#half of those views are from teenage me

[phillieladybird]

Phil and Dan get down! ★ ゲッダン is the first thing I think about when I wake up in the morning and the last thing I think about before I go to sleep at night

[mikareo]

“ ࣭⸰ ★ THE MOON SAYS HELLO. . . ⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀⠀呪術廻船; geto suguru x fem reader ⠀ ꒰ . . part one of three ꒱ . . . word count; 3.6k

⊹ ⠀⠀despite his insistence on never falling in love, suguru fails to stop himself from becoming smitten with his best friend’s beloved. you’ve become a flicker of hope in his darkness— though you’re someone who can never and will never be his to have and to hold.

series contains; if gojo didn’t kill geto n geto was given a chance to redeem himself, redemption arc!geto, human caretaker!reader, kind of e2l but also not really, love triangle, gojo x reader, fluff, major angst, heartbreak, wedding at the end, swearing probably, geto refers to humans as monkeys per usual author's note; rewritten fic, will be 3 parts in total (i'm half done pls be patient w me im a slow writer...)

YEAR ONE, DAY ONE

His face is sore. So sore. It’s red, swollen, and sore after he’s spent the last three hours screaming in frustration with his current predicament. This is absurd, Satoru should’ve just killed him when he had the chance. Geto’s lost count of how many times his palms have slapped his own face; over and over again with wishes that he can wake up from this hellish nightmare the higher ups call ‘rehabilitation’— though he can somewhat still recall the first slap that he’d given himself around the half-hour mark. He’s got a pretty good memory…that doesn’t stop him from hoping his veins aren’t too noticeable as they angrily protrude from his forehead in crimson currents.

He’d rather be dead than imprisoned like this…like an animal…like one of those damn useless monkeys.

The intensity of his wails continue to bounce off of the barren walls— barren aside from the dark mark he’d punched in earlier— and echo like a party of lost ghouls in the bottom of an empty well. Geto feels like a mad man.

He’s only just begun his isolation and he’s already growing mad with boredom. 

A huff escapes his lips as he plops himself down onto the twin-sized bed that’s nestled in the corner of his so-called ‘suite’. With linen sheets and a dark maroon comforter, it’s almost a cozy living situation; in another life, Geto could imagine himself cuddling beneath the covers with his favorite book and a soft record playing in the background for some ambience. That world is far far away now. Even if he asked for a record player, he doubts the higher ups would grant him one. He’s their most valuable prisoner, and they’re sure to keep him as miserable as possible until he’s one-hundred-percent pure hearted once more. However, despite their reluctance to grant him the things he wants, these aren’t the worst living arrangements he’s ever encountered and he knows that Gojo did his best to give him the best commodities he could to…well…a highly dangerous criminal. 

This is the only path to forgiveness, he reminds himself, constantly trying to be optimistic about the utter absurdity of it all. 

Optimism hasn’t been his specialty in a long time; anyone with a working pair of eyes would be able to deduce that, and he despises it. He’s quite rusty with the characteristic and has looked on the darker side for a while now— but wishes that he could be as reckless as he once was as a teenager. He can vividly remember how loud his laughter was with Gojo and Shoko, laughing as they chased each other throughout the school yard and using each other's cursed energy to their advantage in games of tag— but that would be near impossible now. His two best friends can barely look him in the eyes after the treason he’s committed. Gojo views him as a ticking time bomb and Shoko’s healed too many people to count that he’s harmed.

If he stepped one foot out of this room, he believes he’d be smothered on sight.

The Jujutsu Society fears Geto Suguru..

…and Geto Suguru fears himself. 

In all fairness, he deserves everything that’s come to him. What he did was awful; mass murdering humans…trying to murder even more humans…harming innocent students…starting a war during the holiday season…the whole gist. There are obviously bad actions from the past that continue to haunt Geto to this day and will continue haunting him so long as he breathes— but that’s all it is now…the past. He wants redemption. He needs redemption. If Gojo managed to reach clarity within Geto’s awful decisions, then maybe he can too. 

Geto wants to get better, to be better…not only for Gojo…but for himself. 

This is exactly why he and his best friend has devised a plan, one that will hopefully help lead Geto on a better path— a five-year path that will only be completed if he truly wants it to, and a half a decade seems like quite a bit of time to most; but for Geto, he doesn’t know if it will be enough. 

For Satoru…do it for Satoru…

He wraps his arms around himself in an attempt to comfort his heart that beats with fear every second of every day. It’s been so long since he’s been hugged by another, and he doubts he’ll ever feel that love and comfort from someone in his life. It’s the first time in a long time that he’s been alone with his thoughts with no one else to turn to; and if he’s being honest, there’s nothing in the entire world that scares him more than his own mind. 

“Geto Suguru?”

He doesn’t recognize that voice.

The soft sound comes from seemingly nowhere, startling Geto with a slight jump. Whomever it is sounds frail and weak, obviously intimidated by whom they’re going to be in the presence of in mere minutes; and Geto already finds nothing but annoyance at his new companion. Of course they’re going to have prior judgment. He bets you already hate him for the rumors and stories. He doesn’t really have a choice whether or not you come in, though. Gojo insisted on a caretaker— someone to talk to so he doesn’t go insane by himself— and Geto will do anything to make his best friend happy. So, he stands up and dusts his pants off, making sure to look more presentable, and stalks towards the entryway. His hand meets the knob, yanking it open, and ready to meet the stranger on the other side. 

Standing before him is you, a woman around his age. You can’t possibly be older than twenty-six, but perhaps you’re a few years younger. In your hands are various sweets and snacks that Gojo knows Geto loves, balancing on a silver tray that shines more light in the room than he’d care for. The reflections dazzle straight into his eyes, blinding him briefly with a scowl on his face. Of course Gojo would know to send you in with his favorites. He’s so predictable. His best friend is less surprising than he thinks, causing Geto to roll his eyes to the top of his head; though he appreciates the kind gesture. It’s far past dinner, though. Gojo must’ve struggled to convince the others to allow him a proper meal. 

“Don’t just stand there, monkey.” Geto commands whilst gesturing to the small dining table in the center of his confined space. “Come inside.”

The instant you stepped into his presence, it was horribly noticeable that you have no cursed energy. Zero. Not a lick of it…and he struggles to hide the disgust with his body language. He can’t help but be annoyed that a monkey such as yourself is going to be in his company for the next five years. 

With his distaste for you clear as day, he pulls out a chair for himself and disregards the kind option of pulling out yours prior; expectantly looking towards you with the expectation that you’re going to serve him his meal like a servant. 

“Well, monkey…” he trails off disinterested, “I’m waiting.”

You hustle towards him, quickly and efficiently placing the special grade sorcerer’s meal on the placemat before him and taking the empty seat opposite. There’s a small breath you’re holding in, Geto can see it in your throat— it’s suffocating you with fear for your life as your fingers lightly tap the dark wood in a nervous fit. 

You’re completely pathetic. As if a monkey would ever have the courage to speak to him. This is ridiculous.

His hands slam against the table with a loud bang. “What are you doing?” he questions, heavily interrogating you as you cower in your seat like a meak mouse. “Does Satoru expect you to monitor my meals?”

He really is nothing but a prisoner, isn’t he?

“What damage could I possibly do with this slob that’s been served to me by the scum of the earth? Start a food fight in the halls? Overthrow the Jujutsu world with a biscuit?” (If that is the case, in your defense, the biscuits are quite hard. There must be a new kitchen hand in training who based them.) This is a horrible day.

As Geto impatiently awaits your answer, a deep breath escapes your lips— perhaps a way to soothe your heartbeat into something less than a record-breaking speed— and you attempt to focus your stress and fear into a fleeting moment of zen. Your large eyes shut for a total of three seconds; one, two, three…before opening again. This time, as his own eyes make contact with yours, they’re shining with slightly more confidence than before as you swallow hard and settle your gaze on Geto— the look in your eyes evolving from that of anxiety to empathy. 

“Actually,” your lips rise into a thin smile, “Gojo Satoru didn’t send me here, the higher ups did.”

Your eyes search Geto’s for any signs of discomfort or inner rage that could be boiling beneath the surface of his poker face. It appears that he’s grown even stronger at hiding his true emotions towards humans; however, you can see through the veil. Yes, it’s thick and difficult to brush past, but there’s a slight opening in the center that you peek inside— and what you can see in his heart is a man who simply wants to finally do what’s right. 

“The higher ups are aware that Gojo Satoru has a soft spot for you— hell, everyone who knows your name is aware that when it comes to you, he has no reason. He has no right of mind. I’m only here to monitor and report your progress in an honest manner. That’s it. That’s all. I promise I won’t intrude on your life more than necessary.” 

Shit.

“I’m sorry, Geto Suguru…but you’re stuck with me.”

It’s as if his left and right sides are arguing between themselves. His good conscience says that he should give you a chance, perhaps you could be different than the monstrous humans that attempted to kill his beloved Mimiko and Nanako; while his bad conscience tells him to let out one of his cursed spirits to devour you where you stand. Listening to his right side would definitely get him his best case scenario…a chance to see his girls again…but the left side would be so much more enjoyable. Oh well. At least the higher ups sent someone somewhat his age and not an ancient and decaying corpse like themselves. That’s a disgusting thought. He’d rather be hugged by a hundred humans than be forced to befriend a higher up. A shiver runs through Geto’s spine as a newfound appreciation for you is birthed within him.

“Do you have a name?” Geto taunts as he begins to pick at his meal, slightly disgusted with the stale quality of some of the snacks but nevertheless thankful that he at least has something to subside his aching hunger. “Or should I just call you ‘monkey’ as I do with the rest of your kind?”

That sound?

You’re laughing?

Your giggles are surprisingly pleasant to Geto’s ears as they harmonize into a song that he can imagine himself listening to each morning. Why did you find that funny? He was quite literally insulting your entire existence. Geto is dumbfounded by the strange humor you seem to have, considering that he was being entirely serious with his question. Humans are so strange. He’s never really been able to understand how your peoples’ minds work, but perhaps he could begin to learn the basics. It’s not like he has anything better to do, and some entertainment would be nice. 

He’ll keep you around…it wouldn’t hurt and you can be his companion kind of like a pet.

Pets are cute…

…your smile is cute too.

You smile once more, answering his question with a blush on your face. “Please,” your cheeks redden, “Call me by my name, Suguru.”

YEAR ONE, DAY NINETY-FOUR

“You’re late.” Geto crosses his arms over his chest, exhaling a large breath of air in a loud and annoyed huff as he attempts to seem seriously angered by his new friend’s awful timing. 

It’s nearly twenty minutes past the time that you were supposed to be here; emphasis on supposed. He’s been waiting with his eyes staring at the clock, watching it tick and tick as the time passed by with no you knocking on his door. That’s twenty whole minutes of time in which he was forced to entertain himself rather than listen to your rambles and rants about whatever the latest scandal is in the outside world. You love that pop culture gossip stuff that social media and magazines rave about, and in a weird way, you somewhat remind him of his daughters— personality-wise…not attraction wise…that would be weird. 

Over the past few months, Geto’s grown severely accustomed to the daily routine that you’ve developed, becoming so fond of you that he strangely pictures your smile and recalls your laughter when you aren’t even here. Friendship is a funny thing. He doesn’t think he’s ever had a friend like yourself; yes, Satoru will always be his closest confidant…but his relationship with you is different in a way that he can’t quite put his finger on. He’s never considered anyone else the highlight of his every day like he does you. Your company is the kind of presence that he overwhelmingly enjoys; with such a positive and warm nature exuding comfort to Geto’s loneliness, and your judgment-free outlook on life rivaling his pessimism in a perfect mixture of negativity and optimism. He wishes he’d met you sooner, perhaps when he was a child— and if he had, maybe he wouldn’t have turned out the way he did. 

It’s too bad you would’ve only been an awful human to him back then…he would’ve called you his infamous nickname without batting an eye…a monkey…

…a mere monkey whom he never ever thought he’d develop unwanted feelings for.

For his entire life, Geto always told himself not to fall in love. That love isn’t real. It isn’t obtainable, not when there are people like Satoru in the world— people that you can’t help but love— and then people like him; people who you can’t help but hate. With that being said, he’s never necessarily been looking forward to any potential love matches in his future.

…no matter who he was involved with…

…until he met you.

“Sorry about that, Suguru!” you hustle through the doorway, your appearance a tangled mess with dusty dirt particles littered with gravel. 

There’s a large scratch on your right cheek, not deep or in danger of infection in any way, but noticeable enough that he’s able to see it from a distance. Knowing you, it’s most likely accidentally self-inflicted in some sort of way; you being notorious for tripping or snagging your skin on the sharp end of a table. How do you always manage to be so uncoordinated? Geto can’t help but let out a short laugh, his eyes scrolling up and down your body and taking in your entire appearance, dirt and all. You even manage to make dirt look good. What the fuck? He hates this.

Your voice carries on as you approach him. “I was running on time, but then I saw this adorable shop downtown and I just had to make a stop.” The overexaggerated tone you hold is amusing as your hands wave through the air in a physical storytelling of your experience. The skin of your cheeks is flushed red from your sprint through the city, looking beautiful in resemblance to that of a blooming rose. 

Geto can feel his own face heating up at the sight of you, choosing to shrug nonchalantly in an attempt to seem as if he doesn’t care at all about your dilemma…

…as if he doesn’t care about every second of your everyday…

…as if your overall excitement isn’t the only thing that truly keeps him going nowadays. 

“You tell me these things as if what you do outside of this room matters to me.” He hopes his words mask his rising blush. (Spoiler alert: They don’t.)

Flawlessly, you brush off Geto’s phony disinterest without the slightest acknowledgement. It’s as if the phrase had never even left his lips, with no evidence and proof of insult. This isn’t an uncommon occurrence when the topic of what you do when you’re not with him comes up in conversation, as the prisoner typically tries to ignore his interest in your daily shenanigans— and you can’t deny that it hurts. Most of the time, it feels as if Geto never actually listens to anything you say, and you were able to quickly realize that in the early weeks of your arrangement when the pain began to torment your heart; ripping and shredding it to bits with every eye roll and mocking scoff. You don’t seem to matter in Geto’s point of view. He doesn’t care…at least that’s what you believe. 

In contrast to Geto, you’re an emotional spirit— you crave love.Love is all you’ve ever wanted, needed, and desired. In your time with him, you’ve developed inklings of feelings as well. However, you’ve chosen to let your feelings grow and blossom out of the dirtied patch of grass they were planted in— ignoring the warnings every single person in your life has given you in advance. Despite that, Geto continues to stomp on your budding flowers. He takes a heavy watering can, filled to the brim with hose water, and drowns your garden in the tears that you shed in the privacy of your bedroom. Those tears that are a never ending waterfall due to the fact that you know it isn’t your job to fall in love with your client. Your duty to Jujutsu Society is to help Geto learn to love humans and sorcerers as one in the same and to gain the trust of his community once more— not to love you.

“Okay, before you judge me, at least give me a chance to explain myself.” Stumbling towards Geto, you accidentally trip over your own feet in embarrassment, and proceed to hold out a single flower not yet in bloom. “It’s freshly cut. I saw a bouquet in the window and it caught my eye, because it reminded me of you; but I knew you’d hate a flashy bunch of them so I just bought the one.”

It reminded you of him?

Taking the gift into his own hands, Geto studies it intensely. The rose is a dark shade of red, crimson, or scarlet depending on your vocabulary. The petals are a brighter color while the plushness near the stem turns dark, more sinister as it approaches the thorns lining the sides. Just by looking at the rose, he can understand why it made you think of him. It’s gorgeous, but practically untouchable figuratively and literally. There’s only one angle that he can hold the stem at that doesn’t prick his fingers. Ouch. And he just did the very thing he was being so careful of avoiding.

All his life, he’s never been the kind of person who longed for gifts or compliments, but when coming from the right person…perhaps he is. 

Whilst he struggles to come up with a reply— a simple ‘thank you’ or ‘i appreciate this’— you mentally applaud yourself as you’ve finally found a way to make him speechless…

…but your praise for yourself is short-lived.

He can’t be weak. Not even for you.“I guess it’s not terrible.” Geto throws the flower to the ground and lightly kicks it away with his right foot. As one of the beautiful petals drifts away from the lonely flower, he turns away, not being able to endure the heartbroken look on your face and the offended rose on the floor. Why does he have to be like this? “I’m sure that garbage is all a monkey like you can afford anyways.” Why is he so cruel?

His eyes clench shut as he hears the door begin to close. You’re so gentle even when upset. He admires that about you— you’re the calm to his ever-raging storm, the sailor to his tsunami, and the lifeboat to his wreckage— you’re the most pure-hearted person he knows, and you don’t deserve this awful anger he holds within him. 

Is he…crying?

As tears begin to drip down his cheeks, Geto collapses against the wall with his knees buckling beneath him and his weight crumbling down to a pile of patheticness. He’s just a shell of a man undeserving of someone like you. Soft sobs escape his lips and silent cries fill the hollow room, absent of your joy, crying out until he notices the faint outline of the young rose beside him. With the flick of his hand, he snatches the flower off the ground and lifts the thorny plant with careful hands— finally and truly understanding your meaning behind the gift. This is how you see him? He’s dreadful and hurtful to others on the outside, prickling kind people away with his thorns…but when encouraged and supported, he has the potential to become something beautiful.

Someone that could one day be compared to the beauty that is of a blooming rose. 

With the budding rose in his grasp, Geto sits alone. He realizes that he’s only able to become that person with the help of you. You’re the only person that has even come close to seeing him for who he truly is; aside from Satoru you’re the only person who would think of giving such a gift to the number one enemy of the Jujutsu world. You’re the only person who he’s ever come to feel true and honest romantic love towards. 

Geto has to become better. Not only for himself and Satoru…but now, for you.

⋆⋆⋆⠀ ⠀thank you for reading! reblogs are greatly appreciated! ⋆⋆⋆⠀ ⠀i promise i'll post the next 2 parts soon pls be patient :3

[ramp-it-up]

II Most Wanted Pt.I: And I don't know what you're doin' tonight…

Pairing: Syverson x OFC Reader "Buttercup"

Summary: The feeling and flashbacks you get when you saw your high school boyfriend Jake Syverson at your 20 year reunion was quite the unexpected twist in your orderly life.

Warnings: 18+ Only, Minors DNI. RPF. S MUT, Angst, pining, body image issues, flashbacks, horny teenagers doing horny things (over 18 tho) heavy petting, fingering, mentions of teen pregnancy, mentions of breakups, teenage mean girl behavior, the Powerpuff Girls, old automobiles, mentions of drug abuse and difficult childhoods, 20 year high school reunion, drinking, swearing. Explicit description of sex acts. Read at your own risk.  Not Beta’d. All errors my own.

A/N: This is the first installment of II Most Wanted. This is also my first fic in nearly half a year. If you like it, please reblog and comment.

I don't have a taglist. Please follow @rampitupandread and turn on notifications to learn when I post! 😘

I Do NOT Consent to my work being reposted, translated or presented on any other blog or site other than by myself.

-------

June 2024

The visceral reactions started as soon as you entered the parking lot. There it was, Sy’s 1978 white Ford Bronco. Not thinking, you pulled into the space right in front of it, wanting to look inside. You almost lost it when you saw the old charm hanging from the rear view mirror. You couldn’t believe he still had that.

Especially with everything that happened since you put it there.

April 2004

“I claim this ancient truck as my throne!”

You were lit and in love, parked with Sy at the lookout. You were also silly and giggly from smoke and hormones.

“Mmmmm, careful Buttercup.” 

Your boyfriend growled in your ear, making you shiver against him. His attempt at menace was thwarted by the smile you felt against your neck, where he was busy marking you up, a sure sign later for everyone to know who you belonged to.

Sy was known for making bloody the face of those who expressed hate for his beloved Betty Bronco. But you had him whipped.

“It’s a classic, but I’ll let that slide...” 

He wished that you would let him slide, but you were adamant that you weren’t ready to be a parent. He was adamant that that didn’t have to be the outcome, but beneath the red blooded country boy was a gentleman. Sy would never do anything you didn’t want to, not that it stopped him from trying to convince you to admit that you in fact, wanted it as much as he did.

He wasn’t wrong.

You sighed as you placed the Powerpuff Girl necklace you got from Hot Topic on Sy’s rearview as you sat on his lap, giving him a treat. He had you in his grip by the hips and he was subtly moving you against his boner. The attraction between you two was heady, and he almost got what he wanted plenty of times. But you were a romantic and wanted it to be special. You promised him prom night, and Sy couldn’t wait.

“..Driving me crazy, Baby. You can put anything on my rear view as long as you let me get your rear view in the back seat….”

You giggled.

“You’re so corny, Sy.”

You whispered as you turned your head and kissed him over your shoulder. 

“Hmmmm. And you’re so sweet.”

Sy’s sea blue eyes gazed at you as he licked his lips.

He was crazy for you. And you were for him. You felt it. And you just knew you’d be together forever. You grinned as you climbed over him into the back seat. Didn’t hurt to fool around a little, even if you weren’t gonna give him the p that night.

——————

You shook out of the memory as a warm June breeze whipped your short skirt around your thighs. You pulled on the yellow and white designer dress as you contemplated driving back to your hotel and changing. This dress was not a good idea. The triumphant feeling of serving looks when you appraised yourself in the mirror was replaced with anxiety. The dress was too short and you were not the same size you were in high school. Thighs you considered pretty and thick in the mirror just an hour ago seemed massive and you tugged at the deep plunge of the neckline without a bra.

