#but that might’ve been on me | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

eepwtf · 3 months ago

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MY ATOMS HAVE ALWAYS LOVED YOURS.

jock!ben x nerd!reader

that’s what connection is, right? the swallowing of one soul into another. taking them in, letting their essence burrow into your flesh until you couldn’t tell where they ended, and you began. like a splinter, painful and irritating, but impossible to remove. that’s what you were to ben: a splinter digging beneath his skin, refusing to let go.

and maybe that was all ben wanted—to let you haunt him completely. to be tainted by you, stained in ways that could never be undone. to let the memory of you—the presence of you—sink into his skin, his blood, his bones, until he could no longer tell the difference between himself and the ghost you’d left behind.

tw; boarding school au, slight academic rivals, homophobia, toxic masculinity, might make this a continuation perhaps, ben being a big gay yearner, slight cannibalistic imagery used, shotgunning, weed hazy make out sesh… no actual smut like i said, i’ll probably make a continuation for that! wc; 12k...

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⎯⎯⎯ 𖣂 ⎯⎯⎯

THE boarding school was a monolith of old money and grandeur, tucked away in the rolling countryside where the world felt muted and distant. the architecture itself seemed to loom over its occupants, cloaked in ivy and perpetually blanketed by a haze of mist. it was a place meant for the finest, the best, where boys were molded into men who would conquer whatever battlefield lay ahead, whether in the world of business or the trenches of war.

you didn’t belong here—not really. you were the outlier, the scholarship kid among pedigreed names that dripped from tongues with the weight of generations. yet, even in a world built to dismiss you, you excelled. your mind was a razor, carving through equations and essays, leaving the sons of wealth and privilege scrambling to keep up. you had a knack for reducing their inherited confidence to a quiet simmer of insecurity, your brilliance a sharp contrast to their entitled mediocrity.

then there was ben, the golden boy of said school.

ben had everything: the chiseled features of a carved from marble, the charm that made others forgive his outbursts, and a physicality that turned the sporting fields into his personal stage. he thrived in the chaos of competition, the thrill of victory lighting him from within. but you—oh, how you irritated him.

it was in the classroom where his temper simmered, where his smirk faltered just enough to reveal the cracks. he hated the way your hand shot up before anyone else’s, the way your answers came not with arrogance but an ease that suggested you didn’t even need to try. every time you walked past his desk with another perfect score, another commendation from the professors, ben felt the bitter taste of inadequacy curl on his tongue.

he wasn’t used to losing, least of all to someone like you—a quiet, unassuming boy who didn’t play by the rules of their unspoken hierarchy. he couldn’t pin you down, couldn’t challenge you to a fistfight on the quad and settle it like he did with everyone else. you lived in a world of ideas and intellect, a realm where his strength and bravado were meaningless.

and so, ben did what he did best: he turned his frustration into cruelty.

it started small. a snide remark as you passed him in the hall, his voice low but cutting, designed to stick in your mind. then came the more deliberate acts—your books knocked off your desk when he sauntered by, a "careless" shove in the crowded dining hall that sent your tray spilling to the floor. his friends laughed, their amusement a chorus that fueled his superiority. but it wasn’t enough to satisfy him.

he wanted to break you.

he couldn’t stand the way you remained steadfast, unshaken by his efforts to knock you off your pedestal. your defiance wasn’t loud or confrontational; it was in the way you picked up your books without a word, the way you returned to your seat and continued to outshine him. it was maddening, a mirror held up to his own shortcomings, reflecting a boy who was not the best, not even close, despite everything he’d been told his entire life.

the tension between you grew like a festering wound, unnoticed by the professors who were too enamored with ben’s charm and too indifferent to your quiet suffering. in the dormitories, where the shadows stretched long and the air was thick with the scent of damp wool and boyhood sweat, ben would corner you with his pointed glares and low mutters. you could feel his hatred radiating off him, a scorching heat that threatened to consume you both.

and yet, beneath the animosity, there was something else. something ben didn’t understand and refused to acknowledge. a fascination he couldn’t shake, an obsession born of the way you refused to yield to him. it gnawed at him, this unwanted fixation, turning his frustration inward even as he directed it at you.

for your part, you noticed the way his eyes lingered too long, the way his anger seemed almost personal, as though he despised not just your intelligence but something deeper, something he couldn’t name. you began to feel the weight of his gaze like a tangible thing, pressing against your skin, making your pulse quicken in ways you didn’t want to admit.

THE lacrosse field was a battlefield, churning with the restless energy of aggression. the boys moved like packs of wolves, bodies colliding in fierce pursuit of the ball, cleats tearing into the damp, overworked earth. you didn’t belong here. not really. the game wasn’t yours, not in spirit nor in skill. your talents lay elsewhere—in the orderly realm of equations and analysis, where every move was deliberate, not reactionary. but the school demanded bodies as much as minds, and so you played, driven not by passion but by necessity.

ben, on the other hand, owned the field. his movements were fluid, muscles taut beneath his jersey, every step bursting with the kind of confidence only bred from years of unearned praise. the coaches shouted his name from the sidelines, their booming voices dripping with approval. he thrived on it, fed off their praise like a starved beast. and yet, even in his glory, his focus was fractured, his gaze drawn to you like iron to a magnet.

it was infuriating.

you didn’t belong on his field, didn’t deserve to occupy even a sliver of his thoughts. but there you were, darting past him with that maddening air of quiet competence, your presence a thorn in his side. he loathed you, not just for your brilliance in the classroom but for the way you existed in his world without bending at his will. He couldn’t stand it.

you weren’t fast, and you weren’t strong, but your sharp, calculating mind had a way of slicing through the frenzy of the game. you saw patterns where others saw chaos, predicting movements before they happened, slipping through gaps in the defense like a shadow. it wasn’t enough to make you a star, but it was enough to unsettle ben. to remind him that even here, in the one place he should reign supreme, you found ways to upstage him.

he couldn’t stand it.

the game had reached a fever pitch, players shouting, the ball whipping between sticks like a bullet. the air was electric with sweat and tension, the faint tang of impending rain mingling with the iron bite of blood from scraped knees and bruised lips. you were darting forward, the ball cradled neatly in your stick as you made for an opening.

ben saw you, and something snapped.

it wasn’t enough to win. it wasn’t enough to be the best. he needed you to know you didn’t belong here.

he moved in, a predator stalking prey, his green eyes locked on you with singular intent. his shove was perfectly calculated—not enough to earn him a foul but more than enough to send you staggering. you stumbled, feet slipping in the mud, but you didn’t fall. you were steadying yourself when his stick came down, the blunt edge catching your face with brutal precision.

the sound was sickening, a wet crack that silenced the field as you crumpled to the ground. pain exploded across your face, sharp and immediate, a fire that spread from your nose to your temple. for a moment, the world narrowed to a single point of agony, the coppery tang of blood flooding your senses as you pressed a shaking hand to your face.

and then the laughter started.

it began with ben, his cruel bark of amusement breaking the tension. he leaned casually on his stick, grinning like a boy who’d just pulled off the perfect prank. his friends joined in, their laughter swelling into a chorus of mockery that filled the air like smoke.

