible for the kids, they get caught in the middle, unfortunately.”

“Well, my ex and I were never ma-“

“Here were are.” You say, handing Harry a beer, a glass of red in your other hand. “How’s the parade?” You ask sitting down next to Harry.

“Y/N, you interrupted our conversation.” Your dad says. “Harry was just explaining to us how his co-parenting works.”

“Dad…I don’t think Harry really wants to talk about that right now, okay?”

“It’s alright.” Harry says. “I know it must be a tad odd for your daughter to be dating someone with so much baggage, I get it.” He takes a sip of his beer. “I was young, accidents happen, but I wouldn’t change a thing.” He puts his arm around you and sits a little more comfortably.

“Well, we hope to meet little Andy at some point.” Your mom says. “Maybe this summer we can come up for a little visit, Y/N.”

“Yeah, maybe.” You smile and lean into Harry. “He’s so sweet, and funny. He’s a really talented painter too. He’s decorated some things in my office for me.”

“Wow, that’s a big deal. You wouldn’t even let me help decorate.” Your mom chuckles.

“Because your taste is terrible, Mum, no offense.” You grimace.

“She’s right, Becky.” Your dad laughs.

“Oh, what do you two know?” She stands up. “I’m going to see if Phil needs help.”

You and your dad laugh a little.

“Good, now I can switch it to football. I actually don’t give a fuck about the parade.” Richard says. “Pardon my French.”

“No worries.” Harry says. “I don’t give a fuck either.” He grins and it makes your dad laugh.

Okay, despite the bit of awkwardness at the beginning, this was actually going pretty well. You knew your parents had their reservations with Harry, but they didn’t seem too put off. After an hour or so of watching football, everyone is called to the dining area for dinner. The spread looked incredible, your brother outdid himself. He and Julian sit at the heads of the table, and then you and Harry sit across from your parents.

“Before we dig in, I just want to say how thankful I am that we could all be together today.” Phil says. “This is the first year I didn’t have to work, so we were able to do this at a normal hour like other families. It’s nice having to wait until nearly eight o’clock.” He smiles. “Two is much better. Enjoy!”

Everyone hums in agreement, and take what they want. Phil made plenty of veggies and other meatless options for you and Harry.

“Harry, how long have you been a professor for?” Julian asks once everyone has what they want.

“Um, like, ten years I’d say. I taught while I was getting my master’s, so I count that. Got my PhD a little over four years ago, though.”

“Very cool, and did you know you always wanted to be a teacher or…?”

“Honestly, no.” He chuckles. “But I really liked what I was studying and researching, and I knew I wanted to keep doing that, and so when I was getting my master’s and became a TA, I fell in love with teaching. I don’t think I could do it at a K-12 level, but I really like teaching at a collegiate level.”

“That’s exactly what Y/N always says.” Phil says.

“It’s true! I don’t think I could teach young kids, but I really like the college kids. Especially the upperclassmen, they’re a tad more mature.”

“Harry, how did you end up over here in the states?” Your mom asks.

“Ah, well, I was looking to study abroad. I went to a school in London my freshman year, and I liked it, but I really wanted to branch out, so I ended up in New York for school. I loved it.”

“And…now you live in New Hampshire?” Your dad asks.

“Yeah, so, when I was looking for master’s programs I was looking for schools in that area because, um, my ex’s grandparents lived in the lakes region, and we needed a bit of help. Her parents live in Connecticut, and there weren’t any schools I wanted to go to out there, so I ended up at UNH for that. The drive to Manchester every day wasn’t fun, but it made things easier to have her family closer by. It was a decent compromise. I almost moved to that area full time, but her grandparents passed away, and she had to take their home over, so I ended up at our university for my doctoral program so I could stay close to my son.” He takes a sip of his drink. “I fell in love with area. I got into hiking and some of the other outdoorsy stuff there is to do. It’s home now.”

“And your family, they’re in the U.K.?” Phil asks.

“Yeah, my mum and sister both live in London. Mum’s retired and lives with my sister. She’s married with a couple of kids, so she may as well be a live in nanny.” He chuckles. “I bring Andy home to see them for Christmas, and sometimes they come to visit in the summer.”

“So, do you have dual citizenship or just a work visa?” Julian asks.

“He wouldn’t need that since he married a U.S. citizen.” Your dad says.

“See, I was trying to explain earlier, we never got married.” Harry explains. “Um…so, yeah, I have dual citizenship. I was here on a school visa for a bit, and then I got the work visa, but I knew I was stayed so I went through the citizenship process. It was a real bitch, I have to say.”

The table laughs and agrees. The conversation turns to politics, only briefly, and then goes back to light chatter. Once dessert is out and eaten, everyone is stuffed. You and Harry help clean up, and then your parents leave shortly after. Everyone feels like they can take a deep breath now.

“So you two are staying at Julian’s hotel, yeah?” Phil asks.

“Yup, why?” You raise an eyebrow.

“How about we meet you guys in the city, and we go to that bar we all like?”

“That sounds great! Meet us there around eight?”

“Works for me.”

“That work for you?” You ask Harry.

“Yeah, sounds like fun.” He smiles.

Once you’re checking into the hotel, you head to the elevator, and go up to your room. Harry notes how nice the hotel is, and you agree. Julian was a really good manager, and did well to make sure that the place ran smoothly. You key into the room, and you both plop down on the bed with a big sigh.

“I’m stuffed.” Harry says with a slight chuckle.

