#but anyone who says shit like this has never touched a mechanical keyboard in their lives

[good-fwiend-in-wome]

I will literally kidnap and tie all tumblr users to a chair until they sit through a power point on the different kinds of keyboards and type an essay on it on a mechanical keyboard

[jamesfairbrass]

“So we shall let the reader answer this question for himself: who is the happier man, he who has braved the storm of life and lived or he who has stayed securely on shore and merely existed?”

- Hunter S Thompson

It’s been three year since I’ve written anything on here. Three years since I’ve felt the need to visit this page. Three years since I’ve wanted to sit down in front of a computer, or use the annoyingly small touch screen keyboard on my phone. Three years since I’ve felt like I had anything to say ... actually fuck that. If I’m gonna write anything, I might as well be fucking honest about it ... three years since something hurt enough that I needed to get it out.

When I first got sober, I used to write all the time. I carried little notebooks around in my back pocket just so I had something at hand. My hands covered in ink from leaking ballpoint pens, shaking from too much coffee. If I could find those notebooks now, I’m sure the handwriting would be illegible.

I was a raw fucking nerve. Without the booze, everything filled me with overflowing emotions. Feelings that’d been dulled and drowned out for years. Everything felt new. Felt weird. Alien. Uncomfortable. Writing was the only thing I could do to stop me from going completely crazy. Get it out of my head. Look at it from a different perspective. Try and make sense of it.

Over the years life got easier.

No. That’s not true.

Life got different. I learned how to cope with actually feeling emotions. Learned how to be a decent human being. Learned how to function relatively well in polite society.

I worked the steps, had a sponsor, sponsored other. Meetings, conferences, book studies. I walked the walk, and the need to write grow less and less.

Every now and then, something would come up and I’d think about writing, but inevitably other life things would happen and that feeling that I needed to get it out would fade.

These last 12 months have been a cunt ... I never said I learned how to stop talking like a sailor.

Last September, my mum when into hospital for surgery, after being diagnosed with bowel cancer.

Kai and I flew back home as soon as we found out, so we could be with her as she came out of surgery and recovered in hospital.

Seriously dealing with the idea of your parents mortality for the first time, is an overwhelming experience.

I mean on some level, I think we all expect that we’ll outlive our parents. But it’s the sort of thought that hangs out in the back of your head, just lingering. You don’t put much weight, or connect too much emotional baggage to it. It’s just there ... it’ll pop up every now and then, but you don’t take it that seriously.

But having that thought sit down in front you, and windup for a firm open palm slap across the face ... that’s something you can’t really ignore.

It’s the feeling you get in your stomach as you pass the crest of a hump on a rollercoaster. As you start the descent, and your stomach is fighting against gravity ... doing everything it can to occupy the space in your chest where your lungs belong.

But on a rollercoaster, gravity catches up to your stomach and wrestles it back into place.

The realization that your going to have to accept your parents mortality doesn’t believe in gravity. It doesn’t accept Isaac Newton knew what he was talking about. It doesn’t allow gravity to do any of the wrestling for you.

I’ve spent the best part of a year trying to wrestle my stomach back into place.

It doesn’t work. That feeling doesn’t really go away. It ebbs and flows like the tide.

Over the last 8 or 9 years, I’ve really tried to work on my relationship with my mum. It wasn’t always the best, but it was a hell of a lots better than it used to be. Prior to sobering up, I’d effectively cut off all ties with any of my family.

I felt guilt and shame for the way I was living my life. For the things I was doing, and for the women I was doing it with. For being so far from home. Although looking back on it now, there’s absolutely no way I was able to recognize any of that at the time.

Fuck no. I was far too caught up in feeling self righteous. Full of justifiable anger. Piss and vinegar.

A handful of years after I got sober, Kai’s mum passed away. I saw first hand, what loosing a parent looks like.

I knew I’d experience those emotions personally. That slap in the face. That feeling of my stomach ignoring gravity.

It was watching Kai go through that, which prompted me to start to rebuild some relationships with my family. My mum, my dad, my brother, and sister.

It wasn’t nearly as hard as I had imagined it would be. In my head there was a huge expanse between us. Some medieval wall dropped somewhere in the middle of the Atlantic. A height that I’d never be able to scale.

It was all bullshit. A twisted joke my head likes to play on me, to make me feel terminally unique. To isolate me from anyone that really cares about me.

Back when I was drinking, and fucking my life up, it was a defense mechanism - a means of not letting anyone get close enough to hurt me. But now ... now it’s just bullshit. Something from my fucked up brain that I have to ignore.

My family didn’t care about the past. They didn’t care about the shit that was in my head. They just wanted me back. Their son, and their brother. And over the years I’ve been able to do that. To be a son again. To be a brother again.

On Monday, July 29th my mum passed away.

She couldn’t keep up the fight any longer. She was the most caring and compassionate person I’ve ever known, and my heart is broken. These past few week, the distance between me and my family has felt great than ever.

Today, Kai and I are getting on a plane to say one final goodbye to her.

August has been a difficult month. I can’t wait for it to be over. On Tuesday, I got word that a friend of mine had overdosed.

Barb ... you’ll be missed. You were there when I first got sober. You were one of the first people I met when I uprooted my life, and moved to Wisconsin. Your laugh. Oh god, your laugh.

I’m one of the lucky one. On August 8th I celebrated 13 years of sobriety. But I know things could easily have turned out differently. Fuck ... they still could.

But today, I don’t want to drink. I don’t want to self destruct. I have an amazing life, despite some really fucking shitty things happening. I have a relationship with my family that I cherish, a wife who’s been a rock and with whom I couldn’t my life without, and some truly amazing friends who have become family. Stuart, Rachel, James, Ryan, Nina, Lizz, and Nate - I don’t know where I’d be without you.

I am Responsible. When anyone, anywhere, reaches out for help, I want the hand of A.A. always to be there. And for that: I am responsible.

Alcoholics Anonymous; 1965

[tisfan]

One Hand Washes the Other

Title of Piece: One Hand Washes the Other Also on A03 Square filled: A4 - WTF Warning: unrepentant fluff, weird coping mechanisms, first date Pairing: Tony Stark/Bucky Barnes Summary: Bucky doesn’t always eat with the team. It takes Tony a while to figure out why. Created for @tonystarkbingo

Barnes didn’t always join the team for dinner. Tony didn’t always notice when he wasn’t there. At first, it was because maybe Tony was there; they weren’t exactly on friendly terms. But as time went on, and Tony was a rational, reasonable person, the enmity faded. Grew into something like grudging respect, and then grudging admiration. And then, because it was Tony, it might have turned into something like a reluctant crush.

Tony didn’t like to admit that he liked someone; it hadn’t usually worked out well for him. Case in point: Pepper Potts was back on the West Coast again, and sometimes missing her was like an extra hole in his chest, and he was beginning to believe that his emotional make-up was something very swiss-cheese in composition, and he didn’t need any more random aches and pains, thank you very much.

So, Tony tried not to notice when Barnes wasn’t around.

It’s not like Tony showed up to every single one of them, either.

To keep people from fighting about food, team dinners were two different protocols; ordering takeout was on a semi-random, preference oriented schedule. Which was to say, everyone entered in their personal favorites and Friday would select what people were getting for dinner. Which meant pizza was regular, as well as Chinese take away. Burgers.

The other protocol was the cooking roster, because some of the team liked to cook, and others on the team liked to sit down to a home cooked meal. Bruce, for instance, made the words best baby back ribs and absolutely would not tell anyone his secret, even swearing the AIs to secrecy and Friday diligently kept her word (traitor) and refused to allow Tony to access the kitchen camera. Not that Tony could cook, most of the time, but it was the principle of the thing.

But eventually, Tony noticed a pattern, because it was Tony.

The first night they’d done cheeseburgers, Barnes had eaten his portion with a knife and fork. Okay, weird, but a lot of Europeans did that, too, and Barnes had spent a lot of time in Europe. Tony, who drank a lot of his meals (sometimes they were smoothies and sometimes they were booze, and who asked you anyway?) didn’t comment, but Clint did.

And Barnes stopped showing up on burger nights.

He’d never showed up for pizza.

Barnes showed up for chicken one night, but he’d backed up and left in somewhat of a hurry when he saw the containers and realized it was fried chicken, not baked. Clint had waved a drumstick at him, trying to tempt him, but Barnes didn’t even look back.

Tony couldn’t help but notice a pattern after a while.

Barnes never showed up -- or left quickly if he did show up -- when the meal was something eaten by hand. Spaghetti nights, he was as deft with a fork and spoon to twirl pasta against as anyone. He ate epic amounts of steak and potatoes. Raw oysters disappeared like crazy, and sushi was a big hit, but peel-and-eat shrimp or crab legs were right out.

The guy wouldn’t eat popcorn on movie nights, either.

Well, Tony knew all about weird hangups that manifested in odd behavior, and he wasn’t going to call the guy out. Maybe it was some sort of shame-thing about the metal arm, even tho Shuri’s design was top notch, really quite elegant. Or something weird about the way it clicked when he moved it, but… well, it wasn’t Tony’s business, was it?

It wasn’t until one particularly bad bout of engineering fuge where Tony hadn’t slept in days, but had to stagger out of the workshop because he was out of coffee downstairs, and staring at the fabricator wasn’t going to make it run any faster that he actually saw Barnes.

Alone.

[more below the cut]

Sitting in front of the television, watching some late night, black and white, movie marathon and eating out of a bowl.

At first, Tony thought he had some of the left-over noodles -- there were always Chinese noodles of some sort or other in the fridge -- because the bowl was small, he was holding it under his chin, and he was wielding a pair of chopsticks with his left hand. The ridiculous mock up lightsaber kind that Tony had bought from Think Geek, because it was cool, and also because he was a little jealous that he hadn’t thought of it first.

Barnes didn’t take his eyes off the television, dipped the chopsticks into his bowl, and something crunched.

Not like a bamboo shoot, or a water chestnut, either, but…

“Are you eating Cheetos with chopsticks?” Tony couldn’t help but burst out. “Barnes, what the fuck?”

Barnes scrambled to put the bowl down; the chopsticks disappeared like a magician’s trick. “What? I was jus’ watching a movie, can’t always sleep--”

“No, no, that’s fine,” Tony said, waving that away. He knew quite a lot about not being able to sleep. “Can I just ask why?”

“Why what? Why can’t I sleep?” Barnes’s wide-eyed innocent look was both very good and damned endearing, but he wasn’t fooling Tony.

“Why do you eat like that, it’s so--”

“Weird. Creepy. Fucked up. I know.” Barnes heaved a sigh and by the time he was done, he looked somehow smaller and more fragile than Tony had ever seen him. This man, the one in front of him, blushing uncomfortably and fidgeting, that was a man that Tony could call Bucky. Not the cold-blooded killer, or the reluctant Avenger. He rubbed thoughtfully at the palm of his metal hand with the thumb from his right.

“Hey, I don’t let people hand me shit,” Tony said. “I am the last person to give you grief about weird coping mechanisms, I’m just wondering why.”

“Did you know that your computer keyboard has twenty thousand times more germs than a toilet seat?”

That seemed like a non-sequitur if Tony ever head one. Also, pointless. Supersoldiers didn’t get sick.

“There might be a reason I use hard light and projected imagery instead of something as quaint as a mouse and keyboard system,” Tony said. Also, projected imagery was a lot cooler than a clunky board.

Barnes spread his metal fingers to their max extension, all the little plates opening up to allow for the movement. Gold and black, it was gorgeous, and Tony wanted to touch it, poke at it, because, well, he generally had a boner for engineering, even if it wasn’t his own.

“Dust gets caught up in here,” Barnes said. “An’ other stuff.”

Blood, Tony read between the lines.

“There’s no cleaning features? That just seems like a failure in--”

“It was a little easier with th’ old one because there wasn’t a lot on th’ way of actual sensitivity. Used to brush it out with compressed air, but that shit is cold, and this hand can detect temperature extremes,” Barnes shuddered. “There’s coating on the circuits, that makes it waterproof, so like, I c’n wash my hands and stuff. But it’s disturbin’ as hell to wash my hands and see… grease an’ crumbs drippin’ out. Put m’ hand in th’ sewer a few weeks back, durin’ that fight with th’ Wrecking Crew. Took me almost forty minutes t’ wash all the muck an’ grime and other people’s shit out of it.”

“Well, that’s a disturbing image, yes, I can imagine,” Tony said.

“I jus’... don’t like to touch my food with it. And I’m left-handed, so eatin’ right handed is awkward.”

“So, you don’t eat things that you can’t use utensils for,” Tony said.

Barnes’ chopsticks appeared again and he hefted a cheeto and crunched it. “Saw this on one of them videos on YouTube, some girl showin’ how to eat without messing up your makeup, or getting chip dust all over your fingers.”

“Sounds like a good plan,” Tony said, and his mind was already whirring, because that’s what his brain did. Problems existed in order to be solved. Bucky’s chopsticks would work well for small things; chips and french fries and popcorn, but what about pizza? Cheeseburgers?

For that matter, what about raw sewage? No one should have to put up with that inside their bodies, even if Barnes couldn’t get sick, hadn’t he already gotten the short end of the stick with the unwilling body modifications?

“It works, at least,” Barnes said. He crunched another cheeto with pleasure.

Tony got a second bowl out of the cabinet, and snagged a pair of chopsticks. “Mind if I have some?”

“You pay for the groceries,” Barnes pointed out, but he poured out a serving of cheetos for Tony.

“Thanks.”

“What’s this?”

“Add-on,” Tony said, handing over the little disk. “It’s a-- well, consider it a deflector dish. I didn’t get a test audience on the branding, but since it’s only for people with high tech prosthetics, I don’t expect they’ll care what it’s called. Here, it goes on the back of the hand, here--” Tony picked up Barnes’ metal hand without really thinking about it, and the man froze. Tony was standing much closer than he usually did, and when Barnes glanced up at him, they were practically close enough to kiss.

“Right? Then what?” Barnes asked, not pulling back, and his blue eyes went deep and liquid.

“Well, I was studying the princess’s specs, and your arm still has an unreasonable amount of circuit heat, thus the plate mechanism, in addition to flexibility and strength, provides the cooling. So, we can’t quite do without it, yet, but she and I are doing a little collaboration, maybe make Steve Austin Mark III a little less clunky…” Tony said. “But for now… here, come here, and put your hand in this.”

There were not words for the look Barnes gave him, as Tony led him over to a bucket of slime.

“Go on, test it out.”

“I’m gonna make you clean all this shit out,” Barnes threatened.

Tony gave him a smile. “Deal. Put your hand in there, Buckybear.”

Barnes grumbled, but pushed his fingertips into the slime, which hastily shifted and pushed away.

“What th’ fuck?” Barnes -- no, Bucky’s -- eyes lit up, and the smile on his face was beyond joy. Wonder, amazement.

