#but trust me that i will find a way to write him into something in the future | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

jessthebaker · 3 days ago

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How? How? HOWWWW did I not read this when you published it?! Did I read it on ao3 and not here? Did I leave you a comment there and not here? My friend, if I haven’t commented or shared this chapter yet, I have SINNED. Because this is amazing. The whole story is amazing. You are an amazing writer.

Watching Frankie and Lee grow together, watching her grow in her personal life - grow in her confidence that has been planted and nurtured by Frankie - and then she takes that confidence and saunters it back to him in slacks - is the sexiest and most affirming way for her to be.

(That is, until she finds the confidence enough to LEAVE HER ASSHOLE ADRIAN and trust that she DOES have skills to survive without Asshole Daddy’s money. Keeping her in a job she’s not good at, with a man who disrespects her and begrudges her anything good and only wants her around for the status it bestows upon him. UGH. Fuck that guy.)

BUT. I was talking about Lee and Frankie. It makes me so happy that they are talking, sharing parts of their lives, sleeping over, staying over past sunrise (she gets to see his glorious self naked in the daylight?! *swoon*) , getting more and more in tune with each other, more comfortable discussing things - the big things, things that matter more than “what do you do for work” or “where do you live”.

I can only hope that as they separately think about being together for REAL, that they actually discuss the idea together. And that Ava’s arrival is a catalyst to making something happen! Something good!!

My darling Orange, please do not apologise for taking a long time to write this story. If you didn’t write it at all, it would never get written. And that would be an absolute tragedy. Take your time, you are worth waiting for!

Tonight you belong to me, chapter 5

Summary: He comes to you every Friday, in a shady motel on the outskirts of town. Time flies, in room number 2. How much longer do you have, just for the two of you?

Pairing: Frankie Morales x fem!Reader (OFC)

Rating: Explicit 🔞 see series masterlist for extensive tw.

A/N: Happy Frankie Friday, Orange bedroom besties 🧡 It's been a hot minute, I sincerely apologise. Thank you to everyone who stuck around, I hope it was worth it, and thank you to everyone who just passed by 🧡 @frannyzooey my love, thank you for your help on the Americanisms, invaluable as always 🧡

Word count: 13.8k

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Chapter 5: Time in a bottle

It’s late when you pull into the parking lot. Dusk cloaks the motel in its fuzzy veil, the surroundings fading in diffuse shadows. The single-story building stands out in the twilight, akin to an old ship. Wooden poles for masts, hanging lamps swaying gently in the briny breeze, their lights blurry in the muggy air. Tacky and warm, it wafts in through your car’s open windows, dampening the exposed skin of your forearms and the back of your neck.

On the passenger seat, your iPhone’s screen glows in the semi-darkness with an incoming call.

Adrian.

“What now?” you sigh, through clenched teeth.

Your eyes dart up to Frankie’s truck parked in front of you. The word FORD stretched in chrome letters on the tailgate, shining bright in your headlights.

The familiar pull awakens between your constricted lungs. A pounding, greedy little tug compelling you to get out of your car and cover the distance to the room as quickly as your step will carry you. But you want to calm your nerves first. Slow down your heart rate, deepen your breathing.

That discussion you had with your father, earlier this afternoon, still clings to your frame. The humiliation conveyed by his carefully chosen words like tar, black and viscous. You can almost smell its foul stench. And you don’t want to bring any of it inside.

It’s only the third time Frankie gets here before you, if you count that very first Friday back in September. And the second, since you came back from Colorado earlier this month. The pressure in your rib cage eases at the memory of that sweet evening.

All day long, you had rushed through your counting routine. Through the long, icy corridors of your glass prison. Rushed on the 589 northbound. Rushed to strangle the uncertainty of his presence there.

It was a few minutes past 7pm when you parked next to his truck, his early presence cranking up your anxiousness. You got out of your car with an anguished scowl, and you all but ran toward the porch, toward the brass number 2, shoes scuffing the gravel.

The door swung open the very second you stepped under the overhang. A flash of dimple, and his arms wrapped around your waist. He scooped you up from the floor, swift and easy, carrying you inside. Hungry kisses, teeth scraping at your jaw, down the line of your neck. A throaty husk of Happy New Year, Lee Abbott, as he tugged your clothes off your body that thrummed with his scent and his voice and his arms and his taste.

With the density of him.

He lifted you again, your short, giggly yelp bouncing across the room as he hauled you over his shoulder with an easy force. His steps long and balanced, as if your weight was inconsequential to his strength.

In the dim bathroom, he put you down directly into the tub. There, he unbuckled his belt and slid down his jeans, looking at you with a mischievous grin you’d never seen before and that fitted his gorgeous face a little too well.

“Told you I’d fuck you in this shower.”

Thirty seconds later, you were standing together under an aggressive stream of scalding water, his broad back shielding you from the high pressure, steam blurring the tiles and the mirror. You pressed your face into his neck, hands splayed over his chest, feeling it heave with his low, rumbling chuckle.

“ That’s the best I could do. This place is trash,” he scoffed, lips grazing your ear.

“ It’s perfect,” you laughed.

Another notification lights up your screen, yanking you back into the stifling cab of the sedan, to the nagging cramp poking your rib cage, to your hindered breathing.

It glowers at you, bold black letters over a steel gray rectangle.

MESSAGES

Adrian

Your eyes flicker back to the red truck, your face crunching into a grimace.

“Shit,” you grit, grabbing the phone and quickly pressing the home button before you can change your mind.

The lock screen fades as the message app pops open. You squint against the brightness of the glowing white screen.

I made it, babe. I fucking made it. You’re talking to the new senior partner of Balmer & Steigt. Fuck yeah. I finally get what I fucking deserve.

The gray ellipses start blinking underneath the bubble. You frown, bracing yourself.

I couldn’t have made it without you. This is your victory as much as mine.

You scoff, but the dread-inducing ellipses keep bouncing happily. Fantastic. There’s more coming.

I got you something. Something fancy for my fancy girl.

“Oh, hell no.”

Leaning down, you pick up the roomy I ❤ NY tote bag Ava got you as a Christmas present and dump your phone into it, before stuffing the bag under your seat.

If only you could take a full breath. If only your chest would expend. It’s not that bad, really. A few months back, you would have been physically unable to keep going with your day after that conversation with your father. Let alone drive. You’d have suffocated, chocked up on your panic, until you’d been left with no choice other than to gulp down a pill, or two, or three, topped off with a swig of gin. The bitter taste of surrendering.

Is that what it means, to give oneself some grace? You’re doing good, you’re doing better, you’re doing your best.

Closing your eyes, you exhale through pursed lips and ease down your shoulders.

He had you called into his office by his secretary, as you were about to leave, bag in hand, counting steps.

But you were expecting it. In all honesty, you’re surprised it’s taken him this long. Four weeks since you came back from Beaver Creek. Four weeks of defying his strict, outdated, misogynistic dress-code.

The very first morning, you stepped out of the mirror-lined elevator on the 15th floor wearing high-waisted, wide-legged slacks and a loose button-up, the sleeves folded high on your forearms. And flat derbies.

Nervousness, sitting heavy and queasy in the pit of your stomach, beating loud against your eardrums. Prickling under your armpits, raising the hair on your nape.

Kaytee’s eyes widened as she caught sight of you walking by her office, before she remembered to police her expression. The shock on her face turned into something else, something worse. Lurking in the lift-up corner of her lips, in the smugness coloring her cheeks. Something sardonic. Condescension.

“ You can’t spend your life trying to be someone else. ” Ava’s words through the receiver the previous night were a dizzying swirl inside your head, as you walked down the glass corridors, coworkers and subordinates watching you with a similar shocked expression, that blurred their features into one subdued, frightened face.

But who the fuck am I, Ava? you wanted to ask, the only sound on the line that of your short breathing. How did you know who you were? Always. From the very beginning of your life. How did you know how to be so unapologetic about it?

Had it been your gift to her? Does self-confidence require love? Or guidance? Is it innate?

All you know, at this point in your life, is that wearing clothes that you chose for yourself seems like a sound first measure. One that you can actually undertake.

And with that in mind, you stepped into your father’s office, your heart pulsating in your throat, to take a seat across from him, his clear desk standing like a wide canyon between you.

Now, your steps are nearly silent on the shifting gravel, as you walk across the parking lot, fingers brushing along the cool metal of the truck as you pass it by. That pull toward Frankie propelling you forward, inescapable, irresistible despite the nasty sensation oozing down along your legs like thick-flowing tar, weighing your gait.

On the porch, you pause. On Friday evenings, this is when you shed your old skin. Healing wounds, scar tissues. When you set your eyes on the canopy as it swallows the sun, pink-orange dusk fading to dark. Grainy photographs, forgotten vacations. This is when your spine straightens, when you take in the horizon and let it deepen your breathing. When you ready yourself for the life you’ve chosen, between the brown carpet and the yellow curtains and his arms.

But it’s already night. The darkness has erased the horizon and your old skin won’t shed.

The door opens, a draft ruffling your hair.

The first thing you see is the crease between his brow. The tick of his whiskered jaw, and then, his dark brown eyes, appraising the tension that winds up your body, appraising your silence. His grunt, like an echo, distant.

“You sat in that car forever. I was about to come out and get you.”

The concern in his voice rattles something deep inside your belly. You’re not bringing any of it inside that room of yours, you think, as he pushes away from the door to let you in, as you cross the threshold, but it’s stuck to you. Your father’s voice. The tremendous power it still holds over you. His disappointment. Your failures, plural. All the wrong choices.

His hat is set on the desk. His suede jacket is draped over the back of the angular wooden chair. Your gaze lingers on it, you can almost feel the comforting softness of the fabric under the pads of your fingers.

He stands a few feet away from you, giving you space. Dark mahogany searching your features, your posture. His hands propped on his hips, like that other night in the parking lot, after he’d seen the fresh scar in your hairline.

You face away from him. The smell of the room is familiar, in a comforting way. Musty. Dust and the faintest perfume of industrial laundry detergent coming from the starched sheets. He’s pulled the bedspread off the bed. It’s folded neatly on the floor underneath the window. It rises tears along your throat, the idea of him prepping himself, prepping the place, alone in this room where you’ve waited for him countless times and hours. Guilt scrambles your brain, over what, you’re not entirely certain. Keeping him waiting? You failures, plural. All the wrong choices.

“Lee.”

His voice seeps in through the blackness coating your skin, like warm and persistent little droplets of sweet amber.

You turn to face him, at last. An awkward upper-body twist, feet rooted to the brown carpet, teeth clenched around the lump in your throat. He’s wearing that gray threadbare t-shirt you love, the one with a v-neck, and your eyes find the dip at the base of his throat, the fireworks of freckles between his collarbone. Tears well up, too strong to hold back, and you shut your eyes to the muffled sound of his booted steps on the matted carpet.

You’re drifting, enveloped in his warmth, his scent, leather and musk. The contact of his skin as he curls a large hand around your nape, tucking your face into the curve of his strong neck.

His arm wraps around your waist, drawing you closer, flush to his chest, and he presses his chin to your temple. You let go, surrender, honey dripping thick and golden along your loosening limbs.

His pulse beats solid and steady against your cheek. You breathe him in, a hindered inhale at first, and when your shoulders begin to drop, a deeper one. A single tear escapes. It rolls down the round of your cheek into his skin. Your palms skim up to the plane of his back, soaking in his heat, and he presses you in harder, his forearm aligning with your spine, fingers spreading at the base of your skull.

Time stretches. He holds you. You lean in.

Later, after he’s helped you climb into the cab of his truck, you keep your eyes on him as he rounds the red hood.

Sitting behind the wheel, he puts the key in the ignition and, looking at you, tilts his head to the left.

“C’mere,” he says, and you scoot next to him, biting down a relieved sigh as you slide over the seat bench.

He leans over your lap, grabbing the middle seat belt, and buckles you in, then himself. You settle in, with your head against his shoulder, and your hand on his thigh, soft cotton, worn denim. Under your touch, his firm muscles ripple as he drives you into the night, into oblivion. The steady motion lulling you to sleep.

Alongside the deserted road, trees and bushes roll out in the headlights as the truck swallows miles and miles of asphalt.

“I’m sorry,” you mumble after a while, fighting drowsiness.

“Don’t be. You wanna talk about it?” he adds after a pause.

“No.”

You shake your head, your voice so low you’re not certain he’s heard your answer.

“Doesn’t have to be now,” he says. “Whenever you’re ready.”

Your head bobs with his bunching muscles as he releases the wheel to bend his arm at the elbow, fingers threading through your hair. Without lifting his eyes off the road, he leans in, and pecks a pointed kiss on the crown of your head.

Your eyes close. The image of the bedspread neatly folded underneath the window flashes through your mind. You can’t seem to get used to his tender gestures, to his attentions. You hope they will never stop. You hope you will never get used to them.

The emotion washes over you, a soft wave, and you float with it. In the cab of his truck, in his scent and his hold, you feel free of all doubts. Fear and pain cannot find you here. It’s unlike anything you’ve ever experienced so far, a strange feeling, potent and all encompassing, albeit one that doesn’t need to be dulled or tamed.

The words come out of your mouth as a surprise.

“I think I don't want it to define me anymore. My family, I mean. Where I come from.”

This is a new state of mind. Or perhaps it’s been there for a while, a mere shadow on the wall, something you couldn’t clearly discern. Suddenly simple to comprehend and articulate.

“Yea. I get it,” he says.

And you know he does.

You open your eyes, and take in a deep breath, fill your lungs with that distinct old leather scent that clings about him, and the smell of vintage Bakelite from the dashboard, so specific to his truck.

“Music?” you ask.

“Sure, good idea. You like Jefferson Airplane?”

You nod, brushing your cheek against the cottony fabric of his t-shirt, leaving a little bit of you there, for him to find later.

“Yes. I like them.”

“Jefferson Airplane it is, then,” he answers.

Gently, he bends forward, mindful not to nudge you too much, and turns on the stereo. His thick fingers push the tape that’s already there into the slot, and your lips curl with an explicit thought, unlike any you used to have before meeting him. Crude, but welcome pictures that now constantly crowd your brain.

He keeps the volume low, and with the round rumbling of his quiet humming, your mind slowly drifts off again.

You’re about to fall asleep when a thought surfaces, skirting the edges of your consciousness.

“Frankie?” you quietly call.

“Mmh?”

“Are you… Were you in the military?”

The humming stops, his silence abrupt, and his shoulder tenses under your cheek. Pushing away from it, you risk a sleepy glance at his face, plunged in the semi-darkness. It’s not dark enough that you don’t recognize the cocking of his jaw.

