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jeonqquk · 4 years ago

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racket | jjk

↳pairing: jungkook x reader ↳genre/tags: badmintonplayer!jungkook and badmintonplayer!reader, barely any badminton related stuff, rushed asf, accidental confession-?, they dont even kiss wtf ↳rating: everyone <3 ↳wc: 6k

Jeon Jungkook was capable of being the eighth wonder of the world. He may not have come into existence in the 1700s but his ability to do almost everything perfectly was bewildering. Whether it be eating an entire cake in the span of a half-hour or defeating even the coaches at badminton.

Everybody loved Jungkook, his sweet and caring nature paired with those godly features attracted everyone to him- in many ways. Unfortunately, you weren’t part of the everybody lot.

You hated Jungkook. Absolutely despised his abhorrent ass. So much so that if he were the last person alive, you’d even kill yourself just to stay away from him. But that was highly unlikely, so you weren’t going to kill yourself.

The hatred had just always been there, his competitive side seeming fucking atrocious to you. The feeling was mutual, though, so you didn’t feel as guilty as you would’ve if you just detested him while he behaved politely with you.

Jungkook was petty, even you knew that by now. His competitiveness always getting the better of him and turning him into someone with a completely different persona. Losing was not something he was used to. Maybe that’s why he had only a handful of friends, he would do anything to win. It could be a silly bet or even a tournament- Jungkook just had to win.

All the people he was friends with though, their relationship was beautiful. There were only 4 or 5 boys he actually got along with and their adoration for each other could be seen by anybody.

This wouldn’t have been a problem if you weren’t also as competitive as him. You’re technically in no position to say that Jungkook’s hatred towards losing was unhealthy because you hated it too. You thought it made you seem weak, incapable- and you supposed that it was the same reason as to why the youngest Jeon son hated losing as well but you never tried understanding him. Let alone let him speak for a minute if he was in a 10-foot-radius of you.

It was better this way, you thought. It was better to hate him than actually trying to befriend him and catching those unwanted feelings. Hating Jungkook was simpler, easier. Or so you thought for the 10 years of the two of you attending the same badminton academy. And as if that wasn’t bad enough, the two of you were in the same class at college as well. So you had to deal with his annoying self for the larger part of the day.

It was around a month before the annual badminton tournament of your state and obviously, you and Jungkook were taking part in it, more intent on defeating each other rather than the opposing teams. This wouldn’t work though, your coach had called the two of you after practice one day and had said “Listen, Jungkook, Y/n. I know that you’re both really good players and also hate each other.” he sighs, “I’m not asking you to befriend each other, no. I just want the two of you to get along for the tournament. For the sake of our school.” The coach makes a pleading face and you just nod, looking over at Jungkook to see his reaction. He hums and looks down.

After the coach has walked away, you look at Jungkook again, getting ready to tell him that this wasn’t really going to affect the way you behaved with him but he beats you to it, his voice reaching your ears as your lips stay parted midway.

“So, I guess...no more arguing?” Jungkook finally looks at you with a slightly questioning face and you’re left momentarily blank, his proposition seeming so out of character that you’re at a loss for words. This wasn’t expected out of Jungkook. What was expected was that he would just scoff before glaring at you for no reason and stalking away. Him asking you if you wanted to stop the childish arguments the two of you had was not expected.

It takes you a minute to comprehend that Jeon Jungkook was actually trying to put an end to those mini-wars of yours. Your reply is dumb “Uh- okay.” You’re still in a daze from what he said and it’s only when he snaps his fingers in front of your face that you immediately want to spit out a sassy remark but bite your tongue on it, not wanting to disregard Jungkook’s suggestion just after seconds of it having come out of those pink lips of his.

Not knowing what to do, you nod and turn around to get into the locker rooms before heading home. You’re oblivious to the fact that Jungkook almost called your name, wanting to talk to you more, he didn’t know why, but decided against it. You wouldn’t accept the offer anyway.

The walk back to your house is quiet, you’re humming a random tune and there aren’t many vehicles on the road, except for school buses dropping kids home. Unlocking the door, you step into your house and close it behind you before keeping your bag in your room and changing out of your clothes. After all that is done, you check the time and see that it’s 3:18 pm, you have around 2 hours before badminton coaching and suddenly feeling motivated, you heat up some leftover pizza and walk into your room to paint something.

You may not be good at art, you admitted that without any shame because there were a lot of other things you could perform flawlessly. Playing badminton, whining and being able to smell any fried food from miles away to name a few. But you didn’t want to do art because you’d get good at it or something, it was something you genuinely enjoyed and the comments from other people didn’t matter as long as you were satisfied with yourself. And that meant your circles not looking like amoeba.

You take out a drawing book that had been laying in the third drawer of your desk for months and dig up some paintbrushes and watercolour tubes you had left before sitting at your desk to finally start your work. You let your fingers guide you, not thinking much about what you were doing and what the outcome would be. Occasionally dusting your hands from the pizza crumbs, you were quite focused on your work.

30 minutes later, you’re leaning back in your chair and surveying your painting. Woah, it looks pretty-

Wait is that fucking Jungkook you see? “Huh?” your forehead is creased in perplexity, did you just paint a goddamn Jungkook? It looks like Jungkook, though...the bambi eyes and that tiny pout on his lips. How did you-

You were so confused right now. What were you thinking? Well, you obviously weren’t thinking.

Wow. Apparently, you had drawn Jungkook, your sworn enemy, without knowing. Not knowing what to do with the average portrait that didn’t do any justice to his actual features, you quickly clean up your stuff and keep it all back in its respective drawers.

It’s now 4 and you get out your books to get some homework done before leaving for coaching. Ugh. You’d have to see Jungkook there too. You wonder how he’ll behave with you, hopefully, he won’t come anywhere near you.

Sighing as you finish the assignments before stretching back in your chair, you get up to change into your sports clothes before grabbing your bag and water bottle, looking at yourself once in the mirror before walking out towards the pleasantly close by badminton academy you had grown way too accustomed to.

Upon reaching the building, you walk through the reception and smile at the elderly lady who sits there every day. You push the door that leads to the courts and walk on the side, greeting your friends that were warming up. You don’t see Jungkook anywhere right now so that’s a good sign and you bow slightly at your coach in respect although the many years of being taught by the man have obviously gotten the two of you very close. Your bag is kept near a bench in its usual place and you put on the shoes you could wear only on the badminton courts before picking a corner on the side of the court and begin stretching.

You’re walking to get your racquet when you see Jungkook jogging up to your coach, saying something to him with an apologetic look before getting a playful shove from sir as he nods towards the benches where Jungkook would most probably keep his stuff and do some quick exercises before joining the rest of you.

Said boy’s gaze meets yours and he smiles. You don’t reciprocate the gesture, scoffing and moving over to Jihye who’s already looking at you with a cheeky smile adorning her face. “What?” you question, not understanding why she was acting so weird “Don’t pretend you don’t know.” she gives you a playful shove to which you reply by tch-ing and rolling your eyes, done with her childish behaviour. “Seriously Jihye what th-”

“I saw Jungkook smile at you.”

The look on your face is an accurate representation of what you were thinking right now. So what? That smile was nothing, he was just acting upon what he had said earlier. “Yeah, so?” you reply boredly, watching as Jihye’s mouth open wide- wide enough for her to fit her entire fist inside.

“Yeah, so? Are you shitting me Y/n? Jeon Jungkook just smiled at you and you didn’t even do anything in response?” you’re still watching her blankly. Although you admit that it’s not her fault entirely, even you were shocked, very shocked when he first told you about the no-more-fighting pact.

“He just said that we shouldn’t argue now, because the coach at school said that it was going to be bad for our team. You know, in the tournament.” you simply shrug, trying not to make a big deal out of the fact and Jihye is about to reply before the coach is calling all of you for a shadow drill.

Shit.

You are given one side of a court and by some way or the other, Jungkook is opposite to you, his black pants sticking to those fleshy thighs so deliciously and hi-

What?

What is wrong with you? You’ve been thinking about Jungkook unconsciously- first drawing him and now this. Get a grip Y/n.

The whistle of your coach sounds throughout the entire room and your chain of thoughts is broken as your run towards the left side of the net from your position in the centre of the court before picking up one of the shuttles and running back to the centre, moving to the right side of the net now and doing the same as you continue the drill. Jungkook is swift, his feet are balanced and he still manages to look so graceful as he runs around his side of the court.

You’re finally done with all the corners of the court twice as you move to sit in the space between the two different courts as you pant. The two people who were waiting now go to your and Jungkook’s positions as they begin the shadows drill now. You’re surprised to see that Jungkook has opted to sit next to you, you with your bright pink skirt sticking to your skin in all its glory.

“Hi.” he smiles and turns towards you with his hand outstretched in front of your form. With a questioning look on your face, you shake his hand. How far was he planning on going when he said that the two of you wouldn’t be having those silly arguments anymore? To you, it meant that the pair of you would just stick to your own places and not interact with each other or do anything that would result in the bickering to resume.

“Hey..?” Jungkook retracts his hand, leaving yours in mid-air. “So you uh wanna like hang out..um..like somewhere?” This boy had been taking you by surprise too much lately, why would he randomly ask you to hang out?

Sure he had said that he didn’t want the two of you having those little fights anymore but this? This was unexpected- really fucking unexpected.

“Uh...so suddenly?” he slightly frowns “Why? Are you uncomfortable with it? That’s totally fine though!”

Jungkook was being too friendly, a little too friendly, you were confused and shocked at his tactics but tried not to show it on your face. “I mean, yeah, okay.” The words came tumbling out of your mouth before you could even realise it and his face was now bright. His smile so sweet, you feel a cavity forming and he nods. “Cool! After practice then..? He trails off, suddenly hesitant and you’re still dumbfounded by how quickly things had taken a turn, for the better you supposed.

Not even a day ago, the two of you were ready to claw the other’s eyes out and now, you were agreeing to go out with him. This is not a date though. Jungkook and you are just going out to bond as friends. Nothing more, nothing less. Nodding, you smile lightly, trying to reduce some of the awkwardness from your face as you suggest a cafe to meet up at.

Practice is over and you are walking out of the academy with Jihye chattering beside you. “Oh! I almost forgot, so about that Jungkook thing. I saw the two of you talking also.” she wiggles her eyebrows suggestively, or that’s what she thinks it looks like. Turning to face her, you sigh at her usual habit of sticking her nose into others’ business and tell her simply that he had just asked you to meet up at the cafe so you could just chill.

“Holy shit, it’s a date!” Jihye seems more excited about the meet-up, not date, her hands coming up to join in front of her chest as she looks at you in bewilderment. “Why are you so passive?” your friend is way too excited for something so normal but then again, this was you and Jungkook. The two of you could never go a day without insulting the other before. Now you were meeting up with the same guy at a cafe in another hour or so. When you tell Jihye this, she stops walking, putting her hand on the left side of her chest- where her heart was. Her dramatic behaviour was now normal now and you knew the reason for her overreaction.

Your love life was drier than the Sahara Desert in a fucking draught. You had been on just a handful of dates in your entire existence, only 5 or 6 of them ending up with you fucking the guy. The others had just been awkward, mainly because of your edgy self.

It wasn’t that big of a problem though, you were too occupied by your college work and badminton tournament preparations that anything else just seemed like a waste of time. For instance, instead of going out with some guy, you could stay home and binge-watch Stranger Things. There were a lot more practical things that could be done without the company of males.

The only reason you agreed to go out with Jungkook was that you wanted to see how it would end up. There was a very slim chance that your meeting would go very well but if Jungkook kept behaving as sweet as he was now, you wouldn’t even have a solid reason to be rude to the poor fellow. Nevertheless, you were not going to completely relax because one never knows.

“I’m coming over to pick out your outfit!” Jihye is excited, jumpy because this is new- you going out with someone of the opposite gender. And although it was completely normal for someone else, you just looked at your friend judgmentally, feigning annoyance and earning a light shove from her that has you stumbling on the sidewalk.

“‘Kay'” she squeals when you agree and invites herself to your house, saying that you should take a shower while she picks out your outfit. You trusted her though, Jihye’s fashion sense was really good and you knew for a fact that whatever she would pick out would be trendy.

Unlocking your house with the bronze key, you walk in and keep your bag in its place before walking to get a glass of water for Jihye and yourself. She accepts and plops down on your couch before you pull her up by the arm, a disgusted look on your face. “Go wash up first.” she pouts but heads into the bathroom near the hallway nonetheless to wash up. You shout to her from your room that you’re heading to shower and she shouts back an “Alright.” from downstairs as you open the door, heading in for a steamy shower.

40 minutes later, you’re getting out of your bathroom, content, to Jihye’s shrieking. Something along the lines of missing the date and you roll your eyes when you hear the last word. It was not a date for God’s sake!

You nonchalantly nod at no one in particular and apply your cream before heading out in a bathrobe. She’s sitting on your bed with some outfits placed on your bed. At first glance, they all look colour-coordinated with some accessories here and there but upon closer inspection, you see that every piece of clothing on your mattress was one of the shortest you had in every category.

“Do you want me to look like a slut?” you ask with your arms folding in front of your chest, and Jihye looks at you with wide eyes, offended that you even had the nerve to comment on her outfit-picking skills.

“No! These are all fine for a meet-up.” She uses finger quotes for the last word and you smile to yourself, “Uh, let me just stop you there. I don’t really know what people mean when they use this.” you make the finger quotes and she gasps “Did you just-” your shoulders raise and as the laughter dies down, you walk closer to the bed, mentally evaluating each outfit she had oh so carefully picked. They’re all really stylish, you gotta admit that but you’d never say it to her face. The one closest to the headboard consists of a full-sleeved plain white turtleneck that had a greyish-brown dress that reached your mid-thigh laid on top of it. It was something you could wear, maybe with some electric pink leggings. You see that Jihye, who is now rummaging in your collection of shoes, has also laid some black boots in front of the bed that matched the first dress.

Your gaze travels to the one on the middle one and you immediately furrow your eyebrows, already ruling the strapless crop top and ripped shorts out. Too much skin.

The one to the far left is also decided to not be inappropriate for the occasion as you didn’t think Jungkook would want to see you in a burgundy top with spaghetti straps. The jeans that had too many huge holes in them didn’t even look cool at this point. What were you thinking when you bought this.

Jihye comes out with some heels for one of the outfits “Why are you even putting so much effort into this? I can just wear a shirt and sweats.” She huffs out, unamused, as you giggle at her annoyed face. “Kidding. So, I really like this one.” you point at the dress and she smiles slyly “Showing off your long legs I see.” Punching her shoulder, you make some place to sit on the bed, glad that you shaved today. “Now, get out of my room. I need to change and apply make-up.” She nods and you watch her close the door behind her, getting up to lock it for extra safety measures.

Not like she was gonna barge in and catch you in your star printed underwear anyways. Changing into the turtle neck and then the dress, you look at yourself in the mirror and if it wasn’t your frizzy hair, you would even think you looked cute. You brush your hair and settle for a high ponytail. Putting on your shoes, you apply a little bit of make-up, not wanting to seem overly eager but the excessive amount of perfume may or may not give you away.

As you open the door and walk down to where Jihye has changed into some sweats she had kept in your house for times like these, she gasps upon seeing you, chip almost falling out her mouth and chews it before widening her eyes comically “Babe! You look so good.” you smile at her compliment, giving her a twirl as she gets up to probably to hug you before deciding against it, shaking her head.

“So, is my make-up looking fine?” she nods furiously and you pick up your purse that was on the dining chair before looking at the clock to see that you only have ten minutes before Jungkook arrives. You bid Jihye goodbye, not worried in the slightest bit about her being alone at your house.

As you’re walking, the cafe comes into view and you spot a familiar figure walking into the shop as well and you increase your speed to enter at the same time as Jungkook to make it seem as if you weren’t even slightly late. He doesn’t notice you even when you’re right behind him and walks to a table to sit down as you sit opposite him immediately, realising that he had walked to a two-people table in the corner of the shop.

His eyes widen and he stutters out in shock, “O-Oh, you’re here,” Nodding, you hide a smile and greet him back, trying not to get into an argument with him. It’s silent for a while, you think of anything to say to break the awkward atmosphere but just as you’re looking up from the ground to speak to Jungkook, his voice is filling your ears. “Do you want to order?” He waits and you simply nod, “Okay, I’ll come to get my coffee.”

Just as you’re getting up, Jungkook keeps his hand on you without warning, head shaking frantically. “No! I mean, I can get it for you.” Looking up in surprise, you’re unable to speak for a moment. Did Jeon Jungkook just say that he would buy you coffee?

You shake your head and snap out of your trance. Or at least you try to. “No, it’s alright. I can get it myself.” Jungkook rushes to quieten you again and looks like he won’t let you win, so you sigh and back down. “Fine.” He giggles and walks off to the counter while you take your phone out to kill time. Getting bored when you see that there are not any notifications, you switch the device off and look out of the window, watching as people get out of their cars for a pitstop at the cafe before driving away again.

“Here are the coffees.” You turn your head and see Jungkook setting two cups of coffee on the table before sitting himself. Looking at what he got you, you thank him for bringing the correct order and he just sends a light smile in your direction, rubs his hands together and picks up the cup with both hands. You almost coo, but hold yourself together. This was your enemy.

That reminds you, “So, why are you suddenly being so kind to me? It’s really weird to experience you treating me nicely.” You hadn’t meant for your tone to come off as accusing, but it does, and you have to watch Jungkook’s eyes flash with hurt for a second before shaking his head lightly. He places his cup back in the small saucer and his hands on either side of it.

“I knew you would ask me this.” egging him on with a raise of your eyebrows, you take a sip of your coffee “Remember how Coach said that we should stop arguing?” At your nod, he licks his lips and continues on with his explanation, “Well, I thought about it-” “You told me to stop arguing right after he left.” “I thought about it and I decided that we really shouldn’t be having these fights. Like, what’s the point? I’m not getting anything out of it. You’re not getting anything out of it.” He ignores your words and when you hear his, ask yourself why you hadn’t tried to put a stop to the childish arguments you had with Jungkook.

You don’t know why you ever fought back. Well, you did hate losing and Jungkook did everything to rile you up- so he was at fault too- but there was no specific reason as to why you hated Jungkook so much. “I don’t know, you were the one who started them. I don’t have a problem with becoming friends.”

Jungkook looks at you, looking as if he’s trying to figure something out, pouty lips looking kissable but you quickly brush those thoughts off. “So..” his hands come closer to yours and you’re shocked to feel your heart starting to beat faster, its pace picking up as Jungkook’s hand comes closer to yours. “..friends?” his pinky intertwines with yours and you feel your face turn red, the action igniting something in you.

Looking down at your fingers intertwined seems to be a big mistake as you gasp, the sight just overwhelming you. His hand fit in yours perfectly, and even if he meant it just as friends, you couldn’t help but imagine how it would be to be loved by Jungkook.

No! You two just started behaving normally around each other and you’re already thinking about loving him?

A voice in your head sounds as Jungkook retrieves his hand to pick up the call that had distracted you. You take your hand back and keep it in your lap, tingling sensations till lingering.

Jungkook looks at you apologetically for a second, and you reassure him that he could take the call but he tells whoever was on the other side of the line that he was busy, cutting the call after he told the person that he would call them back later.

“Sorry about that.” you barely catch his mumble and shake your head, “Don’t worry.” As you finish your coffee and make small talk with Jungkook about random things, you start growing more comfortable around him, cracking jokes and laughing at his lame ones. You’re discussing some things about the upcoming tournament when Jungkook suddenly leans in closer.

You move back out of shock and he stills, eyes suddenly going wide as his breathing halts. Your own starts getting heavy, his sudden action having caught you terribly off guard. After partially having gained your composure back, you see that Jungkook is still in the same position, “J-Jungkook?” He takes a moment to snap out of whatever trance he was put in and blinks once, twice before gasping loudly and jerking backwards. His back hits the chair and his mouth is still open in shock at what he did.

“S-Sorry..” he trails off, chewing his lip and your eyes follow the motion carefully before darting them back to his face quickly. He furrows his brows and starters ahead of you before shaking his head, murmuring something to himself. “You ok there?” you try to keep your voice soft, soothing as Jungkook shifts his gaze to you, wide eyes looking absolutely adorable.

You question him again, worried, “What wa-” “I like you.”

Silence.

You sputter, his words having caught you off guard and if Jungkook’s eyes could go any wider, they do, his hand instantly coming to slap over his face and he curses, “I-fuck.” You’re still shocked by his confession and your brain takes time to process what he said, the three simple words not registering in your mind until suddenly, Jungkook’s voice brings you back to the present.

“Y-Y/n?” He sounds hesitant, and your face must be an accurate representation of what you’re feeling right now because Jungkook begins speaking again, his eyes filled with worry as he tries to fix his mistake. “No. I mean, yes, I like you-” Your face portrays horror at his words again and he rushes to correct himself, hitting himself on the head once.

“You what?” Your voice is hushed for unknown reasons and Jungkook looks around, trying to calm himself down by breathing in and out and you use the time to do the same, the initial shock having worn off as you exhale loudly and take a bite out of the cookie from the small plate he had gotten.

“I like you, Y/n.” Jungkook’s tone is more serious this time, and you try maintaining a straight face, his words finally sinking and you choke on your saliva. “Like like me?” you question dumbly and he nods desperately, licking his lips and drumming his fingers on the table, a nervous habit of his.

“Oh,” Jeongguk tilts his head at your response and you muster the courage to ask him a question that had been lingering on your mind ever since he confessed. “Since..?”

He coughs loudly into his mouth, trying to hide the blush that creeps up his cheeks and looks at you with a suddenly brave gaze, “I’ve liked you for a long time, Y/n. The reason I started annoying was because I wanted you to notice me, not because I disliked you...And better confess now instead of regretting not doing anything before right?” Your mouth is left hanging at his confession now, the real reason for his pestering finally coming out into the light.