“Same here.” You look over to your bag and tug it towards you, rummaging through it and pulling out a small purple bottle. “Um…so…usually we each have two different bathrooms to use when we have sleepovers, or maybe…we don’t tend to use the bathroom in a certain way, but that’ll be different tonight so I brought this.” You show him the small bottle. “So…we can just use the bathroom and not feel embarrassed.”

Harry smirks and takes the small bottle to read it.

“Poo-perize…” He looks at you.

“You just spray it before you go, and it’s like you never went at all.”

“Ah, well, good thinking. I wouldn’t want you knowing that I took a shit.”

“Harry.” You groan and snatch the bottle from him.

“Are you telling me you’ve never shit at my house in the five months we’ve been together?”

“I…have…just not a lot. I don’t know, I’m not good with other people’s bathrooms. I’m just gonna go stick this in there.”

You get up while he shakes his head and laughs at you. You come back out and lay down next to him on the bed.

“I’m gonna tell you something I told Andy when he was about two years old.” He says to you.

“What’s that?”

“Everybody poops.”

“Gah!” You exasperate. “I know that, obviously, I just don’t want you thinking about me doing it…”

“It’s not like my ear’s gonna be pressed up against the door!” He laughs. “Lighten up.” He pulls you to rest your head on his chest and he kisses you on the top of your head.

“Did you have fun earlier? I hope my parents weren’t too invasive.”

“They were fine, I totally understood why they were asking what they were asking. I know it’s odd for someone my age to have a kid in middle school.”

“I just don’t want you to think they were judging. I actually think they really liked you.”

“I’m glad to hear it. It’ll be nice for them to come visit in the summer. Maybe we could all go to the cabin.”

“God, they would love that, babe.” You snuggle further into him.

After resting for a while, and using the bathroom, you both head down to meet Phil and Julian at a bar down the street. You all grab a booth and start a tab for drinks.

“So, this is where you all go when you visit?” Harry asks you once the drinks are on the table.

“Sort of, this is where I come with them.”

“Y/N has probably been to every bar in this city.” Phil laughs.

“You’re gonna make me sound like an alcoholic!” You laugh. “When you go to school in the city, you gotta find the good places to go. All trial and error.”

“You also had a really good fake ID.” Julian smirks. “Remember when we took her out for her twenty-first, and the bartender practically scolded her?” He laughs.

“Oh my god, he was so mad at me.” You take a sip of your drink. “There was this one place I had been sneaking into for years, and I wanted my twenty-first birthday party to be there, and I had been pretty friendly with the bartender, right? So I had him my new ID, and he, oh my god, I thought he was gonna flip his shit.”

“He gave you free shots though, so he couldn’t have been too mad.” Phil winks at you and you just shake your head.

“Yeah.” You roll your eyes.

The reason the bartender had not flipped out, thrown you out was because you promised a very a good blow job in the bathroom on his break. You had delivered, and then he gave you free shots all night, and you ended up going home with him to further explore after said blow job, but you weren’t about to expose yourself to Harry like that. You didn’t want him to think you were immature, even if it was something that happened years ago.

“Must be nice to have grown up in a place where the legal drinking age is eighteen.” Julian says to Harry.

“Yeah, it was pretty sweet that last year before going to uni. My friends and I would go to the clubs, get in a bit of trouble.” He chuckles after taking a sip of his drink. “I’m kind of glad I came to America for the rest of school, I think it helped me settle down a bit.”

“I studied abroad for culinary school,” Phil starts, “mostly in France, but when I would go out with my friends it would definitely get wild. It was a culture shock to start the evenings so late! We wouldn’t leave until midnight sometimes.”

“Yeah, that’s exactly how it is, and we’d stay out until after four in the morning most times.”

“That was the first time I saw hard drugs being used so casually. People just doing lines in the bathroom and stuff. It happens here too, but it was way less taboo over there.”

“Phil, did you ever…?” You ask him.

“God no, I mean, I smoked share of weed, but I never did anything more than that. I was too afraid of being fucked up while chopping something in the kitchen.”

“Did you?” You ask Harry. You were more curious than anything.

“Yeah.” He says casually with a shrug. “Like I said, I’m glad I came here to finish school.”

“Holy shit, what did it feel like?” You gaze up at him. “I’ve never done anything like that, I’ve never even gotten high…”

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.” He gives your hand a squeeze. “It was so long ago, I don’t really remember, honestly. You just sort of feel happy and out of it.”

“Y/N, you never smoked or did an edible or anything?” Phil asks, almost shocked.

“I mean, I’ve been hot boxed before, but that’s it. I just stuck to drinking.” You laugh. “I was too scared, I didn’t know if I would be one of those people that would freak out or have a bad trip or something.” You finish your drink and so does everyone else.

“Does everyone want the same thing? I can go up and get the next round.” Harry offers.

“That’d be great.” Julian says, and you and Phil nod. Harry gives you a quick kiss before getting up to go to the bar. “He’s dreamy, Y/N, I don’t know how you get any work done.”

“Yeah, I don’t know what type of guy I was expecting, but I’d let him leave marks on me too.”

“Phil!” You giggle. “I’m glad you both like him so far. He’s amazing.”

“And things are still good between you and his kid?”

“Yeah! Andy really likes me. I think it helps that he had time to get used to me a little when Harry and I were just friends. Something tells me Harry had mentioned he had a little crush on me to him though because there was this one time Andy texted me from Harry’s phone to ask me to come get ice cream with them.” You giggle again. “It was so cute.”

“Little wing man, that’s sweet.” Phil nods.

“Sometimes I feel bad because you can tell he prefers to be with me and Harry, as opposed to his mum and soon to be step-dad…I don’t really get it.”

