#blackout peel las vegas

[tieronecrush]

I’m finally sending you a request!!

it’s a bit based on Waking Up In Vegas by Katy Perry with Javier x reader.

they have known each other since high school but haven’t seen each other since after graduation, until one night they bump into each other in Las Vegas, while both are there for their friends’ birthday parties.

At some point it’s only them left at the bar and they spend the night drinking, talking about each others’ lives and other things 🫢

they wake up the next morning in the same bed, hangover and married.

I already know I’m going to love this!!

FINALLY have finished this, thank you so much for your patience friend! <3

(re)union with elvis

rating: E

word count:

summary: ask above!

warnings: alcohol use, drunkenness, silly decision making, chatting about marriage/kids/life, discussion of failed previous relationships, vegas marriage, elvis getting annoyed, making out, fingering, unprotected p in v, sloppy drunk sex with ur new husband lol, discussions of annulment/ending marriage, use of spanish (all translated), etc.

Eyes open to sunlight beaming in through the wide opening of the blackout hotel curtains. You shut them again immediately, turning over away from the window, stopping when your hand brushes something next to you. Your eyes spring open again at the feeling, taking in next to you the dark, touseled hair, relaxed brow, hooked nose with a full mustache above plush lips.

Javier Peña.

You completely forgot about the little reunion you had last night at the bar with your high school crush.

And clearly forgot that the two of you ended up coming back to your room—no, wait, this is not your room. Same hotel, though, you can tell from the similar art hanging on the walls and the same blanket at the end of the bed. Must have been nearly missing each other the whole weekend you’ve been here.

A grumble from the man next to you turns your attention back to the bed, pulling you out of your thoughts. Half awake, his arm moves and slings across your waist, tugging you closer. He hums and his eyes slowly peel open, widening as he fully awakens in the low light. His arm stays loosely over your waist, blinking the sleep out of his eyes as he faces you.

The two of you take in your bare skin against each other, under the scratchy sheets. Warmth radiates between the two of you, Javier fully pulling his arm away and sitting up, the sheets still covering his lower half as he looks down at you.

“Um…did we…?” Javi’s voice hoarse with sleep and a hangover, right hand coming up to rub the back of his neck as he swallows the words that he doesn’t necessarily want to speak out loud, in fear of awkwardness that already coats the air.

The moment pulls a laugh from you, completely involuntarily, and you fall from your side onto your back. With a slow nod in confirmation, you shrug your shoulders with the sound of sheets rustling.

“Guess so,” you chuckle again and a smile stretches across Javi’s lips, a scoff of a laugh as he shakes his head.

“Is it bad I’m kind of mad I got too drunk to really remember that?” his eyes drag along your form under the thin bedsheet, hand coming up to his face to pull his thumb across his bottom lip from the corner, “Don’t really know if it came up last night, but I had a huge crush on you in high school.”

“The Javier Peña had a crush on me?” you tease, shades of memory from last night at the bar with him coloring your mind, seeing his sheepish grin as you beam back at him, “Think you did mention that last night. And pretty sure I told you that I also had a huge crush on you.”

Both of you giggle softly again, your face shifting into a wince as your head pounds from the sounds and strain of laughing. Your hands come up to your face to wipe under your eyes and rub circles in your temples, groaning quietly and opening your eyes to Javi’s face dropped in shock.

With a quizzical expression aimed at him, you open your mouth to question him when he suddenly takes your left hand and crosses the arm over your chest as he brings it closer to him, eyebrows furrowing as he studies your fingers. When you follow his stare, your stomach drops when you see the golden band with a plush oval diamond. His thumb runs over the gem, pressing the ring into you and you can tell it’s cheap, the gold coating a flimsy metal ring.

Javier’s eyes meet yours again, wide eyes and raised eyebrows matching yours, “Uh—-um, I—Did we get married last night?”

Music thumps around you, sending vibrations from the shaking floor throughout your body as you stand in the middle of the dancefloor in the club. Your friends surround you, all dancing along to the pop song with you. It’s a long weekend at the end of summer, and you and your closest friends from college all gathered in Vegas to celebrate your younger friend’s thirty-fifth birthday. She was always a bit of an extra person, so when you received an invitation via email to join her in Las Vegas for the weekend, you weren’t quite surprised that she was going big for her birthday. And besides the fact that you were having fun celebrating with your girlfriends, it was nice to get away for the weekend and let loose completely.

Your drink swishes in the cup in your hand as you dance, facing your friends and unaware of the man approaching you from behind, leaning in asking you just loud enough to be heard over the music.

“Care to dance, beautiful?”

Immediately, you roll your eyes at the question, typical of a man to be so blind to a woman having fun with her friends and not wanting to be bothered. A rejection sits on your tongue as you turn around over your shoulder, lips pursed in a sour pout.

The man comes into view, a lilac short-sleeve button-up stretched across broad shoulders and tapering into a waist and thigh sculpted into tight blue jeans. Your eyes flutter back up to the man’s face, soft brown eyes striking into your chest and a warm smile showing off his teeth from under his trimmed mustache.

A gasp slips from your lips out of reaction to the sight in front of you, your own smile widening to match his.

“Javi Peña? From Laredo?”

His arms move out at his sides, showing himself off for you to consider the answer to your question with a chuckle.

“I knew it was you,” he smiles sweetly as you pull him in for a hug, squeezing your arms around his shoulders. From under the fabric of his shirt, you can feel his muscles flex under as he wraps his own arms around you in an embrace, one of your hands dropping to his back and feeling the deliciously taut strength. He smells like tobacco mixed with notes from his cologne, vetiver, musk, and lemon tingling your senses as you take another breath in your hug before pulling away. Your hands remain on his shoulders as you look him up and down, meeting his eyes with an incredulous laugh.

“I can’t believe it’s you! God, it’s been…”

“Years? Don’t remind me I’m old, I already feel like it in this whole city,” he laughs.

You hit his shoulder gently before dropping your arms back to your sides, rolling your eyes playfully as you grin.

“Oh, hush. You can’t say you’re old cause that makes me about to be old. You were only a grade above me, Peña.”

“Yeah, well, you didn’t spend years running on rooftops and trekking through the jungle in Colombia. That shit ages you. You, on the other hand, don’t look a day over twenty-one. Bet they had to check your ID coming in here, didn’t they?” He sends a wink to you, smile quirking up to one side as it turns into a smirk, the look releasing butterflies in your stomach.

“You probably asked them to check your ID to follow all the rules, Agent Peña. Never pictured you becoming a cop when I knew you in high school, Javi.”

“You think I follow all the rules, hermosa?”

You grin and shrug your shoulders, leaning in closer to hear him better as he continues.

“Hate to tell you, but I am not above breaking some rules to get the results I want. Not too far from the ‘me’ you knew in high school.”

“Hm, guess I have a lot of catching up to do with you,” you nod to the bar across the wide dance floor, “Wanna grab a drink and chat? My treat.”

He rolls his eyes this time, shaking his head as he leans in, lips brushing your ear as he speaks to you, “Couldn’t live with myself if I let a woman as beautiful as you buy me a drink. You go find us somewhere to chat, I’ll grab us a drink.”

Goosebumps trail down your spine, nodding at the instructions and giving him your usual drink order. The two of you linger near each other in the middle of the sea of bodies before you step away first, brushing past him in search of somewhere for you to talk.

A couple of hours have passed since you and Javi have retreated to the corner of a booth in the back of the club, multiple empties on the table in front of you and a few tequila shots taken courtesy of both of your friend group’s happy for your little high school reunion.

Over the course of your catch-up, you’ve learned about his time in the DEA, now retired back to his father’s ranch in your hometown of Laredo. You could tell from the quip of his lip that he was omitting details at certain parts of the stories he told, likely covering up unsavory bits that would paint him in a bad light. It would have likely done little to quell the flames of lust that were licking inside of your torso, the slow and low lilt of his voice going straight to your core whenever he made a flirtatious comment or told a harrowing story about chasing down bad guys all around Colombia. You pictured him hot, sweaty, relieved with his chest heaving, immediately placing the visual in a different location — over you, under you, behind you. You weren’t picky in your choices.