“Why would you annoy me, though? You could've just come up and talked to me, it would've been way easier for us.” At this, Jeongguk blushes, trying to cover his burning cheeks from you and cups his face in his hands. “I don’t know..you were really annoying, to be honest.”

“I was annoying- you asshole!” You lean over and hit his arm, much to his chagrin and he frowns before swatting your arm away. Silence falls over the two of you, but it's not the awkward kind, you just sit quietly, drowning yourself in thoughts about Jungkook.

“So…” Beside you, Jungkook shifts shyly and lowers his head when you look at him, the sight igniting something warm inside you. “Can I ask to ask you out?” His hair sits prettily atop his forehead, hands on his lap and his lips are scrunched into the cutest pout.

“Why don’t you ask me and find out?” You aim for a teasing tone, but miss by a mille, instead sounding breathless and at this, Jungkook smiles before leaning in closer. “Will you go on a date with me?”

Even though you knew he was going to ask you, the words still send tingles throughout your entire body, heart racing and you nod before you can even think.

It has you suddenly thinking about the drastic turn of events. The guy who was once (not even a few hours ago) your biggest enemy had just confessed to you and was asking you out. You’re thinking if it was a bad decision, but with Jungkook looking so innocent and just, like a child, it’s hard to think straight. Your heart beats erratically as Jungkook gives you one last soft smile before getting up and walking to pay, and you try chasing him and stopping him from paying for both your and his drinks but as much as you want to, you’re still stuck in place, everything that happened recently replaying in your head. He comes back in a few minutes and holds out his hand for you to take, and as you’re getting up with his help, your heart can’t help but flutter, the feeling of his warm hand encompassing yours turning you mushy like dough.

“Seriously?” You can’t help but scoff, and beside you Jungkook lets go of your hand to feign an offended face. “What! You said you liked Call of Duty!” Jungkook defends himself and you stare blankly at the venue of your first official date with Jeon Jungkook.

The baby pink blankets that adore his couch look inviting, so do the various snacks on the coffee table but still, this was your first date. You had really expected him to go all out and take you to dinner at a classy restaurant. And then maybe have ended with a drumline playing on a bridge. Ok, maybe that was too much.

This doesn’t mean that you’re disappointed, though. Nope. This- a date on Jungkook’s couch with Call of Duty and snacks- was perfectly fine. Great, even. You finally crack a smile, nudging his shoulder and muttering a ‘Just kidding.’ under your breath when his face turns sad.

You grab his arm and sit on the couch, patting the space beside you for him to occupy as you shuffle through the unhealthy packs of chips and nachos to find your favorite one. Jungkook grabs a drink and you shuffle under the soft blanket, curling up and look at Jungkook, trying to act cute as you prepare to embarrass yourself.

“Cuddle with me?” Jungkook almost spits his drink out, surging forward as his head turns towards your direction you’re positive he gets whiplash. “W-What-Did you..” Nodding, you try pouting but know for a fact that it looks more awkward than cute and huff out, “Just-” Jungkook nods suddenly, “Ok.” and gets under the covers. Your face heats up when you finally realise that you just asked The Jeon Jungkook™ to cuddle with you, and as he ever so slowly crawls towards you, your body turns stiff.

“I-Is this okay?” Jungkook hovers his hand over your waist and as you look at him with wide eyes, you nod lightly, indicating the green signal, his body heat not helping at all. Jungkook’s soft voice filters through your ears, and you swear you could listen to him forever. Even if he was making fun of your obsession with hard peaches. Yes.

“We can watch a movie if you want..and then play COD?” he suggests and you mumble out a “Sure” and watch as he picks up the remote to scroll through the various apps whose subscriptions he had.

He pauses at Netflix. “Can we watch Full House?” his voice is timid, and you turn to furrow your eyebrows at him, wondering why he would seem hesitant while asking that. Everyone loved Michelle.

“Why not?” At your words, Jungkook’s eyes light up and he smiles widely, turning towards the TV to play the show.

You rip open a packet of Cheetos and Jungkook tries (keyword: tries) to slyly wrap his arm around you from behind but doesn’t go unnoticed, and you move forward for him to easily slide his arm around you, not even bothering to look at his red face because there’s a really high chance that you’ll combust.

2 episodes into the new season, you turn to Jungkook and he notices, eyebrows raised as you gulp,

“I think I like you too.”

“That would’ve been really romantic if your Cheetos breath wasn’t hitting my face.”

epilogue

“Yesss, get it Kook!” Jungkook comes running up to you and you slap his arm in enthusiasm. He hugs you, tight, and your arms wrap around his body as well, congratulating him in his victory. His last hit had been a smash, one his opponent hadn’t been able to defend and the match had indeed with your school winning, the trophy yours for the third time in a row.

“We won.” The words coming out of Jungkook’s mouth urge you to hug him tighter, and you do, nodding although he probably can't see you. “We did.” Your boyfriend lets go of you to embrace his teammates and you laugh with all of them, and when your eyes meet Jungkook’s, realise that he may not be as bad as you first thought him to be.

tysm for reading whatever the fuck this is <3 send in feedback, if you want!

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mydisenchantedeulogy · 5 years ago

Text

High Roller [Butch Cassidy]

A close friend once told her: poker is a lot like sex. That same friend ultimately betrayed her, but Petra sincerely agreed with him on this – position was everything. Not to toot her own horn, but she was damn good at both.

Right now, for example, she was dominating.

“Shit! I reckon I fold.” Butch tossed down his cards with a grumble and leaned back in his chair to watch the rest of the game. If there had been money involved, he would have been flat on his ass by now.

Kid knotted his brows and sat his cards face up on the table. “Me too. I ain’t got nothin’.”

He shot a curious glance to the woman at his left. It was her turn – she was bored to tears – but so far, all she did was stare at her recent hand and bounce her foot like a bobber floating on the water. Kid wasn’t sure, but he reckoned she was about to win again. When her lips curled up into a devious smirk, he knew that his gut feeling had been right.

“Full House, boys. Looks like this round goes to me, ne?” Petra sat down three 9s and two 6s as she laughed softly. Butch held a look of pure shock, which made her laugh harder.

Kid chuckled; he’d never seen anyone play as good as her before. “Well, if that don’t take the rag off the bush. Three hands and we lost every single one. Yer pretty good at buckin’ the tiger, miss.”

“Hvala ti prijatelju (thank you my friend). It was nothing more than good luck I’m afraid.” She was lying of course. Poker was a combination of skill and luck – Petra just wasn’t about to give away her secrets.

The outlaws might have had years of experience over her, but she had position. The difference between winning and losing millions depended on who acted last; who had this position at the table. Too bad money wasn’t involved.

Not like it would do me any good here. Petra gathered up the cards and shuffled them. She was going to purpose another game; there wasn’t anything else to do, but it was late.

Morning came early for the three. She and the outlaws were asked to find a fellow Drifter named Scipio, who had fallen from the back of their wagon during the retreat from the Black King and his army; a battle she only heard about. They were retracing their steps, but so far nothing was to be seen of him.

This was their fourth night out in the wilderness and Petra was starting to grow restless. Card games could only do so much for her. She was craving excitement; not the kind this world presented – slaying people and conquering villages – but the kind she got from robbing jewelry stores. Her purpose in this world was unclear, but Abe no Haruakira insisted that as a Drifter, she had the ability to turn the tide of battle for the humans. The only setback was, that until he found a task for her, she was on the bench.

That being the case, she decided to ride with the outlaws until told otherwise. Now … they weren’t terrible companions to travel with, but in the wake of spending time with them, Petra found that she favored them a little more than she ought to, especially Butch.

In a world where death could happen in the blink of an eye, desire for another person was ill advised.

Yet she didn’t care. Petra was almost convinced that she was imagining all this. It was all so unreal. Therefore, when the beat of her heart would speed up to the thought of giving herself to the gunslinger, she accepted it, rather than try to make excuses as to why it was a mistake. He seemed to like her well enough; his constant flirting was evident.

Life was meant to be enjoyed; that two-faced scumbag told her that.

Petra snorted in disdain and watched the cards cascade down into her open hands. She had enough of thinking about that dunce for one night.

“Who’s for another game.”

Kid shook his head. “I’m played out. Gonna hit the hay before the sun comes up.”

“Get on it then,” Butch voiced. He tossed back his hand in a lax wave as Kid stood up from the table. “I ain’t quittin’ until I’ve won somethin.”

“Better most of luck to ya.” He dipped his hat and muttered a brief good night to Petra as he crawled into the back of the wagon.

There was a moment of racket as Kid situated himself, then complete silence. Not even the crackle of burned wood and flames could be heard over it.

Petra was at last alone with Butch, yet she had nothing to say. Topic starters were not a strength she possessed. Rather than make one up, she divided the deck and reshuffled the cards again.

“You goin’ to play? Or is your nerve gone up in smoke?”

Petra snorted again – more girlie than intended. “Ne, I am still fit to whip your ass. Only wish there was something worth playing for.” She slipped Butch his cards, aware that his green eyes admired the swell of her breasts as she leaned over the table.

“I’m sure there’s somethin’ we can sweeten the pot with,” he stated thickly. He grabbed the buckle of his belt and tugged upwards, rearing his slender hips as he did. Regardless of whether he meant to or not, Petra felt her skin heat up. “You’ve been eyein’ this for some time; maybe you want it.”

You have no idea. Petra cleared her throat and masked her embarrassment behind the screen of her terrible hand. “Ne, I am not good with firearms; best to leave that to the gunslingers of our motley crew.”

“Shame. I would have liked to have taught you a little somethin’.” Butch glanced at his cards, but he made no indication as to whether the hand was bad or not.

Not like it mattered; once again Petra had the late position. She was going to analyze his every move until the showdown, then dupe him into believing that she had nothing. This gave her valid idea; a pot worth playing for.

“We have all night,” Petra baited. “Maybe I can teach you something; a game to be precise. One that people in my era sometimes play. It’s called strip poker.”

“What in the blazes is that?”

She figured that she’d better show him. Rearing up, she loosened her belt and set it on the table – the canisters of tear gas she was afraid would rupture if she wasn’t gentle enough with them. In addition, Petra included the hostler with her stun baton on it.

“The rules are the same as regular poker, except we make bets with articles of clothing or accessories that we have on our person. Normally you’d start off small, but if someone should raise the deal, then a piece of equal value must be offered. That, or you fold and lose the pot.”

“So, someone is goin’ to be buck naked by the end of this game?”

Petra nodded in agreement. “I put in my bet. Are you going to raise it, Mister Cassidy? Or do you not like taking risks?”

“You bet your ass I’m goin’ to raise it,” he laughed. Putting his duster on the table, he was left in his button-down shirt. He stared at her for a moment, before gesturing for her to place a higher bet.

Unfortunately for her, she wasn’t wearing a coat. Her hooded shirt had to be offered instead. This left her in a thin black tube top that provided him a clear view of her stiff nipples.

“Cold night, ain’t it? Sure ya want to keep doin’ this?”

Embarrassed as she was to be seen like this, Petra again nodded and glanced down at the board. With no way to check, because of the live bet that Butch played, she had to fold early.

Just an unlucky hand, Petra thought bitterly. She gathered up the cards and quickly shuffled and redealt them. In her hand was a red 5 and a red 6; both diamonds. Betting her heeled shoe, Butch raised her again. This time he put in his own shirt and his gun holsters.

A frown marred her beautiful face.

Butch let out a boisterous laugh. “What’s the matter, pretty lady? I ain’t never seen you so mad before; like a rattlesnake about to strike.”

“Ne, I am not mad. Just never realized that you liked to gamble so high – it’s a bit unexpected.”

“I ain’t got nothin’ to lose. Helps that I ain’t got no shame either,” Butch admitted with a smirk. “On the other hand, you have a lot to lose … like that strategy you’ve been sittin’ the entire game.”

Petra grunted in shock; Butch again laughed.

“I noticed, sweetheart. Not a bad way to play; bettin’ small until ya had the pot. But what are you goin’ to do now? The gamble is high and I’m wilin’ to bet that you ain’t got the best hand. How do ya plan to win this one?”

Sorry, but you are wrong.

“Just like this,” she chirped. Her lips curled up into a smirk as she laid down her hand. The board gave her the cards to make an Ace high flush.

“Nice hand,” he cooed while setting down his own.

Full house, kings full of fours.

Petra went pale. How in the hell? She gave him a glare. “You were playing so terrible earlier; amateurish. What is your angle?”

“Just tryin’ to give ya what you want,” he admitted.

“And what would that be?”

Butch smirked from the corner of his mouth. “I think you know, lady. It’s a bit too late to be playin’ the coot here. The moment you suggested we play this game of yours I knew you were aimin’ to bed me.”

“What do you want then?”

She was optimistic. Her face was hot as an oven, but maybe he wanted her just as much as she wanted him.

“For starters … what I’m owed. You lost some clothes, and I want them.”

Very well.

Petra stood and moved closer to him. She slid between his open legs and grasped the bottom of her top, then slipped it over her head. The cold air made her instantly shiver.

“Now what? It’s very cold out here.”

He said nothing and offered his lap for her to sit on. The lewd way he patted his crotch made Petra bite her lip in anticipation.

She sat down and rested her legs at his side. A sigh of relief left her as Butch warmed her with his hands. His fingers danced up her slender sides, then separated at the base of her ribs. One hand slid behind her back; the other caressed her breasts.

“I thought you wanted to play until you won something,” Petra cooed. His calloused fingers felt so nice against her soft skin.

Butch again smirked from the corner of his mouth. “Who says I haven’t already won?”

He leaned forward and blew warm air across her nipple. When it peaked, he took it into his mouth and sucked gently. The lovely woman on his lap moaned in reply. Her slender hips bucked against his and her fingers slid into his hair, pressing him closer to her chest. A content smirked pulled at the corner of his lips.

As the outlaw was busy, Petra removed her hand from his messy hair and brought it down to the front of his pants. She unfastened his belt and pulled the zipper down. He pulled away from her chest and generously lifted his slender hips, shimmying out of them; his cock sprang free – no underclothes to keep her from touching him. His breath hitched as her hand enclosed around him, giving him a stroke, then another. Her thumb skimmed over the engorged head of his cock, spreading precum over his taut skin.

For fuck’s sake she wanted him.

“Yer turn; them stockings next,” he murmured.

Petra opted not to correct him – cotton-lycra leggings were a social norm in her era – and removed them; panties she never wore on the job and unfortunately, she died before the job was done.

“As smooth as silk,” Butch mentioned as he cupped her bare pussy; his palm he pressed taut against her clit.

She moaned softly. Carting around a straight razor had its uses. Petra rocked her curved hips against him to enhance the sensation, but he pushed a finger into her wet hole, forcing her hips to stutter and still; she sighed in bliss.

“Please … it’s been so long.”

Butch removed his hand and grabbed her hips, leading her into position over him. She rested the head of his cock against her taut hole and sank down to the base; her eyes rolled back. Wanting more, Petra slid her arms over the outlaw’s shoulders and rocked her hips, bouncing her lower body on him.

He swore and took control of her movement, thrusting hard into her over and over. Petra had no option but to cling onto him and endure it; her release was looming quickly, having not been active for a long time. She wanted to last; to revel in the pleasure that was twisting in her stomach, but she wanted so bad to come undone. And she allowed herself to.

She moaned out and buried her face in his unkept hair, figure quivering from her release as Butch pounded into her. He came soon after inside her and sank in exhaustion, easing from her. Petra was fucked out of her mind from the release of endorphins, but felt him unexpectedly tense up. She leaned back in alarm.

“What is it?”

Butch swore. “I forgot about askin’ ya if you had a condom. Them things are expensive.”

“You scared me.” She sighed in relief, thinking he may have regretted having sex with her. “I had a procedure done; one to prevent me from having kids.”

She liked children, but knew she’d never be able to protect one with her line of work.

Butch put aside the issue and slid his hand into her hair, tugging her closer. She rested against him and shut her eyes; he was too warm.

“I’m beat; don’t know ‘bout you.”

Petra was out. She didn’t even notice the fire had went out as darkness consumed her. No dream was this damn good.

#butch cassidy and the sundance kid #drifters #butch x oc

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lilylovessev · 5 years ago

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expectations || snily

Lily Evans smiled away quite contently so to herself as she made the most wonderful cup of tea, before then settling down at her kitchen table and opening up an interior design magazine. This was definitely her idea of heaven, truly so.

Her parents had just bought her first house for her. It was such a thoroughly beautiful ivy-covered, thatched-roof cottage. She had then completely made it her own. It was a little maddening really, that it had taken her this long to actually find a place and settle down into a home of her own. Yet, she had been perfectly happy living back at home. Her parents were both incredibly well-off, from both their heritage and business. She’d been spoilt for the last thirty years of her life, this was her first attempt at branching out from the family home. Well, other than her time away at university.

She was currently a journalist, having worked for a rather high-brow newspaper before then moving onto a well-known fashion magazine. It was all awfully cushy, and she’d very quickly managed to work her way up the ladder of command. On the other hand, it wasn’t as if she even truly needed to be doing what she was doing. It felt more like a hobby that she was paid for at times. She was able to spend her days with a vast amount of pretty clothes and shoes and accessories. It was fun. It wasn’t overly challenging or stretching of her intellectual abilities, but every day brought something different for her. It wasn’t easy though, moreso the... people side of it all, rather than the work.

She had an awful lot of friends, a lot of ventures outside of work and still found the time to get an all too regular and expensive blow-dry at a gorgeous salon in London.

It all seemed so ideal, didn’t it? It was. She was so, so lucky. However, she’d had her fair share of problems in the past. There were certainly demons that she tried her best to hide, to forget all about. It wasn’t as if everything was quite as perfect as it first appeared. Yet, that was the image that she liked to portray of herself, it was somewhat of a self-defence mechanism. That and she had worked hard for this. She was privileged but had done so much off of her own back. She deserved to be able to enjoy herself. It wasn’t as if she was out and about bragging to everyone about her lifestyle, she was far classier than that.

“I’m here, Mother.” Lily sighed, taking off her cap, shimmying out of her jacket before walking into the rather grand entrance of her parents’ home. She set down her tennis racket and bag, before smoothing out her perfectly white tennis dress. She glanced up, smiling as her Mum emerged from the nearby kitchen. Yes, she tended to visit home rather often. It was just handy to be able to do so.

“An invitation came for you this morning, darling. It was hand-delivered actually.”

Lily then reached out curiously, taking the envelope from her Mum, before then opening the wax seal and pulling out the card.

“Marlene McKinnon? I haven’t seen her in years.”

“You are quite the social darling these days, Lil. I’m sure that she’s heard all about you.”

“Hmmm,” the redhead responded distractedly, not quite so sure about that. The last time that she and Marlene had spent any time together, they’d had quite the argument about some spilt nail polish on a very expensive rug. They’d been about fifteen, at a mutual friends’ house. This was all rather curious. Perhaps, she simply wanted to make amends, a great deal of time had passed since then. Her Mum was right, Lily was quite well-known on the local social circuit. She was on all of the society pages in the newspapers these days. That was mostly because she did an awful lot of charity work, and attended a lot of their formal events. “I’ll RSVP to her.”

She had no idea as to whether or not she wanted to go, but it only seemed right that she did, even if she just showed her face for a short time. Although, she was fairly certain that the blonde would be just as annoying now as she was as a teenager. And elusive. She’d clearly been going to a boarding school for bad girls, given that she certainly wouldn’t have been out of place at St Trinian’s back then. Who knows what she’d been doing since that time in their lives.

#para

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silverlightqueen · 5 years ago

Text

The Other Half - Teaser

badboy!Jimin x richgirl!reader ft. bts, nct 127, twice, red velvet, got7, blackpink and exo

Word Count: 2.4k+

Summary - In Winchester, y/n has it all. Gorgeous and glamorous. A friendship group just as gorgeous and glamorous. Fantastic grades. A handsome boyfriend with a family just as successful as hers. A doting dad and a brother just as beautiful as she is. An amazing school, and an even more amazing house. As many cars and clothes and bags and shoes, and as much makeup and money she could ever ask for. But when Winchester Academy puts on an exchange programme with Burnley Tech School, a high school in an underprivileged area, two completely different worlds collide, and y/n has her hands full, practically overflowing, dealing with her exchange partner, bad boy Jimin with a whole lot of baggage...

Warnings - nothing yet except some offensive rich kid talk, a hint of classism and some mild bad language

a/n: I literally got this idea less than 24 hours ago and have already produced a two and a half thousand word long teaser for it so as you can probably tell, I am very excited about this ! lmk what you think so far and hmu if you wanna be on the taglist x

au masterlist

silverlightqueen masterlist

‘And then I told them to deliver it to my house and you know they said? They said they don’t do home deliveries,’ Nayeon wraps up her story, the rest of us girls gasping in shock. ‘You’re kidding?’ Mina asks, one hand flipping her hair over her shoulder, the other clasping Jaehyun’s hand. ‘Nope. I was like, bitch, do you not know who I am?’ Nayeon says, a laugh running around the group at that. ‘So what did you do, babe?’ Johnny asks her, arm around her shoulders, and she grins. ‘I asked to speak to her manager, and she went and got him. As soon as he saw me, his face fell, and he asked what he could do for me. I told him that his employee had told me they don’t do home deliveries and before I could even finish talking, he said that they could make an exception for me, of course,’ she says, a satisfied smile on her face as she inspects her fingernails, pristine no doubt, due to the award-winning nail tech we all share. ‘And did they?’ Tzuyu asks. ‘The clothes were in my room before I got home,’ she replies, all of us laughing.