“He’s eleven, right?” Julian asks and you nod. “I get it. I was a total momma’s boy, and then when I started middle school, I wanted nothing to do with my mom, and it killed her. We fought all the time, and I found myself wanting to be with my dad more. Not even to talk, just being in his presence, you know? I think it’s puberty. I have a great relationship with my mom now. It’s just a phase.”

“Yeah, plus, it must be weird to have two father figures in your life. One’s telling you what to do, but you also wanna respect your actual father. Must be confusing.”

“Alright.” Harry says as he sits down with the four drinks. “What I miss?”

“Nothing, babe.” You smile and kiss his cheek. “These two were just swooning over you, that’s all.” You grin at your brother and his partner.

“Really? Well, I’m flattered.” Harry jokes.

“I have to know, do students, like, throw themselves at you?” Phil asks.

“Um, not so much anymore, when I was younger they did. A lot of them also know I’m spoken for now, so that helps.”

“It’s so awkward! Some of the senior boys I advise have tried flirting with me in our meetings, and I’m like…you’re kidding right? Keep your shrimp dick to yourself.” You take a large sip of your drink and sway your head to the music in the bar.

“I’d love to know what some kid could possibly even say to you in that setting.” Phil chuckles.

“They think they’re so adult, you know? It’s all in the body language. They adjust themselves, trying to get me to look down, and they’ll bite their bottom lips to be sexy, it’s repulsive really. But my problem is I bite my lip when I feel nervous so then they think it’s working, and then they’re shocked when I’m like actually you deserved a D on this.”

Phil and Julian laugh, but Harry doesn’t really like the sound of anyone flirting with you.

“You know, you can report that if it gets aggressive.” He says.

“Oh, it’s fine. They realize when I don’t give in that it doesn’t work, and they should just put the work in.” You see the concern on his face. “Don’t worry, if it was that aggressive I’d call H.R. right away.” You put your hand on his thigh and give it a squeeze.

“You know what I think we should after this? Go to an actual club. I feel like dancing and working off all that food.” Julian says.

“Ugh, I knew you were going to say that.” Phil groans. “I’m exhausted.”

“Can’t help it.” He shrugs and looks at you. “Y/N?”

“Fuck yeah.” You look up at Harry. “What do you say? You’ve never really seen me dance before.”

“That’s true, I could be up for that, although, I probably won’t do much dancing.”

“Good, I’ll have someone to hang back with while these two pop their asses.” Phil says and it makes everyone laugh.

Phil and Julian order an uber to take you and Harry to one of the lgbtq+ friendly clubs they knew of in a different part of the city. You had been there with them before so you were excited. You were also excited that Harry was being such a good sport.

You get into the club easily since the bouncer knew Phil and Julian well, and you all go up to the bar to get drinks. You decide on something fun and fruity while Harry opts for a gin and tonic. Wannabe by the Spice Girls comes on and Julian yanks you onto the dance floor.

“It’ll be hours before we see them again.” Phil chuckles and takes a sip of drink.

“You never dance?”

“Sometimes I do, but it’s not my favorite. I’m not very coordinated.”

“Neither am I! I look like an idiot whenever I dance.” Harry laughs. “But I suppose that’s half the fun.”

Harry peers into the crowd and smiles when he sees you and Julian shouting the words to the song to each other, and giggling. He watches as the two of you dance together and it makes him smile more.

“You two have been together a long time then?” Harry asks. “If you both took her out for her twenty-first?”

“Yeah! That was around the time we made things official. We met right before I went to Italy to do some more studying, and then when I came back we decided to really be together. He’s amazing, an incredible partner. He’s brilliant, honestly.”

“Are you two married, or…?”

“We’re in a civil union.” Phil shrugs. “We’ve talked openly about it, and neither of us really feel the need to get married, you know? We know we wanna be together, we don’t need a court or a piece of paper to lock it in. We each wear these rings.” Phil holds up his left hand. “See the one on my middle finger? That’s a promise ring he gave to me, and I gave one to him. That’s enough.”

“That’s really sweet.” Harry smiles.

“You have a lot of cool rings.” Phil takes one of Harry’s hands to look them over.

“Thanks! Started collecting them basically when I was nineteen. I’ve always really liked rings and bracelets.”

“And perfectly manicured nails?” Phil raises an eyebrow at him.

“Started doing that in uni. The crowd I hung out with was into black nail polish, I got into it too. It’s actually what helped me snag my ex.” He rubs the back of his neck with his free hand.

“Really?”

“Yeah, we were friends for a bit, and one night she got really drunk and she started crying because her nail ripped and she just wanted to take all the polish off and start over, and I told her I had stuff back at my room to do that, so I took her back with me and basically did her nails. I let her sleep in my bed and I slept on the floor, and then the next morning before I could even say anything she kissed me.”

“Oh my god, that’s like out of a movie.” Phil swoons, letting go of Harry’s hand. “But I think I like the story of the camping trip with my sister better.” He takes a sip of his drink. “Actually, I think I like that you casually brought her to a family party, and then brought her back to your place to watch the sunset.”

“Told her I liked her that night too, but I back peddled.” Harry chuckles.

“She picked up on that, but I think she chose to ignore it at the time. I’m glad she came to her senses.”

“Me too.” Harry smiles.

After a few songs, you come back to Harry, throwing your arms around his neck. Your fruity drink hitting you much faster than your others.

“Maybe just one more.” You slur.

“Or, and here me out, you could start drinking some water.” He tucks some hair behind your hair to keep it from your sweaty forehead.

