#going to go write more about them PROBABLY

[chaosartic]

Throw away the caution! | LN4

word count: roughly 2k

warnings: overprotective brother Max Fewtrell, mutual pinning (a bit), Oscar is confused most of the time, bad writing (yes it requires a warning)

summary: Lando (annoyingly) has a crush on non other than his best friends younger sister, Y/n Fewtrell. It was his well kept secret. Why? Because he knows how overprotective Max is of you. What happens when Carlos and Oscar find out about it? Will a drunken night out celebrating a race weekend change their relationship?

a/n: Originally this was supposed to be a one shot but I’m turning this into a mini series. They’re probably going to be three parts. Please note that english is not my first language, I’m sorry for any mistakes in advance.

Lando and Max have been through a lot together as long as both of them can remember. And for just as long Lando has known y/n, Max slightly younger sister. What started as a harmless friendship slowly turned into something more, at least in Landos eyes.

It wasn’t until he was a teenager that he admitted his feelings to himself. He kept them hidden and a secret from everyone. At first he thought that they’re just temporary. The girl he used to climb trees with and joke around for hours grew into a beautiful young lady after all. But the feelings only grew stronger.

Lando was well into his twenties when he talked to someone about his crush, it was no other than his friend and ex teammate, Carlos Sainz. At first he tried to talk Lando into admitting his feelings to you but that was without success. Carlos tried to figure out if the feelings are both sided but he simply didn’t see the Fewtrell siblings enough for that.

He was the silent emotional support through everything after that, trying to get them together alone as much as possible without Max noticing. After all, Carlos didn't know how he would react to the news of his childhood friend loving his younger sister. There were a few close calls in the past but as far as anyone was concerned neither Max nor y/n knew about Landos feelings.

If anyone would ask him why he doesn’t confess his answer would probably be along the lines of wanting to concentrate on his career first. In truth he was scared of your rejection and your brother's disappointment. He and Max are friends after all and it might feel like some sort of betrayal to the older Brit.

Lando was currently in London since he had to be back at the MTC for his pre-season training and meetings. He loved being in his home country even if that meant that winter break was over. It means that he gets to spend time with his friends. Like this evening for example.

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

You hate being late. It wasn't even your fault that a meeting with your boss ran over the scheduled time or that traffic today was worse than the past few days. You were meeting up with your brother, childhood friend and his teammate. And while Max assured you that your late arrival wouldn’t be a problem, anxiety and guilt still washed over you. You navigate your car without a problem down the familiar street to your brother's appartement. The night was cold but with a clear sky, a rare occurrence.

“You know you don’t have to get me anything when you come around.” Max greets you at the door as soon as he sees the flowers clutched in your hand. “Yeah yeah” you wave him off. The apartment was quiet, too quiet for the normal chaos that erupts when Lando and Max are together.

Max notices your confusion. “They got caught up with work stuff too. That’s why I told you not to worry.” He grabs the flowers ready to put them into an improvised vase while adding, “they should be here any minute though.”

“You could’ve added that little detail in your sentence,” you sternly joke with him. He pulls you into his arms mumbling something about next time he will. You missed this, the familiar feeling of being in your brother's arms. Work has been hell for you recently and you didn't get to spend much time with your family or friends. That’s why you didn't think twice about coming around tonight to spend a relaxing evening with your brother and an old friend of yours, Lando.

Before you could do anything else the doorbell rang, announcing the arrival of the McLaren drivers. “I’ve got it,” you said to Max before walking towards the door. When you opened it, you were a bit surprised when you saw only Oscar standing there. “Hey Oscar. Where is Lando?” you ask him after you let him into the flat. “Oh, he’s still parking the car or something,” Oscar said, “he’ll be here shortly.” You nodded your head at his explanation, softly closing the door behind him. You didn’t lock it though so Lando could get in easier.

Max came out of the kitchen to greet Oscar. While the two aren’t that close they still get along well, spending their evenings occasionally in bigger groups together. The Aussi was quickly accepted into the little group of you three after he joined Lando as his new teammate two years ago. You went back into the kitchen grabbing drinks for everyone while the boys already chatted about racing. The table was set, the ordered food waiting on the counter. There is only one thing missing now.

You still had a slightly anxious feeling that you couldn't shake off. Maybe it was because you would spend the evening in such close proximity to Lando. You haven’t said it to anyone out loud but you knew what the butterflies in your stomach meant. While you didn’t want to admit it to yourself just yet, you couldn’t hide it anymore. You were crushing hard and of course that person has to be your brother’s best friend.

“Hey mate”, Landos voice rans out through the apartment. He came into the kitchen with a wide smile, dimples showing on full display. He quickly pulled each of you into his arms as a greeting. His arms lingered around you for a bit longer, both of you silently enjoying the feeling. “Come on guys, the food is still warm.” Max called out while putting the boxes in the middle of the table. His voice was a bit rougher than usual, almost like he was hiding his emotions. You didn't notice it nor did Lando. Oscar however did notice it and for a millisecond a confused look crossed his face. It was gone before anyone could really notice it.

The four of you sat down at the table, a comfortable silence washing over the room. You sit next to your brother across from Lando. You noticed him looking at you a few times out of the corner of your eye. The butterflies in your stomach were running wild, but you hoped that it didn’t show. As much as you like the idea of being together with the Brit, you knew that it wouldn’t be a good idea. Not only because of his career but also because of your brother. You and Max were close and you know his overprotective sides when it comes to the topic of boys being around you. He was always a bit worried about them, maybe given the fact that he raced professionally. It didn't help that you know most of the formula one grid. He was scared of someone using you for your connections, he would not mention this fear though.

You aren't sure how Max would react to the news of you crushing on his best friend nor did you want to find out anytime soon. You talked about everything over dinner; racing, the upcoming season, video games and just what everybody did during the break. You remembered about a year ago when you were all sitting at the same table. Oscar was still new to the group and quite shy, but he opened up which was good to see.

“All right, how about we talk about something different than just racing,” you said. “Not everybody’s life depends on it.” You jokingly added, knowing that the boys love nothing more than to talk about it, especially when they were off for a few weeks. At some point the conversation shifts, now the talk was all about. testing and the upcoming season. “I have a question guys,” Lando suddenly said. His cheeks are a bit pink, unusually so. Your eyes looked over to Oscar slightly, he looked just as confused as you felt. It almost seems like Lando was shy about something perhaps not knowing what to do with the situation. “Do you have anything planned during the weekend when the season starts?” He finally blurted out after a longer pause.

“Not that I could think of,” you replied, looking at your brother. He also shook his head no. “Why do you ask?” “How about you come to watch it?” It was actually Oscar who voiced the question, his eyes always flickering up to you. It was almost like he was saving Lando from something, maybe embarrassment. “For sure,” Max answered quickly, not having to really think about it. The three men turn their heads to you waiting for your answer. “I’m not sure if I can get time off,” you said. “And also don’t exactly have the money for this trip.” You said shyly.

“Sweetheart, do you really think you have to pay?” Lando asked. You look at him shocked, did he really just say that? “I got it covered. Don’t worry about that.” He added quickly. Maybe it was your imagination, but he looked a bit embarrassed about saying it. Max looked at his best friend, confusion all over his features, shaking his head as if he was having a silent conversation with himself.

“Please y/n, it would mean the world for both of us,” Lando added, pointing at him and Oscar. He was almost begging at this point. You didn’t know why it was so important for him to have you there. A small part if you wanted to believe that it is because he also had a crush on you. But honestly those were unrealistic expectations. No, Lando could never have a crush on you. That’s for sure.

“Okay okay,” you gave in with a small smile. “I’ll see if I can get a few days off so I can join you in Australia,”you said. You see from the corner of your eyes that your brother has a sour look on his face again. An uneasy feeling settles in your stomach. ”Well, I don’t know about you guys, but I’m done.“ You try to ignore the look on Maxs face by changing the topic.You took both plates and put them into the dishwasher. You miss the way Oscar looks at both Max and Lando. Ever since this conversation started he has had a slightly confused look on his face, not that you noticed.

It was only a few days after that night when your request for the time off was accepted. That night you spend an hour or maybe two on FaceTime with Lando. He was back in Monaco preparing for the testing in Bahrain. It may have been a few days since that call but you can still see the way he smiled when you shared the news. It was one of the best things ever.

You already talked with Max about when you were leaving to Down Under. While you were more than excited to be in the paddock, see the race and talk to some of the drivers that you know, you couldn’t shake off this weird feeling in the pit of your stomach. It felt like this little trip would change everything but you weren’t sure why. Maybe it was because recently you and Lando have talked almost every night, intensifying your crush on the curly haired man. And even though you were nervous you couldn’t wait to see him in person again in Australia.

part 2 (coming soon)

· · ─────── ·𖥸· ─────── · ·

I hope you enjoy it! Any feedback is appreciated!

Requests are open! Want to be added to the taglist? Feel free to reach out.

[backofthebookshelf]

It's not a controversial take necessarily -- it's just that the particular environment of AO3, where you can see how many times your fic was loaded in a browser window and where the little heart button has a different meaning than it does on every other social media site, is uniquely bad for the human brain.

For the VAST majority of history, both the history of making art generally and the history of writing fanfiction in particular, you did not get to know how many people gave your work a cursory once-over, or how many people checked your book out from the library and never read it, or how many people overheard a line of poetry and thought "huh, neat" and never did anything else. These interactions were, as they should be, completely anonymous and uncountable. Even in the pre-AO3 days of fanfiction, there was an understanding that page hit counters were kind of crap (for one thing, they would count you every time you loaded the page, and you had to load the page to check the counter, so that was incentive not to look at it that much).

Even in other artistic contexts where you do now have page hit counters on everything, they're contextualized through marketing research, not consumed as a raw value. Marketing talks about conversion rate, which is the % of people who saw something who then went on to do the thing you wanted them to do - for a business that's probably buy the thing, for a nonprofit it might be donate or sign up for a volunteer session, for a fanfiction writer it's leave a comment. At work I work with multiple major companies you have definitely heard of who spend half a million dollars and 1-3 full time employees every year on something that increases their conversion rate by 1-2%. They do this because the conversion rate on our emails is 5%, which is INSANELY high.

And yes, leaving a comment doesn't cost money, but it does cost time and energy. Writers overestimate how easy it is for people to write comments--my coworkers are out here using chatgpt to write boilerplate work emails, I can't imagine ANY of them ever leaving a comment on a work of art they enjoyed. Verbally, yes--and "in a friend discord is much closer to verbally than in a comment form--but in writing? Absolutely not.

As for kudos, I can't help but think that the "likes don't do anything, you have to reblog" culture of social media like twitter and tumblr affects that too (and yes, by the latter days of twitter I was seeing people saying that on there, because the algorithm was so broken). Kudos is essentially a like button, and like the like button on twitter that used to be a favorite button before they changed it and some people never stopped treating it like one, it has meanings for people you'll never understand. "It's just a click!" It is a symbol with vague connotations but no specific universally agreed upon meaning; it tells you how many people clicked on that button, and that's all.

So yes, actually, I guess I am saying that as a writer, you are supposed to assume that many more people liked your fic than you will ever hear from or even know about. And that's a good thing! You have the chance to touch someone's life even though they have no idea who you are and don't think of you as a person so much as a semi-mythical figure called "the author". And that's part of the magic, to me, of creating things. You pour yourself into a thing and then you set it loose into the world and you hope it means to someone else as much as it meant to you. Sometimes, very rarely, someone will tell you so, and that's amazing, I'm not going to pretend it's not, but you have to have enough faith in yourself to believe it happens whether you hear about it or not.

I really don't understand how "without getting kudos or comments a fanfiction author is going to assume that people who clicked their fic didn't like it" became a controversial take.

I don't know why some people think an author should imagine, or guess that people who click their fic enjoyed it it when nobody is telling them that.

If you're re-reading a fic constantly, or leaving it up in your tab so that it re-loads every day for a hundred days the author is not going to know that unless you tell them. They'd love to hear it. It would make their day.

And if you don't tell them you liked their fic, there's no reason for them to assume you did.

[totallyxtaurus]

Depollute me, gentle angel

Summary: Sylus is away on a business trip while you sink deeper into your depressive episode. Pairing: Sylus x gn reader Genre: Angst (I guess, I'm not sure lol) Trigger Warnings: depression, mental health struggles, anxiety, self-neglect, and hints of suicide A/N: Soo I was going to make a fluffy/smutty story but my PMDD hit me hard af and then BOOM, this. This was super hard yet easy to write at the same time probably because it's a self insert lol like this is literally me. Sylus' "perfect" persona does intimidate me and I grappled with the thoughts of "what if Sylus was real, could he actually handle this?" I hope everyone enjoys and please please please remember to take care of yourselves! 💗

When was the last time you crawled out of bed today? Your stomach twisting, hunger pangs turn into nausea. But the thought of forcing your limbs to carry you into the kitchen for food feels insufferable. So, you stay buried in the tangle of unmade, unwashed sheets. A hint of fabric softener desperately clinging to the fibers, the stale scent of sweat and skin already taking over. Earlier, you pressed your nose into your shoulder, checking. The sweet floral deodorant from days ago (you think) has spoiled into something sour.  

Each day and sleepless night blend together. They become hard to tell apart, except when the phone rings. Work is calling again—probably to ask when you’ll be back in or to terminate you. You know you should care—you do care! Well, you used to. You liked your job; you were good at it. But does it bring you joy? Right now, does anything?

Everything feels like a chore that you can’t be bothered to attempt. Showering? The thought alone is exhausting. But thinking about the steps that come before the shower is enough to make you sit in your own filth. You reach up absently. Your fingers get lost in the greasy roots and tangle in the mess below. Dandruff flakes dust your pillow. You picked at your scalp while scrolling for hours. Anything to pull you out of this pit you’ve fallen into, for a moment of relief. Your stomach churns each time your tongue touches the slimy coating that has built up on your teeth. Panic spikes at the thought of cavities—the decay, a reminder of neglect. Yet, there you lie, paralyzed by your own anxieties. God, you want to move. You really do. But then you tell yourself, I’ll brush them after I eat, for sure. You know it’s a lie. But it makes the guilt easier to swallow.  

These bouts come and go, pulled in by a force you can’t escape—because you are the force. Like the moon dragging in the tides, summoning waves too strong to withstand. When you’re up, you trick yourself into thinking that you have it all together, like you’ve cracked some secret code. You throw yourself into work, into people, an endless loop on performance mode. Blissfully numb. Until the crash. The tide swells too high, knocking you under and swallowing you whole. Then you’re here, again. Bedridden. Isolated. Time slips through your fingers. Days, weeks—who knows how long. Until someone notices your absence. Usually, him. Then you have to explain why you vanished and begin to collect the pieces of you that have washed back ashore.

“You should trust Sylus more," your therapist had said, voice gentle but firm. “Let him in during these episodes. He wants to help you.”  

You nodded, pretending to consider it, not missing the way they emphasized the "want to help you" part. But the idea was absurd, laughable. Let Sylus see you like this? No, it’s better this way. You can keep your dignity and him, a win-win situation.

This episode—as your therapist calls it—came at the perfect time. Sylus is away on a business trip, conveniently absent when you’ve sunk to your lowest. He gives you roughly three days of no contact before the constant calls start rolling in. This time, luck was on your side, a twisted kind of luck, but still one that was to your advantage. You can’t even begin to imagine the horror that he’d feel if he saw you like this.

Undeserving. That’s the only word that comes to mind when you think of Sylus, especially in moments like these.

Sylus, the man who has everything—and if he doesn’t, he simply acquires it. Always composed, always in control. He’s the kind of person who seems to glide through life, untouchable. You can’t imagine him unraveling, not like this. No, if he ever stumbled, he’d just power through it. There are no obstacles he can’t overcome.  

Until you.

You are the only thing he can’t fix. A threat to the pristine world he’s built. Thankfully, he hasn’t seen you like this, and he never will. He can’t.

Your therapist says your way of thinking is the problem. You don’t let him in. You don’t give him a chance to understand. Your therapist doesn’t know Sylus like you do. What if he does understand—but secretly believes you’re too much? And knowing Sylus, what if he doesn’t leave, but worse—stays out of obligation? Out of pity?

Your chest begins to tighten at the thought, your heartbeat picking up. You’d rather disappear completely than let him see you like this.

But before you can spiral any further, the doorbell rings.

[100vern]

how to cancel your faustian bargain | wjh

FAUSTIAN BARGAIN 🔥 a pact whereby a person trades something of supreme moral or spiritual importance, such as personal values or the soul, for some worldly or material benefit, such as knowledge, power, or riches. faustian bargains are by their nature tragic or self-defeating for the person who makes them, because what is surrendered is ultimately far more valuable than what is obtained.

pairing: attorney!junhui x devil!reader genre: (very lite) enemies to lovers, lawyer au; crack, fluff, smut summary: as the devil, you’re more than happy to grant favors in exchange for someone’s soul, and you’re known for having the most iron-clad contracts around. which is why wen junhui—the scene’s newest contract attorney hell-bent on returning all those souls you’ve acquired—is really starting to piss you off. rating: explicit. minors do not interact with this or any of my work. warnings: member pov, reader is thee devil so needless to say there is a bunch of religious themes and topics here (as a person whose roman-catholic grandfather temporarily disowned her for stopping ccd classes i am qualified to write this dw), jihan as literal devil's advocates, hoshi as a shit-stirring angel who wears questionable shirts, i am the opposite of jovan and do not know the law (especially hell law), i also blocked out most catholicism so don't take any of this for canon, god is genderless and the devil is a sympathetic character sue me, alcohol use, low self-esteem/self-doubt, open but optimistic ending. smut warnings: kissing, mentions of a handjob (actually a major plot point), an actual handjob, oral sex (both receiving), some scratching/marking and biting, jun kinda likes/yearns for pain but it's not a whole thing, light nipple play, fingering, unprotected penetrative sex, everyone orgasms, jun is down bad. in general it's probably much softer than sex with the devil would usually be? wordcount: 22k credits: jess (@starlightkyeom) and bee (@imnotshua) for reading this along the way, beta'ing, and suggesting stupid hoshi shirts. mj (@kkaetnipjeon) and jade (@eoieopda) for helping me with law stuff. everyone in the c&e server who helped me along the way — i yapped so much about this fic that i cannot remember everyone. i am sorry but i love you. note: this somehow wound up being my longest oneshot to date. i don't know how and i still feel like there are parts not fleshed out enough, but big shoutout to my adderall for getting us here. wen junhui, you are a strange little man; i had a blast writing you. this was written for the don't hate, litigate! collab, hosted by @haologram. thank you so much for letting me participate!

The thing is, Wen Junhui is not really supposed to be here.

Not, like, literally here—sitting across from you, the literal devil, at your desk, ass burning a little because it’s really hot here and he is, admittedly, not used to the heat—but metaphorically. Big picture-ly. This is not how I envisioned my life turning out…ly.

The thing is, Wen Junhui barely made it through law school. Barely passed his licensing exam. Watched his classmates score prestigious internships and receive exclusive offers and network and schmooze and, he thought at the time, all but sell their soul to graduate with jaw-dropping salaries awaiting them and no debt.

And it fucking sucked watching that, because he was about to become a lawyer, sure, but he’d gotten scarlet fever as a kid, swore he was going to die, swore he saw not only the light but Jesus himself (his mother called this a delusion, still insists to this day the prodigal son did not travel all the way to Shenzhen to visit him), and decided if he survived he was going to dedicate his life to the church and become a priest.

(He only decided on law school after he got a little carried away with his high school girlfriend, received an honestly mid handjob that had him crying for three straight days and contemplating confession before he decided to take it to his grave, and he’d announced the next night at dinner, weighed down by an impressive amount of guilt and religious trauma, that he was just going to go to university and major in business or finance instead.)

Anyway. Turns out that whole selling their soul thing wasn’t a joke, and where others would’ve seen a loophole, Wen Junhui had seen an opportunity.

Because he didn’t have the grades. Didn’t have the family name or even the drive, because in another life he’s at least a deacon, so he had to do something. Had to think outside the box, get a little creative, carve out a niche for himself that none of his classmates would also be trying to occupy because he had student loans.

“How did you even get in here?” you ask, doing one of those really cool pen flips Jun has never figured out how to do. “A human hasn’t just strolled into my office in at least a millennia.”

Jun swallows, tries not to let show how nervous he is. “I, uh—I’m not sure? I sort of just… walked in, I guess.”

You blink. Study him for a while, eyes narrowed, before you make a small ah! sound and snap your fingers. What the heck? Jun can’t do that, either. “I know who you are now.”

“You do?”

“Mmhm, sure do. You were pretty famous around here for about thirteen seconds when you got that handjob and changed the trajectory of your own life forever. Some of the lower demons had bet money on you eventually becoming the Pope, so you can imagine their heartbreak… and the amount of coin they lost.” You click your tongue, return your attention to the scroll in front of you. “I kept telling them not to bet on that kind of stuff. Teenagers are wildly unpredictable, especially hormonal teenage boys. One of my finest creations, if I do say so myself.”

Not that he had any expectation of privacy here, but to say he’s mortified would be an understatement.

“Oh. That’s… really embarrassing.”

You nod, distracted as you press a large red button on your desk. “Yeah, I imagine for you it would be.”

Two men immediately materialize on each side of you. One is all cheekbones and sharp, calculating edges. Looks like the personification of mischief or perhaps temptation. After that handjob and the subsequent mourning period, Jun had come to really, really appreciate women, but he’s secure enough in his sexuality to acknowledge that the man in front of him—with his long, dark hair and lithe figure; his nonchalant, blasé attitude—is very attractive.

And the other one is no slouch, either. Has what Jun presumes is meant to be a friendlier disposition, a foil of the other man, good-cop-bad-cop, and they must be quite successful, he figures. Can’t imagine a world in which there’s anything that’d be denied to either of them.

Still, they’re well-acquainted with you, because they barely blink as you say, “Please say hello to our intruder,” with a frightening amount of bite.

The dark-haired one offers up a sleazy grin as he leans back against the wall. “Hello, intruder. Do you have a name?”

It’s a predictable question, and yet Jun still startles. Goes slack-jawed as he fixes his posture, sits straighter in his seat. Has the first syllable of his name sitting on the tip of his tongue when the other man sighs and gestures for Jun to stay quiet. “Don’t tell him your name. Better yet, don’t tell him anything, just pretend he doesn’t exist.”

“That’s rich coming from a person who chose to call themselves Joshua.”

Joshua pouts. “I thought there was something to be said for the irony.” A snort tumbles out of him, and Jun realizes that he is not the foil of the other man: he is, in fact, just as impish and rogue. “God is deliverance.” The dark-haired one does not react. “Aw, c’mon, it’s funny!”

“If you have to convince someone it’s funny, it probably is not so.”

Joshua rolls his eyes. “Alright, Jeonghan. As if you didn’t do the same thing.”

“At least when I strive to be ironic, it actually is humorous—”

With an exasperated sigh, you return your attention to Jun, who has suddenly found a fascinating piece of lint on his trousers. Pointedly does not make eye contact with you, because you had been intimidating and hellacious on your own—and, he’s a little flustered to admit, very attractive—but he’s extremely out of his element sitting across from the literal devil and two demons.

“So, Wen Junhui,” you say, tossing a pair of reading glasses onto your desk, “why are you here?”

(“Wen Junhui?” Joshua whispers to Jeonghan. “As in the Wen Junhui that got the handjob?”

“How the fuck am I supposed to know?” Jeonghan whispers back.)

And now it all feels a bit silly, because Jun had walked straight into Hell thinking he’d be able to… what, exactly? Strike up a friendly conversation? Start making demands? Cut a deal that didn’t include handing over his mortal soul?

Maybe the whole becoming a priest thing hadn’t worked out but he’d still learned a thing or two, and he remembers all the words used to describe you, your original purpose. Meant to reflect God’s glory, anointed, given the highest seat at the table. They’d blamed your downfall on pride, on vanity and violence, and Wen Junhui from Shenzhen, China, who once had scarlet fever and got a bad handjob, was a fool to come here and think he could go toe-to-toe with you.

Overcome with nerves, all he can do is laugh as he toys with the hair at the nape of his neck. Considers saying something like you’re gonna think this is so silly before he decides against it. You’ve been accused of having a sense of humor, but Jun can’t imagine this harebrained scheme of his would make the cut.

Still—he wouldn’t be where he is if the bad ideas sitting on his shoulder had kept quiet, and they’re still whispering to him now, reminding him how he wound up here to begin with: less fortunate than his classmates, less connected, looked over for all those internships and opportunities because he wasn’t born with the proper credentials. Those god-forsaken student loans. Desperation forced him to do this, and it’d be a real shame if he got this far only to give up at the last second, wouldn’t it?

So, he does what he did best all those years of law school: he fakes it.

“Let’s say I’m interested in… a partnership, of sorts.”

Jeonghan and Joshua share a look.

“Ah,” you reply, hands folded in front of you. “And what kind of partnership would that be?”

Let no man (or demon) ever accuse Wen Junhui of doing things half-assed, because he’s doing a concerning amount of oversharing and trauma-dumping before he can talk himself out of it. Spills all the highs and lows of his twenty-odd years, including his infamous handjob, much to Joshua and Jeonghan’s delight. They listen with rapt attention, elbowing one another as they gleefully press him for more details, and to their credit they only interrupt him once with lewd gestures before they’re slapping at and falling over one another with laughter.

He gets to his time in law school. Talks about feeling lapped by his classmates and all the advantages they’d been given, the benefits that weren’t on offer for someone like him: the oldest son of a piano teacher and a seamstress. Someone who showed up to class with a worn leather bag (repaired weekly by his mother) and secondhand books yellowing at the edges. Someone who spent his Friday nights and weekends holed up in his dorm room, not invited to parties and mixers.

“I had to do my first internship in personal injury,” he says, arms gesticulating wildly. “No one wanted those internships, and do you know why?” He pauses for dramatic effect. Jeonghan mimics a sound that sounds like game show countdown music. “Those pictures were gross.”

“Tragic,” you deadpan.

“It was,” Jun insists. He’s starting to feel fidgety. Has no idea how his plight is being received. “It wasn’t paid, either, and I had to take out student loans.”

Joshua beams. “Her second best invention.”

“What?” Jeonghan retorts, brows pinching in the middle. “No way, second-best is definitely cocaine—”

From you comes an exaggerated, long-suffering sigh, and Jeonghan and Joshua immediately cease their bickering. You turn your attention to Jun, and if he’d been able to trick himself into thinking a glimmer of patience or good humor or—god forbid—genuine affection had been visible before, no such delusions are available now. Your face is stern, the pupils of your eyes reflecting flames behind him that don’t exist, and the corners of your mouth are tugged severely downward.

He swallows hard.

“Wen Junhui, get to the point. Your human skin is starting to stink up my office.”

Subtly, he tries to sneak a sniff of his armpit. It’s not mountain fresh, but he’s certainly smelled worse, and he thinks he deserves a little leeway as his body acclimates to such extreme temperatures. He then crosses one leg over the other, ankle on thigh, and leans forward on his elbows. Tries to project some—any—amount of authority and confidence as he says, “I need a niche. Something just for me; something none of my classmates are going after.”

“Because you’re unable to compete with them,” you tack on. Unnecessarily and rudely, in Jun’s opinion, but he nods anyway. Behind you, Jeonghan and Joshua are once again elbowing one another, giddy at Jun’s impending failure while desperately trying to keep their expressions neutral. “Let me guess: you want the same deal?” You begin rifling through a drawer in your desk. “I think I still have all those contracts around here somewhere, so I’m sure I can get you something similar, but if we’re being honest you’re worth a good bit more.”

Jun blinks. “I’m sorry?”

“What part are you having trouble with?” you ask, still sorting through files. Only the top of your head is visible over the ledge of your African blackwood desk.

No horns, Jun notes. He was so sure you were going to have horns.

“Er, both, to be honest. What do you mean I’m ‘worth more’?”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes before slamming his palms onto your desk, causing Jun to startle. Just for fun. “Hey, moron, were you not listening when she told you earlier that you were supposed to be the goddamn Pope?”

“You weren’t even here when she said that,” Jun mumbles, every bit the moron Jeonghan accused him of being, because it’s far easier than acknowledging… well, the entirety of that statement.

Does the Pope get a salary? If he does, surely it’s more than Jun’s making now—

“He doesn’t,” Joshua says. Then clarifies, “Get a salary. Just some coins. A woefully underpaid position, if you ask me, considering how many babies he has to kiss.” He shudders. “Disgusting! When you could just eat them instead!”

Aside from the whole eating babies thing, Jun can’t really disagree. Only a handful of coins for being in charge of all of Catholicism and having to know Latin? And having to live in Italy?

