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hyukascampfire · 3 months ago

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𝑯EART 𝑊ORM ⸺ hueningkai ℘˒´ˎ˗

⨾𓍢ִ໋ ˒˒ 𝚑𝔢art𝚠𝔬rm

[𝑛]. a relationship or friendship that you can't get out of your head, which you thought had faded long ago but is still somehow alive and unfinished, like an abandoned campsite whose smoldering embers still have the power to start a forest fire.

⸺ listen to the playlist .ᐟ ‧˚

〝﹙ 📼 ﹚“I was just... wondering,” you say, blood roaring. "Well, Yeonjun wants me to come over to his place this weekend, and... I’ve never...” Sucking in a quick breath, you just spit it out to get it over with, “Would you be my first kiss, Kai?” ˛ ､､

wc ➛ 17.9k

𝔭airings childhood bsf!kai x reader (lowkey soulmates?) ⤷ ft. asshole!yeonjun x reader

𝒢 ‎; smut ˒ angst ˒ some fantasy

𝔴arnings angst, family issues, fingering, jealousy (i’m sorry i just love ts), yeonjun really is an asshole, orgasm denial, thigh fucking, unprotected sex (they're stupid!), strength kink a lil bit, breeding kink, possessiveness, creampie, choking... i think that's all, lmk if i missed any

✎୭ ashlynn's note omg. this was such a fun palate cleanser to write. this wasn't supposed to be as big as it is, but it just kept getting bigger and bigger, and i got super into the story. this kai is SOOOO!! yeah. i’m so nervous posting this because i’ve only ever posted TSFAWC, but…. here you areee (^^;; this is not proofread, so if you see a mistake... give me a sec. i'll get to it. hehe

Though you fan your hand furiously over your face, the little breezes washing over your clammy skin are not enough. The air is thick and heavy with summer’s heat. So thick that you almost feel it each time you swallow. It’s better than just letting yourself melt away, though. The cushion at your back doesn’t help much. It holds your warmth and returns it to you the longer you sit slumped back into it. You suffer it though—you’ve gone too sluggish to move.

You let a leg dangle over the arm of a chair, watching a hopeful moth dance in the light of the buzzing porch light overhead. It flutters frantically in it, making a grand fight to reach that false moonlight, only to drop away when it realizes that it’s being burnt. You watch it rinse and repeat, relentless and sure, for who knows how long. It’s no special moth—no luna moth or the ones with the pretty pink wings—but the light falls down on it and colors it a pleasant stardust silver.

You delight in letting your conscious brain turn off to watch it. It lets you forget the sweltering under your skin, and also that Kai had drug you out here. His dad gives him shit when he plays inside, but it’s way too hot to be out here. Isn’t it supposed to cool off after the sun goes down? It doesn’t feel like it. The deep acoustics are drowned out each time a car whirrs by. Playing outside should be the best option, but you and Kai live right on a busy road.

When the roar of some car going ten miles over the speed limit doesn’t obscure his playing, though, you admire the intricacy of it. His fingers work up and down the neck, jumping frets that you imagine would be impossible to anybody without those long fingers of his. You had always been a loud supporter of his playing, even way back when the most he could play were simple chords, but you became especially so when a few years back he put a guitar in your hands and tried teaching you. Even with his fingers guiding yours, it was quick to learn that the effortlessness with which Kai handles the instrument is hard earned.

He practices on the acoustic guitar, but that’s not his domain. With houses just a dash across the street from each other, Kai had grown up at your home more than he had at his own. So vividly, you remember the stars in his eyes when he’d listen to your dad’s music. Metallica, The Smashing Pumpkins, Linkin Park, any of it. He had fallen in love with it a long time ago. Your whole life you knew that it was only a matter of time before he was in his own band, chasing his dreams with a boundless mind and an indelible vision of himself on stage. How had that time come so soon, though? You don’t know if the notebooks full of inky lyrics that live wherever he deems inspiration might hit him make you proud or nervous. He’s making good on his dazzling aspirations, and you?

You speak finally into the air, cutting through heat waves and his music and the night. “Isn’t it weird that we’re not going back to school after this summer?”

He doesn’t have to even stop playing to answer you. Playing comes to him as a second nature. “Kinda,” he answers, brown eyes flitting up to you. “But it’s not like you won’t be back to it in September. College is the same shit.”

The leg you’d been dangling and bouncing pauses. That’s right; you’re supposed to be going to that college you’d chosen because it was only a three-hour drive away from here. You pluck at the seat’s threadbare fabric, and the moth, still there, becomes oh-so-interesting once again. When his playing stops, you drop your head back with a cushioned thud and a groan that you wrangle in your throat.

“Why are you acting like that?” he says, voice gone sharp like accusation. He doesn’t even know the truth, but he’s known you too long.

Can’t you just keep secrets for yourself, sometimes?

Kai, arms clad in a well-loved hoodie even in this dreadful weather, lays the guitar down. You maintain your silence. “Seriously, what?”

Some secrets have timers, though. This one could only last you until about September, or even August when he realizes that you’re not preparing to return to school. A controlled sigh from your chest isn’t enough to soothe the nerves that sparks. “Nothing.”

“Secrets, huh?” Kai says. When you do finally look to him, black spikes of hair frame his eyes and the accusation in them.

It’s a simple poke, but it gets under your skin as sharp as any thorn might. It’s not like you don’t keep secrets from him, and you’re sure he keeps some from you too. But those are the little kinds, the inconsequential ones—like I ate already when asked why you’re not eating or like Yeah, I’m fine when it’s been a bad day. You don’t hide this kind of stuff from each other. Usually, you’d run over to his place to tell him whatever’s bothering you. Why not, when he’s known even the worst details of your life for almost the entirety of it? You’ve been holding this one close to your chest since somewhere around the end of senior year, though. The longer you let it fester, the worse your nervousness snowballs. “C’mon, Kai. Let’s not do this. Can you keep playing?”

He doesn’t like that, of course. But you watch recognition dawn over his chocolate brown eyes, helpless to stop it. “You’re not going,” he says. It’s not a question nor a suspicion, it’s a bone-dry fact.

Well. There that goes. You want to tear every hair on your head right out. Why had you even thought you’d keep him in the dark about it? When he’s not out in some garage making music, you two are together. The conversation was going to stroll by at some point; this was only inevitable. His disappointment radiates off him in waves and blisters you. He hasn’t even said anything yet, but you know exactly what he thinks of it. It’s why you kept it from him in the first place.

Your silence is enough confirmation for him. “Why?” he says. “I thought you were excited to move out.”

Wincing, you nod slowly. You were. Even went through the whole application process, along with most other kids your age. Ultimately, you never went through with declaring a college. You don’t exactly know why, but somewhere weaseled down in the shadowy recesses of your soul, you know. Taking those steps, the massive and terrifying ones from adolescence into adulthood, meant agreeing that this form of your life was over. It meant that at some point, you’d be moving away from here to where living your days away in Kai’s room would not be a choice. Everybody has to do it eventually, you know that. Kai’s music gig could take off any day, too. He’s going to make it happen. And then what? All this stalling and wishing on just a bit more time would mean nothing, he’d be off and chasing that dream. As excited as you are for it to finally become reality for him, there’s a nasty bitterness that’s budded in your chest, infecting your person.

Can’t things just stay like this?

“I was,” you say. It comes out of your mouth heavy.

“Then why aren’t you going?” he says. Crickets, never seen but always heard, sing their song into the night’s darkness. “You didn’t get rejected. You’re too smart for that.”

An ache sits heavily somewhere near the center of your chest, maybe over your heart. All those good grades, nights spent bent over a desk and AP paperwork—you’re wasting it. You shake your head. “No... just...” It’s an effort to dress your thoughts in a way that might appease him. A quiet moment stretches with your thinking before you continue, “I don’t know what I want to do.”

He doesn’t like that, the yellow wash of the overhead light dancing over his taut lips and hard eyes. “Don’t know what you want to do?” he says, bringing his legs up onto the seat to crisscross them. He wears his favorite jeans. They’re heel-bitten and baggy enough over his legs that he can wear them around the house without any bother. “You’ve wanted to be an artist your whole life. You know exactly what you want to do.”

Your chest only seems to ache harder. When the both of you were only young and hopeful, you both had big dreams. Kai was going to be the face of a metal band, and you were going to be an artist. A painter, potter, sculptor, even doing animation for those big companies like Dreamworks and Disney. You wanted any of it, just as long as you were doing art. You’d even promised him that you’d do the cover art for his albums with interlocked pinkies and flushed, hopeful cheeks. That passion and love wasn’t gone from you, it blazed strong in your veins. This blaze wasn’t the kind that kept you warm and excited to push forward into life, though. It had morphed into something that scalded you when you got too close or started imagining yourself pursuing its call. It’s a taunting silvery glow, no longer a guiding north star. Taunting words of family members stamped down on that hope hard. When you were little, it was said lighthearted and in passing. The older you got, though, the more serious their faces became. They wouldn’t say it outright perhaps, but you hear what they think well enough. Art is a dead-end career.

Shifting in your seat, you tell him, “I don’t know.”

“What do you mean?” Kai says. “There are good colleges for that.”

“I just... don’t know.”

Shaking his head, he tells you, “But you love it.”

You do. In its every form, you love creating. But loving it doesn’t mean that it’s right for you, or that you should trust your future in its hands. “I think I can do it in my own time,” you say, finally pushing yourself upright from the cushion. “Don’t wanna kill the passion by doing it for a living, you know?”

He thinks on that for a moment. “If you love it, you should do it,” he says.

An awful frustration bubbles in your chest. Kai has always had a clear life path, the steps ahead of him set in stone and waiting for him to follow in them. It’s hard for him to see why you might not want to do the same. There’s nothing that makes you as happy as the fact that he has it all figured out, that he knows just where he’s going and that he’s so incredible at it that he doesn’t have to worry about meeting the requirements, but your path seems obscured and untrodden. Punctuating a deep, resonant sigh, you say, “It’s not that easy, Kai.”

“If you’re not doing that, then what are you going to do? Are you just going to settle for a nine-to-five?” he says full of accusation, the tapping on his knees gone still.

A dry laugh, you say, “Maybe I’ll marry a super rich guy and just do my art for a living. No nine-to-five.”

His face flashes. He’d always been a bit reserved, especially around others, but he bared his emotions freely around you. You hold them dearly to your chest and made sure to do your best to make good on that trust. He says, “You’re more than some guy’s housewife.”

Cheeks radiating in the heat, you snort. “I know, dork. I’m a rockstar’s best friend. It’s my personal favorite achievement.”

His face sours when you reach out and pinch hard at his cheek, but he doesn’t pull away or brush you off. The skin there is warmed and clammy. Really, the two of you should go meet the cool AC inside before you suffer heat stroke. But this moment feels so nice—your shoulders feel tons lighter without something to hide. If you had it your way, things would stay like this forever. Just the two of you, sat here like you have so many times before, just taking for granted the time you’ve got together.

His mouth opens to banter, probably something about how he’s not a rockstar yet or to get you back for calling him a dork. Wingbeat and sterling dashes about your face send the image into a blur, though. You’re a quick mess of limbs and a whipping head, as if it’ll chase the thing away from you.

“Seriously?” Kai says. You’d climbed halfway over him, elbows digging into him and knee doing a number on his thigh. “It’s a moth. You’re not scared of moths.”

Lingering for a few moments later to ensure the flying thing was nowhere on you or around you, you hold back a laugh before you climb off him and fix your hair with undignified tucks behind your ears. “He was in my face,” you say around a laugh, because you know it was a bit too much. Nobody likes wings in their ears and spindly legs in their face, though, and you’re in no control of what you do when anything with six legs tries and get too friendly. Even moths.

“You just wanted me to protect you,” he says. A sarcastic, shit-eating smile tugs at the corners of his mouth.

“Oh,” you scoff, batting your eyelashes and clasping your hands together all saccharine-sweet. “Yes, Romeo, won’t you kill that bug for me? This girl’s heart just can’t take it!”

Kai’s nose crinkles, and the playful light twists into a glare. “Nasty.”

“That’s how you sounded,” you say. “I only reacted accordingly.” Laughing, you kick your legs out over his lap and sprawl back out. He takes the guitar back into his hands.

As much as you want to escape the mugginess, you’ll survive it for just a little while longer��if only with the force of an indulgent heart. The eternal moments are those you allow to linger.

⚝⭒

Some things, you forget when you’re older. Maybe it’s time’s hand, eroding memories down and stuffing more in the longer you live to experience them. But also maybe because they’re the sort of things you can’t say in the adult world without a laugh in the face and a look from down their noses.

This memory is one of those forgotten things. It’s moth-bitten and dusty, something you one day folded up in a moving box and decided to never revisit.

You’d been down at the creek. Kai and you had spent so many summer days there. It wasn’t too far from home, just past the filbert trees and into the shallow neck of the backwoods, but there you were out of sight and free to get up to nothing good. It was a wonder your mom ever let you do it. Kai’s dad didn’t care too much where he went or what he did, but your mom dug her claws in deep. You like to think that she imagined you two would have each other, if anything ever happened.

Usually, you’d be there holding your jeans up from the stream and Kai would be letting his jeans go dark with it. The bite of water was nice as it washed over warm skin. Fun was a simple thing to find, then. You dug your fingers into the mudbanks and tossed stones way too big to be throwing at each other, just because you two remembered how much the adults hated it when you did. Then, you’d drag tired limbs home avoiding sweetgum tree spikes that had fallen to the ground and dug splinters out from your feet.

This day, you had been in the blackberry bushes. It was maybe late July or early August, and they’d gotten heavy on their branches. You’d waited until the smell of them, summer-warmed, was sweet and cloying in the air to pick them. With buckets in your hands, you plucked only the fattest berries from their bunches. Your fingers were stained a delightful purple and perhaps a bit thorn raw, but you didn’t mind much then. You plucked for hours, and it was dusk before you could catch it. Dinner was no doubt waiting for you back home.

“There’s a bunch over here,” Kai had said. He reached a long boyish arm, still awkward and lanky with puberty, up high for ripe bush. You finished off picking before climbing around thick branches sticking out to take a peek. A bunch, there was.

When you went to drop a handful of them into your bucket, Kai hissed. He’d been snagged by a vicious looking branch, those ones as thick as a finger with thorns to match and you’d warn each other tongue-in-cheek to watch out for that one. He’d worn those ridiculous shorts that day, the ones that looked half pants half shorts with how long and baggy they were, and the claws of the bush had jumped at the opportunity. At first the scrapes were white, but then red blood crawled out and down his leg.

“Kai,” you said, some parts chiding and some parts just wondering how he’d managed that. You surveyed his leg for a bit, and then determined that he should wash his leg off in the stream. He walked there strong, but of course you noticed the hobble beneath his acting. When you squatted down into the dry grass and cupped water to wash off his leg, you laughed.

“What?” he had said, holding the shorts up. You covered your laugh with a hand, but it erupted past your palm. You remember the glare on his face very well.

You still laughed. “You’re stupid,” you had told him.

“I didn’t see it,” he said. “I tripped over it because it was sticking out.”

That time when you brought your hands to catch some water, there was a twinkle in its surface. You didn’t notice it for a second. The creek moved fast and you could see a lot of things in its reflection. When it lingered, that’s when your brows furrowed. It seemed to twirl, dancing around like alive over the stones.

The sound of Kai’s voice remains with you. “Hey,” he had said, strong to call your attention but also wavered with uncertainty.

When you looked up, there was silver dust dancing around you.

It was fluffy and whorling, fine silver stardust. It’d moved weightless in the air, as though it barely existed. In the center of it were a few moths. They seemed to be made of sterling powder just as the dust was, and they glowed against dusk’s backdrop. If your memory serves you right, there had been a sweet hymn of coos from them. They beckoned you. Summer’s heat felt lighter, and so did your chest. You wondered where they had wanted you to go.

Almost afraid that if you spoke they might have fluttered away, you whispered soft and low to Kai. “What is that?” He was stood frozen there, pant leg still scrunched up in his fist. Stardust glowed soft in his brown eyes while he took it all in, you remember. It wasn’t a scared frozen. You weren’t scared, either—rather, it was as if that lightness had found its way into the core of your being and brushed over it with mending hands.

He whispered back, “I don’t know.” How could he have known? It was absurd.

Those whisps had beckoned you, flowing toward the deeper woods. The soft moths, their murmuring brushing up against your ears, seemed to wait for you to follow. You remember a pull, soft tendrils wrapping themselves around your heart and the yearning it planted there.

But there was also this reluctance, a bone-deep answering that had told you: No. You’re not ready.

“Kai, I wanna go,” you told him.

You didn’t even need to tell him twice. Berry buckets forgotten; the journey home was a stranger one. When your dad asked why you returned from berry picking emptier handed than you had left the house, Kai and you only shared a look. You pair kept that evening at the creek hidden so well that it became more forgotten than shared secret.

⚝⭒

Once, you had been the type of girl that loved being around family. Some of your favorite days of your life were spent in this living room, T.V. roaring over bouncing conversation. Some of those nights ended in rosy cheeks and laughs, and some ended with words thrown angry like fireworks. You never knew which you’d be getting, but you endured the fear of not knowing because it was a simple love—the basic kind built with biology into you the moment your infant skin touched your mother’s. You endured it because eventually, sleep washed away the bad taste left in your mouth and you forgave them quick, sometimes quicker than you ought to, and things would go on as if it hadn’t even happened. You endured it because you could handle its burden, if only to feel the warmth you feel when it’s a good day.

Kai was always there—his dad was hardly home, so he found family in yours. When you were younger, you’d been embarrassed he was there for caustic, spitted words and intimate fights. Now, you’re just grateful for his shoulder.

So, yes. Once, you had loved being around your family. But things feel tenser now, nights spent all together less frequent and when they do happen, they’re tainted by a strange air. You think that this strangeness is new, but an awful worry also makes you think that it’d always been there, that you only feel it now because you’ve grown into your adult mind. A hollow ache stakes its claim in your chest, declaring that it won’t leave until you find that youthful ignorance and joy once more. You think that it might stay there forever.

Bare feet bounding down the stairs, you make a rare appearance downstairs. The cupboard is only half open to make way for a snack raid before your mom’s voice cuts through the air. You know quickly just by the look on her face that you should’ve stayed upstairs.

“Hey,” she says, gathering laundry into a basket. “You’ve been applying to jobs?”

With an anxious belly, you tell her, “Yeah. A few. They’re not really, like, ideal, but I sent applications.” You don’t remember when it got hard to look into your mother’s eyes, but you can’t bring yourself to do so now.

“Not ideal?” she says. “It’s not like you can be picky. Mcdonalds or wherever, I don’t care, you’re going to need to get a job if you’re staying here.”

“I know. I applied,” you reiterate around a mumble. You close the cabinets, not so interested in a snack anymore. “I just... I don’t know, ma. I don’t want to do that for a living, going between those sorts of jobs.”

Face hard and abrasive against the truth you bare, she does that awful taunting smile that makes you feel small. Stupid. “You’re not going to college, so that’s what it’s gonna be. You can’t sit up there and draw for a living. You’ve gotta get into the real world, get some real experience.”

There’s a burst of hurt in your chest, dazzling and gnawing. She’s getting closer to saying how she really feels about your dreams out loud every day. Your face burns and so do your eyes, knot thick in your throat. “Yeah, okay. Got it,” you say, nodding. You’re at the front door before you even know it, slipping on shoes and fighting the greatest internal battle to will back tears. She’d use those against you, no doubt about it. “I’m going to Kai’s,” you throw over your shoulder.

Whatever she barks back at you, you’re glad you don’t hear. Bells on some old Christmas decoration hung on the door that had yet to be taken down, even into summer, jingle and wash it away for you.

Kai’s brows shoot up when he opens the door to your face crumpling. You’d done so well at damming it up, but the wall cracks and the water crashes through once you see him. If it were anybody else, you’d feel icky and attention seeking, but you’d held Kai to your chest through gut-wrenching sobs as much as he’s done it for you. Without question, he takes you into his arms, warm hand running up and down your back. The warm soothing is so familiar. You melt right into it.

He keeps you there for a long moment. Then, his chest rumbles as he tells you, “Come on.” The walk through the AC to his bedroom is nice. Having a house like Kai’s to come to where it can just be you is nice, too. You step around the mess of clothes and scattered belongings on his floor like you have a muscle-memory roadmap of his room. Boxsprings creak and hard mattress welcome you back home. His room is dark as always, a night-dweller you call him. The array of peeling band posters plastered over walls you two had painted blue some years ago, when it’d been his favorite color, don’t help to lighten it up. He keeps a low lamplight on.

“She never listens to me,” you say, crying gone to occasional sniffles from your chest. You rest your cheek on your bent knee.

“I know,” he says. “But at least she cares about you. Pays attention to you.” His voice is soft and deep and right next to you. Always right next to you, there for you even when you might not appreciate it as you should.

His dad cares too little what he does, and yours care too much. The grass is always greener on the other side, you know it. Still, you hold a fantasy where you’re able to do teenager stuff. Where you’d allow yourself to do bad things, because you weren’t so intent on painting yourself with their will. You two hold eyes for a long moment, your twinkling ones caught in that steady brown. “I just want to get away. Be my own person.” Your words are muffled in the softness of your skin.

“You had the chance to do it,” Kai says, hand playing with your fingers. “But you didn’t.”

Holding your legs closer, you lick your lips. What do you say to that? Would it ever be the time to tell him that you did it because you think that your soul is pathetically intertwined with his, and that it might snuff your lifeforce out to even try pursuing life without him? Without this? How do you tell him that you’re so frozen and unwilling to pursue any sort of future because it means accepting that this chapter is over? You clutch childhood to your chest like a wild animal guarding scarce food; you refuse. You refuse to acknowledge its end.

“Kai,” is all you say, trembled and thick. It’s not just your mother’s words that dig at you and tear to shreds the last bits of what dreaming you had left in you, but so many other reality checks too. This isn’t the first time you’ve heard those sorts of words, urging you forward. You can only dig your heel into the ground for so long before you’re swept away in time’s ruthless, endless moving.

He understands. Lifting your face with warm fingers against your cheeks, he says, “Hey. How about we go get ice cream, or something?”

Ice cream does sound nice. “Dairy Queen?”

Smirk tugged over his mouth, he says, “Yes, Dairy Queen. A blizzard. C’mon, let’s go.” Sliding off the bed, he offers you an urging hand up.

But you falter. “I don’t know if we can. She’s mad at me. I don’t think she’ll let me go.”

“Let you go?” he says, eyes narrowed. “She doesn’t have to let you go. You’re an adult now, you go if you want to.” He offers his hand to you again.

It’s so him, freely going wherever he ordain it. The bullheadedness is very him, as well. Always the devil on your shoulder, he was the root of any rebellious thing you’ve ever done. He could never understand your apprehension, or why getting in trouble was such an awful thing to you. “I have to ask to get money.”

