#but yeah im. i just really hope it goes well. i really need this. im tired of not going anywhere not doing anything not having a future

[airenyah]

A LOOK AT STYLE'S JOURNEY | Ep 9

(Overview | Ep1+2 | Ep3 | Ep4 | Ep5 | Ep6 | Ep7 | Ep8)

Yeah, I don't really have any introductory words to say on this one except... ENJOY <3

Pronoun situation: As usual, just assume Fadel and Style use the rude pronouns guu/mueng with each other unless I specify otherwise.

To recap: On their road trip through the country, Fadel and Style ran into an interesting pair and got involved in their (pre-)marital dispute. Style finally figures out what exactly Fadel is mad about and makes him a promise.

No. 1: A Stylish Death

Once more, Style and Fadel are on the road. Fadel finally took Style's advice from the end of episode 7 to heart and is currently taking a nap on the backseat of the car instead of threatening Style non-stop. Style turns his head to check on him, then shakes his head and looks back to the road, his expression amused. It's my personal headcanon that he finds it just as funny and ridiculous (affectionate) how bad of a kidnapper Fadel is as we the fandom do. What kidnapper just sleeps peacefully while letting their victim drive them around in a car without supervision? Speaking of headcanons, you know how there's been talk about where exactly Style got the sunglasses from all of a sudden? My mom suggested that they could be Bison's and that they just happened to lie around in the car, but it's my headcanon that Style actually nicked them from Jimmy and Popcorn's house. He probably found the glasses somewhere around the house and charmed the two of them into giving them to him before he and Fadel left.

Anyway, the radio cuts out and Style ends up finding a photo of some mysterious guy in the glove compartment in search of CDs. To be honest, I don't think Style is all that jealous in this moment (I think he'd know if there was a love rival he needed to worry about, I think he can read Fadel well enough by now), but I do think he's very confused and intrigued. Because Fadel did tell him four episodes ago that he didn't have any past lovers. And only the night before (I assume) they had a chat in which Style mentions that he doesn't know Fadel's past. And I think Style wants to know. About Fadel's past and now about the guy in the photo specifically, because that guy is likely connected to Fadel's past, too. Which Style wants to know about.

But right in that moment, Fadel wakes up. Style quickly throws the photo back into the compartment, slams it shut and immediately ropes Fadel into a conversation so that Fadel doesn't even have the time to ask what Style was doing in case he saw anything. Fadel starts telling Style about Bison's parents' island and house and Style hopes his best friend is still alive. The only thing Fadel has to say about that is: "I can’t guarantee that. You’ll have to find out for yourself." That's not a very reassuring answer. "Can’t you at least lie to make me feel better?" Style asks. Language fun fact, Style's reply actually goes more like:

Can't you give me some hope, please? มึงให้ความหวังกูหน่อยก็ได้ป่ะ [mueng - hâi - kwaam wăng - guu - nòi - gôh dâai - bpà] you - give - hope - me - a little (please) - [particle] - ?

Then Style asks for a quick stop at a clothes store because "I’ve been wearing [your clothes] this whole time, and it’s getting disgusting" and I just love that @panncakes was spot on when they said:

im just saying style is obviously not wearing his own shirt in episode 8 and since fadel had time to prepare for this search mission he obviously brought essentials including spare sets of clothing and baggy black does scream fadel; so im just going to assume fadel has style Who He's Definitely Killing Soon running around in his own clothing because you can't have a dead man running around in day old dirty clothes obviously and not because sharing clothes is becoming their Thing

In a bit we will see that Style actually is wearing a shirt that we've seen Fadel wear before on the show.

They start bickering, because Fadel isn't in the mood to go shopping for clothes, but Style fights for his will by joking about Fadel killing him and going on a very Style-like monologue about wanting to be a good-looking corpse. When he's done monologuing, he turns his head and throws Fadel a side glance to check if it worked.

It did.

No. 2: You Better Run, Better Run, Faster Than His Bullet

It worked. Despite Fadel's reluctance they are now standing in a clothes store on Style's request and that makes 3/3 series that JoongDunk have gone to a clothes store in. I'm starting to wonder if looking at clothes together on camera is in their contracts. Maybe the real sunflowers were the clothes stores we made along the way. (Yes, I am still waiting for a JD sun flower Easter egg. Since sun flowers were such a big thing in both their previous works and their mascot is a sunflower too.) Anyway, so Fadel caved and let Style go shopping for clothes after all, because when does Fadel not give in to Style and Style is hyped. They bicker some more and Style finally calls Fadel out for being a bad kidnapper while at the same time using the opportunity to pointedly call himself Fadel's boyfriend and just as pointedly call Fadel his own boyfriend again as well. Just listen to how much he stresses the word "faen". Actually, let me just share a more literal translation again, because he doesn't just throw around the word "boyfriend" two but three whole times in Thai:

Right now I feel more like a boyfriend. ตอนเนี่ยรู้สึกเหมือน​แฟนมากกว่า [dton nîia - rúu-sèuk - mĕuuan - faen - mâak gwàa] (right) now - feel - like - boyfriend - more Official subs: I feel like a boyfriend. It's/You're like a boyfriend who accompanies his boyfriend while shopping. เหมือนแฟนมาเฝ้าแฟนช้อปปิ้งอ่ะ [mĕuuan - faen - maa - fâo - faen - chóp-bpîng - àh] like - boyfriend - come - watch over, care - boyfriend - shopping - [particle] Official subs: This feels like going shopping with my boyfriend.

(The italicized boyfriends indicate which boyfriends Style pointedly stresses.)

Last episode, Fadel claimed twice that he and Style weren't boyfriends/a couple after Style referred to them as such. Now Style is calling them boyfriends again, but the only thing that Fadel debunks this time around is the claim that Style is his hostage. Fadel doesn't say a single word about them not being boyfriends. He ends his defense by claiming that Style doesn't hold enough value to be exchanged for anything and Style throws him a little nod like Sure Jan whatever you say. 

Fadel continues to say "I'm just letting you find a little joy before I kill you" and that's interesting because:

I'm only letting you be a little happy before you die. กูแค่ให้มึงมีความสุขเล็กๆ น้อย​ๆ​ ก่อนตายเท่านั้นแหละ [guu - kâe - hâi - mueng - mii kwaam-sùk - lék lék nói nói - gòhn - dtaai - tâo nán - làe] I - just - let, give - you - be happy - little, small - before - die - only - [particle]

Let's compare with every other explicit death threat that Fadel has made to Style since he's kidnapped him:

Doesn't matter where [I'm taking you]. You'll be dead anyway. But before I kill you, I have to see my brother.

Once I find him, I'm going to kill you both.

One wrong move, I'm blowing your brain out.

If my car was stolen, not only would I kill you, I'd take a car from your garage.

Just because I let you do this doesn't mean I won't kill you, you know?

Do you see what's different all of a sudden? Yeah, that's right. Fadel threatened Style's life, but he did not say that he would be the one ending it. For once, Fadel did not say that he, Fadel, would be killing Style. The only other time he made a reference about Style being dead rather than him killing Style was the very first time he voiced an explicit death threat and that one was still followed by an "I kill you" in the very next sentence. Now, though? There is no "I (will) kill you" anywhere to be found. It's the same thing a few lines down: "You're going to die soon, what else do you want?" (Btw, I did check the Thai lines in the list above and in Thai he also says that he'll kill Style each time.)

I don't know if Style picks up on that subtle change in phrasing, but he certainly isn't as annoyed by and tired of the death threats anymore as he used to be. Instead, he now deals with them by making light of them, like earlier in the car when he insisted he wanted to be a good-looking corpse and now by asking Fadel to drop his dead body in a beautiful place so that at least his ghost could haunt nice places in nature. And what I love about this is that even though this is clearly meant more like a light-hearted joke, Style still sounds almost kind of genuine in his words. Because Fadel is "serious" about his death threats and so Style will also be serious about his dying wishes. And even though he doesn't believe that Fadel will actually kill him, Style still would rather haunt a beautiful place when he dies (even if it isn't at Fadel's hands). That part is genuine. However, Fadel ain't got no time for this particular wish. And so he threatens Style's life one more time by playing along with Style: "If you don't choose something right now, the only place you're haunting is this damn secondhand store."

Style stares at Fadel for a moment. Message received. It's time for Style to back down from being annoying or else Fadel will really lose his patience. And so Style turns his attention to the clothes rack, but not without showing Fadel how completely and utterly unimpressed he is by Fadel threatening death for the millionth time in the past 3-ish days. Style soon gets distracted from his performance when he notices a nice pair of shorts, which he grabs and then pointedly holds out to Fadel like There. I'm choosing something. Happy now? 

Style seriously starts looking for something to wear after that and he's so focused on the clothes that he misses the way Fadel watches him with the most adoring look in his eyes. Style finds a top he likes and walks off to try it on. When he comes back to ask for Fadel's opinion on his outfit, Fadel points out that Style never really wears stripes:

But I don't really see you wearing striped clothes. แต่กูไม่ค่อยเห็นมึงใส่เสื้อลายทางนะ [dtàe - guu - mâi kôi - hĕn - mueng - sài - sêuua laai taang - ná] but - I - not really - see - you - wear - striped clothes - [particle] Official subs: I never saw you in stripes before.

Just wanted to make a little clarification, because in the subs Fadel actually says "I never saw you in stripes before" when Fadel actually has, in fact, seen Style in stripes. But "not really" and "never" isn't quite the same. In Thai Fadel implies that Style rarely wears stripes, not that he never wears stripes, and I think Style wearing stripes in front of Fadel three times in eight episodes is rare enough to be considered "not really".

Fadel taking note of this fact has Style quite satisfied, because Fadel is clearly paying attention to him. Then Style firmly tells Fadel "You can't kill me. You love me." and this stand-off really reminds me of the one in the storage room in episode 3 when Style tells Fadel "You won't [punch me]. You like me." Except this time Style is even more confident in his words. In fact, he knows he's right, because Fadel has had many perfect opportunities to kill him in the last couple of days, was actually close to killing him a few times and yet Style is still alive and kicking and actively being an annoying little menace in Fadel's life. And he also knows for a fact that Fadel is in love with him. He tested him in the bathtub and got a satisfactory result. Instead of being punched in the gut like last time, Style suddenly finds himself whirled around and on the ground, everything accompanied by the sound of gunshots. 

From one second to the next, Style finds himself worrying about his his life again after he's finally managed to deal with his fear of death triggered by the pool incident. Somehow, Fadel and Style still have the time to bicker while Fadel fires off a few more gunshots and then they run to a different hiding spot. I do love how Style's first instinct the moment Fadel has dropped down on the ground next to him is to reach out to Fadel. And I love how Style doesn't even seem to be thinking about it, he just touches Fadel automatically, his hand seeks out Fadel almost out of reflex.

Fadel realizes he's out of bullets and blames Style who defends himself and then asks how they're gonna fight this guy. And once again we get to see how much of a helper Style is and how much of a need to fix things he has, because he immediately offers himself up as bait to distract the attacker. Fadel hates the idea, but Style insists. He's too helpful for his own good. Style gets in position to run, but turns back to Fadel for a moment when Fadel calls out Style's name a few times. Fadel tilts his head in disapproval like Are you fucking serious right now?! Style nods and blinks at him in a silent answer: Yeah. It'll be fine, don't worry. I got this. Then Style bravely runs off. His need to help overrides his fear of death. 

Turns out Style cannot, in fact, outrun bullets. A bullet grazes him and he goes down. And at this point, let me just leave @secriden's observation here, because it totally hadn't occurred to me and it hurts me, so obviously I need to make it everyone else's problem, too:

[I]it is just deliciously dramatic that Style gets injured precisely dressed in the clothes he'd picked out so he could "at least die in something that's actually my style" and in the place Fadel said Style would haunt only minutes prior.

Fadel finds Style a minute or two later, once he's dealt with the attacker and they're both safe. Style says "It’s just a graze" and "This is nothing" and I'm not sure if he's saying this more to reassure Fadel or to reassure himself. His mouth says one thing, but his face sure says another.

Whatever brave face Style was putting on a moment ago disappears once Fadel starts wrapping his own shirt around Style's injury. Style goes down, clearly in pain. And I'm left wondering... Is that it? Is this why we've been counting Style around guns? Was it foreshadowing to Style getting shot? Only time will tell.

No. 3: Treating the Wounded

Somehow Fadel gets Style onto Bison's island. I wonder how far away they were at the point of Style being shot and how long it took for them to arrive on the island. Style is weak and pale and yet the first and also only thing out of his mouth is "Kant… You're alive. I'm happy to see that". Kant's death is a worry that Style has carried around ever since that morning at the hospital right before Fadel ambushed him and now that I think about it, this worry must have also played a part in Style's fear of and about death last episode. But Kant is alive. His best friend is alive. And that's all that matters through the pain right now.

Kant wants to help but Fadel immediately yells at him to let go of Style the moment Kant grabs Style's arm. I'm sure Style would have been cool with Kant also helping him, but Style currently doesn't have the energy to talk back to Fadel. Fadel continues to lead him towards the house and at one point as they're walking we see Style shut his eyes for a moment in a way that has me wonder if for a second his vision went blurry and/or if he's feeling dizzy from the pain and the shock of the injury:

Once at the house, Bison stitches Style back up while Fadel helps and acts as Style's moral support. I'm not sure how many details of what is happening here will be retained in Style's memory as his brain is certainly too busy with keeping him alive through the pain.

No. 4: Bestie Talk

Style wakes up in a bed and Kant finds him only a minute later with painkillers. Style first voices his relief that he himself didn't die from the shock of the surgery, followed by his relief that Kant isn't a corpse either. Kant's potential death really is something that was weighing him down. But Kant's alive! And he even told Bison about everything! Style can't believe his ears. How in the world is Kant still alive, then? Kant says "He loves me" and Style goes "Ohhhhhhhhh" while I go "The power of love, huh?" and then Style goes "The power of love, alright" and I die of laughter at how predictable Style's words were. Style, believer in the power of love, is very happy that his prediction was right, is very happy for his friend and his happiness. Kant continues "I love him, too. I'll do anything to keep him alive" and Style asks "And how are you going to do that? This mess is getting out of hand. It's not just the cops who are after them, but someone else clearly wants them dead" and it's interesting, because so far in their 1:1 scenes it was always Style being the optimistic one, the hopeful one, the dreamer while Kant kept things realistic and had a more pessimistic outlook on life. This time, though, it's the other way around. This time Style hits Kant with the realism. And it makes sense, because it was also Style who got hit by a real bullet. Style has felt and is actually currently feeling the very real consequences of "I'll do anything to keep him alive". One moment you think you can outrun a bullet, the next you almost die on a make-shift surgery table.

Kant says he doesn't exactly know how he's going to go about it, but that his heart is already in it. Style looks away, clearly thinking about something, then raises his eyebrows and nods.

"My heart is already in this." Style knows. Oh, how well Style knows that feeling. The feeling of wanting to do something, anything in the world for the well-being and safety of your hitman boyfriend. He's been feeling like this for a long time now. If we're being honest, Style has felt like this since all the way back in episode 5 where he told Kant "How would I even get through this? I compromised my whole body, and if we're being honest, I've already compromised half of my heart, too. I'm worried about him now" in that locker room. But back then things were going great for Style. Fadel had finally given him a chance and was happily dating Style while Style was falling in love with him more and more despite knowing his true identity. Back then, things were great. Now, though? Not so much. One moment Fadel threatens him with death, the next moment Fadel saves him from death. Style is happy that everything worked out well for his beloved bestie and his hitman boyfriend, but he himself is quite confused at the mixed signals he's getting from his own hitman: "Meanwhile, my chances are 50-50. He's hot and then cold. He loves me and then he doesn't. I honestly can't keep up with him." And I don't think the 50-50 refers to there being a 50-50 chance on whether Fadel will kill him or not. I think by now everyone and their mother knows that Fadel absolutely cannot bring himself to take Style's life no matter how hard he tries (and how hard he tries to convince himself otherwise) and Style is very much aware of it. He even called Fadel out on it at the store. No, I think the 50-50 is out on whether Fadel will forgive him and whether Fadel is willing to give Style another chance. Style knows Fadel loves him, but is the love he has also enough to let Style in again? Is it enough to put his walls down for Style again? And besides, apart from saving Style's life a few times, ever since Fadel found out the truth Fadel hasn't exactly been treating Style in a way that makes Style feel loved and appreciated while Style has done nothing but show his love and appreciation for Fadel. Fadel hasn't exactly shown that he really cares about Style. Style made it very clear that despite Fadel nearly taking his life at the pool, he still loved Fadel and was even willing to sleep with him anyway and Fadel just handcuffed him to the bed in return and told Style he didn't trust him. Style cried from trauma and the only consolation Fadel gave him was "don't be dramatic" and "I don't wanna listen". Style voiced genuine concerns about being murdered and Fadel came back with approval of Style's murder. Style called them boyfriends and Fadel returns with yet another death threat. Those aren't exactly bright prospects for Style and no matter how much Style stays in good spirits, deep down it's gotta hurt, too. Fadel may love Style enough not to kill him, but does he even care about him at all as well?

But Kant has an outside perspective and sees things that Style doesn't see. And from that perspective it looks like Fadel absolutely does care: "But from what I saw, he had your hands clasped in his so tightly. And the way he looked at you was exactly how I looked at Bison at the hospital." Style looks away again, even more lost in thought this time around as he contemplates Kant's words and thinks about Fadel holding his hand through the surgery as well as his relationship with him. Kant's words should come as good news, but Style still looks rather downhearted.

It may seem a little odd that our usual confident, optimistic, hopeful boy is suddenly discouraged. However, I think it makes sense. Style knows that Fadel loves him, but he hasn't exactly been treating Style in a way that makes Style actually feel that love (not killing Style and saving his life is kind of the bare minimum at this point, let's be real). Not to mention, there are also many things that we, the viewers, see from an outside perspective, but Style himself doesn't see them, like when Fadel nearly reached out to Style when Style was crying, or the look of adoration Fadel was watching Style with at the clothes store, or the concern Fadel showed while Bison was stitching Style up. But for the last incident, there was someone there to witness the outside perspective and finally Style learns how Fadel looks when Style's not looking. And that makes Style think. Fadel does seem to care. And Kant's words also serve to reconfirm that Style is right about Fadel loving him, but is that love enough to make Fadel want to be with Style again? After all, Style still has to work for Fadel's forgiveness. And I think that's why Style ultimately isn't all that convinced by Kant's words, because what good does the knowledge that Fadel loves him do, when there's a chance Fadel still won't take him back? What good does the knowledge that Fadel does care do, when it only happens in moments where Style is missing out on it? When it only happens in moments where that care doesn't properly reach Style?

Kant can tell that his friend is still unhappy, so he changes the topic to something more cheerful: "Thanks, though, for risking your life looking for me." This has Style genuinely laughing again as he says "I don’t need your gratitude." Another interpretation of this line is actually:

No need to get so touching, dude. ไม่ต้องมาซึ้งเลยมึง [mâi dtông - maa - séung - loiie - mueng] no need - come - touching, deep - [particle] - you

I think this is a little more coherent with Kant teasing Style about saying "I love you" afterwards, but that might also just be me. Anyway, Style and Kant bicker a bit and Kant accidentally causes pain to Style's injured arm. When they stop bickering, Style, who is in a bit of a better mood again after feeling a down about Fadel only moments before, now really wants to know alllll the tea he's missed while he was busy surviving the pain of the surgery: "When [Fadel] had my hand in his, how did he look at me?"

Kant goes into a dramatic reenactment for Style until they both break away laughing about how weird the thought of the two of them (Kant and Style) to kiss is. Once they've calmed down, Kant repeats that Fadel is worried about Style. Style smiles to himself, getting lost in thought again. It's still not an entirely happy smile, because Style still has a way to go to earn Fadel's forgiveness and Fadel still needs to make it clear in return that he does care about Style and appreciates him in a way where Style can actually see or feel it, but Style is definitely more hopeful again compared to earlier in the conversation. Maybe there is a chance Fadel is willing to give Style another chance after all. Maybe there really is still hope that Style will get his boyfriend back and that said boyfriend will also start treating him accordingly again. Maybe things aren't so bleak after all.

No. 5: Over My Dead Body

However, things take a dark turn when Style walks in on the love of his life holding his best friend at gunpoint. Style missed the beginning of the confrontation, so technically he doesn't really have context, but he also doesn't really need it, because he knows exactly what grudge Fadel is holding. No need to ask. Besides, the day they were playing with the BB guns Fadel already told Style "Kant has to deal with me. He started all this, after all." And now Fadel is making good on that promise.

But Style has been so worried about Kant's safety for so many episodes already and especially ever since Kant got kidnapped and now that Style's finally got his best friend back, alive, and he is not going to watch his (not-)boyfriend kill him in front of his very own eyes and so he shouts at Fadel not to hurt Kant. However, Kant is ready to accept his fate. But before he dies, Fadel needs to know that Style is innocent: "But Style has nothing to do with this. I lied to get him roped into this." Remember the word หลอก [lòhk] from last episode? Yeah, it makes an appearance again. Just so you know:

I deceived my friend one more time. ผมหลอกเพื่อนผมมาอีกทีนึงอ่ะ [pŏm - lòhk - pêuuan pŏm - maa - ìik tii nueng - àh] I - trick, deceive - my friend - [past tense marker] - one more time again - [particle]

(If you didn't read my ep8 meta: this word means "to trick" or "to deceive" and it came up A LOT during ep8. Lots of tricking and deceiving happening on this show. Who would have thought.)

But Style is not cool with Kant's sacrifice. "Don't you dare take all the credits," Style scolds him. And here, have the Thai version too, because it made me laugh:

Don't be cool all by yourself. มึงอย่าเท่คนเดียวดิว�� [mueng - yàa - têh - kon diieow - dì - wá] you - don't - (be) cool - alone, by yourself - [particle] - [particle]

Style won't let Kant to this alone. If Kant has to die, so does Style. And he makes that very clear to Fadel: "If you're going to kill him, kill me, too." Style's voice sounds angry when he says this and this is interesting, because Style hasn't really been properly angry with Fadel ever since he found himself tied up at the pool. Sure, Style got annoyed and he was even really done with Fadel at some points, but Style was never angry with Fadel, he never held any of what Fadel said or did to him against Fadel. No, instead of getting angry, Style just went with it and often met Fadel with kindness and love instead. But now that his best friend's life is on the line, Style is finally truly angry at Fadel. Fadel can shoot Kant over Style's dead body. And with the many times Fadel has saved Style in the last couple of days, Style knows for a fact that his dead body is not something Fadel can bear to see. Even when Fadel himself is the one who wants Style dead.

Style continues: "Nobody forced me into this. I agreed to it willingly." Style could have gotten out of this mess at any point after he was informed of Fadel's real occupation and of what Kant's real mission was, but Style didn't. Style stayed. And he even stuck to Fadel's side all throughout episode 8 without running away which is something that he did willingly. Not because he was afraid of Fadel's gun. Fadel never really treated Style as an actual hostage apart from that one time he handcuffed Style to the bed and the few times he waved his gun in Style's face. Style had plenty of opportunities to make a run for it, especially when Fadel was napping in the car. But Style chose to stay. Nobody forced him to do anything, not Fadel during their road trip and also not Kant at any time before that. Style went along with everything by his own choice and of his own will. No one's made any decisions for Style. Style also has agency in this game.

Style underlines this point by dropping down on his knees and offering his life by his very own choice. "Don't you have a little sympathy? We've been through all these things together. Why did you bother stitching me up if you're going to end up killing me anyway? Why didn't you just let me die?" Style is still angry, but now his voice sounds more reproachful as well as desperate. Style's hurt is really starting to shine through. He has stuck to Fadel's side with unwavering loyalty these past few days, has shown over and over again that he's serious about Fadel and his feelings for Fadel, he's been nice to Fadel, has helped him, has followed his wishes, has even nearly given his life to protect Fadel in the store. And not a single time has Fadel shown any sign of appreciation or as much as acknowledgment. That hurts. Even more so, when Fadel then goes to murder Style's best friend as a thank you in return for all that Style has done for him. I think when Style asks "Don't you have a little sympathy?" the unspoken question is You don't care about me, despite all that I've willingly done for you? Style's next words are even more loaded: "Why did you bother stitching me up if you're going to end up killing me anyway? Why didn't you just let me die?" This is You do care about me, because if you really did hate me all that much you could have easily let me die back there and finally be rid of me, but you didn't. You couldn't bear to see me die. This is If you care about me and my life this much, then why do you keep treating me so coldly? This is You saved my life and now you're just gonna destroy it immediately after? Are you really this cruel?

As Style is kneeling there, I don't think he is scared for his own life, I don't think he expects Fadel to actually shoot him dead on the spot. I think Style feels fairly safe in this moment, but he is terrified for Kant's life. He knows that Fadel can't bring himself to kill Style, because he loves him too much, but Fadel doesn't feel the same way about Kant. In fact, Fadel feels quite the opposite about Kant. If Fadel kills Kant now, even if he spares Style, Style's life would still be ruined. No matter how much Style insists that he'll like Fadel no matter what, I think if Fadel kills his best friend (or any of Style's loved ones really, like his dad), I think that's the one exception to the rule. I do think they would not be able to come back from that.

This moment here is also the first time Style actually begs Fadel for mercy. Yes, back at the pool he also worked on Fadel not firing that life-ending shot, but back then Style was mostly angry and annoyed and only a little scared. Yes, he did ask Fadel not to kill him, but back then Style was begging for his life, not for mercy. Back then Style didn't ask Fadel to show compassion. But now Style is on his knees, desperately begging Fadel to be merciful, to show compassion, to really think things through. Fadel stares at him.

Fadel may not appreciate the loyalty Style has shown him over the last few days, but Kant very much does appreciate Style's loyalty and voices it, too: "I'm happy to have called you a friend." Style replies "Thank you for making my life such an adventure. It's been so goddamn fun, you know that?" and now tears start falling from his eyes as he's speaking. And what I love about this is despite how Style is crying and despite how upset he is in this moment and despite how terrified he is about their (Kant's) death, for Style his potential goodbye to Kant isn't a tragedy. No, it's a celebration. Style is upset and he is sad and he is desperate and afraid, but he smiles a genuine smile through his tears as he speaks his potential last words that Kant may get to hear from him. It's a celebration of their friendship. Style takes this tragic moment and turns it into a happy one. Because if death is inevitable, he at least wants to spend their (Kant's) dying moment in happiness and with good memories in mind. Kant acknowledges that celebration with a smile and a nod, which Style returns.

But Fadel stays stubborn. "How can we be sure you're not just fooling us again?" Style's smile and brief moment of happiness has disappeared when he replies to Fadel. "You think I'd risk my life for all this if I didn't really have feelings for you?" Style is still firm, but now all the anger from moments before is completely gone. Only hurt and despair is left. Style is asking Fadel All this time you never thought or cared to see my perspective, did you? He's telling Fadel I'm here before you, literally begging you on my knees and you are STILL not willing to believe a single word out of my mouth nor any of my actions. Style may always act like Fadel's continuous stabs at him just bounce right off, but at the end of the day it does hurt him that Fadel keeps pushing him away, keeps refusing to appreciate or at the very least acknowledge Style's genuine sincerity. Style's words are reproachful, like he's asking What else do I still need to do in order to prove to you that I'm being serious, no tricks? How much longer will you disregard my very real feelings? Are you really that stubborn? Is this really the hill you're going to die on?

Now Kant jumps in with a beg of his own to support Style: "People make mistakes. Won't you give me a chance? I really love your brother, and my friend really loves you. The two of us will do anything to make sure the two of you get the life you want." Fadel looks at Style after Kant says "The two of us will do anything to make sure the two of you get the life you want." Style has his eyes fixed on Fadel and despite Style still being tense and his breathing being shaky, the expression on Style's face is firm and determined. Style really meant every single thing he just said or did. And he is especially determined in his decision to die alongside Kant. Style is sending a couple of messages to Fadel here. He's saying Since you're always disregarding my own feelings on this matter anyway it really seems like you don't give a shit about me after all, so killing me in addition to Kant really shouldn't be a problem for you at all, so go on, do it. He's telling him If you kill him, you kill me too. If not physically, then at the very least emotionally. He's asking Won't you finally believe that I'm undoubtedly serious and honest about everything and especially about you?

Style is also observing Fadel, watching Fadel intently to see what he's doing, to see what his next move is going to be. Fadel, who was staring at Style, looks back to Kant, then throws Style another look.

And that's when he makes the decision to not to shoot. To put the gun away, instead. And that decision was without a doubt made for Style, not for Bison. I think Style's words (and especially also the unspoken ones) got to him and more importantly, he got to see Style's loyalty in full action. And that was crucial for Fadel to see, because if Style is this loyal to Kant, then if Style's love for Fadel is true, Fadel can expect the same loyalty from him down the line. In fact, Style actually has shown Fadel the same loyalty all along already, or else he wouldn't have followed Fadel to Bison's island, nor would he have thrown himself in the line of fire at the store to protect Fadel. Although I'm not sure Fadel is really ready to truly look at and acknowledge that in this moment.

Fadel puts the gun down and walks a few steps away. Both Bison and Style rush to Kant to check on him. Once Style has made sure Kant is alright, he looks to Fadel. Fadel is looking at him too.

Then Fadel looks at the rest and asks "Any of you allergic to seafood?" And yes, that comment is funny, but it's funny in a way that in German we call Situationskomik (= situational comedy, comedy of the situation). I really don't think Fadel is making a joke here (like. that is NOT the face of a man who is cracking a joke). No, I think this is a peace offering, actually. It's an unspoken peace offering, because cooking for someone else is a gesture of care. And instead of killing Kant, Fadel offers to cook for everyone which includes Kant.

No. 6: Encouragement

Style on the phone with his dad and I'm relieved, because I'd been worrying about his dad with Style suddenly disappearing just like that without a word. And I'm sooo so glad the series spent a moment on showing us the relationship between Style and his dad again. Like, of course Style is gonna call his dad so that his dad doesn't have to worry. Bison is concerned that Style's dad will be mad if Style shows up back home all banged up like that, but Style is confident he can come up with some superhero story and promises not to spill the beans on Fadel and Bison. Style and Bison have some friendly banter until Bison tells Style that Fadel wants to talk to him and said for Style to meet him at the beach. Style is suddenly worried that Fadel changed his mind and wants to shoot him after all, since Style had already offered as much when he was on his knees earlier that day.

I think we have well-established by now that there is no way Fadel is capable of killing Style, and as I mentioned, I think Style is confident in that, too. So I don't think Style thinks Fadel is actually planning to kill him for real, I think he's mostly just being overdramatic and exaggerating again. Bison then plays along and says "No way. The worst he'd do would be trying to drown you" and when Style blinks at Bison and stares at him in shock I think it's because Style doesn't immediately recognize that this is a joke. After all, he hasn't really spent all that much time with Bison, so he doesn't really know Bison and his humor all that well. So Style stares at Bison with big eyes, then tilts his head and squeezes his eyes a bit, trying to figure out whether Bison is being serious right now and if this is something Fadel would actually do (after all, Bison knows Fadel's killer side a hell of a lot better than Style does) or whether Bison is just joking. Bison notices Style's struggle and clears up that he's just kidding and that Fadel wouldn't do that. But it's already too late. Bison's got Style genuinely concerned now. Fadel has proven over and over again that he won't be shooting Style, but who said anything about drowning Style? It's a possibility that Style had not yet considered.

Bison laughs and asks if Style really does like Fadel. All the fear and worry from a second ago disappears instantly as Style firmly tells him "Whatever Kant feels about you, that's how I feel about your brother. If you understand him, you should be able to understand me." Style fell in love with Fadel in episode 5 and absolutely nothing that has happened since, and especially absolutely nothing that has happened since Fadel drugged him at the hospital has changed any about that. Style chose Fadel at the end of episode 5 and he is still very set on that decision.