“Frankie?” you ask again. “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean–”

“I’m a pilot,” he cuts in, pausing to inhale deeply. “I was in the Army for nearly twenty years. I got a discharge a couple years back.”

You remain silent. His eyes flicker quickly between you and the road, and you give his thigh a strong squeeze with your left hand, before resting your cheek against his shoulder, eluding his searching gaze.

Volunteers is crackling through the speakers, but you don’t hear the music. Fully awake now, your mind is reeling with those scattered, minute parts of him you picked up Friday after Friday to stash them away in your subconscious. His puzzle of shadows. All the things that now make perfect sense, and the ones you’re dying to unravel.

His quiet assertiveness. His hands, quick and sure. His silences. His commanding tone. That long, sideways scar etched on his left flank.

His early rage, and his anger too. The flight forward, dimming his eyes, where deep rich mahogany now glimmers.

The zip ties. Your eyes grow wide, a gasping sound catching in your throat. You’re not ready to address how much you appreciate this particular skill of his, considering where he picked it up.

Your imagination produces a clear vision of him in a US Air Force uniform, the fabric stretched over his broad shoulders, and you bite your lip, your entire body covering in chills.

Frankie has yet to say another word. Something raises your consciousness, something in the scowl sharpening his features as he scanned your face for a reaction.

Images flash through your head. The 8 × 10 picture displayed in your father’s office in its platinum frame, for every visitor to admire. Smooth faced and confident, his sleeves rolled up high on his lean forearms, your father’s shaking hands with Reagan in front of a colorful assemblage of containers, in the industrial quarter of the Tampa Bay Harbor, during the 1984 campaign. His coldly handsome face split by a smile, larger and more genuine than any of those he ever addressed you, let alone Ava.

Recollections of those dragging hours you spent in church as a child, beads of sweat dripping along your spine as you sat in the sweltering heat on a hard wooden bench, rigid and still like a marble statue for fear of being reprimanded.

The hateful, vehement speeches your father would burst into at random, your mother pinching your arm for you to listen, this is important. The uneasy feeling sitting in the pit of your stomach, like bile, like nausea. Wrong. This is wrong. A feeling, not an idea yet. It grew with you, expending, to become impossible to see past by the time you started high.

The list of names in your father’s neat handwriting, scrawled on a crisp piece of paper, that he handed you before driving the entire family to the polls for your very first election. The sheer terror, primitive in its hold over you, prickling on your nape as you systematically disregarded his instructions, choosing the names followed by the three letters DEM.

The rare political meetings you secretly attended in college, the pamphlets in loud colors and bold letters, that you read hidden from your roommate’s prying eyes, as if they were satanic verses. Reproductive rights! Demilitarization Now! No to privatized prisons! End gun violence!

Petitions you signed with a shaking hand, because what if your parents found out? What if they heard of it? A dread so profoundly anchored at the very core of your psyche that you have never told Ava any of it, even when she would chastise your lack of interest in politics, your lack of involvement, lest she’d reveal your treason to them in the heat of an argument.

Could this be when you started finding yourself? In your diverging convictions? Could it be enough? Could it count?

“Do you want to talk about it?” you ask tentatively.

He huffs a short, bitter laugh, shaking his head.

“You’re a hell of a fast learner, aren’t you?”

“I have a very good teacher,” you shrug, trying to ignore the sharpness in his tone.

Curiosity overthrowing your ingrained fear to displease, you ask, “What kind of aircraft do you fly? Planes? Helicopters?”

He simply nods, and your cheeks heat again at the notion, your heart racing.

“I’m very impressed,” you whisper. “I can barely parallel park.”

“I’m sure you got plenty of other skills,” he answers, softer.

“No. I really don’t.”

—

Frankie walks briskly across the parking lot, carrying a take-away bag and a six-pack of beer. His head hung low to shield his face from the thin, mid-February drizzle. His denim shirt sticks to his back with humidity, and sweat from the drive. It’s pulled uncomfortably taut across his shoulders.

He steps onto the porch, hands too full to open the door or even knock on it, so he gives it three light kicks. A tiny screw pops out from the curved top of the brass number two. The whole thing swivels upside down, swinging like a pendulum.

“Jesus christ, this fucking place,” he scoffs.

The door flies open, and you’re here, with that bright, earnest smile and your wide, luminous eyes. You’ve tied your hair up in a casual do, but you’re still fully dressed. He likes those slacks on you, snug on your curves, wide on your legs. It fits you so much better than the tight pencil skirts you used to wear when he first met you. Those made you look like an 80s porn producer fever dream. But these trousers transform your gait, your entire demeanor, into something more relaxed. More confident. He could watch you strut around the room for hours. If only there was more time.

He catches a glimpse of the mesh fabric of your bra, peeking out from the cleavage of your open shirt, and he mentally curses the corporate fucks who get to work all week around you.

“Hey, Frankie.”

The sharp, familiar pang rips through his chest at the sound of your voice, light and cheery. That ache he waits for seven excruciatingly long days to experience again.

“Hey, baby.”

As you let him in, he feels the tip of your fingers brushing his thigh, as if you need to make sure he’s here in the flesh. The miracle of you wanting him, still.

“What’s in the bag?” you ask, dragging the chipped chair away from the desk, so he can set down his bounty.

His eyes fall on your graceful nape as you crane your neck to see what’s inside the bag, too well-behaved to touch it without having been invited to do so.

“Didn’t have time to eat. I took something for you too, I hope you don’t mind. Did you eat? Are you hungry?”

“I don’t usually eat before I come here,” you admit. “I drive in straight from work,” you add, heat visibly creeping up your neck and ears.

He takes off his hat, ruffling a hand through his hair to conceal a smug smile.

“And you’re not starving, by the time I’m finished with you?”

“Quite the contrary, actually. I feel pretty full when you leave.”

Your lips stretch into a wide grin you’re ineffectively trying to hold back.

“That so?” he chuckles, propping his hands on his hips. For countenance.

Pride glimmers in your eyes, as it does every time you make him laugh. He knows it’s mirrored in his eyes. Your levity is his reward.

Everything about you is unbearably endearing. He’s not sure if he’s hungry for food anymore, or if he’s not going to go straight down on you. You’ve already prepared the bed, that ugly bedspread neatly folded under the window. He could lay you prone on your stomach, lower your trousers to your knees, perk up your pretty ass and eat your sweet cunt from behind.

His hunger for you sizzles along his spine, sparkling in his loins, imperious and distracting. The sensation is delicious, and for once, he takes the time to revel in it. He’s so used to barging in here and just taking. He doesn’t savor, not really, not until after he’s had you at least once.

He’s not proud of his unbridled hunger, the consequence of seven days’ worth of pent-up frustration, chasing your perfume on his clothes and the ghost feeling of your cool, smooth skin under his palms. That ever-growing obsession for your scent, for your eyes, and that crippling craving for the sounds you produce when he moves inside you. That high he gets when he makes you feel good. Every time he gives you what you want.

And there’s the absolute black-out on all communications between you throughout the week that drives him out of his mind. He knows that’s the tacit deal the two of you struck at the very beginning. No phone number, no address, no marks. Hell, he didn’t even know your name until you gave it to him at Christmas. Only, he’s left in the dark for seven consecutive fucking days, with no means to check up on you, and no way to make sure you’re safe.

He understands the necessity for secrecy. But the more time passes, the less it makes sense.

So come Friday night, he needs to crush you under his weight. Needs to feel your flesh gushing through his splayed fingers and hear you mewl his name, eyes rolling to the back of your head, your body tensing up in his hold before it shatters around his cock.

He needs to fuck you deep and full, find you in that place within yourself and wreck you there. He needs to make sure you’re alright. Make sure you’re real. Make sure you’re his.

And his control might be tenuous, but he sure loves the way you lean into it.

You’re still smiling when he takes a step closer behind you. Lowering his face into the curve of your neck, he inhales you there, that spot behind your ear, where your subtle scent becomes heady. He feels your chest rising with your own deep breathing, and he pictures your eyes fluttering shut. His hand skims the curve of your hip, sliding up to the swell of your breast over the smooth fabric of your shirt, gripping you roughly as he takes your earlobe between his lips and sucks on it. His hips move against your ass of their own volition, his cock half-hard, fucking twitching.

“Frankie,” you whine.

“Yea?”

He licks a broad stride up your neck, collecting the tangy taste of your skin, mixed with the chemical one of your perfume.

“What’s in the bag?”

“What bag, baby? Oh, right.”

It’s a beat before he can detach himself from you. His cock is beating hard and angry against the confining fabric of his jeans. With a light brush of his knuckles along your side, he reminds himself there’s also pleasure in the anticipation. The word sits in the back of his throat, like a knife ready to bleed him dry. Concupiscence.

Ripping the paper bag open in the middle, he smooths both sides neatly over the desk, and points at the three rolls wrapped in tin foil.

“Took three burritos, and some fried beans. There’s one beef, one pork, and one vegetarian, in case you don't eat meat.”

You look at him with a twinkle in your eyes, your grin getting wider than he’s ever seen it. He braces a hand flat on the desk.

“Oh, I eat meat, I thought you’d know that.”

The words have barely left your mouth that you burst into a fit of giggles, covering your face with both hands.

“Christ, woman!” he laughs. “Alright, sit down. Let’s get proper food into that mouth of yours, for once.”

Together, you unfold the bedspread and arrange it over the foot of the bed. The thing is already stained, and you mutually agree there’s no need to make a mess of the white sheet just yet.

Letting you pick between the two richer ones, he takes the vegetarian burrito, and you start eating together, two open cans of beer at your feet.

His bites are ravenous, while you nibble gingerly at your food, holding the burrito with two hands, the foil crackling between your fingers. After a few bites, however, you start eating in bigger chunks.

“This is delicious,” you moan with your mouth full.

Is he getting jealous of a fucking burrito now? Is that where he’s at?

“What, you never had a burrito in your life?”

You wince, and he immediately regrets the teasing skepticism of his tone.

Setting the food down, you dab a paper towel to the corner of your mouth, catching a fleck of sauce. There’s grace in all your movements, even the tiniest ones.

“My mother monitored everything I ate. God forbid I put on any weight,” you explain, a hint of bitterness in your voice.

He lowers his hands, eyes trained on your averted gaze.

“I know what you’re thinking,” you tell him, looking up at him.

There’s that quiet resignation painted all over your face.

“Try me.”

“You’re thinking I’m a grown woman, old enough to make her own decisions.”

He shakes his head. “Was actually thinking your mother sounds like the exact opposite of mine.”

Your mouth curves into a sad attempt at a smile.

“I don't judge you, Lee. We all do what we can with what we got dealt with.”

A slight frown knits your brow, as you seem to consider his words.

He has spent a lot of time, lately, reflecting over his own choices, and the many places where they’ve led him, for better or for worse.

Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria. Libya and the most dangerous places in sub-Saharan Africa. Nearly everywhere in South America. Twice over.

Over the fucking Andes, and to Tom’s funeral.

Choices that also made him Lua’s father.

Crossroads that have taken him all the way to that shithole bar, last year at the end of August. Conscious decisions that brought him here, into this room. Into your arms. Into your life.

A chain reaction he wouldn’t alter, he knows it now, even if he was given the chance for a do-over.

He used to consider things as definite. Choices as absolute and irrevocable. It took him becoming a father, and meeting you, to understand his mother’s words. Paso a paso, she’d say, watching him with a tender, knowing smile as he rushed toward his life. Paso a Paso, Francisco.

You eat in silence for a while, and he keeps watching you. That sharp pain solidly entrenched inside his chest, blooming through his heart, he has to make a conscious effort to breathe around it.

He bought you the food you’re eating right now. Drove to his favorite place, stood in line and placed his order with you in mind. And you’re enjoying it. In fact, you’re demonstrating an impressive appetite, hungrier, messier with every bite. Sauce dripping down your chin. Pink flashes of tongue licking it from between your fingers.

He could get used to that. Providing for you. Taking care of you. In more than just one way. Sharing the mundane routine of a daily life together.

But this is not real. Whatever is happening between the four walls of this shitty motel is not ground for life-altering choices.

“Do you want to share the pork one?” you ask, crinkling the tinfoil wrapper into a compact ball.

“I’m good, baby,” he answers with a soft smile. “You can have it. Just make sure you’re still hungry for more meat when you’re done.”

—

Adrian has gifted you a new purse from another French luxury brand. It’s a square-shaped thing cut from some grayish reptile skin, with a matching tag and a decorative lock hanging from its handle. It looks insanely expensive and ridiculously vulgar, its tackiness almost cruelly ironic. Like a rich people’s inside joke.

Somehow, you’re vaguely aware this model is exclusive and can’t be bought online or even in stores, however high-end. It has to be ordered, and there’s a waiting list. Useless knowledge you probably gathered from one of your mother’s magazines. A family of four could most likely live comfortably for a whole year for the price of this thing.

Incidentally, there’s a new perfume clinging to Adrian’s clothes when he comes home late at night. The first time you caught a whiff of the heady fragrance, intense vanilla and white musk, it reminded you of the stunning blonde with feline hazel eyes.

The gift immediately felt less like an expression of gratitude for your support than like a reward for your silent compliance. But it’s of little to no importance. The bag sits idly at the bottom of your walk-in dressing. Unused, containing what’s left of the love and respect you once harbored for the man.

Every so often, you think about it, as you cruise along the 589. It makes you smile. A wide, Cheshire cat grin, one that bares your front teeth, and you wonder if it’s cruel of you to smile about the end of something that used to mean so much. Something that meant nearly everything. You wonder if you’ve ever been cruel before. Intentionally, that is.

Then, you conclude you don’t care. This particular kind of cruelty feels far too good. Too righteous. You could get used to it.

And you keep cruising along the 589 northbound.

—

“Mark Twain or Lewis Carroll?”

“Oh god, Frankie, I don’t know…” you moan, too distracted to think straight.

Teeth ghosting a bite over your neck, he wraps a kiss around your skin, sucking on it. Not sharply enough to bruise, but enough for you to clench hard around him.

In the past few weeks, he’s become playful. It’s new to you. Was it always a part of him, constituent but buried underneath the scars and the years, or was it born from your touch?

He’s become talkative, too. Talkative, and curious. But then again, perhaps he always was. Only, not with you.

Thus, there are new rituals between you. Secrets exchanged behind the shielding partition of the yellow curtains. Murmurs shared underneath the droning of the ceiling fan, in the golden lighting from the quaint bedside lamps.

Some of his questions can pose a challenge. You’re not always certain about the proper answer. The right one. You were raised to say what was expected of you. Taught to speak to please, not to speak your mind. To wait for your cue, and hold your thoughts in between.

Frequently, you hesitate, afraid to trip on your words.

