#but he doesn't have the kindness in his heart that my other fictional crushes have

[jjba-smash-or-pass]

[vaguely-concerned]

first of all rye 'hello fellow kids' ingellvar there is nothing in this world or any other I wouldn't do for you. second of all, considering where this story ends... I'm going to die. this conversation -- and how much he genuinely believes what he's saying at this point -- held up against the fact that in a couple of months max he's going to get her killed (well. that's how he feels anyway) and then go against everything she believed in and stood for as a person in the end and have to live forever with knowing that's how he honoured her sacrifice. (and live with how easy it is to live with, the way he doesn't regret what he did at all. she'll haunt him from time to time, that's fine, he's a watcher he's loved many a ghost before and will again. but that won't.) 'no one is beyond help? oh lace I'm so so sorry, wherever you are now please forgive me for who I am, but after what he pulled and by the time I'm done with him on my watcher's oath he will be beyond help. I'll hold every hand in this world that reaches back but his'. and she'll still be gone.

'or none of this matters'. im so fucking sad I feel sick *through tears* this is great I love fiction I love this game (embarrassingly genuine as is my wont)

[jensthwa]

we can't be friends (CS x reader).

part of the love's an uncharted path universe ★.

SUMMARY:

San is your first love. He broke your heart and played with your feelings without even kissing you back when you two were in highschool. Now, many years later, you do your best to avoid crossing paths with him because there's just no way you could ever hate him, but there's also no way you two can be friends again. But his best friend is also one of your best friends, so there's only so much you can do to avoid San when he arranges a dinner you're forced to go to.

PAIRING: first love!choi san x afab reader.

GENRE: one shot (fluff, angst, smut)

WORD COUNT: 20k (yikes).

WARNINGS: SMUT ☽ (MINORS DNI) attempt !!! at comedy, unnecesary pinning, a looot of context, bad friends :(, some arguing, tension, drinking and drunk behavior, tears, making out, description of female anatomy, oral (f reciving), fingering, love making, pet names (babe, baby), flirty seonghwa, wooyoung being a little shit again but also a genius, gyuri almost commiting a crime.

NOTES: hi everyone! this is a lenghty one, i know, but trust me when I say the context is necessary to understand what reader goes through with san. also, some of this may or may not have happened to me (have fun figuring out which part) (it's quite obvious tbh). THIS IS PART OF THE SHOW AND TELL UNIVERSE BUT CAN BE READ AS A STAND ALONE, even though there's some references and characters that you can only know if you read s&t lol. this is 100% self indulgent, as all fics should be, and i think i've re-read it so many times that if you find a typo or something that just doesn't make sense, you can blame it on english not being my first language i guess lmao. i hope you enjoy it and if you do feel free to send/reblog/type in any feedback or thoughts! <3

POSTED: august 06 2024.

permanent taglist: @hotteokkay, @potatomountain, @fairylover68

masterlist.

You and Choi San go way back. 

Well, it's nine years way back? You were only fourteen when you first saw him. 

He moved back to your area of the city a year after you moved from an entirely different one. You thought you knew every school secret there ever was, provided by your new best friend, Gyuri, but she didn't tell you about him at all. 

She claimed that it was because he didn't cause any stir the years they studied together before and after spending a whole first period in your eighth grade classroom with him at the back of the class, silently taking notes, you couldn't phantom why.

He was great at every subject, seemed to have a lot of popular friends and was, overall, a pretty nice guy. He was also very cute, skinny but you could tell he was the kind of guy who played a sport outside of school hours and he had a cute pair of dimples that showed everytime you scanned the classroom just to lay eyes on him. 

Choi San was a perfect boy to crush on, even a perfect guy just to have as eye candy during recess. You felt really strongly about him, not really forming a full opinion although your gut told you right away you were right. There was something about him… but you only figured that something until later, next year, starting your ninth grade. 

Gyuri and you were avid readers. Precocious girls, with minds way above your age. All your teachers praised came laced with the same compliment so you both decided that was the truth. You rejoiced in it, thinking you shared things in common with the grown ups and decided that that was the key to feeling a little superior in comparison to the rest of your classmates, who neither of you liked very much. 

Until they all decided to start dating each other and you two realized you were nothing but two kids with great imaginations and a love for school, praise and fictional men that couldn't be translated to the real world without sounding delusional and weird. 

So you decided to do something about it. And so, on a random Tuesday recess, you two scanned the crowd trying to find two boys (or a boy and a girl, because you always knew you liked girls too) worthy of your affections. One for her, one for you. Bonus points if the two of them were also best friends, of course. 

Double dates were all the buzz at the time anyways. 

Besides, only then they could understand the bond you and Gyuri had. Sisterhood like no other, nevermind Gyuri actually had an older sister and a niece at the ripe age of fifteen. 

And so when your index finger scanned the crowd and eliminated at least three potential crushes before landing on Choi San, you felt like it was meant to be. 

You see, his best friend, Jung Wooyoung, was perfect for Gyuri to crush on. He was almost as tall as she was at the time and his easy, outgoing personality was compatible with her book crush at the time as well. 

He also flirted with her on several occasions before that. 

So it was meant to be. 

Choi San, on the other hand, had never even glanced in your direction before. 

Just like your book crush did before he fell in love with the main character. 

See? Meant. To. Be. 

It was decided then that, although Choi San was not going to be your first crush ever, he was going to be the guy that motivated you to be at school for the time being, because math gets really boring after trying and failing at least ten times. 

You thought nothing of it when it felt a little forced, when you couldn't blush at all at the sight of him and you gathered that it didn't need to happen like in the books you read. You simply needed to say his name when someone asked you if you had a crush on anyone and that was enough to be in symphony with the rest of your classmates. 

Your longing glances were caught once or twice by him and you brushed the weird flip your stomach did everytime he looked away, blushing a little. You never really cared when it happened, really, knowing his crowd and your crowd (Gyuri and you) would never even cross paths in the first place. 

You two kept to yourselves and your little book unofficial book club, sitting on the floor at lunch time and cursing everyone who dared to call you weird for it. San and Wooyoung had a crowd of people at the loudest table laughing with them over stupid teen jokes and, uh, sports? You didn't even know. 

And then the unimaginable happened. 

Jung Wooyoung sat down, criss cross applesauce and everything, in front of you on a random Monday afternoon while you and Gyuri discussed the english assignment due next period. 

Gyuri was not too excited about that. 

Turns out, the only one excited to have a crush at school was you. She was very much still in the Lonely Hearts Club phase while you skipped all the way to your The Notebook phase and she was, in her own words, too afraid to admit it when you came up with your crush plan. 

You forgave her, of course, and decided to wait for her as long as needed because you were certainly not about to be an individual and have a crush on your own. 

And by the time Wooyoung smiled at you both and introduced himself to you, like you weren't in the same class for a year already, you thought your pretend crush on his best friend evaporated and joined the void superficial and fleeting interests you had. 

But then Choi San sat beside him, his knee brushing against yours in the process, and you knew you would have to issue a formal apology to your best and only friend for leaving her behind on this little thing. 

Because, oh boy, were you crushing on Choi San. 

You felt the blush rush to your cheeks and then fell silent while your friend and his friend discussed Fifty Shades of Grey for some reason you never cared enough to discover and you knew you were done for.

It was the first time seeing his dimples in full action, so close to you, so you completely stopped functioning all together. Amazing. 

When you decided to have a crush, you never took into account that you were, actually, quite shy. And he really wasn't, but you noticed that he knew when to talk and what to say and with your friend being a lot more outgoing that you were it gave you the comfort that she would speak for the both of you while you admired from the sidelines as your little duo became a group of friends you still miss deeply to this day. 

He was funny and you laughed at your jokes even though you pretended to be tired and completely worn out by the school day, resting your head on Gyuri’s shoulder and stealing glances at the boy while she kept arguing with his best friend. 

Wooyoung was popular and liked enough to have a few people sit with you later that week, people who never even knew you existed before that. They were good friends with San as well, so you tried your best to keep up with everyone until she sat down next to you one day. 

Arin was not really a bad person. She just was a bit conceited, calling herself princess type of conceited and you never really related to her even if she was nice to you to your face. She was absolutely gorgeous and, you found out with Wooyoung’s arm around your shoulder and a whisper to your ear, she had been San’s crush since they were both in elementary school. 

That would explain the sudden tension at the table when she sat down next to you, said hello to everyone, offered you a sweet she just bought from the cafeteria, and stared at San for the remainder of lunch time. 

You also noticed Wooyoung glaring at her a little and he later explained to you that he didn't really like her all that much. She loved attention and San gave her attention, so she would intentionally flirt with him to get her ego stroked in return. 

It didn't really matter how he felt about the girl, though, he didn't have to like her just because his best friend did. And when you caught her batting her eyelashes at San, you knew you didn't even stand a chance.

You tried to hide the disappointed look on your face but both Gyuri and Wooyoung looked at you while the two of them flirted endlessly for the remainder of lunch time and you figured you were doing a pretty shitty job at it. He didn't glance at you once either way, so it didn't really matter. 

Arin did but she just complimented your eyes and then started a conversation with someone across the table, her annoying sweet and fake voice making your right ear ring in disapproval. 

Either way, you ended up becoming her friend. Gyuri was not very fond of her and neither were you, but you all went to the bathroom together, did your makeup together, did school projects together and then sat everyday at lunch together with the rest of the guys who were, in one way or another, trying to get her to like them. 

Because, once again, she was a sight for sore eyes. 

It wasn't until later, in the middle of the year, that one of them did. Not Choi San, but Choi Yeonjun. 

You remember the day you found out they were together and the gut wrenching concern you felt when you found out that San was not at school that day. 

It was after summer break, you remember Wooyoung telling you that San and his family took a few more days of vacation and if you couldn't believe your eyes when you saw the new couple sharing a sweet kiss at the designated lunch table, you could only imagine how San felt the next day when he saw the same image right in front of him. 

Yeonjun was his friend, right? He knew about his crush and decided to get together with her anyways. Surely, San was devastated. 

But he wasn't. He just cheered them on and then laughed along when Yeonjun shoved his arm playfully after the hollering. 

But you saw through it. 

Your crush on San made you observant. Made you believe you knew him better than everyone else and so, after lunch, you took out your phone and pulled up the notes app. Writing a simple “are you okay?” in it and passing it to him the next second, you were surprised with yourself before you saw him frown a bit. And then he understood what you meant. 

Nodding, he passed you the phone back, before giving you a reassuring smile that you treasured in your heart and saw in your dreams. 

You didn't believe him, though, but stayed close enough to everything related to the situation to hold Arin in your arms when Yeonjun inevitably broke her heart. 

Starting your tenth year, he moved back to his city and decided to play the I thought we weren't even that serious card on her. Which was nasty, considering love it's very, very serious for a sixteen year old girl. 

By this point, you were all a little family and hanging out after school and on the weekends was not unusual, so it didn't surprise you when Arin invited you, and only you, to her house after choir practice on a Thursday. 

She lent you her older sister’s clothes to wear (because her's would never fit you. Her words, not yours) and took you to a walk in the park just to break your heart for the first time ever. 

“You know… I thought love was something I couldn't find in highschool anymore. But San it's really making an effort, you know? He's been there for me ever since Yeonjun left and… Well, I think he's going to ask me to be his girlfriend tomorrow.” 

Grasping the park bench she forced you to sit at, you only nodded and let out a shuddering breath that gave away what she was trying to figure out since earlier that day. 

“I'll say yes but only if you say it's okay to do so.” 

Arin was not really your friend, the same way Yeonjun was not really San’s friend. 

Because there's no way you would ever be okay with it. 

And yet, you tried your best to give her a smile and pretend the sound of your heart breaking didn't bring tears to your eyes “Of course it's okay. Why wouldn't it be?” 

A week later, they were officially dating. The rumors spread around like a wildfire and it took out of you with everyone calling San a nasty rebound and you doing your best to prioritize the ghost of the friendship you had with him. That whole fiasco lasted a few months. 

Months in which your friendship with everyone just grew stronger. Gyuri was still your best friend, Wooyoung was crushing on her hard and everyone knew, Arin and San were a steady couple, a new girl joined your class that year, named Yeri, and the principal assigned her to you because she thought you two would get along really well. 

“I like girls,” was like, the third thing she ever told you while you were showing her the school “I'm just telling you now because I don't plan on hiding it and you are wearing a pride pin.” 

“Oh, that's cool. I like girls too,” you smiled, looking at your pride pin “I didn't hide it either and no one gave me shit about it, so, don't worry.” 

Yeri also liked the mainstream music that you liked and soon she became a new addition to your group. And with Arin spending all of her free time with San, you, Gyuri and Yeri only grew closer and closer. You didn't have Arin’s voice in your ear telling you the million reasons she found Yeri uncool, but you saw it in her face every time the table laughed at one of Yeri’s jokes. 

And so, it went on for a while: 

Your mom driving all of you around in her car to the beach, to dinner, to the movies and letting you have mixed sleepovers at your house (meaning you, Arin, Gyuri, Wooyoung, Yeri and San) was fun and all, but it was not enough to distract yourself entirely. Everytime you glanced at the couple, that sinking feeling in your chest would appear and sulk your whole mood for, at least, fifteen minutes.  

Fifteen minutes of pretending you were okay with them before forgetting completely for an hour or so and then the cycle would repeat until you were alone staring at the ceiling and doing your best to not cry about it.

All it took was your first kiss being Yeri of all people for you to decide that it was time to retire your crush for Choi San once and for all. 

And for a while, it all went according to plan. You decided to tell Gyuri that it was okay because he was your friend first and the guy that you liked second and that you were not fourteen and desperate for love anymore, that it was time to go on with your life as if nothing really happened in the first place. 

You were hooking up with Yeri anyways, so it seemed like you were doing just fine. 

You grew closer to San as well and even though he mostly talked to you about Arin and whatever tantrum she was throwing at the time, you really started to feel some sense of normalcy within you when it came to just speaking to him. 

You no longer blushed when he made you laugh, you no longer looked at him with the longing of a past life lover and you were really happy for him because, at the end of the day, he was really happy with his relationship. 

Until winter break came around and Arin decided to give San his first heartbreak ever. 

She decided to call for a break in their relationship because she was, in his words, too overwhelmed with the amount of love and attention she was getting from him. 

Which was completely fucking insane considering the fact she forced him to save her contact as Princess Arin and all. 

So naturally, you sided with him. And she didn't take it to heart because everyone knew you liked San anyways. 

She told you the news herself through Facebook after asking you to explain to her the English assignment due next day and then she decided to tell you something you'll never understand because you no longer are on speaking terms with her: 

Princess Arin: u know i broke up with him because of u right? :) 

Princess Arin: one day I'll tell u all abt it. 

She never told you anything about it. And by then, you were starting your last year and San was your best friend who hung out with you everyday after school, calling you late at night and helping you with assignments through Skype. So you didn't really care. 

And as the day passed, you started understanding the connection they talked about in books and movies. You thought you did before, Gyuri being your eternal person in this world, but it felt so different with San. 

Different and good. Different and achy enough for you to want to keep it in your life. 

Your dynamic was friendly, sure, but it was alright. It consisted of banter and daring stares as well as laughter and soft moments you treasured till this day. 

“It's way too early to be this annoying, Choi San.” 

“Oh, you think this is me being annoying?”

You both got an hour of detention for disturbing the class that day. 

You loved it. 

But then, after almost a month of picking up the broken pieces of his heart one by one, and your mother giving him a self-help book to make him regain the confidence he lost during the breakup process, you realized that you were in love with him and there was nothing you could do about that. 

You noticed one friday afternoon, when he offered to pay for your and your mom's ice cream at the drive through, when he scrambled to get all the change he had on him to leave a tip for the person who handed you guys the sweet treat, that there was no way you didn't love him. 

And it was confusing as fuck when everyone else started to tell you he had feelings for you as well. 

“Think about it. You text each other good morning everyday” Yeri listed with her finger and you nodded “Then, you go to school, sit together and spend the rest of the day together” another nod “Then after school you either go get ice cream together or hang out for a bit with your mom while she drives him home. And after that, you get on Skype for the reminder of the afternoon and then he calls you on your house phone and you two spend the rest of the night talking before falling asleep on the line together,” she looked at you like you were insane for even denying the accusations made against San, but she continued anyway “And then it's rinse and repeat and it has been that way since… What? Three months ago?” 

You nodded again, defeated. 

“Girl, he likes you.” she sighed, annoyed and a little tired, before sitting on your lap and kissing your lips affectionately “And you're here making out with me instead of him. You really are a lost cause.”

That didn't stop you from hooking up with her until she found a girl who's heart was not reserved for someone else, though. Said girl went to a different school and was a year younger than all of you, but she looked very happy and stopped secretly kissing you in the school bathroom like a week after they met. 

And when she finally told everyone, you were really happy for her, but San not so much. 

It was the night you thought everything was about to change. The night you thought he was about to kiss you or you were about to kiss him, whatever happened first. 

Laying in your bed, facing each other in the dim light, he thought it was the biggest form of betrayal and pouted the whole time he explained to you why. 

He thought you liked her and you realized he didn't really pay attention to you after all. Not the way you did with him. 

Bless his heart. 

You didn't kiss him that night because he wouldn't shut up about you and Yeri. 

“I mean, why couldn't it be you? She clearly liked you if you two were hooking up for over a year” and when his hand came to rest on your back, under your shirt, you breath hitched enough for him to notice it but not enough for him to just don't do anything about it except trace the curve of your silhouette with the pad of his thumb “I don't understand why anyone would pass the opportunity to be with you.” 

Huh. Maybe he did have feelings for you. 

No. He's just being a great best friend. Don't take that for granted. 

But it was impossible for you not to take Yeri’s words seriously as time went on. 

You didn't want to think he was giving you mixed signals, but yet again there was that one time when you reached behind your passenger seat in your mothers car to pinch his leg playfully after he pulled on your hair a little bit from behind, only to end up holding his hand the rest of the car trip to his house. 

His fingers slowly caressing the back of your hand were just too much for you not to get everything mixed up. 

Or that other time when your school held a Woman's Day event, and your class president decided that all the boys in the class were going to give roses to the girls.

When it was your turn to get a rose, you knew no one would give you one. But Yeri stood in line and collected a rose from the bin before the class president had the opportunity to say anything else. 

“I'll take that, thank you very much.” She turned to you, smiling. San blocked her way to you a second after. 

“And just what do you think you're doing?” 

“Giving my best girl a rose, of course.” She peeked around him, giving you a wink that you could only roll your eyes to. 

San turned to you, the fondness in his eyes making you question the decision of not pretending to be sick that day. It was too much for you to handle. 

“To the back of the line, then. I already called dibs on her,” he turned to your friend, snatching the rose from her hand in one swift move “I'll take that, thank you very much.” 

He had no idea what that meant to you back then. It was true that, at school, he behaved a little differently than when you two were alone. 

He was athletic, so he had some friends that you were sure used to ask him what the fuck was he doing wasting his time with a girl like you instead of getting a new girlfriend. 

He had a family that didn't approve of yours, too. You felt it the first time you met his mom and, even though she was nice to you and your mom, you could feel the judgemental stare she gave both of you when your mom told her she was a single parent. 

San told you that it didn't really matter, that his mom didn't have to like you because you weren't her friend, you were his. 

He played with your feelings a little too well. Wanting him, adoring him and letting yourself be consumed by the thought of him loving you back was enough to keep it going. To ignore the fluttering way your heart kept beating whenever he talked to you which was all the time. 

You assumed the way he behaved with you in private was the real him. The one who didn't care about appearances or his family approval. 

The one who cared about you. 

It was dizzying and fantastic and you thought he just might've been the love of your life. 

But then he would tell you how much it hurted when he saw Arin at school and how much he missed her, the intimacy they shared before, and reality would come crashing down and setting your delusions on fire again. 

He had sex with Arin. You would never stand a chance. 

Or so you thought he did. Except when you overheard Arin speaking to her friends and that was the first time you ever got mad at Choi San.

“And, you know, me and San were never intimate like that so I wouldn't know but I think boys have no idea how to please a woman if they tried to.” 

What? 

Oh. So he lied to you. 

And you were so upset by the thought of him making up stories of their intimate time together that it didn't even cross your mind that Arin might've been lying to save face. 

So when he came back from the bathroom and sat at his usual desk in front of you, you didn't even think about his feelings when you decided to treat him like shit for lying about something so important like sex to your face. 

“Leave me alone, San! I don't want to fucking talk to you right now!” 

The hurt expression he gave you after that is one you would never be able to forget. 

But you grew to be stubborn and a little overprotective of your own feelings, so you thought him playing the part of your best friend all these months and sweet talking to you was just another one of his lies. 

“You guys not being friends right now doesn't make any fucking sense, sweetheart.” Wooyoung's tone is careful and laced with affection, but you knew he was playing the devil's advocate on behalf of San. With his arm around Gyuri’s shoulder (by that point, they were a thing for over two months) you could swear you saw him smirk when the nickname brought a scowl to your face. 

He might've been worried, but he was also a little shit. 

“You really are going to let Arin ruin what you two have?” Your best friend was, of course, on your side. But she was your best friend for a reason and her love included pointing out when you were behaving like an infant at the age of seventeen and a half. 