“didn’t think lacrosse was a contact sport, huh?” one of them jeered, the others howling in response. ben chimed in, his voice dripping with venomous charm. “guess it’s not a game for delicate types. better stick to books, nerd.”

the words hit harder than the stick had.

you stayed on the ground for a moment, your breath coming in shallow gasps as the blood dripped steadily down your face, soaking into the white of your uniform. the grass beneath you felt cold and damp, grounding you in the midst of the humiliation crashing over you like a wave. but you didn’t cry.

when you finally pushed yourself to your feet, your knees shaking, your vision swam with the effort. your face was a mess of blood and bruises, the metallic taste thick on your tongue. the coaches had yet to intervene, their eyes blind to the golden boy’s cruelty.

ben’s laughter faltered for a split second when your gaze met his. there was something in your eyes—defiance, yes, but also a quiet strength that made his stomach churn. he could hear the blood pounding in his ears, drowning out the cheers and jeers of his friends. for the first time, he felt something other than triumph in your presence.

it was guilt, sharp and unwelcome, gnawing at the edges of his bravado.

ben forced himself to laugh again, louder this time, shoving the flicker of shame deep down where it couldn’t touch him. his grin widened, and he turned back to his friends, letting their approval wash over him like a balm. but as the game resumed, the image of your bloodied face lingered in his mind, a grotesque reminder that even in victory, something about you made him feel defeated.

he told himself he didn’t care. but the knot in his chest told another story.

YOU dreamt of ben’s teeth in your skin that night, or at least you think it was a dream. the memory lingers too vividly, too viscerally, as though your subconscious left it smoldering just beneath the surface of your waking mind. in your dream—or nightmare, perhaps—it wasn’t the boy you knew from the halls and the fields who loomed over you. it was something else. something primal, something that wore ben’s face but moved with a hunger that no human being could possess.

his green eyes burned bright at first, clear and sharp, their intensity the only thing anchoring you to what little humanity remained in him. but then the green began to darken, swallowed by black until his pupils eclipsed everything else. his grin followed, shifting from the boyish smirk you had come to associate with his cruelty to something far more animalistic. it wasn’t a smile anymore—it was a snarl, predatory and sharp, his teeth bared like a beast ready to strike.

you remember the feel of his hands on you, strong and unrelenting, pinning you down with an ease that made your breath catch in your throat. his fingers dug into your arms, their grip just shy of painful, but it wasn’t his hands that truly frightened you. it was his mouth.

his teeth found your flesh, and for a moment, the world became nothing but sensation. you felt the pressure first, the sharp edge of his canines pressing into your skin, threatening to pierce it. then came the pain—hot and electric, spreading through your body like wildfire. your breath hitched, caught somewhere between a gasp and a whimper, your senses overwhelmed by the strange, horrifying intimacy of it.

and yet, even as your dream-self writhed beneath him, a strange thought took root in your mind. it wasn’t just fear you felt. it was something darker, something that churned in your gut like a sickness. there was a perverse fascination in the way he consumed you, a twisted part of you that reveled in his domination, in the way he claimed you as his prey.

when you woke, your body was slick with sweat, the sheets tangled around your limbs like the remnants of a trap you had barely escaped. your chest heaved as you tried to steady your breathing, the phantom pain of his bite still throbbing beneath your skin. your heart raced, not just with the adrenaline of the nightmare but with something else—something you didn’t want to name.

you told yourself it was just a dream, a grotesque product of your mind’s restless wanderings. but as you lay there in the predawn darkness, your room quiet except for the faint rustle of wind against the window, you couldn’t shake the feeling that it had been more than that.

because when you thought of ben, when you recalled the way his gaze lingered on you during the day—those fleeting, almost imperceptible glances—you felt a similar unease, a similar pull. he thought you didn’t notice, but you did. you noticed the way his jaw clenched when you outpaced him in class, the way his hands gripped the edge of his desk so tightly his knuckles turned white.

you noticed the frustration in his voice when he barked orders on the field, the way it always seemed sharper, louder, when directed at you. and, most unsettling of all, you noticed the way his anger gave way to something else entirely in those rare moments when your eyes met.

it wasn’t just hatred that burned in his gaze. there was something deeper, something raw and untamed, something that made your skin prickle with a strange mixture of fear and anticipation. it was as though he was waging a war with himself, his fury at you battling against some unspoken truth he refused to acknowledge.

maybe your dream had simply dredged up all the pieces of him you couldn’t reconcile—the cruelty, the rage, the intensity that bordered on obsession—and twisted them into something monstrous. or maybe, just maybe, your subconscious had glimpsed something real, something lurking beneath the surface of ben’s golden-boy façade.

you lay there for what felt like hours, staring at the ceiling as the first pale rays of dawn crept through the window. the memory of his teeth haunted you, the phantom sensation of his bite refusing to fade. you told yourself it was absurd, that you were letting his presence in your life warp your thoughts.

but deep down, in the quietest corners of your mind, you couldn’t deny the truth. you had seen the way ben looked at you. and worse still, you had felt the way his presence made something inside you stir—a festering thing, raw and ugly, that refused to be ignored.

the morning air felt heavy, clinging to your skin with a dampness that did nothing to ease the lingering unease from the night. you shook yourself off, trying to dispel the fog that clung to your mind, your hands coming up to rub at your eyes in a futile attempt to erase the dream—or nightmare—that still burned at the edges of your memory. the pressure of phantom teeth seemed to linger on your flesh, a strange sensation you couldn’t quite shake.

your uniform hung stiff and scratchy against your skin as you pulled it on, the starched fabric doing little to comfort you. the ritual of dressing, buttoning and tucking with practiced efficiency, was almost enough to settle you. almost. but when you glanced at your reflection, bleary-eyed and pale, the faint shadows under your eyes told the truth you couldn’t ignore. you looked like someone who hadn’t slept, not properly, not peacefully.

the hallways were already stirring with life as you stepped into them, the low murmur of voices mixing with the squeak of shoes on polished wood. you kept your head down, hoping to avoid unnecessary interaction, your thoughts still churning with the vestiges of the dream. your skin crawled at the thought of ben—not the boy from the nightmare, but the one who existed here, in the real world. the one who seemed to take up far too much space in your mind, even when you weren’t asleep.

you were halfway down the corridor, lost in your thoughts, when a hand gripped your shoulder, pulling you to a sudden halt. the touch jolted you, your pulse spiking as you turned quickly, your body bracing instinctively for something worse than what it was.

“don’t you know it’s rude to creep around?” you snapped, the words spilling out before you could soften them. your voice was rough, gravelly from the lack of proper rest, but the irritation in it was genuine.

your friend raised an eyebrow, unbothered by your tone. “you look like shit,” they said bluntly, their arm swinging casually around your shoulders as if to soften the blow of their words.

you rolled your eyes, the corner of your mouth twitching in faint exasperation. “i was studying,” you replied, the lie slipping out easily, though the weight of it settled uncomfortably in your chest.

studying. sure. if “studying” meant spending the night caught in a cycle of half-sleep and vivid, unsettling dreams about ben—dreams that left you waking with your heart pounding and your skin clammy. dreams that made facing him now feel like a task monumental enough to deserve its own place in Dante’s Inferno.

your friend gave you a knowing look, their gaze sharp despite their casual demeanor. “studying,” they repeated, dragging out the word as if testing its weight. “rightt.”

you shrugged them off, stepping out from under their arm and continuing down the hall. “drop it,” you muttered, not looking back.

but as you walked, the knot of unease in your stomach only tightened. you didn’t want to see ben today, not after last night, not after the way his imagined teeth had sunk into your flesh with such terrible intimacy. but you knew you would see him—of course you would. he was everywhere, an unshakable presence in your life that clung to you like a shadow. and despite yourself, a small, treacherous part of you wondered what it would feel like if the dream wasn’t entirely a fabrication. if the pressure of his teeth wasn’t just some cruel trick of your subconscious.

you shook the thought away, your hands balling into fists at your sides as you forced your feet forward. it was a new day, you told yourself. you would face him, endure his glances, his comments, his presence, and you would survive. even if the memory of his grin haunted you all the while.