You sighed as you tried to center yourself. You told yourself that you were growing out of negative self talk, especially in the last seven years since your divorce. You were reminded of your promise to never care about the, male gaze again. It just wasn’t worth it.

But you hadn’t been under Jacob Syverson’s gaze in 20 years.

——

Sy posted up at the bar, blue eyes taking in the scene of his former classmates reuniting. He downed his two fingers of Maker’s Mark and asked for another. His heart rate was up as he scanned the room, eyes going back to the door again and again. He was waiting for you. No use in denying it to himself. He wanted to see you again, and more. It was his one objective. An objective he was unsure of attaining.

He was more nervous about being in a hotel ballroom tonight than in Afghanistan. 

Christ, he felt like that 17 year old kid again who first laid eyes on you.

——-

August, 2003

Sy knew what he wanted the moment he saw your face. 

You stopped the world when you first stepped into his British Literature class the first day of senior year. He was seated and talking with his best friend and wide receiver, Jeremy Atkins, when the hair on the back of his neck stood up. He let the conversation about which route they should run at the scrimmage that afternoon slip as his eyes lighted on your face. You were anxious, but trying not to let it show. Those eyes held fire, and your lips…

…well your lips besides being everything he dreamt of, he just knew the words that came out of your lips would light someone up as well. He could tell you had spirit by the way you carried yourself.

Your hair was wild and shoulder length, bangs swept aside for vision, and you couldn’t hide that body under your baggy clothes. He lasered in on the fact that you weren’t wearing a bra underneath your graphic tee, and power that  the strip of skin between your shirt and your baggy jeans was not lost on him. He was a 17 year old male, after all.

Sy shifted in his seat as he leaned back and grinned to himself when you scanned the room, glaring at anyone who looked askance. He tapped his pencil on the desk to try to get your attention but you just ignored him as the group of seatless students surrounding you dwindled. You were left alone under the scrutiny of soulless cretins, otherwise known as teenagers. 

You gave each one brazen enough to stare at you a side eye, but you stopped when you finally noticed Sy smirking at you. You stuck your tongue out at him, causing him to choke on a chuckle.

Becca Ferguson, Sy’s girlfriend, kicked him in the leg after noticing that not only Sy, but Jeremy were openly staring at you. Shit, he’d forgotten about her. He caught the way her eyes cut over to you, and he knew what came next. He tried to distract her with a flip of the shelf of his blown out curls and a smile, something that had worked many times before. 

But you were a threat to Becca now; she had to do something about you.

You raised your head high as you walked to the seat that Mrs.Beatty pointed out. You passed down the aisle between Sy and Becca, who scrunched up her face as if she smelled something bad. Sy got a whiff of you and you smelled divine, like that Sweet Pea bath gel stuff that he played off sniffing when he went to the mall with Becca. 

His head turned.

Becca glared at him and he turned toward the front of the room, where the teacher had started to pass out the syllabus. 

—--

June 2024

Just like lunch on the first day of school at Central High all those years ago, Carla and Tiffani engulfed you and took you under their wings when you walked into the Marriott, the venue for your reunion. They crowed over you; your hair, your dress, your glow. You forgot any anxiety that you were feeling about how you looked. These were your best friends. Your Bubbles and Blossom.

These women filled the gaping place in your heart torn open from attending 10 different schools from K-12, following your mother’s loves and whims when she didn’t take her meds, or when she self-medicated. They were your soul sisters. And you still kept in touch even though distance separated you.

Carla had that grin on her face while Tiffani expressed her excitement that you were in town.

“Girl! I am so glad that you made it!” 

Tiffani was the gentle one.

“Yeah, I owe Tiff a c-note, because I was sure you’d chicken out.”

Carla laughed at you while you scowled at her.

Tiffani tskd at her bestie, and took your arm while Carla took the other and they ushered you through the doors of the ballroom.

“Well, she has a new job in town and everything, she had to come.”

“Yeah, she had to come to town, but coming tonight is a wholeeee different story.”

You laughed.

“I don’t have the job yet, Tiff. Interview is Monday. And why wouldn’t I come tonight?”

The familiar banter was back, as if 20 years was no matter at all between you and your girls.

You heard someone clear their throat behind you and Carla peered over her shoulder and then smirked at you. She jerked her head back.

“Because of that.”

You looked over your shoulder, smiling right before your stomach dropped.

There was Jake Syverson, all grown up, and staring at you as if all this time hadn’t happened.

—-

Sy saw you enter the ballroom and he almost wanted to run away. Being in country on a dangerous mission was nothing compared to the thought of actually facing you again.

At least he was trained for war. 

Love was another thing entirely.

He took a deep breath as he focused on you. You had always been beautiful, but now, as a grown woman, you were absolutely gorgeous. Your hair was sleek and your face was perfectly beat with makeup that accentuated your natural beauty. You were glowing and that smile was…everything.

As he leaned on the bar and scanned the rest of your body in that dress, he took another drink. Sy indeed felt 18 again, because his body was reacting as if he were a randy teenager. Your body was everything he remembered, and more. More of everything he remembered loving and lusting over 20 years ago. 

“Damn.”

He said it out loud and the bartender replied.

“Agreed, Brother.”

Sy looked at the young man admiring you who couldn’t be over 25, and threw down some money.

“Watch it, kid.”

That little bit of jealousy fueled Sy’s bravado, and he found the courage to step to you. 

—--

You froze like a deer in headlights. 

Over the years, you imagined seeing him again, in all different kinds of scenario, and you thought you could handle it, but the reality of the situation just about knocked you on your ass. Time stopped as you stared at him. 

Sy was more handsome with age, if that was possible. His eyes, his shoulders, his hair! His gorgeous curls were short and a shock of hair was growing from his chin. Your body reacted as your traitorous brain instantly thought of how his beard would feel on certain parts of your body. He looked good in a suit, but he was massive. You had on heels, but Sy seemed bigger than you remembered. He wasn’t the lithe high school quarterback you remembered.

You unconsciously walked closer. 

He was taller. 

But he was also huge: bigger muscles, thicker limbs; his body seemed more powerful all the way around.

Heaven help you.

And the way he was looking at you as if he still owned you, as if all everything that happened hadn’t happened. As if all these years…

Your arms went out to Carla and Tiff beside you for some support, but they were gone, and you stumbled a bit. Sy grabbed your arm quickly as you laughed to play it off.

“Hey Buttercup. You good?”

Goodness, his voice!

How could that damn drawl be deeper and sexier than you remembered? And his touch on your skin felt familiar, yet strange, like a touch from a dream. What was happening to you?

“I need a drink.”

Sy was silent for a bit as you got your drink and had a sip. The way you licked your lips made him want to fall to his knees and beg.

—--

May 2004

“Please, please, please Buttercup. Just let me put the tip in. I promise I won’t move. It wouldn’t really be doing it…”

Sy was whispering in your ear and you were mute, waiting to hear more as your pussy pulsed in your jeans, the grind against his crotch delicious torture.

“I dream about it, Buttercup. I feel you, Baby. So fucking wet for me. I just know that it would feel so, so so good. I’d slip right in.”

It was midnight on your 18th birthday and you were in the Bronco, letting Sy feel you up under your panties for the first time. Your head was thrown back and your eyes rolled at how good it felt. You didn’t know how you would hold out. But it was just three weeks until Prom.

You were sat on his lap and he had one hand down your jeans and one up your shirt.

He pistoned his hips up, causing your back to arch against his chest. You could feel his heart beating a mile a minute.. Sy’s voice lowered to a whisper.

“‘M Gonna taste my fingers, Buttercup. Watch.”

You opened your eyes as Sy pulled his fingers out and brought them to his mouth. You whined when he closed his eyes and moaned. You throbbed. It had never been like this before.

“You are so delicious… Need more…”

Sy pushed his hand back down into your pants to get you to do that arch again. It sent him feral to see that for some reason.

His fingers found the source and circled it, causing your body to tense up and your fingers to grab his arms.

“Oh my god! Sy!”

You’d come close to this feeling before just grinding with him on the back seat, but this was incomparable.

Your fingernails sunk into his forearms, creating marks for sure. This fueled him even more as he continued his ministrations at your core. He toyed beneath your bra and your mouth opened to seek oxygen as the feeling in your belly continued to tune you to a fever pitch.

“Yes…. Baby….. fuck… You gonna cum on my lap?”

“Hunnnh, hunnh, hunnnh!”

“You’re so fucking hot… I’m about to jizz in my pants… cum for me, Baby…”

Sy grinded against your bottom, and you stiffened while the world’s most wonderful feeling washed over you. You cried out as Sy pinched your nipple and you came, feeling as if the Bronco was caught up in the Wizard of Oz Twister. The world was certainly now in color when you could open your eyes.

Sy held you, watching your beautiful face as you pouted and came back to earth. When you did, your smile was worth all the gold in the world to him. He kissed your temple and slipped his hand out of your pants, sucking your juices off of them again.

You were about to jump him, but Sy interrupted your thought.

“Now that you’ve got a preview of Prom night, let’s get you home, Buttercup. Gotta get your beauty sleep for the festivities later on tonight.”

—-

Sy cleared his throat after staring at you silently for a solid three minutes. The way you licked your lips clean and focused on him was some powerful magic.

“So. How have you been, Sy? How is the family?”

You tried to keep any bitterness out of your voice. The fact that Becca Spurgeon ruined your prom (and your relationship with Sy) by announcing that she was pregnant with Sy’s baby after she was crowned Prom Queen and he Prom King was something you’d tried to get over for 20 years. 

Sy straightened up and looked over your shoulder. You glanced in that direction to see Carla and Tiffani hovering protectively. 

“Well, now Buttercup, that’s a long story. I know you want to hang with your friends. And I don’t know what you’re doin’ later tonight, but I would like to go somewhere quiet and talk about it.”

——

If you like it, hit Reblog!

Next part here.

[iamnotdeadyet]

And they were roommates...

Pairing//: Gojo Satoru x Reader

It was one thing to be Gojo Satoru's roommate. Taking care of his cat when he isn't home, relaxing walks hand in hand when he is stressed, movie marathon nights-you were just roommates!

But it was another thing when you helped him jerk off.

It started off as a joke after hearing Suguru ramble about it and how it's a "bonding experience". Then he started thinking about it while teaching. He knew his students weren't dumb and unfortunately, a boner accident had happened one two many times because of it.

As time passed he was finding himself become throbbing hard when he saw you. Wether it was his imagination he didn't know ,but somehow you would always find a way to bend over or brush against his raging boner and it got Gojo leaking pre like a virgin.

To try and hide this he thought about avoiding you. Didn't go too well though, considering you were roomates and all. Plus slapping that pretty ass of yours made his day so...

Things just escalated until Gojo found himself palming his cock from the outside of his pants just outside your room. Did he feel like a creep? Absolutely. Did he plan to stop? No. Not when he gets knee shaking orgasms from it. Not when the moment he cums sends sparks from the base of his dick to his head. Not when you find out and pull him in your room one night.

It didn't go like Gojo thought it would, like the fantasies he stroked his cock to every night until his back arched and he had to bite down on his lip to keep the whimpers in check. Gojo thought he would be in for a quick handjob, some head if he was lucky but not that.

No, no, no. That night he was unprepared for. His back arched with his ass on clear view to a camera. Lube and cum making a mess in between his trembling thighs. You, knuckles deep in him, keeping his legs spread. Gojo's whimpers were like a sickly sweet melody and with how long you have been going, he had made more than a song with them.

Drool dripped down his chin , brows furrowed and eyes hazed. His tip was an angry red-half from how much he had came that night, half from cumming untouched the whole time-and his thighs were covered in bite marks.

♡♡♡♡

That night found itself being repeated over and over again. Tonight was no different.

Gojo was sat on his knees, your hand on his weeping cock going antagonizely slow. He felt embarrassed, like a virgin teenager, with how desperate he was. With how his hips buckled from the slightest change of pace from your hand, from everything your thumb decided to brush against his tip, making pre spurt out.

Your lips were on his neck, tongue darting out to soothe the bite marks on his neck.

"You're doing so well f'me Satoru...such a doll.~"

With those words falling from your lips, Gojo found himself cumming on the spot. His thighs and abs tense, cum soon covering them, his back arched so far you would think it broke. A pitiful whine graced your ears and a sob afterwards. With drool smeared on his face he felt disgusting and the sticky cum all over his thighs and stomach didn't make it any better.

"...clean me up..."

...

"...please?"

♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡◇♡

[astralis-ortus]

game for two

✱ husband!bc × gn!reader

— guess who just got his old yearbook in the mail?

w.count → 0.8k genre → fluff, married life!au, non-idol!chan warnings → minor cussing (light hearted context), chan referred to as chris ⋆ see masterlist

coming home from work, you’re usually greeted with one of the following­—an empty house, a soft reverberating beat from the small, cozy studio located at one end of your home, or a soft snore while some romance movie thickens its plot on the screen of your neatly mounted tv.

a view of your husband with a stack of books on his lap, however, was not exactly something you would ever have in your bingo card.

“whatcha up to?” became your follow up question after chris’ quick how-was-your-day debrief. it didn’t take you long before promptly securing the spot next to your husband, where he—judging from the way your ivory-colored couch emanates heat—had been hanging around on for quite some time now. “i don’t think i’ve seen those books before.”

“mm, just got them in the mail today,” chris hummed, an arm swiftly encaged your figure as he attempts wrap you in his warmth, “mum and dad found these in the attic while they were clearing out the house. thought would be better to keep these here than to fill up space in their new home.”

it only took you a second to realize what kind of book your husband has been flipping through when a familiar-yet-way-younger-looking dimpled smile came into view, eternally captured in the printed sheet. “oh! baby chris!”

“good lord,” a chuckle ignited from the depth of his chest, ones that always pair with the soft crinkles near his eyes and sometimes a nuzzle to your hair when he couldn’t stand the adoration bubbling in his heart, “i was an angsty, moody teenager there, not a baby.”

“sure, whatever you say, baby,” you teased, emphasizing the word as you stole the perfectly conditioned yearbook from his hands. you’ve seen countless of chris’ teenager years' pictures, sure, but what harm could it bring to have a peek at more?

chris comically let out a sigh as he rolled his eyes—a signature telltale of his attempt to ‘look’ annoyed. “you’d really be in a huge trouble if you call an angsty teenager a baby, you know.”

“i don’t, actually,” eyeing the faint playful glint in chris’ eyes, you decided to lure him into a game. after all, what’s a more fun way to spend your evening than to bicker with your husband? “what would this-” you pointed at his half-heartedly grinning self of the past, “-angsty teenager do if teenager me called him a baby?”

another set of chuckles escapes him—ones louder, which, more often than not, indicates his approval of the arena you’ve built.

he’s in the game.

“well, for starters,” chris tilted his head, quite obviously setting himself to get a full view of your reaction just by gauging the godawfully attractive smirk he got etched on his lips, “i’d probably…”

“…probably?”

his way of building suspense will one day definitely be the death of you. really. if you were honest to yourself, you would actually rather kiss that damned smirk off his face right now—but the game has just started, and you’d hate to lose to your husband on your own little trick.

only… would he even let you win?

“well…” shrugging his shoulder nonchalantly, chris continued,

”i’d probably tell you to fuck off.”

the way your grin transformed into a face of utter disbelief was enough of a trigger to fill the room with echoes of chris’ laugh, filling the space with the kind of warmth you’ve only known after you met him. for now, however, you feel like you’ve been betrayed.

“that’s rude!” you huffed, incredulous. though arms are now completely folded in front of your chest, chris knew you’d still let him push more of your buttons; otherwise, why would you still melt into him?

“i’m your future wife! how could you tell me to fuck off?”

“in his defense, he didn’t know that!” he countered, wiping a stray tear which had involuntarily escaped while he was celebrating his first strike. "he was just a kid who thought the world in general was a mean ol' crone, so he just, you know, returned the energy."

"meeting you, however," setting his yearbooks aside, chris then took the chance to entrap you in his arms, "has changed my view about the world—for the better—and i owe you my life for that."

you've been speculating that there's something going on about chris' voice—is he a siren? or is he actually a highly skilled mage? how is it that his voice alone has never failed to untangle every single jumbled up knots under your skin?

or maybe, just maybe, the problem is you—because unknowingly, somewhere along the way, chris had long become your achilles heels.

"...shut up, christopher."

"aw- look at your ear! they're burning!"

"shut up!"

"heh- i love you too, baby."

©️ astralisortus, 2024. | likes and reblogs are highly appreciated♡

[iridescentxstars]

-> 𝐜𝐚𝐮𝐠𝐡𝐭, 𝐫𝐞𝐝 𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐞𝐝 .ೃ࿐ [ — bangchan ]

➳ published: 13.07.24 ➳ credit: banner & divider: @aaagustd || beta: @wooahaeproductions ➳ brother's best friend!au || genre: smut || rated: m ➳ pairing: brother's best friend!bangchan x reader ➳ summary: it's been a few years since you saw chan, your older brother's best friend and the first guy you ever had a crush on. a few years can change a lot of things, unexpectedly, especially when a fantasy becomes reality. ➳ word count: 3.2k ➳ warnings: age gap (7 years), masturbation, voyeurism/exhibitionism ➳ author's note: i don't think i've ever written an age gap before like this so let me know what you think. ➳ taglist: @byunparklimchoi @djeniryuu @sanjoongie @honey-andmilktea (please let me know if you want to be tagged in future works)

your thoughts and feedback are always welcomed and are always appreciated. let me know what you think of my work so i can continue to give works and know they are enjoyed.

It was an accident.

You need a change of clothes and know that your brother had kept some of your clothes in his room from your last visit, so you went to grab them. All you want is to get changed. All you have to do is head upstairs, take the first left, and head into the first room on the…

Mm.. mmm…

You freeze, hand on the door handle, mid turn. Did you hear that right? Your body temperature rises, thoughts running rampant through your mind as you try to wrap your head around what you had just heard. The sound is unmistakable even if you are trying to figure out whether you’ve finally gone crazy or not.

Ah… fuck…

Swallowing thickly, you turn your head tofind Chan’s door ajar and see the sensual red lights spill across the threshold, stopping at your feet as if tempting you to take a step closer. You’ve always had a crush on Chan, the actual cliche of it all not being lost on you when you finally realised and accepted those feelings while doing everything in your power to chase them away. You dated, compared everyone to him, and always managed to find your way back to him when your heart got broken.

Like that… yes…

At twenty-four, you are a catch. Beautiful, stunning, drop dead gorgeous but Chan never really paid attention to you like that. Why would he? Your older brother is his best friend and there is nothing that could come between them, their bond is unbreakable, and you? You’ve always been the rosy-cheeked little sister with your hair in pigtails, missing a front tooth, chasing after the teenage boys to be included. At twenty-four, you are a woman who has men chasing after her but there’ll always be one man who’ll take the podium alone.

Chan.

You tell yourself you never stood a chance because he’s known you since you were a kid, the seven year difference between the two of you being as much of a deterrent as the lisp you had when you lost your other front tooth. You tell yourself that Chan has never seen you as a woman and that the right thing to do when hearing the faint wet sound coming from his room is to turn around and walk in the opposite direction. You tell yourself that you don’t want to know, that it’s wrong listening to him without his knowledge…

…hss… ngh… good girl…

His door is open. Too open to be an accident. It’s not like he’s rushed into his room and slammed the door but it didn’t catch… It’s… open enough that from across the hall, you can see the foot of his bed, his shirt thrown carelessly onto the computer chair you can see half of– God, you need to walk away.

Yes. Smart.

You let go of the door handle and turn to leave, only to find your feet fighting against the logic being communicated from above. Keeping out of view, you stand with your back against the wall beside his door and clench your eyes shut as if it’ll either hide you from anyone coming up the stairs or keep you from listening to the filthy sounds coming from his room.

Catching Chan in the act was an accident but this? This is you playing with fire.

Chan had come back from the gym, having gone straight there after work and while he knew that you were going to be over, visiting while on holiday for university, he didn’t know that within the last few years of barely seeing you – you would have become an attractive young woman. It hit him like a freight train and while he felt like he was betraying your brother for lusting over you in his mind, part of him certainly liked the way those sinful thoughts were playing out.

You’re his best friend’s little sister. When you were thirteen, he had you drool all over his shoulder when coming back from the beach, he remembers doing your hair before the school play where you were playing the female lead, and he remembers sitting with you in the kitchen as you devoured three chocolate oreo ice cream sandwiches when you had your heartbroken for the first time. Chan knows as much about you as your brother does because he watched you grow up.

He should not be acting like this. He’s better than this, or so he likes to think he is.

It didn’t help that you were helping your brother clean his car, a water fight ensuing when Chan closed his car door and greeted you two only to see that your shirt was soaked. You looked so cute, blushing slightly and smiling up at him as you folded your arms over your chest to hide your breasts from his eyes that had made their way down. “Hey, it’s been a while.” He says, gaining composure after licking his lips and looking back into your shining eyes. You throw yourself at him and Chan chuckles as you wrap your arms around his neck, your chest pressed against his as you wet his shirt. His hands land on your back to give you a small squeeze. “Careful now, petal, Jax might think that you’ve missed me more than him.”

Pulling away, he doesn’t miss the colour in your cheeks darkening as your brother clears his throat and Chan chuckles as he lets you step out of his reach. Fuck, you felt so nice in his arms. Your body has grown into that of a woman with soft curves in all the right places and it’s only because Chan isn’t the type to push anything unless he knows he’s not mistaking the signals that he let you go. “If you want, we can clean your car, too?” You smile up at him and Chan hums softly in thought before returning the warmth in his own smile.

