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animethottywithnobody · 2 months ago

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"You Cryin'?"

~ ft Satoru Gojo

Synopsis - You and Gojo have been inseparable since childhood. Everyone thought that once you both got older you'd be more independent from each other (even you) but Gojo always happened to be there exactly when you needed him... ALWAYS.

cw. dacryphilia, breeding, dubcon?? (aphrodisiacs in your drink), oral sex (male & female receiving), implied/slightly Yandere! Gojo, implied stalking, implied noncon recording, best friend! Gojo, roommate! Gojo, dom! Gojo, sub! reader, black-coded reader, afab reader, pet names are used (baby, dollface, pretty, etc)

wc. 4k

AN: I'm really nervous since I haven't properly written a fic in basically two years... I hope you guys like it.

❗️minors & blank blogs DNI❗️

“Hey baby, wanna get out of here?” You shake your head as you giggle. You're both at the biggest Halloween party of the year hosted by the most popular frat on campus.

“Toru, we just got here.” Quite literally, you and Toru just walked through the door about five minutes ago. You don’t even have a drink in your hand yet. “Let’s have fun, especially since I look so cute doing it.” You’re both dressed as Velma and Shaggy from Scooby- doo, you wanted to be Velma, and Toru wanted to match whatever you wore so people ‘know your best friends’.

“You always look cute no need to go to a party to prove that.”

“But everyone’s at this one.”

“You can see all these people in school.”

“We live together. I can see you all day, every day.”

He groans in frustration. “Well, that’s different.” He wraps his arms around your waist, nuzzling into your neck as he mumbles. “I missed you. Can’t I miss my best friend?”

“I thought that was Suguru?” He groans and you giggle. “I mean, technically, you can miss me, but it should be hard when we’re basically attached at the hip.” You giggle, lifting your hand to run your fingers in his hair. You have been friends with Toru your whole life and have been quite literally inseparable since. Everyone says he is overly possessive and attached to you but he was always like that with everything and everyone… right?

“You say that like it’s a bad thing.” You can hear his pout. “I just don’t want you to, I don’t know, forget about me.”

“Toru.” You lift his head and turn around in his hold. To others, this would look quite intimate but both of you have always been touchy with each other. You hold his face, able to see his pout clearly. “I’d never forget about my best friend in the whole world. You’re my other half.” His cheeks and the tips of his ears turn a cute pink as a small smile grows on his face. “But I also have other friends I like spending time with as well.” His smile drops.

“Ugh, fine, but you’ll never have as much fun as we have when it’s just the two of us together.” He mumbles as you pull your hands from his pouty face with a giggle. You spot Suguru and Shoko walking up so you feel more comfortable leaving him.

“Others might take that the wrong way.” You tease as you walk towards your Sorority Sisters.

You end up splitting your time between your Sorority Sisters, random guys, Satoru, and the others. With your Sorority Sisters, you talk about upcoming events, classes or dance together. When you spend time with Satoru, he leaves the friend group, so it’s just the two of you, and he always has a drink in hand for you. Nothing new to you, honestly. You both dance, sing songs and talk about the most random things. The alcohol is definitely to blame for that, at least on your part, since Satoru is a terrible lightweight, so he doesn't drink much, if at all.

You could feel eyes on you when you were with your other friends, but when you looked around, no one, not even Toru, was looking at you. Strangely, you only felt like someone was watching when you weren’t with Satoru, and not just at this party but just any time you two weren’t together. Shoko teases you whenever you bring it up to her and the girls and says you think you're the main character too much.

But when you think about it, some things don't add up whenever you’re at parties. Guys come up to talk or dance with you, but for some reason, they’d always leave, no explanation, nothing. And every time that happens, Satoru is right there to take their place. He’s always there when you need him. When your car breaks down out of nowhere, he’s there. When you’re too drunk at parties or bars with your friends, he’s there to take you home. When you’re on a date that isn’t going so well, he’s always there making the perfect excuses so you can leave. You always joke that he has spidey senses when you need him since most instances, if not all… you never called or texted saying you needed him, and he’d just laugh.

At some point, the drinks start to taste a bit different, but you assume he’s just making a different mix now. But the more you drink, the hotter you feel. It’s like a fever is running through you, your legs feel weak, and your pussy is about to cause a flood. It’s starting to get bad, so you excuse yourself to the bathroom while your other friends tell you to be careful and that they won’t move so you can find them.

You go to a bathroom located upstairs in the frat to have privacy. Once you reach the bathroom, you can see the sweat ruining your edges and running down leaving streaks in your makeup. You wet a paper towel and dab your face and body with cool water, hoping it will help alleviate the fever, but nothing’s working. No matter how worked up you've ever been, it’s never been this bad or this random.

The door starts to open and you quickly push it closed, cursing yourself for forgetting to lock it. “Um, someone’s in here.” You croak, your voice filled with desperation and anxiety.

“It’s me, princess. Your friends said you were here, so I came to check on you.” You would usually relax when you hear Satoru’s voice, but for some reason, it makes the ache feel worse. “Come on baby, let me in.” The slight plead makes you tremble as the thought of him begging for you crosses your mind.

“Fuck, come in.” You move from the door letting him come in. You give him a once, twice, thrice over. You always knew Satoru was attractive; his fan girls can confirm that, but you never felt the need to rip his clothes off of him until now. You feel like a dog in heat with the thoughts flooding your mind.

“What’s wrong, sweets? You don’t look so good.” He leans close to your face as the cool back of his hand presses against your forehead. You shiver at his touch. Have his hands always been this big? “You feel like you have a fever. Wanna go home lovebug?” His voice moves through you like silk and you feel like you can barely stand.

You practically collapse in his chest, gripping his shirt tightly as you shake your head. “I…I can’t move.” His hands hold your waist causing you to whine in his chest slightly. You imagine his hands holding your waist as he fucks into you from behind, only making your pussy gush. “I feel so weak.” With your head in his chest, you miss the victorious smile on his face. His scent is driving you crazy. You should be used to it by now, but it’s almost like it’s fogging up your mind. “I don’t k-know what’s wrong with me, Toru.”

“Is there anything I can do? Maybe get you some water?” You feel him about to move away from you and tighten your grip with a ‘no’ that sounds like a desperate moan.

“Please don’t leave me.” You look up at him with teary eyes. You feel like you're drowning in him. “I- fuck, this is so embarrassing.” You whine as tears threaten to flow down your face. “I’m so horny Toru a-and I need you to help me. Fuck I know this sounds so insane, but please, I need you so bad.” Tears stream down your face as you beg him.

His face changes from concern to something you can’t tell. His eyes darken from his almost clear ocean blue to a stormy sea blue. His grip on your waist tightens, causing you to whine out his name pathetically, your head falling to his chest again. He grabs your face with one hand, squishing your cheeks as he tilts it up to his. A giant mocking smirk is on his face as he tilts his head slightly. “You cryin’?”

“Don’t tease me!” You try looking away, but his grip is firm.

“Tell me exactly when you need from me.” His face looks desperate to hear it from you. He leans his face close to yours, lips almost brushing against each other. You try to close the gap, but he doesn’t let you. “Come on, baby, say it for me.” He whispers, letting his minty breath ghost your lips.

“Please, Toru, I need you to fuck me.” As soon as the words tumble out your mouth, his lips are on yours hungrily. You’d think he’s the one who needs your help. This isn’t the first time you both have kissed, but this is one without party games and dares involved. You begged for this one, and Satoru is determined to make sure you never forget it.

He turns you both, pushing you against the wall with his hands, bruising your hips with his grip. He moves from your lips down your neck as you let a hand move to his hair. “Fuck I’ve dreamt about this.” He mumbles into your neck as he bites and sucks on the skin, leaving marks you’d have to cover up.

He lets a hand slide from your hip to your thigh, pulling your leg up to sit on his waist. Your skirt rides up, making it easier for him to grind against you. The feeling of your clothed core rubbing against the rough material of his jeans has you writhing and whining. “F-fuck Toru.”

You desperately hump yourself against the tent in his jeans with desperate whines. “Please, Toru- ah s-shit baby- need you inside.”

“I know, baby, I know.” He coos, lifting his head to kiss you on the lips. “I wanna make sure you can take me first, sweets.” He moves the hand on your leg to your clothed core, chuckling. “Aww baby, you’re soaking wet for me. Don’t worry, I’ll take care of you.”

He slips down to his knees, all his focus on the space between your thighs. You lean against the wall for balance when you feel him force your legs apart before brushing his nose against your soaked panties. A throaty groan leaves him as he licks and bites at the drenched material. “Fuck pretty, you taste better than I imagined.” He yanks your panties down, letting them fall to your ankles. He helps you step out of them before pocketing the tiny material. He lifts your left leg that sat on his waist and puts it over his shoulder this time. You swear he has a dreamy look in his eyes when he’s face to face with your dripping hole. “Had dreams of tasting your pretty little pussy. So much prettier in person.”

You can’t even comprehend his words as he shoves his face in between your thighs. He licks, sucks, and groans on your clit while you wiggle and moan. When you try closing your legs, he harshly grips your thighs. “Don’t interrupt my meal.” He growls before spitting on your cunt, using his long middle finger to rub it in before pushing it into you.

Your hand flies to his hair at the stretch. “Oh yeah, baby, I always knew this pussy was so tight. Practically pulling my finger off.” He chuckles as his beautiful eyes stare up at you, cloudy with his intense desire. You almost think Satoru has never eaten in his life the way he devours your pussy like a man starved his entire life.

“T-toru so close…” You whine as you grind yourself against his tongue and fingers, using your leg on his shoulder to push his head closer to your aching core. He groans into you as he pushes his ring finger into you, barely giving you time to adjust before letting his pointer finger join the party. “A-ahhh, wait so much.” You yank at his hair, causing him to be pulled away from you, and the sight is breathtaking.

Finally able to see his entire face again, you see the bottom half of his face is covered in your slick. His eyes are so clouded by lust and desire that it’s overwhelming, and his hair is such a white silky mess between your fingers, almost like this was what his hair was meant for.

“Please baby, lemme keep eating.” He whines as he roughly finger fucks you. “Want you to cum in my mouth before you make a mess on my cock.” Your head falls back against the wall as your eyes close. They shoot open at the slap on your cunt. “Look. At. Me.” He delivers a harsh slap with each word, causing whines to fall from your plump lips, but you make eye contact to the best of your abilities, making the sadist smile. “Wanna see your face when you fall apart, dollface.” He coos at you as he kisses your cunt as an apology, sloppily making out with your swollen clit. “Can I continue my love?”

He truthfully doesn’t care what your answer is. He’s Satoru Gojo. He always gets what he wants one way or another. But seeing you weakly nod at him with a fucked-out look all over your face definitely made him love receiving an answer. He goes back to eating, switching his fingers and tongue so he is eating your pussy and rubbing your clit.

Each pump of his tongue inside you or each flick of his fingers drags you closer and closer to your desired end. “O-oh my fuck! Toru, I’m gonna- shit, I'm cumming,” You whine as you hump against his mouth. He doesn't say a thing, just fucks you harder and deeper with his tongue his way of begging you to give him what he wants. It doesn’t take long for your orgasm to crash over you, feeling more intense than any orgasm you've ever had. You struggle to keep your eyes open, but if they were closed, you would’ve missed the fact that you squirted for the first time in your life all over your best friend’s face.

Your orgasm doesn’t mean he’s stopping, though. He keeps licking at you, pushing you to slight overstimulation as he tries to drink every drop of what he's been waiting for and worked so hard for. You tug on his hair with broken ‘stop’ and ‘no more’ tumbling out your mouth. He lazily pulls away and looks up at you. “I thought you liked this. You always do it to yourself… why can’t I?” Nothing he’s saying makes sense to you, but honestly, you haven’t been able to think straight for a while now.

“Don’t tease me. Need you, Toru.” You plead as you pull him up into a hungry kiss, tasting yourself on his tongue. You let your hand slide to his crotch, fumbling with his button and zipper.

“Fuck, your such a needy girl.” He groans into your mouth as you finally undo his jeans, pushing them down. You look down to see his big bulge, probably the biggest you’ve ever seen. He must’ve seen the look on your face because he lets out a hearty laugh. “You just gonna stare, or you gonna take it out for me, pretty?” He tilts his head with a cocky grin, reminding you who he is.

“Fuck you.” You mumble as you squeeze him over his boxers, causing him to hiss. You slide down to your knees, looking up at him with a small smile. His eyes look down at you with a wild, almost crazed look.

“What are you-” Satoru is rarely shocked, but he didn’t expect to see you on your knees. No matter how much he dreamed of this, he didn't plan on it happening… not this time, at least.

“Need to make sure you can fit, right?” You tilt your head slightly as you pull down his underwear, watching with wide eyes as his cock slaps against his stomach, almost taking an eye out in the process. Not only was he big, but he was beautiful. He’s long, not too thick, with trimmed white hairs. His tip is a pretty pink mushroom that’s a deep, angry red from being neglected. He has a slight upward curve that is sure to destroy your insides. Everything is so perfectly proportioned, like everything else about him… perfect.

When you look back up at him, you expect to see a cocky look, but instead, he’s completely red and looking away from you with a hand covering his eyes. “F-fuck, don’t look at it like that.” He whines pathetically. You never imagined the day you’d see Satoru Gojo this embarrassed or embarrassed at all.

You giggle softly before you kiss his tip gently. He shutters with a shaky whimper, leaving him as his chest heaves. “I guess everything about you really is beautiful, huh Toru?” You tease, causing him to look at you with wide eyes. Once you’ve got his eyes on you, you take his tip in your mouth.

“Oh fuck.” He whimpers as his hand flies to your hair cautiously. He knows better than to touch your hair usually, but right now, he can’t help himself. If he doesn’t hold onto something, he’s going to cum undone right there. “D-don't look at me while you do it.” He groans when you take more of his cock in your mouth, ignoring him. “Don’t wanna- ahh fuck- don’t wanna cum yet baby please.” He pleads with you as his other hand comes down to your head.

You continue sucking his cock, taking barely half of it and using your hand to make up for what can’t fit in your mouth. When your cold hand touches his balls, he bucks into your mouth, causing you to gag. “Fuck, I’m sorry I just - oh shit- you just feel so g-good baby.” He stills your head as he slowly starts fucking your throat as he whimpers and whines, ‘I’m sorry’ over and over again. You hallow your throat and flatten your tongue, swallowing around him to make sure he feels as much pleasure as he’s given you.

You are mesmerized as you watch him fall apart above you. His pale skin is covered in a pink tint while it glistens with sweat, almost looking like glitter on his skin. His eyes are hooded, with his usual clear blue being clouded with so much lust, desire, and desperation. You swear he’s drooling as he ruts himself down your throat. “Oh shit, baby, I-I’m gonna cum- ah, can I please- ahh fucking shit- wanna cum.” You gargle an answer around him, causing him to buck faster. “T-tap twice for yes, baby, please.” You tap his thigh twice, and he wastes no time, brutally using your throat to reach his climax. His head falls back as you feel ropes of cum shoot down your throat. When his hands fall away, you pull him out with a pop, working your hand over him gently. You’re shocked that after all the cum he just released that he's still rock hard. His eyes fall on you as he breathes heavily, and you open your mouth to show you swallowed all his cum.

He yanks you up, kissing you roughly as he lifts you up to wrap your legs around his hips. “Fucking nasty girl, aren’t you?” He wastes no time pushing his tip into you. Your mouth falls open as his tip stretches you out. “You got it, baby. We made sure I could fit, remember?” He gives you barely a minute before he pushes more of his cock into your tight weeping cunt. “You’re sucking me in, I can’t help myself.” He whispers as he bites your neck, pushing himself all the way in. You let out a scream at the feeling of every inch inside of you, hitting spots you’ve never felt touched before. “You take my cock so good, fuckin’ made for me.”

Your head drops to his shoulder as you hold onto him for dear life. “Move Toru, I can take it.” You whimper out, and he does just that. How can he say no to his beautiful best friend when she’s begging to be fucked? He snaps his hips into yours brutally, squeezing your ass as he fucks you with no remorse.

“Such a good fucking girl for me, takin all this dick.” He rests you against the wall so he can move a hand to your stomach, pushing on the bulge he left there. You bite his shoulder as muffled sobs leave your swollen lips. “Feelin’ me all in your tummy, baby?” He coos as you lift your head to meet his eyes. The sight of tears falling down your face does something to him, it always has. He lets out a sadistic laugh as he returns his hands to your ass before proceeding to fuck up into you while bouncing you on his cock.“Fuck baby, cry for my cock that's right.”

Every hit has him hitting your G-spot over and over, not giving it a single break. “I’m gonna ruin you for every guy after me.” He growls in your ear. “Not even your fingers or pretty little toys will satisfy you when I’m done.” You whimper as you feel your second orgasm ready to destroy you. “You’ll beg for me when you play with that pretty little pussy, always babbling dumb shit. Now it’ll be my name on repeat.” His words are so confusing but help drag you closer and closer.