“It’s not very strong, but it extends about an eighth of a millimeter past the plates. Consider it a sort of electrostatic… skin. Works just like our skin,” Tony said. “Keeps all the dirt out, and…”

Bucky swirled his fingers in the slime. “I… can feel that. I can feel it. Not just pressure, not… I can feel that, Tony.”

“Yep, sunshine, that was the plan,” Tony said. He nodded to a cloth on the side of the bucket. “You’ll still have to wash it off, but--”

Bucky wiped his hand free, and then, before Tony was quite aware of what Bucky planned, those metal fingers were stroking down the side of Tony’s skin.

He told himself the tingles that it raised was nothing more than an effect of the electrostatic shield. He was lying, because he’d already tested it, several times, and he knew that there was no way any normal human would detect anything different about Bucky’s arm. That it would just feel like metal, smooth and supple.

“Tony, I can…” Bucky’s eyes filled and a tear spilled down one cheek.

“Yeah.”

“Why?” Bucky pulled his fingers back, rubbed them against his shirt, then held them out again, marveling. “Why-- thank you, but why?”

“Well, mostly, because out of all of us, you deserve to be able to eat a cheeseburger in peace.”

“Thank you,” Bucky said again, and he cupped the side of Tony’s face, as if still enchanted by the way Tony’s cheek felt under his palm.

“You’re welcome,” Tony said.

“Uh, can… will you join me, for a cheeseburger?” Bucky asked. And Tony might not have thought anything of it, except at the very end of the word, Bucky winked.

“Are… you asking me on a date?”

“If I said yes, will you say yes?”

“It’s a date, then,” Tony said.

[danielcooperrp]

SDSP

cw: sexual assault, sex toys (the two are unrelated)

“Connor!” He doesn’t bother knocking on his best friend’s door, pushing it open, stepping inside, and slamming it shut in one swift move. “Connor, we have a crisis!” Eyes wild, he searches the bedroom, and then freezes. “Uh...”

Bottle of lube in hand, Connor’s got one leg propped up on his desk, where what appears to be a neon green butt plug lays waiting next to his keyboard. Face impassive, Connor is completely nude. “Well hey there, Daniel. Come on in.”

At the sound of his voice, Daniel instinctively slaps a hand over his eyes and begins to babble out an apology—before he suddenly remembers that this isn’t even close to the first time he’s seen Connor naked. He uncovers his eyes and says, “Look, put some underwear on, we need to talk.”

Connor lets his leg fall to the floor with a thud. “Not very often a man comes into my bedroom and tells me to put clothes on.” 

“Connor, this is serious. Look, if it makes it more interesting, it’s a sex crisis.”

With a put-upon sigh, Connor snags a pair of rainbow-patterned briefs from atop his dresser and slides them on. Then, still otherwise naked, he motions for Daniel to take a seat on his unmade bed. “Alright, grasshopper. You’ve come to the master for sex advice. You aren’t the first, and you won’t be the last, but I have to admit, I don’t know much about how to make a woman co—”

“Okay, no?” Daniel throws himself onto Connor’s bed, shooting him an annoyed glare. “I don’t need tips from the biggest gay in Boston on how to pleasure my wife, thanks.”

“Oh.” Connor perches on the edge of the bed beside him. “Then what is the sex crisis?”

“Okay. Well. You can’t tell Ally I told you this, but...”

Connor gasps dramatically. “Is she pregnant?”

“What? No, Connor, listen.” He takes a deep breath. “I’m the only guy Ally’s ever had sex with.”

Connor blinks. After a long pause, he prompts, “And?”

“And? And...holy shit, right?”

“Daniel, I was, like, busy before you busted in here with your non-crisis, so if you aren’t going to approach a point any time soon...”

“Don’t be a bitch, this is serious.”

“Fine. Why is it so serious that your wife hasn’t ever had sex with anyone else but you?”

Daniel looks at him like he’s nuts. “Because! She has no idea what she’s missing!”

Connor snorts. “Hey, you’re not gonna get me to disagree with that. I told her as much myself.”

Daniel sits up fast. “What, you know?”

With a shrug, Connor replies, “Of course. You think us girls haven’t dished? What kind of gay best friend do you take me for?”

“Well why didn’t you tell me?”

He throws a pillow at Daniel’s face. “Because I’m not your wife, dumbass. It’s not my place to tell you anything she divulged to me in the sacrament of confession.”

Daniel rolls his eyes. “Fine. But what did you say when you found out?”

“Well, I told her she needed to hoe around more, obviously, not that she listened. She seemed content with the dick she had. No knocking your skill, babe, but she is crazy.”

With a groan, Daniel falls back on the bed again. “What if there’s someone out there who could be better for her? What if there is this, like, magical sex god out there who could be rocking her world every night and she’s never going to meet them?”

“Well, first of all, y’all are not as quiet as you think you are, so I’m gonna say her world is pretty well rocked.”

“Oh my god.”

“And second, the same could be said for you.”

Daniel twists his head to look questioningly at his friend. “What?”

Connor shrugs. “What if there’s someone out there who can fuck you so good your eyes roll back and your toes curl and you pass out?”

“I mean, I have—wait, do you really pass out?”

Connor’s grin is devilish. “If I’m lucky.”

Daniel shakes his head to clear away the images. “Well, anyway, Ally does rock my world. Every single time it’s fucking mind-blowing. But I, you know...”

“You what?”

“I have something to compare it to.”

“Ah.” Connor nods knowingly. “Your SDSP.”

Daniel props himself up on one elbow. “My SDSP? What the hell?”

“Your Self-Destructive Slut Phase.”

“Oh.” Daniel deflates. “Yeah. That.”

Connor grabs Daniel’s hand and squeezes it. “It’s nothing to be ashamed of, Daniel. Everyone goes through one—except Ally, apparently. Some would argue that I’ve been in one for, oh, a decade or so.” He pauses. “Does Ally know?”

Daniel snorts. “Does Ally know that after I ended things with August I spent two years trying to lose myself in every man and woman on both sides of the Atlantic? No, I don’t think it’s come up.”

“You know it’s very common—”

“—for sexual assault survivors to use sex in unhealthy ways as a coping mechanism, I know, I know.” He smiles wryly at his friend. “I read all the pamphlets you shoved at me.”

“Well, you know...things were pretty touch-and-go there for a while with you. I didn’t know if I’d come home and find you staring at a bottle of pills or bent over the back of the couch taking some dick whose name you didn’t even know. We were worried about you.”

“It was...you know.” His throat is suddenly thick, and he swallows. “The end of the cycle with August was usually him having sex with me. That’s when he stopped being angry and started being sweet again. So for a long time I thought...that’s what will make people love me.” He rolls his eyes, now starting to shine. “Can’t hate me if I’m making you come.”

Connor lays down beside Daniel and pulls him close. “If you’re looking for judgement, babe, you’re not going to find it from me, the biggest whore this side of the Green Line.” Daniel lets out a little laugh. “I’ve used sex for some not-great reasons, too, but that’s just a part of my story. And it’s just a part of yours. Ally love you, you moron, not your sexual history. You and your...” He raises his eyebrows. “You know.”

Daniel shakes his head, confused. “My what?”

“Oh, come on, Daniel! We’ve been friends for how long? We’ve seen each other naked too many times for you to play coy. You’re hung like a horse!”

“Oh my god!” Daniel tries to roll away from his shirtless, pantless friend, but Connor keeps a tight arm on him. “I’m just being honest—and judging by the way she was stifling her screams last night, so is Ally.”

“I regret all of my life choices.”

“How are you so prudish for a guy who had a Self-Destructive Slut Phase?” Connor laughs. “How are you so prudish for someone who dressed up as Captain America to fuck his girlfriend?”

Daniel leaps out of bed, shrieking. “She told you that?”

“No, that one I figured out when rifling through your closet. Imagine my surprise when I went in looking for your brown wingtips and stumbled upon a Cap costume with a condom wrapper still stuck to it.”

“You know what, thank you so much for the chat, I have to go be anywhere else right now...”

Daniel tries to escape, but Connor lurches forward and snags his hand to keep him from fleeing. “Seriously, Daniel. Ally has made it pretty clear in, like, every way imaginable that you are the idiot she wants to spend the rest of her life with. And if you respect her and her ability to make decisions for herself, you would believe her. Look, if she told you right now that she wanted to go experiment sexually with other people, would you stop her?”

“I mean, I wouldn’t be, like, thrilled, but I wouldn’t stop her—”

“Exactly. She’s a free woman who can do whatever she wants whenever she wants, and apparently, she wants to do you, and frequently.” Daniel laughs. “Just talk to her, D. Let her know how you feel, and more importantly, let her know about your past. She’s your wife, for Christ’s sake. She deserves all of you.”

“Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. Of course you’re right. I’m being ridiculous.”

“We’re used to it.” Connor squeezes his hand again before letting go. “No, can I go back to what I was doing or is there another manufactured crisis I need to fix?”

Daniel suddenly remembers what he’d interrupted before. “Oh, shit, yeah. So, hot date tonight?”

“Hot date? What, can’t a guy plug his own ass for himself?” Daniel narrows his eyes. “Ugh, fine, it’s Grindr meetup. He’s hosting and I want to be ready to go. Speaking of hung like a horse...”

“Thanks, Connor!” Daniel calls loudly over his shoulder, already halfway out the door. “You’re the best!”

“Any time, you beautiful slut!” Before closing the door again, Connor yells after him, “And knock next time, will you?”

[blublirb]

Medic | Peter Parker

A/N: Oh my god I finally wrote something. It’s not angst like I hoped I would write, but, hey, i got it done! And whoa it takes forever to format on here. Sigh. Let me know what you think!

Word Count: 3,450 (nice, right?)

“I’ll see you later! Good luck!” You ushered your friend out the door, making sure to lock it before you made your way to your room. You quickly changed into sweats, shoving your hair into a ponytail before plopping onto your bed. You had just finished helping your friend Kara plan out and create a homecoming proposal for her girlfriend Erin. It was a cute idea, to say the least. Simple, consisting of flowers, chocolates, and a cute poster board with a pun, but it was adorable. It was about 11 p.m. on a saturday night, and you were excited to see how it would play out on Monday, but you were exhausted.

You couldn’t wait to finally get back to your book, ready to finish the next part of the novel. You reached down below your bed, feeling around on the floor as your eyes gazed through your instagram feed. So many damn homecoming proposals already, and the dance had only been announced a week ago. You rolled your eyes, only realizing you had yet to grab your book when your phone buzzed with a new notification.

M.J.: I’m coming over.

You sighed, giving up on grabbing your book. You quirked a brow as you read the message over and over, trying to find context between the lines. You quickly tapped over the keyboard before pressing send.

You: uh why??

You reached over to close your window curtains, your body threatening to fall off the bed. You caught yourself with your hand, using your other one to grab the curtain and tug. Shit, it’s stuck. Groaning, you pulled yourself off the bed, army crawling over to the curtain and violently pulling it across the window. It still wouldn’t budge, so you stood up, setting your phone on your nightstand and standing on your tiptoes to manually fix the curtain.

Your fingers grazed the hook briefly before you had to stop and take a breath. Why was that thing so damn tall? You reached one more time. Close, closer, almost got it…

Something tapped your window.

“Jesus--” You yelled, stumbling backwards, the curtain coming with you. Well, shit. Now you had to reach to put the hooks on the rack. Perfect. You put a hand over your heart, taking deep, slow breaths. You cautiously looked to the window where your best friend sat, face worried and hair uncontrollably wild. “Michelle?”

“Yeah, it’s me. Open the window.”

“Why are you--”

“Hurry, y/n,” she pressed, looking to her side, muttering words to whatever was there, then looking back to you. You dropped the curtain, stepping over it to unlock the window.

“What are you doing--” You stopped yourself, looking down to a fallen figure at her side through your now open window. You instantly recognised the red and blue suit, the mask, and the iconic spider emblem of Queens’ very own superhero. Spider-man. Spider-man was on your fire escape. “Holy shit.”

“Help me get him in,” Michelle urged, going to the other side of him to grab his legs. You grabbed his arms, struggling to pull him into your room. You weren’t the weakest person in the world, but damn this guy was heavy. You and Michelle laid him on your floor when blood started to pool onto the floor.

“Shit, shit, shit,” You muttered, grabbing your fallen curtain and setting it under Spider-man’s body. “Where is he even bleeding from?” You asked, lifting his arms and legs to inspect the injuries you assumed were there. He had a big gash on his side, carving through his abdomen and into his stomach. It wasn’t deep, but it was large. What was he fighting? He had bruises on the exposed skin you could see, and there were several scratches and cuts on his arms and legs. There was blood everywhere, and you were sure you would have to buy a new curtain. “Why did you bring him here? Where did you find him?”

Michelle sat on the other side of him, tucking her knees under herself as she thought over her answer. “He came to my place.”

“He what?”

“He.. I.. Well, I know who he is.”

“You what?”

“Damn, let me finish, will you?” Michelle huffed before fully sitting down, crossing her legs in front of her. “I’ve known who he is for a while now. He comes over to my place sometimes when he has injuries he cant take home and I help patch him up, but… This one I can’t fix.”

“And you think I can?” You asked, pushing yourself up off of the floor. You walked to the door, opening it a bit to stick your head through, making sure no one was awake in your house. Your little brother and your parents were home and hopefully asleep, so you had to make sure you didn't give them reason to look into your room. After making sure the coast was clear, you opened the door wide and tiptoed across the hallway, opening the small linen closet beside your bathroom.

“Well, shit, Y/N, are you an EMT or not?” Michelle whispered.

“Not. I’m still taking classes, M.J. I practice on minor injuries and cuts. Not superheroes.” You grabbed a white towel and held another one, debating whether or not you’d need a second one. You decided you might, so you grabbed it and closed the closet door as carefully as you could. You tiptoed back to your room and quietly closed the door, hurrying to kneel by the man’s (boy’s?) side.

“At least patch him up? He heals quickly.”

“I.. fine. Fine,” You held your hands up in surrender. You scrambled to look for your medical supplies in your room, digging around your desk and in your closet. You produced alcohol pads and rubbing alcohol, grabbing tissues from your desk and setting them beside the hero. M.J. dug into her black backpack (that you just noticed she had) and produced a hefty first aid kit. “Whoa, you came prepared.”

“I figured you wouldn’t have some of the things you’d need. And I’ve been doing this for a while, so I’ve been stocking up.” You nodded along, grabbing the kit from beside her and opening it, finding some stitching supplies (which you needed) and various patching utensils, including gauze and neosporin and the like. You looked to the patient in front of you, examining the open wounds you could see.

“This is gonna be difficult.”

“What makes you say that?”

“I have to get his suit off to properly disinfect his wounds.”

Michelle made an ‘oh, right’ before pressing on the spider emblem on his suit, the fabric expanding with a mechanical ‘shick.’ She grabbed the material and shoved it down his torso, resting at his hips, making sure not to touch the mask on his face.