“Also,” Joshua continues, “it’s kind of our job to know everything that goes on down here, so we did, in fact, know she told you that you were supposed to be the Pope.”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “And yet he became a lawyer. Imagine if Fibonacci had done the same—the eighth circle would be so boring.”

“Boniface,” Jun corrects him, immediately shutting trap at the look the three of you send his way. “He’s really in the eighth circle? I thought Dante just said that because he was upset about the exile.”

Upset is underselling it, Joshua mumbles. Looks like he wants to say more but has enough sense not to. Beside him, Jeonghan is once again rolling his eyes, growing more perturbed and borderline-homicidal in Jun’s proximity by the second.

Does he really smell that bad? Should he wear cologne next time? Is there a particular note those in the Underworld find appealing? Because Jun doesn’t mind tracking it down. He’s here on your turf asking for a favor, after all, so it’d be basic manners to smell nice and not stink up the place.

He’s about to ask when a booming sound of acknowledgement comes from you. A sly grin sits lopsided on your face as you toss a manila folder onto your desk, so thick a yellowing rubber band struggles to fit around it once. “This is you, Wen Junhui,” you say, pushing it closer to Jun.

All he can do is stare. Feels like his heart is going to pound right out of his chest, and he can’t pinpoint why, doesn’t know what’s got him so uneasy. He doesn’t have to look at it to know his entire life is in that file—perhaps even the before and the after. All the possibilities, all the could-have-beens. The consequences of him going right at the fork in the road instead of taking the left. Endless, and he finally realizes the boulder sitting on his chest is dread: existential variety.

“It’s, uh.” He licks at his lips. “It’s really big,” he finally says, feeling stupid and embarrassed at the way his voice trembles.

“Aish, this fucking kid,” Jeonghan grouses at the same time Joshua snickers and wonders aloud, “Do you think that’s what that girl said when he got the handjob?”

You press the red button again and Jeonghan and Joshua disappear without a word.

“Even in the lowest pits of Hell you must still suffer the displeasure of men,” you say, as if you’re imparting ancient wisdom upon Jun. “I must admit I’ve grown quite familiar with your file.”

“Manila,” Jun replies, also as if he’s being extremely wise. “Didn’t expect to see that around here.”

“Yes, well, the cheap ones are great for papercuts.” You pause and your demeanor grows serious, belying the importance of what you’re about to say. “You’re one of a select few, Wen Junhui. Not many files that come across my desk are this size.”

Pride swells in his chest, booting that existential boulder to the curb. “Oh,” he says, trying desperately to tamper down his excitement. “Yay!”

He does a little wiggle. Mortifying.

“Something you said earlier stuck out to me—something about certain things not being on offer for someone like you.” Your eyes meet Jun’s, and it suddenly feels like he’s been catapulted off the edge of the world. “I don’t think you realize just how much is on offer for someone like you.”

Jun swallows hard. Tries to, anyway—finds that his mouth has gone bone dry. His limbs, too, refuse to work, feel both heavy and weightless, and he’s anxious again, hands and feet saturated with sweat, no wonder he smells, and he knows, he knows, he knows who and what you are, knows this is a trick. Knows he’s offered himself up on a silver platter.

Good god, he came here willingly. No wonder Jeonghan kept calling him names.

“So,” you begin, moving your glasses to the top of your head, “what is it you want? You’re in an elite tier; I could give you almost anything you ask for.”

“Um—”

“You mentioned loans; is it money you want? You’re not quite qualified for billionaire level yet, but I think you’d find both the terms and the offered amount to be quite… agreeable.”

Oh, you’re good. Just as he had with the myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, Jun always thought the story of Adam and Eve was simple: don’t do the thing you’re explicitly told not to do. But now, seated across from Temptation itself, he understands it’s not that simple, that those two never stood a chance. Because the longer he’s silent, the more relaxed he starts to feel. That headache he’s been fighting off for three days finally starts to recede. He feels confident and a bit euphoric, but he supposes everyone would feel that way if they were being offered any and everything they could ever want.

“Actually…”

Wen Junhui isn’t very religious anymore, but he used to be. Used to believe in all the teachings; used to sit at the piano in the living room and hum along as his father played processionals; used to beg his mother to read from the Studium Biblicum at bedtime so he could fall asleep and dream of utopia.

Wen Junhui isn’t religious anymore, but he remembers the basics.

Enough to steel his voice and say, “Actually, I didn’t come here to talk about money.”

Jun doesn’t know what time it is.

It’s late enough that the city has gone mostly quiet. The buses have stopped running, the elevator just outside his door hasn’t dinged in a while, and the light that’s refracted onto his bedroom ceiling is a familiar shade of blue-silver. Not long after two a.m. if he had to guess.

He doesn’t know how he got back to his apartment, either, which would’ve been the more pressing issue at any other time.

But he’s had a long day. Took a little trip to Hell, got laughed at, got offered a lot of money, and got laughed at again. Now he’s got the anxiety shakes. Keeps seeing figures in every shadow. Can’t sleep even though every part of his body is bogged down by exhaustion. All he can do is stare at the swirls in the ceiling plaster and be glad he doesn’t have to work for another two days.

At first, he thinks the knocking is on someone else’s door. Then, once it doesn’t cease, he chalks it up to hallucination. It’s only once it goes from hey, I’m here! to OPEN THE GODDAMN DOOR RIGHT GODDAMN NOW does he stumble out of bed and through the living room.

Through the peephole, all that stares back at him are the dingy fluorescent lights of the hallway.

“You know, judging by the outside, I thought this place was gonna be a real shithole, but it’s not that bad.” Jun shrieks, collapses to the floor with his hand clawing at his chest. “Oops, sorry, dude. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

There is a man in his apartment.

There is a man in his apartment. At two o’clock in the morning.

“Wh-who are you?” he stammers out, eyes squeezed shut as if it’ll protect him. “I do-don’t have any mo-money.”

The man scoffs. If Jun was looking, he assumes it was accompanied by an eye-roll. “Not to be rude, but I was able to ascertain that, yeah.”

Jun peeks one eye open. Before him stands a man of average height, looks to be early to mid 20s. He’s wearing gray sweatpants and a black hoodie that says FEMALE BODY INSPECTOR in large white lettering. His hat, which is so neon pink it seems to glow, simply says SWAG.

He opens his other eye and quirks an eyebrow. “Are you a demon?”

“Ew, no.”

“What are you, then?”

The man pouts. “You can’t tell by my extremely good looks and”—he pauses, clears his throat like he’s trying to remember something—“awesome sauce fashion?”

“I—no, sorry. Also, your what?”

“I’m an angel,” the angel says quickly before he starts digging through his pockets. “Do people not say awesome sauce anymore?” Jun shakes his head. The angel pulls a pen out of nowhere and strikes out something in a notebook. “What year is it?”

“Er, 2024. Almost 2025.”

“What year did people stop saying awesome sauce?”

“I don’t know,” Jun says. “Do you have a name?”

The angel sighs, the pen and notebook both blink out of existence. “Hoshi,” the angel replies. “It means star, which I am. By the way.”

“Okay. May I ask why you’re in my apartment?”

“You ask a lot of questions. You got anything to drink?”

“I don’t remember any angels named Hoshi in the Bible.”

“It’s my Earth name.” Hoshi flutters his eyelashes. “Suits me, right?”

Jun’s eyes narrow. “You also aren’t biblically-accurate.”

Hoshi scoffs, hands immediately finding the waistband of his sweatpants. “I am where it counts.” He starts to pull them down, much to Jun’s horror, and all he can think is, oh my god I’m about to see an angel’s penis, what’s the protocol for this, do I have to look at it, would it be rude not to, this is the weirdest day of my life, I must be in a medically-induced coma—

“I’m getting the impression you don’t really want to see my dick.”

Jun covers his eyes again. “I don’t!”

“Bummer. I’m gonna summon a Baja Blast, do you want one?”

“I—no, no thank you. I think I just—I really need to sleep? But I’m not tired? It’s been a long day and I’m still not one-hundred percent sure I’m not hallucinating all of this.”

Hoshi snaps his fingers and a garishly blue bottle of soda appears in his hand. He beams. “Trade offer: I help you sleep and you take me out for breakfast when you wake up. We have a lot to talk about.”

“You’re just gonna… hang out here? In my apartment?”

“Yes,” Hoshi confirms. “I’m going to look through all your stuff.”

Jun wants to say no. He should say no. Has half a mind to consider Hoshi is lying about being an angel and is instead another demon sent by you from Hell to keep tabs on him, but his aura is different—less… oppressive—so he gives in and nods.

He’s asleep within seconds.

It’s only a few hours later when he stirs awake. Sunlight streams in through the curtains, and the sounds of the city are drowned out by birdsong. Jun feels more rested and weightless than he has in years, and it allows him to wake slowly, recount the events of the past 24 hours and take stock of his body, how he’s feeling. Do some breathing exercises. Briefly contemplate if he has now twice altered the trajectory of his life for the worst.

“Get up!” someone yells from his living room. Right, the angel guy. “I want waffles and the diner stops serving breakfast in thirty minutes!”

Jun stares blankly at the ceiling. There’s no diner anywhere near him that serves American breakfast, but he assumes that isn’t going to stop Hoshi, who has no concept or time or space and no constraints on either.

Thirty minutes later, they’re sitting across from one another in a retro American-style diner.

“Where are we?” Jun asks, peering outside the large window to his right. All the cars are American makes; the walls look like they're made out of silver; all the signs are in English. He doesn’t have to ask why he can understand them. “Besides America. I’m gathering as much.”

Hoshi pours an entire sugar packet in his mouth and grins. “New Jersey. They have more diners than any other state in America, and some are even open 24 hours! It’s my favorite place on Earth.”

“Okay,” Jun acquiesces. What else is he going to do? He’s never been to America before, let alone New Jersey. “What do I order? I don’t know what any of this stuff is.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll order for you.”

Famous last words.

Whatever Hoshi had ordered for him has more sugar in one bite than Jun usually eats in an entire week, but it’s so good he can’t help himself. Half of his meal is devoured before they can get to the heart of the meeting even though Hoshi yaps the whole time—talks animatedly about things Jun doesn’t understand but thinks sound important, like his dog and his favorite music. Hoshi also talks about his love for dancing, and when Jun cocks his head to the side and asks, like Saint Vitus?, all he gets in return is a small smile.

“Okay,” Hoshi says, pushing his plate towards the middle of the table, “now that I’m ready to throw up, it’s time to talk business.” Jun swallows, no longer hungry. “I saw your entire pitch. It was embarrassing.”

Jun groans and face-plants onto the table. “Yeah.” Syrup sticks to his forehead.

“However, it was a convincing story. That’s why They sent me here.”

“They?”

Hoshi waves him off. “Whatever you know Them as: God, the Lord, The Big Boss. They also heard everything.”

Jun slowly picks his head up and studies the angel across from him. Hoshi is weird, no doubt about that, but he’s also endearingly earnest. “And They… what? Want to help me?”

“Precisely,” Hoshi confirms. “And before you ask why, I think that part is quite obvious, but it’s two-fold: yes, it’s partly out of spite, but also—some of those souls were supposed to be ours.”

Jun blinks. Feels like his brain is filled with primordial goo and is about to split at the seams. “Explain this to me like I’m an idiot.��

“That’s what I’m doing,” Hoshi replies, tone measured and slightly confused. “We’re all-knowing up there, as I’m sure you know. We know who’s meant to be ours at the moment of their birth and we keep an eye on them throughout their lives. We’re not allowed to intervene, though, which the Devil knows. Free will and all that.” Hoshi rolls his eyes. “With free will comes temptation, and temptation is a powerful thing. Most people are not immune to it, which is why They took notice of you.”

“Wasn’t I—”

“Supposed to be the Pope? Yeah. They weren’t, like, super thrilled about the outcome of that, but contrary to popular belief, it’s not against Their Word to get a handjob.”

“But I spilled seed.”

The look on Hoshi’s face almost looks like a grimace. “And you’ve spilled a lot more since then. Look, all I’m saying is if the worst thing you do in your life is have sex, you’re not disqualified. We look at the entire itemized receipt, not a single purchase, if you catch my drift.”

“Yeah,” Jun replies, a little dazed. He still could’ve been the Pope. “I became a lawyer for nothing?”

“Not nothing,” Hoshi insists, shaking his head. “You’ve actually put yourself in a very unique position, which is what I’m trying to get to. Some of those souls were meant to be ours, but they fell into temptation and made deals with those fuc—” He coughs. “Those… beings… down there.”

Hoshi reaches across the table and places a warm hand over Jun’s. “They want you to help return their souls to where they belong.”

“And how am I supposed to do that? You saw it: she laughed at me, not to mention she now knows what I’m up to. And how am I meant to advertise? If these souls are already in Hell, it’s not like I can put up a billboard!”

Hoshi’s eyes narrow. “She?” he asks. “That’s how the Devil appeared to you?”

“I—yeah. Is that not how she appears to everyone?”

“What did she look like?”

Jun trudges through the slime in his brain. Tries to remember anything besides—“Pretty,” he answers. “I don’t really—that’s all I can remember. I just remember she was really, really pretty.”

“Like the kind of woman you’d be attracted to on Earth, right?” Jun nods. “You need to be careful. She’ll appear to you again in similar forms, especially now that I’ve been here and told you Their intention.”

“So you’re telling me I have to be suspicious of any beautiful woman that finds me attractive?” Hoshi nods, soliciting a tortured groan from Jun. “This just keeps getting worse and worse.”

“You won’t be able to avoid her, nor are you expected to. It’s to your advantage she entertained you at all, and she certainly wasn’t lying when she said you are of a higher status to her and everyone in Hell. If we want you, it’s only natural they would as well.”

Jun mulls all of this over. Stares into his mostly-empty mug of coffee and tries to make sense of it. “I can’t even remember how I got there. I just had the idea, and then it was like I woke up in Hell. I didn’t mean to—what if I don’t even want to do this anymore? Can’t I just go back to my regular, boring life? This is—this is too much.”

“Unfortunately it’s too late for that. You have been chosen, Wen Junhui, and not just for this.”

Jun scoffs. “You’re making me sound like Harry Potter.”

“Thankfully that lady does not belong to us. Now, would you like to go back to your apartment before we get into specifics? It may take a while.”

“...Can we take another order of these things to go?”

Hoshi grins and flags down the waitress to order another massive stack of sugar-dusted waffles. “I think I’m going to enjoy my time on earth with you, Wen Junhui.”

The specifics are thus:

Hoshi is in charge of what earth-bound lawyers would call advertising. Jun isn’t privy to the specifics; he doesn’t know how Hoshi is even capable of it, if he’s just going to waltz into Hell and hand out business cards or what, but it’s more than he’s able to do so he doesn’t ask. (Well, that’s not entirely true. He did ask, and all Hoshi said in return was, “You know Metatron?” and left it at that.)

Hoshi is also in charge of The List: the souls Heaven wants freed from their contracts and returned upstairs. He allows Jun a brief glimpse of it, who is none too surprised to find a few law school colleagues but still overwhelmed at its length. It’s long—so long it had taken Hoshi quite some time to unfurl the scroll—and it isn’t static. Anyone destined for Heaven that makes a deal with the devil while Jun’s at work will simply be added to the bottom of the list. On and on it’ll go, ad nauseam, until Jun either dies or retires.

Which, speaking of retirement—

In a shocking turn of events, the job comes with benefits. Hoshi had been reluctant to call it a salary. For all intents and purposes Jun will be self-employed: he will be provided with a small office space in a nice area of downtown with no signage, although he’s also welcome to work remotely or wherever he feels most comfortable. Money will appear in his account, though he can opt for other forms of payment if he so wishes. (He’d been offered enough to live off of for a year for even accepting the job but chose to have his student loans paid off instead.)

They will keep him healthy. They will keep his sleep schedule regular and his refrigerator stocked with nutritious food. They will ensure people leave him alone and that no suspicions are cast upon him. They will ensure Jun has every tool at his disposal to be successful.

(It was a lot. Felt like making an inverse deal with the devil—he knew he was playing for the right side, but it was non-negotiable and non-refundable. Wen Junhui had been chosen, and in a moment of self-doubt and self-deprecation, he’d joked, “Can They make me smarter?”

Hoshi’s brows had furrowed. “The list of benefits makes no mention of increased intelligence.” Jun pouted; let out a whiny little oh. Hoshi grabbed another sheet of paper. “Your intelligence stats are nearly maxed, dude.”

“I barely passed law school!” he protested.

“I don’t know what to tell you. If we made you any smarter your brain would explode. Literally.”)

After that, there wasn’t much left to discuss. Hoshi had a lot of planning to do; needed to talk to someone in the marketing department but promised he’d be back as soon as possible. Left a tome in Jun’s possession and told him to study.

Theological Contract Law: A Very Comprehensive Introduction: Cases and Materials - 2326th Edition, it says, and Jun stares down at it full of foreboding. It’s bound in black leather, giltstamped in red. Nothing good comes bound in black leather with shiny red letters.

Still, he does what’s asked of him, lest his student loan pay-off gets reversed. He spends hours hunched over his small dining room table with a legal pad to his right, taking notes on any and everything that may prove important—what he can make sense of, at least, because it doesn’t resemble any legal or governmental structure he’s ever seen.

He groans. Tosses his pen onto the table and leans back in the stiff wooden chair, lets his head loll off the back as the wood digs into his neck. Says, “What the heck am I supposed to do with this?” to the empty space of his apartment, and before he’s even opened his eyes another book appears on the table.

Theological Law For Mortals: An Introduction (Sorry!!!! - Hoshi)

He swears.

The days bleed together. Hoshi pops in briefly to officially assign him his first case: one Kim Mingyu from Anyang-si, South Korea. Apparently sold his soul to be “tall and hot” and Heaven desperately needs him back. “This one’s important to the big boss,” Hoshi says, dropping off a stack of papers with a picture paperclipped to the front with the most attractive, symmetrical man Jun has ever seen. “He was meant to work in recruiting,” Hoshi explains.

Jun whistles low. “Understandable. Look at his face.”

“Exactly, so you get the need for a little urgency.” He tries to stamp it down, but Jun feels the panic start to rise. Has to dig his fingernails into the palm of his hand. “Hey, just do your best. Call me if you need anything.”

Hoshi turns to leave, ugly pair of brand new sneakers squeaking against the linoleum floor of the kitchen, but Jun’s able to stammer out, “What—what if I can’t do it?”

The angel turns, face marred by genuine confusion. “Why would you think you can’t?”

And then he’s gone.

Fueled by Hoshi’s unwavering—and frankly incomprehensible—confidence in him, Jun finds what he needs just after four o’clock Sunday morning. There, on page 4,837 of Theological Contract Law: A Very Comprehensive Introduction: Cases and Materials - 2326th Edition, in subsection 69 of section 567, it clearly states that souls handed over in exchange for vanity-related reasons must adhere to strict guidelines, limited to but not including:

General facial appearance

Eye and/or hair color

Penis, breast, and/or butt size

Height and/or weight

Others TBD

Pushed beyond the threshold of exhaustion, eyes going in and out of focus, he’s not sure the text following the sub-bullet point is real, but there it is: In regards to height, men must be made at least 6’2” or 188 centimeters for the contract to be considered legally binding.

“Hoshi!”

At once, the angel appears across from him. He’s decked out in another stupid t-shirt (Don’t Bully Me, I’ll Cum, this one says) and is drinking a 7-Eleven slushy through a bendy straw. His lips and tongue are stained blue when he smiles and asks, “Good news?”

Jun shakes his head. Tries to erase the scene in front of him. “Maybe,” he answers. “I need you to get an accurate height on Kim Mingyu. And I mean really accurate. Shave him bald if you have to.”

Hoshi’s smile fades as he grows serious. “You really think you’ve got something?”

“I think so.” Jun pushes the book across the table. “Take a look at that part I highlighted. I know his file says he’s 188 centimeters tall, but imagine if whoever measured him just rounded up? If he’s even a millimeter under that, the contract is void.”

Before he can comprehend what’s happening, Hoshi climbs halfway across the table, grabs Jun by the cheeks, and plants a wet, noisy kiss in the middle of Jun’s forehead. “Wen Junhui, you sneaky little minx, I may be a little in love with you.”

Jun’s face flushes hot and red.

“Just—just look into it, okay? I’ve been over the rest of this and I can’t see any other way out of it.” With a sarcastic salute, Hoshi disappears. Feels like he’s only gone a few minutes before he pops back up in the living room wearing a somber expression. “What?” Jun asks, panicked, feeling his stomach drop out of his ass. “What’s wrong?”

“Bad news,” Hoshi replies, heaving a sigh. Won’t look up from the floor. Does an impeccable job at selling it, before he looks up at Jun with a shit-eating grin, barely able to contain his excitement. “For the Devil! Ha ha ha!”

Whiplash. All Jun can feel is whiplash, and he stumbles out of the chair, can barely feel the ache in his bones. Trips over a rogue object on his way to the living room. “What? You mean—”

“You did it! Kim Mingyu officially measured in at a glorious six-foot-one-point-nine repeating.”

Jun grabs onto the back of the couch so he doesn’t pass out. Oxygen is not reaching his brain right now, nor is coherent thought. All those agonizing days in law school during which he resigned himself to being a failure. All those back-breaking nights he had to run to the bus stop to get home from his internship, only a handful of hours before he had to be awake again for class. All the meals he upchucked from anxiety before critical exams. All his classmates that’d ignored and belittled him. And now—

“I did it…” he says, voice colored with pure disbelief.

Hoshi starts doing some kind of concerning, robotic-looking dance. “Yeah, bitch!” A bolt of lightning strikes right in front of him and Hoshi startles. Rubs at the back of his neck and has the good sense to look sheepish. “I forgot I’m not supposed to swear.” He looks up at the ceiling. “Sorry, Boss!”

He turns his attention to Jun. “Go take a shower and get dressed. Wear something nice; we’re going out to celebrate.”

Whatever club Hoshi has brought him to is humid and sticky.

With what, Jun can’t be sure, but every time he presses his fingertips together it takes a concerning amount of time for them to peel apart.

Hoshi leads him to the bar. Hops onto a stool and kicks his feet as he waves over the bartender. She’s cute, Jun thinks; a bright, open smile splits her face as she pulls away from Hoshi, clearly endeared by whatever it was he had said. She moves around the bar with an easy confidence, does a little twirl to avoid her coworker, and Jun doesn’t realize he’s hypnotized until Hoshi digs an elbow into his ribs.

“Take it easy, killer. I ordered us some shots.”

Jun snaps out of his reverie. “Can you even drink?”

“Of course I can, I just can’t get drunk. Not here, anyway. Big Boss made the real good stuff exclusive to you-know-where after a few, uh… mishaps. Down here.” He coughs. “Let’s find somewhere to sit. I’ll come back for the drinks.”

There’s an empty booth tucked away in a corner. Jun takes the side that gives him an eyeline shot of the bar even though it feels a little creepy, and if Hoshi knows what he’s doing he doesn’t mention it. He’s back to yapping about one thing or another, gets distracted by all the commotion in the club—the group playing darts, the packed dance floor, a couple making out near the restrooms. Quite enthusiastically, Jun might add.

True to his word, Hoshi disappears for a second to retrieve the drinks. Jun watches as the bartender hands over a tray of rainbow-colored shots and also as Hoshi pats the pockets of his skin-tight pleather plants. Watches as he panics and frantically waves Jun over. Once he’s in his personal space, Hoshi leans in and whispers, “They say they need a card for the tab. I don’t know what that is so I’m assuming I don’t have one.”

Jun sighs. Explains, “It’s a credit card. How do you survive down here with no money?” Nevertheless, he digs out his wallet and hands his card over. “I can’t believe you invited me out and I’m getting stuck with the bill.”

Hoshi tuts. Hands Jun’s credit card to the bartender without an ounce of remorse. “Relax, I’ll have Matt reimburse you.”

“Who the heck is Matt—” Jun begins to say, but he’s interrupted by the most annoying angel God ever created placing the tray of drinks in Jun’s hands, then asking, “Can you take this back to the table? I’ll be right there.”

Hoshi is not going to be right there. Hoshi is going to hover around the bar because the cute bartender was making eyes at him, and Jun is going to return to their formerly-shared table to drink alone. There aren’t many things more depressing than going out with a friend to celebrate a personal achievement only to end up downing six shots on his own.

…Which are not to Jun’s taste at all.

He’s a habitual Tsingtao drinker. Never bothers to order anything else because he knows what he likes and it has never steered him wrong. Never had his head stuck in a toilet bowl, either, which is territory he’ll rapidly be approaching if he actually goes through with this.

“Is this seat taken?”

Jun knows it’s you without having to look up. Your aura is tangible—something thick and syrupy like molasses and just as dark; something suffocating, something that would drown him—and it follows you like a shadow. Slides into the booth before Jun can answer, just a nanosecond before your physical form does the same, and when you’re at eye level he has to swallow his gasp.

You look completely different.

Still beautiful, he thinks, because it’s hard to think of anything else. Jun knows who and what you are, of course; remembers the warning Hoshi had given him. Knows that this is just another one of your tricks, another layer of temptation, but it’s a beauty like quicksand. It’s a beauty like the misunderstood creatures at the heart of every fairy tale—those haunting kinds of myths meant to both make you wary and suck you in. It’s a beauty accentuated by darkness.

Worst of all, it’s a beauty that’s making his pants a little tight in the dick area.

“What does that imbecile have you drinking?” you ask, reaching for one of the remaining shot glasses. You grimace as you hold it up to the light. “You know, I once watched a man throw back twelve of these things before he stripped down to nothing but a diaper and attempted to rob a convenience store across the street.”

“Oh. What happened?”

You sigh. Place the glass back on the tray. “A comedy of errors, of course. He somehow managed to make it into the store unnoticed, but he had neither a weapon nor something to store the money in. He tried climbing across the counter to get to the cash register, but the clerk hit him in the head with a metal step stool and knocked him unconscious before calling the police.”

“I’m assuming he got arrested?”

“Oh, no.” You laugh, and Jun’s taken aback by how normal it sounds. “He came to before the police got there. I guess the sirens freaked him out because he ran out of the store and got hit by a bus.” Jun must be wearing a particular look, because you follow that up with, “He was always meant to be one of ours, so don’t worry, you won’t have to meet him.”

Right.

Jun had expected this. Not that he’d had a whole lot of time to expect it, considering Kim Mingyu had been freed from his contract for a whopping fifteen minutes before Hoshi was shoving Jun into the bathroom to shower, but it had been a passing thought on at least four separate occasions.

You’re not going to apologize, he tells himself. Wonders if you can hear his thoughts and desperately hopes you can’t, considering he’d thought about getting a semi from how pretty you are. It wasn’t even a semi, really, if he’s being honest. What’s half of a semi? One-fourth of a boner? That’s what he’d gotten, and if you can read his thoughts it’s very important that you know that.

“I’m not Joshua.”

Jun startles. Feels all the normalcy leak out of his body and form a gloopy puddle on the floor. “Um,” he replies stupidly. “Then how did you—”

“I can feel you thinking. Always feels like chickenpox when humans overthink around me.”

He wrings his sweaty hands together. Rubs them on his jeans when that doesn’t work. “Sorry,” he says instinctually. “It’s just—I’m not sure what I’m supposed to say.”

“Why?” you challenge. “Is there something you want to say?”

“I don’t think so. But I can’t imagine you’re very happy with me, and I get this sort of, um. When I know someone’s upset with me it feels like chickenpox, too. And even though I know, logically, that I did a good thing, I still feel like I’m going to throw up?”

Tense silence hangs between the two of you. Jun’s on the verge of word-vomiting another apology when you snap your fingers and turn the remaining shots into something resembling watery honey. You hold one out to him. “Drink this,” you instruct, and Jun makes a point not to let your fingers touch when he takes it.

“Is it poison?”

You heave another sigh. “Wen Junhui, there are some things you need to understand about me. First of all, this is an inherited job. Being The Anointed One comes with a lot of work and responsibility so we get burned out, okay? So there’s only ever been one devil as far as humans are concerned, but in a weird avatar-y kind of way that’s hard to explain and not worth my time to explain to you, specifically, considering you’re the enemy now. Second, I am capable of killing you in ways your human brain cannot even begin to conceive of. I do not need to poison you with ginger tea to take you out.”

Jun looks down at the glass. Raises it to his noise and takes a hesitant sniff.

Oh. Yeah, that’s ginger tea.

That you conjured him… because he said he felt nauseous?