Brows pinching, he says, “You think I’m not gonna pay for you? You don’t need them to give you money, I’ll pay. I’ll take care of it.” He drags you up from the bed this time. “Live a little. Do you want to go?”

It was never the punishments or the getting in trouble that you were scared of, though. Disappointment was a scarier word than grounded. Sneaking out and those sorts of things, it’s not like you had angel wings at your back and never considered them. It’s that you are deeply, utterly terrified of changing how they look at you. You begin to tell him, “I do, but—”

He cuts you off, adamant. “Then do it. Let’s go. If you want to go, then go,” he says. “At some point, your life needs to become your own. It’s not sneaking out when you’re graduated and eighteen years old, it’s going wherever the hell you want. You’ve... You’re gonna end up stuck here, in this town, forever. You don’t deserve that.”

That sounds like both the best and the worst thing you’ve ever heard. You take his hand.

⚝⭒

Your frozen fingers nurse your ice cream. The cup itself is cold, but the Dairy Queen on your side of town is always thirty degrees below what it should be. It’d always been that way. Even way back when you two couldn’t drive, you’d get dropped off here to escape the melting weather and get a frozen treat with a handful of dollars. Each time, you’d start off sagging with the relief of summer’s weight off your shoulders and left the place shivering and sugar-mouthed.

It’s really only you two in here. You crinkle your nose when he takes a spoonful. “Out of all the flavors...”

Unbothered and no doubt expecting you to say it, he offers you a flat, “You get your flavor, I get mine.” He makes a point of taking an extra-long bite. His lips linger around the red plastic of the spoon and his brows rest high in silent challenge.

The corners of your lips twitch up. “Hmm. Well. I just have a hard time believing that Oreo... or, like, brownie fudge, is right there, and you actually want M&M. I don’t get how M&M your favorite.” A familiar banter falls over your tongues. Your heart buzzes and your cheeks radiate. This is the first you’ve done this all summer, and it’ll be weaning off into fall soon. Any other summer, you would’ve been here on all the hottest days. You hate that Kai’s been so busy with his music; you hate that you can hear the resounding ticks of the clock counting down your time. You also hate that the stubborn depths of you still believe that if you freeze yourself here in stasis that the world will relent and stop along with you.

You look over the sharp lines of Kai’s jawline as it feathers with his chewing, and the broadness of his shoulders where his jacket stretches around it, and the starkness of his collarbones against his chest and the bobbing of his adam’s apple when he swallows. No, time doesn’t stop. Some of him remains the same, though. In it, you see the boy that had love creeping up on you so long ago, with all its aching and all its hope. That freckle on the column of his neck, the bump in his nose leading down to the button tip that beckons your lips to steal a quick kiss.

And, those lips. They’re as soft as ever around the discontented grimace he pulls. “M&M isn’t my favorite.”

With a pursed mouth and patronizing brows arched over your eyes, you say, “Oh, huh. That’s funny, because if my memory serves me right, it’s the only flavor you’ve ordered for the past... six years.”

Kai husks a laugh at that. “That’s because they haven’t had my favorite for years,” he tells you, scooping up the final bit and then pushing it off to the side. “It was a blizzard of the month that they discontinued. The blackberry cheesecake one. I made peace with it, though. It lives on in my heart.” He grins, arms crossed over his chest and his back settled into the booth seat to let you finish your cup.

“Blackberry cheesecake,” you say, voice made taunting. Your nod is slow and taunting, too. “Well, forget M&Ms. Why would blackberry cheesecake be your favorite? Ever?”

His face falters, a moment where something flows over his eyes as if reliving a memory in a few short seconds. Then, he shrugs. “It just is.”

You roll your eyes. “Whatever,” you laugh. “Maybe my palate is unrefined.” Imagining the tarte fruit in purple swirls of ice cream, you’re taken back to a humid July day and the scent of churned mud.

The strange memory unfolds itself quick. As if it were waiting for you to find wherever it’d hidden itself away. With a sharp gasp, you say, “Oh my god, Kai. Do you remember that one day? That weird stuff we saw down at the creek?”

He nods. “Yeah. I was just thinking of that the other day, actually...”

Less interested in finishing your cup now, you let the spoon rest. “What?” you say, the word peaking in the middle. That day hadn’t crossed your mind once since it’d happened. “How weird is that?”

Scoffing a laugh, he says, “Weird, yeah. Just as strange as two kids high on fermented berries.”

That draws a breathy laugh from you. “Is that what you think it was?” you ask him with knitted brows. The berries had been fresh, and you two had popped plenty into your mouth. But no doubt, you’d have spat them right back out if they were that ripe. “I mean, we saw the same thing.”

“It happens to animals all the time. Squirrells, and stuff.” He lends you a gallic shrug. “We just freaked ourselves out. Like that one time you said you saw the shape of something in the dark and we freaked out. And it was clothes.”

Well, hallucinating, in tandem, a glowing mist because you two by chance ate fermented berries is a very long shot. However nonchalant he acts about it, he seems to have thought long and hard about it. Enough to reason it away with some far cry explanation. Would you have even been able to get drunk off a handful of fermented berries? And, god, you’re really sure that you’d have noticed. That taste isn’t really one you just don’t notice.

Whatever. Maybe you were just drunk idiots. That’s a lot easier to swallow, anyway.

“Okay, but you saw that. Did it not look sinister?” you say. With your spoon back in your hand, you punctuate the sentence pointing it at him. “You freaked out with me, too.”

An unsatisfied scowl on his lips, he steals a spoonful of your dessert. You don’t even swat him away—your phone buzzes in your pocket.

Catching sight of who’s calling, you share a long look with Kai. It’s funny, how fast those three white letters scramble you up. When you hesitate to answer, Kai tells you, “Answer.”

You hope she can’t tell you’re not at Kai’s by the refrigerators’ dull buzzing. It’s an effort to tussle that invasive worry back. You’re at Dairy Queen. Getting ice cream with the boy she’s known since childhood. She should clutch her hands and thank the sky that you’re here, not out in some nasty frat house like you could be. You thumb the green button.

Her voice comes through the speaker crackled and asking you to run over to do a quick dish load. For a heartbeat you consider telling her that you will and then start rushing home. Instead, you fork out the truth through resistant lips.

The hangup tone sits heavy on the air between you and Kai. Having listened to the whole thing on speaker, he says, “What was so hard about that? The world didn’t end, did it?”

The plush of your lip takes a hard gnawing. No, it hadn’t. “I know she’s not going to get mad at me for just going here,” you say as you rest your elbows onto the table. “It’s that they’re supporting me right now. I still live under their roof. The more I go around and insist I can do whatever I want, they’ll start reminding me of it.”

His face drawn, he lets his mouth twitch to one side. “Yeah,” he muses. “I never thought yours would be the type to kick you out.”

Kai’s dad had started threating him with getting kicked out years ago, when he first started telling him that he wanted to do music. How many times had he let reluctant tears flow into your shoulder over it? Because music wasn’t a real job? Back then, you’d whispered in his ears that he’d become everything he’d dreamed of and more as your fingers carded through shaggy locks of hair.

“I don’t know,” you say, humming it out noncommittally. “Is your dad still... y’know?”

Nodding slowly, his eyes tell. “Yeah. Always.”

“Because you’re taking the band seriously, now?” you ask.

“Probably. I don’t give a shit what he thinks about it. If I’m just his goddamn problem, I’ll give him what he wants soon enough.” His eyes blaze with promise of it.

It takes a bit out of you to not wince. Kai living anywhere but in the house across from yours is wrong. “I don’t think he necessarily wants that, Kai...” You take his hand in your icy ones, the urge to reach out to him thinly veiled under the guise of searching out warmth. He’d always run warmer than you—your personal heater. “It’s probably because he can see that you’re doing it for real. Not just saying it anymore.”

“Yeah, well,” he spits, “I can’t fucking wait to see what he’ll say to me when I make it. That piece of shit, though, he wouldn’t even care. It’s not like he ever gave a shit about me enough for it to matter.”

But, it matters to you, you want to tell him. You understand his need to throw it all in his face, though. “Is that one label going to sign you? The one you were talking about?”

His tongue darts out to wet dry lips. “They haven’t yet. I don’t know. But I don’t need that money to get out of here, I’ve been working on it.”

“They will,” you say. “But, where would you go? Not too far?” You try and keep it light and playful, even as your heart aches.

“Come with me,” he says. It’s painfully blunt, as if it were that simple. “Let’s go get and apartment; you and me.”

“Kai...” you say. “You don’t have to drag me along because you feel bad.”

The idea doesn’t sound half bad, though.

“What?” His face tightens, as if somewhere under the surface your words had scraped somewhere tender. “You don’t have to stay here forever. Please. I want... I want you to come with me. You wouldn’t have to even tell them; just bring all your stuff and go together. We could do it together. Like we said we would.”

“We were like, five. Everybody tries to pretend running away at five,” you deadpan. It’s a washy attempt at lightening things back up.

Living with him, moving out together, should feel like everything you’ve ever wanted. And, maybe it is. But, he’s not asking you to live with him the way you want him to. Not in the way that your aching heart wishes he would.

Kai doesn’t share the laugh you give him. “Yeah, okay,” he says, leaning into the table.

Perhaps you should consider the potent disappointment he’s terribly masking with a face of indifference, though.

⚝⭒

Slowly, the knots in your belly have worked themselves out. When Kai had dropped you off, they’d been so awful that you felt borderline sick. You sat the whole ride there in his old beat-up truck picking at your nails and rambling to him. He listened to you the whole time. And then when it was time to walk in, it had least felt a little easier to do so with his eyes on you, watching to make sure you made it in safely.

You’d gotten a job. It’s not too bad, folding clothes out on display. It would be nice if they kept the lights a bit brighter, but you’ll get used it eventually, you hope.

Most of your coworkers are around your age, but the one showing you the ropes... your heart had fluttered.

“You’ll get it,” Yeonjun says. The smile you find on his lips once he straightens up from placing product on a display is smooth and smug. Sleek strands of black hair fall over his eyes. You fluster under his gaze.

With arms crossed over your chest you say, “Yeah, probably.” You reach into the cardboard box for stock to practice on.

“Where’d you work before this?” he asks, leaning back into a wall to watch you. Suddenly, you make sloppier work of your folding. “Your first retail job?”

Some obnoxious pop song falls down from the speakers over the store. Nobody’s in here yet, thankfully; you’ve got some time to try and get a handle on everything. “No, this is my first job. I was so nervous walking in.”

Interest catches in his eyes. It encourages that smooth smile on his lips further. “Don’t worry, sweetheart, I’ll show you the reins.”

Your mind stalls. The suggestive, sly flicker to it—are you looking too much into it? Maybe that’s just how guys like Yeonjun act. It’s hard to pretend that you don’t see how he’s looking at you, though. It has your belly twisted up in fluttery knots. It’s not like you hadn’t had your share of his type. But, for some reason you’d rather not address, he’s got your heart thumping in your chest.

He laughs at your fifth attempt to fold up the shirt. When he takes it from you to help, he smells of musk and vetiver. “You going to college near here?” he continues.

“Nah, just doing this, I guess,” you answer, watching him fold it up to try and soak it up.

“Really? Why not?” he hums, crossing his arms about his chest. “You seem like a smart girl.”

Buffering, your blood buzzes in your veins and your cheeks burn. “Dunno. Not really sure what to do. Are you in college?”

“Nah. I’m trying to figure things out, too.”

The both of you pop your heads up when the bell rings to announce the arrival of a customer.

“Yeah,” you say, eyeing him. He’s a few years older than you, no doubt, and yet his life hasn’t fallen apart because he’s not done anything grand yet.

Time’s hand around your neck loosens. Just a little bit.

⚝⭒

You sit crisscrossed on top of Kai’s bedsheets. He’d thrown the windows open because the AC died, but it’s no help. The hot air wafting about the room sits heavy on your skin. You’d dressed in as little material as possible to let it breathe, bare thighs clad in a pair of loose shorts and a thin tank top, but it’s still miserable.

Perhaps you two should be going over to yours, but you haven’t had time alone with him for a few weeks now. You hate this busier life, where you struggle to make room for this.

Your new job isn’t so awful, though. Especially with Yeonjun there. A bout of nerves flows up through your stomach. That reminds you.

Sitting up a bit straighter, you consider not doing it. In fact, you really shouldn’t. But your mouth moves before you can put a stopper on it.

“Hey, Kai,” you say. The thickness in your throat makes you believe that your heart’s jumped up into it, caught. God, what are you doing? The unsure waver in your words has you regretting.

His eyes flicker up to yours. He hums out a, “Huh?”

No, this is wrong. You mess with the thin cotton strap of your tank top where it’d slipped down. “Never mind,” you tell him, trying to shrug it off.

That piques his interest. “No, what?” His brow pinches.

You lick your lips and shake your head. “Nothing, never mind. Really.”

His eyes search you from where he sits up against the wall. “Tell me,” he demands.

Really, you shouldn’t have said it in the first place. It was a ridiculous idea. But now you know he’s not going to let it go. And, ridiculously, you say it. “I was just... wondering,” you say, blood roaring. "Well, Yeonjun wants me to come over to his place this weekend, and... I’ve never...” Sucking in a quick breath, you just spit it out to get it over with, “Would you be my first kiss, Kai?”

Insects buzz outside as he looks at you, frozen in spot. You reject the urge to dart away or throw up. You’re honestly just as shaken as him. But really, who else could you trust with something like that? You don’t want Yeonjun to be disappointed if he kisses you, or to seem inexperienced to him.

And, perhaps, the hopelessly in love part of you hopes to at least feel his lips on yours at least once. If you’re going to be alone forever in your longing, you just wish that you can have this.

“What?” Kai says. He looks rattled.

Of course, he’s shocked. You shift. “Forget I said that,” you tell him, unable to meet his gaze.

String-roughened fingers wrap around your upper arm. “I didn’t say anything,” he says, voice strained and face less shock-fallen and more darkened. “But... I mean, you want me to teach you to kiss for some other guy.” He spits out the last bit as if bitter in his mouth.

“You don’t have to do it,” you say. “I just... thought that I might ask you to do it. I don’t know, I’m sorry I said it. I’ll just wing it or something.” His room’s grown ten degrees hotter, if that was possible. Especially where you feel his eyes on your face.

Almost imperceptibly, his hand tightens around you. He swallows hard. “You want to learn how to kiss?” he says. “Fine. I’ll teach you.”

In a heart-stopping moment, your eyes snap to his. Brown and familiar, they hold you with an intensity that turns your limbs into jelly. The air is stifling. “What... do I do?” you ask when the silence becomes too heavy.

A muscle feathers in his jaw, reflected in the low light of his room. It’s quick and so easy to miss, but it tells you everything you need to know about how this is making him feel. How much disbelief he’s in. “Come here,” he says, stilted around the absolute absurdity of it. He pats on his lap.

You make a hesitant crawl across the bed toward him. It seems as though your elbows might buckle beneath your weight, but you make it despite the odds. A fog settles over your brain when you rest your hands on his shoulders and bring your legs to straddle his lap.

But you shove it back; you want to live and breathe every last second of this. No matter how unbelievable or blistering it is.

Breaths fan out over your face. It’s seizing your mind like undiluted liquor. “Where do I put my hands?” you ask him. It’s breathless, the air stolen right from your lungs though your mouths haven’t even touched.

“There is fine,” he says. His words sound breathless, too. The weight of his touch on you as he runs his own up to support your back is unsure. “And then...” he says. It falls out on your mouth slowly, and then he’s taking your lips onto his.

The walls melt away, sound does too. All that is real is the taste of his lips and how they move against you. Your lips start tentative, but you try his mouth movements yourself. It feels like a timid dance—it feels like deep, deep down, finally everything is right. That mist, thick and blinding, falls back over you.

Something changes. Something in it, where you two meet, changes. He becomes hungry. Softly locked lips turn biting and nipping, shaky breaths exhaled slow through your nose. His hands on your back become surer, and one even ventures off to grab your chin. The other holds you to his chest, melded together despite the intense smoke and flame rolling off your bodies. You wonder if he can feel your heart beating a mess there.

Reluctance paints you both when you pull back. You’re panting deep drinks of air. It’s hard to think; your mind’s run off and sits just out of reach. Licking your messy lips, stained with illicitness, you can only manage to brush your fingers against it to form words. “How... was that?” you say, searching his eyes. You find his pupils blown so wide that they consume the warm brown. You’re ready to jump out of your skin with that look pointed at you.

Kai doesn’t answer, though. He slams your mouths back together as if starved by just the brief moment you’d parted for air. Nips on your bottom lip and emboldened hands—he moves like roaring water through a dam. A dam that he’d worked hard to fortify, and yet, at a crack it’s all falling down. Fingertips digging through the fabric of your shorts down to your soft hips, his chest rumbles. You feel it reflected in your core, electricity charging there and shooting up your spine and down your thighs.

You kiss him for all the times you wish you would’ve, but didn’t. The slight rolls of your hips down onto him come easy. You love how it has him making a sound into your mouth and taking the fat beneath his fingers harder into his hands. He helps you.

He drops his head into your neck. Your head swims for air and he has you shuddering with just the brushing of his nose against the column of your neck. The walls of his room spin around you. “Kai,” you whine, every bit of friction his jeans provide, even clothed as you are, just enough to rile you but not to give you what you need.

“God,” he growls, thumbs hooking under your waistband. “You always fucking run around dressed in nothing,” he says, letting his fingers linger like a suggestion of undressing you. “Did you do it on purpose? Expect to make me crazy, knowing I couldn’t touch you?”

And, in those words, it seems that he steals every last bit of breath from you. How often had you gone braless or worn something like this around him? Laid here, in his bed, like that?

Grown tired of your fruitless grinding, he brings a hand down to support your lower back and says, “Turn around.”

Though you explode with the prospect of what he might be intending to do or what’s next, if you’re really going to do this, you do so in a flash of eager limbs. His chest is solid against your back, you melt against the feeling of it. He’d become such a man lately, filled out, and you watched it happen. It was hard for your eyes not to catch on muscle-corded forearms while he picked at strings or to not appreciate the timbred rumble of his voice when you’d feel it come from his chest. How could it not do things to you? Now, he’s dragging your shorts down your legs and you’re in disbelief.

“Fuck,” he breaths out. His fingers find your panties soaked through. “So, you’re the type to get dripping wet.”

An embarrassed blush decorates your cheeks. Kai drags his index finger in circles around your clit through the fabric as if enamored with how much of a mess you’d made of it. Your hips twitch every time he rolls right over it. It’s strange how he’s got your body acting on its own volition with his touches. Even stranger that it’s your best friend doing it. “Sorry,” you tell him, wavering.

He continues those terribly slow circles. “Sorry?” he says, chin on your shoulder. He’s got you wrapped up in him, with nowhere to go but to melt back into him and let his fingers work. Free hand on one of your inner thighs digging divots into the plushness there to hold it still, he tells you, “It’s nothing to be sorry about. It’s hot as fuck. You’re so excited for me to touch you, huh?”

The words wreak havoc on you, feeding the flame that has your belly twisted up tight and the ignition point between your thighs pounding. To hear them coming from him, reserved Kai, has you digging your fingers into his forearm to prove that it’s real. You’d never have imagined him being so... filthy. You imagine him behind falsely nonchalant eyes, devouring you with a perverted mind all the times you’d spent innocently sitting together in this room.

Your cheeks squish beneath his fingers as he takes your face and turns it to him. He wants to make sure you’re look at him as he asks you, “Do you want me to finger you?”

Like a record, your brain skips. Between the blunt, lewd question and his hand on you, it’s in overload. How could he ask something like that so simply? Stunned as you are, of course you want him to. You want him to do anything to you. You nod.

Every last nerve and neuron in your system, just below the skin, cry out when his fingers slow down to nothing. “Hmm?” he says, ignoring the chasing of your hips and the opening of your thighs to invite him into paying your poor pussy the attention he’d ripped from it. He wants to hear you say it.

About ten minutes ago, you lost your mind. It does not return to you now. “I want you to,” you say, chest beating in tandem with your cunt.

“You want me to, right? Not some dumbass you met a week ago, huh?” he says. “Because you know that this is what it’s meant to be. Me, doing these things to you. Not some twenty-five-year-old piece of shit. He doesn’t deserve you, baby. Understand?”

His fingers slider under your panties. Dumb brained and cognition gone muddled, you nod. All you can really think about is the moment his fingers slide over you. Fire licks up your lower belly and your insides as he brushes calloused finger tips finally right against your clit.

Puffed breaths of a scoff raise goosebumps over your skin. “Teach you to kiss so that you can go over there and get his hands on you,” he says, middle two fingertips prodding at your entrance. “As if you were ever anybody’s but mine. You’d come crawling back to me, baby, because it was always meant to be us. He could never satisfy you.”

His words might alarm you or have you asking questions if he hadn’t pushed his fingers into you and begun curling them with strong, pointed presses, pulling soft mewls and hums from you until he finds a spot that twists up your insides. Even through the palm you press over your mouth, your moans come out more like wavering grunts and croaks. Your thighs quiver and twitch, threatening to snap closed against your own will with each. Only your feet stay planted to the mattress. Like a cone of soft serve under the sun’s blistering attention, you melt down him. Just his frame keeps you upright.

“Right there, huh?” he says. The smirk on his mouth filters his words into something taunting. “That’s where you like it.” It’s like he’s learning your body step by step, fulfilling all the questions he’d been forced to only guess at before this.

“Uh-huh.” It comes out whiny and cracks in the middle, but you can’t find even an ounce of you to care right now. If this moment had been a long spiral, a fall from grace, down into a dark pit of forgotten inhibitions, you’ve just hit the bottom. Cheeks blazing cherry blossom pink and with your fingers curling into his pant leg, you don’t doubt that you are a picturesque mess. The kind of mess that’s beautiful because it’s dirty. Your teeth are not gentle on your plush bottom lip. It stings, tugged back and bitten and still a bit swollen with kisses. Perhaps you taste the tang of metal on it, but you pay it no mind.

Kai redoubles his efforts. Now that he knows exactly how to play you, he’s fucking you on his fingers without mercy. The sounds coming from your cunt were wet, but now they’re different— nasty squelching. The only noises coupling with your pathetic keening. Forget anchoring yourself on his thigh, forget muffling your sounds. Instead, your hands fly to encircle his flexing forearm. Under your nails, angry red crescents dig into the muscle there. What had been a languid, building pleasure suddenly becomes everything. Your breaths run away from you, and you chase them frantically. Deep down in your core, the muscles spasm and rage against his fingers. “H—oh god,” you groan. Even the muscles in your thighs and tummy tighten up.

“So whiny...” Kai mumbles, voice taut with the effort of eroding you down into pure, blinding-white pleasure.

