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grigori77 · 3 years ago

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Summer 2021′s Movies - My Top Ten Favourite Films (Part 2)

The Top Ten:

10. WEREWOLVES WITHIN – definitely one of the year’s biggest cinematic surprises so far, this darkly comic supernatural murder mystery from indie horror director Josh Ruben (Scare Me) is based on a video game, but you’d never know it – this bears so little resemblance to the original Ubisoft title that it’s a wonder anyone even bothered to make the connection, but even so, this is now notable for officially being the highest rated video game adaptation in Rotten Tomatoes history, with a Certified Fresh rating of 86%. Certainly it deserves that distinction, but there’s so much more to the film – this is an absolute blood-splattered joy, the title telling you everything you need to know about the story but belying the film’s pure, quirky genius. Veep’s Sam Richardson is forest ranger Finn Wheeler, a gentle and socially awkward soul who arrives at his new post in the remote small town of Beaverton to discover the few, uniformly weird residents are divided over the oil pipeline proposition of forceful and abrasive businessman Sam Parker (The Hunt’s Wayne Duvall). As he tries to fit in and find his feet, investigating the disappearance of a local dog while bonding with local mail carrier Cecily Moore (Other Space and This Is Us’ Milana Vayntrub), the discovery of a horribly mutilated human body leads to a standoff between the townsfolk and an enforced lockdown in the town’s ramshackle hotel as they try to work out who amongst them is the “werewolf” they suspect is responsible. This is frequently hilarious, the offbeat script from appropriately named Mishna Wolff (I’m Down) dropping some absolutely zingers and crafting some enjoyably weird encounters and unexpected twists, while the uniformly excellent cast do much of the heavy-lifting to bring their rich, thoroughly oddball characters to vivid life – Richardson is thoroughly cuddly throughout, while Duvall is pleasingly loathsome, Casual’s Michaela Watkins is pleasingly grating as Trisha, flaky housewife to unrepentant local horn-dog Pete Anderton (Orange is the New Black’s Michael Chernus), and Cheyenne Jackson (American Horror Story) and Harry Guillen (best known, OF COURSE, as Guillermo in the TV version of What We Do In the Shadows) make an enjoyably spiky double-act as liberal gay couple Devon and Joaquim Wolfson; in the end, though, the film is roundly stolen by Vayntrub, who invests Cecily with a bubbly sweetness and snarky sass that makes it absolutely impossible to not fall completely in love with her (gods know I did). This is a deeply funny film, packed with proper belly-laughs from start to finish, but like all the best horror comedies it takes its horror elements seriously, delivering some enjoyably effective scares and juicy gore, while the werewolf itself, when finally revealed, is realised through some top-notch prosthetics. Altogether this was a most welcome under-the-radar surprise for the summer, and SO MUCH MORE than just an unusually great video game adaptation …

9. THE TOMORROW WAR – although cinemas finally reopened in the UK in early summer, the bite of the COVID lockdown backlog was still very much in effect this blockbuster season, with several studios preferring to hedge their bets and wait for later release dates. Others turned to streaming services, including Paramount, who happily lined up a few heavyweight titles to open on major platforms in lieu of the big screen. One of the biggest was this intended sci-fi action horror tentpole, meant to give Chris Pratt another potential franchise on top of Guardians of the Galaxy and Jurassic World, which instead dropped in early July on Amazon Prime. So, was it worth staying in on a Saturday night instead of heading out for something on the BIG screen? Mostly yes, although it’s mainly a trashy, guilty pleasure big budget B-picture charm that makes this such a worthwhile experience – the film’s biggest influences are clearly Independence Day and Starship Troopers, two admirably clunky blockbusters that DEFINED prioritising big spectacle and overblown theatrics over intelligent writing and realistic storytelling. It doesn’t help that the premise is pure bunk – in 2022, a wormhole opens from thirty years in the future, and a plea for help is sent back with a bunch of very young future soldiers. Seems Earth will become overrun by an unstoppable swarm of nasty alien critters called Whitespikes in 25 years, and the desperate human counteroffensive have no choice but to bring soldiers from our present into the future to help them fight back and save the humanity from imminent extinction. Less than a year later, the world’s standing armies have been decimated and a worldwide draft has been implemented, with normal everyday adults being sent through for a seven day tour from which very few return. Pratt plays biology teacher and former Green Beret Dan Forrester, one of the latest batch of draftees to be sent into the future along with a selection of chefs, soccer moms and other average joes – his own training and experience serves him better than most when the shit hits the fan, but it soon becomes clear that he’s just as out of his depth as everyone else as the sheer enormity of the threat is revealed. But when he becomes entangled with a desperate research outfit led by Muri (Chuck’s Yvonne Strahovski) who seem to be on the verge of a potential world-changing scientific breakthrough, Dan realises there just might be a slender hope for humanity after all … this is every bit as over-the-top gung-ho bonkers as it sounds, and just as much fun. Director Chris McKay may still be pretty fresh (with only The Lego Batman Movie under his belt to date), but he shows a lot of talent and potential for big budget blockbuster filmmaking here, delivering with guts and bravado on some major action sequences (a fraught ticking-clock SAR operation through a war-torn Miami is the film’s undeniable highlight, but a desperate battle to escape a blazing oil rig also really impresses), as well as handling some impressively complex visual effects work and wrangling some quality performances from his cast (altogether it bodes well for his future, which includes Nightwing and Johnny Quest as future projects). Chris Pratt can do this kind of stuff in his sleep – Dan is his classic fallible and self-deprecating but ultimately solid and kind-hearted action hero fare, effortlessly likeable and easy to root for – and his supporting cast are equally solid, Strahovsky going toe-to-toe with him in the action sequences while also creating a rewardingly complex smart-woman/badass combo in Muri, while the other real standouts include Sam Richardson (Veep, Werewolves Within) and Edwin Hodge (The Purge movies) as fellow draftees Charlie and Dorian, the former a scared-out-of-his-mind tech geek while the latter is a seriously hardcore veteran serving his THIRD TOUR, and the ever brilliant J.K. Simmonds as Dan’s emotionally scarred estranged Vietnam-vet father, Jim. Sure, it’s derivative as hell and thoroughly predictable (with more than one big twist you can see coming a mile away), but the pace is brisk, the atmosphere pregnant with a palpable doomed urgency, and the creatures themselves are a genuinely convincing world-ending threat, the design team and visual effects wizards creating genuine nightmare fuel in the feral and unrelenting Whitespikes. Altogether this WAS an ideal way to spend a comfy Saturday night in, but I think it could have been JUST AS GOOD for a Saturday night OUT at the Pictures …

8. ARMY OF THE DEAD – another high profile release that went straight to streaming was this genuine monster hit for Netflix from one of this century’s undeniable heavyweight action cinema masters, the indomitable Zack Snyder, who kicked off his career with an audience-dividing (but, as far as I’m concerned, ultimately MASSIVELY successful) remake of George Romero’s immortal Dawn of the Dead, and has finally returned to zombie horror after close to two decades away. The end result is, undeniably, the biggest cinematic guilty pleasure of the entire summer, a bona fide outbreak horror EPIC in spite of its tightly focused story – Dave Bautista plays mercenary Scott Ward, leader a badass squad of soldiers of fortune who were among the few to escape a deadly outbreak of a zombie virus in the city of Las Vegas, enlisted to break into the vault of one of the Strip’s casinos by owner Bly Tanaka (a fantastically game turn from Hiroyuki Sanada) and rescue $200 million still locked away inside. So what’s the catch? Vegas remains ground zero for the outbreak, walled off from the outside world but still heavily infested within, and in less than three days the US military intends to sterilise the site with a tactical nuke. Simple premise, down and dirty, trashy flick, right? Wrong – Snyder has never believed in doing things small, having brought us unapologetically BIG cinema with the likes of 300, Watchmen, Man of Steel and, most notably, his version of Justice League, so this is another MASSIVE undertaking, every scene shot for maximum thrills or emotional impact, each set-piece executed with his characteristic militaristic precision and explosive predilection (a harrowing fight for survival against a freshly-awakened zombie horde in tightly packed casino corridors is the film’s undeniable highlight), and the gauzy, dreamlike cinematography gives even simple scenes an intriguing and evocative edge that really does make you feel like you’re watching something BIG. The characters all feel larger-than-life too – Bautista can seem somewhat cartoonish at times, and this role definitely plays that as a strength, making Scott a rock-hard alpha male in the classic Hollywood mould, but he’s such a great actor that of course he’s able to invest the character with real rewarding complexity beneath the surface; Ana de la Reguera (Eastbound & Down) and Nora Arnezeder (Zoo, Mozart in the Jungle), meanwhile, both bring a healthy dose of oestrogen-fuelled badassery to proceedings as, respectively, Scott’s regular second-in-command, Maria Cruz, and Lilly the Coyote, Power’s Omari Hardwick and Matthias Schweighofer (You Are Wanted) make for a fun odd-couple double act as circular-saw-wielding merc Vanderohe and Dieter, the nervous, nerdy German safecracker brought in to crack the vault, and Fear the Walking Dead’s Garrett Dillahunt channels spectacular scumbag energy as Tanaka’s sleazy former casino boss Martin, while latecomer Tig Notaro (Star Trek Discovery) effortlessly rises above her last-minute-casting controversy to deliver brilliantly as sassy and acerbic chopper pilot Peters. I think it goes without saying that Snyder can do this in his sleep, but he definitely wasn’t napping here – he pulled out all the stops on this one, delivering a thrilling, darkly comic and endearingly CRACKERS zombie flick that not only compares favourably to his own Dawn but is, undeniably, his best film for AGES. Netflix certainly seem to be pleased with the results – a spinoff prequel, Army of Thieves, starring Dieter in another heist thriller, is set to drop in October, with an animated series following in the Spring, and there’s already rumours of a sequel in development. I’m certainly up for more …

7. BLACK WIDOW – no major blockbuster property was hit harder by COVID than the MCU, which saw its ENTIRE SLATE for 2020 delayed for over a year in the face of Marvel Studios bowing to the inevitability of the Pandemic and unwilling to sacrifice those all-important box-office receipts by just sending their films straight to streaming. The most frustrating part for hardcore fans of the series was the delay of a standalone film that was already criminally overdue – the solo headlining vehicle of founding Avenger and bona fide female superhero ICON Natasha Romanoff, aka the Black Widow. Equally frustratingly, then, this film seems set to be overshadowed by real life controversy as star and producer Scarlett Johansson goes head-to-head with Disney in civil court over their breach-of-contract after they hedged their bets by releasing the film simultaneously in cinemas and on their own streaming platform, which has led to poor box office as many of the film’s potential audience chose to watch it at home instead of risk movie theatres with the virus still very much remaining a threat (and Disney have clearly reacted AGAIN, now backtracking on their release policy by instigating a new 45-day cinematic exclusivity window on all their big releases for the immediate future). But what of the film itself? Well Black Widow is an interesting piece of work, director Cate Shortland (Berlin Syndrome) and screenwriter Eric Pearson (Thor: Ragnarok) delivering a decidedly stripped-back, lean and intellectual beast that bears greater resemblance to the more cerebral work of the Russo Brothers on their Captain America films than the more classically bombastic likes of Iron Man, Thor or the Avengers flicks, concentrating on story and characters over action and spectacle as we wind back the clock to before the events of Infinity War and Endgame, when Romanoff was on the run after Civil War, hunted by the government-appointed forces of US Secretary of State “Thunderbolt” Ross (William Hurt) after violating the Sokovia Accords. Then a mysterious delivery throws her back into the fray as she finds herself targeted by a mysterious assassin, forcing her to team up with her estranged “sister” Yelena Belova (Midsommar’s Florence Pugh), another Black Widow who’s just gone rogue from the same Red Room Natasha escaped years ago, armed with a McGuffin capable of foiling a dastardly plot for world domination. The reluctant duo need help in this endeavour though, enlisting the aid of their former “parents”, veteran Widow and scientist Melina Vostokoff (Rachel Weisz) and Alexie Shostakov (Stranger Things’ David Harbour), aka the Red Guardian, a Russian super-soldier intended to be their counterpart to Captain America, who’s been languishing in a Siberian gulag for the last twenty years. After the Earth-shaking, universe-changing events of recent MCU events, this film certainly feels like a much more self-contained, modest affair, playing for much smaller stakes, but that doesn’t mean it’s any less worthy of our attention – this is as precision-crafted as anything we’ve seen from Marvel so far, but it also feels like a refreshing change of pace after all those enormous cosmic shenanigans, while the script is as tight as a drum, propelling a taut, suspense-filled thriller that certainly doesn’t scrimp on the action front. Sure, the set-pieces are very much in service of the story here, but they’re still the pre-requisite MCU rollercoaster rides, a selection of breathless chases and bone-crunching fights that really do play to the strengths of one of our favourite Avengers, but this is definitely one of those films where the real fireworks come when the film focuses on the characters – Johansson is so comfortable with her character she’s basically BECOME Natasha Romanoff, kickass and ruthless and complex and sassy and still just desperate for a family (though she hides it well throughout the film), while Weisz delivers one of her best performances in years as a peerless professional who keeps her emotions tightly reigned in but slowly comes to realise that she was never more happy than when she was pretending to be a simple mother, and Ray Winstone does a genuinely fantastic job of taking a character who could have been one of the MCU’s most disappointingly bland villains, General Dreykov, master of the Red Room, and investing him with enough oily charisma and intense presence to craft something truly memorable (frustratingly, the same cannot be said for the film’s supposed main physical threat, Taskmaster, who performs well in their frustratingly brief appearances but ultimately gets Darth Maul levels of short service). The true scene-stealers in the film, however, are Alexie and Yelena – Harbour’s clearly having the time of his life hamming it up as a self-important, puffed-up peacock of a superhero who never got his shot and is clearly (rightly) decidedly bitter about it, preferring to relive the life he SHOULD have had instead of remembering the good in the one he got; Pugh, meanwhile, is THE BEST THING IN THE WHOLE MOVIE, easily matching Johanssen scene-for-scene in the action stakes but frequently out-performing her when it comes to acting, investing Yelena with a sweet naivety and innocence and a certain amount of quirky geekiness that makes for one of the year’s most endearing female protagonists (certainly one who, if the character goes the way I think she will, is thoroughly capable of carrying the torch for the foreseeable future). In the end this is definitely one of the LEAST typical, by-the-numbers MCU films to date, and by delivering something a little different I think they’ve given us just the kind of leftfield swerve the series needs right now. It’s certainly one of their most fascinating and rewarding films so far, and since it seems to be Johansson’s final tour of duty as the Black Widow, it’s also a most fitting farewell indeed.

6. WRATH OF MAN – Guy Ritchie’s latest (regarded by many as a triumphant return to form, which I consider unfair since I don’t think he ever went away, especially after 2020’s spectacular The Gentlemen) is BY FAR his darkest film – let’s get this clear from the start. Anyone who knows his work knows that Ritchie consistently maintains a near flawless balance and humour and seriousness in his films that gives them a welcome quirkiness that is one of his most distinctive trademarks, so for him to suddenly deliver a film which takes itself SO SERIOUSLY is one hell of a departure. This is a film which almost REVELS in its darkness – Ritchie’s always loved bathing in man’s baser instincts, but Wrath of Man almost makes a kind of twisted VIRTUE out of wallowing in the genuine evils that men are capable of inflicting on each other. The film certainly kicks off as it means to go on – In a tour-de-force single-shot opening, we watch a daring armoured car robbery on the streets of Los Angeles that goes horrifically wrong, an event which will have devastating consequences in the future. Five months later, Fortico Security hires taciturn Brit Patrick Hill (Jason Statham) to work as a guard in one of their trucks, and on his first run he single-handedly foils another attempted robbery with genuinely uncanny combat skills. The company is thrilled, amazed by the sheer ability of their new hire, but Hill’s new colleagues are more concerned, wondering exactly what they’ve let themselves in for. After a second foiled robbery, it becomes clear that Hill’s reputation has grown, but fellow guard Haiden (Holt McCallany), aka “Bullet”, begins to suspect there might be something darker going on … Ritchie is firing on all cylinders here, delivering a PERFECT slow-burn suspense thriller which plays its cards close to its chest and cranks up its piano wire tension with artful skill as it builds to a devastating, knuckle-whitening explosive heist that acts as a cathartic release for everything that’s built up over the past hour and a half. In typical Ritchie style the narrative is non-linear, the story unfolding in four distinct parts told from clearly differentiated points of view, allowing the clues to be revealed at a trickle that effortlessly draws the viewer in as they fall deeper down the rabbit hole, leading to a harrowing but strangely poignant denouement which is perfectly in tune with everything that’s come before. It’s an immense pleasure finally getting to see Statham working with Ritchie again, and I don’t think he’s ever been better than he is here – he's always been a brilliantly understated actor, but there’s SO MUCH going on under Hill’s supposedly impenetrable calm that every little peek beneath the armour is a REVELATION; McCallany, meanwhile, has landed his best role since his short but VERY sweet supporting turn in Fight Club, seemingly likeable and fallible as the kind of easy-going co-worker anyone in the service industry would be THRILLED to have, but giving Bullet far more going on under the surface, while there are uniformly excellent performances from a top-shelf ensemble supporting cast which includes Josh Hartnett, Jeffrey Donovan (Burn Notice, Sicario), Andy Garcia, Laz Alonso (The Boys), Eddie Marsan, Niamh Algar (Raised By Wolves) and Darrell D’Silva (Informer, Domina), and a particularly edgy and intense turn from Scott Eastwood. This is one of THE BEST thrillers of the year, by far, a masterpiece of mood, pace and plot that ensnares the viewer from its gripping opening and hooks them right up to the close, a triumph of the genre and EASILY Guy Ritchie’s best film since Snatch. Regardless of whether or not it’s a RETURN to form, we can only hope he continues to deliver fare THIS GOOD in the future …

5. FEAR STREET (PARTS 1-3) – Netflix have gotten increasingly ambitious with their original filmmaking over the years, and some of this years’ offerings have reached new heights of epic intention. Their most exciting release of the summer was this adaptation of popular children’s horror author R.L. Stine’s popular book series, a truly gargantuan undertaking as the filmmakers set out to create an entire TRILOGY of films which were then released over three consecutive weekends. Interestingly, these films are most definitely NOT for kids – this is proper, no-holds-barred supernatural slasher horror, delivering highly calibrated shocks and precision jump scares, a pervading atmosphere of insidious dread and a series of inventively gruesome kills. The story revolves around two neighbouring small towns which have had vastly different fortunes over more than three centuries of existence – while the residents of Sunnyvale are unusually successful, living idyllic lives in peace and prosperity, luck has always been against the people of Shadyside, who languish in impoverishment, crime and misfortune, while the town has become known as the Murder Capital of the USA due to frequent spree killings. Some attribute this to the supposed curse of a local urban legend, Sarah Fier, who became known as the Fier Witch after her execution for witchcraft in 1668, but others dismiss this as simple superstition. Part 1 is set in 1994, as the latest outbreak of serial mayhem begins in Shadyside, dragging a small group of local teens – Deena Johnson (She Never Died’s Kiana Madeira) and Samantha Fraser (Olivia Scott Welch), a young lesbian couple going through a difficult breakup, Deena’s little brother Josh (The Haunted Hathaways’ Benjamin Flores Jr.), a nerdy history geek who spends most of his time playing video games or frequenting violent crime-buff online chatrooms, and their delinquent friends Simon (Eight Grade’s Fred Hechinger) and Kate (Julia Rehwald) – into the age-old ghostly conspiracy as they find themselves besieged by indestructible undead serial killers from the town’s past, reasoning that the only way they can escape with their lives is to solve the mystery and bring the Fier Witch some much needed closure. Part 2, meanwhile, flashes back to a previous outbreak in 1977, in which local sisters Ziggy (Stranger Things’ Sadie Sink) and Cindy Berman (Emily Rudd), together with future Sunnyvale sheriff Nick Goode (Ted Sutherland) were among the kids hunted by said killers during a summer camp “colour war”. As for Part 3, that goes all the way back to 1668 to tell the story of what REALLY happened to Sarah Fier, before wrapping up events in 1994, culminating in a terrifying, adrenaline-fuelled showdown in the Shadyside Mall. Throughout, the youthful cast are EXCEPTIONAL, Madeira, Welch, Flores Jr., Sink and Rudd particularly impressing, while there are equally strong turns from Ashley Zuckerman (The Code, Designated Survivor) and Community’s Gillian Jacobs as the grown-up versions of two key ’77 kids, and a fun cameo from Maya Hawke in Part 1. This is most definitely retro horror in the Stranger Things mould, perfectly executed period detail bringing fun nostalgic flavour to all three of the timelines while the peerless direction from Leigh Janiak (Honeymoon) and wire-tight, sharp-witted screenplays from Janiak, Kyle Killen (Lone Star, The Beaver), Phil Graziadel, Zak Olkewicz and Kate Trefry strike a perfect balance between knowing dark humour and knife-edged terror, as well as weaving an intriguingly complex narrative web that pulls the viewer in but never loses them to overcomplication. The design, meanwhile, is evocative, the cinematography (from Stanger Things’ Caleb Heymann) is daring and magnificently moody, and the killers and other supernatural elements of the film are handled with skill through largely physical effects. This is definitely not a standard, by-the-numbers slasher property, paying strong homage to the sub-genre’s rules but frequently subverting them with expert skill, and it’s as much fun as it is frightening. Give us some more like this please, Netflix!

