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idiswhadidis · 1 year ago

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math camp

pairing: jungwon x fem!reader

sypnosis: Jungwon's mom forces him to go to a math camp but what happens when his best friend since kindergarden which he got feelings for tags along?

genre: best friends to lovers, fluff

featuring: Eunchae from LE SSERAFIM

warnings: math (lol), cursing, some jealousy

wc: 3,4k

hi everyone, enhypen finally dropped their new album so I have to celebrate it by posting this wohoo. I hope you enjoy.:)

To be Jungwon's best friend could be called as a bless or curse. Most likely a bless cause he’s a polite, distinguished gentleman but even more a pain in your ass.

You know each other since kindergarden you both became friends pretty quick after you saved him from a spider crawling up his leg, you actually freaked out when you touched the spider but little you wanted to be a hero and it worked. Little Jungwon looked at you with big eyes and mouth wide open, mesmerized by your proud big smile.

Then you both went to middle school, hanging out with each other most likely everday, your mother and his mother became also good friends, your familys even went on vacations and trips together.

And now you were in high school sitting in math class, next to Jungwon.

„Boy, if you don’t stop Imma kick you where the sun doesn’t shine“ you glare at him he’s been testing your nerves for 10 minutes. His mom wants him to go to this stupid math camp in the holidays cause his grades let’s just say are not the best but yours are (slay).

„Please Y/n, you can’t let me alone I don’t wanna suffer alone I thought we‘re „the“ dream team“ he's looking at you with desperation,

„We are but I don’t want to sacrafice my holidays for a fucking math camp“,

„and you think I do? My mom is forcing me and I know it’s gonna be more baerable when you come along“, „flattering but no, I have good grades and I want to enjoy my holidays“ a pen in your hand ready to write down what the teachers trying to teach,

„I will pay your food for six months“, well now he’s getting frustrated not hearing a response from you he continues „for 1 year?“ still no response.

He leans back, hand on his chin thinking about how to persude you, when he suddenly quitely slams his hands on the table startling you, looking at him seeing him with a smirk knowing you’re doomed.

-1 Month later-

Sunglasses on your nose a suitcase on your left, a Jungwon on your right and your mood on the ground. Staring at the „Welcome at the math camp!“ sign with this stupid mascot of an owl with glasses waving at everyone. How fantastic.

„You better keep your promise or Imma dunk you into the lake“ death staring him, he smiles at you as if he’s an angel (devil) „Of course“,

„Hello everyone! I’m Bethany and I’m the host of this camp, it’s nice to meet you! I know you might think this are going to be the worst holidays ever but no, I promise you all, even though it’s a math camp it will be so much fun! Our team prepared a lot and I hope you will enjoy it.“

You groan quietly „as if“ you whisper that only Jungwon could hear nudging you in the rips with his elbow.

„Now, when you look to my right you can see there are some pin boards about your camp houses, look for your name and make yourself comfortable we are not going to do much today because it’s already 6 pm so we’re are going to have dinner and a campfire to get to know each other. So we will meet here again at 7 pm. Have fun!“ Bethany stops her ranting and Jungwon takes your hand dragging you to the pin boards.

„camp hause number 4 and 2 let’s go“ and again he drags you along with him „so we’re not together in a house?“, „was to be expected, let’s go to your house first.“

Standing infront of the door turning to Jungwon with a frown „I’m too socialy awkward for this“, „I know but that’s okay give it a chance maybe you will find some new friends“ you look at him with a dissapproving face, him turning you around and pushing you to the door „I will be here at 6:50 so be ready“ you nod and open the door with hesistation walking into the house seeing 4 beds in each corner and one girl arranging some stuff.