of course, your friend, blissfully unaware of the strange, festering thing coiling tighter in your chest, slung their arm around you again, jostling you with a kind of ease that only highlighted your growing sense of unease. their presence might have been grounding if it weren’t for the chaos swirling behind your eyes, the dream—or nightmare—still clinging to your thoughts like cobwebs you couldn’t brush away. each step down the corridor felt mechanical, your body moving on autopilot as the slick, oily remnants of the dream seeped deeper, threatening to consume your focus entirely.

christ, you thought bitterly, why couldn’t your mind just give you peace for once? the dream’s claws had sunk deep, its venom spreading even now, and the weight of your friend’s arm was a tether you couldn’t decide whether to cherish or resent. you couldn’t even focus on their words, the low hum of their voice turning into static, a meaningless buzz drowned out by the feverish imagery curling through your mind.

that is, until their voice cut sharply through your spiraling thoughts:

“she has, like, a nice fucking ass.”

the vulgarity slapped you out of your haze, and you blinked, frowning instinctively. the raw disbelief on your face was almost comical as you turned to your friend, your voice rough with irritation. “what the hell are you talking about?”

your friend snorted, their bark of laughter echoing through the otherwise quiet hall. they shoved lightly at your head, their hand ruffling your already unkempt hair with an irritating kind of fondness that only deepened your scowl. “jesus, man, how long did you study last night?” they teased, their tone dripping with faux concern as they rolled their eyes. “i’m talking about the new teacher. you know, the one half the guys are practically drooling over.”

you exhaled sharply through your nose, shaking your head as they continued to chatter, unbothered by your lack of engagement. their arm stayed slung across your shoulders, anchoring you to their easygoing rhythm, their words spilling out in a cascade of exaggerated admiration. descriptions of the teacher’s figure, her looks, and the collective hormonal obsession of the student body filled the air. it was almost laughable how much they cared about something so fleeting.

but their words served their purpose—they drowned out the dream, tamping down the ghost of green eyes and imagined teeth, pulling you further into the mundanity of the day. you grunted noncommittally, letting their words wash over you without actually processing them. you didn’t care about some teacher everyone was ogling like a piece of meat, but their chatter had pulled you far enough from your own thoughts to notice the weight pressing against your ribs had shifted. something darker, heavier, had begun to bloom there.

and then, like a blade of glass slicing through skin, you saw him.

ben stood further down the corridor, leaning against the wall with the kind of casual confidence only he could pull off. he was flanked by a few of his cronies, boys who lingered like shadows, echoing his movements and amplifying his presence. but it wasn’t his posture or his pack of admirers that stopped you dead in your tracks. it was his eyes.

they were locked onto you, glinting like shards of polished emeralds in the muted light of the hallway. you froze under the weight of his gaze, something sharp and disquieting curling in your stomach as he looked—not at you, but at the arm slung so comfortably over your shoulders. his jaw shifted slightly, tension flickering at the corners of his mouth, though his expression remained infuriatingly neutral.

your first thought was that it was hatred. of course it was. what else could it be? ben had spent months making your life a quiet misery, his snide remarks and calculated glances digging under your skin like splinters. the idea that his stare could mean anything other than disdain didn’t even cross your mind.

his lips curled upward, but it wasn’t a smile—not really. it was more like the barest hint of teeth, a silent warning that you couldn’t quite decipher. and yet, something in his eyes felt different, something darker and unfamiliar, like the faint glimmer of green fire.

your friend, blissfully unaware of the tension coiling in the air, kept talking, their voice a low hum in the background as you stood frozen, caught in the snare of ben’s gaze. the weight of their arm around you, once grounding, now felt suffocating, a heat rising in your chest that had nothing to do with your lack of sleep.

ben shifted slightly, his frame leaning off the wall as his gaze flickered back to your face. it lingered for just a moment too long before he turned away, his attention snapping back to his friends as though the moment had never happened.

you exhaled shakily, realizing you’d been holding your breath. the knot in your stomach twisted tighter, a strange mix of unease and... something else. whatever it was, it made you feel raw and exposed, your skin prickling with the faint sensation of being watched, even as you forced yourself to keep walking.

your friend gave you a nudge, oblivious to the storm raging inside you. “earth to you,” they said, their voice teasing. “you okay? look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

you forced a shrug, your movements stiff. “i’m fine,” you muttered, though the tremor in your voice betrayed the lie. fine. sure. if you ignored the way your heart still raced, the way ben’s stare had burned itself into the back of your mind. fine, if you ignored the strange, festering feeling that had been planted in your chest and was now threatening to bloom.

ben sat across from you, his body a picture of restless arrogance, sprawled as though he owned the desk and everything around it. his fingertips tapped a jagged, uneven rhythm against the varnished wood, a staccato counterpoint to the droning monotone of the professor’s voice. the lesson, whatever the hell it was about, was already a blur in his mind—some dull lecture he’d never bother to commit to memory. he let out an gratuitous sigh, sinking lower into his seat with an air of theatrical boredom, the edges of his lips curling in a smirk as a few nearby classmates glanced his way.

but the act was just that—an act. his attention wasn’t really on the class, nor the eyes that occasionally flicked toward him, drawn like moths to the flame of his ever-present bravado. no, his focus was on you.

it always came back to you.

his green eyes found the back of your head as they so often did during these torturous classes. you sat two rows ahead, perfectly aligned to torment him with your quiet diligence. he watched the way you leaned slightly forward, the slight tension in your shoulders betraying the focus you poured into every word spilling from the professor’s lips. your hand moved quickly, a blur of determination as you scrawled across the page in front of you. he couldn’t see exactly what you were writing, but he knew it was notes.

of course, it was notes.

you always took notes, didn’t you? like some kind of academic machine, recording every detail, every thread of information the professor dared to offer. and for reasons ben couldn’t quite articulate, it infuriated him. or maybe “infuriated” wasn’t the right word. maybe it was more complicated than that—more warped.

his fingers stopped their tapping as his gaze narrowed, following the precise movements of your pen. he imagined the lines and curves you etched into the paper, the careful way you transcribed thoughts into words, words into meaning. the idea of it made his stomach twist in a way he didn’t entirely understand.

ben wanted to see it.

no—he needed to see it.

he needed to know what went on inside that overactive mind of yours, what ideas and thoughts swirled in your brain like storms. what made you so goddamn meticulous, so disgustingly perfect in your execution of everything you did? his teeth clenched, his jaw tight as he stared harder, as though sheer will alone could penetrate the barriers between his mind and yours.

he didn’t just want a glimpse into your thoughts—he wanted to crack you open.

the intrusive image came to him unbidden, vivid and visceral: his hands on either side of your skull, his thumbs pressing into the delicate curve of your temples. in his mind, the bone would give way beneath his strength, splitting like an overripe fruit. he’d tear through the lining, past the fragile casing of your brain, his fingers sinking deep into the valleys and folds of sulci and gyri. he’d feel the sticky heat of your thoughts, the pulse of your consciousness against his fingertips.

and maybe then—maybe then—he could understand.

understand how you worked, what made you tick, why you were always so goddamn far ahead of him. why, no matter how hard he tried to best you, to shake you, to drag you down to the level where he felt safe, you always managed to stay just out of reach. it was maddening. it was humiliating.

and it was intoxicating.

ben’s chest rose and fell with shallow breaths, his fixation on you tightening its grip around his ribcage. he wanted to hate you��god, he wanted to hate you. it would have been easier if he could. but there was something else, something darker, slithering in the spaces where hatred should have lived.

infatuation wasn’t the right word for it, but it was close.

you were perfect in a way that was almost grotesque to him, a reminder of everything he lacked, everything he could never be. and yet, he couldn’t stop watching, couldn’t stop wanting to pull you apart piece by piece until he understood the atoms, and cells inside you.

the professor’s voice droned on, a dull hum against the roar of his thoughts. his eyes didn’t leave you, not for a second. to anyone else, ben looked like a bored boy enduring another tedious class. but inside him, something wild and restless clawed at the walls of his chest, something primal and impossible to name.