But he doesn’t easily relent. He’s playful and curious. But above all, he’s patient and persistent.

“I don’t know,” you repeat.

“You know. Come on.”

“Okay, um… Lewis Carroll. I love– I love Alice.”

“Oh yea? You do? You like following big white rabbits to strange places, huh?”

His chest shakes with his raspy chuckle, and you laugh, until he pulls you in closer, sheathing himself deeper inside you, and your laughter plummets into a throaty groan.

Seamlessly, these new ceremonials have replaced the old ones, the ones that were carried out under wary gazes, in appraising silence.

Now, you don’t always count your steps on Fridays, but you leave work earlier, and when you arrive at the motel, you try to engage Raul in conversation. His discomfort is obvious, bordering on annoyance, as you disrupt his concentration while he’s busy drawing charcoal landscapes of jagged mountains. But these past two weeks, he seems to have loosened up a bit. Either you’re wearing him off, or he’s trying to get rid of you faster.

On the porch, in front of room number 2, you watch the sun slowly sink into the canopy of trees in an explosion of tangerine pink. Every week, the sunset creates a different palette of orange, but your emotion continues to be whole and unaltered.

Before stepping in, you flick the upside-down brass number. It smiles in greeting, swinging on its one remaining screw.

You wish the place carried Frankie’s scent. It never does, of course. As you fold the comforter and prop it under the windowsill, the only smells wafting around are that of laundry detergent, dust, and the faintest hint of mold.

There’s nothing tangible for you to hold on to in his absence, and this is by far the most difficult. It creates a vacuum, a fertile soil for foul, festering thoughts. Doubt, dread, agitation. During those seven days apart, there is no text or voicemail on your phone you can turn to for reassurance. No photo booth pictures stashed inside your wallet. No clothes of his to drape over your body and keep you warm and safe. Keep you sane.

Every so often, when you cannot find sleep, you convoke the memory of his gray t-shirt, the one with the v-neck and the pilled fabric. The sensation of the slightly rugged cotton under the pads of your fingers. The immediate comfort gently lulls you to sleep.

There is one thing, one thing only: the receipt from the burrito place, that you retrieved from the wastebasket after he’d left, that one time he brought you food. It’s tucked between two pages of your Moleskine planner. You’re not sure whether it’s cute or downright pathetic.

You had thought the want, the yearning, would ease with time. It only kept spreading to every corner of your existence, every aspect of your life. Instead of only missing his touch, you now miss his voice, too. His choice of words, the cadence of his speech, the pace of his gait. His crinkled-eyes, dimpled smile. The way he rolls up his sleeves, leaves the top buttons of his shirt open, and the way he undresses. His three-finger hold on his glass. His long reflecting pauses before he speaks. The freedom and safety you experience with him.

You just became better at handling the longing. Recently, you have become very good at handling numerous things. Quietly but steadfastly defying your father’s injunctions to comply with his dress code. Adrian’s glaring eyes of blue, their silent judgement. Ava living a life of her own, far away from you.

Reading helps. You hadn’t read in years, and you hadn’t realized how much you’d missed it. Now, you carry a book with you everywhere in your I ❤ NY tote. In these last moments before he walks into the room, you lie on your side across the motel bed, your head propped on your hand, and you read.

And when Frankie arrives, everything makes sense again, everything is justified.

The wooden door creaks open, the brass number swiveling frantically, and his relief upon seeing you lights up the dim room. Hushed greetings, his large hands curling at your waist, pulling you into him, a husk of Hey, baby, his lips barely leaving yours while he tugs at your clothes, undressing you already.

There’s rarely any other form of preamble beyond an occasional variation of Fuck, I really missed you, Lee , his teeth trailing down the line of your throat, sinking in just shy of a bite. Out of breath, out of time.

The wait is over.

Does he still come here to escape? Does he come here for you? His urgency hasn’t abated. But his intent feels different.

Stop me, skin on skin, chest to chest, the weight of his body covering yours, calloused hands hooked on your shoulders for purchase, pounding into you loud and ruthless.

Stop me, crouched over you like a devouring beast, his face buried into the crook of your neck, shallow breaths and gripping hands, grinding deep inside your heat.

Stop me, and what you hear is, I trust you.

Deep grunts thrumming out of his throat, tumbling from his plush lips into your skin, a searing branding, an invisible mark.

His plea. Lee.

He comes right after you do, pulling out just in time to spurt hot and thick over your arching body, or inside your wanting mouth.

Later, when his spend has dried on your skin, when he’s kissed the soreness better, when your breathing has slowed, he brings you a glass of water, and waits until you’ve drank it all to bury his face between your legs, or fuck your throat if you begged him to.

And on some Fridays, he goes by the desk to sit on the rectangular chair. He positions it sideways from the framed mirror. Says the reflection distracts you. It’s true.

You could spend hours watching him. Watching him move, watching him sleep. Watch the care he puts in the way he handles his clothes and his truck and your pliant body. Watch him button up his jeans or tie his belt around your wrists. Watch his curls catch the light as he combs his fingers through them, the working of his throat, the pulsating throb of his heartbeat in his strong neck. The dip in his collarbone. The darker scar on his side. The muscles of his shoulders and his back, rippling under his freckled skin. Watch, and map those freckles with your lips.

You could spend the rest of your life with him.

“C’mere,” he beckons, with a little tilt of his head, and a light pat on his thigh.

You get up from wherever he left you lying, the bed, the rough carpeting, the bathroom tiles, and walk over to him on wobbly legs. There, he draws you into his lap in a face-away straddle, his hands on your waist guiding you, firm and gentle, as he makes room for himself inside of you. The tip of your toes barely reach the carpet once you’re seated, and you have to rely entirely on him for balance. You like that.

He braces his strong arms around you, and you keep your fingers curled around them, reclining against him, against his warmth. You like the sticky sensation of your combined sweats gluing your loose bodies. Your back molds to his chest like it was shaped for this very purpose.

Your head tips back onto his firm shoulder, and he props his chin in the curve of your neck. The slight swaying of your hips is languid and slow, barely perceivable, in the same way the earth’s revolution around the sun is imperceptible to its inhabitants.

Time lingers, in long lazy stretches, infinite moments in the amber lighting of the room, in the friendly shadows. In the heart of the night, and the folds of your existence. The low husk of his voice like honey in your ears, his words vibrating from his chest to your back, to your core.

You can hear the smile in his tone. If you close your eyes, you can see it.

He asks about your taste in books, music or movies, food and entertainment, and tells you about his. Silly games of Would you rather? and Never have I ever.

Scrunching up your nose under your pinched brow, brain cells scrambling back together inside your hazy brain, you try to produce coherent answers as his lush lips trace intricate patterns along your skin, your throat, your shoulders, nimble fingertips rolling your nipples into hardened peaks. A scrape of his teeth, followed by the wet glide of his tongue, soothing over your flushed skin.

Sometimes, you feel so full it’s overwhelming. The sensation, the emotion strangles the air out of you. Your cunt flutters around the thick, stiff girth of him, and he lets out a gravelly groan, cock throbbing inside your snug walls. Your slick pools down onto the coarse curls at his base. It’s like a virtuous circle. Everything feels right with him.

After a while, when you’ve melted inside, when amber twirls in your bloodstream and your thoughts have turned to swirling molasses, his hand slides down along your stomach. His calloused fingers parting your folds, he starts rubbing at your clit, telling you that it’s time to come for me, baby.

And when you do, he comes with you, shoving you down and deep onto his pulsating length, fingers digging into the soft flesh of your hips. His mouth pressed to that sensitive spot over your pulse point, his feverish grunts sizzling against your damp skin.

When he comes inside you, when you come together, you are made brand-new. Anything’s possible. There’s nothing you can’t do.

The elating sensation is your favorite daydream, sitting at your desk, over dinner, stuck in traffic, or in the blue hours before dawn. It sustains you throughout the week. The promise of it tingles in tense anticipation, from the crown of your head to the tip of your toes, when you watch him walk over to the desk and fold his tall, massive figure into the ugly chair.

Week after week, question after question, you come into focus between his arms. It’s terrifying, and exhilarating. You keep getting better at it.

It’s a bittersweet ache, tender and addictive, to learn about his existence outside this room of yours. The borderless confines of his life. Of him. The details he chooses to confide in you, about his childhood, his past, and his present, in the dead of the night, his body wrapped around yours, chasing the contact of your skin. Chasing your touch, your softness, your understanding, when he used to grunt away from it. Like a threat, with bared teeth, and a shake of his head. A forbidding. A not yet.

It makes sense to you now. There’s an absolute about him. An all or nothing. You’re not sure when it happened. The tipping point. Perhaps in the bathroom, on that sunny morning after Christmas, when he crowded you against the sink with a wolfish look turning his gorgeous face dark and threatening. You think it was meant to scare you. One last attempt. Your last chance to recoil and escape.

You didn’t. You kept blooming, unfurling into your own limbs under the dark depth of his gaze, reflected in the black-edged mirror. You pressed back into him, the solid, steadying bulk of his body, of his broad chest. You pushed back and sunk deeper into his world.

Today, he had to scoop you up from the floor where you were lying, boneless, in the wet mess he drew out of you.

When he stormed into the room, you could still hear the engine of the truck revving. A scowl shadowed his face. Fidgety, tightly wound up, he began undressing you without a word. Unceremonious in his need, an echo of those early days, when he was imprisoned in his past, when his strength was unrestrained, when violence was his sole language.

Fingers digging into the tense muscles of his shoulders, carding through his hair, you sought eye contact, softly cooing, I’m here, Frankie, I’m here, until your voice got through him. Until he heard you, slowing down, drawing you close. His forehead smearing sweat over your temple, his ragged breathing fanning the shell of your ear. His fist clutching the fabric of your shirt in a ball, with a push-pull motion, torn and primal, I need it, Lee. Please, I need you.

You relented, gave into it, lose and pliant as he bent you over the desk with a press of his palm, flat between your shoulder blades, as he pulled your panties to the side and lined himself up, as he thrust into you in one ruthless shove, down to his base. The clasp of his watch biting into your flesh. He was still fully clothed.

Pulling on your wrists with an iron grip, he drilled into you at a brutal pace, skin catching at your entrance along his length, and you bit your lips through it, nearly drawing blood, until, at the very center of you, the pain turned into something blindingly pleasurable, bright and searing. A shockwave, erupting from your core, fast spreading along your limbs, lighting up every nerve-ending.

Tensing under his constraining hold, bucking against his grip, you cried out his name, your back achingly stiff. Slick gushing out of you fast and hot, as your legs trembled uncontrollably, and through the din of it all, his rumbling growl, a guttural string of Fuck, before you slumped onto the desk and he fucked his own release into you.

When he let go of you, he had to lay you on the carpet, where he collapsed next to you, chest heaving with exertion. Time blurred, you might have spent the whole night lying there, staring blankly at the popcorn ceiling, but he got up to undress.

He’s cradling you on his lap now, gently rocking into you. The slow and steady rhythm of his heartbeat aligned with yours, you’re bathed in his warmth, enveloped by his musky scent. You play along, searching your brain for answers. To his questions, and yours.

There’s no evidence of his earlier outburst, saved for his thumbs drawing circles on your wrists where his fingers left a bruising indent. And of course, the wet spot on the carpet.

Nuzzling your jawline, he trails a path of messy, lazy kisses down the column of your neck, capturing the tender skin between his plush lips, his tongue peeking through them.

“I should read it again. Alice. Read it so long ago. When I was a kid.”

Humming distractedly in agreement, your head lolls back on his shoulder.

“Did I hurt you, earlier?”

Your eyelids fly open. His voice is barely a murmur, no more than warm breath grazing your ear, and you feel him throb inside you.

“I don’t want to hurt you. I never want to hurt you.”

The vulnerability in his words shoots through your heart like a bullet. You free your arms to twine your fingers with his.

“What happened today, Frankie?”

His chest stiffens underneath you.

“Nothing. Nothing happened. It’s more… It’s the date.”

The overhead fan hums over the room, louder than your breathing, louder than his.

“A year ago, I agreed to a mission. With my former teammates. It was… It was bullshit. From the start. Nothing went as planned.”

He pauses and you wait, still and silent.

“One of us got killed.”

“I’m sorry,” you whisper, squeezing his hands with all of your strength.

A chilling, bone-deep dread settles over your body in the sweltering heat, so cold he can probably feel it. You don’t want him to.

“You said you resigned a couple of years ago?”

“I did. I worked for the private sector, on occasions. It’s over now.”

“Do you miss it?”

“Fuck no,” he snarls. “But some of my friends did. I– I had to go.” He clears his throat. “I chose to go.”

“Do you miss him?”

He doesn’t answer for a while. Lifting his hand in yours, you give his knuckles a long, open-mouthed kiss. His forehead rests heavy against the back of your head, his eyelashes a fluttering caress on your nape.

“For a long time, I felt responsible for his death.”

His words are dense with defeat. With sadness, and fatality. They sink heavily into you, into your bloodstream. You don’t need a mirror to know what his face looks like at this very moment. Your body will remember it, even if you live long enough to forget your own name. The pitch-blackness of his beautiful eyes, the stern crease splitting his brow, imploring for your touch. The tightness in his jaw. The downward curve of his plush lips.

That first night at the motel comes back rushing like a flood, like a wildfire. His roughness, the urgency saturating his actions, the anger in his grief. His bleeding wounds, invisible, evident, glaring. He reached for you through his despair, clutching your body, clinging to the idea of you.

Are you real?

I don’t know.

A dry sob wells up in your throat, but you swallow it down.

“What do you think now?”

“I think it doesn’t matter who’s responsible for his death. His girls are still orphaned.”

Between your lungs, the wild creature curls up into a ball. Its tears fill up your heart. There isn’t any pill or alcohol strong enough to numb this pain of yours. But it doesn’t matter. You want to feel what he feels.

You turn around. You kiss him.

—

“What about this one?”

He should be leaving soon. But your body’s soft and relaxed, curled into his side on the rumpled bed. Pleasantly cool in the muggy atmosphere of the motel room, in the dawn’s indigo hues. Your thin fingers hover gracefully over his skin, tracing the outlines of his scars, and it’s like you’re reshaping his entire body, all of his wounds, and his whole life, with the gentle touch of your fingertips.

“Frankie, what’s this one?”

He should be leaving soon. The sun’s about to come up.

“Did you save it for last because it’s the largest?” he deflects with a smirk.

Folding an arm over his chest, you prop your chin over it, frowning exaggeratedly with your jaw shifting to the side. He laughs so hard that your head bobbles with his shaking belly.

“That supposed to be an impression of me?”

“You recognized yourself,” you smile, sitting up next to him.