“But-“

He dips his mouth to your ear to whisper.

“I’d like to have a little fun when we get back, and we can’t do that if you’re sloshed, babe.” He moves back to look at you with raises eyebrows and you nod. “Great, I’ll go get you some ice water.”

He returns shortly and you guzzle it down. Once you’re all set you make your way back to Julian. Harry taps his foot along with the beat of the song.

“Hey, handsome, can I buy you a drink?” A guy slightly shorter than Harry says to him brightly.

“Um, I’m so sorry, I’m here with someone.” He points over to you.

“Why aren’t you dancing with her then?!”

“He’s got a point, Harry.” Phil teases him.

“You’re not dancing with Julian!”

“Fair enough.” Phil finishes the rest of his drink and strolls over to join you and Julian. You both hoot and holler with excitement.

“Go on, pretty boy, go show your girl a good time.” The man winks and then walks away.

Harry sighs and makes his way over to you. Your eyes light up and your smile says it all. You’re absolutely delighted that he’s come over to you. You wrap your arms around his torso and press your cheek to his chest, swaying back and forth with him. His arms go around you and he rests his chin on the top of your head. It didn’t matter that the song was fast paced, you were happy to just be pressed up against him the way you were. You look up at him, smiling.

“What?” He smiles down at you.

“I love you.”

“I love you too.”

It was a wonderful night out with Phil and Julian, but it had to end sometime, so you and Harry uber back to the hotel around one in the morning. You didn’t want to be too tired for whatever fun he wanted have with you.

“That was fun.” He says to you in the back of the car. “I like them, they were really welcoming.”

“I’m so glad! I figured you’d get along well since you’re around the same age.” You shrug.

“That club was fun too, got hit on by a guy.”

“You did?!”

“Yup.” He says proudly. “Called me handsome and asked me if I wanted a drink, but don’t worry, I told him I was there with someone.”

“Well, thank god, otherwise you’d be in an uber with someone else right now.” You say facetiously and he laughs.

“Should I be offended that you think I could so easily be swayed to leave with someone else?” He nudges you playfully.

“Nah, I’m just teasing. I know you wouldn’t do that.”

“Besides,” he leans in closer to your ear so the driver won’t hear, “the only tight, little hole I wanna fuck is yours.”

Your eyes grow wide and you feel a shiver go down your spine. You know that he’s referring to your other hole. His mouth had been on it enough times now for you to know he definitely wanted to have anal with you, but you weren’t sure of how you felt about it exactly. You could see him maybe using a finger or something, but his entire prick? Your thoughts are broken when you feel his lips on your temple.

You get to the hotel and head up to your room, hand in hand.

“Oh!” You say as you get inside the room. “I brought something to wear to bed, and I really wanna put it on for you.”

“You never wear anything to bed, though.” He chuckles.

“I know! I brought it special for the trip. I didn’t think we’d be out as late as we were. Please? It’s really cute.” You pout.

“It’s just gonna come off a minute after you put it on, but sure.” He smiles and sits on the edge of the bed. “I’ll humor you.”

You grab your bag and bring it into the bathroom with you. This also gives you a chance to just freshen up since you were sweating on the dance floor. You touch up your makeup, apply some fresh deodorant, and spritz a little bit of perfume onto your wrists, and dab a bit behind your neck. Next you take out the garments you wanted to wear for him. It wasn’t incredibly special, but cute nonetheless. It was a pastel purple set of silk pajamas. The top was tank top style with a little bit of lace where you cleavage would sit, and the bottoms were shorts that just show your under-bum. Class, but sexy. You brush your hair out so it looks less frizzy, and then peak your head out of the bathroom door.

“Ready for me?”

“Ready, babe.”

“Close your eyes.”

Harry sighs and closes his eyes. He had already taken his glasses off and put them away. His palms are pressed behind him on the mattress. You tip toe out of the bathroom and come to stand in front of him.

“Okay, open.”

His eyes flutter closed and then they widen when he looks you up and down. You twirl around for him and giggle.

“What do you think?”

“You look…lovely, Y/N.” His hands come up to rest on your hips. “When did you get these?”

“Not too long ago. I’ve been saving it for a night away where I’d maybe have excuse to change into something else.”

“S’very pretty. I love the color on you.”

You smile down at him and get yourself situated so that you’re straddling him. His hands slide down to your ass and he squeezes you. His hands then move up under the back of the top and then he drags his nails down your soft skin and your head rolls back. He takes the opportunity to sponge wet kisses up your jugular, and around to the crook of your neck. He licks up to just under your earlobe, and sinks his teeth into your skin. You gasp from the sensation, loving the way it feels. Your hands move to clutch at his shoulders as he creates a nice, purple mark on your neck.

“Fuck, Harry.” You breathe after he detaches himself from you.

“To match your pj’s.” He smirks.

A slight whimper leaves your lips, and then you start unbuttoning his shirt furiously. He helps you get it off him, and then you run your hands up and down his torso, making scratch marks of your own. You loved the way his stomach would tighten from the feeling of your nails. Your fingers work next to undo his belt and button on his jeans.

“Need you naked.” You kiss him. “Now.”

He nods quickly and you stand up to help him get his pants off. He kicks them to the floor as he works to get his boxers off as well. Once they’re throw somewhere you kiss him again, and work your way down his body. He opens his legs up more you and you plant kisses up and down his hard dick. You move to tease him a little, nipping at his inner thigh the way he would do to you. He cards his fingers through your hair, and makes a makeshift ponytail for you with his fist. You lick up his shaft with the flat of your tongue and the moan his lets out just eggs you on further. You kiss his tip before taking it into your mouth and you sink down on him, taking him as deep as you can before popping back off him.