4. THE SPARKS BROTHERS – those who’ve been following my reviews for a while will known that while I do sometimes shout about documentary films, they tend to show up in my runners-up lists – it’s a great rarity for one to land in one of my top tens. This lovingly crafted deep-dive homage to cult band Sparks, from self-confessed rabid fanboy Edgar Wright (Shaun of the Dead, Hot Fuzz, Scott Pilgrim), is something VERY SPECIAL INDEED, then … there’s a vague possibility some of you may have heard the name before, and many of you will know at least one or two of their biggest hits without knowing it was them (their greatest hit of all time, This Town Ain’t Big Enough for the Both of Us, immediately springs to mind), but unless you’re REALLY serious about music it’s quite likely you have no idea who they are, namely two brothers from California, Russell and Ronald Mael, who formed a very sophisticated pop-rock band in the late 60s and then never really went away, having moments of fame but mostly working away in the background and influencing some of the greatest bands and musical artists that followed them, even if many never even knew where that influence originally came from. Wright’s film is an engrossing joy from start to finish (despite clocking in at two hours and twenty minutes), following their eclectic career from obscure inception as Halfnelson, through their first real big break with third album Kimono My Place, subsequent success and then fall from popularity in the mid-70s, through several subsequent revitalisations, all the way up to the present day with their long-awaited cinematic breakthrough, revolutionary musical feature Annette – throughout Wright keeps the tone light and the pace breezy, allowing a strong and endearing sense of irreverence to rule the day as fans, friends and the brothers themselves offer up fun anecdotes and wax lyrical about what is frequently a larger-than-life tragicomic soap opera, utilising fun, crappy animation and idiosyncratic stock footage inserts alongside talking-head interviews that were made with a decidedly tongue-in-cheek style – Mike Myers good-naturedly rants about how we can see his “damned mole” while 80s New Romantic icons Nick Rhodes and John Taylor, while shot together, are each individually labelled as “Duran”. Ron and Russ themselves, meanwhile, are clearly having huge fun, gently ribbing each other and dropping some fun deadpan zingers throughout proceedings, easily playing to the band’s strong, idiosyncratic sense of hyper-intelligent humour, while the aforementioned celebrity talking-heads are just three amongst a whole wealth of famous faces that may surprise you – there’s even an appearance by Neil Gaiman, guys! Altogether this is 2+ hours of bright and breezy fun chock full of great music and fascinating information, and even hardcore Sparks fans are likely to learn more than a little over the course of the film, while for those who have never heard of Sparks before it’s a FANTASTIC introduction to one of the greatest ever bands that you’ve never heard of. With luck there might even be more than a few new fans before the year is out …

3. GUNPOWDER MILKSHAKE – Netflix’ BEST offering of the summer was this surprise hit from Israeli writer-director Navot Papushado (Rabies, Big Bad Wolves), a heavily stylised black comedy action thriller that passes the Bechdel Test with FLYING COLOURS. Playing like a female-centric John Wick, it follows ice-cold, on-top-of-her-game assassin Sam (Karen Gillan) as her latest assignment has some unfortunate side effects, leading her to take on a reparation job to retrieve some missing cash for the local branch of the Irish Mob. The only catch is that a group of thugs have kidnapped the original thief’s little girl, 12 year-old Emily (My Spy’s Chloe Coleman), and Sam, in an uncharacteristic moment of sympathy, decides to intervene, only for the money to be accidentally destroyed in the process. Now she’s got the Mob and her own employers coming after her, and she not only has to save her own skin but also Emily’s, leading her to seek help from the one person she thought she might never see again – her mother, Scarlet (Lena Headey), a master assassin in her own right who’s been hiding from the Mob herself for years. The plot may be simple but at times also a little over-the-top, but the film is never anything less than a pure, unadulterated pleasure, populated with fascinating, living and breathing characters of real complexity and nuance, while the script (co-written by relative newcomer Ehud Lavski) is tightly-reined and bursting with zingers. Most importantly, though, Papushado really delivers on the action front – these are some of the best set-pieces I’ve seen this year, Gillan, her co-stars and the various stunt-performers acquitting themselves admirably in a series of spectacular fights, gun battles and a particularly imaginative car chase that would be the envy of many larger, more expensive productions. Gillan and Coleman have a sweet, awkward chemistry, the MCU star particularly impressing in a subtly nuanced performance that also plays beautifully against Headey’s own tightly controlled turn, while there is awesome support from Angela Bassett, Michelle Yeoh and Carla Gugino as Sam’s adoptive aunts Anna May, Florence and Madeleine, a trio of “librarians” who run a fine side-line in illicit weaponry and are capable of unleashing some spectacular violence of their own; the film’s antagonists, on the other hand, are exclusively masculine – the mighty Ralph Inneson is quietly ruthless as Irish boss Jim McAlester, while The Terror’s Adam Nagaitis is considerably more mercurial as his mad dog nephew Virgil, and Paul Giamatti is the stately calm at the centre of the storm as Sam’s employer Nathan, the closest thing she has to a father. There’s so much to enjoy in this movie, not just the wonderful characters and amazing action but also the singularly engrossing and idiosyncratic style, deeply affecting themes of the bonds of found family and the healing power of forgiveness, and a rewarding through-line of strong women triumphing against the brutalities of toxic masculinity. I love this film, and I invite you to try it out, cuz I’m sure you will too.

2. THE SUICIDE SQUAD – the most fun I’ve had at the cinema so far this year is the long-awaited (thanks a bunch, COVID) redress of another frustrating imbalance from the decidedly hit and miss DCEU superhero franchise, in which Guardians of the Galaxy writer-director James Gunn has finally delivered a PROPER Suicide Squad movie after David Ayer’s painfully compromised first stab at the property back in 2016. That movie was enjoyable enough and had some great moments, but ultimately it was a clunky mess, and while some of the characters were done (quite) well, others were painfully botched, even ruined entirely. Thankfully Warner Bros. clearly learned their lesson, giving Gunn free reign to do whatever he wanted, and the end result is about as close to perfect as the DCEU has come to date. Once again the peerless Viola Davis plays US government official Amanda Waller, head of ARGUS and the undisputable most evil bitch in all the DC Universe, who presides over the metahuman prisoners of the notorious supermax Belle Reve Prison, cherry-picking inmates for her pet project Taskforce X, the titular Suicide Squad sent out to handle the kind of jobs nobody else wants, in exchange for years off their sentences but controlled by explosive implants injected into the base of their skulls. Their latest mission sees another motley crew of D-bags dispatched to the fictional South African island nation of Corto Maltese to infiltrate Jotunheim, a former Nazi facility in which a dangerous extra-terrestrial entity that’s being developed into a fearful bioweapon, with orders to destroy the project in order to keep it out of the hands of a hostile anti-American regime which has taken control of the island through a violent coup. Where the first Squad felt like a clumsily-arranged selection of stereotypes with a few genuinely promising characters unsuccessfully moulded into a decidedly forced found family, this new batch are convincingly organic – they may be dysfunctional and they’re all almost universally definitely BAD GUYS, but they WORK, the relationship dynamics that form between them feeling genuinely earned. Gunn has already proven himself a master of putting a bunch of A-holes together and forging them into band of “heroes”, and he’s certainly pulled the job off again here, dredging the bottom of the DC Rogues Gallery for its most ridiculous Z-listers and somehow managing to make them compelling. Sure, returning Squad-member Harley Quinn (the incomparable Margot Robbie, magnificent as ever) has already become a fully-realised character thanks to Birds of Prey, so there wasn’t much heavy-lifting to be done here, but Gunn genuinely seems to GET the character, so our favourite pixie-esque Agent of Chaos is an unbridled and thoroughly unpredictable joy here, while fellow veteran Colonel Rick Flagg (a particularly muscular and thoroughly game Joel Kinnaman) has this time received a much needed makeover, Gunn promoting him from being the first film’s sketchily-drawn “Captain Exposition” and turning him into a fully-ledged, well-thought-out human being with all the requisite baggage, including a newfound sense of humour; the newcomers, meanwhile, are a thoroughly fascinating bunch – reluctant “leader” Bloodsport/Robert DuBois (a typically robust and playful Idris Elba), unapologetic douchebag Peacemaker/Christopher Smith (probably the best performance I’ve EVER seen John Cena deliver), and socially awkward and seriously hard-done-by nerd (and by far the most idiotic DC villain of all time) the Polka-Dot Man/Abner Krill (a genuinely heart-breaking hangdog performance from Ant-Man’s David Dastmalchian); meanwhile there’s a fine trio of villainous turns from the film’s resident Big Bads, with Juan Diego Botta (Good Behaviour) and Joaquin Cosio (Quantum of Solace, Narcos: Mexico) making strong impressions as newly-installed dictator Silvio Luna and his corrupt right hand-man General Suarez, although both are EASILY eclipsed by the typically brilliant Peter Capaldi as louche and quietly deranged supervillain The Thinker/Gaius Greives (although the film’s ULTIMATE threat turns out to be something a whole lot bigger and more exotic). The film is ROUNDLY STOLEN, however, by a truly adorable double act (or TRIPLE act, if you want to get technical) – Daniella Melchior makes her breakthrough here in fine style as sweet, principled and kind-hearted narcoleptic second-generation supervillain Ratcatcher II/Cleo Cazo, who has the weird ability to control rats (and who has a pet rat named Sebastian who frequently steals scenes all on his own), while a particular fan-favourite B-lister makes his big screen debut here in the form of King Shark/Nanaue, a barely sentient anthropomorphic Great White “shark god” with an insatiable appetite for flesh and a naturally quizzical nature who was brilliantly mo-capped by Steve Agee (The Sarah Silverman Project, who also plays Waller’s hyperactive assistant John Economos) but then artfully completed with an ingenious vocal turn from Sylvester Stallone. James Gunn has crafted an absolute MASTERPIECE here, EASILY the best film he’s made to date, a riotous cavalcade of exquisitely observed and perfectly delivered dark humour and expertly wrangled narrative chaos that has great fun playing with the narrative flow, injects countless spot-on in-jokes and irreverent but utterly essential throwaway sight-gags, and totally endears us to this glorious gang of utter morons right from the start (in which Gunn delivers what has to be one of the most skilful deep-fakes in cinematic history). Sure, there’s also plenty of action, and it’s executed with the kind of consummate skill we’ve now come to expect from Gunn (the absolute highlight is a wonderfully bonkers sequence in which Harley expertly rescues herself from captivity), but like everything else it’s predominantly played for laughs, and there’s no getting away from the fact that this film is an absolute RIOT. By far the funniest thing I’ve seen so far this year, and if I’m honest this is the best of the DCEU offerings to date, too (for me, only the exceptional Birds of Prey can compare) – if Warner Bros. have any sense they’ll give Gunn more to do VERY SOON …

1. A QUIET PLACE, PART II – while UK cinemas finally reopened in early May, I was determined that my first trip back to the Big Screen for 2021 was gonna be something SPECIAL, and indeed I already knew what that was going to be. Thankfully I was not disappointed by my choice – 2018’s A Quiet Place was MY VERY FAVOURITE horror movie of the 2010s, an undeniable masterclass in suspense and sustained screen terror wrapped around a refreshingly original killer concept, and I was among the many fans hoping we’d see more in the future, especially after the film’s teasingly open ending. Against the odds (or perhaps not), writer-director/co-star John Krasinski has pulled off the seemingly impossible task of not only following up that high-wire act, but genuinely EQUALLING it in levels of quality – picking up RIGHT where the first film left off (at least after an AMAZING scene-setting opening in which we’re treated to the events of Day 1 of the downfall of humanity), rejoining the remnants of the Abbott family as they’re forced by circumstances to up-sticks from their idyllic farmhouse home and strike out into the outside world once more, painfully aware at all times that they must maintain perfect silence to avoid the ravenous attentions of the lethal blind alien beasties that now sit at the top of the food chain. Circumstances quickly become dire, however, and embattled mother Evelyn (Emily Blunt) is forced to ally herself with estranged family friend Emmett (Cillian Murphy), now a haunted, desperate vagrant eking out a perilous existence in an abandoned factory, in order to safeguard the future of her children Regan (Millicent Simmonds), Marcus (Noah Jupe) and their newborn baby brother. Regan, however, discovers evidence of more survivors, and with her newfound weapon against the aliens she recklessly decides to set off on her own in the hopes of aiding them before it’s too late … it may only be his second major blockbuster as a director, but Krasinski has once again proven he’s a true heavyweight talent, effortlessly carving out fresh ground in this already magnificently well-realised dystopian universe while also playing magnificently to the established strengths of what came before, delivering another peerless thrill-ride of unbearable tension and knuckle-whitening terror. The central principle of utilising sound at a very strict premium is once again strictly adhered to here, available sources of dialogue once again exploited with consummate skill while sound design and score (another moody triumph from Marco Beltrami) again become THE MOST IMPORTANT aspects of the whole production. The ruined world is once again realised beautifully throughout, most notably in the nightmarish environment of a wrecked commuter train, and Krasinski cranks up the tension before unleashing it in merciless explosions in a selection of harrowing encounters which guaranteed to leave viewers in a puddle of sweat. The director mostly stays behind the camera this time round, but he does (obviously) put in an appearance in the opening flashback as the late Lee Abbott, making a potent impression which leaves a haunting absence that’s keenly felt throughout the remainder of the film, while Blunt continues to display mother lion ferocity as she fights to keep her children safe and Jupe plays crippling fear magnificently but is now starting to show a hidden spine of steel as Marcus finally starts to find his courage; the film once again belongs, however, to Simmonds, the young deaf actress once and for all proving she’s a genuine star in the making as she invests Regan with fierce wilfulness and stubborn determination that remains unshakeable even in the face of unspeakable horrors, and the relationship she develops with Emmett, reluctant as it may be, provides a strong new emotional focus for the story, Murphy bringing an attractive wounded humanity to his role as a man who’s lost anything and is being forced to learn to care for something again. This is another triumph of the genre AND the artform in general, a masterpiece of atmosphere, performance and storytelling which builds magnificently on the skilful foundations laid by the first film, as well as setting things up perfectly for a third instalment which is all but certain to follow. I definitely can’t wait.

#movies 2021 #werewolves within #werewolves within movie #the tomorrow war #army of the dead #Black Widow #black widow movie #black widow mcu #wrath of man #fear street #fear street trilogy #fear street movies #The Sparks Brothers #gunpowder milkshake #the suicide squad #a quiet place part ii #a quiet place part 2 #awesome sauce

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hypmic-translation · 4 years ago

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Momoiro Uta Gassen (2gumi Edition)

JIRO: Here it comes! The 4th Momoiro Uta Gassen! JYUTO: This year, we will be splitting up to support the Red and White teams respectively. JYUSHI: Burn the memory into your eyes and ears!

CHORUS Settling the score in this weird team-up, hit it! (Hit it!) And yet we all still have our unbreakable spirits! (Spirits!) Everybody has something that could be a weakness (Weakness!) Even in this world that’s been caked in mud If you stay strong, you’ll have a chance!

JIRO Ooh! You know it’s Ikebukuro’s awesome next Number 2- -Yamada Jiro, the former soccer player; essential Red carded, a volley shot sent high into the air There’s no time for golden goals here on New Year’s Eve! (1)

JYUTO Dispatched by prefectural police, Iruma Jyuto I might be strict but that doesn’t make me family (2) Who do you think you are, disregarding public service? Just this once I’ll close my office year with white! (3)

JYUSHI If time could halt, I might be able to continue blooming without end Come now, all you flowers, stain me with your tears of blood Be nothing more than the red on this wild rose!

ROSHO The year ends, and so does this ceaseless quest for knowledge But relaxation is also a valid formula for victory Only today will I allow you to submit a blank paper You wouldn’t want a failing mark written in red, right?

GENTARO Red-faced in the morn, but bleached bone by the eve (4) Even now, the samurai is seen in Sanada’s red armour (5) (6) We’ll make an impact today like a historical novel! It’ll be good, I insist! Ah, but that’s a lie ♪

HIFUMI Growing close late at night, a platinum call Even from far away let’s have a wonderful talk A rhyming Gigolo, Hifumi-san’s corona (7) I won’t let these hard times get the best of me!

HIFUMI: Woo-hoo! Could you feel the strength of our support? ROSHO: It’s no good, I was so nervous singing… GENTARO: Let us welcome in tomorrow with high spirits. The 4th Momoiro Uta Gassen still has more to come!

NOTES

“Golden goal” is the term for a variant of football/soccer in which the first team to score a goal wins. It’s usually used as a tiebreaker in games where both teams scored equally - so Jiro is essentially saying that one of their teams has to win now.

The word Jyuto uses here is “小舅” which translates to “brother-in-law” or, more literally, “little father-in-law”. While trying to figure out what the hell he was talking about, I found out that “小姑” is the female equivalent (“sister-in-law”/”little mother-in-law”) and is typically used as an implied insult in regards to in-laws who are nosy and interfere with your personal affairs for no reason. I did what I could with the info.

“御用納め” is the term for when the Japanese government essentially mandated that people who work for public affairs get a few days off around New Year’s, which usually makes December 28th their last paid day of work for the year. Jyuto is, of course, a corrupt cop, and it’s common for “black” and “white” to be police jargon referring to people as “guilty” or “innocent” respectively. Basically, he’s joking about how it’s ironic that he’s on the white team.

A proverb which essentially means “live life to the fullest and don’t waste time, because you never know when something might happen”. You could be healthy in the morning and dead by the evening; it’s not something anyone can predict.

Sanada Yukimura was a warlord who was alive during the Warring States period of Japan, and is famous for his use of the “akazonae”, or “red armour”, during the Siege of Osaka (very likely a purposeful reference considering how he’s following Rosho here).

Unrelated to the above, the word “武士” means “samurai” - however when written in katakana as “モノノフ” (“mononofu”), it usually refers to fans and live audience members of the female idol group Momoiro Clover Z (aka the people who host the Momoiro Uta Gassen).

I can only assume what this means is “this is my experience dealing with the coronavirus” but the fact that it’s even mentioned here is wild enough on its own. What a weird year 2020 was.

#Momoiro Uta Gassen #2gumi #Hypmic Translations

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klaineanummel · 5 years ago

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enemies with benefits

Kurt Hummel is the captain of the NYU Violets soccer team. Blaine Anderson is the captain of the Columbia Lions soccer team. They're bitter rivals on and off the field, but that doesn't mean that they can't also be attracted to each other. Right?

Hello everyone!! Welcome to my fic for the @gleepotluckbigbang Glee Potluck Exchange! :) I have been paired with the wonderful @notarelationship, and while I did not receive any official prompt, I did get a bunch of tropes that she enjoys. So, here you go darling! I hope that you enjoy <3

Massive thanks to @mailroomorder for betaing this fic <3 you're the real MVP. Also, I'm fully aware these fics were supposed to be capped at 5K. lmao oops?

A small note, more so for those of you well versed in soccer: I am fully aware that the NYU Violets soccer team is not in the same NCAA division as the Columbia Lions (far from it actually). However, in order for the fic to work, I fudged the facts a little bit. I mean, hey, it's an AU, right? So, apologies to any potential die-hard soccer fans out there for this small inaccuracy.

the seventh time

It’s the first time they’ve done it at Kurt’s apartment. Not because Kurt doesn’t want Blaine here (though, in theory, he doesn’t), but because he lives with four other guys. All of whom are on the NYU Violets soccer team with Kurt. All of whom have a tendency of coming home earlier than expected, and of walking into Kurt’s room without knocking, no matter how many times Kurt begs them to stop.