“Perfect,” you said, and then you got to work. You set to the big cut on his abdomen first, laying a towel on the ground in front of you and pressing it under his side, laying it out to catch any blood that dared to avoid the curtain. “You can start cleaning the cuts and shit on the other side while I work on this one. It might not be all that deep, but It’s deep enough to need a few stitches.” Michelle nodded before grabbing a few alcohol pads and setting to work on her side. You grabbed a few tissues and doused them in rubbing alcohol, patting the wound with little force.

“Ow,” Spider-Man said, raising his head a bit. You jumped back, watching him struggle to sit up. “What’s happening? M.J?”

“Holy shit,” you whispered.

Michelle jumped to action, pressing down on his shoulders to lay him back down. “No, no, don’t get up. We’re patching you up.”

His visors widened and focused on her, before lulling his head around the room. “We?” He asked, before setting his eyes on you. “Y/N? What?” His voice rose, striking a chord with you. You squinted your eyes, thinking you had recognised that voice.

“Peter?” you responded, leaning forward slightly.

“Yeah? What?” He responded. You gasped. Michelle cursed, slamming her forehead.

“Look, what you just fucking did, Spider-Man.”

“Oh, shit, did I just--” Peter started.

“Yes, you did.” Michelle groaned, throwing her hands up. “Take off your mask, you idiot. There’s no point in hiding it anymore.” You started with wide eyes as Spider-Man slowly reached up and pulled off his mask, revealing that one dork you had in your geometry class, Peter Parker.

“Oh my God,” You whispered, setting the bottle and pad down, standing up. Peter waved pathetically.

“Hi? Sorry you had to find out like this.”

“She shouldn’t have found out at all, Peter. I was busy being careful this entire time and you ruin it in 30 seconds.” Michelle crossed her arms, glaring daggers at the boy beside her. You moved over to your still open window, climbing out onto your fire escape, wiping your bloody hands onto your sweatpants. It’ll wash out. Maybe.

You took several breaths, trying to steady yourself by holding onto the railing. You sat by this idiot every weekday at lunch and you never even had the thought that he could be stopping cars with his bare hands and swinging around Queens after dark. You were just patching up your love interest.

Now let’s clear this up. You never liked the word ‘crush.’ It was too immature and reminded you too much of middle school, which wasn’t a good time for anyone involved. That being said, you didn’t like any other words to describe what you felt, so you decided upon ‘love interest.’ It made you feel as if you were a part of a story and it added just a touch of irony that made Michelle approve when you suggested it, so that’s what you’re going with. There was distant arguing inside as you calmed down, wincing when Peter’s voice rose an octave.

You turned around and climbed onto the windowsill, leaning into your room. “Could you guys argue with less gusto? My family’s sleeping.”

“Gusto, she says,” Michelle, mocked, falling silent when there’s a knock on your door. Everyone froze, faces going slack as the door opened to reveal your 5 year old brother, Michael.

“Y/N?” He asked, small, chubby hands on the doorknob. Peter scrambled to put on his suit and mask, hitting the spider, sitting up (with several ‘ow’s) and turning to face Michael. He noticed Spider-Man, his eyes going wide as saucers. Thank god Peter got the mask on in time. “Spider-Man?”

“Hi, Michael,” Spider-man lowered his voice, trying to sound older and more authoritative.

“You know my name?” Michael responded. Spider-man smiled. At least, you think he did.

“Of course I do! Your sister’s told me a lot about you.” Michael looked to you with disbelief, jaw hanging open like he just met Santa Claus. You put on a smile, shrugging.

“Uh, Spider-Man and I are good friends,” you said, climbing into your room. You got down to your knees as you approached Michael, shutting the door behind him and setting him on your lap. “We like to talk about how good you’ve been this year and that Santa would be happy to hear that.” Your baby brother looked to you, then looked back to Spider-man.

“You know Santa?”

“Of course I do!” Spider-man replied, confusion lacing his voice. He was improvising and he clearly wasn’t used to it. I mean, super heroes knowing Santa Claus? You were sure you broke at least six rules on what you can and cannot lie about to children. “You’ve done a lot of good things this year, Michael.”

“Really? He thinks that? Even when I pulled on Sally’s hair and called her a toad?”

“You what?” You looked from Spider-man to Michael, who’s eyes gazed at his favorite superhero with adoration. “Michael!”

“Er,” Spider-Man started. Michelle covered her mouth with her hand to stop herself from laughing. You ignored her. “You shouldn’t have done that, kiddo.”

“No, you shouldn’t have,” you agreed. Standing him up. “Listen, Spidey and I have some very important Christmas things to discuss, so why don’t you head onto bed, okay? And don’t tell mommy and daddy. This will be our little secret, okay? Can you promise that?” You held up your pinky. Michael nodded vigorously and wrapped his little finger around yours. He leaned in close, heavy breaths and all.

“Can you tell Santa that I want a big red firetruck for christmas?” You looked to your friends in exasperation, then back to Michael.

You nodded. “Yeah, I’ll tell him that.” Michael hugged you, then turned to Spider-Man.

“Bye, Mr. Spider-Man!” He said. “I wanna be a hero just like you when I grow up!”

“And you will be,” he responded. “Goodnight!”

“Night!” You kissed Michael on the forehead and ushered him into the hallway. You watched him walk into his room with baited breath until he closed the door. You sighed.

“Holy shit that was close.”

“Spider-man pyjamas, huh?” Michelle asked. You shrugged.

“His favorite superhero,” you explained. Peter took his mask off.

“I talk to Santa now?” He quirked a brow.

“Like you had any better ideas. I’m just glad he didn’t notice the blood. Now lay back down so I can finish patching you up.”

Patching Peter up took another hour. He had gotten into a pretty bad fight with The Rhino, apparently, and the big gash on his side was a spike on the villain’s suit. Brutal. You asked him various questions every now and then, asking how he started, (‘field trip gone bad,’ he had said.) how long he’s been doing it, and who else besides M.J. knows about his abilities.

“May and Ned,” he responded. “Oh, and Tony Stark.”

“May must’ve been pretty pissed-- wait, Tony Stark? Is that what you do on your internship?”

“How’d you guess?” He quipped, voice flatlining.

“Well, this is fun,” Michelle interrupted. “But I gotta get home. I would stay the night but, frankly, I don’t want to wake up to more Michael and even more Spider-Man questions.”

“Fair enough,” you responded.

“I gotta go, too,” Peter sat up, grabbing his mask. “I’ll, uh, replace those curtains.”

“Uh, no you don’t,” you took Peter’s mask from his hands, instead shoving pain relievers to replace them. “You have to rest. I may have stitched up those wounds but it’s not a good job. I ran out of thread, which means if they break, that’s it. Michelle says you heal fast so I expect it to be all healed in the morning or at least good enough for you to do whatever else you do on the weekends. Until then, you stay here. Doctor’s orders.”

“Ouch,” M.J. says. “Bed rest.” She shouldered her backpack, propping one leg on the windowsill.

“Not bed rest,” you corrected. “Just.. room rest?”

Peter scoffed. “You can’t be serious.”

“I can, and I am.”

“Well this’ll turn out great,” M.J. glanced at you. You glared back. She shrugged. “Whatever. I’m out. See you, Spider-Dude. Y/N.” she gave a two finger salute, and then she was gone. Peter grunted and leaned back against your bed, his arms crossed like a child-- like Michael. You shook your head, gathering the various medical supplies Michelle left behind (‘you’ll need it more than me,’ she said). You shoved them into an empty shoebox in your closet, shoving the door closed with your foot.

“This damn curtain,” you lifted it off the floor (the stainless floor, thanks to your curtain). “I guess this is goin’ in the garbage.” You unhooked the matching curtain from your window and bundled them together.

“Sorry about that,” Peter chuckled, running his hand through his hair. You forced yourself not to watch, choosing to shrug instead.

“It’s whatever. I’ve been wanting to redecorate my room anyway.” Shoving them under your bed, you sat beside Peter, shoulder to shoulder. You nudged his arm with your elbow. “So, Spider-Man, huh?” He looked to the ceiling. Your eyes lingered on his jawline (and his busted lip). He didn’t notice, thank god.

“Yeah. Listen, I’m sorry about tonight. This wasn’t supposed to happen and you weren’t supposed to find out--”

“I figured, what, with M.J. and Ned knowing and not me, and the fact that you said ‘oh, shit’ after you revealed it.”

“Yeah, well, we aren’t exactly close, so…” He stopped himself. “I’m sorry. That was kind of rude.”

You laughed. “That’s pretty obvious. Listen, I get it. You don’t think we’re as close as you are to M.J. or Ned. No problem. I don’t expect you to be my best friend because I know your secret identity, Pete. You can go on doing you and I’ll do me. I won’t tell anyone.”

“No, that’s…” He shoved his palms into his eyes, rubbing furiously. He mumbled to himself under his breath for a second, but you didn’t care enough to hear; you just got acquaintance-zoned. You grabbed your phone from your nightstand and unlocked your phone, viewing your texts. A new one recently popped up from Michelle.

M.J.: how’s Spider boy

You spared a glance to the boy beside you, who was busy trying to figure out what to say. Your eyelids drooped impassively, looking back to your phone, typing out a quick reply.

You: Pretty sure I just got acquaintance zoned. Stay tuned.

M.J.: Acquaintance zoned.

You: yup. More to come once he figures out wtf to say.

M.J.: Dare I say, mood.

“Look, I--” Peter stopped himself again once he saw the look on your face. Neutral, yet impassive. Are those the same thing? It didn’t matter. He drew a long breath, turning his body to sit facing you, wincing a few times as he did so. “I’m sorry. I don’t know how to talk, apparently.”

“Noted. Anything else?”

“Damn, you’re cold.” You gave him a cold stare. “I mean-- shit, okay. I wouldn’t mind if we, uh, tried to get closer or anything, you know? Like, you already know I’m Spider-Man, why not stick together?”

“Basically, you don’t want me snitching, so you’re gonna keep a close eye on me.”

“Jesus, no. I--” He covered his face with his palms. “Fuck it-- I like you.”

You stopped breathing. “I’m sorry, what?” You put your phone in your pocket, turning to face Peter. Was this really happening?

“I like you. Like, a lot. More than I should, probably, and I just want you to know that I don’t regret revealing myself to you. Yeah, it was an accident, but I really don’t want us to go back to how we were after this.” He took deep breaths. “I think, since you know now, we could use you on the team. Maybe as our medic! You know what you’re doing, and you’ve already helped me and stuff, and you sit at our table anyway, so I don’t think this would be much different. Just a little bit better, and--”

“Peter,” you interrupted. “You’re rambling.”

He shut his mouth, face going red. “Oh. Sorry, I do that a lot.”

“Yeah, I know, you dork,” You smiled. You climbed over to him, gently grabbing his shoulders and pressing your lips to his cheek. He stared in awe, absolutely speechless for the first time in his life. You didn’t give him a chance to say anything, pressing your lips to his own for something a little more expected. “Luckily, I know how to shut you up. And I think it’s working.”

He remained quiet, staring at you like you were an angel made just for him. Like you were Tony fucking Stark.

“Come on,” you said, lifting him to his feet. “Maybe, if I’m lucky, I can steal some of my older brother’s pyjamas. He’s away at college, so I don’t think he’d care. I’m pretty sure you’re gonna stay the night tonight, anyway, if your wounds haven’t made any progress healing.” You sit him on your bed to wait there as you grabbed the door handle.

“Wait,” he said. You looked back. His face was still red. “So… You’ll be our medic?”

You smiled, hand turning the knob, the other gripping your phone. “Yeah, I think I can make this a full time gig.” You winked, heading down the hallway to your brother’s vacant room. You turned on your phone, going to text M.J.

M.J.: well???

You: Looks like team Spidey has a new medic.

You shoved your phone back into your pocket, smiling like a maniac as you grabbed your definite love interest’s borrowed pyjamas.

[waynct]

adroit

baekhyun x female reader

word count: 7127 genre: fluff, smut warnings: cussing, smut! note: this is a reupload! i was a genius and accidentally deleted the first one. ngl i’m not sure if this will get as many notes but people kept telling me to reupload so here it is! <3

The slivers of light through the window crossed over your eyes, making you wince and throw an arm over your face, trying to sink deeper into your mattress.

Wait.

Light?

Quickly, but groggily, you sat up, patting around your body and pillow for your phone in your half-asleep daze. Your fingers went from touching soft cotton to a hard case, and you immediately flipped the phone over, bringing it up inches away from your face, trying to ignore the brightness as you tried to comprehend the time.

7:47.

“Shit. Shit. Fuck.” You jumped up from the bed, left foot almost tangling in the sheets, and ran to your closet. It took 30 minutes to get to work, and 30 minutes to get ready, and your shift started at 8 every morning besides Sunday, your only day off. You’d already been late twice this week. Honestly, it had been hard to get out of bed, not including the days your alarm didn’t want to go off. Your boyfriend- or, ex-boyfriend, Jackson- had sent you a shitty break-up text the week earlier, and needless to say, you still weren’t feeling so hot about it.

It had been hard to contact Jackson even while you were dating, but he completely ghosted you after the text, not even giving you a chance to respond to it, not that you could have changed his mind anyway.

After you threw on a blouse and jumped clumsily into a pencil skirt, you rushed to your bedroom door, popping it open before getting halfway across the living room. “Where are my keys??” You tended to talk to yourself when you were alone, or more often, stressed. At the moment you were extra stressed, so you were extra talking to yourself.

You scurried toward the kitchen, picking up objects before you got to the end of the counter, where your car keys sat innocently. You aggressively scooped the metal up before racing toward the door, slipping on flats instead of your usual heels.

As you sat in traffic only a few minutes later, you decided to see just how bad you looked, since you hadn’t had any time to throw on makeup or do your hair. You reached up, flipping the lid of the mirror open, and gasped softly as you looked yourself over. Dark circles sat under your eyes, and you had smeared lipstick on your chin. You had completely forgotten to take off your makeup the night before. Not to mention your hair was a mess. Before you had time to wipe off what you could of the excess makeup, the cars behind you were honking and you were throwing up a wave to let them know you were grateful for their ‘help’, after all, they were just trying to get to their jobs too.

 It was hell to try and find a parking space, but you eventually did, and here you were in the elevator. You tried to ignore the stares of your coworkers. After hearing the ding of the mechanism reaching your floor, you followed the crowd of people toward your cubicle, slipping past a few of the workers who you knew sat near you, trying to avoid as much judgement as possible.

As soon as you sat in the seat, a familiar tuft of dark hair and eyes popped up from their cubicle. “You’re late!” You sent a side glare toward your coworker, and turned on your computer. “Ya think?”

Jongin let out a ‘pfft’ and rolled out of his cubicle to get behind you. “What’s up with you lately?” You had been trying your best to not involve your coworkers or boss in your personal life, but Nini was your friend. You could almost feel his brown eyes staring into the back of your messy hair. You’d told him before that Jackson had broken up with you.. but that was the extent of what he knew. Spinning around in your chair, you opened your mouth to explain everything, but stopped because of the shocked expression that very quickly fell over his handsome features. Funny, you had almost forgotten you looked like death.