SOMETHING about you clung to ben like a splinter buried deep under his skin. no matter how much he tried to scrape it out, it remained lodged there, a constant irritant—and yet, perversely, he didn’t really want it gone. it was the kind of ache that grew familiar, even welcome, as though having a piece of you stuck inside him, digging in, was better than losing the connection altogether.

he told himself it was nothing, just a weird, passing fixation. but mondays tested that lie in ways that made his jaw clench and his heart pound harder than any game ever did. mondays meant your ritual: the library. the coffee beside you, still steaming faintly as you leaned into the table, your head bowed over a fortress of books that seemed to grow taller with each passing hour.

he wasn’t sure what you read—probably something mind-numbingly boring, some dense intellectual nonsense he wouldn’t bother to crack open even if someone paid him. but you, with that maddening concentration etched into your brow and your soft, barely-there frown tugging at your lips, made it look like the most important thing in the world.

and when you read, oh god, when you read—you spoke. not loudly, no. just the faintest whispers, as if the words spilled from your mouth by accident, a soft, private litany that no one else was meant to hear. but ben heard. he always heard.

it wasn’t fair, the way your voice wrapped itself around the silence of the library, low and melodic and unbearably intimate. it felt deliberate somehow, like a knife turned just for him. it was as though you knew he was watching, knew he lingered there in the shadows of the shelves, pretending to look for some book he’d never even crack open.

if he didn’t know any better, he’d almost think you were reading for him.

he should be at practice. that thought nagged at him like a coach’s whistle in the back of his mind, sharp and insistent. practice, where his teammates would already be warming up, their easy camaraderie and loud laughter filling the field. that’s where he belonged, where he thrived. that was his kingdom. but mondays had become something else entirely.

mondays were for you.

ben found himself lingering near the library door, his shoulders slouched just enough to blend into the background. his bag hung limply off one arm, forgotten, as his green eyes tracked every movement you made. the way your fingers flicked over the pages, precise and unhurried, as though you had all the time in the world. the slight tilt of your head when you paused to scribble something in the notebook you always brought with you. the way your lips, soft and just barely parted, formed each word you whispered like a prayer.

you were calm and focused, untouched by the chaotic energy that always seemed to coil beneath his skin. you looked... at peace. it made him burn.

ben clenched his fists, his nails biting into his palms. he hated this feeling, this raw, inexplicable pull toward you that felt less like attraction and more like possession. you weren’t doing anything to him—just sitting there, existing, being you. and yet, it was as if you’d reached inside him and turned something vital upside down, leaving him unsteady on his feet.

he didn’t want to care about your stupid coffee cup, the way the steam curled up and caught the faint light spilling through the high library windows. he didn’t want to notice the way your glasses slipped slightly off the bridge of your nose, how you’d brush them back with an absent-minded grace that seemed so effortless it made his chest ache.

and yet, there he was, still standing there.

still watching.

still pretending to give a fuck about some random book he wouldn’t even bother to carry out the door.

ben shifted on his feet, the weight of his indecision heavy in his chest. he should leave. he should walk out, get to practice, and stop wasting his time on you. but the thought of leaving, of stepping away from this quiet moment where he could just... see you without consequence, felt like tearing that splinter from his skin. he’d lose the ache, yes, but he’d also lose the maddening comfort of its presence.

so, instead, he lingered.

and when you whispered another word, your lips brushing the silence like a kiss meant for no one in particular, ben’s grip tightened on the strap of his bag. because deep down, in the part of himself he refused to acknowledge, he wanted to believe it was for him.

it was stupid, reckless even, the way ben’s feet moved without permission, as if something unseen was yanking at invisible strings tied to his ankles. he wasn’t sure why he let it happen, why he allowed this force—this festering pull inside him—to steer him closer and closer to where you sat. he could have stopped himself, forced his body to obey logic, but something in him resisted the idea of turning back.

the quiet sanctity of the library enveloped him, all hushed whispers and the soft rustle of turning pages. the faint, bitter aroma of coffee mingled with the musty scent of old books, filling his lungs as he neared your table. it was overwhelming, suffocating, and yet strangely intoxicating. the closer he got, the more he felt like the world narrowed to just this: you, the fortress of books around you, the steam curling from your cup like it held some secret.

it was too much. too close.

ben swallowed hard, his tongue suddenly dry as he hovered behind you. from this distance, he could see the tiny grooves in the back of your chair, the faint scuff marks on the floor where your restless foot tapped. his pulse thundered in his ears, drowning out the low hum of the library’s fluorescent lights.

what the hell was he even doing?

he didn’t have a plan. of course, he didn’t. ben didn’t do plans; he acted. he relied on brute force, sheer confidence, and the kind of charm that usually bulldozed any obstacle in his way. but here, now, standing behind you, those weapons felt dull and useless.

you shifted slightly, leaning forward to jot something into your notebook, and ben’s eyes tracked the movement like a predator watching its prey. his stomach tightened, not with hunger, but with something worse—something sharper, more desperate.

and then, like some unthinking beast lurching forward, he moved.

the table loomed in front of him, the edge digging into his thigh as he planted himself there, far closer than he should have been. his shadow fell across your books, an expanse of muted light eclipsed by his frame. the breath hitched in his throat, and for a fleeting, wild moment, he considered bolting. running back to the lacrosse field, to the safety of shouting and fists and controlled chaos.

but the thought passed as quickly as it came, crushed beneath the unbearable weight of his need to say something—anything.

he opened his mouth, and what escaped was not a clever remark, not the smooth confidence he wielded on the field or in front of his friends, but a sound. a low, guttural grunt that made him cringe internally the second it left his lips.

you turned at the noise, your brow furrowing as your eyes flicked up to meet his. your expression was a mix of curiosity and mild irritation, as though you were trying to decide whether this interruption was worth your attention.

ben’s hands clenched into fists at his sides, his palms damp and cold despite the heat radiating from his body. the words he’d been grasping for, the half-formed excuse to explain why he’d crossed the boundary of your space, caught in his throat.

what the hell was he supposed to say? that he couldn’t stay away? that your stupid books and coffee and concentrated pout had been haunting him for weeks?

no, he needed something else—something neutral, something that wouldn’t make him look like an idiot.

“i, uh…” his voice came out rough, rasping like sandpaper against the quiet of the library. he cleared his throat, shifting awkwardly. “i need tutoring. in, uh… math.”

the words hung in the air like a poorly thrown pass, wobbling and uncertain. it was a flimsy excuse, half-true at best. sure, he wasn’t exactly excelling in math, but he could’ve asked any of his teammates for help. hell, he could’ve charmed one of the teachers if he’d wanted to. but none of them were you.

you blinked, your lips parting slightly as if you weren’t sure whether to laugh or take him seriously. ben felt a flush crawl up the back of his neck, his pride warring with the strange, gnawing feeling that he might just implode if you said no.