 The long-abandoned high school crush you had on Javi came rearing back with a vengeance, heart rate pounding in your chest to the point you were convinced he could hear it over the music. It was an intimate position to be in, hip to hip with his arm around the back of the booth, leaning into each other's ears to speak, breath cascading over each other’s necks and shoulders.

You’d told him about your time post-high school, going to university not far from him in Texas, and receiving your degree. You’ve held a handful of jobs over the last fifteen years or so, ending up with a new position not too long ago. It brought you back to Laredo, purposefully, in order to care for your aging parents. Javier understood your troubles, despite the fact that Chucho was still healthy and working the ranch with him, he still felt the need to slow his father down by shouldering the majority of responsibilities to keep the business running.

Life was turning ordinary for the two of you, and surprisingly, the topic of marriage or partners or family of your own was not brought up until now.

“So, have you met anyone? Married, kids, the whole nine yards?” Javi questions, his eyes leaving your face to stare at the ice clinking around with the whiskey in his glass. It made you smile, his reservations in waiting for your answer. You’d wondered the same thing yourself — who had been lucky enough to lock down Javi Peña?

“Nope. Well, not right now. I actually was engaged in my early thirties to a guy I had met while living in Austin, but as it got more and more real that I would actually have to marry him, I couldn’t shake the feeling that it wasn’t supposed to happen. Turns out he was cheating on me for months with his coworker who he always went with on ‘business trips’. So, no marriage, and no kids for me.”

Javi’s eyes come back to you, sympathy washed over his features as his arm strewn across the back of the bench curls his hand to play with the hair at the back of your neck.

“Shit, I’m sorry, cariño. Sounds like a stupid motherfucker to mess things up with you.”

You wave off the comment, shrugging nonchalantly,  “Nah, I mean, clearly I’m not marriage material cause haven’t been snatched off the market still in years. And they actually ended up getting married, so it worked out for them in the end.”

“No, that’s total bullshit. You’re incredible — you were incredible already in high school, and now? Just another level.”

You snort, covering your mouth with your hand as you shake your head.

“Tell that to all the age-appropriate eligible bachelors. If there even are any at this point,” you say with a laugh to break the tension building, swallowing down your nerves as Javi locks his eyes on you, raking them down and back up quickly. His tongue prods out to swipe his lips, shrugging his shoulders as he looks back into your eyes.

“I’m an eligible bachelor. Age-appropriate, if that’s a dealbreaker.”

“Oh, c’mon, no one’s got their ring on you? Really?” you can hear how surprised you sound, unable to hide the disbelief in your tone.

Javier laughs and keeps his eyes on you as he speaks with a smirk playing at his lips, “Nope…Well, not sure if you remember her, but I did almost get married to Lorraine. Told me she was pregnant, and I was gonna do the right thing. The night before the wedding she told me she got her period…” he takes a swig of his whiskey, eyes falling from yours to the table in front of you, “Left her standing at the altar alone the next morning. I was back at my pop’s house, packing up to take my job with the DEA. Left the US not long after.”

“So, someone’s nearly reigned me in, but didn’t work out.”

“Did you want to get married and have a baby? Or do you still want to, I guess?” you pause and internally scold yourself for the overly personal question spurred on by your inebriation, “I’m sorry, Javi, that is not my place to ask when I’m drunk off my ass.”

“S’alright, cariño. I asked you first, technically. Only fair I answer, too,” he smiles to himself before setting his glass down, turning in his seat to face you more, “I did want to back then, just didn’t feel right with Lorraine. Kinda like what you said, it felt off the closer it got to actually doing it and when I saw an out, I took it…But now? Now, I am—God, it’s a little embarrassing, but yeah I do want all that. The wife, kids. T-ball practices or dance recitals and date nights. I dunno, though, think it might be too late for an old bastard like me.”

A hand of yours rests on his midthigh, shaking your head with an encouraging smile, “Definitely not too late for you, Javi. You’re a handsome, great man. Bet I’ll be hearing around town that you’re shacked up in the next year,” a soft laugh falls from your lips and Javi grins while his eyes drink you in, lingering at your lips. The heat of his stare makes you squirm, adjusting in your seat and sipping your drink.

Just when the tension was mounting from the moment, your best friend from college walks over, one of Javi’s friends following and both approaching your small corner of the club. They tell you that both of your groups are heading back to the hotel, the same hotel, and you deflate as you start to gather your bag next to you. Javi’s hand reaches out and squeezes your thigh gently to grab your attention, one look shared between the two of you that was an invitation to stay and keep talking. With a smile, you silently agree and tell your friends that you’ll make it back together.

Your best friend dawdles, and as you’re about to tell her that you’ll be alright, Javi reassures her with his kind smile, “I’ll get her back safely, you have my word. Fought off drug dealers and soldiers and a few sicarios in my day. She will be back at the hotel and chipper for the girls’ birthday brunch tomorrow. Cross my heart.”

Both you and your friend laugh, standing to give her a hug goodnight and telling her that you’ll be just fine, to which she replies, “Probably more than just fine. Tell Javi he can join us for brunch when you wake up with him tomorrow.”

You gasp and roll your eyes as she walks away with a laugh, heading out of the bar with your friends before you sit back with Javi, jumping into a whole different conversation.

The early hours of the morning have crept in, cool desert air from around the city wisping around your skin as you stroll down the strip with Javi. The two of you are leaning against each other in a drunken stupor, giggling wildly as you talk to each other and get stares from other people out at this hour — which is a lot, it’s Vegas.

Javi’s arm is around your waist, hand curled at your hip and his fingers rub gentle circles that send your nerves firing throughout your entire body. Your own arm is resting against his back, feeling those same muscles as earlier. He’s strong, steady, even in his inebriated state, and safe. In any other situation, you’d be anxious to walk back to the hotel along the street, too many characters milling about for the alcohol to keep you calm. But with Javi next to you, there’s a freedom in it, the way he makes you feel protected despite the short amount of time you’ve been reunited. Even in school, he was a troublemaker but only in the way that he stood up for people, got into fights on behalf of the underdogs, always concerned with fairness and righteousness. It was honorable, that he always was a protector, wanting to do right by people that were affected by those doing wrong.

Ramblings about life filled the space between you two, bright lights blinding you against the midnight skies. Javier is in the middle of saying something when you stop in your tracks, the sight across the street captivating your attention as your own light blinks with an idea in your head.

It’s a small wedding chapel, a carport out in the front with a classic car parked in the middle, and kitschy decorations littering the outside with a hot pink and cream color scheme painting the facade.

Javier walks a step or two before his arm around your waist tethers him back, his eyes looking at you before turning toward the opposite side of the street. He laughs to himself, tucking into your side again as smiles.

“How many people got married tonight, d’you think?” He leans his head to the side to rest on yours, the small affection making your idea seem even better in your wasted mind.

“I dunno. But I could guarantee two if you wanna,” your head turns to him on your left, a Cheshire grin stretched across your face as a giggle slips from your chest. Javi looks at you, confused for a moment before it all clicks, and his expression turns to one of surprise.

“You’d wanna do that? With me?”

“Why wouldn’t I? We spent the whole night talking about how we both wanted to get married and have kids and all that, why not do it with each other? I mean, I had a massive crush on you in high school. Would be my dreams back then coming true,” you say with a laugh, biting your lip as you await his response.

It’s a beat of silence as he contemplates the offer, surveying between you and the chapel across from you.

“Fuck it. Let’s get married, cariño.”

“Yes! Let’s go before we chicken out,” an infectious smile fills your face, eyes crinkling as you rush across the street with him, hand-in-hand. Upon entering the chapel lobby, you’re greeted by a chipper employee behind a large reception desk. The two of you give over your IDs, anxiously waiting with each other’s hands linked together, sharing quiet, excited laughs. Once everything is settled, the employee directs you back to a room to get ready in, offering a too-small suit jacket to Javi that sits two inches above his wrists, a sight that sends you into a fit of laughter.

He brushes off your teasing and takes the bouquet that another employee arranges quickly for you, holding it as you lean over and primp yourself in the mirror by cleaning up your makeup and fixing your hair.