“How about you head to the bathroom and get cleaned up.. I’ll cover for you.” He recovered and gave you a goofy grin, one you were suddenly glad to have seen almost every day. You slid out of your seat, patting the top of his head before heading toward the women’s washroom. Thankfully you couldn’t see a line, but you didn’t get to think about it for long before a short figure cut in front of you. Your heart almost hopped out of your chest at the suddenness of who you soon realized was your boss, and you could tell your appearance and wide-eyes look made him soften the irritation he’d had on his face.

  “Look, I get it, okay. We all go through this, but.. you really need to get your act together.” Minseok made quick eye contact with you before looking down at the files spread across his desk. You scanned the room while he read your reports and files, a sinking feeling had been in your chest the moment he’d asked for you to meet him in his office. He was the youngest of everyone who was in charge, but honestly you were glad it was him that met you instead of anyone else.

You turned your attention away from the glass windows to tentatively look at him, and his lashes were still splayed across the tops of his cheekbones. Your boss was a handsome man, and many of the girls who worked with you had crushes on him, along with Jongin, but at least you knew Jongin wasn’t interested in any of them. You wished you could shut your friend up about his boyfriend, Kyungsoo.

At the thought you felt a smile pulling at your lips, and you glanced back up to see Mr. Kim staring at you.

All thoughts were pushed from your mind as you started to run through the things you could have been doing wrong at that moment. Sure you were smiling, but that wasn’t against the rules, right?

His eyes slid from your widened eyes to your parted lips, which still were smeared with lipstick beneath, and you felt the tips of your ears turn bright red at his sudden attention to your face. Your boss had never been this attentive to you before, even at meetings when you were giving your opinion. Darkened eyes rose to yours again, and Mr. Kim gave you a smirk before gathering the papers together in a neat file, matching the rest of his spotless room.

“Y/N. I think I might have to let you go.”

You smiled quickly, bowing toward him before you began to stand to hurry back to the bathroom you’d been heading toward before. “Thank you, Mr. Kim, I-“

“I meant let you go as in.. fire you.” Your stomach felt like it had dropped to the floor. Fire you? “I.. don’t know what to say.” And that was the truth. It felt like you couldn’t breathe. 5 years of working in this stupid office building with only one promotion.. and that was it? “Unless,” Minseok began, dropping his eyes to the buttons on the front of your blouse. And that was when it clicked. Mr. Kim was a pig. A tiny huge pig. You brushed off the glances he had given you earlier, but to insinuate this, or be fired?

Standing up slowly, you could see the excitement in the eyes you once thought were pretty spark even more than it had been. “I’ll just go get my things.”

No matter how much you needed this job, you weren’t going to sleep your way to the top, or sleep your way into anything. Sex was meaningful to you, you felt as if everyone had a right to their own body and once someone thought they controlled it- or at least in a non-consensual way- that you no longer had respect for them. Half-way through your turn you felt a hand wrap around your arm, and before you could look at Minseok with surprise and anger, you heard his door open. Your boss dropped your wrist as if it was a scalding pan, and you jerked your head to see the one and only Choi Seunghyun standing in the doorway. His dark brown eyes- framed with thickly rimmed glasses- looked from between the two of you with an expression of confusion. You had no idea what Minseok’s face looked like, but you knew yours sent out an SOS toward the higher-ranking of the two. Seunghyun, or TOP, as most people called him, worked in a separate department a few blocks away. It was technically a different corporation, but the food chain seemed to work the same way. Their bosses were your bosses.

He slowly peeled his gaze from you to glare at Mr. Kim before speaking in a low voice. “What’s going on.” It was more a statement than a question, and suddenly he moved toward the two of you. As he raised a hand, you flinched, and the tall man’s furrowed brows softened when he noticed the small movement. He gently placed a few of his long fingers on the tip of your elbow, guiding you toward the door. “I’ve cleared your recent late notices, Ms. Y/N. Jongin filled me in on what has been happening with you.” That hoe. You were a little frustrated Jongin had so willingly shared something personal, but you were thankful that Mr. Choi’s choice of action was nothing near what Minseok had planned.

“Now, if you’ll excuse us.” You took a glance at Minseok before you walked out, and his expression clearly read- “I fucked up.”

As soon as the wooden door closed, you half jogged over to your friend’s cube, where he seemed to be ready for your arrival at any time from his uneasy stance. As soon as you passed the corner, he jumped up from his seat and swiftly walked toward you, dark hair bouncing with his movements. “What happened? Tell me everything.” His eyes were wide with worry, quite the opposite from his usual lazy nature, and you couldn’t help but to smile at his concern about you, despite what had just happened. You considered not telling him while you pulled on your lip with your teeth, before pulling Jongin by the shirt toward the break room to fill him in, and hint that there was probably going to be a spot open for him later..

  After everyone had gone home that night, you still sat at your desk, fingertips clicking against the keyboard like they were on fire. You could hear a similar, slower tapping in the cubicle next to yours. Jongin had only decided to stay because he was worried ‘about your health’. Which wasn’t a bad thing. The nights you’d been staying at work late you’d always stayed too late, often showing up the next day looking even more tired than you had the night before.

Even though you’d noticed Jongin wasn’t typing anymore, you continued to work on the document you’d been typing at for some hours. Hearing the squeak of his old chair, you lifted your hands from the keys and twisted behind you to meet your coworkers hooded eyes.

“Hey.” You busted out laughing, likely from tiredness, and decided to humor him. “Hi.”

A grin began to creep onto his lips, and he scooted toward you, reminding you of a child playing on their parent’s work chairs. “Did you want some coffee?” His deep voice was laced with sleepiness, but you decided not to comment on that. “Sure. Do you know what I want?” “Yep.” He casually stood up, pushing his chair back to its original place before walking toward the elevator. The vending machines were on the 2nd floor, which was often a nuisance to the people who were on the 30th floor with you. You watched him step inside the elevator before smiling with a shake of your head once he couldn’t see you, turning your attention back to the document. A few minutes later, the familiar ding of the elevator caught your attention, and your heart sped up just at the thought of an iced coffee. Jongin knew just what you liked, and he always made sure to never ask you pay him back. Out of all the people in the office, he was the only one you really connected with as a friend, and you were glad you were cube buddies. You quickly leaned over the desk as you stood, dragging the mouse down to turn the computer off, but once the loading icon showed up on the screen, you felt a warm pair of arms wrap around you. Jumping with surprise, you laughed and placed your hands on Jongin’s forearms. “Very funny. Don’t try and tell me you’re not gay anymore.” As the words left your mouth, you noticed the arms were dark, but nowhere near the honey-colored kind of skin that Jongin had. You quickly twisted and shoved the person away, the shock of blonde hair on his head making you realize it was the person you hadn’t wanted to see at all. Jackson.

His dark eyes were reddened, the dim lights in the office making the wetness that sat at the bottom of his waterline shine even more. “Baby..” Jackson’s raspy voice almost made you give in to him, but you knew if you did, the same thing would just happen again. He began to walk toward you once more, and you stepped backwards, hitting your backside against the desk instead of going any further back.

“Jackson.. I don’t want this.. You said-“ He cut you off, something he did often in your relationship. “I want you baby.. I was wrong.”

When he inched closer you held up a hand out to his muscled chest, the same one you’d fallen asleep and cried on so many times before, and he stopped once he reached your palm. His arms were longer than yours, though, so he reached toward you, fingers brushing against your shoulder. All you had to do was wait until Jongin got back. You didn’t know why he would be taking much longer, but it seemed like he wasn’t going to be coming any time soon.

Jackson was stronger than you. A lot stronger. He moved toward you and your elbow bended with not much restraint. You had to admit, it wasn’t like you didn’t miss Jackson. But this was wrong. He ended it with you with no explanation, and you didn’t want to be fuck buddies with your ex. With his face in your neck, you turned your head toward one of the walls of your cubicle, scrunching your face, waiting for someone to show up. Anyo-

“Y/N?” This was a voice you weren’t familiar with. It was light and soft, much softer than Jackson’s, and it immediately brought you comfort even with the situation. You turned your head toward the entrance of your cubicle. It was one of the more recent employees, but you couldn’t think of his name at the moment. Jackson turned sloppily toward the other man, and you knew from the other man’s expression that Jackson looked either: like total trash, or like a man who was about to fight. The moment Jackson began to speak, you heard a familiar voice call out, “I got the goods!” Internally you rolled your eyes. This was not the right moment for him to be acting like this. Jongin got into your range of sight, and immediately his happy but sleepy expression darkened, losing all of the tiredness he showed before. “Y/N?” He repeated what the other man said, his deep voice was full of confusion and concern, and you shook your head at him slowly. Jackson wavered in his stance, glancing back at you with soft brown eyes. You almost gave in then and there, but something inside stopped you. Jongin spoke again. “Jack, you need to go.” Your ex looked toward the two men standing in the entrance of your cubicle, one holding two bottles of coffee, the other holding papers to his chest. “Make me.” It wasn’t a serious threat, more of an empty one that showed just how drunk Jackson was. Jongin raised a brow at him, and Jackson seemed to sink in response, turning to look at you. He began to lift his hand to grab your face, but Jongin was quicker, and grabbed his wrist suddenly. “Leave. Before I call the cops.” Your friend had moved the two bottles to sit in his other hand, his free hand now wrapped tightly around Jackson’s as they had a staredown.

Jackson ripped his hand away, almost falling backwards as he did so, and spoke finally. “Fine.” He stumbled toward the elevator, but not before sending you a puppy-dog look, and stepping into the mechanism.

 Finally the tense silence was broken. “..Jesus.” Jongin spoke softly, setting your coffee on your desk. “What happe- actually, you just text me it later. I think you both-“ He glanced from both you and the other man, “Need to go home and sleep.” Technically Jongin wasn’t in charge of you, but you did agree with him. You scooped the drink up, deciding you’d just drink it the next morning. The other man looked as if he agreed with Jongin too, and he opened his mouth slightly to speak. “I think you’re right about that. At least for me. I’m not gonna tell her what to do.” His brown eyes connected with yours for a moment and you could have sworn you felt your heart skip a beat. His sharp eyes went back to Jongin, and he began to walk away from the both of you. “Hey, wait.” Jongin called out toward the man, who stopped in his tracks to look at him. Jongin looked back at you. “I know you’re not gonna be able to focus, girl.” And you knew he definitely was right about that, you’d likely be overthinking everything and barely be able to pay attention to the road as you drove. “Baek, you walk, right?” The man’s face went from 0 to 100 quickly, turning a bright shade as he seemed to be trying to not look at you. “Y-yeah.” Jongin smiled at his shy reaction, looking back to you. “Good. He can drive you home, then. I don’t think you guys live that far apart.” You sent a look of surprise and disgust toward Jongin, “How do you know.. you know what, I don’t wanna know.” You stifled a laugh and collected your things. “Only if he wants to.” You looked at the man Jongin called ‘Baek’ before, who was still tinted a pink color.

“Yeah, sure. I can. I guess. If you want me to.” The way he kept rambling made Jongin send the thinner man an unimpressed look. “Anyway. I’ll see you later, okay?” You nodded at Jongin, who walked back over to his cubicle, leaving you and ‘Baek’ alone. He broke the awkward silence.

“I’ll just put these papers away, and then we can go.” You nodded toward him, and he began to walk toward where you guessed his desk was. As soon as the blond had walked away, Jongin poked his head back into your booth. “Cute, right?” You rolled your eyes good-naturedly. “Yeah, he’s cute. But I’m not-“ Jongin held up his hand with narrowed eyes. “He’s a good one, Y/N, trust me. Just at least consider it.”

With a sigh, you waved your friend off just as the other man arrived back at your cube.

  You tapped your nails against the leather padding of the passenger’s seat. It was strange to sit on this side, as you only really remember being in this seat whenever your parents came to town to visit and they insisted on driving. As the man started the car with his pretty hands- ones you had been noticing the entire time on the way to the car- you turned on the music so it would be playing softly in the background throughout the car ride, because you knew the unfamiliarity would likely make it awkward. But he spoke. “So.. you know who I am, right?” Shit. You’d completely forgotten his name, but you’d seen him around the office for a few months. His hair was continuously dyed colors between brown, black, auburn, and now blonde, and that was something you’d begun to look forward to over the months you’d seen him in the break room, wondering what color he’d go to next. “I.. I’m not gonna lie to you. I don’t know your name.” He didn’t look disappointed like you’d expected, but you could see him deflate a little. “I’m Byun Baekhyun.” He glanced away from the road to look at you before looking back, a smile on his lips.

It was one of the prettiest smiles you’d ever seen. You had to force yourself to copy him and look at the road. He continued to speak, he seemed to know you weren’t going to say anything back. “I delivered your reports and stuff to Mr. Kim when I first got the job. And I brought you coffee.” And there it was. You felt bad. You looked at him instead of the road this time, drawing your eyebrows together, but he kept his eyes forward. “Baekhyun, I’m so sorry. I was just super involved in my work.. and that guy that was just in there..” You trailed off, expecting him to cut you off or speak, but you noticed he nodded at you before looking forward again. He was.. listening?

“We never had a good relationship. He.. broke up with me. Last week.” Baekhyun looked as if the airbag had exploded in his face. “He broke up with you?” A smile broke through your guilty expression, and you patted your lap as you softly laughed. “You say that as if I’m a catch.” He looked at you wide eyed, his knuckles beginning to turn white from holding the wheel so tightly. “But you are.” You looked at him, he had turned his attention back to the front, but you noticed a tinge of redness on the tips of his ears. You didn’t say anything after that, the two of you sat in silence that was certainly a lot more comfortable, the soft music playing still on the radio.

When you were a few blocks away from your house, he spoke once more. “I know you don’t really know me, but.. do you want Mcdonalds?” You quickly looked over at him, and he glanced at you as he waited for a response, wrist now casually placed on top of the steering wheel. “I don’t really have money on me.” He shook his head, almost looking insulted at the statement. “It’s fine. I’ll pay.” “Okay.”

 As Baekhyun pulled into your garage, you got out quickly and pressed the sliding door’s button once more to make it close. When you got back into your car, he had a surprised look on his face. You scoffed and smiled at him, closing the door, making eye contact with him once more. “What?” You lifted your brows in curiosity, and he shook his head. “I just didn’t think you’d wanna eat with me.” He looked a bit shy as he pulled his burger out of the bag, quickly unwrapping it. Baekhyun looked like a child, licking his lips in anticipation before glancing up at you as if he’d realized you hadn’t responded. “Why wouldn’t I?” You gave him a smile before reaching in the same bag, pulling out the nuggets and sauce he’d gotten you. You could see from the corner of your eye that he gave a shrug, before ripping a huge bite into the sandwich. Almost with fascination, you chewed on of the nuggets and watched him devour the food in a few minutes, while you only ate a few. It was true that you were starving, but eating in front of him made you a little nervous, even though you’d eaten in front of Jongin and Jackson so many times. His sharp eyes were focused on the burger, and you watched with continued interest as his lips opened around the burger again and again.