“Sure,” he passes you the keys, the words he wants to say on the tip of his tongue but he’s smart. Smart enough not to risk a right hook from Jackson. “I’m heading in to shower.” A simple lie falling off his soft lips – Chan showered at the gym. He needs to stop looking at the shirt clinging to your body and teasing him with thoughts of you. Escape seems to be the only way to keep his sanity. “We can catch up afterward, hm?”

He can’t get into his room fast enough, the door left open in his haste as he pulls his damp white shirt off and throws it in a random direction. He wants to erase the image of you from his mind as he runs fingers through his slightly messy black locks, trying to keep the image of you pure, sweet, innocent – failing miserably in doing so.

Where the fuck did this come from?

He’s always known, Chan thinks about it, he’s always known that you’ve had a crush on him because he saw how you’d behave when you started going through puberty and avoided being near him for the longest time. A girl who was always so happy to give her big brother and his best friend a hug, who would hold Chan’s hand whenever you crossed the road, and who would squeal with joy when he’d give you piggyback rides. You never shied away from his affections until you were fifteen and couldn’t look him in the eye.

He figured it out quickly but never once did he mention it because he didn’t see you like that. Sweet, innocent petal who shines as bright as the sun. That’s what you’ve always been to him and he thought that he’d always think about you that way until…

Were you even wearing a bra? The way your nipples pebbled against your shirt… “Fuck.” He groans, collapsing onto his bed and closing his eyes while taking deep breaths as if it’ll erase the sinful thoughts plaguing his mind.

He can hear the laughter coming through his open window and Chan knows that the only way that he’s going to be able to survive spending the rest of the evening with you is to get off before facing you again. He’s lying to himself, praying that he can believe it as he closes his window curtains and sets the mood to help get through this easier. Chan’s not one for masturbation, he’s not opposed to it either but he’s always preferred mutual satisfaction over solo pleasure, however, desperate times call for desperate measures.

Like fucking his hand while thinking about taking you on the hood of his car.

Ambient music plays, the hexagon LED lights set to a sensual red as he lays his head on the pillow with his eyes closed. His large, calloused hands run over his body, gliding along the dips and rises of his abdomen slowly before moving back up; he’s painting a picture in his mind, a fantasy that he usually wouldn’t play with considering he’s not one to be touched during sex but wouldn’t you be curious? Wanting to map out his body with the same need that he’d have to learn yours, watching to know where to touch, what pressure to apply, and committing every inch to memory. 

To know it like it’s his own.

Mm… mmm…

He’s working himself up, fantasising about everything his mind can play as his heart races and his body temperature rises. The way you’d feel beneath him, how wet you’d be as he plunged his fingers deep into your core so that you were well and truly worked up. “Ah… fuck,” Chan bites his lip as he palms his erection, the hardness evident in his grey sweats and he looks down at how much of an effect you have on him in such a short amount of time. His imagination goes wild; his large hand being replaced by your smaller one as it rubs slowly over his clothed cock and the ache that comes with wanting to stroke himself grows with the fire in his abdomen. “Like that… yes…”

Chan has been one for delayed gratification. More so his partner than himself but it’s not unusual for him to drag it out… especially when his prize is on the other side of the door.

“Hss… ngh… good girl.” He breathes out as he grips the throbbing member wanting to be released. His hand pauses for a moment, so close to reaching inside and releasing himself as he opens his eyes and hears movement on the other side of the door. A smirk plays on his bitten lips as he realises you’ve caught him and tried to hide. He doesn’t know when you had made your way upstairs but it seems that your timing couldn’t have been better because Chan is only just getting started and nothing fuels the man more than knowing the effect he has on someone else.

If there’s no indication that you’ve tried to run away then he knows you’re caught up in him as much as he is caught up in you.

Moving slightly so that he can release his thick cock, the member slapping against his abdomen now that it’s not restrained, Chan reaches beside him and grabs the lubricant next to his bed. Usually, he’d use some proper lube but it’s been a while since he’s masturbated alone and a man has to use the resources around him.

Unless… fuck, his cock throbs at the thought of being buried deep inside you.

Using just enough to allow for a smooth glide, Chan wraps his hand around his cock and begins to stroke, groaning at the feeling and knowing that you’re listening. Are you wet? He wonders, thinking about you standing there in the hallway rubbing your thighs together. How long would you last before you’d need to feel some friction in between your legs, feel some stimulation against your engorged clit while having your nipples pinched and pulled?

How long until you’re begging him to fuck you?

You can hear the lewd sounds coming from his room and from the way he’s moaning, you know that those wet noises are his hand stroking his cock. You don’t know what to do. You do know what to do actually, it’s simply that you aren’t moving.

Escape. Rush back downstairs and tell Jax that you’ll get changed later for any reason that you can think of that doesn’t involve mentioning Chan masturbating.

Except you stay pinned to the wall.

Listening.

Biting your lip.

Imagining the sight.

“Just like that, baby,” You listen to the way Chan speaks, the deepness in his usually dulcet tones stoking the fire that’s building inside you. Clenching your fists, you close your eyes as you’re trying to will yourself away from the wall but all that happens is you moving towards the door and peeking around into his room.

Your eyes widen at the sight before you. You had already figured out that you’ll be unable to look Chan in the eyes again, but this is the moment that it finally sinks in that you will never be the same again. How could you be normal after this? How will you even be able to think about anyone else again when this is all that’ll be in your dreams?

Trying to avoid looking directly at his cock, your eyes move to his face, contorted in pleasure as Chan’s brow furrows and he bites down on his soft lips. Oh, how you’ve thought about the way they would feel against yours, the closest thing you’ve ever come to feeling his lips against you is when he’s kissed your forehead. It’s always been difficult not to wonder how they would feel trailing down the curve of your neck, the way his tongue would trace along your jugular as his hands ghost over your chest, not quite touching but teasing enough that…

A soft whimper leaves your lips as you clench your thighs together because now your gaze is wandering from those bitten clouds of lust down to his chest, body showing off that he does work out and take good care of himself and along his arms. You can see the shadows of his veins, something you’ve always noticed about him, the way his veins are always prominent in his arms and hands. You know exactly how his hands feel from the times you’ve played with his hands, trying to steal the bracelets that adorn his wrists only to have him wrap those large hands around your wrists.

Hands that are now wrapped around…

“Oh my–” 

You didn’t mean for it to come out so loud, you didn’t mean to bring attention to yourself but how were you meant to keep your reaction subtle, quiet, when Chan’s thumb was circling the tip of his cock and you imagined it being your tongue instead? How were you meant to keep yourself from nearly falling through his door when Chan let out the deepest grunt as he rolled his hips like that as he fucked his hand and made you want to be riding him?

Simply put, how are you meant to remain sane when in this moment, you’ve lost all sense of rationality?

There’s no denying that Chan caught you, that you brought attention to yourself and his eyes are on you, burning with an intoxicating mix of sex, lust, and sin. He holds your gaze, not letting go of his throbbing cock as he moves so that he’s now stroking himself while he plants his feet on the ground and sits on his bed to give you a full view. Abdomen tensed, free hand placed behind him so he can lean back as he rolled his hips.

“So pretty,” he says, barely loud enough for you to hear it but the world has faded enough so there’s nothing else that could steal this away from him. “How about you come here, princess?” You take a cautious step into his room, and then another, and that’s when your fate was sealed.

There’s no turning back now…

“Yo!” You hear Jax call your name and you freeze. Chan pauses, eyes on yours to keep you glued to your spot. “Have you changed yet?”

It’s not wise, Chan knows this, it’s not wise to tempt both of you into the abyss that’ll consume you the moment you succumb to it but what is he meant to do? You look too tempting for him to pass up a chance even if it means being caught. It's a risk that logically he wouldn’t make if it was anyone else, but if he’s always thought you deserved the world, why not make you feel on top of it?

“So pretty,” his lips pull up at the corner as he takes you in. Your shirt is damp, see through and he’s sure that you’re cold and needing to change from the goosebumps erupting over your skin but it could be whatever is charging the air between you. He sees the way your tongue peeks out and wets your lips before slowly being dragged back inside and without saying the words, Chan knows you’re thinking about wrapping your lips around his cock.

Fuck, maybe next time.

“How about you come here, princess?” He uses his free hand, the hand that propped him up, to reach out and encourage you closer. It shouldn’t be making his cock twitch with the way you’re so obedient, so caught up in the moment that you aren’t thinking about anything else other than him – until the moment is hit with a cold shower called reality.

Jackson.

Chan watches the conflict in your eyes as you think about the consequences of this and while that should be his thought as well – he’s not letting you get away. He’s quick, pants pulled back over his cock as he makes his way to you, pinning you against the wall. “Where are you going, princess?” Chan looks down at you, his messy hand wrapped around your waist while his other tilts your chin up so that you can see the desire in his eyes. “Do you not like what you see, hm?”

You stutter, “n-no, it’s just…” wow, you’re adorable, he thinks to himself. As you shake your head and try to figure out the reason why this could be a bad idea, Chan pushes his knee in between your legs, and almost as if your body is already under his control, you grind against him. “What if…”

“Good girl,” Chan whispers, lips so close to yours as you try to say coherent thoughts while grinding on his thigh. “Give it a minute, hm?” You nod and Chan doesn’t know whether you’re agreeing because he’s right and Jackson will leave, whether you trust that he wouldn’t lead you into trouble, or whether you’re just as horny as he is and don’t want to ruin the moment.

Whatever the reason, whatever it is that keeps your back against the wall, grinding and making him want to take you right now, he’s thankful for it. It doesn’t take long for the front door to close, and your brother decides to carry on without you. Chan looks proudly at your flushed cheeks as you try and reach that high you desperately want. “That’s a good girl~.” He praises and watches the way it affects you, “now, I think you deserve a reward. What do you think?”

You moan, biting your lip, “mm, yes.”

Chan tilts his head victoriously, a glint in his eyes, “Yes what?”

“Yes, please.”

[twola]

Two words: messy blowjob.

Teehee, let’s go. 

Also, s/o to @revolversandlace, who mentioned writing a possible 1k+ scene literally describing a blowjob, so obviously, I had to give it a try myself. 😉

Convalescence

Arthur Morgan x F!Reader Smut (18+), MDNI

➵ Fic Masterlist ➵ AO3 Link

Feelings are realized as you nurse Arthur back to health after his run-in with the O’Driscolls. Actions, however, are a bit limited during his convalescence.

Everything hurts. From the searing pain in his shoulder to the overall ache of his muscles, this definitely ranks as one of the most painful experiences of his life.

Regards sent to Colm O’Driscoll, of course.

He opens his eyes and a shadowed figure slowly comes into focus, a small, feminine frame seated on a stool next to his cot.

It’s you, but your normally tressed hair hangs limply in a ponytail, your eyes bloodshot and puffy, and it was obvious that you’ve been crying as his vision clears up.

“Wh- why are you cryin’ there, sweetheart?” He hoarsely whispers, voice rough from disuse.

You rub at your eyes, but it is mostly in vain as you can’t stem the flow of tears tracking down your cheeks. “When y-you fell off your horse when you came back, I-I thought you were d-dyin’.”  

Your voice cracks on the last word.

Arthur frowns, “Sweet girl, I ain’t worth them tears. Save ‘em for a good man.”

“You - you’re such a fool,” You grit out, teeth clenching, “You - you are a good man. The best of them, Arthur Morgan.”

“C’mon now, darlin’. Stop your lyin’.”

“I’m not lying.” You move to sit on the side of the cot, hovering over him, “Why can’t you see what a good man you are? Why are you so blind to it?”

He remains silent. Silly girl. You haven’t seen what he can do - what he does - to other men. The blood on his hands. You’d be far less likely to be praising him, far less likely to be…

…leaning in closer to him.

A pang sears through Arthur’s chest, sharp as a whip, when he realizes you aren’t pulling away from him.

“You’re by far the best man I’ve ever known.”

“Reckon you haven’t known many men then, little miss.”

“Shut up.” You mumble, and in that moment, you lean completely over him and press your lips against his, a move he’s not completely surprised by.

His good arm, unburdened with the wound on his shoulder, winds around your shoulders as you press against his chest gently, still hovering so as not to put too much weight on him.

Arthur allows it all, from the first timid press of your lips on his to the far less timid pressing of your tongue, demanding entry into his mouth. He groans in response as he lets you in, and a mewl works its way up your throat.

It's only then, with you hovering inches above his chest, lips, and tongue working against his own, that he realizes that this is quickly turning into a predicament. Of course, it is, considering the view he’s gotten down the front of your blouse.

Someone, god, hopefully not you, stripped him of his bloody union suit, which probably did need to be burned, but failed to re-dress him. He was nude as the day he was born underneath the blankets, and it became increasingly clear as he felt his blood rushing toward his groin. 

Of all the times to act like a damn teenage boy-

He cannot help the groan that wells up in him as you shift, the curve of your waist at the flare of your hip pressing against his own - pressing against his hardening member.

He internally curses when you slowly pull away. 

But your eyes are lust-blown, a red blush settling on your cheeks. 

“Darl-”

“Let me take care of you.” You say, slowly sitting up and reaching for the edge of the blanket with your small, thin fingers. 

He wants to tell you to stop, that you don’t have to do this, that you don’t have to do anything, that he’s been smitten with you since you rode in half-starved and doe-eyed on the back of Davey’s horse all those months ago. 

But silent he remains as you slowly draw the blanket down his body. Your nose crinkles as your lips turn downwards as inch by inch of his chest is revealed to you - bruises and lash marks and signs of the torture he received at Colm’s hand.

“Oh, Arthur.” You sigh sadly, eyes watering over again.

“ ‘m gonna be fine, sweetheart. Just a little uglier than usual.” He tries to lighten the mood with self-depreciation, but the deepening of your frown tells him that’s not working. You blink the tears collecting away and continue to pull the blanket downward, revealing his navel and the trail of dark, wiry hair leading downwards.

He sucks in a breath as the collecting fabric brushes against his ramrod-hard cock.

Finally, finally, your hand slowly pulls the blanket over his hips, first over the curls at the bottom of his pelvis, to expose his cock, leaking from the tip and laying heavily over his thigh. 

You look back at him, and he’s wide-eyed, biting his lower lip, looking down at you hovering over his hips. You can see his chest expanding with his breathing, speeding up as he stares at you. 

You lean down and Arthur’s good arm swings over his head to block his vision, because if he sees this, he’s sure to make embarrassing noises loud enough for the whole damn camp to hear.

He feels your small hand wrap around his cock, and he bites his lip not to make a sound as you gently pull it upright.

But he is not able to stifle the noise he makes when his cock is enveloped in something wet and warm - his arm flies upward and he cranes his head to watch you take him into your mouth. An embarrassingly needy whine escapes his mouth, but that’s better than the shout he wants to let out as you suck gently at the head, your tongue pressing against the weeping slit of his cock.

“Jesus Christ.”

You let go of the head of his cock with a pop, and he bucks up slightly, as if to follow your warmth as you look up at him.

“You alright? Need me to stop?” You ask, one hand still wrapped around his length.

“Oh, darlin’, please, please don’t ask me that.” His forearm slides across his eyes again as his other hand.

“So you want me to keep goin’?”

“Jesus fuck, of course.” He replies incredulously, flabbergasted that you could doubt this felt amazing.

You smile for a moment before turning back to his length, enveloping him once again in the velvet warmth of your mouth. His head hits the pillow as he loudly sucks in a breath.

You slowly, deliberately, work your way down his length, bobbing up and down, sucking on his skin gently as you take more and more of him into your mouth.

It feels like years you’re doing this, inch by inch of velvety skin warmed by your wet cavern. 

Finally, you gag slightly as your nose touches the chestnut curls at the base of his cock, saliva dripping down from your lips and slowly running down toward his heavy, full testicles, and he has to actively clench the sides of the cot to stop himself from bucking upward. 

“Oh, oh god, woman.” He mutters as you slide back up, fingers once again grasping the base of his length as you suck in a breath, looking up at him with a hint of a smile, your lips and chin shimmering with your spittle. His cock shines against the oil lamp’s yellowed light, absolutely dripping wet from your mouth.

You lean back down again, but instead of taking his length into your mouth, you run your tongue down its side, all the way down where you nuzzle against the globes at the base of his cock, gently sucking one into your mouth. He whines, whines, this gunslinger, this outlaw, this hardened mountain of muscle beneath you. All being torn apart as you suckle on him.

After several moments, you pull back, and he’s panting, chest heaving, a sheen of sweat developing over his clavicles, and the bandages wrapped tightly across his pectorals and shoulder.

Your thumb presses gently on the underside of his cock, and he closes his eyes and lets out a low, long moan. You smile, rubbing at his hip affectionately.

“Christ alive, woman, you’re killin’ me.”

“Ain’t done yet, Arthur.”

And with that, you resume, leaning down and retaking him, sucking harder than you have before, leaving him squirming beneath you. 

You suck, and bob, you squeeze his balls and rub at his thighs. Lord almighty, he must have died at Colm’s hand - this had to be heaven.

The burning in his gut reaches a fever pitch, and he knows he’s not long to last.

He tries to sit up, but can’t with his shoulder bound, and finds that he just has to make enough noise to tell you to get off of him.

“Darl- darlin’, I’m gonna come- you- you need to move-”

His sentence goes unfinished as you look up at him, mouth full of his cock, and slowly, deliberately, slide all the way down, saliva dribbling out of your mouth again as the tip of his cock hits the back of your throat.

Arthur’s eyes go as wide as saucers, and he audibly swallows before his head hits the pillow once again. You slide up and down, sucking, tongue working around his length, the gentle suction of your mouth causing him to whimper.

He grunts, hands clenched around the wooden sides of the cot, hips moving despite his attempts not to. He is completely at your mercy - each lick and suck of his cock sends him further down that road of unabashed pleasure.

“Sweet- oh god, oh - fuck - I’m -” Arthur cannot finish his sentence before he trails off into a groan, his hips bucking up as you press down, and he shoots his spend down your throat, you pull back, gagging slightly, and as you sit up, Arthur can barely believe his eyes as he watches a dribble of his white, milky spend drip from the corner of your mouth. Christ, it makes him want to come again.

You wipe your mouth with the back of your hand, clearing your throat, and pull the blanket up to Arthur’s chest once again, where he just looks at you, stupefied.

You cock an eyebrow at him as you slide up the side of the cot, sitting next to his chest. “You alright? That wasn-” You frown, “God, I hope that wasn’t bad.”

Arthur’s good hand grabs the collar of your shirt and yanks you down, where he presses his mouth to yours desperately, not caring at all that he can taste the bitter tang of himself on your tongue. You draw away after a moment, and Arthur tucks a strand of your hair that escaped its braid behind your ear.

“Woman, you’re the only one takin’ care of me from now on.”

[alittlebitofloveliness]

Misogyny in the fandom: let's talk about it

Not gonna lie, the level of interalized or even just blatant misogyny in this fandom is really disheartening sometimes. There is already VERY few female characters in the book, even fewer with speaking roles, and yet I see all of them being hated on in some way. People hate on Cherry for standing up for herself when Dally was harrasing her, and for not seeing Johnny in the hospital, which bullshit to begin with but also, you can't tell me that if the roles were reversed and Cherry sat down behind Dallas and starting talking about how stupid and classless greaser boys are, and Dally threw a coke at her, that the fandom wouldn't love him all the more for it. People hold her to this impossible golden standard, expecting her to literally be perfect instead of a conflicted and grieving teenage girl, when they embrace the flaws and give a lot more grace to much more violent and 'bad' male characters. It's a very 'boys will be boys' and 'girls mature fatser so they should know better' double standard that I really can't stand. Marcia gets a level of the same treatment, with people occasionally calling her vapid or shallow when the book makes it clear she and Two-bit actually really hit it off, and the number she gave him being fake was only Two and Ponyboy's speculation. But I digress. Moving on.

Misogyny and classism intersect when it comes to the few female greaser characters we get a little insight on. So many people LOATHE both Sandy and Sylvia because they're cheaters, but honestly, how is cheating worse than stealing? (And don't pretend they steal because they need to survive Ponyboy makes a point of claiming Two-bit doesn't really need or want half the stuff he shoplifts) How is it worse than jumping little kids? How is it worse than sexually harassing girls? How is it worse than the plethora of immoral or illegal activities the greaser guys partake in? If we're being 100% honest, it isn't. "But-but Sandy cheated on Soda, who really loved her". Yeah, she did. That was shitty of her, I'm not defending that, but she was also a sixteen year old girl in a tough situation she was trying to navigate the best she could. She could have lied and told Soda it was his and trapped him in a marriage raising a kid he definitely couldn't afford if she wanted to- but she didn't. Hell, she told him the truth and he was still ready to do that and she wouldn't let him. I don't think those are the actions of a completely terrible person, I think they're the actions of a scared kid who did some shitty things, but is trying her best and trying to do better. At the VERY least they're the actions of a multifaceted character who deserves the same level of grace and insight afforded to the male characters. (If anyone wants to read more of my thoughts on Sandy and her narrative importance, I have a post here). There's also something to be said about the poor 'greasy' girls facing harsher vitriol than the soc girls, and while part of it is because of Ponyboy's biased narration, it's clear to see that readers very much took his views at face value. Soc girls are 'good girls' and have to be perfect to deserve credit from the fans, but greasy girls are 'trashy' so it's ok for them to be judged and shit on. Spoiler alert: it isn't.