Bison advises Style that Style needs to prove his feelings to Fadel and tells Style "He acts all tough and rough on the outside, but on the inside, he’s just a softie". Style laughs. He did get to see that for himself during that short time period where he and Fadel were actually happy in their relationship. Bison continues: "He never hesitates when he kills. So if you're still alive, that means he's got a soft spot for you." Again, I think this is something that Style has absolutely clocked already and even called out (both explicitly at the beginning of the episode when he said "You can't kill me. You love me" as well as implicitly whenever he was teasing Fadel, for example in his hitman-teerak monologue or when he quoted Popcorn's words and went "I deserve to die" and cockily leaned his head back to mimic giving his life over to Fadel), but I also think that it still hits kinda different to hear it from someone who first of all has an outside perspective on things and second of all who knows Fadel's killer side better than anyone, from someone who's seen over and over again what Fadel is like when he's murderous, from someone who can absolutely judge the difference. Which Style can't, because he's never seen Fadel actually kill anyone, even if he got close to witnessing it a few times.

Style had started to get discouraged, because Fadel just wouldn't budge and just wouldn't let Style back in and Style just kept hitting one wall after another. And we can't forget that Style spent a lot of time repeatedly hitting walls for the first four episodes already and even when Fadel let him in, Fadel never let him in 100% (only 80%) and so even then Style still came across walls. And I think on top of being discouraged, Style was also starting to get tired a bit. It must be quite exhausting to be this persistent, let's be real. There is only so much energy you can spend on running after someone who keeps pushing you away again and again and keeps being harsh to you. Fadel hasn't even talked to Style or checked on him since Style woke up after the surgery. As far as we're aware of, the only time they've talked since then was when Style was begging for mercy on his knees. So yeah. That sure is encouraging.

But first with Kant's optimism and now with Bison's support as well, Style is starting to feel like maybe not all is lost after all. Hesitantly, he asks Bison:

You think I still have hope? มึงว่ากูยังมีหวังอยู่ป่ะวะ [mueng - wâa - guu - yang - mii - wăng - yùu - bpà - wá] you - think - I - still - have - hope - [auxiliary verb] - ? - [particle] Official subs: You think… I have a chance?

Style is starting to get his hopes up a little bit again. Maybe Fadel will take him back and be nice to him again. Bison is absolutely convinced: "Go for it. After all you've risked your life for, what else do you even have to be scared of now?" Style looks towards the ground, uncertain. Yeah, what else could he be scared of?

Nothing, except Fadel potentially drowning him in the ocean instead of rejecting him like a normal person. Or, you know, just the rejection in general, even if it doesn't come with murder. Honestly, at this point I think Style is also lowkey nervous, because now he really does have (strong) feelings for Fadel and Fadel being willing to be his boyfriend (again. or still) matters more than anything this time around. What will Style do if Fadel rejects him again?

Bison taps his shoulder encouragingly and walks off. Style stays back, thinking everything over.

How is he going to proceed from here? Is he going to try yet again and risk running into another wall as always? Or is he just gonna let it go and finally leave Fadel alone?

No. 7: A Vow Fulfilled

Style does go to the beach. When he arrives, Fadel is already there which makes sense, since Bison did tell Style that Fadel wanted to talk to him at the beach. Except Fadel immediately snaps at Style about what Style is doing here and asks about Bison. Style informs him that Bison was actually the one who said Fadel wanted to talk to Style right here. I think based on Fadel's facial journey and the fact that he moves to walk right off, Style can tell that Bison lied, probably to get Fadel and Style to talk to each other. And now, with new found hope, Style does very much have something to talk to Fadel about. So he catches Fadel's arm and pulls him back, asking him to at least stay for a chat. Fadel isn't really convinced and Style hits him with a cheeky "I can't sleep unless I talk to you". He then hands Fadel a list of all the relatives he has in his life, because "I want you to be sure that I'm not lying to you again." And I'm just gonna drop the Thai line again, because – ding ding ding, you guessed it! Our favorite word หลอก [lòhk] from last episode makes an appearance again:

I want you to be confident that I won't deceive you again. กูอยากให้มึงมั่นใจว่ากูจะไม่หลอกมึงอีก [guu - yàak - hâi - mueng - mân-jai - wâa - guu - jà - mâi - lòhk - mueng - ìik] I - want - that - you - (be) certain, confident - that - I - will - not - trick, deceive - you - again

If you haven't read my ep8 meta, I would encourage you to go read at least sections 6, 9 and 10, so that you have context for its significance. Last episode Style figured out that having been tricked (especially into love) was the one big thing that Fadel was really mad about. Last episode Fadel asked Style "You think that you deceiving (tricking) me is no big deal?" when they were sitting on the couch, then later when they were dancing, Style acknowledged that it is in fact a big deal and tells Fadel "But I'm ready to do anything to make you forgive me." Later in the bathtub Style acknowledges again that he did a bad thing by tricking (deceiving) and betraying Fadel (again I refer you to section 10 of my ep8 meta). And now, as Style is actively doing something in the hopes that it will finally make Fadel forgive him, he once again repeats to him the exact thing that Fadel is mad about, promising he won't be tricking/deceiving Fadel ever again. And yeah, the official translation isn't exactly wrong, because lying is in fact a thing that comes with deceiving or tricking people and this word can be translated as "lying", but I just want some consistency in the word choice. Because I'm sure the consistency of the word choice หลอก [lòhk] in the original Thai was very much on purpose. Otherwise they could have just had the characters say โกหก [goh-hòk] (= to lie) or some other word at some point too. But no, they kept (and keep) saying หลอก [lòhk] while the subs are all over the place (from "made someone do something" to "lying" to "fooling someone" etc. etc. -> these are just the ones from the top of my head). The translation student in me wants to scream. I might turn this into my master's thesis.

Anyway, now that this rant is out of the way, let's continue: So Style explicitly tells Fadel he won't be หลอก [lòhk]-ing him anymore and if he does end up doing it again, then Fadel is free to kill him together with his entire family. Fadel is outraged: "You're selling your whole family out for this? And you said you're a family man." And here's the literal translation, for those who are interested (it doesn't really change much):

You're selling your relatives to me? นี่มึงขายญาติให้กูเลยนะ [nîi - mueng - kăai - yâat - hâi - guu - loiie - ná] [interjection] - you - sell - relatives - to - me - [particle] - [particle] But you said you love your family, didn't you? ไหนมึงบอกว่ามึงรักครอบครัวไม่ใช่หรอ [năi - mueng - bòhk wâa - mueng - rák - krôp-kruua - mâi châi - rŏh] but - you - said that - you - love - family - no - ?

Style doesn't see a problem: "Because I know for a fact that I won't ever lie to you again." And yes, he does repeat the word หลอก [lòhk], thanks for asking. In fact, his wording is actually almost the same as earlier:

Well, I'm confident that I definitely won't deceive you again. ก็กูมั่นใจไงว่ากูจะไม่หลอกมึงอีกแน่นอน [gôh - guu - mân-jai - ngai - wâa - guu - jà - mâi - lòhk - mueng - ìik - nâe-non] well - I - (be) certain, confident - [particle] - that - I - will - not - trick, deceive - you - again - definitely, for sure

But Fadel, on top of being hurt that he was หลอก [lòhk]-ed by Style, he is now also offended that he is worth only a car to Style and sasses Style about it: "From what you did to me, I just hope that car's a real beauty." And it's actually kinda funny, because Style agreed to make Fadel his boyfriend, but it's been how many episodes since they've started dating?? And we have yet to see Style with said car. In fact, the only time that he went to Kant to claim the car was when he happily bragged about Fadel being his boyfriend the moment he started dating him many episodes ago, but then Kant told him about Fadel's real occupation and Style was like fuck that, keep your car, I'm out. And even when he agreed to stay with Fadel anyway, Style still didn't leave with the car. In fact, as of episode 6 it was Kant who was still in possession of the car, despite Style and Fadel being head over heels in love by that point (I've reached image limit, but we see Kant and Bison arrive at the bowling alley in that car at the end of episode 6 part 1). Style may have gone into it for the car, but he never actually took the car and by now the car is long forgotten. I didn't go and check, but as far as I remember Style hasn't even brought the car up to Kant ever since that scene in episode 4 where he initially came to claim it. At this point, Style would much rather have Fadel than the car anyway.

Fadel doesn't know any of that, of course. He doesn't know that Style isn't even in possession of the car (for now). And so Fadel drops a bitchy comment about it. Style's eyes widen and he immediately knows that Kant must have told Fadel. Fadel confirms and yells at him: "How are you gonna defend yourself now?" Shit. Style hadn't prepared for that conversation before he made his way down to the beach. Style hesitates a bit as he searches for words and the best way to defend himself without pissing Fadel off even more and making him run away again. Style's voice sounds a little stressed when he tells Fadel that it was only in the beginning that he wasn't being sincere. Fadel stares at him wordlessly. When Style continues to say "But after spending time with you" the stress from just now is gone and when he says "I've changed" his voice is very sincere and there's also an urgency that comes with it. Style really means what he says and it's important to him that Fadel believes him, too. But Fadel just looks away. So Style continues: "I never let anyone get the better of me. But for you, I'd do it again and again. I think we get along well." Now let me just share the Thai wording again:

Usually, I never lose to anyone. ปกติกูไม่เคยแพ้ใครนะ [bpòk-gà-dtì - guu - mâi koiie - páe - krai - ná] usually - I - never - lose (to) - anyone - [particle] But I have a soft spot for you. แต่กูแพ้ทางมึงว่ะ [dtàe - guu - páe taang - mueng - wâ] but - I - have a soft/weak spot for - you - [particle] I think we can have a life together. กูว่าเราสองคนอยู่ด้วยกันได้ [guu - wâa - rao sŏng kon - yùu - dûuay gan - dâai] I - think - the two of us - be, live - together - can, be able to

(Side note: there's a word play in the first and second line: to lose = แพ้ [páe] vs. to have a soft/weak spot = แพ้ทาง [páe taang])

Style uses the word แพ้ [páe] here, which means "to lose" or "to be defeated". And where have we heard Style use that word before? In episode 4, when Fadel drags him out of the Rise Up meeting and into the hallway. Once in the hallway, Style says: "I don't take defeats." And then we actually heard something similar again in episode 5 when Fadel tells Style "A guy like me doesn't know how to accept defeat" during their go-kart date. And now here Style is, standing in front of Fadel, telling him Fine. You win. I lose. And gladly so, if it means I get to have you in my life. Because he thinks they can be together. Style wants that and he's serious about it. Fadel looks away and sighs. So Style continues talking. And I'm just gonna share the literal translation again, not because it really makes any difference in meaning, but because I think some of you might be curious:

The thing I can do now is to convince you that I will be by your side. สิ่งที่กูทำได้ตอนนี้อ่ะ ก็คือพูดให้มึงเชื่อมั่นว่ากูจะอยู่ข้างมึง [sìng - tîi - guu - tam dâai - dton-níi - àh • gôh keu - pûut hâi mueng chêuua-mân - wâa - guu - jà - yùu - kâang mueng] thing - that - I - can do - now - [particle] • is - convince you - that - I - will - be - your side Official subs: The only thing I can do right now is promise you that I'll be by your side. But if you give me a chance แต่ถ้ามึงให้โอกาสกูอ่ะ [dtàe - tâa - mueng - hâi - oh-gàat - guu - àh] but - if - you - give - chance - me - [particle] Official subs: But if you give me a chance I will show you that I'm serious. กูจะทำให้มึงเห็นว่ากูเอาจริง [guu - jà - tam hâi - mueng - hĕn - wâa - guu - ao jing] I - will - make that - you - see - that - I - serious Official subs: I can show you I mean every word.

Fadel, who looked back at Style when he talked about being at Fadel's side, now looks away again and sighs for a second time. He remains stubborn. But Style won't be discouraged. He's made the decision to try getting through to Fadel once more and so he's on a mission now. "You don't believe me? Fine." Stupidly stubborn guys require stupidly silly methods. And at this point I really wanna share @ginnymoonbeam's words on this post:

You know when you've been fighting about something for a long time and eventually you get to a point where you know the other person has won, but you're too stubborn to just give up your position? That's Fadel. Everyone knows he isn't going to kill Style, that he loves Style, that he dragged him on this road trip because he wants to be with Style. He knows it too, but he's climbed on this hill-to-die-on and can't see his way down. Style's dramatic little stunt gives him a way to climb down. He has to get in the water because Style is the one being stubborn and unreasonable. It's gotta be a scene with a sense of urgency to break through that last resistance, but it also has to be something deeply stupid, because a genuine dangerous crisis takes his focus elsewhere. Fortunately manufacturing a deeply stupid emergency situation is right in Style's lane.

If Fadel wants to remain on that hill, then Style will just have to walk straight into the ocean. And he'll just keep walking until Fadel climbs down from that hill and gives him a chance after all. Even if Fadel's mirror last episode said that bad people don't deserve chances. And Style clearly is bad people for tricking Fadel into loving him and being crazy about him and then betraying him. And according to Fadel's mirror people who trick others into loving them all deserve to die. So instead of having Fadel drown him, Style will just willingly go drown himself in the ocean. He deserves to die for tricking Fadel after all. And so Style walks on. But suddenly Fadel starts getting stressed. He shouts after Style that his wound is going to get infected and but Style is determined to show just how serious he is: "And I will die of that, too!" Style is bad people and Style deserves to die for his sins and so Style will drown himself in the ocean and let the infected wound kill him on top of that. For love. Style walks and walks and makes a big show out of it and his injury gets closer and closer to the water and Fadel gets more and more stressed until he breaks after all: "Fine! I'll give you a chance." Style smiles for a moment, before he raises his eyebrows like Oh, is that so? and questions Fadel: "Really?"

Style knows he's won now, but the thing is that Fadel was reeeally stubborn for a reeeally long time and Style reeeally had to work for Fadel to utter the words "I'll give you a chance". And so Style decides drag it out a little longer. I think he partly does it to to playfully mess with Fadel a bit, partly simply just to be a little shit and give Fadel a bit of a taste of his own medicine, and also partly because just as much as Fadel needed to see proof of Style's sincerity, Style also wants to see some proof that Fadel really means it when he says he'll give Style a chance. After all, Style's heart is on the line here, too. And there's only so much rejection a man in love can take. Style doesn't want that chance if Fadel is just gonna turn around and go back to making death threats again as soon as Style is back out of the water. And so instead of walking back to land, Style calls out "Nah, I’m gone. There’s no way you mean it." And let me just–

You're tricking me for sure. มึงหลอกกูแน่ [mueng - lòhk - guu - nâe] you - trick, deceive - me - for sure Official subs: There's no way you mean it.

Yup. Our favorite word is back. Fadel has repeatedly thrown it into Style's face that Style tricked him and now Style is turning Fadel's words back around on him. And it's not in a malicious way, no, Style is affectionately teasing Fadel with it and also being a bit of a little shit and also, as I just said, I do think Style is also lowkey worried that Fadel is in fact just tricking him. And I do think Style wants to confirm that this is not the case. By the way, I'm not sure Style's tease even registered in Fadel's brain, because he's so stressed and he's already moving to walk into the water the moment the words "I'm gone" are out of Style's mouth. As Fadel walks up to him in the water, Style watches him with a happy, expectant expression on his face. That expression turns serious as Fadel approaches him.

Style's behavior just now as he was walking into the ocean was very playful, very silly in order to get Fadel to loosen up and to lose his grumpiness a bit and to get Fadel to climb down from his hill of stubbornness. But what he has to say Fadel is actually very serious: "I promise you that, from now on, you'll only see the 100% real me." I think this is a big relief for Style, because we saw how much he was longing to be able to talk freely about everything with Fadel as far back as episodes 5 and 6. Fadel says "Besides work, I've been real to you from day one" and Style just looks at him without replying, because Fadel is kind of right. Although, it's not like Style could just say it, because apart from the deal with the car, the whole being a police snitch was Kant's thing, not Style's and so it was Kant's secret to spill. And it's not like Style could have just told Fadel Kant's secret, because Kant would have been a dead man right there and then. Style got as close as he could to spilling the secret without actually spilling it and I think especially that night at the rock concert Style would have like nothing more than to come clean and to stop Fadel from going on that mission, but it would have been at the cost of Kant's life and only two scenes ago we saw that Style will not have that.

As much as Style was Style for walking into the ocean just like that, Fadel is also Fadel and of course can't let this go without making another threat: "If you don't stay true to me after this, you'll find out how I deal with liars."

If you aren't real with me after this, you better watch out. หลังจากเนี้ยถ้ามึงไม่เรียลกับกู มึงเจอดีแน่ [lăng jàak - níia - tâa - mueng - mâi - riial - gàp - guu • mueng - jer - dii - nâe] after - this - if - you - not - real - with - me • you - meet - good - for sure

Bye the way, I'm not sure how obvious it is to non-Thai speakers, but whenever they talk about "being real" they actually use the English word "real". And I just wanted to put the Thai wording here, because Fadel also uses the anglicism "real" here when the subs talk about "staying true". Also, his threat is way less elaborate. Literally, the threat translates to something like "to meet good" (like, you'll meet something good as in something bad will happen to you).

Style doesn't talk back. He stays quiet. And I think it's because at this point there isn't really a lot he can say. It's true that he hadn't been real with Fadel and so he quietly accepts his fate. Style then also huffs a little and looks at Fadel fondly. Because even if Fadel just threatened him again, it still implied that they really will have a "from now on" together. And that makes Style happy. That's exactly what he just walked into the ocean for. After a moment, Fadel prompts Style to get out of the water before his wound gets infected. And now Style starts talking back again and teases Fadel: "Even when you're threatening me, you're worried about me."

And here I wanna share the literal wording again, because it reminds me of some other scenes. And let me just explain this one word before I do... So where the subs say "threatening", Style uses the word โหด [hòht] which is a word I actually discussed with my Thai friend after episode 7 and he explained that it can be translated in a few different ways depending on context, but usually it means "cruel" or "aggressive" or "brutal". I'm gonna go with "harsh" as a translation to have some consistency, because I feel like this word could work for all the lines that I'm about to drop.

In episode 4, when Style showed up in the kitchen he told Fadel:

No matter how harsh you are, I'm still hooked on you. มึงโหดแค่ไหนอ่ะ กูก็ยังติดใจมึงอยู่ดี [mueng - hòht - kâe năi - àh • guu - gôh - yang - dtìt-jai - mueng - yùu dee] you - harsh - how much - [particle] • I - [sentence link] - still - hooked - you - anyway Official subs: It doesn't matter how scary you are, I'm still hooked.

Then, in episode 7 when Fadel surprise attacked Style with a shower of kisses at the garage, Fadel had following complaint to Style:

When I'm sweet, you don't like it. ตอนกูหวานมึงก็ไม่ชอบ [dton - guu - wăan - mueng - gôr - mâi - chôp] when - I - sweet - you - [sentence link] - not - like Official subs: You don't like me being nice. When I'm harsh, you still scold me. ตอนกูโหดมึงก็ด่ากู [dton - guu - hòht - mueng - gôr - dàa - guu] when - I - harsh - you - [sentence link] - scold - me Official subs: You complain when I'm cold.

Now in episode 9, Style's words are very reminiscent of that complaint:

Even when you're this harsh, you're still sweet with me. นี่ขนาดโหดนะเนี่ย ยังหวานกับกูเลย [nîi - kà-nàat hòht - ná - nîia • yang - wăan - gàp - guu - loiie] [interjection] - this harsh - [particle] - [particle] • still - sweet - with - me - [particle] Official subs: Even when you're threatening me, you're worried about me.

When Style comments "How adorable", he's still teasing Fadel, but you can also clearly see just how delighted and happy he is that Fadel really seems to mean it when he says he'll give Style a chance after all. He looks at Fadel with the brightest smile. But Fadel has spent a lot of time being angry and hurt and grumpy and stubborn and so he isn't gonna be cheesy from one second to the next. And so he speaks out another (very empty, almost joking) threat as he warns Style he can be worse. "You want that?" Style says no. But if Fadel is already letting him put in requests, then Style wants Fadel to use only his sweet side.

From now on I want you to use only your sweet side. ต่อไปนี้กูอยากให้มึงใช้แต่ด้านหวาน [dtòh bpai níi - guu - yàak - hâi - mueng - chái - dtàe - dâan wăan] from now on - I - want - that - you - use - only - sweet side Official subs: From now on, I just want to see you being lovey-dovey.

This actually makes Fadel laugh a bit and ask for clarification and when he looks at Style after that, his face is suddenly so much softer. Style explains: "In a situation like this, if we weren't fighting, what would you like to do to me?" He smiles at Fadel, his face expectant and mixed with almost a sort of innocence like Oh, this is totally not an implicit request for you to kiss me and it also has a bit of a challenging flair like Do you dare to kiss me? The message reaches Fadel loud and clear. He dares. As long as Style is alive he'd make Fadel kiss him again. And Style did. Fadel is kissing him. By Fadel's own choice. Style left it entirely up to him, didn't force Fadel to kiss him, didn't get physically close to him, didn't try to seduce him in any way, didn't even explicitly say the words "kiss me" out loud. In fact, Style asked "What would you like to do to me?" and Fadel could really have chosen to do anything, but what Fadel wanted to do was to kiss Style. Style may have said earlier that he'd lose to Fadel, but is Style really losing here with Fadel back at his side?

Now. The eyes. Let me address the eyes, because I've seen talk about it. Honestly, the way Style's eye keep fluttering open kinda reminds me of what I wrote about the ep6 rock concert kiss and forehead touch in my ep6 meta:

They seal that promise with a kiss. And it's interesting, because Style doesn't immediately close his eyes when Fadel goes to kiss him but instead looks at him for a moment longer. And then his eyes keep fluttering open for a moment. It's almost as if he can't tear his eyes away from Fadel, as if he can't help but use every opportunity to look at Fadel, to catch every last glimpse of Fadel while he still has the opportunity to do so. They break apart and Fadel tells Style that he's (also) very happy tonight and Style (re)confirms his own happiness. They lean their foreheads against each other. And again, Style can't really close his eyes and fully sink into the moment the way Fadel can. It's like he tries to close his eyes but they keep fluttering open a second later because he just can't keep his eyes away from Fadel, is compelled to keep looking at him while he still can, while Fadel is still right there with him. And even when they break away from each other and turn to look out of the window towards the stage, it takes Style a couple of seconds to tear his eyes away from Fadel, who is already looking elsewhere.

Except now it's the polar opposite energy. Back at the concert, it was the end for Style. Now in the water it's a (new) beginning. Back at the concert it was like Style had to savor every last look at Fadel that he could get before it was too late. Now in the water it again feels like Style just can't stop looking at Fadel, but for a different reason. I think it's undeniable that Style is deeply in love with Fadel. But Fadel started pushing him away from the moment Bison was stabbed and at first Style didn't even know what the fuck was happening, especially with how weirdly affectionate Fadel had been the day before. And from then on Fadel has just kept pushing Style away again and again, outright tried to murder him even, and then just kept refusing Style, kept refusing to believe Style no matter how much Style tried to show him just how serious he was about his feelings for Fadel and how serious he was about their relationship. Fadel was pushing Style away so much that even Style, our beacon of optimism and hope, believer in the power of love, even he was starting to get discouraged that Fadel would ever take him back. But now Fadel is here, kissing him again. Style can't believe his eyes and it's like he has to keep looking at Fadel to check that he's really not dreaming, that Fadel really is here, standing in front of him, kissing him. It's the relief that he is finally getting his Fadel back which makes him unable to stop looking at Fadel to make sure it's real.

And another aspect my mom actually mentioned when I was talking to her about this scene was that Style is also checking on Fadel. I don't remember her reasoning, but for me personally it's that Fadel has been very hot-and-cold lately, jumping from saving Style's life to pushing him away again and threatening him in the very next moment. And as I mentioned above, Fadel is not the only one with a heart that can get hurt. Style is also human, Style also has a heart, Style can also get hurt. Even if it may not seem like it through his easy-going, unserious, always optimistic personality. Style is human and Style isn't the only one here between the two of them who did something hurtful to the other. And so I think part of the reason why Style's eyes keep fluttering open is to check Fadel's reactions. Because just because Fadel is in hot-mode right now, doesn't mean he won't jump right back into cold-mode from one second to the next. And so Style has to keep checking so that he's prepared for it if it happens again, because I'm not sure Style's heart could handle it if Fadel suddenly pushed him away again now without a warning. It would be like that time Fadel dumped him in the kitchen back in episode 4, except this time Style would probably be even more hurt than back then, because now he is undeniably irrevocably deeply in love with Fadel. If Fadel pushed him away again now I think that would actually break Style for real.

But Fadel doesn't. They break apart and Fadel nuzzles his face into Style's neck for a moment (definitely kissing it) and then they lean their foreheads against each other for a while. Together again at last.

No. 8: Lore

They're back in the room and Fadel is about to finish renewing Style's bandages after their little swim in the ocean. Fadel tells Style not to do something like this again. Style smiles and says "But I gotta pull some dramatic stunt for someone like you." Fadel huffs in response but is otherwise very focused on the bandages and doesn't reply. Now that they're finally one on one again and Style is also no longer dying of pain, he uses the chance to finally, albeit hesitantly, ask about the guy on the photo in the car. One could think that Style asks out of jealousy, but to be honest, I don't think so. As I mentioned in the beginning of this meta, I think he'd have a gut feeling if that guy was someone who could actually be a potential rival. Also, there's a chance that the person on the photo was also just a family member or something, not necessarily someone Fadel was romantically involved with. Besides, Fadel did tell him that he didn't have any past lovers and that he didn't want a lover in the first place to avoid getting anyone in trouble. So I think rather than out of jealousy, Style asks out of curiosity and genuine care. Fadel has shared next to nothing about his past, but Style wants to know. His voice is full of concern, but not because he feels threatened by the guy in the photo. Instead it's genuine worry for Fadel. Style hesitates to ask and seems almost a little nervous, as if he's scared that this question will cause Fadel to shut him out again.

Fadel stares at Style for quite a long moment, then goes back to the bandage without answering Style's question. Style immediately says "I'm sorry for prying. If you don't want to tell me, I understand" and that cements it even more for me that Style isn't asking out of jealousy. Because I think if he was jealous, he'd try to find out more. I don't think he'd be all that chill with Fadel not answering his question. No, I think Style's question is him cautiously trying to learn more about Fadel's past, but Style will also respect Fadel's boundaries if Fadel isn't ready to talk about it. Especially since last time Style insisted on Fadel opening up about his past, Fadel dropped that his parents were shot dead. So when Fadel doesn't answer, Style is quick to let him know that he won't be prying this time and that Fadel doesn't have to talk if he doesn't want to. And it's only then that Fadel makes the decision to open up after all. That guy is his ex. This new information has Style a little speechless as it dawns on him that Fadel lied about not having had a boyfriend before.

Once Style has processed this, he continues to ask how long Fadel had been dating this guy for and the reason why they broke up. And again, I don't think Style is bothered by the fact that Fadel does have an ex. There is so much worry and care in his voice as well as on his face while he talks and listens to Fadel. He genuinely cares to know about Fadel's past. And Fadel shares willingly and without any more hesitation: They were gonna start a life together but then the guy disappeared from one day to the other. Fadel jokes "Maybe he was scared of me, thinking I'd kill him if he broke up with me" and Style huffs and smiles a little, but that smile doesn't really reach his eyes.

Style doesn't think the joke is all that funny. He looks at Fadel fondly, but I think he also really feels for him. He feels bad for him for getting dumped like that and feels sad that Fadel thinks his past lover might have been scared of him, so terrified even that he didn't even want to confront him. And we know the latter part specifically really gets to Style, because the next thing he does is that he grabs Fadel's hand and tells him "I'm not scared of you". And Style is about to continue that sentence, but for a moment he just lets this part stand on its own, lets Fadel process that first before he goes on. Style isn't afraid of Fadel and it's important to him that Fadel knows that. Style continues to say that he hasn't been scared of Fadel since he saved the woman at the bowling alley and I call bullshit on that. I think Style stopped being afraid of Fadel by the end of episode 5 and I wrote 12k words about it. However, I do think the bowling alley incident cemented what Style was saying about Fadel being a good person last episode in the bathtub. Style ends with "You risked your life for a total stranger. I know I'm in love with the right man." And let me just...

A person who risks their own life for someone they don't even know. คนที่เอาชีวิตตัวเองไปเสี่ยงเพื่อคนที่ไม่รู้จักด้วยซ้ำ​ [kon - tîi - ao - chee-wít dtuua eng - bpai - sìiang - pêuua - kon - tîi - mâi - rúu-jàk - dûuay sám] person - that - take - one's own life - go - risk - for - person - that - not - know - even I love the right person. กูรักถูกคนแล้วละ [guu - rák - tùuk - kon - láew - lá] I - love - right - person - already - [particle]

I do much prefer the phrasing of "I love the right person", because it's not just a state of being, but it's something that Style actively does, is actively doing, has actively been doing, actively chooses to do over and over again.

Style's words really hit Fadel. And I think this time, he finally fully believes them, finally lets himself fully believe them. Fadel goes through quite the emotional journey, then grabs Style's arm and puts it over him as he lays his head in Style's lap. Fadel finally gets to be a child seeking comfort. Style's free hand immediately finds Fadel's head to stroke him. At one point Style smiles a little and shakes his head, looking a bit amused.

It's my personal headcanon that in this moment Style is remembering Bison's words about Fadel being all rough on the outside, but actually being a huge softie inside and is laughing to himself about how it's true. He currently has a very soft (and vulnerable) Fadel in his lap after all he roughness that Fadel put him through. They continue to stay like this until the end of the scene.

No. 9: Peace, Joy, Egg Cake

Allow me to bulk the last few scenes into one last section and allow me to mostly just skip over them a bit, since there isn't all that much plot happening here and it's more about the characters getting to be a little happy again at the end of this story arc before we go into the last bit (can you tell I'm just trying to get this meta done asap so I can hopefully drop it before ep10 lmao).

We got our OT4 happily playing frisbee in the water and it makes me laugh how Style's wound getting infected apparently isn't the same big problem anymore as it was the night before. It also makes me laugh how Style is apparently also perfectly capable of lifting an entire human man with that injured arm of his. I remember this one time a couple of years ago where I scraped open my entire leg and I couldn't walk on it for at least a week without being in pain, so like. Good on your pain tolerance @ Style, I guess. Same thing with Bison and his stab wound. And Fadel's sprained arm has magically healed as well, apparently. Not to mention Kant with his ocean trauma having absolutely no problem letting loose in the ocean water. This show is so unserious, I love it.

After they're done playing in the water, they sit on the shore and have a conversation about staying on the island, except Fadel reminds Bison that they still have one last job to do. Although Fadel then also says "Once we wrap up the last mission, we can go anywhere and do anything. Not sure if they'd come with us, though." For the last sentence, Fadel turns his head and says it directly into Style's face. This statement was 100000% directed at Style and Style alone, not Kant. Style stares at Fadel for a moment and then makes a face like My love, do you really even need to ask after I've followed you all the way here?

Then he says "Just tell me where, and I'll go with you." and I shake my hands at the writers in disappointment, because this would have been THE opportunity to bring back "hitman teerak". Especially because the wording is also kind of similar.

Episode 7: Tell me where you wanna go na krub, hitman-teerak. มึงอยากไปไหนอ่ะ บอกกูมาเลยนะครับนักฆ่าที่รัก [mueng - yàak - bpai - năi - àh • bòhk guu maa - loiie - ná - kráp - nák-kâa - tîi-rák] you - want - go - where - [particle] • tell me - [particle] na - krub - hitman - teerak Official subs: I'll drive you where you want me to go, my dear hitman. Episode 9: Tell me where you're going. I'm all ready to go. จะไปที่ไหนก็บอก กูพร้อมไปอยู่ละ [jà - bpai - tîi năi - gôh - bòhk • guu - próm - bpai - yùu - lá] will - go - where - [sentence link] - tell • I - ready- go - [auxillary verb] - [particle] Official subs: Just tell me where, and I'll go with you.

Please tell me, does the episode 9 sentence not scream for a "hitman teerak" drop? Does it not look a little incomplete?