He doesn’t feel the need to have his roommates and teammates see him having sex with the captain of the Columbia Lions soccer team.

They’re all out today, though, and Kurt knows this time that they will be out for a very long time. They’re celebrating, after all. 3-2 against the Lions, meaning they’re headed for the semi-finals of the NCAA Division I Tournament, whereas the Lions will have to fight for their spot in a few days.

Winning is one thing, but winning against the Lions? Oh, if Kurt could bottle the absolute joy it brings him, he’d never be sad again.

“Fuck,” he shouts, feeling Blaine’s fingers brush against his prostate. Adrenaline and ecstasy flow freely through his veins, and Kurt thinks he should always have sex after winning a big game, because this is possibly the best sex he’s ever had.

Not that Blaine will ever, ever know that.

Blaine pulls out of him, then comes back with three fingers, shoving them in roughly. Kurt presses his face into his pillow and biting down on the fabric to stop himself from shouting out again. Blaine’s fingers are hot inside him, stretching him much quicker than he usually prefers, especially considering how rare it is for him to bottom.

“Hope you’re ready,” Blaine says, leaning his entire body over Kurt’s to speak directly into his ear, “because I’m tired of waiting to fuck you.”

Kurt turns his head to the side, spitting the pillowcase fabric out of his mouth before he says, “Hope you’re better at topping than you are on the pitch.”

It’s a cheap shot, and not even an accurate one, but he’s still high off his victory and enjoying how rough Blaine is being far too much. He just wants a guarantee that that’s going to continue throughout the rest of their tryst.

As expected--he’s so predictable--Blaine lets out a sound that can only be described as a growl before pulling away from Kurt. Kurt keeps his cheek pressed against the pillow, swaying his ass gently, invitingly, as he listens to Blaine struggle to put on his condom.

Soon enough, there’s hands on his ass checks, spreading them a bit further than Kurt usually prefers, and a slick, latex-covered cockhead pressing against his hole.

“Fucking come on,” Kurt grumbles. “See, this is why we keep beating you, because you don’t know when to fucking – holy shit.”

He’s full in an instant, hips arching high, Blaine’s fingernails digging into them. He reaches up and grabs onto the rail at the head of his head just in time for Blaine to pull out and immediately push back in.

“Shit, Blaine,” the rail digs into Kurt’s palm, but he doesn’t care, because Blaine just keeps fucking in and out of him, and Kurt still hasn’t really adjusted to the size of him and fuck it’s good. “Yes, fuck me, come on.”

“Do you ever shut up?” Blaine mutters, so quiet that Kurt isn’t sure he’s actually supposed to hear. “Or does the sound of your own voice turn you on?” Okay, so he was definitely supposed to hear.

He isn’t sure how to respond to that because yes, he actually does like to talk while he’s having sex – not because he likes the sound of his own voice, but because he loves hearing his lovers during sex as well, and him talking is the best way of ensuring that happens. But he’s not sure he wants Blaine to know that. Really, Blaine already knows too much about what he likes in bed. He doesn’t need the man who’s been his biggest rival the entirety of his university career to know everything.

Finally, he settles on, “Fuck me harder and find out.”

Blaine lets out a low half-scoff half-chuckle at that, and Kurt smirks to himself.

“Or, what?” He continues, tilting his head to the side as though that will allow him to see Blaine any better. “Is this as good as you can give? Because if that’s the case, then no wonder we beat you today.”

“You are such,” his thrusts speed up, and Kurt keens happily, letting his face melt into his pillow and his headboard rail burn into his palm, “an asshole.”

The irony of the statement makes Kurt laugh, which just makes Blaine increase his speed even more, putting a definite pause on the laughter.

The adrenaline spiking through him is mixing with his pleasure, and Kurt can tell that he’s going to come soon. It’s the fastest he’s come in a long time, and he can’t stand the fact that it’s Blaine Anderson who brought him there.

He brings his own hand down to his cock, stroking himself quickly.

“You going to come?”

Kurt just nods against his pillow, biting down on his lip to stop himself from saying anything potentially embarrassing.

“Thank fuck,” Blaine says. “Been on the edge since I pushed into this tight ass.”

Kurt bites into the pillow again as his orgasm hits him. He pumps in and out of his own fist, ass muscles clenching tightly around Blaine’s cock.

“Holy shit,” Blaine says, and Kurt can feel his fingernails digging a little deeper into his hips. He’s definitely going to have some kind of mark there tomorrow.

Blaine’s rhythm becomes a little more erratic as he fucks Kurt through his own orgasm. Kurt lets him, sated and boneless after his own.

When Blaine is done, he immediately pulls out and falls onto the mattress next to Kurt, chest heaving, eyes glued to the ceiling.

Kurt watches him for a moment. Watches the way his eyelashes brush against his cheekbones every time he blinks. Watches the way his pink tongue slips out to wet his equally pink lips. Watches the way his amber eyes are never still, not even now, staring at the absolute nothingness of Kurt’s ceiling.

He watches him until his heart gives an uncomfortable tug and he has to stop watching because that’s not a road he wants to go down.

He moves his own gaze up to the ceiling as well, and then says, “You’re a sore loser, huh?”

Blaine immediately elbows him in the side, and it feels better. More normal. The way things have always been and need to stay.

the tenth time

He’s not at all surprised to see Blaine leaning against the wall opposite the door to the Violets locker room. He’s wearing possibly the tightest jeans Kurt has ever seen him in, and a light purple crewneck that’s doing absolutely illegal things to his arms.

“Sucks, doesn’t it?” Blaine asks, not moving from his spot.

Kurt shrugs his duffle bag higher onto his shoulder. “You here to rub it in?”

Blaine stays still, and Kurt really wishes he’d do something with his body, anything to give Kurt even the slightest indication of where he’s going with this.

When Blaine doesn’t respond for a few moments, Kurt says, “Because if you are, you can save it. I already feel fucking awful, and I don’t think I’m up for one of our snipe sessions.”

Blaine still doesn’t say anything, though Kurt notices his left eyebrow has raised the tiniest bit.

“You know how much this sucks for me?” Kurt can’t help it. He feels raw from the loss, and the almost half-hour shower he’d just taken to try and rid himself of the feeling had done absolutely nothing. All of his teammates have left already, quietly expressing their condolences to him, a few reminding him that they’re planning to get spectacularly drunk at their favorite bar a few blocks down.

Kurt doesn’t feel like getting drunk. He doesn’t feel like sitting around with the team he knows he let down while they all try to convince him that it wasn’t his fault. He doesn’t want to be faced with the reminder that it’s actually completely over.

“You have another shot at this,” Kurt continues, one hand gripping the strap of his duffle bag tightly. His other hand points accusingly at Blaine, not close enough to actually push him but wanting more than anything to do so. “You get another year to redeem yourself, to get the win for your team. I’m done. This was it for me. I’m graduating in a few months, and since we didn’t even make it into the semi-finals, I know that not a single scout is going to contact me, which means that my soccer career is over. I’ve fucking peaked. Now I have to finish my dumbass degree, and then get some bullshit office job that I’ll fucking dread going to every day of my damn life, and all because—”

He doesn’t get to finish the outpour of emotions. Blaine closes the distance between them and interrupts him mid-sentence with a deep, forceful kiss on the lips. His hands come up to cup Kurt’s face, bringing him close.

It takes Kurt a moment to catch up, but as soon as he does, he lets himself melt into the kiss. He wraps his free arm around Blaine’s waist, pulling his middle in closer to Kurt and feels his other hand relaxing around the strap of his bag.

Blaine breaks the kiss, separating with a soft smack of the lips. “I know,” he says, hands still on Kurt’s cheeks, forcing him to look directly into his eyes. “I know.”

Kurt nods as well as he can between Blaine’s hands. He licks his lips, then asks, “Is your roommate home?”

Blaine shakes his head.

Kurt nods again, and says, “Perfect.”

the eleventh time

Just an hour ago Kurt had been fucking into Blaine from behind, letting himself be more forceful than he usually was, his anger at the defeat seeping into every single thrust.

Blaine let him. There were no jabs, no snipes, no bitchy or petty comments. He just let out a few, “Keep going’s,” every now and then to let Kurt know that he was okay with what was happening.

Now, Kurt is lying on his back on Blaine’s bed, with Blaine’s head between his legs, gorgeous lips wrapped tightly around Kurt’s cock.

Kurt can’t stop staring at him, heart jackrabbiting in his chest. His curls are still drying from the shower he’d taken earlier and are so soft around Kurt’s fingers. He keeps shifting his fingers through them, wanting to memorize the feel of them in case he never gets this chance again.

They don’t do this. Or, at least they never have before. It’s always either been quick handjobs in shower stalls after games or fucking in one of their apartments. For some reason, to Kurt, going down on Blaine always felt like it was too much. Too vulnerable. Giving Blaine too much power.

Yet, here Blaine is, doing exactly that. He bobs up and down slowly on Kurt’s cock, swallowing around him every so often, tongue caressing the underside of his dick with every movement of his head.

It feels like he’s worshiping Kurt’s cock, and Kurt doesn’t really know how to feel about it.

Because what he’s realizing now is that he isn’t the one with the power here. Blaine may be the one doing all the work, but it’s Kurt who feels vulnerable. It’s Kurt who feels powerless. It’s Kurt whose heart is practically beating out of his chest, begging for him to just hand it to Blaine on a silver fucking platter.

“Blaine, I’m—”

He doesn’t have to finish the sentence. Blaine brings a hand up and wraps it around the base of Kurt’s cock, then increases his speed, bobbing up and down and Kurt’s cock faster, tongue finding the underside of his cock and focusing on the skin there.

“Blaine,” Kurt warns, tightening his hold on Blaine’s curls. “Blaine, pull off. I’m going to—”

Blaine doesn’t stop, doesn’t pull off, and before he can stop himself Kurt is coming down Blaine’s throat, head falling back against the pillow and eyes closing as he feels Blaine’s cheeks hollow around him, carrying him through the orgasm.

As though reading his mind, Blaine pulls off exactly when Kurt starts to feel sensitive, and Kurt flutters his eyes open just in time to see Blaine swallow heavily.

Blaine moves up until he’s directly next to Kurt, staring right into his eyes with an intensity that Kurt isn’t sure he’s ever seen off the field.

“It’s not over for you,” Blaine says. He reaches a hand out and finds Kurt’s, linking their fingers together. “You’re going to do amazing things in your life, Kurt. One loss isn’t the end. You’re right at the beginning.”

Kurt nods, the words warming his stomach and drying out his throat. He can feel tears pricking at the edge of his eyes, and god, as if this whole experience wasn’t embarrassing enough already now, he’s going to, what? Cry?

“That’s, um.” He has to pause to clear his throat, as his voice comes out scratchy and low. “That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.”

Blaine shrugs, a small, private smile on his lips. “Don’t get used to it, Hummel.”

Kurt’s heart stutters in his chest, and he finds himself smiling as well even as he already starts to sit up, letting Blaine’s hand go to pick up his clothes. “Wouldn’t dream of it, Anderson.”

the fifteenth time

It’s different between them since the Violets got eliminated from the tournament. Not just because they’ve now officially exchanged phone numbers and actually arrange to meet up instead of simply falling into bed together every time they have a match or after running into each other at some sports bar.

No, it’s different because they actually talk to each other now. It’s not just petty insults, sex, a few more petty insults, and see you later. Now Kurt finds himself sticking around for a bit after the sex at Blaine’s apartment to ask about his day, his classes, his life. And the one time they managed to do it at Kurt’s apartment he found himself looking for excuses to keep Blaine around longer than necessary, to the point where his roommate Mike almost caught Blaine leaving.

He can’t help it. He may hate Blaine’s team, and in theory Blaine for being the captain of said team, but as a person Blaine is…

Well, he’s quite possibly the kindest person Kurt has ever met.

“Slow down,” Blaine says, legs coming up so that he can hook his ankles together over Kurt’s lower back. “Sam’s going to be out all night, you don’t need to rush.”

Kurt nods and does as Blaine asks, slowing down until he’s just gently rolling his hips, not even really thrusting. Blaine’s eyes flutter shut and his lips part in a silent show of enjoyment.

And this is the other thing that’s changed – they never fucked face-to-face before. It was always either back-to-chest if they were in the shower, or with one of them on all fours in bed. Yet, this is the third time they’ve done it, and honestly, Kurt is starting to wonder if there’s a way he can request that they stop.

Because actually seeing Blaine’s face while they do this? Looking into his eyes as he talks while they fuck? Watching him as he falls apart under Kurt’s ministrations?

It’s getting to be a little too much.

“Fuck,” Blaine whispers, eyes still shut. He rolls his hips in time with Kurt’s, and a small smile appears on his face. “Don’t know if I’ve ever said this, but you’re fucking amazing at this.”

Kurt’s stomach constricts. “I bet you say that to all the boys.”

Blaine’s eyes open slowly, a slight frown on his face. He reaches a hand up to cup Kurt’s cheek, fingers spreading wide enough to completely cover the left side of Kurt’s face.

With far too much inflection in his voice, he says, “No. I don’t.”

Then, he tilts his head up and presses their lips together, flicking his tongue against Kurt’s in time with the slow movements of their hips.

Kurt lets himself be kissed, lets himself fall into the feeling of Blaine’s warm mouth and Blaine’s ass tight around his cock, loses himself in the emotions it sparks in him.

It’s definitely getting to be too much.

the twenty-first time

Kurt and his roommates decide to celebrate the fact that they’re all back in New York after the holidays by going out for drinks at the bar a few streets down. It’s usually a pretty quiet spot since it’s decently out of the way, which is what makes it all the more surprising when they walk in to find Blaine and a few of his fellow Lions sitting in the booth right next to the door.

“Oh jeez,” Kurt mutters, just as Mike says, “Oh, for fuck’s sake.”

Blaine instantly stands, eyes flying between the five Violets, only lingering on Kurt for a second longer than on all the rest. “Hey Violets.”

“What the hell are you guys doing here?” Matt is scowling down at them, Mike has his arms crossed over his chest, Jake has a massive scowl on his face, and Kurt is just now realizing how ridiculous this rivalry is. “This is NYU town.”

“We’re not trying to start anything,” Blaine assures, raising his hands with palms out. “Honest. Just heard some amazing things about the wings and nachos here, and we couldn’t figure out where else to go.”

“Bit far for chicken wings and nachos,” Kurt mutters, feeling his cheeks warm, fully aware that he’s the one who told Blaine about this place.

“They’re really good chicken wings and nachos,” Blaine says, eyes meeting Kurt’s, whose blush worsens under his gaze. He looks away, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Whatever,” Elliott, shakes his head. “Let’s go somewhere else. I can’t eat with these guys stinking up the bar.”

“Oh, come on,” Kurt rolls his eyes, putting a hand on Elliott’s chest to stop him from turning around to leave. “The season’s done, and we’re all seniors. We’re not rivals anymore, just… five guys who won’t eat at a bar that some other random guys are at? That’s insane,” he shakes his head and pushes Elliott back a little. “We’ll just go sit in the corner and ignore them. Who gives a shit?”

His teammates grumble about it, but they still follow him toward the back corner of the bar, throwing glares behind them every now and then.

“You’ve changed, Hummel,” Elliott says, sliding into the booth and sitting next to him. “A few months ago you would have forced those assholes out on their asses for even daring to come to our turf.”

“Yeah, well, a few months ago we still had a chance at being NCAA champions. Now we’re just college students eating at a bar. Doesn’t seem worth it anymore.”

“Is it too late to rescind your captainship?” Mike throws out, to which Kurt replies by flipping him off.

His phone buzzes and he pulls it out, eyes widening when he sees Blaine’s name on his screen. He glances over at Blaine and tries to shake his head as subtly as possible, because he cannot be reading texts from him in front of his freaking teammates.

Blaine just widens his eyes and gestures down to his phone with his head. Kurt looks away, but still sneaks a look at his phone, trying to do his best to hide it from Elliott’s gaze without making it too obvious that that’s what he’s doing.

You didn’t tell me you were back in New York already.

Kurt rolls his eyes and shoves his phone in his pocket. He looks over to Blaine, mouthing, really?

Blaine shrugs, and Kurt rolls his eyes again, then turns away to focus on his roommates.

It’s at least twenty minutes before his phone buzzes again. He ignores it, pretty sure that it’s from Blaine. But it buzzes again, and again, and again, until he finally grabs it, already shaking his head at what he knows is waiting for him.

Come over tonight.

Kurt.

Come over tonight.

Kurt.

Kurt exhales sharply, shaking his head to himself as he quickly types back.

Your use of periods at the end of every text is unnerving

He doesn’t bother putting his phone away, as sure enough, within moments he has a reply from Blaine.

Please come over tonight. Sam is going to his girlfriend’s. Please.

He bites down on his bottom lip, then sighs and texts back: Fine, but stop ending all your texts with periods you look like a grandpa

Blaine instantly responds: Scouts honour. Text me when you’re leaving here

Kurt rolls his eyes to himself, then puts his phone back in his pocket.

Elliott elbows him, and when Kurt looks up it’s to find him waggling his eyebrows. “Boy trouble?” he asks.

Kurt just shakes his head and mutters, “Yeah, something like that.”

Blaine rides him that night, gripping his shoulders tightly as he does so, bouncing up and down on Kurt’s cock in a way that makes Kurt absolutely crazy.

He isn’t really sure how he managed to go two whole weeks without this.

When they’re done, Blaine lays down next to Kurt. He doesn’t lean in to cuddle, they still never do that, but he does lie down in such a way that they’re completely pressed together, shoulder to shoulder and hip to hip. Their hands touch awkwardly, and Kurt wonders if he’s supposed to hold Blaine’s hand.

“Can I tell you a secret?”

“You ask like I can stop you from doing so.”

Blaine chuckles at Kurt’s response, and his index finger comes out to run down Kurt’s palm.

“I went to that bar on purpose,” he says, voice quiet. “I was hoping to run into you.”

Kurt licks his lips, forcing his eyes to remain on the ceiling, trying to ignore the way the pad of Blaine’s finger feels against the inside of his hand.

“Why?” his voice is a little hoarse, his throat dry, and his heart is beating far too fast in his chest.

He can feel Blaine shrugging his shoulders next to him. “Wanted to see you. We barely talked over the break.”

“I know,” Kurt says. He had purposefully refrained from texting Blaine, even though his fingers had itched to do so every single day. “You could have just texted to see if I was back.”

Blaine shrugs again. “I guess.” He’s quiet for a moment, but then says, “I didn’t want to text you, though. I wanted to see you.”

“But why?”

This time Blaine doesn’t shrug. He doesn’t really say anything.

Kurt sighs, then sits up. “I should probably leave.”

“No, don’t go,” Blaine sits up too, putting a hand over Kurt’s wrist. “Come on, we haven’t seen each other in forever. Just hang out. Tell me about your break.”

“Blaine…”

“Kurt, come on.”

Kurt rubs a hand over his face. “Blaine, what the hell are we doing here?”

Blaine stares at him, lips parted as though on the cusp of words, but nothing comes out.

Kurt shakes his head. “This is insane. You know I genuinely disliked you when we started this? I mean, I thought you were hot, but you were so obnoxious on the field, and the Violets and Lions hate each other, so I just…” His hand goes through his hair, pushing it back. “But now we’re here, and we keep ending up here, and I don’t even know what to think about all this because you’re so…”

“I didn’t like you either,” Blaine says. Kurt meets his eyes, deep amber that he’s always terrified of drowning in. “I really didn’t. You were cocky, and so quick on your feet both on and off the field. So damn gorgeous it infuriated me.” He moves a little closer. “I didn’t think sleeping together would change anything. Just another way to channel our aggression.”

“Right,” Kurt says. “But we’re not soccer rivals anymore.”

“Yeah.”

“But we’re not really friends either,” Kurt continues. “We’re just… two guys who sleep together sometimes.”

Blaine’s finger finds Kurt’s hand again, and he starts tracing a pattern on his palm. “I consider you a friend.”

Kurt closes his eyes, head falling back slightly. “Shit, this is a mess.”

“It doesn’t have to be. It doesn’t have to be complicated, or messy, or any of those things.”

“Blaine…”

“Look, why don’t we, I don’t know. Hang out sometime. No sex, just… coffee, or lunch. Just talking.”

Kurt opens his eyes, but just enough to glare ever so slightly at him. “You mean like a date or something?”

Blaine shrugs. “Whatever you want to call it.”