“The last thing you need to understand is that the loophole you found was… unfortunate, to say the least, but Kim Mingyu’s contract was not one of mine. The next contract that idiotic angel is going to ask you to work on was also not my work. If you free him, too, it will be regrettable, but it will pale in comparison to what will happen to you if you even think about touching one of mine.”

You’re gone before the fear can even set in.

Jun blinks, staring at the empty seat across from him. No indication at all that you’d been there, no lingering shadow, just the taste of ginger on his tongue and one of those cartoon scribbles in a thought bubble hovering metaphorically above his head.

He doesn’t—

He can’t—

No, he decides, he is not going to have a mental break in this club. Not while “Friday” by Rebecca Black plays on a loop. Not while he can hear someone to his left vomiting all over the floor. Not while he watches Hoshi skip back to the table and he notices, for the first time all night, what he’s wearing.

“Did you change?”

Because he swears the angel wasn’t wearing that when they left the apartment. The pleather pants, yes, but not the baby pink cropped tank with a decal of a creepy child in the middle that says BOYS ARE STUPID, THROW ROCKS AT THEM.

“What? No,” Hoshi answers, sliding into the seat you’d occupied only moments earlier. “Why does it smell weird over here?”

Jun plays stupid. “One of the dartboard girls puked on the floor.” He’s not very good at it.

Hoshi shakes his head. “Not that.” An exaggerated sniff, not unlike a bloodhound. “It smells like… it definitely smells familiar. I know this smell. It’s like—you know how it feels when it’s about to snow? How the cold and the air burn your nose, but it doesn’t actually smell like anything? As if it used to have a smell, once, a long time ago, and all it is now is just an imprinted memory?”

Jun lies, “No. Nope, no idea.”

Hoshi visibly deflates. “Well, it’s kind of like that. Also a little bit like you used wet moss to put out a wildfire. It fills me with—” Hoshi pauses. Narrows his gaze as he studies Jun intently. Being stared at like this by a guy in that particular shirt is a bit disorienting, he must admit. “She was here, wasn’t she?”

He’ll know he’s lying, but Jun says no again because it’s a lot easier than explaining that being threatened within an inch of his mortal life made him cum in his pants a little.

After the club, Jun gets a few days of reprieve.

He doesn’t hear from Hoshi at all, nor does he materialize unexpectedly in his apartment. No mysterious books show up, either, which is a relief. He’d stored both Theological Contract Law: A Very Comprehensive Introduction: Cases and Materials - 2326th Edition and Theological Law For Mortals: An Introduction on a seldom-used bookshelf in his living room and now the shelf is starting to bow in the middle. One more tome of that size and the whole thing is going to come tumbling down and earn him a noise complaint.

Another one.

Because Hoshi has already racked up three in Jun’s name.

So he tries to go back to life as usual until he’s needed again. Does his grocery shopping in the middle of the week in the middle of the day when it’s not so busy and he can navigate the aisles without crippling anxiety. Goes to a check-up and has to lie about turning over a new leaf and taking his health seriously when his cholesterol levels are back within perfect range. He plays video games, picks a nice willow tree in the park to sit beneath and read (normal books this time), takes some of the Mingyu money to buy a decent watch and a few tailored suits.

For the first time in a while, he’s able to sleep through the night.

But he can’t shake the feeling that it’s all… strange. Ever since you’d shown up at the bar, he swears he sees you everywhere: in line a few registers over at the supermarket, in the waiting room of the hospital, coming out of a fitting room in the mall. It’s that aura again. Stalks him like prey. Has paranoia pricking at his skin, and it’s not healthy, the way it has him looking over his shoulder at every turn, scurrying away from every attractive woman with a frown and mumbled apologies.

Surely this cannot be the rest of his life.

Hoshi swings by on a Tuesday. Just like you said he would, he asks Jun to work on an assignment for one Lee Chan who tried to sell his friend to the devil but accidentally sold himself instead. “Wouldn’t have really mattered,” Hoshi explains. Today, his shirt says BIG DICK IS BACK IN TOWN. “It’s sort of against the rules to try and sell other people.”

Jun spits toothpaste into the sink and prays the towel stays snug around his waist. Hoshi had cornered him in the bathroom. “So why do you want him back, then?” Rifles through the medicine cabinet for his nice hair serum. “Seems pretty open and shut to me.”

“Why do They want him back,” Hoshi corrects, “and I don’t know why They want this one.”

Jun thinks about what you said: how Mingyu and Lee Chan hadn’t been your contracts, were basically freebies; the… avatar-ness; the not-subtle-at-all threats on his life. Says, “Can I ask you something?” as he rolls on antiperspirant.

Hoshi, who’s sitting in the tub making animals out of shaving cream, simply nods.

“She said something interesting to me—”

“Before or after being mean to you made you ejaculate in your pants like a teenager?”

Jun blinks. “Before,” he answers slowly. When Hoshi makes no move to interrupt him again, he continues, “She said the Kim Mingyu and Lee Chan contracts weren’t hers. That the role is… inherited? Something about an avatar? How does that work?”

The angel hums. Adds what appear to be bunny ears to an amorphous blob that does not look rabbit-shaped at all, and Jun tries to tamper down his excitement at the impending explanation. Everything he’s dealt with so far will have been worth it because he’s going to be in the know. The powers that be will reward him with their trust. He’ll finally get some answers to all those questions he fell asleep pondering as a child.

And then Hoshi waves him away dismissively and says, “You know I can’t tell you any of that,” and everything comes collapsing down like a house of cards.

Fair enough, Jun thinks—he’s only successfully completed one assignment. It’s still early days. “But you will eventually,” he says, and whoever’s listening in must think the optimism in his voice is so pathetic, “right?”

Hoshi is not cruel. They haven’t known each other long, but Jun knows that much. He wasn’t created from some Old Testament mold, when cruelty was the point of it all—intended to impress fear and strict adherence to Their Word. So when Hoshi laughs it isn’t meant the way Jun takes it. When Hoshi laughs it isn’t meant to make Jun feel disregarded and unimportant, small and irrelevant, but that’s where it strikes him all the same.

When Hoshi laughs and has no reassurances to offer, Jun is seventeen again, reckoning with his loss of faith. Now he’s a decade older and is constantly confronted by all those old names and characters, and when you’re trapped in the middle of their bidding, where can you go when you need to hide?

Jun has the Lee Chan assignment completed by Thursday night.

A significant amount of money appears in his bank account. He wakes up on Friday to an enthusiastic message from his landlord, thanking him for paying his rental contract through the end of his lease. His parents thank him for the grocery delivery. On the side, away from the proud ears of his father, his mother is especially thankful. She’s choking back tears as she thanks him profusely, says business has been slow, tells him he’s a good son and he’s made them proud, always, even if he traveled a different path than the one he originally planned to take.

None of it takes away the ache in his chest.

None of it makes him feel any less empty. It’s hard to feel fulfilled when you know you’re just a pawn, stuck in the middle of a holy war that existed long before him and will persist long after he’s gone. Wen Junhui will always be on the outskirts, because everyone needs him, but he’s not important enough to trust. He is someone and no one all at once. He is Purgatory.

He needs to feel human—needs to make human mistakes, destroy himself the way humans do. Needs to commit a few cardinal sins and scold himself, wonder what the fuck he’s doing as he rattles ice around his third glass of baijiu. Needs to wake up with a splitting headache and a fractured memory. Needs a hoarse voice beside him to ask what time it is as he stares at their naked back and wonders how to get out of it.

There’s a bar not far from his apartment. A dive, by every definition of the word: broken, flickering neon sign out front, cheap linoleum floors peeling at the corners, 70s paneling on the walls, the stench of cigarette smoke outlasting all the old regulars. It’s the kind of place ghosts gather; the kind of place Jun was always too scared to go, knew the questioning, distrustful stares that’d be there to greet him as soon as he stepped through the door.

Tonight, though, it’ll do just fine.

He sits on a stool at the bar and orders a beer to start. Intends to stay a while. Watches a trio of old men play dou dizhu at a table near the back, empty bottles at their feet, fat cigars stuck between their teeth, insults and accusations shouted around them. To his left, a middle-aged man tries bartering for another drink. Needs it, he says, because he lost his job and his wife in the same week. Fourth job this month, the bartender replies, no pity to be found. It’s only the twenty-second.

Across the bar sits a kid that reminds Jun a lot of his brother. Can’t be much older than eighteen. Might not be old enough to drink legally at all, but that’s none of his business. There’s dirt beneath his fingernails and a large chip taken out of a front tooth. Not a clean break, all jagged edges—the kind that probably hurts to run his tongue over.

Jun feels guilty for a moment, surrounded by all these people with real problems. He’s got money and a respectable career. Has a roof over his head that’s been paid for by someone else. He’s good-looking, has his health and his youth. Has enough to take care of his family.

“Give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.” You sit beside him with a humored smile that shines through a truly pinched expression.

Jun snorts as he empties his drink. “Thessalonians. Gotta be honest, not one of my favorites.” Spares a glance at you: you’re different again, appearance-wise, but the scent you wear like a signature perfume is the same. Heady, like it was bottled at the center of the earth. “Is this your way of telling me that comparison is the thief of joy or whatever?”

Your turn to laugh. The bartender sets a drink in front of you that Jun hadn’t heard you order. “No,” you reply simply. “I’m not all that concerned with human joy. Just thought it was ironic. Come sit with me.”

“This is starting to sound familiar,” he snarks, but he follows anyway.

A rickety table by the window. Winter air seeps through, frosts the glass; has Jun wishing he’d worn a thicker coat. It was warmer by the bar. The two chairs you occupy are upholstered in peeling vinyl, one ripped with the stuffing peeking through. Jun takes that one, figuring you’ll laugh at his human chivalry, but you take the seat opposite him without a word. That old flickering sign outside reflects on your face.

He didn’t come here for a therapy session—he came to get drunk on questionable liquor surrounded by people who don’t know him. You do, of course, which throws a wrench in his plan. You seem to know everything about him, including that he’d be here brooding. “Why’d you follow me here?”

“Well, it certainly wasn’t for your jubilant demeanor and fantastic conversation.” You put your drink to the side. Fold your hands in front of you. “Congratulations on Lee Chan. The outfit upstairs must be very pleased with the work you’ve done thus far.”

There’s no bite. No sardonic tone.

Jun realizes then how differently you treat him. How honest you are. You don’t lie or stretch the truth; you don’t brush off his questions. Hoshi is truthful at an arm’s length. Makes his stomach feel sour.

“I’m just a pawn, aren’t I? It doesn’t really matter if they’re pleased so long as I get the work done.”

You hum an acknowledgment. “People forget what They used to be like. The atrocities They committed and had others commit in Their name—humans, just like you, who were so desperate to appease their God they would’ve done whatever was asked of them.” Jun’s drink refills. He empties it in one go. “They killed their sons, waged war on their neighbors, have done unspeakable evils in Their name. It’s not only you, Wen Junhui, that has been a pawn to Them.”

He doesn’t react. A glass shatters at the bar. “And you?” he questions. “What are you, then, if those are the things They demand?”

“I’m a foil, of course. Would you still believe in good if there was no evil? Would you believe in the promise of eternal life if there was no threat of eternal damnation? Would you still be moral if there was no corruption?” Rhetorical questions. “Although you’re no stranger to crises of faith, are you?”

He isn’t. The handjob had rattled him, sure, but it hadn’t been the catalyst. Not really. Jun had still gone to church that Sunday. Still kneeled and received Communion and allowed himself to be blessed and prayed over. Still bowed his head before each meal and mouthed along as his mother said grace.

No, his loss of faith had been gradual: a question he couldn’t find an answer to, suffering he could no longer brush off with blind faith, words he used to treat as gospel that began tasting acrid in his mouth as he also lost his conviction. Everything started feeling like bullshit, and once everything started feeling like bullshit, he had to wonder what he’d spent eighteen years of his life chasing. What he spent eighteen years of his life believing in.

Until he found he didn’t believe in all that much anymore.

He has to ask: “Was it your doing?”

You shake your head. “People forget who I am, too. They call me the original liar. They say I am the source of all evil. They attribute every sin and misdeed to me, say it must’ve been my will, and yet it says right there in their holy book, in Isaiah 45:7: I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.” You focus all your attention on Jun—he feels the weight of it like a millstone. “I was the anointed one until I was overcome by sin and became the tempter, right? That’s what they say; how they wrote my story. And yet, by Their own word, it was They who created evil. It was God who created darkness.” A hefty pause. “Some may look at me and say I, too, was a pawn.”

“Do you feel like you were?”

You don’t respond. Instead, Jun watches as his view of the bar crumbles once you snap your fingers: block by block replaced with the interior of his apartment. His dining table instead of the off-balance one in front of the window. The ambient noise of his building instead of the bar. A mug of coffee in place of the baijiu.

“What the he—”

It’s within the four dull walls of Jun’s apartment building that you answer: “Even if I was, why should I feel like a victim? Did I not get the better end of the deal?” Jun feels like he’s standing atop a trap door. Like any second it’ll swing open and down, down, down he’ll go. “I rule over my kingdom and make no demands of anyone. I am a consequence of free will and not an inhibitor of it. I dole out punishment only for those deserving of it.”

The coffee is strong. Bitter. Just for a second before it melts away into something sweet. “You are temptation, are you not? Do the demons not do your bidding? Sow chaos in your name? Are you not the originator of all these contracts I’ve been tasked with destroying? If They are to be believed, those people were not meant to be yours, and yet you wound up with them anyway.”

“I like you, Wen Junhui,” you say. “You have an insatiable curiosity that is both admirable and ill-advised.”

He feels his face flush. “Sorry. Got carried away, I think.”

“It’s of little consequence to me. I must admit I have smited men for asking questions, but they were of a more crude variety. More coffee?” Jun nods. “I am who I am. It is who I’ve always been—I was created to walk this path and so I know no different.”

“Predestination.”

“Precisely, just as those dreadful fucking Puritans believed. God needed a foil, a betrayer, and so They created me. I know no other role.”

“You were an angel,” Jun argues. “They say you were beautiful, powerful, and intelligent; they say you were full of light. You don’t remember any of that?”

Sorrow etches across your face. Only for a second—blink and you’ll miss it. It is not in the same realm of pain Jun is experiencing. Yours is an ancient grief. It is something palpable and overwhelming, something liable to consume and destroy everything within its reach if left uncontrolled. Jun wonders if it has been; if you’ve let it unfurl before reigning it back in. If those are the plagues they speak of. Catastrophic disasters and genocides and everything on earth he cannot conceive of.

And then your face shutters. That grief is now nowhere to be found, borrowed features rearranged neatly once again. “Of course I remember,” is all you say.

Companionable silence. Jun sips slowly at his coffee and enjoys it. Wonders, briefly, how he wound up here, with the CEO and overseer of Hell sitting at his dining room table, before he lets those thoughts get chased away by a more pressing fact: there is an extremely beautiful and kind of terrifying woman sitting at his dining room table, and she hasn’t murdered him—yet.

He’s not above noticing it. Isn’t going to pretend he hasn’t thought about the night in the club roughly every twenty minutes since it happened; isn’t going to pretend he didn’t get a little hard in the shower that same night and that he didn’t relieve himself. Isn’t going to pretend that this isn’t doing something for him—the different disguises, each one just as enticing as the last, all of them conjured from deep within his psyche, checking off all his boxes.

Jun also isn’t going to pretend he has very much game. He hadn’t left university a virgin (although it’d been close) and nowadays women aren’t really falling over themselves to date a newly-licensed lawyer with little money and thrifted suits that feel like they’re playing at adulthood. However, if nothing else, this… partnership he has going on has served him well in the confidence department. He has disposable income and no debt. His clothes fit. He upgraded his cheap Casio watch to something that doesn’t turn his skin green.

“You didn’t really answer my question earlier.” You roll your head to the side, cock an eyebrow. His bravado falters slightly at the line of your throat. “Are you stalking me?”

What he aims for: cheeky, a little saucy; the kind of question that’s delivered with a shit-eating grin and earns him a coy laugh in response as you tuck your hair behind your ear. Oh, knock it off, you’d say as you playfully swatted at him. Of course I’m not. He’d catch your hand and press his lips to your knuckles before trailing them up your arm. The first kiss to the side of your neck would be gentle, a little hesitant, and then the heat would take over.

How it lands: an accusation completely lacking in charm and sass. Jun’s eyes widen in panic as soon as the question leaves his mouth, has him wondering how he’s still alive if the glare you send him is any indication of how you’re feeling. He should’ve known better. Jun is not the sort of person who can pull off a comment like that. Doesn’t have the charisma or the confidence. Isn’t sleazy enough. Jun is the kind of guy who lurks your social media after a one night stand to figure out your favorite breakfast so he can have it waiting the morning after; the kind who takes note of where you work so he can have flowers delivered to your desk and not for any other nefarious purpose.

Which, now that he’s thinking about it—

Every accusation is a confession, or whatever it is they say.

“That’s not—”

“What you meant,” you finish for him. Thankful for the lifeline, he nods, not trusting himself to not dig a deeper hole. “You want to know why it is I’ve shown up twice now, during both of your nights out.” He nods again. “You wanted to be suave when you said it, maybe even a little seductive, but you forgot your claim to fame is crying for three days over a handjob and how excruciatingly awkward you are.”

He waits for you to continue. When you don’t, he nods again, wishing he’d spent more time as a teenager on the degenerate parts of the internet rather than at Bible study.

“Are you an idiot?”

Not that it’s undeserved, but the question leaves him stunned. Has his mouth gaping open and shut like a goldfish. This is a trap, right? There’s a correct answer here that he’s expected to give. “...No?” he tries, and when your eyes narrow he quickly changes course. “Yes,” he says definitively. “Yes, I am an idiot. Sorry for my… idiocy.”

It looks like it’s being dragged out of you by force, but the clouds part, birds start chirping in perfect harmony, Jun feels the warmth of the sun—you laugh. You laugh, and it’s reluctant but it’s real, and Jun’s smile is so wide his face feels heavy under the weight of it. It’s so wide you say, “Wow, even your mouth is heart-shaped,” and, if Wen Junhui knows nothing else, he knows he’s in real big trouble.

“You know what else is heart-shaped?” You gesture for him to continue, except he’d just been yapping. Didn’t have a plan. There’s no punchline. And he can’t set it up as a dick joke because that doesn’t make sense. My dick is heart-shaped? What does that even mean? Unless it’s in a cute way? My dick is heart-shaped… for you. It could work, he reasons. Worse things have worked for other men. “My di—”

“No.”

He pretends to pout. “You didn’t let me finish.”

“Because you were going to make a dick joke.”

“No I wasn’t.” You roll your eyes. “I was going to say my… digantic heart.”

A pause. Another beat of silence.

“I’m not going to laugh at you twice.”

A shit-eating grin on Jun’s face. “But you would, is what you’re saying? If you didn’t already meet your one-laugh quota?”

“Don’t push your luck.”

I want to kiss you, he wants to say. Feels the words biting at the back of his teeth, begging him to open his mouth so they can escape and be real. I want to kiss you but I don’t know if it’d be real. Because it can’t be, can it? All the ways you’ve been described throughout human history, not once has anyone said you’re capable of love. Which—that’s not what Jun is looking for here, right? That’d be ridiculous. He has a crush.

A crush on a beautiful woman who looks like all of his wet dreams combined. Who’s terrifying and smart and maybe misunderstood in all the same ways he is. Who is halfway responsible for his current employment. Who conjures ginger tea for him when he feels sick and hasn’t snapped her fingers to turn him into dust… yet. It’s natural, especially for a late bloomer such as himself.

But that doesn’t mean anything.

You look like all of his wet dreams combined but it’s still just a costume. The same way Jun was playing at adulthood in his ill-fitting suits, you’re playing at being human. Take it off and you’re still the devil. Still primordial. Still not bound by the constraints and constructs of time. Not bound by mortality, which is probably the second-most pressing issue behind the whole fallen angel, prime ruler of Hell, purveyor of iron-clad contracts that are really, really pissing off Heaven thing.

“Congratulations,” you say, ripping Jun out of his spiral, “your overthinking has bypassed chickenpox completely and went straight to shingles.”

“They have a vaccine for that now.” Wow, he is really not nailing this.

“I know. Pestilence was devastated. Moped around for ages. Imagine all your hard work gone, just like that, because of science? That’s why I created Jenny McCarthy.” You sigh. “Anyway, out with it.”

Jun chews at the inside of his cheek. “I’m trying to figure out how to ask in a non-offensive way.”

You blink. “I am literally the devil.”

“Who can kill me,” he says slowly, trying to buy time. So are you, it seems, because you’re content to stretch the silence. Wait until it settles in Jun’s bones as anxiety. One of those old tricks he learned during law school that’s now being turned on him. He coughs. “Anyway, I—” He deflates. “It’s stupid, I don’t know why I even thought—”

“Out with it,” you repeat.

“Right.” He sucks in a breath. “Does this mean anything to you? Not in, like, an affectionate, I’m in love with you kind of way, but in a… human… way? Is it offensive to phrase it like that?”

“I think you’ll find not much offends me—except for you and your fucking lawyer thing ruining my contracts.” There are those flames behind your eyes again. The temperature in the room increases tenfold. “So no, it’s not offensive to wonder how human I am or am not, but I don’t know if the answer will be to your satisfaction or understanding.”

“Try me.”

You huff a laugh. Mumble something about the hubris of man. “You’ve read Their book, so you know how and why the angels were created. Ministering spirits, I think it says. Spirits without bodies. I have never known what it means to be human because I never was. I appear as one to you out of necessity.”

“Because my brain would melt if I saw your true form?”

“What? No. Because it’s terrifying. Would you rather hand over your mortal soul to someone who looked like an eldritch horror or someone who looked like one of those women you’ve jerked off to in porn magazines?” Jun swallows audibly. “Exactly.”

“But what does it feel like when you’re like this? When you’re here?”

“I don’t know,” you answer honestly. “It feels different, but I can’t say it feels human because I do not know what that feels like. You’ve interacted with me and have been to Hell—if I asked you how it felt to be the devil, how would you answer?”

Jun doesn’t have to think. He says the first word that comes to mind, which is, “Lonely. I think it’s lonely, because They have worshippers, Their followers are devout and love and trust without proof, and you were created to be hated and feared.” You move to interject, but Jun continues. “Maybe you have those things too, but they’re not the same. They gave you everything and then They ripped it away. Their followers heed every word of the Bible, name their children after its characters, but where’s your book? Why wasn’t anyone allowed to tell your story?”

“Maybe you should write it.”

What you aim for: cheeky, a little saucy; the kind of suggestion spoken around a sly smile that’s also a little self-conscious at someone taking you into consideration—at someone seeing you.

How it lands: fractured; words spoken slowly and intentionally so nothing is given away. How ironic that it’s the most human Jun has heard you sound.

But your bravery is inspiring, even if you’re unaware of it. Even if you aren’t making a conscious choice to be so, Jun can watch you be vulnerable and think he can do the same. He can finally say what he’s been dancing around this entire time, which is, “If I kiss you, what will it feel like for you?”

“The same as any other kiss, I imagine.”

“You’ve done this before, then? As a… human?”

Seems your patience with him has run out. You stand, make your way to Jun’s side of the table slowly. Drag a finger along the back of each chair, nails cherry red and sharpened to a point. He wants to feel them. Wants the sting as they dig into his thighs; as they scratch down the length of his back and mark him up. He wants to feel the phantom bite for days, long after you’re gone and he’s come to his senses. When he stands beneath the spray of the shower and his skin feels raw, he wants to know it was you that had done it.

He understands, now, why people make those deals and shake your hand.

As you loom above him, slowly encroaching upon his space—as the heady scent of you overwhelms him and makes him dizzy, has his eyes fluttering closed and rolling back in his head—he thinks he’d give you anything you asked for.

You lean in close. One hand on the arm of the chair, one wrapped around the meat of his thigh, just on the edge of sharp. Closer, closer, until he can feel the warmth of your breath against his cheek, the line of his jaw, the lobe of his ear. “Tell me: does this feel human?”

It does. Drives him a little crazy how he can feel each word punctuated against his skin; how he can feel your body heat seep through the fabric of his pants—heat he didn’t expect to find. And it isn’t like it matters, because he’d want you no matter how you felt, but it helps to ground him. Keep him in the moment. So he says, “Ye-yeah,” and knows you’re smiling at the need in his tone.

Need that starts in his toes and settles in his belly. Need that grows as your hand trails up his thigh and settles over his zipper, over the bulge you find there. Jun’s breath catches in his throat. He knows the mechanics—in, out; in, out; in, out—but can’t convince his lungs to work. Feels lightheaded and a little embarrassed because you’re not even touching him properly and he already feels untethered.

All you do is pull away, back out of his space, and for all he knows his world’s been turned upside down. Doubly so when he cracks one eye open and sees you on your knees, looking up at him with a half-lidded gaze, lashes impossibly dark. He can’t help it. He reaches out, places his thumbs in the contours of your cheek, cups your jaw, and presses his lips to yours.

Immediate searing heat.

Jun is engulfed in it. You taste like a storm—taste like the first deafening crack of thunder and the lightning that follows. And he knows he’s coming across too eager with the way he licks into your mouth, but you don’t seem to mind. You match his pace, groan into his mouth, palm at his cock with more intention. Jun’s hips roll, seeking the friction; wants more of the stinging pleasure. Wants to haul you into his lap and fit his hands in the curve of your waist, leave bruises on your hips with his thumbs. He wants to trace every inch of your skin and commit it to memory.

But you’ve got plans of your own.

You plant your hands against his chest and push. Jun goes willingly, chest heaving, missing your mouth already. There’s a crooked grin sitting on your face that sends a spark of excitement up his spine, has alarms sounding in his head, but he can’t look away. Everything you do mesmerizes him: the way you run your tongue along your bottom lip, the slow drag of his zipper, how your voice is husky and deeper than he’s ever heard it when you ask him, what do you want, and your smile when he answers, whatever you do.

And what you seem to want is to destroy him in record time. Pants at his knees, hard cock straining against his briefs, he feels like he’s back in high school. Has that same sense of adolescent urgency, like everything’s happening both in slow-motion and not fast enough, because he knows what’s coming. Watches with a lip tugged between his teeth as you free his cock. Whimpers when you wrap your hand around him, reminds himself to breathe; grips white-knuckled at the arms of the chair when you begin to move.

Your pace is torturously slow to start. You seem to delight in tormenting him; in hearing all those breathy moans that escape him and spur you on. You lean forward and spit and everything is slick. Jun feels like he’s going to come out of his skin. He grips at the chair tighter. Digs his nails into his thighs when that doesn’t work and lets his head roll back, neck on full display. Maybe it’s to tempt you. Maybe he wants you to sink your teeth into him and mark him up. Maybe he has a million fantasies, and not a single one compares to—

Your mouth. The sound that comes out of him is unholy. It takes every ounce of restraint he has not to roll his hips and fuck his cock deeper into your mouth, down your throat. All he wants to do is chase the bliss of that wet heat and give in to it.

But he needs this to last. If this is the only time he’ll have you like this, he needs to make it worthwhile.

He needs to tell you, needs you to slow it down before he embarrasses himself by coming in your mouth, except he can’t find the words. Doesn’t want to deny himself even a second of pleasure. Five minutes is all it’s taken to make a hedonist out of him. And that’s… well, it’s not a philosophy he ever thought he’d adopt, but who could blame him when you feel like velvet? When he starts babbling nonsense and you hum in response and everything feels electric?

“I’m gonna—” A sharp nip at the inside of his thigh has his declaration dead on arrival. His body shivers, trembles, tries to collapse in on itself. “Shit, don’t do that, I’m gonna—”

He feels your smile against his skin. Whimpers as you mouth at his balls. Wonders if he’s going to die like this; if someone will come to check on him and find his pitiful, half-naked body right here in this chair, and that is not a sight he wants anyone to walk in on, so he reaches for you, finds your hair and tugs at you gently. Seals his lips over yours before you can come up with any more ideas.

He hauls you into his lap, just like he’d wanted, and dips his hands beneath your top. Skims his hands over the warm skin he finds. Digs his nails in when you bite at the column of his throat and groans as his cock—so hard he can barely think straight; can’t think of anything except burying himself inside of you—brushes against the harsh fabric of your pants.

“God, c’mere.” You oblige. Kiss him with such intensity he no longer cares where he dies, so long as this is how he goes out. Watches as stars explode behind his eyelids when he realizes he can taste himself on your tongue, that you taste like him. Moves his hands to your chest, traces lightly over your hard nipples, delights in the way you react, that it’s him making you feel good. That it’s him you let pull your top over your head. That it’s him that presses praise into your skin like scripture.