Anyway, Style continues to say a very Style thing and Fadel laughs. This has Kant quite impressed. I have not gone back and checked if Kant is right about never having seen Fadel laugh, but I'm just gonna assume it's true. The only scene that I can think of where Kant may have seen Fadel laugh is at the bowling alley in episode 5, but Kant would have had to be looking at Fadel to see actually see that. Also let me just...

Please, the way Style is smiling so brightly at Fadel. He's so over the moon to have his Fadel back. With everyone being so happy and cute it just has me very worried about what next episode might have in store for them, especially considering the preview (we're not gonna have any more injuries on this show, are we? 🥺🙏).

As for Style's mood in the scene with everyone on the boat on the way back to land, I'm just gonna leave Joong's tweet here...

(Overview | Ep1+2 | Ep3 | Ep4 | Ep5 | Ep6 | Ep7 | Ep8)

[whomeidontknowthem]

Eyes on me – an interactive whump story. Part 5.

Previous part. Masterpost.

Content: institutionalized slavery, imprisonment, dehumanizing language, it/its for an inhuman whumpee, pet whump, whipping, blood, physical abuse, withholding of food, training, torture, intimate whumper, carewhumper, mentioned pet death, tell me if i missed something

Lord Teelo didn’t strike. 

He lowered his arm, eyes never straying from holding the creature’s terrified gaze. The room reeked of blood, now streaming down the lord’s fingers in a warm waterfall. He worked hard on pushing his fury back, taking it under control as many times before. He was in control. He would show it, careful and persistent and levelheaded. He would make sure it remembered the lesson forever. The crop was not meant for punishments, it was too short, too soft – he hadn’t meant to punish it. He was going to be a kind and gracious owner. It had left him no choice!

He opened the door, finding the redheaded guard still in the corridor.

“Get a proper whip,” he ordered. “More chains – gods damned handcuffs, whichever idiot thought of leaving it like this?! And a knife, scissors – or whatever, something to file its atrocious claws.”

The guard stared at him, not in the face – at his arm. Lord Teelo felt it – the consistent drip-drip-drip of his blood. He didn’t feel the ache yet. Nothing but the quiet, cold fury he couldn’t wait to unleash at the world. Haltingly, the guard started, “Should I bring someone to take a look at–”

“I have told you what you should do,” his voice came out as a hiss.

“Yes, my lord,” the guard saluted and hesitated only a moment before running down the corridor. 

Lord Teelo closed the door with a loud crash. He paced inside, steps echoing around the room, as the pain slowly started to radiate out. He hated it. Oh how he wished he could slice the thing’s skin just this moment, not waiting for anything and anyone. He picked up the crop once more, stoped before the creature – it cowered to the very corner between the wall and its cage, never letting its eyes away from him. Oh, now it was looking. It dared to look! 

“You think yourself smart?” the lord hissed. “Think you did something good for yourself? Oh, no, you’re gonna regret this. You’re gonna regret this so much.”

The pain seeped into his consciousness with every heartbeat, radiant and nauseatingly familiar. He held a handkerchief to the cuts until it filled with deep red. He threw it away – it landed in a wet disgusting lump on the table, by the bowl of wet disgusting meat. Oh how the lord had tried to be a nice host, how he had tried to accommodate this, this– 

“Damned, ungrateful, hateful beast!” Lord Teelo roared. The glass of the bowl nearly slipped from his bloodied fingers when he grabbed it, and then shattered to thousands pieces to the side of the creature’s head. Its dinner fell onto the floor, useless. Oh, it wouldn’t get any, it would have to work, to beg for any crumb from then on – it would regret, regret it so much!..

The door slid open soundlessly after a short knock, letting in the heavy footsteps and the clanging of metal. The lord turned on his heels, facing the guard. “And why in the world have you not brought a damned healer!” he hissed. “Can’t you see I’m bleeding out!”

The guard blinked. “But you have–” 

“YOU DARE ARGUE WITH ME?!” 

He was struggling to breathe, chest heaving with effort. The blood was still warm down his arm, still bright on the broken glass and light wood of his floors. How could the idiot not understand!

There were chains in the guard’s arms and a leathery length of the whip. Lord Teelo snatched it and demanded, “Chain it up!” The guard hesitated, opened his mouth. “NOW!” 

He did. The lord watched as he came to the beast, careful with his steps, cautious of it. It squeezed itself deeper into the corner. Lord Teelo could see it shaking. He was delighted to see it shaking. The guard reached out, the first cuff prepared, and Lord Teelo watched from a step away as it lifted its hands up, close to its chest. Its teeth were bared, pupils wide and eyes wider. It tried saying something, but what came out was only a mess of sounds with no meaning. 

The guard squeezed its arm even as it tried to avoid it. It whined and fought back, tried getting out of the grasp, tried pushing him away, tried and fought and struggled as he cursed under his nose. Its claws went through the skin of his palm ripping out a sharp hiss. It managed to raise its hind leg as the cuff clicked around its wrist, its claws scratching against the metal in an effort that only delayed the inevitable. 

Lord Teelo had little patience left. He stepped forward, connecting his heel with the middle of the creature’s tail. It yelped, flinched backwards – its head connected with the wall, and before it could regroup the second handcuff was in place. After that, restraining its legs was only a matter of time.

“Turn it around,” the lord ordered. Chains clang as it fought in an ever increasing panic. “To the wall, yes… yes, just like that.” The locks rattled, forced closed. The guard let the key fall onto the ground, forcing the creature to kneel. It hid its tail between its legs, whining as its head was pressed into the wall. “Is the chain short enough? Will it be able to move?”

“I don’t think so, my lord,” the guard answered. 

Lord Teelo played with the whip, trying it out. “Good. Go fetch the healer– wait. I need – something sharp, something – to secure on its tail. See how it hides it? I need something it can’t hide from.”

The guard looked puzzled. He eased his hold in a test, and the creature threw its whole weight backwards, fighting the chains. They held. Kneeling, with its tail hidden and only back visible, it looked strikingly like a human. “Perhaps clothespins, my lord?” It wasn’t what he had in mind. What he wanted – it wasn’t that. Not this easy, tame solution.

“It would work,” he drew out. He would go to the smith when he had time. He had an idea, oh, that would be a genius idea. “Just this once."

He flexed his left arm and rubbed his right. It hurt as all deaths, but it had stopped bleeding. He failed to crack the whip the first time but managed it the second, inches from the creature’s back. The guard bowed, taking it as a sign to leave. 

The creature mumbled and mumbled more, sounds a meaningless mush falling from its tongue. If Lord Teelo was generous, he could see it as an apology; he would not even entertain the possibility of giving in to it, of course. 

The second crack was right by its ear. It flinched and curled up further but couldn't hide.

It wailed when the whip connected with its back – so loud, so quickly, taken by surprise. Lord Teelo bared his teeth in a smile and struck again, violent purple already flowering on the gray of its skin, and struck again without waiting – three, four, six, twelve hits in a row, as it flinched and writhed and cried out.

He paused afterwards, and saw as it tensed, first, its whole body shaking with the effort of breathing, hiccupping in what sounded almost like sobs. He waited, watching how it trembled more and more. He let it marinate in the anticipation, the fear coiling and coiling with no release, the stinging of its sore back growing as its patience ran thin. 

When it raised its head, just barely, as if to look, the whip snapped through the air again. 

It screamed out. He didn’t give it time to recover. 

The lord hit it with no pattern, pausing and continuing at his leisure, until his arm grew heavy with pain and the creature nearly silent. Lord Teelo could only hear its labored breathing, air forced out of its body with every strike. Its back bloomed with purple that gave way to red when the skin opened, the new lines covering the rainbow pattern in an unstructured, repulsive mess.

Oh, he nearly pitied it, trembling pathetically in the corner. Then he rubbed his arm and the sharp pain was enough to remember why he didn’t. 

He struck for the last time, lazily, with his left, and then a few more for a good measure. When a polite knock announced the guard’s return, he felt pleasantly tired, like after a good work out. He called out for the man to enter. 

The guard did and the healer, an old woman the lord knew for most of his life, followed in. She looked the room over with stony, unreadable expression, and Lord Teelo met her gaze with a nice enough smile. “You’ve got your toy,” she stated and that was all the attention the creature got from her. 

She made a quick enough work of the wounds: cleaned and bandaged them up after applying that miraculous numbing cream the lord appreciated since early childhood. The creature would appreciate it even more, he thought, glancing at the pathetic thing. It had shifted at some point, stretching its legs just a bit but keeping its head hidden. Its body shook violently, trembling so much it in itself looked tiring. 

“Should I look it over?” the healer suggested, all business. 

The lord huffed, “What would the point of a punishment be then?” 

The woman looked him over with that annoying, unreadable gaze. “Call me whenever you change your mind,” she bowed and left when he dismissed her. 

Lord Teelo tried the clothespins with interest, forcing the spring to coil and then letting it go softly around his finger, just a tad, until it started hurting. “Good enough,” he concluded finally and got up. 

The creature flinched when his boots stopped by its form but didn’t try anything. “Poor thing,” he drew out and crouched, ran his fingers along its back lightly, brushing fingertips over the painful ridges of future bruises. Its breaths hitched, but it didn’t make a sound. “And all you needed was to not act like a brainless brat to avoid all this. You have no one but yourself to blame, silly thing,” he told it. It didn’t answer, shivering under his touch but not attempting anything stupid. 

“But maybe you can learn,” he hummed and moved his hand down to where its tail started. It tensed even further, if it was possible at all. “Let’s just make sure the lesson sticks, huh?” It curled up even further as he tagged on its tail, releasing from under the creature’s body. He flickered it back and forth and rubbed between his fingers and was satisfied when it sobbed and shuddered but remained motionless otherwise. 

“Like this, yes,” he muttered. With the softest touch of his second hand, he stoked its head. “But look at me now. Eyes on me,” It didn’t understand. He caught a fistful of its fur and tagged. “Eyes on me.”

Too drained to resist, it lifted its head as he guided it. “Eyes on me,” he demanded again, and it either guessed or truly learned – its gaze settled on him, focusing to the best of its ability – and, oh, what a pathetic mess it looked, eyes bloodshot and wet in ways he’d thought only a human's could be, dark lines from where it pressed into the floorboards marking its cheeks. There was something red around its mouth – did it bite itself, the poor thing? 

Lord Teelo clicked his tongue, smiled softly and released its fur. It settled back instantly, curling up again. Its tail remained in his hands. 

He picked up the first pin. 

It must have assumed at first that he was just playing like he had been, – at least, it didn’t seem to tense up too much, nor expect the sharp pain when he released the spring around its tail. It shuddered, head whipping up, staring at him once again. He smiled. Picked up the second clothespin. 

It tried to get its tail free – oh, it tried as much as it could without hurting him, but he tightened the grasp and played with the pins as it couldn’t help a new whimper, and hushed it and urged it to sit still. “That’s for you to remember the lesson better,” he told it pleasantly. It must have cried, body shaking again, and tried to kick just once, the movement stopped halfway through by a short chain. 

Lord Teelo wondered how many pins would be good for it – should he go with the whole set the guard had brought? He settled on five, at the end, a nice even number not even halfway through what he had. He was feeling rather merciful and forgiving, and it sounded just so pathetic. 

He called the guard in to urge it into the cage when it was done. It didn’t even try fighting, following the man's tagging and pushing until it was inside, drawing its limbs close and curling up to fully fit. Nearly immediately, its fingers itched towards the pins, human-like thumbs ready to work on the problem. Lord Teelo snapped his fingers to get its attention.

“No,” he said, words dripping with finality. He reached through the bars and tagged its tail outside. “The clothespins stay here for the night,” he told it. It probably didn’t understand – there was so little thought in its eyes. He let go of it hoped for its sake it understood what he meant. He didn’t want to have to punish it so soon for their lack of common language. 

When he went to sleep, the shaky breaths and the rare clanging when it tried to settle more comfortable sounded like a lullaby to his ears.

In the morning, his arm stung mercilessly and unendingly, and no melodies of birds and gentle sunrays could make his mood better. He turned lazily, letting his eyes fall onto the cage. The creature was curled inside of it, eyes shut tight and ears flickering restlessly. Its tail fluttered too, freed at some point from the pins, one of its hands curling around it protectively. 

Lord Teelo felt stuck between endearment and irritation. He moved and the cuts on his arm ached, and irritation won. 

“Hey… you,” he called and realized he hadn’t come up with a name. He should think about it as some point, he decided grimly, and banished the thought of the last pet he’d named, back in childhood. That was a just a cat, a stupid spoilt creature with too much attitude. The lord remembered the way it looked, painted red and unmoving, after crossing one too many lines. 

The creature didn’t move at his call, either. He picked up an extinguished candle from his bedside table and threw it towards the cage. “Hey!” 

There was no reaction. With an undignified groan, he forced himself on his feet and towards the cage. He rattled the key across the bars, the way that always seemed to get the creature’s attention.

It didn’t react. It was outright ignoring him! 

Had it learned nothing?!

He reached through the bars and tagged on its tail, finally getting some response in return – it flinched weakly and grimaced. Slowly, its eyes fluttered open, but didn’t settle on the lord. They looked as if through him, unfocused and dizzy, and a pang of worry cut through the just rage when they closed back and its chest heaved, struggling for breath. 

Something was wrong.

He reached through the bars and towards its forehead, forgetting for a second it wasn’t a human. The skin under his fingers was blasting hot and sickly wet. It moved closer to his fingers, all but nuzzling against him. 

Something was terribly, terribly wrong.

Updates every 7-10 days (depending on how much time I have and how obvious the poll result is) (unless something goes wrong and it takes me too weeks to get myself to write something. I'm so very sorry about the delay!)

@isikedmyself878, @fraugustends, @otterfrost, @fuchstastisch, @3-2-whump,

@the-lone-youth, @will-o-the-wips, @catnykit, @granny-aaravos, @mj-or-say10

Tell me to be tagged in the new parts!

[stayteezdreams]

Sorry for still not posting. Things are still a bit complicated and rough in my personal life.

xx

[the-kipsabian]

tomorrow is such an important day, im a mcfucking nervous anxious wreck already gOD

[unnonexistence]

i love my simic mtg deck so much

[always-just-red]

hihihi! sylus girlie here. as a college student i often never take breaks whenever im working and often stay up late finishing up assignments. then i stress out but never tell anyone and suffer in silence:’) i was wondering if you could do something similar with sylus x mc where mc often forgets to take breaks at the hunters association and is always the first the volunteer for missions so she could improve.

but then it’s starting to take a toll on her and is so so stressed, but feels bad about venting to someone or saying no to new missions.

maybe one day she’s doing a simple task like cooking herself dinner (or something) but accidentally burns herself and she just ends up breaking down and decides to call sylus and he immediately goes to her. :’)

feel free to decline or change anything! i just like the thought of someone comforting u when ur overworked and stressed bc i wish someone would do that to me lol.

Fast-tracked this one for you, anon! I'm really sorry you're having a tough time right now, and I hope this brings you a bit of comfort- remember, Sylus would want you to take care of yourself! Good luck with all your studies, and feel free to send in another request if ever you need it! 🥰

Technical Difficulties

Sylus x Reader 🩸

Summary: You're not very good at asking for help when you're struggling. Thankfully? You don't always need to.

Genre: fluff + comfort ft. a very domestic Sylus!

Warnings/Additional tags: stressed reader (has a lil bit of a breakdown!), some swearing, uses of 'kitten' and 'sweetie', Sylus is so soft here he should come with a health warning tbh

| Word count: 2.4k | Masterlist | Opt-in to my taglist here!

Disclaimer: Characters belong to Love and Deepspace. All work is my own, so please don't repost or plagiarise!

In the event of a wanderer incursion where evacuation of citizens is obstructed or otherwise not viable, association protocol 32.3-A dictates that you should first… That you should first… What?

Your pen is poised above the blank space where your answer should be. 32.3-A is a general procedure: something to do moving people to the nearest shelter. Or, wait— are you supposed to try to contact support, first?

You drop your pen with a huff and flop face-down onto the mock exam. It’s too much. Too much information, too much responsibility. Open textbooks are spread over your desk and around your head like an unholy halo— stacks of them, filled with codes and procedures. They’re supposed to be helpful, but they’re not; they’re drowning you.

Your phone pings and you glance up. Text from Tara:

Hi! Hate to be a bother, but did you finish glancing over that practice question for me? xx

Shit. You’d completely forgotten. You straighten, reaching for your laptop so you can load up your latest emails. You’ve got time to look over it; the exam isn’t for another two days. Breathe, ok? You have time.

Seven unread emails. What? You scan over them frantically. Two from the Captain: accepting additional mission requests you’d applied for. Were those both this week? One from Nero: you hadn’t sent in that finished report. Three from your colleagues, all scrambling for help with the exam. One from Tara:

Thanks for saying you’d look over this for me! You’re the best at this stuff!

Ok, so: Tara’s practice question. Nero’s report. Your own practice questions. Then… dinner? Maybe that should come first. You’d skipped lunch— had one slice of toast for breakfast. But you don’t wanna cook; cooking takes time, and you’ve got none. None.

Your phone is ringing, snapping you back to reality, and you peek over at it. Sylus?

“Hi,” you greet as you put him on speaker. On your laptop, you’re opening up Tara’s attachment.

“Are you free tomorrow?”

Always straight to the point. “Uh… yeah?” you frown as you read through your friend’s work. “Why? What d’you need?”

Sylus sighs through the phone. “That was a test, sweetie. You failed.”

“Yeah, well…” you murmur, highlighting a sentence with your cursor. “Add it to the list.”

The man doesn’t find that funny. The phone is quiet— too quiet. “Are you alright?” he asks, just as your gaze wanders to check if the call has disconnected.

“Mmhmm.”

“Really?”

“Yeah, Sylus.”

You stare down at your phone. He’s waiting for more, but you won’t give it to him. You’re one word away from slipping, and you can’t let the dam crumble, especially in front of him. He’s smiling from the phone call background: a photo he insisted would ‘ruin’ his image when you took it last week.  

“I need to go, ok?” Your eyes are shining.

“Ok,” he says softly.

There’s a bleep as the call cuts out, and the photo is gone. Waiting beneath it is another text from Tara, and one from Xavier: Nero told me to txt U bout a report??

You swallow the ache in your throat and slump down on your desk again.

…

You wake up with a start, your head ringing. The tangerine sky outside your window’s turned dark— your laptop, too— and light spills from your desk lamp, yellow on white pages. There’s more, and you turn, tracing it back to where it leaks through the crack of your almost closed bedroom door.

You hadn’t left any lights on in your flat. You hadn’t switched on your lamp, either.

Tiredness is dulling your thoughts and your senses, but you know you feel uneasy. There’s something in the air: smoky, but not unpleasant. You can hear something as well. No— two things. A faint, almost imperceptible hiss, and a more obvious humming.

Hunter instincts kick in. You roll open a drawer of your desk, snatching up one of your standard-issue pistols and removing its safety with a click. You stalk up to the door, your trained footsteps near silent. You take a deep breath, clearing your head. One. Two.

Three! You shoulder the door open, leaping through with your gun trained forwards.

At the other end of your sights, Sylus turns, an eyebrow raised. Your kitchen stove seethes behind him, and he gives you a once over as he sluggishly raises both hands. “You flatter me, kitten,” he smirks in surrender, looking between your weapon and his: a spatula.

You lower your gun, your heart still racing. “I could have killed you, Sylus!”

“That’s the spirit.” His hands drop, too.

“How did you even get in here?”

He’s turned back to the stove, and he’s using the spatula to push something around a frying pan. “Hmm…” he muses, then blink— he’s gone. He’s at your fridge a second later, materialising from thin air. “I wonder,” he finishes as he reaches around for something.

Show off. “You know how I feel about you telepor…” No. “Phas…” No. “Magic…king…?” By now he’s watching you over his shoulder. “You know— that thing you do.” You’re twinkling your fingers. “What do you even call that?”

“Magicking, yeah.”

You huff in response and he laughs, walking back over to where he’s cooking two steaks and preparing a salad. You’re still coming to terms with the fact he’s even here, looking... quite frankly ridiculous, because he’s wearing your apron. It’s too small for him. Baby pink. Frilly, too.

“You know how I feel about you magicking into my home,” you mutter distractedly, because actually? He’s kinda pulling it off. His sleeves are rolled up past his elbows, tight on his arms. “Use the door like a regular person, you psychopath.”  

“Where’s the fun in that?” He sounds smug. Ugh, he must feel your eyes on him; he must know. You think he’s toying with the idea of calling you out, but he doesn’t, and when he does speak, the smugness is gone. “Mephisto saw you were sleeping. I didn’t wish to disturb you. You sounded… tired. On the phone.”

Guilt twinges in your chest as you draw up beside him. “Is that why you’re here? Playing housewife?” You pick at a frill on the apron.

“Poke fun all you want,” he sneers. “This shirt costs more than your entire wardrobe.”

“Snob.”

“Ha.” You have to retract your hand as he threatens it with the spatula. “Watch yourself, sweetie. I’ll remember that the next time you ask to ‘borrow’ my card.”

You laugh gently. Now that’s a threat. You’re about to tell him so when you hear a ping from the other room, and your heart sinks. Just a single sound, and you’re back to where you were an hour ago, at your desk with the weight of the world on your shoulders.

Sylus hums in acknowledgment as you excuse yourself and hurry back to your workspace, snatching up your phone. You missed three calls while you sleeping: all from Xavier. He’s been texting you, too.

Nero’s yelling at me

Wants to talk to U

Can U pick up? Pls?

It’s one report, for gods’ sake. You feel your chest tightening again. You just needed to proofread it, but it’s probably fine, right? You wake your laptop out of standby; you’ll just send it as it is. “I’ll just be a minute, Sy,” you call out. “Need to finish one thing.”

He mumbles something in response, and you imagine it’s for the best you can’t hear it. Your keyboard clacks as you tap out a quick email to Nero, then you surf your files for the report he so desperately wanted. It should be… here. You attach it. Hit send.

Nothing happens.

Huh. You hit send again. Then again— still nothing. You groan, trying to back out of the email. None of your keys are working. Your cursor is stuck. “Oh, come on,” you release on an impatient breath. Switch it off, switch it on again? You hit the off button. The screen goes black.

With a sigh of relief, you wait a moment before switching it on again. The screen stays black.

“No, no, no, no,” you plead quietly, but it doesn’t cooperate. Your phone rings and you snap, hitting more buttons: Answer. Speaker. “What?” you hiss.

“Whoa. Hi…?” Xavier’s voice is cautious. “I don’t know if you saw my texts, but Nero—”

“The report, Xavier! I know! I know!” You try holding down your laptop’s power button. “I’m trying to send it, but my shitty computer won’t—”

“No way!” Tara’s voice comes in on the other line; did they both get the night shift? “Hey you! Did you get a chance to—”

“No, ok?!” you practically cry out. “No! Can you two just back off? Please!”

“Oh, sorry, I…” Tara sounds upset, then distracted. “Wait, Xavier wants to speak to you.”

“Are you ok?” he asks after a second.

Ok? You just want everything to stop. “I’m fine. Shit, tell Tara I’m sorry. I am sorry, Xavier, I just… I just need my laptop to…”

Work. Work! Nothing’s working. Half of your files are on there. How much of it is backed-up? Panic is setting in, gripping your body like ice. Your throat hurts and your mouth is dry, the dam is breaking and you can’t stop it. Tears prick at your eyes as you blink at the blank, hopeless screen. Your reflection stares back at you.

You let out a sob, expelling days of frustration and exhaustion. Everywhere you look there’s something you need to do, something you need to learn, something you need to finish. You can’t. You clasp a hand over your mouth, muffling your own cries.

Xavier is speaking— saying something over the phone— but you can’t hear him.

The light changes, and there’s a figure above you, lifting the phone from the desk. “They’ll call you back,” the shadow says. Sylus.

“Wait, who is this?” Xavier.

“That’s Skye!” Tara.

Your friends’ distant voices cut out as Sylus ends the call. He sets the phone down again, nudging your laptop out of view, then lowers himself until all you can see is him: his red eyes, softer than you’ve ever seen them. “Come on, sweetie,” he coaxes, guiding your hands over his shoulders.

You understand what he’s asking of you. His arms wrap around you and you hold him tighter, letting him lift you out of your chair. He feels warm, his skin ever so slightly flushed from where he’s been standing over the stove, and he pulls your legs around his waist, letting him carry you with ease.

With your face buried in his shoulder, you can’t tell where he’s taking you, and you don’t care. His shirt is going damp against your cheeks. You want to stop crying, but you can’t with the taste of your tears on your lips. You feel weak. You feel pathetic.

Something solid is behind you, and Sylus is setting you slowly down on the kitchen counter. He’s away from you for a moment— moving the frying pan off of the heat and turning a dial on the stove— but then he’s back, standing between your legs, standing close. You’re looking down until his hand is under your chin, lifting it with the delicate touch one employs when inspecting a flower that might break.

He shushes you without a hint of impatience. “Look at me,” he directs quietly, and when you do, he unrolls his shirtsleeves— drawing the cuffs over his hands so he can use them to wipe your eyes. “Now tell me what’s wrong.”

You do— you tell him everything. The hunter’s exam. The textbooks. The extra patrols you’ve been signing up for. The work you’ve been doing for your friends. The stupid report. The even more stupid computer.

Sylus listens collectedly, nodding his head and issuing the odd hum of understanding. He listens to all of it, and when you’re done, he pushes your hair back from your face with a sympathetic sigh. “Oh, sweetie.” A tendril is tucked behind your ear. “You should have said something.”

“I know.” Your gaze is still shy of his. “But how can I? I need to do this— be this— for everyone.”

His hands are on your cheeks again, drawing back your focus. “You’re just one person,” he says. “You— just you— and that’s all you need to be. You’re stubborn, and strong, but you’re not invincible. Even Linkon’s shiniest hunter is allowed to have limits. Everyone does.”

“Even you?” you snivel, setting him up for a quip.  

Nothing. He smiles. Shrugs. “Even me.”

It’s hard to believe when he’s staring back at you, oh so solid, oh so perfect. Always a picture of strength: of fiery determination or calculated coolness. Everything in extremes; nothing by halves. Except… his hair is slightly dishevelled from where he’s been working away in the heat. There’s a damp patch on his shirt. He’s wearing your pink apron, and there’s mascara on his sleeves.

Then there’s the way he’s looking at you.

It shifts when you finally look back. He drops his hands from your face and pulls back a little. “You do a lot for your friends,” he continues with confidence, but he’s rubbing his neck, “and they care about you. You should afford them the chance to return the favour. It’s only fair.”

“You’re right.”

“…Good.”

Perhaps it’s the fact you’ve vaguely composed yourself— or the way you’re watching him like you’re seeing something new— but he straightens self-consciously, rolling his shirtsleeves back up as his eyes go sharp: assuming their usual severity.

“You’re too soft, kitten,” he scolds, reaching out to tousle your hair until you’re glaring daggers from behind a curtain of it. “How many times do I have to tell you? You put yourself first. Always. No-one else matters.”

There’s quiet for all of a second. He can’t help correcting: “Well, except me, of course.” The apron’s crooked, and he flattens it with a brush of his hands. “Any time spent with me qualifies as self-care. You really should know that by now, sweetie.”

Your mouth curls, but you haven’t quite got it in you to laugh— not yet. Stretching his neck with two sideways tips of his head, Sylus returns to his post at the oven, where the meal he’s cooking has almost certainly gone cold. You watch as the stove flickers back to life. The man is humming again, and though the food might yet be salvaged, whatever melody he’s attempting is long-past recognition, let alone saving.

You chuckle to yourself.

And you can’t see it, but Sylus is smiling, too.

[sohnric]

plot twist – k. sunwoo

pairing: kim sunwoo x gn! reader

genre: coworkers au, enemies to lovers au. fluff, a poor attempt at comedy. movie theatre! worker sunwoo and reader. bitch boy sunwoo. the reader has anger issues. owner's son! sunwoo being annoying about everything. winter themes, sunwoo is a little kid about stuff but mostly the snow.

wc: 21k

warnings: swearing, a heated make out session. y/n's inner monologue is just my own feelings about this man im sorry. i watched too much of the office when writing this can you tell. also i made sunwoo's sister underage for plot reasons deal with it.

working with kim sunwoo has so far been the worst experience of your whole entire life. just his existence alone is enough to make your day completely miserable– though, one would think that working with movies on the daily would prepare you for the biggest plot twist of your life.

a/n: this took me SO LONG to write woah. i have a humble playlist for this fic if any of yall wanna listen to it while you read <3 a huge thank you goes to my best friend @csenke for being my biggest motivator and hype man when it came to this fic. thank u for being my first ever beta reader hihi i couldn't have done this without you i am forever grateful ily. also im tagging @heemingyu because whe told me to

ho ho ho! this fic is a part of the secret santa event by @deoboyznet ! @kimsohn maya, i was your secret santa this year, i hope you enjoy the fic i prepared for you

TONIGHT'S PREMIERE – UGLY TRUTH (2009)

If anyone ever asked you about your job in the movie theater, you wouldn’t really know what to say. 

You see, what may had seemed like your dream job when you were little, acquiring the fairytale vision after going to the cinema for the first time to see the Horton movie when you were just 7, quickly turned into reality one ordinary day during your junior year of university. And it wasn’t even that hard; you just dropped off your CV at the movie theater on the corner of the town's square when you saw the sign that said ‘looking for part-timers’ in a messy, giant handwriting on the glass door– and soon enough, you found yourself in the depths of the vintage-looking cinema, wearing the red uniform the owner gave you, selling movie tickets to teenagers and taking out the trash. It’s hard to enjoy the job when you’re on bathroom cleaning duty, though, and the fact that this is what you once imagined to be the most exciting job in the whole entire world turns twice as boring when you realize just how mundane it really is. 

Still, you can’t bring yourself to quit, well, because you need the money.

Do you hate working in the cinema? No. Not really. Sure, it’s kind of boring– especially on the nights when you’re selling tickets at the front and nobody comes in for hours– but it’s not that difficult. It’s not physically or mentally demanding, so you’d say that you’re still on the better end when it comes to work environment. Your boss isn’t a dick and you get paid on time– so really, if anyone asked you if you hated it, your answer would be no. 

Until one fateful day, of course. 

You’re met with a person that’s going to efficiently change this opinion around in one swift bat of their eyelashes and a drag of their hand through their messy hair.

“So… you’re the new part-timer?” a tall boy asks you one day when you arrive at work. You’re already wearing your uniform when you come through the front door– since you don’t really feel like changing in the toilets that are not staff-exclusive here– and frankly, his voice startles you on your way in.

“Yeah,” you nod, furrowing your brows at the stranger. “And you are…?”

“Sunwoo,” the boy says, matter-of-factly, as if you’re supposed to know who exactly he is now that he’s introduced himself to you. The look on your face may show that you’re still clueless, and see, that’s something that must have played with the boy’s ego. “Kim Sunwoo,” he snickers, “the owner’s son..?”

Blinking a few times, trying to remember if Mr Kim’s ever told you about having a son– he hasn’t– you gasp like a fish on the dry, nodding. “Oh… Hello..?” you mumble, not really knowing what to do with the information.

“Hi,” he says, face stone cold and motionless. Something’s wrong, but you can’t quite put your finger on it…. 

Well, you’ll have to deal with that later. “My shift starts in 5 minutes, so I gotta find Mr- your dad, and ask him what’s on my to-do list today, but it was nice meeting you,” you try to force out a polite (maybe even warm) smile before you turn on your heel and march towards the staff room, where Mr Kim usually resigns unless he is helping you out with something at the front. See, on not busy days, working at the cinema requires only one person. On Fridays, though, it can get tough. That’s when the owner makes the popcorn while you both sell and scan the tickets at the same time– sometimes you wonder why he doesn’t hire another person to help out with the job.