Kurt sucks on the inside of his cheek, eyes still narrowed at Blaine. He takes in a deep breath, heart pounding in his chest. “Fine.”

Blaine’s face immediately lights up. “Really?”

“Yeah. But it’s not a date,” Kurt holds a finger up. “Just two guys getting lunch. No funny business.”

“Cross my heart,” Blaine does so, grinning widely. He looks over Kurt’s chest, then says, “You’re not still going to leave, right?”

Kurt continues to glare at him despite the warmth spreading through him at the obvious interest Blaine is showing him. He rolls his eyes, then says, “Fuck it. I didn’t have any other plans tonight.”

Blaine goes to lay back down, shoulders doing an adorable little shimmy, and Kurt follows him back down, finally allowing a small smile onto his face.

the twenty-second time

Kurt chooses a hole in the wall pizza place that he knows is just that much more out of the way for Blaine. He asks to meet at one, knowing that Blaine has a class at three-thirty that he can’t skip. He wears a sweatshirt and a loose pair of sweatpants. He barely spends any time on his hair. He reminds himself five times that morning that he will not offer to pay for Blaine, nor will he let Blaine pay for him.

Basically, he does everything in his power to make this as obviously Not-A-Date as possible.

Blaine is already there when Kurt arrives, dressed casually in beige chinos and a warm, soft-looking peacoat. He has his messenger bag hanging over his shoulder, and his hair is gelled back impeccably. He looks nice, and it kind of makes Kurt feel bad for wearing his most casual clothes and for shoving a beanie on his head before walking out the door, telling himself it’s to protect his ears from the cold and not because he knows it’ll make his hair look suboptimal.

He greets Blaine with a smile, then heads into the restaurant before Blaine can try and hold the door open for him. Blaine follows, already happily chatting away about how his day has been thus far.

They place their order at the counter, only briefly arguing over the financial benefits of sharing a pizza (what Blaine wants to do) versus each just ordering a few slices for themselves (what Kurt wants to do). Blaine ends up winning, but Kurt still forces the cashier to split the bill between them as she rings them up.

Not-A-Date.

Blaine starts to lead them towards a table in the back of the restaurant, but Kurt sits down at a table between a large group of college kids and a bickering middle-aged couple. Blaine looks at him a little weird, but Kurt doesn’t let that phase him.

Not-A-Date.

They chit-chat as they wait for their pizza, and it’s way less awkward than Kurt thought it would be. Blaine seems to have an endless supply of conversation fodder, and he somehow makes even the most inane things sound interesting. Kurt doesn’t say much, only chiming in whenever Blaine asks him a purposeful question, but he doesn’t mind at all. He’s actually pretty sure that Blaine could monologue at him for hours and Kurt would be happy just to sit there and watch him do it.

Not-A-Date.

Their pizza arrives and they tuck in. Blaine is a surprisingly neat eater, taking small nibbles and wiping any grease from around his mouth after every few bites. Kurt, on the other hand, practically inhales his pizza. It isn’t even a ploy to prove that this isn’t a date – Kurt’s had to get used to racing through any shared food after growing up with a human garburator as a step-brother and spending the past two years living with four similarly inclined roommates.

Blaine watches him devour his half of the pizza in the time it takes Blaine to finish a slice and half, lips curled into a tiny half smile. Once Kurt has popped the last bit of crust into his mouth, Blaine wordlessly holds out a handful of napkins to him, one eyebrow quirked, and Kurt blushes as he wipes down his hands and a large amount of his face.

“You got a bit on your sweater, too,” Blaine says when Kurt sets down the tiny mountain of napkins on the table. Kurt looks down and groans at the rather spectacularly sized grease stain on his chest.

He dabs at it with a few more napkins, but gives up after a few moments, rolling his eyes and stating, “Whatever, Elliott’s magic with this kind of thing, I’ll just make him fix it later.”

Blaine chuckles at that and takes another small bite of his pizza, eyes dancing as they stay locked on Kurt’s as he chews.

Not-A-Date.

Kurt takes over the majority of the conversation as Blaine eats, and he keeps it as surface as possible. He mostly talks about school, going into as much detail as he can about all the classes he’s taking this semester, how he only has one class with a professor he’s never had before, and how he has at least one teammate in every class, something he didn’t coordinate but is more than thankful for.

Blaine doesn’t seem to react any differently to Kurt mentioning his teammates than he did to any of Kurt’s other stories, but Kurt still decides not to continue down that particular conversation stream. As much as he’s trying to keep this Not-A-Date, he’s also been having a great time, and he doesn’t want to ruin that by potentially bringing up anything that could lead to a discussion about their rivalry.

Barely an hour has passed since they arrived by the time Blaine finishes his pizza. He wipes his lips and fingers down one final time, smiling a bit too widely at Kurt as he does.

“This was really fun.”

Not-A-Date.

“We should do this more often. You know, just hang out.”

Not-A-Date.

“You’re a really cool guy, Kurt.”

Not-A-Date.

“I’m glad you agreed to this.”

Not-A-Date.

“I’m just sorry that I have to head out so soon. My class is at three-thirty, and the Columbus campus is—”

Not-A-Date.

“Skip it.”

Blaine’s eyebrows shoot up, and Kurt’s heart skips a beat. Take it back, take it back, tell him you didn’t mean it, tell him—

“What?”

Take it back. “Skip your class,” the words come out, his mouth seemingly ignoring all commands from his brain. “Come home with me.”

Blaine presses his lips together, but Kurt can still see the corner of his mouth twitching up.

“I thought you said no funny business.”

Kurt swallows thickly, cheeks heating up. He looks down at the empty pizza box on their table and the heaps of napkins tossed around it.

“Right. Well, you have class, so.”

He hears Blaine chuckle and brings his eyes up hesitantly at that. Blaine is no longer hiding his smile, and his eyes are so warm on Kurt’s that it makes his heart ache a little.

“The semester just started,” Blaine says. “I think I can afford to skip this once.”

Not-A-Date.

It’s faster than usual, Kurt feeling pent up from trying to keep things so casual before. They don’t even get fully undressed, basically just shrug out of their coats once they’re in Kurt’s room and fall into Kurt’s bed, pulling their dicks out and jacking each other off like goddamn teenagers until Kurt’s sweatshirt and Blaine’s vest have tiny stains of come dotting them.

“Crap,” Blaine says once they’ve cleaned themselves up and made themselves somewhat more presentable, looking down at his vest with a bit of a pout. “Sam is going to be so mad at me for doing another load of laundry so soon.”

“Sorry,” Kurt replies, purposefully stopping himself from looking down at the various marks now staining his own sweater.

Blaine looks up at him, smiles, leans over and presses a quick kiss to his lips.

“Worth it,” he says with a grin.

Kurt smiles back, then picks up his phone to check the time. “It’s only two forty-five,” he says, chewing on his bottom lip for a moment. “You could probably still make it to your class.”

Blaine scrunches up his nose and says, “Nah. I’d rather keep hanging out with you,” he presses another kiss to Kurt’s lips. “You want to go for a walk?”

Kurt narrows his eyes at that. “It’s freezing out, Blaine.”

“So, change into something warmer.”

His eyes are sparkling, lips spread into an infectious grin, and Kurt chuckles as he stands and heads to his closet.

“Fine. But if I freeze out there, I’m totally blaming you.”

Blaine laughs, shaking his head lightly and says, “Deal.”

Not-A-Date my ass.

the twenty-third time

Blaine keeps up the façade of hanging out as just friends, no funny business, when he asks Kurt to come over for a movie night a couple of days after their not-a-date at the pizza place. Except he’s very clear that Sam will be out all night with his girlfriend, and that maybe it wouldn’t be the worst idea for Kurt to bring an overnight bag just in case things run late and he wants to crash on Blaine’s couch.

Kurt wants to call him out on how Obviously-A-Date this is, but he also wants to go and doesn’t really feel like getting into it with Blaine.

So, he packs his bag, tells his roommates that he’ll be back the next morning (pointedly ignoring the catcalls they send his way) and hops on the subway to Blaine’s apartment.

In Blaine’s defense, he’s done a good job of playing up the excuse for getting Kurt to spend the night. There’s a folded up blanket and a pillow on the arm of the couch, and Blaine is just as dressed down as Kurt was the last time they met up.

It’s still very much Obviously-A-Date, though, because instead of ordering food in Blaine has cooked them dinner. It’s just pasta, but the effort gone into it doesn’t go over Kurt’s head. He’s also bought a fairly nice bottle of red wine to go with the pasta, and after they’ve eaten produces the most scrumptious looking homemade cinnamon buns that Kurt has ever seen out of the oven.

“I like to bake,” is what Blaine says when Kurt tells him that it’s too much for just a movie night. Which may be true, but Kurt also knows that cinnamon buns are tricky and time-consuming as he, too, likes to bake. He, for one, only makes them when he’s trying to impress someone.

Which, if Blaine is trying to do, is definitely working.

They settle into the couch after their dinner and start up on some shitty romantic comedy on Netflix.

At the start of the movie they’re each comfortably on separate sides of the couch, sharing knowing looks whenever something particularly cliché happens. Then, about fifteen minutes in, Blaine stands up to go get another cinnamon bun, and when he sits back down, he is significantly closer to Kurt.

It’s quite distracting having Blaine so close to him, especially when he starts to lick the excess icing off his fingers after every single bite. Kurt spends the next five minutes ignoring the movie in favor of watching Blaine lave his tongue over his own fingers, cock growing hard in his pants at the memory of that tongue on himself.

Blaine catches Kurt looking moments after popping the last piece of the bun into his mouth. He raises an eyebrow, still licking the icing off of his fingers, and then far too innocently asks, “What?”

Kurt practically pounces on him at that, covering Blaine’s lips with his own and licking out the taste of the icing from his mouth. Blaine moans into the kiss, pulling Kurt closer and almost immediately wrapping a leg around his hips to bring them down onto Blaine’s.

The movie is still running, ignored, in the background when they hop off the couch and hurry to Blaine’s room hand-in-hand.

At least they can say they tried, right?

the twenty-seventh time

“Fuck, Kurt,” Blaine is under him, Kurt’s hands splayed over his chest as Kurt bounces on his cock. His thighs burn, but Kurt ignores them, fucking himself faster on Blaine’s cock as he feels his orgasm building.

“I’m—”

“Me, too,” Kurt says, fingers digging into Blaine’s chest. Blaine wordlessly brings a hand up to Kurt’s cock, wrapping his fingers around it as Kurt continues to speed up his thrusts.

“Shit,” Kurt groans, head falling back as Blaine pumps his cock in time with his thrusts. It doesn’t take long before Kurt is coming all over his own stomach and Blaine’s hand, and within moments he feels Blaine convulsing beneath him as he comes as well.

He practically collapses on top of Blaine once he’s come down, causing Blaine’s dick to slip out of him. Blaine groans at the sensation, and Kurt grumbles into his chest.

“I can’t feel my legs,” he mutters.

Blaine laughs at that, gently pushing Kurt off of him until he is lying next to him instead of directly on top. “Soccer season ending has got you a little out of shape, huh?”

“Get fucked,” Kurt mutters, whacking Blaine on the chest with as much energy as he can summon. Which isn’t actually that much, as the action only makes Blaine laugh a little louder.

“Just did,” comes Blaine’s reply after a few moments.

Kurt can’t even sum up the energy to act annoyed about that, so instead he just mutters a string of words that don’t even make sense into Blaine’s chest, resting his face on its warmth.

“I didn’t quite get that,” Blaine teases, fingers coming up to card through Kurt’s hair.

“Me neither,” Kurt says, sighing at the feeling of Blaine’s fingers.

Blaine chuckles and continues to move his fingers softly. It feels like heaven, the gentle feeling against his scalp in contrast to the burning in his legs. He settles further into Blaine’s chest, pressing a soft kiss to the skin beneath his lips, then lets his cheek rest there.

“My mom got me tickets to West Side Story for Christmas,” Blaine whispers, continuing his ministrations on Kurt’s hair.

“Yeah?” Kurt responds, just to let Blaine know he heard him. His eyes flutter shut as he feels himself relaxing further and further into the bed.

“They’re for next week,” Blaine continues, and Kurt can hear his heart speeding up a little where his head is lying.

Kurt’s finger starts to make a circle on Blaine’s side, where it’s been resting.

“Blaine?”

“Yeah?”

“Are you asking me to go to West Side Story with you?”

Blaine’s heart is definitely beating faster now, and it makes Kurt smile to himself. It’s not every day that he can literally feel the nerves that asking him out is making someone feel.

“Just as friends,” Blaine says quietly, fingers stilling. “No… no funny business.”

Kurt’s smile grows against Blaine’s chest at the words.

Because it’s silly, isn’t it? They’ve hung out so many times over the past few weeks, just as friends, no funny business, and every single time has ended with them in bed and Kurt leaving with a mental countdown to the next time they’ll meet up.

He’s starting to wonder what the point of all this “just friends” stuff really is. Other than a nonsensical fear over people’s reaction to the fact that he may actually like Blaine.

After all, it’s been clear since the first time that Blaine asked him to hang out that Blaine didn’t want it to be just as friends. That something had changed for Blaine throughout their time together. And maybe the first time he’d asked him Kurt wasn’t completely certain if things had changed for him too, but ever since the day at the pizza place, their hang out after, and the subsequent Not-A-Date’s they’ve been on…

“No,” Kurt says, opening his eyes slowly.

He could swear that Blaine’s heart literally skipped a beat when he said it, and Kurt instantly regrets playing coy.

“No?” Blaine asks, removing his fingers from Kurt’s hair.

“No, I mean,” Kurt pushes himself up on his hands so that he can look at Blaine when he says it. “I don’t want it to be just as friends with no funny business.” Blaine’s lips part a bit, one eyebrow raising.

“Then what would it be?” Blaine asks, and Kurt would be annoyed at the impertinence, but he guesses he kind of deserves it.

“A date?” He asks, shrugging one shoulder up and sending Blaine a hesitant smile.

Blaine’s face cracks into a happy smile. “Yeah?”

Kurt nods. “Yeah.”

“Okay,” Blaine says, wrapping an arm firmly around Kurt’s back. Kurt takes the hint and leans back down onto Blaine’s chest, happy when Blaine’s free hand goes back to his hair. “A date.”

“A date,” Kurt repeats, pressing another kiss to Blaine’s chest.

the twenty-eighth time

“You’re looking spiffy Hummel,” Mike says when Kurt exits his room. He grins at his friend, doing a little spin for him and Elliott, who are both sitting on the couch in their living room dicking around the PS4.

“Hot date?” Elliott asks, waggling his eyebrows as Mike wolf-whistles when Kurt finishes the spin.

“I sure do,” Kurt says, rubbing his hands down his thighs and licking his lips. “With Blaine.”

Mike and Elliott instantly frown, turning to each other with narrowed eyes.

“Blaine?”

“As in…?”

Kurt nods. “Yes, as in Blaine Anderson, Captain of the Columbia Lions. That Blaine.”

“Kurt are you—”

“Serious? Yes, I am,” Kurt says, glaring at Elliott, who snaps his mouth shut at the interruption. “I wouldn’t be telling you if I wasn’t.”

“When… how…?” Mike glances between Kurt and Elliott as he stammers, then settles his eyes on Kurt. “I don’t understand.”

“A while, and the how is not important,” Kurt says, not feeling like getting into the hate-sex-becoming-feelings portion of this just yet. “What is important is that I like him, and we’re going to see West Side Story, and if any of you give me any shit over this, I will not hesitate to kick your ass to Tuesday.”

Both Elliott and Mike raise up defensive hands, but neither speaks.

Kurt nods, then says, “Great. I’ll see you guys after my date. Or,” he scrunches up his nose, then says, “Maybe not. We’ll see.”

They don’t say anything else as Kurt leaves, and Kurt shuts the door behind him feeling like he just let a huge weight off his shoulders.

Blaine is waiting for him at the subway station closest to the theater, and the first thing he asks is, “Did you tell them?”

Kurt nods, smiling. “Did you?”

Blaine nods as well. “Well, just Sam,” he says. “He said he always thought there was something more than just rivalry between us.”

Kurt chuckles. “I just told Mike and Elliott. They…” he presses his lips together, scrunching up his entire face, then settles on, “I wouldn’t say they took it well, but they also didn’t try and physically stop me from coming, so. I guess that’s something.”

Blaine reaches out and takes Kurt’s hand, interlacing their fingers immediately. “I guess that’s that, then. Our friends know.”

“Our friends know,” Kurt nods. He squeezes Blaine’s hand. “And now there’s nothing hanging over us to stop us from enjoying our first official date.”

Blaine smirks a little, then asks, “Official?”

“Well, yeah, unlike those unofficial Not-A-Date’s we were going on before.”

Blaine laughs, lifting Kurt’s hand up to press a kiss to it. “You’re great, you know that?”

Kurt grins and nods. “Duh.”

Kurt’s apartment is closer to the theatre, and even though Blaine is a little concerned about the idea of flaunting their new relationship in Kurt’s teammates' faces so soon after revealing it, Kurt doesn’t care.

“They’re going to have to get used to seeing you around sooner or later,” Kurt reasons as they step onto the subway. “Might as well be sooner.”

Blaine grins, leaning into Kurt. “Planning on keeping me around for a while, huh?”

Kurt shrugs. “We’ll see.”

Blaine hides his face against Kurt’s shoulder, laughing a little. “We’ll see?”

Kurt shrugs again. “I mean, I kind of like you. A little. Which is weird, because I totally hated you a few months ago.”

“So weird,” Blaine agrees, kissing Kurt’s shoulder lightly. “I kind of like you too, you know?”

“Well that’s convenient,” Kurt says, and Blaine chuckles yet again.

Mike, Matt, and Jake are all sitting on the couch when Kurt and Blaine walk in.

“Oh, shit,” Matt says, eyes widening. “I thought you were joking,” this is directed at Mike, who rolls his eyes.

“I was not,” Mike says, glancing briefly at Kurt before looking back to the TV.

“I think it’s nice,” Jake says, smiling at the two of them. “Plus, it’s not like they were super subtle with the unresolved sexual tension on the field.”

“Unresolved?” Blaine asks quietly, and Kurt elbows him gently.

“Yeah, dude, good for you,” Matt says, giving Kurt a somewhat hesitant smile. “Anderson’s hot for a dude, even if he is a Lion.”

Both Jake and Matt turn to glare at Mike, who doesn’t respond until Jake kicks him swiftly in the shin.

“Ow, fuck,” Mike drops a hand down to rub at his shin, glaring at Jake before turning to Kurt and Blaine and saying, “Yeah, congratulations, I’m happy you’re happy.”

Kurt chuckles at that, shaking his head at how stubborn his teammates can be. “Mike, I think if you put aside our stupid rivalry – which doesn’t even really matter anymore because, if you didn’t notice, none of us play for the Violets anymore – you’ll find that you and Blaine actually have a lot in common. I bet you guys could even become friends.”

Mike waves a dismissive hand, eyes back on the TV. “Yeah, sure, I’ll get to work on that. Just don’t be too loud when you’re sexing it up in there, okay? It’s distracting.”

Kurt rolls his eyes, but figures that’s about as good as it’s going to get for now. He pulls Blaine towards his room, ignoring the way that Blaine is shaking with silent laughter.

“I guess that could have gone worse?” Blaine says once Kurt has closed the door behind them.

“Way worse,” Kurt agrees, then pushes Blaine back onto his bed, wordlessly telling him that he’s done talking about it.

the thirty-second time

Sam is out, and Kurt and Blaine are tangled together under Blaine’s sheets. Kurt is trying to suck a hickey into the hollow of Blaine’s neck as subtly as possible, while Blaine ruts up against Kurt’s thigh, whining at the not-nearly-enough pressure Kurt is providing.

“Kurt, come on,” Blaine says, running a hand down Kurt’s back, fingernails scratching over him lightly.

“Come on, what?” Kurt asks, sucking a little harder at the red spot beneath his lips.

“Just… something. Anything.” Kurt smirks against Blaine’s skin, then lifts his head slightly so Blaine can see him raise his eyebrows at him challengingly.

Blaine huffs, digs his nails into Kurt’s back, and says, “Fuck me.”

Kurt pushes himself up to kiss Blaine softly on the lips, whispering, “See how easy it is to use your words?”

Blaine groans, pushing Kurt away and towards the nightstand where he keeps his lube and condoms.