We’re sat out in the courtyard in our usual spot; a few benches in a huddle, half in the sun and half in the shade, close enough to the sports pitches and courts for us to keep an eye on the boys during the warmer months. It’s only April now, and sports start up again in May, when the air gets warmer, the days get longer, and our skin gets darker. Only half of our group are sat here at the moment, Nayeon, Johnny, Mina and Jaehyun taking up one bench, Momo and Sana on another, Tzuyu and Mark sprawled across another, and myself and Taeyong in another, my legs stretched across it and Taeyong sat between them, head resting on my chest. We’re all dressed in the tragically unfashionable uniform, the girls in black cardigans, blue blouses, green and blue checked skirts with yellow and red on them and knee high black socks (though we ditch the cardigans at any possible opportunity, our blouses tight and skirts rolled up so we don’t look like conservative catholic school girls from the Victorian era or whatever), the boys in tailored black trousers, light blue shirts and black ties, blazers the same print as our skirts slung over their shoulders. Other students pass us by with eager ears, trying to hear any hot gossip, and eager eyes, desperate to make eye contact and earn a smile from one of us.

I spot the others ambling over towards us, and wave as they near us. Chaeyoung practically bounds up to Mark, inelegantly landing on him and pressing a kiss to his cheek. Tzuyu makes space for Sicheng as Jeongyeon, Doyoung, Jihyo and Taeil take up another bench. Yuta joins Sana and Jungwoo joins Momo, Dahyun and Donghyuck taking up the last bench, and we are all as we should be. With our friends, in our couples, picture perfect as we’ve always been and always will be. ‘Oh, have you heard the news?’ Jihyo says, her fingers toying with Taeil’s tie as she speaks. ‘What news, Ji?’ Taeyong asks, his back vibrating against my chest with his words. ‘I don’t know how true this is, but I overheard Jennie speaking to Jackson and, apparently, we’ve got exchange students coming,’ she says, conversation erupting as soon as she utters the words. ‘No way! I don’t want anyone in my house!’ ‘Foreign bitches? Cool.’ ‘You’re fucking kidding, Ji.’ ‘Ooh, I hope they’re French!’

‘Why?’ Mark asks Chaeyoung, raising an eyebrow. ‘She’s got a kink for French boys,’ Dahyun whispers loudly, all of bursting into laughter. ‘No!’ Chaeyoung exclaims, a blush tainting her cheeks, ‘I just want to practice my French.’ ‘Oh, yeah, she’s fluent, Mark,’ Johnny teases, coaxing more laughter from the rest of us. ‘You can practice your French on me if you want, Chae,’ Taeyong teases with a wink, and I slap his forehead playfully. The jokes go over the two’s heads, both of them looking confused, and I take pity on them. ‘Being fluent in French is way of saying that someone’s… good at… you know?’ I explain, the realisation dawning on their faces, swiftly followed by annoyance. ‘You embarrassed to say it, babe?’ Taeyong says quietly, so only I can hear, as Mark and Chae begin to rant. ‘You weren’t embarrassed to do it,’ he teases. ‘Shut it, Tae, not funny. My brother’s right there,’ I reply, motioning to Jaehyun as Taeyong chuckles to himself.

‘Well, I hate to break it to you, Chae, but, no. They’re not French. They’re actually not foreign at all,’ Jihyo says, and we all frown. ‘What’s the point then?’ Sana asks. ‘Well, they’re so different to us, they’re practically aliens,’ Jihyo grins, loving keeping us all on edge like this. ‘Spill it, Ji, what are they?’ Yuta demands, getting impatient, as we all are. ‘They’re… poor,’ she says, everyone silent for a few seconds. ‘You’ve gotta be kidding,’ Momo says, and Jihyo shakes her head. ‘Oh, my God, I cannot have a poor person in my house!’ Jeongyeon exclaims as Nayeon starts to hyperventilate, Johnny getting the Chanel Grand Extrait perfume from her Hermes clutch and spraying it over her to help calm her down. ‘Jihyo, please tell me you’re joking. I don’t need this stress right now. I’ve got a shoot tomorrow and I can feel myself getting stress hives,’ Tzuyu says in a shrill voice, Donghyuck trying to do a breathing exercise with her. ‘I’m telling my father about this. He won’t allow it, not for a second,’ Jungwoo says, getting his phone out from his blazer.

‘Guys, relax. It’s not the end of the world,’ I say, all of them except Mina and my brother looking at me like I’m insane. ‘y/n, it might not be the end of the world, but how can we relax? What if they rob us, or give us fleas? Or Ebola?’ Taeyong asks, and I have to hold back a scoff. ‘Don’t be ridiculous. First of all, it might not even be true so there’s no point getting all worked up yet. Even if it is true, you can probably opt out if you want. If we did each have a poor person in our houses, imagine how good it’d look on our University applications. We’d look amazing for being so hospitable and charitable, and I bet we’ll even win awards in August at the banquet for it. They won’t rob us, and they won’t have any diseases or fleas. They wouldn’t be allowed to come if they did,’ my brother says, always managing to put a positive spin on things. Not that I thought it was negative anyway. Almost as though Jaehyun’s just said some sort of magic incantation, the others instantly agree with him, now excited to ‘have a poor person’. I zone out, used to tuning out when their rich kid talk gets unbearably stuck up, and it’s only when the bell rings to signal the end of our lunch hour does my mind re-join them.

We all rise up from our seats, heading towards the door into the school, and Taeyong puts an arm around me, his hand resting dangerously close to my ass. I can smell the Tom Ford cologne I bought him for his birthday, and I inhale the subtle scent deeply. ‘What lesson do we have now?’ I ask, and he laughs. ‘We’ve got tutor, babe, it’s Wednesday. Switch your head on,’ he teases, tapping my temple. ‘I forgot. I was thinking about this exchange student thing,’ I reply, and he looks at me thoughtfully. ‘You excited?’ he asks, and I shrug. ‘I guess. It’ll be fun. I hope I can take her shopping and get her some stuff. Maybe she’ll become a really good friend of mine,’ I say. ‘What if it’s a boy though?’ he asks, and I think. ‘Then I’ll take him shopping and get him some stuff. And become really good friends with him,’ I say, wondering what his point is. ‘What if he’s cute? What if he’s your type?’ he asks as we walk through the door into the busy corridor, heading towards our tutor room, our friends making a racket behind us. ‘Then he’s cute and my type,’ I reply. ‘So you wouldn’t do anything?’ he asks, and I sigh. ‘What are you trying to say, Tae?’ I ask, and he takes his arm from around me, holding his hand out to me. I clasp it, wrapping my arm around his so his arm is clutched against my torso.

‘If I get a girl, and I sleep with her, would you be mad?’ he asks, and I raise an eyebrow. ‘Why would I be mad? It’s not like we don’t already sleep with other people,’ I say, and he nods. ‘Yeah, but like, we sleep with strangers from clubs. We don’t sleep with people that our friends know, people that will be living with us, people that will see us being in a relationship,’ he says, and I laugh. ‘Okay, but the people we meet at clubs see us as a couple before we go home with them. Just do what we normally do. Just say you’re cheating, it’s not like the girl will feel indebted to me to tell me, and vice versa,’ I say, and he nods thoughtfully. ‘How did I get so lucky to have a girlfriend like you?’ he says, leaning down to press his lips to mine, and I kiss him briefly, breaking away when I hear my brother call, ‘Stop defiling my sister, Lee!’ ‘I’m not your girlfriend,’ I reply as our friends laugh, and he grins. ‘Okay. How did I get so lucky to have a future wife like you?’ he says, and I laugh. ‘You have our parents to thank for that,’ I reply, and he chuckles under his breath as we enter the classroom. We take our normal seats, Nayeon on one side of me and Taeyong on the other, my brother in front of me and Dahyun behind me. We chat and gossip for a while, our teacher, Miss Jung, walking in a couple minutes later.

‘Class, quieten down please. I have an announcement to make,’ she says, looking around at us over the rim of her glasses. Due to our parents donating a lot of money to the school, we get certain privileges to keep us happy. Because when we’re happy, our parents are happy, and when our parents are happy, they spend. One of those privileges include our entire friendship group being put into one tutor group, just the twenty of us. ‘Is it the exchange thing, Miss? Because we know,’ Mark says, swinging on his chair. ‘You seem to always know things already,’ she says drily before lifting a paper up to read from it. ‘On Monday 4th May, a group of students from Burnley Tech School will arrive at Winchester Academy as exchange students,’ she begins, all of us bursting into chatter. ‘Wait, so are they all like computer programming nerds?’ Doyoung asks, eyebrows raised, and Miss sighs. ‘No, that’s just the name of the school. As I was saying, they’ll be staying for a month-’ ‘A month?!’ we chorus in shock, and she rolls her eyes. ‘And if all goes well, the period will be extended to two months-’ ‘Two months?!’ we exclaim, looking around in shock. ‘Won’t they like… miss their parents?’ Jungwoo asks. ‘Well, they can call them,’ she replies. ‘They have phones?’ Sana asks, all of us looking at her incredulously. ‘Obviously, Sana they’re not that poor,’ Tzuyu says. ‘Who told you they’re poor?’ Miss asks, all of us silent.

‘They’re from an underprivileged area but they’re not poor. It just means they’re not as privileged as you. They can probably still afford all their necessities, and most likely some luxuries too, but they don’t live the same way that you all do. For example, they probably have to commute to school because it’s unlikely their parents can afford to buy them a car. And they probably all have part time jobs,’ she says, gasps running around the room, myself included. Growing up in such a privileged environment, the thought of commuting to school or having a part time job makes me feel faint. Call me a spoiled brat, but I don’t think I could ever. ‘Oh, my God, I feel so sorry for them. Are we allowed to buy them things when they come?’ Chaeyoung asks. ‘That’s to your own discretion, we can’t dictate things like that. But anyway, as I was saying, this exchange programme is to enrich your knowledge of different lifestyles and understand the importance of acceptance and equality. It’s also to show to us the kind of knowledge you all already have of other people’s situations and lives. So far, you’re not instilling much confidence in me, but hopefully, I’ll see an improvement,’ Miss Jung says, all of us listening for any more juicy details.

‘Wait…’ Sicheng says, catching all of our attention, ‘does this mean… we’ll have to go live with them too?’ he says, this development filling us with horror. ‘I’m afraid so. If the programme succeeds, they’ll spend two months with you, and you’ll spend a month with them before coming back in August,’ she says, all of our mouths open in shock. ‘Miss, please say you’re joking. We’ve got to spend a month being poor?’ Taeyong asks, and Miss tuts. ‘Now, now, Taeyong, that’s not very kind of you. As I’ve said, they’re not poor, and you must be open-minded. This’ll be a learning curve for you. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it greatly. We have an evening next Monday for your parents to all come in, get some more information about the programme and sign you up, if they wish,’ Miss Jung says, and I exchange a look with Jaehyun, both of us knowing our father would sign up for it in an instance, always wanting us to take part in these kind of things. ‘I know you’re all very unenthusiastic about this but give the students a chance.’ ‘We’ll give them a chance, obviously. It’s just unlikely we’ll get along. We’re so different,’ Taeil says, and Miss Jung eyes us all before she speaks; ‘You’d be surprised.’

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deaconsleatherpants · 5 years ago

Text

These Shadowed Halls

AO3 Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22475392

Fandom: What We Do in the Shadows (Viago & Everyone)

In which, during a series of attempts to cheer a mopey Viago up, the dishes are cleaned, Rammstein is played, a poster is poked, a laptop is destroyed, and the new television set causes some trouble.

Werewolves were troublesome creatures. At least, there was no evidence to the contrary as far as Viago, Vladislav and Deacon were concerned; not fully human and yet not fully undead, werewolves had always proven to be a source of continued vexation.

The three vampires had bid goodnight to Nick and Stu at the door, and were now standing in the foyer, flicking specks of dried blood from their clothes and (in Viago’s case) hair. Encounters with the werewolves tended to leave Deacon adrenaline-filled and Vladislav somewhat annoyed, and tonight had turned out no differently.

Viago, on the other hand, was somewhere torn between irate, offended and distressed, all at once. He had nothing against werewolves, really, aside from the vague feeling that perhaps they might not bathe themselves quite as often as might be preferred. (That and the pervading werewolf smell.) Still, Viago felt that the resident pack had gone a bit too far tonight. His feelings were singed, and that was that.

Count Fagula. Really? Was that all they thought of him? His bisexuality was nothing to be poked fun of, thank you very much. Was it his mild manner? (He’d thought it quite an attractive trait, honestly. He was the nice one!) Or perhaps his unique sense of fashion?

Viago glanced down at his outfit, brushing flecks of imaginary dust off the front of his velveteen doublet. Lacy cuffs billowed slightly with the movement.

He liked his clothing, frilly sleeves and all. And what was wrong with slapping someone across the face with a glove? That’s certainly what they used to do back in his day, when riled or otherwise provoked. He huffed testily, folding his arms across his chest and scowling down at the carpeting as if it had been made of the fur of those stupid werewolves. He’d not quite been feeling himself lately, that was true, but this was the tipping point.

Viago did not notice the eyes of his two friends tracking him as he stalked off into his coffinroom, nor did he see them glance at each other with matching perplexed expressions. Finally Vladislav shrugged, simply ascribing this behavior to Viago’s occasional tendency to break out into dramatics. He headed upstairs without further comment (covering a wide yawn), but Deacon did not follow.

Instead Deacon stared into the blackness of Viago’s doorway, lost in thought, long after the older vampire had already disappeared into the abyss.

><><><><><><

Viago couldn’t sleep, which was unsurprising, considering it was only around two in the morning - approximately the vampire equivalent of the human “happy hour.”

He rolled onto his side, fingers splaying over the soft red velvet lining the interior of his coffin. Viago usually slept in the stereotypical ‘vampire’ pose - legs straight and together, arms crossed over his chest like the dead man he was - but, he found, he wasn’t exactly in the mood for sleeping just yet. (Once he’d tried sleeping hanging upside down like Deacon, and fell, bonking himself on the head and leaving himself with a rather nasty headache for the rest of the night. Also, he appreciated having all the comforts of a fancy, modern coffin.) At the same time, he wasn’t exactly in the mood for being awake and around other vampires either. It was a strange, restless conundrum.

Without warning, the coffin lid above him shifted; a thin sliver of moonlight took the opportunity to creep inside, making Viago squint and let out a soft hiss. Then the lid was opened even wider, bathing him in soft silver light; propping himself up on his forearms with a feathery sigh, he blinked the dark spots from his eyes and focused with some degree of annoyance on the source of his disturbance - Vladislav.

The older vampire crouched down by the side of the coffin, opening the lid to its fullest extent and wearing a concerned expression, or at least, what was his best approximation of “concerned.”

“Vhat are you doing in your coffin?”

Viago sighed, air whistling out through his fangs. “Sleeping.” He clung to the remote chance that it would work, and make Vladislav leave him to do just that.

“It’s only two in zhe morning!” No such luck, it would seem. “And you forgot to close zhe curtains.” So that was where the moonlight was coming from. Letting out a hiss of minor inconvenience, Viago stumbled to his feet and yanked the fabric closed over the window. The silvery light instantly faded to a mere glow seeping out from under the edge of the heavy brown curtain.

Vladislav, in turn, stood and folded his arms over his chest, expression morphing from “concerned” to “disapproving.” “So… are you going to give us an explanation, or…?”

“Zhere iz nothing to explain,” Viago said, stepping back into the velvet-lined coffin and petulantly lying down again, folding his arms across his chest decisively.

True to his title, Vladislav poked him. Several times. Viago rolled his eyes, then reached up to yank the coffin lid shut. If Vladislav wasn’t going to leave of his own volition, then Viago would simply have to ignore his presence.

Sure enough, there was a muffled expletive, a halfhearted attempt to rattle the lid, and then the shuffle of heavy footsteps out of the room. Viago heaved a sigh of relief, and rolled over onto his front.

><><><><><><

It couldn’t have been more than an hour later when Viago’s eyes snapped open at the extremely loud clamor that had suddenly assaulted his ears. He pushed himself up from the ground in a hurry, banging his head hard on the coffin lid before at last remembering his surroundings. As he cautiously crept out of the room, it became quickly apparent that the uproar was music, of a sort - guitars twanging loudly with a hint of something electric. His sensitive ears twitched as he approached the heart of all the noise.

Deacon. (Of course.)

“Vhat iz zhis?” He had to almost shout to make himself heard, and he wasn’t quite sure if Deacon was simply ignoring him or could, in fact, still not hear him - despite the (apparently limited) miracles of vampire-hearing. The younger vampire was furiously whipping his head up and down, fringes of black hair flopping over his face, and spinning around the room in fevered circles like some deranged, devilish hummingbird.

Locating the source of the racket (the open laptop), Viago noted that Deacon had apparently discovered the world of German metal, and was currently listening to a song with a video that featured what looked like… werewolves... ? To make matters worse, it was set to repeat. He frowned and cleared his throat.

“VHAT IZ ZHIS, DEACON?” This time Deacon responded, floating down towards the computer (and a rather irate flatmate) with a grin that stretched from ear to ear. “I found it on the wee-fee, on MyTube!” The guitar riff kicked in again, and he made a show of playing an exaggerated version of it in mid-air. Viago tapped a patent-leather shoe with increasing impatience, which Deacon ignored with incredible aplomb.

“Isn’t it amazing! Even though it IS about werewolves.” Deacon wrinkled his nose slightly as he said the name, as if he could already smell wet dog smell here in the living room. Viago, for his part, remained unamused.

“You have to turn it down, Deacon!” He at last reached for the volume button himself, but his flatmate quickly batted the hand away, and snatched up the laptop for safekeeping. Viago planted his fists on his hips, in full vampire-mom mode.

“It’s zhe middle of zhe night - all zhe humans vill be sleeping. Zhere are ordinances about zhis kind of zhing! I don’t vant zhe neighbors to complain. Do you vant to deal with zhe poleece, Deacon?”

The police had been called on them before, he was sorry to admit, but so far they’d managed to not kill a single officer. He’d like to keep up the pristine record, but it was apparently getting more and more difficult the more times they were called. Deacon, however, did not seem to see things from Viago’s point of view. He was currently frowning mulishly, crossing his arms across his chest and still refusing to turn down the music. At least he was finally standing motionless in one place (albeit on the ceiling).

“NEIN! What’s wrong with it? It’s German! I’m German! You’re German! You should like it!”

Viago too enjoyed German music, the music of his homeland, but his tastes lay decidedly more towards Beethoven than… whatever or whoever this was. Wrinkling his nose in distaste, he turned abruptly on his heel and shouldered past his flatmate. Passing Vladislav in the hallway (who, surprisingly, actually appeared to be enjoying all the noise) he left the house, letting the front door slam rather loudly behind him. The mid-autumn air was crisp, and if he’d been human, he might have blown air into his cupped hands. As it were, he simply arranged his cravat around his neck, tucking his hands into his pockets and gazing up at the starry, cloudless night.

He could still hear the music; if anything, it seemed Deacon had turned it up even more in his absence.

At least Viago could stay out and about until the police came and went, or until his flatmate grew a brain, whichever came first.

><><><><><><

The black pointer tip tapped impatiently at the newly-hung anatomy poster, Vladislav bouncing his foot with equal agitation. Viago, rather uncomfortably squished into his own antique couch, eyed the pointer with some trepidation; the last time the medieval vampire gave one of these “informative” lessons, it was on the finer points of torture, so one could never know what to expect. Deacon, on the other hand, observed the goings-on from his position perching on the stair railing like some toothy gargoyle, some distance above Vladislav’s head. There was a strange glint in his eyes, which Viago decided pointedly it would be best to ignore entirely.

One corner of the poster began to peel off of the wallpaper at the vehemence with which Vladislav was wielding the stick, thwacking it into different parts of the highly-detailed diagram at random. Viago very strongly resisted the urge to roll his eyes.

“Zhe main artery.” The pointer tip finally bounced over to the thickest stripe of bright red lining the model’s neck, tracing over to the matching band on the other side. “Do not - I repeat: DO NOT bite it!” He made a strange X with his hands, a gesture which Deacon copied above (nearly unbalancing himself in the process). It wasn’t as if Viago was trying to make a mess, he reflected with his mind not entirely focused on the strange pantomime in front of him.

But, as always, Vladislav was continuing, heedless to Viago’s lack of engagement. “You vill end up vith arterial spray, vich basically means zhat you vill end up drenched in blood, vhich might have been fun in zhe middle ages but… isn’t so great now. Especially vhen you hang around vith four other vampires.” This was all said with the air (and slight guilty expression) of a vampire who might have tried to lick his blood-drenched flatmate clean at one point several decades back.

“Yeah, do you want us to lick you again Viago?” Deacon, on the other hand, had a significant lack of such tact, to the point where even Vladislav comedically slapped a palm to his forehead.

“Zhe point is, you vant to bite zhem here.” The rubber tip now poked at the thinner strip of deep blue beside the crimson one. “Zhis vill be enough for you to feed, but not enough to make you a public embarrassment to both yourself and zhis household.”

Viago shifted uncomfortably in his seat, worrying at his lower lip with his fangs for a moment before deciding he’d better go ahead and say something while Vladislav’s lecture was otherwise paused.

“I really can’t learn zhis from a diagram, you know.” He’d had almost four hundred years to try (and fail) to get this right; did Vladislav really think he hadn’t once cracked open an anatomy manual?

To Viago’s mounting horror, while Vladislav at least was nodding (with a hand stroking his moustache) and seemed to be pondering his words, Deacon’s eyes glowed with the excited gleam they’d all come to associate with the unveiling of his darker tendencies.

“Maybe we should dig up some bodies for him to practice on… it was a big thing when I was alive, very popular!”