He mouths at you indiscriminately: your collar bones, the space between your breasts, the swell of skin there. Whines as you grab at his hair and tell him how to please you. Thinks he’s learning a lot about himself when he does as you say, when he sucks and bites at your nipples, and grows impossibly harder.

You sigh, blissed out; tell him you want his mouth elsewhere, fill his mind with thoughts that have him rolling his hips uselessly, thrusting at nothing, but fuck, he wants it all. Wants to taste every part of you. Wants to drag you to the edge and watch as your body writhes in satisfaction. Wants to know how beautiful you look when you come on his tongue, head thrown back, your nails digging into his scalp.

Wants to bury his cock inside of you before you can come down and watch as your eyes roll back and know, with every thrust of his hips, that he’s leaving his mark just the same as you are.

So that’s what he does. He stands, lifting you with ease, tells you to wrap your legs around him as he carries you to his bedroom. Lays you in the middle of the bed and helps strip you bare. Tells you, in every way he can think of, how much he loves seeing you like this, how stunning you are, how lucky he is. Kisses his way down your body until he’s level with your cunt. He breathes in your scent, desperate for all of you, before he circles a thumb over your clit and follows it with his mouth.

Ironic, he thinks, that you taste like heaven.

He gives as good as he got—flattens his tongue and works you over with long licks. Laps and sucks and doesn’t let up when your legs start to shake. Places one over his shoulder and dives back in. Swears fall from your lips in fractured syllables, breathless cries in between commands to keep going. He’s a man possessed. Doesn’t want to waste a second. Doesn’t want the taste of anyone else on his tongue.

You come with a sob, his name the only thing you seem capable of saying. Jun, Jun, Jun, like a chant.

…Like something he’d hear in church.

No reprieve. He stretches you on his fingers, almost delirious as he presses against your g-spot and feels how much wetter you get. Ruts against the mattress at all the crude sounds he’s pulling from you, unable to help himself. Says, “Can I…?” and slicks himself up with what he’s gathered from you when you nod.

He buries his face in the crook of your neck. Kisses the spot just below your ear as he runs his hands up and down your thighs. “How do you want me?” he asks. “Whatever you want, I’ll give it to you.”

He expects you to want it from behind. Maybe on top so you’re in control, turned away. He doesn’t expect you to say, “Just like this,” as you hitch a leg around his hip and pull him as close as possible. He doesn’t expect you to say, “I want you to look at me,” in that tone, like it’s imperative. Like you need it. He doesn’t expect you to grab the back of his neck and kiss the air from his lungs as he pushes inside.

Heat. Everything is white, blinding heat.

Jun whines into your mouth. Rolls his hips slowly as you swallow it. Your hands move to his shoulders and down his spine, settle in the small of his back, press into the dimples there. He pulls back only so he can tell you to mark him up, that he wants to feel you days from now, and you indulge him. Shallow at first—your nails ghost across his skin, more ticklish than painful, before they dig in a little deeper. Jun feels the bite as the welts begin to form and he thinks his smile must look crazed.

He keeps his pace steady. Fucks in as deep as he can and rocks back slowly, trying to hold on to the way your cunt squeezes him, but you need more. You tell him as much and don’t say please, and when Jun tries to be a little cocky, when he thinks he has a modicum of control and says, “You’re okay, baby, you can take it,” you send him such a nasty glare he immediately gives it to you harder and faster.

But he can’t help but laugh. “What, I can’t call you baby?” he jokes. There’s a rebuttal on the tip of your tongue that Jun does away with with a sharp thrust of his hips. He knows he’s playing with fire, that he’ll pay for this one way or another, but the thought thrills him more than anything else.

“I’m the—fuck,” you swear. Jun doesn’t have to ask why. Everything’s starting to feel tighter, wetter. Both of you are hurtling toward the inevitable, and Jun needs to feel you come on his cock, needs to watch you unravel beneath him.

He grabs your hand. Sucks two of your fingers into his mouth. “Touch yourself,” he says. “Make yourself feel good, I wanna see you come.” He moans, loud and unabashed, when you do as he says.

Each pass of your fingers over your clit makes you jerk, has electricity licking at your heels. Jun feels each one. Feels the way you clench and tremble. A bead of sweat runs down the column of your throat and he traces it with his tongue. Keeps fucking harder, deeper; grinds his pelvis against your clit and falls in love with the way you sound in the throes of lust. Wants to bottle it and keep it forever.

“Jun, I’m gonna—”

Another roll of his hips. Deep, deep, deep. “I know.” Two words he’s barely able to choke out. Feels like he’s being suffocated as his vision starts to go hazy at the edges. All he knows in this moment is your pleasure, your satisfaction, you.

Your orgasm hits with a shattering cry. Jun follows right after, unable to put up a fight against the vice grip of your cunt. It feels pathetic, the way his body shakes with the force of it, but when it passes, when he comes back into his body, all he feels is bone-deep euphoria.

He collapses onto your chest. Presses another kiss there. Sighs contentedly when your nails scratch lightly at his scalp. “Okay?” he asks.

“Yes,” comes your easy answer.

Minutes pass in blissful quiet. Neither of you speak, letting your heavy breathing do the talking, and for once Jun enjoys the sounds of the city outside when there’s someone beside him to hear it, too. “I’m gonna pull out,” he tells you, even though it feels a bit silly.

He feels the loss immediately.

Unsure of the protocol for something like this, Jun does what he always does: pretends there’s absolutely nothing out of the ordinary happening at all.

“I’ll be right back,” he says, punctuating his words with a kiss to your temple. He grabs a clean pair of underwear from a drawer, pulls them on, pads down the hall to the bathroom. He pointedly does not look at his reflection as he turns the tap on and waits for the water to warm. Knows his face is blotchy and flushed and his hair’s a mess and that you’re spread out on his bed looking like the most beautiful thing he’s ever seen, so he doesn’t want to look at his reflection and feel bad about himself. Doesn’t want to taint this moment by feeling unworthy of it.

But a bit of that self-doubt still manages to creep in, because he returns to his room and is surprised to find you haven’t left. That, above all else, you look content: laying on your front, one of Jun’s pillows tucked beneath your head, sheets barely covering your ass. You smile when Jun puts a knee on the mattress and you feel it dip. Smile wider when he kisses the length of your spine and tells you, in a voice unrecognizable even to his own ears, to roll onto your back so he can clean you up.

If it’s too intimate, you make no mention of it. If there’s no room in this moment for this kind of care and affection, if all of this is for Jun’s sake and you’re just letting him go through the motions, you don’t mention that, either.

He works slowly and with care. Apologizes when you hiss at the first swipe of the washcloth, the water warm but still colder than your skin. Cracks a joke about taking you out for breakfast in the morning even though both of you know you’ll be long gone by then, and he waits for that knowledge to sting but it never does, but he’s relieved when you laugh anyway.

It’s when you stop laughing, when your smile slowly disappears from your face, that it all starts to sink in. Because you ask, “Did it feel real to you?” and he’s not sure how to interpret that. If it’s a masked plea for reassurance or if you want to make sure he got his money’s worth.

Maybe it’s both. Or maybe it’s neither.

“I know it can’t be for you what it is for me,” he answers, “but if you’re asking if I had a good time, then my answer is yes. And I know what this is, so you don’t need to look like that, okay? I’m not about to confess my love for you and start crying.”

(That’s not entirely true. He really might start crying, but he’ll at least have enough sense to wait until you’re gone.)

“Well, it wouldn’t be the first time, so I…” You sigh, avert your gaze, tangle your fingers in the sheets. “It’s just—you’re doing all this nice stuff for me, so I didn’t… I wanted to make sure.”

“‘Nice stuff’? You mean helping you clean up and offering you a glass of water?”

You laugh again, but there’s no humor in it. “You’re treating me like I’m human, Wen Junhui. Like I’m the same as any other woman you’d sleep with.”

He cocks his head. “Why wouldn’t I?” he asks, and that’s the end of that.

Jun doesn’t use his downtown office much, but since his apartment still smells like you, he figures he can use a change of scenery. Hoshi will know where to find him if he’s needed.

He ducks into a recently-opened coffee shop and orders an expensive latte with ingredients he’s never heard of. When he pops the lid, he’s both horrified and intrigued by the purple-blue coffee that greets him. Back outside, he breathes in the musk of the city: the exhaust fumes, cigarette smoke, the sweat from people rushing to work.

A jianbing vendor is set up at the corner, fills him with nostalgia—smells just like the ones he ate nearly every morning during law school. He smiles as he orders and asks for extra lajiao, foolishly ignoring the questioning glance he receives in return, and he’s happy as he walks the remaining two blocks to his office with it warm in his hand. Sticks it in his mouth to hold between his teeth as he digs in his pockets for the key. Jiggles it in the lock as he accidentally bites down, and it takes a second, maybe five, but then—

He should not have asked for the extra chili sauce.

All 182 of his centimeters crash through the door and carelessly toss aside his briefcase. Water. He needs water desperately, even though it’s just going to make it worse, which he knows, but his mouth all the way down to his esophagus feels like it’s been set ablaze. Feels like he’s breathing magma. Feels like if someone stood in front of him right now and caught wind of his breath, they’d turn to ash.

Which explains how he misses the person sitting at his desk, their feet kicked up and face hidden behind a newspaper from six months ago.

He finally notices them some ten minutes later, after he locks himself in the bathroom and douses his face in cold water and can be sure he’s not about to die from excessive heat intake. Not that this is any less embarrassing for him: he shrieks, clearly not expecting anyone to be there, and the stranger shrieks in turn. The shriek-off lasts approximately thirty seconds and is cut off by an elderly woman sticking her head through the door and asking if everything is alright, to which Jun sheepishly nods and bows in apology as he thanks her for her concern.

Once she’s back on the street, he whirls around to face his intruder.

“Good morning,” Hoshi says, seemingly nonplussed by the entire sequence of events that have transpired. “Had a little mishap with the chili sauce, huh?” Jun ignores him. Snatches the newspaper out of his hands and shoos him out of his chair and into one intended for guests. “Someone woke up on the wrong side of the bed this morning.”

Jun glares. “Why are you—”

“Or should I say the only side of the bed, considering you had erotic entanglements with the devil.”

Annoyance flares within him. Has that lajiao heat rushing back to his skin. Hoshi’s got a lot of nerve—the same guy who refused to tell him much of anything, who just takes and takes and takes, is now criticizing him for exercising his free will. Well, Jun’s not going to accept that, he decides. Adopts a snotty little tone and says, “So you were spying on me? Wow, okay, you pervert.”

Hoshi balks. Trips over his words as he tries to mount a useless defense. “I didn’t—that’s not—no,” is the best he can come up with.

“Did you like the show?”

“Wen Junhui—”

“Very convenient that’s the thing you watched. Missed my whole crisis of faith, huh? Both of them? Didn’t think I’d maybe need some support during those times?” He shakes his head. Tries to hold on to the anger, because it’s less humiliating than crying after acting like a hard-ass. “At least she’s been honest. At least she’s always been upfront about who and what she is. You guys—you guys have all these demands, all these requirements, but at the end of the day none of it matters. We’re all just pawns, and that’s all you’ll ever see us as.”

The angel stays quiet. Can’t quite discern if Jun’s tirade is over. He narrows his gaze, opens his mouth as if he’s going to speak just to see if Jun will interrupt him. (He doesn’t.) He clears his throat and tries to remember the correct pitch for his Comforting Voice: this will prove to be a pivotal moment in Wen Junhui’s partnership with Upstairs, and he’s going to need it.

“Wen Junhui,” he attempts again. No, the tone isn’t right—needs to be a little lower. “Wen Junhui, I am… holding space for everything you’ve just told me.” That’s better. Sounds convincing enough. “Is it fair to say you feel abandoned and unimportant?”

Jun’s cheeks warm to a mortifying shade of red. “I guess,” he mumbles.

“Great!” Hoshi beams. “Thank you so much for trusting me with this sensitive information.” He snaps his fingers and another manila folder appears in front of Jun. “Since you’re feeling better, this is your next assignment! If you open to the first page, you’ll see the contractee’s name is Choi Seungcheol and that he is of the utmost import—”

“No.”

“—ance.” Hoshi, unused to being caught unawares not once but twice in the same conversation, simply blinks, limbs frozen mid-air. “Pardon?”

“I said no.”

“Right, right… See, I heard that, but I’m not following. What do you mean no?”

Jun stands and starts clearing off the desk. Not that there’s much on it besides a framed picture of himself sandwiched between his parents at his graduation and an unused candle. Peach bellini. Hoshi had procured it from who-knows-where, said it was “an important part of Internet history” (that Jun must’ve missed) and called it a “belated graduation gift,” except the smell was so sickly-sweet it immediately gave him a migraine as soon as the lid came off.

All of this is besides the point, which is this: Jun doesn’t need this office. He doesn’t need this weird job where he reports to these weird people.

He says as much.

“Hey!” Hoshi objects, to which Jun responds, “You’re wearing a shirt with a cartoon wolf on it that says Fighting the Gay Allegations Again. I mean come on, dude, where do you even find these things?”

“You don’t like my shirts?”

“No! And I also don’t like that you just pretended to care about my feelings so I’d get back to work like a good little corporate soldier!” He’s able to fit the picture frame in his briefcase, but the candle doesn’t fit. Even if they’re arguing, it seems rude to give it back to Hoshi when he’d gone out of his way to get him a gift to begin with, so he lets out a frustrated screech and decides to carry it back to his apartment. “Find some other would-be Pope to help you.”

Although his face is blotchy and wet, Hoshi seems undeterred. There are, of course, no other would-be Popes available on such short notice—especially not one that’s earned the favor of the devil—so he needs to think up a plan quickly. If he fumbles Wen Junhui, he’ll either never hear the end of it from the lower-ranking angels or he’ll be stoned, and neither sounds very favorable right now.

So he does the only thing he can think to do: he snaps his fingers.

Kim Mingyu looks exactly like his picture.

He’s just as tall and symmetrically good-looking as Jun thought he would be, dressed in an impeccably-fitting white suit that elongates his legs and makes him look far taller than the six-foot-one-point-nine-repeating he’d measured in at. Dark, slightly wavy hair frames a perfect set of cheekbones, and whatever cologne he’s wearing nearly has Jun drooling.

He might actually be doing that, he realizes with horror, because Kim Mingyu also looks supremely uncomfortable. Is fluttering from one thing to the next, never staying more than a few seconds in each spot, tidying and organizing the same items over and over, muttering apologies all the while. And the board room really is not that big, so all that anxiety is starting to wear off on Jun, who was in his own office only a few minutes ago arguing with an angel that is currently nowhere to be found.

“So sorry about the mess!” Mingyu chimes. Jun can tell he’s trying (and failing) for unaffected. “I didn’t know we were having visitors, but no matter! My mother always used to say…” He pauses. Straightens his posture. Grabs a bouquet of white hydrangeas from a stunning pearlescent vase just to drop them right back in. “Er, I suddenly don’t remember anything my mother used to say.”

Jun grimaces and hides it behind his hand. “‘Have a wonderful day at school’?” he offers.

Mingyu smiles, makes a little a-ha! sound as he snaps his fingers; seems thankful for the lifeline he’d been thrown. Says, “Yes, yes, of course!” and starts fussing over the state of the table. He squirts a concerning amount of cleaner and wipes at it so aggressively Jun fears he’s going to wear a hole in the wood. “I’ve been told there was a slight security issue, but please rest assured that the rest of our guests should be arriving very soon! Any second now!”

That last bit comes out more like a demand.

Even though he feels far less intelligent than Hoshi claims he is, Jun is still smart enough to deduce he’d been snap-blasted to Heaven, not only because Mingyu is here and there are vaguely ominous security issues, but also because there’s a placard next to the door:

Board Room 17 Pearly Gates Wing

“It’s weird seeing you in real life after staring at the picture in your file for so long,” Jun says, continuing to look around. Everything is stark white, which he expected, with accents of gold that dazzles so brightly it hurts his eyes and pink freshwater pearl, and the flowers are abundant and fragrant. Jun feels at peace here. If it weren’t for Mingyu and his rapidly-fraying nerves, he might even call it tranquil. “I think I have a crush on you.”

Mingyu flushes. Unsticks his tongue from the roof of his mouth to stammer out a response that’s interrupted by three more figures materializing by the door.

Hoshi stands in the middle of Jeonghan and Joshua, arms slung around both of their shoulders. The two demons, naturally, do not look pleased. Jeonghan especially looks tortured, which is at odds with his new pink hair, and he’s the first to shrug off the angel. He grabs the chair closest to him and makes sure it scrapes against the floor as noisily as possible before slumping into it, arms crossed, scowl so fierce his frown lines nearly touch his jaw.

Joshua does the same, though he looks far more delighted to have a seat at the table.

From an invisible speaker, Beethoven’s Symphony No. 5 in C Minor comes blaring. Hoshi and Mingyu startle; the latter goes in search of a tablet, completely frazzled, mumbling oh no oh no oh no as he rummages through drawers. Jeonghan and Joshua side-eye one another and come away wearing matching glares. To his credit, Jun sits ramrod straight and doesn’t flinch. When no one’s looking he sticks his fingers in his ears to dampen the noise and smiles politely at Mingyu when they make awkward eye contact.

The music cuts out, Mingyu heaves a sigh of relief, and once the tense silence settles back into the room, he turns to Hoshi and stage whispers, “Should I put it back on, or…?” to which Hoshi frantically nods.

Opening blaring once again, it’s then that you walk through the door, flanked on all sides by an impressive security detail. (Heaven’s, of course. They’re also dressed in all white and wearing mitre hats with SECURITY embroidered across the front in gold beadwork. Jun wonders, briefly, if this is where Hoshi gets his inspiration from.)

You’re escorted to a seat. There are seven chairs on the side of the table opposite Jun; you’re given the one in the middle, and Jeonghan and Joshua immediately move to sit on each side of you. You carry yourself with an easy confidence, not at all rattled by being here in this setting. It’s almost comical how your body language contrasts with Hoshi and Mingyu: how they’re at home, where they’re meant to be, and their unease is so apparent; and you’re where you’ve been exiled from, antithetical to what you’ve been put in charge of, a place that Jun knows picks at all those old wounds like a buzzard, and your composure is faultless.

Something you have to be, he figures.

“Gentlemen, gentlemen, what’s with the long faces?” you ask, brows knit in faux-concern. You look the same as the last time Jun saw you—he’s sure it’s a power play, meant to throw him off, and it works. Heat simmers along his skin as the memories come flooding back. He wonders what you look like to everyone else. “It’s so lovely to see you all again.” You turn to Mingyu, who seems to shrink under your undivided attention. “Especially you, handsome. We’ve all been mourning the loss of our favorite eye candy.”

Mingyu squeaks. “Um!” He scrambles to the head of the table. His hands shake as he tries to unlock the tablet. “There’s, uh—an ag-agenda! For this me-meeting. Very important! Just one moment, please, and I’ll—”

“Very fascinating,” Jeonghan interjects. “Do you anticipate this happening at any point today? I have to oversee a workshop this afternoon about new ways to make men insecure about their penises and I simply cannot miss it. It’s my second-favorite event of the year.”

“What’s the first?” Jun can’t help but ask.

“The social media workshops. Next month’s is about online bullying and new ways to avoid getting banned by safeguarding teams so you can continue trolling in peace without fear of repercussions. The one after that is about sending in anonymous gossip to those Spotted In Such-and-such Facebook pages for places no one cares about.”

Joshua nods. “I think the Stevenage one is my favorite. When’s the workshop about the new Lego shapes to step on?”

Mingyu’s mouth snaps closed. In an attempt to nip the derailment in the bud, Hoshi says, “I think what our Head of HR meant to say was—”

“HR? None of you are human.”

“It stands for Heaven Relations, obviously,” Hoshi snaps, “and we’ve called this emergency meeting because we’ve been made aware of a very troubling development.”

You gasp. Lean forward and widen your eyes like you have no idea what he could possibly be referring to. “No! A troubling development, you say?” You fold your hands on the table. “Tell me all about it.”

Jun, however, cannot possibly play it so cool. Feels dread overtake his body as restless anxiety sets in. The mind reader that he is, Joshua sends him a discreet wink that does very little to settle his nerves. Still feels like he’s drank fifteen cups of light roast coffee and is about to sit for a law school exam he forgot to study for.

“It has come to our attention that…” Mingyu looks down at the tablet. Looks up and over at Hoshi. Grimaces. “Do I really have to say this?”

“Yes.”

He huffs and continues. “It has recently come to our attention that one Wen Junhui, would-be Pope and recently-licensed lawyer accepted into a contracted position at Their approval, has engaged in… sexual relations… with the being known colloquially as the Devil.”

Jeonghan looks sideways at you with the most disgustedly disappointed look Jun has ever seen appear on a face. To the contrary, Joshua leans across the table to high-five him and say, “You dirty dog! I bet it was better than that handjob, huh?” He leans back, whistles low. “Goddamn, why is it every time you get some action it’s like some end of days shit? You ever consider becoming celibate?”

“Not involuntarily,” Jun mumbles.

“Shame,” Jeonghan intones. You laugh at this.

Hoshi, once again fed up with his meeting being derailed, says to Jeonghan and Joshua, “Why are you two even here?” to which they reply, “We’re her advocates. We’re advocating.”

“No advocating has ever taken place while the three of you have been in this room.”

Jeonghan rolls his eyes. “At ease, Megamind.”

“Metatron,” Mingyu quietly corrects.

Jun snorts. Of course. Of course Hoshi is one of the most powerful archangels in Heaven. Speaker of God, permitted to be in Their presence and at Their side; celestial scribe and guide to humanity—the guy who appears earthside wearing crude t-shirts and stupid hats. Of-fucking-course.

All of this is enough to drive him to lunacy. All the things he didn’t and doesn’t know, all the secrets kept locked up tight, all the jokes he continues to be the butt of. Everyone in this room is on equal footing except him, and he’s the one seemingly on trial. Heaven doesn’t care what you do—your role is to sow chaos and they’re powerless to stop you, just as you’re powerless here. No, the only one that will feel the repercussions of this is Jun, not only because he’s the only one capable of being punished, but because he’s human.

He must sense his distress again, because Joshua mouths a watch this before saying, with all the conviction and tenacity of a seasoned prosecutor, “Allow me to advocate, then: we do not accept these accusations as fact without being presented with irrefutable proof, which I’m sure you have, considering you’ve made such a show of gathering us all here.”

Mingyu and Hoshi share a look.

“I—well, you see—”

“Surely you don’t need irrefutable proof to understand what a conflict of interest this is and why we’re concerned.”

“A conflict of interest which surely has already taken place?” Jeonghan tacks on. Joshua nods with grave sincerity. “Or have you called an impromptu, emergency meeting to discuss hypotheticals?” Mingyu and Hoshi share another look. “Gentlemen, need we remind you of the criteria that must be met before an emergency meeting may be called? I cannot imagine two high-ranking employees such as yourselves disregarded such strict protocols simply because of the parties involved?”

“Haaa, of course not!” Hysterical, frenzied laughter ensues. “No, no, we would never—”

Joshua shakes his head. “It sure is looking like that’s what has taken place here today, but I hate to assume the worst, so if you could just show us the permits I’m sure we can get this all cleared up.”

“Per-permits…?”

Jeonghan has all the patience in the world as he replies, “Section 894, subsection 12 of the accords states that in order for an emergency meeting to be called and granted between the constituents of Heaven and Hell, the proper permits must be filed and signed off on by the governing bodies of each at least 72 hours in advance. Now, it’s possible the paperwork was signed on our side, but as you know our boss is very, very busy and it seems to have been misplaced, so we have no way of confirming this.” You nod, sharing Joshua’s very serious look. “Hence the permits. Show them to us, please.”

There’s hope yet that Jun will get out of this. Be on the receiving end of his own strategy. Jeonghan and Joshua start up a show us the per-mits! show us the per-mits! chant that sends Hoshi and Mingyu into a panic. The latter, now soaked through with sweat, does a fruitless search on his tablet, while Hoshi tries to distract everyone with an interpretive dance none of them can make sense of.

“I believe this is a reflection of his current state of mind,” you say solemnly, playing the part of an esteemed art critic. “It’s histrionic on the surface, but once you dig deeper, it’s uncontrolled and frenetic at its roots. A wonderful metaphor for a fractured, disjointed mind, but severely lacking in execution.”

“Amen,” Jeonghan and Joshua say in unison.

Minutes pass. It’s clear the permits don’t exist, but Mingyu keeps up the charade of searching anyway, much to the delight of the Hell delegation. “Have you tried the top drawer of that thing?” Joshua asks right after Jeonghan suggests checking the trash folder on the desktop in his office. You, of course, stay quiet, content to soak up your victory in silence—albeit while looking extremely smug.

“Well!” you say, clapping your hands together with a wicked smile. “This was fun. Thank you both so much for the invite, but I fear we must be going. Duty calls.”

Hoshi is having none of this. Permits be damned, another snap of his fingers finds you bound to your chair, chains wrapped around each of your forearms. You hiss at the contact. “Whoa,” Jun whispers, and if Jeonghan’s and Joshua’s mouths hadn’t been removed by the same finger-snap, he assumes there’d be a crude joke coming his way.

“The three of you would do well to remember who and where you are.” Hoshi speaks with all the authority bestowed upon him. It’s a stark difference from how Jun usually sees him—aloof and unserious, more like a court jester—and it has him straightening in his chair. “None of us will be leaving this room until the matter is resolved.”

You roll your neck. Press your tongue into the fat of your cheek but otherwise don’t move. Pain flashes across your face each time the chains leave fresh wounds in your skin and Jun wants to tell them to cut it out, call this whole thing off, say it doesn’t mean anything, but he’s still so clueless. Still so far out of his depth. These matters concern him but are so far beyond his pay grade it’s all he can do to keep treading water.

And you know this, because you say, “There is no conflict of interest. Everything is business as usual.”

Hoshi doesn’t even make eye contact as he retorts, “Which is useless, coming from you.”

Mingyu offers up a tight-lipped smile. “I think what my colleague is trying to say is that we simply cannot trust word of mouth in a matter as serious as this. As I’m sure you understand, Wen Junhui is a special case. It’s quite rare They enlist the help of humans in such circumstances, and if he is no longer able to perform his duties in an unbiased manner due to your influence—”

Teeth grit, you repeat, “There is no conflict of interest.”

Mingyu sighs. Sets down his tablet and narrows his gaze. He seems to have shaken off the dregs of doubt and uncertainty, because he looks powerful. Looks intimidating, which is not a word Jun would have used to describe him twenty minutes ago. “Need I remind you of your role in this universe? Chaos and temptation; calamity and destruction. You serve no one. You do not speak in truths, nor are you concerned with them. Your ambition and pride were your downfall, and it seems you have learned nothing in the years since.” He turns his attention to Jun. “And if you doubt what I say, remember I witnessed all of this with my own eyes.”

“Scandalous! And what were you doing at the devil’s sacrament, Kim Mingyu?”

Jun nods, earning him an incredulous look from Hoshi. “Well, she has a point,” he defends. “There is that saying about stones and glass houses or whatever. He wouldn’t have seen all of those things if he hadn’t made a deal with her in the first place.”

Hoshi is quiet. Mingyu looks betrayed. “Are you not going to—”

“He, too, has a point,” the angel concedes. “I mean, did you really have to do all that? You were already hot and tall, I just don’t—”

Even with no mouths, it’s obvious Jeonghan and Joshua are snickering.

The bickering continues before eventually devolving into baseless name-calling. Jun’s head snaps back and forth like he’s watching a tennis match, and it’s not that far off. Mingyu hones in on your lack of character, prompting Hoshi to chime in with something equally cruel or just nonsensical in an attempt to back him up, and you handle both of them with ease, laughing off their taunting just to get under their skin. Which works, of course, so on and on it goes, ad nauseam, until Jun puts everyone out of their misery and puts an end to it.

“Isn’t anyone going to ask me how I feel?” At once the room goes silent, all squabbling ceased, and the sudden quiet has his ears ringing. “I know you don’t need me,” he says to you, amazed he can meet your eye when he feels like that admission is going to make him vomit. He turns to Mingyu and Hoshi. “But you two do, and throughout this whole experience I have been left out, lied to, and talked over. Did either of you ever stop to consider that’s why I refused the assignment and it has nothing to do with her? That she’s telling the truth when she says there’s no conflict of interest?”

At least they have the good sense to look embarrassed.

Mingyu is the first to crack. He bows slightly at the waist and says, “On behalf of Heaven, I would like to offer you our deepest and most sincere apologies.”

Hoshi follows suit. “Right. Exactly what he said.”

