#he’s like. such a pre-dad he’s like a guy with way too much confidence but not enough like practical knowledge and he never thinks ahead

[castielsupernatural]

i always feel a bit vindicated when my best friend’s husband does a bad job taking care of her because he’s an honest to god idiot

[heartpascal]

the crooked kind

▹ — joel miller x platonic!f!reader

▹ — summary: you were sarah’s best friend, and you reunite with joel years after outbreak day.

▹ — a/n: erm. i love him. again not my best writing but i love this concept sm. also yes now i know there is an audience for father figure joel u will be getting so much of him

▹ — warnings: reader had major family troubles, pre-outbreak & post-outbreak, father figure joel, reader is injured, stab wound, referenced raiders/hunters, bill being hostile as usual, frank being a sweetie

masterlist

∘₊✧───── ───── ───── ─────✧₊∘

25th September, 2003.

After a long shower at the Miller’s house, you got changed and went downstairs to face them, the same anxiety you always felt when this happened arose in your chest. They were in the kitchen waiting for you, matching frowns on both Sarah and her dad’s face. You smiled tightly at them, grabbing the box of food Sarah held out for you.

“Guys, it’s fine! I can’t stay here forever.” You told them lightly, trying to lift the heavy mood that always fell over the three of you when you had to go back to your own house.

“You could! Couldn’t she, dad?” Sarah asked, turning to her dad and knowing the answer before he even said it.

“‘Course you could, kid. You know you’re a part of the family.” Joel supplied, making it even harder to maintain the certain and confident front you always put on when it was time to leave.

You heard the tires of the truck pulling up outside their house, and the truck door slamming shut as Tommy stepped out, his frown matching Sarah and Joel’s, too. He grabbed the box of food from your hand and put it in the bag on your back, clapping a gentle hand on your shoulder and squeezing as you smiled at him.

“Time to go,” you said, and rolled your eyes with a watery smile as you looked at the sulking expression Sarah wore, “C’mon, Sar. I’ll see you at school tomorrow!”

Nobody responded to your words, and their silence clearly conveyed their thoughts, but what about tonight? You were all aware of how much your family disliked when you stayed at the Miller’s but sometimes, you’d rather face their anger when you returned than any extra time at your own house. Aside from the people who lived there, you also never knew if there would be any water, which is why you always took a shower before leaving the Miller’s. You’d likely be back by this time next week, but it never made leaving easier.

You had once tried to stay at your best friend’s for longer, going on a few weeks, but when you had returned to your house to grab some more clothes, your parents had kicked off. Shouting, screaming, throwing things, the likes. They had yelled in your face that they would call the police on Joel, say he had kidnapped you, was keeping you away from home.

The last thing you wanted was the man who was essentially your own dad going to jail because of you.

It’s better this way, you had decided, because there was no other way. You were lucky your parents let you out of the house at all at this point. Every time you took a bundle of clothes stuffed into the bottom of your school bag you were chancing your luck, but you just couldn’t help it. Staying at Sarah’s gave you the experience of a loving family that you so badly wanted. A warm house, cooked food, and working water didn’t hurt, either.

“Let’s go, kid.” Tommy said, giving you a tight lipped smile. He didn’t want you to go back, either, but neither Miller men were willing to let you walk there. Tommy took you home every time, all of you knowing that Joel was much more likely to snap if your parents showed their faces.

“See you guys later! Happy birthday for tomorrow, Joel!” You waved at Sarah and Joel as you headed out of the front door, throwing a wave behind you and hearing them call out their own goodbyes.

You and Tommy sat in silence for the first few minutes of the drive, before he glanced in your direction, saying, “Listen, if you need anything, give us a call. I’m gonna be out tomorrow but Joel will be about. But hey, you need a bit of extra muscle? I’ll be there.”

You smiled at him, thankful to have such a supportive family who had your back at every turn.

∘₊✧───── ───── ───── ─────✧₊∘

Joel sighed as he gripped the steering wheel in his hand, waiting for his brother to finish up the paperwork he had to sign. When Tommy finally approached the truck, Joel turned to him with a dark look, annoyance clear in the curve of his eyebrows.

“Listen, Joel, I’m sorry!” Tommy told him immediately, reluctantly pulling his seatbelt over his chest and holding his hands up as if he was surrendering. “That fucker said her name and I just snapped, man.”

Tommy must have seen the way Joel’s face dropped, because he felt anxiety warm up in his chest as Joel said your name, his expression telling them both that something was very wrong. He remembered the crease to Sarah’s eyebrows when he had finally gotten home, the way she’d told him that you hadn’t been in school, and she felt like something was off.

“She wasn’t at school today.” said Joel, his eyes almost unfocused as all the possibilities for the why flashed in his mind, he completely missed the way Tommy’s jaw set.

The sound of guns going off in the police station sent both of their heads whirling around in alarm, with Tommy reaching back for the box that was kept under the driver’s seat. “What the…” he mumbled, eyes flashing with the fire that had started across the road. It was when they started hearing the helicopters and dozens of military and coppers swarming the street that the two Miller’s realised something was very wrong. “Shit, Sarah!”

∘₊✧───── ───── ───── ─────✧₊∘

23rd May, 2013.

Your arm was throbbing with pain, and you were sure something was fractured at the least. Not to mention the warm red blood that was dripping down from your shoulder, basically the only thing providing you with any heat in the all-encompassing cold. Or maybe all the blood leaving you was what was making you feel so cold. You weren’t sure.

It was the first time in a while that you had left your QZ, and you were ambitious, aiming to travel all the way to the Boston QZ with as little trouble as you could manage. Of course, you hadn’t counted on the people, the raiders and hunters who tried to kill you to steal all the supplies you didn’t have. You were lucky to make it out alive, really. You hadn’t felt very lucky for a long time.

It had been at least thirteen hours since you were attacked, and you knew you wouldn’t make it much further. Already, you were feeling lightheaded, woozy, like the ground was reaching up for you, but you powered on, seeing the glint of a metal fence up ahead.

The wiring at the top told you that it was electric, which you wouldn’t have been worried about if the buzzing didn’t echo in your ears, meaning it actually had electricity.

You pushed lightly against where there was a gate, a keypad there to unlock it. These days, you wouldn’t be able to bet on it being a simple 1, 2, 3, 4. Clearly, this was somebody’s home, and they didn’t take lightly to intruders. Your head dropped against the metal, the metal warm from the sun, and you were glad that only the barbed wire at the top was electric.

Your luck clearly hadn't lasted very long, as you heard the sounds of two guns clicking, the safety turning off.

“Who are you?” A man’s gruff voice asked, and you moved your head from the fence to look at the man stood at the front, “What do you want?” His striking blue eyes tore through you, looking for any sign of a threat, but you didn’t pose much of one in your current state.

“Jesus, Bill, let the girl in, she’s gonna die out there!” A friendlier voice called out, approaching the two men already stood in front of you.

“Or, she could kill us in here.” Bill said, eyes not moving from where you stood, narrowing as you put your hands up in a motion of surrendering.

Your eyes fluttered for a second, and you nodded at the man, understanding of his caution. “I—I’m just looking to get to the QZ. Boston.” You spoke, voice dry and cracking, having only been used when you had yelled out at the people who had attacked you, and that was hours ago. You were dehydrated, tired, and hurt. “Could you point me in the direction?”

“She’s not gonna make it that far.” A woman, who you hadn't noticed approaching, said, eyebrows raised as she looked from the other newcomer to Bill. A part of you knew she was right, knew that you probably wouldn’t make it another fifty steps of the way, but god, you’d come this far, and you really didn’t want to die.

“Bill.” The man prompted, eyebrows raised as he gestured toward the gate. “Just let her in, you can always… shoot her if she tries anything.”

“And I will.” Bill threatened, glaring at you even as you nodded in agreement.

“I’m not infected,” You supplied, because it was the best you could do, “Got a nasty stab wound, little while ago.”

Bill grumbled, sending the man who was trying to help you back into the town for something, and he continued his annoyed mumbling even as he opened the gate, tapping in a code and holding his gun up to your head as you took a step forward. You stilled, eyes following him as he approached, gun still raised, and held a tester to your neck, only huffing as it flashed green.

“Come on in, honey.” The kind man said, approaching your side and helping you stumble your way into their safe haven. You swayed, even with his help, and he frowned at you.

“You sure about this, Bill?” asked the other man, who hadnt spoken before now. You hadn’t really taken much notice of him, too focused on the people speaking to you in hopes that the world might show you a bit of kindness.

“Joel?” You croaked out, eyes going wide and your legs becoming numb as you stared at the man in shock. The guns immediately rose back up to your face, and they glared at you suspiciously, with the man who had been helping you stepping aside with one look from Bill, even if it was with some reluctance. “Joel— It’s you, I can’t believe it’s really you.”

They all stared at you, none of them daring to speak for a few moments. The woman stared at Joel, trying to communicate with him through eye contact alone.

“She—she fixed it. Didn’t she?” You said numbly, feeling like you were going to pass out, but unable to take your eyes off of the cracked watch that sat on his wrist. Sarah had told you her plan for his birthday, even if you’d never gotten to see it in action, but it was broken again.

Recognition seemed to seep into Joel’s eyes, and his gun lowered slightly. He said your name like a question, like your face was an answer he couldn’t work out.

In a single moment, his gun was dropped to his side, and he surged forward, pulling you into his arms. You held onto him just as tightly, or as tightly as you could manage with your fucked up arm, and blinked away tears as you squeezed your hands together behind his back.

His hand held the back of your head, keeping you close to him as he let out a breath. “Fuck.” He said, the words watery with tears you were sure he refused to let out. “I was sure you were dead. The houses on your street were on fire, I—…” He trailed off, pulling away to hold your face in his rough hands.

You forgot all your pain for a moment, eyes full of tears from something else, something like relief, “I got away, my—my dad was arrested and my mom went to get him. When I got to yours, you were all gone.”

He swallowed guiltily, eyes looking over your grown face. You looked so different, so… you looked like an adult.

You looked around at the town, wondering which one belonged to the Miller’s, “Where— where’s Sarah?”

Joel flinched, hands squeezing your cheeks once more, before he shook his head, looking away before he pulled you back to him once again.

“Oh.” You gulped, swallowing down the grief you had already felt for the Miller’s that rose back up, trying to sweep you away.

“Can somebody explain what the fuck is going on?” The woman asked, the first of Joel’s group to speak up since your unexpected reunion. She looked between you and Joel and the two men, as if one of you could answer all of her questions.

You looked up at Joel, and he felt like he was going to be sick, the memories of you doing that before the world had gone to shit hitting him like a brick to the face. He remembered the way you would smile at him, a grin that matched Sarah’s, like the two of you were born as sisters, and not just chosen sisters.

“I…” You began, stepping out of Joel’s arms to face the group and explain, but that wave of nausea hit you, the adrenaline from finding Joel seeping from your body, leaving you feeling like you were about to step into death’s doorway. “Okay, um, let me—”

Joel stepped forward, and you fell into him, with him picking you up like he used to do with you and Sarah before. It hit him then, with how you were heavier, and how he hadn’t done this for anyone in years, but he still managed.

“I—I’ll explain, after.” He said, the words echoing in your ears as your eyes fluttered, the last of your long-winded fight or flight leaving you as you rested in your dad’s arms, feeling like perhaps you’d wake up in the bed beside Sarah’s, and everything that had happened in the past decade would have been nothing but a dream. “Frank?” He prompted, letting the man lead him to wherever he thought would be best suitable to patch you up.

That sickening feeling crept up on Joel again, the situation being horribly reminiscent of outbreak day, almost like your weight was Sarah’s own, and his shaking fingers being from fear and not shock. He hated it, that the feeling of regaining a daughter was so similar to the loss of his other.

He felt a hand on his shoulder as he followed Frank, and glanced to his side to see Tess, and allowed himself to feel the slightest comfort at the nod she gave him.

Your eyes blinked open, and you looked at him through bleary eyes, “I’ve missed you, dad.” You told him, not missing the heartache in his eyes as he looked at you, but he smiled. It was thin, watery, and barely there, but you saw it.

“Kid, you got no idea.” He sighed out, focusing on getting you fixed up before he could start crying.

[ma1dita]

crazy little thing

a ‘partners in crime’ installment - luke castellan x dionysus!reader

words: 3.4k

summary: (pre-established relationship) The one where he spends all his drachmas to make you smile. Sometimes, the Apollo kids are better matchmakers than Aphrodite herself. Everyone’s tired of you two dancing around each other. Luke Castellan x fem!Dionysus!reader

a/n: lil valentines day special though im working on more est. relationship fluff after this!! happy season 2 renewal babies

(posted 2/9/24 unbetaed)

—

“Come on, you gotta admit—it’s kinda funny!” 

Luke is met with blank stares at the camp store after he places a few drachmas onto the folding table in front of the Apollo kids. They’re not sure if he’s trying to convince them, or himself.

Because yeah, that’s the excuse he goes for, wanting to spend his savings on having them sing to a certain head counselor instead of admitting his blatantly obvious feelings, so if you ask Lee Fletcher and his half-siblings, it’s kind of pathetic.

“What do we look like, a traveling mariachi band, Castellan?” he deadpans, watching the usually confident boy scratch the back of his neck with his face red like someone who’s been sitting out in the sun for too long. 

“I’m not saying to follow her around all day or whatever, just pick a random time to sing a song and catch her off-guard,” he insists, before meeting the judgmental look of one of Lee’s younger siblings.

Lee chuckles, ruffling his sister’s hair before looking at Luke quite seriously, “She’s a good friend. You’re gonna have to pay us more than that. Special song for a special lady after all.”

The son of Hermes knows he’s gonna regret this sooner or later, but proceeds to throw the rest of his meager earnings onto the table. He has other ways of being resourceful anyway, the box of chocolates he nicked from behind the store counter feeling heavy in his jacket pocket.

“Right… she’s just a friend.”

Luke’s hands fidget at his sides as he stands there, feeling a little stupid.

Lee’s little sister scoops up the coins from the table, her raised eyebrows and light aura mirroring that of her older brother. 

“What song were you thinking?” she asks, “Gotta make sure I know it if I’m singing it to your…friend.”

The 18-year-old boy tugs at his dark curls, getting more embarrassed and wanting to retreat with every minute that passes, but he’s never been one to back down from anything–swordfights, monsters, capture the flag, but this—trying to impress you...is a whole different story somehow.

Why are feelings so damn complicated? 

It feels like being at the butt of a joke, or more accurately—at the sharp edge of a sword, and Luke never lets his fights end in a draw.

“You guys got it covered. Just…surprise me too, I guess,” he sighs, walking off without finishing his sentence. He wishes he could pray a little harder to his dad for luck, even if he’s unsure of what exactly he’s wishing for (or if his dad will even listen).

“Castellan’s hopeless. You think he knows it yet?” the girl asks her brother, to which Lee laughs.

“I don’t think she does either, even though everyone else can see right through them. The new bets are on who’s gonna break first. Chiron’s been keeping track, but don’t tell Mr. D.”

If Luke wants a show, they’ll make sure he’ll get his money’s worth—and hopefully, it’ll push you two along faster. Lee bet on you two getting together before the summer after all, and he’ll be damned if he loses to Clarisse.

—

Valentine’s Day might be the day of love, but for you, someone who’s single (not by choice), and heavily busy with making sure people aren’t so…enamored in public (you’ve lost count of the reports you’ve written out due to indecent behavior this morning alone)---this just feels like another Wednesday, except with more hormonal teenagers with uncontrollable urges than usual. 

Oh, the joys of being the daughter of the camp director, also known as everyone’s favorite narc.

Honestly, love can suck it. With this much love in the air, you can feel it suffocating you like a plastic bag over your head. 

That’s an uncontrollable urge. Too much?

Maybe Silena was right, you do need to open yourself up more to romantic opportunities. But if you have to watch another person swap spit and get pawed at like they’re the last dinner roll at the table…. You might commit arson and set this place ablaze.

You just didn’t understand why people had to go all out today of all days. Shouldn’t love be shown year-round? Though you were a person of theatrics and enjoy a good show, it is amazing how much grandiose displays of affection make you cringe. It felt very performative, instead of genuine, and you would know, you’re the best actress at camp. You’ve acted out stories before, knowing all of the greatest romances and tragedies by heart. And you pride yourself on being a decent teacher to the campers, but for some of them, love still translates to a bad rendition of a ballad they heard on the radio.

Nothing gets past you at this point.

But that sucks too sometimes, you know?

Multiple failed flings and a heartbreak or two weigh down on you on days like this one, as you’re stuck being a bystander to outlandish displays put on by the Aphrodite kids being put to work. Love is their domain anyway, and yours…makes you feel a little less undesirable. Each demigod has their own strengths and weaknesses, but perhaps in the name of love, some of them don’t know how to take a hint. Several forgettable prose readings, a Sparknotes version of Eros and Psyche, and too many red roses to count have you reeling from exhaustion and a bit of disgust—-and it’s only lunchtime. 

So yeah, maybe you’re a little jealous; they could call you Nemesis at this point.

The only flowers you got today were from the little kids from along the path to the strawberry orchard, and though it’s sweet—the human side of you misses affection. 

Devotion. 

To be a daughter of Dionysus meant to deal in extremes, obsession or nothing, and there are very few people who can handle that. Always being too much to handle, or uninterested as a defense mechanism. Perhaps that’s what scares admirers away. 

That, or the fact that Luke Castellan is always attached to your hip. To be honest, you’ve always preferred it that way—the both of you working as a pair always gets things done faster around camp and he brightens your mood, whether you admit it or not. 

But you two are just friends. 

Really good friends who look for each other in crowded rooms, hands constantly brushing against the other for comfort, and able to pick up where the other one leaves off. Usually he’s the first person you see in the morning, and the last person you say goodnight to. You know how he likes his coffee and he cuts your apples for you as you two sit together in your unassigned seats in the dining pavilion. You watch each other’s workshops and if one of you is missing, everyone knows to ask the other to get an answer.

Right? That’s totally normal coworker/friend behavior.

If you were ever given immortality, perhaps they’d make you the goddess of denial.

You’re sweeping up confetti from the dining hall floor after an uncoordinated excuse of a flash mob was performed for one of the Demeter kids… and not to sound like a heinous bitch, but maybe next time they should use something biodegradable… or less messy. Sighing deeply, you feel someone’s eyes on you, and when you look up, Luke’s standing there with two full plates of food.

“Take a break, Trouble. No one’s paying you overtime,” he jokes, and you roll your eyes as you put the broom aside.

“No one’s paying me at all…” you groan, before taking the plate out of his hands and knocking your head against his shoulder in thanks. He snickers as his hand brushes the small of your back, tickling your spine as he leads you to sit at a table.

“Just another holiday. You know how it is.”

“It’d be nice to have a night off though. Sometimes I regret taking up the position,” you mumble through spoonfuls of soup. He throws his large hand over your shoulder, kneading some tension from your trapezius. Head jerking along with the movements, you giggle as soup dribbles off your spoon, which makes his lips quirk into a small smile. Being around you felt so thoughtless and easy that if you told him to jump off a bridge he’d do it without question, which should be more concerning—the hold you have on him is irrevocable. Feelings are way too difficult for his teenage brain to comprehend at this stage. It’s easier to wash dishes with lava or fight off a dragon (bad example, he knows, but there’s something about you that already makes him feel like he’s losing before anything’s even happened).

Luke is someone who fights until the end, a soldier who’s always trained and so ready for anything that sometimes it makes you wonder what war he’s preparing for. Infatuation, or the scarier, four-letter word was not something he was ever briefed on.

“No, you don’t. You’re a control freak,” he says with a grin. 

Luke watches you play with the pendant on your necklace, the dragon scale he fashioned into your favorite accessory glinting in your hand. Running your fingers back and forth over the smooth surface, your other hand puts the spoon down and you place your head on his shoulder. He thinks if he had to describe the four-letter word on the tip of his tongue, he’d tell whoever’s asking about the way you kissed his healing cheek after you both left the Garden of Hesperides. More than a year later, Luke is still unable to find the right words even if the weakness has made a home in his heart with your name written all over it.

“I swear if I have to hear another person croak out a lovesong I might just drown myself in the Long Island Sound,” you scoff as his fingers trace circles onto your waist.

There’s a low strum of a guitar that reaches your ears and your forehead meets the cool surface of the table as you shut your eyes and grumble. It’s Lee and his half-siblings, beginning to walk through the hall seconds away from singing until they see Luke shaking his head and dragging his finger across his throat to please, gods, stop. The Apollo kids swivel and 180, walking out of the hall as the music stops dissonantly, rolling their eyes and dragging their feet.

“That was quick,” you say inquisitively as your head pops up from the table to see Luke looking off in the distance.

“Heh… I think they were just practicing or something…”

He then had to run off and pay them more drachmas for the inconvenience. 

Fucking hustlers.

—

The sun sets quickly on Camp Half-Blood since it’s mid-February, and Luke finds you trying to calm your nerves as you look at the mess of glitter and paper mache that covers the arts and crafts hall from floor to ceiling.

“I can’t believe this!” you say in disbelief as you look at Luke, and he takes the can of Redbull out of your shaking hand.  

“There’s just no fucking way everyone decided to use glitter. It’s everywhere! I’m—CONNOR, PUT THE SCISSORS DOWN!”

Luke sighs as he holds his hand out for his younger brother to give up the craft scissors, which he relinquishes with a mischievous grin. 

“Guys, go find trouble somewhere else,” Luke mutters, pushing his head away, and where Connor goes, Travis quickly follows, tossing a canister of glitter back at him and not knowing it was still open.

“Oops.” 

Immediately, the both of you are showered in iridescent particles, floating over your heads and stuck in your hair as the older Stoll brother looks at the two of you wide-eyed.

“You've already got Trouble anyway,” he says teasingly, and this asshole winks at Luke before bolting out the door.

The room is silent now, and you pinch the bridge of your nose, before speaking, “I don’t care if he’s your brother, Luke. I might just fucking kill him.” You'd say more but your eyes are shut as you try not to breathe in glitter, and then the sound of the doorknob rattling catches your attention. Luke is standing there, finally faced with a door he can’t open, his eyebrows furrowed in annoyance–but the effect isn’t as menacing as it should be when he’s covered in red and pink sparkles.

“Not if I get to him first, the little bastard.”

“Just open the door,” you say panicked, running over and forcing his hands off the doorknob.

“I can’t if you won’t let me do it!” He grits, elbowing you and trying to unlock the door with both his inherited gift and brute strength.

“What kind of demigod even are you? Lockpicking is supposed to be your thing!”

“Well OBVIOUSLY, but it’s not working, now is it, Trouble?”

Luke finishes off the rest of your energy drink before throwing the can over his shoulder and he swears he can hear you cuss at him under your breath as you berate him about the mess, so he chooses to focus on busting the door down instead of looking at the glitter stuck in your eyelashes and thinking about how the idea of being stuck in a room with you makes him feel weak at the knees.

Through the window, his eyes meet the group of Apollo kids staring at the predicament you two are in (and the barricade of chairs the Stolls put in front of the door). He sighs, and Lee’s little sister flips him off as they start to walk away again, instruments in tow.

“You gonna charge him again?”

A tiny Will Solace looks at his elders for guidance as they walk along the path. As one of the youngest in the bunch, he especially idolizes anything his half-siblings do, going along with whatever they see fit.