Kurt goes happily, grabbing what they need and immediately starting to coat his fingers in the lube. He warms it up briefly, probably not enough, then brings two fingers down to Blaine’s hole and presses them in.

“Cold,” Blaine hisses, just as Kurt expected him to. Kurt chuckles, gently pressing the fingers in and out of him.

“You wanted something.”

“You’re a dick,” Blaine mutters, then gasps when Kurt curls his fingers inside him. Serves him right.

“Maybe enough using your words for now, huh?” Kurt continues the slow movement of his fingers, taking his time in a way that he knows drives Blaine absolutely crazy.

It’s at least five minutes before he pulls out to re-apply lube to his fingers, including a third this time. He presses them in far too slowly, and Blaine groans, punching a fist against the mattress as he lifts his hips and wriggles them.

“Come on, Kurt,” he says. “It’s been forever since we did this.”

“Exactly,” Kurt whispers. “Which is why I want to be extra careful to make sure I don’t hurt you.”

“For fuck’s – Kurt. Please.”

Kurt smirks, stretching his fingers out inside Blaine, then bringing them together to gently stroke at Blaine’s muscles with the pads of his fingers. He can feel the way Blaine contracts around him at the motion, and so repeats the action, thrilling at the feeling of it and the thought of how soon, he’ll be able to feel that around his cock.

“Kurt, oh my god,” Blaine says, punching the mattress again. “Do not make me beg, I’m serious.”

As much as Kurt would love to go down that road, he does have to admit that he’s getting a little too worked up himself. With a quiet, “Alright, alright,” he pulls his fingers out. He makes quick work of the condom, rolling it on and then spreading a bit more lube over his cock.

Before long he’s lined himself up against Blaine’s hole and is pushing in slowly, no longer to tease Blaine but out of fear of this being over embarrassingly soon.

“Shit,” Blaine groans. “You’re so big. Don’t know how I always forget you’re so big.”

Kurt barely hears the praise, focusing on not coming instantly as Blaine’s tight, hot body welcomes him in.

Once he’s bottomed out, he pauses for a moment, eyes shut, and hands clenched around the sheets around Blaine’s head. He bites down on his bottom lip, breathing in and out through his nose.

“Kurt,” Blaine whispers, and Kurt’s eyes open to find Blaine’s directly below him, staring up at him with blown pupils and a softness that Kurt can’t really believe is directed at him. “Hey,” Blaine continues when Kurt’s eyes have opened. “You okay?”

Kurt nods, then lowers himself down to press a kiss to Blaine’s lips, his cock shifting inside of Blaine as he does so.

“Fuck,” he mutters at the same time as Blaine says, “Oh, shit,” against his lips. They both chuckle quietly, and then, not wanting to waste more time, Kurt begins to roll his hips in a slow, but steady, pace.

Blaine’s head falls back against the mattress, and he hooks a leg around Kurt’s hips, pulling him in just a little deeper with every thrust.

Neither speaks as they build a rhythm together, their bodies moving in sync. Despite how many times they’ve done this, Kurt still finds himself amazed at how well they fit together. How easy it is to be with Blaine like this. How, even when they hated each other, he couldn’t help but admit that nobody had ever been so perfectly matched for him, sexually, as Blaine is.

Now, of course, he knows that it’s more than just sex. The few weeks he’s been dating Blaine have felt like something out of his high school fantasies. The way their conversations ebb and flow come as easily as the movements of their bodies together. Their plans always line up perfectly, even if they aren’t exactly what either of them planned, and every time he leaves Blaine’s apartment, or wherever they’ve met up, or watches as Blaine leaves him, he starts to count down the minutes until they will see each other again.

It was only months ago that he hated the fact that he couldn’t stop falling into bed with Blaine. Now he can’t imagine why he would be doing anything else.

“I’m not going to last much longer,” Blaine says, bringing up his other leg to full wrap around Kurt. Kurt takes the hint and begins to speed up his thrusts, simultaneously bringing a hand down to jack Blaine off as he does.

He can feel his own orgasm building but does his best to hold it back. Blaine starts to whine as he gets closer, and soon enough he’s coming over Kurt’s fist, his muscles contracting around Kurt in what Kurt is pretty sure is the closest he will ever feel to heaven.

Kurt lets himself follow Blaine, the feeling of the muscles around him just enough to push him over the edge. He fucks Blaine through it, reveling in the sounds of Blaine’s moans as he starts to come down from his orgasm just moments before Kurt does.

He pulls out as soon as he’s finished, careful to go slow. He makes quick work of the clean up, throwing out the condom and grabbing a few tissues from Blaine’s nightstand to mop things up quickly.

“We’re going to have to shower,” Blaine mutters as Kurt tosses the tissues in the general direction of the trash.

“I have no problem with that,” Kurt says, lowering himself back onto the bed and curling into Blaine’s side.

They lay in silence for a few moments, Kurt enjoying the rise and fall of Blaine’s chest under his cheek. He notices that the spot he’d been sucking on early is indeed starting to darken further, and grins to himself at the knowledge that he put that there. That he’s the one who gets to kiss Blaine, fuck him, and give him hickeys to announce to the entire world that there is someone in Blaine’s life who wants to be known.

He smiles, running a finger in slow circles over Blaine’s chest.

“Hey,” he says, turning his head slightly to make sure that Blaine can hear him well.

“Yeah?”

Kurt feels his smile growing a little bit more as he asks, “Be my boyfriend?”

The sound of Blaine’s heart speeding up in his chest is enough answer for Kurt, but the soft, sweet, “Of course,” that Blaine whispers seconds after Kurt has asked is even better.

the first time

The tiled wall of the shower stall is cool against Kurt’s palm, but Blaine’s back is warm against his chest, his hip is hot under Kurt’s other hand, and his ass is scorching around his cock. Not to mention the spray of warm water falling over them as they groan in unison, Kurt pressing Blaine’s body into the cool tile with every thrust.

It happened fast. They were the last two in the Lions locker room, exchanging snide jabs over the tiny dividing wall between their showers. Blaine leaned over a little too far during a retort and his eye travelled down. The longer he stared, the more it affected Kurt, who found himself embarrassingly hardening under the eye of his rival.

Then, they were kissing. First over the shower divider, then together in Blaine’s shower stall, Kurt pressing Blaine up against the wall. Then Blaine was excusing himself and returning surprisingly quickly with a travel-sized pack of lube and a condom. He pushed the items into Kurt’s hand, then pressed himself back up against the wall, ass sticking out invitingly.

And now they’re here. Despite being able to follow the chain of events quite easily, Kurt is still having some trouble believing that it’s real, that he’s actually fucking Blaine Anderson in the goddamn Lions showers.

“Just so you know,” Blaine says, voice breathless, “this doesn’t change anything. I still hate you.”

“Ditto,” Kurt retorts, moving the hand on the wall down to Blaine’s other hip to be able to fuck him a little more forcefully.

“Shit,” Blaine mutters. Then, a little louder, “I’m still going to kick your ass during this tournament.”

“I’d like to see you try,” Kurt replies, thrusting deep into Blaine’s ass.

“And this isn’t going to become a thing,” Blaine continues as though Kurt hadn’t said anything. “We’re not going to become fuck buddies, or something like that.”

“Don’t you have to be buddies for that to work?” Kurt asks, punctuating the sarcasm with another forceful thrust.

“Exact- fuck,” Blaine’s forehead falls forward and rests against the tiled wall. “So, we’re agreed.”

“Yeah,” Kurt says, gripping Blaine’s hips a little tighter. “Just a one-time fuck. Relieve the tension.”

“Great,” Blaine says. “I’m glad we’re on the same page.”

Kurt continues to fuck Blaine as hard as he can in this position, digging his fingernails into Blaine’s hips, hoping to leave marks that will last at least a few days.

“Definitely,” Kurt manages, pressing his entire body right up against Blaine’s, taking in his warmth, how tight he feels, how perfect he fits against him. If this is going to be the only time, he gets to do this, after all, he’s going to do everything he can to take it all in. Wring every drop of this moment into his mind, where he knows he’ll replay it for at least the entire duration of this tournament every single time he jacks off.

Blaine shouts, “Fuck, Kurt,” and Kurt feels his orgasm growing from the pit of his stomach.

“Yeah,” he murmurs, voice so quiet he’s not sure Blaine can hear him even from this close. “Definitely same page.”

#klaine fic #klaine au #klaineanummel fic #glee potluck big bang #glee potluck exchange #klaine #over 2k under 10k #pov: kurt #one shot #enemies to lovers

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soccer-tips1x2 · 5 days ago

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🔥 Brighton vs Chelsea – Both Teams To Score (BTTS) 🔥

The Premier League battle between Brighton and Chelsea is set for February 14, 2025, at 21:00. With goals flowing in recent encounters, this matchup looks set for another BTTS outcome.

📊 Tip: Both Teams To Score (BTTS) ✔ 6 of their last 7 meetings have seen goals from both sides ✔ Chelsea has scored in 9 of their last 10 matches ✔ Brighton has found the net in 8 consecutive home games

🔙 Recent Head-to-Head Results: ✅ 28-09-2024: Chelsea vs Brighton 4-2 (BTTS) ✅ 15-05-2024: Brighton vs Chelsea 1-2 (BTTS) ✅ 03-12-2023: Chelsea vs Brighton 3-2 (BTTS) ✅ 15-04-2023: Chelsea vs Brighton 1-2 (BTTS) ✅ 29-10-2022: Brighton vs Chelsea 4-1 (BTTS) ✅ 18-01-2022: Brighton vs Chelsea 1-1 (BTTS) ✅ 29-12-2021: Chelsea vs Brighton 1-1 (BTTS) ❌ 20-04-2021: Chelsea vs Brighton 0-0

⚽ Expect an exciting clash with both teams getting on the scoresheet! ⚽

📊 For more match stats and analysis, visit 👉 www.h2hfacts.com

📢 What’s your score prediction? Drop it in the comments! 👇🔥

#tomorrow sure win #best betting #best football predictions #soccer #football tips #betting formula #betting strategies #tomorrow best odd #football #betting #Football #epl #over 2.5 goals #h2h btts

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fizzingwizard · 4 years ago

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I fell asleep so here’s day 5 a bit late to party... Day 6 will surely be late too xP Again, thanks for the comments last time, I enjoyed them, even the ones hidden in tags haha.

Koushirou and Taichi have a talk post-Bokura no Mirai. Watch out, cuz both boys have mouths on them. Taishiro if you squint.

---

Tri week day 5 - Survival - They Make Miracles

Taichi texted him wanting to hang out over after school, and as Koushirou had spent the day at the office, that meant Taichi came there. He spread out on the couch, flipping through the pages of some comic book. Koushirou sat at his desk. They had a bottle of cold oolong each and a bowl of shrimp crackers. Out the window, the din of rush hour traffic filtered in from the Tokyo streets below.

Some might look at them and think they were ignoring each other, each occupied in separate activities, only looking up to acknowledge there was someone else in the room when their hands bumped reaching into the cracker bowl. But their friendship worked like this. In fact, if the long stretches of silence bothered Taichi at all, he would have ditched Koushirou way back in elementary school.

That was something about Taichi not everyone understood: he could get as wrapped up in his own head as Koushirou did. Sometimes it seemed like Taichi sought him out because he wouldn't have to feel pressured to make small talk. He wanted to think, and he wanted someone else to be there while he was thinking, but not Sora, who would want give him advice, and not Yamato, who would stay quiet but coiled with tension until Taichi finally said something to bring them back to known waters. Koushirou, at least, understood the need for privacy for his thoughts, even if he didn't quite get why Taichi still wanted another body there anyway.

So it came as a surprise when Taichi shattered the silence, a page of the comic book suspended in the air as he paused mid-turn. "I'm never going to know if it was a mistake or not, am I," he said.

Koushirou looked up. Taichi's gaze was fixed on a random spot on the coffee table. But then he straightened, throwing his arms over the back of the couch in a deceptively casual move. His face, though, he kept turned away.

On days like this, Koushirou tended to be so involved in his work that, even if Taichi did have something to say, all he'd get in reply was a vague "Hmm." Later he might not even remember that they'd talked. It was a habit that drove Mimi up the wall, but once again, Taichi never seemed to mind that much. Of course, most of the time the conversation was along the lines of "Look at the cool play this soccer star made," or "Can you believe Satou-sensei expects us to finish the group project by tomorrow?" and "Hmm" was, more or less, all the response needed. Plus Koushirou was pretty sure Taichi sometimes took advantage of it to insist he had agreed to things he couldn't recall ever discussing.

Too bad he couldn't pretend this was about a mistake on some test.

His fingers hovered over the keyboard while he weighed his options. "... The world isn't divided into good and bad, Taichi-san," he said at last, though once the words were out, they felt pale and trite horribly inadequate. "For what it's worth, I think you made the right choice. Really the only choice."

He didn't add the rest: that he viewed killing Meicoomon as akin to chopping off a gangrenous limb. A terrible choice to make, but without it, the necrotic tissue would continue to spread and infect until there was nothing left. The metaphor worked, but he felt pretty sure the depersonalization wouldn't sit well with Taichi.

Taichi made a noncommittal noise. Something knotted in Koushirou's stomach. Probably, more than any of the others, Koushirou was the least upset with how things had ended with Meicoomon. In his wildest dreams he'd never imagined separating a Chosen from their partner, let alone - let alone killing one. When he'd realized Meiko might know the password to unlock the Digimons' sealed memories, hope had struck him like a bolt of lightning: all those dark predictions he couldn't see his way out of were about to be swept away by a miracle. Just like when they were kids.

That was the fatal error. There hadn't been any miracles when they were kids.

It had only felt that way because they didn't know how else to explain the unexplainable.

He and Taichi had talked many times over the years, about the fact that they were killers. The others didn't get a lot out of putting it into words like that, but it was true. They'd been killing since they were ten years old, killing to protect, killing to survive. It was just that, this time, they'd killed someone that loved.

"I just," Taichi swallowed thickly. "At the time, we... there wasn't any more time, but... now I just wonder... no one else wanted to do it, they all followed my lead and maybe... Sorry, I'm not making any sense..."

"We followed your lead like we always do, Taichi-san, because you lead us well." In a sudden fit of nerves, Koushirou pushed off the polished surface of his desk and stood. Once standing, though, he felt infinitely more awkward and wished he hadn't.

He was trying to think of an unobtrusive way to disappear behind his workspace again when Taichi at long last gave up staring at the wall. He looked over at Koushirou with liquid brown eyes. It was only the briefest of glances before he hunched over on the edge of the couch, fingers digging into his scalp.

His next words were muffled and wet-sounding.

"Nishijima-sensei died. I was - I was so messed up. I shouldn't have made that decision. I shouldn't have made any decisions. I was - what's the word they use -"

"Compromised?" Koushirou offered.

"Yeah, that."

Fuck.

Why did Taichi have to come to him for comfort? Yamato or Sora would be so much better at this.

If they were better, he would have gone to them, Tentomon's matter-of-fact voice in his head pointed out. Tentomon was in the digital world at present, but Koushirou didn't need him there to know what he'd think about this.

Then another voice, one that didn't sound like Tentomon at all, added: Maybe comfort isn't all he wants.

"You witnessed something... unspeakable," Koushirou said gently. His feet seemed to move as if on automatic, making a winding path around the desk to stand at the coffee table's edge, an arm's length away from where Taichi had begun to collapse in on himself. "It had to affect your judgment."

A beat. Taichi gave a tremulous nod.

"It doesn't follow that your judgment must have been mistaken, Taichi-san."

The hands smoothed down his face. "But I'm never going to know," he said in a dull voice.

Folding his arms, Koushirou sat down on the opposite seat. "Let's not deal in vagaries. Here's what I know," he said, careful to keep his tone level, bussinesslike. "I know the world was going to change, at that moment, one way or another. I know a lot was at stake." Lives, the entire world - Mochizuki and Meicoomon. Taichi was certainly thinking it on his own. Koushirou forced himself to hold his gaze as he went on. "I know Meicoomon's data had been corrupted beyond recognition. I know Yggdrasil and Homeostasis both intended to move regardless of how we felt about it. I don't know how much was ever really salvageable. But I know you salvaged control. We're not their unwitting pawns, and that's thanks to you."

A slow smile crept over Taichi's face, brittle at the edges. "Isn't that thanks to you? Every time we need a miracle, Koushirou, you -"

"There are no miracles," Koushirou interrupted, with a stubborn set of his jaw, "that don't sacrifice on the altar of mysticism the ones who broke their backs to make them happen."

Stunned silence. Taichi gave a startled laugh. "Wow... I'm not sure I understood all the words there."

"Maybe there was a way to save Meicoomon." The words spilled out like a runaway train, and he had no idea if he was helping or hurting, but he couldn't stop now. "And maybe there was a way to save the digital world that didn't involve abducting eight children from their homes and making them fight for their lives, resetting their innocence, teaching them how the world assigns value, whether something is cheap or precious, based on circumstance, on convenience. We all handled it the best way we knew how, and sometimes - sometimes that way wasn't very good. The whole time, there was one thing that got us through it, day after day. Taichi-san, do you know what it is?"

Taichi looked as if he were hanging onto what Koushirou was saying like it were a lifeline. He nodded. "It was hope."

"No, Taichi-san," Koushirou said viciously. "It was you."

Taichi's throat worked, and his long, dark lashes stuttered. He seemed to try to answer, but lost the words he'd been looking for. "Fuck," he choked out after a while, head tilted back to stare at the ceiling.

Koushirou gave him time to get a hold of himself. He'd seen Taichi cry before. Always out of guilt. Well, not this time - not if he could help it.

The ping of an incoming message lit up his computer, followed by an insistent buzz from his phone a moment later. He didn't get up.

"I-I wish-" Koushirou listened in silence as Taichi tripped and stumbled over his unruly emotions. He suspected it had been a while since Taichi had done any sort of maintenance on them. Not since Meicoomon, probably.

"I wish we could have saved Meicoomon, Koushirou." He'd never sounded so much like a child, not even when he was one.

"We all do."

"But I don't know if it's because I regret what I did, or because I don't like the way Yamato and Sora treat me now, like I'm about to break down any second, or because Hikari will never look up to me the same way again-"

"None of the above. It's because you're a good person, Taichi-san."

The look on Taichi's face was somewhere between bleak and utterly desperate. "How can you be so sure about that?"

"I know many things," Koushirou said. "I think you'll agree with me there. I could be wrong about any of them, but not that one thing." He didn't smile, he didn't let his gaze waver. "Never that."

I don't wany any leader that isn't you.

"Fuck you," said Taichi, voice breaking, but there was unexpected laughter at the end of it. "Geez, Koushirou. What am I supposed to with that?" He shook his head, looking exhausted. "I couldn't talk about it before. I couldn't - make things all about me, when Mochizuki's the one who-" He stopped, fists curling and uncurling on his knees. "Yamato will beat me up if that's what I want from him. Sora will tell me everything's fine even if it's not what she really thinks. Hikari won't talk about it all. I figured you at least didn't hate me for what happened. Out of all of us, you would have thought everything through for yourself. At least your opinion would be your own."

"It is," Koushirou promised.

Taichi nodded. The color had begun to return to his face. Slowly, as if carding through his thoughts, he said: "I'll never know if it was a mistake. But it's done."

"It's done."

"That's not much of a balm for the soul," Taichi sighed.

Koushirou looked down. "I guess not," he said. "It's real, though."

Another silence followed. Like the calm after a storm, Koushirou thought. He did feel as though they'd just weathered some catastrophe, or perhaps escaped it by a hair.

"She says she doesn't hate me," Taichi said after a few minutes passed in therapeutic quiet. "Mochizuki."

"Ah."

"But she's... y'know. Kind. She's the type to blame herself for things that aren't her fault."

Koushirou shrugged. "Seems like you two are a matched set, then."

Taichi gave him a sharp look, but didn't say anything. He took a deep breath, whole body swelling like a cresting wave. Then he reached for a shrimp cracker.

"Damn... heavy talk makes me hungry."

Koushirou couldn't help it. He laughed. And reached for his bottle of oolong. He was parched.

"Koushirou..." Ah, he knew what was coming now. "Thanks. When I came over, I didn't mean for..."

"I don't want thanks. Or apologies." I just want you. But, no, that... he wasn't at a point where he could say that just yet. "I just want you at your best. I still think we can change the world, Taichi-san."

A hesitant grin. "That's a promise," Taichi said, only it sounded more like "fash a fwomish" with his mouth full of cracker.