You don’t even have a chance to warm him before your creaming on his cock, making a white ring around his base as he continues fucking into you. He pushes his head into the crook of your neck, leaving bite marks next to the previous ones he’s left. You squeeze him for all he has as you feel a third orgasm approaching. “Shit baby, imma cum baby. Ahhh where? W-where do you want it, princess?” Honestly… he’s gonna cum inside you, but he just wants to hear what you’ll say.

“I-inside Toru, please inside.” As soon as the words leave your mouth, he’s shooting his cum into your womb with a whine of your name and a joyful feeling. Of course, you’d want the same thing he wants. You two are obviously meant for each other, always have been, and always will be. He sits there for a bit as you both try to catch your breath.

“Do you feel better?” He whispers, gently kissing your forehead as he places your feet on the ground. You nod weakly as you lean into his chest. “Good.” He pulls out, pulling your panties out of his pocket and helping you put them on quickly before too much of his cum can fall out of you. Keeping an arm wrapped around you, he opens the cupboard under the sink and pulls out a rag you recognize from home. “I’m gonna clean you up a bit, and when we get home, I’ll properly take care of you.” He whispers as he wipes your legs from the messes you both made. He kisses your legs, fingers, and head as he helps you fix your clothes and himself.

Once you both look somewhat presentable, he pulls you into his chest. “I love you, baby girl,” he whispers as he gently kisses your lips, pulling your skirt down though it already covered you.

“I love you too, Toru.” You whisper back before he walks out of the bathroom. After taking a moment to breathe, you walk downstairs to where your Sorority Sisters are waiting for you.

“Girl, where have you been? We’ve been looking for you.”

“What do you mean? I was in the bathroom upstairs. That’s where you guys sent Toru.”

“Um, what are you talking about? Gojo never came to ask us where you were.”

“Yeah, even if he did, we didn’t know you were upstairs.”

#kinktober 2024 #black coded reader #gojo satoru x reader #satoru gojo x reader #x black reader #kinktober #x black fem reader #gojo satoru #satoru gojo smut #gojo smut

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courtingchaos · 11 months ago

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Bad Man

Steve Harrington x Fem Reader

Summary: Steve is always asking you the same question. Do you think you’ll ever give him a different answer?

A/N: hm. This one got away from me. Went in too many directions and I had a hard time settling with it. Hope you guys enjoy it all the same ❤️

Warnings: Cheating (reader has a bf), Sex, Mentions of driving drunk, Two drunk people having sex, Fingering, Unprotected Sex

NSFW 18+ No Minors

Oh and I won’t ask a single question

A question about who you’re supposed to be

I already know the answer

And the answer

Is you’re right here with me - Bad Man; Fightmaster

“When are you gonna let me take you out?” He asks, leaned over the partition of his register to smile at you. He props his chin on a folded up arm and lets the other one dangle free, his watch clacking against the wood.

“Take me out? Like on a date?”

“No.” He scoffs. “Like a hitman. Of course on a date.” He rolls his eyes, warm hazel full of mirth at his own joke. “C’mon. I know this cute little place over near Marion. Cozy, dim.” He tilts his head and watches you from under his lashes. “Perfect for a date.”

You sigh. You laugh too but the sigh is the precedent you need to set. “I’m sure it is.”

“I mean I know we’re playing this whole game of hard to get, but just admit it.” A customer comes up to his register with a baby on her hip and a handful of formula. “You’ve been got.” He winks at you before turning around to turn on his customer voice. An octave higher and a bigger grin, the lascivious one he’d been giving you gone while he coos at the infant. You bite your tongue though, holding your retort back for later. You know he’s going to corner you in the break room after you both clock out, his shoulder pressed into the row of lockers to ask you again.

“When are you gonna let me take you out?”

It’s his weekly question for you always asked with a grin and short laugh like he knows the answer is going to be different than last week. You tidy up your register and flip aimlessly through your stack of laminated grocery codes and pretend to not look up at the back of his head. He’s been out in the sun recently, lighter brown streaks shot through the darker. His fingers that run through the shaggy locks have a golden hue to them, the moles that pepper his skin dark in contrast to the glow. Broad shoulders flex under his polo and that laugh, as fake as it is, makes you smile to yourself.

So no you aren’t staring and no he isn’t taking you anywhere. A glance down at your watch tells you there’s approximately 47 minutes before you’re off. 47 minutes before you have to let him down again like he doesn’t already know.

The locker door swings shut and you laugh, something from the back of your throat. His smile is bright in the corner of your vision, teeth white and straight behind pink lips.

“What’s so funny?”

“Nothing, I just think I’m getting my psychic visions under control finally.”

“Hm.” His brow furrows before he pushes himself off the lockers. “I’ve got a friend who’s good at that, I can give you her number.”

You can’t be mad at him but you are tired. “What do you want Steve?”

“You know what I’m gonna ask.”

“And you know what I’m gonna say.”

That smile drops off his face. Shoulders relaxed while he shoves his hands into his coat pockets and he scuffs a shoe against the linoleum floor. “Can you tell me something?” He scratches at his eyebrow and squints past you.

“What?” You wonder what else he needs to know about your uneventful life.

“What does he do for you?”

“What?” You ask again and aggressively blink at him while you clutch your bag to your hip.

“What does he do for you? Like, ever.” He asks it so plainly like it isn’t some direct invasion into your life. You want to snap at him and tell him to mind his own business but you stop. It isn’t his fault that he doesn’t think this is out of line, who else do you tell first thing every work day when your boyfriend has fucked up again?

“He…he’s my boyfriend, Steve. He does a lot for me.” You yank on your bag to finalize your lame reason. “I don’t have to tell you everything he does for me.”

“No, but I don’t think you’ve ever said one positive thing about him.”

“He has so many-” You cut yourself off because you can’t even lie about that. He doesn’t have so many positives. He might have two and it’s that he’s never raised his voice at you and he doesn’t get on to you when you forget to pay the water bill on time again. Steve looks at you expectantly but you just huff at him.

“I’m not going on a date with you.” You’ve never said it like that before, so plainly. To his credit Steve doesn’t flinch, just nods his head deeply and swings his keys around his finger while avoiding your gaze.

“Understood.”

The routine of every closing shift with Steve goes the same. He shows up five minutes before he has to clock in to find you reading your last chapter in your book. He’ll compare lunches with you and you’ll talk about your leftovers and he’ll ask.

“Oh, did you make dinner again?”

Steve won’t put any feeling into that question. A simple tilt of his head, a comment about how it sounds delicious. A joke about how you should invite him and Robin to dinner some night because neither of them can cook more than mac and cheese without fear of burning something.

You’ll both head up to the front office to find your night manager and Steve will bump elbows with you on every other step. He’ll talk about the game that was on the night before and you’ll nod along. Rich, your boyfriend, also watched the game but it wasn’t as interesting as when Steve tells you. You’ll tamp that thought down though before it grows legs and runs away with your better judgement. He’ll ask about your night and when you don’t have anything to say?

“What’d you and Rich get up to then?”

The usual. He watched TV and yelled at the Packers for loosing again and you made dinner after being on your feet all day, unlike him and his office job.

“You know,” you’ll say “he’s home a full four hours before me and still didn’t take the chicken out of the freezer.”

Steve will nod and frown while he counts his till before turning on his light for the customers.

“Every night?”

“Every night! And he didn’t wash my sweater again. I swear I’m speaking friggin’ Greek some nights.”

Steve will sigh and huff along with you. He’ll bitch about his date the previous weekend, how she wasn’t interested in hearing about his hiking trip with Robin. How it seemed that it was more a pity date than anything.

“You and Rich got any plans this weekend?”

Of course not. You can’t remember the last time he took you out on a date, much less even went with you to the grocery store. Another slip up in your tales to Steve when you derail and tell him this. Barely a date night in the past year and every time you’ve brought it up it’s met with a sigh. With a hand wave and a promise for next month, when things calm down at work. When he isn’t so tired.

“What’s he working so hard for?”

You wouldn’t know if you even cared to ask. It’s in these conversations where you realize a few things. Every day gives you a new insight and Steve more fodder for his never ending question.

You like working Saturday’s with Steve because Robin usually shows up at closing and he’ll invite you out for a drink. She’s funny and he plays off of her well and by the end of the night you’ve usually forgotten that you’re probably showing up to an empty apartment.

“I’m not leaving until I see you walk in.” Robin chirps, her seat pulled too far up into the steering wheel. She’s the soberest out of the three of you and you roll your eyes at her with a giggle. “I know Rich is there but-”

“No he’s not.” Steve cuts in from the backseat. You see him shake his head in the rear view and Robin gives you an open look.

“Oh don’t get all weird with me, he’s just out with his own friends.”

“He doesn’t invite you out too?” Steve mumbles from the dark.

“Steve.” Robin warns over her shoulder.

“No, it’s okay. They get together earlier than I get off work.” You play with the zipper of your jacket and don’t make eye contact. “I don’t really like his friends anyways.”

“He should get new friends then.”

“Steve.” Robin turns her head sharply to stare into the dark backseat where her roommate sits in the shadows. There’s a silent game of chicken happening between them, something tense and unsaid and you unlock your door to try and cut the rising emotions.

“Thanks for the ride, I appreciate it.”

“Let me walk you-”

“I’m okay, thank you though.” You smile through the headrests at Steve and his insistence, his eyes glassy in the light from the street lamps. You stumble only a little on your way out of the car and once you make it to your door, darkened window greeting you like normal, you can hear the muffled volume of Steve and Robin arguing before she drives them both home.

Steve hasn’t asked you for a date in over a month. He still keeps close to you during working hours but he doesn’t hang in the break room. On Saturday he doesn’t ask you out with him and Robin and he doesn’t ask if you have any plans that weekend.

“Is Robin picking you up?” You ask timidly from inside your locker where you have your head buried, pretending to look for your wallet.

“Hm? Oh, yeah. We’re going to a friends house for a game night.” He waits for you by the door, still intent on walking you to your car. You’re waiting for him to do the courteous thing and ask if you have plans but when he stays silent you bring them up anyways.

“I actually have plans this weekend.”

“No shit?” He sounds surprised but you think you weren’t supposed to see the eye roll.

“Yeah, Rich is taking me to that little place in Marion.” You give him a big grin. “He said he heard good things, wanted to take me somewhere nice.” Deep down you want him to be jealous. You want Steve to feel a little bad for shit talking your boyfriend, even if you agreed with him. You know you shouldn’t have brought it up in the first place, none of his fuck ups or passive attitude, but maybe this could make up for it. Maybe you could show Steve you didn’t have that poor of taste.

Steve nods and bites his bottom lip. You wait for him to open his mouth to say something snippy but he lets the conversation die. He waits for you still, to walk you to your car, but when he gets you to your door he tells you to try the vodka sauce at this little restaurant and leaves you with a small wave while he hunches into the car.

Dinner is…fine.

It’s fine! Rich definitely took you to dinner and he did hold the door open for you and yeah the sauce was amazing and so what you had a brief ten minute interlude of quite between you and your boyfriend where you thought, briefly, about Steve sitting across from you and explaining the different types of pasta that his friend Eddie was learning in his culinary classes.

Then later during the quiet drive home when Rich had turned the radio over to some game he’d missed for your date you’d maybe had let your mind wander again, a wide palm that would rest on your knee and squeeze. Fingers that drift inwards with a promise for a continuation, conversation that makes you fawn and giggle and-

Steve pops up behind you while you shove your purse into your locker. “So, how was dinner?”

“It was fine!” Maybe a bit too snappy with the way he pulls his head back but you flash him a smile.

“Fine?”

“Yeah.”

He leans a shoulder on the lockers beside you, a curious look on his face. “Just fine?”

You swallow when the hand that scratches at his chin brushes your arm on the way down. “Yes Steve. It was…nice.”

“Oh now it’s nice.”

Your sigh is loud and full of exasperation. “What do you want?”

“I wanted to know how your dinner went.” He’s picking on you. That easy grin tells you everything.

“No, you want to know if he messed up somehow.”

“Maybe.”

“He was fine.”

“Oh then I could definitely do it better.”

That makes you pause. Your eyes flick between his trying to decipher his angle while you try to ignore how you can feel the heat coming off of him standing this close. “Excuse me?” It comes out quieter than you meant.

“If I take you out it isn’t gonna just be ‘fine’.” He scoffs.

“If?”

“It’s just a matter of time now.” He slides forward along the locker doors, face closer to yours, enough to feel the edge of his breath he huffs through his nose. “How many more ‘just fine’ dates do you want?” There’s a shift in his demeanor. A squaring of shoulders when he crosses his arms, his gaze softer as he looks down his nose at you.

“Steve, I-” You jump when the break room door opens and he just stands up straight to tug his shirt down before he raises an eyebrow and walks around you to head to work.

“You free tonight?” He asks you during lunch, half his sandwich shoved in his mouth.

“For what?”

“Drinks.”

“You don’t have another game night?” You try to ask it playfully but it comes off a little snooty. All throughout your date you’d caught yourself drifting and wishing you were at that stupid little hole in the wall with Robin and Steve. Once you’d realized how the night was gonna go all you could think about was Steve buying you another round, another cheep beer or the nickel shot of the night. How he’d circle his arm around to place the drink in front of you, careful to wrap himself around your back for a moment.

“Nope.” He pops the word for emphasis and gives you a dopey grin. “All free for you.”

It makes you bashful but what does he do that doesn’t? When you’re finished with your food he wordlessly grabs his trash and yours, even your empty tupperware to rinse it out.

“You don’t have to do that Steve, I have hands.”

“I’m being nice.” He hands you back the dried container. “It’s just a dish.”

But that’s the thing, isn’t it? It isn’t just a dish. His arm brushes yours on your walk back to your registers and you barely keep up with his story about the art gallery with Robin from a few days ago. Lost in the little moments of things he does for you just at work, like walking you to your car. Rinsing your dish out for you and grabbing extra stacks of bags when he’s grabbing his own. Small, minute little things that he just does without you having to ask. It’s a strange concept to you, not having to ask for the small things.

“You aren’t listening are you?” He smiles at you again without irritation or an eye roll. Another thing you haven’t had the privilege of in a long time with Rich.

“I’m not, I’m sorry.”

“Don’t worry, I’ll hold you hostage later and explain what Robin told me about the Haitian art.” He hooks an arm around your shoulders to pull you in. “All it’ll cost you is a single round.”

“Deal.”

Robin is nowhere to be found after work. The parking lot holds just a handful of cars, yours included, and no maroon beemer in sight.

“Are we meeting her there?”

“Uh, no.”

You pause with your key in the driver door. Turned away from him so you don’t have to look at him when you ask. “So just us then?”

“Mhm.”

What you should do is tell him no. Give him a ride home and then head back to your place where you can make a single serving of something and then fade away in front of the TV until your boyfriend calls you from his trip entirely too late and wakes you up.

Instead, “This isn’t a date, okay?” You get in your car and unlock the passenger side for him.

“Sure.”

“I mean it Steve.”

“That’s why you’re buying the first round.” He’s all wide grins and quiet giggles that turn infectious while you navigate to the bar. He finally has your attention so he finishes his art gallery spiel and you have to ask, it’s something that’s been burning in your back pocket forever.

“So when you go on all these dates, is Robin upset or…”

“We’re not together.” Steve sighs and shakes his head. “It really isn’t like that, we’re just friends.”

“Yeah but you two get along so well.”

“It’s…complicated.” He isn’t cutting you off but it’s the answer he’s giving you right now. “Not between us though, we really are just friends.” He points out the street you’re supposed to turn on and you have to make a quick right. “You got nothing to worry about.”

“I’m not worried.” You shoot him a glare as you park, the sudden silence when you turn off the car deafening. “First round on me, right?”

You open a tab when you get there, hellbent on paying your own way to prove to yourself that you aren’t trying to turn this into a date. It’s two friends hanging out, that’s it, and Rich wouldn’t care anyways because you’re allowed to have friends.

You buy your friend Steve a beer and he tells you about his parents retiring to Florida and you talk about your mom’s new boyfriend. Your empty barely hits the table and Steve has a cold can waiting, sliding it across the table at you.

He talks about his friends Nancy and Johnathan getting married and you vaguely mention that Rich is out of town for his brother’s bachelor party. Two shots get set down in front of you and the conversation gets louder with the music and the crowd.

You forget the lines you drew for yourself and reach a hand over to tap Steve’s leg while you’re trying to remember the next part of your story. His nose is red from the cheap whiskey but his cheeks flush when you have to use him for support when you stand, hot palm pressed into the thick of his thigh.

Steve listens to you talk about the drawing class your taking and when you think your starting to bore him he waves you off with a laugh.

“What would give you that idea?”

“I don’t know, Rich kind of drifts if it isn’t about him.” You’ve got enough liquor in your system to start bypassing your filter and you tell it like it is. “He doesn’t give a shit about my ‘stupid little class’.”

“His words or yours?” Steve asks over the rim of his beer. You just shoot him a look and take your shot with a grimace. “Well, keep going. I want to hear more about it.”

The night goes by quicker than expected and suddenly you’re drunk. You realize this while standing in the single stall bathroom while you hold yourself up over the sink to stare at your reflection.