The girls head pops up „Omg Hi! I’m Miya nice to meet you!“ she smiles at you and to not be awkward you smile back „Hey, my name is Y/n“ and now you both stand there smiling... yep awkward,

„so.. bad at math I guess?“ she asks „actually no, my best friend forced me to go with him“, she gasps „what a great best friend“, „right? But if it’s with him it’s okay“, „oh?“ she side-eyes you with a little smirk, „no not like that“ you narrow your eyes at her sarcastically laughing together „I think we’re going to have a great time“ she beams and turns back around to arrange her stuff and so you choose one of the beds getting yourself ready to live here for beautiful (not) 2 weeks.

Opening the door from your camp house seeing Jungwon already standing there waiting for you

„I hope there will be some good food I’m starving“ you say, him turning around „I saw some pizza boxes on the table were we’re going to eat“ he answers seeing your moody face turning into a ball of happiness making his heart burst, „ohhhh yes!“ putting your fist up in the air like you just won in the lottery, „let’s go, let’s go“ taking his hand into yours dragging him to the meeting point.

„38, 39 and 40.. Great! Everyone arrived, so as you can see tonight is going to be pizza night we have enough pizza for everyone so take as many pieces you want and let’s meet at the camp fire and get to know each other!“ Bethany stops talking and you’re the first to speed walk to the buffet making everyone snicker feeling a bit embarassed, Jungwon being your number one suporter having him right beside you his hand resting on your back making you gulp.

Taking a plate and taking some pieces completely drooling over it, grinning at Jungwon „let’s go“.

Walking to the camp fire seeing Miya waving at you making the gesture to sit beside her „Oh, that’s Miya from my camp house“ you tell Jungwon, walking straight up to her and sitting down, finally taking a bite of your pizza groaning quietly „so good?“ Jungwon asks, nodding at him cheeks stuffed with pizza.

„So, I see everyone gathered here so let’s get started. I think this will be more fun when we all know each other so let’s indroduce ourselfes-“ your shoulders dropping whispering in Jungwon's direction „that’s gonna be so awkward“ him squeezing your leg for support „-I will start so my name is Bethany I’m 31 years old and I love to bake nice to meet you all“ she turns her head to the one beside her letting them continue.

And now it’s Jungwon's turn „Hey my name is Jungwon I’m 19 years old and uhm I love to dance“ your time to shine, you gulp intruducing yourself is nerve wrecking „uhm Hi my name is Y/n I’m 19 years old and I love to water my plants?“ making Jungwon laugh, smacking his arm making everyone laugh, amazing you’re going to be the clown of this camp. „I didn’t know you like to water your plants?“ Jungwon whispers „I don’t“ making him shake his head with a smile.

After painfully playing around for 3 hours Bethany finally said her good night.

„That was… exhausting“ Jungwon speaks up tiredly as he walks you to your camp house, „my soical battery is complety drained“, stopping infront of your door he hugs you and quietly says „well my lady, I hope you will have a good sleep and don’t let the bugs bug you“, looking at him in horror „don’t jinx it dumbass“ grinning at you „good night prince charming“.

You are never going to be a morning person, waking up at 8 in the morning during holildays should be illegal.

Sitting around the table resting your face in your hand still sleepy you suddenly feel a hand on your shoulder.

„morning sleepyhead“ turning around seeing the boy of your dreams, „morning“ you mumble him sitting next to you „slept good?“, shaking your head „nah I can’t sleep properly when I’m not in my own bed“, „if there wouldn’t be others in the camp house I would be by your side“ that wouldn’t be the first time but it still makes you blush „I’d actually love that“ him smirking „I know“, …excuse you?

„Good Morning everyone I hope you slept good, today is the very first day of this progamm so we’re of course starting to do math today so eat something and get the day started.“

Walking into the classroom in groups of 10 people so there are 4 classroom and thank the lord you were with Jungwon in the same group.

You actually hoped that a math camp would be something like swimming in the water while answering some math questions yeah.. that was so dumb.

You saw your name tag on the table in the corner of the last row sitting down looking at Jungwon who poorly sits in the first row trying not to laugh as he mouths „help me“, a man walks into the room standing infront of us.

