#college has me by the neck im sorry for not posting anything 😭

[quandaryqueen]

Let it happen

Arkhamverse Edward Nygma X Platonic Reader

Edward values himself as a man with a plan, with an intricate thought process and a divine design... He's partial to primitive instinct but at the heat of the moment, he decided to let something happen without much of a thought.

You know how you'd strongly deny a smile and you'd end up looking like you ate a mouthful of lemon? So you wouldn't really know how Edward actually feels when you present him a gift, something you worked your ass off to create it, embed your blood, sweat and tears on it and he stares at it like an Asian parent presented with report card. Oh he's smiling, he's just a stubborn fuck who, for some reason, still thinks showing vulnerability around you is dumb. But you didn't know that.

It's a reaction you dreaded when you spent a full, two months of preparation for it. You has to scrap myriads of gifts to give him for this special day. I mean, what could you give this man who seems to have everything? He has his own money to purchase whatever the fuck he wants and needs, better yet he can even create them. Sentimental trinkets? No, that's going out of the window, he broke several things without a single thought about it. Cologne? Soaps? Fuck, he might take offense. Clothes? There's a wide array of his wardrobe that he disregards as he has been spending his days in a construction site. Your gift of love and friendship? Oh for fuck's sake, you were not going to find yourself being a lazy fuck with an unoriginal excuse to justify your lack of ideas, you were better than that.

But then it comes to this, Edward looking so... Unamused? Dissatisfied? Irked? Ready to throw you off the curb?

Edward was oblivious to your turmoil, still taken at the gift before him and how you went out of your way to prepare something for him. He dreads his birthday, but fuck, for you to go and get him something well thought out... It does makes his chest flutter, thoughts running through his head were a series of voices only about ten percent coherent.

For you to remember his birthday, get him something is so... It really does touch something within him. This maybe the first time he's ever felt so happy in his birthday, he could cherish the memory forever. For most of the times, he'd dismiss this awful day and go on about his life. He saw his birthday celebration something redundant, why celebrate something as natural as aging? It's just aging, why waste your time?

At least, that's what he says to himself every year. It's not that everyone around him remembers it anyway. He laughs at the notion of his fellow Gotham rogue's celebrating with him, yeah right. Mingling with closed-minded, sloppy ignoramuses? No thanks.

But with you, not only did you remember you really went there and made him feel so loved with this little token of friendship... He could just pick you up and twirl you around... But he can't, he's too speechless to say something and should he do anything, he fears he might make things weird. And so he hid his smile from the fear of ruining things. How was he react in this circumstances anyways?

Thus he didn't notice how overstretched your cheeks were, the white-knuckled fists hidden behind you, and the smallest twitch of your eye.

"Hmm, thank you, Y/N." He says in a flat tone in amidst of the tumultuous spew of thoughts bouncing in his head.

You blink at him owlishly, something that he found a touch unsettling with your exaggeratedly wide grin and enlarge eyes that he has yet to see blink at a normal way.

Fuck, how are you supposed to act after that lackluster of a reaction? How were you supposed to feel? You aren't entitled to what he likes or not, he can like or hate the gift, but fuck is it wrong to be so offended that he seems so ungrateful for the gift? Is he even grateful with that tone of his? Was it okay to be mad? It's his birthday, why would you be mad at him and besides he's had bad experiences with his birthdays! But at the same time, are you really going to take this kind of behaviour? What behaviour? What the fuck is he really feeling— UGH FUCK—!

"Okay then," you pat his back. "Happy birthday, bro."

... What was wrong with you? You really don't know. What was wrong with Edward? You didn't know either. You really can't fault anyone... Fuck, now you've made it awkward for the both of you. How the shit do people express themselves??? You can't even pinpoint what's the current mood of the situation, nor can you identify your feeling, nor his. Just what is happening—

Unknowingly, Edward was at the same page. Confusion all around, maybe it's his lack of exposure to normal, social interaction or his inability to express himself in amidst of a somewhat intimate situation... Is this even intimate? To him, it does but god, it would kill him to show an ounce of emotion. What if he gets attached and you leave him? He'd be a fool to fall but god, were you making that difficult.

Now what? Standing in awkward silence isn't what you really wanted to happen, though it was something that came from one of the scenarios you hated to happen.

"Thanks."

"No problem."

...

The tense silence stretched across the room and there were unspoken thing that's yet to be said, but at the same time, you couldn't really think of anything to say. With Edward's gaze remaining on the little trinket in the neatly wrapped box, he began to soften at the sight of it, whereareas you remain stiff beside him, about neck-deep in thoughts which briefly fly pass you, barely understanding it, before another thought replaces it.

"I-I really like it... No one has done this for me..."

His voice hurls you from further burying yourself in your semi-coherent thoughts. Looking up, you catch him fidget with the bow of the box with a fond smile. A smile he wasn't aware of stretching his features to something pleasant for once. Before he can think about it, he wraps his arms around you, face buried against you.

... If you listen closely, one can hear the windows powering down in your head.

That might have been the first time Edward initiated a hug.