And then, in a swoop of mercy, your belly tightens. You hover here, on the precipice of something so consuming and voracious that your muscles and bones reject it, and yet your heart sings. Your eyes and cheeks and lungs and belly burn, the flame charring the edges of you in a beckon. You answer its call. Kai doesn’t mind the snapping of your legs shut around his arm, nor does your bucking or shaking deter him. He just holds you through it, arm like a metal bar around your waist. He’s everywhere, in this moment—the smell of him, leather and utterly familiar, his mouth dusting hot kisses over your skin, his fingers guiding you through orgasm. Where you’d gone silent in the initial crash of it, you devolve into mewls and grunts as you come down.

He holds you even as you slump against him boneless. Afterglow simmers in your veins and has your brain all lethargic and lazy. Neither of you speak for a while, your pulse thumping a rhythm. His breaths rise and fall against you; it grounds you in this moment where you feel all spacey and gone. You become aware again of how disgustingly sweltering it is in his room, your skin sheened.

That brainless bliss only lasts you for so long, though. When rational mind returns to you, no matter how you wish it wouldn’t, you’re hit in the chest with regret so hard it knocks the wind out of you.

How will anything ever be the same after what you’d just done? Stricken still by the thought, you barely register him pulling his fingers out of you. After all your worrying about making sure no wedge comes between you two, look what you’ve gone and done. No; nothing ever will be the same again.

⚝⭒

A couple of weeks ago, you ruined the one friendship you were supposed to have forever. It presses down heavy one you while you sit sprawled out on Yeonjun’s couch, his arm around your shoulder. His phone casts a glow over his features with all the lights out.

It doesn’t smell like home. He, pressed against your side, doesn’t smell like home.

Some stupid movie that he’d picked out, yet somehow you’ve ended up the only one still watching it, weaves a hum into the quiet of his apartment. Tangy hurt wells up in your throat. Even the moments when you and Kai would sit in mutual silence on your phones never felt like this. This is different.

You haven’t seen Kai since that night. He’s been busy getting ready to move out, and you’ve been here most days. How fast all of it had changed. You wish you’d feel whiplashed, left empty, by the drifting that you’d been so terrified of. But you don’t. It’s just been you, locked on land, watching him being taken away by the ocean’s tide with no way to change its course. You tried and screamed to call him back, but now your voice has gone hoarse.

And instead of watching him go, you choose to look elsewhere. It’s all you can do to protect yourself from the hurt.

“Hey,” Yeonjun says, finally addressing you rather than whoever’s he’s got in his phone. “Did you bring anything to change into?”

“I brought stuff to sleep in,” you say, eyeing him. You know that’s not why he’s asking. If it came down to it, you could just steal something from him and pull it on. He means going out clothes. Your jaw tightens. “But nothing nice. Why?”

He stretches his arms behind his head in a flaunt of long arms and tanned muscle. Hours spent at the gym lent him those; you appreciate the look of it with a watering mouth. Kai had earned his build by hours spent outside with your dad, because his own could care less, helping him fix up cars and vehicles of all ridiculous sorts. You remember when Kai had first gotten his truck—junk on wheels, honestly—he’d spent so much of summer out there getting it running. And, well... the sun-kissed bronze of his skin and frame that came with it, you had no qualms with.

But those memories only sit heavy in your chest as you’re sat here beside Yeonjun. You banish them elsewhere; you need to let him drift off. If you can’t have each other, and your feelings won’t permit just being friends, then you have to. You want him to do amazing things, and you fear that it’s your presence in his life that will interrupt that. As much as your feelings are real, they are selfish. You, your unsure direction and all your dead weight, should let him go. Because you love him.

“The guys want to come over,” he tells you, pushing off from the couch. “You should probably into change into something less showy.”

Less showy. Your mouth drops into a scoff of disbelief, looking down. A pair of shorts and a shirt, showy? You have to laugh, or else you’ll succumb to the strange embarrassment crawling at the back of your skull. What’s he trying to say? Is that what he thinks of you? “What’s that supposed to mean?” you say, face tilted up to him in a twist of distaste. “I’m wearing something comfy.”

He shrugs, hands shoved into the pockets of his black sweats. “Don’t want to give them the wrong idea about you, that’s all, baby. They’re guys; I just want to protect you.”

“No,” you say, the word falling out in a barked laugh. “Why would you even be bringing over dudes that you think will look at me like that? Why are you even friends with people that you think are gonna make moves on your girlfriend?” He holds a hand out to you, but your hands stay right where they are: crossed solidly over your chest.

Throwing that hand up in audacious exasperation, he gives you a look that makes you feel small and petulant—like you’re throwing an overblown fit. And, maybe you are. You should probably just do it; him seeing you as some overbearing or high maintenance girl has that embarrassment flaring like wildfire that’s found dry brush. “C’mon, baby,” he says, a lazy smile on his mouth that gets under your skin. “Let’s just have an easy night. Don’t make it a big deal.”

Let’s just have an easy night. As if you’re the one ruining the night. Something snarky tries to seize your tongue, but you hold it down. “I thought it would be just us. We wanted to watch the movie together, Yeonjun. Can’t you wait to hang out with your friends? Let’s enjoy our time together; you’ve got your shift tomorrow.”

“My fucking god,” he groans, running a hand through his hair furiously. “You’re needy, you know that? The neediest I’ve ever had to put up with. I don’t put up with needy, baby. Can’t you just chill out a little? My last didn’t mind when I’d have friends over.”

Your eyes burn. Your cheeks burn. He’d been with plenty of other girls before you; that, you’re well aware of. It’s been a corrosive source of self-doubt for you. You don’t want that title: the neediest he’s ever had. Don’t want him to think of you as some prude that won’t let him have fun. Just... hearing him bring up the other girls he’d been with before you stings and leaves welts no different from a slap in the face. Feelings of inadequacy shackle you and have you saying, “Fine. I’m gonna borrow some of your clothes.”

Heavy resentment blooms on your skin where he bends down and presses kisses to your cheek, and then mouth, and then down your neck. “Thank you, baby.”

And, where those ugly, wilted flowers of it bloom, you hear echoes of something. Something that tells you that Kai wouldn’t treat you like this. But you’ve made your bed, decided to do it yourself, and now you’ve got to lay on it.

⚝⭒

The frat parties are the worst kind of social outing that Yeonjun insists upon. The smaller kinds, more intimate gathering with just his closer friends, you tolerate much easier. You’re not fond of the circles he chooses. Breathing in thick, smoked-out air surrounded by alcohol-coated breaths is not your type of fun night. Somehow, you end up doing that more than date nights. But that’s better than being here. The base rumbles up through your feet and makes your stomach sick, and it reeks of grinding bodies and body odor, and condensation coats your fingers from the red solo cup as full as when you’d first gotten it.

But, still, you come along. Not every time, but when you don’t, you lay in his bed sickening yourself with images of what he might be doing here. How pathetic is it to attend parties with your boyfriend because you fear that otherwise, he might stick his tongue down the throats of other girls?

You’re looking for him right now, awkward and left alone. He’d promised to stick around; you had begged him to. That was pathetic, too. You know that you put up with too much. If he loved you, or honestly even liked you, you two would be in the thick of the throngs dancing or off somewhere talking with others. Together. The frantic skimming and weeding of your eyes through the blur of faces is not right. That’s not how he should make you feel. It’s not how Kai would make you feel.

Well, Kai would never have you here in the first place.

Venturing out from your little corner, you sift between the bodies of people have a hell of a lot better time than you. Drunken, some you bounce off of like bumper carts. You press your palm over the round face of your cup to spare the floor from spillage threatening to pour over the lip. It’s not like a splash from yours would matter much, though. The linoleum has already been made a fetor mess of dirt off shoes and the sticky sugar of liquor. Your shoes peel from it as you walk. God, what would your parents think of you being here?

You peek around corners and eye big groups. He’s not in the kitchen when you look there, either. Your stomach feels sick in a knowing way—a gut feeling that doesn’t justify anger or tears just yet, but you know. Right in the center of your chest, you know.

It’s in some room that you find him. Sat on the floor along with a few faces you don’t know, he pulls from his bottle. And on his shoulder, he lets a girl with shining curls and pink cheeks rest her head. At your busting in on the intimate gathering, Yeonjun’s eyes slide to you. Recognition flashes over them and wars with bleary drunkenness.

“Hey, baby,” he says. Their gazes all fall on you, but you can hardly see them through blurry eyes.

The girl lifts her head from his shoulder. She’d caught the memo.

“I think I’m gonna go.” You make it sound resigned, try to not let them see your shame, but your voice betrays you and crackles. Maybe it’s better to pretend it doesn’t feel like you’ve just been kicked in the stomach and left to reel against the force, but you can’t. You’re nowhere near shocked, nowhere near blindsided, but still you hurt.

He follows you down the hall. “What’s your problem?” he says, the few, plain words mending and waving into a slurring.

You’ve got one goal: get to the front door, away from the shitty music and him. His words, sharpened, fall off your skin despite his efforts. What good would fighting do you, anyway? It was always going to end up this way. This is just who he is, and he doesn’t give two shits enough about you to want to change that.

“Baby, seriously? That made you this mad? I didn’t even fucking do anything. Stop being insecure,” he says. At the gritting of your teeth, he sees an opportunity and pounces on it. “You don’t need to be jealous. I don’t do jealous shit. We can dance, or something. Shit, I don’t know what you want! Just stop throwing a fit.”

Didn’t do anything? You have to laugh. Maybe you didn’t walk in on him fucking someone else, but that’s not what this is about. Not even a little bit. You’ve checked out, and the fact that he thinks he can make you believe that it’s your fault this time only drives the killing stake in harder.

Maybe you’re bitter. It claws at your insides—turns your face hot and screams in your face that you’ve been used. But beside it sits a sadness. Not the slow kind, but the quick sadness of hurt. Why hadn’t you been good enough for him to love you? To like you? You’d left behind Kai and rested your new life on Yeonjun’s shoulders. You’d wanted so badly for his approval, or for him to want you. You did your best to try and make this work out because you needed it to. You needed so desperately proof that you could fall in love with somebody else. But your best was not what Yeonjun was interested in.

Pins and needles prick your skin as you step outside, like jumping into an ice bath. It shocks you out of dizziness. Words surge up and out in a flash flood like hard reality. You spin on him. “Jealous?” you say, choking out a scathing laugh. “The last thing I’d ever let myself suffer over you is jealousy. Get over yourself. I’m going, stay here if you want. I don’t care.”

“How are you gonna do that, huh?” he says. The flickering yellow of the porchlight paints his features. The shadow of something fluttering around it cuts dark spots in the light, and then a small little moth comes down and jumps around in his face. He waves it off. “Gonna have bitch boy come pick you up? You can’t leech off him forever; he’s gonna get sick of picking up another man’s girlfriend.” It seems like you walking in on that had sobered him up, but his breath still curls out onto your face with the reek of alcohol. “It’s not a big deal. You’re making this a bigger deal than it has to be. Do you not trust me?”

“You are such a piece of shit,” you grit out. “I don’t know what I was thinking. Ever. I don’t know how I let this go on for so long.” You don’t like him having Kai in his mouth, don’t like him trying to act like you’re conflating things, and especially don’t like that face he’s making. As if you’re acting crazy and overblown. “No, I don’t trust you. You didn’t fuck her, but come on, Yeonjun. Seriously? You think I’m stupid, and I’m sick of it. You thought this would be easy because I didn’t have the experience you have, but I’m sorry. I don’t like being walked over.”

“If you’re gonna be so goddamn jealous, then maybe we aren’t gonna work,” he says.

That moth, floating light in the air, is right back in his face. Yeonjun takes two hands and smashes it between a clap of his hands. He shakes its flattened, broken body off his hand. Looking down at it laying there on top of dirt-caked concrete, you get this... feeling. A tickling around your person.

“See if I care,” you snap, throat aching against the onslaught of emotion and held back tears.

⚝⭒

Rivulets of raindrops dilute the tears on your cheeks. Your hair plasters to your face and your clothes to your body.

For a week, you’d went about it all as if it hadn’t happened. And then you came here.

It’d not been this rainy when you first got down to the creek—just a gentle trickle, really. You hadn’t been crying then, either. But, watching the water work at babbling over stone, you let yourself feel it. Here, where you’d had so many good memories. You’ve gone and tainted it, now. But for whatever reason, you’d just wanted to be here. Arms curled around yourself and fingers digging into drenched sleeves, you don’t wipe away the tears or cover the sounds of your crying. You let the stream hear it; it’ll sweep it right up and down the way. Somewhere far off, where you don’t have to feel it anymore.

You realize that, usually, you’d be over at Kai’s right now. The fact that his room was not the first place you thought you could go to anymore is a punch to the gut. You drop your face into your hands and cry harder. Really, you’ve got to stop doing that to yourself. Thinking of sad things—putting your hurt under the microscope to see it closer. It’d be easier to just fold it up and tell yourself that it’ll pass, and that relationships end all the time.

It’s not him that you cry over. Well, maybe some of it is. Rather, it’s that you have absolutely no idea where you’re going. Where you are. Finally, you’d built yourself a raft to get off the shore and go out to sea, because that’s what you’re supposed to do, and it’s breaking apart right beneath you. And, stranded and alone in the water, you’ve got no way to get back to shore to build yourself another raft. You’re stranded, and the scariest bit is that you’re doing it all alone. You weren’t supposed to do this alone. You two made promises back then.

You suppose that a promise is one of those things you were supposed to leave faith in back on shore.

The raindrops are heavy over you. The fall of it roars against the ground, a torrent downpour. It’s not coupled with whipping wind or flashes of lightning—just straight, still falling. It’s a somber feeling no different from the gnawing in your chest.

Like chimes, there’s a distant, gentle sound. Maybe water falling over creek rock, but it’s more like suggestion. A sweet sound that you shouldn’t even be able to hear over the rest of it, it’s as if it’s right in your ear. A whisper.

You fix your blurry eyes with a wet sleeve. Rain falls right back into its place, but you see it: a silvery, whimsy haze. And the moths. They jump and call you, this time. Their glow bounces off the rainy mist against the grey of night’s arrival. Then, all you can hear is the whispering. Where you stand frozen, your feet beg to move. To follow them.

So you do.

Their entourage of moondust trails them where they go, wrapping you up and weaving between raindrop and space. You don’t worry where they’ll take you, or even try to wrap your head around this happening again. You just follow, mind glossed over and entranced with how beautiful it is. When you’d seen them before, it’d made you uneasy. Mostly because it looked so unearthly and unbelievable. But this time you just follow.

A far-off voice, one oh-so-familiar, peaks through the haze. It’s not enough to stop you, but then you hear it again, louder and closer.

You blink a few times. Once to break away the fog, and then twice to focus your eyes on Kai stood in front of you. His hair lays in wet spikes over his eyes and beads of rain trace the planes of his face. He’s as soaked as you.

“Kai?” you say. Looking around you, you’ve ended up somewhere in the field between your houses and the creek. But you’ve got no recollection of walking here. Whatever that mist is, sentient or not, had swept you here.

His voice is strained, but you appreciate hearing it. “Break up with him,” he tells you.

In his eyes, as you search them, there’s stardust glowing like reflection. Your face twists up. “What?” you say, breath a puff of smoke ahead of you. Summer had come and gotten away from you so fast, and now it’s gone all cold again.

“Break up with him,” he echos, face solemn. He looks ruffled.

“Why?” you ask, “And why are you out here?”

“Because I’m moving out today, and I think I deserve to at least see you before I go.” His eyes look over you. “And... your dad said you went down to the creek.”

He’s moving out today, and you had no idea. And really, it’s your fault. You’d driven that wedge between the two of you. “I did break up with him.”

Downpour fills his quiet for a few moments, his face swirling with emotion like the clouds above you. He nods. “Good.”

There are a few more long minutes between you; just you two searching each other's faces, antsy to say so much that it bunches up in your chests and stalls. It’s what a summer of longing does to you. Even with Yeonjun, even trying to slowly chip away the stitching that had connected the two of you at the hip, you were helpless to stop the gnawing of the love you bear for him. Even just seeing him now, you feel those threads mending back up. God, why does it have to be so hard?

He just looks at you. For a few beats, he just looks at you. There are so many questions in his eyes. They flit across and turn over, but all he settles on is, “Why?”

There’s so much you want to tell him. Words pile up to the top, some threatening to spill over. But you know that if you tell him some of it, just to make up for all the time you’d missed out on together, it’ll all come crashing out. And you don’t think you want him to know just how much you accepted, the way you let yourself get treated. So, you shake your head and say, “It doesn’t matter.”

Kai looks like he wants to push that issue, but whatever look he finds on your face deters him. “Come with me,” he pleads. “I want you to come with me.”

Your throat tightens. Curling your arms around yourself harder, the rain only coming down on you harder, you say, “Kai, I want to. I want to. I just... I don’t want to freeload off you, because you’re doing great things, and I’m just...” Your tongue darts out to wet your lips, but they’re already as soaked as the rest of you. “I’m just going nowhere. And I don’t want to be a burden, or ever be the reason that you can’t do what you dream of. If staying here means that you become everything that you’re destined to do, then I’m happy with that, Kai. I am.”

He shakes his head, stumbling toward you. “No, no you don’t get it,” he says, frantically taking your shoulders into big hands. Under his touch, every taut muscle goes slack. You melt. “You don’t get it. You are the music. Every single song is about you. Every single fucking song is about you. I want you to come with me, please. I love you, I have always loved you, and I will always love you, and I thought you’d loved me too, and I don’t want to do this alone. I can’t do it alone.”

He loves you. Kai loves you. The enormity of it rumbles the ground where you stand on legs you fear might just give in. You flex your fingers to combat the tears pricking your eyes. It doesn’t work; they brim and well up, spilling down over your cheeks. “What?” you say, voice softly breaking. “Kai, I didn’t...”

“And just when I thought I finally had you, you left me,” he says, throwing a hand up beside him in a big gesture. “You left me! I woke up thinking you’d be there, and that maybe you loved me too, and you had left me. And then you threw me away for some piece of shit, and you stopped coming around.” His chest heaves for breaths.

Your face contorts. That night, the one where you two had slipped up, you’d fallen asleep curled up against his chest on undiluted contentment. When you woke up, you had panicked. You thought he’d wake up and pretend it hadn’t happened, or he’d be uncomfortable, or even be disgusted and regretting. You couldn’t handle that, so you slipped out before he woke up. It’d been an attempt to protect your tender heart, but looking at the twitching of his lip now, you begin to think it’s the most selfish thing you’ve ever done. He thinks you used him and left him. Your stomach twists. Voice thick, you say, “I’m sorry. I’m sorry I left you, Kai. I thought you didn’t... I thought you didn’t see me that way. I was scared. I’m sorry I hurt you.”

Brows knitted together, he says, “Thought I didn’t love you?” His hand cups your cheek, warm against the soft frozen skin he finds there. “I’ve... I’ve dreamed of you almost every night of my life. In my sleep, I see you, and you’re happy and glowing, and that damn... mist is all around you. I couldn’t get away from you even in my sleep.”

Darting between his eyes, soft and reflecting your face back to you, it’s hard to breathe. Kai’s dreamt of you; he’s as sickly in love with you as you are him. Thunder claps, and the ground shakes, and the heavens open up above you, the trumpets belt, and you two are in love. Somewhere deep in your center, you feel it—your soul nodding yes.

The mist. You know exactly what he’s talking about. “I saw it. That stuff, those moths. The stuff we saw back then.”

“I did too,” he says, wet spikes of hair bouncing with a nod. “Not that long ago. It was the first time I saw it out of a dream since that day.”

Back then, you two had only budding, innocent love for each other. Things hadn’t become mangled and lost to confused hearts or expectations. When they’d appeared to you, you hadn’t needed it. This time, you’d followed it. And it had led you here—somehow had led you right to the very spot you needed to so that every last piece might fall into place. For this moment to happen. You know why it did.

“I’ll go with you, Kai. I’ll go wherever you go; I love you. I’ve loved you since forever,” you say, each and every word massive and lovely on your tongue. “I’m sorry I didn’t say it earlier.”

So unlike the last times your mouth had met, he brings his mouth to yours with a dazzling clarity. No longer is it confused kisses; he locks his lips against yours with the urgency of so many years being unable to. Kai’s hands cradle your wet cheeks, hold you so tenderly into his kiss. His touch grounds you, makes the moment real. You melt into him—your fingers curled into his shirt as if holding him there so that he won’t disappear like something of an incorporeal dream. He sighs through his nose, kissing you harder. Even if it all were fake and this was nothing more than a feverish figment of your imagination, you think you could die happy just knowing this once.

But it is utterly real, and utterly yours. You kiss him harder, too.

When your lungs start to burn and plead for breath, you two pull away from each other. Your eyes flutter open to capture his. Warm and brown and the same ones you’ve stared into so many times before, but not like this, you sink into them. He runs his thumb over your cheek as he sinks into yours. His tongue darts out to lick lips painted with you. In the inches between you, space no longer feels heavy or charged with grievances. Every last unsaid thing had been answered.

“I have my stuff up in the truck,” he says, breaths soft. Brown eyes dart around your face. “I’ll help you add your stuff to it.”

You shudder out a breath. Add your stuff to it. A nervous energy settles down over you, but it doesn’t seem so bad if you’re doing it with him. Together.

“Okay,” you whisper, a balmy secret just like the ones you used to share in small, giggly voices so many years ago. “Okay.”

⚝⭒

Shivers seize you like jittering bones, all wrapped up in a blanket. The velour cushion seats beneath you have soaked up water and become damp, but Kai’s got the heater blasting. You wind around back roads, headlights illuminating the way ahead of you. Stray droplets whip in them, but nothing much. Isn’t it funny how the rain had just stopped like that? That’s just how the weather is, out here. You wonder how the weather might act wherever you’re headed.

Your teeth chatter as if your jaw had its own will. The two of you had the windows down thinking that the wind might dry you off, but all it’s done is lap at your bitten cheeks. You reach down for the handle to crank it up. You’ve got a long drive ahead of you—either you’ll eventually dry off, or you can pull off at a rest area to change in a bathroom. The wet clothes are really not helping.

With an arm up on the steering wheel, Kai turns his attention on you. You know that smile. “Cold?” he asks, eyes darting between your face and the road. With the hand he’s not got working the steering wheel, he runs fingers over your thigh. Soft, gentle massages, yes. The number it does on your core is absurd. Each mindless digging into your thighs and brush of his thumb, sparks sputter there. You’ve sat here, right in his passenger seat, so many times before. Day trips up to the lake, the one he’d joined your family camping at for so many summers, all the times he’d driven you to school in this truck, and even just a quick run down to a convenience store for a late-night snack. You’d deemed it your seat. But never once had you sat in it like this. Your heart does a flip. All those times you’d wish he’d reach over and do just this—a small gesture that would’ve been so big then. And it’s your reality, now.

“Freezing,” you say. A brush of his fingers nearer the apex of your thighs sends you pressing them together and shifting in your seat. “But not everybody runs as hot as you, though, so.”