He stopped suddenly, smiling at you. “What?” His question was laced with a giggle, and you laughed in response, shaking your head at him. “Nothing.” You thought you’d stop there, but your mouth kept going. “You’re just cute.” Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck.

Baekhyun choked on the rest of the food that he was still chewing, holding a fist in front of his mouth, one that barely concealed the curling of the ends of his lips. “Thanks!” He sounded so incredibly dorky with the mixture of the exclamation and his mouth being full that you busted out laughing. Instead of looking on in confusion or looking at you like a weirdo, the smile on his face only grew. He swallowed the food, and slowly used his index finger to close the box he’d gotten the burger from.

When you looked at him again, the atmosphere had changed. In the beginning of the car ride, you’d completely expected him to be silent and serious the whole time, like what you’d seen in the work building. You’d only formally met him earlier, but you already felt like you’d known him so much longer. His casual way of holding himself made you feel like he could have been a model if he’d wanted to be, although his height could be a factor that might let him not be. He noticed your gaze raking over him, because he seemed to straighten up a little. Once you noticed the movement, though, you softly laughed and looked away. You couldn’t look away for that long though. Your eyes seemed to be drawn to him. This had been the first time you’d really looked at his face though, yet he had a dab of ketchup on the corner of his mouth.

When you were trying to stifle a laugh, he noticed and glanced away from the front windshield to look at you, his face amused but quizzical. “What?” He smiled, only seeming to spread the condiment around. You pointed to the side of your mouth, waggling a finger toward it. His brown eyes dropped to your lips, and you immediately became self conscious about the dryness of your mouth. You hadn’t been keeping up with anything about your appearance, and earlier you’d only wiped off your makeup- not putting any more on, since you figured you’d just be at the office late again.

Baekhyun collected himself at last, bringing his hand up to the side of his face. “Where?” You smiled and leaned toward him, grabbing his wrist to guide it toward the red tainting his lip. Once his fingertip touched it, he dabbed at it, bringing the one finger into his mouth and smiling immediately after. You were in shock that he treated such an act as if it was nothing, and you moved your gaze from his lips to dark eyes. “Thanks.” His voice was soft. Softer and lighter than it had been before. You felt yourself wanting to get even closer to him than you were, to get rid of the gap between the two of you.

But he only balled up the paper bag between the two of you and reached toward the door with his other hand, leg already raising to step outside of the vehicle. Without thinking, you grabbed his sleeve. As soon as he turned his head to look at you, you pushed your lips against his, closing the inches that had been between you before. They were much softer than you’d expected, but Baekhyun seemed to be frozen in place, eyes still wide with shock. You pulled back quickly, knowing that if he didn’t want this, you’d definitely made a mistake. Raising your hand to your lips, you shook your head quickly. “I’m sorry. I’m sor-“ This time he cut you off. Baekhyun moved your hand out of the way, throwing the balled bag toward the floor of the passenger seat. His lips reconnected with yours, this time he let out a long breath from his nose like he’d been holding it the entire time. Lifting both of his hands, he intertwined his hands with your hair, massaging your scalp as his tongue ran along the bottom of your lip. This was nothing like Jackson. You practically had to beg Jackson to touch you while you kissed, and you were always the one doing the work. It was hard to think of Jackson at the moment, considering Baekhyun was letting out soft, high-pitched moans from your own tongue pushing back against his. The sound went straight to your core, and you felt your hands inching toward his torso. As soon as your fingers gripped the material of his shirt, he left your lips to trail sloppy kisses down to your neck, the feeling of his tongue twirling against the sensitive skin made you gasp, and wrap your fingers even more around his shirt.

He pulled at your skin lightly with his teeth, eventually pulling away so he could look at you. You were sure your face was just as flushed and flustered as his. Baekhyun’s lips were red from kissing you, and his blonde hair was now twisted into one of the messiest styles you’d seen on him. A smile grew on your face, and you reached up to his hair to smooth it back down. He couldn’t take his eyes off of you, his gaze switching from between your eyes watching his hair to your smiling parted lips.

Once you were satisfied with his hair, you looked back down at his face, where his hooded eyes were boring into your own. You felt a chill run down your spin, and throbbing between your legs just by the flustered look on his sharp features.

“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do that, pretty.” His voice was an octave lower than it was before. The raspiness coming out of his throat made you shiver, while the nickname made you smile.

He gave you a soft smile in return, before pressing his lips softly against your cheek, moving to the other cheek, then to the tip of your nose, which erupted a giggle from your lips. Baekhyun smiled at your reaction, and pulled you back into him, his demeanor changing from a silly boy into a soft, caring man. The middle console dug into your ribs as the two of you kissed, so you decided to get more comfortable. With your lips still interlocked, you threw a leg over his lap, lifting the skirt up your legs even more, and he broke the kiss as you were reaching between the door and seat to move the seat back. His wide eyes watched you for a moment, and you ran your hands up and down the fine hairs on his forearms after you were done adjusting. You hooked your index fingers around his wrists, dragging them up your legs to place on your hips. At the permission to touch you there, he squeezed softly, his fingers kneading into the softness of your love handles through the skirt you wore. You smiled at his testing what he could do, and you dropped to place your elbows on either side of his head. He kept one hand on your hip, but moved the other to slip his fingers through your hair once again, squeezing them together to tighten his grip, a feeling that made you gasp, and made Baekhyun smile with lust before pressing his lips against yours in a sloppy kiss, tongue pressing against your bottom lip as he did so.

You ran a thumb against his cheek while your arm sat against his firm chest, and you moved to sit further up his torso, but stopped once he groaned loudly against your lips. You were confused at first, but the realization where you were placed suddenly came to light and you smiled into the kiss, slipping a tongue into his mouth before you ground into his core again, both of these actions making Baekhyun whine loudly into your mouth, lifting his hips off of the seat to grind into your spot. You gasped at the feeling of his hardness against your barely covered core, and he seemed to notice, wrapping an arm around your waist and doing it again, still barely being able to control his sounds even though he was the one controlling you. You ran your hands up and down his chest as you kissed, hands awkwardly trying to feel him as he pressed himself into you. Baekhyun released you and broke the kiss to smile up at you, that same smile that made your heart flutter. You ran a thumb over his bottom lip, and he playfully made a biting motion toward your hand, before kissing the tip of your smallest finger.

Your hands fell from his face to his shirt again, and your gaze followed, watching as his chest rose and fell quickly in response to your gawking over his body. “Should I take it off?” You widened your eyes at the bold question, but felt a smile creeping onto your face. “Yes.”

Baekhyun leaned toward you, holding himself up on his elbows as he began to unbutton his shirt. You decided to help, getting the last few buttons, and helping him slide out of the shirt. He was wearing a muscle shirt underneath of it, but quickly pulled it off and put the clothes in the passenger seat, leaving himself exposed to your wandering eyes. Your fingers trailed down his abdomen, lips parted in surprise to how fit he really was. He smiled at your reaction, and his hands began to creep toward your own shirt. You blushed slightly, but let his long fingers undo each button, his left hand sliding into your blouse even before it was completely unbuttoned so he could feel your soft skin. Baekhyun sighed at the feeling of your bareness, and finished taking the blouse off of you, his dark eyes immediately locking onto your bra. It wasn’t a good bra day, but you were suddenly glad you put at least a decent one on. His large hands rose up your torso, reaching your chest to knead your breasts softly in his hands, his own mouth falling open as if he couldn’t believe it was actually happening. He let out a soft groan as you began to roll your hips against his again, and his right hand began to lower to the warmth between your legs, eyes watching your face. When you didn’t say anything, he quietly spoke, “Can I?” His lips were still pink from earlier, and you nodded at him, leaning your head back to let him do his thing, hands resting against his thighs. You felt one of his hands lower to your center while the other rose to your face, a finger curving under your jaw. You looked divine to him. The lower hand eventually got to the material of your panties, and even from rubbing it with his thumb he could tell you were completely ready. “Wow..” He rasped, leaning forward to press kisses against your collarbones while a finger slipped into your folds around the underwear you wore. You ground against his finger with a gasp, and he whined at the feeling of you also rubbing against his own center. He wrapped his free hand around your waist while he began to pump harder, inserting a second finger into your wetness as you began to pant against his hair.

You had moved your hands from his thighs to wrap around his shoulders, pressing his head into your chest, an area he obviously didn’t mind being in, something that was evident from his wet kisses in the crevice of your breasts and the moans he was letting out against your skin. He let another whine escape his lips at you grounding yourself into his fingers and hardness again, quickening the pace of his fingers. “Do you h-have protection?” His words were shaky and high-pitched as he continued to thrust his fingers into you, adding another one easily. You couldn’t tell if you answered him or not since your thoughts were blank and your vision was turning white, but you managed to gesture toward the glove compartment. He removed his fingers from you slowly, and you whined in response, grinding against his core once more. He groaned deeply and gripped your hips, pressing them against his own as he pressed his hardness into you through his pants. “Be careful.” Even with your sex-dazed state, you widened your eyes at the sudden change in his attitude, and smirked down at him, grabbing his bottom lip with your teeth. Baekhyun sighed and held the nape of your neck with his hands as he kissed you roughly. He broke the kiss after a few moments and quickly leaned over to pop the glove compartment open, fingers clumsily searching for a familiar feeling wrapper. He made a happy sound and leaned back, not bothering to close the compartment because of how impatient he seemed, and you scooted back to sit on his thighs, still feeling exhausted from what he had just been doing to you. You both watched as he slid the zipper of his pants down, and reached into them to pull out his hard length. While he unwrapped the condom, you wrapped your hand around him and he stopped completely, head falling back against the seat. “Fuck!” You grinned at his reaction of a simple touch, and slicked your thumb over the head, to which he responded by thrusting into your hand and letting out one of his high-pitched whines into the car. You were glad no one could hear you because Baekhyun was the loudest person you’d ever been with. You removed your hand slowly. Baekhyun recovered, blowing out air through tight lips as he rolled the condom down his length, which was a similar size to Jackson’s, except being a little thicker, which was obvious by the tightness of the condom around him.

You scooted forward, positioning yourself above him before slowly sinking down while you moved your underwear to the side. Baekhyun groaned loudly as he entered you, holding on to your hips as he entered you fully, eyes scrunched tightly. You lifted a hand to his face to run a thumb against his cheek. Even through his pleasure, he smiled. You smiled back down at him, leaning down to press your lips against his parted ones, and he quickly responded by leaning forward to kiss you back, slowly circling his hips so you could move against him. You began to grind your hips against him as you were before, and Baekhyun sighed against your lips. The feeling of his eyebrows drawing together was evident against your own forehead. “You’re so tense.” You whispered against his lips, lowering your hands to rub against his chest. Baekhyun visibly softened, and let out a heavy breath as his head leaned back as the two of you began a quick rhythm against each other. He looked absolutely stunning, his parted lips and raised eyebrows were all you could look at as you bounced up and down, the small sounds he was making were bringing you closer and closer to your climax every time they left his mouth.

You stopped bouncing, grinding yourself deeper and you felt him reach a point in you that no one had before in your life. A breath left your lips and he whined louder- if that was even possible. He grabbed underneath your thighs and began to thrust into you quickly, at this rate you felt like you could come undone at any second. You fell forward onto him, wrapping your arms around his head, giving him the perfect position to pound into you. “Fuck!” You gasped as he quickened the pace, hands gripping tighter against your ass as the two of you started to come undone at the same time. Your vision started to go white as he kept pounding into you, his soft moans going into your ear and straight to your core. Panting against his neck, you kept going so he could reach his high as well, bringing yourself down on his thrusts, and he finally let out a grunt as his hips stiffened and he gripped your waist, pressing his face into your shoulder.

A few seconds later, you leaned back and lifted yourself off of him, taking off the condom and shoving it into the paper bag you had both been eating out of earlier. He had his head leaned back, soft breaths leaving his lips now instead of harsh ones. You ran a hand over his taut chest, causing him to look at you with a smile.

“Hi.” You spoke, a smile matching his on your face. Instead of responding, Baekhyun leaned forward to press his lips against yours, both your foreheads sweaty against the others’. You broke the kiss and sat back, trying to fix your hair the best you could before Baek grabbed your hand gently. “You look beautiful.” Even after what had just happened with him, you still felt a blush creeping onto your face, and it must have been obvious because Baekhyun’s smile grew twice the size it had been before. He reached up, pinching your cheek and rubbing it with a thumb soon after.

“Since you’re already here.. in my car.. and it’s late.” You started, tracing shapes on Baekhyun’s chest, “You should just stay the night.” Baekhyun laughed loudly, playfully poking you. “In the car??” You sputtered, a grin crossing your features. “You know what I mean.”

You began to lean toward him for another one of his kisses, but your phone vibrated against the cupholder it was in, making you jump against him. His body began to rumble with a laugh and you playfully glared before scooping it up, just in case it was work. As you read over the text, your eyes grew wider, and Baek got more curious at seeing your expression change, so he attempted to lean forward so he could see.

 Ms. Y/L/N,

   We are considering new people to replace Mr. Kim’s position, and we believe you would be the perfect candidate. I apologize for the late message, but please get back to me as soon as you can.

Thank you,

Choi Seunghyun

[haunted-alien]

so i did an ask reblog and @lamentedandmalcontented has requested for me to do all of them. and as they know, i never back down from a challenge. NEVER. (lmao) so let’s do this!

1: 6 of the songs you listen to most? Seen My Man(Trixie Mattel), Mr. Know It All(Young the Giant), The Calender(Panic! at the Disco), Somebody to Love(Queen), That’s Life(Frank Sinatra), Monster(Kayne West ft. Nicki Minaj)

2: If you could meet anyone on this earth, who would it be? Michlle Obama

3: Grab the book nearest to you, turn to page 23, give me line 17. “Wings, and no eyes, figure unheedy haste”

4: What do you think about most? death lmao

5: What does your latest text message from someone else say? “Do we need coffee creamer do you know”

6: Do you sleep with or without clothes on? with

7: What’s your strangest talent? im not sure. im pretty boring lol

9: Ever had a poem or song written about you? nope

10: When is the last time you played the air guitar? i cant even remember

11: Do you have any strange phobias? not any strange ones

12: Ever stuck a foreign object up your nose? yes....

13: What’s your religion? prefer not to say

14: If you are outside, what are you most likely doing? probably relaxing with a cup of coffee

15: Do you prefer to be behind the camera or in front of it? behind :)

16: Simple but extremely complex. Favorite band? i cant answer this

17: What was the last lie you told? yeah im doing great

18: Do you believe in karma? yes

19: What does your URL mean? it is pretty self explanitory. spooky extra terrestrials 

20: What is your greatest weakness; your greatest strength? weakness: my emotions. strength: willpower 

21: Who is your celebrity crush? kate mckinnon

22: Have you ever gone skinny dipping? nope

23: How do you vent your anger? internalize that shit

24: Do you have a collection of anything? gems and healing stones!