“No, but we’re close enough to the archery range that I might just shoot them through their hearts myself. Eros and Aphrodite themselves are pretty much begging us to,” Lee grumbles.

“Why are we doing this again?” Will babbles, and his half-sister grabs his hand to help him walk faster.

“A crazy little thing called love. You’ll understand it better someday, kid.”

—

Thankfully, it all starts winding down after dinner. Luke finds you leaning against a tree flipping through your clipboard during the camp sing-along, so he tugs at your elbow to get your attention.

“Wanna get out of here?”

You look at him, slotting your pen behind your ear as you notice faint glitter particles still dotted along his cheeks. As your lips pull into a small smile, you say, "I still have a few things to do after this, don't you?"

"Cleared your schedule for the night," he mumbles, and whether it's the glow of the bonfire or he's actually blushing, a teasing expression crosses your face as you step closer and cross your arms at him.

"You cleared my schedule for the night. How on earth did you do that?"

Instead of a proper reply, he grabs your hand, tugging you out to the docks near the lake.

"Don't worry about it."

He's not going to tell you that he owes Chris and Annie a few favors before the end of the month to make up for the night shift they ended up taking. Instead, you both sit cross-legged at the edge of the dock, a gentle breeze brushing at your clothes and for the first time today, you're able to just exist.

"I hate Valentine's Day," you suddenly say, looking up at the night sky, and he's watching you closely as the gentle shine of the moon casts a cool glow on your face. Luke cringes at your statement, thinking he's already thrown away his shot.

"Why's that?"

"Tell me something Luke, am I unlikable? Like, is there anything wrong with me?"

He looks at you like you've told him you’re secretly a cyclops.

“The fuck? How many times do I have to tell you that everyone thinks you’re great?"

You don't even give him a chance to finish his sentence before you blurt, "I don’t want to be great, I want to be loved!" Reeling back a little, you lean back on your hands to create some distance.

 “Sorry... that was a lot, and I’m just...wanting to be noticed. It's nice to have people's attention sometimes, you know?”

You’ve got all of mine, he thinks, realizing he never stood a chance at fighting it—this four-letter feeling you give him is the first and only battle he’ll back down from, and you're the only person he’ll wholeheartedly surrender to.

In short, he’s fucked.

"I always notice you." He pulls out a dented box of chocolates from his jacket pocket, opening it up for the both of you to share, and the look of amusement on your face makes him glad that at least one thing somewhat went to plan today, even if the chocolate truffles are a bit smushed. You’re popping one into your mouth and his dark eyes follow the trail of your fingers to your mouth, feeling his heart beat a bit faster.

But then you both hear the soft strum of a guitar from near the trees, and the two of you turn to hear some of the Apollo kids singing beautifully along the coastline.

I'll be seeing you, in all the old, familiar places... That this heart of mine embraces...

You gasp, grabbing Luke’s arm to push yourself up so that the both of you can turn and face a small group of your closest Apollo friends singing to the both of you. Luke’s eyes soften further when he feels you grab his hand and squeeze, leaning against his shoulder as you listen.

“Did you do this?” you mumble, still entranced by the performance.

“Only if it makes you laugh.”

And you do, in the way that he loves—a bit crazy and too loud, and it’s perfect.

I’ll always think of you that way… I’ll find you in the morning sun….

Whether it’s fireflies or Will bouncing light off the water to look like small, glowing candles, Luke can’t tell—he’s too busy watching your lips pull into a smile so confectionery his sweet tooth starts to ache. The little kid was never good at archery like his other half-siblings, but as your eyes shimmer under the ambient lights, you think his added romantic gesture shot you straight through the heart.

“You know, sometimes I really do hate you, Luke Castellan,” you whisper, and it couldn’t be more far from the truth.

“No, you don’t.”

His eyes flicker to you again, but you’re already looking back at him.

“I don’t.”

And when the night is new, I’ll be looking at the moon… but I’ll be seeing you…

It’s quiet now, and you’re unsure of where the Apollonian ensemble disappeared to but instead of worrying about if they’ll make it back before curfew, you stand there in front of Luke with your guard down.

Getting a little closer than he expected, your noses brush before you pull the slightly crushed wildflowers from your jean pocket, the only physical reminder you’ve kept from today, and tuck them into his jacket pocket, sitting right above his heart. 

“Thank you.”

Luke doesn’t realize he’s holding his breath until he feels your lips gently kiss the marred skin on his right cheek, the blemish having an uncanny resemblance to a stroke of lightning; it serves as a reminder of his weakness. The lines blur as his eyes close to savor it and he doesn’t know if weakness is your kisses or his scar—but he is vulnerable to it all the same, realizing there’s a crack in the otherwise perfect persona that he’s worked so hard on.

When his eyes open again, his Achilles’ heel has taken human form.

—

“This has got to be cheating,” Clarisse grumbles as she watches from the distance, hidden behind the trees.

“It’s not cheating if I’m winning. Silena’s gonna get a kick out of this,” Lee chuckles, ushering everyone back towards the cabins. It’s a bit harder to do this in the dark as they try to be quiet and not interrupt whatever will happen next between their favorite counselors.

“Well lucky for you, your gifts are cute and romantic, what am I supposed to do? They fight enough!”

“That’s what got them into this mess in the first place. Come on, curfew’s in 10. We’ll find out which of us wins the bet soon enough,” Chris mutters, pushing them along back onto the main path.

“Easy for you to say, Rodriguez, you live with Luke!”

“Would I ever lie to you, La Rue?” he says with a mischievous grin, and the Apollo kids giggle at the irony.

—

“My body ages,

my anger burns into a seam.

I am so annoyed by love

and still it comes.”

-Kate Baer

ask to be added to luke/general taglists!

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[chrissdollie]

dad!matt or dad!chris u choose :)

let me tell youuu-- matt is a girl dad! i guesss i could see him with boys but i cant stop thinking of tough matt with little princesses who dress him up for tea parties 🥹

when they're babies, he's always taking pictures. especially when u dress them up in cute fits with matching head accessories :(

gets pissed off whenever nick or chris (more chris tho) swear infront of his kids !!! he does not give a shit, they could both be babies, but he'd worry about it being their first word lmaoo.

"shit, they're so cute." chris grins, tickling both girls gently. cut to matt smacking his arm aggressively

pretends to fight them LMAOO one of your girls is really tired but refuses to go to sleep, so you pull out the big guns-- your husband. u guys know how he always has beef with the camera? 😭😭 he swings (much more cautiously) at the chunky baby and when she jabs his shoulder, he winces dramatically in pain. this tires her out and she eventually falls asleep right next to her daddy

they won't stop crying one night, you're on the verge of breaking down with them and matt gets out of bed, walks over to the crib, picks both of them up (their sobbing winds down a bit), and kisses your lips. "i'll be back in a few. get some sleep sweetheart." and walks out of the room

you didnt wake up all night. and like your husband promised, he was right next to you in bed, snoring softly.

he has a hard time saying no for sure. its sunday and the kids have school tomorrow but they wanna go out. "daddy can we go to the park?" he shakes his head, "dinner's soon, baby, maybe next weekend" both of your girls pout and shrug without arguing, but still! he has to give in

pushes them to be social. he'll be at the store and ask one of them to ask someone where the tripods are or something. she does it without a problem because matt's teaching them that they don't have to be so nervous like he used to be

now in their pre-teens, they're starting to explore the world of beauty. "daddy." your oldest taps matt's shoulder who's on facetime with nick on the couch. "can you ask mommy if i can use some of her makeup?" she plays with her fingers impatiently. he raises a brow. "you don't wanna ask her?" to which she shakes her head. "she might say no to me, but she'll say yes to you."

he chuckles lightly, "baby, why would she say no to you?" and she just shrugs. "i dunno." her answer made herself realize that there's no reason not to ask. so with confidence, she nods to herself, and skips away to find you

one night, you're braiding their soft hair while humming a song the three of u like. the girls sing the lyrics aloud, causing you to giggle and start singing with them. it's a really girly song by the way, so when matt stumbles into the room and the girls plead him to sing along to 'call me maybe', he looks at you with a goofy look to which you grin. he mocks you dramatically before joining in hehehe

now you think your girls are very mature teenagers. they've both already had the sex and drugs/alcohol talk. anyhow one night, you and matt are getting it on in the bedroom (the door is locked!). you thought you were being quiet, but was proven wrong when you heard both of them giggling to themselves outside of your room. matt hears too and pauses his movements altogether. you whine quietly before he whispers a small "shh" and turns his head to stare at the door. "go to sleep!" he yells, hearing them run away laughing. and he gets right back to work when they're gone, pretending that never happened LMAO

[hotpinkstars]

Since we all love crumbs of angst every now and then:

Boothill being a dad is kinda bittersweet on it's own given his past.

But what if-

He lost his s/o due to labor complications. Another person on the list of people he lost out of nowhere.

LOSS - boothill x reader

- you pass away giving birth to your child.

- hi guys im sick 🤒 and i feel like i'm going to pass out but i decided to write 👍 this ask broke me but i just had to write it and i have no regrets... guys i was gonna write angst anyway but this one. this.

- major character death, hurt no comfort, written by someone who has never had a baby or been pregnant, pre-cyborg boothill wc 863

You have reached your due date, leaving both you and Boothill on your toes.

You’ve have a specifically rough pregnancy in itself, being horribly sick in the middle of it, really bad pain for the majority of it, and you were absolutely ready to get this baby out of you.

It pained Boothill to see you in so much agony, so he wishes the same, too. There's only so much he can do when it comes to how painful and hard your pregnancy was. 

So, when he was awoken to moaning and the sight of you leaning up against the headboard at around 2 in the morning, he was excited, but also really nervous. If your pregnancy was harsh, how bad would your labor be?

When you saw him wake up, you immediately gripped his arm, holding onto it for dear life before he could even register the situation unfolding before him. Tears were streaming down your face, little gasps and moans coming from your chapped lips every once in a while.

“What’s going on?” He asked, groggy and barely capable of opening his eyes. You fall into his embrace, crying lightly into his shoulder. 

“It hurts,” you manage to choke out, trying to get as much air in and out as you can.

“Is it baby time?” He sat up, a glimmer in his now wide eyes. You nod, clutching his shoulders and leaning back into the pillow. At the same time he was excited, he was also indescribably nervous. He wasted no time in readying himself to take you to the hospital. 

He ran around your shared ranch, preparing everything possible after helping you walk to the couch so you were in a less stuffy space. He draped a light blanket over your form, occasionally sitting with you while you’re fighting a contraction. 

He got you to the hospital alright, which was a success in his eyes. The only thing he couldn’t do was take your pain away, and it pulled at his heart in a horrible way. The amount of “‘M sorry, sugar,” he whispered on the way to the hospital would be more than countable on both hands.

So now, with you in the nurses hands, all he had to do was help you through contractions, and wait until his baby was born.

He was confident in your abilities to give birth to a healthy baby, and he was also confident in your capabilities of rebounding from the birth. That was, until your pulse dropped.

Thankfully, a nurse was checking how dilated you were, and noticed your breathing pattern was very… labored. He understood something was wrong when she stopped midway through checking you to come up to give you an oxygen mask, and telling you to breathe before frantically finding other nurses. While a bunch of professionals crowd around you, someone pulls him aside. 

“You’re the husband, yes?” The nurse asked, sitting down to type away on a keyboard. He nodded, fidgeting with his fingers while he rested his forearms on top of the counter. 

“Is she gonna be alright?” He asked, some uncertainty laced within his accent, making it thicker. 

The nurse hesitated and stumbled over her words. “I’m not entirely sure,” she managed to get out, crushing the cowboys' already strained heart. “You saw her state, and we're certainly going to have to perform a c-section. She’s much too weak for a vaginal birth.”

He nodded slowly. “When do I get to see her again?”

“You can now if you want to. There's just going to be a lot of nurses in there, that's all.” 

So in the room he goes. He doesn’t want to miss out on anything, even if you’re extremely unstable and barely breathing. He walks in and kneels right by the side of your head, watching as your eyes crack open in the slightest, smiling through your oxygen mask. 

“You’ll be alright, sugar,” he whispered before kissing your forehead. “It’ll all be alright.”

Famous last words.

You, for a matter of fact, were not alright. You could barely even keep your eyes open as they hand Boothill your baby. They were bloodshot, and very exhausted. As nurses were trying to stitch you up, your vision turned to black.

They escorted Boothill and your child out of the room and into a separate room as they try to help you once more. But nothing was working. Your heart had stopped beating, and the oxygen mask was no longer necessary. 

When the news was broken to Boothill, he instantly broke down. A nurse took the baby into a separate part of the unit so she could be properly treated, and he rushed back over to your room with tears flooding his eyes to see if he could catch one final glimpse of you. 

You were deathly pale, laying stiff on the bed, no life left in your body. He once again started to break down before being told to head home for the night, to get as much rest as he could and to come back in the morning. 

Well, he was a father, but his daughter no longer had the mother she deserved.

[cinnnamongrl]

sorority secrets- ellie williams (part 4)

pairing: college!ellie williams x fem!reader

summary: part 4 to this fic. you can find part 3 here.

warnings: [18+ MDNI] explicit language, mentions of alcohol, sexual themes, kissing, ✨tension✨

author’s note: part 4/5 !! have fun gays

“you really didn’t have to do that.” you spoke through a pained smile. “i did! and you have to go because i already told campus news that you are chad are a hot new item” she winked. a hot new item? “you did what?” ellie interjected, sitting up. “why-“ you closed your eyes and took in a breath, “-why would you do that?” you spoke calmly despite the irritation bubbling at your chest. emilia tutted like you were asking a stupid question “because i did some digging and turns out someone has famous sorority blood. daughter of an ex kappa upsilon sigma president dating the current kappa upsilon sigma president… that’s the news people really care about!” she explained. “… is it?” “yep!” she beamed.

~~~~~~

“campus fucking news” you said in disbelief. ellie snorted and held her hand above her eyes to shield the sun beaming down on her as she walked you to your class. “it’s not funny! look at the fucking text i just got from my dad” you handed her your phone.

“jesus” ellie handed your phone back to you. “yeah..” you mumbled. “he’s ‘proud that you’re respecting and upholding family values’… this is all because he thinks you’re dating a frat boy?” you scoffed, “when you put it like that it sounds insane. i think it’s because chad’s the kappa pres and kappa means a lot to my dad. he still gets involved with the fraternity even now. and my parents… they’re traditional. and they have these ideals of me being exactly like them. and they think it’ll get me to where i want to be.” “in a dull marriage where you have 4 kids and 0 orgasms?” you hit her lightly “i’m serious!” she hugged your side into hers and kissed your forehead “i know. i’m sorry angel. that’s a lot of pressure and it must be tough on you.” “what am i gonna do about tonight?” you huffed. she looked at you, “you’re gonna go.” you blinked up at her. “and you’re gonna humour emilia and the others until we figure out how to get you out of this little situation.” you nodded your head a few times, then a small smile appeared as you looked up at her “you not gonna be too jealous watching me on a date with someone else?” you teased. she poked her tongue at her cheek lightly and a little smirk played against her lips “why would i be jealous when he’s not a threat?”. you raised your eyebrows “such confidence, williams.” “well, am i wrong?” she tilted her head towards you and you shook your head with a laugh.

~~~~~~~

warm sticky heat pawed at your skin as you weaved your way through a crowded tipsy bison to reach the bar. you stood waiting to catch a bartenders eye when a hand you knew wasn’t ellie’s was placed on your lower back. “i’ll get the drinks” chad spoke.

despite how much you wanted to be away from this bar and this date, chad wasn’t… awful. sure he’s talked about himself a lot, and yes he’s gone through his camera roll and shown you highlight clips of his football games but he wasn’t the worst frat guy you’d ever come across. he was respectful at least and did seem to have a genuine interest in getting to know you. you nearly felt bad that he was on a date with someone who has absolutely no interest in him. nearly. he placed your two drinks on the little table for two that was conveniently in perfect viewing distance from the booth where your friends sat. you did a little scan; brittney was talking to one of chad’s friends, emilia seemed to be rejecting a kappa guy, madison was ranting to chloe, ellie was… sitting, her back against the booth, manspreading slightly with one hand against the back of the seat, the other holding her drink and she was staring right at you. you adjusted in your seat slightly and let your eyes run over her. she winked half-jokingly and a giggle escaped your throat. “don’t you think?” your brain suddenly processed the background noise you’d been hearing was a question directed at you. you turned your head to chad suddenly. “oh um… yeah.” he nodded thoughtfully and smiled “i knew you’d agree,” he reached his hand out and placed it on top of yours. oh god. “you know… you’re even cuter than emilia said you were.” you lifted your mouth in a hopefully not-too-obvious fake smile. “and you’re like, super smart and shit” you looked down to avoid his intense gaze and his hand reached out to brush a piece of hair behind your ear. you tried not to visibly cringe and instead looked up and change the subject “so tell me about that soccer game again”. he smiled, one eyebrow lifted in confusion “football.” “yeah, that.” he took in a breath and began rambling again about his sporting achievements.

ellie had never really considered herself a jealous person. that was until she was being forced to watch some douche put his stupid hands on your and touch your hair and get to put his dumb frat boy face near yours. the fact that she was having to sit metres away and pretend to everyone else she was rooting for this fake date was adding to the bitterness creeping through her body. she pictured herself striding over there, knocking chad off his chair and carrying you bridal-style out of the bar, knight in shining armour rescuing her princess. watching him lean forward to speak into your ear was her last straw, she couldn’t stride over to rescue you but she also couldn’t sit here and watch chad get to act like she did with you all because of some stupid lie at a party.

you stared blankly at chad as he rambled, practically spaced out and nodding at appropriate times. out of the corner of your eye you spotted ellie getting up and walking towards the restroom and a spark of excitement went through you at finally getting an opportunity to talk to her tonight. you looked back at chad “oh my god no way that’s so funny hahaha imgonnausetherestroomillbebackinabit” you blurted out as you were standing up from your seat, desperate to escape before he could stop you. you headed straight for the restroom, praying all of the girls were too engaged in their conversations to follow you. you swung the door open and were met with an empty room minus ellie who’s arms were stretched out to lean against a sink. her head turned to you as you walked in, door closing behind you and she smirked, “what is it with you always following me into toilets?”

you smiled at her “maybe i just needed to use the restroom.” she stepped towards you, “oh? so you didn’t come running in here so you could abandon your date and get me alone for a few minutes?” you looked away playfully “i don’t know what you’re talking about.” she reached you and placed her arms around your waist. “i don’t blame you. he seems like a boring motherfucker.” you gasped in faux shock “are you… jealous?” ellie rolled her eyes dramatically “yeah i’m crazy jealous,” voice dripping with sarcasm, “he’s out there sipping on his drink waiting for you,” her hands travelled to your lower back, “and i’ve got you in here, pressed up against me” her hands dropped down to squeeze your ass and the action made you fall into her closer. ellie’s words came out casually but her possessive actions were exposing her jealousy which made you want to reel that part out of her even more. “you know, he’s actually quite interesting.” ellie pulled her body from yours by an inch and looked at you. “he’s pretty funny too.”

ellie took her hands from you and placed one on her hip “‘mh. it’s just weird ‘cause i didn’t see you laughing much.” you looked up. “weird. i definitely was.” ellie crossed her arms. “you’re trying to make me jealous.” she told you. “‘m not. was just sayin’ he’s not that bad.” ellie chuckled and grabbed your hands to pull you back into her, face close to yours. “that’s cute. if you wanted me to get all possessive, you could’ve just said.” her tone slightly darker. you chewed on your lip, any response lost before it even reached you. she tilted her head to the side, “hm?”. a barely audible mm left your throat and she laughed. “don’t get all shy on me now, you were trying to rile me up a second ago.” she rested a hand on the back of your neck, thumb stroking your cheek and she brought her mouth inches close to yours “you want a kiss?”. you nodded enthusiastically “mhm”. she was dragging her other hand up and down your side, tickling the bare skin of your upper leg just before your skirt stopped. “then tell me what you really think about chad,” she spoke lowly, “who you’d rather be out with.” you sighed, “you already know. just kiss me.” “i want you to say it”. you huffed, “he’s boring. and not funny. or interesting. and i wish i was out with you instead.” she tutted in sympathy, near-mocking pout present. “me too, sweet girl.” she lowered her mouth to yours and kissed you. you released a little sigh of relief into her mouth. you were all-consumed by ellie; her body pressed to yours, her scent making your mind fuzzy, the taste of her earlier drinks on your tongue and head swarming with ellie ellie ellie. your body swelled with the urge to drag her into a toilet stall and-

the restroom door swung open and you ripped away from each other just in time to hide your activity, though probably not enough to hide your flustered appearance. three girls you didn’t know stumbled into the room and claimed the sinks. you looked at ellie and she looked at you. tension still high but now with no outlet. she slowly backed out of the bathroom and walked back to her booth. you debated following her for a second but you looked over and saw chad, head in his hands drumming his fingers on his beer bottle and you begrudgingly decided to go back over there before your friends pestered you about not trying hard enough on your date. you made your way over to him but before you got there brittney stopped you. “we’re going outside to vape. come with?” she spoke flatly, her question more of a demand. who knew brittney would be your saviour? you followed all of the girls, including ellie outside of the bar. the night’s harsh air was a welcomed by your overheated body. just as ellie made her way to you emilia approached you.

“having fun?” her tone hopeful. “sure!” you smiled. “he really likes you, i can tell. and you clearly like him. you guys should go exclusive!”. you scoffed, “i don’t know about that”. you noticed brittney was frowning at emilia from a distance, manicured fingers holding onto her blueberry ice elf bar. she pulled emilia over to stand with her which left you alone with ellie. “hi” you spoke and tapped her leg with your foot. she laughed “hi pretty” voice out earshot of the others. “um.. here’s an alley by the side of the bar. you think they’d notice?” you asked. she blinked at you with raised eyebrows, voice full of pretend shock “did you just invite me into a dark alley?” you furrowed your brows with a pout barely hiding your smile “not like that, perv. i meant so we could talk more privately.” “oh talking, i see” she laughed. she did a quick scan and grabbed your hand “c’mon”. she lead you to the side of the bar, away from the eyes of anyone except people passing by on the street. you leaned against the brick wall and ellie stood in front of you.