This time, Viago did not refrain from rolling his eyes, as he leapt from his seat with a disgusted exclamation at the thought of vampiric “resurrection men” and other such grave-robbers, and stormed out of the room.

He wondered if, at this hour, he could find a human on the streets with a high enough blood alcohol content to make him forget the past three hundred years.

><><><><><><

The clanking and crashing sounds emanating from the vicinity of the kitchen really should have tipped Viago off to what was going on, but nonetheless it was a surprise to see Deacon ushering him into the room with a conspiratorial look on his face.

“I did zhe dishes! Without being asked!”

His hands were held up away from his sides, still dripping foamy white suds onto the floor; Viago’s hopes instantly sank. “Look!” The pink rubber gloves adorning Deacon’s forearms were infinitely more interesting and distracting than whatever mess he was wanting him to see, but Viago turned to look anyway. Well, the kitchen appeared intact, the sink was relatively sparkly, and it was certainly true that the heaping mound of bloody dishes was gone from the counter, but…

Viago’s gaze flickered towards the cabinet full of white, clean dishes. (He wouldn’t have been surprised if he’d found them in the trashcan instead.) Shockingly, the youngest flatmate had actually done a decent job of the cleanup, with the possible exception of the kitchen itself. The sink still had an unbecoming reddish ring staining the metal, and Viago rather suspected that the stain of O- blood on the cutting board (dating back to an unfortunate hippie victim in the 1960s) would never be shifted despite anyone’s best efforts, but he supposed the effort was better than nothing.

“Ja, zhat’s… zhat’s great, Deacon.” It was rather straining to force a grin for so long, especially for a vampire who was also attempting to hide his fangs behind his lips.

“Good… Good.” He appeared as though he wished to say more, but Viago flashed him a quick thumbs-up before darting back out of the kitchen.

Beside the gramophone in the living room, he flopped bonelessly into a navy wingback armchair, which had to be getting almost as old as Deacon by now. Massaging his temple with the fingers of one hand, he drew his knees up towards his chest, and sighed the sort of sigh he might have sighed more often, had he human lungs.

><><><><><><

A vampire could be allowed to think that, in his own home at an hour swiftly approaching dawn, he would be able to get some uninterrupted peace and quiet. A vampire could also be wrong.

Viago, sitting on his (still) rather reddened antique couch, with a glass of well-aged blood-wine in hand and a copy of Dracula in his lap, was failing miserably at his attempt to relax. The main cause for his failure could generally be described as Deacon, or more precisely: inadvertently listening to his flatmate’s loud and continued struggle with the newfound “Wi-Fi” Stu had installed a few days previously. Viago thought the internet a strange place (after a handful of interactions with Facebook and strange forums full of humans who styled themselves “vampires” but quite obviously weren’t), but he found that he still preferred the comforts of dusty old books and frilled clothing that reminded him of a decidedly simpler time. At least the computer wasn’t being used to blast Viago’s eardrums (and indeed, those of any vampire within a quarter-mile radius) with loud metal music anymore.

“What do you mean, zhe password is incorrect?!” Deacon’s muffled protests from the adjacent room, in combination with a loud crunching of plastic and metal, suggested that the laptop had just been thrown at high speed towards a wall. Viago sighed and rolled his eyes skyward. (Looks like they’d have to be asking Stu for a replacement in the coming days.) But still, every cloud had its silver lining; it seemed like, at last, he was now going to be able to enjoy his book.

Taking a sip of his drink and setting the cut-glass goblet down on a nearby coaster, he flipped the hardcover book open to the first page - but, before he could do more than read the first sentence, was interrupted by the entrance of Nick. His eyes snapped shut in mild exasperation.

“Hey man, uh... Viago?” The vampire in question felt the muscles between his eyebrows tense infinitesimally; still, he drew a breath he really didn’t need, uncrossed his legs, and opened his eyes. The tome audibly slammed shut.

“Yes, Nick, vhat do you need?”

The younger vampire appeared to be nervous, if that was even in his vocabulary; he was twisting his fingers together and looking at Viago with a general expression of concern, even as the muted sounds of Deacon’s unfettered rage continued in the background. “I just wanted to say, uh - I heard what those werewolf guys said, and I guess I just wanna say that wasn’t cool. Really not cool. Like, totally the opposite of cool. So, uncool, I guess.”

For a dandy vampire who was almost four centuries old, millennial speech could be a bit difficult to wrap one’s head around, but Viago surmised that Nick had only the best of intentions, and that surely had to count for something. He sighed, and forced a wide smile onto his face.

“Thank you, Nick.” Deacon was now being suspiciously silent, and Viago wondered if he’d passed out from an impossible lack of oxygen after all that anger, or perhaps had a brain aneurysm.

“Right, well, I’ve said my bit, so I’m just gonna…” Nick was motioning vaguely toward the doorway with his thumbs, so Viago turned his attention back towards him and simply nodded.

Rather than turning and walking out of the room like a normal person (vampire), Nick chose to take the rather more theatrical route of transforming into a bat and flapping away. Viago could hear the distant dull thunk of body against glass, which suggested Nick was having difficulty successfully navigating his way out of the window that had been cracked open in the foyer - right next to the front door, incidentally.

He turned his attention to the closed book, resting in his lap. Running a finger over the embossed leather cover, he considered holing himself up in Petyr’s basement for some well-deserved time to himself. But no, the moment had passed; with a sigh Viago tossed the book onto the musty cushion beside him, downed the rest of his blood-wine in one gulp, and got to his feet.

On his way down the hall he paused to peek in at Deacon, who was currently sitting cross-legged in front of the television set. He’d somehow managed to make his way to the shopping network, and was now seemingly seduced by various items of women’s jewelry, including a tacky and massive pendant that could be loosely interpreted as a bat, if one squinted. The shot shifted to a blood-red ruby set in the black metal of a ring, the edge of which looked rather fang-like. Before Viago’s eyes, Deacon scooted closer to the screen, and reached out a hand to almost lovingly caress the image of the crimson stone as if he could simply pluck it out of the pixels. He made a sound that could only be described as a giggle, and - was he drooling?

Fully aware that he would become physically ill if he was forced to witness any more of this bizarre display, Viago shuddered and turned away.

“I am now going to transform into a creature of ze night, so please, leave me alone.” His announcement was to the house at large, but was met with stillness and silence.

The sight of the hedgehog crossing the street outside the flat would have been unimpressive to anyone, had they bothered to gather at a window to watch Viago leave.

><><><><><><

No matter how fond one was of their flatmates, it was always nice when they were gone, to get a little time to one’s self. In Viago’s case, a lack of Vladislav and Deacon - on their way to meet up with Nick at a club in Wellington Central - made for the perfect peaceful night in. Normally he might use this opportunity to practice one of the many skills and hobbies he’d picked up (only to eventually abandon, but that was another matter entirely) over the centuries, but one failed mess of a pottery attempt later had dampened his spirits somewhat. And then one of his collectable miniature fireplace shovels had fallen on his toe. So, he was now sitting by the window, on his favorite couch, humming softly to himself with his still-unread copy of Dracula by his side (and a sore toe).

Thoughts of trying the new television crossed his mind, but perhaps that wasn’t the best idea; he’d done that once before, and only succeeded in accidentally subscribing their household to HBO. Vladislav’s telephone hypnosis trick had effectively meant that they hadn’t had to actually pay for the service, but that wasn’t the point, was it? Shaking his head slightly, Viago eyed his book, but opted not to pick it up. He rocked back and forth slowly in his seat, wondering what Katherine was doing at that exact moment.

Of course, the relative peace and quiet had made Viago forget that Deacon and Vladislav were not, in fact, the only two other vampires he shared this dwelling with. The forgotten Petyr chose this moment to make an appearance upstairs for the first time in at least a couple decades, appearing in the shadowed doorway and lurking there long enough for Viago to catch sight of him (and leap, shrieking, a literal foot into the air). If Viago had still been in possession of a living heart, it surely would have stopped. He laughed nervously after a few moments clutching his chest in a reflex retained from his human days.

“O-Oh, hello Petyr.” As if he hadn’t just narrowly avoided being scared into a second grave. Viago shifted back towards the window just in time to watch the tiny figures that were bat-Vladislav and bat-Deacon flitter back towards the house, weaving through the illuminated paths of several nearby streetlights. A single howl sounded in the distance, despite the lack of a full moon hanging heavy in the sky. The night was so calm outside the window, and his eldest flatmate so silent behind him, that he could almost forget (again) the simple fact that he wasn’t alone with his thoughts.

… Right up until the moment Petyr dropped a dead, bloody chicken into Viago’s lap. A couple of speckled feathers drifted to the floor below in the shocked silence. Viago juggled the bird with his thighs, attempting rather fruitlessly to keep the blood off his (after many nights of scrubbing, now just vaguely pinkish) antique couch or, worst of all, off his nice khaki pants.

“Oh, yis, zhat’s... zhat’s nice Petyr, but I don’t zhink -“ He was cut off by a sharp hiss, the press of sharp claws into his shoulder, and the dark, bat-like silhouette of his elder flatmate fleeing the room, cape flung outwards.

He appreciated the gesture, but...

“Yuck,” Viago said, holding the bird’s scaly foot between thumb and forefinger while pulling a face. It would be rude to let a gift (and a perfectly good source of blood, at that) go to waste, but somehow it didn’t exactly cater to Viago’s decidedly more refined tastes.

Handily, he happened to know of another vampire in the very same flat who wasn’t quite so… choosy.

Still suspending the dead chicken at arm’s length, Viago got to his feet (using his free hand to hurriedly brush off his lap, hissing in consternation at the daubs of blood already beginning to set in to the fabric). There was no sign of Petyr in the foyer, or on the stairs, or indeed anywhere else on Viago’s intended route.

Brandishing the chicken, he pulled open the door and stuck his nose inside before changing his mind, instead placing it neatly at the foot of - Deacon’s closet.

Heading back down the stairs, he was surprised to hear the sounds of chatter coming from the kitchen; evidently his flatmates had returned at some point during the Chicken Fiasco, but what was more surprising was that he had not heard them enter. Not that Viago’s hearing was particularly exceptional for a vampire, but Deacon and Vladislav were difficult to miss. In his defense, being surprised with a freshly deceased bird in the lap didtend to be a distraction.

“Did you have a good time vith Nick?” He hoped at least one of them had had a good night, because while his hadn’t been the worst on record, it wasn’t exactly great either. He had been a fool to expect a proper answer (and only received a brief nod from Vladislav).

“Ha, Viago, vhen did you start pissing yourself?” With a loud snort and a complete ignoral of the question, Deacon gestured toward the splotches of chicken blood speckling the front of the dandy’s pants. His legs were also crossed at the ankle and propped up on the kitchen table, a habit which Viago abhorred.

While Deacon seemed to be extremely pleased with his own joke, and even Vladislav looked to be stifling a chuckle or two behind that bushy moustache, Viago simply rolled his eyes and strode from the room, on the hunt not for human blood but for a fresh pair of pants.

><><><><><><

The muffled shout of his name, coming from somewhere deep beneath the floorboards, startled Viago from his midnight nap, an open tabloid magazine (6 proven remedies for fang strain!) sliding from his chest and onto the floor in a flutter of pages.

He thought for a moment that he might have imagined the voice, until it sounded again, in the form of a deep bellow that had him scrambling to his feet in a panic. Was it another vampire hunter, come to murder them all? Just how many had Nick given his Skype handle to?

Viago darted down the stairs to Vladislav’s torture chamber, nearly slipping on the mossy surface of the damp stone steps, banging open the door and coming face to face with -

A dead man, hanging upside down from a pair of chains attached to the ceiling, and dripping blood.

Viago yelped, shying away from the body in hopes of sparing this particular pair of pants. The deep clearing of a throat drew his attention away from the unfortunate human and towards Vladislav, who was seated on a stool in front of… a painting easel? The paint palette in his hand could be clearly seen to contain multiple variations on the same color: blood red. (Viago suspected, upon spotting the little white bucket strategically positioned underneath the dead man, that blood red was not simply a creative term for a certain shade of red paint.)

The canvas propped up on the easel, if squinted at, appeared to show a landscape, complete with resplendent pink-topped mountains and a deep, rusty lake that appeared to be clotting. Vladislav was currently sketching in the outlines of what looked like gangly pine trees, although since they too were red, it was becoming difficult to tell. Viago glanced around the room with some confusion.

“Vhat happened here?”

Vladislav broke from his painting just long enough to shrug. “Just a happy leetle accident. Come in.” He leaned back, appraising his own handiwork and nodding in approval, evidently pleased with what he saw. Viago timidly edged his way around the body to stand on a clean section of stone floor. He fought the rising urge to backtrack straight out of the room and pretend he’d seen nothing, but some of the dead man’s spilled blood was beginning to seep into the rug underneath (when had that been placed there?) and he knew if it wasn’t cleaned up promptly it was going to leave a nasty stain.

“I have been thinking.” A dangerous pastime for Vladislav, Viago thought, but said nothing.

“You have not been yourself lately, Viago. I zhink it has somezhing to do vith zhe fact zhat I ate a person on your nice couch last month.” That wasn’t exactly it, Viago wanted to sputter, but was cut off before he could even try. “Perhaps I should bid on a red linoleum sofa. You can bid on anything on ze internet. Zhey vill have it.”

Viago knew Vladislav well enough to simply nod, and thank him quietly. Vladislav did not reply, but continued painting with an unexpected amount of jollity, humming an indiscernible tune under his breath.

“And here ve have some happy leetle trees, vith some happy leetle men impaled on them…”

Viago now took the opportunity to back away slowly, as one might do to escape being noticed by a lion who was otherwise distracted. At least this time he wasn’t being forced to pose for hours, only to discover that Vladislav’s finished “painting” was of something entirely different.

“It iz a representation of my innermost self,” the medieval vampire proclaimed, proudly gesturing to the congealing mess of red, red, and more red dripping down the canvas once Viago had almost reached the door. He could only nod in stunned shock, trying to dissipate visions of himself, on his knees with a soaked sponge and a brush, scrubbing the dark red stains out of the rug for who knew just how long.

><><><><><><

If Viago was going to berate his flatmates for not doing their chores, he had better do his own, he supposed, even if he didn’t particularly feel like it at the moment. He had just finished lugging the swollen rubbish bin out to the curb (somehow, four vampires were capable of creating a staggering amount of trash) and then, spotting a thick slug of dust hiding in the crack between the skirting-board and the floor, reached reluctantly for a broom hanging on a nail. To his surprise, a perfunctory glance around the floor revealed even more dirt and grime, nestled into tiny grooves and corners. Viago’s brow furrowed as he frowned; Vladislav was supposed to have done this last week! With a huffed sigh and a roll of his eyes he set about completing the task, bending over to snag a discarded sock someone had left on the floor.

He completely ignored the sound of a throat clearing behind him, not particularly in the mood to be annoyed by any one of them.

“Here.” The muttered word made him turn, broom in hand, to see Deacon standing in the doorway, wearing a rather sheepish expression; Viago couldn’t help but be reminded of a dog that had been caught peeing on the carpet. He leaned the broom against the counter, dusting his hands off on a nearby (stained, bloody) towel and promptly bracing them on his hips.

“I made you a sveater.”

The article of clothing in question was a soft, skillfully-made (then again, Deacon’s projects always were) lump of colored fabric ungracefully tossed in Viago’s direction. The older vampire unfolded it to see an awkward rendition of his own face peering with threaded golden eyes back at him. The knitted Viago had his fangs bared at his alter ego in a hiss, blood staining his cravat. Little purple bats dotted the maroon background.

He knew, instantly, that he would look an utter fool if he ever wore this sweater. Premonitions of Vladislav’s loud guffaws of laughter were already echoing in his sensitive ears. He stared at it for a few more seconds, not wanting to be cruel but quite literally dumbfounded. Deacon too seemed discomfited by the silence, and chose to wait no longer.

“Well? Do you like it?” Still nearly speechless, Viago forced himself to look grateful and even managed a small smile.

“Ja, I love it.” He didn’t sound even one percent convincing, even to himself. To his surprise, a genuine grin lit up Deacon’s face, and for a moment Viago felt bad that the only thing little knitted Viago’s fabric eyes would likely ever see was the back wall of a closet.

“Good.” Deacon fidgeted for a moment, seemingly unsure what to do with his hands now that they were no longer crushing up a jumper. He finally settled for wringing them at his sides, nodding more times than was strictly necessary under the circumstances.

“Well. That is good, because I don’t make sveaters for just anyvone.” With that, he was gone, almost faster than Viago could blink, leaving the older vampire standing alone in the dusty kitchen still holding up the offending sweater at arm’s length. The broom dislodged itself enough to fall to the ground with a loud, wooden clack.

Viago slung the sweater over the back of the closest chair and picked up the broom, smiling slightly at what was, honestly, a kind gesture, an uncommon occurrence from Deacon.

><><><><><><

Everyone else had already gathered in the entrance hall (with the notable exception of Petyr) in anticipation of a night out hunting, most likely to Boogie Wonderland, which thanks to Nick they were finally able to get into.

Viago was decidedly not in the mood for this. He was in the kitchen, leaning against the wooden countertop and frowning down at the backs of his hands. Mingled with the sounds of excited chatter in the hallway was the scrape of metal against metal in the adjacent room, which reminded him that Stu was over, setting up the replacement for the ruined laptop. Viago ignored all of them.

It was as if he were stuck in a sort of apathetic haze; it wasn’t even about the werewolves anymore, although doubtlessly they had been a part of it. He wasn’t even sure what it was about, but one thing was certain: whoever said vampire hearts were cold and emotionless knew absolutely nothing. It wasn’t until the first drop of blood plopped down onto the back of his hand, swiftly followed by two, then three more, that Viago realized that he was crying.

Unfortunately at that very moment Stu, having completed his work on Deacon’s newest computer victim, entered the kitchen, toolbox in hand.

“Would have thought you’d be with the others.”

Viago spun around, then froze; even to a human who was accustomed to being in the presence of vampires, the twin trails of watery blood running down his face might have a decidedly frightening affect. Indeed, Stu took an automatic step back, staring at Viago for a moment as if gauging what he should say, if anything.

“Woah.” Stu had always been a man of few words. Instead he set down the toolbox on the kitchen table, and approached the vampire with a complete lack of caution. Viago instinctively pressed back against the counter, blinking owlishly at his friend.

Stu hugged him. He didn’t even seem to care if Viago’s strange blood-tears stained his nice sky-blue polo shirt. It was a tight hug that filled Viago with a spreading warmth, until at last he returned the hug, vision swimming with red tint as he fought the urge to cry even harder.

Perhaps all he’d needed all along was a simple hug, the physical contact he hadn’t even realized he’d been missing ever since the day he died. With a last sniffle he tore himself from Stu (who followed close behind) and ran down the hallway, clinging to the first vampire he found.

This happened to be Deacon, who yelped unceremoniously and nearly fell over in the process of trying to fix his hairstyle, with Viago’s arms still attached around his waist. Viago stifled a snicker.

He latched himself onto Vladislav next, who simply froze up, posture stiff, and appeared to be as responsive as a plank of wood but eventually reciprocated with an awkward pat on the back. Once Viago released him the medieval vampire adjusted his hat clumsily, clearing his throat. Deacon, still in the process of fixing his thickly lacquered hair, chuckled.

The door then opened to reveal Nick, who had arrived fashionably late as always; Viago hugged him too, flashing a luminous smile as he glanced around at all of his friends. His friends, all of whom he only just now realized had attempted, in their own unique ways, to break him from his foul mood.

The dishes. The sweater, awful as it was. Vladislav’s attempt to finally teach him how to avoid the main artery while feeding. The offer to buy him a new sofa. Even Petyr’s rather cat-like “gift.” They’d all tried so hard, and he’d failed to realize it. Viago sniffled, wiping crimson marks from his cheeks, and beamed his usual chipper grin.

They were his stupid friends and flatmates, completely idiotic (except for Petyr, who was more in the realm of terrifying), but for better or for worse, he loved them all. And, he was pretty sure, they loved him, too.

#what we do in the shadows #wwdits #viago #vladislav #deacon #petyr (what we do in the shadows)#nick (what we do in the shadows)#stu (what we do in the shadows)#deacon brucke #fanfiction #hints of viago/deacon (according to my friend)#some shenanigans with some vampires

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flightofaqrow · 5 years ago

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adaptation to common society excerpts

jumping on the bandwagon of qrow in the tribe vs coming to vale/beacon while in a meta mood. except this is less something i have actual headcanons about, and more something i try to keep in mind, and let the muse reveal the details as i write. so here’s some excerpts.

╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾ This entire thread with @erudite-rebel is infused with Barty helping Qrow understand the communication towers:

“…these CCT things seem pretty important to protect.” intricacies of mechanical inner workings are practically second nature to qrow, but he’s still working towards full comprehension of all this advanced tech and invisible communication. he halfway hopes to instigate a tangent on that alone to help him catch up…

“They are indeed,” says Barty, unbothered by Qrow’s lack of knowledge on the subject. Once he’d gotten over the shock of things that Qrow wasn’t used to, or didn’t know how to do, he’d adapted. “The CCT towers provide communication to every corner of Remnant.”

[qrow] “every corner that can afford it.”

╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾

mountain girl [ @lifahakondotter ] and forest boy commiserate about HVAC:

Lifa: “You’re one of those Vale kids. The hell are you doing up here? Aren’t you all allergic to weather below thirties?”

qrow: “projected aura? …well that and growing up without heat.”

Lifa: “I’m more used to a hearth than the fancy heating they have in this school. Honestly, I hate the noise it makes. Part of the reason I come up here.”

qrow: “oh man, agreed! i’d take the crackle of flames over bangin’… uh,” what was the word… “ - ventilation any day. can barely hear the crickets at night with that kinda racket.”

╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾

clothing is bullshit!!! also with @lifahakondotter

qrow: sweet stars a warm fire, yes! his shoes are already kicked off by the time she says so. in short order followed by socks, and pants and… once she’s set up her supplies, he’s stripped down to burgundy boxers, hung his clothes from the mantle to dry, and laid down on his back, basking like a cat.

lifa: She turned back around to ask, “Do you like venis– ancestors above me!” He’s practically naked! ...Without an ounce of grace, she tossed [a reindeer skin] over him. “You won’t warm up like that.”

qrow: the fact that baring so much skin could itself cross the lines of decency never even occurred to him. he had found not everyone in the kingdoms had the same openness he grew up with, but that’s why he left the boxers on!

╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾

pickpocketing:

“get away with it? psh. not in the least.” he reaches into his pants pocket to pull a wallet that most certainly isn’t his, “the big guy’s payin’ for it by buyin’ our rounds tonight.”

╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾

difference in kid games with @shcdeacademy (Saphron)

“Yea you can say that again, I have Jaune to thank for that. Since most of my siblings put most of their attention on him after he was born. You know tea parties, dress up, the works.”

“dress up, was a new one the girls taught me, i gotta admit.” some manner of toys could be common across all cultures, even if materials might have changed the quality. plastic swords or sticks, robots or rag dolls. bandit games were more physical, competitive. the tea parties were real. he doesn’t speak of his past as if he felt anything had truly been missing, however, there wasn’t much room for make believe. Especially when, “…didn’t grow up with enough extra clothes for all that.”

╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾

Raven [ @boundariestcbreak ] and qrow adjusting together:

Raven didn’t understand why he’d rather lay on the floor than sit on a bed like she was. Sure, it was what they were both used to, but now that she had a bed, she intended to use it as much as possible-even if it was just to sit on instead of actually sleeping on it.

sure, beds were more comfortable, but they break. qrow has been learning that about many of the civilized little luxuries at beacon, quite literally, real fuckin’ quick. ( qrow loves beds, but his semblance means he can’t have nice things. :[ )

...

Raven laughs and reaches for her water bottle, holding it out for a cheers. “Cheers only work if you actually have something to cheers with, little brother.” She says with a light chuckle. It’s still taking a lot of adjusting to go from living in the woods with no electricity, indoor plumbing or anything of the like, to having all of that at their finger tips, but so far she’s actually enjoying what she has discovered. Even though she can’t quite wrap her head around some things, like the shows that some of their classmates seem so invested in. None of that makes any sense to her, if she’s being honest.

qrow rolls his eyes and reaches over his head to snatch at an empty plastic glass on the bookshelf, pulling it back to raise it over his chest upside down and toast… sort of properly. ... he holds onto it, making mental note to drop it back off in the kitchen. because they have one of those now. it feels strange not to have his own cooking duty rotation...

╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾╾

bad table manners and general adjustments with @whytrose

as he pushes open the door, and the smell of all the foods in the cafeteria hall hit his nose, he supposed he could deal with missing an afternoon drink in trade for the guarantee of three square meals a day. he’s still getting used to that kind of security.

more expectations. more than him trying to keep up with responsible studies when he’s done nothing but learn through trial and error his whole life. more than figuring out how functioning in polite society even worked, right down to the proper attire, apparently.

he takes a lazy lean against the wall near the exit to the atrium, and wonders if Summer is just going to stand there and eat a lunch of only a single apple without even having a seat somewhere. he thought sitting down for lunch together was how it worked anyway. observations of the past several days made it seem so.

he tears a bite of his sandwich and cackles, rude, with his mouth full as the pieces finally fall into place. he swallows, and smacks the table with his other hand - the sound reaching even higher pitch from the contact of his ring. somehow in the combination of tearing at his food, grinning to himself, and that elbow to the ribs he chokes on his own bite and inhale. steadying hands tossed down on the table then squirt juice from a slice of his orange right into his eye. (well, this one may have just been the sloppiness of his own mirth.) one palm covers his eye and one fist smacks high on his chest to assist a cough before extending fingers for Summer to just. give him a moment.

#* hey don't get mad cause i'm right = headcanon *#* gotta look inside / a little introspection = character development *#not exhaustive but what i have for now #maybe will do another one as more get written!

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pilot-boi · 5 years ago

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Shouting In Cafes: Chapter Five

New Impressions

A little more information gets found out, and Weiss has to be forcibly restrained from murdering Sun.

AO3 LINK

Sun came in every single day. His order was always the same- a grande white mocha -but his outfits varied from crop tops to tank tops to shorts to tight, tight jeans. Every aspect of every piece of clothing he owned seemed to share the same goal of showing off as much of his body as possible, even when that part of his body was covered.

When he wore T-shirts, they were graphic with big bold text on them. One said REAL LIFE HORROR MOVIE. Another just read HOT BOY. He only seemed to have two pairs of shoes, which were flip flops and sneakers. He wore the flip flops more often, despite the quickly dropping autumn temperatures outside.

“Why don’t you try something new for once?” Neptune asked once while fixing Sun his daily regular.

He had gotten into the habit of leaning his entire body across Neptune’s counter while making his order. Sometimes propping up his head, sometimes just letting his arms drape over the edge.

Today was a draping kind of day, apparently, because his entire body swayed from left to right as he thought of his answer. “Hmm. Good question! I’ll try something new. How ‘bout… Like a pumpkin spice latte or whatever?"

“Alright,” Neptune said and went to dump out the coffee he already made.

“No, you don’t have to dump it out! Just add the other thing into the first one!” Neptune felt his face twist into utter disgust. He just gave him the original, with nothing added.

Sun didn’t come in with dates anymore. He just ordered his coffee, ran past the counter at high speeds, swept up his coffee without looking, and swung into a chair near a window. Neptune would then watch him rack his brain for what selfie pose he should do that day.

He’d take the picture, then drink his coffee while looking at his phone. Every once in a while, he would bark a laugh at something he found funny, turning multiple heads at the loud noise, before going back to his ‘work.’ Weiss, who Neptune knew from some of his business classes, had all but ordered Jaune to evict Sun on more than one occasion.

Neptune honestly didn’t know how much longer it would be until Weiss took it upon herself to get Sun to stop “disturbing the peace” as she’d put it.

Sun had a habit of tipping back his chair. Once he leaned back too far and completely crashed onto the ground, spilling his coffee all over himself and generally making a huge racket. Neptune had thanked his lucky stars that Weiss hadn’t been there for once.

Once Sun caught Neptune looking at him take a selfie. He waved to him, giving him a cheesy grin. Neptune looked away.

It’d been three weeks since their first meeting and they hadn’t held an actual conversation other than little snippets of small talk, and for some reason that felt wrong. This guy was walking around thinking socks and flip flops were a good idea while also knowing about Neptune’s financial issues

Meanwhile, Neptune didn’t even know his last name. It felt weird. It made him uneasy. Was paranoid the right word?

And to make matters worse, Neptune still couldn’t read him.

Neptune prided himself on his ability to not only read a room, but to be able to read the faces in said room. He got a grasp on Jaune’s mannerisms within a day. All of his professors loved him because he could play to their exact emotions without them ever knowing.

But this fucking guy…

Some of his emotions were no brainers. Like the laugh. And the anger. And the confusion. But the in between ones…

The ones where it looked like the regular Sun stepped away for a moment and revealed a completely different person. What the hell was he thinking during that time? Those expressions didn’t belong on the face of a rich frat boy.

“Neptune?” Jaune was tapping him on the shoulder.

Neptune fixed his posture. He had been leaning against his broom, apparently giving Sun a death stare from across the cafe.

“Did you get enough sleep last night?” He frowned and crossed his arms in a way reminiscent of his friend Nora. “Are you hungover?”

“No, I’m fine mom,” Neptune sighed.

“Okay, good. I have something to show you.”

“What is it?”

“Nora found that guy’s Instagram.”

“Jaune?”

“Yeah?”

“Why the fuck?” he asked, bewildered. “And how the fuck does Nora know about this guy?”

“She got bored, and you know how she gets.” Jaune shrugged and Neptune groaned. He did know how Nora got. The ginger had a habit of tagging along with her boyfriend, Ren, whenever he came to the coffee shop to study. Weiss had succeeded in getting them to evict Nora on more than one occasion. She wasn’t exactly subtle, or quiet for that matter.

In other words, she’d probably get along with Sun like a house on fire. Neptune squinted at him. “You told her about him, didn’t you?”

Jaune had the worst fake-surprised face on the entire planet. “What? No! Of course not! How dare you, Neptune Vasilias!”

“Jaune.”

“Okay, fine I told her. Anyway!”

He suppressed a laugh as Jaune pushed his phone up to his face. Neptune then pushed his glasses up and the phone back at least half a foot. Jaune didn’t seem to notice.

“First of all, he has over 3000 followers on a personal account,” Jaune began. “Second, it’s pretty much all selfies.”

“Unsurprising,” Neptune said and took the phone into his hands to keep Jaune from waving it around as he tried to read. He scoffed. “Wukong?! His last name is Wukong.”

“Hey you’re no one to judge Mr. Vasilias.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Neptune began to scroll through the pictures. They were all selfies, that was true. All in different places, never in the same place. Save for the weekly compilation posts captioned “this weeks coffee! <3” with every single selfie he took during that week there, at The Daily Grind.

“Holy shit.” Neptune was almost impressed. This took dedication. This took effort. This took a man who really admired himself.

“Okay, okay, but this isn’t what I’m talking about. Don’t be an ass.” Jaune snatched back his phone and scrolled to the top of his account. He whipped it back into Neptune’s face, tapping her finger on Sun’s bio. “Look!”

It read:

sun wukong

Gains!

beacon university

“Oh my god,” Neptune muttered.

“Yeah. So, apparently the dude goes to our college.” Jaune took back his phone and pushed it into his pocket. “Nora maybe also stalked his page and apparently he lived in Vacuo for a while and just transferred back here to go to school. Which explains why we haven’t seen him until now. Didn’t you wonder why he was just suddenly here?”

“I’m going to be honest with you, Jaune. I thought maybe he might’ve just been a hellish entity that popped into existence one day to torture me.”

Jaune rolled his eyes. “Okay, well he’s clearly not. And please, you two haven’t even argued since that first time.”

“I have to put up with his dumb hair every day.”

“Shut the fuck up.”

Neptune’s mouth felt dry. He leaned back against the wall. “So, what, is it fate telling us we have to be around each other as much as possible so we can hate each other that much more?”

“Or maybe it’s so you two can, ya know, get along?”

“Not gonna happen.”

Both of their heads turned towards the sound of a squeaky chair scratching against the worn hardwood floor. Sun stood up, still texting on his phone, and grabbed his empty cup with his free hand.

He looked up, and found Neptune and Jaune staring directly at him.

Sun frowned. “What’s up?” he yelled. More heads turned. Weiss glared at Jaune as if he was making this happen on purpose.

Neptune turned away, coughing. He grabbed the broom and began to brush at an already pristine floor.

“We found your Instagram!” Jaune bellowed back, holding his phone proudly over his head like a prize. In the corner, Weiss snapped a pencil in half from the force of her rage. Ren didn’t even look from his books.

Neptune, on the other hand, was sure he was going to have a stroke then and there.

A grin Neptune was becoming all too familiar with spread across Sun’s face as he pranced over to the counter. He quickly made himself at home on the surface, kicking his legs from his seat. His tank top said I FLEXED AND THE SLEEVES FELL OFF.

“Oh, yeah? Like what you see?” Sun asked, winking at him. How was this Neptune’s life?

“Correction. Jaune’s friend found your Instagram and I was subjected to it,” Neptune butted in.

Sun flicked his eyes over to Jaune. “Your name’s Jaune? Do you like what you see?”

“Stop flirting. He’s too good for you,” Neptune said and inched a little closer to his friend, starting to reach up and put a hand on his shoulder before stopping himself. Jaune remained looking blissfully oblivious, bless him.

“Hey, Jaune, your boyfriend’s kinda a prick,” Sun laughed and gestured over at Neptune.

“I’m not his boyfriend,” Neptune said, crossing his arms.

“Okay, okay, jeez” Sun said, raising his hands defensively. He leaned back and his shirt rode up a little. Jesus, what was with this guy and crop tops? “So, you found my Instagram?”

“You go to the same college as us,” Jaune blurted, suddenly remembering how to speak.

He said this at the same instant that Neptune said, “Sun Wukong really is quite the name.”

Sun blinked. “Sorry, what?”

Neptune was about to burst a blood vessel. “Jaune!” he hissed. Jaune was a great guy but… sometimes…

“What did I do?” he shouted, threatening to match Sun in volume.

“He doesn’t have to know that we go to the same college!”

“We go to the same college?” Sun asked.

Neptune failed to resist slapping a hand onto his face.

“Cool!” Sun said. “Why is that such a big deal, dude?”

“I don’t want you stalking me around campus, trying to be my friend!”

A smile spread slowly across Sun’s face, like moss creeping along a forest floor.

“Sweet Jesus.” Neptune shouldn't have said anything. Why did he say anything? Sun could not be trusted with this power.

“Why can’t we be friends, Neptune?” Sun whined and dropped his entire body on the counter again. His shirt bunched against his torso as he over balanced and nearly tumbled over the side. It was probably a health hazard that Neptune would be forced to clean up.

Neptune would have to clean it up, because Jaune was clearly too amused by this entire situation to be any help at all.

“Because we barely know each other. You’re just somebody I met on the job,” he explained. He felt not unlike a teacher having to explain that two plus two equals four to a student who was insisting it was actually twenty-two.

“Yeah, but that’s how friendships start out!” Sun insisted earnestly.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“I’m busy.”

“Then I’ll wait until you’re not!” Sun said this like it was a sudden stroke of genius.

“You’re going to have to wait two more hours then.”

“Okay!” And with that, Sun stood to his full height, pulled his shirt down, or at least as far down as it even went. Then he walked back over to his chair by the window and pulled out his phone.

Neptune stared. No freaking way.

He tilted his head towards Jaune, eyes glared to Sun as his fingers tapped against his phone screen. “He’s just going to sit there until I get off work, isn’t he?”

“It seems like it,” Jaune said, just as focused.

“What the hell.”

“He’s determined, I’ll give him that.” Jaune sounded almost impressed. Thanks for nothing Jaune.

Ten minutes in, Sun seemed to get bored.

Thirty minutes in, his phone died.

Forty minutes in, he started pestering the other customers for a phone charger. Weiss was tearing her hair out.

Fifty minutes in, he just started pestering the customers, despite Ren giving him a charger in a vain attempt to shut him up. Weiss actually just got up and left at this point.

An hour and twenty minutes in, he was chatting up an increasingly bewildered Jaune.

An hour and forty minutes later, he was chatting up Neptune, to Jaune’s relief and amusement. Neptune longed for the sweet release of death, and wished that he could follow Weiss out the door and escape.

How many minutes were left? When could Neptune go home? When could he get the scent of Sun’s hair gel out of his nose? He feared his clothes would soon be coated with it if it was strong enough to permeate the terrible coffee.

#rwby #sun wukong #neptune vasilias #jaune arc #seamonkeys #weiss schnee #nora valkyrie #lie ren #mine #my writing #writing wednesday #shouting in cafes #coffee shop rwby #chapter 5

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mitchsenweek · 6 years ago

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IT’S MITCHSEN WEEK!!

It’s Sunday May 12 down here in Australia so first day prompt creations are being accepted from now. Please tag your work with the #MitchsenWeek2019 tag so I have a better chance of finding them, or you may even like to tag the blog in your post. If I miss yours for whatever reason, send me a message and I’ll get it taken care of.

Also, I’ve decided that my Mitchsen Week fics are being kept tumblr only until the week is complete.

Happy Mitchsen Week y’all!

(And happy Mother’s Day to all you mitchsen mamas out there.)

Day One - Secret Relationship

It started as an accident. Too much alcohol, too much tension. The girls had all consumed way too much in terms of booze, and they were all making a racket somewhere in the house. Aubrey had spotted Beca slinking off down the hall and gone after her, planning on dragging her back to the group - this was a bonding session after all. But Beca had sighed and argued back and said she needed a moment for her sanity because she was not cut from the same cloth as the rest of them.

Aubrey had seized that moment and said that she knew Beca wasn’t Bella material, knew it from the second they’d met. But before she got any further, Beca had her face in her hands and was kissing her hard. Aubrey’s brain faltered for half a step until she pushed back, driving the smaller girl against the wall and went about devouring her in return.

Beca was small, slightly cool despite the warmth in the house, and for some reason she didn’t taste like vodka mixers or cask wine. But the small hands on her face, in her hair, on her waist, they were steady and firm and they let it carry on for a while. When Beca finally pushed Aubrey back a fraction, they stared at each other, panting.

“You gotta let me get some air here,” Beca said. “I’m like... not an extrovert. These girls, I love them. But I have to breathe.” Aubrey only nodded.

“Are you - we? Okay?” she managed. Her hands moved to smooth out her skirt.

“Yes,” Beca said. “Both counts, yes. I just need to - well.” Aubrey let her go. She didn’t know what to make of what had just happened.

It developed into a routine. They’d get together - sometimes just the Bellas, sometimes all the acapella groups - and at some point late in the night when alcohol had eradicated most of the sensibilities of the other girls, Beca would disappear and Aubrey would follow. A stolen few moments kissing fiercely in a dark and out of the way corner, before Beca would sneak away under the pretence of clearing her head.

Aubrey pretended that it didn’t bother her, but the longer it went on, the harder it got. Beca never looked at her or spoke to her in a way that would indicate what was going on to anyone else. And it made her wonder just what Beca was playing at. Whether she saw Aubrey as just a plaything or as something else. She decided she was going to force her to have a conversation about it. It didn’t take long for an opportunity to present itself – the girls had all been out together one day, and she and Beca had stolen away into a quiet corner of campus on the walk back, the other girls planning some other activity for the afternoon. They’d spent a few minutes kissing each other fiercely before Aubrey remembered she wanted to talk to her about this.

“We need to talk,” Aubrey said.

“No talking. Kissing.” Beca leaned in again.

“Is this just some dirty little secret to you?” Aubrey asked. “I’m just something you can keep to yourself and never admit to? You just kiss me and then you run.” The smaller girl realised she was serious.

“Wait. No, it’s not like that,” Beca said. “I mean it, Aubrey. Look, why don’t you just come with me?”

“Come where?” Aubrey asked. Beca just held out her hand, so she took it and they headed out of the shadowed quad they’d been in. She realised Beca wasn’t letting go any time soon, and let her fingers curl into Beca’s as they headed across campus, walking together in the afternoon sun.

“They’re all very, very extroverted,” Beca said as they headed past the languages building. “Don’t get me wrong, I love being a part of the group and everything. But it is a huge effort for someone like me to even attempt to keep up with you all. After one of our get togethers it can take a good few days for me to feel like myself again.”

“It’s that exhausting?”

“It’s easier if I leave like this,” Beca said. “If I make some kind of move that lets everyone know I’m thinking about bailing it turns into one more drink or no not yet, all of that. And I hate disappointing you all so I’d stay and then I’d need to spend even more time trying to recharge.”

“You really are that introverted?” Aubrey asked.

“Extremely,” Beca said. “I’ve chosen a campus job that has me locked in a radio station away from people. My major requires no group work at all. I don’t share about myself often and when I do, it isn’t much. I’m not good at talking about things.” They walked on and Aubrey realised she was headed toward Baker Hall.

“Don’t you want to be a performer though?” Aubrey asked.

“No,” Beca said. “Producer. Behind the scenes, not up in lights.” They continued on in silence for a few moments more.

“Can I ask you a question?”

“I kissed you because I wanted to,” Beca said, pre-empting the question. “Because you’re smart and you’re beautiful and because - as previously mentioned - I’m bad at talking about things and it’s easier to do rather than say.”

“But why have we not talked about this?” Aubrey said. Beca held open the door and raised her eyebrows at the question.

“Well, I just explained why I haven’t instigated a conversation,” she said. “As to why you’ve never brought it up, I wouldn’t presume to know.” That silenced Aubrey for a moment. Beca had a point. She was an equal participant in their entanglements and there was no reason for her to assume that Beca should be the first to begin talking about things. They headed up the stairs.

“I just don’t know what to make of it,” Aubrey said. “I mean, obviously I’m enjoying it, but I do want to know what exactly it means. What I mean to you.” Beca stopped at a door and turned to face Aubrey. She put one hand lightly on Aubrey’s chest, high up near her collarbone, using it to steady herself as she leaned up a little and kissed her. This time it was soft and light, and it didn’t last long.

“It means you should come in,” Beca said, unlocking the door. “If you want.” Aubrey followed her in and Beca hit the lights, dropping her bag on the cluttered but not drastically untidy desk.

“Where’s your roommate?” Aubrey asked. Beca shrugged.

“She’s rarely here on weekends,” Beca said. “It’s good though. Gives me space.” She tugged out her phone and music began playing from a speaker next to her bed. She kicked her shoes off, so Aubrey did the same with her sandals

and shrugged her jacket off, hanging it over the back of the chair.

“So what do you want it to mean?” Beca asked. She was bent in front of a small bar fridge and came out with two bottles of water, offering one to Aubrey. “I’m assuming you’re not the type of girl who does meaningless.” They sat on the bed and got comfortable.

“No, I don’t,” Aubrey said. “I’m not one of these girls who can have things mean nothing. The first time you kissed me, I didn’t think much of it, but the more it’s happened, the more I realise it does mean something to me.”

“And it does to me, too,” Beca said. “It actually means a lot to me. But if we’re going to like, date, then I really need to make sure you understand this solitude thing. Because the group can be tiring, but I do want to spend time with you. As much as I can, honestly. But at times, for example if I’ve had a bad day, then yeah, I might need a couple hours to recuperate.”