He should be leaving soon. And you know it. You’re giving him the space he needs to get up and get out. He fucking hates it.

“Stay here,” he says, curling his fingers around your arm as you’re about to get down from the bed.

The look you give him awakens the pain in his chest. You peer through the curtains, into the blue morning sky, and your gaze returns to him with a silent question.

“Come on. Please. Just a little longer.”

It’s not lost on him that he should be the one getting up. Not pleading.

The mattress creaks in protest as you move over it on your knees, sitting in a straddle across his hips.

“Yea, that’s better,” he smiles, smoothing his palms over your thighs. His left hand slides up to palm your breast, and he notices he hasn’t taken off his watch, tonight. It’s the second time this month.

“What’s this one?” you ask again, entirely undistracted, measuring up your hand to the length of the darker patch of skin.

“Okay,” he sighs, “I crashed a chopper near– wait, I can’t actually tell you that.”

“Jesus, Frankie,” you gasp, spreading both hands over the old wound, as if to stop a ghost bleeding. Your eyes have grown so wide, they eat up half your face.

“It’s okay, baby, it’s old. Wasn’t a big deal.”

It had been a big deal, at the time. There had been talks of awarding him a Silver Star for that mission.

“Did it hurt?”

“Mostly my pride. It wasn’t that bad, don’t worry. Nothing compared to what my sister threatened to do to me if I didn't leave the Army.”

“I can’t say I blame her. I would have probably done the same.”

“Ok, my turn. What’s this one?”

His left thumb skims along the thin line on your inner thigh, and he feels you tensing under his touch.

“It’s nothing,” you snap, taking your hands off his skin as if you just got burnt.

He presses his thumb into your soft flesh. The pain in his chest accentuates, radiating down to his stomach.

“You’re cheating,” he says, as softly as he can.

You face away from him, gaze flickering up to the window again, and you start moving away, but he holds you firmly in place with both hands on your waist.

“Lee. Tell me what it is.”

Seconds turn into minutes, the only sound in the room that of the ceiling fan’s motor, and the pain grows stronger, pulsating from his neck to his gut. Your eyes remain trained on the window, lost somewhere beyond the curtains.

“I had several more like this,” you start. Your tone is detached, your voice distant. “Smaller ones. On the back of my arms. When I was 17, my mother took me to a dermatologist. He removed them with laser treatment.”

You pause, and look down at him.

“She got me fixed, so I could find a good husband.”

His fingers dig into your flesh. It’s a full minute before he remembers to breathe, through his nose, because he can’t unclench his jaw. The chest pain turns into blinding, white-hot rage. His truck is parked outside and in his mind, the sequence of actions is crystal clear. Get you dressed. Get you in the cab. Drive away with you as far as the road goes, and never come back here.

“It burnt like hel—“

“You’re perfect, you know that?” he cuts in.

“I’m really not, Frankie,” you calmly answer. “What I am is a coward.”

He sits up with a cinch, cupping your face so you can’t recoil from him. Somehow, this would be easier if you looked upset. If you were crying. Showing any kind of emotion, really. But you’re far beyond that.

“I can’t let you say that. Not when you risk everything to come here every week.”

“Alright, so I’m a selfish coward,” you say with a joyless little smile.

“No. You’re perfect. You’re my perfect girl. Say it.”

It’s there. Your unbending will, your steel-hard determination. In your defiant gaze and your pinched lips. In the distance you're trying to put between your body and his.

“Okay, fine. Don’t say it. I’ll keep repeating it until you believe me. I can be fucking persistent, you know?” he adds, falling back onto the pillows.

“I know you can,“ you say, lifting a leg off the bed.

“You’re not going anywhere,” he nearly growls, a bruising grip on your thigh, “I’m not done with you.”

His clipped tone appears to be more effective on you. You sit back down, let your shoulders relax, and the palm of your hands find his skin again. Distant gaze, cold touch.

“What’s this one?” he asks, the blunt fingernail of his thumb grazing the grid-shaped scar on your left knee, his tone barely a question, and to his surprise, you come alive with a spark in your eyes.

“Oh! This one’s a good scar. I like it.”

You adjust your position over him, slotting your folds over his resting cock, and a coiling heat stirs in his loin.

“I had a bicycle when I was a kid. The most beautiful bicycle in the entire world. Red, the exact same shade as your truck. With a round cushion protection on the frame, I don’t know how you call that, and the letters MBK painted in white over it, you know the kind?”

He nods, and you continue talking.

“I would spend hours riding it. I would disappear for entire afternoons. It was heaven. And maybe you’re not going to believe me, but I was pretty reckless on that thing.”

“Oh, I believe you.”

You’re smiling again.

“Well, one day, I was too reckless. I hit the brakes too abruptly and I skidded over gravel. I flew ten feet away from the bike and I tore my knee open. I got home covered in blood, my parents were furious.”

A vengeful smile curves your lips, one he’s never seen on your face.

“They confiscated the bike. My mother said it wasn’t ladylike, and my father said– I can’t remember his exact words, probably 'you can’t damage my property,’ or something along those lines. They never let me on a bike again after that.”

“How’s that a happy story?” he frowns.

“I didn’t say it was a happy story. I said it’s a good scar. I got to keep this one. It reminds me of what I’m capable of. Even when I want to forget.”

The sun is rising. A new day colors the sky in vivid bronze. The light filters into the room through the yellow curtains, dust particles suspended in the air, suspended like Frankie’s life when he can’t be with you.

He should leave, but instead, he’s going to fuck you one more time. Pump you full of his come. Brand you with his essence, mark you as his in the only way he can before he has to let you go back to face those people who put murder on his mind.

His hands skim along your thighs to the swell of your ass, roughly kneading the round of your cheeks. His grip settles on your hips, and he bucks up into you, ever so lightly, his length hardening between your lips. He sees it on your face, on your profile bathed in the first ray of sunlight. The moment when you register his intention. The shift in your body, the echo to his desire. So powerful, so immediate, it’s almost like black magic. Your mouth parts open, your back arches. You press down on him.

“That serves him well, your father,” he says, sliding you slowly over his cock.

“How’s that?” you ask, voice laced with lust.

“Look what you’re riding now.”

—

The pillow is damp underneath your back, sweat exuding from your every pore. The last days of March have been unforgiving. You find yourself longing for a room with a proper air conditioning system, instead of the motel’s weak, outdated fan that only swishes hot air.

Frankie’s searing touch doesn’t help. Stroking the back of your arm in a repetitive up-and-down motion, he’s laying across the bed, his head resting heavy on your lap, his long hair curling in every direction in this sweltering atmosphere.

Instead of shying away from the discomfort, you embrace it. With your fingers twined in his locks, you lean into his touch, focusing on his high forehead, and the crease in his brow. On his long eyelashes, the curve of his lips as he speaks, the working of his throat.

Ignoring the dark blue rectangle of night sky, gradually lightening up behind the musty curtains.

Dawn used to be a deliverance. From your thoughts that the night painted black. From the wait, when Adrian wouldn’t come back. From a forced rest that never really came, another disappointment, another let down, another part of your life requiring the artificial help of chemicals.

Now, you resent it. Dawn is when Frankie leaves you behind to go back to his family. Dawn is when he’s the happiest, with his child, without you, in a realm over which you have no grasp.

A rational part of you acknowledges that it’s easier if he leaves before the sun rises. It prevents you from yearning for things you’re afraid to want. Things you cannot have. A life with him in broad daylight. A life without shame.

Recently, he’s become increasingly reluctant to let go of you. Dawn finds him wrapped around your body. Last week, he stayed past daybreak, and fucked you in the sunlight.

The brighter tone of his skin, the lighter shade of his curls, the depth of his mahogany irises hit by a sunbeam, everything was like a knife through your chest.

“Lee?”

The caressing timber of his husky voice brings you back to the soft amber light from the dusty lampshades, to the humming fan, and the blue rectangle.

“I’m sorry. What were you saying?”

“I asked if you like it. Your job.”

“God no, I hate it! Sales productivity statistics and accounting manager, can you picture me?”

He huffs his breathless chuckle, the one that sends tremors rippling through your chest.

“Not really, no.”

“I’m terrible at it, and it’s a problem, but no one says anything because daddy runs the company. I don’t understand why he insists on maintaining me in this position. It’s like a power play. He needs me to be miserable.”

Frankie’s hand pauses, fingers digging into your flesh, and he cranes his neck to peer at your face. You give him a reassuring smile. A genuine one.

“Is that what you studied at university? Accounting and statistics?”

You wipe your sweaty brow with the back of your hand, tucking a loose strand of hair behind your ear.

“Yes. But university was a golden parenthesis. I minored in Russian literature. Not a skill that easily translates to the employment market, but Richard was thoroughly pissed,” you say, wiggling your eyebrows.

“My little punk.”

His smile is brighter than the midday sun. Your index finger darts to the dimple in his right cheek.

“I really like this,” you whisper, your voice dropping, thick with heat and arousal. With affection. “And these,” you add, scraping your fingernail over the bare patches on each side of his jaw.

“Mmh. I’ve noticed,” he says with a smug expression.

“Oh, you have?” You try to laugh off your embarrassment, but what comes out is a quivering sound, betraying the want that hinders your throat.

He grabs your hand and brings it to his mouth, closing his plush lips around your index finger, wrapping his tongue around it. Your belly quakes. You clench around nothing.

He releases your hand, and you hope he’ll get up and move over you, but instead, he reaches for your arm again, resuming his rhythmic strokes.

“So what would you do, if you didn’t do this?” he asks.

You sigh, glancing up, and you catch a glimpse of your reflection in the mirror above the desk.

“I’ve no idea, really. I never allowed myself to consider the possibility.” And before he can prod any further, you add, “What about you? What would you have liked to do, if you hadn’t become a pilot?”

The diversion doesn’t fool him, you know it. You’re acutely aware of his gaze, scrutinizing your face. You picture the familiar, pensive frown. His hand leaves your arm as he suddenly gets up, air hitting your damp skin where his head was lying.

A few strides, and he steps into the bathroom, disappearing behind the partition wall. The tap runs for a moment, and there’s the distinct sound of wrung out fabric before he comes out, holding the hand towel.

You watch him walk back toward you, his naked body glistening with sweat, highlighted in shadows in the warm lighting. You think about how beautiful it is, about your extensive, intimate knowledge of it. How it feels under your touch, every single part of him. How this knowledge is now constituent of the woman you have become.

You know the callousness of his palms that catches at your clothes. You know the silkiness of his curls around your fingers, the smoothness of his chest against your breasts, the taste of his mouth and the bobbing of his pebbled throat between your lips. The thicker skin of his shoulders, tanned and freckled. The coarseness of the darker hairs under his navel, and how they feel rubbing at your clit. You know the weight of his cock in your hand, on your tongue, inside your walls.

And if you know all this, then, isn’t he yours?

He circles the bed over to your side, by the window, and sits next to you.

Delicately, his fingers circle your wrist. He lifts your arm, and brings your hand to his lips, nuzzling the relaxed curl of your fingers open, to press a kiss inside your palm. His eyes briefly flicker shut as he inhales the transparent skin of your inner wrist.

Lowering your arm, he starts running the towel along it and you jolt at the contact of the cold, wet fabric, letting out a short whimpering sound.

The sensation is sudden, seizing like an electrical shock, but the relief is immediate. The coolness radiates on the surface of your feverish skin, soothing your thoughts. Eyes fluttering shut, you relax into it.

“Maybe an architect,” he starts, the towel gliding up to your shoulder, “or a carpenter. Build stuff, for a change. Instead of destroying them.”

Goosebumps break out along your arms, on your nape, as he skims the towel over the plane of your chest in slow, meticulous movements. As he rounds your breasts with reverent care, one, then the other, your nipples tightening in peaked buds, the low rumble of his voice filling your mind, his words boring into your heart.

The towel brushes up, tracing your collarbone, left, then right. Higher along the column of your throat, curling to the side of your neck. A droplet of water rolls down between your breasts, running along your stomach to end its course into your navel. You sigh.

“I could… run a small business, building houses or crafting furniture. In a small town, somewhere up north. Somewhere with seasons,” he says.

The towel wipes over your trembling belly, over your mound, down your inner thigh. He’s slow, precise, thorough. Careful and gentle with your limp limbs. You’re sinking into the mattress, and floating over it all at once.

You lift a heavy eyelid, your dazed gaze landing on his gorgeous face. He’s solemn, focused on his task.

He readjusts his position on the mattress, so lightly the bed barely moves, and twists his torso to reach down your leg.

“You could be my accountant.”

Your eyes shoot open. He’s facing away from you, wiping the towel under the arch of your foot.

“The last thing you want is to have me as your bookkeeper,” you whisper, your heart beating in your throat.

He turns around, looking straight at you. Soft sad eyes, cold hard stare.

“That’s all I want for the rest of my life, Lee. Be with you night and day.”

—

Everything seems to hinge on you now.

His balance, his happiness, his redemption.

You filled a void, a hollowness inside his chest, he carries you with him wherever he goes. A pale shade of yellow and celadon green.

He tries to convince himself it’s harmless. That he’s not doing anything wrong. That it’s easier this way. Easier than the drugs, easier than placing that burden on his daughter’s shoulders. He tells himself the peace you bring him makes him a better man, and a better father. Makes him worthy again. There might even be some truth to it.

He’s not so sure if he deserves the second chance. If he deserves the parts of you that you confide in him. Your past, your regrets, your secret victories. Your hindered aspirations and the shores of your inner island, within his reach. The touch of your cool skin. The strength of your embrace. The veneration in your eyes. Your trust, your faith. Your time.

But he wants to believe it. It’s more of a fundamental need, really.

And as long as he’s with you, the illusion holds. When you’re sitting next to him in the truck, singing along to the tunes playing on the old crackling stereo as he drives to nowhere, when his body’s wrapped around yours in the dark, when he murmurs against your temple everything and anything that runs through his mind, when you’re coming undone between his hold, with his name on your lips. He believes he can be as good for you as you are for him.

But it’s a thin fabric. One that tears the very minute he steps outside the room, leaving your sleepy form tucked under the starchy sheet.

Day after day, until the next week, he’s left on his own to fence off the thoughts that plague him.

The voice inside him, relentless, somber, asking how much longer this can last. How long before the consequences on your life are irreversible? How long until that man who’s not your husband finds out, and takes action? What repercussions would you face, then?

He knows what he’d be capable of if he ever met him. He doesn’t like to think about it.

You won’t open up about your life with him, no matter how much he prods and pry. He knows your strength. And he chose to trust it.

Seven months, and one week. He sat down with the cardboard calendar hanging above Lupe’s desk at work, and counted. His mind crowded, overflowing with what ifs.