Demons couldn't be defeated in a single afternoon, over oolong tea and shrimp crackers, despite best intentions. Koushirou knew that. He'd dealt with his fair share of demons and they were intractable little brutes. But Taichi could out-stubborn anything. He wouldn't have been able to lead them this far if that weren't true.

As for Mochizuki Meiko - even if Taichi couldn't quite admit it yet, Koushirou thought he understood why she was being "kind." Because though what they'd taken had been enormous, they'd done their utmost to give back what they could. It might be small, but seeds always are. Mochizuki had a future stretched out before her too, free from the designs of any government organization or mysterious otherworldly power. Teeming with possibilities, neither good nor bad. Simply there.

Taichi was going to change the world. Koushirou meant to do the same. People would say they made miracles, but the two of them would call it something else.

They would call it living.

---

as usual i am an overdramatic bitch

side note: I was gonna have Koushirou call out Taichi for saying Yamato would beat him up, but just didn’t find a spot for it. So for clarity’s sake, this is Taichi being hard on himself, not indicative of what Yamato would actually do. We all saw him cry after losing his bestie *wibble*

I don’t know how they can both reach the shrimp cracker bowl if Koushirou’s at the desk and Taichi’s on the couch, by the way. I guess it’s hovering in the air between them, or they both have Elastigirl arms :P

#triweek2020 #digimon adventure tri #koushirou izumi #taichi yagami #digimon #fizz writes

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stakegainsblog-blog · 6 years ago

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International Football Betting websites

Football is a very popular sport world wide and also a top source of entertainment to many. This is the most viewed and followed sport in the world. In many homes around the world, this is a major socializing event and people gather with friends or with family to watch the games. Other than watching the sports and enjoying it many of them also like to bet money and win from it.

Legal and Regulated markets

In many countries betting on games is legal and regulated. In these countries you will find hundreds of bookmakers ready to place your bet. There are also completely licensed online bookmakers who offer the same service with better pricing sometimes.

But in many parts of the world betting on games is considered as gambling and is frowned upon. It is compared to the likes of casino gambling, lotteries or poker games. Being unregulated it can be sometimes perceived as illegal getting you into trouble for betting.

So, whichever part of the world you are research well online, refer to all the betting sites and get aware of the laws and regulations completely. This will ensure you to stay safe and in limits when you are trying to bet on the games.

Various Football betting websites

There are a huge number of international websites that you can refer to learn about betting in football. There is enough information on the regulated betting markets around the world too. These websites offer tips to the punters on which could be the winning team in a league or a series game. The players to bet on etc. These tips are based on what their famous tipsters from around the world have to say about matches played and their players.

Conclusion

Enjoying football games with family or friends need not be only entertainment, with a little research and luck on your side it can turn out to be a truly earning event.

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freebestfootballtips · 3 years ago

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Free and Paid football betting tips from experts. Get free tips from professional betting tipsters, free mathematical predictions, and live scores. Free football predictions and betting previews for every game in all the major leagues, including match tips and correct scores. Football tips for todays matches. Get professional football tipsters best football betting tips for today and the weekend. Get Live Football Scores and Real-Time Football Results with BestFootballTips.com. We cover all Countries, Leagues and Competitions in unbeatable detail. Be sure, here you always will find football betting tips for tomorrow. Our experts create best predictions for tomorrow soccer games. If you are new or advanced, consider checking out our football betting blog. Our experts have collected all general betting tips and advice in one place.

#football predictions #bettingtipsfootballfree

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jungshookz · 6 years ago

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falling in crayolove; (kindergartenteacher!taehyung)

✎ pairing: kim taehyung x reader

✎ genre: kindergartenteacher!au, workingman!au, F L U F F, tiny bit of angst at the start :-( but this is literally 98% fluff; y/n and taehyung are like two little kids with little crushes on each other

✎ trigger warning(s): implications of getting an abortion!!

✎ wordcount: 10.5k

✎ summary: y/n is a very single mom and taehyung is a very single kindergarten teacher. emma knows exactly what she needs to do.

✎ note: okay LOOK before you get into reading, this isn’t technically a full fic! this is what happens when you cross a full fic and a baby drabble = this is a BABY FIC which explains why the word count is much smaller compared to the usual! (ps i will probably?? be writing more baby fics for characters such as garbageman!tae or.,,. oTher characters that i can’t think of right now lmao) i was originally going to leave kindergarten!tae as it was and i was just going to continue to write baby drabbles for him but i felt like he deserved a fic?? buT then i was conflicted because his original drabble literally already tells us the full story and i was like ok.,. what else is there to say.,,. sweats,,.. anyways this is what i ended up with! in case you were wondering, yES the original drabble is included in this fic since it’s a crucial part of the story and it would have been a waste to not use it but if you don’t want to read that you’re welcome to just skiP on over to the end lol. also emma is four years old and tae is a pre-kindergarten teacher because i changed my MIND - enjoy!!

pst if u wanna talk to y/n or emma or tae u know what to do ;-)

(gif isn’t mine!)

(((and the read more function iS there but most of the time it doesn’t work on mobile :// i am sorry don’t attack me by sending passive-aggressive anon messages)))

ah, yes.

to be young and i-

“i’m pregnant?!”

the reason why you came to the doctors today was because you thought you had some sort of stomach flu

at first it wasn’t a big deal

but then it started getting worse and you literally thought you had a parasite from eating at that dingy sushi place and you were mad at jin for like a week because it was hIs idea to go there and it’s not fair that hE didn’t get an upset tummy >:-(

jin reminded you that he warNed you about the sea urchin and you responded by smacking the back of his head

you have to admit

it is relieving to know that there isn’t a dangerous parasite living inside of you and feasting on your organs

it’s a,.,. ???

how would one describe a baby as a parasite

a perfectly natural parasite living inside of you!

well

it certainly explains things

the sudden onslaught of violent puking in the morning

you thought it was because your yogurt was starting to get a little funky but apparently it’s because there’s a baby growing inside of you!!!11!!!!

also you should probably start learning how to be more aware of the things that you’re putting inside of your body

also

this should have been a big hint: your period didn’T come this month and your red rain has never EVER been late

“but… i don’t understand.” you let out a breath and lean back against the reclining chair while staring up at the ceiling fan

the lightbulb flickers

“i- we use condoms and- we practice safe sex!!!” you exasperate and sit back up to look at dr. kim “we’re very vERy safe!!!”

“condoms are only effective 98% of the time.”

“yeAH that’s a preTTY BIG percentage” your knuckles grow white as you clench tightly around the arms of the seat in frustration

98%!!!!!!!

that means there was a 2% chance that the condom didn’t work and obviously you are part of that 2%!!!!!

“do you take birth control pills?”

“um, is the sky blue?? yes!!!!” you reply as if it’s the most obvious answer in the entire world

“the sky’s grey today.” dr. kim raises a brow at you before pointing behind you out the window “do you take them consistently?”

“ye-“ you press your lips together “…s…?”

sometimes you.,.., skip a day or two

you’re busy!!!!! you don’t always have the time to remember to pop a tiny pill into ur mouth

you didn’t think it’d be such a big deal

and you certainly didn’t think it’d result in u.., actually getting pregnant

“how many weeks…?” you trail off uneasily and pick at some lint on your sweater

you don’t feel so good now

it’s honestly probably because this baby is about to make you puke again but

oh god

you’re pregnant

you’re barely legal and you’re pregnant

you still see yourself as a kid!!!

you’re a kid who’s going to be raising a kid!!!!!!

kids should NOT be raising kids!!!!!!

“you are about… six weeks pregnant.” dr. kim flips through a chart before looking up at you with a small smile “currently, your baby is about the size of a sweet pea…”

in case it’s not clear

it takes two to tango

in this case

your tango partner is none other than son hyun-woo

otherwise known as

shownu

you’re going over to his apartment for dinner tonight and as much as you doN’t want to tell him you’re pregnant, he’s probably going to become suspicious when your stomach starts growing bigger and rounder as the months go by

you’ve been with shownu since grade eleven

it’s been a great four years!!!

shownu is very sweet and kind and caring and handsome and every other positive adjective that’s ever been recorded in the dictionary

you even chose to go to the same university as him just so you guys could stay together

he’s the captain of the soccer team which is a fact that you like to share with literally everYone because..,,. why wouLDn’t you brag about your soccer captain boyfriend

he’s… he’s the love of your life and that’s one thing you know for sure

you see yourself getting married to him and having kids with him and growing old with him

,..,you’re just not sure if he’d be down to do all of that stuff starting noW

you wipe your sweaty palms down on your leggings as shownu sets the plate of fried rice in front of you “i know you don’t like spicy things, but i threw in a liTTLE tiny baby bit of kimchi in here” he hums and takes a seat across from you “it should be fine though… if not, i made a backup plate of plain fried rice for you!”

you have half a mind to start off the announcement with ‘ah, yes, speaking of baBiES-‘ but perhaps that’s not the best approach to this delicate situation

frick

maybe you should tell him later

but.,,. it’s better to tell him soOner than later

you just don’t know what’s going to happen and you hate it when you’re unable to predict things

how is he going to take it??

he’s usually a very supportive boyfriend but this is a completely nEW kind of supportive

“by the way, thanks for helping me out with my sociology presentation. it went pretty well except for when the prof started asking questions related directly to my slides but luckiLy i was able to bullshit and finesse my way out of-“

“i’m pregnant.” you blurt out

shownu immediately chokes and his fork falls onto his plate with a loud clatter

“you’re-“ he pats his chest a couple times and takes a biG swig of water

he clears his throat

“you’re- i’m sorry, you’re what?”

“i… am… preg…nant.” you mutter sheepishly “pregnant.”

shownu stares at you with wide eyes and for a second you think you’ve broken your boyfriend

and then he snaps out of it

“dude, we’re 19 years old, i don’t wanna be a dad-!“

ok first of all did he just call you dude

and second of all

“and you think i wanna be a mom? we’re both part of this and we need to take full responsibility for our actions. w-we should have been more careful but-“

“i was the careful one! you were the one who was supposed to be on top of your stuPId pills and you couldn’t even remember to take them everyday and now look where we are!”

“look, it’s not the end of the world-“ your fingers tighten around the napkin on your lap

“god, y/n, how dumb are you?! this is going to ruin my life! you knoW how hard i’ve worked to get this soccer scholarship and all of that is about to be completely fucking derailed because of this dumb fucking baBy and- i’m not- no!” shownu snaps and slams a fist against the table

water sloshes out of both your guys’ cups from the vibrations

the dishes rattle slightly and you immediately divert your gaze to your lap

“i don’t want this baby!” he exasperates and throws his head back before placing his hands over his face “god, my parents… what the hell are they going to think??”

he looks over at you and shakes his head “you planned this, didn’t you?”

“wh- what??” your brows knit together and you let out a scoff “what the hell is that supposed to mean?”

“you planned this so that i’d have no choice but to stay with you because you’re carrying my child”

“shownu- obviously i didn’t fucking plan to get pregnant, it was an acCIdent and-“

“if you keep this baby, i will leave you.” shownu growls “get rid of it.”

at first you were upset

but now you’re just angry

how dare he speak to you like this?

“what did you just say to me?” you scoff and cross your arms

“i don’t want this baby. we cannot keep this baby. we will not be raising this baby. understand?”

jesus

“fine.” you murmur quietly “we won’t keep this baby.”

you swallow the lump in your throat and blink away your tears before letting out a shaky breath

“good.” shownu visibly relaxes and clears his throat before picking up his fork

he shovels a big bite of rice into his mouth “after dinner, we’ll make an appointment to go to the abortion clinic tomorrow afternoon. i think it’ll be fine if i skip the first half of training but hopefully we’ll be back before-“

the chair screeches against the floor as you get up and shownu immediately gets up as well “hey, where are you going?”

“you’re right, shownu. we won’t be keeping this baby - i’ll be keeping this baby. and i will raise my baby on my own.” you snap and reach down to grab your bag before storming to the front door

shownu doesn’t stop you

and you don’t look back.

the rest of the night goes by in a blur

it’s pretty fitting that it’s raining like crazy outside

you drop your backpack and keys on the floor once you get back to your apartment

you peel your sopping wet jacket off and toss it on the couch before kicking your shoes off

honestly

it feels like time’s stood still

it’s just white noise in your brain and you can’t seem to focus on anything

you flick the bedside lamp on and a cast of warm yellow washes over your room

you sit cross-legged on the floor at the side of your bed and let out a breath

the atmosphere is completely silent except for the sound of rain gently drumming against the window

a flash of lightning briefly lights up the sky

in the distance, you hear the slight rumble of thunder

you dial your mom’s number with shaky fingers and click the speaker button before setting it down on the mattress

brrrrrinnng

brrrrri-

your mom picks up on the third ring which was wAY sooner than you thought she’d pick up

“hey, look who finally called!”

you open your mouth to speak when suddenly you feel an overwhelming wave of anxiety and fear rush over you

you should have planned something before calling her

what’s the right way for a teenage daughter to tell her mother that she’s pregnant?

is she going to be disappointed with you?

is she going to be angry with you? tell you that you’re irresponsible and that she saw this coming from miles away?

is she going to tell you that this is something you’ll have to deal with yourself?

your parents worked so hard to get you here and they work hard to this day to continue paying for your tuition fees

and you’re about to tell them that hey, i’m pregnant

you haven’t even said anything and you’re already losing your composure

your nails dig into the flesh of your palm as you ball your hands into fists

“-i was wondering when i’d hear from you. your dad isn’t back from work yet but i’ll make sure to tell him that you called. i’m just making dinner now, i’m trying out this new pasta dish that-“

“mom?” your voice cracks and you clamp your lips together and shake your head

your bottom lip trembles and your vision starts to blur with tears almost instantly

oh god

you can’t do this

you feel your face burning up as you try your hardest to hold it back

a beat of silence goes by and you hear some shuffling on the other end of the phone

the first tear rolls down your cheek

“…honey, what’s wrong?”

and that’s all it takes

the rest of the tears follow in an unbroken stream

you immediately let out a pained sob before leaning forward and pressing your hands against the cold floor beneath you

you begin to cry with such force that your chest starts to hurt and your heart starts to clench and you feel like you could pass out at any moment

your mom can barely make out what you’re saying through your blubbering but she manages to pick out ‘pregnant’ and that’s all she needs to know

she waits for you to sob your heart out before deciding to speak up

she asks if you have the resources to raise a child

no, you don’t

she asks if you even want to have this child

yes, you do

she asks you if shownu wants to have this child

no, he doesn’t, but that doesn’t matter to you

she tells you how much she loves you and absolutely nothing is going to change that fact

after all, you’re her baby no matter what

you find comfort in knowing that you have some form of a support system and you’re not completely on your own

you turn and twist in the mirror as you keep your eyes glued on your bare stomach

you were about to take a quick shower but once you stripped off all your clothes you were suddenly moRe aware of your tummy

you don’t look pregnant

you don’t even feel pregnant

it’s just,.,. odd

knowing that there’s a living human growing inside of you

“it’s just you and me against the world, sweet pea.” you smooth a hand over your bare stomach and give it a gentle pat

just you and sweet pea

nine months seem to go by in a blur

shownu never reaches out to you and you never reach out to him

as far as you’re concerned you don’t want anything to do with him

as far as you’re concerned this is your baby and your baby alone

your ankles become swollen and your breasts become sore and weighty

your skin gets blotchy at some point and there’s not enough concealer in the world to hide the angry pimples dotted all over your face

ur mom says u were supposed to be glowing during pregnancy..,,. the only kind of glowing ur doing is from the gREASE

you find yourself casually throwing anchovies into your vanilla ice cream and topping it off with balsamic vinegar

you had to start taking online classes because it was becoming too hard having to transport to campus every day

every time you see a dog on the street you burst into tears because hOUHG my GOD it’S so cuTE *snorts*

you’re in the middle of a midterm when you feel sweet pea kick for the first time and it takes everything within you to not start crying in the middle of the examination hall

jin comes over to your apartment for study sessions but most of the time it ends up with him taping his earbuds to the swell of your tummy and letting sweet pea listen to some classical music

he goes through this phase where he’s obsessed with healing crystals and your apartment becomes scattered with rose quartzes and jaspers because he’s doing it for the baby

occasionally he makes you lie down so he can place small crystals in a circle around your belly button so that the healing energy will be absorbed into your body and into the baby

you’re thankful that you have a friend like him even though he’s literally a lunatic

your mom comes into town once a month and stays for about a week just to take care of you and make sure that both you and the baby are happy and healthy

as time goes on, your little sweet pea grows into a fuLL on watermelon

and eventually-

“jesus chRIST-“ your chest heaves with exhaustion as you lie back against the hospital bed

oh my god

that was the woRST eight hours of your life

your lower body is completely numb and you don’t even want to think about how buSted your vagina looks right now

you put her through a loT today!!!!

“here she is, mama!” the nurse gently places your screAMing bundle of joy in your arms and suddenly all the blood sweat and tears is completely worth it

“hi, sweet pea…” you laugh lightly as her tiny, mucousy hand wraps around your finger

she’s so beautiful

“i’m your mommy…” your eyes are glistening with tears of joy (aND pain) and you lean in to press a tiny kiss to the top of her head “just u nd me against the world”

well

that was four years ago

it’s pretty strange how quickly time can go by

four years ago you were nineteen years old

four years ago you were in a committed, loving relationship with someone you thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with

four years ago you were in your second year of university; first year was a hellish nightmare and you were just starting to figure things out

four years ago you found out you were pregnant and your world was turned upside down

and now you’re twenty-three years old

a lot has changed in the past four years

you are no longer in a committed, loving relationship with someone you thought you were going to spend the rest of your life with; in fact, you haven’t been in another relationship since shownu,., you haven’t even been on any dates

you are in your fifth year of university because you couldn’t graduate last year due to the fact that you were missing some credits; luckily you have moSt of university life figured out at this point even though you occasionally stiLL get lost on campus sometimes

you found a pretty stable job at a drug store a couple blocks away from the apartment

it’s not much but it pays the bills (your parents will occasionally chip in and help out if u need it) ((you’re very grateful to have the parents that you have))

jin is still a big fat doofus (he’s not aS obsessed with crystals but u keep them in the apartment because they’re pretty)

emma’s in pre-k now!!!! it seems like it was only yesterday that she started walking and talking

and now she won’t stop walking,.,. or talking

no tea no shade

emma is the absolute light of your life!!

and you would straight up SLAUGHTER anyone who would try to hurt her

:~)

she’s your little ball of sunshine who smothers you with kisses every morning to wake you up and writes ‘i lov3 mommy’ on literally any surface she can find (you’re flattered but u need to have a word with her about using lipstick to write on the walls) and always wants to help you make breakfast and dinner or fold the laundry or sweep the floors

emma is a peculiar little girl and you are so, so proud to be able to call yourself her mother

she’s compassionate and kindhearted and thoughtful and polite

she never forgets to say please and thank you

she likes to wait for you to get to the dinner table as well before digging into her spaghetti (she can’t pronounce spaghetti yet so she jumbles it together and it becomes spapeggi)

she likes watching nature documentaries (docummeneries) with you and would genuinely choose to watch that over the powerpuff girls or even spongebob and you were like ???? because yOU low-key want to watch spongebob and u don’t want to have to confess to your four year old daughter that you want to watch cartoons instead of a documentary

on mother’s day she woke you up with kisses and breakfast in bed!! she made you a peanut butter and strawberry jelly sandwich and you have to admit that it was *mwah* very scrumptious

emma is very curious as to who her dad is or if she even hAs a dad

she thought jin was her dad and jin was only slightly offended at how hard you laughed at that when she brought it up

because all the kids at school seem to have dads and she only has a mom

which isn’t a problem at all it’s just,.,. she wants to know

like her friend hwayoung has a dad!!!

and his name is hwayoung’s dad

that’s all she knows about him

one time all the kids in class were talking about their dads and emma didn’t have anything to say but lucKily she was able to steer the attention away from herself

(“my dad’s a dentist” “mine is a doctor!” “mine is a cee-hee-ho! emma, what does your dad-“ “cee-hee-ho of what?” “…i dunno” “yeah, cee-hee-ho of what?!”)

talking to emma about shownu is a tricky situation

“your dad is a very, very busy... soccer player...?”

you don’t actually know what shownu’s been up to besides the fact that he’s on the national soccer team which is gReat for him but every time you think about that stupid boy you can’t help but revisit the night when he basically told you that you would ruin his entire life if you kept the child-

“how come he never visits?” emma furrows her brows as she tries to twirl spaghetti around her fork

the noodles are too slippery and emma yelps in surprise when some sauce splatters onto her face

“he… the important thing here is that you have mommy, okay?” you smile and reach over to wipe the tomato chunk off her chubby cheek “don’t worry about your dad.”

emma doesn’t know a lot

but she knows enough to not bring it up again

anyways

even though you’re a mother now

that doesn’t necessarily mean that you automatically have your shit together becAUSe-

“shit shit shit shIt shit” you curse to yourself as you vEEr right into the first parking spot you see

you immediately crank the brake and unbuckle your seatbelt

“i was going to park there, asshole!” you hop out of the car to see an angry looking mother glaring at you from her minivan and you give her a sheepish smile

“i’m sorry!!!! my kid just got off from class and i can’t be late because i need to drive her to ballet and-“ you’re definitely oversharing with this stranger and she obviously doesn’t care because she rolls her eyes and flips you off before zoOming off to find another parking spot

soccer moms are so aggressive

you double check that you have everything with you and you fish your parent lanyard out of your backpack and sling it around your neck quickly as you approach the front doors

you thought that once you became a mother you would instantly become more responsible more organised more matuRe

obviously you were mistAken because you’re still late to almost everything you go to

some things never change!!!!

you hurry your way down the hallway and pick up the pace when you see the swarm of parents standing outside the classroom

as you approach the crowd you get up on your tip-toes to see if emma’s been excused yet

you accidentally bump into a couple and a bit of your coffee splashes onto their shoulders and they turn around and give you a dirty look

“oh, sorry!!!! ….fridays, am i right?” you joke and they both scowl before shuffling to stand somewhere else

oof

tough crowd

none of the parents here like u that much

which is a real shame because you think you make greAt company

you’re just,.,, there’s a big age gap between u and most of the parents here

you’re one of the younger parents in the class

actually you might be the youngest

min yoongi and his wife (you forgot her name whoOps) are pretty young but they’re still a couple years older than you

and side note their daughter is adoraBle

emma is actually friends with hwayoung so you talk to yoongi sometimes

it’s nice to talk to someone who’s around your age

he’s just veRy businessman-y so it’s difficult to joke around with him

but he’s still a nice guy!!

speaking of yoongi and hwayoung

a bright smile makes its way onto your face when you see yoongi nudging hwayoung through the crowd of people before grabbing onto her small hand

“yoongi!” yoongi looks up and he smiles politely

he’s still dressed all spic and span in his suit from work

“ah! good afternoon, y/n. hwayoung, say good afternoon to emma’s mom.” he hums before bending down to zip up her backpack that’s just wiDe open

relatable

“good afternoon, emma’s mom!!” she looks up at you with bright eyes

she’s sO CuTE

“hi, hwayoung-ie!” you bend down and pinch her cheek before reaching into the pocket of your coat and fishing out a little caramel “don’t tell your dad,” you joke and yoongi snorts in response

“thank u!!!!!” she snaTches it immediately and you coo before pinching her cheek again

you get back up onto your feet “you guys on your way home now?”