Sylvia is similar to Sandy in that her cheating and 'loose' behaviour earn her a lot of hate, which again, I'm not defending her cheating, but we need to give her the same analysis and benefit of the doubt given to Dally. Dally is NOT a good person. Ponyboy says this and makes it clear plenty of times. He's a hurt character, so we can explien why he is the way he is, but he isn't a GOOD character. he values loyalty, so he never cheated on Sylvia, but it's clear based on how he treats Cherry and casual comments he makes that he doesn't really respect women. I can't imagine Sylvia's experience dating him was one where she felt very adored. Again, not an excuse for cheating, but I can understand WHY she'd try and take back power within a dynamic and a society where she never had any, and I don't want to vilify her for that. She's also a poor woman growing up in the sixties- the book makes it clear life is hard enough for poor guys griowing up at that time, but it was probably equally if not more hard for poor women. I think, like the gang, she does what she had to to survive. If you can understand why the gang does bad things, and still be humans who can be considered good, you can extend the same understanding to Sylvia (and Sandy.) I think people need to also keep in mind that everything we know ABOUT Sylvia (and the rest of the female characters) we know from Ponyboy, a fourteen year old boy who's narration is INCREDIBLY biased and who doesn't have the full details of any of the relationships in the gang. Ponyboy sees Sylvia and Sandy as these terrible, loose women who have hurt people he cares about, so a lot of the fandom does too, but it doesn't change the fact that by doing so you're accepting and embracing Ponyboy's internalized misogyny and making it your own.

Anyway, I don't think I'm articulating this as well as i want to, and i spoke a bit more about this in this reply to one of the posts on the confessions page, but yeah, I just wish people could accept that fact that if they bend over backward to find ways to defend or explain immoral actions from male characters, but refuse to even attempt to do the same for female characters, they've probably internalized a bit of misogyny they should maybe work on.

[farfromstrange]

Interview With The Vampire | Vampire!Matt Murdock x F!Reader

-> Main Masterlist

Pairing: Vampire!Matt Murdock x F!Reader (she/her)

Summary: You are the first journalist to interview Hell’s Kitchen’s resident vampire vigilante after he requested you personally to tell his story. He’s offering you a way out of your miserable job—to make your voice be heard. You’re desperate and curious, so you decide to take the risk. Most people only know him as Daredevil, but you are about to learn who’s really behind the mask. How hard can it possibly be? As it turns out, interviewing a vampire is a lot more complex than you expected it to be, and Matthew Michael Murdock has set his mind on ruining you for any other man to come.

Warnings: SMUT (18+ MINORS DNI), alternative universe, blood play, marking, scent kink, slight Dom!Matt, unprotected p in v, oral f!receiving, biting, vampirism, angst, religious imagery & symbolism, Catholic guilt, mentions of violence, allusions to suicidal thoughts, lots of plot, age gap

Word Count: 12.2k (this is a beast)

Other Characters: Vampire!Elektra (mentioned), Ben Urich (mentioned)

A/n: I finally got this one edited. This is a beast, y’all! I drew inspiration from Anne Rice’s Interview With The Vampire, but particularly the 2022 AMC series (I fell in love with it then and there), but it’s not based on it, so I just played around with the idea and this came out. It’s a lot, but it wasn’t enough for a full-blown series, so you’re getting a big ass One Shot instead. I used my usual Smut tag list, but since this is slightly Dead Dove Do Not Eat, heed the warnings and proceed with care! Don't read it if you don't want to. Anyway, I hope you like it!

Read Me On AO3!

The sun has long set over the Big Apple. Artificial neon, cars, and ceiling lights burning in the highrises along the riverfront cancel out the darkness that has befallen the country’s east. Noise melts into a flood that rolls over people’s senses, but most in New York City have grown numb to the city that never sleeps. 

Sirens follow cacophonies of screams. Teenagers get into clubs with their fake IDs, adults get drunk in bars or go to work the night shift at their underpaid jobs, and the other half cry themselves to sleep, knowing they will have to get up in the morning and go through the same hell all over again. 

Life has become a miserable existence, and it leaves human beings wondering, ‘How much longer do we have to endure this before we all finally drop dead?’

The system fails them. The law fails to protect them. All they can do is lie down and wait to die. And they will die sooner or later. That’s inevitable. 

In Hell’s Kitchen, in a penthouse with a view of the Hudson through colored windows that gloss over during the day and show the city throughout the night, resides someone who most of the city only knows by an alias—Daredevil. 

If anyone crosses him, he will suck them dry. It’s not a metaphor, I’m afraid; his reputation precedes him. Criminals fear the red eyes that come with fists and a sharp set of teeth that will surely run them into the ground. The rest of the city feels a little safer with him, but so far, no one has dared to question his nature. 

Fear is known to work as a paralytic. And this man living in the penthouse by the Hudson is the personification of what one might consider fear-inducing. Without the fear of others, he would not be thriving. 

An apex predator like him lives for the thrill of the kill. When the adrenaline spikes, it makes the prey start running and the blood taste so much sweeter. It is to a creature of his kind what a good glass of century-old red wine would be to a human being; he savors every last drop of it.

Two years out of your Master’s degree at Columbia University, you have become one of those hard-working adults who fall into bed later than they should, and you lie awake at night, wondering how much longer you have to exist before you can live.

You interned at the Bulletin; you ran the true crime and mystery column for over a year before the newspaper shut down. A billionaire from downtown Manhattan bought it to start his own magazine, and you were the only employee he didn’t fire. Instead of relying on your top-tier education and experience though, he has banned you to the lifestyle and beauty column. He’s a beast if you have ever seen one. 

On a Monday in June then, after the sun has risen and is now falling again, you find an envelope on your desk. You glide your fingers over the fancy paper. The letters are written in handwriting that resembles the old letters from the 18th century you had the pleasure of using as research material for your Bachelor’s thesis.

Your heart skips a beat. Could it be…

It is no secret that vampires exist.

Over two decades ago, scientists published papers on the existence of blood-sucking creatures after years of valuable research, and now governments around the world have set out to burn the inhuman species out before they can cause any more damage. Vampirism though is older than humanity itself and unless law enforcement has evidence of homicide, vampires have the right to exist amongst humans. 

They are excellent at hiding their true nature, that much is true. The lore that has been passed down since the beginning of time is only partly true. They know how to adapt and rise from the ashes like elegant phoenixes. The misconceptions surrounding their existence stem from fiction, horror, and fear, but they persist. 

And a rule has been established in society ever since the truth was revealed: don’t talk about vampires! 

Don’t talk about them unless it’s in a fictional context. Don’t put your research out there. Don’t fraternize with them. Don’t risk becoming prey. Don’t be fascinated by them, and God forbid, don’t you dare write articles about them for the public records. If you want to know about vampires, you have to dig, and you have to do so quietly or society will deem you crazy and a freak. 

The worst thing to be is not a flying android or a super soldier with a shield; the worst thing you can be, in this day and age, is a vampire. 

You were a curious child who turned into an even more curious adult. At times even a bitter one because she couldn’t get the answers she yearned for and had to do it herself. So, of course, the We Don’t Talk About Vampires rule came across as rather absurd, learning about it back when you were merely a teen. 

You started researching, and you found out more than you thought you would—more than you thought you could. You wanted to cover the issue in the Bulletin back when you still worked there, but since humans were raised to fear the very mention of vampires in the real world, no longer romanticizing the concept but rather running from it, the truth shall remain hidden. Again, that seemed absurd, but you had to accept it to get ahead. 

You kept researching to the point you convinced yourself you could be one of them if you tried. You felt like you understood them, but nothing could ever fully answer all of your questions to the point it felt truthful. Honest. Real. 

Growing up, everyone told you dead things aren’t supposed to walk. They aren’t supposed to breathe and exist among the living. They are cruel, and vampires are killers that leave trails of bodies the government is hiding from us. Greediness exceeds common sense. The human mind tends to get sick and twisted, and those who don’t fit in hardly ever stand a chance.

Hell’s Kitchen is particularly quiet on the issue. Rumor has it that the vigilante chasing criminals at night and leaving the worst of them dry at the shore of the Hudson while, at the same time, surrendering those he deems worthy of rehabilitation to the authorities, is one of those vampires. 

They call him Daredevil; the savior of innocents and the downfall of the vile. Only a handful of people know who he is. The truth is caught in a spider web of lies, unable to come out unless someone were to tell his story for the world to hear. 

That Monday in June when you open the mysterious envelope on your desk, everything changes. 

He addressed you personally. Your name resembles a masterpiece, the letters swirling at the edges. 

You don’t know me, but I know you.

It’s strange to read your name out of the mouth of a stranger.

I must admit, Miss, I’m a big fan of your writing. And I’m not talking about the lifestyle and beauty column Mr. Doherty of the ‘Silver Lining’ has confined you to.

No, I am a big fan of the work you used to do for the New York Bulletin. I remember your name headlining many articles on crime here in Hell’s Kitchen—a column my late friend Ben Urich used to call his home.  

It’s a shame that the paper was shut down. I tried to prevent it, but the disappearance of half of humanity and Wilson Fisk’s irreparable damage to the city’s foundation tied my hands. 

The token female journalist reporting on unsolicited beauty advice and lifestyle choices no one is going to follow in the days of social media and fake marketing. It must be frustrating, right? Not having a story to tell. Not getting recognized for your impeccable talent. The Bulletin gave you a platform, but Mr. Doherty and his goons took that away from you.

What I’m asking myself is, are you satisfied? You were probably imagining a different future for yourself. A woman of your caliber must want to be more than a mere object used to make a bottomless magazine look better on the market. 

Excuse my overstepping. I read one of your essays on the magical and the mythic—lore versus reality—the other day, and it inspired me. My life has been taking quite a few turns lately, so I required some new… let’s call it insight. 

You don’t know me, but I am one of those creatures you are fascinated by. I’m the kind of creature people have been telling you not to write about because the weak minds of the public would not receive it well. The Catholics, the church, the fragile and fearful human beings that can’t imagine anything in fiction being real and want to remain the superior species—trust me, I know what it feels like to be backed into a corner. To be abandoned. To be underestimated. Not quite like you, I admit, but I have a few years of experience in and with this world to show for myself. 

I imagine you’re tired of your position. I imagine you’re dissatisfied with human idiocy. You crave answers to your questions. Questions you have been asking yourself ever since college failed to answer them. My kind is being censored—partly for good reason—but that doesn’t sit right with you, does it? To live life in a monotone line with no clear way out of this boring rhythm you have had to fall into? 

I can offer you a different path. A story. Answers to your questions. And the unfiltered truth of a 242-year-old man. 

You are going to find a card with my address attached to this letter. I can assure you, sweetheart, we both want the same thing. I will wash your hands if you wash mine. Think about it, and come find me when you have made your decision. Preferably after the sun has set. 

Yours sincerely,

M.

The paper crumbles in your hands, but only at the corners. Your eyes are glued to the lost drops of ink, the blue blood of an old fountain pen caving under too much pressure. 

He chose his words carefully. Every paragraph circles around your head. You breathe in, and it suddenly feels as though the whiff of the unknown is an inhalable drug, twisting your brain inside out. 

The pull threatens to submerge you in a stormy ocean. You’re flailing your arms around helplessly, but there is nothing for you to hold onto. All buoys have drifted into oblivion, leaving a sea of utter emptiness behind, and in the midst of it, there you are, drowning.

In a moment of clarity, you fold the letter back down on the desk. It lands with a thud, and you look around frantically, checking if anyone is watching you. They aren’t. 

M. That’s all he’s giving you. And the fact he is over two hundred years old proves the rumors to be true. He’s standing by it, but only to you. He wants to reveal himself to you, show you his true face for a story, but he’s a vampire. 

You’re alone. You can wash his hands, but is just showing up enough for him? You don’t even know him. 

You’re in trouble. This time though, you didn’t even do anything. You did your job, and he caught an interest in you. How does that work? 

Your heart skips another beat. It should not, but it does. The danger is exciting. It shouldn't be exciting. You hate what your body is doing, but how can you make it stop? You can’t. You can’t do anything but take it.

This stranger has got you in a chokehold, but in his hands, you might as well surrender to your certain demise. You don’t consider vampires inherently evil, but there is a reason people warn you not to walk alone at night in Hell’s Kitchen. He’s dangerous, no matter his nature, and he is not supposed to lure you in the way he does.

But you’re a curious kitten, and he is offering you the holy grail of answers to questions you have been grappling with for years. He hit the nail right on the head. And it doesn’t even scare you how well he knows you. 

This is a gold mine. Realistically speaking, telling a vampire’s story could make or break your career as a journalist. If you do it for the magazine, you’re done before you can even bring your words to print, but if you do it individually and you do it well, people will certainly eat it up. The question is just, are you going to play your entire life safe, conforming to your boss’s view of you until you get the freedom you crave, or are you going to take the risk and fly? 

The answer is as clear as day, but it takes you a moment to process. It’s as though someone is in your head, steering you in the direction of whoever this M is. Daredevil. This vampire who wants you to interview him, and for what? That’s still an open question you don’t have the answer to. But you do know what to do.

You scramble for your laptop, your notepad, and the letter in the envelope. The clock strikes four. You have another two hours on the clock, but you can’t be bothered to stay. 

Upon hearing the sound of your shoes hurriedly scraping against the linoleum floors, one of your colleagues turns in her chair. “Where are you going?” she asks.

“I, uh, have somewhere to be,” you tell her as you brush past her.

“What, now?”

“Yeah. I forgot I had an appointment.”

“What about Mr. Doherty?”

You stop on your way out, looking back over your shoulder. “If everything works out,” you say, glancing through the window to his office at the other end of the hall, “He’ll have my letter of resignation by the end of the week.”

She gasps softly. “You’re quitting?” her voice is barely above a whisper.

Almost sinisterly, you chuckle. “That’s the plan, yeah.”

“But—”

“Tell your daughter Happy Birthday from me. I gotta go.”

Your steps echo for minutes still, but you are long gone with the wind.

Silver linings are considered an advantage that comes from an unpleasant situation. The name has proven to be entirely unfit for the magazine that replaced a big piece of Hell’s Kitchen’s history. The Bulletin had cultural value as much as it was laden with decades of the city’s stories told to the average person. 

Wilson Fisk was the dynamite that sent New York alight. The Bulletin’s destruction was mere collateral damage in the fight to get the city back on track. You have had so many reasons to leave presented to you, yet you never took them. If you had, maybe you wouldn’t be here, making bad decisions on what started as just another Monday in June. 

The fact is though, you didn’t leave, and you are here now. Facts are what matter. They count. Your hypothetical past, present, and future have no place in this reality because you can’t travel back or forward in time. Vampires may exist, and the Avengers time-traveled to save the world, but things aren’t quite as easy once you look at the bigger picture. You are not a superhero, you’re just a journalist chasing the kind of story that will finally make her voice be heard. 

You know that Ben Urich, at least, would be proud of you.

His address weighs heavy on the small card you pulled out of the envelope earlier that evening. You passed it on to the cab driver, and he began to navigate the dark streets of Hell’s Kitchen. The luxury condominiums in this part of the city can be counted on one hand. You know exactly when you’re there. 

The sun has once again set over New York City. You’re wide awake, not quite sure though if you’re ready to face what you are walking blindly into. Even your driver refuses to take you past a certain point, and that is how you know that you’re not dreaming. This is real, and it’s supposed to be terrifying. 

How come you’re not scared then?

You slip twenty dollars to the cab driver, then climb out of the backseat. The salty air from the Hudson River a few blocks down wafts around your sensitive nose. In the distance, you can hear waves crashing into the docks as the wind picks up in speed. The boats must be moving wildly by now, swaying from side to side and possibly even making the fish in the depths of the water seasick. You would be if you were them. 

With every step, you grow closer to your target. On second thought, maybe you should have brought more than just a pathetic bottle of pepper spray and your precious laptop. You could have brought your grandfather’s cassette recorder, at least that would leave a mark if you hit someone over the head with it. 

Do vampires get concussions? That is another question you can add to the seemingly endless list in your mind. It’s a confusing place as of late, and the weird sense that someone is playing with the controls won’t leave you alone. Either you are overthinking, or you are worse off than you originally thought. 

The apartment complex the card directs you to stretches high above you. You look up, seeing not a single light on. That’s odd, you think, but then again, you are meeting with the city’s most notorious man. If he is who everyone says he is, and if the rumors are even true, that is. 

As you are about to approach the entrance, your fingertips start to burn. A gasp escapes past your lips. Staring down, the cubical piece of paper goes up in flames. You are mere feet from the door, nowhere near close to an open source of fire, and the card starts to burn like a wildfire. 

You pull back, your heart hammering against your ribcage. The ashes fall to the ground, but before they can hit the asphalt, they vanish.

“What the–” before you can finish, the doors before you swing open toward the inside. The lights turn on. Someone even has called the elevator for you. 

Another step forward, and a voice stops you. “Fourth floor, down the hallway, first door to your right,” the voice says through the speaker. Only then do you notice the lack of a doorbell. 

Everything in you is screaming for you to run, but you are rooted in the spot. He dragged you here with a mere letter, and you were more than ready to jump. Desperation was the only thing that drove you here. Your brain seems incapable of rational thought.

What if that is what he wanted all along? To get you complicit by playing on what you so desperately need, which is a story and a way out of this boring everyday life that is threatening to slowly kill you.

He’s like a siren, luring you into his deadly trap, but even knowing all of this, you still can’t find it in yourself to run. 

The second you enter the building, the door shuts behind you, and your only way out is officially locked. You made the decision; you have dug your own grave, possibly quite literally, and now you have to lie in it. It’s better to die chasing a good story than dying at a desk in an office that doesn’t respect you.

You are a disgrace, you can hear your father’s voice in the back of your mind. He always warned you not to be too reckless or your bad decisions will eventually catch up with you. He always taught you not to trust strangers, and to stay the hell away from those who disgrace God, but you have never cared much about being a good girl. 

Your thoughts are as morbid as your obsession with the walking undead. It is time you embrace what people are already saying about you.

The elevator ride feels like an eternity. It goes up and up and up until it finally stops on the fourth floor. The walls smell like nothing but a faint hint of bleach. It’s clean, parquette not carpet, and the walls are kept in a shade resembling a mixture between crimson and maroon, and it is blending into a sort of marble.

The metal doors slide open. Again, you hesitate. A sweet whisper echoes in your ear, dragging you toward the edge. You breach the border between the elevator and the hallway that waits behind it. The voice is distant, and it doesn’t sound human—it reminds you of a siren’s song, calling for you. He is calling for you, and a fog settles over your mind. You’re not in control anymore, he is. 

You imagine him to be an old man, possibly middle-aged. Vampires stop aging when they’re turned. Their mind doesn’t. You’ve read the research plenty. They are wise beings, more intelligent than human beings could ever fathom. That makes them dangerous. 

Their venom rivals the intoxicating feeling of heroin, you’ve heard, and it heightens your senses to the point all you can feel is the one who bit you. Research suggests it’s a million times stronger than an orgasm, for both the vampire and the human being. 

Part of you has always wanted to try it. Part of you wants to know what it feels like to be sucked dry. You want to know what it feels like to be carried into a new dimension by someone who knows how to play the human body like a fucking piano, eliciting the sweetest melody through your very essence and the symphony of your moans.  

This M—Daredevil—is inherently dangerous. He’s as mysterious as they come; a man in a mask lurking in the dark corners of Hell’s Kitchen every night, turning the fight for justice into his hunting ground. 

It’s as though he curled his fingers, and you followed. 

You walk the dark hallway down to the door on the right. Paintings litter the walls. Masterpieces, blotches of white, red, and color. You recognize the red marble as a decorative theme on the wallpaper. Tracing your fingers over it, the rough drywall scratches at your skin. 

You reach out a shaky hand toward the golden knob. Before you can turn it though, the door already flings open. It must be witchcraft. 

Red appears to be his favorite color. At least judging from the hallway, that is true. When you step into the room with a pounding heart and blood pooling in your cheeks though, the inside of the room is a lot more… human. You wouldn’t have guessed it from the gloominess surrounding you on your way there.

A leather couch and armchairs stand in the middle, facing toward the window front. Colored windows, as you have gathered from the rumors. They are see-through now though, showing the city skyline and the moon up high. The chandelier on the ceiling is the only piece of furniture you would consider old. Browns meet hues of blue and dark green, a forest at midnight, and you suck in a sharp breath. The apartment is beautiful. 

You look to your left and see a bookshelf stretching the length of the wall. You can’t help but run your hand over the backs. You would have expected original editions from the 18th or 19th century, but when your fingers trace over the bindings, you are met with the bulging of Braille underneath the elegant golden writing of the titles. None of them seem to have collected dust. It surprises you to only find a mere handful of classics that haven’t been transcribed in Braille and a realization you did not expect starts to crawl its way forward.

“I stole that one from a library in Paris.”

Your racing heart stops beating. The book you’ve been holding falls to the ground, its worn-out leather cracking further around the spine. The thud is deafening. You gasp, turning around. Your shoulders fly up as the tension ripples through every last muscle in your bone. Your bones ache just from how stiff you’re standing, but you can’t move.

The man before you moves as quietly as a mouse. You didn’t hear him coming. The moonlight reflects off his dark brown hair, making it appear almost ginger. He’s wearing a simple suit without a tie, and the white of his shirt is as pristine and clean as the cut of his beard. You can see chest hair poking out from underneath the two open buttons, as dark as the locks on his head. His jawline is irresistibly sharp, leading up to a pair of plump lips he is wrapping around the brim of a crystal glass filled with rum.

Your heart remains frozen. Not a single drop of blood pumps through your veins, yet your cheeks burn brighter than a bonfire on a pitch-black night. 