“it seems like you’re always sneaking me off to hidden places” she said lightheartedly. “well id prefer not to have to sneak away to be able to kiss you but we’re in a bit of a situation.” ellie raised an eyebrow playfully, “and who’s fault is that?” she teased. “hey, i had my reasons.” you defended yourself. “yeah, you were so scared of being in love with me you had a make up a fake crush and he happened to actually exist.”, she laughed. you kicked her with little force “i was not in love with you. i met you a few days before then!” she was still laughing, “and yet i made such an impact you felt the need to deny your real feelings for me”. you crossed your arms, “you’re such an asshole” “hey i’m kidding. i had to pretend to myself that i hated you after that night so i wouldn’t cry” you burst out into affectionate laughter “els”. she smiled and wrapped her hands around your back to bring your body into hers to kiss you. it was sweet and gentle, and yet it still made your stomach flip. against all her body’s instincts she pulled away and took your hand, “let’s not have them wander round here and catch us kissing on your date with dreamy chad”. you giggled and let her lead you back to the bar.

~~~~~~~~~

the drinks ellie used to entertain herself last night while she couldn’t be with you were making themselves known as she woke with a fuzzy head, and the loud banging on her door was not helping. she checked her phone for the time and saw 3 missed calls from you and forced herself out of bed to open her door. you walked past her and threw yourself down onto her bed.

“have you seen it?”. she looked at you for a few moments, “seen what?” you huffed and shoved your phone into her hand. a campus news feature. taking up the screen was a photo of you and ellie kissing. it was dark, zoomed in and kind of blurry like it had been taken from a distance, and anyone who saw the photo wouldn’t be able to make out where you were but you knew it was from last night in the alley. ironically where you’d kissed for about 3 seconds max. under the photo was some writing, ‘chad’s new girl kisses random girl behind his back???’ ellie looked back up at you, “oh god”. you took your phone back and shoved it in your pocket. ellie frowned, “who the hell would ta-“ “we’re going to eta” you interrupted. you practically marched down to the eta house, ellie behind you trying to catch up with your fast pace. when you arrived, emilia, madison, chloe and katie were having breakfast in the dining room. as you stood at the head of the dining table, hands on your hips you realised you hadn’t planned what to say at all. you weren’t even sure what you marched down here to do. accuse someone? defend yourself? maybe they hadn’t even seen it.

“who runs campus news?” spluttered from your mouth. madison looked up at you, “i don’t know. but people can submit whatever they want and most of the time it’ll get published.” the harsh sound of a chair scraping against the floor reached your ears and suddenly emilia was walking towards you “you guys. we saw that feature,” she hugged you both individually. “how awful. and poor chad, he’s already text me asking what’s going on.” selfishly or not, chad’s feeling were at the bottom of your list of problems right now. “so are you two like.. a thing?” katie spoke. emilia spoke up, “no she likes chad! it was just one kiss right? maybe you should go over and talk to him. he’d probably forgive you if you explained it was just a silly mistake. don’t let a great guy like him get away.” you stared at her, failing to hide the confusion on your face. ellie stood beside you chewing on her lip. there were a few seconds of silence. “how do two girls have se-“ “katie.” madison cut her off. this conversation was proving to be even less helpful than you’d predicted. “listen- where can i get in contact with campus news to get the photo taken down?” you spoke calmly, only ellie noticing the frustration peaking through your tone. “you could try calling the number on the website?” chloe offered. “thank you.” you grabbed ellie’s hand and swiftly left the eta house.

back at ellie’s dorm you scrolled through campus news looking for some sort of contact number. ellie sat beside you in silence, a little intimidated by your frantic energy. “babe.” she tried. “mh” you replied, eyes still glued to your phone and fingers scrolling rapidly. “it’s gonna be fine.” she assured you. “‘s not. unless i get it removed from campus news quickly before my parents see it.” ellie took a deep breath, “don’t you think.. in a way it might be for the best?”. you looked up from your phone at her, irritation clear on your features. “how would this be for the best?” she leaned back, resting against the arm being held up by the bed “well you wanted to get out of the chad situation.” “yeah not like this!” you shuffled back a little, frustration building. “not with me?” ellie accused. you rolled your eyes “that’s not what i meant. i don’t want to have to explain this to my parents.” “what’s so awful about your parents finding out? you were gonna have to tell them you’re not dating chad at some point.” ellie said, letting her own frustration show. you picked your phone back up and huffed in anger, not wanting to have to justify why you wanted the feature taken down. “or were you?” ellie spoke. you looked at her again “what?” “were you ever even going to tell them? or am i just some college experiment for fun before you go off and actually start dating a real chad so you can live the life your parents want you to live?” bitterness and hurt ran through ellie’s words. “don’t be like that, ellie.” “well?” ellie waited. she wasn’t sure what for. maybe for you to reassure her, kiss her and tell her she’s being ridiculous and that obviously that wasn’t going to happen.

“i’m gonna go.” you stood up and left her dorm without another word.

part 5

a/n: this is my dramatic tv show outro: dun dun dunnnn! will ellie and reader make up? 😿who took the photo?🫢 and why?😳 find out soon on sorority secrets ! (a cinnnamongrl production) ;)

tag list @ximtiredx @gold-dustwomxn @nil-eena @alexpritch @robinismywifee @sc0ttstre3ted @ilovemoneymorethenmen @amberlynn28 @eyeluvangel @amitycat sorry some blogs won’t tag :(( (might be bc of ur visibility settings)

happy to add people to the taglist but i can’t tag you if you don’t have your age in your bio!! my blog is 18+ !!

[overtake]

every time i remember that gifset of daniel laughing and talking pre-race with max and his dad in spa 2014 and realize that max saw daniel win his third race and red bull's 50th race live and IN PERSON....like daniel must have seemed so cool and larger than life. and then come to find out a few weeks later it's max's test and he had made a welcome video for him. like...it's too much they're TOO MUCH.

This response got ludicrously long.

It’s such “fated to be in each other’s lives forever” shit. It’s always been Max and Daniel. In 2011, before Max was even a red bull junior. In 2014 at spa, ahead of Max being announced for toro rosso. In video form at his super license drive, when Max being his future teammate wouldn’t have even been thought in Daniel’s mind. The things Max got to see Daniel achieve and dream that he might have that and more, and the hot guy doing it is paying attention to him.

He wins that race and backs him, saying he couldn’t have done what he’s about to do and saying Max has the talent to be there… I just know it was good to hear that the man you just watched on the podium believes you deserve this oppprtunity. And if he wasn’t ready at your age and is sitting in front of you a three time winner, what can you achieve by his age?

Obviously, Max has never needed other people’s validation on his skill. He knew he could be successful and had no issue staring his naysayers down. He’s a cactus, not a delicate orchid. You cannot kill him. Your opinions mean nothing to him if you are not in his inner circle (though Daniel certainly worked his way into being someone whose opinion Max holds, hears, and values).

But still, it has to be nice to hear back then that there are people with achievements you want who believe you’re capable of getting there. Even the most brave-faced sixteen year old (with a father who tries to toughen his emotional resolve by saying he will never be anything more than a truck driver) still appreciates having someone believe in him, even if he doesn’t need the validation.

I think people tend to wrongly characterize young Max as some delicate friendless loser and Daniel was the only person to ever show him kindnesses etc etc etc. Max is extremely confident and never relied on Daniel to build self-worth or whatever pathetic way people try to write him. But he always just glowed around him — textbook of that first crush that makes you have the italics “oh. oh” moment. It’s very apparent that Daniel meant a lot to Max as a teammate and that the two of them just liked being around each other, such an anomaly for that era of f1 (ex: like they mentioned in on the sofa 2017, Lewis, — who had been busy with the life altering downfall of his relationship with Nico — was in awe of Max and Daniel and asked for the scholarship of how they got along so well).

It’s so clear that this draw between them started for Max so early from just the way he looks at Daniel on that phone, shy and not knowing quite what to say, and his gaze lingering on it even after it stops playing with that smile. He has to tear his attention away to say his sweet little praise of Daniel. Daniel respected Max as a serious competitor from day one with his quotes about Max’s talents, and that already meant something to Max — but then he also went ahead and liked Max and was kind to Max in a time where he was drenched in doubters.

It’s a great tragedy that we will never know what it would’ve been like to see the two of them in a car that could compete for championships. Obviously tensions would have altered their relationship (I mean, the Renault engine frustration and natural increase in rivalry as it became Max’s team already meant their relationship improved post-leaving), but I’m going to be delusional and think that they never could have hated each other in that bone-deep way because they like each other in a way that is so natural that it feels encoded in their DNA.

Things would have gotten messy as competitive battles do, with many a wall punched and inflammatory quotes in the media pen — especially as Daniel would have to reckon with the inevitability of Max being a generational talent whose already sharp elbows in their early days only doled out more hits on the road to WDC. It’d be claws out, teeth bared tension.

Still, I employ my delusion to say that in that universe, at the end of their careers, they could sit on Daniel’s farm and still enjoy being around each other — like Daniel said in 2019, they had a heated rivalry and pushed each other, but there was always respect. At the end of the day, Max has never stopped looking at Daniel outside the track with anything but effusive love, and Daniel is always there looking back with his mouth open and ready to make Max laugh — and I genuinely believe they would have cared enough about each other to keep their fight contained to the environment and time period and rebuild anything lost when it’s all said and done.

It’s the eternal thesis of them, that everyone has said a million times over: they like each other so much, so genuinely, without a veneer of fakeness and PR to it. They’d like each other in any universe in any conditions, even ones where they were built to hate each other. There could still be fighting and resentment and cold shoulders, but they are not built to hate each other, and that’s why I like them so much.

[meanbossart]

DU drow asks time

Lore questions/sweet messages/stuff that made me laugh that's about DU drow specifically that I decided to compile in a single post!

First of all, "outraged to be used as a medium for old man gay divorce" is a hysterical sentence LOL

As for his thoughts on the Ansur debacle? Negative ones. He hates the emperor, he doesn't care about his third-time-twist real identity, he doesn't particularly care about Wyll either (well - he kind of finds him entertaining, he's kind of really frustrated by him, it's complicated) but he saved his dad on a whim to spite Mizora anyway. BUT HEY, all that trouble would have been worthwhile if he's about to get an ancient dragon fighting alongside him - this old duke sounds a little too confident in this fairy tale, but stranger things have happened, right?

Then the situation unfolds as it does, and if he wasn't eager enough to use that orphic hammer before, he certainly is now. There is very little that the Emperor does past Act 3 that DU drow doesn't find a way to twist into something that confirms his resolve against him. If he could have taken Ansur's side in that fight, he would have - not that he shed any tears over killing him either.

Sick sword though, that helped soothe his nerves a bit and I'm sure spared everyone a little bit of a tantrum at camp later.

HAHAHAHA I can't confirm nor deny because I see so few large body-type elves as it is (which is fair, elves aren't usually... That massive). I did set age to 50% because it does look a little weird when it's all smooth. Maybe that's the trick?

Though I guess if you find it unsettling, then... No wonder it suits him! however this just looks like an impressively handsome fella to me, to be honest. I insist on fucking him up further whenever I draw him for that reason.

Thank you so much for following along and for giving the fic a try!!! And no worries, english isn't my native tongue either so I've been there 😎👍

I do actually have a couple of very short comics planned that take place pre-tadpole, but my backlog of WIPs is... Massive. Not to mention the commission work I do (currently not taking any more). I have one that's about his first interaction with Orin and another about a business dinner with Gortash gone-wrong, but I have no clue when I'll be able to work on them. Hopefully soon though!

You know, I've always hoped that after I died I'd be remembered as the guy who inspired others to make their nipples card-swipe-able.

Joke's aside, thank you LOL I love that my guys' nips have taken up non-insignificant room in your mind, it's always comforting to know that you aren't the only one.

Piercings and the such aren't really his style though. While he finds his scar-work weirdly comforting, he isn't so interested in aesthetic results as much as he just enjoys having pain inflicted upon him in a controlled environment, by people that he loves - He doesn't recall this post-tadpole, but the scars were a result of a kind of... Recurring ritual between himself and Orin that served to replace normal intimacy, pretty much.

Since you touched on it though, I do like to believe that Astarion finds his cut-up body fun, both on the eyes and on the hands LOL.

I'm starting to think you guys are all in on this. It's like the fifth time someone catches me in the act - god damn it, is it that obvious that I wanna slide down Peter Steele's cold corpse like he's a a ride at the Magical Ice kingdom... Which is to say, yes, both the guy and his music are not-so-lowkey a big inspiration behind a lot of DU drow's characterization!

That's all for now folks, thank you so much for the asks!!! This isn't all of them but I try not to spam people's feeds when I can help it/space them out. I see all of your messages and I guarantee you that if I have an interesting answer for them, you will see a reply eventually!

[appeypie]

Did you ever post that Komalink essay that was in your head

I saw you're one post and how you said Zora royalty crush on Link and I might be converted to that ship now 🤭

sorry this took me so much time to answer anon but I WILL GLADLY SHARE IT!!!!

my long awaited KOMALINK TRUTHER ESSAY!!

To start, I adore the parallels between these two... they're both coming of age in their respective cultures! and having a rough time of it, it seems..

They're both very close with their grandmas, though sadly Komali's has passed away... they both have sisters, too!! (or, for Komali, a sister figure. Medli acts very maternal and caring towards him throughout the game, even commenting on watching him grow up saying something to the effect of, "he's grown into a fine young rito, is this how a mother feels?")

Between the coming of age stories, the alive and deceased grandmas, the little and big sisters... they both mirror each other perfectly!!

Of course Komali is going through some major anxiety issues, understandably. link is able to help him through it, which is very sweet to see :)

Before and after finishing dragon roost cavern. I just love the insight this NPC gives us! after Link inspires the confidence in him, he gets so happy!!

At first it's easy to see it as him just simply looking up to link, and I'm sure it started that way, but it starts leaning into crush territory...!

.. EVERY conversation?!?!

Komali's name comes from "hikikomori" in Japanese, which refers to severe social reclusiveness. he seems to be a very sheltered boy who wouldn't have very many friends off island... so who could he be talking about hmm ??? who's the one guy we know he likes off island...? who he wont shut up about....????

There's also this dialogue from a random Rito NPC (sadly I don't have the game caps, but here's it from a text dump):

(If it's too hard to read, it says:

"We used to have such nice breezes blowing through here... Now the air is crazy. I'm positive the strange winds are a result of the wind god's anger. See, there's an important shrine below here that got broken...and now we're paying the price. What cursed luck...

We Rito cannot live without the wind. Before we take to the skies, we always go down and visit the wind god's shrine. That's the way it's always been.")

The Rito and the wind are intertwined... very fitting that the prince would fall for someone who could control it 🥺

And Yes !! LOZ has a pattern of having the Zora princesses fall in love with link...

Since the Zora evolved into the Rito in WW, they decided to mix it up and make it the prince!

We're at the point of this post where I'm out of Ship 'Evidence' and I'm now just throwing images from my files at you. I love this one at the end of the game where Komali is the first one to greet them coming back from what was left of Hyrule (also very exciting for baby me, who was a huge Komali fan)

Link just stares at him...

I also adore how this is the only ship I know where you get TWO!! Height differences. Hard to get a pic of them standing next to each other pre-Valoo scale, but you get the idea

Of course we don't fully know how Link feels about him, but I like to think he was a bit annoyed with him at first (as Komali was with him)... Like why couldn't this guy just suck it up and do what had to be done? It's what Link had to do for his family. But he realized Komali had gone through a huge loss, and his Dad was a little absent. He has this huge sense of duty placed over him, and not much support. Then once he got his confidence back, he was able to really shine! Link could see that!

I feel like I might be missing something, but that's the gist of why I love them so much! Foils that grow to deeply appreciate each other :) cute little themes like royalty falling for Link & the Rito's ties to the wind. they make me so happy. they don't get the attention they deserve tbh

[the-ace-with-spades]

(sometimes I feel) like a monkey pilot fic background bits (heavier on hangster this time), because I wanna write it, I'm having feelings about it, but it isn't coming along

Also, it recently passed 200 bookmarks and my little trans gay heart is so happy 🥹

---- When Jake and Bradley had met for the first time (back when Bradley was pre-transition), they were the opposite of each other's types. They haven't grown into the people they are as the fic begins, personality and body-wise, either, being like 23-24 — Jake was lean but scrawny, had about half of his today's confidence and sass and Bradley was still reeling with compacted anger/sadness and fake-it-till-you-make-it attitude that carried him through college and the basketball scholarship.

---- Bradley up until that point dated only girls and although he was kinda attracted to guys, he identified as a lesbian, and gave Jake a chance on a whim — mostly he thought Jake was a big dork and wasn't making him feel less like a lot of guys did. He felt like Jake didn't categorize him by 'female' standards much and that helped enormously too. Nat might or not have taken pity on Jake and talked to Bradley to emphasize that Jake is just a big dork that grows on you...

---- Jake'd only dated the next-door neighbor type of girls, very feminine and although on the playful side, always softer and more shy girls, usually curvy and tiny in comparison to him. He always imagined himself as a more stereotypical husband, with a housewife and kids waiting at home for him (very similar to the way his own parents were — his ma helped around on the farm, but she was primarily responsible for raising children until they grew enough, and his dad although present, would follow her lead when it comes to childrearing). But there was just something about Bradley, in all the two inches taller, semi-professional basketball player body and the cheeky quips glory and the way he felt challenged whenever they spoke, the way he wanted the attention to never end. Obviously, he found out pretty soon that Bradley was a dork and a softie and just felt even more endeared.

---- The above is also something that causes some problems down the lane — Jake always thought they were each other's 'special ones', that despite being totally different from what either of them would imagine in a partner, somehow they ended just being perfect for each other. He has this whole thing in his head where they're each other's 'exception to the rule' and obviously Bradley still is his exception (because he's a guy and Jake's never been with a guy) but now he isn't Bradley's. It's hard for him to communicate this properly and since Bradley is also very in his mind about Jake wanting him despite being a guy, it causes problems.

---- Their first date (which I'll write eventually) was a stroll at the farmer's market and eating freshly made with produce they bought there breakfast in the bed of Jake's truck. It kinda won both of them on each other and they were goners since.

---- They both dated in the five years of being broken-up. Bradley dated both guys and girls, with various results (some of his dates were trans guy chasers, some were just not clicking) and Jake dated a couple of girls of his previous type (mostly matchmade by his ma...) and a couple more tomboy-ish, sporty girls (mostly on Javy's desperate attempts to get him to move on), but it had never felt the same for either of them.

---- I do also want to emphasize that Bradley's mental state when he and Jake broke up was poor, but not in a very visible way. He's really good at compartmentalizing and since the whole Mav fiasco, also hyper-independent, and given his then-current life, he really didn't see any options that would keep everyone happy — in his mind, he didn't really have a choice but to leave and try to live as a woman once again, but with a clean slate (for both him and Jake) and no expectations but those that the Navy set for him. For him, in the military, it was really easy to lose identity (and also gender as part of identity) — he was an officer, naval aviator, sailor first, woman second, and it was the last line of comfort he had.

---- Jake kinda had a feeling something was off since he proposed and got rejected, but he didn't know how to address it because it wasn't very precise and almost felt as if he was making it up from his own insecurities (because his proposal, which he thought was just a formality, got rejected and now he felt confused and unsettled about how well they really knew each other, even if he didn't doubt they loved each other). Only when Bradley told him they needed to break up and that he was leaving for the Virginia base in half an hour, packed to go, never even having mentioned planning a transfer in the past months, he realized how bad it actually had been.

---- Jake did realize back then that Bradley (still pre-transition) had a lot of insecurities regarding his perception and body, he just kinda misunderstood the assignment and thought it came from the opposite reasons than in reality — that pre-transition Bradley was the most comfortable in the tomboy-ish, cocky image but didn't feel beautiful in typical 'female' standards and such, rather that he, you know, didn't want to feel pretty by 'female' standards at all. The only thing that helped Bradley feel good about

---- Like in most of my fics, I think Mav and Bradley can cook pretty well, mostly due to the headcanoned nature of their upbringings. Mav (who is part Italian in my mind, always), had often helped his mamma cook and then when she passed away, would often be responsible for meal preps as one of the oldest kids in his group homes. He's also used cooking as a way of taking care of the people he loves - Goose would've starved to death if Mav hadn't cooked for the both of them the first year they'd known each other, Carole has a similar upbringing as Mav but doesn't like cooking much, Ice can kinda cook (he can do anything if he tries hard enough) but doesn't like it. And Bradley would often help with cooking as a kid and then had to learn fast when he went to college and didn't have the money or means to not cook. He's also learned to use it as a form of love from Mav, with time.

---- I also think that a major thing about is how being someone's support can set both Mav and Bradley into override mode against all their fears and insecurities. I think Mav overcame a lot of his doubts when he had to take care of Bradley (the idea that he's not made for family, the idea he can only ruin relationships and cause harm to his loved ones, the idea he can be loved unconditionally with reciprocation, etc.) There was a deleted scene (that maybe will come back, I feel a bit weird about it b/c it's really cliche) where Bradley is pretty early in the transition process and where for the first time, he's not afraid to be clocked as trans by a stranger, and this all happens when he's helping another trans person in an icky situation during one of the trans support group meetings.

---- Bradley doesn't come out to anyone in their family — every single time someone found he's transitioning/transitioned, it was from Ice. This is how he preferred it, it started with Slider and Ice's sister (which is also another deleted scene I might post here at some point), and then to take some of the emotional stress, Mav and Ice agreed they could do the initial explanations/coming outs for him. Thing is, Mav always doesn't know how to begin and how to explain stuff without overexplaining it, so it's usually Ice who would actually do the talking with Mav there as support in case something goes wrong (it has not gone horrible even once — with various degrees of explanations and time to process, everyone in their family came around to accept Bradley as a man)

---- the title of this fic, (sometimes I feel) like a monkey pilot, comes from the Comsat Angels' song, Monkey Pilot, and had been chosen mostly because it resonates with my trans experience (and Bradley's) and how it feels to be in the denial, 'if I don't think about it doesn't exist' stage of being trans, when you're so transfixed and not in control of your own life that it all feels like you're just going through the motion and don't know what you're doing, don't care what you're doing as long as you're still in motion (or in the air, in Bradley's case). It's the feeling of doing things out of habit and because that's what is expected of you while realizing sullen it makes you and how there's only a few things that make it better (again, mostly flying in Bradley's case). Also, it's aviation-themed and inspired by J.G. Ballard's short stories, so it seemed fitting to me.

[onlyonetifosi]

Just us against the world

-> Word Count: 1288

-> Warnings: so much cheesy fluff,a bit insecure reader/mick and sorry for the so many temporal jums

->Author note: I would appreciate if you send some ideas or requests for me to write. English is not my first language so sorry for mistakes

Big Thanks to @vickyhateslife who has been alongside me writing this <3

Mick and I have been very good friends for years, we met when we were 10 in a karting competition back in Germany.

We went up at the same time through the junior categories, only that i stayed one year more in F4 than him, and that's why he went upto F1 one year before me.

2022 was my year, I was chosen to be the new Williams driver longside Alex Albon due to suspicious retiremment of Latifi.

Anyways, today is my day, pre-season tests, I was so nervous but I think that wasn't important as my level of excitement. The tests are over, I am back home. I feel great, the energy was just amazing. Everybody here was very friendly and positive, and so were the people of Williams. They welcomed me with open arms, they told me that I am one of them now which feels great. But there's a lot of work ahead to be honest, feels like we're still learning a lot about how the car works and I'm working in guetting familiar with the car.

Now that tests are done, I'm going back to the factory in UK for a lot of sim and training ahead of 2nd round of tests in Bahrein, only 1 week before the firts race there. Can't wait to be back in the car.

Today was media day ahead of the first race of the season, the Bahrein GP and I was going to do some kind of sel presentation for the F1 youtube channel.

I was talking with Mick for the first time in a long time , don't get me wrong i talked to him in Barcelona and last week tests but not as long as we wanted.

Mick has been my crush since always but i don't think he ever felt the same way about me. He is still my best friend and than we have been for over 10 years now. I was lucky, as a child I was born in Switzerland and my dad and I were neighbours with the Schumacher's. My dad, Michael's Schumacher best friends since they were kids,and he moved with him because my dad was the first performance coach of a driver in F1. Moving back to Mick's and mine relationship, it has been very good since ever, he has been very supportive of my career so far but i know he wants to spend more time with me because he os only now that i can really stay for long periods at a time at home.

I realize that although i love sims, going back to real life is weird, as i've said before because even though last season was just a test season it was real enough for me t ofeel like a driver but this one is real now, so the stakes are higher.

In this moment I'm in the Williams hospitality looking trough the windows when I see Mick and his Kevin, talking and Mick seems a bit flustered, I wonder what are they talking about.

Mick's pov

-Mate, you act a little bit patetic, every time you both are talking you guys get all red, it's very cheesy, so please ask her out for gods sake.

-Kev, she doesn't feel the same I'm sure, we have been besties since we were born and I've had girlfriens and she had got boyfiends and we never said each othe anything.

-It's because you both are blind- A voice behind me says and I turn around to see Seb coming to us.

-Not you too Seb- i say embarrased to my confident here at the track.

-Mick, I've know you both nearly since you were born and you've always been crushing each other.

-Whatever Seb, look I'm sorry but I don't think she feels the same way, ok? She's my best mate andI think she only sees me like that.

-Whatever mate you say- Kev says and he turns around and walks away leaving me and Seb alone.

Today we only ahave FP1 and FP2 so it's quite a relax day, while I'm heading to the Williams hospitality, I find Mick going to Haas.

-We are doing the track walk together, don't we? - I ask him as we head the both hospitality, one in front of each other.

-yeah like we always did-

-oks, see you then-I say while fist bumping him.

-bye! -he says too, entering his motorhome.

-Mick, you've been crushing on that girl for years now. When are you going to say something to her?- Sebastian Vettel teased him as they sat in the middle between Haas and Williams motorhomes. Mick Schumacher just shrugged his shoulders, not wanting to admit that he was indeed interested in the beautiful German driver. -I don't know, Seb. It's just...complicated.- He sighed, running a hand through his hair. -What's so complicated about it? You both like each other, I can tell.- Kevin Magnussen chimed in. -Just man up and tell her how you feel!- -Yeah, Mick. Just tell her.- Alex Albon said, coming up to stand beside them. -She's definitely into you too, I can tell.- Mick just shook his head, not sure if he was ready to take that step just yet. Maybe one day, but not right now.

-Hey mate- I say while sitting beside him at the table.

-hey girl- he says while eating his spaghetti.

-ok so...I don't know how to say this- I start and his eyes are on me now.

- you're worrying me, just say whatever it is- Alex says scared by my behaviour.

-I think I like someone- I say after a deep breath.

-who?! -Alex asks immediately.

-It's Mick- and immediatly his jaw drops.

-I knew it! Lando and George owns me and Lily a dinner, yeah!- He says jumping.

-You betted who I liked or what- i say a little bit annoyed.

-Sorry bestie but I love to have a lovely dinner with my girl for free.-He says proudly.

-You're an idiot you know that?-I tell him annoyed while going to my room.

Today was quali day and it was at 6 pm and it was only 11 am because I had data to check and meetings, I was walking to the Haas motorhome from the padock because Mick and I are going to do our private track walk as we always did.

There was a little bit of wind so my hair came to my face, when I was going to remove my hair on my place I feel Mick's hand putting a lock of hair behind my ear, brushing his hand in the process, his action shock me because he had never made skin contact with me.

-Sorry, I just wanted to help you.-He says quickly while I give him a confused smile.

-It's okay, thanks.-I reply.

It's a little bit uncomfortable because neither of us knows what to say but we quickly break the tension by smiling, as I thought we were going to continue with our track walk, but he stopped me.

- I want to talk to you about something.-He said looking at me a little bit nervous.

-Then tell me-I say not expecting what was about to come.

-I've had a crush on you since we were in F3 and i couldn't resist more without telling you- You've been always my crush aswell for a long time.

We finish our walk smiling at each other and grabbing hands, stealing touches of each other and stealing kisses. Only we in our love bubble forgetting about our stressing job.

Just when we were to part ways, he grabs my wrist and he pulls me in a passionate kiss that neither of us want to finish, just us against the world.

I hope you like this! send me whatever you want to my asks.

I would love to know something about you!!

And would you like a mention list? like for me to mention you in my fics <3 <3

Love for you <3 <3

[sprinklenoodles]

Dropping yet another ask :) What do you think are some things that some members of the THH cast likes, enjoys, admires, or owns that completely clashes with the aesthetic they got going on? Could also be something not as tangible like music tastes too! Oh, and by the way! I hope I am not going tooooo overboard with all the asks! Feel awkward having so many that I've already done.

Oooh, this is a good one!

Byakuya totally has a dog. Technically it's his dad's dog, but he loves the thing. It was supposed to be a guard dog... but it had a different idea. It's now the most spoiled dog that wears little suits.

And before Chihiro knew how much of an asshole Byakuya was and just knew that he was also going to HP, Chihiro was very excited to meet him. Like, he admired Byakuya- he was well known and so was his confidence.

And despite how Byakuya treated him at the beginning of their school year (pre-despair) that admiration didn't exactly go away. He knew that there was something more about Byakuya.

Of course, nobody really expected the meek programmer to admire the guy who insults them. (Not exactly what you asked, but I just had to include this)

Kyoko also just likes romance novels. She can't help it. It's just a nice break from all of the thinking she has to do as a detective.

Sayaka also has a knife collection and Leon has a plushie collection. It's just that way.

That's all! Feel free to ask me more if u want! (That goes for everybody reading this :3)

[bazhowletts]

Full Name: Baz Howlett.

Nicknames: Baz.

Age: 39.

Pronouns and Gender: He/Him, Cis Male.

Birth place: Aurora Bay.

How long have they been in town?: His whole life / various leaves of absence but he always ends up back one way or another.

Sexuality: Bisexual.

Housing: Fisher's Cove.

Occupation:  Front Desk @ Titanium Gym.

tw crime, drugs, death // @aurorabayaesthetic

QUICK OVERVIEW:

tearaway teen yup yup yup

only child to perpetual disappointment pipeline

fell into a bad crowd with very little prompting in high school and got involved in some dodgy dealings

shit stirrer since birth

not a violent guy (unless pushed) but he got a little too big for his boots when money started rolling in and pissed off the wrong people in increasingly more creative ways

was with his best friend when he was ended up being killed over a drug dispute that got out of hand and escalated from an argument to a shooting

took off when he heard sirens

still wonders if he could have done something more that night to actually save him - kind of shut down for a long time over that and has done absolutely fuck all to process it really

hasn't told many people about that incident or his actions in the aftermath despite both being there when it occurred and being one of the coffin bearers at andrew's funeral

joyriding since before he could even drive properly (or legally), was the fastest fucker around when it came to stripping cars for parts which is why when he ended up going straight becoming a mechanic was about the only thing he could think to do that didn’t make him want to die of boredom 

broke his mothers heart tbh his dad always likes to remind him that that's what killed her (more aptly it was illness, but it do be getting in on him) 

very much uncomfortable with everything about himself and his life and i don’t think he’s felt genuine joy in years 

suffers from a terminal case of seeming out of place and disinterested 

after working as a mechanic ran its course for him he tried his hand at being a mailman

that lasted all of a year and a half before he was let go after suspicion of mail tampering and not delivering to people he has petty vendetta's against

absolutely justly let go but he'll never acknowledge that

currently working the front desk at titanium and finds amusement in telling gym bros they're looking tiny and questioning the nutritional value of protein aloud

if he cares then he cares but he’s just not the best at making that translate 

a ghoul!

PERSONALITY.

+ funny, confident, indepedent.

- abrasive, disinterested, petty.

FUN ADJACENT FACTS.

ocean crest apartment anti even though he doesn't even live there anymore, can’t stand the ruckus that’s always being caused and has several lifelong enemies in the form of long-term residents who he's beefed with

drives a shitty car, especially for someone so formerly into cars, but he's spent too much time under the hood of other people's cars to care much about that

pathological liar. no real reason for it, it just gives him a giggle

thinks grace and frankie is the greatest show ever made 

known harasser of local politicians

thinks taxes are optional

voted most likely to tell you to get off his lawn

CURRENT CONNECTIONS.

ex-husband of @kaylatullz

employee of @ecchs

friend of @clint-bennet

friend of @peterbasara

cousin of @tabithaxking

sometimes mechanic to / goblin co-kings with @marsmoran

friend of @calinxsava

went on a vday blind date with @the-nelson-quinn

SPECIFIC WANTED CONNECTIONS.

ocean crest residents -- any of the folks he's got absurd beefs with. can range from nonsense to legit, let's goooo!

ex-gf from high school -- someone who knew him before andrew's death and saw that massive shift in him after it that's carried through to this day. pre-plotting required.

people who's cars he's worked on/will take a look at cheap -- from back in the day when he was a mechanic. hasn't much of an interest these days but will do nixers if it's into the hand

ride or dies / friends -- u know u know.

past exes/flings/fwb -- lets get messy.

neighbours @ fisher's cove -- can be positive or negative vibes

just all of it 

GENERIC WANTED CONNECTIONS.

connections wise he’s pretty much an open book right now, but some baseline ideas that can be springboarded off are:

friendly.

a best friend / ride or dies / close friends / childhood friends / pseudo-siblings / friends / drunk friends / new friends / former roommate / people he met on his travels (hasn't been outside of america but anywhere within can be plotted).

romantic

flirtationship / friends with benefits / one time hook ups / tinder matches / unrequited crush (can be either way) / exes from high school / exes on good terms.

antagonistic.

enemies / former (best) friends / exes on bad terms / frenemies / rivals / negative influence / tbh he's an acquired taste so most antagonistic connects would work for him.

[loliwrites]

How would Alex and Addi teach language to their toddlers?This family is a mix of cultures and I'm pretty sure this situation confuse those little guys.🤭

Hah, Non 🥲 This is actually so sweet. Their little baby brains are hardly grasping the concept of one language, let alone two.

Perhaps in the beginning, Alex's big plan was that he was going to speak to the kiddos exclusively in Swedish. It's really important to him that his kids not only know their Swedish culture, but are ingrained in it. He's still very... Swedish... you know? Despite the oodles of time and the residency in America, he still considers Sweden to be his only true home. His family and closest friends all live there. He oozes confidence by nature but it really shines in Sweden. And when he's around family and friends, their natural default is Swedish though they're all expertly proficient in English.

And it's important to Addi, too. For awhile she felt guilty; as if she was stealing this Swedish prince away from his homeland and keeping him hostage in America -- a place that while it was her home, it would truly never be his. So she's steadfastly on board of Alex's plan that the kiddos learn both languages simultaneously. English from mom and Swedish from dad. And maybe in the beginning they thought they were doing an expert job of balancing the two. Sure the older kiddo defaulted to English, and the younger kiddo defaulted to Swedish, but Alex and Addi didn't think too much of that. They just preferred separate languages.

But then the younger kiddo started getting sent home with notes from his teacher. Fails to communicate properly with other students. Does not seem to be as linguistically developed as his classmates. Refuses to speak English in class.

And the older kiddo seems to be growing more and more distant from Alex's family. He'll hardly talk to them (whether they're in Sweden or America). When they FaceTime to chat, he waves hello but then disappears. It's not lost on Addi that he seems to be a little excommunicated from the Skarsclan -- and not in a malicious way. But he's quiet and doesn't offer them anything. Especially when they're speaking Swedish. And there's a lot of them, and a lot of (joyous) noise, and his lack of interaction sort of makes him float into the background.

At that point, both Alex and Addi know something has to change. Alex stops only speaking in Swedish to the boys and Addi increases her usage of the language a little bit. Instead of the tactic being one parent per language, they both start to incorporate Swedish in with English. They'd agreed pre-kiddos that primary residence would be in America at least while the kiddos were in school. It just made more sense for their careers. Once they graduated high school, and with their dual-citizenship (and likely fluency in Swedish) they could decide where they wanted to live, attend university, anything.

So with that agreement, they decide English will be the primary language for the boys, but hoped with time and the new nature of their learning, they'd be able to switch back and forth between languages as easily as their father could. But in the beginning of this change, they're a little nervous. The little one puts up a fight to speaking English and the older one seems to have already missed the boat on forming these truly deep relationships with Alex's family.

Perhaps maybe except with Gustaf. The ever-perceptive, gentle one. When the family gets together and starts getting rambunctious, he's noticed how the older kiddo silently removes himself from it all. And Addi's noticed how Gustaf then removes himself from the group.

The older kiddo, on the floor in the other room, with blankets and pillows all around him like a little nest, staring up at the TV, watching a Disney movie. Gustaf walks in, plops down on the floor beside the kiddo. He's careful not to make too much noise. Noise is what made the kiddo leave the other room in the first place. The kiddo looks up at him, acknowledges his uncle's presence, and returns his attention to the movie without a formal greeting. And Gustaf curls around the kiddo. Lays down on his side behind him, with his head propped up in his hand.

"Is this Robin Hood?" Gustaf asks quietly. He knows it is.

The kiddo nods and looks over at Gustaf. He half-smiles and shrugs his shoulders before glancing back up at the TV. But Uncle Goose sets people at ease regardless of age and temperament. And the kiddo scoots backwards until his bumps up against Gustaf, then then lays his head back on him. A more reclined and relaxed posture now that he doesn't have to be responsible for keeping his back comfortable. Uncle Goose is there for that.

"What is he?" Gustaf asks, pointing up at Robin Hood. "I can't think of the English word. En räv."

"A fox," the kiddo responds softly.

"Yes, that's it," Gustaf says quietly, albeit excited. "A fox. And what is he?" He motions at Little John on the screen, "uhm... en björn..."

"A bear!" The kiddo says a little louder.

"Gosh, that's right! How could I forget a bear?"

The kiddo giggles and rests a little more of his weight against Gustaf. And it doesn't take more prompting than that. From then on, anytime a new character comes on screen, the kiddo's offering the information.

Sir Hiss. "En orm. A snake!"

Prince John. "Ett lejon. A lion!"

Lady Kluck. "En höna. A hen! Kuckeliku!"

Gustaf's the perfect audience for this. Equal parts excited and unassuming though he knew what he was doing and this would be the outcome. But then Friar Tuck comes on the screen and the kiddo takes a deep breath, but stops himself. He looks over at his uncle.

"What is he?" Gustaf prompts, giving the kiddo one more shot.

"A badger! I don't know what he is in Swedish,"

Gustaf nods, pretends to ponder as if the word is escaping him too. Then, like a lightbulb switched on in his brain, "en grävling."

"En grävling,"

Gustaf nods, "and what's two badgers?"

"Grävlingar,"

"Yeah, that's right! Good job!"

An hour or so later, Gustaf comes out of the other room with the kiddo in his arms, propped against his chest and shoulder, fast asleep. Alex walks up to relieve his brother and Addi's close behind. She'd snuck in when he and the kiddo were going through the cast of the movie, and swore she'd never seen her boy seem so engaged with the language or Alex's family. She kissed Gustaf's cheek and gave him the sincerest of thank yous.

[storiesforallfandoms]

talent that runs in the family ~ machine gun kelly

word count: 2128

request?: yes!

“Being rooks sister and substitute him while he recovers and slowly start to fall in love with colson”

description: she steps in to replace her brother when he is seriously injured and ends up gaining feelings for his friend

pairing: machine gun kelly x female!reader

warnings: swearing

masterlist (one, two)

“Thanks so much for doing this (Y/N),” Rook said over the phone. “I appreciate it.”

“Yeah, no problem,” I said. “But does Colson know that I’m...y’know...not a seasoned vet?”

“You’ll do fine.”

I refrained from reminding him that he didn’t actually answer my question.

After Rook’s accident left him out of commission for some time, he came to me to ask if I’d fill in for him. I jumped at the opportunity. Rook had taught me how to drum when I was young and, much like my big brother, it became a passion of mine. How could I turn down working with one of the biggest artists of the year, even if it were just for a short while?

Well, my nerves were definitely telling me I should’ve said no as I walked into soundcheck that day.

“Whatever,” I said. “I’ll call you after the soundcheck.”

“Hey, don’t be nervous. You’re gonna do great.”

I said my goodbyes and hung up. I tried not to focus on how big the venue we were playing in was as I made my way to the otherwise empty stage. I thought I was the first person to arrive until I heard someone calling my name.

“(Y/N), up here!”

I looked up to see the guys sat in a booth in the balcony. Colson was all but leaning over the railing, waving for me to join them. I had no idea how to get up there on my own, but luckily a security guard showed me the way.

The guys were eating pizza and drinking from plastic cups as if they were the ones attending the concert and not performing in it.

“Pre-show ritual,” Colson told me. “Especially when we have someone new joining the band. Sit! Have a slice!”

“Shouldn’t we be practicing?” I asked, but still sat with them. I didn’t want to completely mess up my first day.

“We have hours to practice,” one of the other guys I remembered as Slim said. “And we don’t really need to. We do this every night. A soundcheck is basically just to make sure everything is working tech wise.”

I just nodded, not wanting to point out that I hadn’t been doing this every night. I hoped that I’d have some time to figure out the songs before the shows.

Colson nudged me, bringing my attention to him. “Don’t stress. You’ll do great.”

I smiled at him, wishing I’d believe him.

After our small feast of pizza and beer in plastic glasses, we finally got to our soundcheck. I was so nervous that I kept messing up during the first song. My hands were shaking and I kept hitting the wrong drum by accident. My face was burning with embarrassment as I buried it in my hands and groaned.

Colson walked up to me, a sympathetic smile on his face.

“I’m sorry,” I sighed. “I can get this, I know I can.”

“I know you can, too,” he said. “Just take a breath, relax. We’ll try again when you’re ready. And remember, it’s just drumming. Rook says you’re great at it.”

I smiled at him and nodded. I closed my eyes and took a deep breath. I pictured myself back in my bedroom from my childhood, playing my drums super loud until my parents had to call out for me to keep it down.

When we started practicing again, it went off without a hitch. We did most of the setlist all the way through and did quick takes on the last few songs before our time was up.

I was proud of myself as the soundcheck came to an end. I was still nervous about performing during the actual show, but I felt confident enough in myself not to make too many noticeable mistakes when we actually had an audience that night.

I was walking to my car when I heard someone calling for me. I turned to see Colson running to catch up with me. Or rather he was taking long strides to catch up with me considering he was so tall.

“I told you you would do great!” he said, putting an arm around my shoulder and giving it a light squeeze. “It’s like drumming runs in your blood or something.”

I chuckled. “That’s what mom and dad always said too, but neither one of them can keep a beat to save their lives and no one else in our immediate family plays either.”

“You and Rook are the start of a long line of drummers then I guess.”

I shrugged in response. We both stood awkwardly for a moment. I wasn’t sure what else to say. His arm was still around my shoulder and I didn’t want to pull away and make it seem like I didn’t enjoy the contact because I definitely was not complaining about it.

I guess Colson also realized that he was still touching me, though, because he pulled his arm away and awkwardly rubbed the back of his neck.

“Do you need a run to the hotel or anything?” he asked. “We have the tour bus.”

I shook my head. “I’m good, thanks. I have my car, and besides I haven’t even checked into the hotel yet so I should probably go do that.”

“Oh, yeah you definitely should. Get some rest before the show, too. It’s a lot more physically demanding when it’s an actual show, even if you’re just sitting at a drum set the entire time. I’ll see you tonight then I guess.” He turned to walk away, but paused and turned back to add, “What were you planning on wearing tonight?”

I looked at him, confused. “Uh...this I guess.”

I was wearing a hoodie and a pair baggy jeans and my most comfortable pair of sneakers.

Colson raised an eyebrow at my outfit before looking back up at me. “I mean, it’s definitely comfy, but I would recommend something a little less...well, just less. It’s going to be hot as fuck on that stage, especially with all the lights on you and shit.”

I nodded, taking note of this as I got into my car and internally panicked a little because I didn’t know if I even had anything to wear.