Not that he ever thought of her while he was with you, but times like this Harry couldn’t help but compare you to Paige. She never did things like this for him. He always had to ask her to do it, and she’d only do it for a couple of minutes. She’d give him a hand job no problem, but she rarely would put her mouth on him, which made him sad because he had no problem doing it for her. You, on the other hand, would often initiate with him, and he loved that about you. Sometimes you’d be lounging on the couch or even just reading in bed together, and you’d look at him. He knew the look very well now, and he would just nod, and all of a sudden your mouth would be on him. Times like this it was just more confirmation that he was with the right person.

Blow jobs were things you didn’t particularly enjoy unless you really liked a guy, which is exactly what you told him when you first gave him one. If you were going to make a guy feel good, you wanted to make sure that guy was going to make you feel just as good, and Harry passed that test. Now, you loved pleasuring him like this no problem. Even when you were on your period, you didn’t care that you couldn’t have much in return unless you got in the shower.

You lick over his slit and moan from the taste, which you didn’t particularly love, but just the fact that he was already leaking for you was enough for you to make the noise. You smear your bottom lip along his tip because you know he likes it sloppy, and you know his precome his bound to dribble down your chin. You look up at him and see he’s already watching you, chest heaving. You bring your face away, a string of spit keeping you attached to him before you lick over your lip and smirk.

“What?”

“Well…it’s just…I’m a little tired.” You look away and then back up to him, your grin growing. “So, what if I just put my mouth over you and you do the work?”

“Are you asking me to fuck your mouth?” He was being very serious.

“Yes, Harry.”

“Are you comfortable on the floor or do you want to get on the bed?”

“Maybe just hand me a pillow for my knees?”

He nods and quickly grabs a pillow from the head of for you. You get it situated to get yourself more comfortable, and you nod. He tightens his grip on your hair as you lower your mouth back around him. He starts by just easing you on and off, up and down. Your eyes flutter closed so you can focus on breathing through your nose. He bucks his hips up carefully to get a little further down your throat, and to help you adjust. You widen your throat as much as you can. You keep one hand on his thigh, and the other you keep in a fist, squeezing your thumb. An old trick you learned in college to help suppress your gag reflex. A placebo at best, but it worked.

“Oh my god, baby.” He groans as he really gets a rhythm going, bobbing your head up and down for you as he moves his hips. “You’re so fucking perfect.”

Your eyes flutter open and you do your best to look at him through your lashes, but all you can see are the ferns on his hips and love handles. You had drool and precome dripping down your chin, and you knew he had to be loving it. He was panting as he looks down at you, biting furiously into his bottom lip as to not disturb whatever neighbors were on either sides of the walls.

He was being extremely careful of you, which just turned you on more. It showed how much self-control he truly had to not just be ramming and thrusting his dick down your throat. Your nails are digging into his thigh, and you do choke on him at one point, but you’re okay. Eventually he has you come fully off of him.

“Don’t wanna come in my mouth?” You ask as you catch your breath and wipe your chin with the back of your hand.

“Not if you want me to fuck your cunt later.”

“Oh.” You blush. “Yeah, I want that.”

“Alright then.” He chuckles and helps you up. “Felt so good, baby.” He kisses your now swollen lips.

He lays you down on the bed, your head comfy on the pillows. He reaches between your legs and groans when he feels how wet you are through the silk shorts.

“Christ.” He breathes. “Taking this all off now.”

You nod and lift your arms up. He gets you fully naked and spreads your legs open. Just as you did with him, he kisses down your body, nipping where he pleases, and starts leaving more love bites on your inner thighs, causing you to squirm.

“Stay still for me, baby.”

“M’trying, sorry.”

You give him a soft smile and he gives you one back before he licks around your folds. You feel yourself almost go cross-eyed from the sensation. His teeth nip at your clit before he sucks on it, and he has to use one of his arms to hold you down because you’re just extremely sensitive tonight for whatever reason. His thumb replaces his mouth on your clit so he lick into you.

“Oh, god.” You moan. Your hands fly to his hair to tug on. “Harry.” You whimper and it’s music to his ears. It just makes him fuck you harder with his tongue. His thumb rubs perfect circles into where you need it most, and you feel your legs shaking around him. “Fucking, Christ!” You cry out as you start panting. You could feel your orgasm already approaching. He just knew exactly what to do, and it was incredible.

He pops up briefly to get some air, and then he looks at you, furrowing your brows.

“Wh-what is it?” You ask innocently.

“Would you…” He holds up his index and middle finger.

“Oh! Mhm.” You smile and open your mouth for him. He smiles back at you and brings his fingers to your mouth to suck on. You make eye contact as you lap and suck around him.

“Thank you, darling.”

Your heart flutters as he works his way back down between your legs. His fingers slide inside you while his mouth finds your clit again. His fingers curl up inside you, and you grip at the comforter on the bed. They pump and twist and pet you, and it’s all too much along with his tongue flicking at your clit.

“Ah! Fuck, Harry!” Your back arches off the bed, and your eyes roll into the back of your head. When he retracts his finger from you, you look at him, your eyes growing dark with lust. “Get the condoms.”

He nods and rummages through his bag for them, tearing one of them open, and sliding it onto his hard, throbbing dick. You put your hands onto his shoulders to brace yourself as he thrusts inside you. He buries his face into the crook of your neck as he rocks in and out. You get a fist full of his hair and rock your hips along with his.