But his flawless appearance is not what catches your attention the most. Looking up into his eyes, wanting to know whether they are as red as those set into the devil’s mask, you find nothing but your terrified reflection staring back at you. It’s as blurry as the picture of your face in a still ocean’s water, your wide eyes staring back at yourself. 

The red glasses are all you can see. Round with a black rim. Silver would have looked better on him, or maybe even gold. The black reminds you of an endless pit, a sinister embrace of vampire stereotypes, but you can’t look away from the maroon that won’t allow you even a glimpse into his eyes. They are shielding him from the world, and his eyes from curious, stupid humans like you.

He nods toward the ground. “You gonna pick that up?” he asks. His voice reminds you of rumbling gravel. 

He looks like a man. He talks like a man. If you didn’t know better, you would say he is human. There seems to be blood in his cheeks and air in his lungs. 

You have to pull yourself together. Clearing your throat, you bend down and pick the book back up.

“Thank you,” he utters your name. “It’s been a while since I’ve received visitors that don’t work for me.”

You put the book back on the shelf. Your lips are sewn shut; you can’t find the words. Every time you open your mouth like a fish on dry land, you close it again, and it is embarrassing to be standing in front of him with your guard down. 

“Welcome to my home,” he says. You wish you could see his eyes to know if he’s mocking you. “Do you want a drink, or do you need another minute to process?”

He is mocking you. His tone is gentle, as is his voice, but he smirks like a smug motherfucker, and your anger boils to a tipping point. The candle is about to burn out. 

“I–” you stammer. Internally, you curse yourself for being such a fool. 

“Another minute it is then.”

You don’t need a minute though. “You’re blind,” you blurt out. 

The beautiful—deadly—stranger nods. “Yeah.“

“How?”

“Accident when I was a kid.”

“But you’re…” you leave the missing part of that sentence hanging in the air like a noose. 

“Say it,” he murmurs. You want to say it sounds like a growl, but you’re not sure. He isn’t asserting dominance or trying to force you into submission by scaring you away, but he is toying with you regardless. 

You take a deep breath. The word, the truth, numbers your tongue and your lips with its weight. “A vampire,” you say, your voice barely above a whisper, matching his. 

His smirk broadens. He pushes his tongue against the inside of his cheek for a moment, then releases it as it darts out to wet his bottom lip. “I’m a blind vampire, yes,” he answers. “We’re rare, but we do exist.”

Blind vampires. In all of your years of fascination, that has never crossed your mind. You used to believe that they had healing abilities that far exceeded your own. You were wrong. He lost his eyesight before he got turned into a vampire. He lived as a blind human being and didn’t regain his most crucial sense when he died. 

He came back to life, but he died. It is surreal to stand across from him. He’s not just letters on a piece of paper, he is very much real. And he’s blind. 

“Oh, my God,” you curse.

That elicits a soft chuckle from him. “I was starting to think you wouldn’t come,” he says. 

“I was considering not to.” 

He sees right through you with those empty glasses. “That’s a lie.”

“How would you know?” you counter. 

“I can hear your heartbeat. The blood pumping in your veins…” His head tilts ever so slightly in your direction. You take a step back. It’s an instinct. “Your pulse picks up when you lie, or when you’re nervous, or both,” he states. “When you first saw me, your heart skipped a beat. It did again when you lied to me.”

Your eyes trail down to his thick thighs perfectly fitted in his tailored trousers. His thick digits pat the rhythm with his fingers on the fabric. Thud-thudthudthud-thud. You place a hand on your chest. He wasn’t wrong; your heart is racing. 

His smirk turns into a smile, but only briefly again. It’s a glimpse of humanity he doesn’t want you to see. “I like that sound,” he says. “Has anyone ever told you that you smell good? Sweet, sour, and a little salty. Natural. You don’t use a lot of artificial perfume, but you like cherry chapstick.”

You swallow, taking a whiff of your arm. Besides your deodorant masking the scent of your nervous sweat, you smell nothing. How good must his nose be? His hearing? His sense of taste? 

“Right now, sweat is dripping down your back, and your muscles are tense enough to strain against your bones every time you breathe. Your heart just skipped a beat again. You find it weird,” he muses. “I can’t turn it off, but I get it must be strange for you.” 

“You–” The blood has collected in your head, pushing the temperature in the room to an all-time high. “Get out of my body!” you snap. 

He laughs. “That’s a sentence I never thought I’d hear.”

“And I never thought you would ask for an audience with me, but here we are.”

“Here you are.” 

You want nothing more than to wipe that smirk off his face. He looks so smug, standing there with his drink, wearing a suit too fancy for his own home. He’s fully in his element. It’s scary how alluring he is, too. You don’t want to think that way, but as soon as your eyes gaze upon him again, your chest contracts, and you forget how to breathe. 

He’s a wolf, and you’re a lonely little sheep that doesn’t know any better. That lonely little sheep just wants to be a part of something bigger, even if that means surrendering herself to the big bad wolf. He wants a taste of her, and the sheep would give him that in a heartbeat if he just asked. 

You blink. There is a voice in your head, and it isn’t your own. Far from it. You don’t want to be associated with this stranger. She thinks she knows you. She thinks she knows what you want—the sheep in the eyes of her natural enemy. This voice is the most irrational you could be, and you need to stop letting her win.

And yet you—not just the voice of the lonely sheep you appear to be—would follow this man anywhere, even to hell if he asked you to. 

Your eyes drill knives into his skull, but they are also full of curiosity. Can he hear your thoughts? Your heart beats in your throat. You can taste it on your tongue. If you bit your lip, you would bleed, and he would probably fall into a frenzy. Still, your teeth dig into your bottom lip. What if he can hear your thoughts—hear how fucking needy you are? You’re pathetic. What he must think of you, standing across from him, smaller than human life itself. 

You want to read him, but he is far from an open book. He’s not Braille you can run your fingers over, and even if he was, you don’t know how to read it. He’s an enigma. His face is set in stone; an iron mask you can’t penetrate. 

His chest heaves with another chuckle. He sets the crystal glass down on the coffee table, taking a step forward. “No, I can’t read your mind,” he says. 

You flinch. “What?”

“Your breathing pattern. The way you look at me. I can sense that you’re thinking about something.” He adjusts his glasses. “It’s just… Most humans ask me if I can read their minds, you know. I can’t. Some vampires can, but my senses are the only heightened ability I have.” This time, when he chuckles, a hint of bitterness dances in his voice. 

“At least you’re not in my head then,” you say. 

“No.”

“Good.”

A pregnant pause follows. You clutch your bag to your chest, your fingers digging into the frame of your hidden laptop. 

“Can I offer you a drink?” he asks, pointing to his empty glass.

You wave him off. That’s the last thing on your mind. “No, thank you.”

Sometimes at night, you fantasize about diving into the abyss of darkness. It looks and sounds a terrifying lot like him. You want to know him. You need to know him. When it comes to him and this—whatever this is—the lines between want and need are blurring into an unidentifiable mess. It’s an ocean of emotions with no land in sight. A total eclipse of the heart, if you will. You’re losing your mind.

“What you can do–” You straighten your shoulder, hoping it will add height to your beaten confidence. “You can tell me your name. Sir,” you say. 

He nods. “I suppose it would only be fair, wouldn’t it?”

“Yes, it would.”

“Matthew. My name’s Matthew.” The softness of his features as his lips move to the rhythm of his words takes you back anew. His eyebrows raise slightly, and you catch a glimpse of a pair of beautiful, unfocused hazel eyes that steal your breath away. 

Matthew. It is a name that easily rolls off the tongue. It suits him.

You repeat his name aloud. “That’s an odd name for a 200-something-year-old man,” you point out. 

Matthew scoffs. “My parents were both Catholic.”

“I suppose you’re not?”

You hit a sore spot. His head dips, fingers running over his nails and tongue tracing his teeth. “Not anymore,” he says.

God died for him a long time ago, and all churches burned down.

Your grip on your bag loosens. “Then why Daredevil?” you ask. 

His lips part. “I, uh, have the Bulletin to thank for that one. After centuries of existing in this world, and being despised for no matter what I do, I’ve decided to embrace it. I am Daredevil, not even God can stop that now.”

Matt grabs his glass, turning away from you. He doesn’t use a cane to navigate from the couch to the mini bar on the other end of the room. You carefully follow his movements. One of his hands remains at his side, snapping his fingers as he navigates the familiar terrain of his home. 

He uncaps a half-empty bottle of Whiskey to pour himself another glass. 

“You know, Matthew,” you prompt, daring to step forward an inch, “as big as your reputation is in this part of the city, Silver Lining is not the kind of magazine that would cover your story.”

“You still came,” he says. 

“I could lose my job if anyone knew I came here.”

“And yet you’re here and not where you should be.” He turns his head over his shoulder. “You wouldn’t risk losing your job if it wasn’t important to you, would you?”

You stammer, “I–” He’s got you. You’re a fish with a hook in her mouth. 

“If Silver Lining Magazine won’t cover my story, why are you here?” Matt turns back to you, leaning back against the shiny Mahagoni of his minibar. It offers a beautiful contrast to his strong physique and the slight paleness of his skin. “Could it be because you’re fascinated by the mythic?” he asks, teasing. “By werewolves and witches and vampires?”

It’s your turn to scoff. “I won’t confirm or deny. My boss wouldn’t let me write a vampire vigilante exposé even if I begged him to.”

“And that’s why Mr. Doherty doesn’t deserve you.” Your body visibly recoils when he pushes forward, moving just an inch toward you. “Your curiosity is a virtue,” he purrs. The moonlight sets your reflection in his glasses alight. 

“Is that why you lured me here?” you ask him. “Because my curiosity is a virtue and you consider yourself better than the people in my life?”

“I didn’t lure you here, and I think you know that. That’s not what this is.” The distance between you starts to shrink, backing you into a corner. “I believe you came here because the thought of interviewing a vampire and sharing your findings with the world on your account excites you,” he says. “You want to be heard. You want to be taken seriously as a journalist, and you want to make people happy.”

The only way for you to come out of this with your pride and dignity still intact is to put up walls before the already existent labyrinth of walls keeping your heart guarded and your soul safe. “Again,” you ask, “why me?”

“Why not you? As I stated in my letter, I’m a fan of your work.”

You roll your eyes. “Yeah, about that. How did you write that if you’re blind?”

“I didn’t, my secretary did.”

“Of course.” Of course, he has a secretary. “I… I just don’t get it,” you say. “You’ve been hiding for so long–” 

Matt cuts you off with an urgency you didn’t expect, “Things have changed. Circumstances…” he trails off. 

“Wouldn’t it be a suicide mission?” 

His answer is silence. You let out an exasperated sigh. “If you want me to interview you, you have to be honest with me.”

“I’m not on the record yet.”

“Right. Maybe you can answer this though—off the record, of course—how can you be certain I didn’t call the cops or the FBI before I came here?”

His eyes crinkle. “I’m not stupid, sweetheart,” he says. 

He’s amused. You’re amusing him. 

“Don’t call me that,” you growl. 

He’s spreading you open, holding up a mirror for you to look into. It’s your miserable self in all its glory, and he knows you better than you know yourself. 

You ignore the sharp pain in your left ribcage as you pull the arrow out of your heart. “Unless someone holds up a sign that they are pro-vampirism, how would you even know I’d listen to you and not just refer you to the Journal of Psychiatry?” 

“Are you telling me you don’t believe in vampires?” Matt quips.

“That’s not… Answer my question!”

The sound of your heartbeat must sound almost like the rapid firing of a machine gun, that’s how fast your pulse is racing. Your veins threaten to burst with the excess blood. It’s a heat like no other. You’re a witch at the stake, and Matt is holding the torch to your gasoline-doused body. 

He clears his throat. Your face falls at the words that tumble out of his parted lips, and the rapid firing turns into a deafening silence and a monotone line on a heart monitor. 

“After what I’ve learned from reading Dr. Rice’s research on the phenomena of vampirism, I can confidently say this species is no different than an animal like the great white shark or the Homo sapiens sapiens—our kind,” he recites. “Vampires are a medium of fiction and propaganda to induce fear, but they are also a widely misunderstood species that is being silenced rather than heard. Our species, the human species, likes to consider themselves superior, even when we’re in a position of being someone’s natural food source. Dr. Rice’s research is based on a comprehensible set of facts, and isn’t that what we have been relying on ever since the beginning? Our psychology makes it possible for us to change the narrative in our favor, and more often than not, we ignore the very facts deemed by humans as an intellectual importance to spread the message of an entirely different agenda. Dr. Rice’s research only proves that egotism and humans themselves will be humankind's certain downfall.”

“My investigative journalism essay,” you breathe out. 

“Published by Columbia University.” 

Your heart restarts with a rush of adrenaline. “How… how do you know all of this?”

“I may be blind,” Matt says, “but I know how to read between the lines.”

“That doesn’t answer my question.”

The alcohol in his drink seems to have little effect on him. “I know you have questions, and I’m willing to answer them if you promise to publish a detailed report somewhere other than Silver Lining Magazine.”

You look down at your bag, then back at him. “Ben Urich could have told your story in a way that would’ve made people listen,” you murmur. “I don’t have an impressive career like him.”

“Yeah,” he smiles, “but you could have easily written ‘Attack on NYC’. Ben was a good man, an even better journalist, but he could not have written your college essay. And he could never have been you.” 

Your name rolls off his tongue—not a pretentious nickname that makes you want to vomit but your name, and it flicks a switch within you. 

You glance around the spacious living, pulling your laptop out of its confines, and you bridge the distance between you, finally. You notice he smells of sandalwood cologne and scentless soap. “Okay,” you cave. “Where do you want me to set up?”

Session 1.

The spacebar clicks underneath the tip of your index finger. The white of your screen fills with a series of red sequences as the microphone takes in every little sound around you. Except for the two of you and the fading footsteps of one of Matthew’s assistants though, the world has fallen silent in the dead of the night. He’s sitting across from you, legs crossed, head tilted; your life is about to change.

“So, Mister Murdock,” you begin, “tell me. How long have you been dead?” 

His mouth opens in a wide grin. “242 years,” he answers. 

“And what happened the year you died?”

“Well, it was 1782. I was a good few years out of law school. I was a good lawyer, but I wasn’t successful. That year, I met a beautiful woman at a banquet. I wasn’t rich—trust me, I was beyond penniless—but she had been adopted into a wealthy family, and that made her one of the richest women in the room. Everyone wanted her, but when I sensed her across the hall, she only had eyes for me. And she was the first woman to not see me just because I was blind.” He chuckles sadly. “I thought she was the woman of my dreams, the love of my life, but a few weeks later, after letting her into my life, I realized that she didn’t look at me that night because she was interested. She was hunting me. El— Miss Elektra Natchios…”

The year 1782 becomes apparent before your inner eye. As he tells you about the night he met her, you can see the dark-haired beauty making her way across the ballroom. Red lips and a gown to die for. Her dark eyes were full of mischief, but the passion in them could have knocked a grown man off of his feet. And that is just what she did to poor Matthew. 

“I was going to marry her,” he tells you.

He went to church regularly. His knees were bloody from praying, his senses already heightened before he died. God’s soldier, that is how he puts it. He was told that the accident that left him blind happened for a reason, and he had to fight a war that went beyond the country’s fight for independence. 

That summer, Elektra drained him. He didn’t know what she was. She fooled him. He was obsessed with her. Her dark eyes he couldn’t see lured her in, and it was the venom in her blood that became his downfall after she dug her teeth into him.

Matt tried to beg his priest for forgiveness, but he didn’t even make it past the marble stairs before the doors locked. He knelt in a pool of blood—both his and that of the first human he ever sucked dry to survive as a newborn vampire—offering an eternal sacrifice to Catholicism, but God abandoned him on his doorstep. 

The church walls would have been set on fire if he had touched them from the inside. 

You look up from your notepad to find him now standing at the window. He’s not looking out, of course, but he seems so deep in thought, the memories that aren’t your own but his start to dissipate, and you’re brought back to the here and now.

Matt poured his heart out to you. You expected answers, but not this kind, and certainly not of this magnitude. You see him in an entirely different light. He’s vulnerable, fragile, and human. He has endured trauma that killed him, but he couldn’t die because the woman he loved made him immortal. It’s a bigger curse than growing up with the belief that an accident made you God’s soldier. 

He lost everything. For centuries, he has had to live with that. It’s killing you, feeling his pain, the pure agony that radiates off him. 

Your voice is quiet when you ask him, “What was it like?” You don’t have to say it out loud for him to know what you are referencing.

Matt chuckles, the sound a mere breath in the atmosphere. “Like she took my soul from my body, setting fire to my belief system and already heightened senses,” he says. 

You swallow. “That sounds… overstimulating.”

“It was. Is. My heart stopped, but when that happened, something else awoke inside me. The hunger… the hunger was the worst part. It’s insatiable. One hour passes, and you feel like you’ve been starving for weeks.”

“Like you’ve been possessed by a demon?”

“Like I am the demon.”

“But you’re not.” You should stop the recording. You’re not on track; you’re incorporating your feelings into Matt’s story, but you can’t help it. The words tumble out of your mouth without a second thought, a train that cannot be stopped. 

He raises his eyebrows, you can see it in his reflection in the windows. “Are you religious?” he asks.

You shake your head. “This isn’t about me.”

“Are you?”

The veins on the back of his hands bulge as he balls them to fists at his sides. Your throat is a desert, and your heartbeat resembles a storm that burns right through it, sending the sand flying in all directions of the horizon.

You adjust in your seat, crossing one leg over the other. He takes a whiff. He’s smelling you, and that doesn’t help the speed of your pulse to calm down. 

Tapping your pen on your notepad, you watch the red sequences fill the white space of the recording program. It moves with the sound of your voice when you finally dare to answer. “It’s a complicated question because there is a difference between believing in God and believing in the church,” you say.

“Do you believe in God then?” Matt asks. It’s as though he’s trying not to seethe at the mere mention of someone he used to worship. You make a note of that.

“There is so much bad in this world. So much cruelty. I can’t…” You take a deep breath. “I don’t know how to believe in a God that would let the things humans do to each other happen. If God existed—if he was as merciful as Christians like to claim, he wouldn’t let this happen. And I’m so sick and tired of people using their faith, and their beliefs in God and the church as justification to be disrespectful. I don’t understand it. How can anyone? Why is someone who has to drink blood to stay alive—someone who didn’t even choose this life—worth less and the devil’s breed when humans do worse things to each other? Why would God allow us to start wars that kill innocent people? Children? It’s just not fair that we treat ourselves and others as though we are already in hell, and we’re just supposed to accept that God doesn’t care—” You stop yourself, the tears burning behind your eyes. 

Matt turns back around. You can’t look away. “When I was still human,” he murmurs, “I used to believe everything that happened to me was God’s will. The accident, God’s will. Me going blind, God’s will. I went to confession, prayed until my knees were bloody and bruised. I tried convincing myself that every scream I heard from down the block, every person who lost their life or their innocence was my responsibility. God made me this way for a reason, right?” The scoff is as bitter as the liquor in his glass. “I fell apart, you know. I was a kid, so I didn’t understand. I didn’t understand what was happening to me,” he tells you. 

You hold your breath. The glasses slip from his eyes as he takes them off with shaky fingers. You are met with the most beautiful pair of hazel eyes. Emotions dance a heated tango in a tornado. If you look closer, the green specks bring life to his eyes. It’s human nature in the purest sense of the word. 

Your reflection stands in his irises, his unmoving pupils, and the tears glisten in his eyes. They’re as red as blood, watered-down crimson essence. You want to reach out and stroke his cheek, but that would be crossing a very big line that you can’t bring yourself up to touch. 

“I studied law because I thought it would change something,” he continues. You listen. It’s the only thing you can do—listen. “It wasn’t enough. Nothing I ever did felt like it was enough. I lost my father. Jack. I didn’t know my mother until it was too late. Maggie. I had no one. No money, no prospects, just me and those voices in my head, telling me I was supposed to be God’s soldier.”

“You’re not,” you cut in. 

He shakes his head. “I prayed; I crawled up the stairs of the church, and I spent hours repenting for my sins. I bled myself dry for Him. I sacrificed myself. I sacrificed my youth, my heart, and my soul, and I got nothing back. I begged for help until my voice was sore, but nothing… God, nothing was ever good enough. Until Elektra came around,” he says. 

“She changed everything for you. It makes sense. She turned you into a vampire, but she also loved you.”

“She did love me, in her own twisted way.”

“It’s what you deserved,” you say.

He isn’t yours, but the pang you feel in your chest is treacherous. Your heart cracks like a porcelain vase, jealousy creeping in like a parasite of toxic waste.

In response, Matt only chuckles bitterly. “She made me believe again, then took my soul and crushed it in her hand.” The correction makes your shoulders slump. “Instead of feeling like my world ended though, I felt at peace when she sucked the blood out of my veins and fed me her venom,” he says. “It’s sick, I know. I was aware I died that night, that she turned me into a devil who could only survive if he drank the blood of others. The Catholic in me struggled to accept it, but I had no choice but to embrace what she made me.”

“And where is she now?” you ask.

“Gone.” The light in his eyes has fully disappeared now. “I stayed with her for a while until she died in my arms. She showed me what love is, and she showed me heartbreak. She made me hungry for blood, awakening the devil I’ve been trying to tame. She taught me how to feed, how to hunt, and how to chase. But she also cursed me,” he says. “I only exist for myself now. I only bleed for myself. No God, no church, and no more religion. I’m not Jesus, I’m Judas, and I retired the cross the day I was crucified.”