“Get it together.” You make yourself chuckle. “Seriously, what’s going on with your mascara?” You swipe your still wet hands under your lashes to wipe away the black fallout. A moment of embarrassment when you think about Steve seeing you like that but he’d been laughing too, and the bar was dark.

“It doesn’t matter.” You point at your reflection. “He laughed at your jokes.” Your smile is florescent in this dingy bathroom for only a moment when you remember those lines you laid so carefully and then so quickly crossed. The corners of your mouth fall and you sway when you stand up too fast. You shouldn’t be here. You shouldn’t be drunk. You shouldn’t be here and drunk with only Steve.

Almost as if he’s heard your thoughts he’s knocking at the door rapid fire while a muffled voice tells him that’s the ladies room. “I know, I’m looking for my lady.” He laughs and the girl laughs and you start laughing and god you can’t keep a thought in your head now after what, 6 shots? 3 beers? You open the door and Steve greets you with a surprised face and an arm around your middle.

“See, I found her!”

“Steve,” you giggle against his shoulder while he walks you to the bar so he can pay the tab you were supposed to be picking up, “I shouldn’t drive.”

“Then I’ll drive.” He looks down his shoulder at you with hazy eyes.

“I don’t think you should drive either.” You’re slurring makes him laugh and under his right arm he reaches his left hand through to grab your fingers pulling at his coat.

“A cab then.”

“You’re so smart, you know that?” You stare at him in awe before laughing again, your fingers flexing in his grip and staying put.

Steve blushes doubly so with the alcohol and your words going to one of his heads. He whips his head to the bartender waiting for her pen back and he smiles brightly at her. “One cab please.”

You both fall into the bar top giggling while this poor bartender rolls her eyes and drops the phone in front of Steve so he can call for his own chariot.

He follows you right into the back seat and falls directly onto your side when your shoe catches on the rubber mat that lines the floorboards. The driver looks back at the two of you caught in laughter and sighs, waiting for one of you to give him an address. When you try to give Steve’s first he tuts and gives the driver yours instead, “That way I know you got back safe.” His breath tinged with cheap beer brushes your cheek, his nose almost pressing in if only you’d turn your head a little more.

“Yeah okay.” Instead you just look at him from the corner of your eye while your heart beats a hundred miles an hour. Steve adjusts as best he can, his limbs heavy with liquor so he just huffs into his corner of the bench seat, halfassed clipping his seat belt on.

“I mean it. Rich isn’t there.” Air quotes around your boyfriend’s name and a deep mocking frown accompany it.

“Steve.”

“What? You said he was gone.” He rolls his eyes but closes his mouth when he sees you getting that little notch between your brows. He drops his hand off his lap and inches it over the seat till he’s reaching out to poke your leg once. Twice when you don’t react and then hesitantly he hooks his pinky out for yours draped over your thigh.

God his hand is warm. You can feel it through your jeans where the side of it rests against you. He hooks his pinky and you don’t move a single digit on your hand for fear of turning this into something it shouldn’t be. You feel sober suddenly when it hits you where you are and with who.

“Hey.” He tugs your hand till it falls onto the seat and he can grab it. You don’t fight it, not when his voice has that gravel to it from speaking all day. “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be.”

Steve starts to let your hand go but he’s taking that warmth with him and you finally latch on to him, holding his hand down against your leg. You lean over to lay your head on his shoulder and stare out the windshield. It’s foggy out, the mist collecting on the glass to starburst the streetlights and you stay pressed against him.

The cab comes to a stop in front of your building and before anyone can say anything you finally look up at Steve. A tug on his hand and a quiet question only for him. “You wanna come up?”

The stairs try to trip you but Steve is there with a balancing hand at your hip. When you fumble with your keys he holds out his palm for them and you hope he can’t see the nerves rolling off of you. Your apartment is dark just like you expected but for the first time ever it seems to hold a promise in it, something in the shadows that doesn’t feel so sad. Behind you Steve closes the door and cuts off the light streaming in from the hallway and a switch is flicked inside you.

He’s right there when you turn around to grab the front of his coat and press your lips to his. No startled noise just his hands coming up to cradle your head. You cling to the front of him and he tries to sooth you with thumbs rubbing gently across your cheekbones.

None of this matters in the dark and you need him, need him to understand that. You turn into a flurry of movement trying to get him out of his layers. He laughs and breaks the kiss while you push at the lapels of his coat and tear at the buttons on his polo. You’ve spent months staring at the back of him, his broad shoulders and sun kissed skin. The moles that dot his neck and the chestnut hair that he’s always futzing with.

He’s running those big hands down your neck and over your shoulders.

“We don’t have to rush.” His voice cuts through the quiet hum of the appliances and runs down your spine with its deep timber. “No one else is here.”

He dips his head to kiss you again but the fervor is gone, replaced instead by a slow build of want. He pulls your bottom lip between his teeth to gently bite and you melt into his chest. Hands lay limp against him while he begins your undoing with his kisses. They trail off to your cheek and to your ear and when he’s at your jaw his jacket falls from his shoulders.

He works at your clothes methodically the same way his mouth works at your neck and when you try to tug him towards your bedroom he pauses.

“We don’t have to go in there.” He gives you a soft look, almost pitying. “The couch is just as good.” A small smile against your small frown.

“I want to.” You pull and he steps with you. “It’s my bed anyways.”

Your back hits the bed and he follows you down with laughter and roaming hands. They pull at his own clothes and yours till you finally can touch all that warm skin of his, fingertips tracing between moles on his chest inbetween sloppy kisses.

You can’t remember the last time you felt want like this. Everywhere his fingers drag feels like live wires under your skin. They dance along your collar bones and behind your knees, sensitive skin graced with featherlight touch.

“Please.” You pant while he kisses along your jaw.

“Please what?” He drags his touch up the inside of your thigh and grazes your mound, dancing around where you want him most.

“Please touch me.” Your voice wobbles with emotion, unshed tears stuck behind your lashes. The nerves of the night settle deep into your bones, deep enough you think you might shake apart with them. Long fingers split you open, a slow drag upwards till he hits that ache that you’ve been ignoring all night. Uneven circles drawn while he pants against the side of your neck, open mouthed kiss pressed into your pulse.

Deft fingers pull your pleasure forward quick, a practiced hand between your legs that rivals your own. He hasn’t come up for air since he planted his face against you, tongue and teeth working in tandem against the sensitive spot under your ear while those long fingers dip lower. You can feel his smile like a tattoo on the front of your throat when he sinks one finger in, and then two, his moan singing along with your gasp. Quickly the pads of his fingers find that spot and your knees snap together around his wrist.

“Right there?” It’s all breath in his ask, your nod vigorous. “Come on.” He grits and keeps his pace up while you spiral when he presses the heel of his palm down. “Come on baby, let go.” Teeth scrape against your neck and help to send you over the edge while you grind down on his hand firmly to chase the tails of your pleasure.

Aimless kisses help bring you back to focus along with Steve’s hands gripping you to slide you down the bed. Hooked in the bend of your hips he jerks you to him, thighs hitting his and his cock is there against you suddenly. Hot and heavy between your thighs when he leans down over you to catch your lips in a deep kiss. Short rolls of his hips make him catch on your overly sensitive clit to make your legs shake just a little more.

“Do you know how much I’ve thought about this?” He says against your mouth, sloppy and desperate as he ruts against your heat. “I think about you all the time.”

“Yeah?” You sound just as desperate, rolling hips meeting his own so he can keep nudging your clit. The tip of his cock edges lower but too slow, especially now with him staring wide eyed at you and panting.

“When you went to Marion I-fuck” He looses his composure when you sneak a hand between your bodies to help guide him, fingers wrapped around the thick length. “-I thought about crashing your date.”

You choke on your ‘what?’ when he finally sinks in and the size of him makes you gasp. He pauses for a moment when his eyes slip shut and you hold him between your thighs. When he doesn’t move you shift to get his attention and those blown out eyes find yours in the dark. Hands planted beside your head to cage you in and all you want to look at is his open expression. The grin he wears so well flashed at you while he rocks himself deeper.

“I know it’s crazy.” He half laughs as he starts a deliberate pace. “You make me feel crazy.” Every thrust is a punch of pleasure against that spot he’d found earlier. Precise and slow he drags this out so he can watch your face fall slack.

“I’m sorry.” You sob when he drives in deep and makes your eyes roll.

“No, no it’s me. You’re just-“ he hisses at your nails dragging behind his neck and up into his hair to grab fistfuls, pulling him down closer.

He takes the opportunity to kiss along your collar and mumble against your chest, slurred words only for your ears. Small bites along the swell of your breast and his long fingers rolling a nipple between his knuckles to make your breath hitch. He calls you beautiful and perfect and if you weren’t heading fast into your second orgasm you might cry from the attention.

Everything is big and hot in here. Louder and quieter at the same time. Steve holds onto you while he fucks you, hands gripping and lips searching. No marks but he lets his teeth nip at bared skin before he moves on, letting his fingers press into soft fat at the backs of your thighs and chest. You haven’t felt this kind of passion in a long time, the never ending want for more. You need him deeper, you need him to cover you completely. You want him to suck marks into your skin so you can see them in the morning and know this wasn’t you letting your fantasies get out of control again.

A faltering in his movement before he speeds up, hot breath fanning over your cheek where he kisses wetly up and down and to your ear, his quiet moans making your toes curl. It’s the deep, halting groan that pours out of him when he comes that has you clenching. He grips at you to hold you in place while you shake under him and he talks you down off your precipice. Mumbled praise and reminders of your beauty while sweat begins to cool. He doesn’t let his full weight fall on you but he does lay over your chest, skin sticking and sliding as his hand searches for yours to hook fingers together.

Beside your head you can hear him taking breath, readying to say something and you have a moment of doubt suddenly. He’s told you too much and not enough and maybe your brain is staring to catch up to your actions.

“I’m not drunk enough to say something stupid, but I need you to know something.” He uses his free hand to prop himself to hover over you, his grin skewed over his flushed cheeks. “I really like you.” A stray hair gets pushed out of your rapidly narrowing vision. His look is too soft and his wandering hand too light. It makes you shed a few tears that he seems to catch in the dim light.

“Steve…don’t…” You try to bury your face in the pillows but he’s quick to turn you back to face him.

“Don’t what? Tell you?” His grip on your chin is firm but his fingers don’t press in. He holds you still while his bloodshot eyes flick back and forth over your own. “I don’t…if you want me to leave I can do that.” It’s not a threat but it makes your heart seize regardless. “I’m just not gonna come in here and pretend like this is a one off or something.”

Knees still pressed to his hips holding him close, legs locked behind his knees where he kneels, you slide your hands up his sides for more points of contact. He’s real under your palms. Breathing and hot and sweating and telling you how he feels. The two orgasms barely hold a candle to the blossoming feeling in your stomach when he stares down at you with care.

“Steve-“

“Do you want me to stay?”

“I don’t think-“

“Yes or no.” He sits back with his arms spread wide. “I can go right now and we can pretend this didn’t happen.” He looks hurt when he says that but he holds your teary gaze. “I’ll get my shifts moved so you don’t even have to see me at work.”

You reach for him again, need him under your hands to ground you in the moment. “Don’t do that.” Face pushed into his shoulder sloppily when you rush up to meet him in the middle of your bed.

“If it makes it easier-“

“I don’t want it easier.” You hush. “I want you to stay.” A gentle tug at him to follow you back to the pillows. “Please.”

He falls easily with you, gets his arms around your shoulders to roll you into his embrace. “Okay.” Fingers over your scalp and down your neck to sooth your heavy breathing. “I’m not going anywhere.”

He smells like the bar and his soap and the remnants of cologne that cling to his jacket. Scruff from a full day rubs against your forehead while you get comfortable against his chest and presses a kiss to the top of your head. Your bedroom is quieter than normal with his heartbeat under your ear and his breathing above you, a steady hum that calms you down. You begin drifting off when the liquor catches up to your satiated brain and your fingers loose some of their grip on his sides.

You think he’s still asleep with how quiet the room is but his voice is a deep rumble in the morning after. “Robin is going to kill me.”

You can hear the rub of his palms over his face and through his hair, that deep groan when he rolls either away or towards you, you’re not sure.

You find your own voice then, creaky and worn from yelling laughter at him all night through cheap whiskey shots. “I thought it wasn’t like that.”

“It isn’t.” His long fingers creep over your shoulder to pull gently. “She told me to leave you alone.” When you don’t unwind from yourself he uses you for leverage and rolls into your back, arm snaking around your waist. “And I told her I would.” A chaste kiss pressed to the back of your neck that makes you shiver, nothing chaste in the way it makes your chest flutter. “Obviously I lied, and she’s not fond of me lying to her.”

You turn your head slowly to look at him over your shoulder, mainly trying to prevent a wave of nausea but also to hold off the inevitable guilt hanging over you from dropping like a guillotine. In the late morning rainy light he’s even more handsome, bed-warm and rumpled. His hair sticks up on one side where it was pressed into your pillow, same pillow leaving lines on his cheek. He looks soft and out of focus and warm.

You expect that guilt to bubble up and spill out of your mouth in a wail but it doesn’t exist; there is no guillotine here.

You shuffle onto your back so you can look at him more intently, so you can stare at the green flecks in his brown eyes that roam over your face. “If anyone is gonna be in trouble, I think it’s me.” Barely a wobble to your words. He slides his hand up your stomach, fingers coming to rest in the valley between your breast. No rabbit heart under his palm. No gasping breaths to steady yourself under his gaze. You’ve made your bed and you would really like to lie in it, consequences be damned.

“It was fun.”

“It was.” You blink at him slowly. Rain patters against the glass and the clock in the kitchen ticks down the rest of your day. He tucks his other arm up under his head to look at you better before he sighs.

“I can go. If it’s easier.” Repeats himself from last night but your answer hasn’t changed. You frown lightly but don’t answer and he seems to take that as his sign to get up.

“No.” You reach out for his arm before he can set his feet on the floor. “I don’t want you to go.”

He laughs through his nose before settling in an upright position. “You don’t seem convinced.” A thumb to his nose twice while he stares at a spot at the foot of your bed.

“I’m thinking.” You sit up next to him and lean into his back facing you. Cheek resting on the back of his shoulder you stare at the moles that dot his skin and run a finger between them.

“About?”

“Breakfast.”

His laugh is louder than you expect but it’s nice to hear. “Hungover?”

A dry kiss where your cheek was resting before you scoot to your side of the bed in search of your underwear. “Something like that.”

Quiet shuffling while you two get dressed, Steve wincing at the smell of the bar stuck in his shirt that he shoves over his head. When he passes you to go look for his wallet he stops to lean down for a kiss. Unhurried and soft it leaves you with that same deep want from last night, especially when he hides a grin as he turns away. Bashful like you two weren’t just drunkenly fooling around until the early morning hours.

“There’s a place just do-“

Shrill ringing cuts you off on your way to the front door and you both stop to stare at the phone hanging in the kitchen. Steve looks suddenly adrift in your apartment, unsure while probably Rich tries to call you at too early a time. You let it go until it stops and the silence sits between you until Steve clears his throat.

“You still wanna get breakfast?” Quiet now that reality has stuck its nose back in. He shifts his weight from one hip to the other and you reach over for him, hands sliding under his jacket for a loose hug.

Your smile might be sad and the turn of his chin down at you shows the shadow of doubt on his mind but you wanted this. He did too and the aftermath of your shared night sits around you. The chair out of place from running into it, your shoes kicked in front of the tv and your bed just out of sight with its sheets melting onto the floor.

Guilt doesn’t exist here. Not when Steve told you all his secrets last night. Not now with the memory of gentle kisses and burning touch still searing your skin. You’ll face the consequences tomorrow when your normal comes back into town but for now, “Yeah, I do.”

#Steve Harrington #Steve Harrington Fic #Steve Harrington Fluff #Steve Harrington Smut #Steve Harrington x Reader #My Work #My Fic

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mika-writes-fanfics · 2 years ago

Text

Make it up to you

Professor!Touya x Fem!Reader

Synopsis: You're assigned to be the teaching assistant for the new, attractive instructor at your university. His name? Professor Touya. Ever the good student, you hope to maintain a professional relationship with him and stay in good standing, but when he publicly embarrasses you in front of the entire class, all that is thrown out the window.

Warnings/tags: Colleg AU, quirkless AU, older Touya (coded to be in his 30s), female reader, student/teacher's assistant reader, professor/student relationship, dumbification, fingering, creampie, unprotected sex, multiple orgasms (female), public sex, usage of sir, public embarrassment, lots of dirty talking, messy sex

Author's note: Huge shoutout to @dabisqueen and @history-be-written for being my beta readers and giving me good suggestions. I appreciate you guys sm!!! This fic truly wouldn't have turned out the way it did without you two.

Word Count: 7.9K

“So,” Your friend turns to you, asking you in piqued interest, “Who’d the department put you with? You know who you’ll be an assistant for yet?”

“Yeah, I was told I’ve been placed with ‘Professor Touya Todoroki’,” you answer. The name is completely unfamiliar to you, though, you’re hoping she has at least heard of him before.