“Fuck, Y/N.” He groans and looks at you, peaking his tongue out. You take the signal and let your mouth fall open so he can kiss you. It’s a searing kiss, needy, like he hadn’t kissed you in weeks. That was the thing with Harry, he always kissed you like he hadn’t seen you in ages, like he hadn’t touched you in ages. It was fucking fantastic.

“Harry, I’m gonna come again.” You whine. It was from the way you were grinding against him, otherwise you don’t think you would have had one again so quickly, not that you were complaining. He keeps everything the same so you can get there, and boy do you get there. He puts his hand over your mouth so you can cry out how you need to. You catch your breath and then you look up at him. “Let me ride you.”

He nods and pulls out, flipping on his back. You grip him to line yourself up once you’ve swung your leg over his lap. You sigh with relief once he’s inside you again. His hands work their way up your body to knead your breasts as move around on him in large circles. He looks up at you and starts chuckling.

“What could possibly be funny?” You ask, giggling.

“Nothing, I just like you a lot.” You pout at that. Since you said your I love yous, neither of you had made your like you a lot statement, and it filled your heart.

“I like you a lot too, Harry.” You lean down to kiss him, sucking on his bottom lip before returning up right.

“Gonna fuck me, baby?”

“Mhm, gonna fuck you so good.”

You start to raise and lower on him, his hands coming down to squeeze at your hips. Usually he would even up taking over, but he wanted to let you do it. He knew you wanted to do it, and you were so kind as to let him fuck your mouth earlier the least he could do was let you control the pace just this once. It also inflated his ego immensely to look up and watch your face like this. The joy you were getting from riding him was so delicious to him.

“You’re so fucking gorgeous like this, Y/N.” he squeezes harder at your hips, sure to leave bruises later, but you don’t care.

Your hands plant onto his thighs behind you as you continue to bounce up and down on him.

“Rub my clit, Harry, please.” You nearly whine.

He does so without question and you let out a loud moan. He could feel you squeezing around him and it was bringing him nearly over the edge. He could feel the ecstasy bubbling at the base of his spine.

“Baby, I’m not gonna last much longer.” He groans.

“Good, want you to come, let go, Harry.”

You feel his warm come fill up the condom, and the sensation along with his fingers rubbing on you guide you to your third release, causing you to collapse onto his heaving chest. He tilts your chin up and he smears his lips over yours.

After the long day and night you both had, neither of you were upset to have woke up at 10:15. You shower together, without any funny business, and get ready for the day. Harry furrows his brows at the booties you put on.

“What?” You ask him. “Don’t like ‘em?”

“No, they’re cute, it’s just…won’t your feet hurt walking around in them all day? I know you lived here and everything, but-“

“I promise, Daddy, if my feet hurt I won’t complain and if I do, you can say I told you so.”

“Y/N.” He sighs. “I hate it when you call me that so condescendingly, my express of concern isn’t me being fatherly, it’s me being your boyfriend who would feel terrible if your feet got all blistered.”

Your features soften, you didn’t realize how much your little joked bothered him.

“Oh…I’m sorry, um, these are actually pretty good for walking in. I wouldn’t wear them if I knew they’d hurt, but I appreciate you looking out for me.”

You give him a kiss on the cheek, and he grabs the bags. You check out, and grab a coffee from the complimentary section of the breakfast area, and put everything in the car.

“Julian said we could park here for the day no problem. We just need to talk to the green line stop, and we’ll be good to go.” You explain after locking the car back up.

You make your way to the green line station, and you just use your Charlie Card to get the both of you through, and onto the train that would get you Government Center. You were happy to be traveling with Harry. Sometimes when you were in town with people who didn’t understand the hustle and bustle of the T it could be frustrating, but Harry had the tube back in London, so this was second nature to him.

You almost feel giddy after coming off the train, and see The Quincy Market sign come into view. You tug at Harry’s hand to get him to walk faster towards the shops.

“There’s a Ray-Bans store here I wanna go to. They’re bound to have a sale right now. Oh! And there’s this store that sells really hot sauces I think you’ll like. Does Andy like graphic T’s? There’s a Newbury Comics here and I’d like to get him a gift from there.”

“For what? Thought you only promised a cannoli?”

“I did, but it would be for Christmas. Is that alright if I wanna-mph!” His lips were on yours, his hands cupping your cheeks. He was just overwhelmed with how much you cared about his son.

“Yeah, he likes graphic T’s.” He says it like he didn’t just shove his tongue down your throat, gently intertwining your fingers as you continue to walk.

You clear your throat and nod, giving his hand a squeeze. You go in and out of the shops. You note the sunglasses that Harry pays special attention to so you know which ones to get him for the holidays. You go into Sephora for a bit to look at the expensive makeup on one end of the store, and he looks at the foundation and concealer he would typically use. So much was on sale, you end up buying a ton of new brushes and sponges, and he gets the remover wipes he likes using. You go into spicy sauce store, and pick out a couple of bottles of things you’d each like to try, and then off to Newbury Comics.

“Do you shop at any of these clothing stores?” He asks subtly.

“Not really, I do StitchFix, why?”

“No reason.” He shrugs. Damn. He literally had no idea what to get you for the holidays. You bought yourself a new pair of sunglasses, and pretty much whatever else you needed. He was at a loss.

“So, what shows does he watch? I’d like to get him a shirt that’s relevant.” You say as you both make your way to the clothing section of the store.

“He’s really into Spongebob reruns at the moment, it’s been driving me nuts.”