“Wait– newbie–”

The nickname startles you, again, as you turn around and squint at him. You have a name– and although he has no way of knowing it (other than his father telling him, but seeming that you didn’t even know about his son, Mr Kim isn’t big on sharing information)– but still, you’d love to be called by it. “It’s Y/N, actually.”

“Oh, right…” he hums, “well, Y/N, dad’s not here tonight, so… I’m… kind of in charge,” he says, nodding as he gets the words out, trying to prove his point, “he had other things to take care of, so he sent me down instead,” he explains, watching as your face morphs into one of quick understatement.

“Oh.”

“Yeah,” he nods, sucking on his teeth.

Thick silence overtakes the atmosphere. You feel awkward and out of place.

“So…?” you hum, waiting for him to tell you what to do. 

Because a guy your age ordering you around at work is already embarrassing enough for a university student just trying to pay for their groceries. You’re not gonna ask for the orders yourself. You still have some dignity.

“So… I could take the ticket booth and you can clean the screening room, since there are no movies on tonight?” he suggests, rocking on his heels. The boy seems a bit shaken with the new sense of responsibility, but you figure that even his undoubtful awkwardness still doesn't put you above his position.

You mentally sigh. Cleaning is your least favorite part of the job. 

Still, you’re not gonna talk back to your boss’ son. You’d like to keep your job for a while longer. At least until you find something better.

“Alright,” you nod, turning on your heels once more and preparing to disappear into the depths of the cinema.

His voice stops you again, though, frustration flowing through your veins. “Don’t forget to mop the floors! Oh, and the bathroom could use a clean as well.”

“Alright,” you nod again, your back facing him.

“Also, you need to get the gum off the chairs, I know it’s kind of disgusting, but there’s a-”

“I know how to do my job, thank you,” you turn, smiling ironically over your shoulder.

You don’t know what it is about the man that makes you so, so incredibly irritated. Maybe it’s the fact that every bit of information coming out of his mouth sounds like he’s mansplaining everything to you. Maybe it’s the fact that you feel humiliated to be told what to do by a man that’s your age. Or maybe, it’s just the sheer fact that you hate cleaning– the one thing he just told you to do.

Still, you go and get the vacuum. You go and mop the floors, you go and take the gum off the chairs and scrape it into a bucket you keep in the pantry in the back. You go and clean the bathroom, even though it’s 10 minutes until the end of your shift (you only work 4 hours on Wednesdays) and you spent almost your whole day cleaning the whole screening room by yourself (the screening room that’s giant and Mr Kim helps you with on most days). You go and wipe the mirror in the bathroom, as well as the windows in the hall. 

You say that your work in the cinema is not physically demanding, but by the time you’re out, your back hurts and your knees are all bruised up from getting on the ground so often.

What really sets you off, though, is the sight of the owner’s son sitting in the booth, both legs up on the table and chewing on something, his phone in his hands as he watches, what you presume from the language resonating from the speaker, a silly anime. At least someone had fun during their shift, you think as you leave without saying goodbye to him, slamming the door behind you with a loud bang on your way out.

Quite frankly, you didn’t know what set you off so bad this time. Maybe you just had a bad day. Maybe it could've been fixed with your next shared shift with the guy– you never know.

Little did you know that it was only going to get worse from now on, though.

TONIGHT'S PREMIERE – PALM SPRINGS (2020)

If you knew your boss’s son would play the role of your supervisor from time to time, you probably wouldn't have taken the job when it was offered to you. 

Why?

The reason is quite simple– while you go to work to make money, Kim Sunwoo goes to work to make your whole life a living hell. Ranging from always giving you the more difficult task of the day to making unfunny jokes about your performance (he once asked if you ran a marathon after you mopped the whole hall, his grinning figure staring at you from inside of the ticket booth), you’re starting to think that Kim Sunwoo is mentally stuck with the brain of an 11-year old boy. 

More so with his recent endeavors. You don’t really know what he’s trying to achieve with all of this, but you’re starting to despise going to work even when you know he’s not on the schedule– somehow, you’re afraid his silly pranks and jokes will follow you and surprise you even when he’s not present. Is this his way of asserting dominance? You really don’t know.

It all starts one day before a movie premiere when Sunwoo walks up to you and introduces you to a new concession item to sell in the snack booth. While you don’t really know why one would even think of new combinations to sell at a cinema, since everyone’s just gonna get popcorn or nachos, you don’t really question the idea much further– Sunwoo’s father owns this place, so he must know the best marketing strategies for his business. The reality only downs on you when you’re forced to promote the “Ultimate movie mix” to every customer– which wouldn’t even be that strange, if the mix didn’t include the weird combination of pickles and candy. 

Running on two all nighters and half an energy drink, you didn’t realize the snack stand doesn’t even hold pickles. You were notified the day after by your boss, though, and that wasn’t your best experience.

The terror follows when Sunwoo’s father decides to run a Star Wars marathon one weekend. The flood of customers wouldn’t be as hard to manage when you run the snack stand, but it does get more difficult when your coworker running around with a lightsaber knocks over all the buckets of freshly-made popcorn you just put on the counter for the customers to take. 

He doesn’t even say sorry. Or help clean the spilled popcorn up from the floor. Or help you make a new batch. 

He just laughs.

Sunwoo just loves to laugh at you. Like that one time he made you wear a giant popcorn costume and stand in front of the cinema for the entirety of your 4 hour shift on Wednesday to promote the new movie airing on Friday. Hardly anyone took the fliers you were desperately trying to force into their hands and when you came back, you saw Sunwoo pointing his camera at you from the big glass window. 

The next shift, his dad asked you how Sunwoo did when promoting the movie. You didn’t have the heart to tell him he forced you to do the dirty business instead.

Another time, Sunwoo informs you via text in the middle of your shift that you should clean the bathrooms. The fact itself already makes you furious, but you follow the order nonetheless– because, well, what else can you do? You’re used to cleaning the toilets, since it’s a part of your job. It’s just the fact that a guy your age told you to that’s making you rethink all your career decisions.

The trip to the bathrooms quickly turns traumatizing when you step inside of the tiled room and have the door behind you close with a loud bang, followed by the light switching off. Screeching, you jump and try to escape the room with fear making your heart run faster than Usain Bolt, however, you find the door seemingly locked– the sound of Sunwoo’s snarky laugh coming from the other side making you recognise what just happened and how he’s pulling another one of his childish pranks on you again.

When the door finally opens, you throw the toilet brush into his chest and scream out a “I’m going to fucking quit if I see your face one more time!”. You’re over all formalities.

That doesn’t mean you’re not scared every time you enter a room in the cinema when you work with Sunwoo, though. Your reaction was strengthened very abruptly, you see.

Sitting in the ticket booth, door ajar to monitor your surroundings, you plop your head on your hand and glare at Sunwoo, chewing on your gum. If anyone saw you right now, they’d think you were trying to kill him with your stare, but the opposite would actually be the truth tonight– you were quite enjoying the sight of him wiping the sweat off his forehead and scowling at the neverending flow of customers.

The beauty of having ticket booth duty on premiere night is that everyone bought the tickets beforehand already, meaning that it wasn’t usually busy. Scanning the tickets and running the snack booth were the more difficult parts of the shift, and since Mr Kim decided to show up to work today, Sunwoo was graced with the snack booth duty– something that warmed you up from the inside and made you want to kiss your boss’s feet in gratefulness. 

There’s just something about seeing Kim Sunwoo in misery that makes your stomach turn and do cartwheels. You’re in love with his pathetic, tired face.

His eyes meet yours when he takes a moment to breathe– the look behind them is pleading, almost embarrassingly hopeless as he internally wishes he was in your place. You think this serves him right for the weeks of torture, and when he becomes you to come over with a motion of his hand, you just shrug at him and bat your eyelashes in faked innocence. 

It’s not your fault he’s on duty tonight. What does he want with you?

His lips mouth “Come here,” which makes you battle a satisfied smile. Poor Kim Sunwoo is helpless in his task. The rush just won’t stop and he’s asked of more than he can handle. You kind of feel sadistic when you truly think about your sentiments, but you think you’re only valid for feeding on his misery.

“Help!” he mouths again, and now you truly can’t battle the laughter anymore. His hair is tousled and sticking to his forehead. His uniform is dirty. The tie around his neck is loose. The sight makes you utterly satisfied.

As he mouths “Please,” accompanied by clasped hands and a pleading look that would work on most women, you finally decide to stand up from the uncomfortable chair in the ticket booth and shake your head in disbelief. You can’t even count how many times Sunwoo left you alone in the rush before a premiere, but you can’t really risk his father finding out you didn’t come to rescue his beloved son, since however you might hate this job, you still can’t lose it in your current living conditions.

Sighing and closing the door to the ticket booth after you, your legs take you to the snack stand. Eyes of enthusiastic customers looking almost high on coca cola and the smell of salted popcorn are on you when you finally reach Sunwoo’s side. 

“So I’m supposed to help you with your work whenever you ask, but when I’m left cleaning the whole theater completely alone, you can sit around and play on your phone?” you jab, annoyed with the turn of events. You find a spare apron and tie it around your waist, not really wanting to dirty your uniform as you pour caramel into some buckets of popcorn, hearing your companion chuckle next to you.

“Yeah, pretty much.”

“Okay, so I’ll be back in the ticket booth after serving this customer-”

“My dad’s watching.”

“This is blackmailing,” you snap back, smiling ironically at your coworker.

Sunwoo grins at you when he hands two cokes to the teenage girls behind the counter, shrugging to himself. “Not my problem.”

You learned long ago that fighting with Kim Sunwoo is a battle you can never win. Logically, you know you’re always right, but the boy always thinks he should have the last word in everything, which makes ending an argument with him pretty much impossible. That’s why you stopped trying to prove your truth. In your heart, you know how it is, and no amount of snarky remarks from the feisty boy will change your opinion.

You two work alongside each other in silence for some time. You’d even say it’s efficient– you make the popcorn and he makes the nachos, both of you taking turns behind the coca cola machine, and after a few minutes in his proximity when he’s not being the butt of the Earth, your brain starts to question why you two can’t operate like this on a daily basis.

Oh, how foolish of you.

You’re quickly brought back to reality when you walk over with the grande size bucket of popcorn towards the counter, meeting halfway with Kim Sunwoo’s chest.

It takes everything in you not to scream, but the restraint is deleted as soon as you feel something cold dripping down the front of your uniform, your white button-up suddenly sticking towards your chest in a big, dark-brown pool around your waist area. One sharp look into his eyes is everything it takes you two to come to a mutual understanding of what your next action is gonna be– Sunwoo quickly puts the now empty cup of coca cola onto the counter and puts a hand towards his head in self-disappointment.

“Kim Sunwoo, are you fucking incompetent?!” you scream out, the sensation of your cold shirt sticking to your already sweaty skin making you want to crawl out of yourself and scratch your coworker’s eyes out with the claws of the demon he wakes up in you.

“Look, you don’t have to-”

“I just washed this yesterday, there’s a line of people waiting for their snacks up to the fucking front door, you just ruined the popcorn I made so now I have to redo it, and you just decide to spill this onto me?!” you continue with your rampage, not really caring about the eyes of everyone on you, just letting out all your built-up frustration that creeps inside of you every time you see his face.

“As if I did this on purpose…” he grunts as he turns around in his place and reaches for napkins, not really putting much thought into his actions as he presses the material into the damp place sticking to your skin. 

The image startles you– Kim Sunwoo almost in physical contact with you, a paper napkin soaking up some of the coca cola flooding the surface of your skin– and as you watch his slender palms run over your front, your eyes falling to the fluffy hair at the crown of his head, you feel heat rushing to your insides, making you jump away from him.

“Sorry-” he mumbles out as you forcefully pry the napkin out of his hand, gritting your teeth.

“I’m starting to think you’re making me do everything just because you’re useless,” you spit at him.

Rolling his eyes, Sunwoo pokes his cheek with the tip of his tongue. “It was an accident.”

“Don’t care,” you grunt, walking away from the booth, “I’m going to change in the back, you better not burn the place down with the popcorn machine before I’m back,” you comment, sending him a sharp glare over your shoulder.

All that accompanies you to the staff room is Sunwoo’s loud sigh and a sugary-sweet tone he offers to one of the customers as he throws the ruined popcorn into the trash. “I’ll be right with you, miss!” 

If anyone asked you if you hated your job now, you think you’d say yes.

Who are you kidding?

You’d definitely say yes.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – THE HATING GAME (2021)

You were quite pleased on your way to work today. It’s Wednesday, which usually means it’s not as busy. The weather is cloudy– good enough to not make you gloomy, but not quite sunny enough to make you wish you were outside instead of being stuck in the cinema the whole afternoon– and you packed a home-made sandwich with you to eat on your lunch break. Which is whenever, since you’re on ticket booth duty today– another great news. 

The best thing about today, though? Kim Sunwoo isn’t working today. 

That alone is good enough to make your whole entire day better. The sun shines brighter, your breathing is lighter, the air is clearer and the birds chirp louder when you know you don’t have to interact with the hellspawn that day. It’s like his absence alone is enough to heal all your wounds and delete all your worries– who cares about the fact that you’re barely getting through your Biology class when you know you won’t have to stare at Sunwoo’s face as you contemplate dropping out of university during your shift? 

Maybe you should thank him, in a way.

And with all of this knowledge, a smile plastered on your face as you’re prepared to sit through your 5-hour shift in silence with an occasional swipe through your social media and a well deserved chicken-mayo sandwich towards the end of your shift, it’s quite natural for your smile to freeze and your spirit fall the moment you see the mop of dark brown hair walk through the doors of the cinema. 

“What the fuck is he doing here?” you mourn as he walks by, only realizing you said the sentence out loud when the boy looks at you with a scowled face, a scoff escaping his throat.

“Didn’t know we were speaking to each other in third person now,” he says as he stops in his tracks and plops his head into the door to your booth, infesting your calm abode with his presence.

Deep breaths. In and out, Y/N. In and out… 

“Hello to you too, Y/N,” he smiles, irony dripping off his tongue, “having a good day so far?”

“It was better without you here, thank you,” you snap back, rolling your eyes at him when his eyes flash with something akin to a victory– it seems you both take joy in making the other one absolutely miserable with your presence.

“Sweet,” he nods on his way out, grinning to himself. “Well, I won’t be long, so don’t let your mood drop too much.”

With that, he’s out of the ticket booth. All that’s left behind him is the smell of his cologne– the tingle of lemon and bergamot filling your nostrils in a way that makes the fine hair at the back of your neck stand up all alert– and silence. It makes you wonder about his whereabouts– you can never know… what if he’s setting up a trap for you somewhere? You wouldn’t be half surprised. You make a mental note to yourself to be twice as cautious when going to the bathroom next time. Just to make sure.

Before you’re able to think of any possible situations that Sunwoo could get himself caught in (while completely ignoring the fact that his father is somewhere in his office in the back– for all you know, he might just need to talk to your boss, like a son does sometimes), the woodworm of your thoughts appears in your view again, two rolled-up tubes under his shoulder as he walks over to the front door.

“Wait! What are those?” you ask, eyes zeroing on the very clear posters in his grip. The shiny white back of the big posters you have to sometimes put up in the front of the cinema are unmistakable to anything else.

“Posters,” Sunwoo replies, calling over his shoulder, already halfway out of the building. 

“I know what those are–”

“Then why are you asking?” he huffs, shaking his head in disbelief as he takes a few steps towards the ticket booth, eyes meeting yours. His figure fills the door frame as he towers over you, still sitting on the chair. His eyes have a different kind of twinkle in them– you think, no, you know it’s mischief– making the blood in your veins boil at deadly temperatures.

“Because– well,” you huff, already frustrated, “we’re not allowed to take these,” you say, pointing to the two posters under his shoulder like a kid in the candy store. You try to ignore just how embarrassing you must look right in this moment.

“Oh,” he pouts, taking the posters from below his shoulder, unraveling one of them and resting the other one against the doorframe, “so you’re telling me… I can’t take those two amazingly big, shiny, cool posters of the latest Spiderman movie home for me and my friend Juyeon?” 

You’re only half-aware of the fact that he’s teasing you right now, sighing at his innocent face. “No, Sunwoo. You can’t.”

“Hm,” he hums, looking at the poster from top to the bottom, seemingly sad about the news, “that’s terrible. Says who?”

“Your… your father, Sunwoo. He told me when I asked him the other day if I could take–”

“You wanted to take posters home from the cinema?” he gasps, looking at you with big eyes. He looks stupid. So, terribly stupid. Dumb. No thought behind his eyes. You want to smash his head against a concrete wall. 

…He’s teasing you. It finally dawns on you.

Now, you want to smash your head against a concrete wall.

Still, you admit defeat with a solemn tone in your voice. “Well, I really wanted the Enola Holmes poster to put up in my bedroom…” you mumble.

“And my dad said no?” he asks, eyebrows quirking up towards his hairline.

“Yes, Sunwoo. Your father said it’s prohibited to take posters home from the cinema, that’s exactly why I’m stopping you right now,” you say, tone filled with annoyance. You know he’s enjoying your face full of misery. But still, if there’s one thing you’re good at, it’s following the rules and orders– if Mr Kim says you can’t take the posters home, you’ll go in the back and tear them into pieces before throwing them into the bin like you’re told to. 

If things were going your way, you’d advise Sunwoo to do the same. 

A day with Kim Sunwoo in it never goes your way, though. You should’ve been prepared.

“So I can’t take those posters home because my dad said no?” he clarifies, looking like a dummy. Like one of those kids that ask the most obvious questions during exams. Like one of those kids you want to sucker punch in the face.

“Sunwoo–”

“Well, Y/N-ie,” he purrs, the nickname making your hands curl up in fists, “that’s too bad… because I am the owner’s son, so… the rules don’t really apply to me, you see.”

And with that, he sends another sickeningly sweet smile your way before he turns on his heel and marches towards the front door again– not responding to any of your annoyed, infuriated calls of his name. He doesn’t stop at your warnings. He doesn’t care.

And just like that, he disappears just as fast as he appeared. The interaction didn’t last more than 10 minutes, but you consider your whole day ruined.

Fucking Sunwoo and his fucking privileges. And his fucking annoying face. 

It’s not even that important. It’s just two posters that would get thrown out to the dumpster in the back at the end of your shift anyway. You don’t even care about those posters in particular– you just with equal rules applied to all workers in the workplace.

It’s not like Spiderman Homecoming is one of your favorite movies… not at all.

You could’ve had that poster. You deserved that poster. You sold tickets for it and served the snack booth when it premiered– not Kim Sunwoo and whatever his friend’s name was.

You kick the wall with your sneaker. It leaves a dirty mark.

You should’ve known the day felt too good to be true.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (1993)

There’s a new thing Mr Kim is trying to lure more customers into the cinema. He calls it ‘Rewind Thursdays’, where he picks a movie from the past and airs it in the theater again to bring out nostalgia in the whole town. You think it’s a good idea– you remember when the Harry Potter movies had a rerun back when you were little, ecstatic that you finally got to see them in the cinema because you missed out on the experience when they were coming out for the first time. You went even though you saw them all before, and you had a blast. So in your books, this was the best thing that could happen to the little, old movie theater on the corner of the town’s square.

You were overbeared with joy when Mr Kim went up to you during one of your slow Wednesday shifts in the ticket booth with a paper and a pen, requesting you to write down your favorite movies. He informed you that he’d prefer it if they were older, to, quote, really get the nostalgia going, and you were happy to have some say in the list of movies to play for multiple reasons. One, because it meant he valued your opinion, and two, you don’t usually work on Thursdays, so if your favorite movie is on that day, you can go and relax in the cinema while watching it.

This all happened a few weeks ago. You gave the list back to your boss at the end of your shift, smiling brightly just thinking about it, and he told you he’ll get through it and see what he can incorporate. 

The plan gets to you on one uneventful Wednesday. You are stuck in the ticket booth again. Today is one of the Wednesdays where Sunwoo is in charge, because Mr Kim is out of town. You hate those days most of them all, but recently, he’s been giving you your freedom and letting you work in the ticket booth instead of cleaning the already clean cinema, saying he has stuff to do in the back. You suspect he just sits around in his father’s office with his legs on the table, chewing on his obnoxious strawberry mints. The image makes you furious only the tiniest bit, because the fact that he’s out of your sight and isn’t ordering you around is enough to calm your nerves. It could always be worse, you remind yourself. It could always be worse.

“I have the schedule of ‘Rerun Thursdays’ all done,” Sunwoo says as he walks up to the ticket booth close to the end of your shift. His eyes look a little tired when he holds up a thick card to you, the design of the poster making your eyebrows shoot up in surprise. Did he do that?

“It’s ‘Rewind Thursdays’, actually,” you note, pointing towards the very obvious mistake on the top of the poster.

“Oh fuck– you know what, not anymore,” he scowls, taking the poster back from you and pointing glares at the title he mistyped, “I spent 3 hours on this, I’m not remaking it.”

“It looks like a kindergartener did it,” you note, eyes scanning the bubbly font and the orange-yellow combination used throughout the whole design when he offers the paper back to you. It looks like a Winnie the Pooh convention is taking place instead of an event full of nostalgic movies, and you would tell him that, but he beats you to it with a tired remark.

“Well, if my father wanted this to look professional, he should’ve hired someone to do it,” he mutters, obviously hurt by your harsh words, “I used Canva. I don’t know how Photoshop works and my dad can barely operate the computer, so this is what we’re going with, okay?” he says as he explains, big eyes suddenly bearing into yours. “Unless you wanna redo it yourself…?”

“Absolutely not.”

“Then this is the final poster,” he says, “I’m gonna hang those outside when we close,” he notes, watching you scan the movie titles. The event will take place in 4 weeks from the middle of November to the middle of December (right in time for Christmas movies to air, since you’re certain Mr Kim has another Christmas-themed business tactic up his sleeve). 

“Did any of your movies make it?” Sunwoo asks, surprisingly friendly. You can’t remember a single casual conversation with the male– all you two do it either give each other the silent treatment or scream at each other (more like you scream at him, but he always deserves it…), so you’re kind of surprised at the change. Not pleasantly surprised. Just surprised.

Eyes falling to the second movie on the list, you feel yourself nodding as you smile. It’s like a dream come true– you can finally see your favorite movie in the cinema for the first time. You don’t know who to thank for this miracle, but something in your insides feels very grateful. 

“Yeah,” you say, trying to seem unaffected. You’d rather kill yourself than to show any signs of emotion in front of Kim Sunwoo. All he deserves to see is your stone cold face.

“Which one?” he asks, seemingly interested.

“National treasure,” you hum, pointing to the movie on the list, having Sunwoo nod to himself. You expect him to say something to you– perhaps engage in a conversation like a normal person would– but suddenly, he gasps and takes out a folded piece of paper from his back pocket, offering it to you and playing the role of the manager again.

“Oh, by the way,” he starts, watching as you unfold the paper, “I know we don’t usually work on Thursdays, but since my dad decided to do all of this, we kinda have to, since he wouldn’t be able to handle the premieres on his own, so… Here's your schedule for the next 4 weeks,” he says, clasping his hands together in front of him.

It takes everything in you to not correct the male and tell him that those are technically not premieres, but when your eyes land on the little Excel table Sunwoo printed out for you, the feeling is overpowered with one of deep disappointment.

“I work the second week?” you ask, as if the question might magically change the schedule.

“I mean, I think you can read…” Sunwoo hums, shrugging to himself.

A heartbeat passes by of you staring at the schedule, a pit opening in your stomach at the realization. You only work 2 Thursdays out of 4, noticing the fact that you rotate with Sunwoo (with him somehow taking the first week, much to your surprise), but for some reason, one of those days had to be the day when National treasure is on. 

And sure, you might think this is good– you can just watch the movie while you work! 

Wrong.

Working means either staying in the ticket booth the whole time in case a customer comes, working the snack booth the whole time in case a customer comes, or cleaning the bathrooms. Working means also standing in front of the screening room sometimes, making sure no one is going in without a ticket in the middle of the movie. 

There is no time for you to watch National treasure if you’re working. 

Sighing, you decide to do something you always prohibited yourself from doing– you ask Kim Sunwoo for a favor. “Listen… my favorite movie is airing the week I work, so I was… wondering if we could exchange shifts? So I could go and watch it?” you ask, looking at your coworker with what you presume are pleading eyes. You hope it works on the boy– he looks like the type to fold under a tender gaze.

“So you want to get out of work only to still come?” Sunwoo clarifies, snickering.

“Pretty much, yeah,” you nod, tapping your fingers on the table.

“Well, the schedule is set,” Sunwoo shrugs, “I can’t do anything about it.”

Eyes sending darts to the very middle of Kim Sunwoo’s forehead, you take a few calming breaths before you speak up again. You don’t want to blow up on him when you’re asking him for a favor– you don’t think this approach would help you much in the situation.

“Why?”

“Because,” he shrugs. 

“Because?” you repeat. “That’s the reason?” you say, a weak laugh dragging out of your throat.

“Pretty much, yeah,” he mirrors your previous response, the blood in your veins already growing hot from the confrontation.

“Sunwoo, you– come on,” you say, “just this once, please? I’ll take the first week. We can just switch, what’s the difference?” 

Sunwoo tongues the inside of his cheek, eyes pointing towards the paper. “Schedule is schedule, Y/N. You have to follow it,” he says, an innocent look glazing his big fuckass boba eyes. Oh how you despise that look. It’s the look that tells you he finds this all so, so amusing, but won’t laugh in your face in hopes of teasing you some more. 

“Oh, amazing,” you say, throwing the schedule to the table, “I knew I could always count on you ruining my day, Kim Sunwoo. And I bet you did the schedule as well! You knew it was my favorite movie, so you made me work that week. Very nice of you, you dumbass. Thank you very much,” you grunt, annoyance flowing through your brain and making you truly merciless– you have no proof of Sunwoo even knowing which movie of yours made it in, or proof of him making the schedule– you don’t care, though. All you want at this moment is to claw his eyes out and pop them in between your fingers to ease the anger on your insides.

You can’t do that, though, so a screaming match will have to do the job.

“Stop being so dramatic,” he scoffs, eyebrows furrowing. “I didn’t even know which one your favorite movie was, so how could I do this on purpose? Plus, I didn’t even make the schedule, my dad did–”

“As if I would believe that,” you roll your eyes, huffing. “You’re all owner’s son privileges this, owner’s son privileges that, but when I ask you for one thing, one! Single! Fucking! Thing! You can’t do it,” you bite, words dripping in spite.

“Look, I really can’t-”

“You can’t do this one thing for me?” you cut him off, the question sounding like an ultimatum.

“No,” he shakes his head, seemingly unaffected by the conversation.

“Because…?” you demand a valid reason.

“Because I just can’t,” he shrugs, casual and cool. 

The world stills for a moment. You calculate your next move. Blood rushes in your ears, you see red. Your eyes fall on the clock– it’s 4 minutes after your shift. That’s it.

You take your coat draped over the chair, stand up from the chair and dash towards the front door. You can’t stand being around this man any longer– all he does is bring misery into your otherwise, already boring life. 

Speedwalking out of the place, you yell out a harsh “Go fuck yourself!” over your shoulder, leaving Sunwoo to close the cinema by himself. You don’t even change out of your uniform before you go– your head is too clouded with anger to remember to do so. Cursing out your coworker isn’t the best thing you could do in this situation, more so when he’s the owner’s son, but suddenly, you don’t really care about losing your job at the cinema anymore.

Maybe you should quit yourself, actually.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – HOW TO LOSE A GUY IN 10 DAYS (2003)

In your books, there aren’t many things worse than working three days in a row. You can only think of so many even when you try hard enough: like going to school in your pajamas, getting sick on the day of an important event, ripping your pants on the metro, standing outside of the cinema in a popcorn costume for 4 hours… 

Yeah. Not too many.

So naturally, on the third day of your work week, putting one sweetened coffee into your stomach after another, barely keeping your head up from the lack of sleep you’re getting in between classes, work, and writing your essays until 3 in the morning, you beg god for a calm shift. It’s Wednesday, the first week of Mr Kim’s ‘Rewind Thursdays’ event, and it just so happened that you were set to work the first half of the week while Sunwoo got the other half. 

The only thing keeping you going is the fact that you and Sunwoo will now basically not see each other’s face for the next four weeks– with the exception of Fridays and Saturdays, the premiere days. You’re getting a lot of shifts this month, but hey… Christmas is coming. At least you’ll have plenty of money to buy gifts for everyone this year. (Or not. You’re very underpaid.)

Entertaining yourself by watching the world outside of your window and mentally betting on the race of raindrops falling down the glass surface– because your phone battery almost ran out during class this morning and you forgot to bring your charger with you– you hope you don’t fall asleep right in this moment. Your boss is somewhere inside and if he oh just happens to check up on you (which he never normally does, but you can never be too sure), you’re certain you’d lose your job after taking a nap in the ticket booth. Some things just can’t be accepted. 

Cat fights with his son? Perfectly acceptable. Sleeping on the clock? Not so much…

Eyes drooping when the third raindrop race doesn’t go the way you bet on in your head, you figure you can just rest for a second or two… Eyelids shielding your irises from the orange hues of the lights inside, your brain already turning off and preparing a happy dream for you, you think that taking a nap is not such a bad idea right now…

Wrong.

“Good morning, sleeping beauty,” the noise of a thunder– actually, no, that was just someone’s voice– wakes you up and makes you jump in your chair, your knee hitting the bottom of the table making you hiss in sharp pain.

“Fuck, man–”

“Didn’t know taking a nap was in the job description,” Sunwoo grins at you through the glass window of the booth. His eyes twinkle in amusement as you drag your hand through your hair, trying to smoothe it down after tousling it in your weird sleeping position.

“I wasn’t sleeping,” you mutter, not even meeting his eye. 

“Oh?”

“Yeah… just had… my eyes closed…” you hum, scratching the back of your neck. Clearing your throat, you look back up at him with an disinterested look on your face. “Anyways, what do you want? You’re off today.”

Scanning his figure, fully taking in his appearance– the fabric of his dark gray hoodie a little stained with raindrops (you bet he ran from his car into the building without an umbrella. He seems like the type to be embarrassed about umbrellas.), the fabric of the garment enveloping his head and shading his face a little from the ugly yellow lights. His face is a little flushed– you presume it’s from the running– and his hair is falling into his face. You can barely see his eyes behind the curtain of chocolate locks– he really needs a trim.

“Damn, didn’t know you hated me so much that you can’t stand seeing me on my off days,” he jokes, leaning on the counter as if to stick his face as close as he can into yours. Thank god for the glass shielding you two– you think you’d give him a fist to the nose if you ever felt his breathing on your skin.

“I do,” you agree, impatiently drumming your fingers on the top of the table, “so tell me what you want so you can disappear again,” you say.

“I just went to check up on whether you were sleeping or not so I can tell my dad to fire you–”

“Kim Sunwoo–”

He puts his arms up defensively, eyebrows raising at your threatening tone. “Okay, not really. I don’t actually care that much. Besides, you promised to quit yourself anyway, so,” he explains, shrugging to himself, “believe it or not, I’m here to buy tickets for a movie.”

You shoot him a stare, the look in your eyes dead, stone cold as you ponder on his words. It’s cold outside, it’s raining, and Kim Sunwoo just happens to decide to buy tickets for a movie today. In a cinema that he works at. In a cinema that he works at tomorrow.

“You work tomorrow…?” you mirror your inner monologue, kind of confused at the turn of events.

“You know my schedule? I’m flattered–”

The irritation is slowly creeping into your bones again. Actually, it has been since he arrived, but the more he talks, the more agitating the whole encounter feels. Maybe you should tape his mouth shut the next time you see him– you bet the day would be so much better if you don’t have to listen to him talk. 

“Why don’t you just buy the tickets tomorrow when you work? Didn’t have to walk here in the rain,” you explain, sighing to prove just how annoyed you are with his presence.

“Because I kinda need them today,” he says, clarifying to you with the tone you use when you explain mundane things to a child.

You don’t know what he did in his past life to get the ability to annoy you each and every time you meet him, but you’d like some of it to get back at him in your next life. Why you’re even thinking of past lives and the possibility of meeting Kim Sunwoo in your next one, you’re not really certain, but if it helps you to not smash the glass separating you two, you guess you can get behind the thought process.