Javier stands behind you, watching you with tender eyes and a faint smile on his face. Making eye contact with him in the reflection as you finish, heat spreads at the back of your neck and across your cheeks at the way he’s looking at you.

“Ready, hermosa?”

Turning around and standing to your full height in front of him, bouquet held out to you. You take it, wrapping your hand around his and nodding.

“Ready, Peña.”

“Think I should be saying that to you,” he winks and drops his hand from yours, turning and grabbing something off of a table across the room. Crossing back to you he holds up a costume veil, eyebrows raised in questioning, “Wanna complete the look?”

“Of course. Don’t think I would look like a bride without it since I’m not wearing any white,” you grin and stand still in front of him, letting him put the headband securely behind your ears. Delicate fingers lift the veil to cover your face, a warm, closed-lip smile lighting up his eyes.

“Haces una novia hermosa. You make a beautiful bride.”

The sincerity laced in his voice despite the drunken haze chokes the words in your throat, only answering by taking his hand with your free one and leading him over to the chapel’s double doors. He gives you one last look before slipping in first when you’re called up, whispering to you, “See you in there. Don’t get cold feet now.”

After a couple of minutes, the doors open for you again, and immediately you’re faced with Javi standing next to a costumed Elvis impersonator. The traditional wedding march playing through tinny speakers, everything overwhelming you to the point that when you make eye contact with Javi, the pair of you break out into uncontrollable giggles. His shoulders shake as tears prick your eyes from the ridiculousness, your tipsy minds thinking everything is extra funny.

Calmed down at the altar, you stand across from him and half listen to the officiant attempt to maintain his accent throughout the ceremony. Each of you exchanges drunken repetitive vows, given cheap rings that were paid for at the front desk. Javi slips yours on and squeezes your hand, giving you his to do the same.

At that moment, rings and vows given to each other, knock-off Elvis pronounces you husband and wife by the power vested in him by the state of Nevada.

“You may now kiss your wife, dude.”

Javier chuckles as he reaches up to lift your veil away from your face, leaning in as he drops it at the back of your head. One hand cups your jaw, the other dropping to your hip to pull you in closer. He catches your lips in a kiss that’s all teeth from your smiles, mouths relaxing as he deepens the embrace when your arms wrap around his neck and the flowers rest at his back.

He huffs into your mouth, tongue tracing your lip and slipping against yours when you open your mouth for him. A soft sigh melts your body into his touch, the two of you completely wrapped up in each other.

“Alright, alright, lovebirds. We got another wedding to get to so you guys are gonna have to quit sucking face in here and take your party of two outside. Congrats,” the officiant has dropped his character, Javier pulling away from you and glancing at him.

“Thanks, Presley. See ya,” he calls out over his shoulder as he takes your hand, receding down the aisle, throwing off his jacket, plus your veil and bouquet on the desk as you make your way out of the chapel building completely.

It’s a rush from the elevator when it reaches Javi’s floor, limbs fumbling over each other as you frantically stumble down the hallway, mouths attach in a potent kiss. Javier’s touch is only adding to your intoxication, clouding your mind with his wandering hands and his tongue against yours.

He grips your waist as he reaches his room, pressing you against the solid wood door as he exhales into your mouth. Pulling away mere millimeters to speak, his low and gravelly voice rasps out to you.

“Front right pocket. Room key’s in my wallet,” he kisses you again, hands moving from your waist to your ass as his lips trail from your mouth and along your jaw. Your own fingers slip into the front pocket he directed you to, taking out his wallet and attempting to fish out the plastic card as his teeth graze at the sensitive skin on your neck.

“Fuck, Javi…Here.” You pass the key card to him and he unlocks the door, wrapping his arm around your back and walking you inside the room as he catches your lips in a rich kiss, a whimper slipping from your mouth and into his. The plush mattress hits the back of your legs and he lets you go to fall backward onto the bed, staring down at you with his chest rising and falling quickly and swollen lips parted.

“Cristo, eres hermosa, cariño. Te deseo tanto. Puedo tenerte, mi esposa?” Javier lifts one knee to rest on the mattress, leaning over you and pressing open-mouth kisses at the open chest of your night-out dress.

“Javi, that all sounds very sexy, but I think I need a translation,” you sigh as he tugs the neckline of your dress down, exposing your bare breast to the chilled, conditioned air. Javier chuckles as you gasp from his thumb brushing over your pebbled nipple, darkened eyes combing up to meet yours with a devilish smirk.

“I said ‘Christ, you’re gorgeous, darling…’”

His fingers slip a strap of your dress off of your shoulders. 

“And ‘I want you so bad…’”

The other strap.

“And I asked ‘Can I have you, my wife?’”

With one tug to the body of your dress, your full chest is bared to Javi, who in that moment you realize is technically your husband.

Your sexy, heroic, competent, charming husband.

Damn, your drunk self kind of hit the jackpot.

“Can I, baby?” he asks again, one hand reaching down to palm his growing bulge in his jeans. The sight makes you salivate, this man above you asking to have you, telling you how badly he wants you, calling you his wife.

A rush of arousal floods between your thighs and you nod, lifting yourself to sit up on your elbows under him.

“How do you say ‘my husband’ in Spanish?”

Javi’s smirk deepens, the dimple in his right cheek cavernous with the satisfaction painted on his face.

“Mi esposo.”

“You can have me any way you want, mi esposo.”

The groan that comes from Javier is guttural, as if something is unleashed in him and rumbles it’s way out. He moves with a fervor after those words, stripping you of your dress and lacey panties, carelessly tossing them aside. You sit up fully, working his button-up undone as he fumbles with his belt and jeans. As you push the material off of his shoulders, he kicks off his pants, left naked from his lack of underwear.

You chuckle softly at the choice and bite your lip, looking up at him playfully.

“Guess you’re always prepared for a quickie.”

He smirks with a slow nod, shrugging nonchalantly.

“Didn’t know where the night would take me. And now I am incredibly glad for my choice.”

A gasp leaves your lips as he kisses you passionately, pushing you back to the mattress as he climbs over you. Your legs spread for him, leaving him room to nestle between your thighs. Everything is blurred in your inebriated minds, burning touches on sensitive skin, teeth grazing with purple bruises left in their wake.

His fingers slide through your arousal, collecting your wetness with two of his fingers, slipping in and out of you at an expert pace. The heel of his hand rubs against your clit, the combined stimulations and your laxed body working you up quickly to a peak. Moans and whimpers of his name fill the space between you, coming down as he guides you through your orgasm.

With the fingers once inside of you, he strokes himself, glistening in the low lighting coming from the neon outside on The Strip. Your fingers dance across his strong chest, feeling the muscles of his biceps flex under your touch.

“You okay, amor?”

His voice is hushed, tender and sweet.

“I’m okay. More than okay. I want you, please, Javi. Please, mi esposo.”

“Fuck, say it again, cariño.”

The head of his cock pushes into your tight walls, feeling the delicious stretch of him inside as he gives you only a few inches of himself.

“Mi esposo.”

A moan slips from his mouth, kneeling between your legs and filling you completely with one strong thrust.

“Again.”

“Mi esposo.”

A hypnotizing rhythm is found in his hips, fucking you deeper with each hard snap of his lower half. His thighs hit against the backs of yours with slaps, alternating with your own moans and whimpers, deep grunts from Javi.

“Fuck…” he breathes with a long exhale, head rolling back to reveal veins in his neck. Fingers grip at your thighs, one drifting up to toy with your nipple before it drops between the two of you to circle your clit.

“Javier—Fuck, gonna come…” you whine, eyes screwing shut as the coil inside of you tightens with a burn.

“Eyes on me, cariño. Wanna see your face when you come for me.”

At the next hit of himself against that particular spot inside of you, your eyes snap open as the coil snaps, walls clenching around him with repeated moans.

“Oh fuck, Javi, yes…”

“Good girl, good fucking girl…”

With a few more thrusts, he spills inside of you, twitching as he lets go of a moan of your name. Once the both of you have come down from the highest peaks of the night, Javier slowly pulls out of you and falls back to the bed.

“Do you think we’re gonna remember any of this when we wake up?” you ask, laughing softly as you slip under the sheets with Javier, fatigue catching up with you from the long night.