Jun studies each of them. Mingyu, he knows, is just doing what any human resources officer worth their salt would do: protect the company at all costs. Fortunately this works out in Jun’s favor. He’s important and necessary and, against all odds, has proven his worth and abilities to boot. Heaven can’t negotiate with Hell without him, and it’s this knowledge that spurs him on, has him crossing one leg over the other and folding his arms across his chest. Total power stance. Hoshi gapes a little.

“I think there’s a compromise to be found here.”

The compromise is this: just as there are souls in Hell that were meant to go to Heaven, the reverse is also true. Jun had stumbled across them during his hours of research: souls that had somehow slipped through the cracks and went north when they were meant to go south; souls stuck in an endless purgatory that a lax Judgment Deliverer let in because they didn’t feel like doing paperwork; judgment numbers in which an integer got input incorrectly. What he proposes is a one-for-one trade. Heaven wants Choi Seungcheol, so they’ll have to give up someone in return.

It evens the playing field—

“Which was the original intention, was it not?”

More importantly, and perhaps more selfishly, Jun will no longer be able to be used as a pawn. He’ll uphold his original agreement while doing the same for you—for Hell. He’ll rewrite the terms and conditions of the contracts after each soul has been judged fairly and impartially by both factions, essentially voiding the concept of sides.

“I would be working for you both,” he concludes. “It’s the only way any of this remains fair.”

(He’s also not trying to invoke your wrath and spend eternity getting dipped in hot oil, but he doesn’t feel it’s the right time to admit that.)

After a lengthy silence that Hoshi spends pressing against his ear, the angel eventually says, “Heaven is amenable to these terms if Hell is.”

You heave a long-suffering sigh that has Jun on the edge of his seat. This proposal was certainly better than the last one he’d pitched you, but you’re giving nothing away. Also of little help are Jeonghan and Joshua who have fallen asleep and are snoring loudly. Mingyu leans over to wipe a spot of drool from the corner of Joshua’s mouth. He doesn’t move.

After what feels like a lifetime, you nod. “Fine. Hell is also amenable to these terms.” A chorus of cheers. Jun does an embarrassing little wiggle out of excitement. Hoshi stands on top of the table and pumps his fist. Mingyu, still in HR mode, starts listing off all the potential new job titles for Jun.

(In the end his new name tag reads: Wen Junhui, Special Counsel to Heaven & Hell, Contracts Division.)

Before you leave, and before the celebrations can get too out of hand, Jun clears his throat. “I have a request,” he says, before adding on, “if the whole payment in forms other than money thing is still on the table.”

“It is,” Mingyu confirms.

“Great.” He sucks in a breath. Lets it go all disjointed and shaky. There’s no going back once he says this and they grant it—which they will, considering the way Mingyu’s nearly tripping over himself to give him whatever he wants. But it’s still a massive ask. It will still change the trajectory of his existence, just like that handjob had done. And even though he’s certain it’s what he wants, he still wonders if he’s making a mistake as he says, “I want to be immortal.”

Jeonghan and Joshua jerk awake. “What the fuck did he just say?”

Hoshi, too, looks stunned. “Uh, are you sure?”

No, Jun wants to say, please talk me out of it, but the words die in his throat when he looks at you. There’s not a hint of bewilderment to be found. No shock or awe. There’s just the smallest nod of your head, meant just for him, that says all he needs to hear—that you see him, that you recognize he’d gone through all of this insanity because he needed to find his own path, and that he’s finally found in it the meaning he’d been searching for.

“I’m sure,” he confirms, completely void of hesitation.

Hoshi scratches at the back of his neck. “Well, I—that’s quite a big request. I’ll have to see what we can do.”

Mingyu, however, spoils the inevitable surprise by giving him a thumbs-up.

After that, there isn’t much left to say. Mingyu formally concludes the meeting and thanks Hell for their attendance and participation, to which Jeonghan gives him the finger before disappearing in a plume of smoke that causes everyone to gag. Joshua takes advantage and slips out the door undetected. Mingyu and Hoshi are none the wiser until some of the employees down the hall start screaming. “Please excuse us,” Mingyu chokes out before he, too, disappears in the direction of the shouting. Hoshi hangs back, tries to swallow his amused smile, but then Mingyu returns to drag him away.

Only you and Jun remain. “What did Joshua do?” he asks, less to break the silence and more because he’s nosy.

“Released roughly three dozen of those terrifying tarantulas that eat birds.”

“Oh.”

Silence creeps in anyway—not awkward, but Jun can tell there’s something you want to say. Should he hover? He doesn’t want you to feel obligated (not that you would), but he can’t deny that he’s curious. You, the literal devil, reluctant to say something to him, just a human? It’s too good an opportunity to pass up.

“You’re not gonna get all clingy and weird now that we’ve had sex, are you?” he jokes.

Shockingly, you do not find this funny. “I may have lied about inventing Jenny McCarthy, but I did invent the guillotine. And the electric chair. And the rack—”

“Noted,” Jun replies, giddy all over. Can’t help it as he shoves his hands in the pockets of his slacks and rocks back on his heels. “Should I walk you to the door?”

“Don’t you dare,” comes your response, but Jun does it anyway. Gets away with it by dropping some quip about his mother raising him to be a gentleman, and it’d just destroy her if she knew Jun wasn’t abiding by her teachings.

Your reluctant smile is akin to pulling teeth, but it still shows up.

Whatever havoc had been wreaked by Joshua seems to have been solved. There’s blissful silence as the two of you reach the door, and Jun knows his escort is pomp and circumstance, that you could disappear in the blink of an eye the way Jeonghan had, but he appreciates you going through the motions for his sake, that you’ve allowed him a moment of normalcy.

“Was it hard coming back here?” he asks, leaning against the door frame to stem his desire to reach out for you.

“Well, it’s certainly never easy, but I’ve got plenty of psychologists down there I can talk it over with if need be.” You check an invisible watch. “Do you think Freud is available for lunch tomorrow?”

“If he’s not, I am.”

A bark of shocked laughter has you covering your mouth. “I did not expect that from you.”

“Did it work?”

“No,” you reply instantly. “Have a great weekend, Wen Junhui. I’m sure our paths will cross again soon.”

Jun nods… which is about all he can do, considering he’s stuck here for the time being. Hoshi sent him here, which means Hoshi’s the only one who can send him back—some stupid security rule Jun wasn’t paying attention to when it’d been explained to him. So he sticks the corner of his thumb in his mouth, thinks about how great your ass looked in those pants as you walked away, and pivots back into the conference room to await the angel with the stupid t-shirts.

Except, as soon as he turns around, there you are. Face to face. Close enough that your scent is paralyzing, but it’s different now—softer, he thinks; something that makes him feel less like he’s been ensnared in your web and more like he’s been invited in. Close enough that when you lean in he can feel the warmth of your breath on his skin, that sensitive spot just below his ear.

“You were wrong,” you say, so quiet he’s not sure he isn’t imagining your words, filling in the blanks of what he wants to hear. “What you said earlier, about me not needing you.”

Then you’re gone.

In the blink of an eye, just like he thought you’d be.

He makes a mental note to be available tomorrow around lunchtime.

If you've made it this far, thank you so much for reading! Sharing and reblogging my work is the best way to say you enjoyed it, but I also accept any and all feedback and screaming in my inbox. <3

[theonottsbxtch]

WHEN THE WORLD GOES QUIET PT.2 | LN4

an: i'm seeing a lot of love for this and i'm glad! i hope you guys enjoy this as much as i enjoyed writing this - i'm now omw to the library to write some more stories for you guys hehe

wc: 6.1k

part one

FOR DAYS, SHE MOURNED.

She barely left her bed, drifting between fitful sleep and hollow wakefulness, the hours melting into each other like wax from a candle burned too long. The world outside continued - newspapers shouted about the war, footsteps echoed in the stairwell, rain pattered softly against the windowpane - but none of it touched her. It all felt so distant, like she was floating just outside of reality, unable to reach it, unwilling to try.

The soldiers had come back two days later after the first visit. They handed her a small box - Lando’s belongings. He didn’t have much. A pocket watch, the glass cracked but the hands still ticking. A battered deck of playing cards, edges worn soft from use. A few letters he never sent to her, some half-written, some only a few lines long. A book of poetry she gave him with his name scrawled inside the cover, the pages dog-eared and stained with ink. He lied to her, he said he’d never read it. A cigarette case, dented, still holding one last cigarette as though he was going to come back and smoke it with her in the rain while she sang.

She ran her fingers over each item carefully, as if memorising the feel of them, as if holding these things would somehow bring him back. She placed the box on the small table by her bed and left it there, untouched after that, unable to look at it for too long.

A week passed. The grief didn’t lessen, but it settled into something quieter, heavier, pressing down on her ribs with every breath.

And then, on the seventh day, there was a knock at the door.

It was weak. Barely there. Just a soft, uncertain tap tap tap, as if the person on the other side wasn’t sure they had the strength to knock at all.

She ignored it at first - probably some children selling biscuits. She barely had the energy to move, let alone answer the door. But then it came again, a little stronger this time, though still unsteady.

Slowly, she pushed herself up, wrapping her dressing gown around herself as she crossed the small, dimly lit room. Her body felt leaden, her mind sluggish, and for a moment, she thought it must be one of her neighbours - maybe Mrs. Holloway from downstairs, coming to check if she was still breathing.

She unlocked the door with tired fingers and pulled it open-

And nearly collapsed where she stood.

Lando.

He was standing in front of her, barely upright, swaying slightly on his feet like a man who’d been fighting gravity for too long. His face was bruised and still slightly bloodied, one eye swollen, a cut running along his temple. His uniform was tattered, stained with dirt and dried blood, his left arm cradled against his side as if even the weight of it was too much to bear. He looked ruined. Wrecked by something that should have killed him.

But he was here. 

Alive. 

A slow lopsided grin pulled at his split lip, his voice rough and hoarse as he rasped-

“Missed me, sweetheart?”

Her breath hitched, her vision blurred. For a moment, she could do nothing but stare, her hands gripping the doorframe to keep herself upright.

Then, before she could think, before she could stop herself.

She threw herself at him.

Her arms wrapped around his neck, her body colliding with his so suddenly that he let out a low groan of pain, but she didn’t care for a brief minute. He was solid. Real. Her fingers curled into his torn uniform, her face buried in his shoulder, and the sob that has been trapped in her chest for weeks finally broke free.

He let out a shaky breath, his good arm tightening around her waist as he whispered, “Took a long bloody way home, but I got here, didn’t I?”

Home.

She pulled back just enough to look at him, her hands cradling his face, her thumbs brushing over the bruises there. He winced slightly but didn’t pull away.

“You-” Her voice cracked, raw from days of silence. “You died.”

He gave her a faint, crooked smirk. “Nearly died. Big difference, sweetheart.” His voice softened. “They shot us down over France. I-” He swallowed, something dark flickering through his bruised gaze. “I shouldn’t have made it.”

Her fingers trembled against his jaw, her heart thudding painfully against her ribs “But you did.”

“Yeah.” His voice was barely a whisper now. “Yeah, I did.”

She stared at him for a long moment, her breath uneven, her thoughts a tangled mess of grief and disbelief and absolute, crushing relief.

Then she grabbed his collar, yanked him forward and kissed him.

He made a low sound in his throat, startled, but he melted into her, his lips warm despite the cold that clung to his skin. It was desperate, messy, edged with too much pain and too many unsaid words, but neither of them cared. 

When they finally pulled apart, he let out a breathless chuckle, his forehead resting against hers. “Blimey. If I’d known I’d get a welcome like that, I’d have come back sooner.”

She huffed out a tearful laugh, skating her head as fresh tears slid down her cheeks. “You’re an idiot.”

“Yeah, well,” he murmured, his fingers brushing weakly over her wrist. “You love me anyway, don’t you?”

She didn’t really know what love was growing up, she was raised knowing that she could only love God and the Church. But here, staring at this messy boy with his messy curls and lopsided grin, she thought of how much she mourned him, the lie she voiced for him and realised that yes, she did love him.

She exhaled, her fingers still cupping his face, and nodded.

“Yeah,” she whispered. “I do.”

He closed his eyes for a moment, like he was letting it sink in, letting it steady him. Then, with a small, pained sigh, he leaned into her touch and muttered-

“Reckon I might need a lie-down, sweetheart. Nearly dying’s exhausting work.”

She let out a watery laugh, shaking her head as she finally pulled him inside, shutting the door behind them.

She still didn’t know how this was possible, how he was here, when she had already mourned him. She didn’t know if she would ever stop waking up in cold sweats, thinking it had all been a dream.

But for now, he was here and that was enough for her.

Once inside, she took care of him. Took care of him in the only way she knew how, with love.

The small flat wasn’t much, but it was warm, and it was safe, and for now, that was enough. She helped him out of his tattered uniform with careful hands, breath momentarily taken away as she took in his build. Her fingers ghosted over the bruised ribs, torn skin, the places where war had left its mark on him. He hissed when she pressed a damp cloth to the cut on his temple, but he didn’t complain, only watching her with a look that made her chest tighten.

She tried not to meet his gaze, tried to focus on the task at hand. But then-

“So,” he drawled, his voice still rough, still weak, but carrying the familiar edge of teasing. “Heard you called yourself my fiancée.”

Her hands froze.

Her stomach plummeted.

Her eyes snapped up to his, wide with horror. He looked far too smug for someone who had nearly died, his bruised lips curling into something that might have been a smirk if he wasn’t so exhausted.

She stammered, struggling for words, but before she could say anything, she glanced down at her hand.

And her heart stopped.

The ring.

It was still on her left hand. She had never switched it back.

Heat flooded her face so quickly she thought she might faint. She dropped the cloth to his lap and yanked the ring off, shoving it back onto her right hand, fingers trembling, her whole body ablaze with mortification.

“That was- I had to,” she spluttered. “They wouldn’t have told me anything otherwise, and I needed to know.”

Lando let out a low chuckle, wincing at the movement. “I dunno, sweetheart. Sounds an awful lot like a proposal to me.”

She picked up the cloth and threw it at his chest.

He let out a breathless laugh, catching it before it fell to the floor, but the sound faded quickly, something heavier settling between them. She swallowed, focusing on cleaning his wounds, pretending she wasn’t still burning from the embarrassment.

“You really did that?” he asked for a moment, his voice quieter now, “You went all the way out to Bovingdon?”

She nodded, dabbing gently at his brow. “Didn’t have a choice, did I?”

Something flickered in his gaze- something unreadable, something deep. “That was dangerous darling, what if something happened to your train?”

“I needed to know, Lan.”

He went quiet after that and she continued to work, washing away the blood, the dirt, the remnants of everything he had endured. The worst of it was his ribs, bruised and maybe cracked, but there was nothing she could do except wrap them, murmuring soft apologies when he flinched beneath her touch.

When she was done, she sat back, studying her work.

“You should be in the military,” Lando muttered, voice laced with exhaustion. “Proper little nurse, you are.”

She huffed, rolling her eyes. “I would be in the military, if they let me fight.”

His gaze softened. “I reckon you’d win the whole bloody war if they did.”

She scoffed, but the corner of her mouth twitched upward. For a moment, just a moment. Things almost felt normal.

But then, Lando let out a slow breath, the teasing fading from his face.

“I lost Oscar,” he said.

Her heart clenched.

Lando’s right hand-man. His best mate. She had met him once- just once, outside the bar, both of them too drunk to be serious about anything. He had been tall, full of quick wit and easy laughter, and Lando trusted him with everything.

She didn’t know what to say.

Lando didn’t look at her, his gaze fixed somewhere far away - empty. “We were shot down over France. They got us good. We tried-” He exhaled, his hands twitching, curling into fists. “We tried to jump, but Oscar- his parachute wouldn’t open. I saw him go down. Couldn’t do a damn thing.

She reached for his hand instinctively, gripping it tightly.

“I don’t know how I made it back,” he admitted. “I ran back for Oscar, took him as far as I could and gave him a final prayer. Silly right?” he chuckled. “I took a bullet to the leg after that, nearly starved, but some French boys found me. Got me out before the Jerries could.” His throat bobbed. “But Osc-”

He didn’t finish. 

She squeezed his fingers, her heart aching. “I’m so sorry, Lando.”

He nodded once, slowly. But she knew this wasn’t something he would ever truly move past.

The war took and took and took.

And yet, somehow, against all odds. Lando had come back.

She let the silence settle between them, her fingers still wrapped around his. It wasn’t comfortable, not with the weight of what he had just said, but she knew better than to rush him. Lando seemed like the type of man who carried his grief quietly, let it sink into his bones where no one could reach it.

After a while, she exhaled softly and asked, “So, what happens now?”

Lando tilted his head back against the wall, his bruised face illuminated by the dim glow of the gaslight. He looked tired. Bone tired. But the ghost of a smirk still tugged at his lips.

“Well,” he drawled, “I’m on the injury list until I heal. Not much use to ‘em like this, am I?” He gestured vaguely to himself, to the cuts, the bruises, the way his left arm still hung stiffly at his side. “Can’t fly, can’t fight. Means I’m stuck here for a bit.”

She nodded, trying not to let the relief show too plainly on her face. He was here. He wasn’t being shipped back out - at least not yet.

Lando glanced at her, something unreadable flickering behind his eyes. “Father O’Connell said I can stay at the Church until I’m good.”

That made her pause.

“The Church?” She repeated, raising an eyebrow.

He huffed a quiet laugh, as if he had been expecting her reaction. “They’ve got a spare cot, and it’s better than the street, sweetheart.”

She bit the inside of her cheek, fighting a smile. "You? Sleeping under a roof dedicated to the Lord you don’t believe in?"

Lando smirked. "Reckon I’ll be fine, so long as the walls don’t cave in the moment I step inside."

She laughed then, shaking her head. "Blasphemous and injured. You’re on dangerous ground, Lando Norris."

"Wouldn’t be the first time," he murmured, wincing slightly as he shifted.

She hesitated for a moment, watching him carefully. He was exhausted. She could see it in the way his body sagged slightly against the chair, the way his hands trembled faintly from either pain or sheer fatigue. He was trying to keep up the bravado, but she knew better.

"Stay here."

The words left her mouth before she had fully thought them through, but as soon as she said them, she knew she meant them.

Lando blinked at her. "What?"

She crossed her arms, feigning nonchalance. "You heard me."

He raised an eyebrow, smirking faintly. "Offering up your flat to a war hero, are you?"

She rolled her eyes. "Hardly. Just an injured man who can barely stand upright."

Lando chuckled, but then he really looked at her—like he was trying to understand if she was serious. "I don’t wanna be a burden."

"You won’t be," she said, softer this time.

He studied her for a long moment, as if he was trying to decide whether or not to argue. Then, finally, he let out a small, resigned sigh.

"Alright, sweetheart," he murmured. "You win."

And for the first time in days, she felt like she could breathe.

She looked after him because someone had to.

She changed the bandages on his ribs with careful hands, wiped the dried blood from his temple, made him tea even though he grumbled that he wasn’t some fragile old man. She forced him to eat, nudging a half-stale biscuit toward him when he thought she wasn’t looking. And when his body ached too much to sit upright, she guided him to the small bed in the corner of the flat, ignoring his protests as she threw a blanket over him.

It was quiet work. Steady. Something to keep her hands busy, something to stop her from thinking too much about the fact that just two days ago, she had been mourning him.

She was pouring him another cup of tea when she spoke, her voice quieter than before. "I prayed for you."

Lando, sitting up against the headboard, glanced at her. His injuries had settled into something duller now—still painful, but less sharp, less all-consuming. He wasn’t wincing as much when he moved, but his face still bore the bruises of war.

He studied her, something unreadable in his gaze. "Did you?"

She nodded, fingers tightening around the cup. "At the church. When I thought—when I thought you were gone."

His jaw tensed slightly, as if the thought of her grieving him was harder to bear than his own suffering. Then, after a pause, he exhaled and said, "I prayed."

Her head snapped up.

Lando Hargrove, the man who scoffed at church, who smirked every time she wore her cross, who always had something sharp to say about the God she wrestled with.

She swallowed. "You mentioned, you were serious?"

He nodded, looking down at his hands. His voice was quieter now, rougher around the edges. "When I was out there. Alone. Before the French boys found me, with Oscar." His fingers curled slightly, as if remembering the feel of the earth beneath them, the cold, the hunger, the absolute isolation. "Didn’t know if anyone was listening. Didn’t know if I even believed it." His gaze lifted to hers, raw in a way she wasn’t sure she had ever seen before. "But I thought of you."

Her breath caught.

She didn’t know what to say to that, didn’t know how to unravel the knots twisting in her chest. So she just nodded, her throat too tight to speak.

The night carried on, slow and steady. She cleaned up the small mess from their tea, doused the gas lamp until only the dim glow of the streetlights filtered through the curtains. Lando had already sunk lower into the bed, exhaustion pulling at him with an unrelenting grip.

"You should sleep," she murmured.

His lips twitched. "And where are you planning on going, sweetheart?"

She hesitated. The flat was small—there was only the one bed, and the chair in the corner wasn’t much of an option.

Lando let out a quiet chuckle, shifting slightly to the side. "Come on, then. I don’t bite."

She rolled her eyes but, after a moment, relented. Carefully, she climbed in beside him, keeping a respectful distance, but the bed was small, and warmth carried between them in the sliver of space that remained.

For a while, neither of them spoke.

Then, just as her eyes were beginning to slip shut, Lando’s voice came, barely above a whisper.

"Still wearing that ring?"

Her lips twitched, but she didn’t open her eyes. "Go to sleep, Lando."

He let out a quiet, tired laugh.

And with that, for the first time in what felt like years, they both let themselves rest.

The night was still. The distant hum of the city had quieted, leaving only the occasional echo of footsteps on the cobbled streets below.

She had been deep in sleep, cocooned in warmth, when the bed jolted beneath her.

Then—

"Oscar!"

Her eyes flew open.

Lando was thrashing beside her, tangled in the blankets, his face twisted in something raw, something agonising. His breath came in short, ragged gasps, his fingers clenching around the sheets as if he were still there, still on the battlefield, still losing his best friend over and over again.

"No—Oscar—wait—"

His voice cracked, broken apart by a sob.

She moved before she could think, shifting onto her side, reaching for him. "Lando—Lando, wake up—"

But he wasn’t awake, not really. He was trapped in the depths of it, in the nightmare, his chest rising and falling far too fast, his body trembling under the weight of something she couldn’t see.

Her heart ached.

She touched his face gently, brushing damp strands of hair from his forehead. "Lando, love, it’s alright," she whispered, voice steady despite the tightness in her throat. "You’re here. You’re safe."

His breathing stuttered.

She ran her fingers through his hair, trying to bring him back. "It’s not real. You’re with me."

His eyes snapped open.

Wild. Glassy. He was still lost, still caught somewhere far away. But then his gaze landed on her—really landed on her—and something in him broke.

A strangled sound escaped his throat, and then he was clutching her like she was the only thing keeping him tethered to the earth. His body shook, and before he could turn away, before he could hide it, she felt it—

The tears.

Hot, silent, unstoppable.

Lando Norris was crying.

She didn’t hesitate. She lifted herself up, pressing soft kisses to his damp cheeks, tasting the salt of his grief. She wiped the tears away with her lips, her hands, her whole being, as if she could take the pain from him, as if she could bear it for him instead.

His hands curled into the fabric of her nightdress, his breath shuddering. He didn’t speak, and neither did she.

Instead, she held him.

And then, quietly, she whispered a prayer.

She didn’t know if he believed. Didn’t know if she believed anymore, not fully, not in the way she used to. But she prayed anyway, murmured soft words into the hollow space between them, words for Oscar, for Lando, for the war to end, for something greater than all of this.

Lando’s breathing slowed.

His grip on her loosened, just slightly.

She stroked his hair, pressing her forehead against his temple. "Sleep, love," she whispered. "I’ve got you."

He let out a shaky breath, and for the first time that night, he let himself fall.

And she held him, long after sleep claimed him again.

The rest of the night passed in fits and starts.

Even as Lando drifted back to sleep, his body remained tense, like he was waiting to be dragged back into the nightmare. Every so often, he’d shift against her, his fingers twitching in his sleep, a quiet murmur of Oscar’s name escaping his lips.

She didn’t let go.

She kept him close, her arms a steady anchor, her warmth something solid against the cold weight of his grief. When his breath hitched, she whispered reassurances into his skin. When his body shuddered, she ran soft, soothing strokes through his hair. And when dawn finally crept through the curtains, bathing the room in a muted grey light, she barely realised she hadn’t slept at all.

Lando stirred first.

It was slow—his body unwilling, his mind reluctant—but eventually, his brow furrowed, and he let out a low groan, pressing his face into the pillow.

She smiled softly. "Good morning."

A pause. Then, groggy, voice rough with sleep, he muttered, "Bloody hell."

She huffed a quiet laugh. "That bad, is it?"

He peeled one eye open, squinting at the light before shifting onto his back with a deep exhale. His gaze flickered to her, taking in the way she was propped up beside him, watching him with something gentle and knowing.

"Did I wake you?" he asked, voice lower now, almost hesitant.

She hesitated before answering. "You were already asleep when I came back," she murmured, "but you weren’t resting."

Lando’s jaw tightened. He looked away, exhaling slowly through his nose. "I—" He swallowed, then shook his head, running a hand over his face. "Shit."

"You don’t have to say anything," she said, watching him carefully. "Not now. Not ever, if you don’t want to."

Lando was silent.

And then—quietly, reluctantly—he said, "I dream about it."

She stayed quiet, letting him find his own words.

His fingers curled slightly into the sheets. "Sometimes it’s just flashes. The airfields, the engines, the bloody gunfire. Other times…" He exhaled sharply, his throat bobbing. "Other times, it’s Oscar. Every time I close my eyes, I see him. He’s still there, still trying to hold on, and I can’t—I can’t—" His voice faltered, raw and uneven.

She reached for his hand, lacing her fingers through his.

Lando blinked hard, then let out a small, humourless chuckle. "God, you must think I’m pathetic."

Her grip tightened. "I think you’re human."

He glanced at her, something vulnerable in his expression. Then, without a word, he squeezed her hand back.

The moment lingered.

Then, as if suddenly aware of their closeness, Lando cleared his throat and made a weak attempt to sit up.

She rolled her eyes. "Slow down, soldier."

"I was never a soldier," he muttered. "Just a bloody pilot who got too good at running from death."

She didn't argue. Not about that.

Instead, she shifted out of bed, stretching her stiff limbs. "Come on, then. You need tea, and I need breakfast."

Lando gave her a lopsided smirk. "That an offer to cook for me, sweetheart?"

She arched a brow. "You think I’d let you in my kitchen with your injuries? You can barely stand."

Lando chuckled, wincing slightly as he swung his legs over the side of the bed. "Reckon I should milk this while I can, then."

She threw a pillow at him.

And for the first time in what felt like forever, the morning felt light.

The days passed in something dangerously close to peace.

For the first time in months—years, perhaps—she felt as though time had slowed, folding itself neatly around the four walls of her flat. Outside, London was still at war. Air-raid sirens still screamed through the streets, rations still stretched thinner by the day, and grief still clung to the city like fog. But inside, in the small space she shared with Lando, there was warmth.

Routine.

Something almost like a life.

She looked after him, of course. Changed his bandages when he let her, scolded him when he tried to do too much, forced food into his hands when he muttered that he wasn’t hungry. But he, in his own way, looked after her too.

He made her laugh, sometimes without meaning to. He occupied the space beside her like he belonged there, like there was nowhere else in the world he’d rather be. He helped her with supper, standing over the stove with a cigarette perched between his lips, poking at potatoes with the wrong end of a wooden spoon.

One evening, after she had taken a pan from his hands with a sigh and done it herself, he leant against the counter and smirked.

"You know," he mused, watching her work, "you’d make a bloody good wife."

She nearly dropped the spoon.

The words caught her off guard, lodging themselves in a place she couldn’t quite reach, settling into the corners of her mind like an ink stain.

She glanced at him, half-expecting some cocky grin, but his expression was unreadable. He was watching her in a way that made her chest feel tight, made her hands shake ever so slightly as she turned back to the pan.

"Shame, that," she said, forcing lightness into her voice. "Don’t suppose anyone’s taking applications."

Lando hummed. "Well, I dunno about that," he said. "I did hear you’ve already got a fiancé."

She groaned, covering her face with her hands. "I knew you wouldn’t let that go."

"Course not." He grinned, stepping closer. "Imagine my surprise, waking up from the dead to find myself engaged. You could’ve at least let me propose first."

She swatted at him half-heartedly, but the warmth in her cheeks betrayed her.