“You two are practically dating and you're going to let the evil ex-girlfriend get in the way? Over something you weren't even supposed to hear in the first place? Come on.” 

Again, Wooyoung was a little shit. And you were so upset about everything that you shyness couldn't even help the fury behind your reply: 

“Stop saying that! We are not practically dating, he's in love with Arin and I'm not sure I even like him like that anymore!” Getting tired of everyone and their mother (your mother) feeding your delusions, you came to the conclusion that putting a stop to your friendship with Choi San was for the best. 

And, in doing so, you ended up breaking your own heart for the second time in your life. 

But he didn't put up an easy fight at all. You remember the feeling of pure joy when he grabbed your hand on the way to the cafeteria one day, pulling you so hard you almost ended up sitting in his lap, and the way his pleading eyes begged you to listen to him one last time. 

“Us not being friends doesn't feel right, Y/N…” he said and the word he used to categorize what both of you had hurted you, but you pushed the feeling away “Please, let's not fight anymore. I don't even know what happened, but I forgive you for yelling at me and I hope you forgive me for whatever it is you think I did.” 

Of course, you forgave him the next second without thinking too much about it. And for a while, everything went back to normal. You Skyped as usual and occasionally you let your other friends join the call even though it didn't really feel like it used to before. 

The next thing you knew, your feelings were in full bloom again and when you realized it, it was too late. 

Because by then, you had already let your childhood friend, Sunhee, join a few Skype calls and by the fourth one she invited her friend, Minseo, to them as well. 

Terrible, terrible mistake. Because even through the screen, you could see that Minseo looked a lot like Arin with the added bonus that she was down to earth and cool and liked the same things San liked.

You liked the same things San liked as well, but it never seemed to matter. 

Because not even two months after you decided to stop talking to San over a lie you weren't supposed to find out in the first place and then became friends one more time, he gets together with Minseo and you're sick to your stomach all over again. 

You hated her. Not because she was, suddenly, his girlfriend (not girlfriend girlfriend, but in a friends with benefits arrangement you never even knew why he agreed on in the first place) but because suddlenly she was so fucking obnoxious and didn't seem to like you either. 

Was it not painfully obvious San didn't have feelings for you? Why was she mad at you then? You literally brought them together! 

And all you got in return was her telling him she didn't feel comfortable with him having a girl best friend. That ungrateful bitch. 

He stopped calling. He stopped texting, he stopped carpooling with you and your mom after school and he stopped caring whether your math assignment was done or not. 

He stared pulling away more and more and it didn't matter how hard you tried to get him to talk to you, it seemed like he never really fucking cared about you in the first place. 

And by may that year, you didn't speak to San anymore. Granted, the only person he did speak to was Wooyoung, but even their friendship was falling apart. 

For the first time ever, San broke your heart firsthand. And it felt really, really fucking bad. 

You cried to your mom about it, she reminded you that you were nothing but a great friend to him and that, if he didn't take the time to appreciate that, that was his loss not yours. 

And she started hating him from that moment on. But you couldn't hate San, not even a little bit. 

Why would you hate him for not liking you back? For not loving you the way you loved hi— 

Your laptop closes down right in front of you and when you try to look up to find out who's responsible for interrupting your writing time, you get interrupted again. 

“Ouch! What the fuck, Gyuri?” the slap to the back of your head is quick and fill with rage. 

“What the fuck are you even writing. I can read from here, you know?” 

“I'm just laying my feelings down and— Ouch! Stop that!” You try to hit her back but she turns away quickly when your hands almost knock her coffee mug out of hers. 

“You can't possibly still have love for San, Y/N. It's been years.”

It's been four and a half, to be precise. But who's counting, right? 

“And why are you writing it in third person? You don't usually do that.” 

“I don't really know, Gyuri!” 

“I’m telling you, this celebratory dinner bullshit it's affecting you way more than it should,” she sighs, plopping down on the couch of your shared living room, and you leave your seat at the table to join her “He might not even show up. He has that thing with Kyungmi.” 

Kyungmi. 

You couldn't get to that part on your open document, but San left Minseo when he met Kyungmi at one of the frat parties they love to attend. Wooyoung told you that he said that it was love at first sight and you even met her briefly when you picked Gyuri up from the apartment he and San got when they started college together. 

She’s gorgeous and doesn't look like Arin or Minseo at all. It’s a different type of gorgeous. She's a year older than San and went to the same school as them and Gyuri. 

You think you might even like her better than him. 

You tried to be happy for San when you found out, but you two barely even speak a word to each other and you convinced yourself a while ago that you couldn't care less if he sees right through you and your fake smiles. 

You gathered, after everything happened, that San knew you liked him and took advantage of that. Unintentionally, but he did anyway. 

You sigh, resting your head on your best friend's shoulder. “It’s his best friend's celebratory dinner, though, he needs to be there.” 

Two seconds pass and then you both say it at the same time: “He’s in love.” 

And when San is in love, he has a one track mind with the name of his lover as the goal. 

You nod, but you can't help but to be insistent “It's Wooyoung's celebratory dinner, he needs to show up, right?” 

“I might not even show up, he's a pain in the ass.” She replies but you can tell her annoyance is not genuine and it makes you smile. 

Gyuri and Wooyoung broke up towards the end of your first year of college but you all stayed close friends. A one year relationship was not enough to fuck up the friendship they had and they decided to stay civil until, eventually, they became close friends again. 

To this day, you wonder why you and San couldn't rekindle your friendship when it became clear to you that you missed your friend and not the guy that you liked. 

Because San was always your friend first and your first love second. 

But it doesn't really matter anymore, because Gyuri is forcing you to shower and reminding you that you two need to keep Wooyoung on his best behavior tonight. 

“That girl he used to like before me is going, he said. I looked her up, she's single and he needs to get together with her because I can't take him whining about it anymore.” 

They keep things with each other way too civil, you think. 

“I'm telling you, if we don't show up he's going to do that thing where he gets drunk and makes a fool of himself. I can't have that, I'm on a mission.” 

“A mission to get your ex laid?” You ask, shampooing your hair. 

“A mission to get him a girlfriend so he can stop crying to me about feeling lonely.” 

“Maybe he wants you guys to—” The shower curtain opens and you see your best friend’s scowl before covering yourself up with your hands. 

“Gyuri!”

“Don't you dare say what you were about to say or I'm divorcing you.” 

You chuckle “Sure you are.”

You're left alone again with the water stream and she goes back to do her makeup “I told you back in ninth grade that we weren't a great fit and I was right. We can't get back together,” she sighs “It'll ruin everything.” 

“I doubt it will but you guys have been friends longer than you were boyfriend and girlfriend, so I'll just have to deal with my parents being divorced and civil.” 

“God, don't ever refer to us like that again— Oh! Speaking of parents,” you see her beam at her phone when you move the shower curtain to search for your towel and then she shows it to you “Mingi and Love just celebrated their one year anniversary!” 

Love being Mingi’s best friend. Gyuri talks to you about her college friend group all the time. The drama fuels your dinner conversations, you even follow a few of them on social media. 

“What does that have to do with parents?”

“They're the mom and dad of the group.” 

San is in that friend group, you can see him in the back of the picture and you recognize his apartment layout too. He's not the main focus of it but he's all you can see until you notice the couple sitting near him on the couch. 

The picture shows both of them, her in his lap and Mingi looking at her with stars in his eyes. 

Good for them. 

“Is that the girl he was friends with forever before they finally realized that they were in love?” 

“Yeah,” she sighs in contempt, looking down at the picture again “I was there the day it happened. I mean, not physically with them, but they left Yunho's party together and I told Wooyoung that it was finally about to happen!”

Gyuri is not a romantic person at all. Her excitement shows you that she really loves them and so you soften at the news that would usually give you and your dry love life a headache “It was the day before you called me to get you out of that awful date.” 

Ah, that also happened back then. You shudder at the memory.

“Tell them I say congrats, babe.” 

“I'm bringing you as my plus one.” 

You laugh, confused “To where?” 

“Their wedding, duh.” 

“They practically just got together,” you remind her, a year is not enough time to propose “And I don't really know them, Gyuri!” 

“They love you,” she assures you as you step out of the shower “I have been speaking about your antisocial ass for years. They can't wait to meet you.” 

“So you've been shit talking behind my back for years? Is that what I'm hearing?” 

She laughs “No, babe, that's Wooyoung's job.” 

Clearing your throat and looking at your friend through the mirror, you try to be as nonchalant as you can when you ask: “Has he… Did he tell you if…” 

“No, Y/N, I have no clue if San is going or not and Wooyoung is actually mad at him at the moment.” 

“Why?” 

She looks at you, sighing “He's been lacking as a friend lately.” 

“Hm.” 

“I hope you're not planning on swooning if you see him. Fuck him, Y/N.” 

“I know…” 

“And by fuck him I mean he doesn't deserve you or your forgiveness.” 

“He didn't do anything to me, Gyuri,” you remind her, shrugging “Not reciprocating my feelings is not a crime so I don't have to forgive him for anything.” 

You can practically feel her starting the San hate train engine, so you step out of the bathroom but her voice follows you. 

“And what about that time he ditched you for Minseo when you asked him to go with you to that medical appointment, huh?” 

“Cut it out, Gyuri…” 

But her head peaks around the corner, into the hall where you're rushing towards your room “Or that time when—” 

“Can't hear you!” Turning to look at her, she gives you an affectionate middle finger and heads back to the bathroom.

Closing the door, you lean into the thin wood and sigh, getting San’s face out of your mind so you can focus on getting ready and actually show up for Wooyoung and Wooyoung only. 

He just got a permanent position after completing his internship at a company that's your company's rival. He's going to crush you and steal clients from you but you are genuinely so happy for him. 

You should've guessed he enjoyed books as much as you did back in highschool. The debates he used to have with Gyuri were not all about flirting with her but also because he has a passion for books. 

And now he's going to work in the same field as you.

You're so proud of your friend. 

As you get ready, you remember the excitement cruising through your body when your boss trusted you enough to give you the first manuscript of a new client so you could edit it. You're sure Wooyoung is going to do better than you, taking into account that he actually went to college for this. 

You didn't. 

You met your boss at the part-time job you got in senior year, when you were trying to distract yourself from all the pain and the horrors of becoming a grown up. She was chatty, got a little too drunk on soju and told you she was starting her own book publishing company. 

When she returned months later after remembering that you told her you loved books and would love to work for as a publisher one day, she offered you a job in her company right after graduating highschool. 

You took it because you didn't think an opportunity like this would show up ever again. 

She was truly a blessing, the kind of person you never really believed in until she taught you all you needed to know about publishing and editing and encouraged you to take online classes during the nights so you could get, at least, a certification on what you do. 

You're proud of yourself too. The opportunity found you in a specific moment of your life where both your heart and your self esteem were destroyed and now you're not the person you used to be. 

Maybe that's why the possibility of facing San makes you so nervous. Collective memories are dangerous because the details never match the ones on the other person's head. 

You know who you were back then but… Are you the same person in San’s head? 

You don't even want to find out. 

Scanning your outfit in the mirror for the last time, you take the shoes you're wearing tonight out of your closet and walk over to the living room. 

Only to find Gyuri laying on the carpet under the coffee table, half dressed and on her phone. 

“You're going to mess up your hair.” 

“I don't care, I'm not going.” 

Sighing, you seat down on the couch and staring at the wood of the table covering her face. 

“What happened now?” 

“The bitch canceled!” 

“Wooyoung?” 

Poking her head out, she frowns at you “No, his first love.” 

“You were his first love.” 

“You know what I'm talking about, Y/N!” 

Laughing at her, you offer her your hand “Get dressed. Who cares if she's not going? He's not going to sulk because he's going to have you and his best friends there.” 

She whines like a child when you pull her up from the floor “I had a plan!” 

“Then make a new one, babe. We're going to be late.” 

She starts to whine again but then stops mid-groan to give you a once over. You shift uncomfortably on your feet, suddenly self-conscious about your appearance for the first time in years. 

“You look really hot…” she tells you and you fake gag at her words “Really pretty. Like a fairy and a smoke show at the same time.” 

You can't possibly look like that when you have such a simple outfit on, floor length high waist black pants and a flowy sleeve top that ties in the middle. It's barely formal but now you're thinking too hard about it. 

Blushing, you wave your hand to dismiss her compliment “Oh, my god. Go and change!” 

She rushes to her room on the opposite end of the hall and you finally breathe, looking down at your choice of fit and wondering if it's too much. 

Gyuri would've told you if that's the case, but either way it haunts your mind in the car on the way there, leg bouncing up and down under your best friend's judging gaze that only softens when you pout at her. 

“They are going to love you, babe. I'm so serious, they've been waiting years to meet you.” 

You nod because, yes, you're concerned that her friend group is not all as welcoming as she paints them to be. 

And you wish your doubts would go away but you're really, really not good at making friends. You're cautious, extremely closed off to new people and not as good with conversation no matter how much confidence you gained over the past years. 

When you walk to the loudest table at the laid back restaurant their friend Seonghwa made the reservation at, you think you won't be able to fit in with everyone else. You feel like an intruder, like Gyuri is supposed to enjoy this part of her life without you here. 

That's why you rejected every invitation they ever made. 

You celebrate birthdays with her, with Woo as well, but it's all very intimate and separate from their social circle, the one that includes the man you haven't fully faced in years. 

But you can't exactly back out now, not when one of them turns to you and seems to light up when they see you. 

“Oh? Is this her?” you recognize Hongjoong from pictures, he's the only one facing you when you approach the table, lowkey hiding behind Gyuri like a child. 

“Who?” 

“Huh?”

San is nowhere to be seen. Thank god. 

Slowly, everyone turns around and you see their faces light up with both delight and surprise. Your heart is pounding, you feel it in your throat, in your eyes, in the heat that colors your cheeks. 

But Gyuri just steps aside and presents you with a smile “This is her!” 

“Oh, Y/N!” Wooyoung gets up, rushing towards you and crashing into your frame with a crushing hug “I'm so glad you're here,” he murmurs into your hair and then turns to his friends, quiet them down “Everyone, this is Y/N, one of my best friends in the entire world.” 

He's such a dramatic human being.

You love him so much. 

Raising your hand, you shyly wave at them “Hi.” 

The entire table erupts with joy. Some of them greet you, some of them are saying that they are happy to be finally meeting you and Wooyoung grabs your arm and plops you down into the seat next to Gyuri, at the edge of the table. 

Laughing, you apologize for not meeting them sooner and then you feel a pair of hands on your shoulders. 

Panic raising, you quickly turn around to see who it is before releasing a shuddering, but calmer, breath. 

“She's a very busy woman, guys. She works for the competition, my competition,” everyone gasps at that but Wooyoung is smiling at you “and she's very good at what she does. Which means she's busy, get off her case,” he puts a glass and a can of beer in front of you “Drink, babe.” 

“Thanks, babe.” You whisper back and he leans in to peck your head before going away. 

Gyuri groans “Stop stealing that from us! It's our thing, Y/N, don't indulge him.” 

“It's his celebratory dinner…” you argue with a laugh that Hongjoong and Mingi follow. 

“Yeah! Can you get off my case tonight, Gyuri?” 

She huffs, wrapping her arms around you “I hate you all.” 

“No you don't!” 

The table laughs and everyone returns to their individual conversations when Woo sits down on his spot. 

There's a few seats left, one besides Mingi and one right in front of you but you don't think too much about it because soon Gyuri gets up to ask Yeosang something and Seonghwa occupies her seat right beside you. 

You think he can sense that you're more shy than you let on, because he doesn't include you in whatever he and Yunho were talking about and waits until he stops talking to him to turn to you. 

“So, you work for a publishing company?” 

The question caughts you off guard and you swallow the beer quickly before nodding “Y-yeah, I… Yeah.” 

He chuckles “You're nervous.” 

“I'm just not as good at meeting people as Gyuri is. She usually does the job and I tag along.” 

“I feel like I know you already, though.” He says, leaning back on his chair. 

“Because she talks a lot about me?” he nods “Yeah, she tends to do that.” 

“Wooyoung also talks a lot about you, San too… Sometimes,” your cheeks heat up and he misinterprets what it means “All good things, I promise.” 

You doubt that. 

Your brain gives you a hundred and one possible things San could've said about you. 

For some reason, none of them are good. But you choose to believe the gorgeous, long haired guy in front of you. 

“Well that's good to hear,” you take another sip of your drink before smiling at him “I was sure Woo was trash talking about me.” 

He shakes his head with a smile “He wouldn't dare, he has Gyuri on his ass all the time and I'm sure she would kill him.” 

“I'm sure she would kill him even if he didn't do it.” 

His smile grows wider “That's true,” he says, looking over at them who are, very coincidentally, fighting about something. You let out a sigh and he laughs again before clearing his throat “So, the publishing company. What kind of books do you like to edit the most?” 

Your smile grows wider too. 

For the next hour, you talk to Seonghwa about your job and how you started in it. He asks you about your classes and the challenges that you face on a daily basis and Wooyoung overhears and ends up joining the conversation as well.

You don't even hear footsteps nearing until a voice cuts everyone off. 

“I'm sorry I'm late!” 

“Baby!” Mingi gets up from his seat, but no one else does so he's stuck between the table and his girlfriend. 

“Oh, that's Love, huh?” you ask Seonghwa, Wooyoung too entertained messing with the couple to hear you anyways. 

“Yeah… Is that how Gyuri refers to her?” He frowns.

“Mhm,” you answer, leaning into him like you're about to tell him an important secret “I'm not supposed to call her that, don't tell her.” 

Seonghwa leans in too, pretending to zip his mouth shut and you laugh. 

The girl wiggles her way into the seat reserved for her and everyone lets out a groan when they smooch each other. You can only giggle and the sound draws her attention to you “Y/N?” 

You quickly nod “Yeah, hi, nice to meet you.” 

“Nice to meet you! Finally, I thought Wooyoung and Gyuri had an imaginary friend,” you laugh, shrugging at the joke “Love your outfit, by the way, are those— Oh, San, hi— Are those jellyfish?” 

You want to answer. You truly do, the yes right at the tip of your tongue, but words leave you when you turn your head around and find San already looking at you with wide eyes.

He looks great, he's a bit more muscular than what the pictures show and than the last time that you saw him, his arms hugging the fabric of the dress shirt he's wearing like it was tailored for him and everything. 

How dare he. 

You wonder if his heart is beating as loud as yours is right now. If he's surprised, disappointed or happy to see you at all. 

“Her favorite animal.” He answers for you “Hi, Y/N.” 

“Hi…” you whisper back and it feels like you're in a trance. He doesn't look away but the table quieting down once again snaps you out of it and you turn to the girl with a wide smile that you hope conceals whatever the fuck you're feeling at the moment “I love jellyfishes. Had a phase as a child when I would exclusively talk about them, too,” you chuckle, nervously, reaching for your earrings instinctively “Gyuri gave them to me as a present last Christmas.” 

You definitely overshared just now. From the corner of your eye you catch your best friend getting ready to step in if needed. 

Love looks at you, then at San (who's just standing next to you without uttering a word) and then back at you again, smiling like she just figured something out “Well, I love them.” 

“Thanks…” 

Coughing unnecessarily loud, Wooyoung gets up from his seat “You're late.” 

It takes a second but San tears his gaze away from you to look at his best friend and you take the opportunity to chug down the rest of your beer “Sorry, something came up.” 

Seonghwa turns at that and looks at him as well “You good?” 

“I am. Did you guys already eat? I'm starving.” 

“Nope. We're about to order. Let me get you a drink, come here.” And just like that, he disappears from your view and you almost sigh in relief. 

“Are you good?” Seonghwa asks you next and you reckon he's very observant. But then again, you're not the most gracious human being when you're in San’s presence, so, you figure everyone else noticed your change of mood as well. 

“Yeah, I just… I haven't seen him in a while and I didn't think he was coming. I was surprised, that's all.” 

“I can see that,” his eyes move around your face for some reason, frowning a little bit but then he seems to let it go, getting the menu closer to you “Okay, good, um… I actually made the reservation here because they have the best samgyeopsal in town.”  

“Do they?” 

“Mhm, so…” 

He helps you pick your food and when it's time to order, he moves back to his seat. Gyuri asks you with her eyes if you're okay, you nod and grab her hand under the table with a tiny smile and then everyone is moving around to make space for San and Woo once they return. 

He doesn't sit in front of you. 

Relief floods you and you can finally feel your muscles relax as he is so far away, at the other end of the table and in the same row of seats, so you don't really see him unless you really try. 

Which you don't, so your food goes down easy and the rest of the night as well.

Until everyone but you and Seonghwa move around their seats and he ends up right in your point of view as you do your best to ignore him and focus on his friend. 

Seonghwa asks you about your hobbies, you tell him that you love to write movie essays on websites no one even cares to read and he asks you to show it to him so he can look it up when he gets home.

“And you've always done this? Since highschool?” 

You nod and he beams “I read like the first three lines and it looks really good, Y/N. Is that why you love books so much? Because you're a writer?” 

“I wouldn't consider myself a writer but… Sure, I love to write.” 

“Did you know this?” he turns to San and your smile drops a little. 

“Know what?” 

“Your friend is an excellent writer.” 

“Oh, I know. She, uh… Used to write stories on her notebook instead of paying attention in math class,” he sips on his drink and at the detail you didn't know he knew, you turn to him fully “I used to read over her shoulder sometimes.” 