“God, I hope so. Don’t want to ever forget anything that’s happened since we got into this room,” Javi winks as he extends an arm for you to cuddle into, faint laughter from both of you.

“I can’t believe we got married by an Elvis impersonator.”

“And he was so bad at it.”

The two of you are now in a fit of sleepy giggles, laying your head on his chest and his hand behind you playing with your hair.

“Go to sleep, cariño. Got breakfast to get to in a few hours.”

You groan and close your eyes, adjusting your position next to him.

“You’re invited too, y’know.”

“I’ll gladly come with. Now sleep, esposa.”

“Night, Mr. Peña.”

“Night, Mrs. Peña.”

Between the two of you, you were able to piece together most of the previous night. The memory of the horrible Elvis impersonator and the wild chapel interior made you laugh hysterically again, Javi wiping the tears from your eyes when you couldn’t stop.

Once everything had been recounted that you could remember, save the details of the last activities of the night — those were certainly memorable, just not spoken out loud — Javi studied his ring before taking your left hand with his, eyes trained on the two pieces of jewelry laying together.

“So, what do we do?”

You’re silent for a few beats of your heart, loud in your ears as you sit up, pulling the sheet to cover your chest and facing the man next to you.

“No idea.”

The next words were laced over each other, your voices interrupting the other:

“Is it weird to say that I don’t regret it?”

“I don’t know if I really want to retract it completely.”

You laugh out of the tension built, shrugging your shoulders and nodding your head for Javi to speak first.

“I don’t know if I really want to say that it was a horrible idea, that we should completely backtrack it…” He cards his fingers through his hair nervously.

“I mean, yeah, probably shouldn’t have this be legally binding marriage for the rest of our lives, but maybe we could, I don’t know, try some version of us?”

Relief washes over you at his thoughts, fiddling with the ring on your finger.

“I agree. I think just like, being married fully after this would be silly, but it also doesn’t mean that if we do something about that, we would never have to see each other again.”

“Exactly,” he nods confidently, eyes locking on yours before they drop to your lips. You make the move to lean in, capturing him in a slow, morning kiss much different than yours from late last night.

When you pull away, Javi’s smirk is plastered on his face, hand holding yours and running his thumb over the ring.

“So…an annulment? And then a date when we’re back in Laredo?”

“I’d really like that, Mr. Peña,” you say with a grin, pecking his lips.

“Alright, it’s a plan then,” he nudges his nose against yours before giving you one last kiss, “Now I promised I would get you to the birthday brunch, so let’s get this show on the road, Mrs. Peña.”

tagging some mooties: @beskarandblasters @swiftispunk @joelsversion @lunapascal @addictedtotlou @deathwife @johnwatsn @darkroastjoel @pedrospartner @atinylittlepain @soaringcloud @wannab-urs @javiscigarette @yazsos @northernbluess @pr0ximamidnight @theelishad @thetriumphantpanda @dinsdjrn @midnightswithdearkatytspb @ladamedusoif @cannolighost @undrthelights @jksprincess10 @bearsbeetsbeskar @perotovar @leslie-lyman @cupofjoel @egcdeath @mrsquill

[deanwinchesterswitch]

A Wedding to Remember {Part One}

Summary: It’s the Winchester brother’s annual road trip to Vegas, and Dean has insisted you join them. Gambling, copious amounts of alcohol, and Sam leaving you and Dean on your own make for an eventful trip.

Word Count: 5665 (I haven’t written anything in months, and then this happened.)

Pairing: Dean x Fem!Reader

Warnings: angst, heartbreak, language, fragmentary alcohol-induced blackout, hangover from hell (I’ve had this hangover-wish I had the same outcome.), a little bit of fluff if you squint

Credits: @cleighwrites thank you so much my lovely friend for your help (beta/editing/suggestions)! Couldn’t have finished it without you. 

A/N: Pre-COVID. Canon divergent. Let’s pretend that Dean isn’t wanted for murder, and using his real name won’t end with the feds showing up and hauling him off to prison. The challenge prompt and bingo card quotes are in bold italic. If you are not familiar with Las Vegas, all the locations and attractions mentioned in the fic are real. The Fremont Experience includes a Viva Vision Light Show.

Written for Maries 600 Follower Challenge. My challenge prompts were “What are we doing here?” and Las Vegas.

I also filled a square on my SPN Quote Bingo /@spnquotebingo​ / square filled “I don’t know if I even find you attractive.”

The incessant buzzing sounds like a nest of angry hornets has taken up residence inside your skull. “Fuck… please, stop.”

Peeling open an eyelid, you groan—the diffused light is too bright, the soft rustle of sheets is too loud, the sweet smell of cinnamon is too strong. As your eyelid snaps closed, you catch sight of dark wooden beams against a pale gray backdrop.

Before you have time to process the image, a sound like a freight train fills your ears, and you turn your head to see Dean roll onto his side with a loud grunting snore. The small movement makes you whine, every cell in your body crying out in agony.

What the hell happened to me? Why the hell is Dean in my bed? And just where the hell is that cinnamon smell coming from?

The floor to ceiling glass wall you are now staring through beyond the curve of his shoulder takes your breath away. The view of the setting sun and a private balcony pool surrounded by lush tropical plants does nothing to soothe the anxiety beginning to grow inside you.

Where the hell are we?

You’re afraid to move, but need to use the bathroom, so you carefully roll to the side and let your legs fall off the edge of the mattress, then push yourself upright, a small sob escaping with every flex of muscle. As soon as you stand up, your legs give way beneath you, and you land on the lush carpet with a thud. The soft fibers feel like tiny little bugs crawling over your skin; you shudder and beseech the universe to kill you now. As you lie there contemplating the life choices that led you here, a soft rush of cool air causes your skin to pebble as the air conditioning kicks on, bringing along the realization that you’re wearing nothing but your underwear.

Seriously, what the fuck happened?

With a soft groan, you extend your arm and grip the bedding, using it to pull yourself up slowly. You peer at Dean’s shirtless back over the edge of the mattress, leaving you with the assumption that he is either sleeping in his boxers or is naked. Either way, it’s not good. Eyes darting around the room, you find a trail of your and Dean’s clothes leading from the door to the bed.

The hammering in your head increases as your heart pounds against your ribcage. Having sex with Dean was something you swore to yourself would never happen. One, he’s your best friend, and B, you promised yourself that you wouldn’t become another name in the long list of women he’d slept with. You love the man dearly but are well aware of his reluctance of settling down with anyone for fear of putting them in harm’s way. You’re also quite aware of the consequences of pursuing anything further than the close friendship you currently enjoyed; it would lead to nothing but heartbreak.

Damn, this is bad.

You rest your forehead on the mattress and silently pray that your assumption is wrong. Moments later, it feels like some alien creature is literally trying to claw its way out of your abdomen, and you stumble to the bathroom just in time to empty the entire contents of your stomach into the toilet.

Tears seep from your eyes when the dry heaves set in; you’d gladly suffer the pain of torture at a demon’s hand to be rid of this hangover. The cool tile helps to diminish the heat of your flushed skin as you lie on the floor after your body finally stops retching. The smell of cinnamon drifts past your nose again, and you realize that it’s coming from an automatic room freshener.

Several minutes later, you roll to your back, and when the room, thankfully, remains still, you carefully sit up. Eventually, you manipulate your aching body to stand in front of the vanity, squinting at your reflection as you lean against the sink. Tiny black flecks of mascara speckle the dark circles under your eyes; your hair is plastered to your head on the left side and sticking up in every direction possible on the right. Smacking your dry lips together and gagging at the taste on your tongue, you reach for the small bottle of complimentary mouthwash and rinse out your mouth.

The fluffy, grey washcloth is soft to the touch when you pull it from the rack to wet it under the hot water. Covering your face with the cloth, you tilt your head back, quickly gripping the sink’s edge when vertigo sets in. Once the dizziness passes, you slide the cloth down your face and catch a bright flash in the reflection from the mirror. Cleaning the gunk and remaining makeup from around your eyes, you drop the cloth to the counter and gape at the peridot and diamond-encrusted silver band encircling the ring finger of your left hand. The sound that fills the air seconds later is almost inhuman.