What if he took you out of this shitty motel, for once? Not just to drive into the night, but on a proper date. Dinner. A movie. Fucking lunch. A weekend somewhere. An entire vacation.

What if he took you out of your life?

Lupe started dating this Marcus guy back in December. Now she’s staying at his place every other night. The man is decent, one of the best paramedics he’s worked with, honest, reliable and steadfast. The kind of man Lupe deserves, and that he doesn’t mind around Lua.

He should move out of the house. Lupe hasn’t said anything yet, but it’s just one more grace she gives him that he hasn’t earned. Every time they see each other, Will hints at it, the allusions becoming increasingly less subtle.

The truth is, he sees no point in moving forward with his life if it’s not with you. If it’s not to take care of you, and provide for you. Watch you thrive, keep you safe.

A couple of weeks back, when he’d first thought about it, he’d deemed the idea crazy, painfully aware of all the frustrations a couple’s daily life entails.

Now, it’s the only choice that makes any sense to him.

—

The airport terminal is bustling with flocks of tourists. Noisy families with children too young to travel, transient businessmen and women, groups of youths of dubious soberness flying out after spring break.

Ava stands out in the crowd, her tall frame topped with a short bob of bright purple hair, and you spot her immediately. Standing on your tiptoes, you wave at her until she sees you and starts running in your direction.

She all but leaps into your open arms, and you both grab at each other, leaning into the embrace, laughing. You inhale her scent, searching for that baby smell in the crook of her neck.

“Oh my god, pup, your hair!” you exclaim. “You look terrific!”

“Yeah? You like it?” she asks with a broad smile, running her fingers through her locks.

“I love it! It’s perfect for you!”

In turn, she takes you in, looking you up and down, and lets out a low whistling sound.

“You look good, too. You look better than good. You look gorgeous!”

“Oh shush,” you gesture bashfully, but you can’t hold back your own smile.

The two of you walk to the parking lot to retrieve your car, immersed in bubbly conversation, oblivious to the moving crowds around you.

Driving out of the airport, you glance at the sign indicating the 589 northbound and smile at your precious secret, before making a left turn south.

“Where are you taking me?” she asks, “I’m hungry! Feed me! Feedmefeedmefeedme!” she chants, before breaking into a high-pitched giggle.

“Alright, alright! Hold tight, I’m taking you somewhere special. Do you like burritos?”

“Who doesn’t like burritos? Wait, what? Burritos? Do you even eat burritos? Who are you and what have you done with my sister?”

You had to type the address from the crumpled receipt into your GPS. Until today, you’ve never allowed yourself to go there. Not on your own.

It’s a small cantina with tiled walls and concrete floors, colorful trinkets arranged in pyramidal displays behind the counter, chalkboard menus and an endless list of drinks. Star-shaped lanterns are hanging from the ceiling, and the staff is busy but jovial.

Lunchtime on a Saturday, the place is packed with couples and kids, and your pulse accelerates. You hadn’t considered the possibility of running into Frankie and his family.

You place your orders, and after a short wait, you secure a spot in the back of the restaurant. Sitting on high metal stools behind a round table, you catch up on the past three months as if you hadn’t texted every other day, speaking with your mouths full, sauce dripping down your fingers.

The life she’s built for herself in New York treats Ava better than anything you could have hoped for, anything you could have helped her achieve, had she stayed here. A job in a cutting-edge art gallery, where her vibrant personality and her flair for networking are not only recognized but valued, a bustling social life, more thrilling projects than you can keep track of, all of it balanced by Polly’s grounding presence by her side.

Your choices and sacrifices, justified.

Ava puts down the crumbling remnants of her vegetarian burrito to wipe her mouth, and takes a sip of her margarita.

“You sure you don’t want to drink anything?”

“I’m drinking something,” you answer, pointing at your iced tea.

“Whatever you say, girl,” she shrugs.

“It’s too bad you’re not staying with me. It’s idiotic, you’re only here for a couple of days and you have to sleep over at Jules’.”

“Listen, even if your douchebag of a fiancé had agreed to have me, which I know he didn’t, I don’t want to see his ass face.”

“Alright,” you concede, “valid.”

She nearly chokes on her margarita. Setting her glass down, she gives you a pointed stare, emphatically scrutinizing your face.

“Okay, seriously, what’s going on with you? How are you? I mean, that’s obviously the wrong question, you’re fucking thriving. What happened? What’s happening? New medication? Are you finally leaving him?”

“I’m not taking any medication,” you answer with unexpected satisfaction. “But no, I’m not leaving him.”

You catch yourself before you can add another word.

“Are you still seeing that other guy?”

You nod, dipping your head, heat creeping up your neck. Why are you like this?

“I take it he likes burritos, am I right?

“You are correct in your assumption, detective,” you quip with a grin.

There’s a pause as Ava seems to consider her next question. It’s always so easy for you to forget that she’s a grownup now. That she knows you at least as well as you know her. That she has the capacity to outsmart you. The notion flares pride in your chest.

“Is he married? Is that why you haven’t run off together in the sunset yet?”

“I’m not sure if he’s married or not.”

“What does he do in life?”

“I don’t know.”

Ava throws up her hands.

“Girl! What do you know?” she exclaims with only half-feigned exasperation.

I know what’s important. He’s a father. He’s a friend and a brother. A pilot and a veteran. He's thoughtful and observant. He’s organized and practical. And a reluctant sentimental. He learned to swim in the Pacific Ocean. He’s capable of cold-blooded violence, but it will break him. He’s capable of infinite tenderness. And it will save him.

You pull a face, communicating how little you care about what you don’t know. Your sister shifts on the hard stool. She frowns, and when she speaks next, her voice is low, her tone conspiratorial.

“Adrian doesn’t suspect anything?”

“Of course, he does. Or he did. His attention is elsewhere, for now. Seems serious.”

“Again?”

“Again,” you nod.

Ava squirms on her stool again, probably trying to restrain her temper.

Your mind wanders, jumping back through time at light-speed, to when you first met Adrian. To the way he used to hold your hand when you started dating, squeezing your fingers with his. Letting you choose the wine, opening doors for you. To the affection in his smile, and how fast he started calling you babe . The glimmer warming his cold blue eyes when he introduced you to his family. The way he leaves the bathroom mirror splattered in toothpaste every time he brushes his teeth. The way he lets his alarm ring off forever after he’s gotten up even if you’re still in bed, even on weekends.

The ease with which he admitted to all his flings, whenever you confronted him, but never confessed to the one with his coworker, the ambitious young lawyer.

Would you admit to having an affair? Would you use that ugly word that make you crawl out of your skin? Would you deny it? Could you answer No, I’m not seeing anyone? Could you bear the betrayal of denying Frankie’s existence? The truth of what you share, but can’t define?

“Your fiancé is a bag of dicks,” Ava finally says, shaking her head.

“His obliviousness suits me for now,” you remind her.

“I don’t understand why you don’t leave him,” she snaps back, forsaking her reserve. “He got his big promotion, he got what he wanted! And Richard loves him, it’s not like he’s going to fire him just because you two broke up, right? You don’t really love him anymore, do you?” she adds on second thoughts.

The words spill out of you unchecked, once more. Just like in the truck with Frankie, back in January. Months, years for the idea to mature below the surface of your conscious thoughts, the reflective process unbeknown to you.

“I’m scared, Ava. I’m scared shitless. I want to leave. I’ve been wanting to leave for so long. Adrian, the company, that fucking ugly apartment.”

“Well then fucking do it, Lee!”

“If I leave, I have nothing. No job, nowhere to go.”

And if you could give up a relatively comfortable life, would you be able to renounce the refuge of your sadness? Of your life between the folds?

“You have money,” Ava counters. “You have shares. Sell them. Richard can’t stop you. Get a lawyer, if you have to. One that’s not on Adrian’s payroll. And then you can fuck your man Friday every day of the week, how’s that?”

You think about the folded bedspread under the windowsill. About the wet hand towel brushing up your skin. The trucker hat on the desk, and his fingers splayed on the steering wheel. The pleading arch of his brow.

You think about that space between Frankie’s chin and collarbone, that contains your safety, your desires, and all of your hopes.

“I don’t… I don’t know if I should leave a man for another one,” you whisper.

Ava’s eyes widen. She sits up straight, a smirk tugging the corner of her lips.

“I don’t know either, but it looks like this one fucked some sense into you. The irony.”

She’s withholding something, you realize. It’s in her uncharacteristic pauses, her sideways glances. Surprisingly, human interactions were simpler when pills kept you numbed and oblivious. Being attuned to everyone’s minute expressions is a daily trial.

“Why don’t you move to New York with us?” she eventually asks. “We can take you in until you find a job there, for as long as you need.”

There’s that we again. People talking about you in your absence, judging your choices, plotting your future.

“I don’t know how to do anything, Ava. I have zero skills.”

“First off, that’s not true,” she retorts, relentless with her well-rehearsed arguments. “And then, Polly can help you find something. Lee, if you can leave this company, there’s literally nothing you can’t do.”

Suddenly, you feel exhausted. Weary and old. A bone-deep lassitude. And at the heart of it, the realization that this is a liminal sequence in your life.

“Is that why you flew here for the weekend? To ask me to come away with you?”

“Are you mad?” she asks with a face. A little girl’s expression, afraid of being scolded. Your little girl.

“No, I’m not mad, pup. I can’t be mad. You came back for me.”

“Of course, I came back for you. I was never going to leave you behind, silly.”

****

#tonight you belong to me #tybtm #frankie morales x lee #the pilot™️#francisco catfish morales #frankie morales #frankie morales x fem!reader #frankie morales x you #frankie morales x ofc #happy frankie friday

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revelboo · 3 hours ago

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Are your shoulders tired from carrying the entire Transformers fandom right now, Rev?

Your fics are also inspiring a bunch of people?!? Nice. Love your fics, dying from the angst, but now I'm writing fluff fics while waiting for you to post hahaaha *dies*

I just started writing TF fics because I couldn’t find what I wanted to read 😆 but I’m loving that more people are starting to write stuff, too! I’ve been trying to pester a writer friend (one of the ones that convinced me to start writing TF smut originally to create a Tumblr and share her stuff, too)

Everything Is Alright Pt 107

IDW Starscream x Reader, Soundwave x Reader, Megatron x Reader

• Your palm resting against his own, fingers lined up with his servos drives home how much smaller you are even when he’s mass displaced. How fragile. And yet you can still entrust yourself to him as he curls his other arm around you and tries to explain what he knows of how Cybertronians are sparked. How that spark can become transferred into a waiting protoform. But a hybrid spark? He has no idea if it will still work the same way. You’re so small, will the spark stay your size? Smaller than a true Cybertronian? As defenseless as you are? It’s a struggle to keep his tone calm, to pretend he’s not as scared as you are. As unsure.

• Laying your head against him as he talks, some of your tension eases at the confidence in his rasping voice. Because you really need to believe that one of you has a clue what you’re doing. And there’s still Megatron, who even though he knows you’re no pet, seems determined to force you to keep up the act and play one for his amusement. He’s dangerous. Know that, but speaking to him? You think he’s also lonely and more than a little tired. Hating that he can startle a laugh from you when he wants to, that those big hands are so gentle. That you like those rare smiles and- you like him. Stiffening in Star’s arms, you press your face against his neck, because you can’t possibly like Megatron, public enemy number one and the biggest threat to your life. “What’s wrong?” Starscream asks. What is wrong with you? You have Star and Soundwave. You’re happy with them. You can’t like Megatron, too.

• Wings flaring slightly when you don’t answer him, he takes your shoulders in his hands and pulls you back, not liking when you avoid his optics, face heating. And then hiding your face in your hands as he vents. Another weird human thing? Or something you just don’t want to talk about? Optics narrowing, he rests his helm against your forehead and waits. “It’s nothing. Really,” you murmur, head tipping to brush your mouth against his, trying to kiss away his frown. Wants to trust that, but knows you. Knows you rarely complain or ask for anything. And right now that bothers him. How can he take care of you when you won’t tell him you need something? Resting a palm against your throat before sliding it down to rest over the steady beat of your heart, his optics shutter. Grounding himself in the feel of you. Of home and hope. Won’t push, because he knows he’s terrible at this, too. But he wants to get better. To be better. For you to trust him.

• Megatron can feel Soundwave’s optics on him through the visor. Can also feel the tension in his old friend and he vents softly. “I’m not going to hurt your little human, but you’ll still bring them to me.” But what Soundwave is hinting at, proposing in veiled, cautious words? That he make his own claim upon you just to force Starscream into stopping his attempts to ursurp him is clever, because it’s tempting. And his second in command will despise it. But he knows Soundwave, knows how protective he is of his cassettes and can imagine that protective instinct extends to you as well. If you’re tied to all three of them? Shared between them? You’d be guaranteed safety. “I’ll consider it,” he adds on a growl, annoyed with himself. But when he remembers those angry eyes, the way you’d defended Starscream, arguing with him? You’d challenge him while being no real threat, a little, affectionate mate to sit at his peds while he’s on his throne. Respected and safe because you belong to him. And he remembers the way you’d looked under Soundwave. The sounds you’d made.

• Inclining his head respectfully, some of Soundwave’s tension eases. Betting on Megatron’s own loneliness. That he’ll keep demanding you be brought to him, speak with you and come to know you. Doesn’t really hope that Megatron will love you, only arranging a mating for convenience. To keep you safe whether you want it or not. Telling himself that this is necessary as Megatron strides away, but there’s a shadow of doubt in his spark. Afraid that you’ll hate him for this, won’t understand that he’s doing this all for you. For a future he’s desperate to have.

#transformers x reader #starscream x reader #megatron x reader #soundwave x reader #soundwave #megatron #starscream

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cherryxbooo · 3 days ago

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Most important part of my life

Summary: Pedri's secret relationship is tested by rumors with a new media colleague, leading him to publicly declare his love.

Reader x Pedri

Genre: fluff/angst

Being in love with Pedri González felt like cradling a secret so luminous, so extraordinary, that unveiling it to the world might scatter its magic like dandelion seeds caught in the wind.

It wasn’t just the fact that he was one of the most recognizable footballers in the world, gracing the pitch at Camp Nou with effortless grace.

It was the way he looked at me when we were alone, the quiet strength of his love, and the unspoken promise in his touch.

Our relationship grew like wildflowers in the shadows, away from the glaring lights of stadiums, the endless buzz of fans, and the relentless click of cameras desperate for a glimpse of his personal life.

When we first started dating, the decision to keep things private was mutual, though it came with layers of complexity.

Pedri had been upfront from the beginning.

"I want you to feel safe with me," he said one evening, his brown eyes searching mine for reassurance.