“She's really good.” Seonghwa is looking at your phone, still reading “Really smart, too.” 

San’s jaw tenses a little and you can't understand why “I know.” He says again. 

His friend is none the wiser, blocking your phone and returning it to you “I like it,” he says, smiling and you blush “The essay.” He clarifies after a second, prompting a laugh out of you that he joins. 

San doesn't laugh, but you don't pay attention to him because Seonghwa is asking you something else. 

When it's time to leave the restaurant, Wooyoung suggests going back to his apartment to milk the get-together as much as you all can.

You all throw your napkins at him in feign disgust at the choice of words but you all accept his proposal either way. 

So now you're sitting on the couch, legs crossed and head on Gyuri’s shoulder while you listen to all of them talk (more like argue) about something that happened at their university last week, their voices drowning the soft music playing out of the tiny speaker resting on the counter. 

San is on the floor, to your right. It's hard to keep your eyes off him when you feel him looking at you when you close your eyes and let the noise fade into the background. It's not like you're able to add something to the conversation anyway and Gyuri seems to be drinking her sorrows (not being able to hook Woo up with the girl she told you about) away. 

Your best friend is slurring her words already, drink in hand and index finger pointing at Jongho accusatively because, apparently, the fight they're talking about was his fault. 

“You don't—” she hiccups “You don't even know why it was your fault and it pisses me off even more, you know?” 

“Okay, let me take that.” Taking the drink from her hand and before she starts complaining you stand up to make your way into the kitchen. 

The sink is full and a mess, so you pour the liquid into it and leave the glass sitting right beside it. Distracted by the dilemma of helping Woo out with the dishes or not, you don't notice someone else also entering the space.

That's why you jump a little when you turn and catch Seonghwa leaning on the wall by the entrance. It startles you enough to laugh the nerves out afterwards and he shakes his head, smiling. 

“Sorry, didn't mean to scare you. They're boring me to death with the fight story.” 

You nod, realizing that maybe that's because he doesn't attend the university anymore. He told you he graduated last year “They're too drunk to let it go.” 

“Too drunk to dance to this amazing song, too. Who's playlist is that?” he frowns and you rest your back into the sink, rolling your eyes because he's pretending he doesn't know “Oh! Right, it's mine.” 

“And they just don't know how to appreciate it, huh?” he shrugs and you click your tongue “They're such bad friends, Seonghwa, I truly don't know why you keep them around.” 

“You appreciate it,” it's your turn to frown and he leaves his spot at the wall to walk towards you “You were singing along to it,” he explains and you let out an ah, nodding as he extends his palm to you, clearly inviting you to dance. 

“Oh, I don't… I don't really know how to—” 

“I'll show you.” 

His kind eyes are asking you to trust him. You really, really shouldn't. 

No matter how hard you try to bury the hopeless romantic little girl who decided to have a crush on a guy back in ninth grade, she's still there, begging you to let loose and live a little. 

When you grab Seonghwa’s hand, you think the smile he gives you was worth listening to her. 

You can't even tell the song that's softly playing anymore, a mellow r&b melody reaches your ear but you are not listening. You're focused on him, on the way he spins you around even if it doesn't fit the bit, on the way he laughs softly against your ear when he pulls you close by your hand and then pulls away just as quickly. 

Laughing as well, the spell of this beautiful stranger (because you remind yourself you don't really know him that well) is hard to break. 

Until it does. 

Someone clearing their throat behind you stops you and Seonghwa's feet from moving any further. When the tall, older guy turns you around, you're face to face with San and his scowl. 

“Sorry to interrupt but I need to get started on the dishes. Everyone else is heading out too,” he looks behind you, at the man who's still standing close to you and grabbing your hand “In case you want to ask Mingi for a ride.” 

“They finally stopped fighting!” he fakes excitement, finally letting go of your hand and walking in front of you, blocking San with his body. You chuckle, barely clapping your hands to join the pretense as he's pulling up his phone “Can I ask for your number, Y/N?” 

Blinking a few times, you're not sure if your heart speeds up because he's asking or because you hear San sigh exasperated behind him “S-sure.” 

When you put your information on his phone, he bids you goodbye with a pat on your head and hugs San on his way out the kitchen. 

Now that you two are alone, you suddenly want to run and join Seonghwa. You were doing so, so well. 

Avoiding San like the plague it's much easier when you're safe hiding behind your two best friends. 

Ignoring his stare would be much easier if you weren't stuck into place. 

“I—” 

“You—” 

You both speak over each other and you force out an uncomfortable laugh that he doesn't return. Instead, he motions you to go first while he occupies the space in front of the sink, turning the faucet on. In doing so, he has to grab your waist and move you out of the way which makes you short circuit for a second “I was going to help you with that.” You finally stammer out. 

He lets out what you take as an annoyed chuckle. 

“You seemed busy, I don't know how you would've done it.” 

Ouch. 

Why do you allow his words to cut so deep when you stopped caring about what he does a long time ago? 

The band aid rips, the stitches come undone and all it took him were five seconds to melt your resolve away like it was never there in the first place. 

“I'll… I go get Gyuri so we can leave Woo and you to get to it, then.” 

“Bathroom.” You hear him mutter under his breath as you are taking the final step to leave. 

“Huh?” 

“She's in the bathroom, probably puking her breakfast out,” he looks up at you to give you a tiny smile “You left her alone with Jongho and Woo for five minutes so she got ahold of another drink.” 

“God damnit.” 

Rushing out, you run into everyone else at the door and Mingi has to let go of his very intoxicated girlfriend when she reaches you to give you a hug “Don't be a stranger, Y/N! It was lovely to be around you, hm?” 

The sudden physical contact almost makes you gasp but you cover it up with a shy giggle “O-oh. Yeah, um, lovely to meet you too. All of you.” 

“Sorry about that,” her boyfriend grabs her arms and breaks the hug “She's right, though. Don't be a stranger.” 

You nod once, smiling a little more sincerely now and everyone says bye to you, including Seonghwa, who grabs your hand one last time and gives it a squeeze before closing the front door of the apartment. 

You think you feel your heart skip a tiny bit under all the shit San’s words pulled up to the surface a minute ago. But there's no time to dwell in that: you hear Gyuri opening up the bathroom door before gagging and closing it again with a slam. 

Jesus Christ. 

You two are really getting old. You stopped drinking like an hour ago, when you were starting to feel tipsy after your second beer, and you know she didn't drink as much as she used to maybe four years ago, but the visage that welcomes you when you open the door and find her crouched down in front of the toilet certainly brings back memories of those times. 

“I left you alone for like… five minutes.” Sighing, you lean in to hold her flimsy ponytail and pat her back. 

“I'm good,” she gags again and then holds up her hand to stop you from saying anything else “I'm fine.” 

Smiling, you help her up and she grabs the counter as she's washing away the taste of whatever she ate earlier today and alcohol “Me when I lie…”

“Y/N!” she hits your arm but the movement somehow almost makes her trip. 

“You want to lay down?” 

“Is she okay?” Woo’s head peaks into the bathroom and when he sees his ex, he makes a face. 

“Does she look like she's okay?” you help her out of the bathroom and start heading for Wooyoung's room. 

“Wow, wow— Where do you think you're taking her?” 

“To your room, dumbass!”

“Why mine? San's is literally right there.” He whines, pointing at the door you pass by without a second thought. You don't want to know where his room is or what it looks like at all. 

“Yeah, well, did San get her this drunk?” 

“How was I supposed to know that she was at her almost black-out phase? She never drinks that much in front of me!” he complains again but you're already tugging Gyuri in, who mumbles something incoherent and then flips Wooyoung off “Na Gyuri if you puke on my bed I swear to God!” 

If you didn't know Wooyoung so much, the whining and the attitude would probably make you think he didn't care for her at all. But he's brushing her hair out of her forehead, securing the blanket around her and moving to take her socks off when you reach the door. 

“I'm guessing you're okay with her staying the night?” 

“Of course you guys can stay the night, Y/N.” He says and he stumbles a little to get to you, so you smile and shake your head, about to let him know that you're not staying anywhere near his roommate when he continues “You can come over whenever you like. You know that, right?” 

“I know, Woo.” 

“I barely even see you these days, I… Oh! I forgot!” he points to the end of the hall, towards the kitchen “You guys don't really like each other so maybe don't come over when he's here because I don't want to see you sad!” 

“Lower your voice,” you whisper to him, bringing a hand to his face and patting his cheek a few times to wake him up “Did the alcohol suddenly hit you or something?” you sigh for the umpteenth time “Anyways, you should lay down and I'll get going. I'll come pick her up tomorrow and—” 

“That's such a great idea! Oh, I'm a genius.” 

“You didn't come up with it, Wooyoung.”

“San!” he calls all of the sudden and you wish he was sober enough to read the panic on your features. He seems much, much sober when his best friend starts walking down the hall and stops right beside you “Take Y/N home, please, she's going to give you a bag that you must protect with your life.” 

Said best friend looks at you, his eyebrow arched in a silent question “Gyuri’s stuff.” 

“Ah.”

“Go, go. It's getting late, I'll just… I'll cuddle with my ex until you get home.” 

And she has the nerve to say he doesn't want her back. 

When the door to Wooyoung's room closes and you're left with San on the poorly lit hallway, you make a mental note to never step foot on this place or allow your friends to drink ever again. 

You don't even look at the guy before practically running down the hallway and reaching for your bag. You make sure your phone is secured in your pocket as you slip your shoes on and soon you're grabbing the front door knob and twisting it. 

Keys jingle next to you but, again, you don't spare San a glance. 

“So—” 

“I'll get out of your hair, you don't have to… walk me home or whatever he said.” 

“Y/N, it's late.” 

Turning to him, your smile is as fake as the ones you've been giving him the past couple of years “And I'm a grown up, San, I can walk myself home.” 

“What about Gyuri’s stuff?” 

“She can wear Wooyoung's clothes, it's not like they never shared before. Anyway… Thank you for having me, it was nice to see you. Goodnight.” Your response comes out fast and it sounds as planned out as it actually is, kinda robotic and devoid of actual emotion. 

San can't see through you the way you see through him. It's okay, he won't mind it. 

He probably won't mind that you close his own door on his face either. 

If that door is what you hear when you're making your way down the stairs in order to make a fast escape, you choose to ignore it. 

You have to stop mid-way to compose yourself. You don't know why you feel like crying or why your heart is beating so fast. 

You knew going in that there was a possibility of seeing him tonight. You know how San affects you, so effortless and seemingly like no time has passed at all in between senior year and present day. 

You know all of this already, it's an endless loop that will keep repeating until you either move away or decide to stop agreeing to Wooyoung's plans all together. 

So why is your chest heaving with emotion? Why is nostalgia playing mind tricks with you? Why do you want to turn back and hug him and beg him to turn back time so you can do it all differently now that you know how to look like and what to say to make him love you back? 

Ah, you're definitely not sleeping tonight. So you start distracting yourself while walking down the stairs again. You remind yourself to tell a much sober Wooyoung how proud you are of him. You think about Seonghwa, about his kind eyes and the way he grabbed your hand to dance with him just half an hour ago. You wonder how long it will take you to get home if you jog all the way there. You—

Why the fuck is San outside when you get there? 

In a comedic way, you can see your attempt to distract your mind off of him slipping through your fingers and evaporating in the warm summer night breeze. 

In a realistic way, you're fucking pissed at him for taking the opportunity of a good night sleep away from you. 

You pass him and start jogging like you planned a minute ago. Footsteps follow you until his arm brushes yours and you take a step to the side to stop it from happening again. 

“Go home, Choi San.” 

“Stop fighting it, Y/N. I'm walking you home.” 

“It's a twenty minute walk—” 

“Drop it.” 

You do. And for the first ten minutes, no one utters a word even if the tension feels electric and the street is so quiet so you can hear when his breath accelerates when he jogs to catch up to you whenever you try to leave him behind. 

Isn't that ironic. He was the one who left you behind all those years ago. 

“I didn't know that you danced.” 

He breaks the uncomfortable but safe silence to say that? 

“Well, you saw me dance so I clearly dance when I want to.” 

“You never danced with me.” 

“You never asked me to.” 

He laughs “I'm pretty sure I did on several occasions, Y/N.” 

“Well, you're wrong,” you're getting annoyed. How dare he think he remembers better than you? “It doesn't matter anyway, what's past is past and—” 

“You also gave Hwa your number,” he interrupts, his long legs taking two strides to get in front of you, still walking, facing your direction with his hands on his pockets. 

It's dangerous and stupid, even if the streets are practically empty and the sidewalk barely has any bumps. 

You hope he falls on his pretty face.

“I did.* 

“I don't have your number.” 

“Well, I changed it and you never asked for it, so…” 

“You could've called me or texted me to let me know you did it.” 

He's getting on your nerves.

“San,” you start, taking in a deep breath you hope calms you down “We don't even text anymore, why would you want my number?” 

“Do you like him?” 

“Seonghwa?” you ask, frowning and he nods “Like… As a person?” 

“As a potential love interest.” He clarifies matter-of-factly and you roll your eyes. 

“I met him today, San. Why do you want my number?” 

“Because we're friends?” he offers after a second, shifting so he's walking by your side again. 

“Are we?” you ask, laughing bitterly at that “Because we haven't spoken a word to each other in years.” 

“That's not true.” 

“It is, San.” 

“You… You don't speak to me anymore, so…” 

“Well your girlfriend at the time told me she didn't feel comfortable with me speaking to you anymore,” you sigh “so I didn't and you didn't try to talk to me either.” 

“Well, I want to talk to you now.” 

“And is your new girlfriend aware of that? Is she comfortable with that? Because I don't want anyone telling me what to do anymore and—” 

“Why wouldn't she be comfortable? We're friends, Y/N.” 

“Are we?” you insist, petty, bitter and overall very, very hurt. 

He looks offended at that “I assumed we were?” 

He's getting on your fucking nerves. 

“We stopped being friends the second Minseo asked me to stay away from you because she didn't like me, San.” 

“She’s not in my life anymore—” 

The words are coming out of your mouth without even thinking it through. His demeanor, the way he's somehow reproaching you for whatever he saw between you and his friend, the way he pretends nothing happened between you and him, thinking that you two are still friends. 

“We stopped being friends when you pulled away from me, saw me do the same and did nothing to stop it from happening, San.” 

He stops in his tracks at that. You don't, pushing forward and quickening your step even if your calves burn. 

“Either way,” you speak up “Make sure you tell your girlfriend about wanting my number and then you can ask Seonghwa for it if you want—” 

“She's not my girlfriend anymore!” 

Now that stops you, just a few buildings down from yours, you turn around just to find San closer that you thought he'll be.

“O-oh. I… I didn't know that. I'm sorry.” 

“You didn't do anything to be sorry for.” 

“Still, it must suck so I'm sorry you're going through that.” 

“We didn't want the same things and so we ended it. It is what it is.” 

You nod. 

He walks the few steps separating you and you have to raise your chin a little to look him in the eye for the first time since you left his apartment “I wanted to tell you.” 

“That you broke up with your girlfriend?” 

“Yeah, I don't know why. It happened when I broke up with Minseo too, I just… You're the first person that I thought of calling when it happened. I texted you, too, but the messages didn't go through.” 

You hum at that. 

Why would he even say that? 

You resume your step, not really knowing what to say until you reach the stairs that lead to your building’s entrance. 

“And you didn't ask Woo for my number?” 

He follows you up. 

“I don't think he would've given it to me if I asked.” 

That sounds like an excuse, so you don't let it slide as you enter the code to your building and let yourself inside, San holding the door so he can get in as well “Why would he do that?” 

“Because he…” San sighs, pressing the elevator button “Nevermind. He just wouldn't.”

Frowning, you turn to him “No, now you have to tell me.” 

“It doesn't matter, really—” 

“Tell me, San.” 

He stares for a second and then looks away, like a child, vulnerable and you can't help but soften at that “He didn't like the way I treated you.” 

Eating your words from before, you shake your head “You didn't treat me like anything.” 

The elevator dings and you get inside. 

San follows you. 

“Exactly,” he says, resting his shoulder on the metal “Like you said I just did nothing and—” 

“Well, sometimes that's just what happens,” you want to end this. You want to pack Gyuri’s bag, give it to him and never see him again. 

This conversation hurts, it reopens barely closed wounds and it creates new ones you don't really need when it comes to whatever happened between you two. 

There's only so much a person can handle and it really doesn't help that you're a fool for San. He takes advantage of it, of the fact you can't really push him away at this point and the fact that he wants to have this conversation now instead of four and half years ago? 

Mean. 

He's mean. He's evil. He's… He's staring at you with a spark in his eyes that you recognize too well. 

Hope. 

When you get to your floor, you try to wipe the image away while busying yourself with your keys. Your hands tremble a little but you're able to open the door of your apartment and get in without inviting him. 

He gets in anyway. You take off your shoes as he closes the front door. 

He stays silent as he follows you around the apartment and you don't worry about turning the lights on. You get into Gyuri’s room and start picking out a comfy hangover outfit for your friend. Some clean underwear, sweatpants, two shirts and socks. 

When you drop to the floor, in front of the closet, to look for a bag to stash all of it in, San silently clutches beside you. 

“It shouldn't have happened to us. Never us.” 

You can't take it anymore. 

“San, what is this? What are you doing? I mean, why are we—” 

“I know.” 

“It's been years…”  

“I miss you.” 

He's so mean. But the softness in his tone resembles the one he used all the way back in highschool, when he told you that not being friends with you didn't feel right and you want to cave in right there and then. 

Your heart screams at you to do it, your reason warns you that you both have been through this before and it never ends right. 

You simply can't stay friends with Choi San. 

Your love for him must run too deep, your resentment claws at it and tries to hurt it but it's an immovable force that won't budge even if you try to bury it under the years that have passed, the things he has done. 

Tears gather in your eyes and you try to blink them away as you stare at your best friend's clothes on your lap and try to come up with something to close this path up again, reconstruct the picket fence you built around it the second he broke your heart for the first time. 

“Yeah,” you whisper back, letting the walls fall a little “I miss you too but I don't think I miss whatever version of you you are right now, San.” 

“W-what?”

His shaky voice makes the walls crumble and crash. 

Turning to him, your hand shakes as you place it on top of his “And you don't miss the version of me I am right now. You miss what I was back then, the comfort and the shoulder to cry on I offered you when Arin and you broke up. You miss my availability and the way I didn't press my feelings on you because it didn't matter if I liked you or not, you were my friend first and the guy that I had a crush second but—” you choke up, tears falling down your cheeks even if you don't want them to “I can't do it anymore. I'm not that girl anymore and I won't be there for you now that you and Kyungmi broke up because I can't handle it. I can't, I'm sorry.” 

He doesn't deny any of it.

He stares at you, tears wetting his cheeks as well and it hurts even more this way. You wish you had the strength to hold it together, to treat him like you did on the street a few minutes ago, but you can't. 

There's no way you could ever hate him like you want to. 

“You know…” he starts in a whisper, letting out a humorless chuckle “That's what I used to tell myself too.” 

“Hm?” 

“That you were my friend first and the girl that I had a crush on second.” 

How dare he mutter the words you always wanted to hear, the ones you picture being said in a different setting, the ones that haunted your every waking thought that period of time you doubted your friends, your mom, yourself for even believing Choi San could ever have a crush on you. 

He doesn't get to say them. You want to tell him but the words die on your throat and form a lump that you can't swallow down. 

You don't get to say that. You don't get to say that. 

Your hand drops from his and you look away again only to grab the first bag you find on the closet floor and shove Gyuri’s stuff in it. 

If the lack of response it's what prompts the hurt in his voice the next time he speaks, you don't want to think about it. 

“I wish I didn't. Now it's too late to do something about it, huh?” 

This time the rage comes back with a mask on. Feing settlement for all the what if’s covers you like a blanket on a really hot summer night: unwanted, unnecessary. 

But you can't sleep without it, so you do nothing to push it away. 

“I guess it is.” 

You get up from the floor, leaving the room and wiping your face with bitterness coating your movements as you wait by the door for him to get out. 

When he does and he steps in front of you, you extend the bag and he takes it without missing a beat. 

Voice robotic and words premeditated, you open the front door for him “Thanks for walking me home and taking this back.” 

He leans a little into your space and you don't move away. But just as he did in highschool, he takes in your hitched breath and does nothing more.

“Thanks for letting me talk to you.” 

He didn't give you much of a choice there but it's okay. This is closure, this is the end of your story with Choi San and you convince yourself you're glad that it is. 

“Sure,” you whisper back and he steps outside, turning around to watch you slowly close the door “goodnight, San.” 

He doesn't say it back. 

When the darkness of your apartment engulfs you, that's when you let yourself breakdown. Covering your mouth with your palm, you descend until your knees are against the wood on the floor and closing your eyes you make it a point to let it all out. 

You'll let it all out, drink some water, text Wooyoung and Gyuri to let them know you're safe and go to bed. 

And tomorrow you'll begin your day with the freedom of finally knowing what would've happened if you or San ever took the next step. 

This is fine. This is moving on. This is— 

The doorbell rings. 

Opening the door again, you crease your eyebrows in a silent question that San doesn't care to answer, so you look around the floor in case he forgot something you're missing. You wipe your cheeks and under your eyes as you turn to him again “Did you—” 

Time slows down when he makes it past the threshold and you can't move an inch, gaping at who you once thought was the love of your life “What are you doing, San?” 