~~~~~~

A few hours later, after checking into my hotel room and promptly wrecking it by throwing my clothes everywhere, I was heading back down to the lobby to meet up with the guys. We were going to the show together, which would’ve been my first tour bus ride. I couldn’t lie, I was super stoked for it.

I was the last one to the lobby. All the guys were stood around, loudly talking to one another. You’d think they were just a normal group of guys and not a group about to play a sold out show in a massive arena.

Colson spotted me first. I smiled at waved at him. His eyes widened and his jaw basically dropped, which prompted all the guys to turn. Their reactions immediately matched his as they looked me up and down.

“Rook would kill you guys if he could see you right now,” I teased.

“Damn (Y/N),” Colson dared to say first. “You look...you look hot as fuck.”

I had decided on a loose muscle shirt with a bralette underneath since the shirt showed a little more than what I was used to, a pair of ripped skinny jeans, and kept on the comfortable sneakers I had been wearing earlier that day.

I giggled. “Thanks, but again, Rook would kill you for saying that. Also, it’s not anything super attractive.”

“You got a nice body,” Baze pointed out. “Anything showing it off even a little is hot.”

I could feel my face burning as I waved their comments away. “Okay, enough with this. We have a show to get to.”

We boarded the tour bus and started towards the arena. The guys were distracted amongst one another again, completely forgetting about me and my “hot outfit”. Besides Colson, who had come to sit next to me on the couch while the rest of the guys were already drinking whatever was in the mini fridge.

“Do you guys always get drunk before your shows?” I asked.

“Not always. Usually we get high,” Colson responded.

“Now that I can get behind. I’ll probably be less afraid if I’m high.”

Colson held out the joint in his hand to me. I took it and took a quick puff, the smoke immediately burning my throat and lungs as I tried to inhale it. Colson laughed as I started to cough.

“I still say you have nothing to worry about,” he told me. “You’re gonna do great tonight. You can’t even really see or hear the audience with all the lights and the inner ear pieces.”

“That’s even worse cause then I’ll just imagine how big the audience is.”

He put a hand on my leg, something I assume was just instinct for him to do to comfort someone, but the minute he made the contact I felt a jolt of electricity run through me. Colson quickly pulled his hand away and I wondered if he had felt that too.

“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have done that without asking,” he said.

“You can if you want,” I assured him. “I wasn’t mad about it or anything.”

Colson looked at me and I realized how blue his eyes were. Rook had always made jokes about how Colson could seduce any woman with just his eyes because they were such baby blues, but I didn’t really believe him until the moment I was looking in them myself. Now I was lost, completely forgetting everyone around me as I felt myself moving closer towards him.

The bus jerked to a stop, causing Colson and I to nearly be thrown from our seats. The guys started off the bus first, running towards the entrance to the arena as I could hear the waiting fans screaming outside.