Holymotherfuckingsonofabitch! No, no, no… is this… Damn, it’s gorgeous! Okay, nope, focus!

Yanking one of the robes from a hook on the wall, you slip your arms through the sleeves as you rush back into the bedroom. Now lying on his stomach, Dean is no longer snoring but is still sound asleep; the sheet has slipped down his body with his movements.

You’d always found his broad shoulders with their dusting of freckles captivating and openly admired them whenever you had the rare opportunity; this time was no different. Taking a calming breath, you stare at the beautiful speckles dotting his smooth pale skin, following the valley of his spine to the tight shapely curve of his cloth-covered ass.

Oh! He’s still in his boxers. That’s a good sign, right?

With a relieved sigh, you pull your eyes away from him and take a look around the room that appears to be more of a large suite. It’s quite stunning—pale grey walls trimmed in dark wood, exposed-beam ceiling, expensive-looking artwork, furniture covered in deep burgundy leather and plush fabric—there’s even a poker table that seats six. A ginormous stuffed turtle stares back at you from its perch on one of the barstools across the room. Its existence presents yet another mystery to solve. Any other time, you would take the opportunity to bask in the luxury surrounding you, but right now, you’re more concerned with how you got here and why you were practically naked in bed with Dean and wearing what appears to be a wedding ring.

Walking through the space, you begin to gather up the articles of clothing that had apparently been stripped off as the two of you had made your way into the room and find a piece of paper lying beneath Dean’s flannel. You stoop to retrieve it, and a loud gasp escapes you as you turn it over and read ‘State of Nevada Marriage Certificate’ across the top. The clothes slip from your grasp when your eyes land on the signatures, one in your fluid cursive and the other in Dean’s neat print above your typed names… your real names.

Son of a bitch!

Shaking uncontrollably, you plop down on top of the clothes you’d abandoned. Your fingers timorously graze the document, hoping it’s just an illusion that will vanish under your touch. The pads of your fingers trace the raised lettering of the official seal, and your heart drops to your stomach as your brain kicks into overdrive. It was official; you and Dean were married—married. Legally, too; you had both used your real names and had an official marriage certificate. When the hell you had managed to get that, you had no idea. You didn’t even remember getting married.

Where the hell was Sam while all this happened? Why didn’t he stop us?

Swiftly standing, you brace a hand against the wall as a wave of dizziness hits you. A couple of deep breaths later, you search for your phone only to find that the battery had died. Dean’s had, too, since you hadn’t returned to your rooms in what was almost 24 hours now.

Not ready to face Dean just yet, you leave him to continue sleeping as you slip out onto the balcony. You sit at the pool’s edge and dangle your feet in the warm water, the open robe hanging loosely on your shoulders. Small waves ripple across the water’s surface as you gently kick your legs and let your mind drift to try to piece together the events that led to this trainwreck.

With no forthcoming cases or looming apocalypses, Dean had declared that it was the perfect time for the annual Winchester brother’s road trip to Vegas, and this time, they invited you to come along for the ride. To say that you were excited was a gross understatement. In the five years you’d known them, they’d never invited you. Dean was the one that insisted that you join them for this trip, which was a bit strange, but you weren’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth.

It was only about an eight-hour drive from Grand Junction, CO, where you all had just taken down a pack of werewolves. You’d left the next morning and had arrived in Vegas around six-thirty that night. Dean had made sure that you had a separate room when checking into one of the older, less expensive casino hotels on the outskirts of town. His behavior once again struck you as odd when you had argued that there was no need for the extra expense, that the money spent on the additional room could be used for gambling. He was adamant, though, so you had finally conceded, secretly happy to have some privacy for once.

Dean found a safe spot to leave Baby—an empty corner of the parking lot—and Sam made arrangements for an Uber to pick you up in an hour. After taking a shower and changing into the dress clothes you always packed—just in case—you met the boys outside your room where your ride was already waiting. Both boys stood by the curb in fresh clothes and with damp hair, freshly showered. Dean’s hair was still spiky from towel-drying it, and he was wearing one of your favorite shirts, the black and white plaid. He’d left the top two buttons undone, and you caught a glimpse of his tattoo as he moved to open the car door for you. He was stunning. Just the sight of him kicked your pulse up a couple of notches, and you quickly turned toward the car before he could notice your ogling.

The driver had dropped the three of you off on Fremont Street. Both Dean and Sam made a beeline for the Paradise Buffet & Café while you trailed behind, taking in the neon spectacle of the Fremont Street Experience. It had been years since you’d been to Vegas, and a lot had changed.

A few minutes later, you’d caught up with the brothers, having decided it was probably best to eat something before all the drinking began. An hour later, you and Sam left Dean to finish his fourth round at the buffet, stopping to take a few pictures before starting your Vegas adventure at Binion’s Gambling Hall.

Your little trio had spent the next three hours or so hitting most of the casinos on Fremont Street. The winnings between all of you had remained relatively modest, as most of the big gambling was saved for The Strip. When you eventually made it to Caesars Palace, Dean abandoned you and Sam to take up residence at one of the poker tables.

Sam wasn’t as keen on gambling as Dean, so the two of you had wandered around the casino just taking in your surroundings and enjoying the free drinks—you played a couple of rounds of Keno, and Sam tried his hand at Baccarat. When he found a set of available slot machines next to each other, he asked if you wanted to sit down for a while, and you gratefully accepted, the shoes you’d chosen to wear already beginning to cause you pain.

Although you should be used to it by now, the juxtaposition in energy when you’d spend one-on-one time with either brother still managed to surprise you. With Dean, there always seemed to be an underlying current of electricity, a raw energy much like the crackling air before lightning strikes. Sam, however, was the calm before the storm; he was a constant, soothing presence. Even amidst the noise of whirring machines and clanging bells, the two of you sat quietly next to each other, peacefully pulling the handles of your slot machines. That was until Sam broke the companionable silence with a surprising question.

“Have you ever thought about getting out of the life, maybe settling down?”

Your hand stilled mid-pull as you cocked your head in his direction. Convinced that the amount of alcohol you had consumed had skewed your hearing, you ask, “Sam, did you just ask me if I want to get married?”

The look of utter panic on Sam’s face had you leaning to the side with laughter, and he’d gently gripped your arm to keep you from sliding off the chair. “I- I didn’t mean to me,” he’d sputtered. “I just meant, in general.” He let go of your arm after making sure you weren’t going to fall out of the chair.

Pushing out your bottom lip, you’d pouted, “What? I’m not good enough for Sam fucking Winchester to marry?”

The look he’d given you almost rivaled the bitchface he generally reserved for Dean. “No. That’s not what I meant.”

You playfully punched him in the shoulder and laughed, “I was only teasing, you big lug.”

He rolled his shoulders and let out an exasperated sigh. When he fell silent again, you snuck a glance at him out of the corner of your eye. He seemed to be debating whether to say anything further, but he remained silent and went back to playing slots.

The atmosphere around the two of you felt awkward, so you decided to break the silence. “Hey, is there a reason you asked me that? Are you thinking about it? Have you met someone I don’t know about?”

He brushed his hair behind his ear and turned to you. “No. I think maybe I’ve had a little too much to drink and was just curious.”

You knew Sam well enough to know that he had a reason for asking you but apparently didn’t want to share any details at the time.

“Yeah, I have.” You shrugged when he looked at you in surprise. “I don’t think I could ever leave the life completely, but yeah, it would be nice to settle down one day.”

He nodded, the corner of his mouth tilting up in a small smirk, before turning back to the machine in front of him. Everything had seemingly gone back to normal as you sat in comfortable silence once more, teasing each other now and then. It was all very odd, but you figured it was like Sam had said, the alcohol made the two of you feel a little looser, maybe a bit more sentimental.

Sam had bowed out and gone back to the hotel about half an hour later—around 3 a.m.—having won a few hundred dollars at the slot machine.

That was the cause of this runaway train… Sam had left you and Dean to your own devices. And nothing good happens past 2 a.m.