“Something about it.” 

“What?” 

“Forgive me,” he asks, breathless and in a murmur, fueling your confusion. And then he's closing the distance, dropping Gyuri’s bag and cupping your face so gently that it hurts “but I'm doing something about it.” 

You stopped dreaming about the possibility of San kissing you that one time you two were on your bed and, another time, you told yourself that, if it ever happened, you wouldn't kiss him back. 

It's too late to kiss him back. 

But sparks fly when he crushes you against the wall and takes in a breath before slothing his mouth against yours like he's been waiting to do this every single day for the past nine years you've known each other. 

There's nothing you can do to conceal the way yearning takes over you, pours out of you, making you breathe into his open mouth and kiss him back like you always wanted to. 

You already know it is a mistake by the time you grab his shirt to keep him in place but does it really matter when this is all you ever wanted? 

Feeling warmth leave your face, you notice the way he desperately crowds your space as his chest bumps into yours, leg claiming its place in between yours, the palm that leaves you pressing against the wall, next to your head. 

The kiss is filled with emotion, with longing and desire and it steals the air out of your lungs tragically and beautifully at the same time. Before, you used to dream about his lips making everything feel right, making you fit in in a world you didn't feel like you belonged to. 

But this kiss drops you into uncharted territory, drags you into the depths of something that should be buried by now, after all this time. It brings the flame back to life and it's dangerous. 

The fact that it feels this way, both marvelous and catastrophic at the same time, makes you so sad. 

Sorrow descends down your face until your mouth is picking it up and your tongue is mixing it with whatever emotion is cruising through San right now. 

You have to know. 

He spent your entire youth and early adulthood keeping it to himself, knowing when to show his true colors and when to hide them, choosing who to do it with and you realize the San that lives in your head is nothing but a figment of what you wanted him to be. 

Because him holding to your waist like it's his only lifeline doesn't fit the San you remember, him telling you he liked you back then doesn't fit the guy who was just your best friend. 

You need to know. 

“San,” brokenly, you speak into his mouth and he pulls away just enough to see your face. Your eyes remain closed, your chest heaving and your lips trembling “Why are you doing this?” 

“Because I want you, Y/N.” 

You push him away, weakly, almost like you don't really mean it because deep down you don't but he steps away like you're asking to. 

Because, of course, your mind scraps the bottom of your resentment to give his words a completely new meaning. 

“You can find another girl to fuck and be your rebound, San,” more tears spill down and you wipe them away in anger but more threat to fall down so you cover your face with your hands and groan, desperate “I can't do this, especially not when I know that you know how bad I wanted you. Y-you know what you do to me San so stop—”

“I want you in my life. I don't— What? I don't want you like a rebound, I… Can we sit down and turn on a light so I can look at you when I say this?” 

His words should be reassuring but they're not, the way you tend to feel unlovable around him coming up to the surface, preventing you from thinking clearly. 

You can also feel his lips on yours still. It's dizzying but you manage to push yourself off the wall and pad around until you hit the switch of the warm light lamp near the couch and the apartment comes to life just like that. 

He takes in the space he's never seen before, walking slowly towards the living room and looking over the bookshelf that screams your name all over it. He smiles a bit as he looks over the book titles and you look away before your heart starts acting up again. 

You can't stay mad at him for long if he's looking through something so personal to you and smiling that fondly at it. It feels even more intimate than the kiss you two just shared. 

Wiping your cheeks once more, you are sure you look a mess but he doesn't seem to mind it once he comes into your point of view, sitting down on the couch, in front of your standing form. He grabs you by your hands until you're sitting next to him, close to him, cologne intoxicating your senses. 

“I told you I liked you when we were in highschool, right?” 

You nod. 

“You seemed surprised but it was dark so I'm not really sure. I thought you knew, everyone knew.” 

Oh, he's a comedian. 

“How would I have known, San? I… Yeri told me you liked me one time, in senior year, but I denied it. Then, my mom told me you seemed to want me in a non-platonic way and I dismissed her as well,” you take in a deep, shaky breath “For me, the thought of you liking me just didn't make sense. You loved Arin and she's… She doesn't look or act like I did back then at all, so how would I have known?” 

You didn't need clues and puzzles and what if’s, you needed words and actions that weren't confusing. You needed him to tell you back then, because telling you right now and kissing you senseless after he broke up with a girl he supposedly was very in love with means nothing but pain. 

“I didn't realize you liked me too,” you make a face, about to tell him off, but he interrupts “I didn't! I thought you liked Yeri and I thought you saw me as the annoying guy who wouldn't leave you alone. I only just realized it a couple years ago, because Woo told me.” 

You raise your eyebrows and mutter under your breath “I'm murdering him tomorrow.” 

The corner of his lips twitch before he shakes his head in dismissal of what you said “I liked you. I really, really liked you and never told a soul because… Well, it's scary when you fall in love, right?” 

“San, you had no problem telling Arin, Minseo or Kyungmi that you liked them.” 

He looks down to the floor, lost in thought and you want to open your mouth to take what you just said into a new direction, but you don't “Maybe that's because I didn't love them the way I love you.” 

Oh. 

Love you? As in… He loves you right now too? 

No way. 

“You didn't love me, San. You don't love me right now either, you… Maybe we both were in love with the idea of love? Maybe that's what happened and—” 

“Quit telling me what I'm feeling, Y/N. You always do that, you always assume you know what I'm feeling but you don't!” 

Raising your voice a little more, you try to get your point across in the worst way possible: by being stubborn “You don't know me! How can you possibly—” 

“I knew you back then, Y/N! And I loved you back then, too!” He looks like wants to say something more but he doesn't, instead, he takes a calming breath and then leans into your space for the third time tonight “And I might not know you now but I want to. That's what I meant when I said that I want you. I want you in my life, I want to know the person you became when we stopped talking, I want to talk to you every single day and I want to hold you and kiss you and be by your side however you want me to, I just… I can't lose you again.” 

His confession renders you speechless and you notice his chest is heaving, going up and down in sync with yours. 

But the way he pulled away from you senior year still hurts, it paints a picture of what's going to happen if you accept this. 

You can't believe his words. 

He must feel lonely and confused, like he did when Arin broke up with him. He must be looking for a shelter you can't provide. 

“And when you find another girl that's more to your liking? What then, San?” 

“There's no one that I love more than you, Y/N and I'm sorry I was shit at proving it back then and I'm sorry that it took so many years for me to come to my senses.” 

He's tearing up and your heart pangs absurdly loud at that. 

“I saw you with Seonghwa earlier today, laughing and dancing and flirting and I thought: Oh, maybe if I didn't waste that much time pretending I'm someone I'm not, that would be me.” 

You stare for a second, you watch a single tear drop down his cheek and then look away. 

“Is that what you were doing? Is that why you pulled away?” 

“Maybe?” he offers and you turn to him again. Is not enough and maybe he can see it in your expression, because he goes on “I mean, I… I thought I wanted Arin. I thought I wanted Minseo. I had people in my life who were really happy to see me with them and I just…” 

“Wanted to keep them happy,” you nod, understanding. He doesn't have to say his mothers name for you to know he's referring to her and maybe his other highschool friends outside of Wooyoung “Were you pretending with me as well?” 

“No,” he answers right away “You and Woo were the only ones who saw me for who I really was back then.” 

“And why do you think you love me now, San?” you ask, deflating against the couch and ignoring the way your heart soars at his quick response.

“Because I never stopped,” he stammers out and then clears his throat “Because I looked for you in Minseo and Kyungmi and I wondered for years why they couldn't make me feel the same way. And I told myself I didn't need to feel the same way and that I deserved to wonder for the rest of my days but seeing you tonight? I can't.” 

Straightening your spine, the pained look you sent in his direction is not intentional but it prompts him to lean closer and closer until he's cupping your cheek again. 

“I can't keep wondering.” His voice is a sweet whisper, a siren song that draws you in until your forehead is resting against his. 

All these years, you were so self-focused on changing to a better version of who he used to know, learning from your mistakes and closing off to the opportunity of letting him prove himself a better man, you forgot that time passed for him too. He’s telling you he changed, too. 

Imagination is a safe space. Is where you hide, where desire can take its wings and fly high without hurting you too much. Make belief has rescued you before but this? The way his nose nuzzles softly into yours and your breaths tangle? This is very real. And reality is prone to hurt you. 

But the want you feel is undeniable. The way your entire being wants to cave in and give him an opportunity is suffocating, it makes you choke out a sob that he follows with one of his own. 

You kiss him, softly at the beginning, but his hands on you tighten and you let yourself get lost in the way they go down your neck and your arms, caressing you softly until they reach your waist and pull you into his lap. 

Pulling away, you grab his chin with two fingers and force his teary eyes to snap open, searching for an answer on yours.

“If you hurt me,” you start, breathless “If you're mocking me, if you're using me to get over Kyungmi, if you are pulling me back in to break my heart again, Choi San, I swear to God I will kill you.” 

“I won't do that to you ever again, Y/N,” he returns softly “I love you, I'm sorry if I ever hurt you but I love you.” 

Others would argue that it is pathetic how quickly you forgive him. But then again, you could never be mad at San. 

You were only mad at yourself for how everything turned out. 

“I love you too, Sannie.” 

Saying something never felt so freeing before. 

“Oh, Y/N…” you can see the way relief washes his worries away “Y/N…” he starts to say but then leans in to kiss you again and never finishes his words. 

You don't mind it. 

Pouring out all the pent up affection you pretended to bury for years, you explore his mouth and carve into your memory the way he feels. The way he sighs into it when your tongue brushes his, the way he pulls you in closer when your fingers reach the nape of his neck and pull on his hair there, hands splayed on your back so he can keep you in place as he leans down and places you against the worn out couch. 

He maps you out, hands going down your waist in a familiar feeling that brings back that memory of you two laying down on your bed. Only this time, he's actually touching you with a purpose. This time, you two have made up your minds and your limbs are tangled in a way you can feel all of him pressing up against you. 

It starts to get stuffy, the space on the couch not nearly enough to have him the way you want to. Soon, you're both standing up, mouths still moving against each other and hands roaming everywhere until you're undoing the buttons on his shirt. 

He pulls away to fully take it off, eyes never leaving yours, dropping the shirt to the ground, next to the couch and then he's on you again, making your back crash into the wall as he works the knots keeping your blouse together. 

He walks you through the hall, stopping only to take your top off and then he's walking you to a room that has a familiar scent that doesn't belong to you.

“Wrong room, wrong room,” you say into his lips and he laughs, looking to your surroundings “Mine’s over there.” you point to the other end of the hall, taking his hand and pulling him towards it. 

You don't make it far before he's yanking you towards him again. He looks down, taking your body in and you do the same, his firm and defined stomach a sight you never thought you would be able to see. 

“You're so beautiful,” he whispers, backing you against the wall again and kissing your cheek “So, so beautiful.” 

Turning your head to chase his mouth, he lets out a heavy sigh when his lips trail a path to your neck and murmurs against the skin there “I never told you how beautiful I found you before but you're so perfect, baby.” 

“I always thought I wasn't your type, San,” you let out a noise when he grabs your hips and pulls you forward, crashing his into yours “Fuck.” 

“And I always thought you were too much for me, too smart,” he kisses his way back up, focusing on your jaw and chin until he's kissing your cheek again “too pretty,” he moves to your ear, pecking right under it and you hold him closer “too good for me.” 

It doesn't really matter that this is all new to you, the way he's speaking, the tenor of his voice, the things he's saying… It sparks something familiar in you. You're pulling his hair back to make him look at you, a moan slipping out of his lips at that. 

You want to hear it again. 

He's smiling at your reaction, hand tightening on his locks.

However, that smile drops when he seems to recognize the gleam in your eyes. 

You gather up courage, feeling empowered by the way his hooded eyes darken but wait patiently for you to speak your mind. 

“Maybe I'm too good for you now, too,” you lean in, your lips softly tracing his “Maybe you should prove to me that you deserve me, San.” 

It's a dare. One that he seems to like a lot because his eyes sparkle with the same fire they used to back in the day. 

“Oh, I'll prove it to you, alright.” He whispers, panting when you let go of his hair and he leans into you to kiss your lips briefly before pulling away again.

His hand tilts your head back and you rest it against the cold wall, his fingers touch your bottom lip before going down and down and down until they rest against the seam of your pants, unbuttoning them in one swift movement. 

Going back up, his nails softly dig into your skin and you preen, taking the soft sting of his ministrations like you two have done this a million times before.  

His mouth is on yours again, his hands are pulling you off the wall and into your room until you two land on your mattress with a soft tud, a moan spilling out of your lips when he sloths his knee in between your legs and pulls them apart with expertise. 

You don't have the mind to break down what that means. 

Opening your eyes when he kisses down your neck again, you notice your room is barely lit by the street lights outside, curtains pulled open and windows closed but, this way, you can see the way San kisses between your breasts and your belly, catching his eyes when he looks up to measure your reaction. 

You sigh, already feeling some sort of build up going on down there and he hasn't even touched you properly yet. 

You don't even want to think about how wet you actually are. 

He leans back, open palms going down your legs slowly until they reach your feet. It tickles and you can't help but let out a giggle that he joins short after, his gaze never losing the edge because of it, though. 

“San…” 

He guides your hips up so he can take off your pants and you sigh when his hands return, raising your leg up “I missed your laugh,” he says low, attaching his lips to your calf “I miss being the one making you laugh too.” 

You feel like crying again but then he's letting your leg down and grabbing the other one to give it the same treatment, so your tears can wait. 

This time, he moves upwards till his mouth nears your clothed center and your breath hitches. 

Yeah, you can definitely cry later.

“You want me to prove to you how much I want you, Y/N?” he murmurs, his lips ghosting your mound now “How much I love you?” 

“San, p-please…” 

“Fuck, look at you.” He sounds like he's too lost in the heat of the moment and you're kind of grateful, because the moan you let out when his fingers hook on your underwear and pull them to the side to expose your pussy to his hungry eyes is loud. 

When he kisses you right where you need him, you let out another moan. And when he parts your folds to lick a stripe up to your clit, you curse him under you breath until he's laughing against you softly, the vibrations accumulating heat on your belly. 

He doesn't tease you much longer and you look down at him just to catch the moment his self control slips, eating you out like a man starved while his hand stays on your hip to hold you down and keep you underwear from interrupting his feast. 

“This is like,” he dives in again for a few seconds and you grab the sheets beneath you “All my fantasies coming to life but better.” 

He's so chatty during this and the only thing you can do is stammer a yeah? and pray for it to reach his ears.

“Mhm,” the circles your clit with the tip of his tongue and your legs shake “Taste even better than what I dreamed, too.” 

The heat of his mouth leaves you, lips spreading your wetness through your stomach until he fully reaches your face, your eyes closed and lips already waiting for him. 

Tongue caressing yours, your hands trail down his torso and focus on getting his pants off. You're shaking with excitement so it proves to be more difficult than you imagined at first but he helps you in unbuckling his belt. 

Once the piece of clothing is one the floor (or the bed, you're not really paying attention on where it lands), you don't waste time in feeling him up through his boxers. 

The hiss you get in return makes you smile. 

Bringing your lips to his neck, you suckle on this pulse point and gain another pleased noise before grazing your teeth against skin and moving to his collarbone next.

In a way, you get what he means. If he truly was pining over you the way you were pining over him, the thought of exploring his tan skin and making him moan feels like a dream. 

So you kiss him again in order to make it all last longer. 

The minutes pass between the both of you, softly making out and figuring out what gets both of you going, discarding your underwear in the process. 

You realize your moans make San’s cock twitch against your leg and he seems to notice the way your hips buck up everytime his hands handle you more roughly. 

After a few minutes of just this, you feel his hand making its way down again and the pads of his fingers circle your clit until you're grasping the sheets again. He gathers your arousal and then enters one finger slowly and when it slides in and out with ease, he enters the next one. 

There's really not much prepping he needs to do, already soft and compliant under him, you relax into his comfortable touch before you're aching for something else. And your mouth is preoccupied with his, so you do something else to catch his attention. 

Hands caressing his back, you let them drop to his ass with a soft smack that wins you a soft huff on amusement and then a whine when you move his hips towards yours. 

“Condom?” 

You shake your head “I'm clean and I have an implant.” 

“Oh?” he smirks, about to tease you but you squeeze his butt again and he moans “Fuck. I'm clean too.” 

“Good,” you whisper against his cheek, laughing as he arranges his position. 

And he might've been touching you all this time, kissing you until your mind emptied and your lips are all swollen up, but the look on his eyes when he slowly enters you is what might drive you over the edge. 

Grabbing your hands, he pins them on the side of your head as he moves, dropping his head down with a groan as you take him in, nose touching yours and moth whispering sweet things you can't quite pick up. 

He feels so good. 

This all feels way too good to be real. 

In the cloud you're at, you allow yourself to dream a little more before the reality of what your confessions mean dawns on you. 

For now, you allow San to make love to you. Sweetly, slowly and with a passion you never were lucky enough to encounter before. 

Maybe it's because your previous lovers didn't have your heart the way San does. 

He rams his hips into yours hard, closing his eyes and resting his warm cheek against yours, kissing your face inch by inch when you accompany his movements with your own. 

When his pace picks up, you hug him close and secure your legs around his hips as you moan. 

“Y-yes, fuck.” 

“Like that?” he repeats the movement from before, pulling out and then in with such force it rocks the entire bed. 

“Just like that, baby, fuck.” 

“God, you sound so good,” you smile a little, forehead resting on his shoulder before your head falls down against your pillow again “I love you,” he repeats against your lips, letting your hands go to cup your face with both of his again “I love you so much.” 

Teetering over the edge, you feel happy tears stinging in your eyes. Though closed, you can feel San’s stare on you, on your face, on the way you react to his sweet words and relentless pace. 

You say it back in a whisper and he repeats it again and again and again until you're both coming and tears are spilling down your cheeks. 

He kisses them away. 

You wipe his with trembling fingers as you come down, having trouble breathing from everything that just happened. 

You don't feel suffocated anymore, you feel like you've been freed. Like this was supposed to happen at some point and you two finally got around to it. 

“I love you,” he says once more before slipping out of you with a parting kiss. 

Holy shit. 

When San gets up from the bed and you point him to the bathroom, down the hallway, you're left with a sticky mess in between your legs and a lot to think about but you settle on four things. 

San just made love to you. There's no way that was just sex. 

There's also no way you're coming back from this. 

Gyuri is probably going to kill you. 

And that, obviously, your feelings for San never left. You feel the familiar warmth of them spreading through your post-orgasmic state. They're there, mocking you, asking you who the fuck you thought you were for pushing them away. 

He returns, toilet paper in his hands before leaning in and cleaning you up, lips immediately finding home on your skin as he does. 

You both giggle at that.

You probably need to shower but you've been crying and there's no way you're leaving this bed tonight. He throws the paper away on your bedroom’s trashcan and then crashes into the bed next to you, still naked, still looking at you with so much love you're wondering what stopped you from seeing it was there before. 

Taking his hand, you bring it to his lip and give his knuckles a peck “That was really good.” 

“It was.” 

“I can't believe we actually just did that…” 

He smiles and what he says next shocks you even more than his confession “I want to take you out.” 

“San… You just came inside me not even ten minutes ago.” 

“And?” you laugh and he shakes his head, leaning into your space again “I spent many years doing everything wrong, let me do it the right way.” 

“Making love to me one time and then taking me out on a date is not the right way, sir.” 

He nuzzles your cheek with his nose and you let out a pleased sigh “Who said it was just one time, huh?” Attacking your neck with his lips again, you push him away with a laugh. 

“Oh, come on!” 

He laughs as well “Give me ten minutes and I'll make it two!” 

San makes love to you two more times. And by four in the morning, you're snuggled into his arms and sleeping soundly. 

When you wake up and find the space next to you empty, you think it was all a dream. Your naked form begs to differ and you quickly put the t-shirt you usually wear to bed on and your panties underneath it to go out and face the feelings of your actions fighting with the blender in the kitchen. 

“How do you two live with this stupid thing?” 

“We don't,” you answer, startling him “We don't use it. What are you trying to make?” 

San’s shirtless, wearing his pants and his hair messy. Looking back at the living room clock, you see it's just five past ten. 

Smiling as he approaches you, you forget you must look a mess too when he pecks your lips and barely pulls away “Good morning, beautiful.” 

You pretend to cringe at that, pulling away “Oh, God. Morning, dumbass.” 

“You like it, you're blushing,” he points out and the pink on your cheek deepens as he's going back to the blender “Does anything work here?” 

“The microwave,” you shrug “And the stove. Were you trying to make yourself a…” you look over the ingredients he has pulled out of your fridge “Green juice?” 

“I was trying to make both of us a green juice,” he corrects and your heart skips at the immediate domestic attitude he has with you “But now I can tell neither of you drink anything like it, hm? I'm buying you a blender.” 

“Please don't.” 

“Why?” 

“Why do you think that one is broken?” 

He hums, huffing out a laugh seconds later and you walk over to him, unsure on how to approach him even though what you did yesterday night and earlier this morning didn't allow your shyness to step in. 

Now you're feeling it. 