Colson stood and offered a hand to me. “It’s showtime.”

~~~~~~

After the first song went perfectly, I stopped feeling nervous. Colson was right, I couldn’t see the audience in front of me, but I could faintly hear their screams of excitement over my inner ear piece. It was weird to have it in and not only hear all of us playing, but also the crew talking backstage. It was almost distracting, but it became easy to tune them out.

During one of Colson’s talking points in the show, I reached for my water bottle to take a sip. Colson was hyping the audience up, which made me smile a little.

“Before we continue the show,” he said into his mic, “you guys may have noticed that we do not have our regular drummer tonight.”

I immediately knew what he was about to do and I wanted to hurtle my drumstick at him before he went there.

“As you’ve probably heard, Rook was in a bit of an accident and is off recovering for the time being,” he continued. “So, we decided to get some family to fill in for him for the time being. Everyone, I want to hear y’all make some noise for Rook’s little sister, (Y/N)!”

The crowd cheered loudly. Colson turned to me and waved for me to stand. I glared at him, which I hoped he could see, before standing and awkwardly smiling and waving at the audience.

“All the cool drum shit you guys have been hearing all night has been (Y/N),” Colson said as he started to approach me. “She’s a bad ass fucking drummer, and she’s a pretty fucking cool chick, too.”

I was confused where he was going with this as he came to stand next to me, slinging an arm around my shoulder the way he had earlier that day after soundcheck.

“Which is why, (Y/N), I gotta ask: will you go on a date with me sometime?”

Slight embarrassment was swelling somewhere inside of me at being asked out in such a public way, but that embarrassment was overshadowed by the fuzzy feeling of excitement inside of me. I looked up at Colson, my eyes wide and a smile on my lips.

 He lowered the mic so he could privately add, “I’m being serious. I wanna take you out on a real date. Just the two of us.”

My words were stuck in my throat, but I was able to nod in response. The smile on Colson’s face stretched so wide that I could’ve been convinced he was the one lighting the show.

“Okay,” he said, then lifted the mic to say to his audience, “Let’s get back to the show guys!”

[1kook]

some way, some how

jeon jungkook x (f) reader

Summary: Maybe you don’t know Jungkook as well as you thought you did. Maybe he doesn’t know you. Warnings: emotional constipation, toxic ex, internalized misogyny, jk has bad experiences w/his ex’s dad, one scene where jk throws up, brief episode of panic, mentions of terminal cancer (minor); smut; fingering, praise kink, face fucking, spitting kink, cunnilingus, unprotected sex on top of a car im sorry Misc: autoshop owner!jk, businesswoman!oc, slice of life, childhood crushes, friends to lovers, ex gfs, pining, country bumpkin pjm w/crush on oblivious oc, ex-bf kth but it’s not real lol Wc: 19.4k (wow!!!)

the spirit of auto shop jk possessed me n next thing i knew i was 11k into a drabble. if ur curious: the 1975 corvette, car at the end, the tweed suitskirt (not actually chanel ☹️sowwyyy) also: this is the longest fic I've written!!!!! clap for me!!!!! i proofread the first few paragraphs n was like thats enough professionalism for the day

inspired by ain’t no mountain high enough one of my fave songs ever🥺 the title is a lyric from the song bc i love it so much enjoy !!

The garage is mostly dark when you enter, the faint hum of a radio quietly filtering through the stagnant room, its source coming from the back wall, where the only light is. It’s a rolling lamp, shining down an ugly yellow glow onto the figure of one man.

Jungkook’s sitting in that same rolling stool he always is, the metal one that’s rusted beyond repair, the cushion so uncomfortably flat. He’s caught up in whatever paint job he’s been tasked with this time around, a classic muscle car from what looks like the 80’s. He’s humming along to the radio, so caught up in stenciling out his design that he doesn’t notice you creep behind him until you’re very purposefully rattling the tool cart beside him, a teasing “boo!” making him jump.

“Fuck, you scared me,” he gasps, rubs over his chest as if to check if his heart is in fact still there. You grin, brandish your bag of takeout out for him before he can lecture you on the dangers of startling people who work around very complex machinery. Instead, all he says is, “you’re an angel.”

Once you’ve got the food carefully scattered across his work bench, your cherry cola tucked next to a canister of gasoline like that’s the safest practice, Jungkook wastes no time diving into all the details of his project, the 1975 Chevy Corvette behind him. The longer you look at it, the more you feel you’ve seen it somewhere. Probably a car show, you presume.

“Purrs like a kitten,” he sighs dreamily, completely ignoring the way half his toppings slide out from the opposite end of his cheeseburger. You don’t, and you swipe a fallen pickle from his tray before he can catch you.

“A kitten?” You ask, glance over at the car. It’s desperately in need of a paint job, and you only realize this now as you stare at it more in depthly. The niggling feeling that you know this car is still there, but you ignore it in favor of indulging your best friend. “Don’t people usually compare cars to bigger, better cats?”

There’s a taped stencil running alongside the car, a thick stripe followed by a thinner one, and you suppose Jungkook’s trying to spice her up, give her back the same youthfulness she probably had in her prime. What better way to do so than by adding some classic stripes alongside it.

Jungkook hums, gulps down his soda noisily. “Not this one. Never heard an engine as soft as hers.”

You roll your eyes. For a minute, the two of you quietly chew through your burgers, the radio filling in the gaps while you analyze the car. You know this car, but you can’t remember where. Jungkook coughs into his palm, probably from trying to inhale his fries too fast like he does every time you go to the diner you’re eating from today.

The diner.

A mouthful of braces. A pretty waitress. A strict dad.

“Holy shit, this is Sojin’s dad’s car,” you inhale, the memories from high school suddenly hitting you full force. Jungkook chokes, out of surprise this time, and furiously goes to deny your claims. “This is totally his car. The one he tried to run you over with when he caught you trying to put her on the back of your bike.”

“He didn’t try to run me over,” Jungkook whines, and the tips of his ears are red from your revelation.

You glare. “Why are you fixing that asshole’s car for him?” You interrogate, the last quarter of your burger forgotten in favor of squeezing the truth out of him. You’d had enough of that treacherous woman and her equally deranged father causing Jungkook trouble, and to catch him still helping her now, almost ten years later, was enough to make a brain vessel pop.

He shrugs, avoids your eyes as he picks through his fries. The radio is still on, some tune you recognize from those old days at the diner when Jungkook had become so unbelievably smitten with the part timer that served you milkshakes every Wednesday afternoon.

He had been in love with her the moment he saw her, and the look in his eyes was only magnified by those dorky glasses he wore pre-lasik. You'd been his friend long enough, recognized the jump of his scrawny thigh beneath the table. Like a bunny, thumping in excitement at the sight of her.

Sojin was... full of surprises.

She was nothing less than a supermodel, long legs carrying her around the diner as if it was her runway. She was nice too, so you hadn’t originally had an excuse to dislike her. She was nice, and so endeared with your best friend that it was inevitable when they began dating. Her presence consumed the end of your high school careers, overtook the time that should have been yours and Jungkook’s last year before being thrown into adulthood. He decided on studying at a technical school nearby—per your encouragement to save money—while you travelled five hours out for your degree in business. That last year, when you had finally come to terms with your feelings, had been so painfully ripped away by Sojin and her never-ending list of teenage drama, and by Sojin’s dad and his overbearing need to police her and Jungkook every chance he got.

Jungkook still hung out—“Sojin was busy, do you wanna do something?”—but more often than not those hang outs consisted of Jungkook telling you about her and her dad, about how hard he tried to get into his good graces.

The bike incident had only been one of many. Times where Jungkook would put his heart—and life—on the line for that girl only for it to be in vain every time she broke up with him over the simplest things. You’d heard stories from Jungkook, all told with a tight smile, of a handshake that would bruise, a man chasing him with a bat, of a car following him to school. All things he put up with for a girl who didn’t care for him. One day, after Jungkook had grudgingly sat through an hour long dinner with her family, the stare of her father piercing through him, she broke up with him because she didn’t like how long his hair had gotten.

(If anyone were to ask you, he was handsome with long hair. Dreamy even.)

He cut it that same day.

As her childishness grew, you quickly came to dislike her. She strung Jungkook around, you thought, and just when you thought she was finally done toying with him and making his life difficult in the sneakiest ways, the damn kid started hitting the gym. His growing frame, toned arms and now straightened teeth had turned him into a heartthrob, and Sojin was just as aware of this as you were. “Don’t we look perfect together?” She’d ask, twirl around him like they were on the cover of a magazine and not standing on his chipped front porch.  

Needless to say, by the time graduation had rolled around you despised the woman. You absolutely disliked how she treated Jungkook, how she let her father treat Jungkook without ever stepping up and defending him. Granted, you didn’t know exactly what went on in her household behind closed doors, you’d seen enough of her uncaring attitude to want to ram her and her dad’s head against the hood of the car.

Which is why seeing the old car, in Jungkook’s shop nonetheless, was rekindling a boiling hatred in your chest. “That man should rot in hell for all he put you through,” you huff, glare at the car like it holds some magical connection to him and he can feel the intensity of your stare.

“___,” Jungkook scolds, swirls his cup around to distract himself. “He was just trying to protect his only daughter,” he defends, quietly, like it’s what he tells himself to justify all those years of mistreatment. Even when he and Sojin had continued through college, it had never stopped. You, being five hours away, couldn’t do a damn thing. “Besides, the guy’s old as hell now.”

You snort, finally breaking your staring match with the car. Glancing at Jungkook, he’s got that same forlorn expression on his face, the one he started wearing when he first came to terms with the fact that her dad would never like him. There was a time it was stuck permanently on his face, the pressure and the discomfort that came from the father of the girl you’ve dated for five years looking at you like you were nothing more than a speck of dirt on the bottom of his shoe.

When you came back from school, educated and confident, you almost didn’t recognize your best friend. Tall and broad, tattoos splattered over his arm. Hair long like you loved it, but eyes still as round and wondrous as they’d been when you were kids. He had his own place now, he told you, and you vaguely remembered all the times he mentioned him and Sojin moving in together, mentally preparing yourself to see that wench for the first time in a while.

Much to your surprise, there was no Sojin in sight. No lingering artifacts of her presence. Nothing that showed she existed in this space besides an ugly orange mug she’d given him for his birthday one year, tucked into the very back of his cabinets. They’d broken up, he explained. Almost immediately after graduation.

After stringing him along for the better part of five years, she had decided this wasn’t what she wanted. No, what she wanted was a man ten years her senior with an abundance of cash to flow. Jungkook hadn’t cried. Hadn’t even looked the tiniest bit upset when you ordered pizza and drank some beer, watched your favorite episodes of The Simpsons like you were seventeen and avoiding your homework again.

You stayed the night, a little too tipsy to drive home. Besides, Jungkook had a spare bedroom. It was a room beside his, just a full bed with a chest of drawers. You liked it, liked the scent of him surrounding you after only seeing each other for a couple weeks in between months of distance. You liked it, because when he shifted in bed you realized the beds were pressed against the same wall, and you liked it until the shared wall spared you no secrets, and you listened to him quietly sob into his pillow.

“Old or not, he’s still the devil,” you murmur, snapping back to the present where Jungkook is wheeling himself closer to the car again. “Where did you find that thing anyway?”

He stays silent, quietly pretending like he still has something to do on the car besides paint it. Then, “I bumped into Sojin at the store.”

You sigh, drop your head between your shoulders. You can only imagine what whirlwind of a sob story she had to throw on him to win this favor.

“Kook,” you start, gauging his reaction only from his backside. His muscles ripple beneath his dark t-shirt, his usual red jumpsuit knitted around his waist. “What happened?”

Again, silence.

You say nothing, let him sort through the hurt on his own while you creep up behind him, sliding your hands over his shoulders and pressing down on the cricks behind his neck. He melts into your touch, head lolling forwards as a quiet sigh escapes him.

“She told me she was low on cash, and she needed the car to get to work,” he confesses, and from his ducked position, his voice trembles. You roll your eyes.

“And the paint job?”

A particularly rough press of your fingers has a whimper escaping him. God, this boy needed to see a chiropractor and a masseuse soon. All that hunching over and under these cars was doing a number on his back.

“I… I figured I might as well fix up the exterior too.” Of course he would, you think, Jungkook’s heart was stupidly big and easy to manipulate. He would get so swept up in it sometimes, trying to do the best he can for everyone’s benefit that he’d ignore himself.

You sit in his confession, fingers digging into his skin for a few minutes as you consider what to say.

The mature adult in you, the logical half of you, wants to hit him upside the head, scold him for letting that wench into his life again so easily. You were going on twenty-six now, all three of you, and you didn’t have time to be fixing him every time that childish woman decided to toy with him. Granted, it’s been four years since you last saw her, since you heard him muffle his cries on the other side of the wall, and you liked to think Jungkook was a respectful adult of society now. He didn’t have time to get dragged around by self-absorbed women with insane fathers.

The other part, the best friend since childhood, wants to run away. Wants to pack Jungkook into a suitcase and take him far away from here and from her. Unlike you, who now lived in the city, Jungkook had stayed in your small hometown, a quiet place just outside the bustling city. It was difficult to ensure his happiness when you were always forty-five minutes out of reach. It would be so much easier to just take him and fly to another province, maybe on the beach, Jungkook loved the beach.

“Listen,” he says, successfully pulling you out from your spiral. “I know what you’re gonna say and I just wanna tell you it’s not like that.”

You blink, hands stilling on his shoulders. Your lack of movement allows him to spin around on his chair, gaze up at you with the same shiny gaze he’s given you ever since you were kids. “I’m just doing her this tiny favor. She looked...” he trails off, face scrunching to find the words.

“Like shit?” You propose, and he smiles. “Like flaming dumpster shit behind a club?”

Jungkook laughs, loud and beautiful. You want to kiss the mole beneath his lip.

“She looked bad, okay?” He settles, reaches forward to take your palm in his. You’re standing between his thighs, and you wonder how he would have acted if you were Sojin. “Don’t think things worked out with that CEO she was dating. I’m just giving her a push.”

You sigh, try to push those crestfallen sobs to the back of your head. “Okay,” you agree, briefly glancing back at the damn car. “You fix her car, and that’s it,” you state. Jungkook nods, makes a little X over his heart. He knows how much you hate that woman. “No funny business.”

“No funny business,” he agrees, then reaches down for a white spray can. “You wanna spray some dicks on it before I paint it?”

“Please,” you laugh, taking the face mask he offers you with a grin.

—

One day your car starts making a weird noise as you pull out of the underground parking garage of your building. It’s somewhere between a pig squealing and metal scraping. You’ve been around Jungkook long enough to know this is probably something to do with your breaks, something about them being loose or old, one of the two. You have a short day at work today. There’s repairs being done to the office you work at, so everyone’s been spending more time working from home.

You leave work a little after two pm, head pounding from the hour long meeting you sat through, the mediocre business proposals your boss had asked you to look through and file. There’s a hefty load of emails waiting in your inbox, mostly the interns requesting you write them a recommendation letter. You’ll have to look through those later, pick out the good ones and write them each a unique piece kissing the ground they walk on.

The scent of freshly fried donuts hits your nose as you pull into your old town; the bakery down the road from Jungkook’s has their windows open. You can already taste the sweetness on the tip of your tongue, the iced coffee cooling your insides as you sit and watch Jungkook work on your car.

Jungkook’s shop is on the corner of the street, takes up a huge chunk with it’s massive garage and driveway; the office area is tiny compared to the sheer size of the actual work floor. There’s music blaring through the overhead speakers, and when you pull in you recognize it as Jimin’s playlist.

“Morning, Miss,” the country bumpkin says, leaning against your car door as you rifle through your purse. “What’re you in for?”

“Hi, Jimin,” you reply sweetly, take his hand as he helps you out the door. You very vaguely explain the noise your car had made that morning, glancing around the shop as Jimin gets to work inspecting it. “Where’s Jungkook?”

Jimin’s waving over some other employees, all greeting you in their matching red jumpsuits. “Kook’s in the office,” he tells you, and it’s almost sensual the way his hand glides over your palm for your keys. God, you needed to get laid. “Has some lady friend in there with him.”

You pause, the bustling of the crew behind you fading into the background. Something inside you snaps, and you whirl around the garage, before catching sight of a 1975 Chevy Corvette, almost unrecognizable from how you’d last seen it. It’s bright red now, a color you only briefly saw before you’d left the other night, with two, lightning bolt racing stripes decorating each side. It looks new, almost in mint condition, and the fact it’s still here has you storming through the garage.

Your heels clack loudly, the crew moving to the side as you torpedo straight into the offices. You barely remember to greet the receptionist before you’re stomping straight into the main office.

There’s no knock, no warning given, before you’re flinging the door open, seeing exactly what you’d expected. 

“___,” Jungkook stutters, jumping onto his feet from his position on the couch. He looks frantic, wide eyes flickering between you and the woman sitting in front of him, her back turned to you. But you’d recognize that silhouette anywhere.

“Did you say ___?” She says, and she’s still as tall and as beautiful as you remember her. Had it not been for the heels you wore, you don’t doubt she’d tower over you. She flashes you a killer smile, lips carefully painted red. It almost looks murderous. “My! ___, you haven’t changed a bit,” Sojin exclaims, rushing around the couch to pull you into a tight hug. You don’t return it.

You let her cling to you for a second, before pushing her away as gently as you can by the shoulders. As much as you’d like to rip her in half, tear her apart for all she did to Jungkook, you won’t. You’re older now, elegant in all the ways you weren’t before. It would be a huge disservice to your maturity if you shoved your heel up her ass right now.

“It’s lovely seeing you, Sojin,” you smile, taking her hand in yours.

Besides, being a woman in business meant you knew better, more creative ways to strike.

“And your boyfriend?” You ask, tilting your head in staged confusion. You even glance around the office, like you’ll find the geezer hiding behind the potted plant or Jungkook’s frozen figure. “The rich one with the huge company? Did he come with you today?”

Her smile tightens, red lips pursed as she gauges you with those cat eyes that haunt your nightmares every now and then. “My ex-boyfriend,” she corrects after a minute, pastes a forlorn expression onto her features. “We’ve separated, and you know how it is for women like us,” she jests. “We need a man to push us along—“

“Do we?” You ask, think back on all those years of school, of studying and working and pushing yourself, all the time you spent investing in yourself for yourself. “I don’t think so,” you contemplate. “It’s really embarrassing if you can’t care for yourself without the help of a man. Almost like you don’t trust in your own abilities, and ride other’s coattails instead.”

A beat of silence. Two completely different worlds, and Jungkook hovering awkwardly beside you.

Two palms grasp your shoulders from behind, and when you turn Jungkook is smiling at you, forced and stressed like he can’t stand to be in this uncomfortable situation any longer. “Well,” he announces, pushing you behind him as he guides Sojin towards the door. “There was an issue with her car, so I’ll just check on it real quick, okay?”

You nod, feel empty as he takes her by the wrist, and not you. He hands her her purse, palm on the small of her back as they exit the office. When the door clicks shut behind them, you throw your own handbag at the ground, barely stop yourself from stomping like a child.

Instead, you breathe in, hold it, and exhale, just like your Tuesday yoga instructor taught you. By the time you’ve collected yourself a few minutes have passed, so you kneel down to gather your fallen lipstick tubes and cellphone from the floor, scooping them back into your purse.

Tugging the door shut behind you, you mindlessly wander down the hall, until you reach the small receptionist area and nearly get jumped by Kim Taehyung. “Holy shit, you won’t believe this,” he gasps, takes you by the shoulders and nearly shakes you until your brain falls out through your ears. You would have slapped him, had this been any other man, but he’s quite possibly the only man besides Jungkook you’d let jostle you like this. “You’ll never guess who just left the office with J—wait,” he pales, suddenly connecting two and two, your exit from said offices definitely a key factor in whatever conclusion he’s drawn. “You were in the office with Hwang Sojin and you didn’t kill her?!”

You huff, let him shake you again until you’re nearly tripping in your heels. “Yes, I know,” you groan, finally slap his hands away when you begin to feel this morning’s breakfast bubbling from all the motion. “I’m surprised too.”

“Wow,” Taehyung marvels, leans back against the receptionist desk even though the poor girl has told him time and time again not to. He ignores her, something he can do as second best friend to the boss. “Remember when she showed up crying outside his mom’s house and you threw a potted plant at her? Oh how the great have fallen.”

Rolling your eyes, you drift over to the plexiglass window in the office that looks out across the entirety of the garage floor. In the corner, Jungkook’s got the hood of the Corvette open as he works away on something, Sojin tapping at her phone beside him. “Why are you here, Tae?”

He steps beside you, tuned into the same scene. “Can’t visit my ex-girlfriend every now and then?” He teases, you groan.

“We dated for three days, dude, let it go,” you whine, and watch with rapt attention as Jungkook motions for her to start the engine. She does, and it purrs to life, soft and silky just like Jungkook said it does. She squeals and claps, launches herself into his arms in thanks. You look away.

“Yuck,” Taehyung gags and you couldn’t agree more. “Can’t believe you ended the best 72 hours of my life for that pinhead and the hussy attached to his hip.”

He shrieks when you pinch his side, and you take great satisfaction in the judgemental stare half the crew sends him through the glass. After all, they weren’t soundproof. “You embarrassed me and my brand,” he huffs, crossing his arms as the two of you return to watching Jungkook and the hussy.

“He’s not a pinhead,” you softly retort, watch him wipe a bead of sweat off his forehead as he waves her off. Sojin sends him a brigade of air kisses, none of which he catches. A sick sense of glee consumes you at the sight, but then he’s turning to stare directly at you and Taehyung through the glass, and the both of you quickly whirl away.

“His ability to find you in less than a second is so weird,” Taehyung shivers, and you ignore it, taking the candy from the bowl on the receptionist desk. She doesn’t care, having heard these conversations more than enough times to get the general gist of what you and Taehyung gossip about. You’re surprised she’s never mentioned it to Jungkook before.

Regardless, you listen to Taehyung complain about his life for a few more minutes, before Jimin’s sweet voice pops into the room. His ash blonde hair is all ruffled, and there’s something dark smeared over his otherwise perfect skin as he tells you your car is fixed. Taehyung bids you goodbye, and Jimin walks you back to your car out on the garage floor.

“All set, miss,” Jimin grins, puts a hand against the car so you don’t hit your head as you go in. You thank him, and don’t miss the way he lingers by your window.

“Is something wrong?” You ask, tilt your head quizzically. Jimin’s cheeks flush, and he looks shyly at the ground.

“Actually, I was wondering if—“

“___,” Jungkook calls, jogging over beside Jimin, who looks almost ashamed to be caught doing...whatever it was he was gonna do. Jungkook glances at him, catches him in some weird staring contest before crouching down to your window. “You needed your car fixed? Why didn’t you tell me?”

You blink, don’t know how to politely tell him he was too busy kissing the ass of his toxic ex-girlfriend to help you out. “Jimin helped me,” you smile, the same practiced expression you’ve mastered since college. You usually get by, usually trick people with that look, but not with him. Jungkook knows you too well, knows that look, and knows you’re holding yourself back. “You were busy.”

His lips part in surprise, tugged downwards with the hint of a frown. “I,” he stutters, looks at Jimin, who doesn’t seem that impressed with him either. “I… I would’ve came if you called.”