“You regenerate best on your own,” Aubrey summarised. “Got it. Though if we’re dating now – and that’s what I want – and you do need to be alone, can you at least just let me know so I don’t worry?”

“I could like, probably text you an exploding head emoji dude,” Beca said, tracing hair back out of Aubrey’s face and tucking it behind her ear.

“Then dating it is,” Aubrey said. Beca was starting to lean in. “But let’s not tell the group right away. They’re just going to get straight up in our faces and even I don’t want to deal with that, so I can only imagine how much the thought of it unsettles you.”

“Who knows, the clandestine thing might even be kind of fun for a while,” Beca said. She was so close to Aubrey’s lips, but still not touching her. “I mean, it was always kind of hot just making out like crazy knowing that at any second someone could catch us.”

“Anyone gonna catch us here?” Aubrey asked. Beca shook her head almost imperceptibly, and it was enough for Aubrey to close the tiny gap between them. She let the kiss start softly, but something about this moment felt a little more heated than their darkened corner encounters. Beca’s tongue pushed out and licked against her lower lip, and she parted her lips. Every time they were kissing and their tongues touched for the first time, she got a headrush and a shudder made its way down her spine. Today was no different, but today she didn’t have to worry that someone would hear the moan it brought. Beca pulled back a little.

“That noise is always so hot,” she said. “Every time - it just kills me a little.” Aubrey just pushed against her shoulders until she was hovering over Beca on the bed. She could see Beca’s pupils widening and watched her teeth bite down on her lip.

“This is okay?” Aubrey asked first.

“Of course it is,” Beca said. “Welcomed, even.”

They got pretty entangled on the bed, hands and mouths eagerly going about claiming as much of the other as possible. Beca loved the way Aubrey kissed her, loved the way her lips traced over her neck, her jaw. It made her a little dizzy, in the most pleasant way. Her arms were up in Aubrey’s shirt before she realised what she was doing, nails dragging down her back when she caught herself.

“Can we start to cool it a bit?” Beca said. “I’m not in a hurry. I mean, damn you’re hot and all… but we haven’t even been out on a date. I at least like to do that a few times before we start getting around to sex.” Aubrey kissed her once more, but rolled off to the side. Beca’s hand immediately found hers and their fingers tangled together.

“So can we go out tonight?” Aubrey asked. “Chloe is off doing something with Stacie and I don’t really have any plans.”

“I’m down for dinner or something,” Beca said. “But ideally this right here would be nap time.”

“Oh, let me leave then,” Aubrey said. She shifted so she could get up, only to find herself being tugged back down.

“You could stay,” Beca said. “Just an hour or so, then we can head out.”

“You want to nap with me?” Aubrey said. “How do you know I don’t snore?”

“I don’t,” Beca said. “But you smell good and I like the way your arm feels right here over my body.”

“How am I supposed to argue with that?” Aubrey said. She slid her feet into a tangle with Beca’s and let herself relax into the pillow. She drifted off to the feeling of Beca’s fingers stroking against her wrist.

They managed to keep it quiet for quite a lot longer than either of them anticipated. Beca had confided in Stacie and Chloe about her tendency to hibernate after social activities and they’d accepted it. Aubrey simply explained to the group that she, as a double major, had a lot of study to do. It wasn’t untrue. In fact, it was pretty common for Aubrey to hide out in Beca’s room to study while Beca worked on music. But they were happy together.

They managed to avoid being spotted on dates by simply going further away from campus. They often drove over an hour to just eat dinner together, to kiss each other on street corners without any concern that someone would see them. And Beca’s roommate really was very rarely in the room, which meant when they did start sleeping together there was no danger of being caught by Chloe.

“Do you think it’s time we told them?” Beca asked quietly. They were walking back toward the car after dinner, hands tangled lightly. “It’s been almost three months.”

“If you’re ready,” Aubrey said. “Then sure. I don’t mind waiting if you need a little more time, but if you’re ready, then I’m ready.” She didn’t speak again, seeing that Beca’s brow was furrowed in thought and knowing she just needed a moment.

“I think we should tell them,” she eventually said. “They are our friends and I feel like they’d be happy for us. I know it hasn’t been easy for you, keeping it from Chloe especially. So when we get back, let’s go find her.”

“Okay,” Aubrey said, squeezing her hand softly. “We’ll start with Chloe.”

She texted her roommate as Beca drove back, just to check and make sure that she was in their room and that she was alone. She received confirmation of both of those, so when they got back they headed straight there. Aubrey headed in first.

“Beca?” Chloe said. “Hi. Sorry, didn’t expect to see you here as well.”

“That’s why we wanted to make sure you were here on your own,” Aubrey explained. “We have a confession to make.” Chloe’s eyes widened as she suddenly realised what was happening.

“You guys are together!?” she exclaimed. “Oh my lord. This is… unexpected. But still good, don’t get me wrong.”

“It’s been a lot longer than you think,” Aubrey said. “We’ve been kind of hooking up a bit since the start of the year, but the dating thing, that’s been official for about three months now.”

“Wow.”

“We wanted you to know first,” Beca said. “I know Bree doesn’t like keeping stuff from you, but she didn’t want to hurry me into having to explain it over and over to everyone.”

“Oh yeah,” Chloe said. “How are you going to go with that?”

“Don’t know to be honest,” Beca said. “It might help if you try to tell them to keep their shit calm for a while? Because Bree’s like, really important to me. I don’t want to be overwhelmed.”

“Well, I just want you guys to be happy,” Chloe said. “So whatever you need me to do to help you, I’m in.”

“Thanks,” Beca said. “I should go, though, I have some homework calling my name.” She got up and Aubrey came out into the hall with her.

“Thanks for dinner,” Aubrey said. “Do you want to try to get together for coffee before first class tomorrow?” Beca nodded slowly, and for a moment Aubrey thought something was wrong. But Beca looked up into her eyes and with nothing but total sincerity, she said it.

“I love you.” It was quiet and gentle, but Aubrey could tell that she meant it.

“I love you, too,” she replied, leaning in to kiss her.

“Whoa, what the hell?” came an interruption. They pulled back and saw Stacie was coming up the hall, and that she’d clearly seen them. “What’s this?”

“You go,” Aubrey said. “I’ll handle this.” She planted a soft kiss on her cheek, and Beca escaped down the hallway.

“Chloe here?” Stacie asked. “Also, what the hell?”

“May as well come in,” Aubrey said. “She’s here, and I can explain.” She opened the door for Stacie and followed her in to start explaining all over again.

#mitchsenweek2019 #aubrey posen #beca mitchell #mitchsen #mitchsenweek

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damnedcrybaby · 6 years ago

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CHEAT SHEET: THE BACKGROUND STORY

Quick info: MULTI-VERSE / MULTI-SHIP / OC / FANDOMLESS / RP Default Verse: WESTERN / COUNTRYSIDE AND JUST TRYING TO SURVIVE Link for: CAROLINE // DANIEL // ELIJAH // & the RULES!

Caroline & Daniel have the same mother (Lilly) and father (Levi). Elijah has a different mother (Melanie), but the same father (Levi) as the other two.

Fun bit is-- none of them knew that until recently...

Levi Jackson, the father of all three- lovingly referred to as PAPA by Caroline & Daniel- had Elijah with an old girlfriend (Melanie), back when they were quite young. Melanie wasn’t comfortable with Levi’s racketeering schemes, but his only other option for honest work was to go back to caring for his father’s homestead, as a farmer: which, she assumed correctly, wouldn’t pay the bills. This led to the dissolution of their relationship, but after Elijah was born, his mother decided to send Levi a photograph of him, which rekindled their conversations at least... They tried to co-parent, but that wore off after a few years when Melanie decided she’d have better opportunities in the city.

Levi begged for an address to write to, and promised to send money. Knowing she’d need financial assistance to raise Elijah-- Melanie agreed.

And so, over the course of Elijah’s lifetime, Levi would write to Melanie at least once a week, and would send money in most of them. Of course: Melanie knew the amount of money he’d sent was plenty out of means of a simple farmer... but she needed the cash and Elijah wanted to be a lawyer.. so she accepted the funds and turned a blind eye.

Well, as blind of one as she could. Unfortunately, she saw Levi most every time she had to look Elijah in the face: and though she loved her son more than anything... it pained her to see him: so she bleached his hair when he was young, and made him wear thick-rimmed glasses... a sorry attempt to disguise his father’s features.

Meanwhile, with Melanie and Elijah out in The Big City-- Levi met Caroline & Daniel’s mother, Lilly, and fell in love. She’d always loved the simple lifestyle: grew up on a farm herself, so she fit in just perfect with Levi’s ‘honest living’, and was very content with the budget such employment would leave them with. They were absolutely, undeniably in love, and supported each other damn near blindly: Lilly knew there had to be a reason Levi would go visit all the shopkeepers in town while wearing his suits, she knew the men who’d come around asking for him couldn’t possibly be his family in the typical sense, and she knew there had to be deals going on under tables in order for the Preacher Men to shiver when they shook Levi’s hand at church...

It was when she fell pregnant with Daniel that ignorance stopped being bliss, and she asked to know only the necessities: Levi told her he had business with other men in town, and he revealed the existence of Elijah and Melanie. Lilly insisted he continue to do whatever would be needed for his son, but he made it clear Melanie did not want the families to intertwine. Despite her disapproval, Lilly never argued, and only asked that he make sure their own family is financially stable enough.

He never backed down on the promise-- though their budget was meager in most aspects, it was plenty for the two of them, and Lilly never wanted the big house or fancy cars.

They had Daniel, and years later, darling Caroline came along.

Caroline was sickly most of her young life-- doctors couldn’t quite place the WHY or WHAT; but she survived, despite the illness stunting her growth. Papa (Levi) poured money into taking her to different doctors, and donating as tithes in hopes God could help them where Man failed... He’s not quite sure who deserves the credit for his just-past-five-foot bundle of joy, but she survived and remained the light of his life. He’d bring her along to meetings with his FRIENDS, and she’d sit up sweet and pretty with a smile, but they’d give her quarters for getting candy sticks before business was ever discussed.

Daniel was never one for school-- but the boy was built like a brick house. He grew up trailing behind Papa and learning different trades, mostly construction and the general necessities for keeping up the farm. He’d met them gentlemen too, but mostly preferred to stay behind and take care of the crops or animals: he felt lesser than them, with his dirty cheeks and fingernails while they wore ties and nice shoes... wasn’t really comfortable being around them, felt like they were UP to something...

Levi had intended on leaving the homestead and his side business in Daniel’s care when he retired: but knew the boy would need to finish schooling first. Unfortunately for the lot of them... they never quite got that far.

Papa fell ill, fast. Stomach problems, mostly. Ceased to be able to keep on weight or keep much food down- doctors couldn’t place the cause... Mama took on as much as she could, believing they needed more money in order to properly maintain their homestead. Daniel dropped out of school, gladly, to take on the responsibility of the only moneymaker he knew-- the barn, the crops, the animals, and general handiwork for extra cash. Caroline stayed in school only because her father insisted; but during those formative social years of school dances and teenagers fumbling with each other in fast cars... she’d come straight home to take care of Papa, and to take over the domestic duties so Mama and Daniel wouldn’t have to worry about cooking or cleaning. The gentlemen stopped coming around... conveniently...

Levi’s death devastated all three of them. A few years later, Lilly was buried up on the hill right alongside him. Mama and Papa; together, forever.

Daniel and Caroline were left with broken hearts, and bruised hopes. All he wanted was to fulfill his father’s legacy-- despite not knowing what that was, exactly. All she wanted was to escape-- despite knowing she’d have to chop herself at the roots in order to get away from the place.

Years down the line, after the Jackson siblings pretty much accepted their lot in life: Elijah’s mother fell ill and she gave him Levi’s letters on her death bed, along with all the extra money she hadn’t yet given him. He used only what was necessary, and had also received a hefty inheritance upon her leaving the world, to finish his schooling. With some connections through Professors, he even landed a great job at a prestigious law firm.

But it felt cheap, despite the sky-rise or the floor-to-ceiling windows. He needed more, than the good job and abundance of funds, and decided to leave it all behind in order to go look for the man who’d penned all those letters to his mother...

Unfortunately, he was too late. Papa was already long gone, and when he knocked on the door of that dilapidated homestead: it was little bitty Caroline who answered the door and nearly had a heart attack at the sight of him.

He looked exactly like Levi, to the most minute details, and she knew before he even cleared up the confusion-- he had to be a GHOST or BLOOD... but he was more than willing to dismiss the terror on her face when he felt how she actually looked at him for what felt like the first time in his life...

Which is where we are now...

With Daniel, loathing the thought of an elder brother, who wears his fancy clothes in his nice corner office, while he works by the sweat of his brow just to take care of himself and his sister.

WHERE DID ALL THE MONEY COME FROM!? WHERE DID IT GO!? WHY WAS IT MAILED TO ELIJAH INSTEAD OF SAVED FOR A NEST EGG THEY COULD HAVE DESPERATELY USED!?

With Caroline, both excited over the prospect of learning all about this city-slicker’s life, and delighted over having a piece of her father back that she didn’t know existed.

WHAT WAS UNIVERSITY LIKE!? WHAT WAS THE CITY LIKE, AND THE PEOPLE THERE?! WHY DID IT TAKE SO LONG FOR THEIR PATHS TO ALL PROPERLY CROSS!?

With Elijah, heartbroken over discovering he’s truly an orphan, but desperate to keep a hold on the only shreds of family he’s found actually exist.

WHAT WAS IT LIKE GROWING UP WITH SIBLINGS INSTEAD OF ALONE!? WHAT WAS LEVI, PAPA! LIKE!? WHAT WAS HAVING A FATHER LIKE!? HOW DID LEVI MANAGE TO SEND HIM SO MUCH MONEY WHILE THE REST OF THE FAMILY SUFFERED!?

... and, most notably, who were those gentlemen Elijah had met in town who wanted to steal peeks at the letters he’d hardly mentioned when asking for directions to the return address...?

#~this is shamelessly for myself but if anyone wants to know where the HECKABOOZLE my brain is with these three...#~.... it's a doozy...... and i'm still drabbling the next bit.........#~Caroline; about #~Daniel; about #~Elijah; about #~IMAGINE IF I ACTUALLY WROTE ALL THIS OUT WELL!!! ajkssd #~oh yea and i killed off Mama so now none'a them have parents- it'S FINE!

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belladonnaandulriched · 4 years ago

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amped and wired, part two | chapter six: i’m no good

Mrs. Hamilton took us back to Black Orchid for a brief time, but I wanted to shower off and then relax at home for a bit, especially since I had had my hockey game. That time around, I took the front seat, which meant Scott would be away from that noisy plastic and he could nestle down in the warmth. It wasn't too much of a difference given he was completely right: the window made so much noise I could hardly hear myself think about things. Something brought us to the reservation, not just my own memory.

That dream maybe? No. Maybe it was Mr. Lang and the fact I lived with four ghosts.

But regardless, I really had no chance to think about the clones and when they might make their way up to upstate New York, or Candace's journal for that matter.

Oh, shit, Candace's journal! I completely forgot to mention it back there at the reservation!

It wasn't until we reached the parking lot outside of Black Orchid when I could have a thought or two about that. There was so much of that one entry that I had forgotten about, but I knew that her dying put us right in the midst of things, probably more so than my finding Maya on the sidewalk.

Or something like that. I had no idea.

All I knew was someone close to Candace stood behind the making those clones and they were about to come for us if we didn't find a way to stop them. The music industry made up a small piece of the pie, but a piece is more than a crumb. This could bring the whole world to its knees for all we knew.

I stayed in the front seat as Scott and Frankie climbed out first; Charlie took to the door behind Mrs. Hamilton. She looked over at me with a puzzled look on her face.

“Wanna come back inside, babe?” she offered me.

“I was thinkin' you could take Lars and me home—I need a shower.”

“Okay!” she said. “We can do that. Gives me a chance to check your bachelor pad, too.”

Once the three of them had climbed out, and Mrs. Hamilton told them what was going on, I glanced over my shoulder to find Lars leaning back in the back seat with his arms over the tops of the seats. Little lion man let his hair hang down over his shoulders and he brought his one knee over the other.

Oh yeah. And then there was him.

I couldn't explain it, but my partner in crime hid something from us. From me.

Once the doors were shut, Mrs. Hamilton backed out of the spot and I guided her back to my place. It was tricky given the racket from that sheet of plastic, but we managed to do it, especially since my voice carried more than that of Scott.

She pulled into the driveway at the parking lot and took the first spot closest to my place. We were down from where we found Maya on the back of that van—that was another thing I couldn't seem to take off of: why Lars and I managed to pry her off of there without anybody questioning us or anything like that.

I guided the two of them back to my front door, and the very second I set foot inside, I wanted to collapse onto the couch and take a nap. But I needed to shower and change my clothes first.

“Cute little place,” Mrs. Hamilton remarked as she peeked into the kitchen.

“Rent's good as it'll ever be and it's just me here,” I told her as I took off my coat and hung up my keys. I watched Lars lean his back against the wall behind the kitchen to take off his shoes: I spotted a small hole forming on the inside of the sock on his left foot.

“You know, a shower does sound nice right about now,” she confessed.

“I have spare towels in the closet down the hall here,” I said with a gesture to the hallway.

“Oh, no, Joey, I can't do it here.”

“Come on. You bought us coffee and you're letting Manny, Moe, and Jack stay at Black Orchid for the time being. I might as well return the favor.”

She showed me a little smile.

“Okay—it's a deal. But I don't have my shampoo with me, though.”

“You can use mine. It's one of those real big bottles so it'll last me a long time.”

“Well, aren't you just a sweet heart.” She let her smile grow over her face, to which I shrugged.

“I try my best,” I confessed to her, and without another word, she hung up her coat and made her way down the hall to the closet.

I watched her go inside of the bathroom and then I returned to Lars, who poured himself a glass of water from the faucet.

We were alone again and I had a lot on my mind. It was best to make note of it now rather than wait until Mrs. Hamilton left or we were back to Black Orchid. I swallowed down my nervousness as I watched him drink down that glass of water.

He set it down on the counter and looked at me.

“What?” he asked me. I sighed through my nose and clasped my hands together.

“Okay. I need to ask you something.”

“Yes?” He frowned at me and knitted his eyebrows together. “Is this about me staying here?”

“No. It's got nothing to do with that. It's more important than that. And I need you to tell me the truth.”

“Of course, of course.”

“Okay—um.” My mind went blank right then. He raised his eyebrows at me. I figured it was best to start from the beginning.

“Do you remember when we were in the warehouse running—and you told me there were like musical instruments on the other side of the room?”

He hesitated with his eyes peered off to the side. “Yes,” he replied in a low voice.

“I didn't see any,” I told him. “The next thing I want to highlight is—how'd you know that the music industry is a part of this? Like—we have the pieces—but there's one missing.”

He stared at me but didn't say anything.

“Lars—I'm going to tell you the same thing Mr. Lang said to me. There's something on your mind. There's something you're not telling me.”

“Mr. Lang?”

“One of the ghosts who live here.”

“There's no such thing as ghosts, Joey.”

“Don't change the subject. I need answers from you.”

“And I need to know why you feel the need to try and scare me.”

“I'm not,” I insisted. “And again, don't change the subject. There's something you're not telling me, Lars. How did you know these things before we did? And moreover, what made you think neither of us, be it me or Scott, Frankie, or Charlie, would notice? So tell me. Tell me everything.”

He nibbled on his bottom lip. Those green eyes gazed at me hard. I stood there before him as he held onto that glass by the base.

He then turned back to the sink for a refill.

I watched it fill up towards the rim, but once he switched off the faucet, he never took a drink. Instead, he turned back to me. He stayed silent as he strode past me towards the front room. He took a seat on the couch with the glass still in one hand.

I pressed my hands to my hips.

The whole place was silent save for the faucet of the shower squeaking on and the water running.

“Tell you everything, you said,” he began in a low voice.

“Yes. It's imperative that we get the secrets out. You're all about that, anyway.”

“True.”

“So why the hold up?”

“It's—It's pretty awful. The truth, I mean.”

I knitted my eyebrows together and shook my head.

“Can't be that bad.”

“It is,” he said. “Trust me, it is.”

He gestured to my recliner chair.

“Have a seat.”

I wiped my hands together and took one more glimpse down the hallway. It was just in there for the time being.

I sank down in the chair next to the phone and the couch. Lars took a small sip of water before launching.

“You know, my better half—my wife—she is deceased.”

“Right. What's she gotta do with it?”

“She knew all about it.”

“Really?”

To which he nodded.

“More so than me, if you can believe that.”

“I'll believe it.”

“She was into the whole writing thing as well as figuring out what was going on with the music business. You know, I am just learning these things—I still am, too. And it's even more so the case now that I am out on the job from Metallica. But she—she had it all down to a science. She knew what was up and she would stop at nothing to figure it out, what was going on with Maya and Candace and all the bullshit happening behind them. She was more than willing to figure it all out—and she did it in a way that would protect me, because she knew that when—or, if, I should say, she always treated it as a possibility because you never know how these things will work out in the end—it would jeopardize my future, perhaps more so than being fired.”

“So she was like—she was like a spy?”

“Kind of. She had so many irons in the fire and I often worried it would put her in danger because she had such a mouth—you think I have a mouth on me! Given Metallica's status prior to my departure. She often got in trouble and she made a great deal of enemies, and I just knew that if something were to happen to her, the whole system would sustain a chain reaction in failure. You know, the whole thing about how we musicians are not walking in a vacuum.”

“Absolutely. We have other interests.”

“Exactly. So I figured that if something happened to her, the shit would hit the fan. All of the secrets would be uncovered, Maya and Candace's lives would be at stake, New York would go first, and the rest would follow.”