He wasn’t just asking for patience, he was offering me trust, a sanctuary in a world that rarely afforded him the same.

The privacy was liberating in ways I hadn’t anticipated.

We could wander hand-in-hand through unfamiliar streets in cities where Pedri’s face wasn’t plastered on billboards.

We could spend entire evenings tangled up on the couch watching old movies, his laughter filling the room as I teased him about his terrible popcorn-making skills.

In those quiet, unguarded moments, I discovered who he truly was, not just Pedri the footballer, but Pedri the person I fell in love with.

Still, keeping our love a secret wasn’t without its sacrifices.

There were nights when I longed to post a picture of us on social media, to scream to the world how much he meant to me.

But I knew the cost of such exposure.

Pedri’s life was a constant whirlwind of matches, media obligations, and the ceaseless adoration of fans who believed they knew him intimately.

I’d seen the toll it took on him, how even the smallest misstep could spark a wildfire of speculation.

Sometimes, being in love with him felt like standing at the edge of an untamed sea. His life was the tide, vast and unstoppable, threatening to pull me under if I wasn’t careful.

I remember one particularly tough evening when he was away on a grueling road trip, the distance between us amplified by the silence of my apartment.

I stared at my phone, scrolling through a sea of articles about him, wondering if I’d ever fit into his world.

But Pedri always had a way of grounding me.

He called late that night, his voice warm despite the exhaustion that laced his words.

"I miss you," he said simply. "You’re my calm, mi amor. Don’t forget that."

It wasn’t a grand declaration, it didn’t need to be.

It was enough to pull me back, to remind me that what we had wasn’t just a fleeting romance but something deeper, something worth navigating the storms for.

We had our own rituals, ways of carving out space for us amid the chaos.

Pedri loved to write little notes for me, tucking them in places he knew I’d find later: a pocket in my coat, the inside of a book I was reading.

Once, I found one on my bathroom mirror that simply said, "You’re my favorite part of every day."

It was these small acts of love, these intimate gestures, that made me feel like the luckiest person alive.

Who would've thought that footballers could be so romantic.

And yet, there were challenges I couldn’t ignore.

Being with Pedri meant learning to share him, not just with the fans who adored him, but with the game that consumed so much of his time and energy.

There were moments when I felt like a spectator, watching him shine while I stood in the shadows.

I’d be lying if I said it didn’t sting sometimes, but then he’d find ways to remind me that I wasn’t an afterthought.

One evening, after a particularly intense match, we sat on his balcony overlooking the city.

The air was cool, the distant hum of Barcelona serving as our soundtrack.

Pedri reached for my hand and pulled me close.

"You know," he said softly, "everything I do out there, it’s for us. For this."

His words settled over me like a warm blanket, and in that moment, I knew that no amount of distance, scrutiny, or secrecy could diminish what we shared.

But that feeling didn't last for long...

It all began when FC Barcelona announced their newest hire, Valentina.

She was young, vibrant, and clearly eager to make her mark as the team’s new media coordinator.

Her job was to handle interviews, create social media content, and give fans a closer look at the players they adored.

At first, I didn’t think much of it.

Pedri had mentioned her in passing, a new addition to the team, someone he was helping adjust to the job.

I’d nodded, smiled, and asked a few polite questions, not giving it another thought.

But then the content started appearing.

At first, I convinced myself it didn’t matter.

Pedri was just being himself, kind, warm, and approachable.

It was part of what made him so magnetic, not just to me but to everyone around him.

This was the man I fell in love with, after all.

How could I fault him for being the very person who stole my heart?

But as the days turned into weeks and the “shipping” online intensified, I felt my confidence begin to waver.

It started subtly, like a shadow creeping into the edges of an otherwise sunny day.

A fan edit of Pedri and Valentina laughing during an interview would pop up on my feed, the caption declaring,

“The chemistry is undeniable!”

I’d roll my eyes and scroll past, telling myself it was harmless.

But the comments below were relentless.

"They’d be such a cute couple!""Honestly, Valentina and Pedri give me life!""Look at the way he’s smiling at her, come on, that’s love."

I’d catch myself staring at my screen, rereading the same comments as if the sting would lessen with repetition.

It didn’t.

Instead, it gnawed at me, a quiet whisper in the back of my mind that grew louder with every passing day.

The first time Pedri showed me one of the videos, I forced a smile, feigning indifference.

“Look at this,” he chuckled, holding up his phone.

“They’re making compilations of every time I’ve talked to the new media girl. Fans are wild.” (brother can't be this clueless omd)

I leaned over, barely glancing at the screen, and shrugged.

“Yeah, wild,” I muttered, keeping my tone neutral.

“You okay?” he asked, tilting his head to look at me.

“Of course,” I lied, standing up abruptly.

“I just remembered I need to finish something. Be right back.”

I didn’t meet his eyes as I left the room.

How could he not see the true intentions behind those edits? (ugh men smh)

The little things began piling up.

Each new fan theory, each edited clip, felt like a pebble being dropped into an already overflowing jar.

I told myself it was silly, irrational even, to feel this way.

After all, I knew the truth. Pedri loved me, not her.

But logic and emotions rarely danced in harmony.

It wasn’t just online, either.

At a recent game, a group of fans behind me had spent the entire first half discussing Valentina and Pedri.

“They’d be perfect together, don’t you think?” “She’s got that bubbly personality, and he’s so down-to-earth. Total power couple vibes.”

I gripped the edge of my seat tightly, my nails digging into the fabric. I wanted to turn around and scream,

“You have no idea what you’re talking about!”

Instead, I stayed quiet, plastering on a strained smile for the rest of the match.

Back home, my silence began to speak louder than my words.

“Hey, how was your day?” Pedri asked one evening as we sat at the dinner table.

“Fine,” I replied, not looking up from my plate.

“Anything interesting happen?” he pressed, his tone light but curious.

“Not really,” I mumbled, shoving a forkful of pasta into my mouth to avoid elaborating.

Pedri frowned, setting down his fork.

“You’ve been quiet lately. Is something bothering you?”

I shook my head, forcing a smile that didn’t reach my eyes.

“Just tired. Long day.”

He nodded slowly, clearly unconvinced, but he didn’t push further.

Instead, he reached across the table to take my hand.

For a split second, I felt the warmth of his touch, the comfort it usually brought me.

But then I pulled away under the pretense of needing my water glass.

The hurt that flickered across his face was brief, but I saw it.

My chest tightened with guilt, but I couldn’t bring myself to explain.

One evening, the tension between us became unbearable.

We were sitting on the couch, a movie playing on the TV, but neither of us was paying attention.

Pedri’s hand rested on his thigh, close enough to mine that the absence of contact felt glaring.

Without warning, he paused the movie and turned to me.

“Alright, what’s going on?” he asked, his voice soft but insistent.

I stiffened, my heart pounding. “What do you mean?”

“You’ve been distant,” he said, his brows knitting together.

“You barely talk to me, you pull away when I touch you… something’s wrong.”

“It’s nothing,”

I replied too quickly, the tightness in my throat betraying me.

“It’s not nothing,” he countered, leaning closer.

“I know you, amor. Something’s bothering you, and I want to help. But I can’t if you won’t talk to me.”

I looked away, my gaze fixed on the coffee table.

“It’s stupid,” I whispered, my voice barely audible.

“Then let me decide that,” he urged gently.

“Please.”

I hesitated, the words caught in my throat.

How could I explain something that felt so petty?

How could I tell him that seeing him with Valentina, innocent as it was, was eating away at me?

“I’m just tired,” I said finally, standing up before he could press further.

“I’m going to bed.”

“Wait—”

But I was already walking away, leaving him sitting there, confused and worried.

In the quiet of my room, I replayed the moment in my mind, hating myself for the walls I was building.

But as I scrolled through my phone later that night, another video of Pedri and Valentina popped up.

The comments filled with speculation and admiration for their supposed connection.

I turned off my phone, buried my face in my hands, and let the tears fall.

Not knowing it was about to become worse.

The next evening,

It started like any other evening.

I was curled up on the couch, scrolling through my phone, half-distracted and trying not to think too much about the growing distance between Pedri and me.

But then the headline caught my eye, bold and damning:

“Are Pedri and Valentina More Than Colleagues? Here’s What We Know.”

My thumb hesitated above the screen, my heart already sinking, but I couldn’t stop myself.

I clicked.

The page loaded, and my stomach twisted with every word I read. The article was a masterclass in speculation.

Blurry photos of Pedri and Valentina laughing together accompanied captions like,

“Too much chemistry to be just friends?”

A still from a video of her hand casually resting on his arm had the writer waxing poetic about

“intimate body language” and “the undeniable proof of a budding romance.”

Every word felt like a small dagger, but it was the comments that truly gutted me.

"I knew it! They’re perfect together!""Pedri deserves someone like her. She’s stunning and sweet!""Finally, the couple we’ve all been waiting for. #Pedritina"

My hands trembled as I set my phone down, but the damage was done.

I felt like I couldn’t breathe.

It didn’t matter that I knew the truth.

It didn’t matter that Pedri had never given me a reason to doubt him.

The narrative was there, glaring and insistent, and it felt like it was pulling him away from me, like I was losing him to a story that wasn’t even real.

That night, I couldn’t bear to look at him.

The weight of my emotions was too heavy, threatening to spill over if I let him get too close.

“Hey,” he greeted me warmly as he walked into the kitchen, where I was furiously scrubbing an already-clean countertop.

“What are you up to?”

“Just cleaning,” I said curtly, not turning to face him.

Pedri leaned against the counter, his eyes following my frantic movements.

“It’s nine at night,” he said with a soft laugh.

“The kitchen’s spotless mi amor. Come sit with me.”

“I’ll be there in a bit,” I replied, my voice clipped.

He frowned slightly, stepping closer.

“You’ve been… acting different lately. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine,” I lied, still not meeting his gaze.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his voice gentler now.

He reached out to touch my arm, but I stepped away, pretending to grab a dish towel.

“I’m sure,” I said firmly, my tone leaving no room for further questions.

Pedri watched me for a long moment, his brow furrowing in concern.

“Alright,” he said quietly, though his voice carried a hint of defeat.

“I’m here if you want to talk.”

I nodded but didn’t respond, and he left the kitchen, leaving me alone with my thoughts and the unbearable ache in my chest.

I threw myself into meaningless tasks for the rest of the evening.

Folding laundry, reorganizing the spice cabinet, rearranging the books on the shelf, anything to keep my mind and hands busy.

But no matter what I did, the article and its comments haunted me, looping endlessly in my mind.

What made it worse was how vividly I could picture it all.

Pedri’s laughter as Valentina joked with him, the way he always leaned in when someone spoke, giving them his undivided attention.

I knew it was innocent.

I knew it was just who he was.

But knowing didn’t stop the jealousy and insecurity from creeping in, filling the cracks in my resolve.

By the time Pedri came to bed, I pretended to be asleep, my back turned to him.

He sighed softly as he slipped under the covers, and for a moment, I thought he might say something.

But he didn’t.

Instead, the room fell into silence, broken only by the sound of his breathing as he drifted off.

I stayed awake long after, staring at the wall, tears slipping silently down my face.

For the first time in our relationship, I felt like I was losing him.

And the worst part? I didn’t know how to stop it.

The next day,

Meanwhile, Pedri was wrestling with his own frustrations.

The training session had wrapped up, but instead of heading to the showers with the others, he lingered in the locker room, sitting on the bench with his phone in hand.

His thumb hovered over the screen, but his mind was elsewhere, replaying the strange tension between you two over the past few weeks.

Every clipped response, every missed kiss, every moment you pulled away lingered in his thoughts, gnawing at him.

He sighed, running a hand through his hair in frustration.

“Yo, Pedri,” Ferran’s voice broke through the quiet, light and teasing as always.

He strolled in, a towel slung casually over his shoulder.

“Why do you look like someone stole your boots? You alright?”

Pedri looked up, his frown deepening.

“Not really,” he admitted, tossing his phone onto the bench beside him.

“It’s… Y/n. She’s been acting different. Distant.” He shook his head, as though trying to shake off the confusion.

“I don’t know what’s going on with her. I’ve tried asking, but she keeps saying she’s fine.”

Ferran raised a brow, a knowing look spreading across his face.

“Different how?”

“She barely talks to me anymore,” Pedri said, frustration clear in his voice.

“When we’re together, it’s like she’s somewhere else. I don’t even know what I did wrong.”

Ferran leaned against the locker, crossing his arms.

“You sure it’s something you did?”

“I don’t know,” Pedri muttered.

“Maybe? She’s never been like this before.”

Ferran hummed thoughtfully before his eyes lit up as if a lightbulb had gone off.

He pulled his phone from his pocket and began typing something.

“What are you doing?” Pedri asked, sitting up straighter.

Ferran didn’t answer immediately, his focus on his screen.

Then he turned the phone around, holding it out for Pedri to see.

“You seen this yet?” Ferran asked, his tone cautious but pointed.

Pedri frowned and leaned closer, his gaze locking onto the screen.

It was an article, the bold headline instantly grabbing his attention:

“Are Pedri and Valentina More Than Colleagues? Here’s What We Know.”

“What is this?” Pedri asked, his tone sharp.

“Just read it,” Ferran said, handing him the phone.

Pedri swiped through the article, his jaw tightening with every word.

The photos, blurry snapshots of him and Valentina during team interviews and moments caught on video, accompanied captions that painted an entirely false narrative.

Phrases like “unspoken chemistry” and “undeniable connection” jumped out at him, making his blood boil.

“This is…” Pedri trailed off, shaking his head in disbelief.

“This is ridiculous.”

“You think that’s bad?” Ferran said, leaning over to scroll down.

“Check the comments.”

Pedri’s frown deepened as he skimmed the comment section, where fans had enthusiastically declared their support for the supposed couple.

"They’re so cute together!""I ship them so hard!""Finally, Pedri’s found someone who matches his energy!"

Pedri tossed the phone back to Ferran, his frustration palpable.

“None of this is true,” he muttered, running a hand through his hair again.

“Yeah, well,” Ferran said, pocketing his phone,

“if Y/n saw this, it might explain why she’s acting weird. Can’t blame her, man. This article’s painting a pretty convincing picture.”

Pedri exhaled deeply, leaning back against the bench.

“She didn’t say anything about it.”

Ferran shrugged.

“Would you, if the shoe was on the other foot? Imagine reading something like that about her. You wouldn’t even need to believe it to feel like crap.”

Pedri rubbed his face with his hands, guilt beginning to creep in.

“I didn’t think this could be bothering her. I didn’t even know about this until now.”

“Well,” Ferran said, giving him a pointed look,

“now you do. So what are you going to do about it?”

Pedri didn’t hesitate.