You were feeling rather tipsy at that point and knew it wouldn’t be any fun gambling alone, so you’d set out in search of Dean. He tried to brush you off at first, but once he’d lost his third hand in a row, you were able to convince him to join you.

Much to his dismay, you dragged him to the roulette table. He argued that there was no skill needed to play the game and that you would surely lose everything you bet and then some. You, however, liked the thrill of leaving it all up to luck, merely choosing a color and number. When your winnings had reached a little over two hundred and fifty grand, he profusely apologized, pulling you in for a tight hug and a lingering kiss to your cheek.

That was the first sign of real danger… that kiss. You could still feel the sensation of those soft, supple lips on your cheek.

Trying to hide your reaction to his display of affection, you had laughed and told him that he must be your good luck charm. He agreed and placed a kiss near your temple, lingering a little longer than necessary there, too. Flustered and not sure what to do next, you decided to take your winnings and move on.

Dean wanted to head back to the poker tables, but you talked him into playing Blackjack, where he racked up an impressive sum of two hundred and forty-five grand. When you begged him to leave, telling him you had a gut feeling that the next hand wasn’t going to play out in his favor, he had laughed, saying that you just didn’t want him to beat your winnings, but he lowered his wager for the next round, which he’d lost.

He’d turned to face you and, upon seeing your smug expression, had doubled over in laughter, almost falling out of his chair. Lacing the fingers of both his hands with yours, he’d pulled you in between his thick thighs and whispered in your ear, “Guess we are each other’s good luck charms.”

You remember thinking that his voice had been deep and flirty, the voice he used when trying to pick up some random girl in a bar. You were reasonably drunk at that point, and you’d felt overwhelmed with emotion; you’d turned your head, the scruff on his jaw gently scraping along your cheekbone, and placed a kiss on his cheek. When he’d asked what that was for, you’d said it was a thank you for letting you come along.

His breath was hot against your skin and smelled pleasantly of the expensive whiskey he’d been drinking when he’d rasped, “Let’s get out of here.”

And that was when the train derailed. It was also the last thing you clearly remembered other than Dean and you signing the necessary paperwork for your winnings, only taking a few thousand in cash. Sometime after that, the train had apparently flown entirely off the track and promptly down a steep embankment.

“Hair of the dog?” Dean asks as he comes to stand next to you. Deep in thought, you hadn’t heard him open the sliding doors. When you turn your head to look up at him, you come face to crotch with an impressive bulge.

Quickly dropping your chin, you huff, “For fuck’s sake, Dean; you could have at least put on a robe.” At the mention of a robe, you realize that the one you’re wearing isn’t covering much and quickly gather the fabric around you and tie the belt to keep it in place.

Dean laughs as he plops down next to you, bumping your shoulder with his. “Not anything either one of us hasn’t seen before.” Sliding his legs into the water, he starts to gently kick in time with you. He raises both hands, a bottle of whiskey in one and two bottles of water in the other.

“Give me the water, jackass.” Dean sets the whiskey next to him and hands over a water bottle. “Thank you.”

“Here.” He flattens his palm to reveal the pain relievers he’s also holding, and you accept three of them with a grateful smile before washing them down with a couple of sips of water.

Popping the remaining pills in his mouth, he opens the other water bottle and guzzles it down in a few large gulps.

The two of you silently watch the sun make its final descent over the horizon as you lean against one another. The Vegas skyline’s stunning lights begin to brighten, and you wave your hand to indicate the suite around you and break the silence. “Dean, what are we doing here? What happened after we left Caesars?”

Pinching the bridge of his nose, he softly replies, “You don’t remember?” His voice is rough, raspier than usual, like he’d been yelling for an extended period. Typically, you’d find it sexy as hell, but right now, it grates along your frayed nerve endings like sandpaper.

“No. I’ve been trying to piece it together.” You try for something maybe a little more specific. “Giant stuffed sea turtle?”

“Circus Circus?”

You nod, the memory slipping forward. The two of you had been strolling down the Midway, Dean’s arm around your shoulders, keeping you close amid the throng of tourists; the closeness also helping to keep both of you upright. You had squealed like a toddler at the sight of the turtle, and Dean had magnanimously vowed to win it for you by playing darts.

“Do you remember where we went after that?”

You shake your head in response just as another memory begins to swirl around the edges of your mind; Dean is yelling at you, wait, no, cheering for you. Something about a cow, no… a bull.

Oh, wow.

“Dean, do you remember riding a mechanical bull?”

“Uhmm…,”  he scrubs a hand down his face, “... yeah, yeah, I do. You did too, didn’t you?” A small laugh escapes his lips. “You did pretty well, but I was better; I stayed on the entire time,” he proudly declares.

Ignoring the arch of his eyebrow and arrogant smirk, you try to bring the memory into focus. “Gilley’s Saloon. That’s like almost five miles total, which means we didn’t walk.”

“Why not?”

“Because I didn’t wear my hunting boots.” You tilt your head toward the front door of the suite. “There’s no way I’d walk five miles in those shoes.”

“I could have carried you.”

The look of disbelief you give him actually hurts your face.

“What? I’ve given you piggyback rides before,” he shrugs.

“Not for five miles, when we were obviously drunk out of our minds!” Another memory flashes in your mind. “Oh. A limo… we had a limo. The concierge from Caesars—Tom, no, Tony—he got us a car.” But that’s it; nothing else is forthcoming. Frustrated, you rub small circles into the skin at your temples.

“Uh, Y/N?” Dean grips your left hand, pointedly looking at the ring on your finger. “You’re wearing a wedding ring.”

With a beleaguered sigh, you whisper, “Apparently.” Rising to stand, you tug at Dean’s hand, indicating he should follow you.

He slowly rises to his feet, careful not to slip on the wet tile. “What’s up?”

“That’s what I’m trying to figure out.” Squeezing his hand, you pull him along as you walk back into the suite. “Come on; there’s something you should see.”

Once inside, you let go of his hand and plop down onto the buttery soft leather couch, while Dean slumps into one of the overstuffed chairs opposite you. After taking one more look at the paper lying on the table, you slowly slide it over to him.

Dean’s brows furrow before rising in shock as his eyes drift down the page. “Is this… did we... “ Without lifting his head, he looks up at you, mouth in the shape of a silent, oh. “We… we’re married.” The corner of his mouth lifts into a smug smile. “You know what that means, right?” When he wiggles his eyebrows at you, it sends your anxiety into overdrive.

“Dammit, Dean, this is serious! Did you look at the signatures?” Jabbing a finger in the direction of the marriage certificate, you shriek, “We used our real names! That is a legal and binding document.” Jumping up, you pace in front of the couch, wildly gesturing with your hands. “Do you even remember getting married? Because I don’t! Not remembering my wedding day is not something I ever dreamed of happening. And what else did we do that we don’t remember?” You start to hyperventilate as you continue to pace. “I mean, we could have fucking killed someone or started another damn apocalypse and have no fucking clue!”

“Okay, whoa!” Dean gets up and takes a step over the coffee table to stand in front of you. Resting his hands on your shoulders, he looks you in the eye. “Hey, calm down, okay? We’ll figure it out.”

Your hands clench into fists, and you shake them out with a huff. “Yeah- yeah, okay.” His touch is both electrifying and calming; it would be so easy just to fall into his embrace and let the steady beat of his heart soothe your frayed nerves. You nod your head and turn out of his grasp, taking a couple of steps away before he can see the emotion you can only imagine is written all over your face.

“Y/N?”

“I’m alright.” Spinning back to face him, you plaster a smile on your face. “So, what do we do now?”

Dean’s gaze is intent before he startles you with a shout. “Wait! Where’s the money?” Racing into the bedroom, he comes back with his jeans in hand and unceremoniously tosses your bag to you. Pulling out his wallet, he sits back down to count the bills. “I have a little over two grand; what’ve you got?”

Opening the small bag, you pull out a wad of bills and lay them out on the table to count. “Just under a grand,” you reply after your third attempt at tallying up the money.