He can tell, because he stops fighting with the steel appliances to grab your waist and pull you close “I wanted to make you breakfast.” 

“We can make breakfast together and I can order your green juice,” you compromise and he nods, but he doesn't let you go “And later we can go out on that date you promised me yesterday and we can go over what we're going to tell the two idiots.” 

His smile drops. 

“Oh, fuck.” 

Grimacing, you nod “It was the second thing I thought about after waking up.” 

“What was the first?” 

“Oh, I was trying to remember if you ever asked me to dance before,” he nods with a smile “Guess what? You didn't.” 

He fake gasps at that “I did!” 

“No, you didn't!” 

“Babe, yes I did,” he insists and you laugh, which prompts him to wrap his hands around you tighter when you try to get away from him “It was when—” 

“Oh. My. God. I'm going to be sick again.” 

Now when the fuck did Gyuri come back. 

And why is Wooyoung with her too, jaw slack as he watches both of you pull away from each other and create a safe distance that doesn't help whatever your best friends just saw. 

“It worked?” he asks and you can barely hear him until he hollers like a crazy person “Oh, it worked! I am a genius!” 

“Wooyoung, hold me! I'm going to kill them!” Gyuri looks like she's about to launch towards you at any second now, so you close your eyes and accept your fate. But nothing happens “Wait— What worked?” 

When you open them again, San is hiding behind you and Gyuri’s back is to both of you as she looks at Wooyoung with, what you assume, murderous intentions. 

“Gyuri, let's talk about this,” the black haired guy puts his hands up “You were too drunk to discuss it so I made the choice of— Gyuri, no!” 

You burst into laughter when she starts chasing him around the apartment and San giggles as well, only more nervous than delighted by their little cat and mouse game. 

He's probably sensing he's next on her hit list. 

As if you would let anything happen to him in the first place. 

“Stop, stop! I'm sorry, please leave me alone!” you hear Wooyoung’s voice echoing through your hall and in a second he's entering the kitchen, rounding you and San “I'm so happy for you guys, really, this was meant to happ— Stop!” He cries when Gyur catches onto him and yanks his hair to stop him from running.  

“Y/N,” she starts, chest heaving and you take a step back, crashing into San’s chest. He holds onto you only to push you a little and protect himself from the fury of your best friend “When I told you fuck him I didn't meant this!” 

“I know.” 

Wooyoung whines but he can't get away from her grasp so he just accepts it and pouts like a child. 

“A-and you!” She points towards the guy resting his chin on your shoulder “How dare you! If this is something casual for you then—” 

“I love her.” He defends himself quickly and your heart all but stops at that. 

“You do?” Wooyoung coos, amazed at his best friend’s confession. 

Gyuri's anger falters at that. 

“You… You do?” 

“And I love him,” you let out in a shy whisper, smiling a bit “But you already knew that.” 

“Of course I already knew that, bitch, I am your other half,” she makes a point to stare at San as she says it, letting Wooyoung go and he massages the part of his scalp that was targeted by his ex “Don't forget that.” 

“Y-yes ma'am.” 

You laugh again and Woo joins the embrace, eyeing you both expectantly and rolling his eyes when neither of you say anything to him “Well, you are so welcome guys. What are we having for breakfast?” 

You and San don't get to go out on that date. 

But when you do, he asks you to be his girlfriend the next day. 

And when you say yes he almost breaks down in excited tears.

Eventually, even Gyuri comes around and threatens him into treating you right, which means he earned her seal of approval. 

You delete the document on your laptop when you find it a month into being his girlfriend and, instead, start drafting your new beginning on it, in first person this time because the story doesn't feel like it belongs to someone else now.

The first line read as it follows: 

How did I ever think San and I could be just friends? 

If you read all the way down here: THANK YOU SO MUCH. Any feedback would be greatly appreciated!

© jensthwa, 2024.

[byuntrash101]

realistic sex with san

san x f!reader fluff | smut | mdni a/n: welcome to this series. where i'll try to imagine how each member would actually fuck, as ✨realistically✨ as possible. happy sannie day. enjoy ♡ disclaimer: i say realistic but lets be honest this is pure delulu behaviour and total fiction. everything is solely based on the vibes the boys give off.

i feel like san isn’t the pursuing kinda guy. he’s really shy at the beginning, especially if he’s crushing on you. since he’s a cancer baby ♋ he would actually avoid you/ignore you. 

At first you would just think he just does not care about you, not necessarily hate you because he would seem so laid back about it but in reality his heart is racing when he sees you and it’s just easier for him to avoid you

so why doesn’t he just go for it? what??? no! you’re crazy? what if you weren’t interested? he would never be able to accept the rejection. so he’d rather have this crush stay as it is. unless you take actions into your own hands? (spoiler it's what you’ll have to do to score this man)

at some point the others are tired of seeing san snob you when you’re around then gush about you when you’re away so one of the member just spills the tea (spoiler alert it was either joong or woo because they were sick of it or yeosang but he didn’t mean to)

so with that new knowledge you’ll just have to make your move

i think he has a careful/cautious nature so he doesn't fold immediately because you could be playing games we never know but he definitely doesn't take long before he gives in because he’s head over heels and can't resist you

after a while, if your actions and words are consistent things change. he gets confident and he’s all over you all the time.

he’s pda line with mingi and woo

he just loves to have you near him, he wants to feel that you are near.

if there’s people around he wont care he just wants to hold your hand or for you to sit on his lap (if he’s feeling naughty he will even sneak his hand on your ass, give a light quiet little spank or just squeeze it in his large gym rat hand because this man just loves your ass)

he’s perfectly fine with you doing your own thing. he doesn't require to be doing every single little thing together but he wants to stroke your thigh when you’re reading and he’s watching his cheesy romantic kdrama. because yeah san is a whole ass romantic. the hopeless kind.

but he’s also realistic. he knows loves comes from trust and communication and oh boy he just knows how to talk to you. even if he’s a little susceptible sometimes (i think he is a sensitive boy thats who’s hiding being the muscle mountain) he always communicates with you effectively. and that's because of his nurturing nature (cancer baby ♋)

At the end of the day san wants to coddle you, cherish you, LOVE YOU.

he has so much love to give. i mean he said it himself he grew up receiving a lot of love so he knows how to receive it and give it

speaking of it love isnt san’s only infinite resource 

i feel like san has also a lot stamina probably the highest out of all of them doesn't mean he has the highest sex drive (that’s probs mingi or joong) but when he’s in the mood he can go for a looooonnng time he is tireless, he is relentless

for instance he never taps out first. when your body is exhausted and your shivering and trembling and he’s came thrice already you have all the rights to assume he is done but then he folds your legs up on your chest again and you whimper because you don’t know if you can take it anymore so he whispers “please baby i just need one more, okay? will you be my good girl, just one more time?” you moan and arch your back as he slides in and he shivers from slight overstimulation. but nonetheless you look up to him through your wet lashes and nod. so he instantly starts to sharply snap his hips against yours, making you whimper meekly. “that's right baby. I knew you could do it, you’re doing so well” he whispers as he gently holds your chin up to bend down and kiss you.

that would be a common occurrence if he’s domming BUT! san is a switch especially with you he likes to hand out the reigns once in a while because he trusts you.

and if he subs that stamina becomes your greatest ally. you can just tie him up and work him with a fleshlight for hours, milking him so many times that the last orgasm has his cock twitching but nothing coming out anymore. You make him cum so much that you both lose count at some point. if he finishes and he softens a little sloppy kiss, a little teasing of his nipples (i feel like he has sensitive nipples idk why kdslmfkdfdmlskf) and then boom he’s hard again. that man just can’t resist you. and he whines for you to stop, to continue, he’s not sure. you can just make him go insane and he loves that.

ok so i teased it in yunho’s part but i think san has a size kink. big one. 

the reason behind it i think is actually an insecurity of his. i don’t think he’s satisfied with his height you can kinda pick up in his body language that it’s a sensitive subject whenever it’s brought up by the other members and i think it’s also part of the reason why he works out so much. sure he will never be tall tall but he can definitely be big. so i think san would be into a partner that’s smaller than him (rip us tall girlies)

so he loves to tower over you, he loves that he’s able to hide you behind him, completely conceal you.

if he’s fucking you missionnary he loves to really emphasize that. “look at you, so small down there?” he loves taking the overly sweet and condescending tone when he doms (it makes you melt every time). “you’re doing so well for me baby. your tiny little body is taking my big cock so well” and he would lay his weight on you, really making you feel small.

also quick side note regarding 🍆 size. i don't think san is really long i think he’s average BUT he’s definitely girthy. He’s got some width to him and i also think he’s slightly curved upwards and god does he take advantage of that. if he fucks you missionary the angle is just devine and he loves to push down on your belly making sure you really feel him (dont mind me screaming rn because of san’s secret bulge kink)

he also loves when you tend to his size kink while he’s subbing. that could sound counterintuitive at first but hear me out

if he’s lying on his back on your shared bed and you are riding him and edging him he would keep his hands to his side not to influence your rhythm. he goes absolutely insane when you say “look at you big boy?” giving a particularly harsh bounce. “you’re suffering quietly? why aren’t you flipping me over and taking me exactly how you'd want” at this point he would beg and squirm so perfectly. “i know why because you know you must not. because you’re a good boy and you’d anything keep it that way right baby?” maybe teasing his nipples a little bit making him grit his teeth. “yes yes i wanna be good for you. i wanna be your good boy. p-please. ah fuck… pleaseplease”. so there you turn around and aim for the finish line he just can't get enough of seeing your perfect ass bounce on his cock. it’s his favorite position he just loves it whether he doming or subbing he loves it and it doesn't take long before he collapses and stuffs you full of pipping hot cum with grunts interspersed with small whimpers.

then when sexy time is done i feel like san is the kind of guy that has to hop in the shower he doesn't stand being sticky especially to bed. if you’re too tired it’s okay because he’s strong and he will carry you to the bathroom and wash you and then he’ll tuck you in bed and spoon you 

he’d rather be the little spoon because he’s a big pouty baby after sex. but he’ll settle for anything if he gets to sleep curled up with you

bonus: i think san’s special kink would be recording you, making a sex tape with you. then watching it together. he would actually love to see more clearly how good he makes you feel or how small you actually look next to him. something he cant really see when he’s in the heat of the moment. he would also definitely tease you about it. “look at you, love. you’re shaking. i guess i must be that good” he would get so cocky about it but if you retort anything his wits go from 100 to 0 real fast. “what about you? look at you fucking moaning and worshipping my pussy? you really can’t get enough of it can you?” then he pouts for a second. Then he wraps his strong arms around your waist and pulls you close to him. “you’re right i can’t get enough of your pretty little pussy.” gives you a kiss on your nape and breathes heavily against your skin “i love how wet you get for me.” an other kiss and another sultry whisper. “can you show me again?” (circle back to the stamina thing… he’s INSATIABLE 😵‍💫)

IF U WANNA HELP ME PLEASE REBLOG WITHOUT USING THE COMMUNITY LABELS 🖤

a/n: finally back with this series! san was so fun to write actually. who will be next jongho, yeosang or hongjoong? just request them in the comments hehe <3

realistic sex with seonghwa, with mingi, with yunho, with wooyoung

ateez masterlist | navigation

[genshin-side-piece]

Sorry for yet another Neuvillette thirst but I keep thinking about kinda accepting him as your captor caretaker and that you can never get away from him, but now you don’t know how to act around him

The awkwardness between the two of you before was because, well, you didn’t like being kept in his house and having no autonomy, but now that you tolerate him (and dare I say, like him) the dynamic is changed and you don’t know what to do

You used to runaway or push him away when he was near but now the two of you are sitting amicably on the couch and you’re heart is fluttering and your face is on fire because he’s so close (and, you begrudgingly admit, quite attractive)

I love the idea of a once defiant darling developing a crush on their yandere and not knowing how to deal with it because suddenly everything is so awkward 🫣

Keep em coming! I love to talk about this kind of stuff. :) Hopefully I don't burst your bubble.

There's a bunch of different things going on here, so I'm going to break it down into pieces.

Let me start with the scenario itself. Is it possible, yes. Do I think a bunch of other stuff has to happen to make it possible? Also yes.

To me, when it comes to fictional yandere scenarios, there are two types of acceptance that can occur. There is acceptance of the situation and the reality of which darling finds themselves and then there is acceptance of the yandere themselves as anything more than a captor or keeper.

The way I view Neuvillette and his darling is that ultimately darling has accepted the life he has provided them, because there is no other option for them. If they manage to escape or if he casts them out, they will in theory have nothing. More so, if they try to explain where they've been or the situation to anyone, it's doubtful many would view the circumstances as truly horrible. Darling had a good home, provided for by the Iudex himself. Regardless of his "quirks", they're insane to leave it. I've said this in another post, but to me Neuvillette carries some built in immunity due to his position and reputation. Darling also lacks one crucial thing when it comes to all of this and that's evidence of mistreatment or wrong doing. Without it, people may view Neuvillette's over all actions as a kindness and darling as ungrateful for seeking outside assistance.

In the series, darling chooses to stay when Neuvillette sends them away during the crisis and they choose to accept their fate when it comes to him. What they don't do is choose him. Neuvillette remains as he always was. He is still their captor/keeper. The change is that protector is added to that list and darling feels/shows gratitude for him keeping them safe during the crisis. That gratitude takes the form of tolerance, specifically of Neuvillette and his need to be by darling's side. Tolerance is not equal to friendship or love. Acceptance is not the same as forgiveness.

Let's not beat around the bush. What Neuvillette has done is wrong. It can be classified as illegal. In order for things to progress between the two of them, Neuvillette would have to offer recompense to Darling for his misgivings, as well as extend a fair amount of trust when it comes to darling's movements. He would have to allow them their full liberty with the understanding that they will come back to him AND not try to turn him in. In turn, Darling would have to fully forgive Neuvillette for his actions and demonstrate that same level of trust by fully allowing him into their life, with the understanding that he will not try to control it. If that doesn't happen, then both subjects become an awkward sticking point between the two and the relationship goes into a weird territory. I don't think it's impossible for darling to develop feelings for Neuvillette without forgiveness. They've been locked in the house with him for a year, with varying levels of contact. The way I see them in my mind, is that they chalk the crush up to convenience or captive audience and not real feelings. I think it would go as far as them having their stupid sexy Flanders moment with Neuvilette and that would be it. Also hopefully I'm not aging myself with that reference. :)

That being said, IF both sides can come together, then I think they can safely move into crushes and butterflies in the stomach over how Neuvillette's whole face lights up when he smiles or how good his arms feel around them at night. I can't say for sure how Neuvillette would respond to the crush, but I think he would find their awkwardness fascinating and that's if he finds it awkward at all. The idea that they want to be near him, that they want to touch him? He's over the moon about that. He'll happily drink up every moment he can with darling, if for no other reason than he doesn't know if their mood will change and they'll begin avoiding him again. He just sort of goes with it, planning or in certain instances plotting different ways to keep them close. Him hiding all the throw blankets except for the ones big enough for two come to mind. He picks up the latest detective novel or the latest gossip rag and reads it to them as he encourages them to take their afternoon nap in his lap. They both go for walks in the country or he tells awful jokes that he picks up from the gestionnaires in the Palais, all in the hope that he can make them smile or laugh. The sky is really the limit in terms of how hard he tries. The question is, how much do you want to encourage him?

[diorkyeom]

THE @diorkyeom / @fairyhaos AO3 FIC REC LIST

last updated: 16/09/2023

masterlist. part two. part three.

a compiled list of all the ao3 fics that i've read for seventeen which i've loved, kudosed, and proceeded to download so i'll always have with me. to be updated whenever i have new recs!

are you soaked in dreams? - poppyseedheart

verkwan, non-idols, f2l, oneshot

hnggghhhhhh the softest, most caring fic ever. literally i adore when fics have hansol as this calm and loving force for seungkwan and seungkwan doesn't even REALISE that hansol is always by his side until something happens and he's hit with the full force of how much he adores him

stumble and fall (stage left) - pocketpastel

verkwan, uni au, romeo and juliet production, chaptered

the seungkwan characterisation is off the charts level of accuracy. i loveeee when people have kwan being as obsessed with hansol as hansol is with him pls it makes my heart so happy :< also theatre kid seungkwan and awkward skater boy hansol is just so sweet

Adventures In Fiction - thanku4urlove

verkwan, canon au, crack, fluff, oneshot

the hilarity and the feels are just sooo prominent. also reading fanfiction out loud to one another as part of bonding activities feels like a very very seventeen thing. i can imagine them doing it together and also seungkwan getting so emotionally attached to a fic??? the funniest and realest thing ever actually

i like you a latte - mysterywoozi(writers_haven)

soonhoon, coffee shops, uni au, fluff, oneshot

fluffy. so so fluffy, the kind of strangers/friends to lovers that really fits soonhoon so well. ngl i'm not too keen on reading loads and loads of enemies to lovers fics for soonhoon bc people don't understand that that's their banter, that's how they are as friends, and so i love when fics appear where they are these friends who have fun ribbing off each other. also it's the best when woozi is Whipped and he doesn't even realise it.

Skin;Heat - kwanies

soonhoon, synaesthesia, fluff, oneshot

it is INSANE how much i adore this oml. the idea of jihoon with this type of synaesthesia where he hears sounds and music for people? gorgeous. utterly incredible and so so him. and then soonyoung acting as jihoon's opposite and also his equal.... it's beautiful

Fast Pace - Mistehri

soonhoon, choreographer!hoshi, producer!woozi, crack, oneshot

funny!! so so funny and the rivalry of soonhoon despite being strangers is utterly hilarious. i just. love the soonhoon dynamic so much and this one feels like it encapsulates it so well and makes it lighter and cooler and sweeter and yes i adore it too

I'll Be Your Man - jeosheo

meanie, office au, rivals to lovers, fake dating, crack, chaptered

this author literally writes such gold in terms of humor oml. this is one of my favourite meanie fics bc it feels so so them and also?? mingyu and his family as these people with weird entrancing abilities is so so funny. also the FEELS wtf it's so good

spooked - lunahui

meanie, uni au, strangers to lovers, crack, oneshot

TOP TIER MEANIE FIC. the characterisation is so so them and i love the idea of mingyu hot guy who's actually lowkey just a soft loser. they're so sweet and so lovely and it's such a fun fic

Habit - alswiffy(lunahui)

meanie, canon au, falling in love, soft, oneshot

CRYING. I ONLY JUST REALIZED THIS IS BY THE SAME AUTHOR AS THE OTHER MEANIE FIC I ADORED. i love the domesticism of this, of loving someone like breathing, of working through feelings together and realising that you've been in love with each other all along

How Sweet It Is - orphan_account

gyuhao, baker!gyu, costume designer!hao, idiots to lovers, oneshot

SO FUNNY. SO THEM. i adore when people manage to get minghao's internal monologue right, (along w wonwoo's) and the way minghao also just becomes so stupid when he's found this hot guy to have a crush on??? gold. i love it sm.

press restart - Acavall

seoksoo, clap era, feelings realisation, oneshot

so so so soft oml. i don't actually read seoksoo a lot bc imo people don't really get their characterisation right, but this is just gold. it's the standard. i love it so much

The Light of Ulleungdo - Mistyreflections

seoksoo, village au, feels, chaptered

(check warnings for this fic)

i could talk for years about this fic and never be able to fully articulate how much it means to me. the imagery and the descriptions and the way it just instantly had me hooked?? i was originally sceptical about reading it but then i opened it, read the beginning in hao's pov, and the next thing i new it was 5 hours later and i had tears streaming down my cheeks and my heart thumping so hard in my chest

[thesweetnessofspring]

Do you subscribe to the theory that Katniss had a crush on Peeta before the games (but she wasn’t aware of it obviously) or do you think that she only kept track of him through the years because he saved her from starvation and was thankful?

I really love all your opinions, you really do make me see things from a different perspective sometimes and are also very sweet . Thank you so much 😊

Girl I subscribe to "Katniss was crushing on Peeta from the dandelion scene moving forward." I mean

Our eyes met for only a second, then he turned his head away. I dropped my gaze, embarrassed, and that's when I saw it. The first dandelion of the year. A bell went off in my head. I thought of the hourse spent in the woods with my father and I knew how we were going to survive. To this day, I can never shake the connection between this boy, Peeta Mellark, and the bread that gave me hope, and the dandelion that reminded me that I was not doomed. And more than once, I have turned in the school hallway and caught his eyes trained on me, only to quickly flit away. Maybe if I had thanked him at some point, I'd be feeling less conflicted now. I thought about it a couple of times, but the opportunity never seemed to present itself.

So first, our how-do-I-do-feelings Katniss is saying she's "embarrassed" about making eye contact with the cute boy who just saved her life. Do you know what a crush is? Embarrassing. Like omg it is the WORST thing especially when your crush is the most amazing person. Other people have shown Katniss kindness, even kindness that is nearly impossible to repay, like when Madge gave her the mockingjay pin and Finnick restarted Peeta's heart, but she doesn't feel embarrassed by it. Flustered and confused, yes, as well as resentful at times, but not embarrassed. So why is she embarrassed after catching Peeta's eye? Because she has her first crush right after being traumatized and thrust into a parentified role so she can't be a normal kid about it. And Katniss thought about thanking Peeta but didn't because the "opportunity never seemed to present itself" just sounds like a teenager avoiding talking to their crush. "Oh no, sorry, I didn't talk to him because things weren't lined up exactly perfectly for that to happen" is exactly what having a crush as a teenager is for us introverted people.