You have run out of questions to ask. Too overwhelming is the sight of his walls crumbling down, this stranger you now know better than any living being seems to. You no longer see money in this, or a story to chase, you only see Matthew, and the halo above his head he still believes is a pair of horns. The world broke him. His faith in God broke him. It crushed him, and he lost everything. How broken he must be. 

“Not such a pretty story when I say it out loud, huh?” He scoffs.

The spacebar clicks again. The recording comes to a sudden halt. One hour and fifty-eight minutes, the first session of your interview with the vampire. You need to put a halt to it now because what you are about to say or do as you reach your hand out to brush his cold, dead skin is not something that should be found on a record. And you won’t ever tell.

Matt pulls away when your warm fingertips brush his. You’re standing across from him now, so close he can smell, hear, and feel all of you at once.

Your touch is the holy water that burns his skin, but the fire sustains him and shoots straight to his core the same way the blood rushes to yours.

“It’s not a pretty story, no,” you say, your voice barely above a whisper, “but it did tell me what I already knew.”

“And what’s that?” he asks.

“That you’re not evil. You’re not the Devil. You’re misunderstood. You’ve been beaten; you’ve been abandoned, hurt, and broken. That doesn’t make you a monster. Trying to make this city a better place does not make you a monster.”

“If you only knew the things I’ve done…”

“I know the rumors suggest that you were the one who fought Wilson Fisk and got this city back where it needed to be. You’ve saved countless women from the worst of fates. You are the reason the innocent people of Hell’s Kitchen feel safe. By picking up that mask, you became a hero, not a villain, and that is the story I want to tell.”

In lightspeed, he has moved you from the window to the other end of the room. Your back hits the wall. 

Matt towers over you in all of his intimidating glory. His eyes spark red, but you hold his unfocused gaze. He has such beautiful eyes. This pull between you is far from human; it’s unhealthy, and it is exactly where he wanted to get you. You’re trapped, pinned underneath him like a deer caught in headlights. 

Exhaling, your breath strokes his cheeks. He closes his eyes, savoring the taste of you. Every particle in the air, he inhales. His tongue darts out to lick his lips. Oh, what you wouldn’t do to suck that tongue into your mouth. 

Your pheromones play his head like a puppeteer pulling the strings of his marionette. He growls. “Do you have any idea how dangerous I am?” 

The moonlight catches his sparkling white teeth. This time though, you come face to face with the sharp edges of his previously concealed fangs. Your jaw drops open. He’s ethereal. 

“I could snap your neck—” Matt places his hand on your neck, “I could make that heart stop beating, take the air from your lungs. I could eat you…” He traces the vein in your throat from your jaw to your collarbone. “I could bite you and suck your blood until you’re empty. I could kill you, sweetheart. My kind is your natural enemy. You shouldn’t be here.”

You shudder. His nose brushes the sensitive skin below your ear. He’s so close you can smell him. On inhale, and his scent consumes your senses. He is all you can feel now. You reach out to hold onto his arms, his muscles tensing under your teeth. He’s big and strong, and those hands have a mind of their own as they begin to wander but never where you need him most. 

You shouldn’t be here, yet you came. He asked you to him, and you complied. Is this your fate now? Chasing after your big bad wolf like the helpless sheep that you are?

Your walls clench around an agonizing emptiness, your swollen clit brushing against your soaked underwear. Whatever he is doing to you, it’s the cruelest form of torture. 

A strangled noise breaks out of the back of his throat, rumbling in his chest. “You have no idea how badly I want to taste you,” he breathes. 

“Do it,” you beg. “Taste me.”

He utters your name again. “Stop.”

“Please.”

Your tone shatters him. When he kisses you, finally, fireworks explode in the universe around you. All the stars seem to finally align. Your heart opens, and it sucks him right into you. Your soul yearns for him. He’s so close yet so far away. 

The moon stands between you, but you cross even that ocean as you push against him, forcing your tongue into his mouth. He takes like heaven and hell; he’s the apple Eve bit into and cursed her for all eternity. But he’s also the snake, the one who compelled you to take this journey of bad decisions and jump right off the cliff’s edge. You melt into him like a broken candle. 

He pulls away. Those fangs are alluring, as sharp as a knife’s tip. You want to know what it would feel like gracing your skin, digging into your as he thrusts his cock into your tight cunt. The thought alone sends your mind into a spiral.

Your lips are swollen, but he has yet to draw blood. Matt looks as though he wouldn’t dare, his eyes darting around in a darkened conflict he feels might cost him more than your dignity. You are begging for it, as is your body, but he’s holding himself back. He’s the one who tied himself to an invisible pillar, keeping his hands locked behind his back. But that is not the Matt you want. 

You lean your head to the side, exposing the length of his neck. All control has slipped from your fingers. It’s in his hands now—you are. He cups your head gently. A mere few inches lie between your fountain and his lips.

You press a kiss to his calloused palm—a desperate and needy kiss, tracing your tongue over the lines that tell his life’s story in a way no interview can retell—and it is then he is forever done for. He’s doomed, and you are the second woman to pull him under the pits of hell. 

Saliva drips from his fangs. You hold your breath. He hisses, a weak admission of surrender; the words die miserably on your tongue when his lips close around your pulse point with all his might, and his teeth drive home. 

You moan aloud. Your fingers tangle in his hair, forcing him deeper as he sucks the dark red essence out of your vein. The sensation is more than you bargained for. It’s a drug that wrecks your system. The synapses in your brain backfire with all their might, and what follows the initial explosion of pleasure shooting white hot through your being is complete and utter silence as this God of a man feeds on you. 

The invisible string between you glows a bright crimson. It slings around you, tying you together like the roots of a tree. It’s an eternal sacrifice. You are giving your all to him, the very core of your existence that is now flowing into his mouth. You swear you can hear his thoughts mingle with yours. Yes, more, please. You taste so good. Your knees buckle, but you remain standing strong. He makes sure you don’t fall. Don’t slip away from me. I need you. 

A tear rolls down your cheek. You could sob. It feels so good—too good to be true. In that moment, you become one. There is no telling where one begins and the other ends. The coil in your stomach tightens, and the only pain you feel is the pleasure threatening to overwhelm you. He’s taking everything as you give him everything, but it is not enough. It has never been enough. 

When your body struggles to catch up with the lack of blood, he pulls away. His fangs drag out of your neck agonizingly slowly. You whimper at the sudden loss.

Matt catches you as you stumble into his arms. “You okay?” He cradles your face, brushing the hair out of your face. Your blood stains his lips. Blinking up at him, the force of your metaphysical connection slaps you awake. 

You cease to exist in all solar systems but his. 

He pokes the tip of his index finger with the sharp edge of one tooth, sliding it over the two holes that are pulsating with the work of your heartbeat.

“I shouldn’t have—” he begins. 

“No,” you say. “You did exactly what you should have.”

“I couldn’t stop.”

“But you did.” You wipe the blood from his mouth. “And I felt you. I only felt you.”

The living room passes by you. Before you know it, your back lands on something much softer than a concrete wall. He’s not a monster, that one, but he surely is an animal. 

You taste your blood on Matt’s luscious lips as he devours your tongue. It tastes of copper and a little bitter, but that is what makes him moan. That sound is the last thing you could ever grow tired of. 

His palm rests on your chest. Your heart pounds against his palm. “You’re so alive,” he says.

You cradle his face in your hands. “And you’re more human than you think.”

If he wanted to pull your heart out and hold it, you would let him in a heartbeat. 

He leans you back. He strips you bare. He kisses down your body like you are a fucking masterpiece for him to explore. That is how he sees you. 

Your head falls back. The kisses wander from your hips to the inside of your thighs. Every kiss brings his breath closer to your center. Matt pulls them apart. He opens you up to him. Your scent clouds his senses, and he groans, but he doesn’t touch. 

His fangs graze your skin. “Mine,” he growls. 

You gasp. He bites into the sensitive flesh. Hard, passionately. Your legs wrap around his head, trapping him there. He sucks, and he sucks, and he drinks, and the wetness pools out of your cunt in an obscene amount. This is foreplay to him. It drives you toward the edge leading to an abyss you are afraid you might never be able to crawl back out of. There is no bottom, it is just a pit, and he’s pushing you closer and closer, and—

Your back arches, but he pulls away before the coil can snap into a million butterflies. He pries your legs away from his head, spreading them further on the mattress, as far apart as they will go. 

Breakfast, lunch, and dinner have been served on a silver platter. He breathes in. The scent of your soaked pussy sticks to the hairs in his nose. It isn’t enough. He breathes in again, your arousal sweeter than fiction. You’re everything and more. He wants to taste that part of you more than anything, suck up the slick that is soaking the sheets—and you didn’t even think that was possible—but he waits because he needs to savor it. He doesn’t want it to be over too soon. neither for him nor for you. 

The blood is still dripping from his tongue and his fangs, and the raw inside of your thigh. He runs his finger through it. The sting runs from the wound to your folds, then back down. Still, he doesn’t touch. He plays with the blood, sucking on his fingers until they’re clean, and then he dives back in for a taste. He doesn’t bite, he kisses and sucks, but he doesn’t push it further. He doesn’t hurt you. 

You’re his saving grace; he has to worship you. Pain only has a place in pleasure. 

“Matthew,” you moan. 

He chuckles, kissing where his fangs left deep indentations. “No one will ever touch you again,” he purrs. “I’ll make sure of that.” 

You try to protest, but the words die on your tongue when he leans in, capturing your clit with his hungry mouth. The wound on your thigh closes. The blood from his lips mixes with your juices, and you cry out at the intensity of it all. 

He eats you with the ferocity of a man starved for weeks. He eats your pussy like he ate your blood, savoring every drop but still feasting for the taste to spread out in his mouth like wildfire. Sour, sweet, and copper. He sucks your sensitive clit into his mouth. His tongue drags through your folds, up and down, and then the tip slides inside, tasting your walls. He grows bolder as your moans accelerate. 

Matt cradles your thighs. He forces your hips back down to the mattress, stronger than the average human man. You have to endure his beard scratching and burning, and the pace he has set.

The orgasm creeps up on you. Before you know it, he has plunged his tongue into you, and your body convulses around him. You scream into a pillow as you come. 

You are each other’s forbidden fruit. No prayer in the world could keep you apart. 

Faintly, you can hear him say, “Good girl.” Your legs quiver. He pulls away, then comes right back like a boomerang. 

He’s warm now. He was cold before, but when he kisses you this time, he’s warm. He’s hot. You run your hands over his bare chest, the scars that lie under the dark strands of hair. You tug at it, and he moans. You can tell he is a little insecure, but by pressing your lips to one of the cuts on his shoulder, he relaxes. 

What he must have endured, what he must have lived through before he died and was resurrected in the same breath, just without a beating heart—you don’t want to think about it or you will break, but you can still feel him through the crimson tie that holds you together, and you know that he has suffered enough for more than two lifetimes. You wish you could take it all away from him. You wish you could have saved him before it was too late, loved him more than the woman who turned him, but turning back time is an impossibility. You are both acutely aware of that. 

“Hey.” Matt tilts your head toward him. “Where did you just go?” he asks. 

“Thinking about you,” you murmur. 

“Me?”

“You.”

“Why?”

“Because I want to be your salvation.”

You. His salvation. He kisses you, softly this time. He pours gratitude into his lips and bleeds them out in poetry as they slide into your mouth, and you swallow every last drop. 

If someone had told you a week ago where you would see yourself on that particular Monday, you would have laughed at them. And if someone had told you a week ago that you would be making love to the devil, you would have called them crazy. But it’s happening. 

He thrusts into you without a warning. His thick cock fills you like nothing and no one ever has before. Your cunt has been molded to fit him, you’re sure. You take him in, and you moan at the stretch. It’s a pain so delicious you could fall apart right then and there just from the feel of him inside you. 

Every thrust drags the tip of his cock along your sweet spot. Every added sensation drives you closer to your death. 

Your body tingles. He explores your face with his lips rather than his fingers, moving to your neck again. You cling to him, oh-so-desperate for him. He likes you like that, and you like him like that. 

“You’re fucking with my head,” he tells you. “Offering your pussy to a vampire. Letting me drink your blood. Begging me to fuck you. You’re in my head, baby. Can’t get you out of my system. Fuck.”

You are his downfall, his salvation, but he is all of those things to you as well—all of those things and more. If he could read your mind, you would tell him that. Words can’t do justice to how you feel. Not right now, maybe not ever. 

“Bite me again,” you beg.

His thrusts falter. He searches your body for any sign of regret. His fangs come out, and he buries them deep in your jugular vein. The floodgates open wide. Your walls clench around his cock, your clit pulsates, and the wave crashes into you. 

You come as he devours your neck and your blood. You transcend into another dimension, far away from everything and everyone but never him. Never Matthew.

The sensation of you wraps around him like a weighted blanket. His balls tighten, your blood unfolding its taste on his tongue. You are all over him, inside of him, everywhere at once. He falls head-first, dragging you down with him. 

He comes with a shout that is only muffled through his teeth buried in your flesh, his cum spurting into you and filling your cunt to the brim. Your eyes roll back. You’re flying and falling all at once. 

Oh, how good it feels to be consumed by him. To be fucked and sucked dry. You would have never expected this to come out of your week, let alone your life, but now that it has happened, you are floating on cloud nine. 

Dizziness threatens to take over, but before you can pass out, he forces himself away, allowing your heart to catch up with the lack of blood in your system. He collapses on top of you. His cock softens, but he stays inside. You need him there. You want him there. And that is the only place he wants to rest tonight. 

He heals the wounds on your neck. “You have a mark,” Matt rasps, tracing your skin with his finger. 

You choke out, “Yours.”

“Yes, you are.” He kisses you there. Once, twice, even a third time. “Mine,” he says.

You’re his. He’s yours. It doesn’t get any better than this. 

The minutes tick away on the obnoxious clock on the wall. Matt pulls out eventually, wrapping you up in a blanket. He coaxes you to drink, but you’re barely lucid. Only when he begins to stroke your hair you start coming back to yourself. You thought you might regret it, but as you look at him, his almost guilty eyes staring back at you, all you can do is reach out for him. 

“Session two tomorrow?” you ask.

He chuckles and retorts, “Have I not scared you away?” There is some truth to it though.

He’s covered in your blood. It sticks to his lips, his hands, and his chest. It’s sickeningly intimate, in a way.

You shake your head in response. “You could not possibly.”

He listens to your heartbeat. You’re as honest as they come. 

“Okay,” Matt says. “Session two tomorrow then.”

That night, you fell in love with the Devil, but he also fell in love with you, his angel in the form of a reckless journalist, and the only blood he ever wants to taste again until the end of his miserable, cursed days. 

Matt Murdock (Smut) Tag List: @shouldbestudying41 @theradioactivespidergwen @cheshirecat484 @1988-fiend @acharliecoxedfan @gpenguin666 @linamarr @mcugeekposts @itwasthereaminuteago @norestfortheshelbywicked @yarrystyleeza @littlenerdyravenclaw @etanordoesbullsh1t @thychuvaluswife @harleycao @schneeflocky @imjustcal @pipsqueakkitten @merlinbtch @sya-skies @amberritonicole @ravenclaw617 @pigeonmama @bohemianrhapsody86 @a-girl-has-n0-name @winkev1 @callsign-ember @chittaphonstar @buckyyyismahhlife

[jokeroutsubs]

[📝ENG TRANSLATION] We spent a day with the band Joker Out with whom we talked about everything (including the new album)

Original article written by Tijana Čvorak for Vogue Adria, published 15.11.2024. English translation by IG marija_rocen, review by IG irenalemajic, @moonlvster, proofread by IG Gboleyn123.

Full article under the cut 👇

(Ph: Primož Lukežić)

It's Friday, late in the morning, my colleague Tesa and I met up at the agreed place, in the middle of the industrial zone. On one side there was a parking lot, and on the other an industrial hall and office buildings, a self-service laundromat, a small bar... And a blue metal door. Behind the door is the charming, cozy music studio of the band Joker Out, full of instruments, books and character. When we entered, a friendly voice greeted us from above, and when we looked up, we saw a smiling Jure Maček, the band's drummer, in the gallery.

We climbed the stairs to a platform with a fence, which was obviously the production chill corner of this studio. There were two sofas, a Biedermeier-style wooden table, which surely once graced a bourgeois living room from the 80s, and on the other side there was a table with a computer, an impressive screen and a small mixer. Delighted by the atmosphere and appearance of the studio, we learned from Jure that we're standing in a former garage and that, in addition to musical talent, he also has carpentry skills - because the wooden interior of the studio is actually the work of his hands.

(Ph: Mark Pirc)

Whether you're from this region or not, the media attention that Joker Out has been getting since performing at the Eurovision Song Contest has been hard to ignore. Since 2016, when they formed the band as teenagers, they have won several 'Zlata piščal' ('Golden Whistle') awards in the Artist and Newcomers categories and were nominated for a MAC Award for Best Regional Ex-Yu Rock Band. Their hit 'Carpe Diem' has a more than impressive 23 million streams on Spotify and is the third most popular Eurovision song. I remember when they performed in my town last summer, just a few hundred metres from my house, so I could listen to them with a glass of wine on the terrace. Even though I wasn't standing in front of the stage, I could feel the contagious energy they were spreading, and the singing and cheers of the audience seemed even louder and filled with euphoria.

While I was preparing for the interview, I found out that Joker Out are also popular beyond the borders of our region - at concerts abroad, the audience sings songs with them in the Slovenian language. Furthermore, I discovered that the release of their new music video for the song 'Bluza' was scheduled on the day of our interview. "Yes, exactly," Jure confirmed to me, "let's wait for the others, then we'll watch it together." Soon the other members of the band arrived, some visibly disheveled and sleepless, because the editing of the video lasted until late at night. By the time we all impatiently looked at the monitor, waiting for the new video to be displayed, it had already collected 6,000 views in just a few hours, while the song 'Bluza', since it was released on streaming services, had already reached more than half a million streams. 'Bluza' is one of the singles from the new album 'Souvenir Pop', which is being released today and it represents a sort of a musical diary of the past year and a half of their lives, from the performance at the Eurovision Song Contest onwards.

"The inspiration for the album were the events from the tour, love stories, even global geopolitical topics," laughs Bojan. "All the reflections and deliberations that happened to us in the past year and a half." They say that the new album differs from the previous ones primarily due to the fact that it's sonically much more diverse and richer with instruments.

"Apart from those usual clichés - the whole album is more mature, we've developed the sound and so on - with this album we didn't strictly stick to our own instruments, but rather experimented and explored with different instruments", Kris Guštin, the band's guitarist describes for us. On this album, for the first time, they recorded about half of the songs with Jan on keyboards. "And the lyrics are darker this time, more gloomy than on 'Demoni', so we went one step further there as well." Bojan adds that on this album, for the first time, they recorded songs written in three languages ​​- Slovenian, English and Serbian.

(Ph: Vita Orehek)

We asked him if he could single out any advantages or differences in writing songs in different languages, and he tells us that the language of a song is often dictated by the inspiration itself. "The story already comes with its own language and I don't like changing the songs just because they should be in another language. I don't want to adapt or distort the story as it is." He also discovered that he has different attitudes towards himself in different languages. For example, in Serbian, he says, he can be the most honest when he writes about love, while for the song 'Everybody's Waiting' in English, it's easier for him to be open and honest with himself about unpleasant feelings. On the other hand, it's most natural for him to talk about world and political topics in Slovenian.

The process of creating the album was described to us by bassist Nace Jordan: "The album actually started with the Eurovision song 'Carpe Diem', and after Eurovision and the tour, we moved to London for two months in January this year, looking for new inspiration for the future album. After the tour finished, we spent six weeks in two studios and finished the album with our producer Žarko Pak." Kris, for example, is most looking forward to performing the eighth song from the album 'Mesto duhov' ('City of Ghosts'), because the song contains many unpredictable moments. "I can't wait to hear it and perform it live on stage and see the reactions of the audience who will see it for the first time," he says. "Wow. I haven't even thought about that", Bojan comments. "I have," Nace and Kris answer in unison. We asked them what exactly they thought. "The song is actually a kind of psychosis, where the lyrical subject jumps from a very aggressive and melancholic state to a pompous, almost post-mortem atmosphere," explains Kris. "It seems almost like a funeral song that constantly jumps between the stanza and the chorus, changing the sound image, the tempo, the atmosphere, and, in fact, the whole attitude of the song."

"Not only is it fun to play, but it will also be challenging to practise." When asked which song gave them the most problems, they all unanimously agreed: 'Šta bih ja'. "It's a song that requires a precise fit of all elements, otherwise the song simply doesn't work," Bojan explains. "We couldn't find the formula to arrange all the elements correctly and we were searching for a solution for a long time." "We recorded it more than 130 times", Nace adds. "We're still not sure if it's a slow or dance song," adds Kris, and the guys laugh in agreement. "One or two attempts are usually enough for us - just right", Bojan concludes.

(Ph: Vita Orehek)

When asked about how they developed and changed as artists over time, Bojan smiled and immediately handed the microphone to Jan Peteh: "You can start, keyboard player." Jan, the band's guitarist, continued and explained how, during the recording of one of the songs from the album, 'Everybody's Waiting', they found themselves at a standstill with the arrangement, unsure in which direction they should proceed. But thanks to Žarko's solution, everything fell into place. Jure improvised on the drums on the verse "What a wonderful life", and Jan complemented him by playing electric keyboards. "We connected a Rhodes keyboard to the amplifier and since then, in fact, I've been playing both keyboards and synthesizers in our songs," Jan concludes. "Don't be so modest", Bojan adds and continues: "Actually, it was discovered completely by chance that Jan is also extremely talented on keyboards, which delighted us all. Even our producer Žare was impressed by Jan's approach to playing an electric keyboard, which doesn't happen often. Jan proved to be a great instrumentalist.”