It stuck with her more than she wanted it to.

After that, the thought wove its way into everything.

When she was brushing flour from her hands after baking the world’s most pitiful loaf of bread, she caught him watching her, and the words you’d make a bloody good wife flickered through her mind before she could stop them. When he reached for something on a high shelf, when he nudged her with his shoulder as he passed by, when he said ta, love with that easy grin—

It settled in her chest like a secret, like a whisper of something neither of them dared say out loud.

The week and a half passed like that. Cooking together, filling the flat with the scent of onions and broth, losing themselves in the simple pleasure of warm meals and soft laughter. The war felt distant, just for a little while.

She knew it wouldn’t last.

But God, she wished it would.

Another week passed, a haze of quiet mornings, warm meals, and the occasional conversation that lingered too long, as if neither of them wanted to break the fragile cocoon they’d woven around themselves. There were days when they barely noticed the outside world at all, as though the war had turned into nothing more than a distant rumble, something happening on the other side of a window that had been carefully closed.

The mornings had become routine—her getting up first, brewing tea, him shuffling into the kitchen in a half-awake stupor, ruffling his hair as he grumbled about being woken. The evenings fell into a rhythm too, with them sitting on the small couch, half a room away, each wrapped in the comfort of the other’s company, while the world continued its war somewhere beyond the windows.

One morning, she woke with the warm weight of Lando's arm around her, his breath soft against the back of her neck. She hadn’t realised it at first, but somehow, during the night, he had pulled her close, and now she lay pressed to his chest, his hold tight, as if he couldn’t bear to let go.

She shifted, careful not to disturb him, and the soft sound of bells reached her ears—faint at first, a distant chime that grew louder. She frowned, trying to make sense of it. It wasn’t the air-raid sirens, and it wasn’t a church bell for a funeral. No, this was different. This was... celebration?

She carefully pulled herself out of his arms, wincing at the small space between them, and padded quietly across the room. Her fingers brushed the curtains aside, and she peered out of the window.

The street below was buzzing with life. People were spilling into the streets, laughing, shouting, and cheering. Flags were being waved. And there—there were the children, dancing in circles, holding hands like they were marking the end of something heavy. The sounds of joyous voices drifted up to her.

Her heart began to pound. No... it can’t be…

"Lando," she whispered, her breath catching in her throat.

She turned back toward the bed, her heart thundering as she crossed the room in a few quick strides. She leaned over him, shaking him gently at first, then more urgently. "Lando, darling—wake up!"

He groaned, rolling over and blinking up at her with a dazed expression, his messy hair sticking up in all directions. His face softened when he saw her, but it didn’t last long as the sound of the bells filled the room.

"What—?" He froze, his eyes suddenly clear, his breath catching.

She couldn’t contain the excitement in her voice, her hands gripping his shoulders. "Lando, the war—it’s over. They’re celebrating. Can’t you hear the bells?"

His eyes widened, then narrowed as he slowly pushed himself up, confusion flickering across his face before realisation dawned on him. The sound of the bells reached his ears, clearer now, and he could hear the cheering too. The world outside, the noise, the celebration—it was undeniable.

He sat up, blinking as he rubbed a hand over his face, disorientated for a moment as if he were still in a dream. Then, a half-laugh, half-sob escaped him, and for a moment, he didn’t move. He just looked at her, his gaze flickering over her face.

"Bloody hell," he muttered under his breath. "Is this... is this really happening?"

She nodded, her own disbelief mirrored in her wide eyes. "It’s true, Lando. They’re celebrating. The war’s ended. It’s finished."

He sat there, silent for a beat too long, before shaking his head as if to clear it. Then, he suddenly sprang from the bed, moving quickly, as if the news had sparked something deep inside him, something that couldn’t be contained.

In a few long strides, he was at the window beside her, his eyes scanning the crowds below. People were hugging, crying, dancing in the streets. And for the first time in years, there were no sirens, no orders to follow, no planes overhead.

Lando’s hand reached for hers, his fingers squeezing with a kind of urgency she hadn’t felt in days. His voice was soft, still somewhat stunned. "It’s over," he whispered, his lips curving in something fragile—something that might have been a smile, if not for the look of wonder in his eyes.

She nodded, her heart swelling with something she didn’t know how to name. "It’s over, Lando."

He turned to face her, his hand still holding hers, his thumb rubbing along her knuckles in a slow, tender motion. His eyes softened, the hardness that had lingered around the edges of them for so long finally ebbing away. "What now, then?" he asked quietly, as if the question itself was almost too much to ask after everything.

She thought about it for a moment, the uncertainty of the future heavy in the air between them, but the weight of the moment didn’t seem as daunting now. The war had ended. The world was open. And somehow, impossibly, they had made it.

"I don’t know," she replied, her voice soft, "but we’re still here. And that’s enough for me."

Lando smiled then, the warmth returning to his face, and for the first time since she’d met him, it wasn’t just a smirk or a teasing grin—it was something full of hope, something genuine.

Then, without another word, he leaned down and kissed her.

The moment his lips met hers, the world outside—the cheers, the bells, the war that had just ended—ceased to exist.

Lando kissed her like he had waited his whole life to do it, like he had been holding it back for weeks, months, maybe even longer. His hands cupped her face, rough and warm, his fingers sliding into her hair as he pulled her in like she was the only thing tethering him to the earth.

She gasped against his mouth, barely catching her breath before he kissed her again, deeper this time, more desperate, more real. Her hands clutched at his shirt, fisting the fabric like she needed to hold onto something solid, like if she let go, she might slip away into whatever fever-dream this felt like.

His body was warm against hers, his breath uneven as he pressed her back against the wall, his lips trailing from her mouth to her jaw, then to the hollow of her throat. She shuddered at the feeling, at the way his hands mapped out every inch of her like he wanted to memorise her in case she vanished before his eyes.

She felt alive.

After everything—after loss and grief, after nights spent in silence, after waking up to a world that had been at war for too long—this was the only thing that felt real. This moment, here, with him.

His forehead pressed against hers as he caught his breath, both of them dizzy from the weight of it all. His voice was low, rasping against her lips, breathless and full of something she couldn’t quite name.

"Well, what to do with my life now?" he murmured, his mouth quirking into something like a smirk, "s’pose I’ll just live here then. With my fiancée."

She let out a breathless laugh, her hands still tangled in his shirt. "Oh, will you now?"

"Reckon so." He grinned, but there was something warm and certain behind it. "Would be a bit odd for me to be staying with a woman I’m not engaged to, don’t you think? The people they’ll talk and your reputation. It’ll be ruined."

She raised an eyebrow. "Lando, you do know you never actually asked me, right?"

For a second, he looked taken aback, as if the thought had never even crossed his mind. But then, without hesitation, he stepped back, took her right hand in his, and before she could say another word—

He dropped onto one knee.

Her breath caught in her throat, her heart hammering wildly as she watched him, watched the way his fingers gently pried the ring from her right hand and held it between them.

His eyes found hers, and for the first time, there was no teasing, no bravado—just Lando, raw and real, looking at her like she was the only thing that had ever mattered.

"I haven’t got a real ring," he said, voice quiet, steady, "not yet, anyway. But I’ll get one. I swear it." He swallowed, his thumb brushing against the band between his fingers. "I’ll find a job—something stable. I could go to school, or work at Billy’s pharmacy, or whatever pays enough to get us something real, something good. And then..."

He took a breath, his lips quirking up into a lopsided smile.

"Then, if you’ll have me, I’ll marry you proper. But for now, all I can do is ask."

He reached for her left hand, slipping the ring onto her finger where it belonged.

"So what d’you reckon, sweetheart?" His voice was softer now, his eyes never leaving hers. "Marry me?"

She stared at him, her chest tightening, her whole body light and heavy all at once.

And then, with the weight of the war finally lifting, with the streets outside alive with celebration, and with the man she loved on his knee before her—

She nodded.

"Yes," she breathed, tears pricking at her eyes. "Yes, Lando."

And before he could even stand, she threw herself at him, kissing him again like she would never stop.

the end.

taglist: @alexisquinnlee-bc @carlossainzapologist @oikarma @obxstiles @verstappenf1lecccc @hzstry8 @dying-inside-but-its-classy @anamiad00msday @linnygirl09 @mastermindbaby @iamred-iamyellow @isaadore @driverlando

[ficsilike-reblogged]

Shelter - 2

Summary: You save Soap's life. Yours continues to go off the rails. Pairing: Simon "Ghost" Riley/F!Reader Warnings For This Chapter: Canon typical violence, panic attack, my continued attempt to write Soap and Ghost's accents, military inaccuracies, more canon divergence, Soft!Simon. MINORS DNI A/N: I truly cannot believe how sweet you guys were about the first chapter. Thank you so much for being so kind! I apologize for the wait. I was almost done with this chapter when I decided I hated it and scrapped all of it and started over. I also finished another draft of my novel! Busy times. This is definitely more of a slow burn romance and I'm thinking it'll be around 10 or so chapters.

Well, at least you were out of the hospital room. It wasn’t far from the hospital room, but the horrendously beige room down the hall had a television and a few chairs you could sink into and a small kitchen that always seemed to be stocked with snacks in neat boxes on the counter. Were they good snacks? Not really. But you weren’t about to complain when it was a break from the nutrient dense and flavorless food they’d been shoveling down your throat the last handful of days.

Coronation Street was playing on the television as you soaked a plain biscuit in your tea. This was probably a breakroom of some sort, cleared out of anything that you could have possibly used to communicate with the outside world and you were pretty sure the blinking light in the corner was a camera to make sure you weren’t going to do anything ridiculous. Like climb out a window.

No.

You just wanted out of that stupid room with its uncomfortable bed and terrible pillow and beeping machines.

The biscuit crumbled in half when you tried to remove it and you stared at your tea for a stretched moment as the soap opera continued to drone on. Dammit. You shoved the rest of the biscuit into your mouth and then sipped on the tea for a moment before digging out the remnants of the biscuit with your spoon. Not your proudest moment.

You were pulled from your sad cup of tea and entertainment by the door opening and Soap walking in, arm still in his matching sling.

“Why am I hearing about ye not taking yer pain killers?” He asked instead of a greeting. You found that Soap did that. He barged right into things. No slow starts for him. It would be endearing if this were any other situation.

And just like you not saying anything to Ghost about your sister and why she wouldn’t be found in any intel about you, you wouldn’t give Soap a straight answer either. You were not going to take any of those pain killers if you didn’t feel like you needed them. You knew… Well, that didn’t matter right now. “Are they telling you my medical history? I don’t think that’s legal on either side of the pond.”

He frowned. The big Scot frowned and you almost laughed with how it made him look like a puppy. “Don’t ye need it? Ye were shot.”

“I’m aware of that. Trust me.” You turned and grabbed at the sleeve of biscuits, knowing it was a blatant change of topic. “These are awful, by the way.”

Soap snatched them out of your hand and scowled at them. “These are shite. Why’d ye do that to yerself?” He then pivoted and rummaged through the cabinets you weren’t brave enough to open and then set down a pack of shortbreads in a fancy looking tin which he popped open with one hand (you tried not to be jealous about that particular skill). “That’ll be the only thing going near yer tea.”

The shortbread was delicious and you wordlessly made another cup of tea for yourself and a cup of coffee for Soap. You were prouder than you wanted to admit to hear you guessed correctly when you said he looked like he preferred coffee and prouder still when you dug some out of the cabinet and made it just the way he said he liked it as he settled on the lumpy couch beside you to watch the rest of the episode. He knew what was going on better than you and regaled you with the storylines long since finished and convoluted family ties of the characters. It was nice. Soap was…nice.

He had finished his coffee by the time the episode ended and scooped up your mug on his way toward the breakroom’s tiny kitchenette and set them both in the sink. He turned back toward you, bright blue eyes scanning your face for something. He had a casual set to his shoulders, even with the sling, but you knew the look of a smart man trying to pick his words carefully. Soap honestly reminded you, just a little bit, of a guy you went to highschool with, who looked the part of loveable idiot but eventually went to an ivy league school on a football scholarship. He was currently a doctor, knee deep in cancer research, if those annoying alumni emails had any truth to them.

“Just say what you need to say. I’m sure I can handle it.”

The corner of Soap’s mouth twitched like he was trying not to smile. “I wanted to let ye know that yer intel was good.”

You just nodded. That would explain why you hadn’t seen the other three lately. They had been sent to Kastovia. “That mean I can go home?”

Soap sighed and your heart shriveled a bit more. “No, lass. I’m sorry.”

Someone had left a calendar in the breakroom. You had tried to keep track of the days that had slipped by, but you just wanted to be sure. You counted on your fingers how many days you thought had passed, but the pain killers the first few days after the tunnel had made everything hazy. You worried your bottom lip with the blunt edge of your teeth as you flipped through the next month and dragged your finger down to the day you knew Kirby was due.

Just a few short weeks. That’s all you had. You needed to be there. You needed to be back in time. You’d promised Kirby you would be. You’d never broken a promise to your younger sister and you didn’t want to start now. Those stupid, useless tears stung at your eyes again and blurred the calendar dates. “Fuck.” You wiped at your eyes, trying to keep them from falling before anyone saw, before you felt more useless and trapped than you already did.

Another episode of Coronation Street was playing, a hum at the back of your mind, but it started to mutate and grow until it was a screech. You needed to get to Kirby. They had what they needed from you. You would sign anything they wanted, change your name, dye your hair, live off the grid. But you needed to see Kirby.

You promised.

The door opened easily and you strode out into the hallway. Did you know where you were going? Not really but you just needed to leave. You could figure out the rest later. After all, Kirby always said you landed on your feet. It was time you proved her right. You turned down another hall and yelped when a meaty hand clapped on your uninjured shoulder. You turned, tamping down the urge to throw an elbow and snarled as you realized it was only Soap and his ridiculous blue eyes.

“What’re ye doing?”

“I’m leaving. I have to go.” Your heart thudded painfully as you turned, slipping out from his grip. The edges of your vision started to blur and you hated that you knew what this meant. It had been years since you felt like this—but this situation hadn’t exactly been great for your mental health.

Thud.

Thud.

Thud.

Each beat of your heart hurt.

“Ye cannae do that, lass. Ye know that.”

“I’m leaving.” You turned again to leave and grunted when he pulled at the back of your shirt. “Let go of me.”

“Lass-”

You turned and tugged your shirt free, letting the snarl curl your mouth as your vision continued to tunnel.

Thud.

Thud.

Thud.

“I’m leaving!”

What happened next was not your finest moment but you’d also been through worse. Soap reached for you again and after you pulled out of his grip once more, he lowered his shoulder and ran at you, hauling you up and over. His arm anchored you down, a weight across your back as his shoulder dug into your stomach. You didn’t even freeze as he turned, presumably to bring you back to the breakroom. Your arm pushed out of its sling and you wrapped your hands around one of his thighs and let his next step help pull you from his grip. Heat lanced across your shoulder as you wiggled against the grip until you yanked your legs free and kicked them above his head and over your own until your heels hit the ground. And then you were throwing yourself forward and dashing down the hallway. Out. You needed to get out. You needed to leave. Every breath burned a little more and-

The tile was cool against your cheek but Soap’s arms were a heavy firebrand as they banded around your waist. “Calm down. Calm down fer me.”

You thrashed against his hold as he stood but he didn’t seem to care and it wasn’t like you were a match to those dumb, hulking muscles. But still, your memory was hazy as he dragged you back to the breakroom and shoved a shortbread into your hand.

“Now, I’ll talk to someone. But ye cannae do that. Ye understand?”

By the time Simon arrived back on home soil, they’d moved her and Soap to a different part of the base. A hall of barracks that had been recently constructed but not yet assigned to a different squadron had been a good place to hide away their injured sergeant and American informant. Laswell had informed Price of the move and then sent along a video in lieu of an explanation.

Simon wasn’t entirely sure how many times he watched her claw and wiggle her way out of Johnny’s grip but Price did eventually take the phone away from him. (But not before Simon sent himself a copy.) She was wily. Strong. Stubborn.

Even when she had tears smeared across her face.

It was easy for Simon to claim one of the rooms as his own—it had always been better for Simon to be on base anyway. His flat in Manchester never felt like home. Just an expensive place to rest his head when he was ordered to take his mandated leave. Knowing the others were down the hall was more comfortable than any sort of high priced pillow anyway.

The mission had been successful. And a shitshow. The second, and larger, cache of gas in Kastovia had been exactly where her intel had said it would be in a barren steel plant. But the handful of missiles had been an unexpected find. As had the small militia that awaited them. While they had been easily dealt with, one of them managed to set off what Simon could only describe as a failsafe to take out the entire plant and the surrounding area. The gas dissipated quickly but not before it had caused extensive damage. Makarov wanted them dead. And he wanted her dead, too, if the picture one of his men had pinned up beside a map of different caches and routes to take over borders was any indication. It was upside down and some artist had taken it upon themselves to scratch out her eyes and draw an obvious axe buried in her neck. Charming. There were a few smaller pictures beside it but he didn’t get a clear look at them.

The explosion meant they didn’t have more than the one picture Gaz took of the map and Simon’s lungs burned a bit every time he took a breath. Nik had been quick in the exfil but still cut it close. Too close. And it grated on his every nerve that Makarov hadn’t been there. Still in the wind.

Simon had been told to visit the medbay before going to bed—Laswell was supposed to be arriving tomorrow for a debrief—but he thought that was more of a suggestion than an order. He’d dropped his bag on the floor and rinsed off before lumbering into the small bed, letting the standard-issue sheets scratch at his skin. It felt like coming home. And he watched the video again, feeling a strange smile push at his mouth.

He could bother Johnny about her ability to get away from him in the morning.

The doctor whose name you couldn’t be bothered to remember told you to start physical therapy. And, just your luck, Soap had been told to do the same. If he was wary of you because of your outburst, he didn’t show it at all. He would smile at you, eyes crinkling, over his coffee whenever you opened your door at the crack of dawn. A tea would be in his other hands and ready for you. It was a nice routine as more days continued to slip by.

You’d stretch and grumble about the slowly fading pain in your shoulder and Soap would do the same. At least you didn’t need to use the sling anymore. But this was, pathetically, probably the closest you’d had to a friend. He’d talk and talk and talk. About his mom and sisters up in a small town outside Glasgow. About the dog he had as a kid—“Boots was the best dog a boy could have, lass, lemme tell ye.” About anything that seemed to pop into his head as the sun would intermittently peek out from behind the low hanging clouds to splash warmth across the dead grass beneath your sneakers. You counted it as a win that they let you outside. It was behind a fence with razor wire at the top, but a win is a win. Mostly. Maybe they were seeing if they could actually trust you outside those beige walls.

You’d swallow nails if it meant you could be at Kirby’s side when she needed you.

One of the more ridiculous exercises the doctor had you and Soap do was passing a yoga ball between one another—of course, you had to move your arms a certain way to get the right stretch or whatever, but it all felt a little silly, even with the twinge growing more pronounced with each pass. Hands on top and on bottom, twist so they’re on the side, hand to Soap. He’d repeat.

“This feels very stupid.”

“Aye. But they’re watchin’ so we’d best play nice.”

The yoga ball nearly slipped from your suddenly-slick fingers. “What do you mean?” You’d heard a bit of thudding from the empty room next to yours last night but thought it was a faulty air unit. Was there someone else here?

“They got back last night. Give ‘em a chance to settle before they say hello, aye?” Soap’s blue eyes sparked with mirth and you might have shoved the ball back at him a little harder than necessary. He just laughed at you.

You chanced a glance at the rectangular windows cut into the metal building, close to the sharp edge of the roof. He was probably just being funny, but now you couldn’t fight the feeling of someone watching you. And why did your mind conjure Ghost’s ridiculous mask?

He hadn’t said much after you had told him you weren’t going to pour your heart out to him. But he’d continued to stare until he and the others left for Kastovia without a word. One guy who’d found you “mysterious” while you were in undergrad thought that he could figure you out and stared, too. Thought that his attempt at a psychology degree would unravel all…well, all of you. He gave up after a couple of months. Ghost didn’t seem the type to give up. But that still didn’t mean that you were going to tell him anything.

You threw another glance toward the window and the yoga ball hit you in the face.

Simon stared down at the inhaler. This was stupid. The doc had hurriedly explained that being exposed to the gas during the explosion had done a number on Simon’s lungs. At least he wasn’t Price who’d hit his head on his way out and was told he’d had a concussion and also needed the inhaler. Gaz had been the only one who’d managed to get out mostly unscathed aside from needing a butterfly bandage for a cut over his eye.

His next breath burned and Simon finally shook the damn scrap of plastic and took a puff just as he heard the back door open. He stood and watched Johnny and the woman trudge out into the dead grass, carrying a few bits of equipment, including a yoga ball, craning his head just enough to see them through the high window. And well, if he stood on the small desk chair to watch, who would know?

He couldn’t hear them but he watched her throw a few glances toward the window. And then Johnny hit her in the face with the yoga ball. She promptly slingshotted one of the resistance bands at his head in retaliation.

“Heh.”

The debrief later that morning with Laswell had gone as expected: More intel was good. Makarov not being spotted was bad. They needed time to heal. Farah and Alex would investigate possible gas caches just within Urzikstan’s borders.

The picture Gaz managed to grab was helpful and did verify a majority of the intel they had already. But it did mean that Makarov’s network was larger than they had ever thought. One of Laswell’s contacts had enhanced the slightly blurry picture and Simon recognized each of the 141’s faces, pinned to the board, too. They were targets just as much as she was. Small bits of paper stemmed from Price, Soap, and Kyle’s pictures and Simon knew what they represented even without the fancy tech trying to make it clearer. They were hunting for weak spots. Family. Friends.

They needed to leave. Keep low. Hide. Simon hated it. He hated that the others had families on the line and he could do nothing but take a few puffs of his stupid inhaler and wait. These were men who’d become his brothers-in-arms and their families were at risk. He knew what it was like to lose.

Price’s hacking cough basically ended the debrief and Laswell said she needed to make some calls, disappearing to another part of the base and Price griped as Kyle urged him to go back to medical. Johnny said he was going to start packing.

Simon walked away as Price continued to grumble and walked down the small hallway toward the bunk rooms and–

BANG.

Simon paused just for a moment, straining his ears as he pushed further down the hallway. With how the mission had gone, he couldn’t rule out that someone had attempted to get onto base and finish the job the gas couldn’t. There were security gates and checkpoints, of course. The high fences. And this part of the base was underdeveloped for now. But having a traitor in the midst wasn’t something Simon could write off.

“Fuck,” came an annoyed voice.

The tension slipped from his shoulders as he pushed open the nearest door.

Sitting in a chair in front of the mirror atop the tiny dresser, she was picking at her stitches with a pair of needle nose pliers. A small pile of the twists sat atop the dresser—apparently she’d been at this for a while. Simon walked in, watching as she leaned closer to the mirror, trying to see the stitches across her shoulder better as she plucked at them. She’d jammed her tongue between her teeth and the strap of her thin top had been tugged down. A book, probably pilfered from the breakroom, was open beside her.

(Simon stared. Just for a little.)

The pliers fell from her hands and bounced off the dresser before hitting the floor. That had been the sound he’d heard.

“Need a ‘and?”

She let out what he could only describe as a squeak as she turned toward him, hurling the book at his head as the pliers slipped from her other hand. He caught it without letting loose the laugh he felt growing.

“Jesus Christ! How long have you been standing there? Don’t you knock?”

“Heard something. Thought something bad ‘appened.” Not a lie. He tossed the book onto the bed. He watched her mouth curl at the edges and Simon wasn’t sure if she was going to yell at him or laugh.

“Right.” She stared at him for a little longer before bending down to grab the pliers again. She settled in front of the mirror again and stared at the remaining stitches. At least the ones she could see. Simon had a clear view of the mess of stitches on her back. She’d never reach those.

She stared back at him in the mirror. The grip she had on the pliers was tight and grew tighter when he stepped closer. But he still easily pulled the tool from her hand and then reached down to turn her chair around to face him.

“What’re you doing?” She asked as he started to untwist the next stitch.

“Helping.”

“I didn’t ask you to do that.”

“Doin’ it anyway.”

Well, fuck.

You could do very little except stare at Ghost as he undid each of the stitches. You weren’t stupid enough to tell him to fuck off. What he was doing was nice. You couldn’t deny that but why the hell was he doing it? He was even bigger from this angle as he loomed over you. But he was being gentle with you, so gentle. And silent. Maybe it would be better if he talked to you through it all or said anything at all, but he was…quiet.

And so were you.

Until the door opened again and Gaz came in, gun drawn. You had pivoted back toward the door, only for a moment before Ghost let out a short, sharp breath from behind his mask and nudged you back into position. You still managed to see Gaz holster his weapon with a smile on his face, perfect teeth glinting in the low light. “All good here, LT?”

He grunted but didn’t turn to look at his teammate. You chanced a look up at Simon to see him still singularly focused on your stitches. His dark eyes didn’t stray from them even though you were sure he could feel you looking at him.

By the time he reached down to turn your chair again, letting him start on your back, you found yourself liking how quiet he was. Small talk had never been your forte and you surmised that it wasn’t high on Ghost’s list of skills either.

When his thumb pressed into your spine, covered by the harsh fabric of his gloves, you tried not to shiver as you let him move you so he could see the stitches better. And he removed those, too.

It was when his finger trailed against the new scar on your back, barely a whisper of a touch, that you couldn’t stop it. God, you really were pathetic. When he moved the strap of your shirt back up your shoulder, you managed to bite the next one back. “Thanks,” you said, the word uneven and warbled. “You going to help Soap take out his, too?” You weren’t sure if you were being sarcastic or not.

The way Ghost tilted his head made you think he wasn’t sure, either. “Cap did ‘is already. Looks like shit.”

And you laughed.

The nondescript SUV rocked slightly side to side as it tore down the road. Gaz seemed hellbent on getting wherever you were headed quickly. There had been some good-natured ribbing about not letting Ghost drive. They seemed to like each other, a good camaraderie between them that seemed as easy as breathing. But you guessed that would probably happen in their line of work. Defying death together usually did that. Price, however, did seem at least a little put out about not being the driver.

And you were stuck at the back of the SUV, listening to them talk amongst each other. To his credit, Soap and Gaz both tried to involve you in the conversation. They would ask what you had been doing in London, if you’d ever been outside the city, if your shoulder was giving you trouble. It was nice.

They were still nice.

You didn’t really understand why they were trying so hard but you weren’t about to ask. Especially not now when you had a black bag over your head. They didn’t really trust you but it had been a weird kindness when you’d felt Ghost buckle you in and place a light blanket over your lap before you’d departed. It was probably a silent order to go the fuck to sleep seeing as you hadn’t been sleeping well since you’d hastily weened yourself off the most intense pain killers. It didn’t help that you’d been shuffled outside right after midnight and told to get in the back of the vehicle without much fanfare. And you knew better than to argue.

You had a bag over your head and were heading to an unknown destination. The power dynamics didn’t exactly scream trustworthy. They kept you alive, that was true. But they didn’t trust you. Funny.

You leaned your head back against the seat and sighed, the fabric rustled against your mouth. It was a strange feeling. Weirdly comforting, like when you’d push your face into the pillow and scream when you were a child, desperate for an outlet.

“I can see why you like the mask,” you muttered.

“Whot?”

Hm. You said that out loud. Well, too late to take it back now. “I said I see why you like the mask.”

“She’s bloody insane,” Gaz whispered. But you liked to think he was smiling while he said it.

“Maybe Ghost’ll lend ye one of his? Ye two could match.”

There was an answering smack and “och, what was that for, LT?” before the blanket was adjusted over your lap.

“Go to sleep.”

You smiled beneath the bag. And, knowing you had nothing better to do…you went to sleep with Ghost’s low rumbling echoing in your ears.

A/N: Thank you so much for reading! Please let me know what you think!

[salemsinss]

18+ MDNI reader is GN but there are some feminine terms.

Part one Gardener!SimonRiley x Oldmoney!Reader

PrivateChef!Price x Oldmoney!Reader

(TW: creampie, breedingkink, jealousy, masturbation, overstimulation, all of these are vague if you read deep into it)

AN: I was not expecting the amount of love my first post got so thank you so much（≧∇≦）

also currently suffering from a UTI, and when I told my partner he was like you have an std 😭 I told him to kys immediately after men are dumb guys (and I chose this voluntarily…)

Anyway wish me luck with my UTI

Oldmoney!Reader like to happily spend their time at home being a couch potato, they already have enough money to put them and the next three generations through life some would they waste their time working when they can take up any hobby they can imagine

Oldmoney!Reader always finding the most unique recipes on TikTok or Instagram and spamming PrivateChef!Prices inbox on all the apps and even iMessage

PrivateChef!Price who doesn’t live on the manors land like the rest of the staff but actually commutes daily to come to readers home, prep food, cook for them, them return to his own home

PrivateChef!Price who does as best as he can to recreate the recipes reader sends him, making sure to do at least one a week, writing down the ones reader likes more and keeping them in a little note pad he tucks away in his apron.