His eyes catch the movement in just the split second he looked over to you. “Huh,” he says. He turns to look at you, his gaze flickering with something anew. Something that you’d only ever seen once before. “Is that it?”

It’s hard to swallow. His fingers brush higher, and higher, feather-dustings of calloused fingertips that sends tingles shooting up your spine at the slightest suggestion of where he’s headed. “Yes,” you say, feigning indignance to cover the shiver that threatens to overtake you. When his fingertips dance at the waistband of your bottoms, it does so anyway. “Kai,” you say, blood hot in your veins. “You’re...driving.”

His eyebrows pinch into a taunting furrow. “I am,” he says, nodding. “Don’t worry about it, baby. I’ve got us.”

And he does; fingers slipping under the band of both your bottoms and your panties, he doesn’t even tear his eyes off the road. He’d driven these roads so much, you think he might be able to do it asleep. Even drawing a mewl from you with a brush over your clit, he doesn’t look away more than a quick glimpse at your pinkened cheeks.

Two fingers dragging up your folds, right over the source of the mess. “You get excited so easily, huh?” he hums. “You like it when I play with you.”

When he presses those fingers at your entrance, you can’t help but be taken back to that night. It echoes and reverberates through you. Long fingers, strong and punctual brushes against the sweet spot—he was criminally good with his fingers. Playing guitar did more for him than just music. He seemed to know exactly how to utilize those roughened fingers and trained flicks. Your muscles flicker as he abandons your hole for more brushes at your bud.

Those teasing, sly touches turn to something more serious. His fingers roll over your clit, slow but enough to have you sighing and rolling your hips against the seat belt. But last time had gone just like this, him touching you and receiving nothing. He should feel good, too. “Shouldn’t you pull over?” you sigh, muscles taut. Your breaths come out shuddering and half-controlled, interrupted by the tightness that each delicious swirl provokes. The door takes the brunt of your grip, white-knuckling the interior.

He laughs, a husky sound that is tinder to fire. He knows what you mean. “Maybe,” he says. “But I think I’m enjoying this plenty. I think I want to see you cum on my fingers again.”

Fingers pinching and flicking faster, you grow breathy and whiny, hips rolling against the seatbelt and back into the seat. Your muscles, all the way down your thighs and deep in your belly, jump and twitch each time his fingers run over your clit in just the right spot—that tender spot that’s so good that it teeters on overwhelming. The kind that makes you hiss and then want more. “Shit, Kai,” you whine. “Right—there, keep going."

He doesn’t answer with any teasing words. No, he just doubles down right at that angle and pressure, leaned back into his seat and driving as if he wasn’t fingers-deep in your panties right now. His sculpted profile at total ease—it does something for you. A delicious tightness curls its fingers over your center, promising a sugary ecstasy that you can’t help but chase. Bucking into his hands as best you can, you go quiet. Right there—right there, you feel it. The cusp. Your fingers brush over it, clenching around nothing and squeezing your thighs tight around him. Every last drop of blood in your body reaches for it, singing and dancing through your veins and making you dizzy.

And then he stops. Your mouth drops open, whiplashed and helpless to its slipping away from you. You whittle your gaze into something sharp and turn to him. “What—why?” you complain. The tide slips further and further and further back, but you still taste sea salt on your tongue. Frustration sets in its place as you feel it go. Seriously, you’d been right there. “You’re so mean.”

He slows and then with the clicking of the turn signal, he’s off the road and pulling the truck into park on a little secluded side road. Where the headlights pierce the pitch black, nothing but gravel and field surrounds you. He doesn’t kill the engine, instead pulling his hand free from you.

Your heart, still stuttering with your lost orgasm, kicks back to life as he smears your slick over your mouth, dragging it over your lips and then taking his thumb to run it right over the plush of your mouth. “Am I?” he says, fingers taking your chin to meet your eyes with his. Endless hunger, pupils so blown that his eyes look black, pins you. “I don’t think you’ve seen mean yet, baby.”

Darting your tongue out to clean your lips, you look at him through your eyelashes. “Show it to me, then.”

Something dark passes over his face. It has your skeleton jumping out of your body. Then, he says, “Is that what you want? You want mean?”

Brain gone to mush that can only really think about him touching you, a slow nod is all you can manage.

The engine’s hum prevails for some long, thick seconds. And then, he tilts his head in a gesture. “Get in the back.”

Holy shit. You want to sit there frozen in an overwhelming sort of excitement, but his seatbelt clicks undone and you’re set into motion. In a flurry of giggles and clumsy limbs, you climb up over the center console and into the backseat. He slips out of the front seat, not bothering to even kill the engine.

The door beside you opens in a swirl of cold wind. In nothing more than a blink, a strong hand has both your wrists pinned to the cushions and your back flush against it. Nose-to-nose, his breath hot over your face. “I’ve got plenty of ideas as to how I can warm you up.”

You appreciate each other’s faces for a beat more, you looking up at him big-eyed and waiting. Kai breaks the moment to attack your neck in a procession of bites and kisses. Your mouth falls into a silent sound.

“You know,” he says, free hand working your pants off. His eyes are trained on you, though. “I thought about doing this to you all summer. Touching you again.” He moves on to your top, pushing the fabric up until your chest is freed, clad in soft cotton. He eats the sight up. You want to reach down and cup the back of his head or feel his hair between your fingers as he presses his mouth against the soft beginning of your cleavage, but he’s got your wrists firmly planted. So much so, that you wonder exactly how he’s got you so secure with just one hand. Kai is strong, but maybe you hadn’t seen just how strong. Your skin aches under the purple bites he decorates you in. The sight of him—face in your chest and marking you up so lazily—has your teeth abusing your bottom lip. Whatever sounds you might make otherwise would be embarrassing. Kai lifts his eyes to you. “And I think you thought of me, too. Didn’t you?”

“Oh, god, yes,” you say, writhing beneath him. He’s going so slow. You want him all over you. “So much.”

He likes that. He takes your pebbled nipple into his mouth through the fabric. Soft grazes of teeth and sucks, you’re burning all over. When he pulls back, he’s left you dark wet patches when the bra had only just dried against your body heat. “Good,” he rasps, taking his big hands demanding and hungry over your torso. They swallow your frame up, soothing skin but lighting it aflame all the same. “Good girl.”

You never thought just words could unravel you, but those did the job. Not a gasp, nor a sucking in of breath—no, you go silent and brainless, fumbling for rational thought.

The dropping of your jaw has Kai delighted. “You’re so pretty,” he says. In a swift and powerful hoist, he’s tugging you down the cushions toward him with greedy fingers. He’s got your thighs pressed up to your chest. You’re bent right in half.

Out of breath, you huff out, “You too.”

A quick laugh falls from his mouth, lips pulled into a smug tilt. He nips at your calf up by his face. “So sweet, it almost makes me feel bad for what I’m about to do to you.” Reaching down for your panties, he pulls back on the suffocating press for only enough time to drag them up your legs. Those get discarded somewhere on the floor. Who cares about that right now, though? All you can register is the metallic clinking of his belt being undone. It’s got your nervous system twisting up.

And, those words. Electricity shoots bolts of pure, sizzling revery into your core. What I’m about to do to you. You imagine a great deal of things that he might mean, but still, you think that none could hold a candle against the promise his voice held in saying it.

Kai presses his body to your thighs and hooks your calves over his shoulders, and it all becomes real. The press of his heavy cock to your folds, the digging of his fingers into your outer thighs, his pretty eyes sparkling with something feral. As real as it gets—more real than anything you’ve ever felt in the entirety of your life. Your hands find perch flattened to his broad chest.

The position leaving you two no option but to look right into each other, he holds your gaze and begins slow drags of his hot length up and down your slit. Tantalizing, awful, awful drags. When his tip nudges your eager clit, you jolt. And then he does it again. And again.

“Kai,” you mewl. A press against your hole has you hopeful, and he lingers there for a moment, but doesn’t give it to you. Can’t he just fuck you? You’ve never been more pitifully in need of something in your life.

“Shh.” His ruts get more daring, smearing your slick up onto your belly. “Take it.”

You wiggle your toes in the air and make passes at arching yourself into him in search of better friction. He’s got you pressed so suffocatingly into the seat that it does absolutely nothing for you. In fact, he holds your harder and changes tack so that your thighs press together. At the very apex of them, his weeping cock slips through the seam.

Pressing his cheek into your calf, he watches you. Every gasp and shaky inhale, he watches. It spurs his rutting on, sticky sounds and pants eating up the air. Your nails claw at his hands as, finally, a knot tightens in your core.

“Yes, please,” you breathe. He fucks your thighs harder. Faster. Every nudge at your clit and hole becomes euphoric. “Kai, baby—I’m gonna—”

Just as furiously easy as last time, he rips it all away from you. The rushing away of the buzzing and promise of shaking thighs—he takes it from you again. It brings prickling tears to your eyes. “Kai?” you hiss. “Again?”

His eyes aren’t playful. He pulls your calves back over his shoulders, handling your hips into a better position to press his cock right at your entrance as if you weigh nothing. Face utterly straight, he says, “I don’t think you deserve it, do you? Not after what you did with Yeonjun.”

A swallow goes down your throat hard. He presses himself just a bit harder into you. Not in yet, but right there.

When he does begin sliding in, the stretch of it... You cling to him and squirm between him and the warm cushions behind you. Each inch is a heady feeling, all the way up to the hilt of him. He shudders a controlled breath. “You’re so fucking tight, though,” he grits out. “Did he not fuck you right?”

Slaps of skin bounce off the car interior and between your bodies. He starts off at a brutal pace; you know it’s meant to make your brain go foggy. Squeezing your eyes closed, you manage, “I... didn’t fuck him.” It comes out strangled, voice bouncing as he fucks you into the car seat.

Thumb tugging your bottom lip down and then dipping into your mouth, he watches the show of your ecstasy down to every last detail. “Yeah?” he says, voice shaking and almost desperate. “Always thinking of me, huh? Such a good little princess. You know exactly where your heart belongs.”

You want to answer him, even just with a whine or moan. You try to. But with his thumb pressing down on your tongue, enough to pin it to the floor of your mouth, it’s not gonna happen. He tastes salty in your mouth.

His truck consists of his grunts and whines, and your taut groans for some moments that seem to stretch forever. The planes of his groin grind against your clit when he delivers occasional pointed rolls, but mostly it’s just an animalistic, feverish dancing of your two sweaty bodies, holds growing more frantic the closer you get.

Thumb wet with saliva; he frees your mouth. The hand trails slowly down your face and your chin, brushing feather touches, until he finds your neck.

Your eyes fly open, wide. He pressed his fingers into your neck—no real pressure yet, he looks at you through damp strands of dangling hair and says, “Want my fingers around your neck?” His thumb brushes over the buzzing pulse point there.

“Yes,” you grit out, body bouncing and back raw with friction against the coarse cushion’s surface. Your breath stutters, your mind stutters. Even your blinks stutter, eyelids too lazy to keep up. “Please.”

The pressure of his fingers there—it frightens you and has you tightening around him at the same time. But you would trust nobody more with your life than Kai.

He presses his cheek to your calf to indulge in the sight of you like this: underneath him, folded in two, nowhere to go but to take his pistoning hips, cheeks blazing, and his fingers pressed into your windpipe. If the way he becomes sloppier and more desperate in his tempo has anything to say for it, it does something for him.

“Gonna be my pretty little girlfriend, huh?” he says. His voice is tight—so is your belly. You’re both so close. Hopefully, this time he’ll let you cum. “Take you to every show; show you off to everybody. Fuck.”

Brain like static and swimming with a pinched flow of oxygen, you slur your words. “You’re—hah—gonna have other girls all over you.”

The taunting, split-second raise of his brows flips your belly. You tighten around him again. If he keeps hitting that spot, tip ramming into the soft spot deep inside you that he’d taken such delicate care of finding last time, you’re going to burst into sparkling flame and firework. He growls, “Well, I’ll just have to knock you up so that they know I’m yours, huh?”

Holy shit. You like the sound of that. Your nails dig into his wrist around your neck, but you cry out a pitchy, “Yes!”

“Oh, you like that?” Kai releases your throat to take both your hips. You gulp for air, finding nothing but the thick air of sex and humid breaths, at the opportunity. He’s ramming into you like he’s found a purpose. “Isn’t this the perfect position to do it? Get you pregnant?”

With every last bit of brain power you’ve got, teetering on the edge excruciatingly close to salvation, you groan a long, hoarse sound. “Fuck, yes! Please, Kai, inside—” A hot trail of tears roll down your temples.

It’s all he’s got to hear to still inside you. His growl rumbles deep in his chest, holding you in place and filling you with his hot cum deep in your cunt. That feeling, coupled with his short grinds against your clit as he fucks his seed deeper, takes your soul by sinful claws and crumbles it down into nothing. You burst into a shaking, whimpering peak, sucking your lips into your mouth to bare through the sheer twisting of your insides and the flame that consumes up your thighs and cunt.

He falls on you heavy, face in your neck. Warm kisses against your clammy skin meld with your slow floating down, the two of you a beautiful, nasty picture of fucked out. He stays right inside you—the absolute stillness of him, you think he has no plans of pulling out any time soon. His long fingers card through your sweaty locks of hair.

Finally, he presses himself off you. You get a glimpse of the window behind him—fogged up and filthy with your affairs. Anybody to see the truck from the outside would know exactly what went on inside, but right now, you don’t care. Not one bit. Your panted breaths drag in nothing but musk and thick, hot air. The drumbeat in your chest tells you that, despite how you feel ripped straight from your body, you are very much still alive. More alive than ever.

“Warm?” he says, pushing sticky hair off his forehead. He’s a mess, too. His hair is ruffled with your touch, his clothes rumpled the same, beads of sweat rolling down the planes of his cheeks and neck, and his eyes a lazy smolder. As much as he looks like sex personified, a soft smile twitches at his lips.

You snort. You can’t help but feel giddy, here with him. You’re with him. Nothing has ever felt more right. Unplugged when he pulls out of you, your mess trickles down onto the seat below you. “Yeah,” you say. “Very.”

Warm is not enough to begin to describe how you feel. In your ears, you hear whisperings. Soft and gentle. Perhaps it was divine intervention, or the fates lending you their word, or maybe just rational thought. It says:

Home. You are home.

✎୭ ashlynn's note how do we feel about this pair? i really didn't mean for this to get so long, but i ended up RLLY liking their chemistry. i had to do their story justice. also, i finished this with kai as a guitarist and then his drummer performance came out... hmm.

﹙🏷️ ﹚@lvrs-street2mmorrow , @soohashits , @f4iryfever , @arcturus444 , @linqed , @serenityism00 , @immelissaaa , @luv4cheol , @lickingan0rchid , @20-cms , @hhoneylix , @beestvng , @hyucktapes , @bewitchless , @prince-jjae , @blankliving , @yaoizee , @stormy1408 , @missychief1404 , if your tag isn't working, check the mentions part of your settings!

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juniperskye · 3 months ago

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Three’s Company

This is just a lil blurb about Aaron Hotchner, Derek Morgan and you being in love! Based on the following Request: @satans-bitch Hi! Idk if you would be comfortable writing it, but I love the idea of Aaron hotchner x reader x Derek Morgan just all being so in love with each other. Thank u Xx – I took some creative liberties…I hope you like it!

Hotch x BAU! Fem Reader x Morgan

Word count: 883

REQUESTS ARE OPEN - not edited - please be kind. Requests are open and feedback is welcome if it's constructive!

Warnings: My blog is 18+, minors DNI, Fem reader, pet names, poly-relationship (I’m not the most familiar with this lifestyle) canon typical violence, mantion of babies and pregnancy, Let me know if I missed any.

I do not consent to having my work translated or reposted to any other site. That being said I do not own the characters portrayed in this story.

So, neither Derek nor Aaron ever and I mean EVER thought they’d be in a polyamorous relationship. But let me tell you, when you arrived at the BAU, they both knew they had to have you. Aaron had gone to Dave time and time again seeking advice and Derek did the same with Penelope.

They’d both complain that there was no way you were interested, because clearly you like the other guy. Only, that wasn’t quite the issue.

You didn’t just like Aaron or Derek, you liked them both. They were so similar and yet so different and there was no way you could ever choose just one of them.

After many instances of the men fighting for your attention and affection, you pulled them both aside to have a serious conversation.

“I think I should leave the BAU.” You stated.

“What? No!” Derek blurted.

“Why would you think that?” Aaron inquired. “If our behavior has made you uncomfortable, I am so sorry. It was never my intention, and I would hate to see such a talented agent leave because of my idiocy.”

“It’s not your guy’s behavior that’s making me feel this way. It’s my feelings for you.” You said, gesturing to both men.

“Feelings for who?” Derek questioned.

“Both of you.” You blushed.

That evening you’d explained to the men that you had feelings for both of them and had the situation been different you’d have suggested a poly relationship, but you knew that it was too much to ask of two alpha males who’d never been in one before.

What you hadn’t expected to happen was for them to give you a quizzical look and then ask you to give them some time to think about it.

It had been nearly a year since then and the three of you had developed something truly beautiful. Aaron had been so stoic at work but at home he was soft, and he always did everything in his power to ensure you and Derek were both cared for.

And well Derek, he was clingy at home. Always wanting his hands on you and he’d come to really enjoy having physical contact with Aaron.

Like when you’d watch a movie, Aaron would have his arm slung over the back of the couch while you cuddled up into his side, and Derek would be sitting as close to you as possible, practically sitting you in his lap. This position would allow for Aaron’s hand to rest around Derek as well and that warmth became a comfort for him.

There had been another shift shortly after that, pet names…they’d been slipping out more frequently. And not just them men using them with you either.

“Sweetheart can you pass me my phone?” Aaron had asked, looking directly at Derek.

“Sure thing sugar.” Derek had replied.

You had been shocked initially, but it ultimately had warmed your heart to see them falling into this relationship more and more. Their comfort in this had been your main priority, you hadn’t cared about anything else.

Work had been the toughest part of this newfound dynamic. When any of you got hurt on a case, the other two couldn’t exactly hold it together. And with the team being out of the loop of your lifestyle, well they definitely suspected something.

The most recent had been Aaron, he had been shot while taking down an unsub. Thankfully it had been a flesh wound, but when you heard the shot and saw him go down, you couldn’t help the wail that tore through you. The paramedics had requested you step away, and Derek pulled you into his embrace to get you to comply.

“Baby he’s gonna be okay!” Derek said while holding you close.

“He was shot D! What if he’s not?” You cried.

“I know he’s gonna be okay baby. He has to be.” Derek mumbled the last part.

You looked up to see the tears falling from his misty eyes, and you held him tighter. The team sat by and watched the situation play out, fully convinced now that something was transpiring between the three of you. More than they had initially assumed.

The newest development had been the discussion of children. The guys had baby fever, they had seen you interacting with your sister’s newborn and you swear you saw them both drooling over the sight of you.

So…have you ever thought about having kids princess?” Derek posed.

Currently you were lying on the couch, your head in Derek’s lap and him pressed against Aaron. The movie playing, long forgotten as Derek combed his fingers through your hair and Aaron traced shapes on Derek’s bicep.

“Um, yes…I have thought about it. Why do you ask?” You sat up.

“Well, honey, we had a conversation about it the other day.” Aaron clarified.

“You two…had a conversation about me having a baby?” You questioned.

“About us…having a baby.” Derek said, gesturing to the three of you.

Your jaw dropped in shock. What had started as inappropriate flirting in the workplace had developed into a serious relationship between the three of you. One fueled by love, safety, and trust.

“I would love to have a baby with you guys.” You smiled. “I love you.”

“I love you.”

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comicaurora · 2 months ago

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Tahraim is my fav absolutely adore him! I love that you’ve made the smith deal in introspection and cryptic bs, a lot of times smiths are very straightforward characters in stories. What made you decide to shake it up?

Can gods be tied to concepts as well as cities? As Tahraim seems to be a god of blacksmithing (or at least has some serious motifs) does he have a city thats just forges?

He also seems a lot more mobile than the other gods, or is he just “tied” to Danix?

Tahraim is a conceptual god, a class of deity considered grander and more untethered than city or nature gods. Also in his weight class are Emnis and Erebas (dreams and nightmares), Shanyasi (music), Sennaia (knowledge), Jiya (war), and a whole bunch of others. They're gods of ideas, and their domains are in the collective consciousness of mortals. They can manifest anywhere they hold sway, and several of them have constructed domains of their own in pocket dimensions; Sennaia has a transfinite library hidden away somewhere, and Tahraim has a forge.

Tahraim's personality comes from my own experience with artists and craftspeople. Many artists are acutely aware that in order for their work to be better, they need to be better. The process of creation and introspection becomes inextricably linked. Forging a tool changes the forger, little by little.

There's also an element I've observed from teachers. I was always a firm proponent of "don't be cryptic or cute, just tell me the thing and I'll get it," and while that's true a lot of the time, there are concepts that cannot be Just Told in any meaningful way. They don't hit or stick if the person doesn't put them together themselves and construct a way that works for them. Teaching isn't always the impartation of information; a lot of the time it's guidance so the student crafts the tools that work for them. Even if the teacher can perfectly communicate what method works for them, everyone is different, and a student that does the exact same thing exactly right might gain no benefits or be actively harmed by the process. Instead, the student has to parse the lesson and create their own tools to execute the same goal.

Personal example under a readmore because it got a little long:

I've sporadically dealt with intrusive thoughts my whole life, though I didn't understand what they were at the time and they've mostly gone away on their own. When I was little, upsetting thoughts would get stuck in my head and stay there; things would give me nightmares that lasted for weeks, or I'd be stuck awake in the wee hours ruminating on every time in my life I'd done something shameful or harmful or wrong. My dad recognized I was upset, and tried to teach me a method of "counting thoughts" that worked for him, where I could sit for a few minutes and just passively observe the thoughts floating by, counting them and observing them and thus becoming aware that they were small, fleeting things with no power on their own. The problem is, this method didn't work for me at all, because "count the thought" didn't communicate to me "and that makes the thought not a problem anymore." The thought still hurt just as bad, all I was doing was reminding myself how many bad thoughts were happening. I would get overwhelmed and end up more distressed, and the fact that this thing that should have worked didn't work just convinced me that I was trapped and nobody could ever help me.

It took actual years before I found a method that clicked in my brain, and it was just one step further down the path of counting thoughts:

"Having that thought is harmless."

Every thought that got stuck in my head was about times or ways I might've harmed people. The things that distressed me most were things I'd done wrong that I had zero power to change, so the wrongness would just haunt me forever, making me miserable forever. But the root of the distress was that I had messed up and hurt people.

The thing that clicked was that having the thought does nothing to anyone but me. The thought is harmless, even if the event the thought is about wasn't or wouldn't be. Having the thought hurts no-one else. And since 90% of my distress was distress at the thought of hurting other people, it hit me that in reality, even in the depths of my angst, I was just sitting there, hurting no-one.