It’s your turn to ask her a question, and you choose to say, “Have you ever had him?”

Much to your dismay, she shakes her head no.

“Nope, never had him,” she replies. You frown slightly at her answer. Turning to your friend’s roommate, you hope to find that she has had some sort of interaction with him.

“What about you? Have you had him before?” You question her. Just like your friend, she shakes her head, much to your disappointment.

“I haven’t,” shesays. “I don’t even think anyone else has talked about him before either. I’ve never heard his name in my life.”

Damn.

You were wanting to hear your peers' experience with your soon to be ‘boss’ of sorts, so that you could prepare yourself, but it seems you’re shit out of luck. You’ll just have to go in blind.

“You know, they hired a new professor this semester. It might just be him,” your friend points out. She smiles at you mischievously before adding, “And rumor has it, he’s hot as fuck.”

“Ooooh, how lucky. I’m jealous,” your friend’s roommate giggles. You scoff at the reaction.

“No reason to be. He’s my professor, ‘s not like I can, you know, do anything with him,” you counter.

You check your phone, seeing that the time to meet the new professor has come. “I gotta head over to his office before his lecture starts. I’ll catch you around.”

“See you later then. Have fun~” your friend farewells in a singsong voice.

You chuckle at her antics and make your way over to the department building and to his office. When you get there, you stop to peer through the window on his office door, trying to see if he’s inside. Luckily, he’s there, looking down at a paper in his hand, unaware of your presence.

You notice right away he doesn’t look like the rest of the university staff. He looks quite a bit younger than the rest of the aging faculty. Though, he was still a couple years your senior, in his early thirties at least. What makes him really stand out to you, apart from his piercing cyan eyes and dark, shaggy hair, is the way he dressed. He’s wearing tight black jeans, a form-fitting white button up, an expensive wristwatch, and black Converse. You can’t help but admire his intense, blue eyes as he studies the sheet of paper in his hand, too focused to notice your staring. Your eyes travel the expanse of his face, taking in his features.

You remember your friend’s words, her little comment echoing in your brain. ‘Rumor has it, he’s hot as fuck,’ you’re reminded. For once, it seems her gossip is true. Even you can’t deny it; Professor Todoroki is very attractive.

But you won’t act on your feelings, you can’t. You’re supposed to be his assistant after all! And so, with that thought in your mind, you snap yourself out of your daze. You take a deep breath, steeling your nerves and suppressing your desires, before knocking on the door.

He looks up from his papers and glances at you through the window in the door, before beckoning you inside his office. You swing open the door and take a few tentative steps into the room. He quickly looks you up and down, just for a split second, only for his eyes to settle back on your face and look at you expectantly. You hate how his overt glance at your body flusters you and makes you feel hot all over.

“Excuse me, are you Professor Todoroki?” You ask with a soft voice.

“Yep, that’d be me. Although, you can just call me Professor Touya. I don’t use my father’s last name,” he explains. His deep, smoky voice worsens your nervousness. The way his voice drawls has butterflies swarming in your stomach. He tosses the papers he was reading off to the side and approaches you, smirking down at you. “But what can I do for you, sweetheart?”

The pet name is something you’re surprised to hear coming from your professor. It borders dangerously on unprofessional, and yet, you find yourself letting it slide. Hearing him say something like that to you sends a wave of heat between your legs.

Keeping your cool around him is not going to be easy, especially if he keeps calling you that.

You start by introducing yourself and telling him your name before continuing. “I’m sure the department informed you already, but I’ll be your TA for this next semester,” you start. “I look forward to working with you.”

He hums in response.

“So you’re my little assistant? Gonna help me with all the long hours grading, hm?” He asks.

“Yes sir,” you answer. There’s a darker expression that flashes on his face, but it passes just as quickly as it appeared. He narrows his eyes slightly and lazily leans against his desk, supporting his weight using his forearms. Underneath the fabric of his button-up, you can see the muscles of his arms flexing.

Oh god.

He’s fucking ripped too.

“You know, the other faculty told me about you,” he mentions. You can’t help but quirk up at the comment, feeling curious. What did the other teachers say about you?

“Nothing bad, I hope,” you joke.

“They all said you were a good student. Never a rule breaker, always professional. Top of your class too, I heard,” he starts. It fills you with a sense of pride and accomplishment, to hear your hard work has gotten you some recognition. You’re practically preening at the praise. And yet, it feels like there’s something else he wants to add. He straightens up and leans off of his desk. The space between you closes as he stands dangerously close to you.

“But there’s one thing I think they got wrong,” he counters.

You tense up as your mind reels. His voice lowers and he adds, “I’m willing to bet you’re not as good as they say you are.”

Your brow twitches in annoyance at his bold claim. Just who does he think he is?

You clench your jaw, biting down the urge to snap back. He’s your superior. You can’t just yell at him and let him have it, not this early in the semester at least. Thus, you settle for tense questioning. “And just what is that supposed to mean?”

“I guess we’ll find out,” he insinuates and takes a step back. The distance between the two of you gives you space to breathe, space to fume. “We’ll meet an hour before class to go over the lesson plan. I give a lot of tests over the semester, so come by every afternoon to help with grading.”

Oh great.

You’ll be spending most of your week nights with this hot asshole.

“Understood?” He asks. His cobalt eyes bore into yours as he looks at you expectantly, waiting for your response.

“Yes sir,” you answer flatly. Despite your lack of enthusiasm, he seems to grin at your agreement.

“Hm, sir. That’s not something I’m used to hearing from my students,” he teases. There’s a darker look in his eyes that disappears as quickly as you notice it. “Your underclassmen tend to be more… casual around me.”

“And does that bother you?” You ask, suddenly feeling a bit awkward at your apparent odd choice of words.

“No,” he says, quickly denying it. His voice seems to drop an octave, and he adds, “I prefer it, actually.”

There seems to be something off about the situation, something greater lying behind the surface of his words, but you can’t seem to figure out what greater meaning lies underneath something as simple as an honorific to him.

The tension is broken after he clears his throat and leans off of the desk upon looking at the clock. “But enough of that,” he starts. “Our first lecture is scheduled to start soon. Let’s start talking about the lesson plan.”

If there’s one thing you've learned about Professor Touya over the course of the next few weeks, it’s that he’s both fun to talk to yet incredibly strict. He has a penchant for teasing you and the two of you often banter with one another, but despite the growing bond forming between the two of you, he still insists on you calling him sir.

You suppose he still wants to maintain at least a bit of an aura of professionalism between the two of you. And so, despite how awkward it feels, you continue to address him as such, unaware of the little quirk in his smirk that always follows.

In speaking with him and sitting in during his lectures, you find yourself being intrinsically drawn to him like a moth to a flame. You reason it’s because you admire his remarkable intelligence, amongst other enigmatic qualities.

He’s driven. Witty. Mysterious. Captivating, even.

With how much he has going for him, it’s no mystery why the university hired him; he’s easily one of the brightest minds in his field, and an engaging professor as well. You could learn from him.

Yeah.

That’s all it is.

You just want to learn from him, is all.

That’s why you’re gravitating to him.

You don't want to think about him outside of class.

You don’t want to think about the way his attractive smirk gives you butterflies.

You don’t want to think about kissing those soft lips of his as you stare at him speaking.

And you definitely don’t want to think about his fingers descending down your body and touching your aching core.

You try to avoid thinking about those less than pure daydreams you have about him, both out of self respect for yourself, considering the insulting implication he threw at you during your first meeting, and out of aversion to entertaining lewd ideas about your professor. However, despite this conscious decision, your subconscious has other plans. You find yourself often stealing glances his way, admiring his attractive features, much to your own dismay.

Today is another instance of your subconscious betraying you, and your eyes are now fixated on him, taking in the frustrated scrunch in his brow and tensed shoulders. He abruptly stops setting up the presentation on the computer and walks over towards the windows in the classroom. In an attempt to get respite from the rising heat in the room, he cracks open all the windows.

“You’d think with the high tuition they’d have enough money to fix this damn AC already,” Professor Touya scoffs. The building’s lack of cool air is a well-known problem, which is why you wore such a thin, short dress today in the first place. It was too damn hot to show up to class wearing much else.

He sighs in annoyance as he unbuttons the cuffs of his shirt and rolls up the sleeves, revealing something that has your breath hitch in your throat. They start from his wrists and travel up his arms. Shades of purple and blue accent his black ink work, the hues of blue matching his mysterious, cerulean-colored eyes. From what you’re able to discern, his tattoos go even farther than just his forearms. You wonder just how many he has, and where. The curiosity makes your mind entertain some less than pure ideas, picturing his bare skin and imagining just what kind of ink work he hides underneath his clothes. You try to reign in these fantasies of yours, but you’re too busy drooling over him.

Too busy to even notice that he’s caught you staring.

He smirks to himself upon seeing you ogling him. His hunch was right, there was something more between the two of you; an unspoken, mutual sexual tension. Though, you seem to be fighting your apparent attraction to him, he could see it in the way you quickly caught yourself and looked away, avoiding looking at him much more at all. He’s hoping he can change that. Maybe he can make you see there’s no shame in it. He’d be more than happy to indulge your naughty fantasies.

He lazily glances at the clock, seeing how the scheduled lecture will start shortly. It’s then that he remembers something. He leans closer to you and taps the desk, startling you and flustering you with his sudden closeness, and requests, “Hey, I had some handouts for today’s class printed out upstairs. Will you go pick them up for me?”

“Yes sir, I can do that,” you agree.

“Thanks, sweetheart,” he says. And with that, you leave the class and head to the printing room. Shortly after you leave, a couple students trickle into the room, all belonging to the same close-knit clique of fraternity members. They each take their usual seats and continue to talk amongst themselves freely. Their conversation is painfully loud. He can hear them all the way from the front of the classroom, even though they sit far in the back.

“Aw man, that hot TA isn’t here today,” one of the frat boys bemoans. “She’s usually around before class.”

“Fucking bummer,” another complains. “Was hoping to get her number.”

“Yeah, wouldn’t mind getting a piece of that,” the other agrees. “She’s a total fucking nerd but I bet she’d be a decent fuck.” They all loudly laugh at that comment and continue making their comments about you.

He knows their type, and just how it would end for you should you associate with them. Besides the fact that they’re all idiots and that alone would be enough to disappoint you, you would be wasted on them. Those frat boys wouldn’t know what to do with a girl like you. They wouldn’t know how to make you cum. They wouldn’t make you completely dumb with pleasure. There’s just something special about getting a normally smart girl to completely fall apart for him, to give a girl so much pleasure that everything else melts away. And truthfully, he wants to take you there. He wants to see just what it would take to fuck you stupid. He has to know, just how much pleasure does it take to turn your brain to mush.

His desire for you is why these frat boys irk him so much. They casually talk about seducing you into their bed like you’re an easy lay. But the fun that comes with you is the cat and mouse game, the deliberation in your brain between suppressing your attraction towards him and wanting to cave into your own desires. Your little errand couldn’t have come at a better time. He’s glad you’re not here to give them an opportunity to make a move on you, but he can’t keep sending you away before class starts to spare you the misfortune of these idiots making a pass at you.

No.

He needs to send a little message to the competition.

And lucky for him, he’s got just the idea.

More students start filing in as he makes his plans. He has everything thought out, and all that is left is the final piece: you. But shortly before Professor Touya starts the lecture, you make it inside the classroom, papers in hand. You attempt to start passing out the handouts, when he stops you in your tracks. He takes the stack of sheets from your hands and haphazardly tosses them aside.

“I thought they needed that for today?” You ask, thrown off by the apparent change in plans.

“Nah, we’ll just have them copy the diagram themselves for today. I saw some research that suggested it helps more with memorization. You’ve seen their test grades, the students need all the help they can get,” he lies. You can’t help but genuinely chuckle at his light jab at his own students. As much as you think it’s a waste to discard the handouts– if Professor Touya believes it’ll help the students, you won’t argue with him.

“Alright, whatever you say, sir,” you laugh. The lecture starts as it normally does and follows the previously discussed lesson plan, until it comes time to show the students the diagram. He turns to you mid-lecture, about to ask you for some sort of assistance.

“You’ve got better art skills than me. Draw this diagram. Top of page ninety,” Professor Todoroki instructs. He slides over his copy of the textbook, pages turned to a rather complicated figure. It’s far too much information to draw from memory.

“Sure thing,” you answer. You pick up a marker and uncap it, before holding the textbook in the crook of your arm. You’re about to start copying the figure near the bottom of the board when he interrupts you.

“Ah, I’m going to write more notes there in a minute. Why don’t you put it over here instead?” He points far up the whiteboard to some blank space tucked in the upper corner. Your stomach sinks at seeing where he wants you to place the diagram. You’re regretting wearing such a short dress today. But still, short dress or not, you have to do this. Maybe… Maybe you can manage it, without flashing the entire class?

Without much of a choice, you study the diagram, balancing the heavy textbook in one hand while you reach up the whiteboard with a dry-erase marker in hand. You start to stand up on the tips of your toes and you try to aim for a slightly closer area of blank space, all the while your mind is preoccupied with the hem of your skirt. You’re dangerously close to accidentally erasing all of his previous notes, something you’re not too keen on doing given his strictness.

“Having trouble?” Professor Touya teases, with an amused grin on his face.

“No, ‘m fine,” you lie. Not that you would admit it to him, but it’s more than just a bit awkward to both hold onto the book and stand up high to draw the figure.

“Here, let me,” he insists. He comes up behind you, his crotch just barely brushing against your ass. Your breath gets caught in your throat at your body involuntarily stiffens. You internally cringe at how something so simple as a passing touch makes your body feel hot.

He plucks the textbook from your hands, allowing you a bit more freedom of motion to stand up higher and draw with precision. He sidles up next to you and holds the book open for you. Still, even with his help, it’s still hard to draw exactly where he wants you to. Your dress already feels rather high on your legs as is, you’re sure disaster would happen should you stand up higher.

“Come on, you’re almost there, just stand up a little more,” he encourages and goads. You almost jolt when you feel a warm hand touch your waist, egging you on to push the envelope just a little further. Not wanting to disobey him, you do as he says, though the regret is instant. The skirt of your dress hikes over your hips and reveals the curve of your ass. A sharp, hushed silence sweeps over the room. Your ears feel like they’re burning and tears are welling up in your eyes at the sheer humiliation you feel in this moment. You draw the figure anyways, albeit carelessly and sloppily.

You just want this to be over.

But since your back is turned to the class, you’re completely unaware of the silent exchange happening between Professor Touya and the frat boys in the back row. While you are doing as he asked, ever his obedient assistant, he’s busy glowering at his competition.

The message is clear.

You are off limits.

When the diagram is finally drawn, you straighten back out and place your feet flat on the ground. You should be a bit relieved when your dress finally covers your body once more, but you’re unable to feel that respite. The damage is done, and you’re now left to simmer in your own embarrassment.

“Is that all you needed from me, sir?” You ask, voice barely above a whisper and thick with emotion. There’s a lump in your throat forming as you fight back the urge to cry.

“Yeah, that’s all, sweetheart,” he answers, in a manner that’s almost a subtle attempt at soothing you. You let out a shaky, uneven breath.

“Okay,” you say through a tense sigh. Your voice cracks when you speak once more, “I-I’ll be in your office to… get started on grading.”

You dismiss yourself and nearly rush out of the classroom, all too eager to distance yourself from the source of your shame. Once you’re in the safety of the hallways, you freely let the tears flow down your face. You’re at least thankful the halls are somewhat sparse, meaning that few are able to see you fall apart like this. The last thing you can handle emotionally is someone asking you what happened or if you were okay. Talking about it would just make the humiliation much more real.

When you finally reach Professor Touya’s office, you close the blinds on his door behind you and prop yourself up against the desk with your hands. You try to recollect yourself, to no avail. Your shame just eats away at you. But at least with his office so far out of the way of all other classes and the blinds drawn down, no one can see you fall apart like this. You can stew in your emotions somewhat privately, at least until Professor Touya gets back.

Professor Touya.

You want to sneer at the thought of him. The more you think about what happened during the lecture, the more you can’t help but assume he wanted to embarrass you on purpose, like the asshole he is. He enjoys toying with you too much, but this time, he really went too far. You think you’ve been much too cordial with him. When he gets back, you swear you’ll give him a piece of your mind. Fuck professionalism, that was thrown out the window when he forced your hand and caught a peek up your dress.

Speak of the devil, or rather, think of the devil, and he appears. More time than you thought must have passed while you were smoldering in your feelings, as Professor Touya leisurely strolls into his office, now apparently finished with the lecture. You wipe your tears on the back of your hand, trying to make yourself look a little less weak in front of him and steeling your nerves to tell him off.

“So what the hell was that about, huh? Why do you get off on being an absolute dick to me? I know you did that shit on purpose,” you accuse. He makes his way over to you and stands in front of you, partially caging you against the desk. The close proximity to him makes you feel hot with what you assume is indignation.

Yeah, that’s what this feeling is.

You despise him.