If they could choose with whom to have their dream-collab musical collaboration, with any musician, living or dead, from our region or beyond, Jure would choose Dire Straits. The boys exchanged glances and agreed to choose a band together. At Nace's "Ready, set, go", they say "Buč Kesidi" in unison. "It would be great if we could collaborate with them," adds Kris. And I have to admit that I agree - that would certainly be their dream musical collaboration.

Since we learned all about their plans for the future, we were interested in what they remembered from the past. For example, memories of the craziest concerts that will remain in their memory forever. Jure recalls their performance at Belgrade Beer Festival. Before that, they had already visited Serbia, "but this was the first time after the performance at the Eurovision Song Contest. Even before we went on stage, we heard the crowd chanting "Joker Out" behind us. I couldn't believe what was happening. I think it was one of the best concerts.” Jan continues and highlights the Ruisrock festival in Finland and the Summer Well festival in Romania. "At both of them, we were also greeted with loud chants by an audience of approximately 8,000 people," he tells us, while the other band members nod their heads in confirmation. Kris also adds the performance at Exit festival in Novi Sad and recalls the feeling while watching the footage of that concert: "It's a particularly strange feeling when you see that endless sea of ​​people, which you're not even aware of while you're on stage." "Yes." Jure agrees, "Some concerts really knock you off your feet. That was one of those." Bojan recalls another one: "For me, it was crazy at Wkrwglca in Sežana." The others join in laughing. They start listing who they were performing with that night. "MRFY, VAZZ live, Jet Black Diamonds... there were several Slovenian performers who we met again and the audience was really warm", Bojan recalls. "I felt like I was at one of those nostalgic college parties from the 80s that our parents used to tell us about."

(Photo: Vita Orehek)

We finally got to the topic of fans, and as soon as we asked if they could share any interesting or crazy fan-related stories with us, the guys went quiet and thoughtful. "People ask this all the time, and we still don't have the right answer," Kris notes, which prompts laughter from the others. We learn that they're always met by fans at the airport in Finland, where they have quite a large fanbase, and how much that means to them. Then, completely casually, they mentioned the voodoo dolls they had received as gifts. Tesa and I just looked at each other, we had to find out more. "They made dolls of all the band members in our Eurovision outfits. We actually got them twice, but they were only presented as voodoo dolls the first time," Kris explains with a laugh. Some band members still keep their dolls safe at home, while Kris, for example, doesn't even know where his is.

While they tell us about events from the concerts, like the one where Bojan's jacket was stolen or where they had a backstage in the middle of the forest marked only by tape around the trees, Tesa and I wonder if there is anything that fans still don't know about the band. There's silence again, and I can almost see them jogging their memories with serious expressions. Then they remember - they don't like making music videos.

Namely, it always happens by chance that they shoot music videos in winter, and in rooms without heating. Or, let's say, the fact that Kris has a talent for finding trashy music, or as Bojan calls him - "the best music editor for trashy music". Surely even the most loyal fans don't know that if they were to choose a name now, it definitely wouldn't be Joker Out. Some members of the band don't like the name at all, and Kris adds that it calms him down that his father doesn't like his band's name either, so they almost comfort each other by listing bands they know have a similar story with the name. Speaking of the name of the band itself, we were interested in how the name Joker Out came about. Kris starts the story and explains that it all started in a group chat where everyone actually met, and of course, at some point, like every band, they needed a name. Someone suggested the word "Joker". Since that word was not enough, they also added "Out". The proposal received three likes and the name stuck. Bojan continues: "I remember we were thinking then - if Ota Roš says our name in Pop In and if it sounds good, then it's the right name."

(Photo: Vita Orehek)

Through talking and evoking memories, we've gone way back, to the time before Joker Out was created. At the age of eleven, Bojan was in his first band called No Name, which lasted only a few weeks and played only one song, 'Tears in Heaven'. After that, he was in the band Apokalipsa, which disbanded when, as he says, he "stole" Jan and Nace¹ from other bands, and that's how Joker Out was born.

¹There has been a mistake in the original article. This should say: “Bojan "stole" Jan and Kris from other bands”, not Nace as originally mentioned.

If they had to single out their favourite or most important moment in their entire career, Jan would choose their first concert at Cvetličarna, because it seemed to him that it was then that he felt the turning point in the band's recognition for the first time. It was their first big solo concert, two in a row, both sold out. "Even if we played at Madison Square Garden now, I don't know if it would be as big a step forward as it was then. I don't think I'll ever experience that kind of adrenaline again." Nace points out that the breakthrough moment for him was the concert in Dublin, when they performed abroad for the first time and the audience sang the lyrics along with them. Jure, on the other hand, says that he will never forget the moment of entering the Eurovision final, when everyone sat together on the couch and nervously waited for the result. There was only one spot left when they were announced as finalists and the name Joker Out appeared on the screen.

Kris concludes that he could hardly single out just one moment, because the whole of the year 2023, along with the experience of Eurovision and the European tour, was the best year of his life. Bojan follows up on Jan's words and says that the concert in Cvetličarna was also a turning point for him: "I have never felt such sincere and pure happiness as after that concert, when I cried continuously for at least 45 minutes. I simply broke down under the weight of all the emotions; all the people I love the most were there with me and then, maybe for the first and last time, I felt like the best thing in my life had just happened. Then I also announced a concert at Stožice, which really came true."

(Photo: Vita Orehek)

I can't help but try to imagine what they were like almost ten years ago when they formed the band, thinking about what they wanted to play and what messages their lyrics would convey. Whenever I have the chance to look at young people full of enthusiasm, who really love what they do, I root for them inside. And that is even more powerful when I see how much they have succeeded. There's no doubt that Joker Out have come a long way, and who knows, maybe a very difficult way to get to where they are today. They're currently the most popular Slovenian band, whose songs are sung by fans all over Europe, posting covers of their hits or interpretations of their songs in their own languages on TikTok. If there's anything left of those teenagers, it's the positive energy between them, mutual jokes, contagious laughter and sincere friendship.

Also, they've kept that modesty which you can feel when they talk about their successes and milestones in their careers and the respect they have for each other and for their work. At the same time, I can't help but imagine where else their musical path will take them. With their music and visual presence, they are undoubtedly the messengers of their generation, and the feeling that great milestones, successes and endeavors are ahead of them is almost palpable. Therefore, I can only congratulate the guys on all their achievements and the new album and wish them a big – Carpe Diem!

(Photo: Vita Orehek)

[helenofsparta2]

Can we talk about how interesting Percy’s dynamics with the Olympians actually is? Like, both on an individual and on a general level?

He and Ares have a rivalry. A genuine rivalry, based on mutual dislike. Frank described them in Son of Neptune as “two old war buddies talking trash” and Phobos described Percy in “Stolen Chariot” as a “sworn enemy” of Ares. That’s actually insane if you think about it. Those are the immortal god of war, and a sixteen-year-old teenager. Ares would have been fine with Percy becoming a god, because he looked forward to just fight with him or beat him up for eternity.

Percy is the only known male demigod Artemis respects, who won the friendship of not one but two of her lieutenants.

He is the demigod, who challenged Dionysus views on heroes as a whole, and that, as a son of Poseidon, half-brother to Theseus, the hero who betrayed and left Dionysus wife. The hero, who ignited Dionysus hatred of half-bloods in the first place. Still, Dionysus placed his trust in Percy to save both Olympus and Pollux in the Last Olympian.

He and Nico are the only two demigods to ever canonically acknowledge Hestia. Percy even sacrificed hope to her, which was probably the biggest sacrifice and the biggest sign of respect she ever received from a demigod.

Aphrodite takes a special interest in his love life.

Hermes and him are on pretty friendly terms. So far, that Percy even refers to him as a “friend” in the Staff of Hermes. He is also the only demigod to ever completely openly criticize him on how he handled Luke’s situation and doesn’t back down from a rather intense argument. At the end of the last Olympian, Hermes gives Percy a list of his children outside of Camp half-blood and asks him to personally escort them to safety.  

Despite Hades trying to imprison him and threatening him with death, Percy is, together with Nico, the reason why Hades and his children are accepted at Camp Half-Blood.

While Hera dislikes him, she still acknowledges Percy’s importance for her plans and describes him for one as “constant as a compass needle” when it comes to his friends, and also as someone who inspires loyalty in “Son of Neptune.”

Poseidon, centuries-old god of the ocean, who probably had thousands of children in his life called Percy his favourite son in Battle of the labyrinth. After a conversation about Antaeus, who, for over three thousand years has sacrificed people and monsters in honor of Poseidon. Still, it is Percy, who is his favourite son.

He is the only modern demigod to get offered godhood but chose instead to use their favor to create a better world for all demigods and to request forgiveness for the gods who fought on Kronos’ side, which changes some of the quintessential rules of their world.

Percy is blunt and not afraid to openly challenge them on their views and actions, but because he is probably the most powerful and accomplished hero to ever live, and because he has saved them and the world on numerous occasions, they can’t just ignore him or kill him off, and even have to listen to him on some rare occasions.

None of the other demigods really have that, at least to this scale.

It’s so interesting to me, how Percy’s relationship to the Olympians, both negative and positive, echoes more the relationship they would have to another god, than to a half-blood. 

[techramonic]

The Pinnacle of Self-Hatred: A Close-Reading on Elliot Rodger's Manifesto

“I named it the Day of Retribution. It would be a day in which I exact my ultimate retribution and revenge on all of the hedonistic scum who enjoyed lives of pleasure that they don’t deserve. If I can’t have it, I will destroy it. I will destroy all women because I can never have them. I will make them all suffer for rejecting me… And I will slaughter them like the animals they are.” (Rodger, 2014, p. 101)

On the Friday evening of May. 23, 2014, Elliot Rodger had perpetrated the Isla Vista Killings. A series of stabbings and shootings that claimed the lives of six people, injured fourteen, and concluded with his own death from a fatal self-inflicted gunshot wound on the head. Before this, Elliot was like any other normal teenager growing up.

As he mentioned in his own manifesto, he had a seemingly good childhood up until his parent’s divorce. Even until the separation, he still spent time with both sides of his family, maintaining the privilege to have access to many luxurious items such as a collection of designer clothes and even a BMW 328i. He traveled a lot, and at just the age of one, he had already traveled to France, Sussex, Malaysia (where his mother grew up), Spain, Greece, and California.

People on platforms such as Reddit often questioned why no one considered dating him at all. Elliot had also asked himself this question time and time again. In one of his youtube videos, entitled, “Why do girls hate me so much” he says:

“I’ve been attending college in Santa Barbara for two and a half years now, in those two and a half years I have experienced nothing but loneliness and misery, and my problem  is girls. There are so many beautiful girls here, but none of them give me a chance and I don’t know why. I don’t know why you girls are so repulsed by me.”

While it is easy to dismiss that Elliot solely acted upon his crime because he thought that girls were the problem, upon the surface where misogyny lies, there are layers upon layers of complexities that shaped his views. Elliot did not simply hate women and men who got with women he dreamed of, it was that ultimately, he hated himself—a hatred that manifested toward outward factors.

Elliot has exhibited a long string of stunted self-worth ever since he was a child, and while it is easy to throw around names like: monster and pure-evil; the fact remains: he is still considered a human amongst all those. One who is consumed by insecurity.

In understanding a crime, we must first examine the criminal and approach their case with empathy. Understanding the human aspect of these criminals does not however mean that one should excuse, dismiss, or condone their actions. Only understand the reasons behind their motivations. Here are some aspects I have noticed in his personality and life that may be able to better explain why.

MATERIALISM AND INSECURITY

In his manifesto entitled: “My Twisted World”, Elliot had confessed to having lived a good childhood. He was a nice kid who lived a nice life, up until his parent’s rocky divorce. While reading his manifesto, I have garnered his tendency to place his worth on materialistic things, moreso, his wealth. There were two instances of this on pages thirty to thirty-one of his manifesto. The first was when he was hesitant to invite his new friend from school over to his house because he was ashamed of his wealth:

“I was a bit hesitant to invite anyone from Pinecrest to my mother’s house, because it was located in Canoga Park, a bad area, and most of the kids at Pinecrest were upper-middle class who would look down on me for living there.”

On page thirty one of his manifesto, Elliot said that he was eager to receive an Xbox solely because many kids from his school wanted it:

“My mother bought me a brand new video game console, the Xbox. I heard a lot of kids talking about how great the Xbox was at school, so I was really eager to have one.”

This trait had continued on to his older years. In the same video where he questioned why girls disliked him so much, he stated:

“I do everything I can to appear attractive to you. I dress nice. I am sophisticated and magnificent. I have a nice car, a BMW.”

From this, it’s observable that Elliot tends to desire things just because other kids desire it too. This is rooted in his craving of validation and acceptance. This materialistic need for validation also transcended from mere objects to even his own appearance. Whenever he did not have what others had or wanted, he would be very ashamed of himself.

At the age of six, Elliot had moved to Topanga Elementary Charter School, a school based in California. The school has a thirty two per-cent minority rate, making seventy eight per-cent of the ethnicity population white. With the population being predominantly white, Elliot  had developed a view on the world that separates people by their differences: the “cool kids” and the “losers”. Mostly, Elliot described these cool kids as the higher-class, privileged, centered on attention, and white. 

“I realized, with some horror, that I wasn’t “cool” at all. I had a dorky hairstyle, I wore plain and uncool clothing, and I was shy and unpopular. I was always described as the shy boy in the past, but I never really thought my shyness would affect me in a negative way, until this point. This revelation about the world, and about myself, really decreased my self-esteem. On top of this was the feeling that I was different because I am of mixed race. I am half White, half Asian, and this made me different from the normal fully-white kids that I was trying to fit in with.”

He even dyed his hair blonde and tried to pick up on skateboarding because he thought it would make him appear more cool. On his manifesto he wrote:

“My first act was to ask my parents to allow me to bleach my hair blonde. I always envied and admired blonde-haired people, they always seemed so much more beautiful.” (Rodger, 2014, p. 17)

“I then started to notice that all of the cool kids were interested in skateboarding. I had never even ridden on a skateboard before, but if I wanted to be cool, I had to become a skateboarder.” (Rodger, 2014, p. 18)

This materialism had soon influenced his fixation on racial hierarchy. Elliot in his older years constantly demeaned and berated others of asian descent even if he was half-malaysian himself. To him, he considered whiteness as a prestige. On platforms such as reddit and facebook, he had made several negative comments regarding the appearance of some Asian men. 

A comment he had left on a reddit thread stated:

“Full Asian men are disgustingly ugly and white girls would never go for you. You’re just butthurt that you were born an asian piece of shit, so you lash out by linking these fake pictures. You even admit that you wish you were half white. You’ll never be half-white and you’ll never fulfill your dream of marrying a white woman. I suggest you jump off a bridge.” 

The paragraph entails Elliot calling out a man for linking fake pictures of himself. Elliot speculates that the man had done this because he wished he was white, then he tells him how he was not considered as attractive because he was simply born Asian. Elliot was also very fixated on his looks, specifically his height. He had repeatedly mentioned his envy of other boys and even girls who were taller than him.

On page fifteen of his manifesto, he wrote:

“As Fourth Grade started, it fully dawned on me that I was the shortest kid in my class – even the girls were taller than me. In the past, I rarely gave a thought to it, but at this stage I became extremely annoyed at how everyone was taller than me, and how the tallest boys were automatically respected more. It instilled the first feelings of inferiority in me, and such feelings would only grow more volatile with time.”

In other instances, he also noted that he was bullied for being physically weak and short, and often he would blame this solely on his descent. He saw being mixed as a form of inferiority because this made him “undesirable”.  His image of attractiveness is measured by euro-centric features: fair-skinned, blonde, blue eyes, and tall. In many instances, he changed parts of himself to better fit the narrative of being “cool”.

To him, it’s all a part of growing up and fitting in, but what he failed to see is that the more he takes and changes parts of himself for people to like him, the more it just makes him hollow. Elliot’s childhood and teen years, best summed up, is a fixation on trying to keep up with those who are higher on the social status ladder and this continued to his later years. 

EARLY EXPOSURE TO PORNOGRAPHY AND SEXIST MEDIA 

Elliot was lonelier during his teen years, at 13 years old, he stopped having contact with his only friends because they started having their own separate lives together, making him spend more time alone by himself (Rodger, 2014, p. 38). This was when Elliot recounted his first-time exposure to pornography by catching a teenager watch it in an arcade called Planet Cyber.  He re-called it as a traumatizing experience, confused on why such an explicit thing would be considered as “love”. Despite this, his innocence was damaged by this accidental exposure. Though he did feel aroused, he was more guilty and confused.

“One time while I was alone at Planet Cyber, I saw an older teenager watching pornography. I saw in detail a video of a man having sex with a hot girl …  I didn’t know anything about sex at the time. I barely even knew what sex was. I was slowly starting to develop sexual feelings for hot girls, but I didn’t know what to do with them. To see this video really traumatized me. I had no idea what I was seeing��� I couldn’t imagine human beings doing such things with each other. The sight was shocking, traumatizing, and arousing. All of these feelings mixed together took a great toll on me. I walked home and cried by myself  for a bit.” (Rodger, 2014, p. 38-39)

This was the pinnacle of Elliot’s misery. A kid who searched for validation with his looks, now searched for it in sexual gratification as well. He only found himself loved if people flocked over to him. Furthermore, he had this distorted mindset that his worth is only measured by how many girls he could get and how fast he'd lose his virginity. This can be akin to the stereotypical portrayals of boys in media that often influenced teens and their concept of self-worth: the "cool" guys having lots of girls, while nerds and "losers" have none.

With this type of thinking, he tried his best to gain things that he thought women would like, yet he did little to no effort to actually get to know them and socialize. He believed that just because he had what others wanted or did not, people would love him. According to his friends, they thought he was almost always one-sided, expecting women to just swoon over him because he has things that are desirable.

ENTITLEMENT

Furthermore, despite his initial pleasant middle school years at Pinecrest High, such as dancing with a girl during a school dance (Rodger, 2014, p. 29), socializing eventually became difficult for Elliot. Often, this is because of  his appearance, where he experienced bullying because of his height. According to his friends, he barely talked to women but still complained no woman wanted to talk to him. 

Elliot was easily persuaded and subjected to peer-pressure because he had no clear identity. He always followed what was the trend because it made him feel less insecure about himself, since it was what he thought the people accepted and desired.

Despite his insecurities, Elliot had a fine record for being privileged, which he used to his advantage to "fix" certain qualities in himself that he deemed undesirable. Ever since he was younger, he often used his wealth to modify certain aspects of himself, even the smallest things: dyeing his hair blonde, purchasing designer clothes to appear more attractive and rich, purchasing mass amounts of body-building pills, and only picking up hobbies such as skateboarding and basketball solely because he found them useful in climbing up the social ladder.

Elliot also had a strong dislike for people who did not support his motivations. He expressed a strong resentment toward is step-mother, Soumaya, because of her assertive nature. He considered his dad to be “weak” for following her orders around, when in truth, she was only trying to teach Elliot a lesson about independence. 

“Not only did she kick me out of father’s house, but she forbade me to go there even for a short visit. And still, father didn’t do anything about it. Father kept saying that the house is her house as much as his, and that she has the right to kick me out. No! I am the eldest son! The house should be MY house before hers! This caused any respect I still had for my father to fade away completely. It was such a betrayal, to put his second wife before his eldest son. What kind of father would do that? The bitch must be really good to him in bed, I figured. What a weak man.” (Rodger, 2014, p. 62)

At his step-mother’s insistence, Elliot began looking for a job and eventually found work from a family friend who offered him a job for a house construction project. He felt more comfortable with it, seeing the job as helping rather than typical employment. After getting his driver’s license, Elliot enrolled in summer classes at Moorpark College but struggled with attendance, again, due to his jealousy of campus couples.

He dropped out midway through, briefly worked as a janitor at an airport office, and quit after one day. Knowing his mother would be upset, he re-enrolled at Moorpark but eventually dropped out again (Rodger, 2014, p. 70). Upon learning of Elliot’s decision to drop out again, his parents decided he would move to Santa Barbara, where he would live alone in an apartment paid for by his mother, receive a $500 monthly allowance from his father, and enroll in classes at Santa Barbara Community College (Rodger, 2014, p. 77). 

CONCLUSION

Elliot is very persistent on the idea that to be accepted, he needed to be loved, when in truth, he couldn't bear to accept himself. No one has absolutely any obligation to love someone because the other sees it as a form of validation. Self-worth comes from yourself, not from others. Due to Elliot’s constant fixation on trying to be accepted, he lost the identity that made him authentic and genuine. He lost what other people could not give him: self-worth.

Concluding, Elliot Rodger is a complex individual that cannot be summed up to one set character. He is not solely “pure evil”, he is a person with a background that influenced his decisions. He is not less deserving of humanity or empathy because just like others, he had also felt humane emotions. With criminals, it is always important to remember that to understand a certain event or phenomena of crime, we also have to understand not just the perpetrator that the media portrays, which is often easily pushed into a oversimplified narrative of “pure evil”; we must also consider the genuine person behind the crime. 