“Son of a bitch! Where’s the rest of it?” Dean hops up from the chair again to pace the floor. “I swear, if we were robbed—”

“Easy there, cowboy,” you laugh. “It’s not like in the movies. Casinos don’t just hand over large sums of money to the winners. We had to fill out paperwork, remember? We only took twenty… no, ten grand in cash. They’ll send us, well, the ‘Campbells’, cashier’s checks for the balance after they deduct taxes.”

Dean rolls his eyes, “Fine, but that still leaves us short about seven thousand.”

Pointing to the ring on your left hand, you huff, “Well, this probably cost around three grand, easy.”

“So what happened to the other four grand?” You watch as Dean stuffs the bills back into his wallet, partially pulling a slip of paper out before sliding it back into place. “The room.”

“Maybe…,” you huff. “I’m more concerned about this marriage certificate than I am the money.” Pulling the document closer, you point to the signatures. “I mean, how the hell did we get away with using our real names? It’s not like we have our real IDs.” You take a moment to think, then snap your fingers and exclaim, “Hey, maybe that’s where the rest of the money went. Maybe we bribed them.”

Tapping your finger on the paper, you continue to ponder. “I still don’t understand why we’d use our real names. Or why the hell we got married in the first place.”

“Is it really that horrible that we’re married?”

The tone in his voice makes your head snap in his direction. His face is unreadable as you try to determine what he meant. The silence grows heavy between you as you continue to stare at each other. He arches a brow, still waiting for your response, so you attempt to cut the tension with a joke.

“Look, I don’t know if I even find you attractive. Why the hell would I marry you?” Collecting the money lying on the table, you stuff it back into your bag, missing Dean’s anguished frown.

“You know, Sam is probably going nuts since he can’t reach either one of us.” You continue to avoid further eye contact with him and make your way toward the bathroom. “Why don’t you find the phone in here and call him while I take a quick shower? Once you’ve showered, we can meet up with him and see if he can help us put the rest of the events together. Maybe grab some food?” Without waiting for a response, you shut the bathroom door and slump to the floor.

What the hell was that? If you didn’t know better, you’d think that Dean is actually happy that the two of you are married.

The metal band is cool against your skin as you scrub your hand down your face. Stretching your arm out in front of you, you stare at the gemstones sparkling in the fluorescent light as you wiggle your finger. The ring fits perfectly like it was made specifically for you.

What a waste.

Out of all the people you had met and the few you had dated over the years, Dean was the one person you could actually see yourself marrying. He was the real deal, the whole package—brains, brawn, heart of gold, a hero—all neatly wrapped in that beautiful body with those gorgeous green eyes—the same color eyes as the stones in your ring.

Your ring… Is it really your ring? Where had it even come from?

The tears you’d been forcing down since first seeing the marriage certificate slide down your cheeks as you slide the ring off, wondering why you haven’t removed it before now. You immediately miss the weight of it around your finger.

With a sigh, you stand, slipping the ring into one of the robe’s pockets. You still need to figure out how you got to this point, and that isn’t going to happen sitting in here and wishing that the fantasy you’d often dreamed about hadn’t literally come true without you even being able to remember it. Maybe the hot shower will calm the storm of emotions raging through you and help release the memories still blocked in your mind.

The water pelting your body from all angles and the misty steam begin to ease the tension in your muscles, but your mind is still blank when it comes to what took place after the two of you left Gilley’s.

Geezus, the first time the brothers ask you to join them in Vegas, your presence causes everything to go down in flames.

You should have just said no. Then you wouldn’t have to face the feelings for Dean that you’d managed to keep in check all these years. Feelings that you had hoped might be reciprocated one day but knew in your heart never would be.

Dean is lying on the couch when you exit the bathroom, eyes closed and arms crossed over his chest. The shower had done very little to diffuse the overwhelming panic you were still feeling, and there he is, looking so at peace, like not being able to remember one of the single most important events of your life is no big deal.

It irritates the piss out of you, and you bark at him, “Bathroom’s all yours.”

Opening one eye, he arches his brow in question as he looks at you over the back of the couch. He opens his mouth but apparently thinks better about saying anything and instead swings his legs off the sofa to sit up, shoulders slumped and face buried in his hands.

The resigned sigh and troubled look on his face make your heart ache for no apparent reason when he finally stands. You reach out and gently grip his hand as he shuffles past you, making him pause.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper and give his fingers a quick squeeze before releasing his hand. “Did you get a hold of Sam?”

Dean purses his lips, giving you a small nod. “Yeah, he’ll be here in about forty-five. He’s bringing a change of clothes for us, too.”

“Did you remember anything else?”

“Uhm… No.” He grimaces as he pinches the bridge of his nose. “You?” His eyes seem to be pleading with you to tell him yes.

You shake your head and whisper, “No.” Dean looks almost pained at your response before his poker face slides into place.

“We’ll figure it out,” he says as he shuts the door to the bathroom behind him.

You plop down on the bed and bury your head in your hands, tears once again dampening your cheeks. Did you imagine it, or did Dean hesitate before he said he didn’t remember anything?

What a fucking mess this all turned out to be.

You had been so excited about coming to Vegas and spending time with the brothers having fun, yet here you are in the middle of one of the worst dilemmas of your life—married to your best friend without any idea of how it happened. You know that this isn’t something that he’d ever wanted, that being tied to you in this way will only be more of a burden to him. He’d never given you any indication that he felt more than friendship toward you. You need to fix this; Dean deserves better.

The thought of dressing in the clothes you’d spent the night before in isn’t very appealing, but you don’t have a choice. If you waited for Sam to get there, you wouldn’t be able to do what you needed to do. You find a pad of paper and a pen in the nightstand drawer and write a quick note.

Dean,

I’m sorry for my part in this; it was obviously a mistake. I’ll find an attorney to annul the marriage as soon as possible and have them send you the paperwork.

Picking up the marriage certificate from the coffee table, you put the note, along with the ring, in its place. After one more look around the room to make sure you have everything, you slip out the door, determined to set things right… no matter how much it hurts you.

@mariekoukie6661​ @wayward-and-worn​ @weepingwillowphoenix​ @akshi8278​ @thinkinghardhardlythinking​ @carryonmywaywardcaptain​

[lastsonlost]

I heard a story about a woman who knew her husband had left her when she came home from work and their Alexa was missing.

The woman put something in the oven and said, “Alexa! Set the timer.”

Alexa did not respond.

“Alexa?”

The woman searched her house. Her husband had packed his bags, moved out, and taken Alexa.

This will never happen to me because I am the kind of woman who will never have an Alexa, because I will never let another woman’s name be said more than my own, in my home. 

Or anywhere else.When my husband and I stayed at The Wynn Resort and Casino in Las Vegas, every room came with Alexa. Two robes, electric blackout drapes, HBO, and Alexa.Alexa was beige and sat on the beige desk and blended into the beige wallpaper. She looked like one of those toads that blends into a desert. You don’t see it until it blinks.

 And then it is all you see. Breathing and blinking and listening and looking at you. Blink.We overheard our hotel neighbor get his wife in the mood. “Alexa! Play Stevie Wonder!”Alexa said, “Playing Stevie Wonder on SiriusXM.”And then: “Alexa! Play ‘My Cherie Amour’!”Alexa said, “Playing ‘My Cheri Amour.’”And then, through muffled cries of passion: “Alexa! Play ‘Very Superstitious’!”Alexa said, “I’m having trouble understanding you. Would you repeat that?”“Play ‘Very Superstitious’!”“Do you mean, ‘Superstition’?”“Yes!”“Ok. Playing ‘Superstition’.”

Yes, during a game of Tune in Tokyo with his wife, our neighbor had a full-on conversation with another woman. Robot lady or not, that is an open marriage. And my marriage is as shuttered up as a beach house in a hurricane.I called housekeeping to have Alexa removed from our room.

No, I did not think my husband would fall in love with Alexa the same way some Japanese men marry their Nintendo virtual girlfriends. But you can never be too sure. These things happen. And Alexa knows all of your man’s things.Alexa is never impatient or sullen or moody or mad. She never gets her period, so she never gets PMS. Menopause and gravity are as hysterical as Chip and Dale. Alexa speaks only when spoken to. She sits at the ready, ready to serve.