He doesn’t say anything, instead choosing to let you vent out your frustrations, taking the spite you hurl at him. You’re very much angry at him, filled with so much frustration that your voice is unsteady as you yell, “You’re such a fucking ass. And for what! I did nothing to you, I’ve been nothing but helpful and polite. What could possibly make you want to humiliate me like that? What have I done to make you hate me like this?”

“Oh sweetheart, I don’t hate you,” he soothes. His voice sounds much more husky when he adds, “Quite the opposite, actually.”

“Well I still think you’re an asshole for that little stunt you pulled, even if it wasn’t because you hated me,” you counter, speaking in between breaks in your voice. There’s still tears breaking past your lash line as a consequence of feeling so heated. Your emotions are only further worsened by the confusion you feel. If it wasn’t a malicious attempt to knock you down, why would he do such a thing to you?

“I know, I know,” he agrees. “How about I make it up to you then?”

“How could you possibly make it up to me?” You question as your voice cracks under the weight of your emotions. You move to wipe your face when he beats you to the punch, brushing away the tears falling down your cheek with his thumb. His hand stays on your face and he tilts your chin to him, angling your face closer to his.

“Well, I could start by making you feel good, give you something else to think about,” he insinuates. Your breath gets caught in your throat at his implication. “I know you feel it too, this tension between us. I’d love to indulge your fantasies about me, if you’d let me.”

You part your lips, searching for the right words and the strength to reject him, but with his face hovering tantalizingly close to yours, lips mere inches away, you realize you don’t have it in you.

Fuck.

You want him so bad.

“P-please,” you whisper. He has a shit eating grin on his face at your meek and embarrassed begging.

“What was that? You’ll need to speak up, sweetheart, I can’t hear you,” he teases. You swallow the lump in your throat, and lock eyes with him.

“Please, make me feel good,” you say again, this time with a little more conviction.

“Atta girl,” he praises. And with your agreeance, he closes the distance between the two of you and slots his mouth against yours. A gasp escapes you at the feeling of his lips working against your own. Your yearning and daydreaming didn’t prepare you for the intensity of this, for the pure wanting behind every movement of his lips.

The kiss becomes more and more heated as he presses his body further against yours, leaving little space between the two of you. His tongue dips out from his mouth and runs along the seam of your lips and you part slightly, allowing him the space to slip the wet muscle inside. You find yourself shuddering at the contact and gripping onto the fabric of his button up as a way to tether yourself in this moment. It’s almost a bit embarrassing just how much you’re melting into his touch from something as simple as kissing. Your body is eating it up regardless, sending waves of warmth throughout your entire being and pooling between your legs.

“Can I touch you?” He asks, after parting from the kiss, his breath fanning over your lips. Although you’ve been dreaming about this moment, and you desperately want to feel his touch all over you, your mind can’t help but chime in; you shouldn’t.

You really shouldn’t.

But with his hardening cock pressing up against your stomach and professionalism now abandoned, you throw caution to the wind and give in. You give him a nod and allow his hands to roam over your body. It’s almost dizzying to feel his touch, especially when his hands palm your chest and grope your ass, squeezing the plush flesh in his hands. He dives back in to press his lips up against yours in an intense, crushing kiss once more. You whimper against him, flustered at the feeling of his hot touch over your clothes. You’re becoming drunk on lust just from touches alone.

Your arousal is heightened as the hands at your ass trail to the front, reaching your hips, before snaking up your dress. His fingers press against your clothed mound. He smirks into the kiss upon feeling the wetness already clinging against the fabric.

You whine at the loss of friction when his fingers pull back, but the absence of his touch is short-lived. He hooks his fingers under the waistband of your panties and tugs the clothing down your thighs. You part your legs to allow him to completely rid you of them, leaving your cunt now bare before him. You’re glad the blinds on his door are drawn, preventing anyone else from seeing the debauched sight of your panties on the floor in front of your professor.

The pads of his fingers teasingly trace up your inner thighs, slowly inching bit by bit up your legs and making his way to your aching core. You let out an involuntary gasp when he finally grazes your pussy, his touch now no longer separated by a layer of clothing.

His fingers run up and down your folds, spreading your juices over yourself and teasingly avoiding sinking into your eager hole. You squirm and jolt every time the tips of his fingers brush against your clit. His warm touch on your engorged bundle of nerves sends jolts of pleasure up your spine. The embarrassment and shame melts away into pure, unadulterated desire with every drag of his fingers over your slit, leaving you wetter and wetter. Your slick coats his fingers as he grazes over your hole. He looks down to see his skin glistening with your wetness, causing him to suck in a breath at the sight.

Realizing he’s teasing himself by waiting any longer, he decides to give you what you’ve been wanting. Two fingers finally dip inside of your heat, slowly at first. You let out a breathy moan as his digits sink into you. When they bottom out inside of you, you want to squirm at how full you feel with just his fingers alone. They’re the perfect combination of long and thick, stretching out your cunt with ease.

A sharp inhale escapes you when he slowly pulls out, almost entirely, before pumping back inside of you. He sets an agonizingly slow pace at first as he watches your every reaction, studying what movements and angles have you panting for him. Ever observant, he effortlessly finds your most sensitive spots and hones in on them before quickening his pace.

Your legs tremble and shake with every harsh thrust of his fingers, bringing you closer and closer to cumming with little effort on his part. He knows just how to curl them up, just how to press the ball of his hand against your clit, just how to get you panting for him. The relentless pumping of his fingers in and out of your hole sends floods of wetness to your core, coating his fingers with your slick. Moans loudly tumble out of your mouth when he slips another into your heat. Though as much as he’s enjoying hearing your slutty moans, he seems distracted.

He puts his palm over your mouth and leans into your ear. “Shhh, someone’s coming,” he hushes. “Might wanna quiet down unless you want your classmates to barge in and see your pussy full with my fingers.”

You don’t have to see him to know he’s smirking at the comment, feeding off of your apparent embarrassment. The sounds of footsteps and talking nears closer and closer to the door. Knowing your classmates are nearing the door while your legs are obscenely spread for your professor and stuffed full of his thick fingers makes you feel hot with humiliation and overwhelmed with panic, but the pleasure Touya gives you is too much to give up. And so, you bite back your moans in an attempt to stay completely silent. Your body tenses with the risk of getting caught, causing you to clench down even tighter around his fingers. But even though you’re desperately fighting back the urge to whine and wail for him, with very obvious strain, the bastard keeps pumping in and out of you. You just hope the sound of wet squelching isn’t audible through the door.

“I can’t see in, the blinds are closed. Is he not here today?” A student asks, her question partially muffled through Touya’s office door.

“No, he’s here. My roommate just left his class a while ago,” another student replies. The door knob jiggles as she tries to open the door. You hold your breath, expecting it to swing open and to be caught in the act.

Only, it never happens.

The knob refuses to yield to the student’s attempts. She mutters out of frustration, “Damn, must be in a meeting right now. His office is locked.”

“Huh, I guess we’ll come back tomorrow,” the other classmate shrugs.

You sigh in relief, letting some of the tension dissipate. So long as you’re quiet, you can make it through this without anyone knowing what went on in his office. Still, even that is proving to be a challenge with the way his fingers continue to slam in and out of your pussy. Your knuckles turn white as you grip onto the desk like it’s your lifeline, pouring all your urge to moan into tensing your hands. His half-lidded, cobalt eyes stay trained on your face, seemingly searching for something, while a lazy and smug expression plasters his own face.

A change in the angle of his fingers sends shockwaves of pleasure through your body and a stifled squeal wrangles past your lips. He snickers at your failed attempts at staying quiet. You instantly feel yourself sweating, either from the anxiety or from quickly racing towards your peak, you’re unable to discern. Hopefully the students didn’t pick up on it.

Much to your horror, one of the students speaks, “Wait, did you hear that?”

“No? What’d you hear?” The other asks in confusion. You cringe, worrying that their curiosity will lead to your social downfall. If they know someone is in there, they’ll demand you answer them. Should that happen, you’re sure Professor Touya will make you answer the door. Not only that, but with the way he’s eating up your embarrassment, you worry he’d make you answer their questions, all the while he still fingers you out of view.

“It was like… a squeak or something,” she explains.

“Might have been a mouse, this building is super old ya’ know,” the other offers.

The suspicious student laughs and says in disgust, “Ew, let’s just get the hell out of here. Lab starts in 5 minutes anyways.”

You can’t seem to hear the sound of their footsteps leaving over the sound of your heartbeat in your ears and the wet noises of your cunt gushing around his fingers. Evidently, Touya hears. “They’re gone, sweetheart,” he whispers against the shell of your ear. The feeling of his breath against your ear has you shuddering in response. His hand retracts from your face, no longer muffling your sounds. “Since we’re alone again, why don’t you let me hear those loud, slutty sounds of yours, yeah?”

He starts to mouth your neck, intermixing his kisses with rougher bites against the delicate skin of your throat, leaving behind blooms of teeth marks and hickeys in his wake. It’s almost as if he wants everyone on campus to talk, like he wants your classmates to know you slept with him; the marks all over your neck damning evidence of your hookup. The sensation of his lips all over you and the curving of his fingers against that bundle of nerves inside you has you keening for him, whines now freely escaping your mouth.

“A-ah, feels so good,” you moan with a drawn out voice. He thrusts his fingers in and out of you in earnest, spurred on by your sweet sounds echoing in his office. You let out a choked noise upon feeling him speed up, and your walls clench down on his fingers, sucking them further into your heat. He can tell you’re quickly nearing your peak with the way your pussy flutters around him, contracting wildly.

He pulls away from your neck and mutters against your skin, his breath fanning over the sensitive flesh, “Yeah, my fingers fucking your cunt feel that good? Gonna come on fingers then?”

The sound of his deep voice spewing such filthy words pushes you over the edge. Your orgasm crashes into you like a harsh wave, stealing your breath away at the impact. You loudly moan as your cunt contracts around his fingers, all the while he continues to pump in and out of you, working you through your release. True to his orders, you gush around him, and your slick freely leaks from your sensitive hole. He finally relents and pulls out of you when you squirm from the overstimulation, attempting to wriggle away from the excessive pleasure. A pleased smirk paints his face upon seeing his fingers glisten with your wetness in the light. The sight gives him an idea, one that goes straight to his cock just at the thought.

“Open up,” he commands. The fingers wet with your juices hover over your lips, waiting for you to follow his demands. You shyly part your lips, allowing his fingers to slip into you. The tang of your own slick touches your tongue and you hold eye contact with him as your mouth closes around his fingers.

The feeling of your tongue swirling around his digits and the sight of your lips closing around him has his mind racing. He can’t help but think of how your mouth would feel on his cock and how filthy you would look on your knees for him, pretty face nestled against his pelvis and teary doe eyes looking up at him. But he’ll save that for another time.

He needs more than just your mouth right now.

Once his fingers are sufficiently cleaned off by your tongue, he pulls them out. He surges forward and kisses you, sliding his tongue past your lips. The taste of you still lingers in your mouth. He lewdly moans into the kiss, feeling that much hornier upon sampling your taste.

“Shit,” he curses against your lips after pulling back. “You taste so good.” He dives back in, passionately kissing you once more and tangling his tongue with yours. “Fuck, sweetheart. I’d bend you over this desk and devour this cunt, but I’m just dying to be inside you.”

“I need it, I want it too. Please, take me,” you beg. Never once did you anticipate you’d be begging for your professor to fuck you in earnest. Never once did you think you’d see the smirk on his face at your lewd pleading. And you certainly didn’t believe you’d ever feel his hands slide under your dress and lift it over you, unclasping your bra along with it, leaving you bare before him.

He pulls back from you and starts to unbuckle his belt. The sound of the metal clinking in the room makes your ears burn at the lewdness and your pussy clench in anticipation. He frees himself from the confines of his dark jeans, leaving you salivating at the sight of him.

You want to drool upon seeing how he’s quite thick and long, with prominent veins running along his shaft. You’re then pushed down flush against the top of his desk, splayed over a mess of papers, and he hooks one of your legs over his shoulders. Your breath hitches when he positions his cock in between your folds with his other hand and runs the head up and down your slit, collecting the slick dripping from you and lubing his cock.

He locks eyes with you as he finally pushes the tip in, relishing in your expression as he slowly slips in, inch by inch. Meanwhile, your full attention is focused on the way his thickness stretches you out and how the veins on his shaft drag against your walls as he sinks into you. You feel a bit breathless when he finally bottoms out and his tip kisses your cervix.

He starts to pull his hips back until his cock nearly slips out, before pushing back into you and filling you up once more. You feel completely stuffed. True to his words, you can’t think about anything else, the embarrassment you felt frowning more and more distant in your mind and being replaced by sheer, mind numbing pleasure.

But when he really starts rutting in and out of you?

Your brain is filled with cotton. He can tell by the way your eyes glaze over and soft moans sound from your parted, panting lips that he’s slowly fucking you stupid. It fills him with a bit of pride to see you being reduced to a brainless, horny mess for him, and the realization goes straight to his cock.

“T-touya,” you stammer and moan upon feeling his thrusts increase in tempo. You never called him by his first name before, but now that he’s inside of you, it was reasonable for you to believe the two of you are well past formalities.

“It’s still sir to you,” he growls, correcting your slip up. He punctuates his statement with a hard and deep thrust, making you sharply gasp. His stern voice draws a shudder out of you and you find yourself clenching down on him.

“‘M sorry, s-sir,” you apologize. You can feel his cock throb in your walls at the honorific. Even through your lust clouded mind, you put the pieces together.

Oh.

That’s why he liked you calling him sir.

“Yeah, that’s better,” he breathes. “Like the sound of that out of your mouth more than my name. Keep it up, sweetheart.”

Spurred on by your words, he hooks your other leg over his shoulder, slightly raising you off of the desk and angling his thrusts to hit even deeper inside of you. You grip onto the edges of the table as he fucks into you harder.

He’s canting into you so deeply and sharply that the desk shakes with every harsh clap of his hips against your thighs. Papers scatter onto the floor, picture frames fall flat on the table top, pens spill out of their holders and clatter onto the ground, all the while he chases one goal: to make you a stupid, incoherent mess from his cock.

His pace quickens and you bite down on your knuckle in an attempt to muffle your whines and moans, not wanting to fill the entire wing of the building with the sounds of sex. You feel the pleasure rapidly building as he hammers into you, pressing up against that sponges bundle of nerves along your walls. It’s easy to tell he is feeling the same, as more and more deep moans and curses tumble from his lips while he ruts into you. The sound of his voice moaning out for you combined with the angle of his cock pushes you to the verge of orgasming.

“Hah, fuck. ‘M close. Wanna cum, sir. Please make me cum,” you desperately beg. He throbs at your dumbified state and from the word sir coming out of your mouth.

Shit, he’s getting close too.

“Yeah? You gonna make a mess all over these papers then?” He asks, amid pants. He becomes drunk at just the thought of you cumming and dripping all over his cock. It sends a shock wave of pleasure straight between his legs and he rambles on, “Think you can squirt f’me too?” His hips brutally snap into yours, giving you the friction you need to finally be pushed over the edge.

“Yes, yes, yes, yes, fuck!” You chant, slurring each of your words in drunken pleasure. You finally fall apart with a silent scream, and just as he was hoping, you gush around him.

“That’s it, cream all over my fucking cock, sweetheart,” he encourages. Strings of your slick cling to his cock and snap with every clap of his pelvis against your skin. He continues to thrust in and out of you, recklessly chasing his own release as you lay below him, now teetering on the edge of overstimulation.

Your pussy clamping down on him and your walls fluttering finally pushes him over. His hips stutter and he cums with a deep groan, painting your insides white.

He stills, momentarily keeping his cock nestled in your walls, as he lowers your legs back down against the desk. Slowly, he pulls out of you, glancing down between your legs to see your combined releases leaking out of your hole. He watches, eyes transfixed, as his seed slowly starts seeping out of you and pooling on the sheets below.

The two of you really did a number on his desk, and his entire office, for that matter. You lay there on the table, dazed and panting, attempting to catch your breath and come back down from your high. He can’t help but smugly chuckle at your dumbified state, before he tucks himself back into his pants.

“What a mess you’ve made,” he teases. He walks off and heads to the door, about to leave, when he turns over his shoulder and adds, “Make sure to clean up after yourself.”

You steal a glimpse at the wrecked state of the desk, partially horrified at the wetness pooling between your legs and onto the assignments and handouts. You stare at the wet spots on the sheets of paper.

Fuck.

Maybe it’ll dry off.

You hope so, at least.

Your face burns when you walk into his classroom the next day. You make eye contact with him as you go to stand near the computer, bringing up the PowerPoint for the lecture. The situation is more than just awkward.

How do you proceed from here?

You’re not even sure what to say to him, if you’re supposed to greet him as usual. Your mouth feels dry from nervousness, and you take a drink from your water bottle. A student then walks up to Professor Touya, thankfully taking the heat off of you to speak to him.

“Professor Touya?” The student starts, preparing to ask him some sort of question.

“Yes, what is it?” He answers.