“I need to fix this,” he said firmly, determination sparking in his eyes.

Ferran gave him a pat on the back.

“Good. Go home, talk to her. Don’t let this article ruin things.”

As Ferran walked away, Pedri stayed seated for a moment longer, his thoughts racing.

Now it all made sense, your distance, the way you avoided his touch, the sadness in your eyes.

He couldn’t stand the thought of you hurting, especially because of something so far from the truth.

He stood abruptly, his mind made up.

He had to make things right.

When Pedri came home that evening,

I was sitting on the couch, my laptop open in front of me, but my mind was far away, drifting aimlessly through thoughts I couldn’t quite organize.

The quiet hum of the apartment felt heavy, like it was pressing down on me, and I couldn’t escape it.

I had been trying to keep myself busy, just so I wouldn’t think too much about the distance that had been growing between Pedri and me.

But it didn’t help.

The more I tried to ignore it, the more the emptiness crept in.

The quiet space between us had only grown, and every little thing felt like a reminder of how lost I had become in my own insecurities.

I couldn’t keep pretending.

Every time I saw him laughing with Valentina, or when I came across fan edits of them together, the nagging feeling in my chest had gotten harder to ignore.

The worst part wasn’t even what people online were saying. It was how much I had started to doubt myself.

Doubt us.

When Pedri stepped into the living room, I felt the change in the air.

His presence filled the space, but something about his posture, his eyes, told me he had noticed something was off.

His gaze locked onto mine instantly, and I felt my stomach tighten in anticipation.

He didn’t say anything at first, just stood there for a moment, as if weighing whether he should bring it up.

His expression softened, but I could see the concern brewing beneath the calm.

“We need to talk,” he said, his voice calm but carrying an undercurrent of determination.

My heart skipped a beat.

“About what?” I asked, even though I already knew the answer.

He sighed, the frustration and worry clear on his face as he walked toward me.

He sat down beside me, his body close but not quite touching.

It was like he was giving me the space to open up, but I wasn’t sure I could.

He reached for my hand, and for a brief second, I considered pulling away.

The distance between us was still too fresh, the hurt too real.

But I didn’t.

I let him take my hand, his fingers threading through mine in the most familiar, comforting way.

But I could feel the weight in his touch, the uncertainty that had settled in his chest too.

"Why have you been pulling away from me?" he asked gently, his voice carrying a soft sadness that made my heart ache.

I glanced at him, feeling a lump form in my throat.

I had been trying to bury everything inside, trying to make it through without having to confront it.

But now, here we were, facing the truth of what had been building for weeks.

I swallowed hard.

“I don’t know how to explain it,” I admitted, my voice barely above a whisper.

I had to look away from him, unable to bear the rawness in his gaze.

“It’s just... everything that’s been happening with you and Valentina... I can’t help but feel like I’m losing you. I don’t know if I even matter anymore.”

The words left me in a rush, tumbling out before I could stop them.

The weight of them felt like a confession, a cry for help.

Pedri’s eyes softened as he took a deep breath, and I could feel the tension in his shoulders as he gently cupped my cheek with his hand.

“Cariño,” he whispered, his thumb brushing away a stray tear I hadn’t even realized had fallen.

“You matter more to me than anything in this world. I hate that this has made you feel like you don’t.”

His words wrapped around me like a lifeline, but they didn’t take away the pain.

I had watched, day after day, as the rumors built up.

The comments. The speculation.

The way people thought they knew something about us that we hadn’t even shared.

“It just hurts,” I whispered, trying to hold back the tears that threatened to fall again.

“Seeing those pictures. Reading the comments. Watching them ship you with someone who isn’t me... It’s like you’re slipping away, and I can’t do anything to stop it.”

Pedri’s thumb brushed against my cheek again, wiping away the tear that had fallen this time.

“I never wanted you to feel like this. I never wanted you to feel invisible,” he said, his voice thick with emotion.

He moved a little closer, pressing his forehead against mine.

“I’m so sorry you’ve felt like you had to hide, or that you weren’t enough. You’re everything to me, Y/n. Please don’t ever doubt that.”

I closed my eyes for a moment, just taking in his words.

They were exactly what I needed to hear, and yet... something was still missing.

There was so much more I wanted to say, but the fear of making it worse held me back.

I took a shaky breath and looked up at him.

“It’s not about not being enough. It’s just... this whole situation. The rumors. The fans. They have this image of us, Pedri. And it’s like I’m not even in the picture.”

Pedri’s eyes darkened with frustration, and I could see the anger brewing beneath the surface.

But it wasn’t directed at me.

It was directed at everything else, the media, the fans, the narrative that had been spun around us without our consent.

“You’re not invisible,” he said fiercely, his voice unwavering.

“You’re not on the sidelines, Y/n. You’re the most important part of my life."

"I can’t stand seeing you hurt because of something that’s not even true.”

I let out a shaky breath, my heart starting to settle just a little, even though the ache hadn’t completely gone.

“But what are we supposed to do? How do we fix this?”

Pedri looked at me with such intensity that I felt like I was being pulled into his world, where nothing else mattered except us.

“I’m done hiding, cariño,” he said, his voice steady and filled with conviction.

“I want the world to know about us. I want everyone to see who you really are to me. You’re not a secret, and I’m not going to let the media or anyone else make you feel like you are.”

My breath caught in my throat.

I could hardly process what he was saying. It was so big, so bold, yet it felt like the most natural thing in the world coming from him.

He wasn’t just speaking out of anger or frustration; he was speaking out of love, and it made everything in me feel like it was finally falling into place.

“Are you sure?” I asked, my voice barely a whisper.

“This is... this is a huge step, Pedri. Are you sure you’re ready for this?”

His eyes softened again, and he reached out to touch my cheek, his thumb tracing gentle circles against my skin.

“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life,” he said.

“I don’t care about what the fans think. I care about you. About us. And I’m done hiding us.”

I felt tears well up again, but this time, they weren’t from hurt.

They were from relief, from the overwhelming love that suddenly felt so certain, so real.

“I love you,” I whispered, my voice thick with emotion.

“I love you too,” Pedri replied, his voice full of warmth and sincerity.

He leaned forward, pressing his lips softly against mine.

For the first time in weeks, I felt like we were finally back on the same page, ready to face everything together.

pedri posted on Instagram!

Liked by yourusername, gavi, ferrantorres and 112,452 others

pedri El amor de mi vida.

View all comments

yourusername Love you the most 🩷

pedri Yo también te amo mi amor ❤️

ferrantorres 👏👏👏

pedri 💪

pedri_and_me6 I’m honestly shocked! Didn’t see this coming Pedri and his girl look cute together 🥹

barça_love_89 Pedri be scoring on and off the pitch dayuum

pedriclosetclothes8 Forrealll he bagged a baddie 💅

pepilvr8frv Wow I thought Pedri and Valentina were really together this is so unexpected but I’ll always ship Valentina and him. 🤷‍♀️

frbtogethergavi30 Girl stfu you don't even know them 🙄

brcculer8 Not you rooting for something that doesn't exist 🤦‍♀️

blueredlyy7 I just know it stinks girl get out of here 🥱

lvlybarca8630 Pedri that's our girlfriend now 🤭

delulu4pedri8 Ew he deserves better 🤢

chichiclassypepi8 Really living up to the name

fnzygvi6 He isn't going to acknowledge you stand up sis 😒

The end

#pedri x reader #pedri imagine #pedri fluff #pedri gonzalez x reader #pedri x you #pedri fanfic #pedri x y/n #pedri angst #football x reader #football imagine #football fanfic #fc barcelona x reader #barcelona x reader #barca x reader #pedri gonzález x reader

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n0tamused · 14 hours ago

Note

How elves deal or even feel jealous? What/how easy is to make them jealous?

A/n: Hello, yes I can! You didn't specify which elves you wanted this for, so I just picked a few of the ones I thought would go nicely with this idea. Also, I am trying these different styles of hcs, so let me know if you prefer lenghtier headcanons or shorter ones like these? I'm trying to find some balance with requests and my ability to write them.

Contents: (all separate) Thranduil, Legolas, Lindir, Haldir, Glorfindel x GN! Reader. Jealousy hcs, not proof read lol

⋆𓄃Thranduil

-Thranduil can be quite jealous and, more so, protective over his beloved and he does not care to ever admit it. He is quite avoidant of his subjects and feels a bit shocked (or looks like it, he did expect you to point it out eventually tbh) when you point it out to him

-Would make sliding comments about your attention lingering too long on someone, or even something at times.

-A play of words is sure to ensue if you keep pressing him for his reasons, and throughout he never raises his voice or anything of that sort, he is rather calm and eventually you come to understand that he is enjoying this, both the banter and the attention. This can be sometimes flustering or frustrating when he begins to smirk and offer sass and teasing words.

-The Elven king has seldom ever expected to ‘fall into’ love like this, or to behave like this while loving someone, but even through his long years of living he is still learning some things.

-Thranduil is quite wary of others, especially outsiders even if they are his distant kin. So he may keep you away from meetings or tedious dinners with any delegates or visitors that may seem like ‘too much’ for you to be exposed to them.

-He is stubborn, so chances are it would take a long time for him to let up on his views, as he deems it all necessary for your protection and happiness

-But even he cannot deny that he does carry a great weight on his heart and consciousness, and long, late night conversions are not something rare with him. He enjoys them more than anything else because he feels more justified to be vulnerable when the rest of the world falls asleep. He is more open to physical touch as well, and he tells you his worries and his feelings clearly then.

🍃Legolas

-The prince of Mirkwood is still quite green in the area of emotions and how one deals with them, despite his years. But he is notably much softer in comparison to his father.

-He would find it odd that he feels this way and would hide it away from you for the longest time until he can bear it no longer. It is like poison to him

-Although you would be able to see it all happening and coming down on him with the way he stares out at nothing, sometimes at the people besides you, the way his lips pull into a deep carved frown and how his jaw sets, almost uncomfortably, even for an elf - especially for an elf. His shoulders are so tense you can put a table on him

-Once he expresses his feelings to you he does apologize as well, he doesn’t want you thinking that he doesn’t trust you or that he believes you’d go behind his back and take the offer of another heart - he truly can’t explain the feelings and where they stem from.

-It’s multiple things all at once - he wants you safe and happy, and the people around may not have the purest intentions, but at the same time he feels odd that you sometimes seem to be having much more fun with someone else than him. So there’s quite a lot to unpack with him, but he is not impatient or unwilling to learn.

♬Lindir

-Lindir is more prone to fits of jealousy that strike seemingly out of nowhere, he is quite dense with it too although not nearly as secretive as he would like himself to be. He may be quiet, but the face he stays quiet with is a completely different story..

-His jealousy does stem from a sense of insecurity in his own ability to be a good partner for you, it eats away at him at times and he can take up to saying witty responses to the individual/s that he perceives as sources of his feelings. He is never malicious of course, neither to you or them, as he understand these feelings can quickly turn to poison

-He may require some more support from you at times like these, and in private he feels utterly defeated in face of his own jealousy. He is not the one to openly ask for attention from you, but at times like these he may ask you questions that may reassure him again. Hold his face in your hands and just kiss the elf, that would be my advice, plainly delivered

-He would grow flustered at such actions, and he may even give you some sass for it, but he is never refusing your advances at pouring some more of your love on him

°˖➴Haldir

-The Marchwarden of Lorien is not the most open when it comes to his own emotions and it can be difficult to read his exact trail of thoughts at times. But jealousy is not foreign to Haldir, he knows how it feels and he has long since come to truly dislike(hate) it.

-It is unbecoming of his station and just of his own character in general. Nonetheless, this jealousy he feels holds its roots in worry for your safety rather than any kind of distrust of you, and it's greatly amplified by the distance between the two of you when he is away on duty.

-Haldir doesn’t act out on his jealousy, although he makes his opinion known if he agrees or disagrees with you on your choice of companions. If he is at home with you, he would also tag along with you, if you so desired or if he just really, really did not like the company you’re going to be with. He knows nearly everyone in Lorien, and so he knows who to be wary of. That is not to say anyone from there would be a liability when it comes to physical harm, he knows that much is less likely to happen, but when it comes to needs that are more from within, love, need for attention - then he is not so sure. He cannot read the minds of others, and everyone changes over time, even elves.

-His jealousy does lessen up when he is with you, as he is not as worried when he has you in his eye. If there is danger, Haldir would do whatever was in his power to eradicate the source of it.

-You may notice this particular mood on him by the stiffness of his jaw and the hard look he sometimes directs at no one in general, as if holding an internal monologue with himself over what he’s experiencing and feeling

☼Glorfindel

-The Slayer of Balrogs is not susceptible to jealousy, and he was never a jealous individual to begin with. And that’s also without mentioning that he trusts his partner as well, otherwise he would not be with someone he did not trust.

-After his re-embodiment he may come off as a little clingy - he stays with you for as long as he can, not letting any moment go to waste, even if you are an immortal being as he is. He leaves kisses on your hands and your forehead when no one is around to see, it is intimate and he simply wants you to know that you will always have his love and support

-He is also very clear in his communication with you, and trusts that you’ll tell him if anything is bothering you, although sometimes he does know to postpone telling you something if he believes it could put a strain on you.