“But she ended up going anyways,” I said in a soft voice.

“Yeah.” His face fell. “Quietly, I should add. Quietly, but—slowly. Very, very—very slowly. Painfully, too.”

“Do you know what it was—that killed her?” I asked him in a low voice.

He fetched up a sigh.

“I have my theories,” he confessed, “but nothing concrete. Nothing solid that I can rely on and say in a public setting when provided the choice. I am still—putting together the pieces. Pulling it apart and putting things together, if you will...”

He took another sip of water.

“So let me get this straight,” I started as I leaned forward in the recliner, “if it really is that dire—like if it's going to fuck me over at some point, and more so that I was the guy who found Maya laying in the street—or the clone of Maya, I should say—why am I just now hearing about it? Like, why not go public with this? Because it sounds horrifying. Your wife sounded like a real important lynchpin in everything.”

“Well, it's a touchy subject for me,” he contined, “especially after what happened with Metallica on that bus.”

“Right. But of the three of you, you were the one who took it the best. That's what I heard, anyways.”

“I took it the best but I also took it the worst. James and Kirk were agitated beyond belief—I was in over in my head, too, but it was more... I wish I had more time with Cliff. I wish I had more time to rekindle things with him. To call him more than just my friend, but my brother. To take more interest in what he liked. To do more than just tighten the strings on his bass guitars or his boots and maybe buy him breakfast or a drink at one point. To—” He closed his eyes and took in a deep, full breath of oxygen to fill out his chest. “—even so much as say 'thank you' to him, for being my brother. My band mate. And a part of my world.”

“Let them figure out how to thank you,” I muttered under my breath. He opened his eyes and took another drink of water, a slightly larger gulp that time.

“I will tell you this, Joey,” he started again, that time in a lower voice to where he sounded as though he was on the brink of tears, “—I am glad I was able to confess this to you, because—if I am honest, I couldn't hardly say this to either James or Kirk when I was alongside them. It was such a difficult tricky subject for me to talk about that I was about two rounds of tequila of burying the whole story altogether and letting it all come. I want to thank you.”

And I nodded my head at him.

“It's the best I can do, man,” I said. “So—now that this is out in the open, or at least between you and me—what do you think we should do next?”

“Well,” he began again as he set the glass down in his lap, “I just think about—what we talked about in the reservation earlier. To stay on guard, because it's all up in the air right now. My wife died, Candace is now gone... and the clones are insane down in the Big Apple at the moment.”

“Where are they coming from, by the way? I mean—they all look the same. They're all clones, made of—human flesh. They're based off of... somebody. They're comin' from some place and from somebody.”

“Yes, from Maya,” he stated, nonchalant. “Maya Sorenson, whom my wife knew.”

“Yeah, but,” I said, “is there actually a Maya Sorenson, though? Like is she a real person?”

“Yes.” He paused. “...as far as I know.”

“As far as you know?”

“Clones, remember?”

“Well, if she isn't a clone—is she alive?”

He opened his mouth to say something but no sound came out. He peered off to the side in thought; I could see him piecing it together.

“You know, it's—it's the weirdest thing,” he admitted, “I don't know. I have no idea. My wife died and I fell out of contact with her. I have no clue if she was a clone or the real thing.”

“Oh, well, fuck me sideways.” I leaned back in the recliner chair with my arms upon the armrests. He took another sip of water; I could still hear the water in the shower running, but I also heard a splash upon the shower floor. She had to be almost done at that point.

Mrs. Hamilton was buck naked in my shower. Naked and unafraid and totally real.

“I have no idea—if she was clone or the real thing,” he repeated in a soft voice.

I then leaned back forward so my face was close to him.

“What was she like?” I asked him in a low voice.

“Exactly like the clones—before they malfunction, of course. I do remember she—wore a back brace, like she had a lot of complaints about that part of her body. I remember we had her over for dinner one evening and she had trouble staying in one spot for prolonged lengths of time. She told me it was hard on her back.”

I flashed back to when we were in the City and Frankie drove right into that clone, and it hit the windshield and splattered blood all over the hood and the roof. As far as I knew, it landed on the pavement on its back and died right there. Complete and utter bloodbath aside...

“She suffered from a lot of headaches, too,” he continued, “—like I couldn't play music too loud, otherwise it would hurt her head. I just think about you—doing—that—in the sewers the other night. Bringing all of those clones to their knees and allowing us to find you and Mrs. Hamilton.”

“'Metal Thrashing Mad'?” I recalled with a smirk.

“Exactly!” he replied with a chuckle and another sip of water.

“It would also explain why you've gotten so heavy, too.”

“Exactly,” he repeated in a more somber voice. “It's just—it's hard. It's hard, you know?”

“Stressful,” I suggested. He took one final drink of water and leaned back in the couch cushions.

“I remember the first,” he started as he gazed up to the ceiling overhead, “—I'd say week—week and a half thereabouts—I didn't eat anything. I mean, Candace had enough guts in her to eat fucking paper—I didn't even have that! I might as well have not had running water in my place because I didn't even have that.”

“What changed?”

“Finally couldn't take it anymore. I looked at myself in the mirror and said, 'fuck it.' I just sat down with a big apple pie—”

“Apple danish,” I recalled.

“Apple danish,” he echoed with a nod of his head. “But I sat down with a big apple pie and ate the whole thing by myself. I kept going—eating more pies and more of everything, really. I did not limit myself or restrain myself in any way. And now look at me—all heavy and round, but I still feel strong, though. There is a lot of strength here—it may not look it, kind of like you are, being all skinny.”

“I'm a lot stronger than I look, it couldn't be more true,” I declared in a single breath.

“Mister Hockey Player and—fast runner. It is in fact true that strength comes in all forms.”

I winked at him once he said that.

“But I have become so ravenous,” he continued, “—and yet, I love it. I love the feeling. I love looking down at myself and seeing what I have become, this heavy supposed mess of human emotion, when that couldn't be further from the truth. You ever do something that's considered massively taboo like overeating a lot food that's supposedly bad for you?”

“You are preaching to the choir,” I told him as I thought back to that morning and to lunchtime and all of the food I had eaten.

“It was just—it was euphoric,” he confessed. “It was especially good for me to unleash that from myself, not just because I lost my wife, but—when I was in Danish school, the kids would pick on me for my round face.”

“What?” I was taken aback by that. “Why?”

“Who knows?” he admitted with another shrug of the shoulders. “As far as I knew, having a round face is considered too girly or too feminine. I can only imagine what you've been through being... half Native American and everything, especially after walking around that reservation, but for me... to eat to my heart's desire and come to terms with all of it, I was free. Free from my slender body and from obligations. But—even freedom has its limits.”

“You needed someone to talk to,” I said in a soft voice. “And yeah—when I was playing in bands up here before Anthrax, I would get weird looks from people. You know, I'm this funny lookin' brown skinned boy with a gap in his teeth and it wasn't from dental problems. And yet I could drum and sing like it was nobody's business. I remember when I played in this good sized place up in a town called Plattsburgh—way the hell upstate, it's almost in Canada—and I got so many dirty looks during set up. But once I opened my mouth, it was like 'game over for all you numb nuts.'”

He laughed at that and I leaned back in the recliner once again.

“And when I joined Anthrax, you know, it was totally alien to me. I didn't know what thrash was or anything pertaining to that. I always got a lot of shit for having a cleaner voice in comparison to James or Dave, or Tom for that matter. Hey, a clean voice will mop the floor better than a filthy, snarled one, you know.” He kept on laughing for a few more seconds, and then he looked down at his glass.

“Pretty good tap water here,” he proclaimed.

“Eh, it's alright,” I said with a shrug and a folding of my hands over my lap.

“It beats the ever loving fuck out of the water out in Cali,” he pointed out.

“New York water beat up Cali water and took its lunch money.”

“Yes!”

Speak of the devil, the water pipes stopped running right then and I lifted my head from the recliner cushion.

“Do you need a shower?” I offered him.

“Maybe. I am feeling alright but nothing in comparison to what you have consorted with today.”

“As long as you find a way to damn your own socks when I get my booty in there.”

“Damn my own socks?”

“Wait a minute,” I backed up. “Is it damn or darn?”

“Darn socks,” he corrected me with a puzzled look on his face. “And why would I darn my own socks?”

“I figure it's gonna snow tonight and I would think you'd wear your socks to bed. I don't want your sock feet in my face.”

“That still doesn't explain why there's a problem with darning my own socks.”

“Oh, yeah?” I pointed down at his feet. He raised the side of his left foot a bit, and he spotted the hole.

“That's right on the angle of my foot, though, Joey,” he pointed out.

“A hole is a hole, though—and it gets bloody cold here when it snows. The lake effect don't fuck around, my Danish friend.”

“How am I supposed to darn my own socks?”

I paused for a second. “Duct tape?” I suggested.

“I am not darning my own socks with duct tape,” he scoffed.

“I got a roll of electrician's tape in the kitchen,” I continued.

“I am not darning my socks with tape!”

The bathroom door swung open down the hall and I heard Mrs. Hamilton padding out of there. She emerged from the hallway with her hair dripping wet and her body clothed in nothing more than her skirt and a towel. She smelled like my shampoo and my soap, although she wore both better than I did.

“It's all yours, Joseph,” she informed me with a smile on her face.

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pncsports · 5 years ago

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gambhirs-blog · 5 years ago

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Influence-The Psychology of Persuasion

by Dr. Robert Cialdini

What are the factors that cause one person to say yes to another person and which techniques are used to bring about such compliance? Why it is that a request stated in a certain way will be rejected, while a request that asks for the same favor in a slightly different fashion will be successful? These are questions asked and explained in Robert Cialdini’s book “Influence”.

Lesson 1: Contrast

Today’s works moves at a fast pace. We need to absorb, process and act on information constantly. When we need to make a decision, we often resort to using shortcuts in the decision making process. One such shortcut is the contrast principle. The contrast principle affects the way we see the difference between two things that are presented one after another. Simply put, if the second item is fairly different from the first, we will tend to see it as more different than it actually is. This “weapon of influence” as Cialdini calls them does not go unexploited and its greatest advantage is not only that it works but also that it is virtually undetectable. Have you ever been shopping for clothes, selected a fairly expensive suit or dress and then been persuaded to accessorise with a shirt, shoes or bag? I have – at least with the suit, shirt and shoes! That’s the contrast principle in action. It is much more profitable for the salesperson to present the expensive item first, not only because to fail to do so will lose the influence of the contrast principle; to fail to do so will also cause the principle to work actively against them. If we the first thing we buy is comparably cheap the more expensive seems – more expensive. Do you want fries with that?

Lesson 2: Reciprocation

The second of Cialdini’s weapons of influence is the rule of reciprocation. The rule says that we should try to repay, in kind, what another person has provided us. A large number if not all of us have been taught to live up to the rule, and know about the social sanctions and derision applied to anyone who violates it - moochers, freeloaders, spongers. Because there is general distaste for those who take and make no effort to give in return, we will often go to great lengths to avoid being considered one of their number. Cialdini suggests , one of the reasons reciprocation can be used so effectively as a device for gaining another’s compliance is its power. The rule possesses awesome strength, often producing a “yes” response to a request that, except for an existing feeling of indebtedness, would have surely been refused. As a marketing technique, the free sample engages the reciprocity rule. The promoter who gives free samples can release the natural indebting force inherent in a gift while innocently appearing to have only the intention to inform. A person can trigger a feeling of indebtedness by doing an uninvited favor. The rule only states that we should provide to others the kind of actions they have provided us; it does not require us to have asked for what we have received in order to feel obligated to repay. Most of us find it highly disagreeable to be in a state of obligation. It weighs heavily on us and demands to be removed. Consequently, we may be willing to agree to perform a larger favor than we received, merely to relieve ourselves of the psychological burden of debt. There’s no such thing as a free lunch.

Lesson 3: Top Lining

Cialdini’s third weapon of influence is the top lining technique. This is easy to state: first make a larger request of me, one that I will most likely turn down. Then, after I have refused, make the smaller request that you were really interested in all along. Most likely I’ll oblige. Here is a commercial example. You go to buy a new Laptop. The sales assistant, Bob, invariably shows you the deluxe model first. If you buy, great for Bob. He’s just made a bigger margin. However, you’re likely to decline – after all you don’t need the bells and whistles. Bob counters with a more reasonably priced model. You’re hooked, you buy. Bob wins again, after all a sale is a sale. This technique happens all the time in retail. Tomorrow, count the rejection and retreat offers you encounter. I expect there are more than a handful.

Lesson 4: Consistency

Cialdini tells us something fascinating about people at the racetrack: Just after placing a bet, they are much more confident of their horse’s chances of winning than they are immediately before laying down that bet. Of course, nothing about the horse’s chances actually shifts; it’s the same horse, on the same track, in the same field; but in the minds of those bettors, its prospects improve significantly once that ticket is purchased. This is Cialdini’s fourth weapon of influence: The force of consistency. Quite simply, once we have made a choice or taken a stand, we encounter pressures to behave consistently with that commitment. We fool ourselves to keep our thoughts and beliefs consistent with what we have already decided. But because it is in our best interests to be consistent, such consistency can also be exploited by those who would prefer that we don’t think too much in response to their requests for our compliance. Take toy manufacturers wanting to increase sales in January or February. They start prior to Christmas with attractive TV ads for certain special toys. The kids, naturally, want what they see and extract Christmas promises for these items from their parents. The manufacturers undersupply the stores with the toys they’ve gotten the parents to promise. Most are forced to substitute other toys of equal value. The toy manufacturers, of course, make a point of supplying the stores with plenty of these substitutes. Then, after Christmas, the companies start running the ads again for the other, special toys which are now in great supply and as a parent we need to be consistent to our promise and hey presto. Double toys, double expense.

Lesson 5: Compliance

“How are you doing today?” The caller’s intent seem to be friendly and caring. But it has a cutting edge. There is a sales pitch approaching. The theory behind this tactic is that people who have just asserted that they are doing fine—even as a routine part of a sociable exchange—will consequently find it awkward to appear stingy in the context of their own admittedly favored circumstances. You’ve fallen into the compliance trap. Cialdini tells us to be very careful about agreeing to trivial requests. Such agreements not only increase our compliance with similar, larger requests, it can also make us more willing to perform a variety of larger favors that are only remotely connected to the little one we did earlier. Whenever you take a stand that is visible to others, you are driven to maintain that stand to look like a consistent person. Commitments are most effective when they are active, public, and effortful. So how are you doing?

Lesson 6: Social Proof

Like Seinfeld? Ever join in the laughter while on your own? To discover why canned laughter is so effective, we first need to understand the nature of yet another of Cialdini’s weapons of influence: the principle of social proof. The principle applies to the way we decide what constitutes correct behavior. We view a behavior as more correct in a given situation to the extent that we see others performing it. Advertisers love to inform us when a product is the “fastest-growing” or “largest-selling” because they don’t have to convince us directly that the product is good, they need only say that many others think so, which seems proof enough to us. In general, when we are unsure of ourselves, when the situation is unclear or ambiguous, when uncertainty reigns, we are most likely to look to and accept the actions of others as correct a phenomenon called “pluralistic ignorance.” We will use the actions of others to decide on proper behavior for ourselves, especially when we view those others as similar to ourselves. We like people who are similar to us. This fact seems to hold true whether the similarity is in the area of opinions, personality traits, background, or life-style. Consequently, those who wish to be liked in order to increase our compliance can accomplish that purpose by appearing similar to us in any of a wide variety of ways. Which leads nicely onto the next lesson

Lesson 7: Liking

An important fact about human nature: We are phenomenal suckers for flattery. Although there are limits to our gullibility—especially when we can be sure that the flatterer is trying to manipulate us—we tend, as a rule, to believe praise and to like those who provide it, oftentimes when it is clearly false. Liking: Cialdini’s next weapon of influence. A host of examples is possible. Most are familiar, like the new-car salesman who takes our side and “does battle” with his boss to secure us a good deal. In Olympiad years, we are told precisely which is the “official” hair spray and facial tissue of our Olympic teams. The linking of celebrities to products is another way advertisers cash in on the association principle. Professional athletes are paid to connect themselves to things that can be directly relevant to their roles (sport shoes, tennis rackets, golf balls) or wholly irrelevant (soft drinks, popcorn poppers, even after shave).

Lesson 8: Scarcity

The scarcity principle: opportunities seem more valuable to us when their availability is limited. Whilst in conversation we are routinely interrupted to answer the ring of our cell phone. And we answer rather than continue talking. In such a situation, the caller has a compelling feature that our face-to-face partner does not: potential unavailability. If we don’t take the call, we might miss it (and the information it carries) for good. Cialdini suggests people seem to be more motivated by the thought of losing something than by the thought of gaining something of equal value. For instance, homeowners told how much money they could lose from inadequate insulation are more likely to insulate their homes than those told how much money they could save. As a rule, if it is rare or becoming rare, it is more valuable. A variant of the deadline tactic, much favored by some face-to-face, high-pressure sellers, carries the purest form of decision deadline: right now. Customers are often told that unless they make an immediate decision to buy, they will have to purchase the item at a higher price or they will be unable to purchase it at all. Incidently, scarcity is a also a primary cause of political turmoil and violence. Revolutionaries are more likely to be those who have been given at least some taste of a better life. When the economic and social improvements they have experienced and come to expect suddenly become less available, they desire them more than ever and often rise up violently to secure them. When it comes to freedoms, it is more dangerous to have given for a while than never to have given at all. So remember once delivered you can’t take it away.

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cutenmysterious · 6 years ago

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soobadnoonecanstopher · 8 years ago

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2AM - part 4 (A Minseok Series)

Genre: Angst

Characters: Minseok X You

Description: You have been continuing a secret friends-with-benefits relationship with your best friends older brother Minseok, who is idol group EXO’s Xiumin, for two years now, while secretly concealing the very real growing feelings you’ve always had for him. A sudden blind date for you and for him suddenly forces you to face those feelings or end the relationship entirely.

2AM [M] - part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10, part 11, part 12

Your phone was ringing by the time you made it inside the cab. Minseok must have left the awkwardness of the restaurant by now and the on and off buzzing inside your purse punctuated the humming you felt inside your chest – you saw his name flashing boldly across the screen of your cell phone.

After the first three calls went ignored he was texting and the taxi was pulling up outside of your home just as you turned off the buzzing and left the phone to deal with ignoring the man you hated to have the misfortune of falling in love with. Your home was quiet. Your cat was sleeping curled up in a ball on the sofa that you’d long since given up on keeping her off of and you slipped out of your shoes. As you walked through your home you slipped out of the expensive dress and you let the garment fall at the floor of your bedroom door way and kicked it lifelessly through the threshold, aiming for, and missing the hamper full of dirty clothes.

You needed your pajamas. You needed alcohol and possibly ice cream and you needed a little mind numbing comedy television.

Your bra joined the dress nearly in the hamper but not quite and you were halfway into your comfy pajama top when a rough pounding on your door sent a jolt of alarm through your system.

A glance at the clock told you it was too early for his usual visits–

But tonight was anything but usual.

Not quite 9pm. Not quite time for Kim Minseok to be done with whatever he had been doing with his busy busy life and back to pull you into his arms and his lips and demand your attention for another night.

But he had no schedule tonight. You wondered how long he even debated before he made his way to your door.

When you lifted your silent cell phone you saw the string of messages. Questions peppered in between pleas, some demanding, some nearly begging and confused. All scandalized, victimized, and thoroughly blindsided.

He couldn’t be serious.

Was this man really so clueless as to why you were mad–

No..mad didn’t cut it.

You were furious.

You were livid.

You were done.

You tossed the phone down onto your bed and your legs carried you to the front door where the pounding sounded out again. Much louder and more abrasive than Minseok had ever sounded in the past.

What could possibly be going on in his head to warrant such strong emotions from the stone faced statue of absolute composure himself?

You heard your name, in his voice spoken through the door. Muffled and strained yet clear enough to ding against your heart wound.

“Please just open the door, I know you are in there.”

The softness of his voice didn’t match the tension you heard in the way he pounded on the door.

You steeled your emotions and unlocked the door before one of your neighbors came out to investigate the incredible racket he was making. The last thing you wanted was someone recognizing him right now in his current state.

You pulled the door open quickly and caught him mid fist-raise as he poised to pound against your door again.

“What are you doing making so much noise in someone’s else’s home Kim Minseok?”

Your tone was admonishing and his eyes widened as his pretty mouth opened to speak. He was suddenly struck dumb by something and you watched his eyes blink rapidly, pink cheeks and messed up hair as if his hands had been running through it. You saw the light redness over his cheekbone that Sohee had given him and there was an intensity in those eyes that spoke volumes where his words seemed to fail to deliver.

“Can I please come inside?” When he found his words they were tense and his lungs raged inside his chest, accentuating his rapid breathing.

You then realized you stood with your body blocking the doorway, blocking his entrance into your home and you glanced down curiously at your own body which usually stepped aside for him to slip inside so easily.

“I-I promise I will be–” his voice was unsure again, unsteady and you heard what you thought was a tremble somewhere inside his chest. Those eyes looked down at your neck as he spoke, refusing to meet all way into yours and you figured the anger in your own eyes had quelled some of his courage.

“You’ll be what Minseok?”

His eyes steadied themselves and he slowly looked up into yours. You watched some sort of a battle taking place in there and you wondered exactly what it was he was having so much trouble saying. He felt different. You couldn’t believe it, but he seemed much more intimidated than he’d been around you in the past.

You didn’t miss the way he swallowed, his lips tensing out flat as his throat bobbed up and down, exhaling a puff of air through his nose.

“You’ll be quick? You’ll be quiet? You’ll be a decent human being? What will you be if I let you inside Minseok?”