“mhm. is emma still available for a playdate this sunday?” yoongi swoops hwayoung off her feet and props her up onto his hip and she immediately rests her head against his shoulder

“affirmative, sir.” you salute and yoongi rolls his eyes playfully “i-“

“emma y/l/n?” you perk up when you hear emma’s name being called

“yeah, we’ll see you sunday! have a nice night!” you turn to squeeze your way into the crowd and once you make your way to the front your heart immediately starts going boom-boom because

it’s taehyung

emma’s teacher

kim taehyung is uh

whOo

putting it simply he is a very attractive man and he’s only a couple months older than you so like you’re preTTY sure this is god’s way of telling you it’s meant to be

the only time you’ve really talk to him is during the parent-teacher conference and even theN you can barely get a word in because emma’s a little chatterbox (one time she almost let it slip that ‘mommy dressed extra pretty for you!’ and you were literally about to pounce on your child in the middle of a classroom)

he’s really sweet n nice and when he smiles that boxY grin you can’t help but smile aNd he’s endearingly dorky and super charming aND funny and he’s so good with the kids and OH my god his voice is like..,., silky smooth dark chocolate.,,.,. rich caramel.,, that u want to driZZLE all over your BODY

okay no R-rated thoughts when there are children present

don’t be weird

since he’s your kid’s teacher you’re not sure if that’s even allowed

the whole parents dating teachers thing

anyways

he looks so soft today

he’s wearing a crisp button up with a pair of jeans

he obviously let the kids mess with his hair because he has a little sproUT in his hair

and you’re pretty sure you have a glasses kink because you’ve never felt this way when seeing someone with their glasses sitting on the top of their head

“hi, yeah, that’s me- i mean, that’s not me, but that’s my child- you know what i mean” you blow a strand of hair away from your face before adjusting your backpack with a sheepish grin

woW what the hell was that lol

taehyung presses his lips together to keep himself from bursting into chuckles

you’re so awkward sometimes but he supposes that’s just part of your charm

he wants to tell you you look real cute in your periwinkle sweater

and it’s endearing how the laces on your converse shoes are undone

no doubt from your frantic running down the hallway (he notices everything)

but of course he has to keep it professional because you are the parent of one of his students it doesn’t matTer that you’re the same age as him and that he’s very very very veRY attracted to you

“hi miss y/l/n.” taehyung smiles kindly before ticking next to your name on the clipboard “emma’ll be ready in a minute! we did finger-painting today so the kids are taking a little longer to wash up. how was your day?” he suddenly remembers the little ponYTAIL in his hair and he yanks the hair tie off quickly

“oh, y’know, the usual. it’s not super exciting having to keep studying after four whole years of studying.” you snort before pulling your own hair tie from your ponytail and letting your hair down

“i admire that! education is important.” taehyung hums

your hair looks so soft

it probably smells good too

o god he’s being creepy stop being creepy

“i suppose you’re right. what else happened…uh… had a really good caramel macchiato and a mediocre turkey sandwich for lunch-“

“mommy!” you snap out of your little trance when emma suddenly ziPs out of the classroom

her little backpack bounces against her back

“hi baby!” you grin and swoOp down to scoop her up into your arms

you smoosh kisses against her chubby cheek while she giggles away before you plop her back down onto the ground

it takes everything within taehyung not to mELT into the ground because even tho he sees you do that basically every day it never fails to turn him into a pile of mush IT’S SO CUTE

“we finger-painted today!” she cheers and holds her paper up for you to look at

“yeah, mr kim was just telling me-“

“that’s me, n that’s you, n that’s mr. kim!” she grins and points to the third figure in the painting and almost immediately bOTH yours and tae’s faces go bright red

you think you might actually be on fire right now (even tho this isn’t the first time this has hAPPENeD) ((ur referring to the time the class made play-doh people and emma made one of you and one of tae and the play-doh versions of you two are holding hands))

“oh! that’s, heh, uh, that’s nice! that’s so good, you did a good job, baby” you clear your throat and your eyes flicker over to taehyung

he tilts his head and offers you a meek smile

“will you put it up on the fridge when we go home?” she asks as you tuck it into her backpack for her before ziPping her bag up

“mhm…” you get back up onto your feet and dust your knees off “say g’bye to mr. kim”

“bye mr. kim!” emma turns around and hugs his legs

her face is like on the same level as his knees so he’s basically kneeing her and are u an awful mother if you kinda laughed at that

“goodbye, sweetheart!” he replies with the same level of enthusiasm as he gets down onto his knees so that he can give her a proper hug and she gives him a sweet lil kiss on the cheek “have a nice weekend, hm?” his eyes flicker up to you and you feel your heart skip a beat

emma pulls away from him and skips over to you “oh, and don’t forget to tie your laces, emma.” taehyung hums as he gets back up onto his feet

you look down because you remember putting emma in slip-on converse this morning not-

“he means you, mama.” emma not-so-subtly whispers and you look down at your undone laces before looking back up at taehyung who’s looking very amused at the moment

there it is again

that fuzzy feeling in your stuPid heart

u know what

you have to get over it because it’s never going to happen

you’re an adult

you can get over it fine you’ll be finE

this is just a silly little crush

“how do you feel about spaghetti and garlic bread for dinner?” you clutch emma’s little hand in yours as you guys make your way down the empty hallway

look

spaghetti is the only thing you’re actually reaLLy good at making okAY

obviously you feed your child other things,,,.., she likes kimchi fried rice with chunks of spam,,.,. a refreshing greek salad,,.. peanut butter (beanut putter) and jelly sandwiches,.,., sometimes a little fruit salad,,.,.

“yummy! with extra cheese?”

“it wouldn’t be as yummy without the extra cheese… but we obviously have to go to our usual place to get a hot chocolate first…” you’re rambling on and on about hot chocolate but emma isn’t really paying attention

because she has concocted a sneaky plan in that tiny brain of hers

she knows you like mr. kim

and she’s positive mr. kim likes you back

you always get so red around him

and he always gets so red around you

and red is the colour of love

which means that you must love mr. kim and mr. kim must love you

and she’s been trying her hardest to try and get you guys to hold hands or touch butts or whatever it is grown-ups do to prove they love each other

but each time she does something she’s never successful!!!

she tried to tell mr. kim about you dressing extra pretty for him but you smacked a hand over her mouth before she could get it out

she made a play-doh mommy and a play-doh mr. kim and presented them proudly to you and mr. kim and the both of you just laUGHED in hER FACE

do you people think she’s just a SIMPLE F O O L

and she has to admit the painting of you and her and mr. kim is probably one of her weaker moves but it’s better than nothing

and u know what

she just wants you to be happy

because she loves you a lot

and you’re a good mommy

and good mommies deserve to be happy

and from what she knows

mommies need daddies (sometimes mommies can be with other mommies!!!)

but yOU, specifically

you need a daddy

and mr. kim is the perfect fit!!! she likes mr. kim a lot

he’s always really nice to her and he lets her braid his hair and he gives her candies and kisses her cheeks

this next part is all part of her evil plan and she’s positive that this time something will happen

all of her peers (including herself) have their own cubbies in the classroom

emma purposely left her snack box in there so that you’d have a reason to go back

AND she left a little note in there for you and (hopefully) mr. kim to read

emma is your child after all

meaning she’s a very verY clever girl

she just has to wait for the right time.,.,.

and the right time is noW

“mommy, my snack box is still in the classroom!!” emma stops in her tracks and you nod before pointing to the direction of the classroom

“go ahead, go get it”

“but i need to pee.” she squeezes her legs together and makes a face of discomfort “you need to get the snack box, mommy”

“i-“ you look back at the closed door of the classroom “mommy can wait for you to finish peeing and then you can go-“

“no, no, you need to go get it i need to pEE” the next thing you know she’s spRInting towards the washroom and you’re left standing in the middle of the hallway with question marks floating around your head

what in the hickory ham is going on

“gO GET MY SNACK BOX MOMMY” you hear her voice echo from the washroom

“alRIght alright” you snort before turning and heading back to the classroom

you don’t know why you’re suddenly so nervous

you’re retrieving your daughter’s snack box from her super attractive teacher that you definitely have a crush on there’s nothing to be nervous about

hi tae! emma left the ol’ snack box up in here!

whaddup mr. kim! mind if i just pOP right in??

yo Yo yOOoo have u seen a purple box anywhere?? because it belongs to emma and i need it

o god

all of these options are terrible

you need more time to rehearse your lines-

you’re about to reach up to knock on the door when suddenly it swiNgs right open and you stumble back in surprise

“oh shit!” taehyung reaches out and grabs onto your waist before you can fall flat on your aSS and you let out a squeak

in the midst of your almost-fall you’d grabbed onto his bicep and now.,.., he has an arm…, wrapped around your waist.,., while you have one hand on his bicep and one hand curled around the nape of his neck.,,,..,.,

the two of you snap out of your respective trances when you hear a door open down the hallway and you immediately leT GO of each other

also tae was right ur hair does smell really nice

“hi. sorry about that! i was on my way to the washroom and i didn’t know you were outside…” he clears his throat and prays to god he’s not as red as a tomato right now

“no, no! it was my bad, i’m sorry.” you reach up and scratch the back of your neck “i, uh, emma said she left her snack box in here.” you breathe out

“oh, uh, come in! i’ll help you search for it. it’s probably in her cubby. she’s always leaving things in there.” taehyung falls back into his ‘mr. kim’ persona as he leads you towards the cubbies in the back “let’s see… emma… here~” he bends down and you follow suit

oh my go d he even smells good is this aLLOWed

you perk up when you spot emma’s box

“hey, you’re right! here it is-“ you reach in and grab the box but you’re surprise when you notice the piece of paper stuck to the back of it

it’s an A4 piece of paper with a little card stuck to it and a note written in crayon on it

you recognise the card

it’s the business card of that little cafe you take emma to every friday after school

the one that you’re supposed to take her to right noW

‘mommy’s faveriate drink is karomal makkiatoe and mr. kim’s faverieote drink is hot chalklate’

“huh.” both you and tae are kinda just staring at the note

the gears are click-click-clicking away in both your guys’ heads

and then it hits the both of you at the same time

oh.

taehyung isn’t typically a ballsy guy but like

he’s feeling vEry brave all of a sudden

“can i take you out sometime?” he blurts out and your eyes widen in surprise

well

you certainly weren’t expecting that

the both of you get back up onto your feet and you tuck emma’s box into your backpack

your cheeks flare up and you let out a little chuckle before scratching the back of your neck “i… uh…”

“i mean, don’t feel pressured to say yes just because i’m emma’s teacher!” taehyung stammers “i just, y’know, i don’t want to overstep here but i think you’re a very beautiful woman and-“

“i would love to.” you clear your throat and take your bottom lip in between your teeth “yeah, i would love to. actually, uh- emma and i, we usually go to this cafe every friday - if you’re free right now, maybe you can come and join us?” you rub your slighTLy damp hands on the back of your jeans and taehyung immediately lightS up and nods quickly

“i would love that. yeah, just… just gimme a second to clean up real quick! i’ll meet you and emma outside?”

“great! yeah, totally. she’s just.. she’s peeing right now so i should probably go check and see that she hasn’t flushed herself down the toilet or anything” you joke as you make your way towards the door and tae splits off to head to his desk “i’ll see you outside!”

you shut the door behind you and you have to quickly press yourself against the wall and you nearly bite your bottom lip off to keep yourself from screaming

your heart is going a million miles an hour and there are butterflies just having a raVE in your stomach

as soon as you leave the room taehyung pumps a fiST into the air in victory because Y E S HE DID IT

“did you find my box?” emma’s sitting outside the washroom as you approach her and you raise a brow before nodding

“mhm.” she gets up and grabs onto your hand before looking back at the classroom door

huh

did her plan not work

she knows she’s not supposed to say bad words but what the h*ck

she really thought her plan would work!!!!

“mr. kim’s joining us for hot chocolate today, by the way. hope you don’t mind.” you add casually and a cheshire-cat grin takes over emma’s face

the whole time you and emma and tae are at the cafe emma can’t help but feel proud of herself

you and mr. kim are sitting very vEry close to each other in your booth chatting away while she sits opposite of you two quietly nibbling at a scone and taking small sips of her hot chocolate

S U C C E S S has never tasted so good

luckily enough emma’s ballet class was cancelled today and you secretly thank the gods above because you’re having a really nice time with taehyung and it would have been a big ol bummer to have to leave early

he’s so sweet and considerate and he’s a really good listener

and he’s sO funny and super dorky in the best way possible

“oh my gosh, don’t even get me started on nap time. i love watching the kids sleep!” he pauses and his eyes widen “i promise i wasn’t trying to make that as creepy as it came out… they’re just so cute when they sleep!!! …okay, yeah, that still sounded creepy.”

you’re having so much fun with tae you’ve barely paid any attention to emma which is totally fine to her because she wanTs you and mr. kim to talk more

it’s just

emma gets pretty sleepy after a good snack or meal

sometimes she falls asleep halfway through eating (she used to do that a lot when she was a baby) ((one time she fell face flat into a bowl of mushy peas))

and the blueberry scone paired with the hot chocolate.,., that was a good snack,,..,

“oh my gosh, look at the time-“ your eyes widen when you realise it’s literally almost seven o’clock

you turn to look at emma and immediately stifle a laugh when you realize what’s happened

she fell asleep

her mouth is agape and there are a couple crumbs dusting her bottom lip

she only finished half her scone and she’s griPPing the other half in her tiny hand

you scrunch your nose and turn back to face tae “em and i should probably head home…”

it sucks because it’s still pretty early and u really really wanna keep hanging out with tae but,,.,.

“yeah, don’t worry about it!” tae nods understandingly and dusts his hands off before sliding out of the booth “i’ll help carry her to the car.”

“thank you for treating us to the hot chocolates and scones, by the way.” you hold the door open for tae as he steps outside with emma in his arms

she has her arms wrapped around his neck and her chin propped up on his shoulder

she still has a death grip on that scone

“of course! don’t worry about it.” taehyung hums and follows you to your car parked all the way at the end of the parking lot “by the way - did emma get you to sign the parental form for the trip to the aquarium?”

“she woke me up this morning by shaking it in my face.” you laugh lightly and open the door for tae “i’ll sign it tonight so she can hand it in tomorrow. oh, the car seat’s a little tricky so you can just plop emma in it and i’ll take care of the-“

click

clack

zip

snap

taehyung buckles emma in eaSILy and you’re genuinely taken aback by how quickly he did that

usually it takes you like five minutes to attach the one on her chest

and uh,,.., you’re pretty sure watching him being able to smoothly operate a child’s car seat isn’t supposed to be hot,.,. but dat shit was kinda hot

“sorry about that. what were you saying?” taehyung pulls away and closes the car door shut gently

“uh,.., i was just talking about that aquarium field trip form.” you clear your throat and resist the urge to fan your face

“ah, right! i’ve been meaning to ask - would you maybe be interested in being a chaperone for that field trip? we already have a couple parents who have signed up, but,.., i don’t know, i thought maybe it’d be fun to,.,”

okay taehyung has no idea how to word this

he just wants u to be a chaperone as a sneaky excuse to spend more time with you lol

“emma actually tricked me into signing up to become a chaperone, so unfortunately, you will be stuck with me for like six hours straight.” you smile and punch tae’s arm lightly

“sounds like a rough time but i’m sure i’ll be able to soldier through it.” he teases and raises a perfectly arched brow

a moment of silence goes by and all that can be heard is the slight buzzing from the cafe’s neon OPEN sign along with the faint chirping of crickets

“so, miss y/l/n.” tae clears his throat “can i put you down in charge of sandwiches and juice boxes?”

“sounds good, mr. kim.” you playfully resort back to your proFesSional names and you both stand up a little straighter before bursting into giggles

you don’t know what it is

maybe it’s because tae’s the first guy in a while you actually genuinely romantically like

maybe it’s because it makes you happy knowing that emma adores him and he adores emma

maybe it’s because within a couple of hours he’s successfully wormed his way into your heart because he’s so warm and kind and caring

but you have an overwhelming urge to just-

ᵖᵉᵏ

you surprise yourself when you lean in to plant a tiny kiss on taehyung’s cheek

his eyes widen and his cheeks flush in surprise

he reaches up to adjust his square-framed glasses before letting out a small chuckle “i look forward to seeing you tomorrow morning, miss y/l/n.”

taehyung drives home that night with a megawatt smile on his face

anyone who passed by probably thought he was a maniac but he doesn’t care!!!!!!!

you kissed him on the cheek!!!!!!

he’s a maniac in love!!!!!!!!

you’re not any better

once you park the car in the driveway you let out a breath and then a little squeal and punch the horn compLetely forgetting that emma was still snoozing away in the back

emma peels one eye open to look at you and you lock gazes in the mirror

she immediately squeezes her eyes shut

you turn around and gawk at her “how long have you been awake for?”