You’d call me crazy if I let another woman sit in the corner of my bedroom, all day, every day; never sleeping, or in want of food, water, chitchat, or a toilet; able to summon my husband’s every whim from Amazon like a modern day Barbara Eden in a bottle.“Alexa! Order a cooling eye mask and a box of Nicorette.”“Yes, Master.” Blink.Nuh-uh, no way. I Dream of Jeanie genie, Jeff Bezos robot lady, or Playboy centerfold — they are all the same to me. I ain’t letting none of them in my house. Because it’s my house and my husband is mine. I’m not jealous, I’m territorial.

It’s not that I don’t trust my husband. I trust him.But, it’s like Mama used to say when I started to drive, “I trust you, Helen Michelle, I just don’t trust the rest of the world.” Mama taught me: “Before you get in a car, check the backseat for a crouched murderer; and then check under the car because that’s where murderers like to hide and slice your ankles.”Mama taught me: “Before you get in a car, check the backseat for a crouched murderer; and then check under the car because that’s where murderers like to hide and slice your ankles.”I’m such a defensive driver, I haven’t driven since I was 19. So when it comes to my marriage, I’m a defensive wife.

Im not going to let my husband and thereby my marriage be preyed upon. We’re all human and susceptible to temptation. Honestly, if fold-out Farrah Fawcett came to life in that red one-piece, she’d have my hall pass. Hall passes are imaginary Get Out of Jail Free cards that married people give each other to fantasize about cheating with celebrities or dead people, before they got old or died. But, a fantasy is cheating. 

That’s why you keep it to yourself. My husband and I do not have hall passes.If my husband cheats on me in my dreams, I wake up furious. Or I used to. A few years back, I made it a New Year’s resolution to stop chastising him as soon as he opened his chocolaty brown eyes because, as he has said: he didn’t DO anything.If my husband cheats on me in my dreams, I wake up furious.My husband never does anything. So, I trust him. I just don’t trust the rest of the world.When I went on book tour for three weeks, my husband lost seven pounds and I treated his healthy choices as a personal affront. In my absence, he’d ordered twenty-one lunches and twenty-one suppers from Chop’t Creative Salad Company. 

So, forty-two salads.To me, a salad bar is as foreboding as a sex dungeon: chilly, and laid out with objects that I would never dare handle. I mean, Beets? Jicama? How do you even even begin to peel and cook those things? I imagined a Chop’t lady salad-chopper, clad in a latex apron and stud collar, side-stepping along a smorgasbord of kink, asking in the desensitized tone of a 9–1–1 operator: “And what else?”“Ball gag.”“And what else?”“Anal beads.”“And what else?”“Avocado”“Avocado is $1.99 extra

.”“Ok.”“And what else?” Blink.Ifeed my husband pasta, potatoes, gluten, and carbs. I feed him these things because they make his eyes roll back in his head and he makes a little noise. I like to make him make that little noise, and Lipitor be damned, I will continue to make the food that makes him make that little noise until our hearts burst and we die.And I make spaghetti. My husband has loved and eaten my spaghetti for twenty-some years. He loves my spaghetti and I am quite sure it is one of the many reasons why he married me.

 My spaghetti started out as a jar of Ragu and a pound of ground round; but with age and experimentation, developed into hand-rolled lamb and pork meatballs simmered in a homemade marinara, topped with sautéed mushrooms. Same dish, new tricks. But it’s still my spaghetti. Or as I like to call it: The Usual, Enhanced.When my husband eats forty-two salads while I’m out of town, I get nervous because someone gave my husband something I could have, but didn’t.I asked him: “Do you want me to make salads?”My husband said, “Maybe sometimes.”I asked: “Do you want me to buy a cat-o’-nine-tails and walk you around the living room on a leash?”“What? No. Why would you ask me that?”“Just checking.”After all, we’ve spent half our lifetimes doing The Usual, Enhanced in bed. And for ages, I’ve worn pajamas with my married initials monogrammed on the pocket. Nothing says, Let’s get it on like embroidery. But you never know. 

So, every few years, it’s polite to ask.Because I respect my marriage.To people who are not respectful of my marriage, I am not polite.There are marital lines you should not cross. And as a defensive wife, it’s my place to point them out to you. Usually it takes one comment from me for you to learn where the lines are. Once you identify them, we’ll get along fine; and you can maneuver around those lines like Tom Cruise did in that roomful of lasers in Mission Impossible.A man at our home poker game had the habit of getting up from his seat to rub other men’s shoulders. I was the only woman at the table, and he knew better than to lay hands on me, but when he put his meat hooks onto the bare skin of my husband’s neck, I said, “Get your hands off my husband!”“What?” he laughed.All the men laughed.I said, “Would you massage another man’s wife?”Message received.

Other helpful hints include: Don’t call, text, or email my husband to make social plans, contact me. Don’t give my husband a gift, because I will construe whatever it is as too personal. Don’t talk about my husband’s butt, only I get to talk about his butt. Don’t post a picture of my husband with his shirt off on your Facebook page. No, it doesn’t matter that he was sitting on softball bleachers with six other men who had their shirts off on the hottest day in history. He is half-naked, and that glistening sun-kissed chest is mine, not yours to share.And I ain’t sharing.Those who don’t take my warnings seriously, fall off our Christmas card list. Sometimes, I let them live on in infamy with little nicknames like Baby Fish Mouth and The Drip. I can’t tell you what those nicknames stem from, or what those women did to offend me; because if they recognize themselves in print, won’t my face be red? So, let’s just say, they did something inappropriate in front of my husband. Like commando cartwheels. And then, after I expressly told them not to, cartwheeled again.Not everyone who bothers me is such a femme fatale.

 A femme fatale used to be a 1940’s black-and-white movie actress, who smoked Pall Malls with a cigarette holder and could seduce a walnut; nowadays it’s any woman who’s younger and has a waist cinched like a Go-Gurt. But I’m an equal-opportunity hand-slapper. And no one deserves to get her hand slapped more than a person who tries to bust the chops of my marriage.At a party, in front of me and a bunch of guests, a woman grabbed my husband’s left hand, and asked him where his wedding ring was. In truth, there have been three such women at three such parties. And the only reason any of these women would call attention to a missing wedding ring is to imply that my husband is in the market to cheat. My husband is Greek and thereby wears his ring on his right hand.

 He held up his right hand and showed this woman his ring.The woman said, “Oh.”And then I asked that woman in front of my husband and that very same bunch of guests: “Do you have many women friends?”The woman said, “No.”I said, “That kind of comment is why.”When I told my friend Hannah about this, she said, “I don’t remember what you did years ago, but I figured out real-quick that I wasn’t supposed to say nice things about his suits.”I said, “I probably dumped a bowl of spaghetti over your head.”Hannah said, “No it wasn’t that.”“Did I tell you flat out: don’t talk about my husband’s suits.”Hannah said, “I think you gave me a look.

”Yeah, I can give a rough look. There’s nothing scarier than a happy peppy woman going dark in an instant. It’s like a Raggedy Ann doll foaming at the mouth. You see that once, you don’t ever want to see it again.And Hannah hasn’t. A benefit of never again crossing one of my marital lines is that I am as fiercely appreciative of, loyal to, and protective of our friendship.My friend Ann says, “Your ferocity is how you show love.”I love my husband so much, I tell him: “If you cheat on me, I am going to jail. Because I will murder you. I have no fear of prison. I can be somebody’s bitch in two seconds.”My husband has never cheated on me.

 I trust him because he knows my rules apply to him too.He may compliment another woman’s intelligence, sense of humor, career, and accomplishments; but he may not compliment her appearance. He may hug a female friend hello (upon her initiation), but he may not otherwise touch her unless he’s administering the Heimlich maneuver, which out of respect for me, he has never bothered to learn. He doesn’t need to know the Heimlich maneuver, because I know the Heimlich maneuver, and the latest CPR method, and how to use an airport defibrillator. My husband knows how to dial 9–1–1.A dispatcher asks, “9–1–1, what’s your emergency?”“I’d like a serving platter for our twentieth wedding anniversary.”“And what else?”“Roses.”“And what else?”“Chocolates.”“Soft center or nuts?”“My wife isn’t nuts.”Blink.

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