You tug your sunglasses out from their little case, slide them over the bridge of your nose as you strap your seatbelt over yourself. “Would you though?” You ask, flash him another polite smile before shifting your car’s gears. Jimin walks off, clears the path for you to exit, and with just Jungkook standing there, you speak freely. “I would hate to distract you from something important.”

—

Some of the proposals end up being better than expected, and after carefully sifting through them, your boss asks you to sit through presentations for the next few days. Your time gets consumed in graphs and budgets. There’s a multitude of businesses you have to look into, some big and well-known, and others small and local. You drive around the city one day, visiting business after business, until your ankles hurt in your heels and your cheeks hurt from all the smiling. Your only comfort is the nice Chanel skirt suit you’re wearing that makes you feel like the most important person in the room wherever you go.

By the time the week’s over, there’s a thin cut forming on the back of your ankles from all the walking you’ve done in your heels. You slump against your front door, tossing your heels in the vague direction of the closet before padding through your house.

You nearly scream yourself sore at the figure in your kitchen, hunched over what looks to be a hastily made cake with a number three candle. “Oh my god,” you seethe, turning the overhead light on to illuminate Jungkook’s grinning figure, dirty and sweaty from work. You glance at the clock on the stove; it’s only been about an hour since his garage closed.

“Surprise!” He exclaims, and you’re not the slightest bit amused when he begins humming the happy birthday song on a day that is definitely not your birthday.

When he’s done, you don’t clap and his beaming smile doesn’t waver. “It is not my birthday,” you calmly state, placing your leather padfolio on the counter.

Jungkook blows the candle out for you. “It’s the birthday of when we first met,” he explains, and gets to cutting the cake. How he remembers such a day, you don’t know. You do know that this is his mom’s birthday cake recipe, and you love that. “Can you believe it? Friends for almost three decades.”

“Almost,” you repeat, dutifully sitting across from him and taking the plate he offers. He nods at you like a bobblehead. 

His eyes are sparkly and big, like he’s drunk, and it’s only then you notice the red wine on the table, bottle open and halfway done. You set your fork down, grasp the neck of the bottle in your hand. “Have you been drinking?” You ask, even though the answer stares you right in the face. You frown. “You hate drinking.”

Jungkook rolls his eyes, shovels more cake into his mouth to delay his response. “Needed it,” he offhandedly explains, nearly eats the candle but you jump forward to snatch it off his fork before he can.

“What do you mean?” You inquire. You’re not hungry anymore, too interested in whatever’s going on in his head to make him think he needs to be drunk around you.

Jungkook gulps, reaches forward for more wine but you cradle the bottle to your chest. You nearly gasp when he levels you with a real, stony glare, the expression out of place on his face. “Cuz you’re mad,” he huffs. “At me.”

There was a time you would coddle Jungkook’s every mistake, never let him think he was at fault for anything. You’d grown out of it shortly before high school, recognizing boys were stupid no matter how much you tried to prove otherwise. Since then, you’ve watched him get into trouble time and time again—Sojin being the prime example—and only intervened when absolutely necessary. Some part of you, the half that hates seeing him upset, wants to tell him you’re not. The mature part in you, however, doesn’t let that happen.

“I am,” you agree, watch his eyes widen almost comically at your admission. You set the wine bottle back on the table, leaning your chin on your palm as you level him with the most unimpressed gaze you can. “I’m furious, actually.”

He whimpers, actually whimpers like a kicked puppy, and you can almost see the metaphorical ears pressed against his head and the tail tucked between his legs. His lips are big and pouty, stained from the wine. You’d love to know what they feel like.

Jungkook’s vulnerability lasts all of three seconds, before he’s shaking himself out of whatever emotional pit his foggy brain has him in. “Well, it’s dumb,” he spits, and it’s your turn to sit in shock. “You can’t tell me what to do.”

“Excuse me?” You ask, incredulously, because this has never happened before. Are you overprotective and sometimes overbearing? Sure. Has Jungkook ever voiced discomfort with that before? Never. “I’m not telling you what to do,” you sneer, crossing your arms over your chest.

He rolls his eyes, pushes away from the table like a moody teen. You know it’s because he’s drunk, because he’s not himself, but you have to remind yourself that he obviously felt this way somewhere in his heart to voice it to you now. “You’re not my mom.”

You choke. “I’m not!” You angrily agree, pushing away from the table as well.

Jungkook snarls, “well you sure do love acting like her.” He picks up his plate, glances over at you with a look in his eyes that can only be likened to that of a sneaky cat, and then purposefully shoves the bread and frosting down the garbage disposal in the sink. You shriek, fly around the table and shove him away.

“What is wrong with you?” You seethe, push him away rudely with a hand on his face. Jungkook stumbles back, slips on the floor and nearly cracks his head on the corner of the counter. “Oh my god,” you exclaim, abandoning the sink in favor of watching the way his face twists up at the sudden motion, stomach contracting beneath his black t-shirt, cheeks puffing. “Oh god, oh god,” you stammer, tugging him to his feet with the strength only a panicked individual about to see an entire cake regurgitated onto their kitchen tile can have.

You’ve barely kicked the door to the bathroom open when Jungkook begins throwing up, gooey vomit spewing from his mouth and onto the floor. It touches your arm, and you shriek before shoving him in the general direction of the toilet.

“Ew, ew,” you freak, shoving your hand under the sink faucet to get that gross feeling away. You wanna vomit yourself, but you tell yourself there can only be one sick person at a time, and right now it’s Jungkook.

He’s got his head in the toilet, disgusting sounds echoing off the ceramic of it. By the time you’ve calmed down and washed your arm thrice, you move over to pull his bangs away from his face, letting him hurl in peace.

“I’m sorry,” he mopes, spews another round of birthday cake into the toilet.

You look away, blindly reach out to turn the bathroom fan on. “Mhm,” you nod, rubbing a hand over his back. Jungkook nods sadly against the toilet seat.

“‘M sorry,” he repeats, gags around nothing but the gross feeling left in his throat. “I-I know you just want…” a pause as he considers throwing up some more, “...want what’s best for me.”

“I do,” you agree, wipe a hand down the side of his face that he leans into. “Not trying to be your mom,” you assure him, and he snorts.

“Be a good mom,” he murmurs, so soft you don’t hear him. You hum, leaning closer and he repeats it. “You’d be… a good mom.”

Not knowing what to do with that information, you just pat his back until he falls asleep, cheek against the toilet seat.

—

“Woah, the sexual tension in this garage is off the charts,” Taehyung blurts from behind you, and you smack your clipboard against his chest. “Oof,” he grunts, rubbing his chest like it actually hurt. “You doing finances for him again?” He asks and you nod.

In an ideal world, Taehyung would leave upon finding out you’re busy. In this world, he simply leans into your personal space, nearly knocking you into an empty tool cart. “Oooh, an extensive list of all the money Jungkook’s stupidly blown this month. How much did he spend on neon signs this time?”

You relent, showing him the shop’s finances. Anywhere else, revealing a business’s finances without the consent of the owner would be a federal crime. Here, it’s the equivalent of showing Taehyung Jungkook’s browser history. “He spent how much on window tint?!”

“A lot,” you say.

There’s a whistle from across the garage, the shop’s resident country bumpkin Park Jimin standing at the huge garage doors with his hand on his hip. “No fraternizing, please.”

Taehyung rolls his eyes. “Boooo,” he shouts, peels himself away from you to flick an impolite finger Jimin’s way. “He’s just jealous,” he tells you, and you frown.

“Of what?” You ask, and Taehyung nearly loses his shit.

“My precious ___,” he sighs, leans his forehead on your shoulder. “So beautiful and smart, yet so slow.” You flick the side of his forehead just as Jungkook strolls by and, seeing your attack, slaps the back of Taehyung’s neck. “Why do you guys hate me!” Taehyung exclaims, jumping at least five feet away from you and Jungkook’s giggling forms.

“How’s it going?” Jungkook asks you, completely ignoring Taehyung’s soulful cries as he glances over your shoulder at the clipboard. You tilt it his way, but he stands close anyway, until you can feel his breath huffing against the back of your neck.

“Okay, but you’re spending a lot of money stockpiling on things that haven’t shown signs of running out yet,” you explain, pointing at the window tint that had astonished Taehyung only a moment ago.

Jungkook grimaces, pink tongue swiping across his lip as he looks at the total amount he’s spent the last three months. “Well, it’s a good thing I have my accountant,” he grins, throwing an arm over your shoulder.

“Not your accountant,” you correct, “just a friend who doesn’t wanna see you run your business to the ground from overspending.”

Jungkook waves you off, and Taehyung tries to sneak into the receptionist office behind you, but Jungkook catches him with his free hand. “This is the life,” he sighs, wistfully gazing over the garage floor. It reeks of motor oil and car paint.

“Count me out,” Taehyung snorts, voicing your disinterest toward such greasy and smelly work. He tries to wiggle out of Jungkook’s hold, but the muscle bunny only straps an arm around his neck, until Taehyung’s squirming and clawing for air against the red sleeve of his jumpsuit.

“My own successful business, a shitload of sexy cars, and of course,” he pauses, squeezes the two of you tighter until you’re both groaning. “My two best friends.” The sap has the gall to peck the top of your heads, and that seems to be the final straw for Taehyung who rips himself away.

“Have this lovefest somewhere else, man,” Taehyung says, flattening his rumpled clothing down. “You’re really putting a nail in my reputation around here.”

Jungkook cackles, mindlessly goes to wrap himself around you from behind. “Your reputation has been trash since that scream you let out the other day,” he informs him, swaying the two of you back and forth. Your heart thunders in your chest, and you just barely manage to avoid Taehyung’s pointed stare.

“Whatever, I’m outta here.” With Taehyung peaced out, you’re left in Jungkook’s arms, gazing over his business like two old lovers. It makes your chest tight, so you quickly go to shake him off.

“We’re okay?” Jungkook murmurs, so soft you almost don’t hear. He’s got his hand wrapped around your wrist, thumb massaging over the bone there like he’s afraid you’ll bolt the second he lets you go.

You nod, tuck the clipboard to your side. “Why wouldn’t we be?”

Those sad puppy eyes, pouty lips turned southward. You want to wipe that look off his face. He sighs, glances at where your skin meets and gives it a squeeze. “I’ve been an ass lately,” he settles on saying. “Said some mean things and ruined your bathroom rug—I’m sorry.”

You don’t know what to say.

Jungkook takes your silence as understanding, reaching down to hold both your hands in his slightly dirty ones. “It won’t happen again. I’d rather lose a million friends than lose you,” he confesses, and something about it feels too real, too raw. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”

You nod, the constricting feeling in your throat only tightening when he smiles at you, those gentle eyes and plush lips for only you to see. You want to kiss him, swallow him whole. Right here on the garage floor so everyone knows he’s yours.

But you can’t because he’s not.

You settle on swinging your arms between you. “Just don’t do anything stupid,” you warn him, narrowing your eyes playfully. There’s a heavy feeling in your heart, something akin to anguish, but you could never voice it out loud.

“I won’t,” Jungkook promises.

—

Jungkook visits again on a weekday, and you nearly send him straight home when he brandishes another bottle of wine in your face. “It’s nonalcoholic!” He exclaims before you can shut the door on him, foot lodged against the frame. You give in.

“To what do I owe the pleasure?” You ask, curling up on the couch in just your shorts and huge t-shirt. Jungkook pops the bottle open, pouring the wine into two limited edition Shrek 2 cups you pulled out from the depths of your cabinet.

“Can’t hang with my bestie?” He throws back at you, snatching the remote from your hands before you can click on another episode of that dumb housewives show. You end up watching National Geographic, some documentary about the role of bioluminescent shrimp in the sea.

“Aw look, they’re kissing,” he cooes at a pair of seahorses that wander across the screen halfway through a shot of some school of shrimp. “How romantic.”

“Wonder what that’s like,” you comment, not thinking too much on the meaning behind your words until you can feel Jungkook’s stare pierce your cranium. “What?”

“You’ve never been kissed?” He blurts, and you choke on your wine.

“You were my first kiss,” you remind him, flush at the memory of the two of you sitting criss-cross applesauce on his bed, knees knocking in what was probably the worst first kiss in the history of first kisses.

Jungkook blinks. “Oh yeah,” he laughs. “With the Tony Hawk poster behind my bed, right?”

“The one and only.”

Jungkook hums, and the two of you melt back into the silence. Nice aquatic sounds fill the room, the camera panning over more colorful fish that Jungkook oohs at appreciatively. You don’t really pay attention, more interested in the way the wine swirls in your cup and the way you can feel Jungkook’s thigh pressed against your knee, like when you were thirteen and trying something new.

You know it doesn’t mean a lot to him. Just another silly childhood memory of you. Not like you have hundreds, thousands of them with each other. By the way he’d blurted the question, you doubt he even remembered it most days. But you did.

It plagued your mind all the time, the soft feel of his mouth and the trembling hand that had held yours. You wonder if he kisses the same still, lips gently puckered. He’s had years to learn, half a decade to get creative with Sojin, and the past four years of being a bachelor to explore more.

You’ve kissed too, plenty of guys who had no meaning and ones you thought would replace him. But it’d been a long time since you’ve let anyone into your bed, more content to please yourself without the overbearing weight of feelings and emotions to wrap around your throat.

Jungkook coughs, and you shake yourself from your thoughts.

He’s looking at you inquisitively, like he can’t get his usual read on you and would rather just ask what’s wrong. “You don’t,” a pause, “hang out with guys?”

It’s devastatingly cute, the way he asks if you’re fucking, and you want to pinch his cheeks. Instead you shake your head, try to hide the grin on your face from his inquisitive expression. “Just you and Taehyung,” you admit.

Jungkook nods. “Do you and Tae…?”

You shake your head furiously. “No! God no, we don’t do anything like that,” you clarify, the thought of Taehyung in your bed enough to make you want to gag.

Jungkook says nothing, just turns back to the documentary to watch more Nemos and Dorys flit across the screen. You polish off your cup of wine, leaning forward to settle it back on the coffee table. As you settle back into the couch cushions, Jungkook speaks again. “So you take care of yourself?”

You freeze.

“Yeah,” you admit after one complete meltdown in your head. Where was this coming from? Why did he want to know? You and Jungkook were close, but you never did this. You never divulged the details of your sex life, never bragged about who you slept with or how many there were. What was going on?

Jungkook doesn’t say anything after that, just turns his attention back to the tv screen, where you’re almost certain the sea horses from before are fucking. Not that you know what it looks like, but you hope at least someone in this room was enjoying themselves and not drowning in the mortification of having their life long crush ask them if they masturbate.

“So, do you use your hands or a toy?”

You choke, slap your chest to ease the pounding of your heart at Jungkook asking such a question. “E-Excuse me?” You ask, scandalized that Jungkook, your sweet and caring childhood friend turned Fabio, could ask you such a bold question about your personal affairs.

“What?” Jungkook says, like he truly doesn’t see the inappropriateness of the situation. He even raises his eyebrows at you, as if urging you to answer the question.

You sigh, fight the flush of your cheeks and stare idly at the cups on the table. “A toy. Hands don’t feel good,” you curtly reply, crossing your arms over your chest and straightening your legs off the couch, hoping that’s the end of his curiosity. This was enough to fuel your 3am anxiety meltdowns for the next five years.

Jungkook nods, and you can feel his penetrating gaze on the side of your face again. A great white shark swims across the screen. Jungkook strikes. “My hands feel good.”

“Jungkook!” You exclaim in horror (and excitement, but you’ll pretend it wasn’t there). “What has gotten into you?”

“What!” Jungkook defends, Bambi eyes looking at you like you’re the unreasonable one here. “We’re having a civil conversation in which I’m trying to open up your worldview.”

You’re flabbergasted. “This is not a civil conversation, what are you even talking about?” You scold, tug your arms around yourself like it’ll actually protect you from the words that don’t seem to be filtering out of his mouth properly. “Why are you so concerned about that?” You interrogate, hope your forceful tone will scare him away.

It doesn’t. Jungkook shrugs, some noncommittal i dont know sound. “I can’t be interested in what you get up to? What my best friend gets up to?” It’s the obvious emphasis on best friend that makes you step down.

“No,” you sigh, rub a hand down your face. “You can be interested,” you tell him gingerly. “We just never really… talked about... those kinds of things,” you rush out, turn away from him as the narrator on screen dives into the intricacies of bioluminescent shrimp in the animal food chain.

As if sensing your discomfort, Jungkook softens, scooting closer to you. “I’m sorry,” he murmurs, too close and too warm. “I didn’t mean to make you uncomfortable,” he says, places a palm on your knee.

“I’m not!” You rush to assure him, facing him head on again. His eyes are big and implorative still, and you wonder why he became stuck on that of all things today. “It just surprised me.”

His lips quirk to the side, an unsure grin that has you leaning into his shoulder. You sit in silence, the rise and fall of his body with every breath lulling you into a sense of comfort.

A false one that Jungkook zeroes in on.

The documentary’s wrapping up, soothing ocean sounds and wind instruments playing as the credits roll across the screen, when the hand that had been laying so comfortably on your thigh inches up. At first, you don’t notice it, writing it off as Jungkook just shifting around. You tell yourself it’s just that, until his pinky makes contact with the end of your shorts.

Slowly, you turn towards him, catch his mocha irises lustfully lidded as he toys with the hem. “Kook?” You murmur, so soft, barely there.

“Hm?” He replies, continuing to play with the edge of your shorts, until he gets brave and his fingers slip beneath, index finger just barely grazing the panties underneath. You gasp. “This okay?”

Stuck between your arousal and your common sense, you flounder for a response. He’s so close, and smells so good, curls brushing against your temple the closer he gets. You want him so bad, want him to find his place between your thighs and put those pouty lips to use. But you know it’ll make things different, change whatever it is you’ve had for the past almost thirty years, and you’ll never bounce back. Another brush against your panties, pointer finger wiggling it’s way beneath the fabric, and you’re choking out a “yes.”

“Good girl,” he murmurs, and something in your core tingles at the name, thighs clenching together. “Uh uh,” he chides, nudges them open. “Stay still for me,” he commands, and you do, for all of ten seconds, but then he’s pressing his finger on your clit, panties and shorts muting the sensation. Still, it makes you squirm, fingers clutching the couch cushion beneath you as you struggle to keep them open. “Too much?” He asks, and you shake your head no.

“I-It’s fine,” you whisper, and Jungkook smiles.

He pets you, almost wondrously, for a few beats, watches the way the muscles in your thighs twitch with every press against your mound. Eventually, he decides it’s enough. “Hands don’t feel good for you?” He inquires, your words from earlier obviously having left their mark on him. Slowly, you shake your head. He glances down at the fist you have on the couch, composed features sliding up your face. “Well, yours are so small, princess. Of course they don’t feel good.”

He manhandles you around, tugs you onto the couch until you’re laying down, legs sprawled on either side of him. Pleased with the arrangement, Jungkook glances back down to your bottoms. “These have to go,” he tells you, hooks his fingers in the waistband and abruptly yanks down, leaving you just in your t-shirt.

You go to shy away, but Jungkook stops you, palms resting on the insides of your thighs, thumbs pressing into the skin soothingly. “My fingers are long, see?” He says, raising a hand to wiggle his fingers at you. You nod, heartbeat thundering in your ears. “They’ll feel nice inside.”

You know they will.

You can tell he knows his way around a woman’s body just from the way his hands glide over yours, carefully like he’s mapping you out. Ever so slowly, one hand grows closer, until his thumb is gently circling your clit, and you inhale sharply.

“So wet,” Jungkook hums, his other hand traveling further down, until he’s spreading your pussy lips with two fingers, trailing them through the arousal that gathers there.

You’ve never been so attentively cared for, never had a man zero in on your cunt like it was his first meal in ages. Jungkook’s eyes are clouded with lust, tongue peeking out from between his lips as he watches your pussy lips flutter at his touch.

He swirls his hand over your clit, pressing down. The first sound escapes you, a soft whimper that has you clamping your hand over your mouth in embarrassment. Jungkook grins down at you, shifts closer to press a kiss to the knuckles over your mouth.“Don’t hide from me,” he purrs, pulling away and pressing a kiss to your neck.

You cry out when he gets back to it, massaging your pussy with gentle hands and a thumb against your clit to placate you. “Jungkook,” you choke out, and he beams at his name, takes it as a sign to finally slip two fingers inside. “A-ah,” you whine, arching beneath him.

He basks in your noises, leans close again to press a kiss beneath your ear, against your jaw. “This okay?” He murmurs, curling the fingers inside of you. You mewl, throwing your arms around him as he begins working you open. “How does it feel, baby?”

“G-good,” you pant, turn your head until you can bury your nose in his hair, drown even more in his all-consuming aura.

Another kiss to your neck, before he’s suctioning his lips right below your ear, nipping and sucking at the skin to brand you his. “You like my hands?” He husks, and the patch of saliva he leaves on your neck feels cold without his mouth there. You nod, and Jungkook rewards you with a soft smooch over the hickey he’s left.

His fingers inside you curl and scissor, brush against every inch of your walls until you’re quivering beneath him, gasping his name out. You could melt if his fingers weren’t holding you together. “So tight,” he groans, curling his fingers. The movement touches upon something sensitive within you, and you moan his name loudly.

“O-Oh,” you pant, wiggling beneath him as you try to feel that again. Jungkook lets you, watches you desperately rut into his hands. He drifts away, lets his tongue mouth over your breasts, licking until there’s a damp spot on your t-shirt, the flimsy house bra you’d worn and the t-shirt combined not enough to hide your pebbled nipples.

The drag of his hands against your pussy isn’t enough, the motions not quick enough. Jungkook glances at your twisted features, your quivering pussy, and then, ever so gently, ducks over you, puckered lips letting one, long glob of saliva touch down on your pussy, trickling around his knuckles.

“Fuck,” you choke, watch his tongue swipe over his lip to break the thin bridge that connects you too. Suddenly, everything is smoother, the combined lubrication of your arousal and his spit making the glide of his fingers sinfully slick.

Frantic for release, you lose yourself in him, ready to free fall into your pleasure so long as Jungkook is there to catch you. “That’s it,” he encourages, picks up the pace of his fingers inside you. “Come on, beautiful, let me see that gorgeous face of yours when you come.”

“K-Kook,” you sob, and he smiles against your neck. His fingers work fast, until your muscles are all pulled tight, waiting for that final push to unravel. You make the mistake of glancing down, only to be caught by that pearly smile and adoring gaze. You’re in heaven, you know you are.

There’s no other explanation for this—the way Jungkook holds you like you’re his, hands so gently caressing your most intimate parts. You’re almost convinced you’re having a fever dream, a sick, too realistic dream, but then Jungkook’s biting down on your shoulder through your t-shirt, subtly rutting against your thigh.

“Cum for me,” he purrs against your neck, and you do, sobbing as your orgasm rolls over you, the heavy weight of his cock against your thigh. “Jungkook,” you cry, so pitifully, it has him lunging forward, a kiss pressed to the corner of your mouth.

You feel sweaty and gross, unbelievably tired from the gentle way he opened you up. Blindly, you reach down, feel the hardness of his cock beneath his sweatpants, but Jungkook nudges you away. You huff. “Let me,” you whimper, reach for him again even though you can see the slowness in your movement. “Need your cock in my mouth,” you drawl, almost sleepily. 

“Shh,” he soothes, lips pressed against your neck, where he’s still licking and sucking over every inch of you. You whine. “You don’t have to do a thing, gorgeous,” he assures you, “just wanted to make you feel good.”

—

Work gets stressful shortly after. There’s a new batch of interns coming in this season, new faces who will mess up your coffee orders and jam the printers for a good few weeks. There’s normally a team of employees who train them, a mix of relatively older people from different departments who show them around; a girl in the finance department, the one who usually trains them, is on maternity leave. With no one else to fall back on, the head of the department pushes the duties off on you, claiming your flexibility and work ethic make you the perfect candidate for such a role.