“i’m… not great with numbers,” he added quickly, the words tumbling out in a rush. his hand came up to rub the back of his neck, his posture stiff despite the casual tone he was struggling to maintain. “figured you could help. since, y’know, you’re always… doing all this.” he gestured vaguely to the books and notes sprawled across the table, his movements broad and almost clumsy.

there. it wasn’t perfect, but it was something. a lifeline, thin and fragile, tossed out into the silence between you.

the air is dense, clinging to the library like an unwanted second skin, thick with the sour tang of aged paper, spilled coffee, and the faint decay of something almost alive. it’s the kind of air that wraps itself around your throat and sinks into your lungs, suffocating and intimate, a silent predator. ben breathes it in deeply, like he needs the burn to keep himself tethered to this moment, to you. but there’s something else here, too, something sharper, something that cuts through the miasma and lodges itself inside him.

it’s you.

it shouldn’t be so distinct, yet it is. a clean, woody undertone, with a hint of leather that somehow feels ancient and personal, like it carries stories older than either of you. it threads its way through the stagnant library air like an interloper, lacing itself into ben’s senses until it becomes the only thing he can taste. it doesn’t belong here. it doesn’t belong in this quiet, suffocating place of rot and whispers. but it belongs to you. and that’s enough.

he swallows hard, his throat tightening as though the scent has wrapped itself around his neck like a noose. it fills the hollows of his chest, seeps into the marrow of his bones, and carves itself into the darkest corners of his mind. It’s a scent that shouldn’t linger, but it does, a ghost that haunts him in the silence. you’ve branded him, burned yourself into him without even trying, and he can’t tell if he resents it or if he craves it more than his next breath.

“didn’t think you’d need a tutor,” you had said, a faint smirk on your lips, sharp enough to cut. but you didn’t say no.

and that’s how he found himself here.

the silence between you is a strange kind of beast. ben isn’t used to silence—his life is noise, chaos, endless sound that fills every corner of his world until there’s no room for anything else. his father’s voice, sharp and grating, tearing through the walls. the roar of the crowd on the field, his teammates’ shouts blending into a cacophony that drowns out the sound of his own thoughts.

but this silence isn’t like that.

this silence is alive.

it breathes. it stretches. it crawls into the space between you and grows, not oppressive but thick and full, like it’s waiting for something to happen. it hums with potential, a quiet pulse that syncs with the rhythm of his own heartbeat, and ben finds himself leaning into it, letting it wrap around him.

this silence isn’t empty. it’s full of you.

you sit beside him, close enough that he can feel the faint warmth of your body bleeding through the small gap between you. the edge of your sleeve brushes his forearm when you move, and it’s enough to send a spark of something sharp and electric jolting through him. he shouldn’t be able to feel you this acutely, shouldn’t be so hyperaware of every tiny shift in your posture, every soft inhale you take.

but he is.

the scent of you still lingers, curling around him like smoke from a burning altar, like something ancient and sacrificial. it feels alive, like it’s slithering into his veins, infecting him with the ghost of your presence. he breathes it in and lets it take root, lets it crawl through him and fill the hollow spaces he didn’t even know were there.

and the silence stretches on.

it’s not the kind of silence that demands to be broken. it’s a language all its own, a secret shared between you, full of things unsaid and unspoken truths. ben doesn’t need words to fill it. he doesn’t need to speak to know that you’re here, beside him, so close he can feel the heat radiating from you.

but the quiet is also dangerous. it lets him think. let’s his thoughts spiral into darker, hungrier places.

ben’s gaze flickers to you, catching on the curve of your jaw, the faint furrow of concentration in your brow as you scan the open book in front of you. he lets himself linger there, drinking you in like a starving man given his first taste of water. there’s something almost holy about the way you look right now, bathed in the soft glow of the overhead light, your fingers brushing absently over the edge of the page as though the words have bewitched you.

but ben doesn’t feel holy.

the hunger inside him is sharp and unrelenting, a gnawing thing that writhes beneath his skin. it twists through him, dark and consuming, and for a fleeting moment, he wonders what it would be like to pull you apart, to see what makes you tick. it’s not obsession. not really. obsession implies something fragile, something rooted in longing or insecurity. this is something deeper, more primal.

ben doesn’t need you. not in the way that people talk about need. but he wants you. he wants to unravel you, to pry you open and dig his fingers into the soft, vulnerable parts of you. he wants to understand what makes you sit here every monday with your coffee and your books, what makes you whisper to yourself like you’re reading something meant only for him to hear.

it’s curiosity, he tells himself. nothing more. just curiosity, burning hot and insatiable, spreading through him like wildfire.

but curiosity doesn’t feel like this.

curiosity doesn’t feel like his chest tightening every time you glance his way. it doesn’t feel like his hands itching to touch, to hold, to possess.

THATS how it went. mondays transformed into something entirely different, a new ritual that ben couldn’t explain and wouldn’t dare question. practice? a memory. the familiar rhythm of drills, the roar of his teammates, the barked orders of the coach—it all faded into insignificance the moment you came into focus. he told the coaches he was studying, his voice steady, unwavering, despite the lie rolling off his tongue like poison disguised as honey. they believed him, of course. why wouldn’t they?

ben didn’t bother telling himself he cared about the material. the textbooks, the equations, the neatly drawn graphs—they were background noise, static that faded into nothing the second you started speaking. he told himself he was there because it was convenient, because it was an excuse to escape, but deep down, in some festering corner of his mind, he knew that wasn’t true.

it was you.

you, with your quiet focus, the way your lips would move ever so slightly as you read aloud to yourself without realizing it. you, with your unwavering concentration, the crease that formed between your brows as you worked through a particularly complicated problem. you, who seemed completely oblivious to the way your presence had carved itself into ben’s very bones, anchoring you there like some unwanted parasite he couldn’t bring himself to kill.

ben would sit there, his body rigid and his mind anything but, trying to focus on the numbers sprawled across the page but failing every single time. he wasn’t looking at the work. he was looking at you. watching the way your fingers skimmed the edge of the paper, how your pen would tap against the table in rhythmic little bursts as you thought. every tiny movement, every subtle shift in your posture, dug deeper into him, threading itself into the marrow of his being until it felt like you had become a part of him.

when you spoke, your voice soft and even as you explained some mathematical concept that should have been straightforward but felt like greek to him, ben didn’t hear the words. he wasn’t listening to the numbers or the logic. he was too busy taking in the way you looked. the curve of your mouth as you formed each syllable. the way your eyes would light up, ever so slightly, when you solved something particularly tricky.

fuck, it wasn’t fair.

it wasn’t fair how easily you filled the empty spaces inside him, how effortlessly you seemed to occupy the corners of his mind he didn’t even know existed. you didn’t just exist in the same room as him; you invaded it. you seeped into him, into the cracks and fractures he thought he’d hidden so well, spreading like rot until you were everywhere.

and he let you.

even as he told himself he didn’t care, that it didn’t matter, that this was just about studying—just a convenient excuse to avoid practice—he knew the truth. he cared too much. he cared in a way that scared him, a way that felt too big, too heavy, too impossible to contain. he cared about the way your voice would drop into a lower register when you were focused, the way your laughter—soft and fleeting—would bubble out when you realized you’d made a mistake and corrected it.

he cared about how you made him feel.

like he was tethered. like he was drowning. like he was alive in a way he hadn’t been in years.

and maybe, just maybe, a part of you already knew. maybe you sensed the way he hung onto every word, every glance, every accidental brush of your hand against his when you passed him a paper or a pen. maybe you could feel the weight of him sitting across from you, silent and heavy, his presence wrapping itself around you like an unspoken confession.

or maybe you didn’t notice at all.

maybe it was all in ben’s head, this strange, suffocating thing that had planted itself inside him and grown wild and unruly, its roots digging deeper with every passing monday.

but it didn’t matter.

because mondays weren’t about practice anymore. mondays weren’t about drills or games or any of the things that used to define him.

mondays were you.