25: Do you prefer talking on the phone or video chatting online? video chatting

26: Are you happy with the person you’ve become? yes and im excited to see where i go

27: What’s a sound you hate; sound you love? love: mechanical keyboards and acoustic guitar. hate: racism

28: What’s your biggest “what if”? what if i just died?

29: Do you believe in ghosts? How about aliens? yes and yes

30: Stick your right arm out; what do you touch first? Do the same with your left arm. right: my monitor, left: my glass of water

31: Smell the air. What do you smell? my seaside candle

32: What’s the worst place you have ever been to? the inside of a heroins addicts house

33: Choose: East Coast or West Coast? east coast

34: Most attractive singer of your opposite gender? brenden urie

35: To you, what is the meaning of life? 42

36: Define Art. complicated and subjective

37: Do you believe in luck? kind of?

38: What’s the weather like right now? cloudy with a chance of rain

39: What time is it? it is 7:33pm

40: Do you drive? If so, have you ever crashed? i do drive and i have never crashed

41: What was the last book you read? a midsummer’s night dream

42: Do you like the smell of gasoline? i do

43: Do you have any nicknames? alien

44: What was the last film you saw? i believe it was moana

45: What’s the worst injury you’ve ever had? i skinned my face

46: Have you ever caught a butterfly? yes :)

47: Do you have any obsessions right now? d&d

48: What’s your sexual orientation? bisexual

49: Ever had a rumour spread about you? many times

50: Do you believe in magic? in a way

51: Do you tend to hold grudges against people who have done you wrong? i try not too but i can be pretty petty

52: What is your astrological sign? scorpio

53: Do you save money or spend it? save

54: What’s the last thing you purchased? my new computer!

55: Love or lust? love

56: In a relationship? no....

57: How many relationships have you had? one

58: Can you touch your nose with your tongue? no, i wish

59: Where were you yesterday? i was home

60: Is there anything pink within 10 feet of you? some pink running shoes

61: Are you wearing socks right now? yup

62: What’s your favourite animal? orangutans 

63: What is your secret weapon to get someone to like you? sarcasm i suppose

64: Where is your best friend? at their home

65: Give me your top 5 favourite blogs on Tumblr. @maryarty @bestbewaremysting @hammertimeinthegrill420 @yourlocalvodkaaunt @thatsthat24

66: What is your heritage? Irish, Italian, and Slovakian

67: What were you doing last night at 12AM? watchin youtube i think

68: What do you think is Satan’s last name? i think that is his last name

69: Be honest. Ever gotten yourself off? .......

70: Are you the kind of friend you would want to have as a friend? im honestly not sure

71: You are walking down the street on your way to work. There is a dog drowning in the canal on the side of the street. Your boss has told you if you are late one more time you get fired. What do you do? save the dog

72: You are at the doctor’s office and she has just informed you that you have approximately one month to live. a) Do you tell anyone/everyone you are going to die? b) What do you do with your remaining days? c) Would you be afraid? a)no, just tell the people that should know b) try to settle my life and worries c) i dont think so

73: You can only have one of these things; trust or love. trust

74: What’s a song that always makes you happy when you hear it? seen my man by trixie mattel

75: What are the last four digits in your cell phone number? 0844

76: In your opinion, what makes a great relationship? love, trust, humor 

77: How can I win your heart? be nice to me and like me back

78: Can insanity bring on more creativity? yes but also getting the help you need is more important

79: What is the single best decision you have made in your life so far? talking to the pretty girl who gave a presentation on fanfiction

80: What size shoes do you wear? 9

81: What would you want to be written on your tombstone? “i wanted to be cremated you twits”

82: What is your favourite word? soft

83: Give me the first thing that comes to mind when you hear the word; heart. beat

84: What is a saying you say a lot? “fuck” “fcuking shit”

85: What’s the last song you listened to? currently listening to told you so by paramore

86: Basic question; what’s your favourite colour/colours? black, white, blue

87: What is your current desktop picture? kermit the frog

88: If you could press a button and make anyone in the world instantaneously explode, who would it be? kim jong un

89: What would be a question you’d be afraid to tell the truth on? if *that person* asked if i liked them

90: One night you wake up because you heard a noise. You turn on the light to find that you are surrounded by MUMMIES. The mummies aren’t really doing anything, they’re just standing around your bed. What do you do? panic, wonder where the hell they came from

91: You accidentally eat some radioactive vegetables. They were good, and what’s even cooler is that they endow you with the super-power of your choice! What is that power? honestly i feel like the most practical is endless money

92: You can re-live any point of time in your life. The time-span can only be a half-hour, though. What half-hour of your past would you like to experience again? prom with *that person*

93: You can erase any horrible experience from your past. What will it be? being locked in my room while my parents screamed at each other for hours

94: You have the opportunity to sleep with the music-celebrity of your choice. Who would it be? probably lana del rey

95: You just got a free plane ticket to anywhere. You have to depart right now. Where are you gonna go? london

96: Do you have any relatives in jail? yes

97: Have you ever thrown up in the car? yes many times

98: Ever been on a plane? yup

99: If the whole world were listening to you right now, what would you say? please just be kind to one another and please just listen to each other. if everyone actually listened, we would be in a much better place

my goodness that was a lot! if any of you suffered through that, hi :) anyway that is them all! 

[swan-archive]

@herowndeliverance continues in her fine tradition of generously allowing me to plagiarize the ever-loving shit out of her works! i thank the jesus baby EVERY day and hope that at some point i will Git Gud enough to do them justice.

anyways here’s Patsy teaching a fish to play the harpsichord

--

“What is that?”

Patsy yelps, mid-measure, and slams her hands down on the harpsichord keys. The instrument lets out a dreadful ploing and the interloper leaps out of sight behind the doorframe with a yelp of his own.

“Alexander?” Patsy asks, when the discord has died down to a ringing twangggggggg and her heart has settled down a bit. Rhetorical—Mama and Papa would never sneak up on her like that while she’s practicing, and Jacky wouldn’t bother hiding after jumping out at her. Her suspicions are confirmed, though, when Alex pokes his head around the doorframe, wincing at the racket.

“You scared the sh…y-you scared me, Alex,” Patsy says, a little annoyed at the interruption. “I didn’t even hear you come up!”

“I didn’t mean to surprise you,” he says, hovering in the doorway. Patsy knows she ought to be nervous, caught alone with him, her mother’s warned her enough times to just be careful, please, your Papa trusts him but I worry, all right, you can never really know with a creature like that…But it’s very hard to be scared of Alex when he’s twisting his hands like that, shifting from foot to foot like a schoolboy who’s been put on the spot before the whole class.

“Did you need something?” Patsy asks pointedly, after they’ve stood there considering each other for several long, awkward seconds.

“No, it’s, I only wanted to know…I was in the other room reading and I heard you in here. And I just wanted to ask what that was.” He gestures at the harpsichord vaguely.

“It’s a sonata I’ve been learning in my lessons. Scarlatti. It’s not ready to show anyone yet,” she says, with a little frown. “Not ready to perform. I’ve just learned it. It’ll sound better when I’ve figured out the fingering on this middle section. That’s why I was so surprised when you popped up out of nowhere, I didn’t want someone hearing it before I’d really worked through it.”

“I see,” says Alex, with that look on his face that means he’s trying to decide between asking for clarification and looking like a fool or pretending he understands what’s being said to him and risking being called out. He stands there mutely for a moment.

“…Oh,” says Patsy at last. She pats the cover of the harpsichord. “You mean this—? Um. It’s a harpsichord. A musical instrument? You press the keys here and it makes notes with the strings inside…” She trails off, hoping Alex won’t enquire as to how the mechanism works; her mother is indulgent with her, as a rule, but even Martha might be given pause if Patsy and Alex dismantle the harpsichord for a science project.

Alex seems satisfied with that explanation, though, and strays closer, peering under the cover. He runs his fingers over the strings, producing a soft shimmery sound. “It was nice,” he says at last. “That song from before. Scarlatti. What does it mean?”

“Mean? Well, Scarlatti’s the composer, he was from Naples…”

“No, like, was it a hunting-song, a warning-song, an—um—a l-loving-song…”

“There aren’t any words to it, Alex, it doesn’t mean anything. It’s just music. Just a song. A song-song.”

“Really?” Alex comes around and examines the keyboard. “I would’ve sworn—there were parts of it that sounded almost like words.” He reaches out and depresses one of the higher keys, pling. Hums a little, high in his throat, in that surprisingly sweet contralto of his, and examines the sheet music on the stand. He traces his finger along a run of sixteenth notes. “Is this the song? You can read this?”

“Yes—”

“Show me.”

“Show you, please,” Patsy says, sarcastically—Papa’s wrestled enough with Alex’s lack of manners for it to have become a household joke—but Alex hunches his shoulders and looks at Patsy with a shy, tentative expression.

“Show me, please,” he says. And, okay, maybe it’s a good thing that those lessons in deportment haven’t taken yet, because that was…kind of charming. Patsy finds herself softening against her own will.

“All right, here.” She takes Alex’s hand and places it on the keys. “All the notes have letter names, A through G, the lines for treble clef are E-G-B-D-F, that’s every good boy does fine, and the spaces spell out face, F-A-C-E…”

“I can spell,” Alex complains, but he dutifully plays each note along with Patsy. His skin is cold under her hand. “And these ones, the in-between notes?”

“Those are the flats and sharps. See, here—this little symbol. This means the F note, but a half-step sharp. So the key between F and G.”

“Wait, but surely you could—there’s no key between these two.” Alex taps the middle C and the B just below. “So you could call this C a B sharp?”

“You…could,” Patsy allows. “But most of the time you wouldn’t. It’s easier to just call it a C.”

“You could even call it an, um—” Alex does a quick count of the keys. “An A-sharp-sharp-sharp.”

“That’s stupid.”

“An E-sharp-sharp-sharp-sharp—”

“Stop, now you’re just being ridiculous!” says Patsy, laughing and swatting at his arm. Alex grins at her with a mischievous air; he’s warmed to her touch and her proximity, and his eyes are very big and dark, and—why is she blushing all of a sudden?

She coughs, stares very intently at the sheet music, willing the heat to go out of her face. “Right. So. Those are the notes. And there are key signatures and time signatures and things. I can teach you those next, if you want. It’s all quite simple.”

Alex chirrups to himself, executing a half-tempo, clumsy approximation of the run he’d pointed out before. “And this line, here—it’s the same as the first one?”

“No, that’s the bass clef, the notes read differently for the left hand.”

“That doesn’t make any sense, why would you write it so you have to read two different things at once?”

“It’s because the lines overlap, sometimes, so you have to be able to read them separately or together, like this…” Patsy plays a short passage from one of her other pieces to demonstrate.

“Oh. Huh.” Alex cocks his head at the sheet music. “It just seems overcomplicated to me, that’s all. The way we do it, you don’t even have to write it down, you just hear and you remember—” He snaps his mouth shut, darts a guilty glance at Patsy. Tries again. “I mean, um, the way mermaids do it—”

There’s a bizarre flush rising on his cheeks, splotchy and varicolored like an old bruise, green-brown-purple. It’s very unpleasant to look at. Perhaps it’s better to move past this quickly. “Yes, I’m sure that’s all fine for you,” says Patsy, shuffling through the sheet music on the stand, “but humans can’t just memorize a song after hearing it once.”

“I’m not a—”

“It’s fine, Alex. I know you’re a mermaid. I’m not stupid, after all. And you’re a terrible liar. So why bother pretending?”

“But the Colonel said—that is, I’m not to—” begins Alex, miserably.

“Never mind what Papa said. That’s for other people, not for us. I certainly won’t tell anyone about you. And I don’t care what you are, as long as you don’t try and eat me. So it’s not worth worrying about, not now. Not here. Not with me.”

Alex bites his lip, but relaxes slightly, enough to tap out a few more notes on the keyboard. Patsy shoots him an encouraging smile.

“Anyway,” she says, “I taught you this, now you have to teach me something. You must know an awful lot of songs that nobody’s ever even tried to play on a harpsichord.”

Alex looks at her in surprise before barking out a genuine laugh. “You couldn’t play them,” he says. That grin from before is back. “Not even close.”

“Oh, yeah?” Patsy meets his eyes in challenge. “We’ll see about that, won’t we?”

[oscillate-wilde-ly]

Enough

Listen – listen! It’s not like Henry doesn’t know he has a problem, it’s just that it’s part of the whole gig, the whole folk-rock-singer-slash-drifter thing. You just don’t do that kind of thing without developing a drinking problem; it’s practically a pre-requisite to be at least halfway to drunk before attempting any Bob Dylan song in earnest. Even your basic college-aged indie youth with an acoustic knows that.

Waking up hung over with his head pounding on an unfamiliar couch, mouth as dry as the overflowing ash tray on the floor beside him – it’s just part of the look. Part of the lifestyle that justifies the early graying at his temples and the beaten shadows under his eyes, the way he shakes with sobs in his sleep a couple times a month, and the way he can’t remember what happened last night.

Last night. What happened last night.

           The question echoes through him unanswered but full of pregnant possibility, and Henry knows better than to chase it any longer. Not here, anyway. Here with the Ikea couch and found-artisan rug and the who-rescued-who shelter cat sleeping square on his chest, all of which belong to the very nice couple who – this much Henry remembers – have just been beside themselves with sedated, bohemian excitement to put up local legend Henry “Hank” Darling for the night.

           With a quiet groan he sits upright – or, as upright as the feline weight on his chest will allow. Soft gray light filtering in through the blinds on windows just above the couch tells him it’s just barely morning. It’s the kind of wake-up after the initial pass-out where he’s still a little tipsy, but sober enough to know he wants to be gone when his hosts wake up wanting to hear tales of the gig from the night before.

           The night before.

           It drops heavy like a cannon ball in a kiddie pool and in a second Henry’s up. The cat’s on the floor and so are his feet.

The best thing about being a folk-rock-singer-slash-drifter is that it’s real easy to pack up your stuff and go when everything you own fits in a guitar case and the pockets of your jacket. The best thing about staying with millennial-hipster-youth is they always put a glass of water out for you before going to bed when you pass out on their couch. He drinks it too fast but keeps it down – a trick of the trade that gets him out, out, out the door so that the little black rescue cat barely has time to sprint for the opening before it’s closed again.

Hangover sunglasses? On.

Guitar case? Secured.

Leering next door neighbor? Ignored.

Whenever the walk from the front door to the sidewalk takes longer than five seconds on account of the landscaping, you know you’re in a nice neighborhood. Whenever there’s someone outside before seven AM in matching jogging clothes or anything that buttons, you know you’re in a nice neighborhood. The aesthetic configuration of succulents and perennials dotting porches and hanging from verandas is utterly lost on Henry.