“Okay,” you nod, painfully calm for the amount of screaming you’ve been doing internally, “what movie?” you ask, turning your body to the computer on your right and breaking eye contact with him. If he’s a customer, you’re going to treat him like one– no small talk and no arguments. You won’t ruin your day even more over a man that doesn’t know what chapstick is. (You don’t stare at his lips, just for the record. It’s just painfully obvious when he talks. Sometimes you want to reach over and pluck away the dead skin with your fingers– you won’t, though. That would be weird.)

Sunwoo straightens his back as he fishes for his wallet in the front pocket of his jeans. “National Treasure,” he smiles, making you break into cold sweat, “two tickets, please.”

Like a scene in a horror movie, your head turns without moving the rest of your body, eyes twitching when you see him standing at the other side of the booth, calm and collected. Suddenly, the scene makes sense– he bought the tickets to see your favorite movie on the day of your shift. Of course. He just has to rub it in your face. 

Not only are you working that day. You will also most likely serve popcorn to him as he goes inside with whoever he is buying the second ticket for. And you will try not to trip him on his way inside the screening room.

It was a smart move for him to not go inside the ticket booth with you, even though he has all the right to. You bet he knows you’d claw his eyes out if you had the chance.

“You have to be kidding me.”

“What? I can’t buy tickets for a movie?” he asks, innocence dripping off his tongue.

Breathing deeply– while trying to contain the demon that’s begging to crawl out of your insides and tear him into 25 different pieces– you smile ironically at the male, gulping before you speak. “That would be 12 dollars, please,” you say, your customer service voice turning kind of eerie.

Not even letting the male choose his seats– he lost the privilege when he decided to come and buy the tickets for your favorite movie– you print out two tickets with the worst possible view (the ones in the first row, far right. If Sunwoo loses his neck because he has to look up at the screen for the entirety of the movie, well, who are you to hate that) and offer them to your coworker.

Like a mind game, the male slips them into his pocket without even looking at them, not breaking eye contact with you sitting behind the booth. 

“Have a nice day,” he says as he takes two steps back before fully turning and escaping through the front door, figure dashing towards the old Prius parked in front of the building.

Bawling your hands into fists, you try the breathing exercises you found the other week. Calm your body and your mind, the title said. You knew you’d need those when you saved the post into one of your boards on Pinterest.

Still, you can’t help yourself. You simply cannot. You let it out– it’s not healthy to keep negativity inside. 

He can’t hear you, but you still mutter a spiteful “I hope you choke,” under your breath as you settle back into the uncomfortable surface of the chair.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – YOU’VE GOT MAIL (1998)

Remember the time you said you didn’t really mind having more shifts in November, because it meant a bigger paycheck? Yeah… that was true. For a few days.

Until you got a phone call one day from none other than Kim Sunwoo– whose number you didn’t even want to save into your contacts, but after his insisting that it’s for work purposes, did so under the name ‘dumpster raccoon’– telling you that you have to get to work immediately, that his dad said so, and that it’s an emergency. 

Do you believe him? No. Absolutely not. 

His tone of voice was too calm to be in an emergency. If his dad wanted you to come to work today, he could’ve called you himself instead of making his son do it. And also, you really don’t know what’s so important to take care of on a Wednesday, since it’s the slow day of the week, but still– you angrily took off the facemask from your face before the timer even went off, shut your laptop with a half-watched episode of The office in your Netflix window, changed out of your comfy clothes and marched towards the cinema. 

Because you never know. He might be saying the truth, after all. And if that was the case, you didn’t want to be caught disobeying your boss.

You get to the old movie theater on the corner of the town center at 4 in the afternoon. The sky is already getting dark and you feel the coldness of November seeping into your bones, and so you waste no time in getting inside and chasing the heat of the vintage-looking interior. Your boots make a thudding sound as you walk across the hall, seeing Sunwoo sitting in the ticket booth in his usual habitat: with his phone in his hands and his feet up on the table, chewing on his favorite strawberry mints. Now this sight screams emergency if you’ve ever seen one.

“What was so important for you to call me to work and then chill in the ticket booth all afternoon?” you ask, spite slipping off your tongue with every word you speak. 

Sunwoo looks up at you from under his eyelashes, hair still slightly shielding his eyes. He doesn’t even have his uniform on– there’s a gray hoodie enveloping his torso (you swear he lives in this garment. You wonder if he even washes it sometimes) and black jeans hanging off his hips– and the more you stare at him, the more you feel like punching him in the face.

“Oh,” he hums, stretching out his limbs from the hours of sitting on the chair unmoving, “dad said to tell you to clean the screening room. Since it’s Thursday tomorrow, and all.”

The look on his face is innocent. He looks like he just told you the most casual piece of information– and truth be told, he kind of did. The whole thing is just not making any sense right now. 

“I should clean the screening room today? You’re on the clock, though, why don’t you do it?” you ask, frustration clearly written all over your face. You were looking forward to having a self-care day today, so you can only imagine how tired of his endeavors you are right in this moment. 

“Yeah, but I am on ticket booth duty, so I can’t,” he shrugs, frowning a little to prove his nonexistent point.

“It’s Wednesday. It’s not busy. You know you can do both.”

“Look, it’s not me, it’s my dad–”

“Is it? Is it, Sunwoo?” you huff, arms flying into the air. “Or are you just using me to do the work you don’t feel like doing? Because it really does seem like that right now,” you bite, running your hand through your hair in exasperation. 

“Do you want me to call him?” Sunwoo asks, tone of voice suddenly threatening. 

A heartbeat passes. You continue to have a staring contest with him. The fury inside of you rages like a storm. Still, you nod to the feeling of authority coming from your actual boss, and so you wordlessly turn on your heel and march towards the screening room, ready to clean the place in the least amount of time so you can go home and back to your selfcare endeavors. (You’re adding printing out Sunwoo’s face and throwing darts at it to the list of activities. You think you really need that right now.)

The screening room is dark when you come inside, and as you reach towards the lightswitch, you almost fear something jumping at you. See, the traumatic response from being locked up in the toilet from your coworker is still very present in your bones. When you stop working here, you’re going to ask for financial compensation for all the damage this boy did on your mental health.

You walk down the aisle of seats and try to inspect the damage. No movies air on Wednesday and there was only one kids movie going on Tuesday, so you can either expect it to be almost clean, or full of snacks that fell off the hands of grabby children during the cartoon. The more you inspect the place, though, the more it seems like… somebody already cleaned it before?

The floor is clean. The laminated surface under the seats has no smudge of dirt on it, like someone already mopped the place. And when you think back, the bins were empty as well.

The screening room was definitely cleaned before.

Which means that Sunwoo brought you here for absolutely nothing.

Suddenly, the lights go out. The whole room falls into darkness, and the anger inside of your veins very quickly mixes with panic as you try to climb up the stairs on the side of the screening room and escape. Your throat gets dry as you yell for your coworker, not really caring if your next outburst is going to get you fired or not.

“Kim Fucking Sunwoo, why the fuck did you call me to clean an already cleaned screening room?!” you yell, not really knowing if he hears you or not. Doesn’t matter– it feels cathartic to do so anyway.

Your feet stumble on the awkwardly-long stairs, your figure almost falling to the ground. Managing to hold yourself up and steady your body before your head hits the sharp corner of one of the stairs and makes you die, you continue on with your small tangent. “You really think this is funny? You’re having fun pranking me all the time? I hate your guts, Kim Sunwoo, and I hope you burn in hell!”

A bright light suddenly illuminates the screening room, coming from somewhere behind you. When you look over your shoulder, the screen is white for a few moments before the opening credits of a Jerry Buckheimer film flash on the big surface, halting you in your movements. The sound is a little too loud in the speakers, but it gets adjusted the moment you almost lose your hearing. The moment you see Nicolas Cage appear, it’s clear as day.

There’s a movie playing. And the movie playing is National treasure. 

You think you’re hallucinating. This is surely a fata morgana.

Standing in the middle of the screening room, your mouth hangs agape and your eyes go wide as you watch the first few scenes of the movie. Ben Gates already learns about the hidden treasure passed down through American history when you feel a slight nudge to your shoulder, making you turn your head to see a tall figure staring you down with a bucket of popcorn in their hands.

You are confused. So utterly confused. The movie was on last week. You’d know– you worked the snack booth that day. The screening room is empty and it’s Wednesday– what’s going on? 

“Can you sit? Or are you just going to watch the movie standing in the aisle,” Sunwoo grunts, balancing the big bucket of popcorn and two drinks in his large hands, the sight comical and almost making you want to watch him suffer some more.

Caught off guard, though, you let him back you into the aisle of seats, your figure slouching into one of the red cushions like a rag doll. Sunwoo takes place next to you, placing the big bucket of popcorn into your lap, before he settles into a seat as well and focuses his eyes and attention on the movie.

“What… what is this?” you ask, frozen in the seat. 

“Hm?” Sunwoo frowns, looking at you. “National treasure,” he hums, “I thought you’d know, since you threw a scene about it that one time.”

“I- I know that, I just…” you trail off, still surprised at the turn of events, “what’s going on right now…?”

“We’re watching National treasure,” he notes, talking to you as if you were slow.

“What…?”

A sigh escapes Sunwoo’s lips at your utter confusion, his hand coming up to the bucket of popcorn in your lap and throwing a handful of the snack into his mouth before speaking. “Look, Y/N. You said you wanted to watch your favorite movie in the cinema, so that’s what you’re doing. Enjoy my owner’s son privileges for once,” he shrugs, watching as your face morphs into an unreadable expression.

That explanation satisfies you for a bit. The shock in your insides, though? Still present.

There’s something about the whole gesture that makes your stomach feel uneasy. Sunwoo did something nice for you– out of the kindness of his own heart– and you really don’t know why he would even think of something like this. You two aren’t on the best terms either, after all. Maybe he finally went crazy.

Or maybe you did and this was all the result of your imagination. Either or. 

Yeah, you must be the one that’s gone batshit insane. Surely. You’re certain of the fact when you reach for the popcorn and accidentally touch his hand, the two of you deciding to get some at the same time, and your stomach does a flip and your brain makes a sign for you to quickly retract your hand– but the feeling of his slightly cold hand against your fingertips is now engraved into your memory and won’t leave and let you focus on the movie no matter how hard you try.

“You wouldn’t have to do this if you just let me switch schedules with you that time,” you note, “just saying.”

“I couldn’t,” he shrugs.

“Huh? But you bought two tickets..?”

“Yeah, but those were for my friends. I had to drive my mum down to grandmas that day, so I couldn’t go or take your shift that day,” he hums, not once breaking eye contact with the screen.

“If you would’ve just said so, I wouldn’t have made a scene about it–”

“Yeah… but I enjoy watching you make a scene,” he grins, shifting his attention towards you for a second with that lazy smirk playing with his lips. His hair is falling into his eyes and you have the urge to get it out of his face with a motion of your hand while also scolding him like a mother to finally get a haircut, just so you could see the twinkle in his mischievous orbs.

“You need to get serious help, then,” you grunt, pointing your gaze back towards the screen, unable to look at his face for any longer. He’s being annoying again. You’re annoyed.

“Probably,” he admits.

You two sit in silence for a while, the only sound accompanying you being the movie playing out on the big screen in front of you. You think this is the calmest you two have ever been around each other, and you’re starting to think that if Sunwoo just didn’t talk, you two could even get along.

Something touches the side of your thigh in the darkness of the room. Eyes darting to the source, you notice Sunwoo’s thigh pressing against yours, the cause of his obnoxious man-spreading, and something about the closeness of his body and the smell of his citrusy cologne makes you feel like your chest is heaving in on itself. You can’t stand him around you. You two can’t share this close of a space.

“Are you not leaving?” you ask.

“No,” he hums, “should I be?”

“Well, you’re on the clock…”

The man snickers, shaking his head in disbelief. “Y/N, you and I both know that the possibility of someone coming to buy a ticket on a Wednesday afternoon is close to zero. Me being there makes no difference in today’s sales.”

His hand knocks into yours again as you reach for more popcorn. You gulp, nodding. “Right…”

“And I wanted to see the movie to see if it’s really that good to make a scene about it,” he teases, another playful look sent your way from the corner of his eye.

You grunt, rolling your eyes. Oh how you hate his guts…

And even though you love the movie, you pray for it to end quickly. The more time you spend with Sunwoo forced into your zone of comfort, the more uncomfortable you feel– even the slightest movement of his body affects you and makes your brain turn on overdrive. It’s strange and it’s weird, and you don’t understand how hatred for a person could manifest in such reactions. 

It’s better that you didn’t notice you two sitting in the love seat. God knows you wouldn’t handle that well. You’d rather die than to hold on to that knowledge.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – CLUELESS (1995)

They say that you only start realizing just how stupid people can be when you work in customer service. As one of the only three employees of the small, vintage cinema on the corner of the town’s square, you can only agree with the sentiment– you have a lot of stories to tell about the wonders of the human brain.

Like that one time you got screamed at because the movie tickets were ‘too expensive’ – because naturally, you should be able to change the price of them when asked. Or that one time you got screamed at because the movie tickets were sold out– because naturally, you should add more seats to the screening room just for the two middle-aged women to sit on during the premiere of the newest Orlando Bloom movie. Or when somebody yelled at you for the toilets being full after the movie– naturally, you are supposed to throw people out in the middle of them peeing. Or build new stalls. Either or.

They say that you only start realizing just how stupid people can be when you work in customer service, but truly, you also realize just how rude they can also be for no reason at all.

Much like today. It’s Friday, which means it’s premiere night. The tickets to all movies this week are sold out already, so no one is on ticket booth duty, and much to your relief, Mr Kim took the snack stand himself. Your responsibility for the day is scanning the tickets and then making sure no one is getting inside during the movie without a ticket. 

It’s not a hard job. Not at all– you would even say nothing about working in the cinema is hard, when you don’t have an annoying coworker trying to make your whole life a living hell– but you see, customers love to make your job harder just by being unreasonably rude about things that are clearly out of your control. 

“Sir, I really can’t let you in, I’m sorry,” you say, tone of voice polite despite screaming on the inside. In front of you is standing a tall man, maybe a few years older than you, the expression on his face full of anger and vexation. They say a customer is always right. You agree only when the customer looks like they could wait for you after work and beat you up in the bushes. Sadly, that still doesn’t mean you can let the man inside without a valid ticket.

“What do you mean? Little one, I’m telling you I bought the ticket here, so if you don’t let me in–”

“All tickets purchased for the screening should be able to scan through this, sir, and if it doesn’t work, I am not allowed to let you inside of the cinema,” you try to explain, getting kind of desperate. The line behind him was forming and the movie was supposed to play in a few minutes, so if you wanted to scan all the tickets in time, you had to be quick.

He wouldn’t budge, though. His eyebrows are furrowed and the guy behind him seems to be getting angry as well, making the hair on the back of your neck stand up alert, like a cat when it senses danger. You try your hardest to keep your tone firm, hands clasped politely behind your back. “I’m gonna have to ask you to leave, sir, or maybe check in with the owner about the issue? I don’t have the competence to–”

“Listen, I won’t be talking to anyone, because you will let me in, okay?”

“Sir, I can’t-”

Your sentence is cut off by the man again, his fury making you take a step backwards in fear. “And if you don’t, you will see the consequences.”

Gulping, you try to think of a way to get out of this situation. Mr Kim is too far away for you to call, and he is also busy– the line is long and Sunwoo isn’t working today. It’s just the two of you today, so your options are getting slimmer. You can’t let that man in without a working ticket– it seems like the one he’s showing you is either a fake one, or bought in another cinema– but it seems like if you don’t, he’ll have you dead before the next morning. 

“So?”

Opening your mouth to answer (although your brain is still empty and you don’t even know what more to say), a low voice coming from behind you startles you in the middle of your crisis. “Is there a problem here?” 

Turning your head to the source of the voice, you’ve never been more relieved to see Kim Sunwoo in your close proximity. You watch as he puts a rolled-up poster to the ground behind you before he takes another step closer towards your figure, his expression stone cold and glaring at the man in front of you. 

“Your coworker here won’t let me in to watch the movie,” he complains, hand waving around in a threatening way. 

Just having Sunwoo around makes you more confident. Clearing your throat, your eyes dart to your coworker, seeing his face morph into irritation. “It won’t scan his ticket, so…”

“If it won’t scan your ticket, it means it’s invalid and we’re not allowed to let you in,” Sunwoo says, tone of voice way less polite than the one you were using before.

“That’s ridiculous-”

“You are ridiculous,” Sunwoo grunts, annoyance clearly written all over his face. “You were asked to leave, so maybe you should.” 

Truth be told, you’ve been in a couple of arguments with Sunwoo before. In none of them has he ever looked and sounded like this, though. You and Sunwoo argue with spite– sparks flying waiting to start a fire, curses and harsh words thrown around carelessly in moments of heated hatred. His tone is stern, but never threatening. Never mean. Not in the way he’s being right now.

It makes you stare at him wordlessly. He seems to be taking the lead in the situation, reacting territorially to the man in front of him. You can’t say you don’t feel safer with him around– you would be lying.

“Maybe you could just let me in and get this over with–” 

“And maybe you could fuck off,” Sunwoo says back, something in his tone making your stomach feel all light. He looks serious, standing his ground, and the man finally seems to get the memo that he’s not watching the premiere tonight, because he backs off and grits his teeth at the male.

“Your boss will hear about this,” he threatens, making Sunwoo chuckle.

“I’m sure he will.”

Sympathetic looks are thrown your way from the women in the line behind that can finally come up to you so you scan their tickets. You smile at each one and try to seem unaffected by the exchange, but the memory of it still lingers in your brain and doesn’t make you rest easy as you greet the rest of the customers. 

You didn’t even realize Sunwoo was still standing next to you, watching you work. He seems to recognise your shaken-up composure, tone of voice sympathetic and quiet as he asks: “You okay?”

“What?” you ask, surprised by the question, “oh. Yeah, I’m fine. He was just… being a bitch, the usual.”

“Yeah,” he snickers, “why didn’t you just scream at him like you do to me? I bet that would scare him away,” he notes, making you roll your eyes at the comment.

“Because he looked like he could beat me up, Sunwoo.”

“And I don’t?” he gasps, suddenly offended.

You scan the boy up and down, pretending to think it over for a few before you shake your head. “No,” you shrug, “I could beat you up.”

“Excuse you?” he gasps, crossing his arms at his chest in a defensive stance, the shock on his face mixing in with amusement. 

“Don’t believe me? Wanna try?” you test, the conversation suddenly flowing freely, without you even noticing. You don’t pay it much thought, but you guess getting along with Sunwoo is easier when he’s on your side. Most of the time, he’s not, though– and maybe that’s the problem.

“Okay,” he nods, “meet me in the back when you’re off. No weapons allowed, we’ll do it the street style. This is a battle of fists,” he points a finger at you, the sentence making you sigh dreamily and point your eyes towards the ceiling.

“You can’t even imagine how long I’ve been waiting for this moment.”

Sunwoo smiles at that– that dumb, boyish smile you usually so despise– and shakes his head at your antics. The conversation dies down a bit after the exchange– with you scanning the tickets and trying your hardest to make it through the line before the movie starts, when your coworker, dressed in none other than his signature gray hoodie and black jeans, nudges you with his elbow. “Want me to stay for a bit, or are you good now?”

“I can take care of myself, Sunwoo,” you sigh, “you can go about your day.”

“Well, it didn’t seem like it a few minutes ago–”

“I can take care of myself when I’m not confronted with a tall muscled man that is threatening me, Sunwoo,” you repeat, looking at the rest of the line, “so with him gone now, you can go about your day. What are you even doing here, by the way? I thought you were off today.”

“I am,” he nods, rocking a little in his place, shifting weight from his heels towards his toes, “I was just… here to drop off something for you,” he says, clearing his throat and pointing towards the poster he was holding when he first approached you, the shiny tube now resting against the nearest wall. 

You shoot the boy a curious look, eyebrows furrowed in question. You don’t get to ask for clarification about the character of the poster, because he abruptly cuts off your train of thought, speaking fast as if to avoid making any more conversation with you. “I’ll see you in the back after you’re done for that fist fight, then. Bye!”

And before you get a chance to say anything back, Sunwoo swiftly turns on his heel and awkwardly marches towards the front door. You don’t have much time to inspect the thing he dropped off for you, but after you’re done with scanning the tickets and have time to breathe when the movie starts, you allow yourself to peek inside– 

only to see a National treasure poster staring back at you, surface glossy and glimmering, as if you just opened a chest full of gold. 

As you take the poster to the staff room with you (while also wearing a huge, embarrassing grin on your face for someone staring at the face of Nicolas Cage), making sure it’s safe and sound until you can bring it home with you, you wonder why you haven’t been civil with Kim Sunwoo before.

It’s good to have a taste of his owner’s son privileges sometimes.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – ME BEFORE YOU (2016)

The day is Friday, the 1st of December. Mr Kim’s ‘Rewind Thursdays' event is over and while Fridays are always the premiere days, meaning you usually have to work the evenings either in the snack booth or in the ticket booth, your boss told you you can have the night off under one condition– you come in the morning (since you told him your classes are done for the semester, he’s been keen on making you work at random times of the day) and help Sunwoo with Christmas decorations in the cinema.

And, well, who are you to say no to a free evening? Maybe you can finally have that self-care time you’ve been needing before your exam season starts.

“Can you get the ladder from the back?” Sunwoo asks, tone of voice not at all interested. You don’t know what the reasoning behind his mood is, but you figure it’s either the fact that he had to get up before 12, or the fact that he doesn’t really seem like the type to like decorating.

“Why don’t you get it?” you huff, wiping your forehead off the sweat that’s cumulated on it over the time you spent bringing out all the boxes full of decorations out of the staff room. “I brought everything in, maybe you can do some work for once.”

One would think your dynamics with Kim Sunwoo would shift after he’s been nice to you on multiple occasions. And sure, you don’t really fight with him as often and he hasn’t pulled a prank on you in a while, but some days, his whole presence is still just as annoying to you as it’s been for the past couple of months. There’s not really much you can do about it– especially not when he’s bossing you around and not doing any actual work himself.

“I built the christmas tree,” he grunts, opening one of the boxes full of ornaments, squinting at the contains with disgust on his face. “And I put up all the other useless stuff before you got here too,” he says, pointing a glare at you. 

Looking around the theater, you notice various types of decorations all over the place. There’s some mistletoe hanging off the ceiling (which has you wondering how he even got it there in the first place) and garlands framing all the doorways– the greenery making the whole place decorated in a very vintage tone. It’s fitting to the theme of the cinema, though, and you can tell that Sunwoo really can’t be arsed to do any better, so you don’t mention it out loud in favor of avoiding another one of your petty cat fights.

Admitting your defeat, you storm back into the staff room and carry out the tall ladder, struggling to fit through the doorways and to cross the corners, praying to all higher forces that you don’t accidentally scratch off pieces of the wall on your way to Sunwoo.

You put down the metal construction with a loud thud, making the boy look up at you from beneath his bangs, the silent curse evident in his eyes. You don’t know what’s up with him, but again, you won’t ask. You try to tell yourself that you don’t really care either, but with every glance towards his direction, the question keeps bugging you and dancing around your brain. 

You force yourself not to care.

Watching as he tries to untangle the Christmas lights, struggle evident in the frustration written all over his face, you sigh and walk over to him, taking the bundle of wire out of his hands and threading your skilled fingers through the lengthy cable. You’re an expert in untangling– you don’t own bluetooth headphones, so you do this pretty much every day before listening to some music. Your headphones love to tangle in your pocket no matter how neatly you try to keep them in your pants– it’s a mystery. Almost like the Bermuda triangle. 

“I can do it myself,” Sunwoo huffs, eyebrows furrowing when he watches you work your magic.

“You seemed like it too,” you ironically note, letting the spiteful side of you win, enjoying yourself when you’re rewarded by the snarky roll of Sunwoo’s eyes– everything is back to normal. You two aren’t friends, you don’t like to be in each other’s presence, and no number of shiny stolen posters and private sessions in the screening room will ever change that.

“Hold this,” you say, thrusting the end of the cord into his hand, walking a few meters away from him as you detangle the lights, watching as he impatiently stomps the floor with his heel, reminding you of Snowball from The secret life of pets movie.

When you’re done and the Christmas lights are now a straight line of wire, you slowly walk over to the tall tree in the middle of the room, wrapping the lights around the fake forest-green needles. You’re glad that the lights are long enough to cover the whole thing and you don’t have to untangle another ones, and when you’re done, you watch your coworker plug them in, examining the small, colorful light bulbs. 

“Okay, now the ornaments,” you say, more to yourself than to anybody in the room, as you waltz over to the boxes and take out the decorations varying in shapes and sizes. You don’t really know what color scheme Mr Kim wants you to go for– and you doubt Sunwoo is aware either, so you just take out the ornaments you find the most pretty and hang them all over the tree, making sure each branch is covered.

Sunwoo stands around for a while, unmoving as he watches you, before he sighs to himself and finally decides to help. You leave him be, thinking that it’s for the best if you two don’t speak today when he’s in such a bad mood, but you break that promise almost immediately when you stare back at the tree after retrieving some more ornaments from the box to your right and notice the almost painful clash of colors.

You should’ve known you can’t trust a man with decorating. The beautiful contrast of the baby pink and brown ornaments you put on the tree is now ruined by the green ones you intentionally left on the bottom of the box. The colors don’t go together at all and you want to claw your eyes out every second you have to stare at it.

“Sunwoo, those colors don’t go together at all,” you say, point and blank– no sugarcoating, no offensive words, just straight facts.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean, that tree looks terrifying, and it’s all because you ruined it,” you say.

Okay, maybe you are overreacting just the slightest. But isn’t there fun in making your coworker completely out of his mind? Is this your roles being reversed for the first time? Are you finally winning this little game? 

Nevertheless, you are enjoying the outburst that follows from Sunwoo. Mainly because he looks like a child throwing a tantrum as he huffs and takes off the green ornaments he put on to the tree and throws the handful back into the cardboard box, not really caring if they break or not. You’ll be replaying this scene in your head forever before you go to sleep, for the absolute frustration and annoyance on his face is one of your biggest trophies. Right now, though, you’re battling the urge to laugh.

“Fine, do it yourself, then,” Sunwoo says as he walks away from the tree, choosing to sit on the floor cross-legged, taking out his phone and scrolling through social media.

Again, you don’t know what’s gotten into him today, but you force yourself not to care. You have a job to finish here so you can go home and enjoy your day, and that’s why exactly you just shrug and finish putting on the pretty ornaments, admiring your work every once in a while when you take a break and stare on the tall tree, kind of breathless from the beauty.

You’re not really big on Christmas, but you must admit that this is fun. 

The sound of Sunwoo swiping through Instagram reels is the only thing accompanying your actions, and as you look over your shoulder and see his almost sad face, you bite your lip just to not ask him what’s the matter. You’re not supposed to care. And you don’t.

“Can’t you put some festive music on?” you ask instead, your lips just begging to have a conversation with the male, despite your best judgment.

“No,” Sunwoo barks back, not even taking his eyes off the phone as the sound of the reel changes into another one, a swipe of his thumb across the screen showing him another video. 

Nodding to yourself, you carefully try to pick out your next words. Not really sure how to address the male, you choose to approach him with a hint of humor you’re not sure he’ll appreciate. “What’s up with you? You’re bitchier than usual,” you say, scanning the male with cautious eyes.

Sunwoo stops for a while– a millisecond of him halting his scrolling, an action you wouldn’t notice if you weren’t trying to see any shift in his composure– before he speaks up again. “Nothing,” he shrugs.

“Okay,” you say, a tone of voice full of doubt. 

When you conclude that you’re not getting more answers out of him, you nod to yourself and dart back towards the Christmas tree, making sure you make more eye contact with the glossy ornaments than with your coworker sitting behind you on the ground. Not much time passes by before he speaks up again, though, tone of voice quiet and hesitant.

“I’m just not in the mood today,” he sighs, “I have a final next week and it’s stressing me out, I haven’t slept well in quite a few days, my dad’s making me work more than usual and on top of that, I absolutely hate winter.”

“You hate winter?” you choose to focus on the least serious topic of the little rant, not really knowing when your boundaries lay in discussing the more serious ones.

“Yeah,” Sunwoo chuckles, “it’s like a shittier fall. It’s cold and dark all the time. It would be different if it snowed, though. I love it when it snows.”

Snickering at his sudden confession, you shake your head. “You’re like a little kid.”

“I remember you calling me a child once,” Sunwoo hums in agreement.

“That was different,” you say, hoping to cheer the male up at least a bit with your usual quarrel.

“I figured by the way you threw the toilet brush to my chest,” Sunwoo laughs, the memory of torturing you fond in his brain. The poster he gave you almost made you forget about the fact that he managed to make your life a living hell for quite some time– maybe you should consider this a wake-up call.

The conversation quiets down for a bit, even the sound of Sunwoo’s Instagram reels discontinued as you two marvel in the now much more comfortable silence. Testing the waters, you clear your throat before speaking up again. “Don’t worry about that exam, by the way. I’m sure you’ll do well.”

“How would you know?”

“You’re clever. You need to be clever to come up with all various ways to make my life more miserable,” you say, smiling when you hear him let out a breath of air through his nose, signaling a silent laugh.

“Any advice on the sleepless nights?” he asks, tone of voice light and humorous.

“Less things in your head,” you hum, putting the last ornament onto one of the branches, satisfied with your work. “Or melatonin.”

“Noted,” he nods, sharing a smile with you.

Walking over to the boxes stored a few feet away from the male, you open up the slim one thrown on the side, holding up the star. Your eyes meet his, a carefree twinkle in your orbs when you try to cheer up the boy’s inner child by doing a child's favorite activity. “Do you want to put the star on?”

He fails you, though. “No.”

“Why not?”

“You decorated it all yourself, so you can do the star,” he shrugs, not really into your idea.

“Oh come on–”

“I don’t feel like standing up,” Sunwoo grunts, the joy on your insides finally dying down when you get a taste of his usual composure– the one that really can’t be arsed with anything. 

Sighing to yourself, you waltz over to the tall ladder, and despite your biggest worries, you continue climbing up the metal construction even when it wobbles and makes you fear you’re gonna fall. The whole thing is kind of unsteady and makes your heart thump in your throat, but you choose to get it over with and finally climb to the very top, outstretching your arm and putting the star on top of the tree, the decoration process now done and freeing you off your today’s work responsibilities.

Something akin to satisfaction beams in your insides as you climb down the ladder, and now, you’ll write this off to you being a little too excited with the vision of a face mask and popcorn at home– but your leg slips on one of the steps and despite the ladder being now magically steady, your body comes crashing down to the floor.

A yelp fights out of your throat, hands go flying in a desperate need to steady yourself or hold on to something that would make you not fall hard against the marble floor, when a miracle straight down from heaven comes to rescue in a form of flesh holding you up and shielding you from the fall, a grunt landing in your ears when your body settles into soft fabric of dark gray.

Head snapping to the source of the arms around your waist, surprised at the person’s strength used to balance you two on your feet as you fell (well, your knees buckled, but still, they haven’t yet hit the ground), you notice a pair of chocolate orbs staring down at you through a curtain of dark hair, wide eyes scanning your face and breathing out a puff of air.

“Look where you’re stepping next time, for fuck’s sake,” Sunwoo huffs, watching as your brain tries to process the near-death experience.

Registering his arms firmly placed around your waist (now realizing the soft fabric was the hoodie he’s been living in for the past few months), the citrusy scent of his cologne makes your head spin, eyes scanning his face in quick motions, as if not aware of who was your savior. You wonder how he even got to you on time (not really noticing him walking over to the ladder as soon as he saw it wobbling under you, holding it down to keep you from toppling over), and when your eyes curiously gaze at his chapped, yet plush lips, the warmth in your stomach makes you finally snap out of it. 