PrivateChef!Price going far beyond readers expectations with every new recipe he tries and convinces the picky eaters that reader is to eat.

Oldmoney!Reader always looking at the new dishes like they are poisonous and vile, wonder just what they where about to eat rather than having price make them their comfort foods

Oldmoney!Reader who likes to invade prices kitchen and sometimes even kick him out so they can make snacks for Gardener!SimonRiley

PrivateChef!Price who is insanely jealous of the brew chemistry between Oldmoney!Reader and Gardener!SimonRiley

PrivateChef!Price trying to find a way to bend reader over the kitchen counter and take them right then and there but has to snap out of his thoughts to not burn the dish he was working on

PrivateChef!Price a food connoisseur but he can’t help but wonder just good reader would taste laying half naked on the kitchen island, back arched as he ate your cunt like it was the most perfect meal he’s ever eaten

PrivateChef!Price watching reader stumble back into the kitchen after seeing both reader and Gardener!SimonRiley disappear into the garden shed for a while, and reader comes into the kitchen clearly having just been fucked

PrivateChef!Price who has words to say to Gardener!SimonRiley, nothing nice of course because Simon got to his bird first when he had been planning and planning just how he would take the most private of reader as his own

PrivateChef!Price having to leave early the day you and Gardener!SimonRiley get freaky disappeared into the garden shed so he calm his own nerves and not kill the other man, but got the hard on he got strains so tightly in his pants as he saw you walk back into the kitchen also made him have to excuse himself

PrivateChef!Price masturbating to the thought of how fucked out you would look from you taking every part of him, picturing how many orgasms he could probably draw from you within a night, while he ate out your cunt, delved his fingers Into you to stretch out your tight pretty cunt, flicking at your clit while pressing on that soft gummy spot deep inside you before he’s spitting on his cock and slipping it between your folds to lube it up before making you take him inch by inch.

PrivateChef!Price cumming so quickly into his own palm but wishing it was deep inside your cunt so he could see you so full of him cum as he fucks it right back into you until that white ring is forming around the base of his cock, and your crying from overstimulation and too many orgasms to count on one hand

[cosmicmunsonwrites]

can you do rafe is your brother’s best friend?

a phone works two ways, you know

brothers best friend!rafe cameron x thornton!fem!reader

cw — fluff, angst, kinda sad if you squint but also kinda happy ending, alcohol

summary — rafe does his best to hide his feelings for his best friends younger sister until he cracks one day.

authors note — thank you so much for the request!! i’ll probably be posting a little celebration for 1.5k today where i’ll be writing as much as i can for as many requests as possible so please stay tuned for that :)

“topper, did you take my speaker again?” you asked your older brother, voice soft but teetering on the verge of annoyance. he always did this. he snuck into your room when you were out and stole it, drained the battery, then forgets to give it back as if he can’t just buy his own. “i’m going out to the pool and i need it.”

the three boys turned their heads over their shoulders, kelce murmuring something under his breath, rafe just staring at you, and topper fake gagging from his spot between them. you were wearing a baby pink triangle bikini with a towel in one hand and a bottle of water in the other. “jeez, can you at least put some clothes on? my friends are here.”

you rolled your eyes at him and huffed. “its a million degrees outside and i’m literally going in the pool,” you said as if it were obvious. “can you just get my speaker please?”

“its dead,” he said dismissively before turning back to the tv to watch the football game with kelce. rafes gaze lingered for a couple extra seconds until he followed their actions.

a groan left your lips as you turned on your heel and headed for the back door. “you’re the worst,” you mumbled before shutting it behind you. thankfully your tanning chair was already set out from the day before, so you carefully laid your towel down and your water bottle underneath it then sat on the ledge with your feet splashing in the water.

you casually scrolled through your socials, checking up on what was going on as of late considering you hadn’t done much but sit in your room with sarah. after a few minutes of sitting alone, the door opened. the sound didn’t catch your attention and neither did the footsteps. you didn’t even notice anyone was outside with you until water splashed all over you.

a gasp left your lips and you watched the culprit return to surface in the water. you glared at rafe who was now smiling and rubbing his eyes. “dude. are you serious? i had my phone in my hand.”

he could only laugh. “you’re by the pool. why do you even need it?” he asked teasingly. it only made you more annoyed.

“i was doing stuff, asshole,” you muttered, pushing the wet strands of your hair behind your ears.

he quickly swam over to you and grabbed your phone from your hand then tossed it over to your chair. he parted your legs slightly and stood between them with his big hands resting on your upper thighs. “i think,” he began, his thumbs rubbing soft circles into your damp skin. “you should just pay attention to me instead.”

you chuckled under your breath and pushed at his shoulder gently. “you’re such a cornball,” you replied jokingly. “why are you even out here? shouldn’t you be watching the game with them?”

“kelce started bitchin’ about how it was too hot so topper got all pissy and suggested coming in here with you,” he explained, his blue piercing eyes staring up into yours. “i mean, c’mon. you know i’d never deny the opportunity to see you.”

you shook your head and looked away. “don’t do that, rafe,” you said firmly. you chewed your lip anxiously and pushed his hands off of you. small beads of sweat formed on your forehead from the heat and beaming sun, making you quickly get off the ledge and into the cool water.

he tilted his head slightly and turned to watch your movements as you created a small distance between the two of you. “do what?”

“that,” you stated. “don’t say things like that. the moment topper comes out here, you’ll act completely different and pretend none of this ever happened. you can’t just do that. its not fair and it makes me feel like crap.”

he moved forward so he was close enough to grab you with a frown on his lips, his hands gently holding your waist and bringing you to him so your front was pressed flush against his own. “you know i wouldn’t if i had the choice, sweetheart. we both know top would kill me if he ever found out.”

you pushed away from his again as he hands fell from your body and limp by his sides. “maybe you should’ve thought about that before you kissed me then.”

your first kiss. it was a week ago when he’d taken you out to get ice cream while your brother was out at a party that he had no interest in attending, especially if it meant he’d have you all to himself for a few hours. he’d driven you to some cute little ice cream parlor by the beach and kissed you under the stars like it was some movie and you two were the main characters. you thought things would be different after that. apparently you were really far off.

“c’mon baby, its not like that. you’re making it seem like that was a mistake,” he tried to reason. he didn’t like the fact that you were stepping further and further away from him. it made his heart clench uncomfortably. “i don’t regret that and i don’t want you to either. trust me, if it weren’t for topper, things would be different. we jus’ have to let him warm up to the idea.”

you scoffed under your breath and looked down at the sparkling water. “yeah? and how long is that gonna take? weeks? months? years even?” your voice was surprisingly calm and it was beginning to genuinely worry him. “you knew how special that was to me. and in all honesty, it does feel like a mistake, rafe. if you weren’t planning on having anything serious with me then you shouldn’t have even bothered. i’m not gonna let my brothers opinion dictate my entire life and you shouldn’t either.”

you could visibly see his posture drop slightly and his expression turn into and unreadable one. before he could try to convince you otherwise, the two boys emerged from the house all smiley and cheering loudly. “we found the good booze,” topper said excitedly.

they each took a bottle of beer, kelce handing one to rafe before giving you a glass cup full of a thick pink slush. “top made it for you since you’re too boujee for beer,” he joked while walking down the pool steps.

your brother joined the three of you in the water and took a quick sip of his drink. “i tried making that strawberry shit you liked in mexico,” he explained, waving his free hand around carelessly. “used vodka instead of rum though since you apparently don’t like that either.”

you laughed softly and thanked him as you listened in on the conversation kelce started up with rafe. except it was more of him just talking to anyone who cared to listen considering the others attention was elsewhere. the moment you glanced around the pool, your eyes met rafes. they hadn’t left you even for a second since you moved away from him.

— a few hours later

the house was now full of people. the scent of expensive cologne, alcohol, and a dull mix of sweat permeated the air and made your head spin slightly as you squeezed through the crowd and outside to the patio where more people were. lucky for you, the cooler full of what you needed was right beside the door.

you quickly reached down to grab a beer for sarah and a bottle of smirnoff pink lemonade. the moment you stood, a boy you recognized was standing at your side. “hey. you’re toppers sister, right?”

your brows furrowed as your eyes met his green ones. he was cute, you couldn’t lie but you were definitely caught off guard. “yeah,” you said wearily. “and you are?”

he chuckled softly and readjusted his stance to be a little more comfortable. “mike,” he stated. “we met once a little while ago at a party. i jus’ wanted to say you look really good tonight.”

a blush creeped across your cheeks and you smiled to yourself. “thank you,” you replied sheepishly. “you’re one of my brothers friends from school?”

he nodded and flashed a smile. “yeah, we met through our frat. we both happened to be rushing alone.”

you jokingly made a disgusted face and turned your head to look the other way. “whew. top always told me to stay away from frat boys. he says they’re dangerous.”

mike let out a hearty laugh. “not all of ‘em,” he said suggestively. “maybe come with me and find out?”

“i think shes gonna have to pass on that, dude. sorry,” you heard rafe chime in as he appeared next to you and wrapped an arm around your waist, pulling you into his side. “actually, i just ran into your other girl inside. think she was lookin’ for you..”

you rolled your eyes and pushed yourself away from him. he didn’t get to dismiss you at one point then want you at another. “you’re ridiculous, rafe,” you said before squeezing past mike and pushing through the crowd to get up the stairs and to your room.

when you got inside, sarah was laying on her back in your bed scrolling through her phone. “finally. thought you got lost and i was gonna have to come down there and rescue you,” she joked playfully.

you handed her the beer and placed your own on the counter. “you should’ve. at least i wouldn’t have had to endure whatever that was down there,” you mumbled. “i’ll be right back. i need to use the bathroom really quick then we can get back to watching.”

as you left your room and shut the door behind you, you caught a glimpse of rafe coming up the stairs. you laughed angrily and headed towards the open door down the hall. “wait,” you heard him call out. you attempted to close the door, only for him to catch it before it clasped shut. “can you just talk to me?”

“can you stop being such a douche?” you shot back, crossing your arms over your chest. “what the hell was that out there? i was talking to someone. you don’t just get to pick and choose when you want to be with me. and you definitely have no right to just come in and get all protective over me.”

he sighed softly and stepped inside the bathroom with you, closing the door behind him. “with mike? really? he sleeps with everyone and jus’ moves on to another girl an hour later. trust me, you don’t want that.”

you could feel the rage bubbling deep in your stomach. he had some nerve. “what if i do? what makes you think you can tell me what i want and don’t want?”

“because i know you and i know you aren’t one to just sleep with someone random. what happened to that whole conversation about needing a connection with someone?” he questioned.

“were you also thinking about this when you kissed me?” you snapped back. “you do all these things to make me think you actually like me and then you just make me feel like an idiot the moment we’re in a crowd. you barely even talk to me when toppers around, rafe. i’m not gonna keep getting my feelings hurt over nothing.”

he shook his head and uncrossed you arms, taking your hands in his bigger ones. “i don’t wanna hurt your feelings, sweetheart. you know i wanna be with you. i just— i can’t do that to topper. he’s my best friend and—“

“then we can save the hassle and stop talking about this,” you interrupted. “you don’t get to get my hopes up anymore. i’m not doing it. its either you want to be with me or you don’t. if you really want to be with me, then you’d be willing to make sacrifices. do you really think i expect my brother to be completely okay with it? of course not. but i’m willing to work through that. if you’re not then theres no point in continuing this and you can leave.”

a frown spread across his lips and he looked down at his hands that were still holding yours, his thumb rubbing circles into the backside of your hand. “i wanna be with you, i really do. and i don’t wanna lose you over this,” he said softy. “can we just take things slow? i don’t care what topper thinks, i jus’ don’t want him to try to stop us from seeing each other.

you stared at him with a slight hesitation in your gaze. “how do i know you’re being serious? how do i know you’re not just gonna flake out on me again?”

he squeezed your hands a little tighter and took a step closer so there was only a couple inches between the two of you. “cause its always been you, sweetheart. you’re the only person i’ve ever felt this way about and i really, really don’t wanna lose you,” he explained. “i like you a lot. it scares the shit outta me but i’d rather do this with you than anyone else.”

you felt heat creep up your neck and onto your cheeks. “please don’t make me regret this, rafe.”

he smiled before moving one hand to cradle your jaw and the other to your waist. he pulled you close and placed a soft kiss to your lips, tilting his head slightly to deepen it as it went on. your arms wrapped around his neck and you arched your body just enough to press against him.

a muffled whimper left your lips when he squeezed gently at your hip and slipped his tongue into your mouth. you could feel your heart pound in your chest. you’d never gone this far. fortunately he was taking it slow though and allowing you time to mimic his movements.

too caught up in the moment, you didn’t even hear the door open. “what the fuck?”

[hottt-cakes]

The only reason I watched the show fr😅ANYTHING FOR BTS!! But since we’re on the topic let me rant a little🤭

Warning Spoilers ahead (YOU SHOULD PROBABLY STOP READING NOW)

Also it’s kinda long…my bad🫶🏾

This show pisses me off don’t get me wrong it was watchable but the plot and the storyline gave the potential to be BINGEABLE!! At a certain point I had a hard time wanting to continue watching.

Now if you loved it great!! Good for you but since this rant is about ME!! I’m going to say what I want to say.

Because how do you take a show with a plot as juicy as this and FUMBLE it😩 (here’s what I mean)

The MC FL was given the chance to go back in time keeping all her memories of the future and SHE DIDNT BECOME A MENACE?!?!?

Like she could’ve made her ex bf and ex besties life miserable (IN-Fucking-TOLERABLE) but instead SHE TOOK THE HIGH ROAD lowkey 🤦🏽‍♀️

She honestly could’ve gone BEAST MODE on them and have us all gagged clutching our pearls BUT NO!! ( out of the whole show only two scenes gave something close to that energy)

I just felt like she could’ve done way more she was just too nice in my opinion

Yes the bf and bestie got what deserved in the end but it would’ve been way more satisfying if SHE! messed with them more and made every moment of their lives unlivable until the very end😅

Next if we don’t watch a show for the plot best believe we in it for the LOVE story but IT WAS SOOOO DRYYYY (I wanted to rip my hair out). I couldn’t tell if they even wanted each other until the very end like WTF!!!

At that point it felt thrown in my face because the whole show there was NO CHEMISTRY NO SPARKS!!!

Supposedly the MC ML has been in love with the FL since college?.?.? But never got the chance to tell her and after she died he too died and was also sent back in time (with his memories mind you) to SAVE HER!!

The love plot alone could’ve been a GOLD MINE. We could’ve had scenes/moment that had us all screaming, going feral and gasping for air BUT NO!!! Instead we got NOTHING!!

Not even talking about steamy scenes or anything like that. In the kdrama world we keep it cutesy and demure strictly hugs and hand holding but nonetheless the scenes be giving you butterflies and having giggle being all shy but not with this show NO!! WE GET NOTHING!!

Not once while watching did I ever think the couple were specifically chosen by the stars and put together in the same timeline just to be together 😩

While watching, it got so bad I started begging PLZ MAKE ME FEEL LIKE THE THIRD WHEEL🫠

Also even the side characters had a little kindling romance and usually those be hitting the spots the MCs romances missed. Take Goblin or Business Proposal for instance those side character romances were so delicious I couldn’t get enough.

With this one it felt forced/rushed I feel like they could’ve worked on it a little more. She’s a foodie and he’s a chief like come on the shit basically writes itself. They could’ve been so cute☹️

Anyways I’m done, it just didn’t give what it was supposed to or could’ve give🙄

how to find fellow time traveler. tell them about your favorite unreleased BTS song

[shikaizer]

PAIGENEXTDOOR p.b x reader PART II

summary : PART I The aftermath of hooking up with your enemy has been lurking discomfort towards the both you, the firm avoidance towards each other and the unsolved feelings has you dumbfounded.

warning : smut 18+, agressive, confusing feelings, degration, slight angst? hair pulling.

a/n : my writing in the first part was kinda ass 😭 as because i was finishing up two drafts at the same time.

eversince what happend between the both of you, you both stumbled upon the akwardness and the avoidance towards each other, therefore, you didn't want to ignore her or whatever, she was making it harder for the both of you by acting like you never exist at all whenever its only the two of you in the same area, she just acts like shes all alone, she would only talk to you when it was you who would inititate a conversation.

you never figured why she was acting like this, because what you remembered, she was the first one to make the move, and all of the it felt like she felt a sudden shame wash over her body.

of course you are enraged by this, you tried to understand, you wanted to but whenever you would bring it up she would dodge the question.

just when you had enough with her constant bypass, without hesistation you have paige pinned, both hands on the counter, glancing up at her, she looked irritated but her eyes is telling you a different story.

"what are you doing?" paige uttured under her breath looking down at you, even though you were small it seemed like you had full control over the situation making paige gag at the thought.

"tell me, why the fuck, your avoiding what happend" you gnarled between words, pressing yourself closer to her your warm breath hitting her face.

"what happend?" she asked makeshift of her confused words, you slammed your hand on the counter aggresively making her flinch

"if this is about that night, forget about it." she states composed as if its not a big deal, meanwhile you on the other hand is going crazy so close to pulling out your hair.

"are you serious right now?" you murmur in disbelief, you backed away slightly and relaxed your shoulders.

she stayed quiet and the both of you just looked at each other for a moment, you hesitated to speak up, but you already took the courage to bring the situation up, so there was no turning back now.

but before you could open your mouth words came out of her mouth first. "i was confused." she state and you scoffed letting out a snort cocking your head.

"fucking confused? you gotta be kidding me!" you yelled at her completely losing it, and she sighed as if you are the one stressing whos in the wrong.

"was that a one night stand then?" you gained composure letting your hands rest on your hip and she looked down probably trying to gather some words to say, "i wanted to shut you up." she mumbled somehow unsure of what she just said

"your fucking stupid, do you have any idea what i feel right now?" you whimpered and she finally gain back her gaze towards you and her face softening when she saw the tears swelling in the corner of your eyes.

"im... sorry.. i was just fazed.. i.. i dont know.." she looked down on the floor feeling guilty as she stammer thru sentence, you clench your jaw your eyes relaxing, and you spoke up again.

"fuck me." you cut her off, she was quick to look back at you her mouth slightly open, stunned at what she just heard.

"what..?" she voiced out like she didn't hear what you said clearly, you walked up to her again this time your fingers had reached for your zipper pulling them down to reveal your bare body, with nothing underneath but just a sweater which you have now threw aside.

you pressed your body against her, your boobs pressing on her body making her let out a small whimper before both hands are now rested on your hips.

she leaned down to your level pulling you in for a kiss, her grasp on your hips tightening as the kiss becomes more rough and passionate.

you moaned thru the kiss when you felt her hand make its way to your tits pressing and squeezing them, pulling away from the kiss.

"cant fucking resist you.." you confesses and she cooed smirking, her lips brushing on your jaw as her hand reaches at the center of your short, she lifted you up with ease placing you on the counter, she looked up at you and moved a strand of your hair behind your ear.

"cant get enough of me huh?" she teased sliding your shorts down and she chuckled amused at the sight of your bare cunt. "not even a fucking underwear, been waiting for this moment are you? slut."

she spat on her hand and rubbed them on your clit making you grunt "fuck yes." you express jerk your hips forward and without warning, she slammed her fingers inside you the only source of lube is her spit and the build up wetness inside you.

"oh shit!" you threw your head back, your hips twitching adjusting to her fingers. "wanted this so bad right? fucking take it." she spat her fingers starting to move faster, her other hand slapping the side of your hips keeping her eyes on you.

she kept her focus on you, entertained at the sight of you and your fucked out face, her current view was enough for her to be pleased.

"look at you.." she cooed scanning your body up and down watching the way you respond to her fingers, you wrapped your arms around her shoulder pulling her closer, she gladly took your embrace by placing one hand on your back the other one working its way to delight.

"fuck fuck fuck.." you cant even think straight, your mind is absent and the only thing your thinking about right now is how deep shes moving inside you.

the curl of her fingers made you yelp arching your back, she took a full of your hairing pulling them for you to meet her gaze.

"pai..paige i love you" you uttured out of the blue and she squinted her eyes taken back from the sudden confession, her pace slowed down trying to process what you said.

her jaw clenches and gained composure slamming inside you again this time it was very rough and deeper, and it seemed like there was a mix of anger in it.

you yelled out pulling her closer to you nails digging on the back of her neck your eyes rolling to the back of your eyes.

you dont even realize that you are close to cumming, and before you know it, you have squirted. paige slowed down and kissed your shoulder.

your cheeks quickly heat up when you felt the wetness between your thighs and you looked at paige, she just smiled at you kissing your forehead.

"lets get you cleaned up." she voiced out lifting you up to the bathroom, completely putting aside the fact that you just expressed your love towards her.

[kurokawaia]

ATTITUDE!! 彡 Bakugou, Shoto, Dabi, Hawks

| MDNI - 18+ | WARNINGS :: bakugou x fem!reader, hawks x fem!reader, dabi x fem!reader, x fem!reader, shoto x fem!reader, second pov, suggestive content, nsfw themes, implied smut/nsfw, no actual naughty acts, pet names used: babe, baby, sweetheart, dear, my love + more? MINI ONESHOTS. total wc :: 1.5k

⋆·˚ ༘ *REQUEST :: Could you maybe write a headcannon where reader says can you please shut the fuck up to them ? It can be more nsfw suggestive like. Like dabi finds it kinda hot and katsuki is kinda pissed but more in a amusing way. Could you do it pls for hawks,dabi,katsuki and maybe shoto? - @carokitten

DABI

Yeah good luck with you saying that actually making an impact because, surprise surprise, it is not going to work, if anything that just turns him on. "Don’t pretend you don’t like it when I—" You didn't even know what Dabi was rambling about while you were trying to concentrate on your task.

"Can you please shut the fuck up?" you snap, the words just slipped out before you could register even saying them. Immediately after you bit your bottom lip, mentally cursing yourself because you know your mans a freak, it probably gets him going.

Dabi stops abruptly after hearing your outburst and rests his hand on his palm, his elbow balanced on the table right beside you. A smirk rises on his lips as he nudges your shoulder. "Damn, babe. That's kinda hot," he chuckles before slyly slinging his arm around your shoulder, his hand moving your chin towards his face as you were looking away. With a swift movement, you are know dangerously close to his face, only a mere inch away, the pad of his thumb playing with your bottom lip teasingly, watching your face turn red. "Say it again," he teases, moving closer until his lips will graze your own, until your heart is pounding so loud you can't process any thoughts, licking his lips like he’s about to devour you whole.

You roll your eyes. "I swear to god, Dabi—"

He leans over you, almost causing you to fall of the chair, Dabi's lips press against yours and a haste movement of his tongue slipping past before you could even register until he pulls away. Swear all you want, babe, I’ll make you beg me to keep talking, to help you through it..." he murmurs slowly and your cheeks flare up knowing he was referring to something other that yapping your ear of.

HAWKS

Hawks has been teasing you for the past ten minutes, throwing in suggestive comments every chance he gets. He’s clearly enjoying the way your cheeks heat up and the way you stiffen momentarily whoch just made his experience so much better. Flustered, {name}, flustered, {name}, flustered, {name}, is the only thing singing in his head right now. "Y’know," he muses, his chest pressing against your back as you finished wiping the counter, causing you to be flush against him and the cool marble. "I could just keep talking if it means getting a reaction outta you. Kinda fun watchin’ you get all flustered like that—"

"Can you please shut the fuck up?" you cut in as nice as you could. Hawks freezes because he has never aroused such a reaction in you such as that before and it made him let out a laugh from behind you, moving his arms to cage you in, so you won't move. No, no, no, no. You aren't going to let him get to you. "Ohh, feisty," he grins and you let out a shaky breath feeling his lips graze the crook of your neck. He's getting to you. "Didn’t know you had that in you."

"I mean it, Kei'," you mumble, unable to comprehend between the sensations of his touch and how his words made your lower abdomen do flips. "What if I don’t?" he murmurs and you could feel him pressing in closer to you, you aren't going to last if this keeps up, his voice dipping lower. "What if I just keep talking, keep whispering in your ear, keep making you—"

"Kei, stop right now," you say, cutting him off but this only riles him up further, and did you really want him to stop? No. No you did not. One of his arms move so that now, after his hand slowly traces up from your hips to your chin, tilting your head back into his shoulder, having clear access to your neck to place kisses on. "Well, sweetheart, you just made this a whole lot more fun for me." Oh, you just made this a whole lot more fun, sweetheart."

BAKUGOU

Bakugou is ranting about something—probably a fight that happened on patrol, probably how he’s the best—and you’ve been nodding along, but he just. Won’t. Stop. And, Oh my days, it is giving you a headache. "So then that extra tried to land a hit, and I fuckin’ dodged it—like obviously, dumbass should’ve known better—"

"Can you please shut the fuck up?" you sigh, rubbing your temples, shoving your face into the pillow your head was laying on. For a moment, he looks like he’s about to explode—literally. "Ohh, you think you’re real funny, don’t ya?" He smirks and you don't reply, the headache in your temple getting worse.

Suddenly you feel a big, heavy mass fall onto you causing a winded groan to leave your lips, muffled by the pillow on your face. "You don't get to say that to me and just sink into the pillows, baby," he taunts, snatching the pillow off your face, a surprised escaping your mouth. Blush coats your face as he leans his forehead against your own, lips about to press to yours, your breathing stills while your heart begins to poud hard in your chest. "Go on. Say it again. See what happens."

Maybe you should snap back at him more often...

SHOTO

Shoto has been talking in his usual calm, tone, explaining something in excessive detail. At first, you were listening, but now he’s been going on for several minutes, completely unaware that you’ve stopped paying attention. "I read that different types of ice melt at slightly varying speeds depending on density," he continues, watching the ice cubes swirl in his drink, referring to the ice in the cup, comparing it to his quirk. "It’s not significant, but it is interesting to consider in—"

"Can you please shut the fuck up?" you say, your cheeks meeting your palms. Shoto pauses mid-thought, blinking at you. He's buffering, trying to process your words. "…Did you just tell me to shut the fuck up, dear?" You sigh, resting your chin in your palm. "Yes, my love. I did." For a moment, he just stares at you, as if contemplating something. Then, so effortlessly it makes your stomach flip, he leans in slightly, his gaze steady.

"That was rude," he states. You open your mouth to reply, but his fingers brush your wrist absentmindedly, and you suddenly feel very aware of how close he is and lord have mercy, you're about to fold. "You don’t usually talk like that," he continues, "I think I like it."

What?

He was leaning in to place a kiss to your lips, and you were about to fall onto the futon in reciprocation until he pulls away, going back to yapping about his ice water. You groan. "Oh my god, Sho'."

Do not copy, steal, modify, etc. Relogs and like are appreciated.

honey's a/note:: i do know about dabi's past i just don't want to spoil anyone who isn't up to that bit yet in the manga/show! i got spoiled on for his reveal and i will not be the one to spoil it for anyone else! so i will try my best!

[midnightsnyx]

come back home - jack hughes

pairing: jack hughes x reader warnings: angst with a hint of fluff word count: 879 requested: yes / no author note: i have like a million other projects i need to write but i just need to get my sad feelings out so yeah, sorry lol masterlist requests are open

It’s quiet when you step in to the apartment you and Jack shared which wasn’t unusual in the past few months. Quiet was how the two of you lived lately. Tip toeing around each other as if you were walking on egg shells.

Part of you was tired of it and asked yourself if it was really worth it. But the other part of you wasn’t sure if you knew how to live without him anymore and that thought alone scared you. It made you realize how much you had grown to depend on him.

You hear his voice before you see him.

“You’re home.”

His voice is hoarse and you know that he just woke up from a nap. His ruffled appearance confirms it when he meets you in the living room.

“Yeah,” you whisper, staring at the floorboards. You hadn’t been home for days - not since the fight the two of you had. Your best friend let you crash at her house after you told him you needed space which explains his next question.

“Why?”

Truthfully, you aren’t sure what made you decide to come home. Your friend had told you that you were welcome to stay as long as you needed and had even put her two cents in on the whole situation.

Her words stuck with you since you broke down and told her everything that had been going on.