-He is quite free spirited though and open minded at that, just a chill guy, the chillest on this list I dare say

-All in all.. 10/10, would recommend

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myrmica · 19 hours ago

Text

some loose thoughts on The Full Story of WORMHOLE: Minecraft’s Deadliest Exploit...

largely building on thoughts i had while watching it with my partner, and conversations i had on discord (shoutout will 75hearts irrealisms). i started writing notes in the s4 directory and it got away from me so it's a post now. disclaimer also that while i am very critical here, i still found the video interesting. the problems with it are interesting problems. second disclaimer that everything is about vitalasy (and princezam) forever.

the video is presented as The Full Story, the Truth, things spoke didn’t want to show during season 4 or in the videos he released about it then, because it would make him look too bad. he says this about it in a youtube comment, before it's released:

the first hour or so of this video succeeds incredibly in being what he says it’s going to be; you get information we’ve never heard before about the dupe war and spoke’s thought processes therein. you get this, the best moment of the entire video:

[51:00 - 54:40] Spoke: I'm not kidding when I say this, but this was probably the angriest I've ever been while playing minecraft. Not only was I so dumbfounded that I really just sat there popping totems, but after I died I was dead silent for 15 minutes. Except for the few times I practiced the lies I would have to tell Mapicc and Zam, to somehow save this plan. [Video cuts to that recording of Spoke talking to himself after he respawns. He wanders around the post-dupe-war wasteland, no items in his inventory.] Spoke: What was the thought process? [cut] I just wanna ask, what—[cut] I'm really curious… about the thought process of this one. [cut] Come here for a second—[cut] So here's the first issue. [cut] Here's the problem I see with this thinking. [cut] I thought you were very well aware of the intentions. [cut] there's a difference between... and prolonging—[cut]—I need to keep going with the plan. I want to get back to the vault. [cut back to voiceover] Spoke: I needed a way to somehow gain their trust back and keep the vault safe, so I wouldn't be banned. At first I thought about telling them my plan to trick Parrot into doing the exploit, but I already had too much on the line to risk something like that. The second idea was telling them the lie I told Parrot, about doing this for the NPPP, but that would just confirm their beliefs and they would for sure pocket the duped items. The only idea I had left was to tell them... I scripted this. A couple months before these events, I ran a staged roleplay server called Unstable, and I would invite these guys on for the scripted recordings. So I already had that stigma with me, and I assumed if I just told them I was helping the enemy find the vault for content, that I learned my lesson or something, they would forgive me and let me back. I knew from there I just had to go on with the plan in a different way, so I joined a call with them. But I didn't realize how bad I truly messed up. [cut to that call] Spoke: So what's the plan? Mapicc: Spoke, you—[exhales]—you've given us so many reasons not to trust you. Spoke: Which is? Mapicc: You speak ominously, you have a bad record, you're—you were in contact with Parrot the entire time. Vortex called me and said there are at least three or four double agents that are on Team Awesome right now, that are actually on Parrot's side. Spoke: Christ. You guys—okay, okay, i'm just gonna be completely clean, bro. Parrot's a double agent on APO. Parrot is an obvious double agent on APO. But he's not a double agent in content, guys. He's a double agent to make the story better. I literally have not told them the base coords to make this more interesting. Mapicc: The base is gone, Spoke. Spoke: YOU BLEW IT UP? Mapicc: we took— Spoke: WHAT THE--WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? Mapicc: We took a ridiculous amount of money and we're hiding far away, Spoke. Spoke: WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU? WHY. [cut to narration] Spoke: There was literally no point in me continuing this lie, since the vault was confirmed to be gone. But, what you're about to see is what no content creator should do on any SMP. And despite me using quote-unquote content and entertainment against them to get my way, all I really did was ruin their videos.

my whole point in the barrier blocks essay about season 4 was that lifesteal’s storytelling is competitive. and it is something weaponized on screen in season 4 plenty of times, but it’s never so blatant as this. It’s never admitted like this. Spoke outright saying, “i fucked everyone else over so i could get my video.” I never considered that the scripting thing might be a flat out lie like this. even though i knew spoke was ultimately doing all of that as part of the plan to get parrot in position for wormhole, and even though i came to the conclusion that dupe war couldn’t really have been “scripted” in a way that mattered even without knowing that spoke was lying about this, because WHY would you LIE ABOUT THIS?

It’s kind of beautiful. the perfect piece of information about season 4 to tie it all up in a bow.

and it’s incredible for being this albeit brief, raw glimpse into spoke’s mind. a completely off camera moment that nobody ever would have seen. something you never, ever get from spoke, who rarely streams, and refuses to let other players see inside of his head, or even have real conversations with him in season 4. whose power is predicated on maintaining that exact distance. because it all falls apart if you get to hear how he feels underneath it all, if you get to see the way everything he does in season 4 is nothing but madly improvising lie after lie, trying to keep the tower he’s built intact even as it is constantly at risk of falling out from under him. It’s spoke making himself for once truly vulnerable, truly seen.

but… AFTER this point, the video largely loses this undercurrent of emotional vulnerability that sells the whole thing’s premise. It doesn’t matter if spoke is lying about minutiae in that first part of the video, fudging dates and summarizing events, because the emotional honesty matters so much more. but a lot of the threads spoke presents to us in the beginning of the video never feel like they actually get delivered on, and this window into his mind is closed to us again. It feels like he falls back into the motions of just, making a lifesteal video, making a minecraft youtube video. this moment with the dupe war feels like something legitimately special and unique, precisely because of that element of vulnerability. It’s probably the closest a lifesteal video has ever come to capturing the parts of lifesteal that i love, the things you only really get on stream where it’s much harder to keep up the sort of powerplays spoke relies on.

unfortunately you are hardwired to make youtube videos and there is no saving you. I would wager there are two full hours of reused footage that adds basically nothing. and it’s the worst deflationary effect i’ve ever seen. the tension builds to this crazy height and then it’s just gone and you’re watching, dr. donut vip day. poopies the endermite nonsense. nothing against poopies the endermite nonsense, but you show me all of that and then you expect me to watch you fuck around with minecraft mobs for 40 minutes straight?

and just as a side note, it’s edited in the most confusing way possible. i think this was heightened for me because i watched it with my partner who isn’t quite as into lifesteal as i am, but this video is comprised of: 1) brand new footage and new voiceovers by spoke explaining his current feelings/reflections on what happened then, 2) old stream footage, and 3) footage from old videos that spoke previously uploaded, including the editing choices from those old videos. none of these things are ever flagged or indicated to the viewer, you have no real way of knowing which is which unless you’ve seen all of those old streams and videos. and this carries over into the way spoke presents information to you, because it’s still largely done in the rapid-fire information summary, telling instead of showing style that plagues these videos. i don’t know how you are expected to absorb any information from this narration style if you don’t already know the minute details of everything that happened in season 4. which i do, so it was fine, just stylistically puzzling on several levels.

which brings us to…. an elephant in the room. the thing left out of what is billed as the full truth. vitalasy is not part of this video. spoke’s relationship with the other exploiters at large is never really dwelled on or explored, even when ash does appear on screen relatively frequently, but there is not a single clip of vitalasy speaking in this video. we get a couple screenshots of his discord messages, only on screen for seconds, a few of which appear to be dated from a different day than spoke says they are. he’s mentioned about as infrequently as you could possibly manage to discuss season 4, let alone wormhole, without vitalasy. who we know spoke was working with in some capacity throughout the full duration of these events, who appears both in the beginning of this video as spoke establishes where the exploit came from, and in the end, when spoke jumps into the void and ops vitalasy in the same moment.

there are all of these scenes where the bedrock prison is there but never explained, or someone (parrot in one of the last pivotal conversations spoke has with him in the video) is holding an eclipse shield, and it all makes him so overwhelmingly present in his absence. spoke seems to realize how glaring it feels, because he addresses it:

[3:25:17 - 3:25:34] Spoke: I told Ash I would give him whatever item he wanted, except operator. Even though he was bummed out, he said it was fine. Vitalasy on the other hand wasn't too happy. There was some more stuff between us that I had to cut out since this video is already too long, but long story short Vitalasy felt entitled to it because he found the glitch, which does make sense. However, the risk of another player having admin was too much, and I declined.

every other time spoke mentions vitalasy, it’s with this same combination of avoidance and active dismissal. I keep coming back to that scene at the end; “i gave vitalasy op” and no further acknowledgement. what do you mean more happened between you but you’re not going to show us, and in everything we do get it feels like nothing at all has changed since season 4, you’re still portraying him in the exact same way he was portrayed then? framing it as the full truth, but there’s still this central point you’re taking great pains to talk around. the video is too long. the video is already four hours, how much worse could it get? what about all of that reused footage? that you could cut, and the pacing of the video would be better for it? am I really supposed to believe that’s why you made that decision?

and ultimately this plays into why the video doesn’t really work for me past that hour-or-so mark. because spoke isn’t actually being honest. past that point, things are glossed over or hidden the same way they would be in any lifesteal video.

maybe part of this is the fact that the dupe war stuff is new information to me where what was streamed at the end of season 4 isn't, even if it was cut out of the youtube videos, but i really don’t think it’s just that. It’s in the pacing of the video, what’s prioritized and what isn’t, the amount of time and dramatic attention given to these final moments.

In the scene towards the end where spoke monologues to parrot, after he tricks parrot into giving him admin, parrot doesn't say anything. It’s just spoke talking at him, and then the scene ends without parrot getting a word in edgewise. you get that little moment between them before spoke puts on pants and jumps into the void, but that's still parrot responding to spoke's lie, not to the truth. even if you don't get some sort of conclusion or elaboration on parrot's thoughts here, which is fair enough, you don't even get any real reflection on all of it from spoke in the end.

this is how the video ends:

[3:55:40 - 3:57:25] Spoke: After that I was left thinking, why in the world did I do this? I mean, I was so confused I ended up yelling "Ah, fuck this." then I put on some pants, gave Vitalasy op, and jumped in the void. No one understood why I did this, and I didn't either. Why did I let them win? Why did I follow the rules of the challenge in the first place? Why did it feel like I did all of this for nothing? I wouldn't find the answer until far later. For the next season Parrot didn't want to be the owner anymore, due to the stress and time it took, but he reached out to me and Ash to take his place. He did this, apparently, because we knew a lot about server stuff, but we were willing to give it a shot. I ended up hating that season. Since, no one trusted me, my only teammates on the server were Ash, and surprisingly Planetlord, who almost became the server villain himself, but the worst part was that there was no point in exploiting anymore. Why would I break the game to obtain something I could just get through console? Except, that's when it clicked. The following year, I brought back my Unstable series, this time with Parrot and Wemmbu. These videos would be scripted, but not scripted to save time or be efficient, but instead to push the boundaries of storytelling in minecraft. I've had so much fun this past year, creating things that have never been seen in the game, and that's when I realized it. My favorite moments from the wormhole were when I was making a plan destined to fail, or when I abused a new exploit, or literally any moment when i was doing something that had never been done before. I did the wormhole because it felt like I was doing the impossible. And that feeling was pretty cool.

the whole thing kind of defeats it’s own point doesn’t it? All of this weight on your self reflection, and the mistakes you made, and the way you prioritized your own Content/Story/Narrative/Career/Etc above the other people you were playing with, about chasing this feeling of power. and how, the power was only made real in the lie. you had to lie about how powerful the exploit was in order to trick someone into handing real power to you, and you had to keep that lie up so he wouldn’t stop you, because at every moment you worried that he could stop you. the wormhole is nothing, the exploit was nothing, in any of the ways that really mattered. at one point in this same video, spoke launches a hack client because he’s bored and it isn’t even remarked upon, because there’s no weight placed on launching a hack client. it’s not about what the wormhole can do, it’s about convincing everyone that what you’re doing is interesting enough, is powerful enough, that the power becomes real. it's a social game. If spoke is honest, spoke loses his power. If spoke is vulnerable, spoke loses his power. If spoke, at any moment, stops obfuscating and posturing and acting scary and obtuse and selling his power, spoke loses his power.

that’s what happens to vitalasy. vitalasy is vulnerable, and more importantly accessible, to both the audience and to the other players. because he will sit there and talk to you for hours, and argue with you, and consider your point. spoke makes himself unreachable, so vitalasy receives all of the social consequences that spoke is outrunning by keeping that careful distance. and you have to assume that vitalasy becoming the scapegoat was nothing but useful to him, even if it wasn’t something spoke did intentionally, or consciously.

at a certain point, the only explanation for why spoke won't just actually come clean to parrot instead of hanging onto all of these false pretenses, pivots everything he does on the nppp story in the end, instead of being honest about the conditions nppp was formed under in the first place, is because he doesn't want to deal with the consequences.

everything spoke does in s4 is both chasing that feeling of power in doing what should be impossible, and running away from the point where all of that crumbles and he has to face social repercussions for it. especially when it's obvious that in spite of the lie underpinning everything, and the fact that he was using parrot to achieve godhood, he still cares. it's not like there's this sense of glee in his villainy that will endure, it's just going to hurt if he stops digging himself into this pit, so he can't stop.

he still spent that time with parrot. it was still a real team, no matter why spoke did it in the first place. and the story spoke is telling about the nppp is so much more compelling, so much more meaningful, even when it can never add up right in the end. it's one thing to hurt someone by lying to them, and it's another thing to start wishing the story you were telling was the truth because you won yourself over. In the same way that vitalasy changes course during season 4 because of how much he cares about zam, only you never get to see it happen with spoke. If spoke does feel this, it doesn’t stop him. he doesn’t change his course.

what happens to vitalasy is maybe what spoke is afraid of. because vitalasy does receive those social consequences, on screen, and it’s worse by far than anything we ever see spoke receive. It all falls apart and vitalasy has to respond to it right then and there, taking center stage in a way that allows spoke to slip by under the radar.

despite this, it’s a strange kind of mutual parasitism that works out for both of them in the end: spoke remaining committed to his lie, keeping himself hidden and detached, is what allows vitalasy to avoid playing the villain role he realizes he hates, even when nobody but vitalasy seems to apprehend this as a victory for him. neither wants to be in the other’s shoes. it's easy to look at spoke doing all of this heavy lifting and think, vitalasy really didn't do anything, did he? he found the glitch and that was it, he got spoke involved. but in the end vitalasy says: this is exactly what i wanted.

and vitalasy is put in that position of social vulnerability largely through zam’s presence, acting on lifesteal as a force that (largely unconsciously, at this point) demands vulnerability on multiple levels; not only must you be visible to the audience, but you must be comfortable losing, you must open yourself to embarrassment and potential mockery. you must care. where spoke lets the audience in on nothing, zam lets us in on everything. If zam is going to portray vitalasy a certain way no matter what (and she is, because she refuses to do anything if the audience isn’t there with her), the only course of action is to attempt to control the narrative yourself. even though the more information the audience has, the more you're seen, the less control there is. (a second shoutout to will 75hearts irrealisms on this one)

i guess i don’t know what i want, really. you can’t expect more. It’s a youtube video. he’s not going to stop behaving like it’s a youtube video. but there’s something there, there’s really something there.

zam is my favorite lifesteal member for a reason, and part of it is in the pure lack of care for making videos. going back and watching a zam stream from season 3, the difference is immediately apparent; everything zam did then, she did for the sake of a video. and somewhere over the course of season 4 that changes. so much changes.

If we’re being honest, lifesteal isn’t what I want it to be a lot of the time. most of the players don’t approach it in the ways that interest me. but the thing I care about is real. it is there. and every once in a while, you get it from someone you aren’t expecting, at least for a moment. but whatever, that feeling was pretty cool, wasn’t it? the exploit was pretty cool.

#m #lifesteal #being really weird about it as always thumbs up #more to be said in relation to all of this about zam joining spoke at the end of s4 but i can't collect my thoughts on that #there's also a whole thing about. like. in the long run it's maybe better not to be so emotionally vulnerable to the audience. that was #kind of awful for the people involved a lot of the time. and in post-s4 lifesteal there is a very palpable push and pull about this because #it's like everyone has realized The Potential For Vulnerability and is trying to reconcile with it or shut it off or (etc)#however that doesn't change the fact that it's what makes me care about any of this

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