this monday was different. this monday, you were in his dorm. the space felt alien with you in it, as though your presence had shifted the walls closer, warped the air, and made the small room hum with something electric and volatile. you sat on his bed, legs crossed, one deft hand tapping against the spine of a book you hadn’t opened yet. ben’s eyes were drawn to your fingers, tracing the slow rhythm of your movements, catching on the faint smudges of ink and the tiny doodles that crawled over the back of your hand. they looked like they were singing to him, little glyphs alive with secrets, symbols carved straight from your soul and offered up to him like a taunt.

he couldn’t stop staring.

the thought came unbidden, crashing through him like a breaking wave: if i could, i’d swallow you whole.

not in some grotesque, animalistic way—at least, he didn’t think so. no teeth or sinew or blood. it was something deeper, stranger, something even more horrifying. he didn’t want to eat you; he wanted to absorb you. to make you a part of him. he wanted to pull you inside him, past skin and muscle, past the fragile shield of his ribs, until you were tucked deep into the raw, pulsing places no one else could see. he wanted you to haunt him, to bury yourself in the cracks and crevices of his very being, until you became inseparable from the rest of him.

he wondered, if he did it—if he somehow consumed you, if he allowed the essence of you to dissolve into him like sugar in water—would a part of your soul become his? would it taint him, change him, twist him into something unrecognizable? and, more importantly, would it leave anything of you behind?

would he be carrying the ghost of you forever, absorbed into his marrow, etched into the fabric of his being? would you haunt him in every heartbeat, every breath, every restless night spent lying awake, staring at the ceiling and tracing the memory of you through the air?

ben’s gaze drifted back to your hands, to the tiny movements of your fingers, the way they danced against the book like they were keeping a secret. his own fingers twitched, aching to reach out, to press his palm against the back of your hand and feel the warmth of you seeping through his skin. would it burn? would it leave a mark?

his chest tightened, and he swallowed hard, the sound loud and awkward in the thick, oppressive silence of the room. you didn’t look up. you were so focused on whatever small thought was flitting through your head, your brows furrowed, your lips pressed into a soft line. you had no idea, did you? no idea that you were unmaking him with every passing second, tearing him apart piece by piece, leaving him raw and exposed in a way he’d never been before.

maybe this was what ghosts were, he thought. absorbed parts. fragments of someone else clinging to the living, refusing to let go. maybe you were already haunting him, slipping between the cracks in his thoughts, curling around the jagged edges of his mind.

maybe he was already swallowing you. piece by piece. moment by moment.

and maybe you didn’t even notice.

ben turned toward his bedside locker, moving with a calmness that betrayed the storm inside him. his hands, rough and deliberate, fumbled just slightly as he tugged the drawer open and reached beneath a clutter of barely concealed items. a tin rattled faintly as he pulled it free, his movements revealing a quick flash of glossy porno mags and a half-used tube of KY jelly. he didn’t flinch at the sight; shame wasn’t something he had much room for these days. instead, his fingers found the prize he was looking for—a small plastic bag filled with neatly rolled joints, their pale paper taut and waiting.

the tin hit the desk with a soft thud, and ben’s lips curved into something between a smirk and a grimace as he turned back to you. the dim dorm light caught the faint sheen of sweat on his brow, but his voice came out smooth, easy, coaxing. “you should relax,” he said, rolling a joint between his fingers as though it were the most casual thing in the world. his green eyes flicked over you, your expression caught somewhere between curious and wary. “we’ve been at this all week.”

it sounded reasonable enough, like he cared about the tension in your shoulders, the furrow of your brow, the way you kept pushing yourself harder and harder. but it wasn’t reason that fueled him—it was desperation. he wanted to see you like this, to be the one who unraveled you. the idea of you finding comfort, your edges softening under the haze of weed, made his pulse quicken in a way that felt dangerous, electric.

he thought about it as he pulled a lighter from his pocket, the small metallic click breaking the thick silence between you. the flame danced for a moment before he brought it to the end of the joint, inhaling deeply, the embers flaring bright red. he let the smoke roll out slow, curling upward in tendrils that hung heavy in the air between you.

ben could almost feel it already—the way the weed would soften your movements, blur your sharp edges, make you pliant and lightheaded. the image lodged itself in his brain, searing there like a brand. he didn’t just want you to relax; he wanted you to sink into his orbit, to feel like the world outside his dorm didn’t exist anymore. he wanted you in the palm of his hand, trusting him with that quiet, unspoken vulnerability.

he held the joint out toward you, fingers brushing yours as you took it, and he didn’t miss the way the slight contact sent something sparking through his veins. you hesitated for a moment, your lips parting like you were about to protest, but instead, you leaned in, bringing the joint to your mouth.

ben watched, captivated, as your lips curled around the paper, as you inhaled slow, tentative. he wondered if you could feel him watching you, if you knew the way your every move seemed to carve into him, marking him deeper and deeper.

he leaned back against the edge of the bed, feigning nonchalance, though his body felt taut as a bowstring. smoke curled lazily around you, and ben’s voice cut through it, low and coaxing. “better, right?” he said, the words deliberate, his green eyes glinting like embers in the low light. he wanted to keep you here, tethered to him, letting him smooth out your edges until there was nothing left but the two of you and the thick haze of smoke.

and maybe—just maybe—you’d feel it too. that pull, that invisible thread that kept bringing him closer to you, no matter how hard he tried to fight it.

ben’s breath hitched as he watched you, utterly transfixed by the way your eyelids fluttered shut while the smoke swirled slow and steady from your lips. you looked at ease in a way he’d never seen before, and the sight carved into him, leaving grooves he didn’t want to smooth over. when you handed the joint back to him, the faint dampness of the paper and filter from your saliva caught his attention like a beacon. it wasn’t just a joint anymore—it was touched by you, part of you lingering there. that tiny, fleeting connection left his pulse skittering wildly beneath his skin, though he’d never admit it.

“would you believe me if i said this was my first time?” you asked, your voice light, tinged with nervousness but carrying that easy charm that made ben feel like you’d handed him a piece of yourself. he took the joint from your fingers with a nonchalant shrug, though his heart thundered like a war drum beneath the surface.

“yeah,” he said, his voice low and teasing as he brought the joint to his mouth. the ember flared red as he inhaled, using the moment to steady himself. “i don’t doubt that for a second.” he exhaled slow, the smoke curling between you, a fragile wall of haze that couldn’t stop the pull he felt toward you. as the words left his mouth, ben forced a smile, throwing it your way in what he hoped passed as charming. but his smile faltered slightly when he caught the way your cheeks flushed, a soft bloom of red spreading over your skin.

god, red looked so good on you.

it wasn’t just the color—it was the way it transformed you, made you seem more tangible, more real. the heat rising in your cheeks told him he’d affected you, that his words, his smile, had reached you in some small, undeniable way. it was addictive, watching your reaction, seeing how you twisted under the weight of his gaze without even realizing it.

ben’s grip tightened on the joint, his thumb running over the paper as he took another hit, letting the sharp burn fill his lungs. he needed the edge of it, the distraction, because the truth was threatening to claw its way out of him. the truth that he wanted more than this. more than just mondays, more than stolen moments of proximity. He wanted to press closer, to watch the way that blush deepened when he was too near, to feel your breath against his skin as you stumbled through words you didn’t yet know how to say.

“you’re a natural, though,” he said, his voice a little rougher now, smoke coiling in his throat. “could’ve fooled me.”

it was a lie, of course, but he said it anyway, watching as your lips twitched into a small, bashful smile. and he wondered—did you know what you were doing to him? did you know that with every glance, every word, every touch of your fingers against his when you passed the joint back, you were branding him, marking him as yours?