And I mean, come on. She associates hope and her very survival to Peeta?? At this point we've moved past first crushes into soulmate territory. She "can't shake the connection." This girl is a survivor, she hates vulnerability because it seems to be a weakness, and if it were just a crush she would talk herself out of it within a day. She logics her way out of finding Finnick attractive and running off with Gale into the woods. But Peeta is lodged in there before they even know each other. They have that red string of fate tied around their fingers and they cannot escape it.

Also thank you so much, I'm glad you like my little Everlark analyses! I really love talking about them, the best fictional couple ever created (I say with my whole chest and absolutely no exaggeration).

[desultory-novice]

...Needs Therapy? Tierlist

I don't often do these but I happened to see @icedragonlizard ‘s list and liked it enough that I wanted to do my own take on it based around my own HCs for the cast! (in a light-hearted way!)

[BREAKDOWN OF THE WHY'S BELOW!!]

-

[Row 1 / Doesn't Need Therapy]

I almost put Kirby in his own tier for "...is the therapist" but I thought it might look like he was giving up on the last row! (And in some cases he kinda did but still! XD) But anyway, yes. I think Kirby is just as strong mentally as he is physically. He doesn't need someone to talk to about bad dreams. He's the one who eats up bad dreams. ^_-

OG Animal friends (Rick, Coo, Kine) are all good in my book. Maybe they're just blissfully unaware of some of the chaos from the later games or maybe they're just okay with it cause they've got such a good foundation of support built up already? And despite creating "Apologies," I think Adeleine is not all that troubled on the day-to-day and is being an adventurous kid living her best life right now! Ribbon went through some trauma but I actually think she'd be handling it okay? She could arguably be moved down a tier though. Gryll MIGHT could be moved down a tier too, depending on whether you see them as a compulsive thrill-seeker or not! Elline is also doing great. That notebook-diary of hers is peak good mental health routine!

-

[Row 2 / Got Sorted Out in a Few Sessions]

I don't think Gooey's actual -problems- would/could be solved in a few sessions, but it's clear to me he's living his best life and I think our fictional therapist would see that and encourage him to keep going! Just let the guy know that it's okay to not know who you are. Bandee by my judgement has some issues, but he seems the type to respond really well to therapy and healthy suggestions!

Pitch could maybe be moved up a tier if he really is just a baby bird. But I look in those eyes and I just...wonder sometimes if he's okay up there?? Vul definitely needs someone to talk to, but I don't think his issues are all that severe either? Voted #1 Regular Guy on this entire table. The Fairy Queen and Claycia could use someone to talk to about possession trauma, I think. Void's here instead of a lower tier because the way I see it Void already GOT therapy in game! Clawroline and Gorimondo could be moved up a tier as well, but Carol may want to talk about seeing her partner, y'know, lose his soul and Gorimondo's routines MAY be slightly unhealthy?? (How many times are you going to let Meta Knight curb stomp you, man?)

-

[Row 3 / There's a LOT to Unpack Here...]

Whispy Woods has got a long history with Kirby, sure, but the whole attacking people as soon as you wake up? I think life's taken a toll on him and that's gonna need some discussion. Dedede is...obvious. Nothing unique to add here! Chuchu's placement depends on if she's still crushing hard on Kirby after all this time or not or just sees them as friends now. Kind of a joke placement at her expense! I’m sorry, Chuchu! I really do think you’re great! Best flapjack octopus!!

Skirby could maybe be moved down a tier as their coping methods are leaning a little into the sketchy as of late! Have they turned to violence for kicks or are they just challenging their mainverse self to grow stronger? Daroach is less here for Dark Nebula and more for all the OTHER stuff he lets slip in Mass Attack! (When did your hatred of tomatoes first start, Daroach?) Prince Fluff is here entirely because of the unused missing mom lore. Without that, he's so fluffy (haha) I'd moved him all the way up to "Doesn't need therapy." Flamberge definitely has issues, as the who~le cult does, but she still strikes me as the most balanced of the three mages? As I recall it, she actually sounded kinda excited to see the Star Allies during their second fight, as opposed to the first, which was just revenge for Fran. Leongar could be bumped down a tier, since he had his soul shattered in addition to being body-puppetted and forced to speak and adopt a foreign culture for years (?!) by an evil alien lifeform(!!) but...I dunno, he seems so chill in the ending and is seen back with the support of his pack? I think he'd be really receptive?? Elfilin also has sooooo many issues, but he's demonstrated so much growth already that I think with some help processing the return of/unification with his other self, his prognosis is very good!

-

[Row 4 / Gonna Be There for the Long Haul]

It's not that I think the lonely/jealous thing for DMS is particularly damning, but when combined with the ~Dark Matter~ thing and the fact that it may be nearly impossible for them to willingly go against hive programming/defy Zero is what's gonna give them a difficult road ahead. (Gooey's a sign it can be done though.) Honestly, Drawcia might could maybe be moved down a tier? I mean, if you see her "art therapy" as the World of Drawcia then... :sweats: But I have a lot of positive Drawcia HC and I want her to be happy ^^

I think Magolor is another self-explanatory one. Even Merry Magoland makes you wonder if he's still, y'know, "okay" on the inside. Taranza and Sectonia are obvious ones too. Susie is the only one I would consider maybe moving up a tier because she's got issues but the only one she was clinging badly too in my mind was the stuff with her father and she's moved on from that better than Taranza, who was still looking to resurrect Sectonia circa Star Allies. Was tempted to move President Haltmann down a tier simply because...I don't think a therapist can do anything about the evil super computer induced brain damage/LITERAL MIND DELETION.

Francisca gets here because of the corpse-sicle thing but maybe she should be moved down a tier too? ^^ I think most of the fandom has similar feelings on Zan and her level of damage. (/loving) And while he would have deserved it mid-game, I didn't want to put Hyness in the bottom tier now because that felt kinda cruel given the guy is trying his best to get better in the end of Star Allies!

-

[Row 5 / "...Well, I think we're done here."]

I don't think there's ANY reasoning with Kracko. Kracko is just a lifelong hater! (And we love him for that!) With Marx and Meta Knight, of course the joke is that they're both irreparably unhinged (/pos) but I think there's an element of, "Well, you SEEM to have your life sorted out according to priorities that make the most sense to you (...even if those aren't what the rest of society feels is healthy OR safe...) and you seem happy where you are so, best of luck to you!"

Zero is either emotionless or made of negative emotions and neither feels receptive to therapy, I'm afraid. With Galacta Knight... I just think it's best for the therapist to get out of there before the office is destroyed! Why risk the chance it doesn't work out?! And while I don't think Dark Meta Knight is hopeless myself, I DO think the therapist would be totally valid to politely tell them, "...I don't think you need MY help ^^; Have you considered checking out your local SCA chapter?" (Alternatively, DMK could be raised a FEW levels because between the joy with which he goes at those crayon drawings and the wing-sunning flappies, he may know how to treat himself better/ know better self-care than MK - hilariously.)

ShaDe may a walking bundle of possessions in a body and I don't know how you would tackle that in therapy?! Get him an exorcism?! Sillydillo is also living their best life with, um ...a-art...therapy... so I think they're fine...? Yes. Fine. Let's go with fine. (I love you so much, Sillydillo. I love you and your only-boss-in-Kirby-with-a-one-hit-instant-kill-attack-and-it's-shockingly-brutal-in-a-still-safe-for-little-kids-way! Shine on, you crazy star!) ...Attempting to talk down Fecto Forgo nearly led to the destruction of TWO planets so let's give them a little more time centuries to cool off first, yeah? Sounds good!

...Lastly, I almost moved Morpho Knight up to the first tier because, I mean, THEY don't seem to have any problems. THEY'RE just doing their job! Maybe their problems are everyone else's problems?! XD

-

As stated before, this is more my HC (with a dash of humor) rather than an entirely objective view of the Kirby cast and is all meant in fun! (Especially the placement of guys like Meta Knight XD)

I hope it amuses/inspires rather than upsets...!

[d3lly1000]

AU: TEAM SONIC HUMANIZED!

Hello! I don't post much here… But I want to change that! And to start, I finished the concepts for my take on "What if Sonic characters were human?" and voila. There it is!

I have HC'S and extra costumes for each one that I would like to share, so if you are interested, you can read this entire post to learn about my alternative :) (I will be giving credit for some versions that inspired me to create these babies too! X3) ~~~~~~ >>> SONIC, THE BLUE HERO

He is an athletic, supportive guy, loves running and likes to always keep moving. Contrary to what many people think, the "Blue Blur" cares a lot about his appearance and maintains his "SportLife" and "RacingLife" style;

He hates wearing pants. He always prefers baggy shorts!

His hair is originally wavy, but as time goes by it has lengthened with the help of the wind that always messes up his strands;

He is very popular with girls, but he is not that interested in it;

Fear of water in large quantities, specifically deep oceans and rivers;

The Bracelet with the greenish sphere on his right arm was a gift from his old friend Chip, but known as Light Gaia;

He has always grown up with his considered brother, Miles, being one of his greatest inspirations;

Secretly tries to impress people, more specifically Amy;

He always arm wrestles with Knuckles, but he always loses; • After he grows up, he tends to reduce his playfulness. Although this is a characteristic trait of his personality, it is a way for him to convey confidence to those he loves;

>>> AMY ROSE, THE FEARLESS HEROINE

She is a kind, sweet, loving and very generous girl. Amy always helps people and tries to do her best to welcome anyone in need;

But don't let her loves fool you, she can also be quite aggressive and fearsome when necessary;

Boys are afraid of seeing her angry;

Her style is focused on delicate blouses, dresses and lots of bows;

Her high-heeled boots make her look a little taller, but she is actually short;

She really likes cooking and giving Sonic surprise Chilidogs;

Knuckles is like an older brother to her. He is super protective, although he doesn't doubt that she can defend herself;

Tails and her spend a lot of time together while Sonic is away, making her a great friend and advisor;

Amy "secretly" has a crush on Sonic, although she never confesses it directly, she finds the Blue Boy's unstoppable and righteous nature very attractive;

• She has a great appreciation for romance and hero movies. She is inspired to protect everyone and lead the Resistance, even though she is often under pressure, she is a good-hearted girl;

>>> MILES "TAILS" PROWER, THE PRODIGY GENIUS

Tails is a young prodigy, he loves technology and creating new technological devices never seen before. He is the great creator of several prototypes used during the Resistance War against Dr. Eggman's Domino World.

Despite being a young genius, he is still a child. He likes to read science fiction and watch movies related to Heroes, and Amy usually accompanies him;

He sees Sonic as his older brother and dreams of one day becoming as great as him;

He is very afraid of thunder, which makes him very distressed during storms;

Knuckles and he developed a great friendship, he venerates him a lot and also aims to be a great protector like him;

He has already created a little robot fox to help him on missions. In addition to being a faithful partner, it also contains several upgrades for attack, defense and even espionage;

Tails wears his sweatshirt tied around his waist the wrong way around, making a parallel from the sleeves to his 2 tails…

>>> KNUCKLES, THE LAST MASTER GUARDIAN

He is extremely strong, has great control over his strength and resistance. Even though he is considered a "hot-headed" guy, Knuckles does recurring meditations to be able to control his inner forces;

He and Sonic have a very competitive friendship, both like to tease and make fun of each other whenever they have the opportunity;

Knuckles tends to be quite protective of Amy, so much so that it is one of the reasons he tends to be hard on Sonic sometimes;

He and Rouge also live a great "cops and robbers", and even though the Bat clearly shows an interest in him, Knuckles does not understand this yet;

He is the Guardian of the Master Emerald, so he is quite committed to his responsibilities, being very strict about it;

He usually wears very baggy pants, tank tops, leather vests and his trusty "cowboy" hat; ~~~~~~~~ ALTERNATIVE COSTUME:

EASTER EGG COSTUME:

My Inspirations: - @/Hallsth_eien - @/Angie Nekoblue - @/Lauren Ilustrated Thanks for read this!! And sorry for my bad English <3

[softguarnere]

Can I requests a oneshot with Ron Speirs x reader? everyone in easy thinks that big grumpy speirs holds a grudge against the reader bc he often gives her paperwork or smth but in reality he just wants to keep her around him out of protectiveness bc he likes her? But she doesn't know and thinks he doesn't like her either so shes kind of intimidated but also has a massive crush on him? But when he sees the reader with some other easy members he gets jealous and snaps so now he has to tell her that hes in love with her. Don't stress yourself, i just thought it could be interesting, thank youu

From Scratch

Ron Speirs x reader

Summary: No, what bothers you is that ever since he gained control of Easy Company, he’s done nothing but take opportunities away from you. You’re proud to be a lieutenant. But what’s the point of holding the rank if you never do any of the work that comes with it?

A/N: Thank you so much for the request, Anon! I swear I didn't forget about this - or the other prompts in my inbox. School has been keeping me busy this semester, so this took me a long time to write. But it's here now, and I hope you enjoy it! (This is written for the fictional depiction from the show - no disrespect to the real life veterans!) 💕🕊️

Warnings: mentions of war

“Uh oh!” Nixon singsongs when you step into the command post. “Looks like someone is in trouble.” He flashes you a broad grin as you make your way over to his desk and drop a stack of files with a heavy thwack! “What’d you do this time?”

Anger boils in your chest. Not towards Nixon. It’s not his fault. For his sake you try to keep your voice just as light and joking when you shrug and say, “Oh, you know, just the usual sort of thing. Got the scouting mission that I was supposed to lead taken from me and given to one of the sergeants.” You shrug. “No big deal.”

Except it is, and you both know it.

Nixon lets out a low whistle. “Damn. And might I inquire as to who arranged this?”

You roll your eyes. “Do you really need to ask?”

Speirs. It’s always Speirs.

Which seems unfair, somehow. You can still remember the first time you saw him, way back in Camp Toccoa, when he was in a different company, but already gaining a reputation for himself as one of the best runners. One time you passed him as you were going up the mountain and he was going down. He had nodded at you as he passed, and something about the niceness of the gesture made your heart jolt so fiercely that you almost tripped as you started on the switchback.

Then he went on to distinguish himself in other ways – the ever present whispers of rumors and stories that follow him like a cape made out of mystery – and suddenly, after he was put in charge of Easy Company, he didn’t seem so nice anymore. The rumors have never bothered you; Ron is a good leader, and you trust that he’s making whatever choices he needs to in order to keep the company safe.

No, what bothers you is that ever since he gained control of Easy Company, he’s done nothing but take opportunities away from you. You’re proud to be a lieutenant. But what’s the point of holding the rank if you never do any of the work that comes with it? (Well, besides paperwork, that is.)

The most frustrating part of it is that as angry as you are with him, you still feel your heart begin to hammer away in your chest whenever he enters a room – or race into triple time if you think he’s looking at you. How dare your own heart still feel so fondly towards him when your eyes can clearly see the obvious fact laid before you?

The fact being: Ronald Speirs dislikes you. Which kind of makes it feel as if someone is crushing your heart under their shoe, like a cigarette being ground out on the sidewalk, when you think about it.

You push the thought – and the feelings – aside. Or try to, anyway.

“I hate paperwork,” you mutter as you take a seat across from the intelligence officer. “Almost as much as he hates me.”

“I don’t think Speirs hates you.” When you fix him with an incredulous look, Lewis holds up his hands in surrender. “I mean, he might hold some sort of grudge against you, maybe, but hate you? If that were true, I think you’d be dead by now, (Y/N).”

You roll your eyes; it’s a conversation you’ve had before, and one that never fails to fill you with the smallest shred of hope that maybe Nixon is right about Speirs not completely hating you. “Well, now I hold a grudge against him for making me do all this paperwork.”

“You sound like somebody else I know. Ah, and if you speak of the devil, then he shall appear!”

Quick, confident footsteps approach the desk from behind you. Neither you or Nixon can stop the smiles that spread across your faces when Dick appears. Even something as simple as his presence has always been able to lighten the mood, and today is no exception.

He returns the smile as he pulls up a chair from a nearby desk to join you, but not before glancing over both shoulders, searching.

“The devil?” He huffs a laugh. “Weird. You were already here, Nix.”

“Oh ha ha,” Nixon deadpans. He props his feet up on the desk and leans back in his chair.

Dick gently pushes his friend’s feet off the desk, which makes Nixon sit upright. For his part, though, Nixon doesn’t seem to mind it. Or mind that Dick sets more paperwork in front of him. Well, at least someone seems okay with filling out forms. Maybe if you’re extra nice, you can trick him into doing all the work that Speirs assigned to you.

Just as you’re trying to sneak your stack of files in with Nixon’s, Dick raises an eyebrow at you.

“There a reason that you’re stuck inside again, Lieutenant?”

You shrug. “Oh, you know how I just can’t stay away from office work. And how much I love to be bombarded with company gossip by Nix.”

Lewis puts a hand over his heart and gasps. “What?! You mean to tell me that you don’t hang around here because you enjoy my witty banter and winning personality?”

“Actually, I would rather – “

You’re cut off by the sound of someone clearing their throat behind you.

Slowly, you turn to see Speirs standing a few feet away from where the three of you sit. Upon first glance, he looks a bit like a child standing on the fringes of a friend group on the first day of school, nervously waiting to see if he’s going to be invited to join in. But when the shock clears off, it’s impossible to miss the look in his eyes – there’s a darkness lurking beneath the surface that suddenly makes it so easy to see why every rumor thrown his direction sticks to him like he’s covered in paste. It makes your heart drop.

“Good afternoon, Captain,” Dick says, leading the charge bravely, as always.

After a nod and a brief salute, Speirs turns his attention to you. “Lieutenant (Y/L/N), I forgot to give you this.”

Your heart sinks when you realize that he’s holding yet another file full of paperwork. It’s such a setback that your heart can’t even bring itself to run wild when your hands briefly brush his as he hands it to you.

“Oh.” The words feel rough as sandpaper as you force them out. “Thank you.”

When you manage to meet his eye, Speirs has furrowed his eyebrows, which makes him look thoroughly annoyed. Standing so close, it’s easy to see the striking features of his face – like a marble bust of a Greek hero. He’s so handsome, even with the lines between his eyebrows and the frown tugging at his lips. It makes you want to reach up and smooth them away, let him lean into your touch so you can soften his features, molding them like clay into the gentle man that you imagine he might be under his tough exterior and the cold armor of rumors that make every line so harsh and so jagged to everyone else.

But you can’t do that. Instead, you’re separated from him by his armor, just like everyone else. You hate that you’ve caused him to look this way – to look at you this way.

“You know,” Speirs says, his voice quiet and as cold as the look he’s giving you. “it’s a lot safer here than it is on the line.” He glances back at Nixon and Winters before looking you up and down. “Get to work, Lieutenant.”

Then, just as quickly and as silently as he appeared, he’s gone.

It’s so cold, so impersonal. Your stomach turns to a block of ice.

Behind you, Nixon lets out a low whistle. “Well then.”

Get to work. Part of you wants to scoff, brush it off, and go back to your friends. The other part of you is chasing after him, trying to figure out where it all went wrong. Instead, you’re stuck standing there, staring after him, looking forlorn.

No, you decide. You can’t carry on like this.

The file falls unceremoniously onto the desk in front of Nixon as you toss it at him. “Finish this for me, will ya?”

Dick can’t contain the small laugh that escapes him when he sees the surprised look on Nixon’s face. You’re out the door before either of them can offer a proper response.

Outside, you don’t make it far. The door clicks shut behind you, and when you look up, you see him. Ron is a few feet away, coming towards you, closing the distance between you. Unlike a few moments before, he doesn’t look mad. The hard edges of his expression have softened into something like concern.

You stop in front of each other, each waiting for the other to say something.

“Can we talk?” You ask at the same time that Ron blurts out, “I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done that.”

You blink. “You’re what?”

Voices fill the air as a small group of officers approaches the command post. Ron gently takes your elbow and guides you aside so that they can pass, not seeming to notice or care what it does to your poor heart.

He lowers his voice as the group passes. “Can we talk? Privately?”

The Ronald Speirs wants to talk, alone, with you. There’s no question about it – you follow him.

He leads the two of you into one of the remnants of a building that soldiers have been quartering in. The skeletal remains of the structure probably provide no protection for whatever words he wants to exchange, but at least you can be away from prying eyes.

Alone, his dark eyes look you over. The motion isn’t as harsh as it was back in the command post. No, this is . . . gentle. Like he’s studying you.

You find yourself nervous under his gaze. Clearing your throat, you try to find your words. “You wanted to talk?”

Ron looks unsure of himself – something that you never would have imagined was possible. He runs a hand through his hair and sighs, the sound filtering through the hollowed out room you stand in like it’s the building’s last raspy breath.

“I was an accountant, back before the war.”

Whatever you thought he was going to tell you, it certainly wasn’t that. You raise an eyebrow.

“Oh?”

He nods. “I’m good with numbers; that’s my strong suit. Words . . . don’t work themselves out as easily. Some people mistake quietness for cruelness.” The dim light casts shadows on his face as he tilts his head. “You’ve heard the rumors, just like everyone else?”