Untangling yourself out of his limbs, much like you did with the Christmas lights a few minutes ago, you clear your throat and try to get your breathing back to normal. Your knees are a little weak, but you write that off to the shock of falling. 

“This wouldn’t have happened if you just agreed to put the star on,” you complain, straightening your clothes as you walk over to the empty boxes nearby, stacking them into one another and avoiding all possible eye contact with the male.

It’s working– at least that’s what you keep telling yourself– up until you hear him chuckle and see a pair of hands taking the tower of boxes out of your hold, a charming grin sent your way as he walks away from you to the staff room. “If you say so.”

Okay, so it’s not working.

You’re fucked.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – THE PROPOSAL (2009)

“So… I was thinking,” Sunwoo starts one day, a bundle of rolled-up posters stacked up in his arms like a pyramid, puffs of cold air making clouds appear in front of his face as he speaks, “would you want to go see a movie with me?” he asks, tone of voice casual, as if he was asking you about the weather.

The poster you’re currently putting up into one of the glass holders outside of the cinema almost slips out of your frozen fingers out of shock, your heart skipping a beat. “Huh?” you hum, taking out a container full of pins out of your coat pocket and securing the poster to its designated place. “You want to bring money to your father’s competitor?” you joke.

“What? No,” he quickly replies, furrowing his brows as he shakes his head. “I meant, like, here,” he says, nodding towards the building to prove his point, taking a step aside when you close the glass door of the poster holder and move towards the next one, 3 more movie banners left to put up outside of the cinema. 

The wires in your brain work on full force, trying to clear out any confusion caused by his sudden invitation. Sure, you two have gotten closer ever since you talked with him at the Christmas tree a week ago, but still, you didn’t know it was enough to hang out outside of work hours. 

Instead of focusing the conversation on this unpredictable development, you turn towards clearing out the logistics instead. “How would we even do that? We either work at the same time or you work when I don’t and the other way around,” you say, taking the next poster from him and putting it up.

All of the movies airing the next two weeks are Christmas movies. Some of them are old, some of them are premieres, but still– you can’t really imagine watching a festive movie with your coworker. Up until last week, you thought of him as the next reincarnation of Grinch.

“I could get my sister to switch with me on a day you don’t work,” he hums, sheepish about his preposition. There’s something bashful in his tone, something shy in his gaze as he watches you put up the movie poster, but you try your hardest to ignore it for the sake of your sanity. You’re already having a hard time dealing with the fact that he appeared in your dreams twice since he caught you in his arms last week. You don’t need to add the switch in dynamic to the mix.

“Isn’t she underage?” you ask, snickering.

“Yeah, and?” he shrugs. “It’s a family business, Y/N. Everyone has to be included, underage or not.”

A laugh erupts out of your throat at the comment, shaking your head at the boy in disbelief. 

“What would you even wanna see? Those are all Christmas movies,” you say, moving along and focusing your attention to the glossy material in your fingers.

“I don’t see how that’s a problem,” he says. 

“Oh, it is,” you mutter, “I don’t like Christmas movies.”

Sunwoo grunts. “Well, I don’t really care. I saw your favorite movie with you, so you can return the favor and see my favorite movie with me,” he speaks up, making you roll your eyes at his words.

“There’s no way any of those movies is your favorite,” you note, doubtful tone haunting the boy.

“You wouldn’t know,” he laughs, making your heart do cartwheels at the sound, his teasing making you feel warmth despite the cold breeze trying to make your bones freeze into blocks of ice. 

“I won’t go unless I believe you,” you say, grinning as you close the glass box and take the last poster out of Sunwoo’s hands, watching as the boy puts his frozen fingers into the comfort of his warm jacket, shielding them from the cold. 

“Not fair.”

“Very fair, actually.”

“Oh come on,” he sighs, shaking his head in disagreement, “I thought we could watch a Christmas movie as a celebration to the end of semester,” he says, tone of voice almost pleading.

Securing the last banner into its designated place, you turn towards Sunwoo with an examining look on your face. He seems to be completely serious, eyes big pools of honey as he watches your face morph as you think. Something in your stomach makes it feel like it’s flying, making you clear your throat as you avert your gaze towards the line of Christmas movie posters on the brick wall. “Fine,” you gulp, “so what do you wanna watch?”

“The Polar Express,” he says, pointing towards the A3 scale you put up last, showing one of the movies that were older, but Mr Kim decided to air anyway– as if he was aware.

Fuck, you think. That’s my favorite. 

“Absolutely not,” you cough, “I hate that movie.”

“Huh? How?” he sighs, face full of disappointment. 

“Just because. It’s too long.”

“It’s not even two hours?”

Eyes quickly darting towards the poster, pupils shaking as you look towards the airing dates at the very bottom, you chew on your bottom lip, trying to find a way out. “You’re working on the 18th.”

“Okay, then we can go on the 19th,” Sunwoo says, determined to make you watch the movie with him. Why? You don’t even want to know at this point.

“I go home for Christmas break on the 19th,” you say, shrugging. “See? It wasn’t meant to be.”

“Y/N, come on–”

“Listen, can’t we just go back to hating each other instead of you annoying me about this stupid movie?” you sigh. In the whirlpool of events, you forgot just how insistent Sunwoo could be– who knows, maybe this was the real reason why you were so irritated with him in the first place.

Slowly walking back towards your workplace, hearing Sunwoo’s sneakers hit the ground behind you as he trails after you like a lost puppy, a sense of momentarily victory flows through your veins when you recognise that you found your way out. There was no way Mr Kim would let his underage daughter work instead of Sunwoo, and you truly were leaving home the evening of 19th. You already had a train ticket– you’re not gonna change your plans because of a man you despised just a few days ago.

“I never really hated you, by the way. Besides, you’re only saying that because you hate the movie,” Sunwoo grunts, chiming in front of you– making you think he’s being petty and doesn’t want to talk to you anymore, surprising you when he opens the door for you and offers you a solemn gaze, waiting for you to walk through the entryway and go back to work. (For you, it’s sitting in the ticket booth in silence. For Sunwoo, it’s pretending to work in the back, since his dad is absent today again)

Reciprocating his gaze, noticing the disappointment behind your coworker’s eyes, you feel something in your stomach drop, the weight of it so heavy you quickly avert your look. 

“Maybe,” you shrug.

And maybe, the true reason is something completely else. 

The words resonate through your brain– ‘I never really hated you, by the way’. Funny. Then what were all those months of torture all about?

You decide you no longer want answers.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – WHEN HARRY MET SALLY (1989)

You can’t believe you’re doing something nice for Kim Sunwoo.

Shoes hitting the gravel, your scarf pulled up so it covers your nose from the ice cold air, a hat hugging your head in warmth and shielding you from the aggressive weather, you start to contemplate your choices and your next moves. A sigh escapes your throat when your eyes land on the marquee above the entrance of the movie theater, teeth chewing on the inside of your cheek as you shift your weight from one foot to another.

Pulling out your phone to check the time, a shiny 7:24PM stares back at you, pushing you to walk up to the door of your workplace on your day off, 24 minutes after the beginning of The polar express. 

You feel silly. You feel oh so stupid when you push the door open and your body is immediately engulfed in warmth, the yellow dim lights of the cinema making your eyes slowly adjust to the brightness contrasting the darkness of the outside world. You feel like you must have gone crazy, especially when your insides start to get all light and bubbly, hints of nerves tingling at the tips of your fingertips and the deepest corners of your stomach. There’s no turning back now, you tell yourself– and when your feet automatically take you to the ticket booth, gaze landing on the boy with his bangs in his eyes and an expression worthy of a kicked puppy on his face, you suddenly feel like your trip to the cinema was all worth it.

Clearing your throat, you notify your coworker of your presence, his big, doe eyes staring at you in surprise. Sunwoo’s mouth goes agape, shock overtaking his features when he takes in your appearance. (You bet he thinks you look laughable– your eyes teary from the cold and your figure stoic, numb limbs hanging by your side.)

“What are you doing here?” he asks, the question not as aggressive as it sounded out of your lips every time he paid a visit to the cinema on his days off for all these months.

“Uh… I forgot some things in the back and I wanted to take them home tomorrow, so I came back for them,” you hum, the practiced excuse slipping out of your lips with ease, “can you come help me?” 

Sunwoo looks even more surprised at your question– although there is now a hint of confusion in the mix. What could you possibly have in the back to need his help with? For as far as he knows, you only ever kept your work uniform in your locker. “What? Can’t you get it yourself…?” he asks, noticing as you shake your head in disapproval.

“It’s… it’s on the top of the lockers and I can’t reach it, so-”

“Grab a chair…?” 

You didn’t really expect to have Sunwoo question your half-assed excuse. Truly, you thought this was going to go smoothly– but knowing Kim Sunwoo, you should’ve known it was never going to go the way you planned. You’re determined to win, though. 

And so it’s the time to bring out the big guns– men never say no when you praise them and make yourself look incompetent.

“Please? I don’t feel like bringing a chair and you’re tall enough. It will only take a second…” you pout, watching as the male in front of you sighs and stands up from his seat, nodding at your humble request.

Sunwoo follows you as you walk down the corridor, your heart thumping with the start of your little plan. Your steps are calculated and your movements carefully programmed, the nervousness in your stomach making you even more giddy with every meter of distance you two cross. 

Before you two get a chance to make it to the back, you make a swift turn and open the doors to one of the rooms on the left of the hall, dragging Sunwoo by his hand and tugging him inside. His body stumbles against yours, but the door closes behind him faster than he can react to the impact. Steadying the boy back to his feet, you watch him with anticipation, awaiting his reaction.

The truth is, you haven’t thought the plan out this far. The depiction of it in your brain always ended with you sneaking him into the projecting room and his curious eyes peering into yours. Something about the image of the events always made you feel too overwhelmed– you never dared to imagine the situation further. (That would mean admitting some hidden desires to yourself, so you never even tried. That all makes this situation twice as nerve-wrecking, though.)

“What… are we doing here?” he asks, eyes darting around the darkness of the projection room, the only light illuminating his pretty features being the movie playing behind the glass of the small booth.

“Didn’t you say you wanted to watch The polar express with me?” you ask, voice a few octaves higher than usual. 

“I… did…” he mumbles, confusion making him stumble over his own words.

“Well, you are working and I leave tomorrow, so I figured I had to find a way…” you shrug, watching as Sunwoo looks at you a little frozen, big eyes staring you down, gears turning in his head. You can’t really read him– you don’t really know if he’s going to laugh at you or send you home for ruining his shift. You don’t know if he appreciates the gesture, or if he thinks you’re being embarrassing. You don’t know if he registers the slight tremble of your hands and the lightness of your breathing, you don’t know if he realizes how much his reaction could make your day or completely ruin it (just like always), and so, you panic– and when you panic, you ramble. “I know we are technically not supposed to be here– well, me, at least– but I think that being with the owner’s son could make my boss let me off even if he somehow finds out, which I doubt he will, but–”

Sunwoo’s face starts slowly morphing, the slightest of shifts slowly adding up to a change of expression, having the male break out into the biggest, happiest grin you’ve ever seen him sport. His eyes light up and glaze your features in the softest of touches, his head shaking in disbelief. “Oh, you’re adorable.”

“What?” you ask, your heart doing seven somersaults and five cartwheels, eyes a big pool of surprise.

“You did this for me?” he beams, his grin so big and pretty it takes your breath away. Butterfly wings tickle in your stomach at the sight, having you mentally curse yourself– hold it together, Y/N. 

“I- I mean, I didn’t really do anything, we just sneaked in–”

“This is the sweetest thing you’ve ever done for me,” Sunwoo hums, the teasing tone making its comeback in his voice, “actually, this might be the first sweet thing you’ve ever done for me–”

“Well, okay,” you roll your eyes, an embarrassed laugh dragging out of your throat as you turn on your heel and walk closer to the little table in the opposite end of the room, needing to avert your gaze from the boy for at least a second. The air is suddenly too heavy and it’s hard for you to breathe, heat rushing to your cheeks. 

Eyes focusing on the screen in front of you, your brain tries hard to focus on your favorite Christmas movie. Failing, your head running thoughts full of conflicting emotions and erratic exclamation marks screaming the name of the boy behind you, you ask yourself how and when exactly you’ve gotten yourself into this mess.

Maybe you shouldn’t have gotten this job in the first place.

Ears painfully alert, listening to each sound heard in the small projecting room– the shuffling of Sunwoo’s feet as he nears your figure, the muffled noise of the movie playing in the screening room in front of you, the resonance of your own heartbeat in your ears as Sunwoo’s hands suddenly sneak around your middle, your jacket squeaking from the contact of his limbs as he hugs you.

“What–”

“Don’t fight me, Y/N. Just this once,” he hums, voice deep, but still a bit hesitant. It’s like he’s walking on unsteady land, cautious of his movements in fear of making you run away. He’s in a new territory, in your personal space– the scent of his cologne fills your nostrils again as his head settles itself on your shoulder, the two of you silently watching the movie for a few seconds, not really knowing how to proceed.

There’s something intimate in the way he holds you, in the way the movie is a mere background noise to the marathon of your thoughts, the blue light illuminating your faces as you both try your hardest to keep your cool. 

A flashing thought of just how much you from a few months ago would hate the position it’s  in right now passes by your brain, making you instantly feel foolish. Oh how much you’d love it if you stood here unaffected right now– there’s no way to battle the warmth flooding your insides right at this moment, though.

“This is nice,” he mumbles, voice barely louder than a whisper. “Thank you,” he says, your insides squeezing at the sincerity. It’s not often you get to see this side of Sunwoo– the sweet, patient one, the side of him that makes you feel safe in his arms and appreciated with the soft tone in his words. And while you realize you don’t hate the playful side of him just as much as you thought you did, you must admit the novelty of the situation makes you feel a bit more joyful than you’d like to admit.

The weight of his head disappears from your shoulder, making you feel momentarily disappointed by the action. You expect him to pull away and take a seat on the chair, to finally focus on the movie playing in front of your eyes, the thought alone making your spirit fall. The fire in your inside lights up like a match thrown into a pool of gasoline just as fast again, though, when you feel soft lips come in contact with your cheek.

They stay only for a second before they disappear, an airy laugh landing in your ear a second later. “Please don’t run away now,” he says, tone of voice uncertain, telling you that now the ball is in your court– your next actions could either make him the happiest man on Earth, or completely break him. 

The choice is yours.

Your head turns his way, eyes instantly locking with his brown orbs searching for any signs of discomfort in your face. Slowly, as if still processing the events of before, your eyes trail over his features– the awfully handsome way his face was sculpted, the softness of his eyes and the sharpness of his jaw, the slope of his nose and the plushness of his lips. They’re not as chapped today, making you wonder if he started wearing vaseline, and before you get a chance to stop yourself, you start wondering of the way his lips would feel on yours, imagination running wild. 

He heaves out a shaky breath, your eyes darting back into his– as if to ask for approval, see if he’s okay with it. There’s a dazy look in them, gaze pressed to your lips, then to your eyes, then your lips again– a look you take as an invitation as you act against all your best judgment and lean towards him, pressing your mouth against his.

As if testing the waters, you make the kiss short. It was long enough to engrave it into your brain, though– to remember the way his perfectly shaped lips pressed against yours, the way the world stopped just for a moment, the way he tasted of the strawberry mints he always eats at work whenever he has nothing to do. 

Sunwoo seems to find liking in the action– lips glazing yours again, pressing another peck to them before he deepens the kiss, the tingling in your fingertips intensifying and the excitement bubbling in your frame making you turn in your position, front facing him and pressing up against his chest. His hands quickly adjust, slipping under your opened jacket and settling on your clothed waist, the slightest contact making your knees weak and settle your bottom against the table behind you, hands grabbing the fabric of his sweatshirt. 

He pulls back to catch some air, a boyish grin breaking out on his face, forehead knocking against yours in a sweet, giddy manner. “I’ve wanted to do this for months,” he huffs.

The sentiment makes a thousand question marks appear in your head– why did he make your life a living hell, then? Why did he pull pranks on you and make you hate every second spent with him? Why did he make you so furious each time and argued with you about the smallest things? How could Sunwoo possibly have wanted this for months, when you just only started noticing his attractiveness a few weeks ago?

“Why–”

“I’ll tell you later,” he says, cutting you off as he presses his lips against yours again, your mouth automatically welcoming his presence. Brain erased of all previous questions, his kisses working like a spell, you focus all your senses on the man in front of you.

Having your hands feeling up his abdomen, Sunwoo hesitantly asks for entrance with his tongue, running it along your lower lip until you welcome him in. You like this type of power battle much more than the one you had going on until now, and with each new movement, you feel yourself falling apart under him. 

His fingers tug down on the sides of your jacket, pulling it down. You don’t need it anymore– with how heated you’ve gotten, you are actually kind of happy that it is gone. One of his cold hands sneaks under the hem of your jumper, fingertips trailing up and down your side, the other one tugs down the hat from your head, discarding it somewhere on the table behind you before it finds its place on the side of your jaw, angling your head in a way that allows him to deepen the kiss even more, the contact of your lips growing firmer as seconds go by. 

Your scarf is swiftly untangled off your neck, Sunwoo’s skilled lips blindly trailing down the side of your mouth towards your jaw, feathery kisses ticking you before he gets more bold and sucks on the side of your throat, a shaky breath shyly escaping your lips.

“Sunwoo…” you say, tone of voice not really present, no real intention behind the call of his name.

The boy hums against your neck, having you gasp again when he lightly bites the softness of your skin, your hands shooting up to tangle in his hair when he licks the spot to soothe it after. Threading your fingers through his locks to ground yourself, you can’t believe you ever hoped for him to get a trim.

His hands firmly hold the underside of your thighs before he hoists you up on the table, continuing his confident attack on your neck when you’re sitting comfortably on the hard surface. It’s not like you didn’t feel excited, the tiniest bit thrilled at the mental image of his possessive marks all over your throat, but you were glad it was freezing outside and you could wear a turtleneck to hide the bruises from your family tomorrow. He nuzzles his nose into the hot skin of your neck, the action making you grin in ecstasy and endearment.

Getting lost in the way he was handling you, his touches firm, yet delicate, acted out in a way that makes you feel safe and comfortable with his passionate ministrations, you almost don’t notice the door swinging open, the figure of your boss like striking like the lightning in the doorway of the screening room.

“Sunwoo!”

The boy jumps, his body quickly ungluing itself off yours, as he listens to his father scolding him. “I don’t care what you two have going on over here, but you’re on clock! There’s a line waiting for the tickets for tomorrow’s movie and someone has to sell them right now.”

The boy clears his throat, voice a little hoarse. “Coming,” he says, trying to keep his composure. His hair’s a little tousled, cheeks rosy and lips puffed– the image that will haunt you in your sweetest nightmares now– and before you get a chance to say anything or let your brain process the events of the last few minutes, your panic works faster, making you act.

Quickly scattering for your things, you run out of the projecting room without saying goodbye to either Sunwoo or your boss, never once looking back.

You think of what you’ve done on your way home, bones freezing now that they weren’t in his presence. You try hard to regret your actions, but you don’t find it in you to do so– it’s kind of hard with the feeling of his lips still playing with yours.

Even though you’d hate to admit it just a few weeks ago, you must do it now. 

Kim Sunwoo does make a really good kisser.

TONIGHT’S PREMIERE – PRIDE AND PREJUDICE (2005)

There are many thoughts swimming around your brain as you walk through the coldness of the town the next day, your duffel bag hanging off your shoulder. There’s a conflict between the actions of your body and your thoughts – feet on their journey to the train station, but head stuck in the small projection room of your workplace, your coworker’s kisses occupying your every sober thought.

It’s not surprising, but you haven't heard from Sunwoo since you left the cinema last night. Not a single text or a call– but you figure that this is just your dynamic. Sunwoo’s never been much of a texter when it came to you. He’s never had the reason to text or call you, unless it was work-related, and you think it will stay that way, even though you did make out with him just last night.

Maybe he regretted it. Maybe he just didn’t feel like pondering on the events any longer– maybe it was just a one-time thing for him and he didn’t put much significance to it. You wouldn’t know– it’s not like you’re suddenly an expert on the way he feels and operates. 

You, though? How do you feel about the turn of events? Despite not wanting to admit it to yourself, the answer came to you the second you tried to fall asleep last night, every soaring thought in your brain showing you the reflection of his dazed look, desires of wanting him to look at you that way all the time oh so skilfully infesting themselves into every crevice of your neocortex. You want Sunwoo to like you. You want Sunwoo to want you. You want Sunwoo to be so enchanted with your existence that he thinks about you before he goes to sleep at night– just like you have done for the past few weeks. 

The answer comes to you again when you feel something wet fall on the top of your cheek, making you turn your eyes towards the sky. Your breathing comes out in puffs of air as you watch the magic happen right in front of you– and as you watch the snowflakes scatter all around the place, you are in another inner argument. While the rational side of your brain is screaming at you to keep walking to the station so you don’t miss your train home, the delirious side is cooperating with your feet for once, your figure crossing to the other side of the street and walking over to the place you could get to even with your eyes closed at this point; all because you suddenly remember the conversation you had with Sunwoo when you were putting on ornaments to the Christmas tree.

It’s the first snow of the season. 

Kim Sunwoo loves it when it snows.

Speed-walking towards the vintage movie theater at the corner of the town’s square, you feel something akin to childish excitement bubbling in your insides, a hint of nervousness inviting itself into your insides when you push the door open and aim straight towards the ticket booth, where you know Sunwoo will be sitting, wasting another shift away.

He’s there– eyes pressed towards the window, gaze following the snowflakes kissing the cold ground. You expected more excitement in his character, more childlike joy in his figure– and after taking in his composure: shoulders slouching and fingers picking at the skin of his cuticles, you suddenly feel silly for coming.

Well, here goes nothing, you think.

“Sunwoo,” you call, making the boy snap his head towards you in surprise, big eyes meeting yours the moment he recognises your voice.

You don’t receive a verbal response for a while. The boy just stares at you, a bit hesitant and clueless. His face reminds you of a small puppy trying to take in the new situation in front of it. His lips are formed into a small pout, gears in his brain turning and trying to process the reality of having you standing there, face beaten from the cold.

Clearing your throat, you try to take charge of the situation. “It’s snowing outside,” you say, eyes peering out of the window, all thoughts suddenly escaping your brain, words blanking off your tongue, “and, well… you said you like the snow, so…”

The boy’s mouth hangs agape, a twinkle in his eyes slowly appearing once again when he stares at you, your nervousness doing wonders to your conversation skills. “I- I don’t even know what I wanted to say with that, it’s just- I don’t know… I saw it was snowing and I automatically came here, so-” you stutter, the sentence cutting off as Sunwoo jumps to his feet and grins, wordlessly taking your hand into his and dragging you outside.

The duffel bag falls off your shoulder somewhere in the middle of the hall, discarded to the floor, before Sunwoo sharply halts in his steps and runs back towards the ticket booth, still dragging you with him by the hand. The boy grabs something off the table, the item not visible in your rear point of view, and before you have a chance to register what’s happening, you’re outside of the building again, coldness instantly slapping you in the face.

It’s dark out, but the heaviness of the snow provides enough light in the silent evening for you to see where you’re going under the yellow lampposts on the street. Instantly noticing the lack of Sunwoo’s warm hand in yours when he suddenly lets go, you turn your head to look at the male.

Terror fills your veins when you notice him gathering snow from the ground and pressing it into a tight ball, a screech escaping your throat when you watch him swing it at you, a playful, boyish grin playing with his features. The male chases you around and most of the snowballs don't even hit your running figure (he does have an awful aim), but you still duck anyway and try your hardest to win your snowball fight.

Numb fingers creating snowballs and halting them at his tall frame, but missing most of the time due to his fast reflexes, you laugh and let go of all the worries and questions clouding your judgment. Sunwoo looks enthusiastic, so much more lively than when you found him in the ticket booth just a few minutes ago– but that’s still not enough for you to let him win.

Gathering the icy texture into your hands, you run towards him, taking advantage of his inattention as he’s bent over and taking more snow into his hold, and halt the whiteness into his face just as he straightens his back and wants to prepare for his attack.

More laughter bubbles out of your chest when you watch him drop his snowball to the ground, admitting defeat. The snow is all over his face– slowly running down his cheeks like teardrops, redness tinting his nose and the sides of his face. 

The male shudders from the cold, and you instantly start feeling bad. Only now you realize that he ran out without a coat, a gasp escaping your throat. “Oh god,” you mourn, hands flying towards his frozen face to wipe off the snow from his cheeks, fingers carefully tracing over his cold skin. His eyes open as he watches you, something in his gaze so tender you feel yourself melting even in the middle of the snowstorm.

The male shuffles his hands into the front pocket of his gray hoodie, taking out the item you now recognise to be the hat you accidentally forgot in the projecting room yesterday (and already mentally paid goodbye to), his frozen fingers tugging the fabric onto your head. 

“Why are you putting this on me? You’re the one that’s freezing over here!” you scold him, shaking your head at the male. 

He rewards you with an amused grin, watching your next moves. Acting on auto-pilot, not really putting much thought into your actions, you unzip your jacket and step impossibly near to the male. Holding the jacket open, you hug him around his middle, making sure you are sharing the warmth with him and keeping him as close as possible, shielding him from the cold with both the fabric of your puffer jacket and the heat radiating off your body.

Faces just inches away from each other, you peer at his face. He wears a warm expression, eyes peeking out from behind his dark bangs. Clouds of breath escape his mouth when he speaks, voice quiet, as if to not ruin the atmosphere. “I thought you would regret it,” he says, making you break out into a foolish smile.

“I thought so too,” you nod.

“And you don’t?”

Shrugging, you reply. “Not really.”

“Why?” he asks, suddenly doubtful. “You said you hated me. Which was odd to hear, honestly, since I did all this to get your attention anyway and I thought it was just how our dynamic works, but… I could see how it could be annoying to you…”

Chuckling, you roll your eyes at the sudden revelation. It’s sickeningly sweet how endearing he looks when he doubts himself, explaining himself to you in a nervous blabber. “I don’t hate you. At least not anymore.”

“You don’t?”

“No,” you shake your head, a tender gaze shared between the two of you, “I actually quite like you, I think…” you mumble, a little bashful to admit it out loud.

“You do?” he asks, the twinkle in his eye glimmering twice as much as ever before, tone of voice playful, yet laced with honest joy and surprise at your confession.

“I do,” you nod, voice barely louder than a whisper as you watch him lean closer towards your face, cold nose bumping into yours before he angles his head, breath mixing in with yours in the few seconds before he dares to kiss you again, capturing your lips with his.

The kiss is sweet. The kiss tastes of strawberry mints and the first snow, of unsaid confessions and longing looks sent your way every time you weren’t looking. The kiss makes your stomach fill with a thousand little butterflies, it melts away the ice around you, the two of you like a spark of a fire in the middle of a snowy land. 

His actions have your composure faltering, hands untangling from behind him and moving up to cradle his face. He melts under your touch, leaning into you as your fingers trail over his cheekbones. Holding on to him, thumbs padding his soft skin, you’re reminded of the cold only when he breaks off you and shudders again, teeth clattering from the freezing temperature.

“Let’s get you inside,” you say, planting a short peck to his lips, “before you turn into an icicle,” you giggle, watching as he scrunches up his face.

“I won’t,” he shakes his head, “love warms me up,” he grins, making you roll your eyes at his bold statement.

“You’re so cheesy.”

“But you quite like me anyways, no?”

Sighing, moving away from him and tugging him back inside the cinema, you shake your head at the boy. “I’ll think about it on my train home,” you bite back, opening the door to the theater and aiming towards the duffel bag you dropped on your way out.

Sunwoo watches you with a warm gaze, an adorable smile playing with his lips. His figure seems to be visibly taking in the heat again, his face adorning a flush, pink color. 

“So I take it as you’re not quitting anymore, then?” he teases as you walk back to the door, both of you ignoring the customers waiting for their tickets in the line in front of the forgotten booth.

“We’ll see,” you shrug.

“I’ll text you the schedule for January?”

“You better text me about something else too, Kim Sunwoo,” you bark back, opening the door towards the cold landscape, “or you’re gonna have a very uncomfortable return back to work in January!”

The boy laughs, the noise like a Christmas carol to your ears. “Noted.”

Slipping outside, you watch as he waves at you goodbye, your feet dragging through the snow towards the train station having more pep to their step now. You don’t even know if you can make it to the train on time, but you surprisingly have no regrets– you can always catch the next one, right?

Mentally wanting to slap yourself for the lovesick grin playing with your lips, you sigh. 

The male that once made your life a living hell is now the one you look forward to seeing the most once you come back after Christmas break. It’s kind of strange, really. 

One would think that working with movies on the daily would prepare you better for the biggest plot twist of your life.

[itsthatmff]

helllooo, can you write boyfriends headcanons with other men like flashy flash and amai mask please? ~

IM FINALLY BACK WITH MORE HEADCANONS! writing for these was so hard- it was my first time doing amai mask too- I hope they turned out well 😩

Please keep the requests incoming I’ll try to work through them! I’m sorry for taking so long and Thank you so much for the patience.

Boyfriend Headcanons on OPM men Pt. 2

Fem!reader

Included: Flashy flash, Amai mask, Saitama, Zombie man

Flashy Flash

Having him as a boyfriend sure isn’t for the weak

He’s definetly the leader of the sassy man apocalypse

He takes his night routine SERIOUSLY like you will have a 20 step hair routine and a spa session

He gives great hair care tips though

Lets you braid his hair when you’re bored or does your hair when you’re tired

Gossiping with him is super fun

When he’s annoyed or jealous he scoffs a lot

Tiny bit reluctant over physical affection but his hugs and kisses feel so gentle, you could melt into them.

He goes all out when you’re on your period, like he knows exactly what you need and what to do.

Gifts you hairclips on random occasions !

Doesn’t like you touching his katana cuz he’s worried you’ll hurt yourself.

You get the best dates with him because he knows the best spots, prefers staying at home with you though in case one of his opps are after him.

He does bicker with you from time to time because he knows you too well and can’t be bothered to deal with your overdramatic ass

"Yeah fine we get it you’re just angry because you’re craving some desserts. Stop whining and lets go get it.“

Amai Mask

Might seem like a narcissistic and selfish bastard at first but he really just has issues

As a boyfriend he might not be able to spend much time with you since he is a hero AND a celebrity with a filled schedule

Makes sure to spoil you rotten tho

You get expensive gifts from him on a weekly basis and he takes you out to the best restaurants

He has to be very discreet with your relationship since it could cause him a bad reputation and backlash from the media

Whenever he’s overwhelmed or had a bad day he seeks comfort in your embraces

Feels like you’re the only one who understands him

Genuinely opens up to you and shows you his vulnerable side from time to time

He gets VERY jealous like he better not catch you admiring some other hero

At first he’d laugh it off not wanting to believe such a thing but slowly the jealousy would start creeping up

“You’re mine understood?”

Is just scared of u leaving him

He calls to tell you there’s a new magazine out that features him and wants you to buy it.

Thinks you’re his biggest supporter and likes to brag about you.

Saitama

Dates consist of gaming or getting deals at different supermarkets

I can totally imagine that he’s willing to try some new things at the convenience store with you and do taste tests.

Never rates the food a 10/10 cuz he thinks Genos could do it better.

YES sometimes Genos DOES make dinner dates for you two, he goes all out making a 5 star dinner for his sensei and his girlfriend.

Saitama secretly loves it when you come and sit on his lap as he watches tv.

He may not look like it but he really notices the small details, like he’ll ask if you put on different perfume or shampoo. Does it so sleek too.

He’d lean in to your neck and WHISPER INTO YOUR EAR

"Hm..you smell so good, got a new perfume?“

This guy just knows how to get you flustered

Is very nonchalant about most things, doesn’t really get jealous. (Unless you’re being overly nice to someone that has like really good hair)

“Yo genos. How much do you think a hair transplant costs?”

“Why are you asking sensei?”

“No reason really..” as he GLARES at the guy you’re talking to.