"yeah, whatever, man," you mutter, the words slipping out on a breath of smoke, your tone carrying that threadbare edge of disinterest. disbelieving. coy. ben’s ears latch onto the inflection like a predator catching the faintest rustle of prey in the underbrush. coy he can work with. coy feeds his craving in a way that’s both maddening and exhilarating, like the sharp burn of whiskey sliding down a raw throat.

coy is fragile. it’s the flickering light of a candle before the flame gutters out. it’s a wounded fawn—big, trembling eyes and wobbling legs—abandoned in an open meadow where every shadow hides teeth. vulnerability wrapped in a thin veneer of bravado. It invites, dares, the predator to inch closer, closer, until there’s nothing but a gasp between them. you, he realizes, are his own personal Bambi. and he, the beast in the long grass, stalking, waiting, savoring the taste of the moment before the pounce.

“no, really,” ben murmurs, his voice dropping an octave, taking on a warmth that shouldn’t be there, a softness that belies the feral pull beneath his skin. he watches you carefully, the way your lips curve slightly around the filter of the joint, how your lashes cast soft shadows against your cheekbones in the dim light of the dorm.

something inside him sparks, an idea crawling up from the depths of that writhing, unnamed thing he keeps locked in his chest. before he can think twice, he’s moving. “here, let me.”

the joint burns between his fingers as ben takes a deliberate, slow drag, holding the smoke deep in his lungs until it stings. and then, before you can react, his hand comes up, warm and sure, and it cradles your jaw like he’s done it a hundred times before. his thumb brushes over your cheekbone, just barely, but it leaves a trail of heat that lingers, sets your pulse stuttering in your throat.

you blink, caught off guard but not pulling away, and that’s all the invitation he needs. ben leans in, the space between you vanishing in an instant, his breath warm against your lips as he exhales the smoke directly into your mouth. it’s intimate in a way that feels invasive, his lips hovering a whisper away from yours. the smoke curls between you, sliding over your tongue, into your lungs, leaving its bitter trail in its wake.

your eyes widen, and ben feels the way your breath catches, just barely, but enough. enough to tell him you’re unsteady, uncertain, caught in the moment like a fly in a spider’s web. your vulnerability is intoxicating, your wide-eyed stare a silent surrender.

his lips barely graze yours, not enough to call it a kiss, but enough to blur the line between audacity and desire. his grip on your chin tightens ever so slightly, grounding you, tethering you to him in this suspended moment.

the seconds stretch thin before he finally pulls back, his eyes dark, hooded, like he’s barely holding himself together. “see?” ben’s voice is rough now, a low rasp that scrapes at the edges of silence. “easy.”

ben doesn’t get the chance to say anything—doesn’t even get the time to process the swirl of thoughts clawing at his mind—because your lips crash against his. the force of it sends him sprawling back into the pillows, his head hitting the worn fabric with a muffled thud.

oh.

oh, this is something he can work with. this is something he’s dreamed of, imagined in fragments during sleepless nights when the thought of you wouldn’t leave him alone. but this—this is better.

this is you. raw. over him. devouring him like he’s something worth breaking.

ben’s always been a master manipulator, a professional at weaponizing sexuality, at using it to tilt the odds in his favor. it’s a game to him—one he always wins. and now? now he has you, ravenous and unrestrained, a perfect storm pressing him into the mattress. he knows how this should go: make you pliable, make you vulnerable, use your hunger to turn the tides in his favor. but the second your lips meet his, it’s like the script is ripped out of his hands, and all he can do is follow where you lead.

and god, are you leading.

you don’t taste like he expected. ben thought you’d taste bitter, sharp, like the sting of smoke lingering on the back of his tongue. but instead, there’s something sweeter, softer beneath the haze of weed—something that feels like a reward he hasn’t earned. the thought sends a shiver through him, his hands gripping at you like you’re the only thing tethering him to the world.

you’re relentless, teeth dragging across his bottom lip, tugging with a force that’s just shy of painful. a sharp gasp escapes him, swallowed by the heat of your mouth. you’re moving now, climbing on top of him, your knees pressing into the mattress on either side of his hips. your weight settles over him, and he’s distantly aware of how you’ve slotted yourself perfectly between his legs, forcing them open, pinning him in place with nothing but your body.

the desperation in your movements is a mirror of his own—hands tangling in the fabric of his shirt, dragging him closer, deeper, harder. until he wonders if you mean to tear him open and climb inside. it’s messy and frantic, all teeth and tongues and muffled moans, the kind of kiss that’s more a battle than an embrace. but ben loves it. He loves the way your hands roam across him like you’re mapping him out, pressing against his thigh, his waist, his chest, leaving a trail of heat in their wake.

your fingers find his throat, wrapping around it with a precision that makes his breath catch. it’s not enough to choke him, not enough to hurt, but enough to hold him still, to remind him who’s in control. and that—oh, that sends a spark of something electric racing through him, pooling low in his stomach. his neck has always been a weak spot, something he’s never fully admitted, and the way your grip steadies him, grounds him—it’s almost too much. it feels like you’ve reached inside his chest and curled your fingers around his ribs, cracking them apart to get at the soft, beating thing underneath.

a small, breathy whimper escapes him before he can stop it, barely audible but undeniably there. it’s embarrassing, humiliating, but he can’t bring himself to care when your mouth is on his again, swallowing the sound like it’s the most natural thing in the world. his hands find your back, sliding under the fabric of your shirt to press against the bare skin beneath, feeling the way your muscles shift and tense under his touch.

ben’s lips part, his tongue sliding against yours in a move that’s both practiced and desperate. you both moan at the contact, the sound muffled but unmistakable, a shared release of tension that only feeds the frenzy between you. his heart thrums in his ears, loud and insistent, and he can’t help but think of prey animals in their final moments, blood pounding as the predator’s jaws close in.

“if i’d known you’d like shotgunning this much,” ben pants against your lips, his voice rough and uneven, “i would’ve done it sooner.”

the words are punctuated by a low groan as you press into him harder, your hands fisting in his shirt to pull him impossibly closer. the scent of you—smoke and sweat and something uniquely yours—fills his senses, drowning out everything else. it’s overwhelming, intoxicating, and ben can feel himself unraveling beneath you, his carefully constructed facade slipping away piece by piece.

your lips travel from ben’s mouth to his jaw, teeth sinking into the flesh like you mean to strip it away, gnaw it clean from the bone. it’s violent, carnal, the sound of your bite wet and obscene, and ben feels the sharp pressure like a knife slipping under his skin. he’s powerless to stop the groan that escapes him, low and guttural, as your hand clamps down on his jaw, your fingers digging into the hinge with a precision that feels surgical, deliberate, inhuman. he’s the mangy dog under your heel, and the dull ache of your grip feels like worship.

his green eyes squeeze shut, his breath hitching as the pain shifts to something addictive, something alive. every nerve in his body sparks to life beneath your touch, the sensation of your nails scraping against his flesh leaving a trail of fire in their wake. his blood sings for you, a desperate hymn to the beast in you that has claimed him for its feast.