And suddenly I found that the last few intrusive thoughts rattling around in my brain withering, because the last thing that had been feeding them was gone. I was given the technique for Counting Thoughts, but it wasn't made for my hands. I had to make my own version out of it. And just because it worked for me and my own personal brain doesn't mean this method would work for someone else, just the same way the method that worked for my dad didn't click for me. If I wanted to teach someone a way to bypass intrusive thoughts, all I would have to work on would be what worked for me, but I could try to guide them through a path similar to the one I followed to find my method so they could maybe find their specific hangups and what specifically would work for them. Every mind is different.

This is also why it's so frustrating to hear someone say stuff like "Oh I used to worry about that too, but it's actually fine, you can just stop worrying about it!" And it's like, "oh, fuckin brilliant, just stop worrying about it? Absolute genius, I just hadn't thought of that-" like yea it sounds flippant and yea it's not helpful, but they are using the only frame of reference they have and describing what they did. They stressed about something, realized it was not actually a problem, and knowing that was enough to make it leave their mind alone. But saying that they "just stopped worrying" doesn't make you understand or internalize how they did it. And because they can't seem to help you, it makes you mad. But then sometimes, with time and perspective, you look back and think "wow, yea, at some point I really did just stop worrying about that." It doesn't mean their advice worked, it just means somewhere along the line something clicked in your mind and started working.

Tahraim is a smith who sees no difference between shaping a tool and shaping a person, but there are some ways that people can't be shaped from the outside, and instead have to shape themselves. He likes to be subtle and cryptic, but he also has good reason to be. The only way to make something click in someone's head is to guide them towards it and nudge them when necessary. It's not all hitting stuff with hammers.

#asks #aurora #writing stuff

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luveline · 1 year ago

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Omg I love the hot bombshell bau reader x Spencer!! Could you write a scenario with them when the team is out drinking and she’s flirting with him even more & she can take it a lil further because they’re not in work? Thank you🥰

thank you for your request! this isn't a perfect fit of what you asked for but I hope you like it! fem!reader, 1k

"Psst! Psst!" Your perfume floats his way. "Spencer!"

Spencer turns to your whisper shouting, much less whisper than you probably mean it to be. You're as in his personal space as you can manage without falling into his lap. Luckily, the rest of the team seem to be more interested in the previously unheard story Emily's deigned to tell about a Sin to Win weekend in Atlanta, and no one turns to investigate your secret.

"What?" he asks.

"Can you get me another drink?" you whisper. You insisted on sitting next to him, your breath sharp with cherry liqueur. If you hadn't, he would've tried to make it this way anyhow.

It's not fair. You've drunk enough to get cut off and still you look so pretty, bombshell through and through —there's no other word for it. Your eyes are glittering and unsmudged despite an evening of laughter and a pitcher's worth of bourbon bombs, and they're looking at him with this weird pinching pleading that makes his stomach twist.

"I don't think you should have anything else."

"Spence…" You put your hand on his thigh. Not cupping it, nowhere inappropriate, just your fingertips pressed to the fabric of his pants as you twist in your seat to beg. "Please, Spencer. Please."

He really likes you, and this tone you're using threatens to haunt him forever. Resigned, he moves your hand off of his leg and grabs your empty glasses. "A spritzer," he says, standing up from the booth. "That's it."

"Hey, no," JJ says, her thin brows pinching as she smiles, perplexed. "She's cut off."

"That's why Spencer's going to get it for me. He's my angel," you brag, words tipping, tumbling all over the place.

Spencer looks at the disapproving expressions on their faces, Hotch, Emily, Derek and JJ all looking as though they learned how to frown from the same place. Only Penelope and Rossi seem encouraging. Penelope tipsy herself, and Rossi a self-professed believer in, "Living life to the fullest. Get the girl another drink, Reid."

"A spritzer," Spencer says again.

You smile gleefully and follow him out of your seats toward the bar. The barkeep gives Spencer a knowing look when he orders your drink but doesn't say anything when Spencer puts the change in the tip jar, which is questionable. Spencer secures your cold beverage and hands it to you, fully intending on walking you back to the booth.

You pull him off course. He has little power in the situation, a yelp and a yank and you're dragging him toward the bar jukebox. Your spritzer paints your hand as you put it down, lips wet with it as you beam at him from over your shoulder.

"Pick a song?" you ask.

"I don't know if they'll have anything I like."

"Pick one anyways."

Spencer has to stand directly behind you to read the titles. "Why don't you pick one?" he asks gently.

You sway. He doesn't know if it's down to the alcohol or the five seconds of music that plays as you scroll through songs. "I don't have a dollar."

Spencer laughs and gets his wallet out, handing you two dollars from the fold. "There. Pick two."

"You're such a nice guy, Spencer, and I don't mean it like, oh, you're a nice guy, you don't mess girls around, I mean…" You fold the dollars he gave you mindlessly. "I mean, you're just nice. In the best sense of the word. You're gentle, kind…"

You gasp, sounding pained. Spencer's hand leaps to the small of your back, "What? What's wrong?"

"They have Out of Touch by Hall and Oates. Hold my spritzer, handsome, I need to put this on before I die."

Derek comes looking for you both somewhere in the second play of the same song. Spencer's cheeks are bright pink, people staring in confusion at the repeat and the pretty drunk woman speaking the words. Spencer tries to flag Derek for saving, but when Derek sees the way you've wrapped your arms around Spencer's bicep, he chuckles and waves goodbye.

You look up to Spencer eagerly. You're close enough to kiss him. "You know how to play nine ball?"

"In theory," he says weakly.

"Good! If I win you can buy me another spritzer, and if you win, I'll let you take me home."

Spencer was always going to be taking you home tonight, but for a distinctly different reason. "If you win," he says, licking his lips, "I'll give you another dollar for the jukebox."

"And if you win?" you ask.

"I'll take you home," he says slowly. "But only to take you home."

"That's cute."

No matter what drunken delusion you're under, Spencer does end up taking you home after a third round of Hall and Oates. You're not so drunk as to need help standing, and you manage to get to bed without help. He just wants to make sure you lock the door.

You kiss him on the cheek, your hand behind his neck like you might turn his lips to yours. Spencer turns his face away.

"I'm not gonna try anything, Spence," you say, stroking the hair at the nape of his neck. "Just wanted to say thanks. You'll stay, right? Don't get the train."

Spencer sleeps on your couch. In the morning he wakes to the smell of eggs fried in sesame oil and the heavy scent of hot chocolate. Oh, and you in your tiny pyjama shorts at the helm, completely untouched by the copious booze intake of the night before. "Loverboy," you sing-song. "Come on! I'm gonna sit in your lap and feed you like a Grecian emperor. It'll be fun."

It'll definitely be something.

#spencer reid #spencer reid x reader #spencer reid x you #spencer reid x y/n #spencer reid x fem!reader #spencer reid imagine #spencer reid fluff #spencer reid fanfic #spencer reid oneshot #spencer reid scenario #spencer reid drabble #spencer reid fic #spencer reid fanfiction #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds #criminal minds fic #criminal minds x reader

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ratzmatazz · 1 year ago

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I think I got possessed by charlie chaplin and the only way I can tell this story is by greentext I hope you all understand

>be me (20 year old fool) >live in nyc >walking around and realize I haven’t eaten and also need to do some work so I decide to go to a cafe >walk around for like 30 minutes until I finally find one, looks great very peaceful plenty of people working >walk inside order bagel the guy behind the counter is french(???) and he talks slowly but my brain is on autopilot so I look like an asshole who talks too fast because nyc cafes are usually a quick-time event and I'm disrupting the cafe zen I guess >panic order first bagel I see to redeem myself >ice coffee and loaded bagel (whatever that is) is 20 dollars altogether >whatever the place looks nice for work >barista gives me a number stand for my bagel and I walk away and stand in the main space before realizing I need to still get my coffee? Come back looking even more like an asshole >coffee is in incredibly inconvenient glass cup and filled to the brim too >sugar station is right next to barista so he watches me now pour an obscene amount of sugar syrup but very very slowly >sugar syrup pourer is mildly broken and every time I try to get it to flow faster than "pouring cold tar" it squirts a pump onto the table >sit down >realize I’m sitting in their fucking decorative ~aesthetic~ chair and not a real fucking table >spend 2 minutes slowly dragging a table closer before realizing I look insane and moving all my stuff >still sitting in decorative chair during all of this >guy talking to his friend nearby is watching me and trying not to laugh at me out loud >preparing myself for putting the table back and admitting defeat >do not take coffee off of table >stand up for this but the table is lighter than expected and I tilt the table when I try to scoot it back >coffee leans slowly and cartoonishly close to falling over but I quickly scoot the table over and put it down before it can fully tip and ruin me forever >do this routine of up and down table 3 fucking times moving it back >sit down in shame at real table >guy talking to his friend subtly angles himself to be watching me over his friend's shoulder >take out laptop to work and it’s out of power >no biggie I’ll plug it in I even sat next to four power outlets :) >try first one >no good >try next one >all four outlets don’t work. >want to leave but still have bagel so maybe life is good >bagel arrives >no fucking cream cheese on my bagel. >lady who brings out my bagel is an elderly old-school nyc lady who looks at me with barely hidden disgust for my unknowing bagel monstrosity of 99% spring mix, warm cucumber slices, three pieces of bacon, and a fried egg >bagel is too tall for the second bagel piece to go on top of the bagel >trash can is right next to barista so they’ll see me throw out the untouched shameful top of the bagel too >table is also too small for the bagel plate and my laptop and too cramped for me to easily put it away >eat with laptop on lap (top) (haha) >bite bagel >runny yolk >egg bursts >YOLK ALL OVER LAPTOP. >guy still watching me >tiny courtesy napkin to wipe up my egg shame. >humiliating smooth jazz is playing during all of this. >charlie chaplin's ghost finally releases me from my torment.

#greentext #news from the ant hill #original post #god it's really haunting me

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rubiehart · 9 months ago

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JJ and reader sneak away on the island of Poguelandia to get some… “alone time” iykwim

when obx3 first came out this was like my main scenario to sleep lol.. i love u nonnie

all the pogues sit around the makeshift fire, faces illuminated and cheeks blushed from the heat, listening to cleo’s bizarre stories from before she fell in with all of you, but you’re not really listening.

you adjust yourself on the log you’d used for seating, digging your toes into the sun warmed sand as you eyes jj across the flames, he was focused on cooking whatever he’d caught that day, the only thing you were focused on was the way his biceps flexed, deep blues occasionally flitting over and meeting your own eyes before correcting himself when he realised he’d been caught, smirk playing on his lips.

you’d had this arrangement far before this misfortune, stranded on an abandoned island in the middle of nowhere. you’d sit on his work bench, watching him fix up his bike, popsicle slotted between your lips as you watched him. before he’d had enough for your teasing and bent you over the warm metal, denim shorts pulled down to your knees as he pounded into you.

but something had changed ever since you landed on the island, he was so much softer, kinder, a lot less demanding when he’d fuck you. he really took his time with you when he could, he’d make you feel so good, it didn’t happen as much as it used to back home, so you’d learned to appreciate it a lot more when it did.

you clinged onto his tan shoulders, outgrown fingernails digging into the muscle as he finger fucked you behind a tree, the squelch of your wet cunt the only sound heard as he clamped a ringed hand over your mouth, willing you to be quiet with praise as he hit that spot over and over again. his jaw clenched as he kept half on eye on pope and cleo not too far away collecting fruits for your breakfast, fixing you up and giving you a quick peck before sending you off back to the group, strolling back a few after you like nothing had happened.

that was last week, and he hadn’t even touched you since. to say you were desperate was an understatement. sure, the island was desolate but that didn’t mean it was big, and sneaking away to fuck yourself and risk getting caught wasn’t something you wanted to do. so you thought eye fucking was enough of a hint for him, spoiler, it wasn’t.

he kept you on the edge of your seat all night, he knew what he was doing and he loved the power. concealing his grin when he caught you discretely rub your thighs together whenever you’d look a him.

you got what you wanted soon enough, when everyone was pretty much knocked out on their makeshift leaf mattresses, stepping over john b cautiously as you made your way up the sandy bank where you knew he would be.

you were finally at peace when he had you splayed out against a large tree, legs spread around his his head, his matted blonde tresses tickling your inner thighs as he devoured you like a starved man. his cocky persona dropped as he practically begged for you, even though he already had you in your head.

“wanted to taste this fuckin’ pussy all day.” he mutters, tongue dipping into your clenching hole as he brings two fingers up to steadily rub at your clit, your back arching beautifully against the rough bark of the tree, hand forcefully gripping his hair and keeping him right where you wanted him.

“strutting around in that little top, you dunno’ what you do to me, infront of all our fuckin’ friends.” he admits, skilled fingers punching your g-spot, a loud moan leaving your lips as your climax approached, immediately recoiling back into yourself as the sound echoes over the extensive ocean surrounding you, hoping your friends didn’t hear.

jj sensed your sudden shyness and tapped your thigh, one hand shaking up to grasp at your boob, calloused thumb teasing your nipple as he circles your throbbing but with his tongue. “nah- let it all out, wanna hear how good i make you feel.”

“yeah- gooooood girl. you got it.”

#꒰ jj maybank ꒱ྀི #jj maybank smut #jj maybank x reader #jj obx #jj maybank blurb #outer banks #jj x reader #jj maybank headcanon #obx #jj maybank obx #jj maybank outer banks #jj maybank fluff #jj maybank

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gigabyte-flare · 5 months ago

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The Ferocious Beast

[A Gigabyte Flare One Shot]

Summary: After an intense night with your wolf Thiren partner, your unsuspecting daughter notices a peculiar mark on your skin. Lycaon wastes no time mischievously adding fuel to the fire.

Word Count: 1.2k

Pairing: Von Lycaon x fem!reader (afab)

Disclaimer: This story is a work of fiction. You are responsible for your own content consumption. If any of the following warnings trigger you, please read at your own risk. Minors do not interact, this story is 18+ only.

Warnings: dubcon, unprotected p in v, pinning, biting, mating press, knotting, breeding kink, creampie, pregnancy mention

A/N: This came to be thanks to the horny thoughts of myself and @vampiricgf and my equally horny thoughts of Lycaon being a dad. I dedicate this to all my Lycaon besties in the little community we made on here! Line break divider by cafekitsune

You had no idea what had gotten into him. You had come home from work to find Lycaon making dinner, same as any other evening; your six year old daughter having come home a couple hours prior from school. She was sitting at the kitchen table drawing another picture of her Mommy and Daddy with her beloved crayons. Your heart warmed when you saw her tiny little ears flick forward at your arrival, wasting no time to jump up from her chair to give you a hug and welcome you home. Meanwhile, Lycaon simply looked over at you, a smirk crossing his lips before returning his attention to making dinner. He was strangely quiet for the rest of the evening until he put your daughter to bed.

You didn't even have time to react, immediately upon entering the bedroom, Lycaon had shut and locked the bedroom door and pinned you face first into your shared bed. Your pants were an absolute goner, having been torn off you and discarded before burying his face into your folds, inhaling your scent deeply.

"It took everything in me not ravish you as soon as you walked through the front door…" Lycaon had said with a breathy growl before gliding his tongue from your throbbing clit to your leaking hole.

Your body had shuddered, your fingers gripping into the sheets as your knees dug into the mattress, completely at Lycaon's mercy as he fucked you with this tongue. It wasn't until this very moment with your torso being pressed into the mattress by one of Lycaon's massive hands on your back as his cock rams into you that you realize that he is in his rut. His other hand gripping your hip like a vice, feeling his claws dig into your skin as you feel your cunt begin to stretch around his knot with each of his powerful thrusts.

Abruptly, he pulls out. You begin to whine in protest as drool spills from the corner of your mouth when he flips you over onto your back, his hands spreading your legs open to settle his hips against yours. His throbbing member has no trouble slipping back inside and he takes your legs and drapes them onto his shoulders, practically folding you in half as he resumes his grueling pace inside you. Grasping both your wrists, he pins your hands above your head as he lets out a guttural growl, nuzzling his face into the crook of your neck.

"Let me give you my knot, my little dove…" he moans into you, his thrusts becoming slower but more powerful.

That nickname sends chills straight to your cunt, feeling your walls squeeze around his cock as his knot threatens to seal the two of you together.

A couple of tears involuntarily stream down the sides of your face as you nuzzle your face against his; finally, you give him a subtle nod before whispering, "go ahead, Lycaon…"

With a snap of his hips, you feel his knot pop inside you, the head of his cock pressing against your cervix with each thrust now. His instincts taking hold, his cock aggressively rabbits into you, his claws digging into your wrists as he practically fucks you into the mattress. He lets out another growl as his thrusts become more erratic until finally he pushes himself as deep inside you as he possibly can, his powerful jaw latching onto the crook of you neck as he comes. Your eyes roll into the back of your head as you come undone with him, moaning his name as your legs quiver on his shoulders as he pumps you full of his seed.

Once he comes down from his high, Lycaon's entire body weight collapses on top of you after moving your legs off his shoulders, feeling his tongue lap up where he had sunk his teeth into your neck as his arms wrap around your body. You drape your arms around his shoulders, giving him a gentle squeeze as you kiss the side of his muzzle. Meanwhile your legs gently wrap around his waist, knowing full well his knot is going to keep the two of you sealed together for a majority of the night. It doesn't take long for exhaustion to consume you both and you drift into a dreamless sleep.

The smell of breakfast and coffee drags you from the realm of sleep, your eyes fluttering open only to wince at the sun pouring in from the windows, the gentle late summer breeze caressing your senses. You let out a loud yawn as you sit up in bed; Lycaon is unsurprisingly already up. You swing your legs over the side of the bed and stand up, your legs still a little wobbly from the previous night's escapade. Also unsurprisingly, you find Lycaon had already cleaned you up; how he didn't wake you is beyond you.

Putting on one of Lycaon's button up shirts and a pair of pajama shorts, you slowly make your way out into the kitchen, where you find your daughter and Lycaon already eating breakfast at the kitchen table. Upon seeing you come in, Lycaon immediately stands up.

"Good morning, my love," he says as he opens the oven, taking out a plate that he had been keeping warm for you, "I made you some pancakes with bacon. I do hope you enjoy them."

He sets the plate down just as you take a seat. You look up at him, smiling warmly at him as he walks back over to his seat to finish eating breakfast.

"Good morning, Mommy!" your daughter cheerfully greets you before biting a forkful of pancakes, a big smile spreading across her lips, "Daddy always makes the best pancakes!"

"He sure does, sweetie," you reply softly before taking a bite, closing your eyes to savor the flavor; fluffy and cooked just right.

"What's that on your neck?" your daughter suddenly asks.

Your eyes snap open, your right hand reaching over and feeling where Lycaon's teeth hand sunk into your neck the night before. You don't doubt that there's bruising, too.

Before you can even think of formulating some kind of response, Lycaon replies to your daughter's query as he takes a sip from his coffee mug, "your mother was attacked by a ferocious beast last night."

You look over at Lycaon just as he lowers his mug, the most devious smirk crossing his lips as he gives you a knowing look in his exposed eye. Your heart palpitating in your chest, you kick him under the table, which is immediately followed by a sharp pain going up your leg when your toes make contact with the metal of one of his prosthetic legs.

"Sh-- Ow!" you hiss silently as you reach down to massage your toes.

"What was that?!" your daughter once again asks.

"That would be the ferocious beast eating your mother's toes." Lycaon replies nonchalantly, that smirk still on his face as he closes his eye while taking another sip from his coffee.

"Oh no, not Mommy's toes!"

"Lycaon!" you say as you give him a playful shove to his shoulder.

You weren't sure if it was instinct or fate that a few weeks later, you decide to pick up a pregnancy test at the store after work. You can't say you were entirely surprised when the result came up positive.

#von lycaon #lycaon #von lycaon x reader #lycaon x reader #von lycaon smut #lycaon smut #zzzero #zenless zone zero #zenless zone zero smut #gigabyte writes

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little-miss-dilf-lover · 1 month ago

Text

FIRST, SUGAR. 18+

pairing. raymond smith x fem!reader word count. 1932 summary. ray's mindless touches on your thigh while you read begin to catch up with you, though he's too busy working to realise. so he offers you a promise, "if you can give me twenty minutes. I'll fuck you for twice as long." warnings. 18+ only! general filth, little bit of fingering, pinv, horny writer's thought pls excuse me. mdni > I know this will not get read bc he's not popular anymore but I needed to get it out of my system (he's still not out my system btw, it’s a sickness. help!)

⎯ ☆ ⎯

It’s quiet, the evening calm. The only sounds coming from the crackle of the fireplace and soft, steady breaths. Both yours and Ray’s attention obtained by your individual papers in hand: yours, a book, and in Raymond’s, a stack of papers he’s been asked to look over.

The feel of it all so comfortable, so familiar.

The backs of your thighs horizontally rest over his, lounging across him with your back propped against the arm of the sofa — your new read held close to your face. Ray’s seated position remains close, tucked to you like you are to him. Nestled into one another casually.

His feet sit on the coffee table ahead, one hand clutching the pile of papers, his other resting over your thigh, touch mindless as he grazes your bare skin. The careful caress simply an absentminded act, an act of spontaneous, unprompted protection maybe. His focus fully engrossed in a page of nothing but information and numbers.

Though to you, it wasn’t just nothing. Ray’s thoughtless touches act as a distraction to you, each stroke and brush and graze pulling your attention further and further away from your story until all that remains are muddled, merged sentences. The plot lost to you by now.

And so you peek at him over your book, gaze focused and almost delirious as you watch him, completely unaware of your lusty set of eyes. You observe him, vision fixed on his casual grip on you: ringed pinky and large, veiny hand perched upon your skin like it’s where it belonged. Everything about it so confident, so manly. Cardigan woven with wool and residual notes of whiskey and cigarettes — like it was a fortuitous, accidental representation as to who he is: gentle and virile.

You quietly pay attention to the way he works, his glasses resting atop his nose as he skims the page — his articulate, precise nature urging him to comprehend everything written. His heed to detail being one of the things most attractive about him. And yet, he had no idea what he was doing to you. Sat there, utterly unaware of his power.

Though that changes as your breathing grows inadvertently heavy, a sudden sharp inhale from you makes his neck snap to follow the sound. His eyes now focused on yours over your novel, a slight quirk in his brow as if to analyse you.

Your expression —or the top half, what he can see— is blissed, pained even. These last thirty-some minutes of gentle grazing begin to catch up with you.

He hums shortly, the noise an attempt to scope you out, though by now there’s no need for connecting dots or guessing — all evidence as clear as day. He looks down to his palm just above your knee, your thighs pressed tight together in an effort to alleviate some of the pressure you feel between them.

He uncrosses his ankles on the coffee table and leans forward, placing the stack of papers beside his whiskey tumbler. Ray clears his throat in his fist, a sly, faint smile forming behind his hand as if he’s debating with himself. His eyes drift down to the hand on your lower thigh, gaze following the ever so slow tail as he itches under your robe.