Doesn’t call you often, more like he randomly texts you what he’s doing and if your schedule matches his you both hangout.

Wants to climb up the ranks in order to impress you and loves to tell you about his day when he gets home.

Gets the most expressive around you.

He kicks out Genos when you two need your private time.

Gives the best piggy back rides.

Zombieman

Hands down the best boyfriend out there

He’s so chill about everything

Likes to take you everywhere with him, especially on shooting ranges, coffee shops or jazz bars

Respects your boundaries a lot, if you don’t like the smoke from his cigarettes he’ll try not to smoke around you, if you’re a smoker yourself he always looks forward to smoke some with you.

You both have a very casual relationship, there’s no awkwardness at all nor the cheesiness and pampering

That also includes physical affection. Cuddling on the couch or holding hands seems natural to you.

As nihilistic as he is, he can’t hide whenever he’s jealous.

“Was it fun chatting to that human?” He’d ask whilst pressing down the last remaining of his cigarette onto the whiskey glass. He wasn’t upset, more like curious of what you saw in another man.

Only calls you in the evenings after he walks you home. Likes to hear your voice before he goes to sleep.

He loves to get you roses

Asks childish emperor for advice on what to get you. Doesn’t even realise himself that he slips in your name in every conversation.

Is the kind of boyfriend that is happy enough to just watch you from afar.

Never ever gets aggressive with you. In fact you’ve never seen him angry.

Likes to polish his guns while you sit on his lap.

[mattsjuul]

GRAVITY. chris sturniolo

༣ summary: chris is on tour and misses his girlfriend .ᐟ ♡

༣ pairing: clingy!reader & tour!chris

༣ warnings: suggestive, just a cute lil oneshot tbh, pet names ( i think only one tho ), long distance ???? idk

༣ authors note ♡: ok i rlly didnt know what to do for this tbh i js wanted to write for chris lol!!!! this MIIIGHT get a pt 2 tho. so twoshot!

you stand in your kitchen, your mind constantly filled with thoughts of your boyfriend while he's off on tour. is he sleeping? maybe he's eating something. i hope he's enjoying it. is he gonna call me? isnt he in new york? thats three hours ahead. three whole hours. so if its six pm here then its... seven... eight.. nine. nine pm there? so is he asleep? i dont know if tour's got him sleepy. gosh. can he call me? i bet he looks so good right now. fuck. then your thoughts are interrupted by a very specific text tone. it's chris! "Hey" "R u busy imy" you read, causing you to almost start jumping for joy in front of your open fridge. although you do a little squeal instead. "definitely not" "call me im begging" you reply. "I like that" he replies, making you giggle to yourself. seconds later, your screen lights up with a picture of chris with a big smile holding your dear friend, madison, 's cat.

"well hellloooo" you answer with a smile far too big. "hey sexy" he smiles back just as much. "i've been waiting for this call" you admit. "yeah? you been thinking about me?" he asks in a cocky tone. but it was lowkey doing things to you. well. highkey. "you'd like that wouldnt you?" you ask. "yeah." he proudly says. "i was actually about to rub one out since im alone. show me your tits" he jokes. "don't tempt me" you giggle. "i mean.. you're free to do whatever you want. you're an adult with free will in your own home" he babbles on. you take a deep breath, honestly debating it. why not? he's seen them pleennttyy of times. more so, touched them plenty of times.

"ya' know." he interrupts your debating. "i've had lots of time to think. especially to think about you. and ya' know, we're never really apart for longer then a week. and it's made me realize that you really hold me down. i feel like i need at least one night with you every week to function. not like night.. i mean one sleep. i feel like it's made me sleep not so well. is that crazy? i'm not making sense. but then also, it'll be like 10 am here and i'll argue with nick or matt and i cant run to you. you'd be asleep and i dont want you to be upset the moment you wake up. i hate this seperation. i hate making you wait.. like what if you stop liking me before i get back. fuck. you're not hanging out with that actor guy you like, right?" he goes ooonnn n on. well boobs wouldnt be too appropriate right now. "okay.. no" you reply for starters. "and i dont think it's crazy. i get it. but you're veeeryyy cute for thinking all this. i love you chris. i miss you so much." i say. "i love you. can i see your boobs?" he asks, a giggle escaping your lips at his very stupid words.

yet you lift your top up, getting a shocked look from chris. "oh.. i like those.. a lot." he says, a big smile on your face as you shake 'em a little. "just.. stay there for a second" he says, seeing him moving around, clearly pulling his sweats down. "join me, yeah?"

a/n: ohhhhh em geeee.... idk if i like this tbh lol. but lmk if u want a part two w phone sex hehe. im sorry its so so short sad face.. i actually rlly liked writing this tho idk. yaaay hope u like :') ♡ lmk if there r any mistakes pls i didnt proof read!!!!!! (im in class..) 🐻‍❄️

[wands-natsthing]

𝐖𝐞𝐥𝐥 𝐁𝐞𝐲𝐨𝐧𝐝 𝐌𝐲 𝐘𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐬

HEYYYY HIII HELLOOOO long time I KNOW IM SORRY LSKDKD AND I KNOW I SAID THE WEEKEND BUT I GOT SICK

buttt just to give a lil info, since it has been so long since I updated I put the last bit of chapter 2 at the beginning of this just as a refresher I guess!! And more overall story info (R=23) (W=30) (N=34)

I also wrote kinda like a Wanda’s POV of what happened in the janitors closet so let me know if you want that!!

Feedback is more than welcome!! I love reading all your comments they make me feel like my writing isn’t shit 🤓 and they make me smile :)) I also tried to make this as open as possible this is for everybody!! (I hope I worded that right) I mean as in there rlly no descriptions of r

Warnings: I really don’t think there are any besides maybe it starts to seem a little homewreckery BUT ITS NOT I PROMISE!!

Word count: 1.3k

Summary: You guys come out the closet and have lunch idk

"Who's the woman standing outside the door with you?" you asked.

You can tell Wanda hadn't been expecting your question by the way her eyes widened.

"Oh um, that's Natasha, After you graduated I started teaching a co-taught English class and well she's the co-teacher." She paused before confirming the suspicion you had earlier. 

"She's also my wife…" 

Your heart dropped. 

“Your- your wife…You got married? You ask with a tremble in your voice. 

“Yeah, I did um just a few years ago…” 

“Oh- that's uh, that's cool. Um, congratulations.” 

Wanda’s smile faltered slightly as she sensed the mix of emotions swirling inside you. The joy in her eyes seemed to dim ever so slightly, replaced by a hint of concern.

“I know it’s a lot to take in,” she said quietly, her voice softening. "Maybe we could talk more about everything over Lunch?"

Your eyes snapped up at that. The thought of having lunch with her again all these years later was just too enticing to pass up, no matter how many messing feelings it brought again.

"Lunch? Are you- are you sure?" You asked with a hopeful smile on your face.

"Yes, I'm more than sure. I am positive." She reassured you with a gentle touch of her hand running up and down your forearm.

"Okay, then yes I would love to."

"great! What about this weekend at 1:00 at the cafe we saw each other last week? (a/n: Its Wednesday)

"That's perfect!"

"Okay good then it's a date." She said scrunching her nose up in a way that always made your heart melt.

Date.

"I am so sorry, but I better get back, can't leave Natasha by herself for too long with all those parents and kids out there, But I can't wait for our lunch date!"

Date. There goes that word again.

“Yes, of course, I’m sorry for keeping you for so long,” you replied, trying to shake off the rush of emotions swirling in your mind.

Wanda smiled warmly, as if she could sense the turmoil within you. “No need to apologize. It’s nice to catch up, I've missed you."

You both stood there for a moment, staring into each other's eyes. The bustling sounds from the school faded slightly as you locked eyes.

“Alright, I better get going,” she said after a pause, and you could hear the softer undertones of sadness in her voice. “But I’ll see you this weekend, okay?”

“Yeah, I’m really looking forward to it,” you replied, offering her a genuine smile.

Wanda gave you one last look, her expression revealing a mix of excitement and a hint of uncertainty before she opened the door of the janitor's closet.

You took a deep breath, calming your racing heartbeat. You had so many thoughts swirling through your head but at the same time, you felt as if you couldn't think.

As you finally turned to head out back to your car, you felt a strange sense of hope take root inside you.

You couldn’t help but replay the moment in your mind, the surprise of learning she was married mixed with the thrill of the upcoming lunch. It was complicated, but one thing was clear: you wanted to explore this. No matter how much it might hurt in the end.

The rest of the week felt like an eternity. You replayed snippets of conversations you had shared over the years, moments of laughter, and even the unspoken feelings that had lingered in the air. Each thought made the anticipation for the weekend grow stronger.

Finally, Saturday arrived. You stood in front of your mirror, carefully selecting your outfit for lunch. The end of summer's warmth lingered in the air, but a hint of fall was beginning to whisper in the breeze. You chose a lightweight mustard-yellow sweater, perfect for the transition between seasons. Its soft knit hugged your figure comfortably.

For pants, you chose a pair of high-waisted, olive-green corduroy pants that offered both warmth and style. The slightly flared legs provided a retro vibe, making them an ideal choice for early autumn. On your feet, you wore your black Converse. Always a staple in your outfits.You topped everything off with a silver chain that went slightly past your collarbone and small gold hoops that reflected off the light.

Never understood the big deal about mixing silver and gold.

And a light spritz of your favorite fall-inspired perfume, with notes of vanilla and sandalwood, completed the look, a warm scent perfect for the season.

As the clock ticked closer to 1:00, doubts and anxiety started creeping in.

What if she doesn't show?

Is my outfit bad?

Does my breath smell? You make sure to brush your teeth one more time before leaving.

When you arrived at the cafe, a wave of shyness washed over you. You spotted Wanda almost immediately. She was sitting at a cozy table, her reddish auburn hair catching the sunlight, and you wondered how someone could look both familiar and new after all this time.

You exchanged hesitant glances. The soft murmur of conversations around you felt louder than usual, amplifying the butterflies in your stomach.

As you approached, her face lit up, the warmth of her smile easing your nerves.

 “You made it!” she exclaimed, standing up to greet you with an embrace that felt both comfortable and electrifying.

“Wouldn’t miss it,” you replied, taking a seat across from her.

For a moment, the air was thick with unspoken words. Both of you are unsure what to say.

Fortunately, as if sensing the tension in the air, a waitress approached to take your order.

"I'll have a hot caramel latte and a turkey and cheese sandwich, please," Wanda said with a soft smile. You returned her smile, appreciating the familiarity of her order.

Both Wanda and the waitress turned to you, waiting to see what you'd chosen.

"I'll have the same, please. Thank you."

*****************************

You sipped your coffee, the warmth seeping into your hands, trying to ground yourself. Slowly but surely the conversation began to flow just like how it had all those years ago.

It was as if nothing had changed. 

As if neither had gone through drastic changes.

Yet, even as the conversation deepened, the thought of her marriage lingered at the back of your mind and the fact that they worked together. Soon within a day, they both would be your coworkers.

Curiosity nudged at you, and you found yourself leaning in.

“What’s it like? Teaching together, I mean? That must be… interesting.”

Just like in the janitor's closet, she was surprised by your sudden question.

Though she laughed softly, easing the tension. “It is, we balance each other out. She’s all about structure, while I tend to go with the flow. It makes for some creative lesson plans."

Though you were more so wondering if they shared any lunches like the two of you did; 

You'll take it.

Gathering up as much composure as possible you try to sound as "mature" as you possibly can. “Sounds like a great dynamic,” you replied, picturing the two of them in a classroom full of students, bouncing ideas off each other.

"Yeah it is, we make a great team." Wanda smiled, her eyes lighting up.

 "You know, I would love for the two of you to formally meet."

Your heart raced and your mind went blank.

What the fuck?

"Wait...I'm sorry, what?"

Wanda repeated herself slowly, not sure how to take your response.

“Oh, um, really? Your wife?” You stammered, shocked from the sudden/not so sudden twist in conversation. "I mean are you- are you sure that is a good idea? You know, me being me?"

Wanda smiled at you comfortingly. "Of course, it's a good idea, I mean besides you were gonna meet her soon anyway with school starting Monday-"

She stops mid-sentence playing with the necklace adorning her neck, a telltale sign 

She's nervous.

"Natasha also already knows exactly who you are to me." 

♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎♥︎♡︎

𝐨𝐨𝐩 🤓

𝐋𝐞𝐦𝐦𝐞 𝐤𝐧𝐨𝐰 𝐰𝐡𝐚𝐭𝐜𝐡𝐚 𝐭𝐡𝐢𝐧𝐤 𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐟 𝐲𝐨𝐮 𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐭 𝐖𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐬 𝐩𝐨𝐯!!

@nebthetautora @esposadejoyhuerta @w4ndsversew0nder

@skz-xii

[bloomblood]

pitfighter/'emo' arc vi x piltover scientist reader (soulmate au)

(IVE HAD THIS IDEA FOR SO LONG IMMA SPEW RANDOM NONSENSE BC IM ASS AT WRITING LMAO)

•basically, reader is from piltover and has studied love and soulmates her entire life. she looks for vi, the name engraved on her wrist because she was desperate for answers.

•reader is reffered to as 'she,' or, 'the girl,' it gets a little confusing. also sorry for ooc!

it seemed like a sick joke. yeah, there were letters-a name-carved into her skin since birth. she would stare at them on lonely nights, thinking, wondering.

maybe this person would love her, even after everything. every person lost, every mistake. after caitlyn.

maybe she had hope after all.

vi scoffs in the girl's face. this random girl, vi had seen her before, but she was looking specifically for vi. they were soulmates. yeah, soulmates-like that meant anything to vi. she could care less; the ache in her chest suggested otherwise.

"you- you're serious?" the girl asks. vi rolls her eyes. "i don't need a soulmate. i don't need you, piltie. i've been on my own, and it's gonna stay that way." vi's lips twitch up into a sly smile. both of them knew it was forced.

"so do yourself a favor, sweetheart." vi steps closer, towering over her. "run away and forget about me. let's pretend this never happened."

she crosses her arms. this woman-the one she wore the name of-just told her to leave?

"then leave. im waiting." she snaps, glaring at vi. "but just know, we'll end up in this situation one way or another. i've chased this-the answer to this for my entire life, and i almost have it." she says. vi stands there for a moment, brows furrowed. she was definately going to leave, but she seemed a little crazy. or determinded, to put into better words.

"answer to what?" is all vi asks her. "the reason for soulmates." she replies with an eyeroll. "there's a scientific and logical reasoning for everything. this should be no exception."

vi rolls her eyes. yeah, totally crazy.

"right, well...you have fun with that, sweetheart." vi says casually before turning around. she pauses. a wave of panic crashes through her stomach. she thought vi would stay, ask her what she was looking for specifically, anything. but no, she was going to leave?

"wait!" she calls out as soon as vi starts walking. "what?" vi snaps out. she didn't have time for this. after everything, she couldn't. with a wound as fresh as caitlyn and pain from everything, from jinx...

"y-you're just going to leave? no questions, no nothing?" she questions, voice quiet. "you don't even know anything about me!"

there's silence. uncomfortable silence. it surrounds them, engulfs them.

"you aren't curious? about...who i am?" her voice grew even smaller. vi shakes her head as if it would shake her thoughts off.

she was really curious. after fights, on lonely nights, after a couple drinks (more like a couple bottles, with vi), after a loss, she was curious. who was she tied to? why them? why her? how would things be different if she met them? what would change? it was only the surface of questions that had swirled in her mind.

"i don't need a little soulmate to fix everything. stay away from me. go find someone that isn't me." vi replies, voice almost barely audible. "we've met before." she blurts out. "in- in piltover. you and these other kids blew up a-"

"don't." vi cuts her off. that was the beginning of everything falling apart. "it's a part of this cycle!" the girl's voice raises. "two people are born with the other's name on their skin." she starts. "then, it goes to passing. a singular moment in time the two people see each other." there's a pause. "from there, it's meeting, which develops into a bond. whether it's lovers, enemies, friends-it's all the same." she rambles.

vi's silent for a moment. this girl was...interesting, to say the least. a piltover women and a fighter from the undercity. perfect match.

"we're complete opposites, sweetheart. we aren't meant to be." vi mumbles. "w-well humans are attracted to contrasts. it's what we learn to go to or stray from." she says softly. vi sighs. maybe, in a sense, they were alike. they're both stubborn. this girl was fragile, shy, stubborn. but vi is a fighter. she's strong and stubborn.

some people aren't meant to be. they aren't destined to succeed. others...it's in their blood-on their skin. just how in black letters, it read 'violet,' on her wrist.

(i'll write a part 2 if y'all like this lmk please!!! i'll take requests too if anyone wants any because i need to write more-)

[rafeandonlyrafe]

separate lines

words: 600 (+ three images)

warnings: entire fic is through phone calls/text messages, parental death (ward), established relationship, kinda protective rafe but its cute he just misses his girl, includes pictures of "readers" face/body, kind of illusions to sex (like barely!), overall pretty fluffy

“rafey!” you squeal as you answer your phone seconds after it rings. “how's it going?”

“well, everything is still standing.” rafe huffs out. you can practically hear the stress in his voice.

“that's good, baby. i miss you a lot.” sure, he just left this morning to drive back to the outer banks, but that doesn't change the fact that you miss him anytime he's away from you.

“god, i miss you too. if rose didn't need me here id still be-

“i know.” you cut rafe off. “you're back for three days with your family. it'll be fine and then we will be back together.”

you know being back in the outer banks is stressful for rafe after everything that happened. the mess with barry, the pogues, and then all culminating in his dad dying. when you decided to go a couple hours away to college, you still thought you'd have to persuade your boyfriend to come with you, to leave the only life he's ever known, but he jumped at the chance.

you live in a luxury townhouse right near downtown. you're even able to walk to most of your classes, of course with rafe by your side.

“you're right.” rafe hums. “we are figuring out the will stuff tomorrow morning.”

“i wish i could be there for you. text or call if you need anything.” you have classes tomorrow, but you'd drop anything if rafe really needed you.

“yeah just… text me updates, please? even if you just do the laundry or something. it helps to know.”

“of course i will.” you smile, hearing some commotion in the background. “and rafey? give wheezie a hug for me.”

“is that y/n?” you hear her voice in the background, then the fumbling of the phone being handed off.

“y/n!” wheezie squeals.

“wheezie, my girl!”

--

--

“how are you getting to class?” rafe asks, looking into the room where proceedings are about to start, going over his fathers will and who gets what. he knows most of it will go to rose, most likely the house and the real estate company. he doesn't really care. he has a new life now, one with you.

“amber is gonna drive me and pick me up. and no, her boyfriend will not be there.” you giggle, knowing even though amber and her boyfriend steven have been together since third grade, rafe would still worry with him around.

“and you're going to poli sci and then your geology lab, right?” rafe has your schedule memorized, but he likes to hear your confirmation anyways.

“yup!” you nod, even though rafe can't see you. “im excited for todays lab, actually. it's not rock identification, which you know i suck at.”

rafe let's out a soft laugh, having sat and listened to your complaining about rocks for hours already this semester.

“rafe, it's starting soon.” rose says, her words being picked up by you, otherwise rafe probably would have just ignored her in favor of keeping talking.

“alright, baby. hope it all goes well and doesn't take too long. i love you.” you coo into the phone.

“love you more.”

--

--

“home tomorrow.” rafe whispers softly, not wanting to wake up anyone else in the house. he's exhausted, so they must be too. it was a long day with lots of legal jargon, but everything got divided up about how he expected it to. 

most to rose, then the additional savings divided up evenly between him, sarah, and wheezie.

“im glad.” you whisper back, matching his tone even though you're home alone. “i ordered a cute pair of pajamas to wear to help me sleep. you know how much i struggle without you.”

“your insomnia cure.” rafe smiles, remembering what you called him after you first started sharing a bed, able to easily relax into him and fall into a true deep sleep.

“mhm.” you hum out, letting out a yawn. “do you mind staying on the call until i fall asleep?”

“baby, ill stay on all night.”

--

sfw tags: @winterrrnight @bejeweledreverie

[oatmealdoodles]

My messy thoughts on the new episode

(spoilers for Ghostf**kers)

tldr I LOVED this one the animation saw POPING OFF the writing was great, it was well paced, everything. I just wanted to ramble so here i am talking to no one:

Ok right off the bat i had to pause this like 7 times in the first five minutes because the beginning of this is just packed with insane jokes, glass to see they havent forgotten about being a comedy show

It’s so sad to see Blitzo in this state, especially that it’s been over a month. Like look at this guy he is GOING THROUGH IT.

also this was uncalled for how can you do me like this?

ok like my one problem i don’t like this little Scooby-doo reference with old people. I just skipped it and lost nothing, i don’t know why this is here.

the fight between Blitzo and Millie in the vents was also really well done im so glad Millie is putting up boundaries on dealing with everybody elses Bullshit.

I also don’t hear anyone talking about this but Vivinie Williams (Millie’s VA) did so well in this. Like all the voice acting in this show is peak but I’ve only really heard praise for Brendon and Bryce. Their argument here specifically, the fury in her voice was so well done, bravo.

JESUS CHRIST THEY DID NOT NEED TO GO THIS HARD this scene has been stuck in my head for the past two days, Brandon killed it in he recording booth, the animation is also just so VICERAL. Also the way the fire starts from his hands because he blames himself for it, like Viv went too far with this one. That was not ok.

Bitzo’s panic attack was also done so well. Little detail but i love that when Blitzo screams “Don’t touch me!”, Millie respects this and doesnt, instead comforting him with words. They only touch when he’s calm and ready. Love that.

Bro i was NOT expecting a flashback on how Millie met Blitz, also Millies design slays so hard

the way I gasped.

I also didn’t realize how much I needed an episode focusing on these twos friendship until now. Like FINALLY a Millie episode that doesn’t suck!

Little thing i realized but notice how Blitzo doesn’t make a sex joke at this. Blitzo. Not making a provocative joke. Really just goes to show how UNCOMFORTABLE and SCARED he is. I physically recoil every time I see this it’s gross

Those flashback scenes were also just so brutal. Like chaining his horns so he’s FORCED to watch is so psychotic I can’t.

its kinda sad that Blitzo’s whole motivation for doing this is to distract himself from his feelings, when that’s what he’s literally forced to confront by Ronaldo.

Love a possession story. I can really appreciate how Millie does not believe Ronaldo for a second, she knows that Blitzo would never think that of her and she trusts him enough to be confident in it. Nice subversion, you go girl.

This was so needlessly brutal and funny, they really went all out with this one

Yeah I think that’s all I wanted to day, just again i loved this one and it was definantly worth the multiple-month wait. Though my Hyperfixation has mostly died im hopeful that it will resurrect soon. We’ll have to wait and see.

[prettyboyeddiemunson]

There is an all girl metal band that fucks guys/performs sexual acts on stage

Imagine rockstar reader x virgin eddie

HOLY SHIT YESSSS

imagine you’re in a big-name metal band, and maybe you’re the lead vocalist. eddie is, of course, a big fan and has the biggest crush on you. he saved up all his money to be able to afford tickets to the show, and he knows what he’s getting himself into before he goes to the concert. in fact, he’s hoping that you select him out of the crowd as the lucky guy; he did save up for front row, after all, just for that reason. he’s a virgin, but he doesn’t care about that. to lose his virginity to you, on stage in front of so many people, is actually his dream.

it happens. you find him in the crowd, and think he’s the most gorgeous man you’ve ever seen. you call him up on the stage, and the rest of your band call up their own men. you’re so glad to have gotten dibs on eddie, and you introduce yourself with a shake of his hand.

“I’m uh, im eddie,” he says, bashful. “It’s nice to um…nice to meet you.”

“nice to meet you, too, handsome,” you say, leading him to center stage. “everyone, say hello to eddie.”

the crowd echoes the greeting, and you chuckle. you run your hand along his crotch, and smirk when you see that he’s already hard. you seek his consent, and when you get it, you tug his cock out of his pants. you don’t know what he has to be so shy about; most men would kill for a dick that was as thick as his, as beautiful. you jerk him off and he groans, before he leans confidentially into your ear.

“I’ve never had sex,” he whispers.

“that’s okay, right?” you ask. “I mean, you don’t mind what i’m about to do?”

“no,” he says. “I don’t mind. In fact…I want you to. it would be a dream.”

“one of your wet dreams come to life, huh?” you tease, and he nods. “okay, let me start by sucking you off. you’re okay with that, right?”

“hell yeah,” he says, watching as you fall to your knees. you don’t waste even a second, taking him into your mouth as his lashes flutter. “oh god..”

you hollow your cheeks, gagging on him as you take him deeper. you move your head up and back down, eyes on him the whole time. you jerk him off into your mouth after a moment, in tandem with your movements. he groans above you, one ringed hand tangling in your hair as you work on him. over the cheering of the crowd, you hear his breathless pants, his groans, his whimpers. you could tell it was his first time doing this as well; it radiated off of him like heat. you swallowed around his cock, and as you felt him twitching, you popped off.

“not yet,” you say, standing up and hiking up the short skirt you were wearing. “i want you to fuck me.”

he groans, running his fingers over your exposed pussy. “fuck, you’re really wet.”

“fuck me,” you say, bending over and exposing your soaking cunt to him. “anytime you’re ready.”

he didn’t need long. he pushed inside of you with a groan, and you could feel him twitching even more. you knew he wouldn’t last long, but you were determined to make it the best time of his life. you moaned as he started to pound you, looking back at him with your teeth in your lower lip. he was looking at you as well, his own eyes heavily lidded. you clenched, and you could hear him suck in a breath.

“cum for me,” you urged, fucking yourself against him. “i want you to cum for me.”

he kept going, spilling inside of you with a groan a few moments later. you started to rub your clit, but he pushed your hand away to do it himself. you came a moment later as well, and then eddie was withdrawing himself. you put your skirt back down and he tucked himself back into his pants, and the crowd was erupting in more cheers as you put an arm around his shoulders.

“a big round of applause for eddie!” you said into the microphone, which prompted the crowd to cheer even louder. then, to him: “you did such a good job, but I’ll bet you could do even better. meet me backstage after the show, and we’ll see what we’re working with.”

————-

taglist: @andvys @succubusmunson @eddieschains @eddiemunsons-missingnipple @trashmouth-richie @eiightysixbaby @happylilthought @likedovesinthewnd @sunkillerdreamer

[fragileporcelaine]

౨ৎ ˙⋆.˚ brothersbestfriend!rafe saves you from a tragic date

you decide to download some dating apps due to your non-existent love life, after swiping left at some weird matches until a guy catches your eye ethan baker you swipe right intrested at his profile, minutes later a message is sent.

" Hey! your really beautiful " he types

you smile at the sweet message and type back " aw! thank you, your not too bad yourself " a few messages turns into you and ethan constantly messaging for 3 days straight until ethan decides to make a move

" I really do enjoy speaking with you, so would you like to go on a date with me? " you grin because you really do like him you quickly type back " of course! how about that really nice restaurant that just opened in figure eight on friday? "

friday finally comes around and you put on a short jean skirt, red floraly scandalous shirt, you hear a knock on your door and know its ethan.

" hey ethan, its nice to finally meet you! " you say with a cheeky smile on your face, ethan leans down and kisses your cheek.

" hey gorgeous, same with you, the reservation is really soon, we really have to get going " he holds your hand and leads to towards his car, ethan walks straight to the drivers side expecting you to open the passenger seats door yourself, you brush off this one mistake thinking in your head " hmm, maybe its not that serious to him "

" sorry is it okay if i put my headphones in, just nerves you know " you look at him hoping it doesnt bother him

" yeah of course i'd rather talk when we're at the restaurant too not good at multitasking " he says nervously laughing

you eventually get to the restaurant and your about 15 minutes into the date, you like ethan, you have a good feeling about him until you dont.

" how did your last relationship end? " you ask curiously

" oh, well she broke up with me due to my "misogynistic views" she called it apparently saying her job should be cleaning is misogynistic? " he said rolling his eyes

you immediately have a weird feeling in your stomach but brush it off. another 15 minutes go by.

" hey so after this we're going to mine, i have some wine" he confidently says expecting you to agree.

" could you excuse me, i need to go to the bathroom " you stand up and walk away fidgiting with your hands, " i need to get out of here " you think to yourself. you message your brother hoping he responds

" please pick me up this dates going horribly " you rapidly message him. he responds as soon as the text goes through " can't. "

you look through your contacts wondering who else you can message, rafe cameron your brothers bestfriend, you sigh knowing you and his friendship isn't the best, but he's your last resort " please pick me up, this dates tragic and i feel really unsafe " you type hoping he responds, 2 minutes go by, no respond. you walk back to the table tragicly hoping you somehow get out of this. 3 minutes later you hear a slam coming from the entrance.

rafe cameron.

rafe walks towards you plopping his motorcycle helmet on your head " we're going " he says nonchalantly. ethan stands up " who the fuck are you " he says in an agressive tone stepping towards rafe. " one inch closer and your leaving with your nose broken. " ethan steps back almost in fear. you feel your face getting warm as rafe grabs your hand and leads you to the front door holding your hand softly.

rafe hops onto his motorcycle holding your hand making sure you dont hurt yourself, he takes your hands and put them around his waist making sure your secure and safe,

" thank you so much rafe. " you say breaking your silence, rafe doesnt respond and starts speeding away to your house. after a very silent couple of minutes you get to your house and rafe leads you to your front door.

" hey do you want to come in for a second? " you ask rafe hoping he agrees, to your luck he nods and steps inside, you both walk towards the living room and you fall down onto the sofa in relief.

you start rambling " listen im so sorry i know its a friday night and i just took you away from whatever you were doing like im just so sorry and i should of waited and i could of messaged my brother again and like- "

" stop speaking. " rafe says in a soft tone

" excuse me? " you say almost confused.

" i said stop speaking, do you want to know what i was doing? "

you nod waiting for him to continue

" i had a bunch of friends over. "

" oh my gosh im so sorry "

" stop speaking. " he says with a rougher tone " i saw your text i saw you felt unsafe i saw you needed me, i grabbed my helmet i grabbed my keys and i left. i didnt say anything i just got on my bike and i got to you, because i will choose you over everyone else every time. "

you furrow your eyebrows, again waiting for him to explain what he meant. rafe steps towards you looking down at you sitting down.

" what are you- what are you saying? " you say knowing your face is turning red

" i will choose you. "

" okay but what about my brother " you say almost laughing thinking this is a joke

" over your brother every time. "

" what does this mean? " you say feeling something you've never felt before.

rafe crouches to get to your eye-level " i'll show you what this means " rafe kisses you on the lips for a second. " but i'll show you on a different night, when you havent just came back from a shit date. "

rafe walks towards the door not allowing you to get out another word. next thing you know you hear the engine of a motorcycle driving away.

[manicpixiefelix]

head, heart, hand. {Felix Catton/Reader/Oliver Quick}

Part 7.

Summary: A chance to look through Oliver Quick's eyes as he watches through windows, decides he wants to be loved, and finally takes a chance with the reader. Until it comes crashing down because Michael Gavey called Felix a slag, and it's made Oliver's problem.

{ masterpost }

Need to Know: They/Them. Explicitly NB Reader. FWB!Reader/Felix. Reader is from a well off family but has pretty much been adopted by the Cattons.

Warnings: SMUT (we see reader topping felix from last chapter but through oliver's perspective, cockwarming, vague somnophilia because of that i guess??, reader getting head and reader giving head but reader's AGAB is not specified), also some vaguely unsettling imagery i guess, and the scene in felix's room with the cleaning is made even more tense and uncomfortable

A/N: 7084 words. POV shift to Oliver! Also this chapter is FUCKING HUGE, i tried to find a good place to maybe split it, but couldn't find one. so you're stuck with 7k, eat up friends! also i would really appreciate if anyone has any thoughts about how i've written oliver, id love to hear them, i don't want him to 100% like the reader, and i think ive managed to have him come across more uh, cerebral i guess im going with? yeah thoughts good, would love some. holy shit this chapter goes so many places.