“He may love you. He probably does… or at least he maybe thinks he does. But that’s not what matters, sweetie. What matters is what he is doing to show you that he does and right now… he isn’t doing anything.” She squeezed your hand and smiled gently. “You deserve someone who goes out of their way to show you how much they care about you.”

The worst part was that she was right. When was the last time he had went out of his way to do something for you? It made you think back to the beginning of your relationship when he treated you like you were the most important thing in his life. But you suppose that all new relationships begin like that.

You realize that he’s still staring at you intently and you try to come up with some reason you came back rather than the truth, which was that you were too dependant on him and you felt like you needed him as much as you needed air to breathe.

“Can you at least tell me one thing?” he asks after you’ve been silent for so long and all you can do is nod.

“Why did you leave?”

You don’t have to think about the answer to this question because it was something that had been haunting you for quite some time.

“I guess I started to feel like I needed you more than you needed me,” you tell him quietly, wrapping your arms around yourself tightly.

“Look at me,” he says and you let your eyes meet his. “I love you.”

You want to believe him but your friends words keep coming back to haunt you. Did he love you or was he drunk on the idea of it? Something your mom told you a long time ago was that there is a distinct difference between loving someone and being in love with them. It’s easy to lie to yourself about loving someone but you can’t lie to yourself about being in love with them.

“How are you so sure?” you ask him.

“How could I not?” he says and you’re about to tell him that his answer isn’t good enough but he doesn’t stop there. “Baby, you’re the first person I think of when I wake up and the last person I think of when I’m falling asleep at night.” He slowly walks over to you and reaches out with one hand, letting his thumb run across your cheek. “I think about your smile and your laugh and about how you are the only person I want to come home to.” You watch as he looks away from you and stares at a picture of the two of you. It’s from a trip the two of you took last summer during break. 

“I don’t know what to do,” you admit. You’re scared that if you let things go back to how they were before, you’ll end up back here in this exact situation. “I’m afraid that this will become a cycle and I can’t do it, Jack. I physically can’t handle that.”

He doesn’t say anything for a minute, he just looks at you as if you’re the only thing in the world, his world, that matters. It makes you weak in the knees and this is the Jack you fell in love with. 

“Just come home,” he whispers. “We can figure everything out. Together.”

It’s a risk, deciding to give everything another shot. To put your heart on the line. But you remember something else your mom told you once.

“The right people are worth staying for”, she had told you.

You take a deep breath and nod, hoping that you’re making the right decision.

“All right,” you tell him and he grins, kissing you for the first time in months and it feels like coming home.

[forgetfulfish]

I think as well it's the spiraling horror of the way the tasks get more and more mundane. The viewer sees Gabby's situation and they're jarred by how screwed up it is. Severance for personal and selfish reasons. Then they emphasise the reality of this kind of existence so blatantly with Wellington Gemma's "I was just here", going to the dentist over and over again.

This image of the ultra rich handing off uncomfortable things goes from childbirth, to the dentist, to airplane turbulence. People so devoid of humanity they would in a literal way slice off a part of their own self and use it to avoid all pain and discomfort. However, the airplane amps it up a level of bizarreness, because that's a discomfort that is already fully avoidable. Countless nervous flyers every day take a sleeping tablet on a flight. Checking out of the concious world on a flight is already an option, so what's the appeal? That one could stay awake and converse and keep up appearances while on the flight? There's no possible reason that isn't entirely based on keeping up appearances. There's a whole other more ethical way to avoid that discomfort right there. The situation has spiraled from selfishly avoiding pain and locking that poor innie in the cabin 3 times, to the Wellington Gemma that ensures endless dental procedures to allow an outie to avoid even the most routine and trivial uncomfortable procedures, to keeping a person eternally on an airplane to avoid showing any even perceived weakness or fear. We've seen what having only the severed floor does to the Lumon innies, even with other innies around and diconnected from the outside world. Now scale that down to an airplane but there's nobody who understands you and you're never really anywhere always in the sky. Always expected to socialise with outies like you aren't even an innie. Gabby's innie wouldn't admit to being one, she put up a front, it's a reasonable jump to assume that's what will be expected of them.

And then they show the Christmas room. An innie created to avoid writing thank you notes at Christmas. A person who exists solely so that one would not have to go to the effort of actual human connection. But it goes deeper than that, this is a task one could pay an assistant to do for them. Any person who doesn't give a damn about thank you notes and can afford an optional brain surgery like severance could probably outsource this task with ease. Heck, a thank you note is something you could just forego entirely. But no, they think that one must keep up an appearance of gratitude, of a hand written thank you note, and they see no issue having one woman write forever so that they can have that. And this one scene hammers home the goal of keeping up appearances because the innie is expected to return their spouse's declartion of love. The innie must behave as the outie spouse would. A big cultural holiday that's meant to be about spending time with family is turned into her constant suffering all in the name of the outie avoiding being even slightly inconvenience having to perform a kind gesture. And what better framing for the corporatisation of human feeling than Christmas, a holiday famously intensely corporatised.

We went from singular rich lady selfisly offloads her suffering, to avoiding routine medical procedures by having a person go through them endlessly, to having somebody locked eternally in a vehicle simply to save face, to creating an innie to avoid anything that is even mildly annoying and in doing so turning what should be a relatively mundane task for the outie into an infinitely stretching never ending hell for an innie.

The viewer sees the horror of Gabby's innie's situation and the show just takes it lower and lower and lower. Absolute doom spiral of situations and motivations. Quality storytelling.

thats actually crazy. what if you didn't have to be present at the dentist, while on a boring flight. what if someone else (who was you) wrote a bunch of thank you cards until their hand hurt. what if you still felt the pain, but it was their whole life. what if you did immeasurable violence to yourself in a million tiny ways every single day. and that's the bright shining future of severance.

[zerosbubble]

Coffee Routine.

Tim Bradford x Rookie!reader [PLATONIC] — Ongoing series: Like Father, like Rookie.

A/N: Thank you so much for the support! I honestly didn’t expect so many of you guys to love this series. Definitely gave me more motivation to write! 🥹

Summary: Your everyday routine consisted of many things—one of them being bringing Tim coffee right before roll call without fail. However, one morning, Tim notices something awfully wrong. You didn’t bring him coffee today.

The first time it happened, Tim barely even looked at you.

You strolled into roll call, dropped a coffee onto his desk without ceremony, and took your seat like it was nothing. Like you hadn’t just handed him a large black coffee from his usual spot, perfectly made.

Tim blinked at it. Then at you.

You didn’t even glance up, already flipping through your notes.

Alright. Maybe it was a coincidence.

But then it happened again. And again. And again.

Every morning, like clockwork. Before his first cup of the day, before he even had a chance to be irritated at something stupid, you were there, sliding the cup over without so much as a greeting.

Like it was routine. Like you just knew.

And Tim—being Tim—did what he always did when confronted with something odd. He ignored it.

For weeks.

But then, one morning, he got to work a little later than usual, and when he walked into the briefing room—no coffee in hand—he felt it immediately.

Something was missing.

He glanced around. You were at your desk, looking half dead, chin resting on your palm as you aimlessly scrolled through a report.

And on the table that he sits at every morning?

Nothing.

No cup waiting for him. No routine exchange. Just an empty desk and a sluggish-looking rookie who was barely upright in her chair.

Tim frowned. “Where’s my coffee, kid?”

You blinked up at him, eyes unfocused, like it took you a second to register the question. “Huh?”

“My coffee,” he repeated, slower this time. “The one you hand me every morning like some kind of overgrown intern.”

“Oh.” You yawned, rubbing a hand over your face, expression hazy. “Didn’t get one.”

Tim squinted, like it was a riddle that he (for once) didn’t have the brains to decipher. “You didn’t get one?”

You shrugged, barely lifting your shoulders. “Forgot.”

Forgot.

That was new.

You had managed to grab coffee every single shift for the past three weeks, unprompted, like some weird unspoken pact. You weren’t exactly a creature of habit—more impulsive, more instinct-driven—but somehow, this had become routine. Reliable. And now, suddenly, you just… forgot?

Tim crossed his arms, taking in the mess of you. Your uniform was a little more wrinkled than usual, your posture slumped. Dark circles weighed under your eyes, and you had that glassy, half-there look of someone running on fumes.

It clicked.

“You overslept.”

You groaned, dropping your head onto your folded arms. “Why do you say that like it’s a crime?”

Tim huffed, unimpressed. “Because for you, it kind of is. What happened? Alarm not go off?”

“Woke up an hour late,” you mumbled, voice muffled against your sleeve. “Didn’t have time to stop.”

Tim stared at you for a long moment. Then, without a word, he turned on his heel and walked right back out of the briefing room.

You barely even noticed. Probably too half-asleep to care.

Five minutes later, when he returned, he dropped a cup onto your desk—your usual order, still warm.

Your head lifted slowly. You stared at it. Then up at him.

Tim just arched a brow. “What?”

You squinted. “Did you… just get me coffee?”

He scoffed. “Yeah. It’s called returning the favour.” He muttered, before clearing his throat to restore his imagine, “—and I can’t have a rookie who’s sloppy just because they didn’t have their morning coffee. Don’t overthink it.”

You blinked again, as if trying to make sure this was real. Then, with an exaggerated sniffle, you clutched the cup to your chest. “I take back every bad thing I’ve ever said about you.”

Tim rolled his eyes. “Drink your damn coffee, kid.”

And just like that, the routine was set back into place.

[julysalad]

My Big List Of Underappreciated Tomarrymort Works On AO3.

❗This list is based solely on my own fanfiction preferences. I think all fanfiction deserves to be read and known, even if I, personally, don't include it in this list❗

As a very picky reader, I'm usually left dissatisfied with the portrayal of characters or quality of the plot even in works that have many kudos and bookmarks. I often find my attention straying from the text, even if I was interested in a work after reading summary or first chapters.

So, in this list of recommendations I will include fanfiction that, in my opinion, deserves more readers and recognition. And that is the reason why I'm setting the bar at works that have less than 5000 kudos on AO3.

I'm also not adding fanfics that fall under Plot What Plot/Porn Without Plot tag on AO3 here. Firstly, because I've never seen anyone read their porn based on anyone's fic recommendations 🤷🏼‍♀️. Secondly, because I don't find myself lacking high-quality, well-written tomarrymort porn.

Works will be placed in no particular order.

More Precious than Rubies by Strange_Soulmates (T, 44K, 6/6)

Harry Potter has recently escaped from his dragon-guarded tower. So has his fellow prisoner - the dragon who was enchanted to guard him. Harry's friend is missing, however, and so he sets off to assure himself of his well-being before he finds the person responsible for imprisoning them both. Accompanied by a stranger with a familiar name, Harry finds himself with more questions than answers as he slowly learns about the customs of dragons and the history of the dragon he befriended, the fearsome Voldemort.

Fantasy AU. One of the first tomarrymort fics I've ever read and instantly loved. Very fluffy and tender work, no hurt only comfort. Harry and Tom | Voldemort are just really sweet together in this one.

The Nature of Mating by Strange_Soulmates (E, 22K, 6/6)

Ron and Hermione have spent the last year searching for their missing friend, Harry Potter. Just when they think they have finally found an answer, they're swept away themselves.

Harry Potter is tired of waiting for Tom to finish making a move, and is determined to take the last steps of their courtship himself if that's what it takes.

Voldemort? Voldemort just wishes his little pest had better taste in treasure.

Sequel to More Precious than Rubies. If you loved the first part, you'll probably love the second.

Mary Magdalene by @vashhanamichi (E, 17K, 4/?)

Based on a prompt for the Daddymort fest: when Harry tries to destroy four of Voldemort's seven Horcruxes they turn into babies instead and latch on to Harry like ducklings.

or:

SCANDAL! Young Mother Of Four Claims Dark Lord Hasn't Been Paying Child Support

The summary is self-explanatory in this one. Very enticing, very sensual work with dark themes. Mind the tags. Even though it hasn't been updated in a while I really hope it will be continued 🙏

Those Made of Lightning and Blood by A_Single_Cactus (E, 53K, 5/5)

A story in which Harry believes his soulmate bond is unreciprocated. Voldemort is his soulmate, but he's not Vodemort's. What he doesn't realize is that he's meant to speak his first words to Voldemort in a different time, not in front of the Mirror of Erised.

Time-travelling Harry AU + Soulmates AU. Falls under Tom Riddle Is His Own Warning tag (like most of the works in this list, to be honest). I really love the author's style in writing, the fanfic is a very easy read (I read it in one go).

The Reverent Son by A_Single_Cactus (E, 9K, 1/1)

When Harry decided to raise Tom Riddle as his son, he never could've imagined, one day, that the demon would want him. He never could've imagined his child growing to be a monster.

Lord, save him.

Church AU with demon!Tom. Mind the tags. Another work by the author of Those Made of Lightning and Blood. This fanfic comes close to Porn Without Plot category, but I still decided to include it because I really like this author's style.

In Your Soul is Sealed a Pleasure by mosiva (E, 22K, 2/2)

“So confident,” Voldemort murmured, “to be waiting here alone, this late at night.” He let a little menace seep into his tone.

The man merely smiled in return, cocky. “Oh, is this a bad area?” he said. “I hadn’t realised, what with the lack of streetlights and the not-so-distant screams. Silly me.”

Harry’s been sent back in time, but he’s still not worked out what it is about this specific moment that gives him the best chance to change things for the better. All he’s managed to do so far is talk to an oddly intense man in an alley and try not to get mugged.

Time-travelling Harry AU. The times of the First Wizarding War, with obsessive Voldemort and funny, charming, witty Harry.

A Light That Never Goes Out by @kippipies (M, 108K, 13/?)

Harry steals from the wrong people and finds himself left for dead with a bullet in his skull.

Except he doesn't die.

And now, he has an infamous criminal organization called the Death Eaters hot on his tail, determined to correct that mistake. Even worse, the group is led by a deranged kingpin named Voldemort, who seems to think trying to kill Harry is the best fun he's had in years.

Mafia | Mob boss AU. I've never thought I would enjoy a non-magical Harry Potter AU, because, for me, the whole point of Harry Potter is it's a magical world and a very important part of both Harry and Tom's characters. So if you're sceptical, like me, please give it a try – I promise you won't regret it. No "big strong alpha mafia boss falls in love with tiny little weak omega at first sight" in this one. An incredible story of slowly progressing obsession. The work is regularly updated.

One of my most favorite works.

What quickens me is the violence in thee by @i-dream-of-libraries (M, 16K, 6/6)

Harry is sold at auction to a man who is clearly in some kind of disguise - Lord Riddle isn't as charming as he looks, and the way he looks at Harry...

A bit of guilty pleasure fanfic for me. I just love works with dark obsessive Tom | Voldemort and a bit of old fanfic tropes...

Saving the World, One Blowjob at a Time by NixandShit (E, 13K, 1/2)

Harry goes back in time to stop everyone from dying and ends up in a weird Slytherin hierarchy and saving the world by distracting the future dark lord with sex.

Time-travelling Harry AU. This work also comes close to Porn Without Plot category, but, just like with "The Reverent Son", it has plot and I just reeeeally love the author's style in writing. So yes, I'm including it.

And the Living Will Envy the Dead by @k-s-morgan (M, 114K, 6/23)

When Harry looks at Tom, he feels overwhelmed. There is a spark that makes him hopeful, the fear that nothing he does will save Tom from himself, and the horror at what his lies might lead to.

When Tom looks at Harry, he feels nothing. Until he does, and then Harry’s world starts drowning in blood.

Time-travelling Harry AU. The work by the author of "What He Grows To Be", one of the most popular tomarrymort works on AO3 (the amount of kudos is completely deserved). The author's style is incredible, the portrayal of characters is immaculate, the plot and plot twists are one of the most well-written I've ever seen! The fanfic isn't finished, but please support the author and read it anyway!

One of my most favorite works.

Extenuating Circumstances by Origin_Of_Symmetry (M, 87K, 2/2)

“You’re really quite a delight, Harry. I can’t believe I went weeks thinking you were useless and boring.”

Somehow, unwittingly, Harry finds himself engaged to Tom Riddle.

He’s not entirely sure how that happened.

Time-travelling Harry AU. A work full of funny scenes, smart dialogue and entertaining plot! The progress of Harry and Tom's relationship is portrayed realistically, and this is one of the most important things I value in fanfics.

The Sense of Self by SpitFire97 (E, 87K, 7/7)

This is the story of Death entrapping Harry Potter and Lord Voldemort in a series of reincarnations to undo the chaos the two of them have collectively caused. It’s a story of how two adversaries tangled in fate are forced to learn about themselves and through that, about the other; of them trying to work together for a change - if only, to pursue their individual goals.

Time-travelling Harry AND Tom | Voldemort AU. The character portrayal, the plot, the relationship between Harry and Voldemort – everything is portrayed perfectly in this work. I don't usually read works that have Death as a sentient being in them, because I usually find it frustrating when Death treats Harry Potter as someone special, almost bowing to him, and sends him back in time. So if you're, like me, wary of reading such fics – rest assured that this won't be a problem in this work. Harry's MoD!status doesn't make him overpowered – he's just as powerless as Voldemort, both of them being puppets in Death's hands.

One of my most favorite works.

Yule Ball by @holaolla1 (E, 5K, 1/1)

“How do you find our first dance, Professor?” the Slytherin's voice snapped Harry out of his thoughts bringing him back to the harsh reality. He looked skeptically over to Riddle's face, a sly smile playing on the latter’s lips.

He raised an eyebrow.

“Do you think we'll ever have another?”

“I’m sure we will,” Riddle’s smile grew wider. Harry huffed deciding not to comment. After all, if one ignores the problem long enough, the problem will eventually disappear on its own.

Professor/Student AU. A short, well-written work.

Vicious Circle by Bakuko, cyberslut404, kewpiekewpie (E, 194K, 37/?)

Harry and Hermione are transported back in time, while Tom Riddle begins his first year at Hogwarts.

Time-travelling Harry AND Hermione AU + Professor/Student AU. The work is regularly updated. I really love the plot and author's style.

One of my most favorite works.

Kisses Cursed by The_Fictionist (NR, 49K, 13/13)

Fairytale AU. Loosely inspired by Beauty and the Beast.

Some said he was once a man, cursed, and some that he sold his soul to demons and became one in turn. Others said that such evil as he could never have been human. That he was instead a nightmare, left lingering upon the earth a very long time ago.

Harry just knew it wasn't safe to walk near the Riddle House after dark.

Incredible. Just incredible. I have no other words for this masterpiece. I stayed up until 6 AM because I just couldn't put my phone down until I finished this work. This fanfic deserves to be published as a Harry Potter fan-book. The author of this work became a professional writer and, let's just say, I can see why.

One of my most favorite works.

The Devil's Playground by The_Fictionist (NR, 26K, 3/3)

AU. The Devil's Playground was the most exclusive nightclub in London, if not all of Europe. So, frankly, Harry wasn't entirely sure how he came to be bathed in its flawlessly concocted ambiance, with music pounding in his ears and an entirely delicious drink cold against his palm. But it had something to do with the deaths.

Supernatural AU. The work by the author of "Kisses Cursed" .

The Closing Of The Year by kcstories (T, 4K, 1/1)

After his divorce, Harry Potter moves in with Tom Riddle. So does his ten-year-old son Albus Severus, who tries his utmost to get used to his new surroundings and to the strange, sinister man his dad has fallen in love with.

A very fluffy, comforting work featuring post-war Harry, Tom | Voldemort and Albus Severus. I really like the budding relationship between Tom and Albus, love for Harry being a bonding point for them. All three of them are just so sweet together.

Enthralled by @obsidianpen (M, 5K, 1/1)

“Do you know what it is like, to be bitten by a vampire?”

Vampire AU. A work by the author of "No Glory", one of the most popular tomarrymort works on AO3 (and one of my most favorite fics). Very sensual, enticing and hot work.

Dulce Et Decorum Est Mori by beetaker (E, 134K, 10/10)

“Do you think he meant it?” Harry asked, once the professor was gone, tracing the gilded lettering of his own name on the letter he'd given Harry. “We're really Wizards?”

“It makes sense,” Tom shrugged, though he could hardly look away from his own letter, the proof of what he'd always known, in some pit inside himself, that he was something different from everyone around him, that he was something better. He'd believed the first priest that had told him the same thing, albeit it opposite in nature, that he was a devil. It had made sense at the time, just as this answer did. Anything that offered an explanation for his being set so apart.

“I'm glad it's both of us,” Harry said, green eyes somehow greener, the natural brightness in him turning incandescent. Tom had thought he'd known the answer for that before too, dull hours at Sunday service spent gazing at the sun illuminating stained glass portraits, thinking: angel. “I'm glad we're going together.”

“We'll always go together,” Tom said, knowing it as fact, unable to imagine anything different. Wherever he went, Harry was sure to follow. It'd been that way forever. It would surely always be that way.

Time-travelling Harry AU + Tom and Harry Grow Up Together AU. This story is Tom Riddle's POV and it's very well-written, it's an amazing study of his character, his sociopathy, his relationship with Harry. The great character portrayal+great plot combo I'm always looking for in tomarrymort work is present here. Please go read it, it has awfully little attention!

One of my most favorite works.

Keep Your Enemies Closer by @duplicitywrites (T, 3K, 1/1)

"Evans does have quite the... physical advantage," says Avery.

"We saw him tackle that enormous Hufflepuff beater during the last match," comments Lestrange. "He's mad."

"Do you think he could lift you, Tom?" asks Nott.

"Shut up, all of you," Tom says, but it's too late. He's thinking about it.

Time-travelling Harry AU. Funny, comforting work with Tom Riddle Outsmarting Himself ™.

The Marry-Harry Incident by Anna_Hopkins (G, 3K, 1/1)

"Why, is that an engagement ring you're buying, Harry? Who's the lucky witch or wizard, hm?"

Harry... panicked. "...You. It's for you."

Or: When Voldemort shows up at a Muggle department store, Harry blurts out the first explanation that comes to mind.

A funny, humorous and comforting work.

The Heir de la Mort by @rowena-rain (E, 82K, 18/?)

When Voldemort hits Harry with the Killing Curse in the Forbidden Forest, it fails yet again. Only this time, the problem is that instead of ending a life, it creates one.

“Harry Potter,” he says softly, tasting his prophesied killer’s loathsome name on his tongue. “The Boy Who Lived.” Come to die.

A pause. And then, he utters the fateful words. “Avada Kedavra.”

First, everything goes green.

Then, everything goes black.

When the Dark Lord regains consciousness, he hears before he sees, and the first thing he hears is crying. Why is there a baby crying?

Child fic, but not a fluffy, no hurt only comfort work – it has dark themes, as Voldemort is not exactly what one might call a great parent. However, the work is well-written, I like the plot and Voldemort is slowly changing as the time passes. I highly recommend this work.

In the Shadows by orphan_account (M, 5K, 1/1)

For so many years Harry had been running. Hiding. Hoping that Tom had simply forgotten him. Or, thinking that Harry was just a beta, had decided to chase someone else.

He should have known better.

Living close to knockturn alley.

Even the shadows all have eyes.

Omegaverse AU. Another guilty-pleasure fic for me, as Harry in this one is kind of damsel in distress, but sometimes I just want to read something that is predictable in a good way.

[itsacruelsummerbaby]

𝑻𝒉𝒆 𝒑𝒖𝒍𝒍

The Red Thread of Fate… To your surprise, it turns out Hotch believes in it.

pairing: Aaron Hotchner x reader || tags: fem!reader, bau!reader, soulmate AU || wc: 1.2k || navigation

You put the cup of coffee on the table in front of you, then pick up the Cosmo you left open. Out of the corner of your eye you see the small half-smile that appears on Hotch’s lips at the sight, but he doesn’t say a word, he just returns his attention to the report in front of him.

“I hate these articles so much,” Emily suddenly says in the seat next to yours, pointing at the page you’re currently reading. You send a questioning look her way, and she turns in her seat to face you. “I once took their “signs he’s into you” piece seriously, made a move on the guy, and it turned out he was into men.”

Somehow Derek heard this story over the music he was listening to, because he pushes the headphones down to his neck as he laughs. “Don’t tell me you actually used to believe what they write. It’s all stupid,” he says.

After briefly wondering if you should kick his shin under the table, you decide it’s not worth the fight. “It temporarily shuts down my brain,” you begin to explain. “That’s more than enough for me.”

Suddenly, Hotch lays the report on the table and raises his gaze to look at you. “Good thinking. I would have been disappointed if it turned out you’re the type to consider this magazine as some sort of a Bible for women.”

Derek and Emily exchange glances, and even you raise your brows in surprise. Why is he paying attention to a conversation about such a magazine? Not like you mind, of course, which sometimes truly bothers you. You shouldn’t want his attention this badly, your dreams shouldn’t be plagued with thoughts of him being with you.

It all began when the first signs of troubles with his marriage began to show. You saw that something was eating him, so one day after work you went to his office and started a conversation to figure out why he always stayed late. For some reason, he decided to tell you the truth, going into details that were none of your business.

Is it an emotional affair? Maybe.

Is it bad? Probably.

Are you happy to have even a scrap of his attention? Surely.

“Did you really think that’s a possibility with me? That I’m like that?” you ask hesitantly.

Hotch’s gaze is fixed on you, as it was just the two of you on the plane. “No,” he admits softly.

The way you’re looking at each other piques the interest of your colleagues, and not just Emily and Derek’s, but JJ and Rossi’s too. Lucky to you, Spencer is sleeping peacefully on the couch. To make sure your boss finally stops, you tear your gaze away and gently bump your foot into his leg.

Sadly, Hotch takes this as a challenge and hooks his legs around yours while returning his attention to the report. The others lose interest eventually, hopefully letting this go for now. It’s bad enough that the man across from you is playing some stupid game with you.

This is the first time he makes such an obviously flirty move, which leads you to an uncharted territory. Is he planning to take whatever is going on between you to another level? Because if he is, you’re not really sure if you’re ready for it. He’s still married, even if Haley wants a divorce, you can’t jump into a relationship with him.

When you try to untangle your legs, he subtly glances over at you with a disapproving look, one which tells you he’s not letting this thing between you end anytime soon.

You know for a fact that he and Rossi had a glass or two of whiskey at the airport while you waited for the jet to be ready, but after this case, you honestly couldn’t blame them. Maybe it’s the alcohol that gave him the courage to make a move on you, but you’re afraid he’ll regret it the next day when he sobers up.

It’s your responsibility to be smart, to help him without making him believe you want something from him. He’s handsome, intelligent, competent, and yes, every woman would be happy to have him for herself, but the timing just isn’t right.

Less than two hours later the plane lands and the team disperses to finally head home, and sadly Hotch uses this opportunity to catch you alone. He gently grabs your wrist to make you come to a halt, and when you give him a questioning look, he just shakes his head and pulls you in the direction of a place in the hangar that’s far away from everyone.

“You need to stop,” you tell him right away.

He lets out a sigh and takes a step closer to you, his hand moving up to cup your cheek. “Don’t tell me you don’t feel it. That pull, that goddamn force every time we’re close to each other. Hell, it’s even present when we’re apart, trying to get me to see you again.”

It’s insane; he’s insane if he honestly believes this. “And what is this… pull exactly?”

“It was a mistake to make you forget it,” he whispers when he rests his forehead against yours. “If I hadn’t done that, we would be together now. Maybe Haley and I would have never gotten married, because I would have been waiting for you to be old enough.”

Making you forget? “What are you talking about, Hotch?” you wonder, the conversation making less and less sense to you.

His hand drops to his side and he takes a few steps back. “You wouldn’t believe it, it’s better if you don’t know. Forget I mentioned it,” he says with a small, sad smile.

But there’s no way you’re letting that slide now, you need to know what’s happening, so you reach out for his hand to squeeze it reassuringly. A move that makes him take a sharp breath, as if your touch sent a wave of electricity through his body.

“What wouldn’t I believe?”

“That we belong together. You always found me when you were little, you were honestly getting on my nerves sometimes,” he says with a short laugh. “But… I got scared of what this was, what this could be, so I asked someone to make you forget about me, about that string that connects the two of us.”

This rang a bell in your head. “Like the Red Thread of Fate or something?” you ask him quietly, unsure about the whole thing. He nods, but remains silent, so you go on. “Hotch, it’s… Why would I believe you?”

“You don’t have to. Maybe I’m wrong, maybe you really did forget about this for good, and in that case I'll have to accept that you will never love me back. Unless, of course, you’re willing to give me a chance,” he says softly.

Blowing out the air you’ve been holding in gives you time to think it through. It must be the alcohol, there’s no other reason for this stupid story. But in that case, why doesn’t he look drunk? After another few seconds of waiting, you let out a sigh and give him your answer, hoping he will come to terms with it eventually.