“Seriously? That show is over twenty years old…”

“I know! He discovered it a few months ago, and he thinks it’s hilarious.” Harry sighs. “He also likes The Simpons, The Office, oh! He’s really into Malcom in the Middle right now.”

“How does even know about that show?”

“He found it on Hulu one night and he asked if he could watch it and I said okay. He loves it.”

“Hmm.” You tap your chin for a second. “I may need to go on Etsy then. I think I know of a shirt he would like, but I doubt they have it here.”

“You don’t have to go to so much trouble, Y/N. He’ll like whatever you give him.”

“That’s just it, I don’t want him to like it, I want him to love it.”

Harry thought his heart was going to burst as you looked around. You come to the section of the store with all of the different card games.

“Is he too young for Cards Against Humanity? Could be fun for him and Brandon.”

“Wee bit.”

“Alright…oh, what about What Do You Meme? That’s age appropriate, no?”

“Oh, he’s actually been asking for something like that. It’s a good stocking stuffer.”

“Perfect!” You snatch a pack. “This will also be from me.” You wink at him and keep looking around.

“What do you usually do for the holidays, anyways?”

“Well, whenever Hanukkah falls, I usually do something with my family, and then I lay low on Christmas.”

“Maybe during one of the nights of Hanukkah you could come over and the three of us could do something traditional with you.”

“I’d love that, Har.” You smile at him. “I could show you how to make homemade potato pancakes.”

“That would be a lot of fun.” He kisses your cheek.

Eventually you both walk over to the North End to get some Italian food for a late lunch/early dinner. You each enjoy raviolis and lots of bread. You make sure to stop off at one of the bakeries to grab some cannolis.

“You can just put these in your freezer, they should still be good when he gets home.”

“Sounds good, he’s gonna be so excited.”

You make your way back to the hotel garage and get into the car.

“Babe, let me drive, you’re tired.”

“No, I can do it.”

“Y/N.”

“Let me just get us through the city, and then I’ll pull over at the rest stop in Londonderry.”

“Fine.” He rolls his eyes.

You end up doing just that. You zip through the city, staying in the left lane the whole time, and then you pull over at the rest area. You let Harry drive the rest of the way, and he drives back to your place.

“Did you wanna stay over tonight? I could come to yours tomorrow, or if you’re sick of me we can-“

“Why do you always say that?” He chuckles. “I could never be sick of you.”

You beam at him, and you both get up inside your apartment. After you unpack your things, you both get into bed, and fall asleep quickly. It was the perfect Thanksgiving.

“Dad, these are so good.” Andy says, mouth full of cannoli Sunday night. “Y/N is the best.”

“I’ll pass the message on to her.” Harry smiles. “Listen, uh, how would you feel if she started staying over sometimes when you’re here?”

“I’d be okay with that, I don’t really care.”

“I just wanna make sure you feel comfortable with it. It’s okay if you don’t.”

“Dad, I really don’t care. I’d like it if she stayed here. I feel bad that she thinks she can’t. Then we could all have breakfast together in the mornings, that would be fun.”

“Yeah, it would. I’ll let her know you’re cool with it, thanks.”

“Thanks for asking first.”

“It’s your house too, not gonna make any big changes without consulting you.”

Later that night, as he’s crawling into bed, Harry texts you.

Harry: got the okay from the head of the house, you’re good to spend the night any time you feel comfortable doing so…he loved the cannolis btw

You: oh well, glad I was able to butter him up with those, lol why don’t we give it a try tomorrow?

Harry: are you just saying that because you know Mondays are baked ziti night????

You: what?! I’m offended! I want to come spend the night with you, it in no way has anything to do with your delicious, amazing, incredible, mouth watering baked ziti

Harry: god, you know what complimenting my food does to me 😈 😈 😈

You: goodnight, Harry

Harry: no!

You: yes

Harry: don’t do this

You: I’m so tired! You barely let me leave your bed this morning…need to catch up on sleep

Harry: everything we did today you wanted. I know because I asked and you said yes

You: very true! And now I’m telling you I’m going to sleep, I love you, I’ll see you tomorrow

Harry: alright, I love you too, sweet dreams, baby

The next morning, Harry gets up at 5AM to do his yoga in his bedroom, and then goes into the kitchen to get zome ziti boiled. It wasn’t a difficult dish to make, especially since there wasn’t meat in it, but Harry did use three types of shredded cheese, and he had a homemade marinara sauce. Once the ziti is cooked, he layers it all in a glass dish and sticks it in the fridge. It’ll go in the over to bake when he gets home later.

His next task is to shower, and get dressed before waking Andy up.

“Buddy, time to get up.” Harry comes in and sits on the edge of Andy’s bed. “Come on, sun’s up and everything.”

Andy groans like he does most mornings.

“Don’t gimme that. What do you want for breakfast?”

“Scrambled eggs, please.” He mumbles.

“Can do, now get up.” He takes the top blanket away and Andy groans louder, but it wakes him up enough to get out of bed.

Harry whips up some eggs for Andy and some peanut butter toast for himself, and sets it on the table. Andy comes out in jeans and a long-sleeve T-shirt.

“Basketball’s gonna be starting in a bit, you must be excited.”

“Yup.” Andy smiles. “And winter program starts this Friday, I’m really excited for that. Do you think you’ll chaperone?”

“Probably. I’ll find a Friday to come out and help.”

“Y/N should come too.”

“I don’t know if she skiis…”

“How could she not in this area?”

“It’s not for everyone.” He shrugs. “I’ll ask her if she wants to come up to the cabin some weekend or something before having her help out with a bunch of kids.”