“You didn’t want to disturb me, did you?” Raymond questions, eyes pleased and proud as they flicker up to you.

“No,” you murmur with a faint shake of the head, voice catching in your throat as you watch.

His fingers move inwards and under your nightdress, slotting between your thighs as if to separate them — his hand protruding through both thin layers of fabric.

“So patient of you,” he teases, tilting his head forward, peering at you over the top of his glasses. “Must’ve been agony.”

It was. It really was.

With his spare hand, he reaches for your book and takes it from your hold — placing it open and faced down beside his papers to keep your space. He pulls back to sit in his original position, feet now planted on the floor, knees apart in a manspread. He taps at his thigh, running a hand down the beef of it like he was beckoning you, summoning you almost.

“Come on,” he whispers, the instruction soft as he gestures you along. He taps at it again and rolls his hips underneath himself to reposition — preparing for you.

With an excited giggle, you do as asked, finally about to get what you want after all of his mindless teasing. You situate yourself over his lap, knees either side of his thighs as you use his shoulders for your support — keeping you up right. His eyes fix on you above, watching the antsy knitting and curving of your brows.

He spreads his arms either side along the back of the leather chesterfield, maintaining his dominance while he lets you take the lead. Or so he lets you think.

You reach between yourselves, your fingers hurriedly finicking with his belt, urging him out of his trousers. Your too quick movements stall your attempts, and you huff, the sound more similar to a whimper than anything else.

His head cocks, amused, watching you fiddle with the buckle. Watching you fail with the buckle.

He lifts a hand from its spot behind the sofa, redirecting it to your cheek — palm large and warm as he cups the side of your face, making you look at him. Ray’s touch glides backwards to behind your neck, thumb resting over your ear as he urges you closer. Pulling you inwards.

“Give me some sugar first.”

You lean in, pressing a quick kiss to his lips before moving away, trying to move away. Though he has other plans. His hold firm behind your neck to keep you there — bringing you back in so he could return the kiss. His beard skims at your chin as he deepens and roughens the kiss, intensifying the moment.

Though his dick is not yet hard, the presence of him is just as noticeable as if it were. The faint brushes of his big, thick cock through his trousers sends your mind into a tizzy. All your bodily responses become all the more evident, as if you’re betraying yourself.

And with your attention consumed by the way he kisses you, he’s slipping his other hand between you both, reaching between your thighs. He itches a finger to skim down your cunt and you jolt, his touch catching you by surprise. You moan into his mouth, the sound stifled and muffled, before you pull away.

You look down to watch, but your view is obstructed by your fabric pooling around your thighs. And then he clicks his tongue, eyes still boring on your face. You follow the noise, looking back up and he nods slowly, wordlessly praising you for following along.

With your gaze fixed on his, he’s hooking his finger into the elastic of your underwear, parting it aside within his very skilled hand. He trails down your slit, all arousal noticeable when he’s met with no resistance, the slick of your cunt granting him easy access to toy with you.

He raises a brow, both satisfied and impressed. His touch remains light as he brushes the pad of his middle finger downwards, circling your entrance briefly before he’s slipping inside your cunt.

It was something, but not enough. Nowhere close to being enough.

You wrap your arms around his neck, mouth grazing his with the closeness.

“More,” you utter against his lips, a slight whine to your voice. “Another.”

Your hips wind involuntarily, like you’re preemptively chasing after something — anticipating it. The feel of a lone finger is far from what you needed to satiate the gaping want.

“Another what?” he speaks into your mouth, a twinge of whiskey being tasted on his tongue. He knew what he was doing, and he was abusing his power over you. “You’re a smart girl. Tell me.”

“Finger. Another finger,” you plead. Your answer is quick, like you thought the speed of your response will get you what you want faster.

He tuts quietly, lips brushing against yours as he shakes his head.

All you can respond with is a whinge, a frustrated whinge at that and your hips still. The sensation of his finger being withdrawn from you. You mumble a faint, “What?” when you feel his hand part from behind your head, the one near your cunt too.

And then his hands drop to his lap, placing them between your thighs as he unfastens his belt — the jingling sound of the metal making your eyes widen, lighten almost. His hips raise underneath you as he tugs on the waistband of his trousers, pulling them down just enough to comfortably reach into his boxers.

He wraps a hand around himself and brings his cock out over the top, fisted grip tight as he gives it a few pumps — polishing his head as if to ready himself. With his other hand, he’s bunching the fabric of your garments, holding them up so he could guide himself closer to your cunt underneath.

He knocks his head at your clit just to see and hear and feel you shudder, a response he often loved from you. And so with you right where he wants you, right at the edge, he’s lining up with you — his eyes fixed on yours like it's all coming from a place of muscle memory, not needing sight to know what he’s doing.

Ray presses the tip of his dick against your pussy, the shape of his head kissing at your entrance so perfectly. And when he feels like you’ve suffered enough, he’s feeding himself into you, filling you from underneath as you lower down — meeting him halfway.

Strength in your neck dissipates, your forehead collapsing against his as you inhale shakily, taking all of him until nothing remains. His balls pressing up against your cunt’s lips like you’re sitting on them.

You lean in to kiss him while you give yourself a moment to reaccustom to him, familiarising with the thick feel of his cock. Your breath catches in your throat when you feel him bump up into you, a small jut upwards knocking the air out your lungs.

With himself wedged fully inside, he moves a hand to your throat, lightly holding under your jaw. There’s no pressure behind his touch, simply the presence there to guide you, to feel you. He keeps his mouth to yours, swallowing the little gasps you make and he tests the waters once more — adjusting his hips, pushing himself up into you entirely. The full weight of you perched upon his lap, sat on his dick.

“This what you wanted?” he murmurs, speaking against your lips.

You nod. Blissed, hazy eyes doing the talking for you as if you’ve suddenly become incapable of speaking.

Ray runs his spare hand behind you and to the cheek of your ass, palm resting over the satin fabric as he guides you — ushering your hips forward to grind over him. Though the presence of his touch is short-lived as he reaches forward, collecting his papers from before.

With his hand on your jaw, he brings you inwards, tucking your face into his neck. He brings the papers in his view, holding the stack just to the side of you.

“If you can give me twenty minutes to finish this” he says, voice soft beside you. “I’ll fuck you for twice as long,” Ray whispers, his words a promise.

Raymond Smith is a man of his word.

⎯ ☆ ⎯

#raymond smith #raymond smith x reader #raymond smith smut #raymond smith fanfiction #the gentlemen #charlie hunnam characters #charlie hunnam

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janeyseymour · 7 months ago

Text

Sneaky Link

Summary: A request from an anon- Secret relation between R and Melissa, Ava flirting with reader until Melissa breaks and threatens to take a Edith houghton to her

WC: ~3.9k

Not edited in the slightest and written in a depressive era lol enjoy

It’s funny the way the world works out for you. It always has been, and it probably always will be. So when Melissa Schemmenti, the known regular at one of the bars you’re also a regular at, comes sauntering up to you after a long day of searching for jobs and interviewing with what seems to be no such luck- well, you think maybe the universe really was looking out for you.

And that was months ago. Now, you and that hot, tough on the outside but soft on the inside, teacher have been together since that night. It’s… it’s something special. You thank whatever high power there is out there for bringing her to you on that one night when you really needed someone.

The thing that the universe hasn’t done in your favor? Given you a job. Until…

“Babe!” Melissa calls you as you’re leaving one of the schools you’ve been subbing at.

You smile at her voice. You always do. “Hey. What’s up?”

“We’re still on for dinner tonight?”

“Of course we are,” you chuckle softly. “I would never give up the opportunity to see my beautiful woman. That isn’t why you called though, is it?”

“No,” she admits. “I was just talking with my principal, and she said that they are for sure hiring a new second grade teacher over the summer. Do you want me to throw your name into the ring and put a good word in for you?”

“How about you let me go so I can drive to your place, and we can talk about it over dinner?” you suggest. “And you drive safe too?”

“You know I never drive safe unless I have you in my car- precious cargo,” she teases you softly. “But okay. I’ll see you in a bit, mi amore.”

That night, the two of you chat about the position opening up at her school. As it turns out, the position is for another second grade teacher, and if you were to get the job, your room would be right next to hers.

“I don’t know,” you sigh softly as you lay your head down in her lap. “I just… I want to get the job on my own terms, not be a shoo in because I have the world’s hottest teacher in my corner.”

“That would be you, mi amore,” she says quietly as she weaves her fingers through your hair. “But that’s fine. I do think you should apply though. You would be a great addition to the team, and you would get to be on my team and balance out Janine with all of her energy.”

“You know I have just as much energy sometimes,” you chuckle as you reach for the television remote.

“Yeah,” your girlfriend laughs. “But I find it endearing with you.”

“Because we’re dating.”

“Because I’m in love with you.”

You end up applying for the job, and when you go in, it’s quite easy to see how the redhead has maintained working here for so long. It’s a rundown school where she can make a difference- she refuses to burn out for the sake of the children. And you’ll refuse to burn out for the sake of the children right with her if you end up getting hired here.

The secretary leads you back to the conference room where there sits a panel. It’s clear who the principal is, but then soon either side of her are two women. One who you know from Melissa’s stories is Barbara Howard, and the other is… It’s Melissa herself. It takes everything in you to not chastise her for being a part of your interview, or for at least not giving you a warning- especially after you had spoken with her on the phone earlier that morning about how nervous you were for the interview. You’ll have to save that for after your interview.

“Well, hello there,” Ava’s eyes rake you up and down. “Principal Coleman, and this is Barbara Howard and Melissa Schemmenti- two of Abbott’s finest teachers. Although, you may just join Red in the running for hottest teacher here.”

If this were not a professional setting, you would quip that you could never stand a chance up against your girlfriend, but you’re interviewing, and you know nobody at work knows of her relation to you. So you press your lips together in a fine line and reach out to shake each of their hands. While you meet both Ava’s and Barbara’s eyes, it is much harder for you to look at those green eyes you usually love to see.

The interview is- well, it’s somewhat of a joke. Barbara and Melissa ask you the more sensible questions about classroom management, behavior plans, and lessons, while the principal asks you what your favorite reality tv show is and how you would survive on a deserted island if you needed to. Nevertheless, they all seem impressed with your responses, both to the professional and unprofessional questions that were thrown your way.

You’re told to stay out in the hall for a few minutes while they deliberate, and you’re dying to know what’s being said about you in the conference room you’re hovering outside of. It takes all of five minutes before you’re being called back into the room by Melissa herself, who is nothing if not professional.

“I have one more question for you,” the principal states seriously. You nod and smile nervously. “When are you able to start?”

“A-are you offering me the position?” you ask, eyebrows raised in surprised. You thought for sure they would be asking to see a demo lesson or something of the sort.

“Hell yeah we are,” Ava grins. “Abbott could use a hottie like you.”

Because you’re so busy shaking the principal’s hand and accepting the position, you miss the glare that your girlfriend sends her boss. You’re stuck there for a bit signing papers before you’re shown to your classroom by Barbara and Melissa- Ava claiming she’s trying to catch up on her newest reality television show. They end up giving you a tour of the school before handing you the curriculum binder and seeing you out.

“We’ll see you for development week, dear,” the kindergarten teacher smiles at you. “We’re very excited for you to join our team.”

Melissa just nods, hellbent on keeping up her tough South Philly girl act. You smile at them as you head out of the building. As soon as you’re in your car, you text your girlfriend.

What the hell? Why didn’t you tell me you were going to be in my interview this morning?

We’ll talk when I come over, okay? Her response is almost immediate. It’s quickly followed by a, Congratulations, mi amore.

As soon as she pulls up to your townhouse, you’re standing outside on your front stoop with your arms folding over your chest as you stare her down. She comes running up your steps and pulls you into a hug, kissing your temple, then your cheek, then your nose, and then finally your lips. For as annoyed as you are with her, you do end up kissing her back.

“Lissa,” you say sternly.

“I’m so proud of you for getting the position,” she tells you as she rests her forehead against yours.

“Thank you,” you smile softly. But then your face drops again. “Why didn’t you tell me that you were going to be in my interview?”

She leads you back into your house and kicks off her shoes before sighing. “I didn’t know that I was going to be in your interview. It was supposed to be Janine, but she got sick and called out last minute. Someone from the second grade team had to be there, and by the time Ava had called me, I knew you were already in a tizzy, and I didn’t want to stress you out any more than you already were.”

You bring her into the kitchen where you already have some of the ingredients out for dinner, along with a bottle of champagne. “I just… I wasn’t expecting to see you there. It threw me off, and all of my words and thoughts got all jumbled up in my head while I tried to keep my eyes off of my insanely hot girlfriend.”

“Trust me when I tell you that you were fine,” the redhead promises you as she makes her way over to pop the bottle. “The idiot before you… I’m pretty sure he literally wandered in from off the street.”

“Did they only offer me the position because we’re-” you got to ask, but she cuts you off.

“They don’t know we’re together,” Melissa tells you. “You did not get offered the position because we’re dating. You got the position because you are a wonderful teacher, and Barbara pushed for you.”

“You had nothing to do with it?” you raise a brow.

“I stayed pretty quiet while they were talking,” your girlfriend says. “I even made sure I threw in a comment about how I wouldn’t learn your name until I was certain you were going to stay. They have no idea.”

You smile at her. “Then, a celebratory dinner we’ll be having… and then…”

Green eyes meet yours with a glint of mischief in them. “What?”

“And then, I want to be your dessert.”

Melissa’s eyes go wide, and she nods eagerly. “If that’s what you want, you know I’m always more than happy to make that happen… Might even have to go in for seconds after today’s accomplishment.”

The rest of summer passes in a warm haze. It’s filled with love, lazy days, and excitement as you plan for the upcoming school year with your girlfriend. But the days of lazing out at a pool or staying inside and binge watching your shows to beat the heat are quickly coming to an end. Melissa and you still haven’t talked about how you’re going to interact with each other at the school- especially now that the two of you have moved in together.

“Hun?” you call from the bedroom as you put on makeup for dinner tonight. It’s your last hurrah before the two of you really have to start focusing on the school year.

“What?” Melissa’s voice floats into the room as she waits for you downstairs.

When you don’t respond in hopes that she just comes into the room, she sighs and gets to her feet. She appears in the doorway a few seconds later, a soft look in her eyes as she watches you ready yourself.

“What’s up, mi amore?” she asks as she makes her way over to you. Her arms wrap around your shoulders, and she presses a gentle kiss to your hair before resting her chin on your shoulder.

“You know what I just realized?”

“What?”

“We never discussed how we were going to act at school.”

“Shit.”

Dinner is spent discussing that the two of you will have to work together due to the fact that you’re both on the second grade team, but your relationship at school will stay professional. You know that you can stay professional, but it’s going to be interesting to see the hard ass persona that Melissa likes to put on in front of her coworkers as opposed to the sweet and kindhearted woman that you know at home. It’s going to be jarring for sure- at least to start until it isn’t so suspicious that she likes the newbie. Once that’s squared away, the two of you enjoy a dinner that doesn’t revolve around lesson planning or any talks of school.

Development week is upon you, and you almost wish that you would’ve decided to just go into this job being out with Melissa, but you understand where she’s coming from with not telling HR that the two of you are together- at least not yet. And you genuinely do not want some sort of rumor to start that the only reason you got the position is because you’re dating one of the “scarier” teachers in the school. So, while you wish you were driving in with your girlfriend while she recites affirmations to you, you instead have to settle for driving in by yourself. You pull in next to her car, but she’s already inside- you know this much.

It’s weird when you head into the staff lounge. You’re so used to her making you coffee in the mornings, but today you have to fend for yourself. And while everyone else is cordial with you, your girlfriend is standoffish and cold, calling you by the wrong name on purpose and telling her coworkers she’ll bother to learn your name once you’ve proven that you aren’t just going to up and leave the first time things get hard for you (you catch the sympathetic glance she throws your way as she’s heading out with her friends for the meeting).

Most of development week ends up being your principal just flirting with you and your girlfriend being as hostile as she is with other new hires. At night, once the two of you settle in together, she promises you that she loves you more than anything and she apologizes for her behavior and attitude towards you at school.

“I didn’t realize this was what I would be walking into at school,” you chuckle as she massages your back gently. “But I have to admit, seeing you like that… damn it’s hot.”

“You always think I’m hot,” she rolls her eyes as she begins to work on a new tense spot right by your shoulder.

“Well, I’m not wrong for that,” you half chuckle, half groan. “But I always get to see sweet soft Lissa, and at school you’re a total badass.”

“I’m a total badass in front of literally everyone except for you,” she tells you as she kisses the slope of your neck. “I don’t know why, but you melt me like butter.”

“Well, ain’t I lucky then?”

“I’d say I’m the lucky one,” she throws right back at you.

Your days at your new job continue on like that, and so do your nights. During the day, Melissa is nothing but a bitch to you and offering you apologetic glances when she can. And at home, your girlfriend is the sweetest woman, even more sweet than usual because she feels so guilty that she can’t treat you like the amazing woman that you are in your place of work.

But that changes when the kids start their school year. Because your classrooms are right next to each other, she has a front row seat to see just how talented you are when it comes to working with your kids. She observes how much effort you put into their daily routines, how you explicitly state your expectations and hold them to it, and how you manage behaviors within your classroom, all while still getting them settled in for the school year.

It’s at lunch on the first day that she softens up on you just the slightest bit. You’re sitting at one of the tables by yourself when she and Barbara comes strolling in.

“Ah, Y/N, dear,” the kindergarten teacher smiles at you. “How is your first day with the kids going?”

You break out into a grin. “Honestly? I’m loving it. These kids, while they all have their challenges, like any kids, are absolutely precious. I already have a handful of drawings sitting on my desk to be hung up on the bulletin board behind my desk.”

“That’s great to hear,” Barb tells you as she pulls her lunch out of the fridge.

“Wow, newbie,” Melissa’s eyes sparkle just enough that you can tell. “Better than I expected.”

“And how did you expect my first day to go?” you challenge her to act. She had told you this morning in bed that she knew you were going to be just what Abbott needs, but could she play it off that she thought you were going to crash and burn now?

The redhead shrugs. “Most newbies run out of here with their middle fingers up and crying.”

“Well, that won’t be me. Thank you very much Miss Schemmenti,” you shrug as you take a bite of your salad (the one that she had prepared for you last night).

“Good,” is all she huffs out as she sits down to eat her own lunch. “Abbott needs some stability.”

That night at home, it’s an early night. The first days, and even the first weeks, of school are utterly exhausting.

“I meant what I said when most people leave with their middle fingers up and crying,” Melissa sighs as she lays her head on your chest. “But you, my dear? I never had a doubt in my mind that you would be the perfect addition to the Abbott team. And I saw how great you were with your kids today. They’re lucky to have you.”

“Just as your little eagles are lucky to have you,” you chuckle softly as you begin to run your fingers through her hair.

Slowly, Melissa’s tougher than nails demeanor shifts. She begins to treat you like she treats Janine, although it is different. But that’s because the two of you are hiding a relationship, unlike with Janine. It’s nice. And at home, she’s still as loving as ever and even still apologizing for not treating you the way she should at school.

“When are we going to tell them that we’re together?” you ask casually as you’re looking over the weekly plans.

She hums. “Whenever you’re ready.”

“I just don’t want anyone to think that I only got the job because we’re dating and you were in my interview. I know you said that Barb was the one who pushed for me, but…”

“If you want to wait a bit, we can.”

You’ve settled into teaching at Abbott quite nicely. Your coworkers love you, Melissa has only continued to soften up at you at school, even calling you by your real name now. You have to say, you love this job. It’s the best job that you’ve had in quite some time, and that includes when you worked in more affluent areas. These kids just… get it. The staff is like an odd, dysfunctional family. And you get to see your girlfriend at work everyday. It’s almost perfect.

The reason it isn’t perfect? Your boss, Ava Coleman, flirts with you constantly. She finds reason to be in your room more often than not, and whenever you’re all having lunch, there’s some excuse for her to end up in the staff room with you.

Melissa, of course, is well aware that your principal is constantly trying to hit on you. You let most of her comments roll off of you, but some just have you shaking your head at the things she insinuates.

“Ava,” you finally sigh one day after seeing the absolute death glare that Melissa is sending her way. Oh, if looks could kill. “Quit flirting with me.”

“And why would I do that, boo?”

“Because you’re in a relationship,” you roll your eyes as her own eyes scan over you.

The woman shrugs. “And? It’s open.”

“And I have a girlfriend who I know for a fact would not, and does not like the fact that you are constantly trying to get with me,” you reveal.

Everyone looks at you in surprise at that admission. Everyone except for Melissa, who angrily stabs at the salad she’s got out for lunch (the salad that you lovingly packed her this morning).

“You have a girlfriend?” Jacob is quick to cut into the conversation. You just nod. “How did I not know?”

“I don’t know, Jacob,” you breathe out. “I don’t really go around announcing it to people.”

“But there are usually signs!” your coworker protests.

At that, you shrug.

“Who’s to say that your girlfriend wouldn’t be into it?” Ava directs the conversation back her way.

You glance to Melissa, who won’t even look up from her meal. “Just trust me when I tell you, my girlfriend does not appreciate the fact that you flirt with me.”

“Well, what’s her name?” Janine asks from her corner of the room. “I wanna meet her!”

You laugh at that. “Lissa,” you tell them. And nobody figures out that that’s the nickname you have for the redhead in the room. Everybody at Abbott, or at least everybody who has been deemed worthy of calling her by a nickname, calls her “Mel”.

“Alyssa?” Mr. Johnson makes his own presence known. “She hot?”

Your ears turn pink. “I wouldn’t be dating her if I didn’t think she was. But enough about me,” you try to diffuse the situation. “Can we-”

Ava turns to you after a few seconds of scrolling through her phone. “You don’t know no ‘Alyssa’.”

“What do you mean?” you raise a brow in her direction.

The principal shoves her phone in your face. “I just looked through Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, even your Venmo for anyone under that name. There ain’t nobody there. You making a girlfriend up so I stop flirtin’ with you, ain’t you?”

“I am very much not,” you reply. “I do have a girlfriend.”

Ava hums. “I don’t believe you, but if that’s the story we’s goin’ with, sure thing, baby boo. Just give me a call when you decide that you want a piece of this fine-”

“Enough!” Melissa finally shouts. “Enough!”

“Woah,” the principal’s eyes go wide as she stares at the redhead. All other heads in the room whip around to look at the second grade teacher sitting next to you. “What’s got your panties in a twist? I’m just flirting with-”

“Flirting with my girlfriend!” your girlfriend explodes. “Quit flirting with my girl, unless you want me to take Edith Houghton to your damned head!”

As if to prove a point, Melissa grabs your hand and shows it off. “She’s mine,” the woman practically growls. “And I swear to God, if you make one more comment towards my girlfriend about how hot she is or about how you want her- I will make you regret it!”