“and i think you don’t hate me as much as you pretend,” you growl against his throat, the words coming out like gravel churned in a rusted, grinding machine.

ben laughs, the sound ragged, hollow. “i think you’re full of shit,” he manages, but the way his head tilts to bare his neck betrays him. your hands are satin-soft as they explore him, but the sharpness of your intent is anything but. ben’s hands, by contrast, are rough, leather-worn, and scarred—hands made for tearing, clawing, and surviving. yet here, under you, they’re useless, twitching at his sides as if unsure where to land, as if afraid to touch the thing consuming him.

your hips grind against him, deliberate and cruel, and he feels every drag like it’s carving him open, splitting him down the middle. the pressure is maddening, a firestorm radiating from every point of contact. “oh, fuck,” he breathes, the words barely more than a rasp. his head falls back, exposing more of his throat to your hungry mouth, his body betraying him further with every grind of your hips.

you pull back just enough to meet his gaze, your hands grab at his shirt, tugging with a force that feels like you’d tear it clean off him if it wouldn’t come loose fast enough. “take this fucking thing off.”

ben’s too far gone to resist, his laugh airy and broken as his fingers fumble to obey. “mm, yes, sir,” he teases, the words forced through a grin that barely holds together. he doesn’t miss the flash of something dangerous behind your irises—a flicker of control you’re savoring like a wolf tasting the first blood on its tongue.

ben’s known guys like you. guys who’ve been crushed, splintered into jagged pieces by the weight of the world. broken little boys fumbling to piece themselves back together but too desperate, too fucking hungry for control to do anything but burn. and ben? ben’s always been the kindling, the spark, the gasoline-soaked rag ready to go up in flames for someone like you.

your hands work with fervor, helping him strip the shirt off his body. it’s discarded to the ground like the wrappings of a fruit too ripe to resist, and your fingers trace the lines of his chest. your fingernails rake across his chest, leaving pale, raw lines in the tan expanse of his skin. they sting, those scratches, like ghost wounds from some darker thing, as though you’ve marked him for death. ben doesn’t care. he wants to wear your marks, wants to let them fester, to let a part of you be with him.

your mouth crashes against his again, desperate and sloppy, all teeth and tongues. he can taste the bitterness of smoke still clinging to you, mingling with the salt of his own blood where your teeth have nicked his lip. the metallic tang hits his tongue like a blade, and he moans into your mouth, a sound thick with surrender.

as one hand pops the button of his pants and slips beneath the waistband, the other wraps around his neck, digging into his flesh like it’s meat you intend to rip apart. your lips travel down his throat, sucking, biting, leaving bruises that bloom like rot beneath his skin. you pull back long enough to mutter against his neck, “i’m guessing you’ve done this before.”

ben can barely suppresses an eye roll. don’t get respectful on me now. he doesn’t need your reverence, your curiosity. he needs you to keep consuming him. he nods, the motion jerky and strained. “obviously.”

he reaches for your belt, his fingers trembling as they tug the leather free from its loops. he’s rushing now, frantic to get it off, his hands moving like they belong to someone else. “condoms. lube. drawer,” he rasps, the words cracking as they leave his throat. his hands are shaking, distracted by the way your teeth drag over his collarbone, the way you bite down hard enough that he thinks he can feel the crack of bone beneath the surface.

your hand fumbles blindly through the chaos of his locker, searching for the stash he swore was there—a condom, lube, anything to keep the fire between you burning. your fingers brush over cold metal, loose papers, the faint grit of something unidentifiable, but the haze in your brain and the heat building in your gut make the task feel impossible.

behind you, ben curses under his breath, the sound more growl than word as he wriggles out of his jeans. the fabric catches on his knees, and he fights with it, hips lifting off the mattress as he struggles to free himself. there’s something almost pitiful about the way he moves, so desperate and clumsy in his rush to shed the last barriers between him and you.

you’re so focused on your task—so consumed by the feverish need to keep this moment alive—that you don’t hear the door at first. the creak of the hinges barely registers, a ghost of a sound swallowed by the pounding in your ears. but then:

“ben?!”

the voice slams into the room like a thunderclap, shattering the fragile intimacy you’d built. it’s loud, sharp, cutting through the thick fog of arousal like a jagged blade.

your hand freezes mid-rummage. ben freezes too, mid-push, his jeans tangled around his thighs in a way that makes him look utterly ridiculous. ben groans—a guttural, agonized sound that’s halfway between a growl and a plea for mercy. “oh, for fuck’s sake,” he mutters, his head falling back against the pillow. his voice is muffled, but the irritation in it is clear, as palpable as the sweat clinging to his chest.

the voice called again, louder this time, followed by the unmistakable sound of the doorknob jiggling. “ben, you in there?”

ben’s brain scrambled for a plan, any plan, but his thoughts were a tangled mess, caught between the ache of his body and the dread clawing its way up his spine. of course it had to be now. of course his teammates couldn’t pick a better time to come barging into his dorm, not when he was like this—half-naked, flushed, with you practically draped over him like some pagan offering.

he looked down at himself—his jeans bunched awkwardly around his knees, his shirt discarded somewhere on the floor, his boxers doing a piss-poor job of hiding just how far this had gone. the situation was bad. no, worse than bad—it was catastrophic.

“shit,” ben whispered, his voice barely more than a rasp as he reached for his jeans, yanking them up in a hurried, graceless motion. the denim stuck to his skin, damp with sweat and urgency, and he cursed under his breath as he fumbled with the zipper.

you didn’t move at first, still hovering over him like a statue caught mid-motion, your eyes wide and dark with something that wasn’t fear—but something close to it. “do we answer?” you whispered, your voice low and hoarse, and ben almost laughed at the absurdity of the question.

“yeah, sure,” he muttered sarcastically, his hands fumbling at his belt. “let’s just invite them in, have a nice little chat while i’ve got a fucking hard-on.”

the knock came again, sharper this time, more insistent. “ben, come on, man! open up!”

they wouldn’t leave. ben knew they wouldn’t. his teammates were persistent, nosy bastards who treated each other’s business like communal property. if they thought something was up, they’d dig until they unearthed it, and ben couldn’t let them. because if they saw you here—if they saw him like this, disheveled and flushed and exposed—it wouldn’t just be teasing. it would be annihilation. they’d tear him apart, not in private, but where it hurt most: the locker room, the field, the hallways. his every movement would be shadowed by whispers and pointed laughter. they’d know.

they’d know he wasn’t like them, wasn’t the ben they thought they knew—the one who made dirty jokes and leered at teachers and bragged about conquests that never existed. they’d know he was a fraud.

ben shoved at you lightly, a signal to get off him, to move, to do something, but the moment his hands touched your sides, you didn’t budge. if anything, you leaned in closer, your lips quirking into that infuriating small smile.

“oh, this is funny to you?” he spat, his voice a harsh whisper, trembling with frustration and fear.

your lips twitched, the corner of your mouth curling into a grin you couldn’t quite suppress. “it’s a little funny,” you admitted, your voice barely above a whisper.

ben rolled his eyes, running a hand through his hair in exasperation as he stumbled off the bed. his jeans still weren’t properly fastened, and he could feel the waistband slipping down with every step. he grabbed a discarded hoodie from the floor and threw it over his head, the fabric clinging to his sweat-slick skin as he stalked toward the door. he needed to look normal. casual. like he wasn’t all over you, like you weren’t tearing him apart.

before opening the door, he turned to you, his eyes flashing with a mix of desperation and warning. “not a word,” he hissed, the words as sharp as a blade pressed to your throat.

ben took a deep breath, his face schooled into a mask of nonchalance, as he yanked the door open. his teammates stood there, grinning like idiots, and ben felt a fresh wave of dread wash over him.

“what the hell took you so long?” one of them asked, stepping forward as if he had any right to barge in.

“busy,” ben grunted, leaning against the doorframe to block their view of the room. he prayed they couldn’t see you through the narrow crack, prayed they wouldn’t notice the flush on his cheeks or the faint bruises forming on his neck.

“busy with what?”

“homework,” ben said, deadpan, and the lie was so ridiculous that even he almost believed it.

#eepwtf’s works ! ( •)▄︻テحكـ━一💥#soldier boy x male reader #x male reader #the boys #wrote this while half asleep #also listening to she by tyler the creator i think it might’ve been a little inspired #soldier boy x reader #the boys tv #also i made this for me but if you like it you’re an angel #gay yearning #soldier boy #18+ mdni #top x bottom #cannibalism used as imagery #the boys smut

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