What matters now is the motion. Moving one foot after another, so that the little townhouse filled with rare vinyls and unchallenged monogamy and Swedish furniture is only getting smaller and smaller behind him all the time. It’s enough to get his blood going again so that the pain in his head is joined now by an ache in his back and one on his side, bruises fresh and festering. Little lines of red flecked across the fingers on his right hand, glowing pink cuts only a few hours old.

New.

Gained most likely in the past twelve hours judging by the blooming blue color on the ones he can see. The past twelve hours.

Out here in the newborn daylight, with the sounds of mechanical fits being had by lawn sprinklers and the occasional errant Labrador barking at his footsteps, Henry tries to remember.

…

It was like this: the open mic night part of the gig was open to anyone, but only he­ – Hank Darling­ – would be headlining, listed, and therefore, getting paid. At the best of times it was a “kitschy” hipster bar that had discreetly set up a stage in the back corner for local talent. In reality it was a dive of a place with a lone stool and a microphone older than the yellowing health-inspection paper forgotten on a wall (a wall plastered decoratively with cigarette-scented coasters and questionable stains).

It paid mostly in drink tickets and “exposure”, but that had never stopped Henry before.

And – listen! Henry would never judge anyone for the way they chose to live, or who they chose to fuck, or not fuck, okay? He wasn’t – isn’t – “-phobic” of any kind. That kind of shit could never stick to a kid too sad and scared to give a fuck, and it wasn’t apt to change just because the kid managed to survive long enough to make a career out of his drinking problem.

It was just that he didn’t – he didn’t expect to see him there, in the audience, bobbed black hair just perfectly curled under his ears, with eyelashes just too long to be natural and lips just too red to be naked and – what was he wearing? Henry had only just been a few beers back when he’d spotted the gender-bending boy who’d been babbling in his ear these past couple nights suddenly conjured before him in the audience like a spirit, all glitter and fish-nets and post-grunge-pop-crop-tops that flashed wildly when he talked (as if he ever stopped doing that).

The boy was like a siren who refused to even pretend that he wasn’t luring you to your doom in a shirt that said “SLUT” in big holographic letters and a mouth that said, “Come crash on my rocks, baby.”

His name was Alexander and only Alexander the way Henry’s name was Henry and only Henry. Hank was strictly the name he sang hopeful love songs under, or slow and sad covers of love songs someone else wrote, or long ballads of admiration and awe to nature that he shut up inside him when he shut up the guitar case every night.

Alexander had told him he didn’t go by Alex anymore, not since people assumed too fast it was a girl’s name, not since someone else’s assumptions meant someone else’s fist in his made-up face when they didn’t find the parts that they assumed matched the name under his skinny jeans or mini skirt or hot pants. (He told Henry this with a smile and a wink and a hand on Henry’s shoulder just barely touching).

From backstage (otherwise known as the corner behind the stage equipment) Alexander locked eyes with him long enough to curl that Cheshire cat smirk on his face before going back to making eyes at a stranger, like he was interested in whatever conversation he was having with whoever was buying his drink currently.

Fuck, maybe Alexander was interested in it. Not up to Henry to notice, to look, to care. One leg swung wantonly from the barstool Alexander was propped up on, too short to reach the ground even with platforms on.

He should have stuck out like a glittering thumb, looking like that in a shitty bar like this, even with the collection of riot grrls and nu-goths milling about. Alexander stuck out in the way that you were either looking At Alexander or Not At Alexander and never anything or anyone else. But the confidence Alexander exuded like a neon glow on some offensive sign dared you to want to fight him or fuck him; either option you chose said something about you, not him.

Either way it was your problem.

Either way he’d still be there.

It was only ever a question of how long it’d take Henry before he had to resign himself to approaching the bar to turn in a drink ticket for something to hold in both hands, just like it was only a question of how long after doing that before a newly familiar voice was in his ear, buzzing like a radio or maybe purring like a cat.

“This place is a shit hole.”

The best thing about being a folk-rock-singer-slash-drifter was most fans felt it was uncool to approach you before a gig. But Alexander was not a fan, and even if he was (was he?) nothing he did was uncool, anyway.

Henry leaned his front too hard against the bar for a second so that the sharp corner of the top bit sweetly into his stomach before he turned a lazy expression on Alexander. He replied first with a sip of his beer, then, “So you should feel right at home, then.”

The slightest tug at the corner of Henry’s lips when he spoke betrayed a whole lot more than his teasing intentions – not that he was noticing. Henry rubbed at the tip of his nose, sniffled, and settled on watching some kid with a laptop and a keyboard struggle to find enough plugs for her set-up behind the mic.

“Ha. Ha,” Alexander said the words in favor of actually laughing, but there was a grin on his face and in his too blue eyes that Henry refused to linger on. “Maybe I should have said something like: ‘Come here often?’ Would that have been better for you, Henry?” Alexander said it like the set up for a joke but the punch line never came.

Henry answered with a shrug and drink.

“Mm,” Alexander hummed undeterred by Henry’s silence, his back to the bar and his elbows on top so that his hands dangled off it with red-rubbed knuckles and bitten-down fingernails. “That’s my sister.” He nodded towards the woman on stage, then, after a beat he added: “You didn’t think I was here to see you, did you?”

Henry ignored the question (again).

She was a waifish thing with hair some impossible color of pink and she was wearing enough layers to suggest she had tried to walk out with the whole thrift shop on (if it was a thrift shop for very small drag queens). There was glitter under her eyes (they must share glitter, Henry figured) and when she opened her mouth to sing it sounded like what Henry imagined an especially innocent kitten might sound like if it knew how to work a Mac laptop and a synthesizer.

“I can see the resemblance,” Henry noted, and he plugged his mouth with a beer to keep from saying anything else.

Instantly Alexander’s face was in his as much as their height difference would allow, smug and sparkling, his lips saying: “Oh yeah? Is that because she’s so cute and I’m so cute? You can just say it, Henry. It’s okay. You can. Just. Say it.”

A groan. A grumble. Another beer to stop up his voice. It burned inside him alongside the alcohol, made his free hand ball into a fist now and then, choked him up into communicating with grunts and nods as Alexander carried on the conversation for him – both their parts and then some.

One or two dark-eyed boys stumbled on stage with their poetry journals in tow and left in the wake of scattered applause for bravery; now and then Alexander would put a hand on Henry’s shoulder when he talked, or on his arm. Chipped black nail polish winding around some loose threads of Henry’s jacket, winding and winding and Henry ignoring the way his muscles tense with every touch.  

By the time Henry was meant to soundcheck, he had already moved on to hard liquor. Alexander’s voice was in his ears telling him, “Go get ‘em, Hank,” with that knowing self-satisfied smile that he seemed to always wear as if he always, always, always had something to be smug about.

Like just his existing in front of you was a triumph of rebellion.

It was an expression that had been searing itself into the back of Henry’s mind, which was arguably where he kept the majority of things that stuck with him for too long. A therapist had told him once in a stuffy counseling office in elementary school that trauma makes us compartmentalize differently, makes us wall things off and scale things back so that the focus is just on surviving today – right now – and everything else just gets pushed out of sight as a means to an end. Henry liked to think he was acutely aware of what was on the other side of his own mental walls, and that’s precisely why he kept them up.

His walls were translucent; hazy glass so he could squint and look at the monsters on the other side whenever he needed to, whenever he wanted to, and like a beta fish squaring up at his own reflection it made his colors brighter. By forcing himself to stare down his own monstrous self-destructive origins on a regular basis, Henry could justify his total inability to be anything to people other than an inevitable let-down. It made his music ache deeper.  And it made every true emotion that managed to break through his haze of cigarette smoke and cheap whiskey drinks sear through him like a hot iron out of control.

It wasn’t something he would recommend, but it was one way to live.

With whiskey in one hand and his guitar in the other, Henry sat down at the rickety stool amongst casual whistles of approval and still out, over the little crowd that had gathered, was Alexander’s come-up-and-see-me-sometime smirk leering at him from the bar. Every passing sip made every coming strum of his guitar sound more and more and more like the mewling voice of indiscretion singing:

“Go get ‘em, Hank.”

…

After that, things get a little hazy.

A lot hazy.

The kind of hazy that makes his headache worse when he tries to push through it, and the way the sun keeps getting higher and brighter as Henry puts pavement behind him isn’t helping. There are some things that even hangover sunglasses can’t block out.

By now there are signs of life all around him as he walks; the front lawns have become invariably shorter and the picket fences have begun to morph into chain-link. Garages turn into rusted-out beaters haphazardly driven onto driveways and forgotten for eternity. The faces he passes aren’t glancing away at the last second when he comes close like they do in the nice neighborhoods – they never look at him in the first place.

The cuts on his knuckles sting in his pockets and shifting too much makes his bruises sing hymns of regret but walking with his head down is safe, it’s always safe.

Hands in his pockets, it’s only now that he’s dipped back into reality that he realizes what he’s been fiddling with in there. The little paper he’s been fondling idly, Henry discovers as he pulls it from his the pocket of his jacket, is a small napkin, partially shredded and particularly worn from his idle fingering.

In curling handwriting and black ink that seems too black and thick to be pen but otherwise unidentifiable to Henry, are the words:

5350 S Mryland ave #142

Beneath it, there’s the half-smudge of a too-red lipstick stain: a kiss mark done in haste.

Beneath that, Henry’s hands feel heavy and sluggish. There’s an itch in the back of his brain like something waiting to be overturned, some face about to come into focus – only if he starts looking for it, it might look back. So he crumples the thing, forgets he knows exactly where that address is, forgets that he’s trying to remember anything at all except how to put one foot in front of the other.

It’s the telltale crunching of glass under his feet that sends him back to the night before for the second time, this time against his will; broken glass from broken bottles that stick in his memory with edges jagged enough to cut through the blackout.

…

It was like being caught in an undertow: wave after wave crashing over him in slow, agonizing succession. Or it was like a prizefight with Henry Darling in both corners. The memory of his actual show was gone almost completely aside from picking up on those blue blues occasionally glancing at him from the back of the bar – occasionally! – with lazy disinterest and maybe one finger drawing circles on the bar top.

That image was clear as blue skies, but then – nothing.

Henry’s typical post-gig ritual was like this: find a table near the back and make his drink tickets and pocket change take his liver as far as they could. He kept his sunglasses on, mostly to discourage the average bar patron from making the mistake of thinking he was looking for company – if they happened to do anything to hide his own expression, or where his eyes were, that was purely coincidental.

The level of excitement that this tradition involved tended to vary from town to town, depending widely on the company he was keeping at the time, or lack thereof as the case may be. If anyone visited for very long that night, Henry’s blackout consolidator had efficiently wiped them from the scene.

The only thing that had stuck was, predictably, Alexander.

Alexander not coming over to sit with him the way he had the night before, or the one before that. Alexander not wheedling whatever words he could out of Henry with teasing back-handed compliments and fleeting touches.

(“So are you always this grumpy or is it just because you like me so much?” / “I bet all the girls think the gray in your hair makes you look like a sexy professor or something.” / “Henry. Henry! Say something nice to me and I’ll share my cigarette.”)

Instead it was Alexander and his sister trading cigarettes and mixed drinks. Alexander always just in his line of sight giving lingering looks and touches to some pair of fair-trade sneakers with a trendy haircut and always, always, always with that smile on his had-to-be-painted lips.

It figured, Henry argued to himself from the other side of the bottom of his glass on the other side of the room. It figured that Alexander would eventually lose interest, would eventually move on to someone who didn’t shut up tight like a vice any time things got too comfortable or close. He couldn’t tell you why Alexander had followed him around for a while up until now in the first place, but it didn’t come as any surprise that he’d figured out it wasn’t the best use of his time. The best thing about being a folk-rock-singer-slash-drifter was nothing surprised you about people, anymore.

Didn’t mean he wasn’t allowed to be pissed about it, though.

Pissed! Not jealous. Pissed.

Pissed that some wet-eared college drop-out with a sob story of student loans had replaced him as the object of Alexander’s chosen attentions as if the Henry was interchangeable with that kind of mediocrity.

From his table in the back of the bar, Henry considered just how forgettable the kid was, how utterly unimpressive. It took him a good full ten minutes of whiskey-fueled brooding to even recall that the face that Alexander was mooning at had also come up on “stage” at some point during the open mic before Henry’s gig, reciting some hack-job poetry that tried to force you to feel something in the name of art or ego or circumstance.

Comedy acts were better live, because you went with a purpose – with the intent to laugh. Same thing with shitty poetry: it just sounded better with a brick wall behind you and the lights down low. Going with the intent to feel. What a fucking joke.

So: a bottle, a broken bottle, the sound that pulled from the abyss the remains of images that he was moving towards closer and closer in his mind – it was louder than anything, louder even than the sound of performative laughter at unfunny jokes and the longer that Henry sat in the memory of watching and drinking and watching and drinking the louder it got.

There was the distinct feeling of burning anger in his stomach, brewing and bubbling like poison threatening to unleash itself from his lips. It was the sort of drunken anger that settled on him like increased gravity: made it hard to get up or do anything else except watch and drink (and watch and drink).

It was the napkin that finally made Henry snap.

The worst thing about being a folk-rock-singer-slash drifter was how you didn’t get to pick and choose what stuck and what the alcohol washed away. Some things you always lost to the liquor, like when he’d got a beer bottle in his hand or what he’d said when he crossed the room in a tempest two seconds later. All that had stuck was the feeling of fire in his chest, the way the bottle felt smooth and tense in his hand like it was about to pop.

Through the drunken lens of memory Henry saw himself snatching the napkin from Alexander’s fingers as he’d finished writing on it, just as Alexander was sliding it across the top of the bar over to whatever no-name emotional plagiarist he’d been oozing all over.

Henry couldn’t remember reading it at the time, or even trying to; the content didn’t matter to that version of Henry who had been marinating in a potent combination of alcohol, self-loathing, and a new kind of repression he hadn’t before thought possible for himself. Slow-cooked at a cool seventy-eight degrees on a mid-summer night, shaken, stirred, and ready to blow.

“Alexander!“ Henry heard his voice say it like it was someone else talking, but he felt the words rumble up from inside him as he wheeled on Alexander so he knew it was himself talking. He watched as he wedged himself between Alexander and this boy, this Not-Henry, like he was watching a movie.

A biopic.

Starring: Alexander’s blue-blue eyes sparkling like the glitter on his cheeks and six shades too dark from behind the lenses of his sunglasses, staring up at Henry with a fixation to suggest he was watching a car crash, a train wreck, a forest fire. The bar buzzed around them, the dim lights swimming and glowing like fireflies.

There was no one else.

Then that sound – that sound of glass shattering, and it was only neck-deep in his own inebriated flashback that Henry could now place the origin of the little bright cuts on his hand. The beer bottle was broken before he could think twice about it; smashing it on the bar was a knee-jerk reaction to the sounds of protest coming from the boy he’d cut out when he’d inserted himself in the situation like an expletive.