TAGLIST IN COMMENTS!! // TAGLIST ALWAYS OPEN ! (just message or comment to be added)

----

Y/N's been rambling on about reading Anna Karenina for one of their classes ever since they'd met Oliver after his final class for the day, but he's barely able to focus on their words. Usually he likes to look like he's paying attention to their words, he knows it makes him seem attentive, and everybody loves to feel heard, but Oliver's mind is elsewhere. It's in the garden outside of Y/N's window. It's outside their door where he'd sat patiently, giving blithe smiles to your dormmates and telling them he was simply waiting for you to get dressed. The doors of the Oxford dormitories were thick, but not thick enough to hide sound on the other side from an ear pressed up against them when the hallway was empty.

It's not even close to the first time he'd seen you in these moments together; how no-one else in your group of friends, apart from Farleigh he suspected, believed you two were sleeping together was baffling. Wilful ignorance is a hell of a drug. He hopes the two of you never learn how to close your blinds.

But there was something different about yesterday.

"Any of youse seen Felix? Or Y/N?" He'd approached the group on the grass with the same kind of hesitancy he'd always put on for them, never wanting to seem too arrogant, to comfortable in their presence. He knew they didn't like him, but people like this liked feeling powerful over the 'lesser folk'. Anyways, it's not like he was particularly keen on befriending any of them, it was okay to hold them at arm's length.

Farleigh, beautiful, condescending Farleigh, looked up at him through his lashes; there was no sun in his eyes, the squint was more likely to be him half-pulling a face of contempt with plausible deniability.

"Maybe." Unhelpful.

"Y/N came through here like a fucking hurricane," Annabel told him; Oliver could only think of the irritating nasal in her voice as she'd listed off all the things she hadn't liked about him to Felix when they hadn't known he was around. Oliver fought not to make a face of his own.

"Took Felix and headed that way," a blonde boy -Rex? Reg? Oliver hadn't even bothered to retain his name - nods in the direction of the dorms.

"They're so co-dependent sometimes," India shakes her head, strange little expression on her face. Perhaps she did know and was trying to convince herself otherwise.

"Yeah," laughed Annabel, "they could have at least tried meditating or something."

"I don't know," Farleigh shook his head, clicking his tongue, "I don't think they have any other coping mechanisms apart from their co-dependant shit."

"They've always been like this?" India actually sounds a little fond.

"It actually used to be worse," Farleigh snorted, and Annabel pitched herself back in the grass, claiming that it couldn't be true.

"I mean, with that kind of money I think Felix is allowed to be weirdly close to his cousin," India says with a shrug. What? Why was the group laughing like it was an in-joke.

"They're cousins?" Oliver asks; Farleigh he knew about, but no-one had ever really talked about how Felix and Y/N had gotten so close. Considering all he'd seen them do together -

"Kissing, codependent cousins," Annabel sighs, sitting up.

"Hot, kissing, codependent cousins," India wraps an arm around her in solidarity, and the girls share an exasperated chuckle, though from looking around it seemed that a lot of the group shared that sentiment.

"You're hot too, Farleigh -"

"Thanks, but I'll stick with just that for now, I'm happy being the non-kissing, non-codependent cousin," he chuckled, before turning his attention back to Oliver, still awkwardly by the edge of the group as everyone else continued to gossip. However, catching Farleigh's eye, for the barest moment, his wolfish grin, Oliver had total and complete confirmation that Felix and Y/N were in no way actually related.

Which, if he were to guess, meant that Farleigh definitely knew the two of you were sleeping together.

And judging from all the times Oliver had spoken to you both, neither of you were aware of this well established gossip in the group, Farleigh was never ever going to correct anyone, considering how damn funny he clearly thought the entire bit was. It at least explained how the rest of the group was so unphased by the closeness you and Felix shared, while still apparently - kind of - dating other people.

Eventually, tired of putting up his awkward façade, though he was grateful for the slim amount of information he'd learned, he clears his throat.

"So -"

"That way," Farleigh doesn't look at him this time, voice flat, thumb jerking towards Y/N's dorm.

Its the afternoon, grey, most people are at classes, so the courtyard outside of your dorm room is empty of any other living souls. Whenever he stops in, or even walks past, he checks in your window out of habit to see if you're in; you don't close your blinds often so it's an easy way to tell. Anyone passing by wouldn't be able to see anything, not unless they stopped and made an effort, but Oliver wasn't most people, and knew the layout of your room and how to search it when granted even a sliver to look through like today.

And today, not only are you in your dorm with Felix, as predicted, but the sight of you both makes his mouth go dry.

Felix Catton on his back, arching, perfect mouth open in some kind of wanton, whorish noise undoubtedly as you masterfully worked his cock with your hand. Fuck, Oliver knows he shouldn't be here, shouldn't be watching this.

He steps forward into the bushes. They rustle, his heart jumps, but neither of you seem to notice.

He can't see your face with your back to him like this, but you must be saying something, because Felix's lips are moving and his chest is heaving as he's gasping out words. Oliver knows he's embarrassing flush, embarrassingly hard in these fucking slacks, but the courtyard is still empty, and he knows all too well how little the outside world matters to you and Felix in these moments.

He can feel his heart beating in his throat, in his ears, painfully against his ribs as you slide one leg so smoothly over Felix's hips, hand between your own thighs as you hover yourself above him. You're toying with Felix, taking your time, taking full and total control in a way Oliver's never seen you do. He didn't know anyone could make Felix act like this, look like this; he never thought Felix would let anyone. But he shouldn't be surprised that it's you of all people.

When you lean down over Felix, your chest against his, like a proud lion over its prey, Oliver feels sick with himself, with how he wants to burn this fucking image into his brain, with how fucking perfectly he can watch from here as you take the entire length of Felix's cock. Its impressive, both his length, and how fucking easy you make it look. You're kissing him. You're fucking him. You're riding this Adonis in a way that makes him pliant and desperate beneath you.

Oliver steps back from the window, finally glancing around to double check his surroundings. No-one peeking out of windows, no-one around. He heads inside. He knows he shouldn't but he does, pulls out the sweater he'd loaned from Felix and folds it in his lap when he sits with his back against your door, both as an excuse should anyone walk past, and to hide the visible hardness in his pants.

Sometimes you're too quiet to hear, but the way the bed creaks and the two of you moan, it's some kind of debauched symphony. Oliver swears he's not a masochist, but it almost hurts to hear you both like this, like something out of a dream or a fantasy, and to remain stone-faced at your bedroom door -

"I want everyone else you ever fuck to be jealous of the way you let me fuck you."

Oliver can't even begin to imagine the things this means, the things you want to do to Felix, but then he hears -

"Yes, fuck, yes- my Y/N, anything you want - please." Felix gasping, begging like Oliver's never heard before. Sounds he knows only you could have elicited from the man who makes people around him fall in love with him by accident.

Oliver Quick is never going to get these moments out of his head; he's never been so desperate to be wanted by anyone in his life, let alone two people. There is a shameless, lascivious kind of love between you both that he vows to get the chance to drink from the source.

It's again changed his perception of you, perhaps made him a little bolder once more. So the day after, walking to the pub after class, barely listening to you talk about your book, he's trying to see if anything's changed. As far as he was aware, your encounter with Felix the day before was unusual for you. Perhaps something's changed, and perhaps he's not subtle about looking.

It's something unspoken between you, it ebbs and flows depending on Oliver's mood, how bold he's feeling. A quiet, voyeuristic exchange you share, the pleasure of being watched, and the pleasure of watching. The roles reverse and your eyes are on him in the way eyes rarely are.

More the observant than the observed, he'd told you, yet he took pleasure in feeling your gaze upon him, taking the time that he knows is so precious to you to watch him. You are familiar to him in a way that is so foreign; you are watching and adapting and anticipating the desires around you. Not action, but reaction; a people-pleaser down to your bones, wrapped up Felix's brand of hedonism. You get off making people feel loved, but Oliver can't help but wonder about the desire you keep to yourself, just below the surface.

Neither of you have spoken about the night at the club; Oliver's desperate to see how long it will take you before you act, rather than get pushed into reacting. He doesn't know how long he can last.

Felix shows up to the pub with Annabel and a strained smile that doesn't reach his eyes. Which is better than Annabel's outright scowl. They sit in chairs across from the rounded bench that always took up half the table your group liked to tension filling the ample space between them. As the last to arrive, everyone else's attention was drawn to them, going quiet as everyone picked up the couple's sour mood.

There's a moment where Oliver catches the way Felix looks at you across the table. No-one else picks up on it, since in the next moment Felix raises his hands to cover a cough, and what Oliver suspects is a grin, but you've turned your head sharply, sniffing loudly and almost managing to press your face into Oliver's shoulder. After a beat you fake a sneeze, and apologise. Oliver brushes it off, and fights off a smile of his own. He doesn't have all the details, but clearly you made good on your promise to make Felix's other future fucks jealous.

"You know what? I'm desperate for a pint, anybody else -" Felix goes to stand, attempting to break the tension, but immediately Annabel scoffs.

"Desperate sounds about right." And she's not quiet with her scorn.

"Can you not do this now? We've been here two minutes, you want a drink?" He hissed, trying to keep up a positive façade despite the faint anger and embarrassment in his eyes. It doesn't last, of course, not with all eyes on the pair of them. It's Farleigh who speaks up first, not even bothering to hide his smug smile.

"You okay there, Felix?" He wears a grin that's all teeth.

"What?" Felix frowns, but Oliver can see exactly what Farleigh's talking about. When he brings it up, however, he does his best to sound genuinely innocent, concerned even.

"Have you got yourself hurt, Felix?" And when Felix meets his gaze he knows it's come across as intended, the conflict and frustration still somehow looking beautiful in his brown eyes.

"No, I'm fine," he tugs at the collar of his shirt, hoping it sits a little higher, hides the hickey that's clearly there.

"Burn yourself on a curling iron, Felix?" India teases, matching Farleigh's earlier energy, and while it did nothing to help Annabel's mood, at least Felix no longer seemed conflicted.

"Had a run in with a particularly aggressive vacuum cleaner?" You piped up from beside Oliver, and the minute Felix sees your own triumphant grin he starts to go pink around the ears and has to duck his head.

"Try several vacuum cleaners," Annabel snapped to the table, "or one whorish townie girl!" For just a moment, the group is quiet, contemplating what she'd said, the upset in her voice, but it's short-lived.

"How many vacuum cleaners?" Farleigh leans forward, elbows on the table and chin on his hands with a grin like the Cheshire cat. Felix tells him to fuck off, but his blush is still distinct.

"They're all over him," Annabel sticks her nose in the air, arms crossed and looking especially petulant. The lads at the table did actually cheer at that, much to her continued frustration.

"You spend entire nights hitting on other guys in front of me! You made eye contact while one latched himself onto your neck as I was trying to dance!" Felix argued back, and the jury of their peers began to shake their heads at this new information. Annabel pouted for a moment.

"That's different -"

"It kinda isn't," India tried to shoot for sympathetic, wincing as she said it, which was enough for Annabel to sigh dramatically, standing from the table.

"Fine, I do want a drink," and she immediately made a furious beeline for the bar. Felix, however, hesitated for a moment, watching her leave before he turned back to the group with a cocky smile, yanking down the collar of his shirt to show off several more bright, scandalous hickeys.

"Best vacuum cleaner I've ever had," he tells them all smugly, before standing up straight and righting his shirt, "okay, this round's on me." A cheer rises from the group, but as Felix walks off, Oliver catches the way he winks at Y/N. You snort a quiet laugh, but Oliver's pretty sure he's the only one who heard it.

Christ, you two weren't even trying to be subtle half the time.

Still, for all her apparent frustration at Felix's mystery partner, it seemed to only make Annabel cling to him further. No more flirting with strangers, no more sitting apart. She reeks of insecurity, but Oliver just watches you watching her. There's something in your eyes in these moments, like a lion too sated to be bothered with the hunt, but the instinct to pounce could resurface at any moment.

But Oliver's obsession with the intricacies of your lives still lead him outside of Felix's window after one of countless parties. Still watching with animal curiosity and a cigarette in hand, as Annabel works hard to stake her claim on a man she desperately wants to own.

Annabel is an unenthralling understudy, Oliver thinks.

Throwing the butt of his cigarette into the bushes, he can't bring himself to stay. He knows where he needs to go, knows what he needs to do; in his mind Annabel is a lithe and graceful performance of extasy, and Felix is all quiet focus and hard, gorgeous muscles shining with sweat from the exertion of it all. But there's no love. It's all performance, a pleasurable performance for them, he's sure, but it's just two beautiful people smashing their bodies together in sloppy ecstasy.

Fuck.

No only is a creep, and a pervert, but now he's a picky, creepy pervert.

But his thoughts stop in the courtyard outside of your dorm. You light is on. Your window is open all the way, and there you are, looking like a dream in your pyjamas, sitting on the windowsill and having a smoke.

"Ollie!" He'll never get sick of how you say his name, how you smile when you see his face. There's a split second where he has to make a decision, has to figure out how to approach you in this moment. At the club you'd all but folded on the spot at his bold approach, he knows he could have had you practically there and then if he'd been inclined, but part of him can't stop thinking about how you'd had Felix on his back, practically begging.

Oliver feels like every time he thinks he's close to figuring you out, he learns something knew about you that makes him rethink it all. He wants to know all of you, your hopes and dreams and the grotesque desires you will never tell the world, desperate to keep testing you and your reactions, and perhaps even your limits if it ever came to that, to figure out how to get underneath your beautiful skin the way Felix had. Part of him feels like you're never going to stop surprising him, one way or the other. You are intrigue and unexpected and he wants to carve a home for himself in your bones.

"Thought you'd still be out," you tell him, back flush with the frame of your window, one leg up on the ledge while the other dangled over the gardens he'd watched you from more times than he'd like to admit.

"'s not the same without you," he admits after a moment, hands in his pockets. Your endeared, bashful smile is predictable, but no less heart-warming to see. He loves the way you react to him.

"Is that why you're here," it sounds teasing, but he can hear a hint of something that almost sounds hopeful. When you look back at him again, there's that same look you've been giving him since he'd held you, kissed you, ghosted you at the club.

"I don't know," he lies softly, "I just started walking."

"Come on then," you grin, stubbing out your cigarette on the windowsill, "you came all this way, why not have a sleepover," and you swing your legs inside, hopping off the ledge. He moves automatically towards the window, but when you hear him moving, you frown over your shoulder, "door, Ollie."

He's never been inside your room at night.

It glows with the same gold light that all these old building with their old lamps glowed, casting all your knickknacks in shadow and sharp relief. Only your bed lamp was on, book open on your bed. Jane Austin's Emma.

"Sorry, I don't mean to impose," Oliver's voice matches the rest of how he wants to appear; small. Sitting on your soft, patterned duvet, he looks not at you, but around at the room you call home, cataloguing everything in this new light, trying not to think about Felix and Annabel fucking, Felix and Annabel laughing, Felix and Annabel joking about how -

He's a scholarship boy who buys his clothes from Oxfam; no-one wants to sit next to fucking Oliver.

"I love you Ollie," you tell him blithely, easily, truthfully, "you never impose."

Annabel grates on his ears and his nerves and his fucking memories. Your smile is like a balm for that the burn that snobby bitch leaves in the back of his mind when he thinks too hard about her.

You move with such ease around the space, not that he should be at all surprised at that. Perhaps it's more that he still feels like a stranger in his own room at times. Planting yourself against your headboard legs crossed and looking so at ease in your summer pyjamas, you ask, tone light, "you don't mind if I read for a bit, I'm not going to be up much longer, but like I said, you're always welcome to stay."

"What are you reading?" Oliver lets himself relax in your presence, lays himself back on the bed, looking up at the sculpted ceiling of the old building. He knows what you're reading, he just likes hearing your voice.

"Emma," he can hear the rustle of the pages, had seen the worn spine and yellowing paper, wonders if it's vintage, wonders how you got it if it is, "Jane Austen for my lit class."

"Finished Anna Karenina?" You make a quiet hum of acknowledgement. More silence and the warmth of company and lamp light, "it's been a while since I've read any Austen."

"Do you want me to read some to you?" Of course there's humour in your tone, but Oliver can hear it for the genuine offer that it is. When he looks at you, he can't help but smile. There's such fond affection in your eyes as you look at him over the top of the book.

"Please," he says it so softly, so sweetly, and it's enough to see you smile before you disappear behind the book again.

"I'm near the end, you won't get the context -"

"Doesn't matter," he sits back up, pulls off his jacket, kicks off his shoes, and settles back beside you.

"Settled?" Your voice is a murmur, barely a whisper, and when he laughs quietly, he knows you can feel the way it rumbles within him.

When you start, your voice is soothing, halfway through a chapter, through a conversation between characters he has no clue about. He's never read Austen but he'd devour her books if you were the one reading them. It feels like an almost perfect moment.

"- Seldom, very seldom," his head is on your shoulder, eyes scanning the page, the words as you read them, "does complete truth belong to any human disclosure; seldom can it happen that something is not a little disguised or a little mistaken, but-”

"I did come here for you," something about the line makes the hairs prick on the back of his neck, he can't keep quiet; there is want still simmering beneath his skin, and each time his mind drifts to Felix and Annabel, something furious and desperate coils in his gut. You fall silent, book still open and aloft, cheek still resting against his head where he's kept it on your shoulder. When you take a deep breath, he feels it, both of you move in sync, "of course I came here for you."

This time, he doesn't reach out, doesn't touch you more than he is. Every time he's reached out, he's gone against the pattern you've observed of him, he's always made a connection with you where you know he holds back from others. This time, he waits with bated breath.

"If there's nothing more you want from me than moments like this, I'll never say another word about it," he assures, as if trying not to spook or pressure you. But still he waits.

"What do you want, Ollie?" To pick you apart like a vulture, to see the desires you keep so close they're written on your bones.

"You," he says instead, all gentle words and just as gentle breathing, "if you'll have me." Tell me what it is you want. Tell me you can want. Tell me you know you can want things for yourself, want things beyond a reaction to the wants and needs of everyone around you -

Carefully, you reach over to your bedside table, trying not to jostle either of you too much, and keep your place with a bookmark before you put the book down.

But you do make the first move. You take his face in your hands, holding him like he's fragile and perfect and porcelain, shuffling to face him properly. This kiss tastes almost like home, like finally from you both, until his tongue runs along your lips and you part willingly for him, the kiss turning quickly more passionate. Oliver's not even sure how he came to be straddling your lap, nor how he didn't notice you undoing half of his shirt buttons already, but when the kiss breaks he takes your hands in his.

"Of course I want you," tumbles from your lips, sounding heady, needy, and for just a moment, Oliver breath stutters in his chest. But he slows things down again, leans in to kiss you sweetly once more, before he's pulling off your pyjama shirt.

"I want to know what you want," he murmurs against your lips, kissing his way down your jaw slowly as he speaks, "wanna know how to make you feel good."

"Anything you do -" you try, but he looks up after pressing a kiss to your sternum.

"You need to be needed," he says softly, punctuating each statement with a kiss, refusing to break eye contact with you, "and you want to be wanted," his warm lips on your belly, he sees the conflict in your eyes, the desire and embarrassment all at once, "and you're very good at those things, one of the best, I'm sure." Hooking his thumbs into the waistband of your underwear, he pauses, "is this okay?" You nod quickly, enthusiastically, and he gives a warm smile.

"You're like me, sweetheart," he says softly, resting his cheek on your inner thigh for a moment, watching you still. Reaching out, you card your fingers through his hair, fingers trailing down his jaw, and he turns his face to kiss your palm, "I know that if I gave you half a chance, you'll figure out how to be all I could ever want, but tonight I want everyone to hear how you sound when someone's making you feel good-" he doesn't realise he's quoting something he should not have heard from Felix until it's too late, but you cut him off. You didn't even seem to realise.

Then your other hand is in his hair, a new look in your eyes, a newfound determination, a nervous excitement. You grip on his hair tightens.

"Yes?" He gives a cheeky grin, and you finally smile like you mean it.

"I get it," you roll your eyes, but there's nothing malicious about it, especially since the gesture has Oliver pressing his own chuckle against your thigh, "now you have one guess as to how I'd like you to shut up." There's that confidence he'd heard the other day, the confidence that was burned into the back of his mind, the confidence that had been part of the reason he'd spent a good hour in the shower after hearing it.

"Only if you turn out your lamp," he smirks, though inside all he can think about is how bright the whole room is through the gap in the curtains. It doesn't seem to bother you, it never has, and though he was grateful for it when he was on the outside looking in, there's something about being the one potentially being watched that causes him a faint sense of unease.

You call the moonlight more romantic anyways, and Oliver doesn't need to be told twice to go down on you.

When Oliver wakes the next morning, still in your bed, still in you, he almost wants to pinch himself. It's a childish sentiment, but you're in his arms, wrapped up in him and this early morning light through your curtains. Though he tries not to jostle you too much, the arm beneath his head is asleep and getting more uncomfortable by the second. Except the movement just makes you mumble around a breathy moan, hips moving against his.

"Fucking hell," he groans into your ear, and he gets a sleepy, contented chuckle in return, turning your face a little more towards him to give an affectionate bump against his forehead.

"Ollie~"

For just a second, Oliver thinks about living in this moment for the rest of his life.

"You okay?" He murmurs, watching your smile grow. Everything about you looks so pleased, so content, so satisfied.

"Never done that before," you admit, wiggling your hips a little. Oliver swears under his breath again, but judging by the mischievous smile you wear and the twinkle in your eyes, you knew exactly what you were doing. Then, with all the casualness of any other conversation, you manage to catch him off guard again; "anyone who thinks you don't fit in has clearly never fucked you; you fit perfectly -" his teeth sink into your shoulder before he can even properly figure out how he should have reacted.

But instead of finding it strange or off-putting, you let out a breathy laugh, tension easing in your shoulders. Your hips begin to roll against his, consistent, deliberate. He wonders how many people you've let fuck you like this, like they love you, like they care about you. Oh he knows you fuck your friends with love on your tongue, treat them like they're your last meal, like they mean something, but Oliver gets the feeling you don't expect them to return the favour. He's seen the kind of company you keep, he's pretty sure they never do.

How many of them have seen you grateful the way you look now, bathed in the morning light of Summer, laughing and unable to stop talking with such casual fondness in your eyes and on your lips.

When you go down on him in the shower, Oliver thinks he sees hearts in your eyes.

There might just be something very fucking wrong with you, and he's grateful for it every day.

But it doesn't last.

It's on a Summer day that's too hot, less than a week since he'd spent the night with you. Summer days around here seem to always be too hot, but this might be the worst. Felix still doesn't close his blinds, sun painting him golden where he lay on the floor of his room with a cigarette. Oliver had perched himself on the windowsill as you'd taken up residence on Felix's bed, sitting with your back to his headboard, engrossed in what appeared to be notes, or some kind of file.

Oliver has no idea if you've told Felix, or what you would have told him. The dynamic between the three of you appears to have remained otherwise unchanged. Sometimes, however, Oliver catches Felix looking at him out of the corner of his eyes, head tipped, curious like he was about Oliver's past; his expression is always unreadable, but it's started pitting in Oliver's stomach whenever he catches it. Felix always looks away. Felix has been looking at him less lately, that too causes some kind of anxious feeling Oliver would rather not dwell on.

"I don't like Michael Gavey," you announced from your relatively dark corner of Felix's bed. How did you even know Michael Gavey?

"Who?" Felix makes a face in the sunlight, whole expression wrinkling up, as if trying to wrack his brains. But you're looking at Oliver. There's no affection in your eyes, manila folder in your hands.

"He's-" Oliver feels like he's on the back foot again. All the comfort and good will he'd built up around the two of you feels suddenly so far away, "he's in my year." There's no precedent, no road map in his mind for where this could be going.

"He likes you," it's accusatory coming from you. Oliver looks to Felix for a moment, if only to avoid the intensity of your gaze, but he's closed his eyes, staying out of it.

Oliver considers bailing out of the window, but thinks better of it.

"He, erm, kind of was my friend, I suppose."

"Kind of was your friend?" Felix's voice is almost cold, surprising Oliver, but apparently not you. It's clear you're both looking for some kind of elaboration. Why did this feel like an interrogation? What had Michael done? Why was Oliver on trial for it? Felix cracks his eyes open as he takes a long draught of his cigarette.

"Back at the start of the year," Oliver wets his lips, fidgeting, focusing his attention only on the folder you held, desperate to know what was in it.

"Nasty friend you had," you tell him. It's so cold it almost stings.

"Is he the one who got you all riled up the other week?" Felix finally appears to connect the dots, sitting up on his elbows. Thankfully, however, his amusement breaks the tension, and you have to hide your face behind the file as you opened it and began to read. Oliver could feel his heart in his throat, confused, anxious -

"Impressive mathematic record across the board for his first semester, as well all throughout sixth form," you rattled off, eyes narrowed as you look at the paper, "several documented attempts to contact the Head of Math, Phys-Ed, and Life Sciences to," you cleared your throat, shaking your head with surprising disdain, "beg to be exempt from any potentially mandatory Humanities or Social Sciences courses. Unsurprising," you rolled your eyes, "since he bombed his English and French GCSEs, and I think he's the kind of person who prides himself on a perfect GPA."

Every fact you list you do so with such casual cruelty, momentarily folding the file closed and leaning down to make sure you could see Felix.

"He went to high school with us apparently," so casual it actually hurts Oliver a little to hear, "year below us he said," and you wiggle the file in your hands, "looks to be true."

"Still don't know him," Felix shrugs, like he doesn't give any kind of a shit how you got your hands on all of this information. Sitting back, you continued;

"Applied for scholarships - didn't get them; turns out you have to play sports to get a sports scholarships," you click your tongue as you flip through the pages of Michael's file like you were reading the newspaper, "no clubs, no social life, and a notably arrogant prick." You snapped the file closed, levelling a look at Oliver that he'd never seen you make. It was nothing, like a void, demanding a reaction, a response from him. Accusatory yet without any hint of blame, there's something about this look of intense, demanding neutrality that makes him feel actually sick, like you'll be able to know when he lies, know all his secrets if you look at him long enough.

Felix settles back down on the ground, seemingly immune to the tension so thick Oliver felt like he was choking on it. Even if he looks away he can feel your eyes boring into him, like a spider watching a futile fly in it's web.

"What's your problem with him?" Oliver can only bring himself to look out the window, bringing his hand up to scratch at his nose. Maybe if he covers his mouth he won't spill his guts under your gaze. Then, almost so fast it gives Oliver motion sickness, the tension drops.

You sit yourself back, kick your feet out in front of you, and toss the file to the end of the bed. That can't be legal.

"It's sweet that your friends are protective, but he knows you're your own person, right -?" God your light, flippant tone all but rings in his ears. Still, Oliver knows a warning when he hears it.

"He's not my friend; he was, but he's not," Oliver quickly insists, desperate to be on the other side of this deeply uncomfortable conversation. The tension eases in your shoulders when he looks over to you; the right answer. Something about the relief he feels doesn't sit quite right; why had you brought Michael up now of all times? Why had your gaze felt so constricting, even when he and Michael weren't even close; all you would have had to do was ask -

"Said some nasty things about us is all," your voice goes quiet, rueful even, and he follows your gaze to the edge of the bed to where you knew Felix lay, "called Fi a slag."

But there it was; the true audience for your show of force, and the blade that sliced so cleanly through any other attachment people think they have with Felix, all in one.

Its a simple nickname, the most basic nickname anyone could give to a guy named Felix, but no-one else calls him anything but Felix. No-one else calls him Fi the way you do, they wouldn't dare. He wears your nickname like a collar and he doesn't even realise.

"What a cunt," Felix groaned, so infuriatingly uncaring.

In the moments that follow, Oliver almost feels like his head's spinning from the interaction that had just been forced upon him. There's so many questions, new, anxiety-inducing implications for the information you've brought to them both today. Felix doesn't seem troubled by it, but that seems to be the point.

"So fucking hot," he sighs into the afternoon heat, finishing off his cigarette like none of what you'd said even mattered now.

"I know," Oliver finds his voice again, barely. He can't look at you, at the way you're lounging in what he could mistake for triumph. All he can see is Felix, the centre of the fucking universe.

There's something grotesque about you both in this moment, in this room, beautiful and terrible; the perfect picture of privilege and squalor.

"What's that smell?" Pizza, mostly empty drinks, plates and cups unwashed, dirty clothes -

"Uh," if Felix thinks about it, he isn't thinking too hard, clearly, "I don't know." Smoke rings from his pretty lips aren't enough of a distraction from the moment, from the filth of it all now that Oliver's starting to properly look around.

Again he finds himself realising that he has no idea about your background, how you came to find Felix. Sitting with your back to the headboard and eyes closed, even you seem to not care-

"Can't believe you let him live like this," Oliver actually scoffs, hopping from the windowsill, needing to do something with his hands, move, shake off the layer of moral grime that your verbal attack on Michael Gavey had showered him in.

"What?" Felix barely even props himself up, "what are you on about?"

"It's disgusting, Felix."

"It's fine."

"Right, I'm cleaning up -" Oliver moves without thinking, picking up a the waste paper basket and throwing out trash from every surface he can reach. He can't look at Felix, can't look at you, but you're both watching him, "only rich people can afford to be this filthy," he hears himself say. Then, after barking a laugh with no humour in it, he turns his shallow gaze on you, "and what's your excuse? Just picked the habit up after all those years?" For a moment you look at him with genuine confusion, but you give him no real response before Felix tells him to fuck off. But Oliver doesn't stop.

Even as Felix is growing more fed up, insisting he'll clean up later, Oliver's own frustration rises. Felix will never do anything for himself.

Except he doesn't mean to say that part out loud.

That's what gets Felix on his feet, gets him to grab the basket, irritation and resentment on his tongue. Oliver feels like he's touched a live wire, like he's pushed Felix too far, watching him tall, frustrated, glowing with sweat from the afternoon heat. It's the heat Felix complains about as he blows about him room, resentfully stuffing rubbish into the bin, complains about the building and it's age and it's wood fucking panelling that can't be ruined with an air conditioner.

In the moment Oliver chooses to glance to you, he's surprised. You only have eyes for Felix, watching him with an expression Oliver can't begin to fathom, curled up in the corner of his bed. You are waiting. You are holding yourself back. You are desperately trying to let Felix prove Oliver wrong.

"Stressing about the exams?" Oliver tries to pivot, tries to redirect the conversation to something he can claw his way back from, that will keep these relationships from being unsalvageable.

"I'm not stressed about the exams, Ol," Felix sounds like he could snap at any moment, sitting on the edge of his bed, wastebasket held on his knees while his other hand reaches out to you. Still half a foot of space between you, and you keep yourself compact, but the intention is clear; Oliver wonders if he even knows he does that, or if it's just instinct for the two of you these days. Felix, however, is looking at him, that same look he's been giving Oliver since you'd slept with him, "you're driving me fucking -"

Felix seems to realise what he's saying, however, with a sharp inhale as he looked away, moving his free hand from beside you to run through his hair. What is there to say now?

Felix says he's got revising to do, that he'll text later about going to the pub. Oliver desperately wants to believe it, but can hear that it's a lie. Felix can't even fucking look at him.

Oliver finally throws a helpless, hopeful glance to you. This time you are looking at him, but there's apology in your eyes. It's enough. It's the confirmation he'd dreaded, that makes his stomach drop.

"Ollie," even just a few hours ago he'd been in love with the way you said his name. Never like this.

"I'll catch you round," he can't look at either of you as he retreats, cant bare your eyes on him like that, and Felix's turned away.

A million thoughts, desperate ideas, all circle the drain that is quickly becoming his mind as the anxiety and the anguish sets in.

Unsalvageable. Past the point of no return. Irrevocably, awfully different.

With all he'd learned of you both, however, he couldn't just let it go to waste. Oliver had worked for all he had in this life, this prestigious place, among these self-important people. Despite his ongoing attempts to figure you out, he at least knew that if he was good to Felix, he was in good with you.

And Oliver knew exactly who Felix Catton wanted him to be.