“Did you spill something on my papers?” The student confronts. You choke on your drink as he presents his graded assignment that looks to be partially sullied by water damage, only you and Professor Touya both know- that is definitely not water.

“Hm, good question. I’m not sure, my TA graded most of these,” he deflects, feigning ignorance. He thinks for a moment, before snapping his fingers and saying, “You know what? Why don’t you ask her? She might know what happened.”

To your horror, the student takes his suggestion, turning to you and interrogating, “What is this? Is this milk?”

“Haha, yeah. Milk. It’s just milk,” you force out. You wish you could crawl into a hole and disappear at this moment from the sheer amount of embarrassment you feel. You awkwardly apologize, “Um, sorry about that.”

“I mean, it’s okay I guess. Accidents happen,” the student shrugs.

“Alright, if that’s all, we have to set up for today’s lecture. If you’ll excuse us,” Professor Touya intervenes. The student then walks off to take his seat as other students start trickling in. With the student now out of earshot, you confront him.

“I hate you so much right now,” you say. “That was so embarrassing!” He chuckles at your situation, evidently very entertained by your dismay.

But as much as this circumstance embarrasses you, you can’t help but want more of last night, ruined papers be damned. Feeling bold, you ask, “Make it up to me?”

He gives you a cocky smirk, thrilled to know you want to be fucked dumb yet again. “Sure thing, sweetheart,” he agrees. “I’ll be waiting in my office whenever you want me.”

Tags: @the-milk-anon , @mirayasimpinghard

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funniestpersonalivefr · 6 months ago

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resident evil music headcanons

OKAY OKAY first time writing something and putting it out there but i need to speak my truth lmfao. dont judge too harshly im just autistic about resident evil

includes: albert wesker, leon s kennedy, chris redfield, claire redfield, jill valentine, rebecca chambers, and carlos oliveira

albert wesker:

let's be so fr wesker is gonna be a prick about music

only listens to classical music and maybe some slow smooth jazz

he only listens to music at home playing it through a record player

just imagine him sitting in his at home office working on research with tchaikovsky playing in the background

he'd enjoy going to ballets, symphonies, and operas and you cannot convince me other wise

leon s kennedy:

"he's so lana del ray coded" shut up his ass is listening to limp bizkit be so fr

especially when he's older its just divorced depressed dad rock

he's screaming the words to higher by creed in a bar and chris is trying to calm him down like yikes

definitely would try to go to concerts but they get so loud it gets a little overwhelming for him

he's got a banger cd collection and he's got a portable cd player he refuses to get rid of

chris redfield:

he says he doesn't have that much of preference in music as he just will listen to whatever is playing on the radio

however i think he definitely likes classic rock and classic country

he enjoys bands like queen, pink floyd, and the police

with his work schedule he rarely gets the opportunity to attend concerts and a lot of his favorite artists are dead (rip me too tho)

chris doesn't listen to a bunch of music but that's okay the man is busy

claire redfield:

claire, claire, claire

i wanna say claire is listening to abba and she sings along and dances whenever she does

she also would listen to stevie nicks

(also probably bands like weezer and gorillaz)

and i think as lana del ray started popping off claire was there listening like cmon guys she'd love the ultraviolence album

jill valentine:

jill is listening to the cranberries and the cardigans

when she was younger she loved loud rock but as she's getting older she finds herself wanting to listen to calmer music

when she was younger she would've loved bands like nirvana

now she likes to just plug her headphones in and lay down (its her way of escaping everything and taking a step back)

her and claire make playlists together 🫶

rebecca chambers:

can i real quick just say i love rebecca? okay thank you she is my girl

now idk if this is gonna be controversial but im gonna say it

she'd be a swiftie

she certainly doesn't enjoy taylors carbon emissions but she loves the music (her favorite album would be 1989 or lover)

she's also someone who uses a streaming platform instead of lugging around cds or something

carlos oliveira:

whore.

i just know this man is listening to songs like daddy's home by usher

he probably enjoys a lot of hip hop and rap

some of his favorite songs are captain save a hoe, california love, and it wasnt me

he's like if hey sexy lady by shaggy was a person

anyways just remember these are all my opinions and dont like scream at me for it yk. this is just a silly post. :)

#resident evil #claire redfield #jill valentine #albert wesker #leon kennedy #chris redfield #rebecca chambers #carlos oliveira #resident evil headcanons #im so in love with all of them #i love rebecca so much i wish i saw more people writing for her

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entering--hyperspace · 3 months ago

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Tribune Echowatcher (Ls1)

My design musings below

Literally only doing this bc I love Leo soooo so so so so so so much. I also in general just love character design So!

1st. I Know I wanted to push the limits of what Charr Look like, I know theyre big ""cats"" but whenever I design ocs I like to push boundaries and play with what aesthetic restrictions exist.

Hyenas came to me (i think, it was 6 years ago when I originally made him so my memory is foggy) because I saw Hyenas around Ascalon and thought, what a fun concept to play with.

I knew I really wanted the very clear shape of hyena ears to stay while also keeping the charr 2 ears, my only choice was to kind of shift the horn placement around. You can see that his ears cover half of the horns, and that theyre a further back on his head in general asba result. I really didnt want to limit myself with the shape of charr ears bc even though I love them, having a character with very clear rounded Hyena ears was too charming of a concept for me to drop.

2. I inverted the colors of a Hyena! Hyena cubs are actually born with black fur and then get a lighter shade as they grow as with many animals, but I thought it would just be a fun way to play with a more unique color scheme, a primary black/gray fur with orange highlights than simply keeping a more realistic and usual color pallet.

3. Spotted Hyenas have some shaggy fur! Its so cute! Its thinner around the neck which I thought was another key feature of the animal that I wanted to translate onto Leo.

4. His armor is definitely not what I consider to be super unique, I needed a ls1-HoT quick armor to draw him in, so I just threw shapes together. I did however want to keep his color coded: Green. Originally I was trying to find some huge complimentary color to add to his outfit but realized that the orange of his mane and spots was already complimentary enough that adding a different color or more to his outfit would feel like Too much. Thus I went with homogenous green/blues and silver for the metal color.

5. His nose...his head shape...his more "Canine" Features I guess are just huge charmpoints to me. Yes this is me just gushing about my love for my own character but if you clicked read more thats ur own doing. Ive said this before but Leo is Heavily Mexican coded, this plays into both his design and lore in a lot of ways.

Xolotl is the Nahuatl god of death, hes a dog! Dogs being a bit of a symbolism for companions in the afterlife and guides was really important to me, so its why I do really adore what canine features Leo does have (I know Hyenas arent canines but you can see the same kind of shapes.)

Id gush more but thats the big ones....

Leo became a Tribune of the Blood Legion, because bangar wanted one of his own reporting back on the growing power of the Pact and the Pact Commander that was less of a loose canon than Rytlock, especially as theyre investigating draconic threats with the underlying ulterior motive. For now, hes playing along.

#gw2 #gw2 charr #gw2 oc #gw2 fan submission #gw2 art #Leonard echowatcher

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pinkmirth · 2 years ago

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Bertholdt being shy about how big his dick is has me kicking my feet n twirling my hair <33

He would 100% roll his hips against yours when you’re making out with him n then get shy when you’re surprised because you can feel how big n heavy his cock is sjfjakcnkand

𝒢ℰ𝒩𝒯ℒℰ 𝒢ℐ𝒜𝒩𝒯 . . !

𝓈𝓎𝓃ℴ𝓅𝓈𝒾𝓈: based on this post! a teensy-tiny drabble for bertl! my sweet big boy 💘

𝒸ℴ𝓃𝓉𝒶𝒾𝓃𝓈: (700+ words of . . .) aged up!bertholdt hoover x fem!reader (black coded), nsfw/smut, bertl has a mega size kink, handjob, oral (m!receiving), penetrative sex, mention of bertl’s big bawls, lowercase intended, explicit language, minors shoo!

omfg sandie!!! now this is everything to me! there’s nothin’ like a giant man who can’t truly grasp just how large he is.

bertholdt is well aware of his height— since his earliest memories he’s towered over others, standing head and shoulder above them. but when it comes to size-size? bertl doesn’t fully register how big he is. this bashful man don’t got a clue in the world!

your reaction to bertl discarding his underwear is what gets him to finally understand. to you, he already looked fairly large when wearing his boxers, but witnessing the real thing proves to be a stark difference. you unashamedly observe your boyfriend’s fat dick as it throbs lewdly, free of any confines. he can feel your keen eyes fixate on him.

“you’re fuckin’ huge.” you release the airiest whisper.

to that, bertholdt’s breath catches in his throat, adam’s apple bobbing. he gets self-conscious, even more so than usual. a stream of questions swirl about in his head. is he too big? will you be able to handle him? are there even condoms in his size?

his worries quickly dissipate once you begin to wrap your dainty fingers around his cock. you stroke whatever you can manage to reach, touching down his shaft and twirling your hand over the precum-smeared tip. you gaze at his endowment with lust-blown eyes, seemingly appreciative of what he has to offer.

“how big are you, baby?” he doesn’t know. hell, he’s never cared to check or measure before now. your assumption is nine whole inches, maybe ten.

“i— fuck,” he lets a foul whine slip past, bringing a hand to cover his mouth. he shyly speaks through his slender fingers, “i-i’m not sure...” with a stammer, bertholdt instinctively rolls his hips, bucking against your hand. his pale-green eyes stay trained on how you can barely close your fingers around the base of his girthy dick. in that very moment, within the depths of his mind, he can practically hear a switch flicking— that’s the size kink he never knew he had, officially turning on.

following that experience, bertholdt’s shyness considering his length doesn’t get any better. he’s easily flustered, but also more self-aware than he’s ever been. bertl starts to notice how wide your plush lips stretch around his cockhead when taking him into your wet, pliant mouth. he finds it amusing; how you can’t mutter a word when he fills up your throat, weighty and pulsing against your tongue.

he admittedly likes to give himself a rush during sex, by sizing you up— placing his rigid cock onto your tummy, just to make an estimate of how far he’ll reach. before long, he brushes past your folds and pushes into your velvety cunt. you clamp down fervidly, eager to take all of him.

he’s settled in your womb. you’re so fucking full. “it’s big,” you brainlessly mewl. bertl interlocks his fingers with yours, cheeks dusted red. he makes slow, impassioned thrusts forward, swiveling his hips to plunge into you just right.

“is it too much, love?” bertholdt’s words spill out shakily, wavering breaths dropping from his agape mouth. dark shaggy bangs fall across his forehead. you thread your hand through his hair to help him brush it back. faint traces of sweat trail down his forehead. “uh-uh. it’s perfect, baby,” you reassure with a soothing smile, pressing your lips to his. he returns the haphazard kisses, immodestly groaning into your mouth.

you’re always given generously thick loads when he finishes, because his balls are fat and heavy, too. bertholdt is slowly, but surely, learning how to use his imposing size for your benefit.

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hussyknee · 2 years ago

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Red, White & Royal Blue: Collector's Edition Henry PoV bonus chapter by Casey Mcquiston.

(transcribed from the page pictures posted)

This is the coda to the end of the book, so don't read it if you haven't read the book first. Sadly, the Collector's Edition doesn't seem to be available on Kindle so. Arrrr matey.

Download link for file at the end.

....

HENRY

“I am not asking you to believe in it, or even to like it,” Henry says stonily. It’s been a long morning already. He is beginning to perspire. “I am simply asking you to show a modicum of respect.”

“To–to your quiche?”

“Yes. To my quiche.”

Bea puts down her tape gun and wipes her eyes. “Pez!”

“Yes?”

“Henry says he’s going to make us a quiche!”

Pez’s squawk of a laugh bounces down the stairs. “Pull the other one!”

“I make them all the time for Alex,” Henry insists. “They are perfectly edible.”

“So, when you promised us breakfast if we got up early to help you.” Bea says, “you meant that you were going to make us breakfast?”

“Yes!” Henry says hotly. “Stop laughing!”

“I’m sorry!” Bea says. “It’s only that...well, Henry, the last time you cooked breakfast for me, you were twelve and you put a sausage in the microwave until it exploded.”

“That was your idea! And it’s been ages since then! I’ve studied, all right? I’m quite good now. Those pictures I send the group chat aren’t just for show.”

“Oh, aren’t they?” Bea says rudely, as if his incredibly generous offer to cook her a shallot-and-thyme quiche with mushrooms from the farmer’s market means nothing at all. As if he’s lived in this house for five entire years without learning to use its kitchen.

Perhaps if their lives weren’t so chaotic, if Henry weren’t flying out of New York every time Bea had a spare moment to fly in, he could have proven this to her earlier. But Pez, who lives mostly in the city now and visits so frequently he’s earned his own Secret Service code name (Cardinal, since Henry is Bishop), should know better.

“Percy Okonjo,” Henry says as Pez joins them, “you were here last weekend when I made mince pie. You loved it.”

“Did I?” Pez wonders aloud, with an annoyingly Bea-like lilt.

“Look at this apron!” Henry gestures to himself and the navy blue apron he’s wearing. Alex gave it to him for his birthday last year. “Would a man who can’t make a quiche have an apron like this? It’s monogrammed.”

“You’re royalty, babes,” Pez points out. “Everything you own is monogrammed.”

From the pocket of his serious-home-cook apron, his phone buzzes. Reinforcements. The FaceTime connects, and Alex says, “Good morning, love of my li–”

“Alex,” Henry interrupts, “tell them about my quiches.”

Alex pushes up his sunglasses and frowns into the camera. He looks so lovely with his faded T-shirt and jean jacket and shaggy hair. Pure American heartthrob, might as well have a cowboy hat on. Henry never does tire of it.

“Sorry?”

“Bea and Pez don’t believe I can make a quiche.”

“What? Have they seen your apron?”

“That’s what I said!”

“Henry’s quiches are great!” Alex says loudly, to the kitchen at large. “I almost never find shells in them!”

That sets Bea and Pez off again. On the screen, Alex’s face crinkles into laughter.

“Thank you very much, Alex, you’ve been a tremendous help,” Henry groans. “How are things? Florist this morning, wasn’t it?”

“Just finishing up.” Alex says with a grin. “Final approvals done. Everything looks great.”

With only one week until moving day and two until the wedding, it made sense to divide and conquer. Henry agreed to stay in New York and finish packing up the brownstone with help from Bea and Pez, while Alex, June, and Nora are ticking off the last of their checklists in Texas.

“Of all the surprises that wedding planning has brought us,” Henry says, “your ability to micromanage floral arrangements has certainly been...one of them.”

“You know I love to curate a vibe,” Alex says.

“That you do,” Henry agrees. “Where are the girls?”

“Getting donuts,” Pez answers before Alex can. He holds up his phone, open to a photo of June blowing a kiss while Nora fellates an éclair.

“Donuts!” Bea says. “Now there’s an idea!”

They spend the rest of the day drowning in cardboard boxes and bin liners, packing everything but the furniture and the downstairs television. Pez reminds him once an hour that they could pay someone to do this, but Bea is stubborn, and Henry is reluctant to let anyone else wade into all the intimate trappings of his and Alex’s life. It was bad enough explaining the contents of the trick drawer in their dresser to Pez, much less some mover he’s never met.

When it’s done, Bea puts A Knight’s Tale on in the living room and promptly falls asleep on Pez’s lap. Pez passes out too, but Henry stays awake, because Heath Ledger deserves an audience. And because he knows if he doesn't wake Bea and move her to the guest bedroom, he'll have to hear about her back spasms in the morning.

David hops up beside him on the loveseat, and Henry strokes the top of his snout until his little body relaxes into Henry's side.

"Nervous old boy," Henry hums. It still does seem like the ultimate irony that the dog he adopted for emotional support has anxiety. David has grown more and more worried all week, as more and more of his home disappeared into boxes. "We won't leave you, I promise."

The brownstone has been a good house for them. Sturdy brick walls, neighbors that actually let them be. Henry has loved it more than he ever loved Kensington, or at least as much as he loved Kensington when his parents both lived there too. Some mornings, when he comes downstairs to find Alex with the coffeepot and the kettle already on, he feels the way he did when his family all slept under one roof. This roof is quite a bit smaller than that one, but the feeling isn't.

So, perhaps David hasn't got entirely the wrong idea. It is hard to let the place go. For the past month, Alex has kept asking Henry why he's staring, and the truth is that he's been committing to memory exactly how Alex looks in every room. How the bannister fits in his hand, the place on the foyer wall where he always braces himself to pull on his shoes.

Everything that's happened in the past five years has happened, at least in part, inside this house.

…

It's seven months after Alex's mother's second inauguration, and Henry is wishing he had never even heard the word "credenza." Then he wouldn't have to decide where to put one. Alex is arriving in half an hour to help him move it, but Henry still doesn't know where. Across from the fireplace, perhaps? But what if he wants to put a sofa there? Does he want a regular sofa, or a sectional? Should it go upstairs, in his study? Or should he leave room for bookcases?

He longs to be back on a beach, sipping something from a pineapple.