Ava’s eyes go wide, and her hands fly up so quickly in surrender that her phone drops to the floor. “Shit. Okay.”

Everybody else can only watch in slight horror as the redhead continues to point her fork in your boss’s direction.

“Listen, I just thought that-”

“You thought wrong,” Melissa grits out. “Not another word out of you about her.”

“Okay, okay,” Ava backs down. “Damn, Schemmenti. Good on you though. She-”

You have to practically hold your girlfriend back as she goes to lunge at the principal.

Ava quickly runs out of the room and back into her office, coffee forgotten and probably fearing for her life at this point.

Melissa huffs and rights her shirt before holding your hand again and taking a deep breath. You ground her quickly with a few squeezes to the hand in your own. She pulls her chair closer to yours and drops your hand before wrapping an arm around you and silently daring anybody to make any comments about the outburst that had just taken place.

You see the way that they’re all staring at you and your girlfriend though, so you just settle for a weak, “Surprise?”

TAGS: @schemmentis @thesapphictimelady @marvel210 @itisdoctortoyousir @morgana-larkin @thesamesweetie @doesthatsuggestanythingtoyou @marvels--slut @gwennybriggs @megamultifandomtrashposts @lemz378 @http-sam @melissaschemmentisbranzino @imaginesmultifandoms @sexysapphicshopowner @lilfartbox1 @maybe-a-humanbean @imlike-so-gaydude @sapphicxrat @a-queen-and-her-throne @notinmyvocab @melanielaufeyson @dvrkhcld @cosmichymns @sasheemo

#abbott elementary fanfic #abbott elementary #abbott elementary fanfiction #melissa schemmenti fanfiction #melissa schemmenti fanfic #melissa schemmenti #melissa schemmenti x reader #melissa schemmenti x you

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innocent-artery · 2 years ago

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You Snooze You Lose

3.9k words

Summary: you're just about to give up on the dating scene altogether, so who better than your neighbor friend to show you how good dates usually end? can you tell this is my favorite trope

Pairing: Eddie Munson x reader (can be interpreted as older!Eddie)

For the sake of avoiding spoilers, extensive warnings will not be given. This story includes sexually explicit material, reader discretion advised.

While reading, I recommend listening to the altar is my hips, a spotify playlist by me!

Your head fell back against the car, inhaling deeply and heaving a long sigh that devolved into something of a groan. Your social battery was impossibly drained.

You had just come from another pitiful excuse of a date, someone from work that a mutual friend had set you up with. It wasn't a total disaster, but it didn't leave you with butterflies either. But you were home now, so you could forget about the experience for the timebeing.

A voice calling your name pulled you from your thoughts. It was one you recognized immediately as your next door neighbor, Eddie. When your eyes located him you saw him sauntering out of his open garage towards your driveway, beer in one hand and jean pocket over the other. His chunky boots set in stone his walk, so casual and powerful, and oh god he's right in front of you now.

"You must be doing some serious thinking out here," Eddie chuckled, leaning on your car opposite you. "Either that or there's more to that tree than meets the eye because you've been staring at it for the last five minutes."

You chuckled back at him. "You've been watching me?"

"With a face like that, it'd be a crime not to."

There it was again. That little game you and Eddie played. Even from your first day in the neighborhood Eddie welcomed you with his abrasive charm and an open invitation to his services on a car. Which he seemed to exercise often- his garage door was often open during the afternoons, blasting music as he sat under his car doing god knows what. He never failed to wave and wink at you as you pulled into the driveway every day as you came home from work.

As you became more accustomed to him, your friendship evolved into frequent Friday night hangouts, sitting on the ground in the living room with a six pack talking about anything and everything.

You hated to admit it, but it didn't take long for your cheeks and ears to start to get embarrassingly red in front of Eddie, especially when your conversation topics became more, well, intimate. Whether or not he'd picked up on it, you didn't know- nothing had ever come of your little crush; you'd been content to leave that between you and your vibrator.

"Kid? Y'alright?"

There you go again. You shook your head, blinking a few times before shooting him an apologetic smile.

"Yeah, sorry."

"You seem a bit on edge. Wanna talk about it?"

You shrug. "It's nothing, really. Just got home from a date."

"Assuming it didn't go well?"

"It wasn't bad, it just- I don't know, it felt forced."

Eddie hummed, nodding lightly. "I hear ya. Tell y'what, take ten to get settled and let me clean up, then come over, we'll break out a couple of bottles and you can tell me all about it, yeah?"

"Sounds great," you agreed, and Eddie gave you a playful salute before sauntering back to his own driveway- which you may or may not have watched for a little too long.

Once you'd changed into more casual attire, you took the short walk down the street to Eddie's house. By this time, the sun was half set, and his garage had been shut, the only evidence that someone was home being the lights on in the kitchen.

"There you are. Was starting to worry," Eddie grinned at you as soon as the door swung open. You noted a flash of silver behind his teeth as his tongue swiped against his side teeth, and the tickling in your lower gut a moment later.

"Aw, you worry about me?"

“All the time, sweetheart,” the man flashed a grin, stepping aside to welcome you inside. "So, what's gotcha down?"

You heaved a groan, plopping onto his couch. "It's such a long story, I'm not even sure I have it in me to tell the whole thing. But he treated me like one of the guys. I mean, I want us to be friends too, but..." you clicked your tongue and sighed, words escaping you.

Meanwhile Eddie just watched you, arm slung over the back cushion across from you on the other side of the L of the couch. His beer bottle rested on his knee, balanced by his hand. "You wanted to be romanced."

"Yeah, I guess so. He didn't even make sure I got to my car safely."

Eddie's eyed widened, head cocking in disbelief. "Are you kidding?" When you shook your head no, he flung his hands in the air. "That's not even romantic! I do that for my friend's kids I drive around because I don't want them getting kidnapped!"

"I know, I know. That's not even the worst part."

Eddie scoffed. "What could possibly be worse?"

"Let's just say I know more about his bowel happenings than I would like to."

Eddie wrinkled his nose, sucked in a breath through his teeth. "Yeah, y'know princess, I get the feeling he's not your soulmate." He set his bottle down with a clink on the wood, running his hands up his thighs. "Man, even I could do better."

Something in your stomach turned over at the thought. Eddie seemed to notice your change in demeanor, however slight, and set his bottle down.

"Could you?"

Although it was after a few long, heavy seconds, the words escaped you faster than your brain could process them. Eddie's eyebrows twitched in something mixing amusement and bewilderment.

"I could," he mused. You swore that when he shifted his legs opened a little bit wider. "'Least your night wouldn't end complaining to a friend over a beer."

"Oh yeah? How would my night have ended?"

Eddie cocked a brow, lips curling.

You tilted your head to the side, eyeing him. Another long, heavy moment settled between you two, where you sat staring at one another.

Then your mouth moved of its own accord.

"Show me."

Slowly, so slowly, Eddie stood. sauntered over to where you sat. He watched you like a hawk, mischievous eyes captivating yours. A single, calloused hand reached out to your jaw, tilting it up a bit so that you were facing him. Eddie's mouth quirked up at the new sight.

"Y'want me to show you how your night should've ended, princess?" He crooned. You nodded dumbly, earning another chuckle. "Show you how you deserve to be treated, hm?"

Before you could give a response, Eddie's mouth was on yours, slow and deliberate and relaxed, seeming to simultaneously pull tension from your bones and set your skin on fire. Your fingers reached for his jacket, tugging him closer. Eddie gripped the couch back behind you to hold his weight, other hand coming to cup the back of your neck, slinking into your hair. His thumb rested on your pulse, smirking a little when he felt it racing.

"Pretty thing," he murmured in between hot kisses, "are you sure about this?"

"So sure, Eddie, please," you breathed, tugging his jacket off; the leather was cool to the touch, nice on your searing fingertips.

You could feel his mouth quirk up at your desperation. The hand that held the couch came down to your legs, lighting fire in their wake and finding the crook under your knee, tugging outwards. Heat brewed in your core at the implication- fueled even more so when Eddie pulled back with a grunt to tug his jacket away. Your eyes seemed to be locked in on his, somehow darker and lit with something primal. His kiss-bitten lips hung open in a lazy grin.

"C'mere, pretty." Eddie's hands grip your thighs with a searing mix of worship and need, pulling them apart and tugging you towards the end of the couch by the crooks under your knees. You let out a squeak, breaking quickly into a stifled hum of pleasure as his mouth found and made quick work of your neck, kissing and nipping and licking with that damn ball of metal down the front of your throat, hands splaying over your thighs appreciatively all the while.

"Eddie," your voice had risen into a near whine, but you couldn't bring yourself to care. All thoughts were clouded with his storm- his breath fanning your jaw, warmth radiating onto your body, almost chest to chest, hands teasing dangerously high.

"Hm?"

"Please, please Eddie..." you weren't sure what you were asking for, really, you just knew you wanted more of him. However he would give himself to you you would gladly take.

"Please what? Y'know I'm all yours, honey, I'll give you everything you want and then some but I can't help you if I don't know what that is."

"More," you huffed, reaching for his wrists.

"More?" Eddie teased; the condescending lilt in his tone was overwhelmingly obvious, but in your frenzied state you only nodded limply. Your hand tugged at his, and he followed your lead as you dragged his hand towards your neck, pressing at the back of his hand to indicate what you wanted him to do.

"Oh? Princess likes choking, huh?" The excitement in Eddie's voice was hardly containable, but he managed to play it off cooler than how he really felt- like a dog who just heard dinner being poured into his bowl. "That is interesting."

Eddie's grip on your neck wasn't really that strong, but it made your head spin nonetheless, eliciting a weak, content noise from you.

"There we go, fuckin' love hearing that." Eddie gave a kiss to your cheek, his other hand occupied with sending shock waves down to your gut as his fingers walked up the back of your leg. "What else does princess want, hm?"

You only let out a whine, too engrossed with the building, unbearable heat in between your legs, which, at the sound of his nickname, twitched further open.

Lucky for you, Eddie picked up on that immediately. "Aw, sweet thing, shoulda told me." He tuts, moving both hands under you and rearranging the two of you so that your crotch was hovering over his thigh, other leg hooking onto yours so that you were spread open for him.

"Here we go honey, y'wanna use my leg, hm? Get yourself off?" His words were muffled by the skin of your shoulder.

Realistically you knew you wouldn't be able to orgasm from dry humping his thigh alone, but God you were so eager for friction you were willing to try. You whimpered an 'mhm', setting yourself down on his leg- even that small touch made you gasp. Eddie's hands reached for your ass, helping you grind down onto him, nearly knocking the breath out of you when the contact you so desperately craved turned into a wildfire of need.

"That's it, sweetheart, keep going. 'S'it feel good? Yeah?" He mimicked your whimper of response, proud grin never faltering, even as he nipped at your jaw. His hands, firm, surprisingly gentle for how rough and calloused they felt, traveled from your ass to your waist, fingertips slinking under the hem of your shirt.

"Can we take this off, princess? Want to see you, pretty please let me see you." His voice was low and sultry and had goosebumps rising on your back. You whined an 'mhm', the thought of what he was going to do when you were topless spurring you to pull it over your head yourself.

Once your chest was bared to him, Eddie's hands, trailing lightly enough to tickle, found your poor, sensitive nipples, thumbs brushing over them enough to make you jolt, gasping in surprise.

"Eddie, Eddie- fuck, more, need more, please," you cried, hand flying to his hair when his head dipped to lick over your chest. Whether it was to tug him away or keep him there, you didn't know.

"Aw, I know, you're just insatiable, aren't you?" Eddie gave you his best faux sympathetic voice, and for a minute you actually thought he might feel sorry for you, like it wasn't his plan all along to get you worked up like this.

Eddie's hands worked under your legs, pulling you closer to him before hoisting you up, stomping somewhere in the house you'd only visited a handful of times and never under this circumstance- his bedroom.

It was a dimly lit room, smelling faintly of weed, but you weren't given much time to take in the sights because Eddie plopped you down on his bed, immediately towering over you, caging you in with his arms. His curls tickled your face, then your neck when he moved there. A few sloppy kisses quickly turned heated again when his leg wedged itself between yours. You took the opportunity, however fleeting, to rut yourself against the material.

But this time Eddie gripped your hips, pinning you down. "Patience honey, I'm getting there." The glint of warning in his eyes had you nearly shaking in excitement. A glimmer inside of you wondered what he'd be like if you ignored his warnings.

Eddie slithered down, slowly, kissing his way down to your navel. You willed your hips to stay down, not to lean into his touch, but they did anyway. Your eyes fell shut, head falling back and fingers finding the pillow for something to weakly grip onto.

But a tap on your hipbone snapped them open, looking down at a pair of big brown eyes staring up at you, hovering over your cunt. Knowing what he was asking, you responded with lifting your hips, making it easy for Eddie to slip your bottoms down Your phone nearly fell out of your back pocket from the force with which he flung them, as if he detested the fabric for its audacity to cover you up.

"Good, doing so good." Eddie gave your thighs a squeeze, smiling up at you with something a little kinder, more endearing than the smirk he'd donned the whole evening. With another squeeze, his head dipped down close to your clothed cunt. You swore you could hear him inhale, but your train of thought was halted when Eddie licked a fat stripe up the front of your underwear, sending shocks to your already hypersensitive clit.

"God- fuck!" You tried to clap a hand over your mouth, but Eddie tugged it away as quickly as it came.

"Y'doin' alright, princess? You seem a little tense." Eddie's teasing lilt came from somewhere under you, you could see the grin even through closed eyes. You opened them anyways. His smile was turned into something more playful, a glimpse of the boyish humor he always charmed you with. His head leaned against your thigh like a puppy, pouting up at you with false concern.

"Wonder fuckin' why," you gritted through your teeth, throwing your head back in exasperation.

"Easy tiger," Eddie chuckled, fingers pulling your underwear down- this time you definitely heard an inhale. You heard him mutter something along the lines of "saving these for later."

Eddie's fingers were quick to find you again, thumbs brushing over the joint between your thighs and your pussy, as if he thought the action was soothing and not setting you on fire.

You let out a strangled sound. "Eddie, I swear, if you don't fucking touch me-"

"You'll what?" Eddie's brow raised. His gaze alone made any snide remark die on your tongue.

As if on cue, your phone, long forgotten on the edge of your bed, lit up with an incoming call.

"Well?" Eddie prompted. You reached for the phone, seeing the absolute last name you cared to see illuminating the screen. You gulped, a tinge of guilt seeping in.

"Ah, I think I know who it is." Eddie chuckled, forehead knocking into your thigh as he made a poor attempt to hide his thorough amusement. "Well? Y'gonna answer it?"

You paused, made a face. You didn't even want to talk to him, really.

Eddie barked out a laugh at your reaction. "Shame. He could've learned a thing or two."

You giggled, but it quickly turned into a loud moan as Eddie's tongue, followed by that damn metal ball in the middle, began teasing circles over your clit. Somehow you were both infinitely relieved and worked up even more. Your phone was long forgotten, flung a little too far as, somewhere in the back of your brain, you heard it clatter on the wooden floor. Not that you could be brought to care, not with the way Eddie's tongue felt tracing your weeping hole.

"Fuck, all this for me? Sweet thing, if I knew how good this pretty pussy was sooner." You wondered momentarily what the end of that sentence was, but with his lips around your clit you weren't too worried. Ceaseless and electric his mouth was, bringing you slowly but surely towards that high you'd been chasing fervently for an hour now.

"Eddie, Eddie, I'm gonna- fuck! So good, Eddie, I'm gonna come, pleasepleaseplease-" You could barely understand yourself speak, so lost in your cloud of pleasure. But Eddie seemed to understand perfectly, cooing sweet praises into your cunt as he shook his head back and forth.

"Gonna cum, princess? Go on, you've earned it. Been so good, so patient f'me. Good, good, let go." He pulled both of your hands towards your lower stomach, interlacing them with his.

The noises you made as you unraveled under his marvelous touch were downright pornographic, downright sinful. One might be tempted to say you'd forgotten how to blush, but the heat in your cheeks would have shot down the theory. Waves of pleasure crashed over you, pulling pure electric heat from your sex as you writhed and shivered from Eddie, Eddie, Eddie.

But when the pleasure subsided into jolts, Eddie didn't stop. His tongue continued tracing your clit languidly, and- oh- a new sensation at your core had you squeezing his hands.

"Eddie, ohmygod-" Quickly you realized what he was doing, one finger prodding around your entrance before sinking into your embarrassingly wet cunt, which welcomed him. Your back arched when his finger curled, a guttural sound ripping from your throat as he pushed deeper, searching for that spot, the one that would ensure a noise complaint from a few neighbors.

"Shh, you're okay, you're doing so well, hm? So well, yeah, relax- just like that." Eddie hummed, another finger joining the first and a high-pitched moan from you following shortly after.

And then he found it. That damn spot deep in your gut, and he bullied it with his fingertips over and over and over again.

"Eddie!" His name fell from your mouth like a hymn, moans almost swallowed by the pillow you tugged to cover your face when the brief thought of the neighbors made you a slight bit guilty. Your second orgasm of the night was coming at you full steam ahead, much easier to find from your oversensitivity as well as the new sensation that joined his thumb swiping over your clit.

"That's it, princess, give me another. G'na get you nice and ready, yeah?" Ready for what, you had an idea that sparked, if possible, even more delicious heat in between your legs.

You were animalistic at this point, nearly screaming for him to make you come again. You almost sobbed when his fingers pulled out from you, hands reaching weakly for him.

"Easy, easy, I know. Gonna make it worth your wait, mm? You want my cock, sweet thing?"

Your mouth salivated at the mention, and you immediately propped up onto your elbows to watch him line himself up with you.

"Please, Eddie, please," you sighed, head lolling back.

And there it was, that delicious stretch that had your mind reeling and fingernails digging into Eddie's inked shoulders.

"Oh, oh oh, so good, so good, Eddie, right there!"

Your hands were grabbing for every bit of him you could find. Tugging his hair, scratching down his back, pulling his neck down into a searing, heavy-breath kiss.

"Fuck, princess, keep clenching and I won't last." Eddie grunted into your mouth. His hand, previously pressing onto your lower stomach, pulled your legs so that your ankles rested over his shoulders, bending down a little so that he could move deeper, and did it have you seeing stars.

"Keep- ah- keep going, please, 'm gonna cum, gonna- Eddie!"

Your cunt convulsed around Eddie's cock, throbbing inside of you as you felt white-hot release wash over you. You sobbed into Eddie's pillow, chanting his name as he overwhelmed you with praise. Eddie fucked you through it as best he could, but you could feel he was slowing down, spurts of wet heat in your gut moments later.

"Oh, baby... didn't know you could do that." Eddie was grinning like an idiot, incredulous grin staring down at his thighs. Dizzy, you looked down where he was staring like he just won the lottery.

His thighs were splattered with what you could only guess was your own arousal, even a few drops on his stomach.

"Oh my god," you flopped your head back, hand covering your eyes and trying to cover your embarrassed smile.

"Hey, that was hot." Eddie pulled your hand away, giving you that same sweet smile, squeezing your thigh before pulling himself out. You winced at the feeling, guilt following as you realized his sheets were definitely soiled.

You let out a long exhale, mind still racing. Eddie, having tucked himself into a new pair of pants, watched you. When he concludes you've had a moment to sit and think, he strokes your arm.

"Hey, cutie. You alright there?"

"Uh huh."

Eddie chuckled at the stupid smile you're sure you wore. "C'mon, gotta get you cleaned up."

"Yeah- sorry about your sheets."

Eddie pursed his lips, shrugged. "It was worth it, don't you think?" You attempted to stand, but Eddie held up a hand. "Allow me."

Eddie carried you into his bathroom, seating you carefully onto the toilet before excusing himself. He came back a moment later with your phone, wet wipes, and a glass of water.

You and Eddie fell into more casual conversation- the latter participant heavy on the cocky jokes- it was comforting. He'd offered you to stay the night; not like you hadn't conked out on his couch before anyways.

Brushing your teeth with your finger, you tapped your phone to check the time- and almost knocked it from the sink.

"FUCK." You nearly sprayed toothpaste foam all over Eddie's mirror, holding the phone inches from your face in case your vision had somehow failed you the first time.

"What, what what??" Eddie shouted from the shower, a bottle clattering on the tile shortly after.

You spat your foam out, coughing. You pulled the curtain open enough to push your phone into the shower to show him the time and name of your most recent call.

A pfft noise followed by loud cackling echoed off the tiles. "Oh shit! Y'think he got a show too, sure it wasn't FaceTime?"

Meanwhile you sunk your head into your hands in utter mortification.

Although a tiny part of you was laughing too.

#eddie munson smut #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson fanfic #eddie munson #eddie fanfic #eddie munson one shot #eddie munson x you #eddie munson x fem!reader #eddie munson x gn!reader #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson x female reader #eddie munson imagine #eddie munson stranger things #stranger things fanfic #stranger things 4 #stranger things fanfiction #stranger things #eddie stranger things

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lamentationsofalonelypotato · 7 months ago

Text

Chapter 2: What A Great Freakin’ Way To Start The Day

Pairing: Soldier Boy x f!reader, Reader POV

Summary: When you decided to work with Butcher and his merry band of supe hunters to take down Homelander, you never expected to be saddled with a sullen, grumpy, jerk like Soldier Boy when the job was done. The more you’re around him the more you hate him, but you can’t help but wonder, is he really as big a jerk as you think? Reader is a supe with plant powers. This takes place in an AU about a month after the end of The Boys Season 3, in which Butcher has let Soldier Boy continue to work with him on his team. (I'm real bad at summaries, please forgive me!)

Tropes: Enemies to Lovers (Not in this chapter), Age Difference (Reader is in her 20s), Protective Ben/ Soldier Boy,

Word Count: 5.2K

Warnings: I'm going to label this 18+ because Soldier Boy (he's a warning and everyone knows it), swearing, mentions of sex, sexual innuendo, sexual tension. Ben/Soldier Boy might be a little bit OOC.

Note: This is told from Reader's perspective. Any references to the reader is made using you or your. There is minimal use of y/n. I tried my best to proofread, but nobody's perfect. If you don’t like, don’t read, but if you do like, you’re my favorite!

Internal monologue is in italics and is in first person.

Spotify Playlist 🪴

Series Masterlist

Main Masterlist

The morning begins the same way it always does, with your neighbor Mike blasting "I Will Always Love You" in his apartment at exactly 8 am just as he had each day since you met two years ago. It was the only constant in your life, but at least you didn't have to use an alarm clock anymore. The sound of Mike belting out the lyrics at the top of his lungs was enough to wake everyone in the whole building, including the people on the eighth floor, five stories above him.

But because Mike bought the super’s probably illegally made cologne and because the super was dating Mike’s mother, something that made you regret supe hearing very much, it never stopped despite the numerous complaints.

Then again it was Annie's favorite thing about sleeping over, she liked to scream the lyrics back at the wall and jump on your bed like a crazy banshee. Honestly you hoped that it would stop after Ben had pretended to be your boyfriend, that Mike would finally figure it out and give up.