Who hasn’t heard the rumors, the stories? Speirs can’t walk through a room without turning heads and leaving a trail of whispers in his wake.

“Yes,” your voice comes out as a whisper. Are they true? you stop yourself from asking, because with his sudden openness, you’re starting to question everything that you’ve ever known about Ron Speirs – everything you’ve thought you’ve known. Who is this man, really?

“I . . . didn’t mean to snap at you,” Ron admits, his voice as soft as the look that he’s giving you. “And I’m sorry about all the paperwork. I don’t have a grudge against you.”

You cringe. So he did overhear that part.

He wets his lips, not quite meeting your eyes. “I try to keep you off the line so that you’ll be safe. There’s no grudge or dislike or . . . I just wanted to keep you safe because – “ He cuts himself off with a deep breath.

With the quiet all around you, the frantic beating of your heart fills the silence. “You want to keep me safe?”

“Yes. If you’ll let me.”

Being in the same room as him felt impossible a few minutes ago. Now though, some inexplicable force draws the two of you together. You both step forward so that there’s hardly any space left between you. Something in the back of your mind wonders how things have changed so quickly. What else have you been wrong about?

“Who are you, Ronald Speirs?”

So close to him, you can see the smile tugging at the edge of his mouth when he replies, “There’s your answer: Ronald C Speirs. That’s all that I am.”

An accountant. Someone’s son, brother, friend who got drafted into the war. A man. The rumors and myths that shroud him fall away until someone you don’t know stands before you. You want to get to know him.

“Well, Ron, it’s nice to meet you. I’m (Y/N).” You smile at him, and it feels natural when he returns the gesture. “Can we maybe start over?”

Ron lets out a laugh and you could swear it was the sweetest sound in the entire world. “I would like that very much.”

[messinwitheddie]

Squee "Nny!! It's been, like, 45 minutes! It's a tiny-ass mobile home! What are you still DOING in there?!"

Nny "Right now, I'm sitting on the ugliest crushed velvet couch I've ever seen while eating a big bowl of the best slow cooker chili I've ever had. I can't wait to learn this recipe in the future. On that note, I should invest in a slow cooker."

Squee "Come on, man! You haven't found ANY physical proof he's not the future you yet??"

Nny "I mean... Other than the alarming number of empty tequila bottles left all over the place."

Squee "Ok, well, you never drink, so he's not you. Mystery solved. Let's ho home, please?"

Nny "Eh... I've started worse habits.

Future me is supposedly dying. Maybe I just stop caring."

Squee "Jesus, Nny, really?"

Nny "He lied about having wife. I haven't found any kind of medical bills or ID or photos or anything-"

Squee "Maybe he keeps his ID and important papers on him at all times, because, you know, cops are dicks."

Nny "Maybe, but-- The fuck--? Future me has a vintage dough boy salt shaker... And it's filled with baby teeth!"

Squee "What?"

Nny "Baby teeth, some shiny rocks and a Canadian dime?... I'm going to draw on it. See if I notice."

Squee "Don't draw on his shit, man."

Nny "Seriously, what's with the teeth?

I found a JAR completely filled with gold-capped teeth in his bathroom cupboard. I found a 25 lb bag of powdered lime in his pantry-"

Squee "Oh God..."

Nny "Yup. Just like the one in my pantry--

A chest filled with jewelry-- pirate booty shit."

Squee "That's kind of neat--"

Nny "And a BIRD WATCHING diary filled with nothing but terrible doodles of the local bird population. NO WORDS."

[Previous page

(Excuse any and all spelling mistakes. I always overlook one or two.

Oh, the invasion of privacy. Poor Mr. Casarez. Don't shit on his hobby, Nny lol.

To me, one of the funniest things Nny does, at least according to Twitter what I recall, is break into peoples' homes and helps himself to their stuff before killing them (because it's all fiction!! To be clear. I wouldn't think it was funny if it happened to a real life neighbor or real life person in general.)

Also, now I really want chili, but it's almost well past 3 AM and I have no ingredients for good chili. My fridge is all condiments at the moment. Been a rough year...

Finally, Noise is born!! Sorry, @psycho-doughart for the slow crawl to his debut. Poor little guy doesn't have a voice yet.

Again, I really appreciate any reblogs, comments or tag-comments I've received from previous strips. Tugs my heart strings.]

[got-into-worm-by-mistake]

Interlude 15.x Live Reactions

(This is going to be a very - no, insanely - long post)

As I noted, after this I'll be trying (ha!) to read faster, and on my phone more so I can just get this done.

This is gonna be an interesting read. Purportedly, after all, this is where we're supposed to get the idea that Amy raped Vicky. Though supposedly Wildbow had to do a line by line analysis to make that point on reddit (which I have not read) and I feel like if you have to do that for something like rape, you've kind of failed your task as a writer, at least in terms of conveying what you meant.

I wish, even more than usual, I could be coming into this fully blind but I'm not. I know the 'official' interpretation of this scene is rape, and that the text of the sequel makes it canonical that Amy raped Vicky here, but I also know large numbers of people never got that take, and Wildbow somehow spent years not noticing massive swaths of his readership didn't realize rape had happened... supposedly.

We'll see if I come away convinced that rape is the best reading that can be constructed from this scene, though from what I gather, it's more that a rape reading in this scene feels wildly out of place with all of Amy's other stuff.

It's certainly hard to reconcile the Amy we just saw in Arc 14 with Raping Vicky, though 14.10 makes it not impossible.

Of course, since I'm not coming in blind - I'm aware of the official version, and I've seen some people make the arguments in support of that reading and I've seen a bunch of arguments against that reading, etc - it's not like that all won't be hanging over all of this.

And the thing is, on a certain level, it doesn't actually matter. In the context of the universe itself, it certainly matters, but from the perspective of all these characters not actually existing in the real world, it doesn't really much matter to me.

On the level of Amy's actions: What she does do to Vicky that everyone agreed on (changing her brain, then mind controlling her in 14.6 and 14.10, not immediately removing the 'love me' change from Vicky's brain, wretching her - intentionally or accidentally or a mix or w/e - and not fixing her brain at any point there, and so on) is a gross and horrifying betrayal and a deep, deep violation of Vicky's mental and bodily autonomy. Making actual, real rape a thing that happened here as well is just icing on a cake, really, in a lot of ways, in the context of Worm. (Ward can and will be safely ignored for the rest of this post - in just a moment anyway)

For another, while it appears a lot of readers and fans did turn on Amy - her popularity in the fandom and in fics and stuff purportedly took a bit of a nosedive after the rape was made clear in Ward and in Wildbow's various WoG, though apparently there were still people who read Ward and missed that rape was made clear (Maybe use the word? Apparently Wildbow doesn't even use that word in Ward), it wouldn't actually change much for me.

(Now ignoring Ward)

See, some of my favorite fictional characters have comitted rape.

Damon Salvatore? Mass murderer and... though the narrative doesn't really linger on it, he rapes Caroline Forbes in early Season 1, and his girlfriend that he gets at the end of S2 (I think) and is dating in early S3 is a relationship so full of Compulsion (mind control ability vampires have in TVD verse) that it's moved well past dubcon, I'd say. And there's probably other shit like that in the man's past. Again, the narrative doesn't linger, but it's fucking rape. Still love Damon, amazing character, my trash son, but yeah, committed rape. Absolute monster, by any reasonable standard.

Regina Mills - again, mass murderer, tyrant, and... at the very least, she raped the Huntsman for possibly up to 38 years. (Again, it's never clearly stated, but she ripped out his heart - which in OUAT verse is a thing dark magic allows that lets the holder of the hard dictate commands to the person and also just kill them if they crush it - and then commanded her guards to bring him to her chambers. Ten years later, she casts the dark curse, and the Huntsman's cursed persona is having sex with her about once a week, at least, for the next 28 years, though given the nature of the curse, only Regina and later her son Henry are aware of the passage of time.) Regina is my favorite OUAT character, has an amazing redemption arc, and is unquestionably a hero to the point where she's crowned the 'Good Queen' in the series finale by Snow White (i.e. the girl she became evil while chasing revenge on). The narrative doesn't really linger on it, I'm not even sure the writers quite realized that it was rape, but I never believed it anything else. Still love her, because she and the Huntsman are both entirely fictional. Not real people.

On BtVS, Faith attempts to rape Xander, and basically does rape Riley while in Buffy's body (Riley is Buffy's boyfriend and thinks it's Buffy he's having sex with. Also she also effectively rapes Buffy by having sex with Riley while in control of her body). I still love her, one of my favorite characters. Again, the narrative doesn't really linger on this (the show in general has a bad habit of not lingering on female-on-male sexual violence or sexual harrassment).

Also on BtVS, Willow wipes her girlfriend's (Tara) memory so she forgets a pretty serious argument they were having, and then they have sex the next day, which Tara would probably not have had if she was still angry with Willow. While the show never calls it rape, I and large parts of the fandom consider it as such. (Tara never calls it rape either, though she is incredibly furious with Willow when she finds out, and they break up - and then get back together 12 episodes later, buuut :shrug) Still big fan of Willow, Tara/Willow is still the biggest ship for willow and one of the largest ships in the fandom.

Now, it's true that in all four cases, the writers either didn't realize it was rape, or didn't care and never really address it, but the key point is that I am perfectly capable of being a huge fan of Amy and wanting to see her redeemed/get better/etc (which I am and do) and accepting that she committed rape. So it's not like I'm going to just insistently refuse to see rape

Now, apparently part of the argument against the 'rape happened' reading is also how 15.x fits into the rest of the work, both before, and after, with regards to the fact that (apparently) Amy doesn't really talk about Vicky with any sort of sexual element, just a worshipful adoration, etc, (and the fact that rape never comes up and so forth) which I won't know until I get that far. But again, it is worth noting that large numbers of people didn't get rape as the intended reading, which again, seems like a pretty big detail to fail to convey to the reader. It's worth nothing that the comments for 15.x on the actual worm website mention 'mindrape' and that it felt 'rapey' but not 'rape' full on.

Now, with a much larger preface than intended, let's actually read this godforesaken Interlude.

Actually, having done the live reaction below, I'm gonna put it all below a readmore

Some of that was fatigue, some of it was hunger, some was thirst.  She had no idea how much time had passed.  She might have been able to guess from her period, but her body had decided such would be a waste of precious resources.  It hadn’t come, and she had no idea how many weeks or months it had been.

You only keep a Kidnap victim for weeks or months if you think there's a chance of a ransom. The fact that Carol's parents refused to just fucking pay the goddamn ransom for that long says a lot about how shit they were. Carol absolutely sucks as a mother, but she did have a pretty shitty starting point (though, somehow, somehow, Sarah managed to be at least halfway decent, so Carol could have come out better, but now I'm trying to compare traumas here and that's pretty sucky, but remember this is a Carol Dallon Hate Blog)

“Amy has always insisted she couldn’t heal brain injuries.” Alan winced.  “I see.  The worst sort of luck.” Carol smiled, but it wasn’t a happy expression.  “So imagine my surprise when, after weeks of taking care of my husband, wiping food from his face, giving him baths, supporting him as he walked from the bedroom to the bathroom, Amy decides she’ll heal him after all.”

Love how she just glosses over the part where Bonesaw actively did even more, possibly eventually fatal, damage to Mark's brain. Even when she does Mention Bonesaw invading the house below, she doesn't mention that part.

I feel like Mark would be able to mention that, so I'm sure Carol is just conviently ignoring the part where Amy was faced with 'Mark fucking dies if I don't break my rule'

“Oh, I imagine she was.  Victoria went looking for her after she ran away, returned home empty-handed.  I think she was even more upset than I was, with Amy taking so long to heal Mark.  She was almost inarticulate, she was so angry.”

So that would suggest that at least at first Vicky doesn't tell Carol what Amy did to her. Which would fit with Vicky saying she hadn't told anyone back in the early parts of Arc 14 (don't remember which chapter she said it) but the context could have just meant 'didn't tell the Protectorate/PRT' Though, it does still leave the open question: Amy was running around the city for fucking DAYS, a week possibly? between Interlude 11h and when she shows up in Arc 14.2 or 14.3. Did Carol even look for her? Why isn't she looking fucking now? She's your daughter, right, and Slaughterhouse Nine is looking for her too?

Is Sarah looking? Mark? Crystal?

Even if you don't love her or care about her, you shouldn't want S9 to have ahold of her, so maybe look for her rather than FUCKING FILE PAPERWORK?!

Carol fidgeted.  “Oh, that wasn’t even the worst of it.  Victoria’s been flirting with the notion of joining the Wards, and she went out to fight the Nine just a few days ago.  Apparently she was critically injured.  She was carried off for medical care and nobody’s seen her since.”

Ah, so this is now happening post-S9 leaving the city (though there's still no mention of Carol looking for her) and she's... not even looking for Vicky?

Like, okay, big city, might not be able to find her, but I feel like if I had a kid that I purportedly loved (as Carol does supposedly at least love Vicky, in her own horrible abusive sort of way) and said kid was missing and I had superpowers making it safe to go looking, I would be looking, damn the goddamn paperwork.

This woman just can't actively not suck.

Also, of all the people to be talking about this to, why the fuck is it Alan Barnes. Just a weird character to use for this. Is it supposed to be a juxtaposition - Carol was a neglectful bitch and Alan a too supportive parent and both ended up screwing their kids up?

“Or dead,” Carol said.  She blinked a few times in rapid succession, fighting the need to cry.  “I don’t know.  I was patrolling, searching, and I felt my composure start to slip.  I feel like shit for doing it, but I came here, I thought maybe if I took fifteen minutes or half an hour to center myself, I could be ready to start searching again.”

Okay, so there's that, so she was looking and just (understandably) needed a moment, but again - did you look for Amy at all earlier? Did fucking anyone? Somehow no member of New Wave actually showed up anywhere during Arcs 12 or 13 or 14, apart from Amy and Vicky.

He’d tried to attack them?  Carol couldn’t understand it.  He was the one who’d taken care of them.  When he’d appeared, she’d been happy.  And now it felt like that had been ruined, spoiled. She felt betrayed and she couldn’t understand why.

Stockholm Syndrome is a hell of a drug. But trigger trauma isn't much of an excuse, Carol, really fucking isn't.

“We didn’t know where you were.  But let’s not fight again.  The important thing is that Tattletale pointed us in the right direction.  We think we know where your daughters are.” Daughters?  Plural? Carol couldn’t put a name to the feeling that had just sucker-punched her.

Right, because with what little you know about the situation, you shouldn't actually have much reason to be that worried.

Technically, you're right this time, which I really kind of hate on the 'Carol Sucks' level of my personality, but you have no valid basis, because your paranoia was not actually well-founded.

The Brockton Bay Brigade closed in on the man who stood by his leather armchair, wearing a black silk bathrobe.  He held his ground. “If you’ll allow me to finish my wine-” he started, bending down to reach for the wine glass that sat beside the armchair.

Marquis really is the textbook fucking definition of classy, isn't he? :rofl:

 It meant she didn’t fall on her rear end, and she could pick a more appropriate posture as she snapped back into her human shape.

I mean, falling on your ass in a fight is just bad from a tactical standpoint, but also, I mean, you can't go losing style points, right?

The needles retracted.  Marquis rolled his shoulders, as if loosening his muscles.  “Broke your foot?  How clumsy.”

If nothing else, he's fun.

Well, only in a sense.  They still hadn’t touched him, and two of their members were out of commission.  Three, if she counted Fleur being occupied with a wounded Lightstar in her arms.

And so let's use his child against him! Great move!

Let's invade someone's home without checking to see if there's any innocents around! GREAT PLAN!

Was he distracted?

Maybe ask yourself why.

Though, I will say - Marquis didn't have to play Coy. He quite literally could have just said 'my daughter's in that closet'. They might not have believed him, but it wouldn't have been hard to show them.

I'm not saying I don't get why he didn't, but technically Marquis didn't make the most optimal choice here.

But that... happens.

“Careful now,” Marquis chided her.  “Don’t want to get decapitated now, do we?”

*giggle*

Instead, she turned and charged for the closet, creating a sword out of the crackling energy her power provided, slashing through the plates of bone that had surrounded it, then drawing the blade back to thrust through the wooden door-

I dunno. I know it's Amy - we all know it's Amy, at this point, even people reading Blind - and we're inclined to dislike Carol anyway at this point, again, even people reading Blind, I assume - but this just seems incredibly foolish.

Like, I guess maybe leaping straight to 'there's a kid there' might be a bitch much, and Carol in particular probably would have a hard time imagining Marquis as caring about another person because she's projected her issues with her kidnapper onto him for... reasons, but I mean, he could have a wife (or husband, I suppose) or girlfriend or all manner of things in there you may not want to hurt, and like... I dunno, I'd at least fucking open the closet before swinging in there? Maybe?

Fic idea - Marquis is a little too slow, but instead of killing her (I have read one fic where that happened. Marquis, understandably, kills Carol right after) he like, maims Amelia or something, cuts off her arm, or gives her a major scar or something.

That could be a really interesting story. Especially if Marquis still gets beaten, or Carol gets away and has to look at her daughter after having done that.

(I may hate Carol, but I can't imagine she'd be blithe about having maimed an innocent child, even Marquis kid, in the middle of a fight.)

*ads the fic idea to the list, which won't stop growing*

She stared down at him.  That long hair, it was such a minor thing, but there was something else about him that stirred that distant, dark memory of the lightless room and the failed attempt at ransom.  Her skin crawled, and she felt anger boiling in her gut.

This is so insane and then you take that projection and add a second layer onto Amy and like what the ABSOLUTE FUCK is wrong with you sick little woman?

“What were you so intent on protecting?” Manpower asked.  “This where you stash your illegitimate gains?”

Because Marquis didn't just say he didn't really care if they destroyed his expensive home a few minutes ago. Jesus Christ Manpower really is a dumb brute, isn't he?

“Her mother’s gone, I’m afraid.  The big C.  Amelia and I were introduced shortly after that.  About a year ago, now that I think on it.  I must admit, I’ve enjoyed our time together more than I’ve enjoyed all my crimes combined.  Quite surprising.”

Is that actually a thing anyone does? Or ever did? Is that a Canadian thing? Or a new england slang? 90s Lingo? I feel like no one has ever called Cancer 'The Big C' before.

That feels like something a writer - not necessarily Wildbow - invented and people just ran with even though it wasn't actually a thing people did.

If Marquis had realized how fucking terribly Carol would have raised Amy, I have to imagine he'd have settled for foster care instead. :rofl:

The idea disturbed her.

Why? Maybe get some fucking therapy for that, bitch? Seriously.

WHY THE FUCK DOES THIS DISTURB YOU?!

Maybe ask yourself that question?! But then, I suppose if you were capable of a single iota of self-examination, you would not have been such a shit mother and indeed, shit human.

That cultured act, the civility that was real.  Marquis was fair, he played by the rules.  His rules, but he stuck to them without fail.  It didn’t match her vision of what a criminal should be.  It was jarring, creating a kind of dissonance. That dissonance was redoubled as she looked at the forlorn little girl.  Layers upon layers, distilled in one expression.  Criminal, civilized man, child.

Right, and how dare something not line up with your view of the world? How DARE?! Surely the problem is with the thing, and not you?! SURELY!

“Then you take care of her,” Brandish replied, even as she mentally prayed her sister would refuse.  There was something about the idea of being around Marquis’ child, that uncanny resemblance, having those memories stirred even once in a while, even if it was just at family reunions… it made her feel uneasy.

*shakes head* jesus christ.

I wonder what Amy Pelham's relationship with Aunt Carol would have been like. A lot of 'why doesn't Aunt Carol like me?' I imagine. Which might have led to Sarah berating Carol into getting help sooner, because I can't imagine Sarah wouldn't have loved her daughter Amy as much as Eric and Crystal.

Though who knows. May just be grass is greener.

“You should.  Amelia’s Vicky’s age, I think they would be close.”

*nervous, awkward, darkly ironic laughter*

“I’m sorry to bring it up,” Brandish said. “But it’s relevant.  I decided I could have Vicky because I’d know her from day one.  She’d grow inside me, I’d nurture her from childhood… she’d be safe.”

And you did a bang up job with her! Two thumbs up! /s

“That child deserves better than I can offer.  I know I don’t have it in me to form any kind of bond with another child if there’s no blood relation.” Especially if she’s Marquis’. “She needs you.  You’re her only option.  I can’t, and Fleur and Lightstar aren’t old enough or in the right place in their lives for kids, and if she goes anywhere else, it’ll be disastrous.”

I can't believe I'm saying this, but: Sarah, Sarah, look at me.

Listen to Carol. For once in her life, she's actually right about something.

Look at me Sarah. Listen to your sister.

You could grow to love and trust that little girl, too.”

Truth is, she probably could have, but it would have required Carol getting over herself, and that, as it turns out, was borderline impossible.

I don't believe it would have been completely impossible - people always have a choice - and that's why, at the end of the day, I will never let sympathy for Carol rise beyond the barest of minimums, because she had a responsibility to be better, to get better, not just for Amy, but for Vicky, and she didn't, and so again, This Is A Carol Dallon Hate Blog.

Was the girl in shock?  Carol couldn’t muster any sympathy.  Amy was stopping her from getting to Victoria.  Victoria, who she’d almost believed was dead.

See, this is just...