Normally you’d thrive at the praise, eat up every single word like it sustained you. In a way, it did. It was nice to be appreciated and recognized for your hard work, to be thought of so highly, especially in a male-dominated company. However, this time, you know it’s out of convenience that the head kisses up to you, and you end up begrudgingly taking the role.

The gaps in your schedule you’d normally spend relaxing or catching up on other projects are filled with bumbling interns, calling for help every chance they get. It’s like they’ve never done anything on their own, this group, always asking you the correct way to do this, the right way to do that. You haven’t mentored interns in a while, so you spend the first day breezing over old powerpoints and print outs you made years ago. You remember why you’re not fit for mentoring when one of them asks you how to navigate Excel. You nearly rip their head off.

There’s so much going on, you barely get time to see Jungkook, let alone text him. You saw him once the morning after, stack of pancakes on your kitchen table as he rushed you off to work. The shop didn’t open for another hour. He was sweet, kissed your forehead as you left, but he’s always done that. You didn’t have time to talk about whatever the night before was, or what that made the two of you now.

On Friday night, one week into your nightmarish role, you pull into the shop. You'd like to convince yourself it was routine, visiting the shop, but that’s a lie. You desperately miss Jungkook. 

 Most of the garage doors that are usually pulled open during the day are shut, save for one. The last of Jungkook’s employees are leaving, bidding you adieu as you step out of your car. Park Jimin is there, repairing some rickety car in the back corner.

“Boo,” you call playfully, and Jimin doesn’t flinch, merely pulls his head from out of the hood to flash you an easygoing smile.

He whistles at the sight of you. “You look like you’ve been through one of helluva week,” he says, and you, despite your strong personality, feel yourself blush at his comment. Jeez, did you look that bad? Jimin doesn’t elaborate, just pulls out a stool for you to sit on beside where he’s working. “Penny for your thoughts?”

You glance at the plexiglass, the offices hiding down the hall. Jungkook could wait, you presume, settling down beside him. Your skirt tugs up as you settle onto the pleather seat, so you cover your legs meekly with your purse. “Work’s been crazy,” you explain, and Jimin laughs at the obvious.

“You’re telling me,” He hums, and you roll your eyes playfully. “What’s going on at work?”

What hasn’t been going on, you think to yourself, before launching into a full retelling of your new horrendous position, of all the interns with their clueless eyes and useless notebooks. Jimin chuckles, indulges you in a few comments here and there that only fuel you on. He’s just about done with whatever he’s doing to the car at the same time your story wraps up, explaining how you found yourself here, desperate for Jungkook to whisk you off to that arcade you loved as kids. “Jungkook?” He asks, and you nod. “He left a while ago.”

You freeze. “Huh?” You say, dumbly. You almost want to laugh at your own impulsiveness, for showing up without sending him a text or a warning to let him know you were coming. You almost do laugh, but then you remember you and Jungkook never did that anyway. Hell, he showed up at your house a few weeks ago unannounced and drunk. The two of you were hardly the type to plan ahead, so it was weird for him to not be here. He’s been at the shop almost every night since it’s opened, the days he’s not usually a holiday.

“Jimin…” you begin, glancing at the receptionist window once more. “Where’s Jungkook?”

Jimin shuts his tool box, kicking a cart off to the side. “He left with that lady,” he tells you, doesn’t hear the way your heart rips straight out of your chest. No way. “Tall, pretty. Had that nice Corvette he fixed up a while ago.”

“Sojin,” you mumble, and Jimin nods.

“Think that was her name.” As if sensing your tumultuous thoughts, he steps closer, one hand reaching out to steady you. “You alright?”

“God,” you exhale, pushing yourself away from Jimin and the garage and the window. The stool rolls away, almost hits the side of another car but Jimin catches it. He rushes over towards you, watching you wobble in your heels.

“Honey,” Jimin says, steady and warm beside you. “Sit down for me, yeah?” He guides you to a row of seats against the wall, nailed into the floor so you can’t push them away and make even more of a mess. Not that that’s your concern, your mind and heart too preoccupied with thoughts of Jungkook lying to you, going out with that woman again, despite your obvious hatred for her and his promise to you.

Jimin disappears, rushes over to the other side of the garage before returning with a water bottle for you. He cracks it open, presses it into your hands, and then against your lips when you don’t move. “Drink,” he encourages, watching you with worried eyes that only grow more and more concerned the deeper you fall into your thoughts.

You want to cry and beat Jungkook up at the same time. You want to scream at him for lying to you after treating you so nicely, holding you so warmly. Instead, you gasp for breath, clutching your face in your hands like it’s the only thing that grounds you.

There’s a beep outside, chirpy and cute in the way only older models are, and you whip your head up, the headlights of the Corvette painting you in shades of yellow as it rolls to a stop, the tears you hadn’t felt glistening under the light.

Jungkook flings himself out of the driver’s seat, and a sob catches in your throat when Sojin steps out of the passenger seat. Jungkook shoves everything in his path to the side, carts flying into the few automobiles on the floor, tools clanging loudly onto the cement, and just as those arms you love so much are reaching out for you, there’s a hand on his chest stopping him.

“What did you do to her?” Jungkook snarls, pushing Jimin roughly to the side. Jimin, smaller but not weaker, holds his ground, clutching Jungkook by the material of his jumpsuit a second time. “Let— go!” Jungkook shouts, finally worming away from his employee.

He nearly trips before you, stumbling to his knees as he takes your quivering hands in his. “What’s wrong,” he asks, throwing a nasty glare back at Jimin who watches silently from the side. Sojin is still by her car, leaning across the driver’s side now. “What did he do, what did he say?”

You shake your head, dropping your head to tuck your chin against your chest. You hate this. Hate letting him or Jimin or Sojin see you cry. It’s not the person you are, not the self-made woman you claim to be as you cry over the same man who is unknowingly defending you from himself.

“Let go,” you whisper, hoarse and choked. You shake your arms, but he doesn’t let up.

“Tell me what's wrong,” Jungkook pleads, inching closer to you. His breath is warm and he smells like oil, just like he always does. He also smells sweet and floral in a way only a woman could. He smells like Sojin.

You sob, rip your hands away from and scurry blindly towards Jimin, who catches you in his arms despite the shock that paints his face.

Jungkook watches with an expression of hurt, watches you snuggle into the arms of another man over an issue you won’t tell him about. Jimin says nothing, just rubs his palm over your back. He gestures towards the red corvette, the woman standing by it and Jungkook takes the hint.

You hear the kitten-like purr as it pulls off, the silence that follows afterwards. You don’t know where Jungkook is, if he’s here or if he left with her, and you don’t want to. “Tell me he’s gone,” you beg Jimin, quiet gasps against his neck.

He nods, slowly lets you untangle yourself from his arms as the two of you stare over the empty garage. The Corvette is gone, and so is Jungkook. Before Jimin can tell you where he is, you’re wiping a hand over your face, embarrassed at the moisture it comes back with. 

“I take it he’s not supposed to be with her?” Jimin tries to joke. 

Neither of you laugh. 

You sniffle, process what just happened, how you acted. You’ve never felt that way before, never experienced such brutal heartbreak. 

You don’t know what you expected from Jungkook. In your heart, you convinced yourself what happened in your apartment was the start of something new between the two of you, a natural result of your long friendship. Realistically, you know you should’ve waited until the two of you spoke, discussed whatever happens next. But you’d spent the past week comforted by the fact you’d finally gotten to experience something like that with him, daydreaming about him every chance you got. 

Somewhere in your mind, you had convinced yourself your involvement with him would finally be what broke his connection with Sojin, the final nail that would make him forget about her. It’s painfully funny how such wasn’t the case. 

Jimin breaks you out of your thoughts. “You okay to drive home?” He gently inquires, and you turn your gaze over toward your car. 

Did you trust yourself to make it home without shedding a single tear? Absolutely not. But between Sojin and Jimin, you had let enough strangers see you fall apart over a man tonight. 

“Perfectly okay,” you tell him. 

—

The interns pick up on your sour attitude the week that follows. They don’t ask dumb questions, and don’t mess up your order. You talk them through a presentation, show them how to properly organize finance charts. There’s a slide that has clip art, a goofy dollar sign with a smile and shoes. Jungkook put it there when you first made the PowerPoint. After the little lesson, you go to the bathroom and try not to cry.

A week later, and the interns don’t need you anymore. They do well, and your boss praises you for being such a good mentor. You thank him and he lets you go home early.

Home is empty. Jungkook doesn’t show up unannounced, mostly because you’ve changed the number lock on the door. You want to eat salad today, for some reason, but don’t have any of the ingredients for it, so you walk to the supermarket a few blocks away.

The supermarket feels the same as it always does at night. That ghostly feeling of being watched in an empty aisle, the scratchy tune of whatever Top 50 radio station they settled on today. You get there and decide you don’t want salad anymore, so you buy ingredients for a stew instead, all of which you probably had at home.

When you step outside, the air around your bare thighs is cold. Summer was ending, which meant Jungkook’s birthday was coming up. You ball the receipt in your hand and fling it at the trash. You miss, so you hobble over to pick it up.

The trash is beside a red Corvette with two racing stripes.

“Hey,” Sojin says, arms crossed over her chest as she walks up behind you, sizing up your crouched form beside her car. “What’re you doing to my car?”

You breathe in, shake the crumpled up receipt at her, before stuffing it in the garbage. She says nothing as you stalk by her, and you’re back on the main road when she pulls up next to you, window rolled down to speak to you. “Get in,” she gestures, “it’s gonna rain.”

“No,” you say, and a fat raindrop falls right on your nose.

The door unlocks and you climb in, plastic bags crowded by your feet.

The drive is silent. You only live a few minutes from the store, and you point out an empty spot by the sidewalk for her to pull up to. A dry thanks is on the tip of your tongue, but you never get to say it.

“My dad has cancer,” Sojin says.

“That sucks,” you respond, feel bad right away and say, “I’m sorry.”

Sojin doesn’t seem bothered by it, shifting the Corvette out of drive and cutting the engine. “He’s probably not gonna see Christmas,” she adds, and you don’t know what to say. You don’t care about her or her crazy father.  “I wanted to do something nice for him before he, y’know.”

“Died,” you fill, and at that she glares.

“Yeah,” she huffs. “Before he died. So I fixed up his car. But the place I took it to didn’t know how to fix an engine so old, and ended up fucking it up even more.” You nod, she continues. “Then I bumped into Jungkook and—“

“Took advantage of his kindness,” you finish, remembering the twinkle in his eyes when he’d told you about their encounter, that day in the empty garage that seemed lightyears away. “Well congrats. Hope your dad liked it,” you sigh, push open the door and get soaked to the bone immediately.

“Wait!” Sojin calls, hopping out after you. She’s still as beautiful as she was when you were seventeen, even with rain soaking her entire being. “I didn’t ask him to repaint it, but that’s what my dad loved the most.”

You want to go inside, make your stew, and cry in it.

Sojin doesn’t seem bothered by the bangs that stick to her forehead or the water that washes down her spine. “When I told him Jungkook did it… he wanted to see him. Apologize and stuff.”

You snort. “Apologize,” you repeat, tightening your grip on your shoppings bags. “For what, Sojin? For almost killing him with this car or for treating him like shit for five years?” She says nothing, stares at the hood of the car like she doesn’t know what you’re talking about. “He was crazy for you, you know that? He would have done anything for you and not once did you stand up to your dad for him. You let that man call him worthless, stupid, a waste of space. And for what? For you to break up with him for some rich asshole who would never treat you half as good as Jungkook did?” You sneer.

The rain feels cold and your groceries feel heavier, so you whirl on your heel and make for your building entrance.

“He never liked me,” Sojin calls out, and you wonder if she even heard the second half of your emotional outburst. You turn to face her with fire in your eyes, and are only a little surprised at the sadness that paints hers. “He never liked me the way he said he did.” You could knock her teeth out.

“You’re stupid,” you spit, and she rounds the car at an insane speed until she’s glaring down at you over her perfectly sculpted nose.

“He never liked me,” Sojin repeats angrily. “He was always busy looking at you—for approval, for attention, I don’t fucking know. He would hold me and touch me but it never felt real. It always felt like practice for him…” she sniffles and your breath hitches in your throat. “We dated all through college,” she says like you don’t know, like you didn’t stress about it for years. “Everyday closer to graduation felt like a ticking bomb. Like he was just waiting for you to come back. To come home.”

You remember it.

The excited texts he’d send you everyday, the plans he made for you. Jungkook was more excited than your parents about you coming home. The five hours had done a number on him, and after four years all he wanted was to have you close again. You remember the hug in his driveway, the way his mom had told you he’d waited all day for you. It’s weird hearing it from Sojin.

Too overwhelmed, you decide to deflect. “You don’t know what you’re talking about,” you murmur, and you’re surprised she hears it over the pouring rain.

A loud scoff. “You’re stupid,” she repeats back, jabbing a finger at your chest. You glare, and so does she. Like two animals in a cage you size each other up. “You’re stupid and ugly and I hate you,” she spits, and you drop your shopping bags to lunge at her.

You don’t swing, just grab her by the shirt and move to slam her against the wall, but she’s tall and a little strong, bony fingers wrapping around your wrists like spiders. “Why can’t you see how much he likes you?” She screams, like it hurts to admit it. “He’s been in love with you since forever, and all you’ve ever done is run away!”

“I never—“ you gasp, pushing her away from you. Sojin stumbles, but she doesn’t fall. “I’ve never run away,” you defend, heart beating in your chest too fast to be normal. “Some of us have careers and lives we want to live—I don’t want to depend on a man for the rest of my life!”

She growls, tugs at her wet hair like you’re giving her a headache. Stomping up to you once more, she pushes you hard with both hands, and you barely catch yourself in time. “He would have followed you to that fucking fancy school, but you told him it was better to save money here! Told him to not waste his time and just settle there! You did this to us—to all of us!”

You choke. Lightning flashes behind her, and for a moment all you can see is your gentle prodding, sitting behind him as he filled out applications, big wannabe business brain telling him the easiest way to save money for his auto shop was by going straight into technical school. The small frown on his face that day you’d packed for college, and the way he’d stood in your parent’s driveway until you couldn’t see him anymore, a little spec in your rearview mirror.

Sojin, sensing she’s made her point, says nothing. She scoops up your fallen grocery bags and shoves them into your trembling hands, stomping back to her car and pulling off with a roar, loud and ferocious, and nothing like a kitten.

The groceries in your bag end up in the trash.

—

Taehyung invites you to lunch one day, and you go. You’re starving and desperate to get away from work, where you’re paranoid everyone knows there’s something wrong with you. You meet up at a cute little bistro, and he smiles and hugs you when you arrive. You sit in comfort for all of two seconds before he jumps into his interrogation.

“What’s going on with you and Kook?” He asks, casually flipping through the menu. Your hand stills around your glass of water, and you eventually set it down without ever taking a drink. Your mind instinctively maps out a lie, but Taehyung has known you a while now, knows the quirk of your lips when you’re about to lie your ass off. “Don’t lie to me. I haven’t seen you at the shop in almost a month. And he doesn’t go out,” he mentions. “I think he spent four nights at the shop before I made him go home.”

You deflate.

Too embarrassed to explain, you flip through your own menu, and when the waitress comes you order the first words your eyes focus on. Taehyung doesn’t push you, just patiently gazes out over the bustling street.

Finally, you break. “We… did a thing.”

“Uh huh,” he nods, reading some ad on the side of a bus that passes by. “Need you to elaborate, babe.”

You squirm. “We… fooled around,” you say for lack of more appropriate wording. There’s a family sitting beside you, and you’d rather die than let some nooby pre-teen listen to the details of yours and Jungkook’s night.

“You fucked?” You choke, make a loud sputtering noise like it’ll drown out Taehyung’s voice to the other patrons. “What’s wrong with that? We all knew it’d happen sooner or later,” he shrugs.

“No,” you seethe. “We didn—I didn’t.” Taehyung rolls his eyes, the same way Sojin did that day on the sidewalk. You almost throw your glass of water at him. “We…” you sigh. “We did a thing, and then the week after he went out with Sojin.”

Taehyung scowls at the mere mention of her, so the glass of water is returned to its coaster. “Really? He went out with her right away? He’s cancelled.”

You nod, rubbing your hands over your face. “He… her dad has cancer and is literally on his deathbed so she wanted to fix up his car for memories sake, which he loved, so he wanted to apologize to Kook and thank him for fixing up his car,” you rush out, and now Taehyung chokes, water spewing out of his nose. You shriek, drawing everyone’s attention as you pat down your soaked blouse. “Tae!”

“I’m sorry,” he cries, wiping at the sting in his nose. “He-she, what?!” You ignore him, focus on battling the damp spot on your blazer. “God, that’s crazy,” Taehyung snorts, winces at the feeling in his nose.

After the two of you have settled, the manager kicks you out for your inappropriate conversations and childish behavior. You leave with your tails tucked between your legs. Taehyung holds your hand as he walks you back to your workplace, you quietly fill him in on all the other details surrounding yours and Jungkook’s fallout, from your breakdown in the garage to your weirdly dramatic confrontation with Sojin. “Well,” he claps, slamming a hand down on the traffic light button, even though both of you know it doesn’t work. “That explains a lot of things.”

“Yeah,” you agree, pushing down the crosswalk when the light finally changes of its own accord. “Do you,” you pause, feet glued to the sidewalk. “Do you think she was right?”

Taehyung glances back at you, so small and unsure in the midst of a bustling crowd. He smiles, sweet and soft. Rare coming from him. His free hand ruffles the top of your head, and he brings you into his chest. “Babe, the hottest guy in your grade was intimidated by scrawny, pre-muscle bunny Jungkook. I’m pretty sure he feels some type of way towards you.”

Your lip wobbles dangerously, and you bite down on it to stop. Taehyung pats your head, barks at some old guy when he yells at the two of you for standing in the middle of the sidewalk.

When you’re outside your office, you speak again. “You were not the hottest guy in our grade, by the way.”

Taehyung snorts. “I totally was.”

—

You hideout for the rest of the week.

On Friday night, you finally have the balls to show yourself again, and you hop on the highway leading out of the city before you can overthink it. The buildings slowly melt away, replaced with cozier homes, tinier shops, and by the time you’re pulling up the street, you’re deep in doubt again.

It’s not that late yet, only a little past sunset, but the garage doors, usually open to the street, are all shut. You frown, pull around the block, reverse into a spot across the street. Locking your car, a gust of wind nearly trips you as you cross the street. The front office is dark, metal shutters pulled over the entrance.

Eventually, you stumble around until you find the tiny backdoor squeezed beside some dumpsters, grateful for the key Jungkook had given you so long ago.

Just as Taehyung predicted, a pair of red jumpsuit clad feet stick out from beneath a car. A nice car, an even older Corvette than Sojin’s dad’s, still shiny despite the model it is. It looks like a show car with the way it glints at you, black paint almost glossy. The only light in the entire garage is a lamp, positioned over the area where the legs are working, and a flashlight that occasionally beams at you when the holder loses his grip. No music today, just the hum of a rotating fan. You creep over.

Jungkook’s humming a song when you get to him, foot tapping idly on the ground. You suck in a deep breath and nudge his foot with the tip of your heel. You have exactly two seconds to jump away when he abruptly rolls out from beneath the car, concentrated features scanning quickly around until they land on you.

The garage is still, until Jungkook jumps into action. “___,” he stammers, stumbling to his feet. The rolling board drifts away, bumping into the corner of the metal table beside you. “Hi, um,” he flounders, brushing his fingers through his hair, palms wiping over the front of his pants. Finally, “hi.”

The bad bitch Chanel skirt-suit you’d worn today fails you for the first time in a long time. Your hands feel sweaty, so you clutch them behind your back. “Hi, Jungkook,” you exhale, and all the emotions you’d swallowed for so long, the feelings that tightened around your chest and throat like boa constrictors, come oozing out, until all you can see is his puckered mouth and twinkling gaze.

He coughs, tries to casually lean against the car, but greatly miscalculates the distance. “What, um, what brings you here?” He asks, foot tapping nervously against the ground.

There’s a box of takeout on the floor he tries to subtly kick beneath the car, and a plastic bottle of soda that makes a loud noise when he tries that too. You twist your lips, watching the anxious shuffling of his feet. You breeze over his question, plaster a tight smile into your face, and ask your own question; “how long have you been here?” Tentatively, you lower yourself onto a rolling stool. “It’s late,” you state the obvious.

Jungkook’s leg bounces, and he pats his hand over it nervously. “Um, an hour? Just working on something,” he answers, cheeks warm as his eyes flicker everywhere but you. “What brings you here?” He repeats, and you know you can’t deflect it this time.

Shrugging half heartedly, you wait for him to finally look at you. When he does, he almost looks away but the glint in your eye stops him from doing so. “We need to talk,” you finally say. Jungkook visibly deflates, lips pulling into a thin line. You contemplate letting him relieve his thoughts first, but you came here with a point to make, for questions that needed answering, and you’re scared one word from him will wash them all away.

“Listen,” you start, smoothing your hand over the edge of your skirt. “I know something weird happened between us, and then I kinda freaked out on you, but… I need you to tell me the truth.”

Jungkook doesn’t hesitate. “Always.”

You swallow, try to push back the frustration that builds in his throat. “Did you ever even like Sojin?”

Jungkook blinks. “Huh?” A snort. “You’re joking,” he snickers, wipes at faux tears in the corner of his eyes, before your unsmiling face registers and he’s schooling his features. “___, I did like her. I dated her for five years. How could I not like her?”He says seriously, like he can’t believe you would ever question such a thing. 

You exhale, pick at your fingernails. “I met her,” you admit, and Jungkook’s face twists in confusion. “At the supermarket last week. She said you never liked her.”

Jungkook rolls his eyes. “Of course she’ll think that—we’re exes. I doubt she remembers all our best memories,” he sighs, turning back to organize his tool cart like he’s done with this conversation.

Raising to your feet you call his name again, and he hums absentmindedly. “Sojin said you never liked her because you were always chasing after me,” you accuse, laying all your cards out on the table. Your claim startles him, and you watch as he jostles half the tool cart with his surprise.

“She, what?” He huffs, cheeks as red as his jumpsuit. He forces out a laugh, airy and tight like you’re starring in your elementary school play again and the nerves are eating him up. “I-I don’t know why she’d say that.”

He’s flustered, obviously so, as he scoops the metal tools back onto the cart, bumping into three other things before settling back down on the floor to roll under the car. He pushes himself under, and you sternly call out, “Jungkook.” He freezes.

You strut over, brush your hands behind your skirt as you crouch beside him. “Always,” you quietly remind him. Jungkook says nothing. For a moment, you wonder if you’ve grossly misread the situation, if this was just another one of her schemes to drive the two of you apart.

Slowly, Jungkook appears from under the car. There’s a new stain on his cheekbone, brown and slick. He sits up, wide eyes tracing over your features likes he’s trying to seal them in his memory. “Yeah,” he admits, lips twisting as he watches the surprise take your features, before he’s lolling his head back to stare at the ceiling, leaving you to stare at the column of his neck.

“I do,” Jungkook admits, pushing through his emotions. It’s hard for him to confess, you realize, watching the way his Adam’s apples contracts and his jaw twitches from having to say so. “I like you so much it hurts.”

His confession leaves you feeling weird. On one hand, you want nothing more than to spring yourself on him and kiss his face until the stray oil marks are gone and replaced with the outline of your lipstick prints. You want to smother him and hold him, let him know he’s yours, always has been.