Guess not.

You sit up in your bed, stretching your hands over your head while humming the chorus under your breath, but you were more of an ABBA fan. If Mike had decided to serenade you with "Take A Chance On Me" or even Aretha Franklin's "You're All I Need to Get By," you might have looked at him differently.

The memory of the dream of his mullet smothering you in your sleep momentarily passes over your mind, causing a shudder to travel down your spine. Or maybe not.

Your bedroom was similar to your living room, covered in plants. Trailing jasmine and bougainvillea blanketed the wall behind your bed in deep red and white, budding lavender, lilac, and honeysuckle sat in pots along the top of your dresser, and a blush colored rose bush, that never went out of bloom, stood proudly in the corner. The only difference was that there were two large piles of books almost as tall as your ceiling, some old some new, braced beside the rose bush like Roman columns. You kept trying to remember to buy a bookshelf, but each time you thought about going to pick one up, Butcher usually called and asked you to help out. Both piles were covered almost completely in pothos and more hung from the brick walls above your only window, that opened the floor length pale yellow curtains with a flick of your hand.

An annoyed purring sound greets your ears as the honeyed light from the now open window wisps over your covers. Bean, your cat, stalks up from the end of the bed, his yellowed eyes narrowed with annoyance at being woken up so early while his charcoal gray coat turns lighter in the brilliant sunlight. Last night he had been in your bedroom when you got home, which meant that he hadn't been around Ben when he came in.

A good thing, because Bean hated just about everyone except Butcher, which you thought was weird. But whenever Butcher dropped by to talk to you Bean always came over to look for rubs, while hissing at anyone who tried to interrupt them. Hughie was actually afraid of Bean, and because Bean was a cat he immediately picked up on this and purposely would jump on the couch next to Annie so Hughie couldn't sit there, Bean also followed after Hughie to the bathroom and waited outside the door to swipe at his ankles whenever he would come out.

But you didn't love him any less.

He puts his paw on your thigh lightly extending his claws to get your attention.

"Oh are you talking to me now?" You smile, rubbing him behind the ears. "I thought you were angry because I woke you up?"

He purrs and pushes his chunky gray head against your hand, but startles when the song switches to "My Heart Will Go On" which causes Mike's mother to join in to his karaoke session.

I'd move if my apartment wasn't so damn cheap.

"Maybe they should take the show on the road. Huh buddy?"

Bean purrs his response while pushing his head further into your hand.

His mom wasn't that bad of a singer, in fact, you thought that you remembered eavesdropping on a conversation between her and the super when she talked about a career as a cabaret singer a while ago.

"Come on, let's see if Gramps killed any of my plants." You smile down at your cat. "If he did I'm going to turn him into a tree."

Bean purrs in agreement.

You get out of bed, adjusting your shirt back down over your shorts before walking to the door with Bean following behind you. You step out into the cool hallway, with more enthusiasm than usual as you try to escape the butchering of the Titanic's soundtrack and collide into something warm and wet.

It takes you exactly seven seconds to realize that the warm, wet, thing that your face is currently stuck to, is in-fact Ben's chest, his shirtless chest. Why he's standing in the hallway outside your door, soaking wet and wearing a towel you have no idea. All you know is that your face is physically laying against the warm flesh of his pectoral muscles.

"Why are you NAKED?" You scream as you peel yourself off of him and turn your gaze away. Your face felt so warm that it was like you'd been standing in front of a volcano for too long and you were sure that you had blushed to the roots of your hair.

You'd only seen him without his shirt on once, when the door to his bedroom was cracked at the apartment he shared with the rest of the group. But it was from the back and you had been walking by to go to the bathroom, and you hadn't looked…

Well, you may have stopped for a second to admire the powerful muscles on his muscular back and maybe thought about waiting for him to turn around so you could see if the front was as good as the back… but you hadn't.

And he certainly hadn't been soaking wet then, and it made you hate him more now, because no one should look as good as he does soaking wet. You personally knew that you looked like a drowned poodle whenever you stepped out of the shower, but him? Soldier Boy looks like he just finished filming a shampoo commercial.

You could see it in your head, him standing under a crystal blue waterfall with the water splashing against weathered rocks before running through his soft brown hair, curving around his broad shoulders, down his toned stomach straight down to his-

NO. Not gonna go there. You could feel your skin heating in embarrassment, almost as if you thought he could read your mind.

"I'm not naked doll, I mean I could be if you wanted me to." He smirks as he hears your heartbeat begin to pick up and reaches for the end of his towel. The towel that was almost too small to wrap around his waist and left very little to the imagination.

"NO!" You shout holding up a hand to stop him, but again brush the front of his chest.

Fuck, you could zest a lemon on those abs.

"Are you sure?" Ben smiles wider, taking a step forward. He's so close that you can smell your grapefruit mint shampoo on him and feel the humidity and warmth of his body as he stands there. For some reason the fact that he used your shampoo, and smelled like your soap, made you feel warm and tingly. It was almost hypnotic. You hated how much you liked it. "Because you're turning that cute little red color you always do whenever I'm around, and your heartbeat is kinda fast."

"No. I don't." You grit your teeth together. "Why are you standing outside of my door naked?"

"Maybe I was waiting for you to come out." His hand presses against the doorway next to your head. "You know, I already took a shower, but if you wanted I'd be happy to get back in with you."

"No thanks. I don't need a shower and I wouldn't shower with you if it was the last shower on earth and I hadn't bathed in forty years." You purse your lips. "Oh right, that happened to you."

Ben frowns at your mention of his time in Russia. You didn't often tease him about being trapped in a lab, you knew that it was a sore spot for him. Plus you'd seen the footage of exactly what those doctors did to him and it was enough to make you want to book a one way ticket to Russia and personally show them what happened when a tree got shoved up your ass.

You open your mouth to apologize.

"I was going to ask if you have any other clothes here. Mine are still wet from last night." He raises an eyebrow, but the humor is gone from his eyes.

"Oh. Um. I can take a look." You turn and walk into your bedroom, trying not to feel awkward about bringing up the lab.

He was a jerk, but he didn't deserve a reminder of how shitty the last forty years have been.

Truthfully, you weren't sure if you had anything that would fit him. Ben was a lot bigger than you, taller and broader. You usually did wear things that were a little big for you, but you didn't think that Ben would fit in any of them.

Maybe I have something from when my brother was here last time.

Darren often dropped by when he was in the city visiting his friends or had a new "business" venture. The ones that never seemed to last and the friends that always seemed happy to spend the moan you "loaned" him for his "best idea yet" as he always phrased it. But he hadn't been by in at least a year.

"It's really green in here too." You hear Ben say under his breath.

You didn't think that he was going to follow you into your room, you thought he was going to stay in the hallway, but no, he had followed you. And he made the room feel even smaller than it was with his broad shoulders and over six foot stature.

The sunlight from the window glinted off his still wet chest and it made your throat uncomfortably tight. For the love of chocolate pudding, WHY does he look so good all the time?

"You can wait in the hall-"

"Wanted to see your bedroom." He smirks. "Though I think that you wanted to show it to me last night-"

You ignore him and turn back to your chest of drawers while Mike and his mother switch to "What Makes You Beautiful" by One Direction. You wince as they begin.

"Do they always do that?" Ben asks.

"Yep. Since I moved in." You sigh, shuffling through your t-shirts.

"He's really got it bad Sweetheart. Maybe you should throw him a bone. Kinda seems like the poor guy needs to get some ass-"

"If it's any of your business- which it's not- I do not like him that way."

"Well they're a little loud." You feel Ben take a step closer to you. "But I bet you and I could give them a run for their money. We are in your bedroom after all, might as well make the most of it."

"I didn't know that you liked Karaoke. I'll keep that in mind for you 105th birthday party."

"What? No I meant-"

Bean purrs loudly from his position on your bed and you wait for the telltale sound of Ben shooing him away when Bean tries to puncture Ben's impenetrable skin with his claws, but it doesn't come.

You glance over your shoulder. Are you kidding me?

Bean is sitting on your white plush comforter, rubbing up against Ben's hand, purring while Ben scratches him behind the ears.

Traitor.

"Didn't know you had a cat." Ben says continuing to stroke his hand down Bean's spine, who stands up and turns so Ben can have a better angle.

"I didn't peg you for a cat person. Kinda ruins the whole all-American Man image you have going on."

He shrugs. "I like dogs more, but I don't hate cats. Usually they don't like me very much."

"I wonder why that is." You grumble watching Bean lean into Ben's hand again. "His name is Bean."

"Bean? Why?"

"Because when I got him I was trying to grow green beans in the linen closet and he would sit outside the door and screech until I gave him a green bean to play with."

"You were trying to grow green beans in the linen closet?"

"Yeah. Seemed like a good idea, but they like the bathroom more-" You finally find the oversized Led Zeppelin shirt your brother left the last time he crashed at your apartment and a pair of jeans. "A lot of my plants like the bathroom more actually."

"I was going to ask you why the bathroom floor and wall was squishy."

"It's moss. It thrives in humid environments." You hold out the clothes for him.

"Uh-huh." He frowns at the clothes for a minute. "So you're saying you wouldn't want a guy to serenade you like that?" Ben nods his head towards your bedroom wall, just as Mike and his mother begin to belt out the chorus. "Thought girls liked sappy shit."

"I'm not a fan of One Direction."

"Right. You like ABBA more." Ben turns towards your door to go back to the bathroom to change.

Shock momentarily spikes in your chest. "How did you know that?"

He freezes as if you caught him doing something bad, turning slightly towards you. "Um- well, you hum their songs a lot."

"When?" You cross your arms over your chest.

"Whenever you're on stake outs. Sometimes when you're reading those files or waiting for Annie at the apartment." He shrugs. “When you were walking last night you were humming ‘Fernando.’"

He noticed that?

"How long exactly were you following me?"

"Long enough." He raises an eyebrow. "Are you trying to keep me talking because you want me to change in here? Because I would be more than happy to drop this towel and show you what a real man looks like Sweetheart."

"Don't flatter yourself Gramps. If you drop that towel the only thing that'll happen is Bean will think you brought him a green bean to play with." You roll your eyes. "Now get out of my room. I have to change."

Ben begins to say something, but the vines hanging above the door push him out into the hall and shut the door behind him.

That felt good.

After you put on a white t-shirt, your favorite pair of jean overalls and your dark green converse, you make your way out into the living room. Ben is there, lounging on your couch like he owns it. He’s wearing the jeans and t-shirt you gave him, but you can't help but notice how the clothes are just a little too small for him. The way his muscles pull at the t-shirt, the way the jeans hug his thighs and butt-

He's getting way too comfortable here. You think to yourself to avoid the thought of how good he looks on your couch. How it almost feels natural that he's sitting here in your living room, inhabiting your space.

"So what's for breakfast doll face?" He leans his head back to gaze at you with a mischievous smile that makes a warm tingle travel down the length of your spine.

"Well, I'm going to have oatmeal and you're going to have whatever you want I guess?"

His eyes darken. "Whatever I want?"

"Calm down Gramps I meant that there's cereal in the cabinet." You roll your eyes to avoid thinking about the kiss last night and then thinking about how it felt for your body to be pressed against his in the hallway when you ran into him. Which inevitably leads back to the waterfall fantasy and-

No. No. Not going to do that. Not with him. He's just good at getting women into bed, he doesn't care about you. You think about how he remembered that you liked ABBA. That doesn't mean anything. He doesn't see me as anything more than a conquest and he probably remembered that because he's changing tactics and trying not to act like a creep.

“You’re not going to pour me a bowl?” His smirk pulls down in an attractive pout.

“I think it’s simple enough for your little brain to do.” You don’t turn around from the kitchen cabinets, grabbing a raspberry from the refrigerator and popping it in your mouth. For some reason you noticed that whatever you grew tasted better than anything you bought at the grocery store. You hoped that it didn’t mean that your powers supercharged whatever you grew and that it was actually radioactive or something.

Because that’s exactly what I need, to turn bright green.

“There’s nothing little about me doll.”

“Can’t you ever have a conversation with someone without it revolving around sex?” You grumble banging around in your cabinets to find your instant oatmeal.

It was a valid point and you were tired of getting whiplash every time Ben acted caring and then flipping back to horny manchild.

“Where’s the fun in that?” Ben laughs. He stands from the couch and makes his way into your kitchen.

It was hard not to notice how small each room in your apartment looked with him in it. His head was only a foot below the ceiling, not to mention the kitchen was only composed of six cabinets, a small sink, a microwave shoved into a corner, a stove top, and a refrigerator that only came up to Ben’s shoulders. Your bathroom was worse, sometimes the shower was small even for you and you didn’t know how Ben fit in there.

He probably had to duck down to stand under the shower head.

And then as you thought that, the image of Ben standing under a waterfall comes creeping back, making the strawberry plant on top of the fridge, the raspberry vines, and the blackberry vines covering your refridgerator burst into bloom.

Thankfully Ben didn’t notice, because he was rooting through the white top cabinet in the corner for one of the cereal boxes.

I’d never hear the end of it if he saw that happen.

You glare at the plants in question, eyes shifting to a deep green as the flowers develop into fresh fruit to cover your slip.

Ben pulls out a box of Lucky Charms, but frowns at Lucky on the front cover, who is throwing a handful of marshmallow charms into the air around him.

Guess he's not a fan.

“If I’d known you were going to sleep on my couch I would have gotten Bran flakes and prunes for you.” You smirk as you pour water over the oats in the bowl before placing it in the microwave to cook. “I know people your age need that kind of thing sometimes. Gets the bowel moving.”

“Make fun of my age all you want.” Ben steps around you to grab the almost empty bottle of milk from your refrigerator. “One day you’ll be happy to find out just how experienced I am.”

“Keep dreaming.”

His dark eyes meet yours. “You’re all I dream about baby.”

You can feel his breath on the side of your neck from how close he is to you, the kitchen seems smaller than it ever has, and he leans forward, sensing your hesitation. One of his hands goes on the kitchen counter to your right, the other places the milk down and then braces on the counter to your left caging you against him.

“Do any of your lines actually work?” You say, throat tight.

“You’d be surprised.” He smirks wider, green eyes sliding up and down your body.

The air in the kitchen electrifies, something passing through the air between the two of you that makes you feel like your heart is going to burst out of your chest. His eyes are softer green now, reminding you of the color of fresh leaves on an oak tree in spring, bright, strong, and full of life. His body is pressed gently against yours, the strong muscles of his abdomen laying on your hips, muscular arms making sure that you don't walk away.

You try not to think again about how good he looks in your apartment, how calm and relaxed he seems when he’s away from Butcher and not wearing his uniform.

Standing here in your apartment, he looked normal, human. Sometimes it was hard to remember that you were, when you could do what you did, when you saw him get hit with a car and shove it away with one hand.

He was still ridiculously attractive, the kind of attractive that you’d read in romance novels and in classic Roman literature, the kind of beautiful that people wrote poetry about, the kind of ruggedly handsome that made smart girls stupid.

You were really feeling that last one. Because you were desperately trying to hold on to your dream of being with someone that understood every part of you, but Ben was making it hard.

It wasn’t that the idea of sleeping with him was terrible. It wasn’t. It was far from terrible it was the idea of having sex without feelings that you didn’t like. You didn’t want to sleep with him because you knew that he only saw you as something to be possessed not as an equal or someone he cared about. Soldier Boy only cared about himself, that was apparent.

He’s only interested in you because you haven’t given in. You think to yourself. It's all about the thrill of the chase, nothing else. I'm worth more than that. I'm worth more than one night.

“In fact, I think it’s working on you doll.” Ben leans down towards you so close you can feel his words in the air between your faces, his eyes searching yours as if waiting for you to say no.

That made you pause. Ben didn’t seem to be the type of man who was patient. You’d walked in on him making out with numerous women on the couch back at the apartment he shared with the rest of the team, saw how he took control, saw how he didn’t seem to wait for them to say no or really say anything at all. Not to mention one time when you walked into the shared apartment and could hear Ben with one of his "dates" in his bedroom. Nothing about that seemed patient at all.

But this Ben standing in your kitchen was different. He was almost smiling, dark hair still damp from the shower curling on his forehead, the t-shirt damp around the collar, jeans a dark blue, and the smell of your shampoo fills your senses again all over again. It made you wish for this person all the time. The one that you could see yourself falling in love with, not the racist, sexist, and inappropriate jerk that seemed to dominate his persona at all other parts of the day.

Funny, the only time you’d ever seen Ben like this, was when the two of you were alone- well sometimes- other times he annoyed you without end and made you want to jump out a window.

But why? Why only around me?

The feeling in your chest grows. It jumps from synapse to synapse, pulses along your skin, buzzes in your blood, tangles through your hair, and radiates through the air like a sound wave. Your eyes drift down to his lips remembering exactly what it was like to kiss him last night. How he seemed to consume you whole, how everything else fell away, how Ben curled himself around you, how he-

Your cell phone rings, breaking through the moment, and making you remember exactly why you didn’t want to give in to Ben and remember the kind of person he was.

You push him away and pull your cellphone out of your pocket. Butcher's photo and name appear on the screen.

Shit.

"Hey Butch, what's up?" You look away from Ben, forcing yourself to calm your racing heart.

Ben perks up at the mention of Butcher’s name.

“Do you have any idea where Soldier Boy is?”

“Soldier Boy?”

“Seems like our blunt smoking man out of time has vanished. Been trying to text him all bloody morning.”

At least he doesn’t know that Ben is here. That’s good. I’d never hear the end of it if-

Ben snatches the phone from your hand and holds it up to his ear. “What the fuck do you want?”

The softness was gone, his eyes had hardened again, and the spell was broken. Ben was no longer relaxed, his shoulders were tensed and guarded, jaw set.

It didn’t take a genius to know that Ben didn’t like Butcher. Sometimes you wondered why Ben decided to stay.

Probably because the alternative was being frozen like Han Solo next to his son.

When Ben had knocked Homelander out, you hadn’t believed it, and despite Ben’s arguing Butcher wanted to keep Homelander a supe, and just put him on ice. You had no idea why, especially since Butcher had been gunning for him forever, but had the sneakiest suspicion that it was because of Ryan.

But you didn't blame Butcher for that, watching your father get killed in front of you seemed traumatic, not to mention Ryan was still reeling from watching his mother die.

You turn back to your microwave to pull out your bowl of oatmeal with a groan.

Now Butcher’s going to mock me endlessly about going home with Soldier Boy. We didn’t do anything! Well…

Your mind flits back to the searing kiss you shared and to five seconds ago when whatever the hell just happened.

“You want me to meet you in fucking Jersey?” Ben laughs.

You choose not to eavesdrop on the conversation, instead you busy yourself with sprinkling brown sugar onto your breakfast and plucking a few more raspberries from the vines.

“Fine.” Ben almost growls before holding out the phone to you. “He wants to talk to you.”

Of course he does. Maybe I can pretend to lose the signal with a piece of paper or a candy wrapper.

“Hello-“

“You crazy wanker.” Butcher chuckles into the phone. “Guess your night was a little more exciting than mine eh? Oi Hughie, you owe me a tener!” He shouts to Hughie who you can guess is sitting nearby.

“What? He’s with y/n! No way!” You hear Hughie shout back, muffled but there.

Damn it he’s gonna tell Annie. She's going to start sending me pictures of babies photoshopped in supe suits.

“You guys were betting that he was here?!” You shout making eye contact with Ben who only smirks before he busies himself with getting a bowl for his cereal.

“He left about two minutes after you did. Said some bullshit about a smoke break.” Butcher is smiling and you know it. “How was he? Was he as good as all the girls say?" Butcher coos on the other side of the line.

“Nothing happened-“

“Sure it didn’t Cherie!” You hear Frenchie crow. “Hopefully you got to relieve some of that tension no?”

“I hate all of you.” You grumble, and before Butcher can say anything else you hang up the phone and glare at Ben. “This is your fault.”

“What do you mean sweetheart?”

“You just had to follow me home!”

“You shouldn’t have been walking out there alone.”

“I do it all the time!”

“Not anymore.”

“What is that supposed to mean?”

“I’m not going to let you walk around alone in the middle of the night.”

"Like hell. I don't need a babysitter!"

"I think you do-"

"No I don't. In fact why are you still here? Why haven't you left?" You shout, snatching your bowl of oatmeal before moving to the wobbly kitchen table that you smooshed up against a window that looks out onto your fire escape.

"Because I tend to like morning sex. It's a great way to start the day. Thought you'd be interested." Ben winks as he sits across from you, barely fitting in the wooden chair.

Your phone buzzes where it sits on the table beside your bowl. When you flip it over, you see the text from Annie.

Annie: YOU SLEPT WITH SOLDIER BOY?!!!!

You: I'm not going to dignify that with a response.

Annie: That's a yes. TELL ME EVERYTHING!!!

You sigh and shovel a spoonful of oatmeal into your mouth, eyes drifting up to the top of your phone screen focusing on the time.

"SHIT! I'm late for work!" You shout before shoving as much oatmeal as you can into your mouth.

"Work?" Ben looks up from his bowl of cereal confused as you begin to run around the room.

The half-eaten bowl of oatmeal falls into the sink with a resounding crash, Bean's cat food lands haphazardly in his bright green food dish, and you practically run to your tote bag that hangs on a peg by your front door.

"I told you. I work at a plant shop." You glance back at your barren coffee maker mournfully. The thought of trying to get through the day without coffee seemed impossible, not to mention you didn’t have time to grab one on the way to work from your favorite shop just around the corner.

"I thought you were joking."

"No. Some of us have to work for a living." You run your fingers through your hair quickly pulling it back in a loose ponytail.

"You should leave your hair down." Ben says from the table watching you.

"What?"

"It's prettier when it's down."

"I don't have time for your misogynistic comments. Come on let's go."

"What?"

"I'm not going to leave you here in my apartment alone. You don't have a key."

"You could give me yours-"

"HA. No that's not going to happen. Come on." You tug on his muscular arm, trying to get him up out of the chair, but he barely moves.

“You know you could call out of work and we could spend the day in bed.” He smiles, eyes tracing your figure. “I mean you look good baby, but I think you'd look even better naked. Plus, Butcher and the rest of those fuckers already think we slept together so we might as well-“

“Not a chance Gramps. Either get up out of the chair and leave through the door or leave through the window. It’s your choice and I have no qualms with throwing you down to the street. But please don't make me do that because I can't afford a new window."

Ben rolls his eyes, but finally gets up to follow you. He actually tries to open the door for you, but you place your hand on his chest.

“Nah uh uh. Bowl in the sink. I’m not going to clean up after you.”

Ben sighs and mumbles something under his breath that’s lost in Mike’s inhuman screech of “Love on Top.”

Yeah. What a great fucking way to start the day.

Thank you so much for reading! If you'd like to be added to my taglist for this series let me know :)

(Photos for series picture found on Pinterest)

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