While it is important to recognize that these are profoundly disturbed individuals who must be held accountable for their actions, it is also crucial to understand that despite their crimes, they still remain human. Although, this does not mean that his background excuses or condones his actions. It only provides a framework to comprehensively understand both the case and the criminal behind it. 

[cordyceph]

one big thing about iwtv i like is that Every character has flaws. even characters we're meant to unapologetically sympathize with in other medias

paul, for example, is a very clearly sick man whos sickness weighs on his family. in any other media, hed'd be virtually untouched by any flaw other than being tragically sick. in iwtv, the first time we see him he's harassing louis' prostitutes (and we Know its harrasment because she tells louis he wont leave and paul isnt listening when she tells him she isnt interested.) we also see paul detest levi- who he views as having taken away his sister- and then act borderline hostile to lestat- some weird white man who's come to take his last sibling away, by attacking something he Knows he can win (religion, implying that lestat is either a blasphemer or gay) (either way, living in sin)

i think the only character who is like not an asshole without reason to be is grace? because shes generally kind and understanding until louis endangers her kids, literally disappears for months, years, until their mother dies, until she has to 'kill' him in her mind. sure, she was aggressive and insulting at their mother's funeral, but like... i would be too. if my brother fucked off for who knows how long, comes back Wrong and more of an asshole than before, literally breaks a door down, threatens me? id be way more upset than she was. like shes kind of a saint compared to literally everyone else. armand? armand. need i say more. louis? half the show is 'look at louis be unnecessarily cruel to those around him' (claudia, daniel, armand, lestat) lestat. oh my god lestat. i want to study his brain and be like brother how do you have every disease.

claudia is kind of a special case because for as much as she acts grown shes permanently stuck in that fourteen year old era. i know i, when i was an unsupported mentally ill teenager, said horrible things i deeply regretted later on. claudia goes through that too, just by like... a hundred or so years more. its not until madeline really treats her like another adult woman that she acts more like. well. an adult. louis didn't treat her like an adult ever (as much as lestat did wrong by her specifically, i do think he treated her like an adult, but never a child. but thats for another ramble) anyway, claudia says awful things and does awful things because shes fourteen and being treated like a child, but shes an adult, but no one treats her like one. like babydoll from batman animated

daniel . daniellllllll. olllllld man. i lost my steam thinking about that old man im gonna be real. hes just really funny and pretty and smart and cool okay im gonna jackhammer that guys pelvis

[tangent101]

Have we gotten Rachel wrong this whole time?

There are plenty of theories about Rachel Amber in the LiS community. Some folks like to think of her as a manipulator who only was out for herself. We have others who think she was deep in love with Chloe and would never cheat on her and everything she did was to get her and Chloe out of Arcadia Bay. It seems like everyone looks at Rachel and sees something new. But… what if we were all wrong? What if Rachel was something else… someone who tried avoiding conflict by talking to people and agreeing with them… and thus everyone saw her as they wanted to see her?

There is actually some evidence toward this in the game. First, Chloe herself points this out, though in a way that is perhaps less than flattering: "She blended like a chameleon. Clearly more than I knew… or wanted to know…." People take this as to Rachel was able to see what makes a person tick and just become the person that someone else wanted… but we can see several people who had a rather negative view of Rachel. So what is it about those people that had a negative viewpoint of Rachel?

First, we have David Madsen, who detested Rachel and saw her as a bad influence and a criminal. He was investigating Rachel and had photographs he felt were of her being a drug mule. Next, we had a truck driver who talked about Rachel really wanting to get out of town. And of course there is Mark Jefferson who also had a… twisted view of Rachel, though it also seems Rachel was so enthralled by Jefferson that she may have been sleeping with him (and both Stella and Victoria seem to be interested in what's going on in Jefferson's pants as well, though I'm not sure why, he's not that charming).

The truth is that Rachel was something other than a manipulative gold-digger or the like. She were a teenage girl who disliked conflict and was adept at listening to people and when talking to them would agree with them? I mean, consider her two breakup letters, one to Frank and one to Chloe? Rachel so wanted to avoid conflict that she left a letter to Frank because he scared her. She did not want a fight. She wanted out. So she left… with a note basically giving her reasons and essentially ending things. (Frank thankfully accepted that.)

Chloe also got a letter. Honestly… given it was all crumpled up, I half-wonder if Chloe had read it while high one time and crumpled it up and forgot about it afterward. But we have a very important line here: I don't want you to hate me. I don't want you to hate me. That's a very interesting thing to say. There is no deliberate malice, this is someone who has found someone else who just rings all those bells but wants to keep the friend aspect. She still wants the laughter, the moments of sharing a glance and both having the same thought, the things she envisions friends do… but to walk away from the sensual intimacy.

Remember what Victoria Chase said to Max in the Dark Room, that she was just a teenage girl? That's Rachel. Rachel Amber was not a seductress or a narcissist or a monster. She was a teenage girl who was avoiding conflict in her life, but in doing so ended up in a shallow grave in a junkyard. Because quiet girls don't make history… they end up used, abused, and discarded. They end up on the rooftops willing to throw themselves to their deaths because no one would listen to them. They end up abandoned because they were not good enough, because they ultimately were not willing to stand up to those who would use them.

Max, before Chloe reentered her life, was one of those quiet girls who ends up used and discarded. The reason folks keep seeing Rachel in Max is because Rachel stayed quiet and let people make up their own minds about her. And they saw in her what they wanted.

Or at least, it's one way to interpret Rachel Amber.

[marnerparty]

secrets

Trevor Zegras x Hughes!reader

ynhughes

Liked by edwards.73, elblue6 and 27,888 others

ynhughes guess the song

View all 276 comments

user1 life is a highway

jackhughes we ignoring the elephant in the room?

ynhughes elephant?

jackhughes idk maybe like who’s arms are those?

ynhughes Luke’s?

lhughes_06 not mine, can confirm

ynhughes Luke wtf you’re my least favorite

jackhughes so an answer??

ynhughes no ❤️

nicohischier that’s a nice car I wonder whose it is

ynhughes thanks for letting me borrow it 🤠

jackhughes ARE YOU TWO DATING

ynhughes WHAT!? NO!

nicohischier besties use each other’s cars jack

jackhughes I’ll kill you both, don’t think I will

ynhughes you def won’t

nicohischier all bark no bite

jamie.drysdale is it one I can play on guitar?

ynhughes Jamie, honey, there’s like one song you play

trevorzegras hey he got it up to 3 and a half actually

jamie.drysdale it’s actually just 3. I forgot the half of the other one 😔

trevorzegras knowing you, something country

ynhughes damn right 🤠

_quinnhughes not sure whether to be like Jack or keep my mouth shut

ynhughes I vote second!

_quinnhughes 🤐

ynhughes and this my Quinn is why I love you most

lhughes_06 your other brothers are here yn 🙄

ynhughes then go away!

tysmith_6 anyone guess the song yet

ynhughes no, they’re all worked up about the mystery arms 🤷🏼‍♀️

tysmith_6 okay well was it Last Night by Morgan Wallen

ynhughes HOLY SHIT IT ACTUALLY WAS TY

tysmith_6 SHUT UP

ynhughes ty I swear on everything holy omg

ynhughes we just became best friends

user2 do we think it’s a hockey player?

user3 yes

jackhughes better not be

trevorzegras

Liked by jamie.drysdale, dostyy_2 and 67,552 others

trevorzegras a dub & a date

View all 418 comments

jackhughes Jamie how did you feel about this?

jamie.drysdale bad. I got kicked out of my house for this

trevorzegras don’t act like this wasn’t planned

user1 tell me it’s a joke

tterry19 the kid’s growing up

trevorzegras you’re my inspiration Troy

masonmctavish23 he’s off the market

ynhughes dubs for days

trevorzegras 🤘🏻

user2 I’m sad

jamie.drysdale she better not have used my blanket

trevorzegras def did. it’s her favorite

jamie.drysdale this is why we can’t have nice things

ynhughes t swift 😉

jamie.drysdale leave

simon_benoit11 kiddd

trevorzegras bennyyy

colecaufield you just crushed every teenage girl’s dreams

trevorzegras it’s what I do best

user2 hope she’s worth losing all of your fans

trevorzegras she’s the only fan I need!

Liked by ynhughes

tysmith_6 uh anyone see this liked comment here?

ynhughes no what’s it say?

trevorzegras where?

tysmith_6 kinda sus you two …

jackhughes WHERE WHAT’S SUS

ynhughes 🤷🏼‍♀️

lhughes_06 I think I know who this is

trevorzegras take a guess and text me

lhughes_06 okay I did

trevorzegras you got it right 😳

lhughes_06 STFU

ynhughes you’re lying. first try?

trevorzegras swear

jackhughes MOOSE SPILL

_quinnhughes SERIOUSLY TELL US

lhughes_06 guys I can’t

jackhughes Luke this is so fake what the fuck

ynhughes

Liked by _quinnhughes, colecaufield and 29,006 others

ynhughes for those wondering, I hide him from my overprotective brothers :)

View all 268 comments

_quinnhughes we are NOT overprotective

ynhughes 🤨

user1 not surprising they’re like that tbh

nicohischier we can still hang out right

ynhughes ofc Nico. besties before whatever they say

jackhughes maybe if you just told us we’d be fine

ynhughes why do I have to tell you??

jackhughes common courtesy

ynhughes isn’t your best friend hiding a girlfriend from you?

jackhughes it’s different for Z

ynhughes that’s bogus

lhughes_06 fun fact, I know who it is

jackhughes so now you know Trevor’s AND our sister’s secret lovers??

_quinnhughes WAIT WHAT IS THAT HAND PLACEMENT NO

ynhughes remember when you said you weren’t overprotective?

_quinnhughes fair

trevorzegras where to?

ynhughes just canada

_quinnhughes uh why are you going to Canada? I don’t play at home

ynhughes uh my boyfriend quinn

_quinnhughes lives there?

ynhughes playing there . . .

lhughes_06 WHAT

jackhughes DOUBLE WHAT

tysmith_6 are we going to ignore that I’ve been trying to say something all along???

user2 someone help me do some digging

jamie.drysdale thanks for leaving me behind

ynhughes you said, and I quote, “not gonna come with to see you guys constantly eye banging”

jamie.drysdale okay fair

trevorzegras

Liked by masonmctavish23, jackhughes and 71,340 others

trevorzegras I’ll never get used to this 🫶🏻

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user1 I wish that was me 😭

jackhughes my eyes

jamie.drysdale this is really funny actually

jackhughes 🤨

jamie.drysdale oh you’ll get it eventually

masonmctavish23 Z man 😎

trevorzegras MM 🤘🏻

ynhughes I bet you didn’t even ask her abt posting this

trevorzegras def didn’t

jackhughes I think I know who this is

trevorzegras oh yeah?

jackhughes no I’m actually really lost, just hoping you’d tell me

trevorzegras sorry bud

colecaufield damn Trev this is scandalous

trevorzegras says you ya pimp

user2 imagine waking up to THE Trevor Zegras

jamie.drysdale not as great as you’d think tbh

ynhughes true

jackhughes TRUE!?

_quinnhughes how the fuck would you know miss?

lhughes_06 remember when I figured out yn and Trevor’s secrets? well how do you think I figured them both out at the same time

jackhughes IS YN DATING TREVOR

ynhughes ding ding ding, we have a winner

_quinnhughes I’m speechless

jackhughes WAIT THAT MEANS THAT’S HER IN THE BED

_quinnhughes OH MY GOD

jackhughes Trevor we need to freaking talk

_quinnhughes this is unacceptable

jackhughes we can’t be uncles yet

ynhughes GUYS GET OUT

_quinnhughes MOM WE NEED YOU

trevorzegras don’t get Ellen involved

jackhughes that’s Mrs. Hughes to you, bud

ynhughes

Liked by lhughes_06, yourbestfriend and 35,655 others

ynhughes okay, no more hiding :)

tagged trevorzegras

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trevorzegras

Liked by tterry19, griffinzegras and 99,017 others

trevorzegras my favorite Hughes ❤️

tagged ynhughes

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masonmctavish23 this broke the internet

anaheimducks now who will yn root for?🤔

ynhughes can’t I root for all 3 teams??

_quinnhughes nope

trevorzegras nope

lhughes_06 nope

jackhughes nope

tysmith_6 I KNEW IT

trevorzegras you really did

_quinnhughes ew

ynhughes you literally love Trevor

_quinnhughes yeah but I don’t need to see you guys being gross

trevorzegras you love me? 😏

_quinnhughes I take it back

trevorzegras too late

_quinnhughes shit

ynhughes I love you 🤍

trevorzegras love you more

jackhughes 🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮

ynhughes don’t be salty bc you’re not in love

jamie.drysdale I love yn. she can use my blanket whenever she wants

ynhughes do you really mean it 🥹

jamie.drysdale of course

user1 worst couple ever

jackhughes caption?🤨

trevorzegras legally I have to say that (you’ll always be #1) (bros over hoes)

ynhughes what’d you call me?

colecaufield well you are w/ Trevor

trevorzegras HEY NOW

elblue6 officially a part of the family ❤️

trevorzegras oh my gosh really 🥹

ynhughes this means when we get married you have to change your last name

trevorzegras done.

tterry19 Z’s the man

trevorzegras learned from the best

user2 this means Trevor and Jack can be brothers

jackhughes that’s actually amazing

nicohischier love seeing yn so happy 🫶🏻

ynhughes Nic 🥹

nicohischier do anything to her Zegras I’ll hurt you

trevorzegras you scare me so okay 🫡

[mellosdrawings]

i loved seeing your character sheets for yuu and hayeli, especially hayeli’s!! it’s clear that a lot of thought went into them and i think his on/off mode is such an interesting concept (also a pomefiore student with blemishes?? yes please!!)

i’d be super curious what your creation process looked like, i.e if where there concepts you scrapped or how you went about choosing a name for them (it’s just a topic i love talking and hearing about but of course you don’t have to get into it if you don’t want to :])

not me also having ideas for an oc with mirror magic, but based on the mirror from the snow queen instead

First I'm so glad you like my characters! It seems Hayeli's bad skin is very popular and I love it! Give me more teenagers with bad skin and not making a huge deal out of it please!

As for my process... dear, that'll be a long post.

General process

Ok so my general character creation process starts with two ways:

1. I have a role to fill in a story that can't be fulfilled by a pre-existing character

2. I have a vibe and I need to turn it into a character

From those needs and/or wants, I'll go through several steps:

1. Age: surprisingly deciding on a character's age first unlocks at least half of its mental and physical design. Is it an adult who already has its shit together or a teen in the middle of a crisis?

2. Vague personality: is the character going to be introvert or extrovert? Shy or outgoing. Proud or self depreciating. Bubbly or quiet. Easy to anger or chill. It doesn't need to be its full personality yet, just guidelines.

3. Race: for fantasy and realism. A character's skin color and cultural background will shape how they view the world a lot!

4. Gender and sexual orientation: i usually decide on the gender based on how many characters I already have of each gender, or whether I want a character to be traditionally feminine/masculine or the total opposite of what's expected. Obviously the gender will affect the design, but the orientation will also affect how the character reacts to others.

5. Assets & weaknesses: for fantasy, it'd be their powers and their shortcomings, for action it'll be their strengths and the things they haven't mastered yet, for romance it'll be their best personality trait and their worst.

Once I have that base guideline, I can start working on a chara design. Age and race help with the body, personality and strengths/weaknesses help with how they dress and present themselves. (An outgoing person will have an easier time dressing in original ways while a shy person would be more traditional for example.)

Once I have a design, I draw shitty little doodles and meme redraws until I have a better sense of their personality. Slices of life and comedy and angst are great way for me to get to know my character. For writers, it'd be writing random scenes to test the characters' reactions.

Then, I double down on the strengths and weaknesses. Make them stand out. Make sure they are coherent to the characters. Make sure the weaknesses are as important as the strength. (For example, I have a character who has super speed. Arguably one of the most cheated powers in existence. I counterbalanced it by giving him poor stamina. In theory he is all powerful. In practice, not so much.)

Lastly, I chose a name. Sometimes it's just about how the name sounds. Sometimes I'm looking for names to mean something. If your character is POC, think about whether they'd have a common name or a name from their own culture. Both are valid but you need to think about it! (For example, I have two maohi characters in the same story. One is called Fray (common name), the other is called Tanemahuta (maohi name) because they and their families have different relationships with their own culture.)

Yuu

Well, that's a strange one since Yuu already does exist in the game, but it's a blank slate, a place holder. Let's make them something worth remembering, shall we.

First, I went with their gender. Most of my placeholders characters end up nonbinary because that's what I am and also I can't be bothered to role-playing gender when playing a simple game.

Then I went with a vibe and a bullet list of things I wanted to keep from the game and things I wanted to add.

To keep:

1. Not very proactive

2. Not very talkative

To add:

1. Raccoon

2. Clever/cunning

3. Physically rather weak

From there I made a design that gave "raccoon vibes". Semi long disheveled hair, lazy eyes, lazy dress up.

Now, what was important was to make up for their weakness: they don't have magic. The world around them is harsh and they get threatened by characters having breakdowns every two months. What is there strength? For Yuu, I wanted them to be clever and cunning. Have them actually outsmart our dear schemers. That's Yuu's one and only strength, they're a schemer themself. They see others as cards that make up their hands the same way Leona sees others as chess pieces. Once you have those big pieces from earlier plus the survival instinct, you get a character that is easy to handle. They don't talk much, keep everything to themselves, manipulate others from the shadows to defend themself.

But. Let's give them one more weakness, shall we? It's funnier that way. Let's make them yearn for connection. They are a teen who got kidnapped from their family. Let's give them a big family. But they are rather independent too, so let's find a way to remove the parents from the picture to explain why they are already able to fend for themself. Now make them yearn for real friendship. Make it obvious their manipulation comes from defensiveness. Have them slip up when they interact with people they genuinely end up caring about.

And there you have Yuu.

Hayeli

Now, for Hayeli, I started out with a vibe. He's actually pretty old, comes from before the game was even released when there were only countdown arts and some vague informations about the game. As I said in his description, he's based on the Evil Queen's mirror. I didn't know at the time there were already plenty of mirrors in the game haha

Contrary to my usual process, I started with his powers first. His Signature Spell had to be something about mirrors. The easy way out would be to have him shape-shifting. There are plenty of angst and fun opportunities from shape-shifting. But that was too simple, I didn't like it. Instead I went with the capacity to copy others' magic. In game there was already Azul being able to steal others' magic through a high requirement spell, so I went with this kind of power. High requirement high reward. I don't like for my characters to be overpowered and I wanted Hayeli to just be average in magic, so I doubled down on the requirements to make his magic near useless.

Then I went on to his gimmick. He still didn't have a personality or body at the time, I really went full mirror first. Hayeli is a mirror. He copies others' magic. What if I double down and make him copy everything as a by-product of his Signature Spell? Ok, now, since I still don't like overpowered characters, how do I make it ruin his life?

And so we come to the problem of his personality: he doesn't have one. He's a blank slate. A mirror. He reproduces others' behaviors and mannerisms and personalities and he has no control over it. He has no idea who he is himself. The angst creates itself.

Once there, it was easy process for the rest. Make him a body. Average size since he's just a copy of others. Pomefiore attitude and presentation since he's in Pomefiore. I like curly hair and there aren't enough of them in Twisted Wonderland so I went with that, but they couldn't be long since Yuu already has semi long curly hair.

I still needed one way to recognize him. Make him pop amongst the other characters. What makes Hayeli physically Hayeli?

1. Moles. So many moles.

2. Bad skin. He's in Pomefiore? Do the contrary of what's expected there. Give him a malleable standard face and add bad skin to it.

3. Strange eyes. He's a mirror who can reproduce everything he sees. His eyes are important. Make them pale like mirrors, make his pupils white to reflect others, make the shape a bit blurry as if the mirror isn't perfect.

And there you have Hayeli's body!

Oh. A name? Google translate, please tell me how to say mirror in different languages please. Mirror in Armenian is "Hayeli", I like the sound of it. Sold. So Hayeli shall be Armenian irl, that'd probably be on the frontiers of the Scalding Sands (thanks a friend for helping me with that part), so maybe I should make his skin darker. Besides, dark skins in a dorm that values beauty is also not the first idea people get. Sold!

(Somewhere during the process, I actually had an objective with Hayeli. "Make him represent Teenagehood itself". Teenagehood is a particularly difficult period, teenagers try to become their own person independently from their parents. They copy each other and all the people they look up to to find what suits them best, but they also hate not being able to tell who they are as a person. Hayeli represents that struggle, and that's also why I gave him a heavy bout of acne and red cheeks and baby fat but a lean body. Teenagehood isn't pretty, and it shouldn't be. Hayeli is awkward, his body is morphing a lot, he has no idea who he is or who he wants to become, he copies others without realizing. But he also has a lot of fun. He cheats at tests, he bothers his classmates and dormmates, he has fun with makeup, he tries a lot of new things. While Yuu was meant to represent survival, Hayeli is meant to represent teenagehood, for better and for worse.)

There you have all of Hayeli's creation process.

TLDR: Mostly I just... don't go with the very first thought I get. Do you know that Pixar or maybe Disney process where they give up on the first dozen ideas they get because it's too "normal" and easy to guess? It has its flaws but I think it's not that bad. I go with the contrary of what's expected (dark bad skin for a dorm that represents beauty) or I push the concept further if I can (copying magic instead of shapeshifting). And most importantly, I give my characters flaws and weaknesses. That's the most important part of the creation to me. What can I give him that'll make him struggle? The scenario writes itself as soon as you give your characters challenges to overcome within themselves.