On the other hand… it’s sad. Going on thirty years and never did the two of you guess your feelings for each other. You doubt either of you are good at hiding them, with the way everyone seems to have known except you two. Maybe you don’t know Jungkook as well as you thought you did. Maybe he doesn’t know you.

A hand touches your knee, and you return your attention to his downtrodden appearance, chin tucked against his chest. “Please,” he murmurs. “Say something.”

You say nothing.

Tentatively, you reach a hand out, run it along the side of his head, through his mane, chocolate waves touching his cheekbones. He almost looks like when you guys were kids, round eyes watching your every move. Your hand continues down the back of his head, cupping the nape of his neck comfortingly. Jungkook leans into the touch, even though his shoulders are tense. You soothe your fingers over the tight muscles in his neck.

“Since when?” You inquire.

Jungkook blinks, lets your palm trace along his jawline and cup his cheek. “Since you dated Taehyung when we were sixteen.”

Mentally, you curse every deity in existence for putting Kim Taehyung in your life. “God,” you groan, burrowing your hands in your palms. Jungkook, surprised by your reaction, rolls closer, moves around until you’re crouched between his long legs. “Since me and that pinhead dated for twenty minutes?” You repeat.

Jungkook shifts closer, rubs your back. “It was 65 hours, actually,” he corrects, and the exact duration of your relationship makes you cringe. “I… counted.”

Small and shy, almost embarrassed. You glance back up at him. “Why?” You prod, and Jungkook’s cheek flush, palm stilling.

“Uh,” he starts. “I was nervous? That you two were in it for the long run. And I, I don’t know. It was easier to just count,” he lamely finishes, and his dangly earring whips around with him when he avidly avoids your gaze.

You sigh, catch his hand in yours. “Tae and I would have never lasted,” you tell him, remembering all the times the guy made you pick him up from one night stands in the last few years. “He wasn’t who I wanted.”

His foot jumps, toe tapping against the wheel of the car next to you. He wants to ask, you know he does, but Jungkook was quite possibly the only other person on this planet who could overthink something more than you.

Deciding to ease his worries, you give his hand a squeeze. “It was you,” you confess, feel like an elephant lands straight on your chest. “It is you,” you correct.

His forehead knocks against yours, hard, and you hiss at the bump that probably forms. “What the fu—“

“Tell me it’s not temporary,” Jungkook pleads, eyes crinkled in worry. You’re going cross eyed from trying to look at him like this, so you flit your eyes off somewhere to the side. His hand is heavy in yours. “Tell me you’re not just doing this for closure, or because you want to see what it would have been like, please,” he begs, “that would be so fucked up, because I’m so in love with you I actually think I might die.”

The dramatic confession makes you painfully warm. You nod, your lower lip trembling at the way he looks at you, like you single-handedly controlled this entire world with a flick of your wrist. “I-I love you too,” you parrot back, the first time you’ve ever said it, the millionth time you’ve ever thought it.

Jungkook visibly relaxes, pulls away from you to drop his head on your shoulder instead. Your legs are starting to cramp from the tight crouching position, ankles wobbly in your heels. His hair smells good still, despite the hours he’s probably spent beneath a car, and you gingerly pat the back of his head.

“I love you,” he murmurs, and you repeat it. “I love you,” he says again, and you repeat it. “I lov—“

“Me, yes, I’ve heard,” you cut him off, smile at the snort he releases, and when he turns his head, his lips brush against your neck. You’re instantly thrown back a few weeks, to that night on the couch with the limited edition Shrek 2 cups and the wine; the gentle touches that left you trembling for weeks. You inhale quickly, grabbing him by the shoulders and pushing him away.

His eyes are too soft, face too relaxed as he stares at you. “My legs hurt,” you tell him, quickly getting up. You whirl around, facing the car and digging through your purse like you suddenly have something to do.

“Oh,” you gasp, watch two arms wind around your waist, the dirty red jumpsuit contrasting against the tweed material of your high-end Chanel jacket. Jungkook sighs lovingly by your ear, snuggles his face into your neck. “W-we should go out,” you blurt, nerves jumping when he squeezes tighter, burrows closer. “To celebrate!”

Jungkook hums. “Yeah?” His voice is too low. You’re in trouble. “Celebrate what?”

You squirm, breath catching in your throat when he presses you closer against the hood of the car. “Um,” you shakily exhale, hands splaying out over the sleek surface of the black hood to steady yourself. It’s so shiny you can almost see your reflection. “U-Us!” You finally manage to exclaim.

A kiss against the side of your neck, and your spirit just about exits your body. Your knees feel weak, and you're just about ready to throw another mediocre excuse his way, when something warm and wet traces up the column of your neck. “Kook!” You gasp.

“Shh,” he murmurs, deep voice instantly soothing over your nerves. His hips nudge against your behind, and you jump at the bulge that presses against your lower back. One hand unwraps from around you, gliding down your arm sensually until he’s trapping your fingers on the hood of the car with his own. A swift kiss against your ear. “You owe me, remember?”

You flush, remember the filthy promises your list-addled brain has spewed that night at your house, the almost erratic development of your thoughts as you became consumed in the thought of him. Reminisce on the prod of his fingers against your cunt, his hot breath against your ear.

Suddenly, Jungkook whirls you around, traps you with his gaze as two hands flutter to rest on the small of your back. He’s looking down at you with those lovesick eyes, hooded with lust as they trace over the dip of your Cupid’s bow. “You’ll do that for me, won’t you?” A soft brush of his mouth against yours, pouty lips guiding you through a kiss, until you’re sighing against him, and he’s pulling away.

Numbly, you nod, almost hypnotized by the soft smirk that overtakes his features as he pushes you down, watches you sink to your knees before him. The concrete feels cold and hard beneath your knees. His jumpsuit is knotted around his waist, and you shakily unravel it, the elastic waistband staring you in the face afterwards.

“Take your time,” Jungkook croons, hand coming to rest on the side of your face, knuckles brushing over your skin delicately.

You tug it down, and one flash of that underwear band has your nerves flying out the window. You shove his t-shirt out of the way, let your hands trail over the ridges of his abdomen in your haste. He helps you by tugging it over his head. With that gone, his black boxers stare you in the face, and you yank those down with no hesitation.

“Jesus, baby,” Jungkook chuckles, though it’s choked off when you grasp his engorged cock in his hand. You should be surprised, marveling at the sight, considering it’s the first time you’ve ever seen him like this. But you brain is working overtime, too immersed in the vein that runs alongside it and the tip that throbs back at you. Later you can worship it, you think. Right now, you needed it down your throat.

The tip is flaming and swollen, his cock still growing plump in your hold, your hands slowly dragging up and down the length. You lean forward, press a gentle kiss below the mushroom head, trail kisses down the length until you're meeting your knuckles, and trail them back again. Jungkook sucks in a tight breath, leans to rest his palms on the car behind you, as he watches you on him.

A head of precum escapes, and you lunge for it, swirl your tongue in and around the slit on his cock, until his entire body tenses up. “Fuck,” he grunts, watches you ease his cock into your mouth. You groan at the stretch, the drag against the corners of your lips making your eyes roll backwards. “___, baby, a little more?” He asks, voice hoarse as he watches you sink down further on his cock.

You comply, close your eyes and focus on relaxing your throat. There’s a hand on the back of your head, impatiently pushing you down his length. “Shit,” he cries, unconsciously ruts against you. You gag, and he shushes you with a caress against your cheek. “Sorry,” he huffs, “just a little more for me, okay?”

Eyes squeezed shut tightly, you let him push you down until his cock hits the back of your throat and you can’t take anymore. The prod against your throat has tears springing to your eyes. “Gonna move now,” Jungkook announces, thumb brushing away the tears that collect in the corners. “Be good.”

He drags himself out, your saliva coating every inch of him, and when just the tip is resting on your tongue, he shoves back in. You whimper, palms digging into his thighs. Jungkook brushes a hand down your hair, soothes you for all of two seconds before he’s pulling out and doing it all over again. He picks up the pace, loses himself in the feeling of your hot mouth around him, tongue dragging over his cock.

The feeling in your throat burns, each thrust of his hips against your mouth making your jaw more and more sore. But god, it feels good to have him so close, his scent swarming your sense, groans like music to your ears. You want to please him, want him to feel as good as you did at your place. You want it even more now that you know how he feels, know he’s probably thought about this before.

A brutal thrust has you gagging, throat contracting around his length. “Shh,” Jungkook sighs, the fingers buried in your hair flattening out to run over your head. “Doing so good for me, beautiful.”

You bask in the praise, let a hand flutter down to the apex of your thighs, pressing down to relieve some of the pressure. Jungkook groans, rolls his hips against you and keeps you there for a second. Your throat spasms, his dick pressed hotly against it, and you feel your panties grow embarrassingly sticky. Eventually, he draws back out.

“You like this?” He hums, rutting against you faster now, nose brushing against the sparse hairs on his pelvis with every slam of his hips. You nod around a gag, eyes clouding with tears, lips slippery with saliva and precum. One particular thrust is so hard, it nearly sends you knocking back into the car, Jungkook’s hand on the back of your head barely saving you. “Fucking hell,” he spits, “look so pretty with my cock shoved down your throat, princess.”

You moan around him, feel a subtle twitch against your tongue before he’s pulling himself out. “Shit,” he cursed, pushing you away as he goes to grab his own dick in his hand, tugging at it like a madman. “Wh-Where?” He asks, and you stare dumbly at the sight of him playing with himself, almost don’t realize he’s asking you a question.

You take too long, scramble for words too long, and even if you did have one your throat is far too sensitive yo answer. Jungkook grows impatient. Pulling you closer by the collar of your Chanel suit jacket, tugging it open until the flimsy buttons snap, and the tank top you wore beneath comes into view. He aims the tip of his cock towards your sternum, and a few jacks later, he’s coming, cum spurting against your chest. You watch the cum trail down between the valley of your breasts, until the feeling comes to rest against the inside wire of your bra, sticky and gross, sliding along the underside of your boobs. “Shit,” Jungkook repeats, eyes furrowed over you.

Your knees ache, and you nearly trip when you stand up, steadying yourself against the side of the car. Jungkook seems to regain his sense by then, hand trailing around your waist. You meet his eye, and almost immediately turn away, the blood in your face rapidly rising.

Jungkook laughs. “Don’t get shy on me now,” he teases, gets too close and your noses bump. “Sorry,” he smiles, too shiny and bright for the sinful acts you just committed in an auto shop.

“Put your dick away,” you huff, let him nuzzle closer to you, and when he doesn’t move to tuck himself into his pants, you go do it for him.

Jungkook frowns, swats your hand away. “This dick has places to be,” he informs you, and you scoff.

“Refractory period,” you remind him, and he rolls his eyes.

“Well I’m not exactly gonna stick it in you this instant,” he drawls. “Gotta stretch you out first.”

You go to complain, tell him he doesn’t have to over exert himself. Truthfully, with Jungkook you feel like one good session was enough to sustain you for weeks. After last time, your skin had flowed for an entire week. But then his hand is slithering up your backside, sneaking under your skirt to grab a handful of your ass.

There’s quickly drying drool collecting at the corners of your mouth, saliva from when he’d fucked your throat just a few moments prior, that he kisses away. His mouth slots over yours, and your heart and pussy both flutter at the kiss.

It’s gentle and sweet for all of ten seconds, his mouth moving against yours until you feel the wet press of his tongue against your bottom lip, tracing along until you open your mouth. He wastes no time shoving his tongue past your lips, letting it dance with yours as he pulls you closer, hands gripping the globes of your ass. You let him lick his way into your mouth, more and more saliva catching in the corners of your mouth until he’s pulling away with a wet pop.

He pulls away, doesn’t stray too far, proud smirk crossing his features at the sight of your slicked lips. “You liked that, didn’t you?”

“Huh?” You ask dumbly, tongue mindlessly swiping over your lips.

Jungkook’s eyes track the movement. “The saliva,” he clarifies. “The spit. You liked it at your place too,” he reminisces, moving in on you again. “Liked watching me slobber and spit all over your body. Isn’t that right, baby?”

You blush, discreetly rub your thighs together. “I-I do,” you admit, willing the warmth of your face away because at this distance he must certainly feel it.

Jungkook nods, doesn’t say anything else as he captures your lips a second time. He doesn’t bother with the gentle prodding anymore, jumping straight into tongue right away. He’s messier, letting his saliva coat your lips and drip down your mouth, and as messy as it is, you love it. You whimper when he pulls away, but gasp when his hand tugs at the hair by the nape of your neck, pulling you back until you’re looking up at him.

“Open,” he murmurs, and you do, tongue pressing against your bottom lip.

It should be disgusting, the rev of his throat, the sound of his saliva collecting, and the way his jaw shifts when he’s got enough. It should be filthy, the way he shoots it down your open lips, the way it splatters against the back of your throat. It should be gross, but god do you love it. “Swallow,” Jungkook commands, and you do, feel his spit drip down your throat like it’s your own, whimpering at the feeling. A quirk of his lips. “Good girl.”

You have to bite down the pride that grows in your chest.

Jungkook’s hands continue their mapping out of your behind, eventually ending with a hard squeeze that has you squealing. Automatically, your back arches in surprise, breasts pressing against Jungkook’s chest. He smirks down at you.

“Bet you taste good,” he says, pressing a kiss against your cheek. “Let me taste?”

“Please,” you beg, nearly losing your shit when he lifts you up onto the car, the cool metal making you jump, heel on your foot nearly kicking the side view mirror clean off. “Wait, Jungkook,” you sputter, glancing down at the sleek metal. “This is someone’s car.”

Jungkook ignores you, pushes your legs apart to slot himself between them. His palms run up your legs, over your thighs, until they’re toying with the hem of your skirt. Mocha eyes glance up at you, as if daring you to question him again, so you promptly zip your lips shut. The skirt goes, ever so slowly, over your thighs, bunches up at your waist until he’s staring at your lace panties.

He presses a kiss against the inside of your thigh, nose faintly brushing against your skin. The kisses trail over your skin, until he’s hovering over your panties, and he’s staring like a man starved. He gives no warning, suddenly leaning down to press his mouth over your party-clad folds, nose flush against your clit. “Kook!” You squeak, hands flying to clutch at his hair.

Jungkook mouths at you, drags his tongue against your panties until they’re soaked in both your essence and his saliva, just how you like. A hand slithers around your leg, wrapping around until he’s got a firm grip on it that he uses to hold it open.

“J-Just take them off,” you gasp, squirm when his mouth moves towards your clit, lapping against you. “Please,” you cry.

He doesn’t.

Jungkook tortures you with those kitten licks, muted through your panties, until you’re begging him to stop, to take them off and do it right. He loves it, you can tell, dazzling smile peeking up at you every time you tug against his hair, until finally, he’s had enough.

The underwear comes off, dangling uselessly by your ankle, and then the show really begins.

“Wait,” you choke, head falling back against the hood of the car when he finally gets his mouth on you, suctioning his lips around your swollen clit. The niggling reminder that this is some stranger’s car he’s eating you out on rings in your brain, and perhaps that’s what makes it more exciting.

His mouth is warm, tongue flicking over your sensitive bud like it’s candy and he needs the sugar. The sounds are so loud and wet, the squelching of your pussy every time he pulls off a pop that resounds throughout the garage. He pampers your clit for what seems like hours, switching the movements of his tongue every time he gets the chance until you’re quivering.

When you think he’s done, he’s not.

Fingers slide up your thigh, featherlight, as they reach your drenched cunt. They drag over your lips, and you mewl, feeling the muscles jump and tighten at his touches. “Jungkook, please,” you moan, rolling your hips against him, but it’s hard and everytime you move, you feel the sweat on your skin weigh you down, glued to the metal beneath you.

The first finger breaches you, just the tip of his index slowly wiggling inside. You muffle a moan in your palm, and Jungkook pulls away with a huff. “No hiding,” he warns, slowly lowering back to your cunt with a stern glare. You nod, but can’t help it when his second finger pushes its way in and you bite down on your knuckles.

“Oh,” You sob, body quivering as he begins scissoring his two fingers inside you. With your attention focused on the digits sheathed inside you, he pulls away from your clit, bestowing one final kiss against it that has your foot kicking out wildly. “Th-there.” His other hand catches your palm in his, presses it against the metal by your head.

Jungkook smiles, curls his fingers around until he finds the soft spot inside you that turns you to jelly. “There we go, beautiful,” he purrs, pushing himself to his full height, leaning over your trembling form. “So sweet for me,” he sighs, licks his lips like he’s remembering your taste.

“I'm gonna,” you choke, become hypnotized by the dark cloud in his gaze, the arrogant smirk on his lips. He curls his fingers, palm brushing against your abandoned clit. The touch makes you jump, nerves tingling.

“Cum for me,” he encourages, silky tone swarming your head as your pleasure slowly washes over you. It’s probably the most relaxed orgasm you’ve had in your entire life, his low voice and delighted eyes guiding you through it, until your entire body clenches, dissolving in a puddle of contentment. Your arousal surges around his fingers, trickling down onto the metal.

“Oh, Jungkook,” you pant, overwhelmed from the touches and the kisses. Jungkook’s smile gets swallowed by your greedy mouth, desperate for more kisses now that he’s made you feel like this.

The kisses only placate him for so long, and when he presses his body against yours, there’s an awfully hard cock that slides against your dripping cunt. “Think you can go again, gorgeous?” He murmurs against your jaw, nipping at the skin on the way down. You nod, eyes falling shut at the warmth you feel in your bones.

Jungkook kisses your neck one last time, before leaning back once more to line himself up.

This was a scene straight from your teenage fantasies, a dripping, shirtless Jungkook at full mast between your thighs, looking at you so lovingly. It makes your heart thunder, imagining how long you could have been doing this if you weren’t both so stupid. As if reading your thoughts, Jungkook rubs a palm over your thigh, eyebrow quirked. You nod his concern away, squirm closer until the tip of his cock nudges against your hole.

“Fuck,” Jungkook sighs, moving his hands to your hips as he slowly pushes in. His fingers, bless their intentions, could have never prepared you for the size of Jungkook’s cock, thick and veiny as it pushes inside. You whimper, clawing at the hands on your waist that stop you from impaling yourself on it fully. “Waited so long for this.”

“Then fucking do it,” you beg, nearly pass out when he shoves in harshly at your tone. “J-Jung—“

“I got you, baby,” he assures you, jostles you until you’re flush against his cock, clit brushing against his pelvis. Your back arches, and Jungkook slips his arm around you, the other lingering on your waist.

Every subtle shift has him brushing along your swollen clit, and you sob at the sensation, begging him to move. He complies, changes his stance to make it easier, and finally begins thrusting into your throbbing pussy.

“So good,” he huffs, eyes zeroed in on where the two of you meet. You would have looked too, if your body hadn’t felt so completely boneless beneath him, the grinding of his cock sending shocks of pleasure up your spine. “So pretty and mine.”

“Yours,” you choke, heart swelling in your chest at his words. It’s almost animalistic, the way he ducks down to bite at your neck, like some animal staking its claim, and you like it. You like it because it’s all you ever dreamed of for so long. “Faster, Kook,” you urge, wrapping your arms around him.

He does as you say, slow and careful thrusts transitioning into a fast piston that would have had you bouncing out of his reach if he wasn’t holding you so tightly. “Fuck,” he chokes, lost in the way you clench around him, lips dragging against his cock with each thrust. “Baby,” he grunts, sweat trailing down his temple, eyes furrowed shut. Eventually, his head falls into the crook of your neck, his weight pressing down on you uncomfortably, subtle ridges on the hood making you ache. At this point, you’re too far gone to care. “All I ever wanted,” he gasps.

You could cry, right now and he’d pull out right away, big heart fretting over your emotional well-being. Which is exactly why you hold your emotions in, let yourself get fully immersed in the feeling of Jungkook pounding you against some stranger’s car and not the inevitable emotional crash you’ll have later.

He fucks like he’s waited all his life for this, and you guess he sort of has if what he’s saying is true. You have no doubt it is, and when his lips suck a mark against your neck, you feel like you’re in heaven. “Almost,” you pant, legs wrapping around his waist tightly. Jungkook nods, his hair tickling your jaw and neck, as he picks up the pace. Your cunt swallows him up every single time, suctions him in until he’s shaking, and so are you.

It can only last for so long, your heart and body eventually reaching their peak, and you unravel. His arms are there to catch you, to pick up the pieces and hold you together. You want to cry, you really do, and when the coil in your stomach snaps, you finally do. “I love you,” you sob, and Jungkook shudders, glances at your tear-struck face to push himself off.

“Love you too,” he mumbles, grinds his cock against your spasming folds one last time, and comes mid-thrust, cum spurting inside you. He holds you, just like you knew he would, as you come down from your highs, hot breath fanning across your skin.

You feel warm, loved, and in love, body trembling in sensitivity afterwards. He’s pulled out since, soothingly rubbing a hand against your side. You’d like to say you wouldn’t be anywhere else, but one shift reminds you of where you are.

“Shit,” you groan, taking in your surroundings before letting your head fall back against the hood. Jungkook hums, round eyes looking your way. “We really just confessed and had sex on some stranger’s car.”

Jungkook snorts, leans away just the slightest to look you in the eye. He’s lost in thought, chocolate irises swirling as they drink you in. “Say thanks to Taehyung,” he finally says.

You roll your eyes, and when you shift beneath him, your sweaty skin sticks uncomfortably against the metal hood. “Yeah, let me thank Taehyung for dating me for three days and awakening your crush,” you huff sarcastically, resigning yourself to your new life stuck against the hood of some classic automobile from the 50s. Jungkook laughs, tucks himself back into his underwear. “Thanks Taehyung, for your noble sacrifice ten years ago that allowed me to fuck Jungkook on some stranger’s car—“

Jungkook hums, snuggles closer to you. “Tae’s car.”

“—after confessing our—Taehyung’s car?” You shriek, sitting up with the strength of three football players, Jungkook toppling off you. “Oh my god. No.” Jungkook rubs his elbow where he knocked it against the hood, looks at you with solemn eyes. Slowly, a smirk crawls over his features. “No,” you gasp, mortification crawling up your spine. “We didn’t.”

He tugs you off the car, tugs your skirt down when you wobble on unsteady heels. “Yup,” he says, pops the end of the word like a child. “Say hello to Taehyung’s new car!” He exclaims, patting the hood you just defiled. “Straight from the car auction he went to this morning,” he beams.

“Oh my god,” you groan, covering your face with your hands when you finally spot the puddles of... something on the black hood. “This is terrible.”

Jungkook ignores you, wipes up the mess with some napkins from his takeout bag, but there’s already some that's dried, only fueling your mortification. “Not like he’ll find out,” he shrugs, then narrows his eyes at you. “Or will he?”

“No!” You stutter, carefully rounding the car as if inspecting it for any more signs of the treacherous things you and Jungkook did on or around it. “I-I won’t tell him.”

“Uh huh,” Jungkook teases, settles on that rolling stool and pushes himself towards you. There’s a hand easing itself around your waist, tugging you between open legs. Still in shock, your hands flutter around his neck, muscle memory causing you to immediately begin massaging the skin there.

Jungkook sighs into the touch, eyes falling shut. “Too bad Jimin’s not here,” he sighs, and you visibly see his nose grow in arrogance. 

“What? Why should Jimin be here?” You ask, pushing your fingers against the knots in his neck. 

Jungkook levels you with an unimpressed, one-eyed glare. He scoffs, “maybe you are as dumb ad Taehyung says.” And then, “hey!” when you tug his ear. He isn’t upset, just tugs you closer until his face is buried against your stomach. “You know country folk like him marry on the spot right?”

“What are you even saying,” you huff, burying your hands in the hair at the nape of his neck, tugging his head back to properly look at him. “Why do you care who Jimin marries?” He doesn’t bother answering. 

Instead, Jungkook sighs into the touch, an easygoing smile thrown your way, and for a moment you forget about the trauma Taehyung will have when he inevitably learns about this. “This is the life.”