“Okay, fair point. Oh! You could teach her to ski, you’re a good teacher.”

“I’d have her take a professional lesson, Andy. It’s not as easy for adults to learn this kind of stuff as it is for kids.”

“You could still show her the basics.”

“Eat your eggs.” Harry rolls his eyes. “By the way, she’s coming for dinner tonight.”

“Of course she is.” Andy giggles. “It’s baked ziti night.”

“That’s what I said! Anyways, she’s gonna try staying over with us. Want you on your best behavior.”

“When am I not?” Andy scoffs.

“Hmm, let’s see…” Harry holds his hand up to start counting on his fingers.

“Okay, okay, I promise I’ll be good.”

“Thank you.”

It was a busy work day since it was the Monday after a short holiday break. You barely saw Harry, but you decide to leave him a little love note on his desk while he was teaching. You notice he left his phone on his desk. Something he rarely does, but it happens once in a while. You see it light up with a news notification, and you do a double take. His lock screen was a picture of the two of you. You pick it up and hold it closer.

“When did he…?” You trail off as you smile. It was a picture of you from one of your hikes. You’re looking up at him, smiling and sweaty, but smiling nonetheless.

“Y/N?” Harry says coming into his office. “What are you doing with my phone?”

“I…I was just leaving you a note, and it lit up…and…I didn’t realize I was your lock screen…” You hand him his phone.

“Of course you’re my lock screen, you have been for a while…”

“I guess I never noticed.” You look away. “I have a picture of the two of us as mine, see.” You show him your phone. “It’s from when we made that mess making waffles from scratch. Makes me smile every time I look at it.”

“Can’t believe I never noticed either…” He looks at the screen and then to you. He steps towards you. “You were leaving me a note?”

“Yeah, I…we barely saw each other today, and I know you need to get home soon, so I was just leaving you a little love note.”

“Oh.” He sets his things down on his desk and comes even closer to you. He tucks some hair behind your ear, his tell for wanting a kiss.

You lean up and he leans down and your lips press against each other. It doesn’t last long, you’re at work after all.

“Okay, well, I have some work to do.” You blush. “Um, I’ll be over by 6:30, does that work?”

“Works great.”

He watches you leave and he sighs dreamily as he gathers his things. He zips home and helps Andy with his homework before getting the ziti in the oven. You get over there around 6:30, with your overnight bag slung over your shoulder.

“Hi, boys.” You say as come inside after Andy answers the door.

“Y/N, those cannolis you got were so good. Thanks again.”

“Oh! I’m so glad you liked them, Andy.” You ruffle the hair on the top of his head and go to put your things down in Harry’s room before coming into the kitchen to give him a kiss. “It smells so good in here.”

“Just took it out of the oven, sit.” He smiles.

After dinner you’re itching to change into come comfier clothes, so you do. You put on a pair of sweatpants and a sweatshirt, one Harry gave to you, and you come out with your laptop to the living room.

“You don’t mind, do you?”

“Nope, Andy?”

“Do your thing.” He shrugs as he flips the TV to Hulu to put Malcom in the Middle.

“Remember, two episodes and then you can go read before bed.” Harry reminds him.

“I’m fully aware, thanks.” He rolls his eyes.

“When I was your age, my bed time was 9:30, but CSI, the Las Vegas one, was on at nine, and I used to watch TV with my mom in bed every night, and CSI was on Thursdays, and so every Thursday we’d have the same fight because I had to see how the episode ended, you know? And then my mom would get so tired that she’d just let me stay up and finish it.”

The boys both look at you with wide eyes. You had a tendency to talk really fast when you had a story to tell.

“Dad says I can’t watch TV right before bed because then I won’t sleep well.”

“He’s right about that! I could never sleep after watching TV with my mom. She’d watch Date Line and scary shows like that.”

“If you were scared, then why would watch with her?” Andy asks.

“Well, my mom worked until eight most nights and I just wanted to spend time with her, so getting into bed and watching TV with her was my way of doing that.”

“That’s sweet.” Harry says, putting his arm around you.

After Andy goes to bed around nine, making sure to give you and Harry a hug, you both decide to get ready for bed as well. You do your routine, and chew on your bottom lip.

“What is it?” He asks he slides into bed with his book.

“Can I still sleep naked? Does he ever come in here?”

“Hmm, how about just a t-shirt? Grab any one of mine from my dresser.”

“Okay, fair enough compromise.”

You change quickly, and get into bed with a book of your own.

“This is nice.” He says, smiling at you. “Having you here on a Monday night.”

“Yeah, feels right.” You kiss his cheek and open your book to the page you dog-eared.

Even though Harry just wanted to ravage you, he knew that would probably have to wait until you showered in the morning. You did look awfully cute when you passed out with your book still in your hand. Harry takes it, saved your place, and sets it on the night table closest to you. He takes his glasses off and turns off the lights, then kisses your forehead before wrapping himself around you. You adjust into him and drift off fully.

You’re woken up abruptly around midnight by Harry’s phone buzzing. It goes off a few times so he finally turns over and grabs it.

“Oh, shit.” He says.

“What?” You mumble.

“Paige called three times, hold on.” He swipes his phone to call her back.

“Harry?!”

“Hey, what’s going on, is everything alright?”

“No…everything’s not alright.” She sobs.

“What happened?” Harry sits up fully. “What’s wrong, darling?” When he says that it makes you sit up. He was clearly trying to calm her down, but you didn’t like him using the term of endearment.

“My…my father died.”

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