His startled wide eyes watched you as his stupid mouth was silent again. As always, minseok chose to remain quiet when an answer, any answer would help. Why was the man so stubborn and frustrating?

You couldn’t stand there and watch his inaction any longer. Your temper was getting the best of you now and you had to leave. You spun on your heels and retreated leaving the door open and that frustrating, stubborn man at your door.

“Do whatever you want. You always do anyway.”

Your legs carried you to your kitchen where your body seemed to be moving of its own will as you grabbed a single glass from the cupboard and a bottle from your pantry. You half recognized the clear liquid as vodka, but you would be satisfied with whatever bottle your hand grabbed first.

You didn’t wince at the taste of the alcohol. You didn’t feel the burn as it made its way down your esophagus into your stomach. It felt nearly the same as drinking water with how disconnected your mind felt right now. You weren’t feeling anything but the anger that coursed through you and when you looked up you were surprised to find him nowhere in sight. No where in your kitchen, at your heels, demanding answers to your rage, demanding you talk to him, demanding for you to forgive him this instant and be his best friend again–

–but he wasn’t there.

Curiosity is a stupid thing.

Curiosity made you move first and you walked back to the door where you’d last seen him, frozen like a beautiful statue.

Sure enough he was there, feet firmly growing branches down into the your doormat that sat just outside your door – the word “welcome” was clearly not meant for him.

He was watching you and you caught the tremble in his eyebrows as they furrowed together and his eyes had an instability about them that you weren’t used to finding in Minseok.

“Do you hate me now?”

As soon as you appeared back into his line of sight the question whispered out through his lips and why the fuck did his voice sound like that? Where was the asshole of the night before? Where was the dominant, confident, imposing man that took whatever he wanted whenever he wanted without any regard for your feelings? Where were his distant flippant words that echoed through your ear when he was on tour, telling you he was busy, laughing at your attempts at being cute, and baiting him with sweet I want yous and I miss yous.

The words, you were sure were always true for you, but never for him.

When he missed you it was usually just his dick talking, and when he wanted you, you knew it was just because his balls were getting heavy.

Minseok missed the sex. Minseok didn’t need you, or want you like you needed and wanted him.

“Get inside before someone sees you Minseok.”

“Do you hate me?” The uncharacteristic tremble in his voice, the uncertainty that you were sure you saw there had transformed into what you could only describe as a … pout.

But that was impossible. He couldn’t possibly be pouting. This was some sort of a trick.

Despite the ridiculously out of place pout on his face that had you rolling your eyes so hard you felt the strain against your eyeballs, he was still coming inside your home. You watched him pull the door closed behind himself and slip his shoes off at the door. He slipped on the house-shoes you always kept at the door for him. The house-shoes you had forgotten to get rid of when you’d made the decision that Kim Minseok was out of your life.

How could you have missed those during your self cleansing rampage the night of the cash shower over your head?

“It’s not like you to feel sorry for yourself.” You didn’t even bother trying to control your snarky response..yet for someone with so much alleged self resolve when it came to this man, it sure felt comfortable to see him walking back into your door. You felt annoyed with everything about this situation. Particularly with how well he fit inside your home. Had your sofa always matched perfectly with his clear bright complexion? Why were your curtains the exact shade of dirty blonde as his dyed hair?

What the hell were you thinking with those? You’d change them tomorrow to something dark. Something that didn’t match at all with the look of this beautiful man who was rocking back and forth on his feet as he took a tentative step closer to where you stood–your arms at your hips, as much bravado as you could possibly harness displayed proudly on your person.

“I’m not feeling sorry for myself I’m–” his hands were outstretched and the nervous way he rolled back and forth on his feet looked out of place.

“Look…the cash was a mistake. I admit that–” he was speaking now and you waited for the words any sane person would say next.

You expected it. You anticipated his apology – you longed for it and begged for it…you half wondered if you’d accept it easily or make him suffer forever instead.

But still no apology came out of his lips.

“At least let me pay you back for dinner” his hands were reaching again, behind himself you saw his fingertips grace against the top of his back pocket, about to pull out that god forsaken wallet again and you exploded.

“Forget the fucking money Minseok I don’t care about that.” You shouted and he visibly flinched as he froze where he stood. A new look of surprise on his face that you would shout at him, that you would finally voice the rage and the hurt and the anger that had been stewing just below the surface for years.

Silence.

The heavy kind of stubborn silence that suffocates those too weak to withstand it loomed in your living room. The longer the silence went on the worse the pain in your chest felt. Was this it? Were you suffocating? Were you really this weak? A stinging burning sensation behind your eyes signaled trouble and you closed your eyes as you gathered your will to fight that.

You’d never shown this kind of weakness with Minseok.

“I-I don’t want to lose you” the desperation in his voice stabbed at your eardrums and you willed the ache in your chest to subside and the burning in your eyes to give up, but it didn’t. Your chest ached with each shaking breathe and the burning in your eyes was changing as you felt the tell-tale relief. The moisture accumulated and you were powerless again as the first tear fell.

You’d lost. You were too weak to fight anymore and you wrapped your arms around your chest as new tears fell.

“W-Why are you—”

You felt his hand, warm against your shoulder and his touch made you jump back. Away from the feeling of his hand on your skin. -crying?” He whispered as he finished his sentence and you saw hurt on his face at your reaction to his touch.

“I’m not…” you stubbornly shook your head and angled your face down, looking away from him and you angrily swiped at the tears on your face, frustrated with your own weakness.

“It’s just because I’m so mad.” Your voice was as quiet as his as you felt your chest shaking now, sobs threatening to break free with him standing right here in your fucking living room, those slippers on his feet and that misplaced concerned look on face.

“You–” he began and cut himself off as soon as your eyes found his again. Something in your eyes gave him pause.

“You’ve never cried before, I didn’t–” his face changed again as he closed his eyes tightly, squeezing out the light from the room and the sight of your embarrassing breakdown.

“Minseok what do you want? Why are you here tonight? What do you want from me?” The dam holding your tears back wasn’t the only one that broke. Your question was abrupt and forceful and you watched his eyes widen instantly with your bold question.

“I-I can’t lose you,” he repeated, perhaps for emphasis.

“I thought we would be okay… I thought we would still be friends no matter what.” He’d taken another step, closing in again where you had retreated from him. This time you stood your ground.

“I think you must have thought too highly of me. There’s only so much I can take Minseok.” Your honest words didn’t hold the relief you thought they would and you heard what sounded like a tiny scoff of disbelief from Minseok. The man was working something out in his head and you felt the skin on the back of your neck prickle.

“Why does this bother you so much? It’s not like you’re in love with me.” His words had a bitter, sarcastic tone to them.

A cold feeling traveled down your spine, from the nape of your neck, slowly between your shoulder blades downward, scraping sharp talons as it moved and you felt the tears that had been flowing suddenly stop. Your face, still wet, felt cool under the ceiling fan blowing over your sofa and you stared into his face.

This…here it was.

Here was the painful, bitter tasting truth that sat stagnant in the back of your throat reminding you of each time he fucked you and left you.

Deny it.

The taste that overshadowed the sweetness of the times he hugged you sweetly and smelled your hair and rubbed your back, happy to see you after a long tour, laughing and drinking together with Minhee and his closest friends from before…from before the fame.

Fucking deny it! your brain was shouting over the distracting humming in your ears. And his sarcastic smirk was fading the longer he stared at you.

The bitter taste that came flooding back after every phone call that started with “I miss you” and was cut short with “I gotta go, I’ll talk to you later.” Every desperate kiss of his lips as he pushed through your doorway, peeling off his shirt and pants on the way to your bedroom, tasting like liquor and feeling like a hurricane.

Your mouth was hung open as your world crumbled at your feet.

His eyes widened and his brows furrowed. His posture straightened and he looked at you, square in the face, suddenly seeing everything as plain as fucking day yet still in denial. Because it couldn’t be. It was impossible. It had been against the rules really. Never spoken outright but certainly implied enough times to be clearly expected of you.

“Right? That’s not it right?”

You felt sick now. You couldn’t clear that taste no matter how much you swallowed and your words weren’t working right. You knew you should deny it, but the words were stuck in your throat.

He was staring at you and the longer the silence dragged on the more you saw the realization hit him hard and fast.

“Y-You can’t be… I’ve been so careful…I mean I was such an asshole so this wouldn’t happen…so you wouldn’t–”

The room felt as if it was closing in the longer you stood useless and small and his words echoed back again and again in the tiny space you found yourself trapped inside. Was he behaving this way on purpose?

I’ve been such an asshole so this wouldn’t happen

You shook your head, unwilling to believe that his actions lately were anything more than Minseok acting like an entitled prick.

“How long?” He finally said after staring at your silent face for too long.

You closed your eyes and winced at the pain inside your chest.

Only since…forever Minnie. I’ve loved you forever.

His voice felt soft. Too delicate for the amount of pain and dread you felt inside you as you sat under his microscope, with all of your deep secrets in his sights now.

You hadn’t denied it. And he knew you well enough to know what that meant.

“How long have you been in love with me? Why didn’t you ever say anything?”

“I think you should leave.” You interrupted him and his eyes widened as he looked at you with a new pain behind his eyes.

You couldn’t look into those eyes and when your own eyes crumbled under the weight he shifted.

“How long?!” His voice raised to an unusual volume that sounded like someone else entirely and you saw the step he took before you felt his hands on your arms.

The outburst made you jump and you instantly tried to hide it, shaking your head in a stupid desperate attempt to deny something, anything you could.

“God dammit will you just fucking answer me? Just fucking be honest with me for once – how long?”

Months…years…a lifetime. The answers danced on the tip of your tongue, being pulled at by his pleading eyes. His hands gripped your arms hard and he dipped his head in front of you, forcing you to look at him, forcing you to face this and answer his question.

But the fear inside of you took your truth and buried it down.

“I think you should leave.”

You were the world’s biggest coward.

“Please just t-talk to me, you won’t ever tell me anything please just tell me the truth for once.”

“I want you to leave.”

“Please–” his eyes watched you, hurt and pain deep within them flaring up and he shook his head back and forth. “–you don’t mean that.”

“I think it’s best if we stop this…all of it. Let’s not see each other again.”

You saw it happen. The change in his expression as he realized what you had said.

His eyes searched yours, pleading, begging, desperately hoping for something, anything in your own that would give him a clue about what you were doing here. Perhaps he knew the truth all along–that you were so in love with him that you could no longer find any reason to resist. That you had lost yourself so completely along the way that you no longer had any idea who you even were anymore.

He was silent as he watched your face and you put your walls back up – so carefully constructed after all, the bricks were strong and they fit together easily. Your tears had long since dried up and the bubbling confession of love that had seeped up somewhere along the foundation had been shoved down so forcefully that you were sure it wouldn’t make any more appearances in this lifetime.

Your secret…maybe not as much of a secret as you would like, not with the way he was watching you right now, but your secret nonetheless, was still yours.

Filthy. Weak. Disgustingly naive.

And yours.

“Can we still be friends?”

For the first time in much too long, Minseok sounded fragile as he asked you a simple question. His eyes now held on to something else, something that looked like resignation and you heard a quiet sniffle from his nose. His voice sounded thicker than usual and you felt your own head move a tiny bit as you shook your head, giving your response a rhythm before you pried your lips open to speak.

“I don’t know that we ever were.”

The long exhale that vacated his lungs filled the silence between you two and he took a step back, his hands rose as he rubbed roughly over his face.

You stood your ground and waited for it to be over. Waited for him to leave your apartment and your life for good and never call you or speak to you again.

“Do–” he spoke from behind his hands, pausing to inhale a deep breath before he continued.

“–you really want this?”

Why was he even asking this again? The decision had already been made by his actions.

“I’m done… I can’t do this anymore.”

His hands were down from his face. His eyes avoiding yours now as his grim expression his whatever emotions you knew he was concealing from you now.

“I know better than to try and change your mind when you’re like this…” Was that it?

Was he giving up already? So easily?

“I hope I can trust that you will keep all of this from my family.”

There it was again. As if on cue, his precious reputation when it came to his parents and his sister was the utmost important, above the fractured friendship of years that sat crumbled at your feet. You thought you heard the pieces crushed under his feet as he moved through your living room room to your front door where he was silently grabbing his shoes, moving so quickly you wondered what he could possibly have left to be running away from.

“O-Of course.” You whispered to his back that rolled with hushed agitation and tension as he reached for your door knob. You noticed a tremble in his hand as he moved and you heard what couldn’t possibly be a sound from him, a shuddering gasp…one that nearly sounded like a sob if it would’ve come out of any other person in the world but from Kim Minseok that sound should have been impossible.

Yet you saw his hand move up to quickly cover his own mouth as he turned away from you and pushed roughly through your front door.

The door slammed loudly, sending an boom that echoed through your ears swiftly followed by a wake of silent desolation that hit you in the face. The silence brought your tears back and the realizations hit you again and again. More than the physical, more than the sweet kisses and hot sex you would be without, the sting was worse when you remembered the conversations. The laughs and the inside jokes and the secrets and the friendship built up over the years.

Maybe Minseok had been right. The emptiness coursed through your chest, cold and consuming. Maybe you had just lost your best friend.

——————

“So I don’t get it, was it just sex or was this guy really something special?”

Minhee was grunting as she used the ice cream scoop to dig through the carton, tossing the plastic utensil down angrily onto the granite counter with a huff when the frozen treat wouldn’t budge.

“Ugghhh–” you groaned out loud from the big plush sofa in her living room where you had plopped your lifeless body down in a huff an hour and a half ago in great need of her comfort and encouraging words.

“–I don’t know Minhee. I mean everything was supposed to be casual.”

“Well if it was supposed to be casual why are you moaning and groaning on my couch and why is this ice cream so fucking frozen?!”

It had been exactly 72 hours now since your last spoken to Minseok and your low mood had become quite obvious by now to Minhee who made you come over and spill the details of your latest guy trouble.

“So how come you never told me about this guy before? I didn’t even know you were seeing anybody…friends with benefits even…I have to admit, I’m proud.” The couch dipped as she plopped herself down next to your head and handed you a small bowl with a spoon stuck inside.

“So what’s his name? What does he do? Do I know him? You said you’ve known him for years right? I must know him. Come on…spill it.”

Kim Minseok. A.k.a. Xiumin of popular idol group EXO, your dear brother whom I have known since the 2nd grade and have spent more nights daydreaming over than any other human being on this entire planet. The man who I’ve been secretly in love with for longer than I’ve known what love was and the man who, until his most recent tour, used to call me at nearly every opportunity he could to tell me stories about his shows, send me pictures from the tour, ask me questions about my day and share secrets with me that I swore I’d take with me to my grave.

“You don’t know him.” You said as convincingly as you could manage and you felt the lie tumble down to join the countless others you had inside your belly.

The comedy you both watched together barely made a dent in your mood and when the door latch sounded out and Mrs. Kim walked through the door you looked up into her face that stared back at you with a cold unreadable expression that mirrored the one you’d seen Minseok sporting countless times.

Her phone was in her hand, still illuminated from her recent phone call and something in the way her eyes zeroed in on you, completely ignoring the greeting Minhee called out made you sit up straighter.

You felt your stomach drop with that look.

“I’ve just had a chat with Sohee’s mother–”

Scenes from your double blind date replayed like a grainy horror film in your mind. The sweet touching and the over the top flirting that Minseok laid on extra thick that night. Building Sohee’s hopes up so high while simultaneously causing a rage of jealousy in your own body.

The sound of her startled gasp when she found you and him in that bathroom…you embraced in his clutches, his hands in your hair, his firm body leaning well into you–enough to feel the steady thrum of his heart beating against your breasts, with his mouth on yours with a kiss that definitely didn’t seem like an accident or silly experiment.

“Can I have a word with you in the study please?”

You weren’t even sure how you got your legs to work at this point, your heart was pounding so hard against your ribs you were sure anyone within shouting distance could hear it.

Minhee shot you a curious look as you nodded at Mrs. Kim’s back and shrugged innocently at Minhee.

You walked down the grand hallway toward the door that stood ajar at the end with what you were sure was your certain doom on the other side of the it and when you reached the threshold you caught sight of the small woman with familiar eyes and hardly a single wrinkle on her pretty face. She was hunched slightly over a large desk with both of her hands resting flat against the surface, her darkened cell phone sat face up on the table between her hands.

“Close the door please.”

Your hands were trembling at this point but you did as you were told, anxious to just get on with it. She could call you a loser and a whore and tell you never to set foot inside her home again, effectively cutting you off forever from the people who had been like a second family to you for your whole life. You braced for it and tried your best to keep the shaking in your hands under control.

“Mrs. Kim I can expl–”

“What exactly happened on that blind date the other night?” There was an edge in her voice that sounded distinctly motherly as she cut you off instantly with her abrupt question.

Your words had been cut short and your mind scrambled for something, anything that might explain the fucking nerve you had to be caught in such a situation with her precious son, by his date no less…but she was speaking faster than your scrambling mind could work.

“I mean, what did he do to this one? Didn’t they seem to get along? Didn’t he seem to like her? And yet–”

Something was off in her words the faster she spoke and you tilted your head, trying to grasp where she was going with her impending accusation.

“Well Sohee’s mother says she came home that night refusing to even discuss Kim Minseok…wanted absolutely nothing to do with him…actually cried in her bedroom for two hours straight–”

Your jaw hung as the words left her mouth and realization hit you.

“–and is completely silent about what he did that could have possibly ruined everything so completely. I need to know. What happened that night? What did Minseok do to Sohee that would cause her to cut him off so completely?”

She didn’t know. Minseok’s mother didn’t know…which meant dear used, scorned, broken Sohee hadn’t uttered a single word to her mother or anyone else who might tell, about what she had walked in on in the bathroom that night.

Sohee… had kept her mouth shut. Whether out of respect, or solidarity, or embarrassment, you had no way of knowing but she hadn’t said a word.

As out of your control as it had been, you suddenly felt that much worse for playing any part in her deception that night.

Your mind was working now as your own little crisis seemed to smooth over and vanish with the churning tides of the room and you were quick to relay the events of the night of the blind date to Mrs. Kim as convincingly and of course as selectively as you could.

In the end you had convinced the well meaning, though obviously meddling woman that the two must have simply had some disagreement while you had left to use the restrooms, since by the time you had returned, she had already left without saying goodbye to you.

“That boy!” Mrs. Kim’s frustrations with her son, though for vastly different reasons from your own, felt comforting in their own way and you wholeheartedly nodded your head in complete agreement with her sentiment.

A distant sound made both of your heads perk up and she rose to her feet at the sound of shattering glass from what you assumed was coming from the direction of the kitchen.

You were closest to the door and you exited quickly, making your way down the hallway toward the sound of now, cursing, muttered in a slurred voice.

A unexpectedly familiar slurred voice.

When you reached the kitchen you saw him– Minseok, standing at the counter, a shattered bottle of soju at his feet and a new, unopened bottle in his hand as he hastily unscrewed the cap and lifted the bottle to his lips.

“Minseok are you okay?” Mrs. Kim was rushing toward him and you reached for her arms to stop her from walking through the broken glass that littered the floor all around him.

Her eyes followed where you pointed and Minseok stood, still steadily draining the bottle that he had just opened mere moments ago.

You saw the tremble in his hands as he slammed the empty glass onto the counter too hard and the way he closed his eyes tightly, a delayed comical wince at his mistake, told you that he was, of course very very drunk. Perhaps more so than you had ever seen him in the past.

His eyes opened up at the sight of you and something in those bloodshot eyes looked dangerous.

“What’s going on?” Minhee stumbled out from her bedroom at the commotion and your briefly turned to shoot your friend a worried look.

From the corner of your eye you saw it.

Movement.

Minseok was moving, walking straight toward where you stood, stepping right over the broken bottle at his feet, you heard the crunch of the glass under his feet and your eyes widened to see him advancing into your space.

His hands reached and you felt the tips of his fingers first as he touched your face, taking another step, more glass crunched and a quiet gasp sounded out beside you from his mother. A second gasp, in stereo, from Minhee as his hands pulled your face to his own and you felt his lips crash roughly against your own surprised parted ones.

You felt frozen. His mouth moved over yours and the grip of his hands was strong, his lips parted and his tongue pushed inside, bringing along the taste of alcohol, strong and bitter and you came to life at the taste.

You lifted your hand to his strong chest and pushed. He didn’t give. His drunkenness was too noisy for him to hear what was happening outside of his own mind right now and another hand was what it took to push him away.

He stumbled, his eyes opening in surprise to find you there, the one he was kissing in the kitchen of his parents house, in front of his mother and his sister and you saw recognition breakthrough the drunken haze.

His lips, still wet from the kiss pulled into a sweet smile and you felt the relieved exhale against your mouth as he said your name in a breathy whisper.

“You- you came back.” He slurred through drunken lips and you heard his mother calling his name, desperately trying to make sense of his erratic drunken behavior.

“I thought you were gone forever, don’t you know how much I missed you? How much I always miss you?” His eyes were on yours and his hands held their strong grip on your face as he spoke. You felt his thumb brushing sweetly against your cheek.

“Don’t leave me again okay? I love you so much, don’t leave me again.”

He was moving, his eyes looking down at your lips and you braced your hands against his chest again, ready to push him down to the ground if you had to when you felt his weight suddenly vanish completely from below your palms.

You heard a shriek from beside you and felt the tumble of his weight at your legs as he collapsed into a drunk, and now unconscious heap, at your feet.

2AM [M] - part 1, part 2, part 3, part 4, part 5, part 6, part 7, part 8, part 9, part 10, part 11, part 12

#exo #exo fanfiction #exo smut #exo scenarios #exo angst #minseok #minseok smut #minseok angst #minseok fanfiction #minseok scenario #xiumin #xiumin smut #xiumin fanfic #xiumin scenario #xiumin angst

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