It’s been a long, glorious summer since Alex packed up his White House bedroom, called Henry, and asked, "Do you want to get the fuck off the continent?" They did Dubai first, then Lagos. Rio, for old time's sake. Buenos Aires, paper lanterns in moonlight and Alex flirting with the bartender for free drinks. June through August became a lovely blur: Alex asleep against his shoulder on the plane, Alex throwing his Portuguese phrase book out the window of a speeding car, sand in unmentionable places, Alex Alex Alex. Endless runways and half-arsed disguises, swimsuits that got smaller and smaller until they simply didn't wear them anymore. Falling in love, the sequel, with fresh suntans and all the time in the world.

And now here they are in Park Slope, where Alex is renting the second floor of a brownstone two blocks from Henry's.

It's practical, they agreed, to live in the same neighborhood before they live at the same address. They've scarcely gotten a chance to date the normal way yet– if it can be called "normal" when their combined security teams are headquartered in an empty apartment down the street. Still, Henry wants this to last.

They've sprinted headlong into everything so far, but now he wants move slowly, in delicious increments. He wants to savor nights, minutes, firsts, to covet them and then let them dissolve on his tongue, like the sugar cubes he snuck off his gran's filigreed tea trays when he was small. He wants a life.

He wants someone to tell him where to put this damned credenza.

It's a vintage Broyhill Brasilia piece, walnut with clever brass drawer pulls. June helped him pick it out when she was in town with meeting her editor, but she never gave him any advice on where it should go. He hasn't ever been allowed to decide where furniture should go before.

So, it’s...there, in the center of the empty living room, the first piece in the entire house.

“Maybe you could start with a rug or two,” says Alex from the foyer.

Henry turns to find him with his keys in one hand and a paper bag in the other, smiling in a beam of mid-morning light, and, ah. Yes. There it is. That sweet, sharp gasp of nerves. The half second when he forgets how to use his mouth. If he knows nothing else, at least one certainty remains, which is that seeing Alex Claremont-Diaz in the flesh will always do this to him.

Alex in a photo is handsome, but Alex in life is a symphony. He’s refracted light with a cherry cola chaser. He’s got a Fibonacci jawline and a troublemaker smile and thick forearms built for posing in doorways with his sleeves rolled and thumbing corks out of champagne bottles. The first time Henry ever told Pez about him, he said, “God, but he’s lethal.” It’s only worse once you get to know him.

“Weird place for a credenza,” Alex comments. He kisses Henry’s cheek, then passes him a warm bundle wrapped in parchment paper. “Hope you like sausage-egg-and-cheese.”

“I don’t know where to put it.”

“Sandwich goes in your mouth, typically.”

“The credenza.”

“Ohhh, right,” Alex says, pretending to have just caught on. He winks. Henry sighs theatrically but accepts a second kiss, on the lips this time. “Why don’t you just put it right here?”

He points to his left, where a blank wall stretches from the front door to the foot of the stairs. It does, upon closer inspection, appear to be the exact right size.

“Oh,” Henry says.

This is where they overlap. Where he ends and Alex begins. Great gooey puddle of feelings, meet course of action; endless burning energy, meet point of focus. Agonies, meet your most obvious, most natural, most inevitable conclusions. It’s frightening sometimes for a person like Henry, who has spent his entire life pedaling his agonies about like baguettes in a posh little bicycle basket. What is he to do with them now?

Yes," Henry concedes, "I suppose I could," and Alex laughs.

...

It's the summer of 2022. Henry has opened his third shelter, and Alex has just finished bulldozing his first year at NYU Law.

A few boxes of books still wait at Alex's place, but otherwise, he lives in Henry's brownstone now. Their brownstone. A UT pennant beside a Chelsea scarf on the living room wall. A fridge full of Topo Chico and Bulmers. Two pairs of shoes by the front door, brown Barker derbies and Reebok trainers. Nobody could mistake it for anyone else's.

It's their first Chore Sunday (Alex's idea), and Henry has put the last of the laundry in the dryer. He's in the kitchen doorway, watching Alex unload the dishwasher.

Alex once told Henry the type of man he's typically attracted to: tall, broad-shouldered, pretty eyes, a little haunted. Bit of attitude and a smile that makes you curious. For Henry, it's never been so simple. He liked boys in his classes because they bothered with the assigned readings and fancied one of Philip's awful Eton friends because he could sail and smelled of cinnamon. The only thing all his Oxford boys had in common was that they didn't know how to speak to him. He's never had a type, and he's always been sure Alex was singular, anyway. Alex is unlike anyone he's ever met before or since.

But here, now, watching Alex bend to remove a salad bowl from the bottom rack, he is confronted with the hard truth. All those boys did, actually, share one trait.

"Are you gonna help me with this," Alex says without even an investigatory glance over his shoulder, "or are you just gonna keep staring at my ass?"

...

It’s Christmas 2022, their first since Alex officially moved in, and Henry is going to make a yule log if it kills him.

Perhaps he’s been too ambitious. He’s rather new to all. Growing up, he was rarely permitted in the kitchens, and he concentrated his uni diet on fast food and takeaway. He can make toast and boil an egg, and he’s got a deft hand with the coffee percolator and a gin swizzle from time to time. He knows about food– the finest foods, actually, he’s yet to meet an Englishman who can select a better brie– but he never learned to cook, until recently.

Recently, as in when Alex became too fanatically involved in his second-year coursework to remember to feed himself.

It began with force-feeding Alex a bacon butty twice a week. Henry’s arms suffered little constellations of grease burns, but bacon was easy. And those faded, so they didn’t deter him for long. Curiosity piqued, he taught himself the basics of pasta, how one can simmer almost anything with garlic and onion and butter and it will taste good over noodles. It bolstered his confidence enough to truly commit, and now, between hours at the shelters and video calls with his mum, he watches tutorial after tutorial on how to brown butter and roast chicken. Only half of what he makes turns out the color it’s meant to, but he loves it.

He loves walking to the market on the corner and hunting down specific ingredients from the family recipes June sends him. In fact, it’s become such a regular pastime that the paparazzi have cottoned on, which is why his mother finally forced his security team to hire an actual body double. Now some bloke named Angus with his height and build and nearly the same face goes on diversionary strolls while Henry peruses jarred chilies.

With all his independent studying, he was certain he could manage a dessert. He wanted to do something impressive, since they’ve convinced their families to let them host Christmas dinner. Only, his sponge has gone all wrong, and if he’s learned anything from Bake Off, he knows it’s not meant to have cracked in five places when he tried to roll it up. Paul Hollywood would have him pilloried.

“Think you might’ve left it in too long?” Oscar asks from across the kitchen island. He’s wearing his white elephant prize, a sweatshirt airbrushed with the slogan YOU CAN’T SPELL CONSTITUTION WITHOUT TITS. Inexplicably, Henry’s own mother brought that one. “Lookin’ kinda dry there.”

“I appreciate that you are trying to be helpful,” Henry enunciates, “but if you say one more word I may start crying, and then we’ll both lose some respect for me.”

Later, when Pez has persuaded him to “call it, mate, put it out of its misery,” he carries his disgraced platter of ganache and cake and marzipan out into the living room and lets everyone go at it with spoons. The house feels full to bursting, and not just because of the Christmas crackers. There are all three of Alex’s parents, Henry’s mum, June and Nora, Bea and Pez, Shaan and Zahra on speakerphone, occasionally an awkward Philip and Martha via FaceTime, and, because he had nowhere else to go for the holiday, Angus.

(“I don’t like him,” Alex muttered when Henry suggested inviting his own body double to Christmas dinner.

“Why not?”

“Because he looks exactly like you, but I find him deeply unattractive, and that freaks me out.”)

Ellen tells everyone the story of the year Alex got his first real bike for Christmas and knocked out his two front teeth by Boxing Day, which prompts Catherine to recite eight-year-old Henry’s letter to Father Christmas, in which he requested a leather-bound journal and a holiday to East Wittering so he could gaze at the sea. Bea pushes Henry behind the upright piano, and he takes requests for an hour. It only ends when Pez rewrites half the lyrics to “God Rest Ye Merry, Gentlemen” to be about his own lactose intolerance. No one wants to follow “tidings of Lactaid and soy.”

After the third round of mulled wine, when Alex’s parents have called their drivers and his mum has retired to the guest room, June and Nora find themselves under the mistletoe. Everyone whoops and whistles until Nora finally pulls June in by her Christmas-light necklace and kisses her to a round of applause. June's cheeks turn red, but she looks pleased as anything.

"I can't believe it took this long for y'all to finally kiss." Alex says, to which Pez bursts into laughter. "What?"

"Alex," he says fondly. He drains his glass and pecks Alex on the forehead. "You gorgeous, stupid little turnip."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Pez just shakes his head and strolls off to the kitchen.

"Wait," Alex says.

He frowns, like he does when he's trying to recall something incredibly minute and specific from his torts textbook. Then, suddenly, a light goes on, and his own mug is clunking on the lamp table, and he's running off after Pez.

"Pez, what's that supposed to mean?"

...

It's late morning the summer before Alex's last year of law school, 2023, and Alex is the first word out of Henry's mouth.

Truthfully, that's how he begins most mornings. On a Monday morning five time zones away, "Alex" pitched low to the screen of his phone. On a Friday when Alex's early lecture is cancelled, "Alex" in F major, muffled in the pillow as his body moves and the day stretches out before them. Half three the night before an exam, a hoarse "Alex," followed by, "turn the bloody light off and come to bed."

This morning, it's because David is barking at the door. A rainstorm is brewing, and if jet lag didn't have Henry dead under the bedclothes, the gray gloom would. Alex was the one who surfaced from sleep half an hour ago and blearily ordered three entire pancake breakfasts from some 24-hour diner a few neighborhoods over. He should have to get up and answer the door.

“Alex.” Henry mumbles, turning over.

Alex has got the quilt tugged up so high he’s only a shock of wild curls on white linens.

“Nnnghh,” Alex groans from the depths.

“Breakfast is here,” Henry says. The doorbell helpfully rings again. David howls.

Alex’s face appears, pouting. There’s a crease from the pillow down one of his cheekbones, a comet’s tail in a constellation of freckles. “Can you get it?”

Henry rolls his eyes but smiles. Inevitable.

He drags himself out of bed and pulls on the joggers and hoodie from last night’s flight. It’s not until he feels the breeze on his ankles as he descends the stairs that he realizes they’re Alex’s, not his.

On their doorstep, a pink-haired delivery girl is looking bored under her bicycle helmet.

“Sorry to keep you waiting,” Henry says. He fishes a crumpled bill out of Alex’s pocket. “For your trouble.”

The girl pulls a face.

“Got any real money?” she asks. Her accent reminds him a bit of Alex’s mum.

He blinks down at her hand, which is holding a twenty-pound note. “Ah. Sorry again. Er.” He snatches his wallet out of the bowl on the credenza and gives her all the American dollars he has.

“She’s gone, Davey,” Henry says afterward to David, who’s now fretfully circling the living room. “You’ve protected us from another fearsome home invader. Well done.”

He lets David out into the back garden to do his business, then carries the food upstairs. Shockingly, Alex is awake and propped up against the headboard.

“I’m getting too old for red-eye flights,” Alex says, rubbing his eyes.

“Love, you’re twenty-five,” Henry reminds him. He deposits the bag on the nightstand, and Alex wastes no time tearing through the plastic and tucking in to his breakfast. “And I’m older than you.”

“Yes, you are. But like... I get why we have to go to Philip’s kids’ christenings. The cousins, though?” He sets to work smothering his pancakes in syrup. “I mean, at least my cousins would stack their baptisms. One and done, baby.”

Henry opens his mouth, prepared to answer with one of a thousand things. That the tabloids will have even more of a field day than usual if he stops doing his chores, that there will always be a church dedication or a swan upping or an appointment for a top hat fitting, that he’ll always be obligated to have one foot in London and one day they’ll have to choose where to settle down. It’s far from the first time they’ve had this conversation.

But then Alex shovels a massive bite of pancakes into his mouth and says, “Anyway, I love you. Do you wanna have June and Nora over tomorrow? We can play Mario Party again. I wanna see them get in a fistfight. Oh, and my dad’s in town next week, and he said to tell you he’s bringing that book you asked about–”

And that’s when Henry knows: He doesn’t ever want to go back.

...

It’s the end of spring 2024, and Henry is not eavesdropping, per se. He excused himself to answer a call from Shaan, which really could not be avoided. Shaan has taken to his new life as a househusband with predictable aplomb, and most of his calls these days involve Henry getting to talk to a baby who is clearly destined to become prime minister. He simply can’t send that to voicemail.

It’s the first time they’ve had room in the schedule for his mother to visit since Alex accepted his law job, which Henry understands very little about but has been assured is the most strategic next step for Alex’s career long game. When Henry left the room, Alex was still trying to explain it to Catherine. It all sounds terribly prestigious.

He is just returning to the sitting room with a fresh pot of tea when he hears his name from around the corner.

“–and the next morning Henry and Arthur vanished,” his mother is saying, “and when Uncle Algie called, I told him that Henry couldn’t go on the annual pheasant hunt because he was violently ill, but actually Arthur had taken him to Rome for two weeks on the set of that go on ridiculous car heist film he was working on, the one with, oh, what’s his name–“

“Jason Statham,” Alex says promptly, through wheezing laughter.

“That’s the one!”

“Loved that movie,” Alex says. “I can’t believe Henry got to be on set.”

“It was all Arthur’s idea, but he was right to do it. Uncle Algie is a dreadful bore, and Henry despises his son. Guilford. Did you meet Guilford at the wedding?”

“Henry made sure I avoided it.”

“Yes, that’s for the best,” Catherine says daintily. “He has matured into an absolute dickhead.”

Henry wishes he was in the room to see the way Alex sputters out, “Oh my God.” Alex always forgets that Catherine went to uni and married a commoner from Sheffield.

And then Alex sighs and says, “When Henry and I get married–”

Henry manages to recover the teapot before he drops it.

It’s not a surprise to hear Alex mention marriage. They’ve been sorting it out for years: political logistics and Alex’s child-of-divorce anxiety and a thousand questions about a royal wedding neither of them actually wants to have. He’s already bought an engagement ring, even, and judging by how tetchy Alex gets whenever Henry tries to put his underwear away for him, he’s not the only one.

But it is the first time he’s heard Alex mention it to his mother. He dropped it so casually, so matter-of-factly, as if he’s been talking to her about marrying Henry for years. Henry supposes it’s possible he has been. Is this why Alex had tea with her in London last month and told Henry he wasn’t invited? Have they been conspiring?

They’re discussing hypothetical guest lists now, which cousins secretly hate one another and who wore an inappropriately large fascinator to whose birthday tea, but Henry isn’t listening anymore. He’s thinking of a cafe table in Rome, his dad waving over a second round of gelato.

In his memory, he’s nine years old, and his father is saying, Whoever you marry, Henry, make sure they think your mum is a laugh, because she is. She really is.

He clears his throat and finally rounds the corner. “Tea, anyone?”

...

It’s 2024, and nobody knows they’re engaged.

Granted, they’ve only been engaged for about three hours, but Henry is curious to see how long they can go. It feels nice to keep a secret that doesn’t have to be a secret. It’s more that they’re keeping it like a pet, or something especially beautiful from the garden that they’ve coaxed into a jar.

A record is spinning on the turntable, one of Alex’s, maybe the Joni Mitchell he borrowed from Bea. They’ve shoved their phones under the couch cushions and ordered a pizza the size of the moon, and now they’re sitting in the center of the living room floor, demolishing it. They kiss, then eat more pizza, then get distracted kissing again. Henry licks a streak of pepperoni grease from Alex’s forearm, which is a fantasy he didn’t know he had until he’s living it. They tangle up on the rug, and Henry decides he’ll take Alex sailing next weekend, or even out to the edge of the river, just to see him against a horizon.

Four-nearly-five years in, the main thing he’s learned is that Alex is a world without end. All Henry wants is to go on with him forever. To keep finding new favorite parts, to keep turning things over and studying their soft bellies and finding the best bits.

So, he will.

...

It snows on New Year’s Eve 2024. Alex looks out the window and shrugs off his coat.

The Young America Gala may be no longer, but Nora, June, and Pez aren’t to be stopped from throwing a New Year’s party, especially now that Pez has gotten his own part-time flat in the city. They’re the three fates of New York City’s holiday social circuit: birth (June, managing invitations), life (Pez, topless), and death (Nora, also topless).

“What if,” Alex says, turning to Henry on the foot of the stairs, “we don’t go to the party?”

“Nora will murder me,” Henry says. “She told me she’s not afraid to do that now that I’ve given up my title.”

“Murder is still a crime even if you’re not officially a prince.”

“Yes, but she said, quote,” he puts on his best American accent, “They can’t put me in the Tower anymore. Who’s gonna arrest me now? Mr. Bean?”

“Why don’t we just send Angus? It’s dark. Maybe she won’t notice.”

“Where’s your double, then?”

“We live in New York, I’m sure I can find a male model somewhere.”

“As always, sounding the very bass string of humility.”

“Is that fucking Shakespeare?”

“Henry IV.”

“I’m gonna give you a wedgie, you fucking nerd.”