I mean, I'm glad Carol didn't kill Amy here, but Carol has not even an iota of concern for Amy, and yet, once she sees the state of Victoria and supposedly finds out that Amy raped Victoria, she suddenly has enough sympathy for Amy to not kill her?

I -

Seriously. Absolute bizzaro world shit here, Wildbow.

“So I thought I’d put her in a trance, and make it so she’d forget everything that happened.  Everything that I did, and the things that the Slaughterhouse Nine said, and everything that I said to try to make them go away.  Empty promises and-“

Okay, so like, you can Amy's lying here, but all we have to go on is what she says, you know? If Wildbow wanted us to get the takeway that Amy's lying here, he kind of needs to make that more clear.

Like, far from done, and I am kind of biased against WB at this point, to say the least, but it's just really fucking hard for me to see this girl acting like this if she just raped her sister.

I mean, really, man, if that really was your intent, you did a REALLY bad job of conveying it, and when you fail as a writer you don't fucking take that out on the readers.

(Right, sorry, I said I was ignoring Ward. Back to doing that)

She could never be my daughter because she’d never stopped being his.

She doesn't even remember him, you crazy psycho!

Amy kept talking, her voice strangely monotone after her earlier emotion, as if she were a recording.  Maybe she was, after a fashion, all of the excuses and arguments she’d planned spilling from her mouth.  “I wanted her to be happy.  I could adjust.  Tweak, expand, change things to serve more than one purpose.  I had the extra material from the cocoon.  When I was done, I started undoing everything, all the mental and physical changes.  I got so tired, and so scared, so lonely, so I thought we’d take another break, before I was completely finished.  I changed more things.  More stuff I had to fix.  And days passed.  I-“

I'm having trouble seeing it. I really am.

I get that we're supposed to see 'break' as like... Amy raping her or something but -

But that -

no.

 It might even have been something objectively beautiful, had it not been warped by desperation and loneliness and panic.

Everything about this scene just paints Amy as pathetic and pitiable. She really is a sopping wet poor little meow meow here.

I'm not saying a rapist can't also be pitiable - someone can be victim and victimizer, of course they can - but if you want the pitiable character to be seen as a rapist, or, you know, hated, for what they did -

Especially when it's from fucking Carol's POV, and Wildbow just got done explaining how little regard Carol actually has for Amy, how she has no sympathy for the girl and everything.

If there's any POV that should not be painting Amy as pitiable, but as the rapist we're supposed to believe she is, it's Carol's right?

Then I’d go and spend the rest of my life healing people.  Sacrifice my life.  I don’t know.  As payment.”

Wildbow makes the most woobifiable character in the world, and then gets self-righteous when people woobify her.

News at 11.

And with everything laid bare, there was not a single resemblance to Marquis.  There was no faint reminder of Brandish’s time in the dark cell, nor of her captor.  If anything, Amy looked how Sarah had, as they’d stumbled from the house where they’d been kept, lost, helpless and scared. She looked like Carol had, all those years ago. The weapon dissipated, and Brandish’s arms dropped limp to her sides.

All this does is make Carol look narcissistic in the weirdest and worst way. She can only give a shit about someone who reminds her of... her?

But I mean, the whole reason she supposedly loved Vicky is because Vicky came from her, so she should have that take priority over...

I'm sorry. I'm just not seeing it. I'm not -

And Carol's actions here, even with the 'she looked like carol had' just...

No. This is weird. This is confusing. This is nonsensical. And I'm sure as shit not getting a 'Amy Raped Vicky' takeaway here.

Even allowing for Jack's comment about 'indulging' in 14.10. When Amy didn't agree or anything, and Jack would have no way to know what Amy did or didn't do when he wrote that letter we see in 14.11.

Like, if I squint and force myself to twist my brain into nots I can... pretend I can see it... but even then...

I mean, maybe Amy's lying, and characters lie and misrepresent and so on, true, but unless the text gives us a good reason to believe they are, which it hasn't yet...

I mean, it's the official version, the official narrative, that it's Rape. That's the WoG. And like...

Even if I didn't have my, admittedly largely unfounded, suspicions that Wildbow is just flat out lying about his original intent or meaning, I do believe that WoG should be an enhancement to and addition to the text, not a direct contradiction.

It really does seem like WB ended up falling into the trap of figuring he could just let his WoG paper over mistakes in his writing rather than getting it right the first time?

Carol stared as Amy shuffled forward.  The cuffs weren’t necessary, really.  A formality.  Amy wasn’t about to run.

I mean, this is another thing I don't get. Amy haters harp on Amy 'running away from responsibility/consequences' but I mean... quietly going to the Birdcage, an unaccountable black box of a prison where (IIRC from what I've heard) 2/3s of the prisoners ended up dying by the time of the breakout is sort of the opposite of running away?

I mean, Amy should have fixed Vicky before going, this is true, but it seems clear she wasn't sure she could, and would Carol and Sarah have even let her?

As if she could convey everything she wanted to say in a single gesture, she folded her daughter into the tightest of hugs.

I -

I mean, I suppose stranger things have happened, but of all the times to actually suddenly start giving a shit about Amy, it's here and now?

Yeah, I can't reconcile this with Wildbow's official narrative of things.

“Victoria is gone.  There’s nothing of her left but that mockery. 

Yeah, okay, back to Carol just sucking 100%. That's more familiar ground.

The day I cease seeing her as his daughter and see how she could be mine, he takes her back, she thought.

Well, no one to blame but yourself, Carol.

Yeah, my official verdict is: if this is supposed to be the scene that convinces the reader Amy raped Victoria, then...

Yeah, I'm not seeing it. I'm not seeing anything that makes that implied even with a tortured reading. Even with the most hostile reading, I don't -

I don't see it. I really don't. I'm trying to have as open a mind as possible, I tried to look for it -

This isn't me questioning a victim in the 'was it really rape' way or whatever, I'm questioning whether the writing of a scene conveys the idea that one character committed the physical/sexual act of rape on another, and this scene does not. Maybe there's another scene later on (In Worm) that will convince me, but...

This one sure doesn't.

[smokersbaby]

Hello :D first of all, I love your Tumblr blog and writing, your posts about Smoker make me feel butterflies in my tummy. (Yeah, he deserves more love, he's such an underrated character and husband material, so I'm really happy to read all your writing about him ✨) Sorry for not sending a request or leaving a comment sooner (I was nervous because I don't speak italian, my native language is spanish, and I'm insecure about my english knowlege 🙏) I'm so excited to see blogs like yours, Smoker is my favorite One Piece character and let's say he was my unexpected fictional crush from the series haha. (He is such a handsome, kind, righteous and complex character, I feel an unhealthy amount of love for him😭)

So, after all that thirst for Smoker, the request. Do you have some thoughts or headcanons of him being a husband or even a father? I've noticed that people often forget that he is such a sweet man with children and that side of him just melts my heart. (The moment with the ice cream little girl in Loguetown made me fall in love with him in the first place💖)

Thanks for all the love and effort you put in your writing :D you don't need to answer my request if you don't feel comfortable with it so feel free to ignore it, I will understand 👍🏻✨ And keep on writing, you're doing amazing🌟

Thank you so much for all your kind words! Don't you worry about the language since I'm the first one who makes a lot of errors here! Moreover, my sister lives in Spain so when she comes to Italy with her little daughter we speak in Spanish (at least I try).

Smoker is the perfect husband material, I'm sorry if I haven't written more SFW about him until now but I didn't have the chance, so I am more than happy to expose him like that! (that scene in Loguetown lives in my head/heart rent free and I go look at it every time I'm sad, just to let you know) 💕

Characters: Smoker TW: mention of sex (intimate moments part) Notes: if you love Smoker and need some comfort, this is the perfect fanfic for you, I hope you enjoy this as much as I did writing it 💕

-> As a husband <-

Jealousy -> he isn't the kind of person that demonstrates openly how jealous he is towards you when someone else gives you attention (there will not be jealousy dramas), but he'll look at the other person with a deadly look from distance. He is jealous of you, more than you could imagine, he can't think of you in someone else's arms.

Sleeping together -> He loves when you use his chest as a pillow (and you love poking and squeezing his boobies too, let's say that), with his arms caressing your back when you fall asleep on him. He doesn't move a muscle when you nap, even though he grunts as he starts to feel his arms getting dizzy from the uncomfortable position due to your weight on him. He snores when he sleeps (sorry for that) and can be a quite heavy sleeper when it's with you (the opposite happens when he has a mission and must be alert).

Protection -> do you remember Smoker saying "you ain't laying a finger on my soldiers!" when he fights pirates? Well, he's protective towards you as well, but hundred times as much! Nobody could harm you when you are with him, if someone does, that person would be torn apart within minutes.

Cuddles -> he doesn't demonstrate his love in public, and Smoker blushes a lot trying to stay calm when you try to do mushy stuff with him in front of people. But, when you two are alone, he loves cuddling you whenever he has the opportunity. The thing he loves the most is hugging you from behind and placing his chin over your head as he does so, it happens almost whenever you are in the kitchen cooking or just brushing your teeth in the bathroom.

Cooking -> Smoker is not the best cook in the couple, he tried a lot of times and with a huge effort trying to impress you but he ended up throwing away a lot of pans since they were almost burnt or too difficult to clean after he finished. Once he gave you the only edible meal he cooked and he thought you were joking as you told him that it was quite good.

Living together -> Smoker never thought he could enjoy living with someone else this much. Since you two moved in together, he started to do everything with you, most of all because his work schedule it's quite strict and he tries to spend time with you as much as possible in your shared house. He's quite an organized person, if you thought he might be messy with clothes you're wrong: it's mostly the times he reproaches you for not putting your things in order (he's a marine after all, what did you expect?)

Going out -> He loves taking you out to play pool with him. He can't help but chuckle seeing you try your best and lose against him. When you make mistakes missing the balls with the billiard clues Smoker laughs a bit, but just because he can use this opportunity as his advance, placing his hands on your waist trying to teach you how to play properly (of course most of the time you pretend you can't play to make him approach you).

Intimate moments -> He's intense, for real. He won't let you leave the bedroom until he satisfies every desire of yours (it's him that insists to do that, not you). He loves your body and kisses every inch of you before using his mouth to make you see stars. Smoker adores you when you ride him taking the lead since he's accustomed to giving orders in his job, it's like a kind of role reversal to him. He can be a little bit rough at times in bed, grabbing you by your thighs and leaving small bites on your neck, but he won't ever push you beyond your limits. Smoker also loves when you ask him to spank your butt since he can't take his hands off of it. He has a slightly praising kink and loves telling you how good you are at taking him all inside of you.

-> As a father <-

Smoking -> he doesn't smoke around you when you are pregnant as doesn't smoke around his children since his family is the top priority to him, but since his kids want to be with their dad all the time he's quite stressed about abstinence from smoke.

Protection -> Good luck to everyone who tries to harm his children, no one could ever think about such a thing, and when the idea of someone harming his children comes into Smoker's mind, he can't help but think about all the things he would do to make these people pay in the most atrocious ways.

Boy or girl? -> He wants a girl, definitely, but he'll be hella protective towards her when she starts growing up. He'll treat her like her little princess and bring her on his shoulder every time he can. Smoker can't resist but give her all she wants, even when he knows he shouldn't spoil her but he can't say no to his little princess.

Cherishes your body -> There's no need to be insecure about your body after giving birth since he'll love every curve of yours during and after pregnancy: every pound you gained in the 9 months is a pound more for him to love. Your stretchmarks are just a sign of you bringing to this world his child. He doesn't care if your body changed after the birth of your babies, this is just another reason to make you feel appreciated more than before since he can't see you sad about it and won't ever let it happen.

Finds time to stay with you -> Probably it won't be easy for you two to find time for yourself when you both have children to take care of and he's away in marine missions for days. But when you finally find a little bit of time to spend alone with Smoker it's like when you were just married, snuggling in bed as he gives you all the attention he can to the person he loves the most.

Playtime -> Smoker tries to find time to play with them, which can be kinda difficult at times because of his job. His children love pranking him while he's busy or distracted. Smoker sighs and puts on a (fake) grunt on his face as this happens and then starts chasing them playfully all over the house. They love pretending to be pirates escaping from the big marine that is their father, Smoker plays along but he's kinda worried when he sees his children enjoying this game, he hopes with all his heart that his kids won't ever become pirates.

When the kids grow up -> He teaches them the difference between what's right and what's simple, which can be difficult since he has seen so many people taking the wrong way in life, but he tries to not push them about it since he knows he'll probably get the opposite reaction from them. He loves his children so much and is a little bit scared of them growing up, Smoker wants the best for them.

[thefiery-phoenix]

YANDERE PETER QUILL X SHY READER (GUARDIANS OF THE GALAXY)

You promised yourself that you wouldn't fall in love with anyone and yet here you were day dreaming and fantasizing about the star lord who was none other than Peter Quill. You just couldn't help yourself, you still remembered the time he saved you from some inter galactic beast and he made sure you were all right. That moment was magical for you because that was the first time you've met him. When you joined their team you were thrilled,you could prove your worth to Quill and impress him with your skills. It also gave you the chance to be more closer to him but however there was a tiny drawback to this wonderful plan of yours: You had a feeling he liked Gamora and KEYWORD, I said FEELING

You saw how close they both were with each other and you could understand why he'd chose Gamora. She was strong and skilled and extremely tactful. Not to mention she was pretty good looking too and she made you feel like an idiot most of the times. Gamora was never mean to you of course but her skills made your powers look like an absolute joke next to her. She was pretty friendly to you as well which was why you didn't really have the heart to split Peter and Gamora's relationship with each other so you just had to push your feelings deep down inside you and forget about Peter. However Peter wouldn't forget about you though

Quill was getting worried with the way you were acting these days. You barely talk to him now and it's making him go crazy and insane. He loves hearing your voice and when you talk about something you're passionate about your eyes sparkle and light up with joy. He found that endearing and it takes him all his self control to pinch your cheeks and hug you. You used to bring him coffee whenever he'd stay too late and convince him to sleep and get some rest. He was touched with your kindness and soft caring nature. Overtime he's become increasingly possessive of you of course but you haven't really noticed it. Whenever you talk to someone else he'll either interrupt the conversation with something he's done better than the other person or he'll just drag you the heck away from there and spend time with you instead

He doesn't mean to be a nosy snoop but it's hard not to when you leave your cute little black diary sitting out in the open like that. He tried to resist reading it since you know he was supposed supposed be your hero and heroes don't look at other people's things without their knowledge and permission. But temptation eventually got the better of him. Insecurity does wonders to a person in the most desperate times. He didn't see what he was doing was wrong because in his eyes he was just making sure his darling angel that is you was safe and nothing bad was happening to you else he'd go nuclear

He took it to his room and plopped down on his bed and started reading your diary. You wrote about this fictional character and how he was really cool which made Quill jealous. The only person you should be thinking about his him, your future husband. He got extremely irritated when you even wrote about Thor, he was itching to barge into your room at the moment to show and prove to you that you're only his and no one else's. He flipped through some pages and stopped when he saw his name. He was curious to know what you've written about him and he started reading

'I can't believe Quill actually made me dinner today that was really sweet of him. I really wanted to eat it with him and talk about the most random stuff but Gamora would probably hate me for this and I'm pretty sure he wouldn't really want to be caught dead hanging out with me anyways not when someone as strong as Gamora is there for him compared to my childish immature self'

His eyes couldn't believe what he was reading. Childish? Immature? You most certainly aren't any of the above mentioned words. You had a crush on him which he found endearing and was glad you felt the same way about him and the thought of him being in a relationship with Gamora was extremely amusing to him. True Gamora was nice and all but she was a bit unpredictable at times. He preferred to just stay friends with her and he felt bad that you were ignoring him because of this little misunderstanding. But not to worry he'll prove and show you just how much he loves you

He went out and saw you looking for something and he could guess what you were looking for, your diary. He decided to play the role of the knight in shining armor and return your diary back to you and when you got it your face beamed with joy as you hugged him and thanked him for it. "Oh, I'm sorry" you mumbled sheepishly after realizing what you've just done but he just pulled you back into the hug and replied "Don't be. I love this. I love you Y/N, you're mine" he said in a possessive manner and you couldn't help but blush. "Quill are you sure you're all right? This most certainly is a prank isn't it?" you asked him hesitantly and he grabbed your hands in his and replied " Darling, I love the way you look at me and smile. Your smile is the most beautiful thing for me in the world. The twinkle and the sparkle in your eye when we talk about something you're passionate about makes me want to listen to you for hours and hours as I get lost in your mesmerizing spellbinding eyes. You're the reason for my courage and determination. You're the only one I wouldn't mind losing my sleep for, I'll never let a tear fall down your cheeks and even if it does it'll be tears of happiness and not sadness. I love you Y/N" and you couldn't believe what you were hearing

"Quill... I didn't know you felt that way" you blushed but he replied "Y/N there isn't anyone I'd choose over you, you're made for me and I for you" and you felt happy. He confirmed he was very much not into Gamora and he admitted that he liked your soft and silly nature. It hurt when you're insecure of your own self but Quil would change all that. He loves you no matter what and he's willing to do whatever the hell it takes to make sure you stay with him. Even if he has to commit a few murders here and there but it's all in the name of love

[misrepresentedmorallygrey]

PROPAGANDA

Mapleshade

Apparently some parts of the warriors fandom can't wrap their head around an unreliable narrator. She's not an innocent victim or a pure evil villain. She's complex. She was selfish, she took advantage of people but she was also cheated on by her mate (who by the way face little to no repercussions for having a half clan relationship with Mapleshade) and forced to leave her kit's bodies to be buried on RiverClan's territory, where she'd never be able to see them again. Mapleshade is a cat that never learned how to face the consequences of her actions. She arguably went insane from having her whole life be torn apart from her in a single day. Tbh I'd argue that if she was a tom, more people would be sympathetic towards her.

a woman will murder 3 people, use a dead guy's name to protect her and her kids' reputation, groom a kid into becoming a xenophobic dictator and people will still claim that she's an innocent justified victim. i love her and think she's a very interesting character (with her killing people partially to avenge her kits) but god, half the fandom doesn't read the books and it shows.

Future Luke

Warning: This character is a walking spoiler so PLEASE tread with caution if you haven’t played Professor Layton and the Unwound Future. It’s a game so dear to my heart that everyone should play. With that out of the way… I love him and I get it. I do. He was one of the first fictional crushes I remember having way back in the day and even though that’s way long past, I still think he’s neat as a character as is the role he plays in the story. Yes his backstory is tragic (Bill Hawks go to hell challenge). Yes it makes him sympathetic in a lot of ways. Yes it would be so nice to see more canon content with him someday, maybe set far after the events of the game, where he gets some kind of true redemption arc and makes good on his word to atone for his wrongdoings. But. He is antagonistic in a looot of ways that people brush over because half his fandom likes to woobify him (the other half fully acknowledging that he’s awful and embracing it). He objectively still kidnapped, trapped, and gaslit dozens if not hundreds of people. The Mobile Fortress incident, an act of national terrorism, easily could have a death toll in the thousands. Even if getting revenge on Bill specifically was justified, ruining the lives of innocents in a disaster, not too much unlike the very one that killed his parents and led him down the path of destruction, was not. He deserves whatever consequences he gets and then some tbh. As an aside, while this thankfully isn’t as common as it was in the early 2010s, people shipping him with Flora leaves such a bad taste in my mouth. They have an 8-9 year age gap, with Flora being a minor (her age is never explicitly confirmed but per reasonable assumption, she can’t be above 15 *at most*), which seems to get conveniently forgotten about - not cool!! Their only significant interaction in the game is him kidnapping her after the big reveal, which while not worse in canon context than anything else he does, is gross to frame in any kind of shipping light.

[wondrouswendy]

I've been working on the Out of My Hands sequel (currently untitled) and two songs have been giving me strong Fictional Alex Casey/Alan Wake vibes, and I've been listening to them on repeat:

But his eyes are crushing your defenses And it's hard to fight And it's breaking all the reasons not to let him in tonight Oh neons, you're in the spotlight every night Oh neons, forget the lights let's run tonight

The other song in question:

I might be sick, I might be haunted I might be everything you wanted Another night, you pull me in So take my heart and tear it open 'Cause everything inside is broken You know where I've been

I love these songs and they've been giving me big sequel vibes for Out of My Hands. It's fun because my plan with the sequel is to focus on Alan's darkness and his light, and how this will ultimately be dealt with by Casey. Casey knows that Alan is kind of bad news. He's pretty dangerous, for just being a writer. He's already betrayed Casey twice. Fictional Casey of course has plenty of reasons to not trust Alan. Alan has power (even if he doesn't know it fully yet what he's capable of coming into Bright Falls), and that power is not yet refined in Alan Wake 1 in the same ways it's displayed in Alan Wake 2.

I just love a relationship dynamic where Character B knows Character A is dangerous, prone to hurting them, prone to sending the relationship to catapult towards disaster, but they can't turn away, they can't help but be drawn in by their magnetic presence. I like to imagine Alan as pursuer, hunting down Casey and wanting to claim him for himself. The Dark Place eventually becomes his domain, and Casey is a subject of that domain, and Alan wants him... leaving Casey to have to make a choice.

My longer Caseywake playlist (I'm always adding new songs to this, it's mostly used for inspiration for my fic series, has lots of synthwave but there's also other genres too):