There was no one else because Henry had made sure of it.

Shattering the bottle on the top of the bar took less than a second. “Enough,” Henry uttered the word more like a prayer than a command and then as if in answer the bar went quiet. He couldn’t be sure for how long because now with bits of glass on his knuckles and his mouth dry from all that he’d shut up inside of it, the seconds stretched on with impossible slowness.

It could have been an eternity that he stood there and Henry wouldn’t have noticed, for all Alexander’s expression had caught in that moment rooted somewhere between animal fear and sheer incredulous excitement.

And there it was: that little smirk tugging at the corners of his ruby lips, pulling just up through his cheeks and then finally flooding into his eyes so that he was practically beaming at Henry from where he sat on the barstool, legs still swinging, glitter still flashing and blinking on his cheeks like pinball lights.

Like a slot-machine jackpot – and Henry was going to get his cherry.

There was no denying that Henry was the one who kissed Alexander first, desperate and more than a little frustrated against Alexander’s still-smirking mouth. Henry would be lying if he said he hadn’t thought of kissing that smirk off his face once or twice before, but lying was half of surviving most days. This was more than surviving.

Alexander tasted like sugar-flavored vodka and clove cigarettes. He was warm and pouring all over Henry like water, flowing into him and flooding his senses with soft skin and a softer tongue. At some point Henry must have put his hands in Alexander’s face hair because it was between his fingers in an instant, threaded through them like the glittering siren might slip away through them.

The last thing that was clear to Henry was the feeling of hands in his pockets, and the upcoming rush of sound of a bar responding to some drunken asshole breaking a beer bottle coming to crash over him.

…

Then it goes blank: just the couch, the daylight, the cat.

By now he’s walked enough blocks to feel as at home as a homeless drifter can; the shouts of children and the errant smell of burning cigarettes feel more like home than manicured lawns or minimalist-modern-brownstones.

There’s a moment where Henry has to decide on a street corner: right or left. He can look up, catch the street signs and consider one or the other as though it might make a difference but he knows better. His feet know better.

A simple turn around the corner and he’s there: “5350 S Mryland ave”. He folds and unfolds the napkin in his hand, not looking at it – just holding it.

Number one hundred forty-two is visible from the sidewalk. It’s always been visible, each of the countless times he’s walked past it during each of the countless times he’s drifted through this city. Now, through the haze of a summer mid-morning, it looks different somehow. Henry has never before noticed the little Dollar Store paper lanterns dangling from the overhang, partially shredded from weather and age, but they seem appropriate now. The string of fairy lights wrapped around support beams peeling with paint look even more so.

Whether or not he meant to end up here, and why his feet took him here, are two questions that Henry kills with his fist against the door – knock knock – one for each. Seconds pass where Henry is just some guy with a hangover, waiting on a doorstep of an apartment he’s never really seen before, and then it opens to the petite pink-haired pixie whom Alexander has identified as his sister. She’s either half-dressed or whole-dressed in half-clothes, and her face goes from casual annoyance to screwed-up distaste in record time when their eyes meet.

“What the fuck do you want?” She demands, her voice going up and down on “fuck” and “you” and she’s looking him up and down like he’s made of garbage and oozing something worse.

It’s not the least hospitable greeting Henry’s had – not even the worst he’s had in this city – maybe the worst on this block.

She’s got her hands and arms crossed over her chest and they’re covered in various bracelets and rings and tattoos that are small and black and simple. Henry can see over her shoulder and into the tiny apartment (which is particularly easy, given that she’s even shorter than her brother by Henry’s judgment) to where Alexander has flung himself on a couch that’s ragged and may have once been a nice shade of green. He’s laying there like a ragdoll of Daisy Buchanan or Dorian Gray, cheeks rosy from the oncoming summer heat or something else entirely.

“Just thought I’d drop by,” are the words out of Henry’s mouth, though his eyes are still over the sister’s shoulder.

She observes: “How fucking considerate,” and from inside in a perpetual whine Alexander calls out without lifting his head and with mock fascination,

“Is that Hank Darling? Artemis! Don’t be rude.”

The pastel-pink princess who is apparently Artemis offers him a very un-nymph-like scowl to make it clear she isn’t moving out of his way with anything short of reluctance. Henry understands, as his reflection prompts a similar scowl on his own face most days, and he moves inside careful not to brush past her too close.

The apartment is what nice people would describe as cozy, more accurately an explosion of books, clothes, posters, ash trays, lighters, and throw pillows strewn across so many second-hand surfaces, all of which contributed through color and the apparent possession of a Bedazzler to an overall aesthetic kicking somewhere between Lisa Frank and heroin-chic. If one looked closely, it might be noted that none of the wall adornments have been hung in such a way as to leave any structural marks on the apartment itself. For how littered the place is, it’s small enough that the two of them could pack it into so many boxes and disappear without leaving so much as a fleck of pink hair dye to mark their history there.

Alexander pulls his legs up from where he’s lying on the couch, tucks them under him presumably to make room for Henry who doesn’t need to look to see the pleased smile on Alexander’s face. He sits. Alexander stretches his legs out across Henry’s lap and makes a kissy face at him and the loud sounds of smooching to match.

For her part, Artemis affords them both a healthy scowl before disappearing behind one of two closed doors in the place (the one with strands of star-shaped lights carefully balanced on the top of the doorframe and handing down on either side as opposed to the other one which is similarly decorated only by some repurposed bar signage now used, Henry assumes, to mark the bathroom, as it reads “The Boom-Boom Room”).

The morning-turned-afternoon light makes the place feel warm and for a little while it causes the yellowing pink bong on the coffee table to throw rosy colors across the room as sunshine filters through it. Alexander’s toenails are painted some old shade of lavender and he’s on his back watching Henry, his arms thrown casually over his head to dangle off the side of the couch like someone tossed him here and then just walked away.

“How’s your hand?” Alexander asks with a knowing look, and he has to press his lips together to keep from grinning about it. Henry opens the fist he doesn’t realize he’s been making, and for a moment he examines the tiny cuts on his knuckles born from beer bottle glass.

“Fine.” Henry answers with the faintest hint of a laugh. He takes his sunglasses off, and the little bit of stomach peeking out from under Alexander’s shirt and the sun-bleached green of the couch all get six shades lighter. Six shades brighter.

Suddenly Alexander is moving, upright and shifting closer to him. “I wasn’t sure you’d get my note,” Alexander declares like he’s singing a victory song. He’s on his knees crawling towards Henry, and he reaches across into Henry’s jacket pocket and pulls out the napkin like a prize.

Alexander asks: “How much did you drink last night?”

“Enough.”

Alexander puts his head on Henry’s shoulder, looking away from him, into the sunlight coming in through the blinds and, again, asks: “How much do you remember?”

With a smile just audible in his voice, Henry answers:

“Enough.”

[ethicallysourcedhumanmeat]

Lost Boys

[<][First][>][Masterpost][AO3]

Day One: Part Two

He hadn’t had a part in a while. It had been harder to find sponsors since the RFA had stopped holding parties; even the climbing numbers in his fan club didn’t comfort him at this point. These days it was mostly people who thought he was pretty and he was getting sick of just being the pretty guy.

He’s walking from the train station, looking at his feet when he thinks he hears someone say Jumin, he glances around. That was all he needed tonight, to run into that Jerk when he already felt shitty. Still, where there was Jumin Han there were cameras and it couldn’t hurt to be seen.

There’s a bit of foot traffic on the sidewalk but no trust fund jerk anywhere in sight, the only thing that stands out to him is someone ahead of him, looks like a woman judging by the amount of curly red hair piled on top of their head and the way their coat cinches at the waist.

He wonders, it’s been so long since he approached someone, maybe he should introduce himself, invite them for a drink, skip rehearsal tonight. He picks up his pace but then that voice at the back of his head reminds him women don’t normally like being hit on in the dark on a sidewalk, don’t be that guy Zen. He hates to admit it, but when they turn towards the same building as him his chest tightens a little.

But then they reach towards the railing on the stairs into the building and miss, he runs up behind them and grabs them by the arms pulling them backwards into him. Big green eyes stare up at him and blink a few times. Shit, she’s really cute. He stands her upright and makes sure she’s steady before he lets go.

“I’m okay,” she says quietly to whoever she’s talking to on the phone. She doesn’t take her eyes off him, frowning the whole time.

He waits, he wants to talk to her. She looks familiar, he’d probably seen her at rehearsals 100 times, this is why you don’t have friends Zen, he chides himself and almost turns to go into the building.

“A giant caught me,” she smiles at him but it’s obvious she’s listening to someone on the other end of the line.

He can’t make himself turn and go into the building. You’re just concerned, he tells himself, but her eyes are still glued to his face and she’s frowning again. The last time he’d helped someone falling they’d cried. He’d worried that she’d hurt herself but she had just been a really big fan, a fan of his face not his talent. You’re just a pretty face Zen, he scolds himself.

She’s stopped talking though so he reaches out and touches her arm where he’d grabbed her and starts to ask if she’d ok but she interrupts him.

“I’m sorry, thank you,” she blushes and stifles a nervous laugh.

“You’re alright?” He asks. “I was worried I’d startled you—”

“When you saved my life? Oh no,” she shakes her head. She looks embarrassed “I tripped over my own feet, can’t walk and talk you know?”

He laughs. “I’ll see you in there then.”

She smiles, and goes back to her phone call, never taking her bright green eyes off of him. He’s almost through the doors when he hears her call out his name. He turns and waves but she blushes and looks away. She’s really cute, he thinks.

He’s barely gotten his coat and shoes off when the Director is pulling him into the office. “Hyun I just got a call, there’s a producer coming by, says he’s scouting for a casting director didn’t say for what, didn’t mention any names. I’m not telling anyone else.”

“That’s a little unusual.”

The director shrugs. “Just make sure you have something prepared.”

It’s loud in here on Thursdays and he loves it. The musicians have so much energy when they have their Friday night gigs. He almost misses when that used to be him, just to be seen, taking every little job he could find that would land him on a stage. Not that much had changed; he could just be marginally pickier these days. Regardless if the director thought someone would be scouting he knew exactly where to be to stand out, and not be overwhelmed by the cacophony of the rest of the space.

Plus from his spot on the risers at the back of the stage he can see the girl with the red hair. She sits with one of the musical group’s regulars and a guy he doesn’t recognize. He scans his phone for something to rehearse, lines, music, should he dance? Couldn’t the director give him more to go on?

She’s stretching, she’s so tall, taller than most of the people around her, almost as tall as he is. When she finishes he watches her straighten her back and the way her brow furrows while she delivers lines. He can’t hear what she’s saying over the static noise of the room but she’s performing with her entire body, not simply running lines like most of the people around her.

It looks like she’s known whatever she’s rehearsing for her whole life, like she’s lived it. The way her face falls, her posture changes subtly, the slight way her lips part in response to her scene partner’s delivery. He wants to move closer and listen to what they’re saying, but then her face contorts and she shoves the man in front of her and they dissolve into laughter.

She straightens her back and makes a few quick movements forwards and the man with her flinches and then nods. She doesn’t even look at him when she passes on her way to the prop table. He watches her feel out a few of the foils. He’s a little jealous when he realizes she actually knows what she’s doing; she holds one out and spins it around her hand.

“Show off!” The girl sitting with them laughs.

“You too could obtain useless skill number 217 with a theatre degree for the low low cost of crippling student debt.” She laughs turning back.

Head in the game Zen. He moves off the stage, there’s no one important here right now, it can’t hurt to just be somewhere he can’t see her right now, somewhere he can focus. It works mostly and he manages to work on something besides a pending infatuation.

The noise of the rehearsal space calms and he checks his phone, late enough most people have probably taken a break to eat. He glances off the stage and confirms his suspicion. Most of the performers are gone now; their things still piled in the seating, or hung at the back, a few scattered groups eating box-meals over scripts or in small groups.

The old off key prop piano is playing and two girls are sitting at it one of them singing, the tall red head is sitting with her back to him, and the voice that joins the first has to be hers. He pulls the ear bud out of one ear so he can hear her better. He watches her turn, still sitting cross legged on the bench, and pick up the harmony on the keyboard. She doesn’t seem to notice that her friend has stopped singing. She nods her head in time and leans on the smaller woman as the song ends.

Then the snapping starts. Zen recognizes Min-ju as she advances on the group at the piano; the 3 of them join in. The red head is blushing but she sings along with her friends, smiling and laughing when they stumble on a few of the words. She mimics Min-ju’s liquid arm movements, keeping still from the waist down and the small woman with the high ponytail throws herself in the redheads lap as the song ends.

Shit, he thinks as Min-ju makes eye contact with him. It doesn’t take much to look busy, the director is advancing on him and he almost runs to meet the older man.

“They want to see No,” the director practically spits.

“Who?” Zen frowns.

“No Kira,” the director shrugs, as if that explains everything.

��Who’s that?”

“I know right, they want her to sing, I told him she doesn’t sing solos, she’s not even one of mine, her agent isn’t even here tonight.”

He doesn’t want to seem arrogant but, “I have no idea who you’re talking about, what do you want me to do about it.”

The director sighs and grabs him by the arm. “Just come with me.”

At the back of the seating the director jabs a finger towards a man in a nice jacket with strange green eyes.

“You didn’t even speak to them,” the man says not looking at him.

The director snorts. “I’m sorry Kira doesn’t sing, I don’t want to bother them, this is an unusual day for them to come to rehearsal.”

“Lucky me,” the man says dryly. He eyes Zen up and down. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

Zen blushes, angry.

“I don’t represent No Kira, but I have Zen here—”

“I am here to listen to No Kira sing.” The man leans forward and rests his chin on his hands crossed over the back of the chair in front of him.

The director snorts and turns to the stage. “No, on stage now please.” He starts an almost March down the aisle.

Zen watches the little group at the piano scramble all looking towards the red head as they exit the stage. The red head sits very still staring stage left and stands slowly. She walks mechanically to center stage and takes a knee leaning forward to meet the director’s eye line as best she can. Zen is still standing at the back of the room.

He can see her pale at whatever the director says, shake her head. He grabs her hand and she yanks it away. She straightens nervously and squints towards the back of the room.

“Is there something specific you’d like me to sing from?” She asks through gritted teeth.

The man doesn’t stand or sit up, he shrugs. “Whatever.”

No clears her throat. She stands stiff at attention, her shoulders back and she looks like she’s sweating. She makes it through one shaky verse of something Zen isn’t familiar with and shakes her head and then just stands there.

“Zen, is it?” The man in the seat says shifting only his eyes to Zen.

“Yes,” Zen says curtly.

“Go fix that mess.”

Are you fucking kidding me, Zen wants to say. No was obviously uncomfortable, she doesn’t perform in musicals the director had told him. The man snaps his fingers and Zen’s shoulders tense but he does what he’s told.