“long enough 2 know dat u kissed mr kim on the cheek” she replies with her eyes still shut

goD

she really is a sneaky little bugger

“come on, mama - let’s go see your boyfriend!!!!” emma drags you down the hallway and you nearly stumble over your feet

“he’s not- mr kim is noT mommy’s boyfriend-“

“okay.,,.” emma pauses for a split second before her face lights up again “let’s go see your daddy!!!”

you choke

“that’s nOT ANY BETTER-“

surprisingly enough you made it a liTTle bit before eight o’clock when usually you always buSt in through the doors at like 8:05

the other parents are dropping their kids off for the day and it’s safe to say that this is the first time you’ve seen yoongi in the morning

he has a little bit of bedhead but

his tie is nice and neat as per usual

“good morning, yoongi! morning, hwayoung!!” you chirp and offer him a smile before reaching down to pat hwayoung’s head

“morning, y/n. morning, emma.” he smiles back at you before turning his head and letting out a small yawn

“good morning, hwayoung n hwayoung’s dad!!!” emma grins and bounces up and down on her feet

“morning, emma n emma’s mama.” hwayoung hums sleepily and reaches up to rub at her eyes whilst leaning against yoongi

huh

like father like daughter

“min hwayoung?”

you turn your head when you hear tae’s rich baritone voice

somehow it’s even 𝓁𝑜𝓌𝑒𝓇 in the morning

“alright, in you go. i’ll see you after school, chunky monkey.” yoongi bends down and gives hwayoung a quick hug and a kiss on the cheek before she’s scurrying off to the classroom. “goodbye, y/n. i’ll see you after school as well.” he pats your arm and you laugh lightly before saying goodbye and moving aside to let him through

“emma y/l/n?”

you’re about to sWEep emma up and smoosh kisses all over her face then say goodbye but she grabs your hand and vEry aggressively drags you through the crowd of parents and her peers “emma, what are you-“

“good morning, mr. kim!” emma greets brightly and taehyung looks surprised to see you here because usually he just sees the kid in the morning and not the kid’s parent

“ah, good morning, emma! morning, miss y/l/n.” he smiles shyly before ticking next to emma’s name

“good morning, mr. kim…” you trail off and reach up to scratch the back of your neck

it’s probably because u don’t have any coffee in your system yet but you can’t think of anything else to say

and for a second taehyung forgets that he’s literally in the middle of his job and he has like ten other kids to take care of

“mama, don’t you have something for mr. kim?” emma tugs on your hand and you look down at her before furrowing your brows and shaking your head

“no, i do-“

“yes, you do!” she moves behind you and unZips the front pocket of your backpack and you let out a sQuawk when she yanks you down slightly “here!” emma pulls a shiny red apple out of your bag and hands it to you

you take it from her and raise a brow “i didn’t-“

“you packed this this morning, remember? to give to mr. kim?” she blinks and squeezes her eyes shut before opening them as wide as possible

.,,.is she trying to wink at you?

you’re going to have to teach her how to wink proper- oHHHHHh

“right! i… did! i did pack- here you go, tae- mr. kim.” you smile sheepishly and hand him the red apple

goD

now you feel like a tiny little teacher’s pet because none of the other parents ever bring tae apples and apparently you bring him apples now!!!

“thank you!” taehyung laughs lightly “that’s very sweet of you, miss y/l/n.”

you feel like your entire face is redder than the damn apple “uh, anyWays! em, i will see you later.” you pat the top of her head before nudging her into the room

“bye, mama!”

you glance back at tae “and i will also.,., see u later.,.”

woWie

what an interesting start to the day

“i don’t know how she managed to sneak an apple into my backpack without me noticing.” you slam the car door shut and jin laughs a little and shuts his door

you fling your backpack over your shoulder and jin hands you the takeaway cup of hot chocolate

sometimes you pick jin up from his place after you drop emma off at school just because it’s on the way and jin says he would rather dunk himself in boiling water than go on public transport at 8:30 in the morning

he makes it up to you by paying for the starbucks drivethru drinks

“she’s probably picking it up from me. i am super smooth, after all”

you snort immediately “oh, right, like that one time you- shit!”

“okay firSt of all i would NEVER defecate in public-“

“no, i’m not talking about you, you weirdo!” you scowl before unlocking your car and opening up the passenger seat door “emma left her lunch bag in here…”

jin checks the time on his watch “if you go back and drop it off you’ll only be… twenty-ish minutes late to class? don’t worry, i’ll catch you up on anything that’s important.”

“thAnk you so much you beautiful man-“

seokin gasps and purses his lips “so you ADMIT it you think i’m-“

“oh my god not noW-“ you hop into the driver’s seat and fling your backpack to the front seat before shoving the key into the ignition

you bought one of those fancy sandwich cutters and emma’s peanut butter and jelly sandwich is shaped like a butterfly today and you’ll be daMNed if she doesn’t get a chance to show it off to her classmates

you parked the car hastily so it’s kind of crooked but it’s fiNE

your sneakers squeak against the linoleum as you make your way down the familiar hallway

and you heaR the chorus of kids singing coming from tae’s classroom

you even hear tae singing along

“five little ducks went out one day, over the hill and far away, mother duck said quack quack quack quack, but only four little ducks came back-“

you peek into the room a little and giggle lightly when you see tae wiggling his arms and shaking his butt like a little duckling

how precious!!!!!!!

:’-)

u hate to interrupt the fun morning song but you really gotta get the heCk out of here and go back to class

you already hate that you might be missing 20 minutes of class so you’re trying to minimiZe those minutes as much as possible

you give the bright red door a couple knocks and shoot everyone a sheepish smile when the entire class and tae turn to look at who’s at the door

taehyung tells the kids to busy themselves with the duck song before he excuses himself

“hey!” he steps out of the room and shuts the door behind him “what’s up?”

“hey… emma left her lunch bag in the car so i figured i’d drive back and drop it off so it doesn’t look like i’m a negligent mother.” you joke before holding it out for him to take

“the girl loves her beanut putter sandwiches, doesn’t she?” taehyung takes the bag from you and shakes it gently

he only knows that because she has it for lunch like every day and she’s always showing it off to her friends because ‘my mommy cuts mY sandwiches into hearts because she loves me!!!!!!!!!’

“i keep telling her it’s peanut butter and not beanut putter… i think she knows the difference but she’s just doing it because she’s a little joker.” you snort and look down at the takeaway cup in your hand

you feel bad for interrupting the class so- “oh, before i forget! i brought a hot chocolate for you. it’s from starbucks so you know it haS to be good-“

“first an apple, then a starbucks hot chocolate?” taehyung beams and takes it from you “if i didn’t know any better, it’d seem like you were buttering me up or something…”

“ah, was it really that obvious?” you tease back

a beat of silence goes by

the both of you are now fully aware that there is a mutual attraction here

the unfortunate thing is that you’re both still big ol wuSSIes

taehyung wants to ask you out on a proper date.,.,. which he did yesterday!! but then you kinD of asked him if he wanted to join you and em for hot cocoa and scones??

and he kinda wants to take you out on a date that perhaps doEsn’t include emma.,,. no offence to her, of course!

he just wants some alone time with u

“so… yesterday was nice!”

almost instantly your cheeks flush and you let out a light laugh “yeah, it really was…”

well

he has you alone

so he might as well go for it agaIN

taehyung clears his throat “hey, so… i don’t know if it wasn’t clear yesterday, but i… would you want to go out on a date with me? like, a proper one?”

“you mean yesterday wasn’t a proper date?” your brows knit together and taehyung automatically enters pANIC mode

“n-no, not at all! i kinda meant l-like, ah, i don’t know, maybe this isn’t a good-“

“tae-“ you reach over and pinch his arm gently “i’m kidding. i would… love to go out on a proper date with you.”

taehyung lights up immediately and nods quickly “how does tonight sound? i overheard emma and hwayoung talking about their sleepover tonight, but if you’re busy we can totally find another time to-“

“tonight’s fine! tonight’s good.” you nod and smile at him

taehyung’s heart skips a beat

he doesn’t know why he’s so nervous and stuttery around you

“i can come pick you up at your place since i know where you live-“ oH gOd okay reel it back “-bECAUSE it’s on the registry-“

“sounds good! you can text me what the plans are after class today so that i’ll know what to wear-“

ᵖᵉᵏ

your lashes flutter when taehyung leans forward and kisses your cheek just like you did to him last night

you unintentionally let out a little gasp and reach up to brush your fingers over your reddening cheek “mr. kim! keep it professional…” there’s a playful glint behind your eyes and taehyung can’t help but snort and roll his eyes playfully “besides - it looks like we have an audience.”

he glances over his shoulder and sure enough all the kids are squiShed up against the window in the door to sneak a peek at mr. kim and emma’s mom

“…scATTER-!“ you hear emma and you can’t help but laugh at the sight of the kids panicking and heading back to their spots

you open your mouth to speak

and then it happens

“mr. kim and emma’s mom, sitting in a tree! K-I-S-s,,,,..,,e?,,.i…a!!! i..?” the song trails off into unsure mumbles because none of the kids know how to spell kissing yet and you let out a groan and reach up to cover your face

taehyung stifles a laugh and shakes his head

“i think that’s my cue to leave” you kiss your teeth and point towards the hallway

“you’re going to leave me here to face the merciless teasing of all those kids by myself?!” taehyung gawks at you before turning to look into the classroom where all the kids are huddled by the whiteboard trying to figure out how to spell kissing as if it was some biG ol conspiracy theory

so far they have ‘khisign’ and ‘keccing’ and.,., one kid wrote down ‘kitten’

huh

maybe he should replace morning singing with morning spelling from now on

“i’ll make it up to you, mr. kim!” you’re already hALfway down the hall and taehyung’s heart goes bAbumP when you blow him a kiss

“i’m holding you to that promise, miss y/l/n!”

ah, yes.

to be young and in love.

2K notes · View notes

coeurdastronaute · 5 years ago

Text

Either/Or: WWC 4

Previously on WWC

Jet lag and time zones made the bed feel like heaven. Body still on the west coast and brain doing its best to keep up with the new place and practice and preparation, the sheets and the pillows were a godsend. Kara laid, face first in the large bed in her hotel room, with only the light still on in the bathroom as the only light in the room. She didn’t care about it at all for the moment though. Her body was still coming down from the workout and then the recovery, pushing herself harder than ever to be better and faster and stronger than ever before thought imaginable. The sun wasn’t close to ready to set, still early in the summer evening, but the curtains were drawn tight and tried to hide the welcoming glow of a beautiful city at the golden hour.

She should take a shower and eat something, but the bed was so comfortable and her body was so tired. Only when she ran out of air did Kara turn her head to the side and push hair out of her face. It took her a few minutes to push herself up and resign herself to exist.

Kara didn’t look at her phone because on it was a picture of her and Lena from some Sunday morning of sleeping in and waking up with messy hair. If she looked at it again with a longing glance, she’d have to admit that she was missing her, and that was a dangerous thing.

She settled into the same routine she’d had for the past week since arriving: shower after moping, order food, and settle in to watch game footage. Kara was preparing, and she had the first game in just eighteen hours.

And though she tried to sleep and prepare, despite being exhausted, sleep evaded her until she was tossing and turning and attempting to find some kind of relief. But it only came in one way.

“Darling, it’s two in the morning.”

Kara smiled sleepily into her pillow as she was greeted with Lena’s lovely, quiet voice from thousands of miles away. She pressed the phone between her head and the pillow.

“I’m very bad at jet lag.”

“It’s been over a week. You should be adjusted.”

“I just miss you I guess.”

“Don’t try to be cute to avoid me scolding you. You need your rest. I expect a hat trick tomorrow.”

Kara smiled in the dark and pulled the covers up higher around her shoulders before stretching her legs and sighing at the comfort. Relatively new to the sport, Lena was studious when it came to learning, and through that, somehow developed into Kara’s number one fan. It was mostly because of the orgasms. But also because she loved watching the joy on the player’s face when she was in the thick of it-- a smile when she got downed, a grin when she battled for the ball, a smirk when she made her move, and the humble joy that came when she scored.

“How was your day?” she tried.

“Long, and still going. I have dinner with the group that came in from Metropolis. They were here all day and I had to entertain them.”

“I doubt you did stand up for a dance for them. You’ve been preparing for this for a month.”

“It’s just so annoying,” Lena began off on a rant.

Kara loved listening to Lena talk. She loved the inflection of her vowels and the way her voice sounded when she was happy or mad or sad or anything. She had a certain way of getting lost with the words, telling a story and remembering something else, always on a tangent. There wasn’t anything else Kara could think of better.

“Just give me access to your stuff and you can have access to mine, but let’s solve this problem, you know?”

“If anyone can solve some of the issues of the climate crisis, it’s you.”

“Well, I’m certainly trying.”

Back home, back in her office, Kara was certain Lena was leaning back in her chair at her desk, twisting a pen around her fingers as she stared absently at the window. She was predictable despite the fact that she woul argue she was an enigma.

“Are you nervous about tomorrow?” Lena asked in the quiet that settled there. “Because you shouldn’t be nervous. You are going to do amazing.”

“Just regular nerves. I’ll recover.”

“Anything I can help with?”

“Are you propositioning me?”

“Yeah, you’re fine,” Lena chuckled to herself as Kara smiled and yawned. “I’m glad I got to talk to you. I was afraid it was too late.”

“I figured you missed me.”

“Very much.”

It made Kara blush, to be wanted by someone like Lena was an accomplishment and it felt like something that would sustain her. It added a certain level of weight to her as a person-- that the CEO of a powerful company wanted her around.

“I should let you sleep,” the CEO remembered. “You’re representing the entire country tomorrow.”

“I nearly forgot.”

“I’ll be watching.”

“And wearing my jersey?”

“Of course. And not much else if that helps motivate you.”

Kara let out a loud groan at the image now seared into her mind. Winning and scoring goals on the biggest stage in the world would only slightly beat out the idea of Lena in her jersey and nothing else. And sometimes, Kara wasn’t certain it did.

“I guess the viewing party you’re hosting for investors will get quite a show them. Those guys from Metropolis will definitely want to work with you.”

“You’re right. I’ll wear clothes and save the other stuff for you.”

“Good,” Kara grinned and yawned again.

“You need to sleep,” Lena reminded her. “And I am going to be late for dinner.”

“Could you give me one of your pep talks before the game?”

“It’s not a pep talk. It’s just facts.”

“List some facts for me then.”

The line was quiet for a moment and Kara closed her eyes to imagine the woman on the other end, leaning back in her chair at her desk as she thought. Kara could see the smile on her face that softened to a thoughtful furrow. She watched her fingers play with the edge of the desk as she stared somewhere in the office but didn’t see anything.

“You are my favorite player. You are so determined and focused, and your team respects you and idolizes you. The entire city here is behind you. There are signs all over the place wishing you luck. Kara, you love this sport, and you are going to have so much fun tomorrow, and you’ll leave it all on the field and win or lose, I know you’ll still be loved and idolized and adored for your heart and kindness and body.”

Kara smiled and felt her cheeks burn slightly.

“Those are not fact, but I’ll allow it.”

“Get some sleep, tiger,” Lena murmured with her smile.

“Thank you.”

“Goodnight, Kara.”

“Night, gorgeous.”

XXXXXXXXXX

It was a long twenty-four hours, but Lena was wide awake anyway.

Before she even hung up the phone with her girlfriend, she planned her trip. While they chatted, while she heard the sleepy voice who refused to sleep on the other end of the line, she chatted her assistant and figured out how quickly she could be gone. It took a lot of weaving and working around, but it was important, and Lena couldn’t believe she was dumb enough to think that she wasn’t going to go.

But she had her dinner and she let Jess make the arrangements, receiving a long list of meetings and things to accomplish while she was in Europe. She packed a bag and decided to be more like Kara, ready to buy what she needed if she truly missed it. And Lena let her driver take her to the airport where she boarded her private jet, the stewardesses and pilots smiling politely.

It would be an easy trip, she promised them. None of them wanted to take her up on the offer, but quickly after take off, Lena settled into the small bedroom in the back of the plane, preparing and attempting to sleep.

When she landed, it was a mad rush to make it to the stadium with less than two hours before kick off. Traffic didn’t want to cooperate, but by kickoff time, she was entering the stadium through the back security gate, the president of the federation and a few others inviting her to their box.

All of it happened before she even stepped foot into her loft.

Somewhere between her dinner meetings with a research group on another continent and the game, Lena traversed an entire ocean just to see Kara play in person. And though she felt slightly tired, she smiled and cheered for her hero.

Even though it seemed impossible, Lena wondered if Kara would find her in the sold-out crowd. Deep down she knew that the soccer star wouldn’t think to look, but also that Kara was inherently focused on the pitch and only the pitch when it was game time.

It was a beautiful game that Lena spent with other owners and fancy fans in a box. She made her small talk and she networked on accident. She didn’t want to, it was just natural, and as much as she wanted to be, she wasn’t just a girlfriend watching and supporting the girl she had a crush on but rather a business woman. She held her breath though, when Kara got a free kick which led to the first goal. The exuberance on her face was so contagious Lena found herself cheering. And toward the end of the game when Kara scored again despite being blocked a few other times, Lena cheered louder than anyone else in the box.

By the time it was all over, Kara did a victory lap with her team and Lena realized she’d been holding her breath for a large portion of the afternoon and the difference in time zones was going to catch up with her. But she made her way back to her condo and sent Jess to leave a note for her girlfriend at her hotel.

XXXXXXXXX

Even as she stood at the door in the ritzy building in the nice end of the city where the oldest money lived and loved, Kara couldn’t believe that Lena was here. It seemed almost like it would turn out to be a cruel joke because surely it was impossible for Lena to travel across the glove just to watch her play, especially with how busy she was. There was no way it was possible.

But the night felt impossible. Kara scored two goals and an assist, and that seemed super unlikely. She did it in front of millions and for entire country, and that seemed downright impossible. That was the theme of the night.

“You’re here?” Kara breathed as Lena opened the door.

“I am quite a fan of the sport. Seemed like the place to--”

It didn’t matter the reason or the super witty thing Kara wa sure Lena was going to say. None of it really did. Instead, she hugged her tightly and smiled into her neck as she earned a giggle at the move.

“I’m so happy you’re here,” she whispered, rocking slightly as she kept hugging.

“I’m sorry it took me a little longer to realize that I should have been here all long. Work be damned.”

Lena adjusted her chin and clutched at the soccer player’s shoulders, inhaling the fresh, shower-clean smell that lingered on her skin.

“Did you make it in time to watch?”

“I was in the owners box the entire time. Some of them didn’t even watch, but I couldn’t look awa--”

Again, it didn’t matter. Kara knew enough to kiss Lena mid-sentence. With the kiss, Lena forgot her words as well. It certainly didn’t matter, just like the rest of it. She was there, and Kara was there, and it was enough.

“Are you going to invite me in?” Kara asked when she came up for air,chests heaving with the exertion.

With a nod, she felt her arms tugged and the door clicked shut behind her.

XXXXXXXXX

“I have to get back for bed check.”

“Do you really?” Lena purre, stretching languidly in the bed. She kissed a black and blue mark on Kara’s thigh and pressed her cheek there, looking up at the naked body in her bed.

“I think an international scandal about a missing soccer player during the World Cup might be something everyone wants to avoid.”

“That’s very true.”

“I didn’t know you had a place in the city.”

Lena shrugged slightly and smiled as she closed her eyes. Kara’ scratched her scalp softly and swore she earned a purr.

“I went to boarding school here. This was the first place I lived on my own when I graduated.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“I bought this place myself with my own money,” Lena sighed, adjusting her legs as she smiled at the thought. “I love feeling like I have a home I can run away to.”

“Good thing the Cup was in Paris.”

“I’m sorry I didn’t come earlier.”

“I didn’t expect you at all.”

“But you should have,” Lena shook her head and furrowed, sitting up slightly. “I want to be someone that you expect.”

“You are forever unexpected,” Kara smiled.

“You’re a secret, but I do like you a lot.”

“I know.”

“Would you have played harder if you’d known I was there?”

“Oh man, I would have scored a lot more goals,” Kara grinned as Lena moved up her body.

“I knew it.”

“Will you at least get to do some work while you’re here?”

“Of course,” Lena nodded, settling between Kara’s legs as she kissed her. “But I came to watch you play.”

“I can’t believe you’re here.”

“I can’t believe you’re going to leave me all alone in my beautiful loft to go to a lonely hotel room.”

“What are you doing tomorrow?”

“Press stuff and you.”

“Amazing To-Do List.”

“Dinner tomorrow?”

“I can do dinner.”

“And after?” Lena wondered, hovering close to Kara’s lips.

“Show me your favorite city.”

Lena grinned and slid her leg so she was straddling her girlfriend. There wasn’t much else she really needed. Perhaps it was the time zones and the tiredness that came. Perhaps it was a naked soccer superstar beneath her. Perhaps it was being in her old loft in her favorite city. Perhaps it was watching Kara play. Perhaps it was just suddenly realizing she was happy, but Lena pressed her palm against Kara’s chest and felt her heartbeat and sighed.

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