In the end, it doesn’t take much to convince Henry to stay in. Lately, it never does. Alex texts June a flimsy excuse, and they toe off their shoes and relax out of their button-downs.

Henry does have to admit he’s exhausted, in the way that one only can be on the last day of the year, when every other day of the year piles way up behind it. It’s been a big one: Alex’s first law job, the endless press about Henry’s decision to surrender his title, the engagement, Bea’s wedding, the incident with the croquet mallets and the Dutch ambassador at Bea's wedding.

Sometimes Alex jokes that they squeezed it all into one calendar year because no headline can stick if there's another next week, but it's only half a joke. They've been bone-tired for months.

"I'm surprised you're the one who wants to stay home," Henry says. "I remember a young lothario who lived to ruin people's lives on New Year's Eve."

"Ruin?" Alex says. "That's not how I remember it."

"It certainly felt that way at the time."

They drift to the kitchen, past all the traces of the year. The dried flowers, the new scuffs on the floorboards. The box of bound manuscripts of Henry's first finished poetry-ish short-fiction-ish essay-ish collection. The holiday cards from senators and diplomats and old Texas friends, topped off with Alex's favorite of Rafael Luna and his astonishingly fit partner in matching Christmas jumpers. Henry would think Raf had been forced into it if it hadn't come with a case of beer and a note of thanks for letting him stay over the last time he visited Alex and had one too many tequila shots at drag bingo.

Alex withdraws a bottle of Clicquot from the refrigerator and says, "We're not washed, are we?"

“We're aging," Henry points out.

"That's right," Alex says, eyes immediately sparking at the opportunity. Henry preemptively sighs. "You're almost thirty."

"Almost twenty-eight is not almost thirty."

"It basically is. You're old. You'll be thirty a whole year before me. You'll be popping antacids and I'll be in the club, popping my p-"

"You're not even in the club now."

"I could be, I'm just choosing not to, because I don't want to deal with the snow. That's not aging, it's growth."

He slides Henry a glass of champagne and adds, "It's probably time for us to start talking about what's on your Do Before Thirty list, huh?"

Henry takes the glass and chooses going with Alex's bit over pointing out that he's entering his late twenties, not dying.

“I’ve done quite well on that front so far, actually,” he says. “Wrote a book. Started a nonprofit. Engaged to the love of my life.”

“Involved in an international sex scandal.”

“Shook the hands of all five Spice Girls.”

“Best dressed at the Met Gala.”

“Cried in the Water Lilies room at the MOMA.”

“Grew your hair out, then cut it all off.“

“Taught myself to make beef Wellington.”

“That one’s, uh, still in progress,” Alex hedges. Henry gives him an affronted look. “But, yeah! Definitely. And you got really good at scones.”

“That I did.”

“Right,” Alex agrees. “So what’s left? Streaking? Dropping acid? Having sex on our kitchen island?”

Henry takes a moment with that one.

“Having sex on our kitchen island?”

When the clock strikes the new year, the house is quiet. The timer on the light over the front stoop clicks off. The champagne bottle rests between two glasses on the edge of the sink, spent and sticky around the rim, a single soggy strawberry at the bottom of each flute. Miles out from their apartment, fireworks fight the snow over the East River, but in their kitchen in Park Slope, the only sounds are the two of them.

Henry, almost twenty-eight, presses his warm body to the cool marble and gets his midnight kiss.

...

“Do you know what today is?” Alex asks on a lukewarm September.

It’s 2025. He’s in the doorway of Henry’s study, where Henry has been all evening, answering emails.

“Hm? No.”

When Alex doesn’t immediately fill the silence, Henry looks up from his laptop screen.

“What is it?”

“Five years since the story broke,” Alex says.

It takes a moment for him to realize what story Alex means; there have been so many of them. But of course, he means that gigantic, terrible one. The one that changed their lives forever.

“Oh,” Henry says. He closes his laptop, leaning back in his chair and away from it. “Well. Hated that.”

“Yeah,” Alex agrees. “Zero out of ten. Would not do again.”

His tone is light and casual, but when he folds his arms across his chest, Henry can see his glasses in the front pocket of his flannel. It’s been months and months since the last time Alex didn’t feel confident enough to wear them.

For his part, Henry can remember much of that day, but not all of it. He remembers stirring sugar into his morning tea when Shaan walked in wearing an expression Henry had never seen before. He remembers Pez arriving like the cavalry in Gucci slippers, hustling Henry away from his handlers with the same graceful disdain he used to direct at Eton classmates who stared at them too much. He remembers Bea finding them in the music parlor and refusing to hear Henry’s apology, and he remembers Alex’s call and Alex’s arrival.

The funny part, though, is he can’t remember anything between Bea and Alex. He knows that Philip was involved, and there were stories on every news channel, and he spoke to his mother at some point. But the space in his memory where those hours belong is simply blank. His psychiatrist says it’s post-traumatic stress disorder, and Henry is inclined to agree, considering the two of them spent the entire following year recalibrating Henry’s anxiety and depression medication around the event.

Those hours will always be gone. There are things he will never get back.

Most of the time, though, when he thinks of that day, the second worst thing that's ever happened to him, he thinks of Alex's hand in his under a Buckingham Palace table. He remembers, clear as a bell, Alex's voice telling him they would survive it together. It happened to Alex too. It wasn't what they would have chosen, but it was what they received, and they've done their absolute bloody best with it.

He rises from his desk, crosses to the doorway, and gathers Alex up against his chest. Their size difference isn't that pronounced—Henry is taller but lean, Alex shorter but sturdy—but in moments like this, he's thankful for the way Alex's cheek perfectly aligns with the crook of his neck. He's grateful for how effortless it is to slip a kiss to Alex's temple.

Neither of them says anything else. It's all been said a thousand times, in speeches and through official statements and in the dark when it's only the two of them. It's enough to stand here in the center of the house, in the quiet, and let it hold their weight.

...

At the end of 2025, Henry has a bad day.

There's nothing specific that causes it. The days just happen like this sometimes, even with all the therapy and medication and supportive partnership and fulfilling creative projects in the world. There are other people, he supposes, who don't spend their lives waiting for the next bad day. He's had every bloody luxury but that one.

Alex comes home from work to find him curled up on the armchair in the study, staring out the window at the light-polluted night sky over the row of brownstones across the street.

“What are you doing?" Alex asks him.

"Looking for Orion," Henry deadpans.

Alex kneels on the rug in his tailored suit pants and rolled-up sleeves and rests his cheek on Henry's knee, the way he often does when Henry's in a mood. Henry's fingers slide into his curls. They've grown a bit longer in the past few months. Lately. Alex looks quite like he did when they met, except for the glasses and the stubble dusting his jaw.

“I’m tired of big law, “ Alex confesses. It would appear he’s in a mood too. “I know it’s only been a year and a half, but...I kind of hate it.”

Henry contemplates that, along with the dark circles around Alex’s eyes.

“You don’t have to do it, you know.” Henry tells him.

Alex looks at him like he did in that hotel room in Paris the first time they woke up together, like the only thing he knows for sure about what he’s being offered is that he wants it completely. It’s an intimidating look to receive, but it’s only ever improved Henry’s life in the end.

He kisses Henry’s knuckle, just below his ring.

“I have some ideas.”

...

In February 2026, a flu sweeps through Park Slope. Neither Alex nor Henry can agree on who gave it to whom first– Henry knows it was Alex, since he’s been up late consulting with his mum about a voting rights bill in Texas, and his immune system always suffers when he gets upset about Texas—but regardless, they’re trapped in the brownstone together for a week. At least Alex doesn’t have to work through his illness the way he usually does, since he resigned from his job last month.

Somewhere around day five, Henry realizes it’s the longest consecutive amount of time they’ve both been home in years. They always seem to be leaving or returning: rushing off to appearances, climbing out of security caravans in half-undone suits, meeting Cash at the curb at three in the morning with bags over their shoulders. It’s nice, in a way, to get reacquainted with this home they’ve built together.

While Alex naps, Henry paces the entire floorplan.

The first floor, with its long living room and the original beams and mantelpiece, which Henry had restored before he moved in, because he always has been precious about the history of things. Then the kitchen and the deep blue cabinets and the wide back window over the knotty pine dining table handed down from Alex's dad. Upstairs, on the second floor, the guest bedroom with all of his mum's preferred hand creams in the attached washroom and the sitting room with the shelf of swan figurines Pez started collecting years ago in a dramatic fit of June-related yearning. One more flight up to the top floor, with his study and Alex's office and the hall with their photo from Shaan and Zahra's wedding and, at the far end, their bedroom.

The bedroom is his favorite part of the house, and not only for the obvious reasons, no matter how much Alex tries to imply otherwise with suggestive eyebrows. He loves the high ceiling and the chipped plaster medallion of roses at the center. They picked out the bed together, and every morning that he wakes up in it, he gets to turn over and see Alex's loose pens and glasses wipes scattered atop the dresser and know that this, his life, is still real. Perhaps he likes the room best because it feels separated from every other part of the house, lifted up and bundled in, which is the first time he's ever been safe in a tower.

Most importantly, of all three levels of bay windows jutting from the redbrick front of the brownstone, only the one in the bedroom has a seat. They've filled it with velvet pillows and mossy green cushions, and once or twice a year, on one of their vanishingly rare slow days, Alex will climb in and fall asleep.

That's where he finds Alex when he eases into the room with a mug of soup in each hand. He recognizes the quilt wrapped around him: they slept under it in Alex's childhood twin bed the night Ellen won her second term, and then Alex crammed it into his suitcase and brought it back to Washington.

He stirs as Henry sets the mugs down on the dresser.

“Thanks,” he says in a hoarse voice.

Henry nudges in beside him, gingerly removing Alex's glasses from beneath his elbow before they get crushed.

"You know," Henry says, "I chose this house for the bay windows."

Alex blinks at him, fully awake now. "Really?"

"I thought you might like them. You always talked about the one you grew up with. Hoped they might make the place feel like home."

Alex smiles. "They do."

Henry looks at him in his quilt, sleep-mussed and flushed from fever and overdue for a shave, and he remembers that night in the yellow house in Austin. Before Alex led them back to his old bedroom, he peeled up the cushion in the living room window seat and showed Henry pages of elementary school scribbles still hidden there. And he told Henry that he thought once of hiding a picture there too, if only he'd had the nerve to tear it out of his sister's magazine.

Love, Henry has found, has a way of growing backward. You fall in love with a person in the present, and then every person you've ever been gets to fall in love with every past version of them. A sleep-deprived Georgetown freshman falls in love with an Oxford sophomore who's testing out undoing the top button of his shirts sometimes. A ruddy-cheeked teenager with his nose in a book loves a backtalking lacrosse captain. A boy comes home from school with perfect marks and sees a picture in a magazine, and the boy from the picture pauses on a palace staircase.

The crux of it is, he loves every version of Alex to ever sleep under that quilt. Everything else is mostly set dressing

"I'm having a thought," Henry says.

"Congratulations," Alex deadpans automatically. Then, "Tell me."

"This life we have here," Henry says. "This house. It's good, yeah?"

"Yeah, of course it is."

"But we could have a good life somewhere else too."

Alex frowns. "Like where?"

"Somewhere... farther from everything, maybe? Somewhere we could slow down, and things could be quieter, and you could do the work you want to do. I think I could use some time away from it all, honestly. Maybe I wouldn't even have to have a body double anymore."

Alex considers that for a long moment. They both know where Henry means, even if he doesn't say it. Besides New York and DC, and London on its best days, there's really only one place Alex would seriously consider living. They've joked about it before, but Henry's always thought it might be nice to spend a few years somewhere completely different than he's used to. A place where he could see the stars.

At long last, Alex sniffs and says, "You're gonna fire Angus? He was just starting to grow on me.”

...

“If you don't wake Bea up, you're gonna have to hear about her back spasms in the morning,” says a voice that is most certainly not Heath Ledger's.

Henry startles awake to find Alex leaning over his shoulder from behind the loveseat, curls everywhere. The room is dark, and the end credits are rolling.

"You're not home until tomorrow," Henry mumbles.

"Moved up my flight," Alex says. He's so close to Henry's face, he's gone a bit cross-eyed. His lips bounce off the tip of Henry's nose. "I missed you."

It's only been a few days, but the truth is Henry missed him too. He supposes he should be used to empty beds and time differences by now, especially when they began that way, but he suspects he'll never stop waiting at the door. You know what will be the best part of getting married?" Henry asks Alex.

"The line dancing."

"The way I won't have to miss you nearly as often."

Alex softens, then maneuvers himself over the armrest until he's draped across Henry's lap. David climbs on top of him and curls up on Alex's left buttock.

Letting go of the house has been hard, but this particular decision was easy, once they finally said it out loud. A gradual, careful withdrawal from public life, at least for a few years. They’ve given so much of themselves to the world and had the privilege of feeling a legacy take shape beneath them, but they need rest too.

It was June who convinced them, actually. Even now, there are certain things only June can say to Alex. Early in the spring, when she was finally transitioning out of her speechwriting job for Raf, she called Alex from Colorado and told him she was moving to New York to be closer to Nora and Pez, and she wanted to sublet the brownstone. When Alex pointed out that he was still living in it, she said, "We both know you've been looking at farmhouses in Austin for six months, it's time to shit or get off the pot."

(Henry loves his particular collection of Americans. They truly do say what's on their minds.)

The new house is beautiful. Henry's only seen it in person once, but the previous owner was a reclusive tech executive with shockingly good taste, so Architectural Digest featured it last year. He's had the article open in a tab on his phone for two months, and he scrolls through all those perfectly lit photos twice a day, getting high on possibilities. Lazy mornings in the wide sunroom, midnight dives in the lake. It's easy to imagine Alex mellowing into a brisket-smoking, tamale-rolling Texas dad out there, and it's just as easy to imagine them basking under cedar trees until their mid-thirties and then deciding they're ready for another round. The wonderful thing is, they can take their time either way.

It isn't a full release from their obligations, but it is the next step after formally relinquishing his title. More boundaries, more of their own rules about what they will and won't do. No royal wedding, but a private ceremony at the lake house and a honeymoon unpacking boxes. A job for Alex at a smaller firm where he can finally get his hands in the earth. A quieter life.

"You're right," Alex says. "You know what else is gonna be awesome about married-people life? We can have actual, real-life date nights. Just imagine it: free refills and bottomless chips and salsa."

"Oh, I've got another one," Henry says. “You can finally show me how to navigate an H-E-B."

“Baby, don’t talk dirty to me in front of company.”

“Please,” says a groggy voice from the couch.

“Hi, Bea.”

“Time’s it?”

“One in the morning.”

“Ugh.”

Grumbling and tugging a blanket around herself, Bea wakes Pez and the two of them head off to wash up before bed. The odds of Pez returning to the couch for the night or availing himself of their bed so that Alex has to sleep on the couch are just about even, based on six years of Pez falling asleep at their house. It’s a comfort to know that when they leave the brownstone and June moves in, Pez will still be making himself at home in it.

Downstairs, surrounded by boxes, Alex crawls out of Henry’s lap and slides a large shopping bag out from behind the loveseat. “I brought you something.” Alex says.

Inside the bag is a box made of the sort of heavy cardboard that augurs something expensive. He imagines Alex hurling his patched-up rough-ridden leather duffle into the overhead compartment of the airplane and then sliding this bag under the seat so carefully that there’s not even a crease in the paper.

He takes the lid off the box and unwraps layers of tissue paper to reveal a hat. A cowboy hat. It’s made of gorgeous, thick felt, with a cattleman crown and a satin lining. A nearly identical one has hung in Alex’s office since he moved in, though Alex’s is midnight black and this one is a warm, pale sand. Where Alex’s hatband has a small gold buckle, this one has a silver pin in the shape of an English rose.

“It’s a Stetson,” Alex says. When Henry looks up at him, his cheeks have darkened faintly. “I know it’s not really your thing, but you ride horses, and it’s kind of a big deal where I’m from to get your first Stetson, so I wanted to be the one to give it to you since you’re about to be an honorary Texan. You don’t have to wear it if you don’t want–“

“I love it,” Henry interrupts.

Alex pauses, then breaks out in a grin. “You do? I was afraid you’d think it was a joke.”

“It’s the least ridiculous hat I’ve ever been given,” Henry tells him. “It didn’t even come with a matching tailcoat.”

“Nah, but maybe we can get you some Wranglers,” Alex says.

“Some chaps, perhaps.”

“I just told you not to talk dirty to me.”

Henry laughs and kisses him over the open box, thinking of the next year of their lives. Sunday morning fry-ups, swimming holes, a wedding cake that doesn’t wind up on the floor. Tomorrow he needs to ask if Alex checked on the bakery while he was in Austin, and if they have any more packing tape, and whether Amy’s daughter has gotten her flower girl dress yet.

Tonight, though, Alex is home a day early, and the house is making all its soft, familiar night-time sounds around them. No one sees in through the windows. No one comes in through the gate.

“Henry,” says Alex.

“Alex,” says Henry.

“You and me,” Alex says.

“You and me,” Henry agrees.

End.

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