„Hello there, I’m Zach and I will be your math teachter for the next 2 weeks nice to meet you all. Now before we start I will explain how this progamm actually works, so everday besides Saturdays and Sundays we’re going to start at 10 am in this classroom with math till 4 pm with an one hour break, so 5 hours of math a day is not that bad right-?"

Not bad? If you would be at home you could lay around in the swimming pool for 5 hours but thanks to your best friend you’re going to suffer to death. Rubbing your eyes and cursing Jungwon in your head.

„- and after 4 pm is Bethanys fun progamm. So because you’re here willngly or because your parents sent you here I want you to do your best so you can see math isn‘t that hard and you will for sure get better grades once you return to school. And now for the typical rules we’re going to respect each other and if someone says something incorrect we’re not going to make fun of them. So let’s get started open your books at page 1.“

Not even 1 hour in it, you’re ready to shoot yourself call it dramatic but you would rather sit in a room full of tigers, and to top it you’re getting irritated by a girl who’s constantly staring at Jungwon.

You wouldn’t call yourself a jealous type of person but when it comes to Jungwon something switches inside you.

Update it’s been 3 hours and girly girl with the name Lissy has been trying too much. You don’t know if Jungwon is dumb or dumb af, cause that girl is pushing it asking Jungwon math questions over and over again batting her fake lashes and pouting when she doesn’t understand a single thing. Rolling your eyes when Jungwons cluelessly helps her.

„Alright guys you all did amazing it’s been 3 hours, time for the one hour break.“ Zach announces everyone standing up ready to leave this hell off a classroom, passing by Jungwon not sparing him a glance.

Opening the door form the bathroom getting frightened when Jungwon suddenly stands there,

„Why didn’t you wait for me?“ walking pass him washing your hands „You were too bussy with that girl and I had to pee“ drying your hand on the towel not noticing Jungwons little smile „There’s no other reason right?“ he asks tilting his head challenging, little shit knows you too well,

„No, why would there be?“ slightly narrowing your eyes „hm sure.. then let’s go, the girl wants to introduce her friends to me and I’m taking you with me“ before you could say no Jungwon helds your hand tightly in his, trying to wiggle out of it but to no use.

Seeing miss Lissy from afar gives you the ick seeing her excited waving at Jungwon „Won you came“ you swear your eye just twitched,

She walks up to you both literally grabbing him away from you letting you stand there alone

„so this are my two friends Jason and Mike, Jason Mike this is Jungwon my new friend“ you couldn’t take it anymore turning around ready to run away-

„And who’s that girl?“ god damn it, „That’s Y/n my best friend“ sighing turning around „Hey“ making eye contact with the two boys refusing to look at Lissy.

„Oh weren’t you the girl who loves to water her plants?“ blinking at him „apperently yes“, „girl come here I’m a plant lover let’s talk“, univerese sure has a thing against you, you neither love to water your plants neither have you any knowledge about plants.

You don’t know how you got here but you were actually enjoyning the conversation with Mike, you talked in the beginning about plants but you quickly found out that Mike is a fast topic switcher (thank god) now you were talking about his dog?

„And he really took a shit on your bed after you scolded him?“ you asked „Yes, you should have seen his face it was like „yes I just did that“ that little shit.. he even ran away with still shit on his ass I had to chase him around the house“ having to laugh outloud making Jungwon turn his head around making him currious what you find so funny,

„God I would have loved to see that“, „I mean if you want we could meet up someday after this math camp and we could take a walk with him“ looking at him surprised „uh yeah sure?“ the both of you continued your conversation but what you didn’t catch was Jungwon's intense stare.

Sadly the one hour break came to an end and you were back in hell, it felt a bit weird walking with Mike and not Jungwon „So I hope I will see you later“ Mike says when you seperated into your classroom „for sure“ you smile at him noticing Jungwons glare.

Sitting down in your seat ready to grieve for your bed once again.

You thank god for letting the 2 hours of math went by fast, now you were all at the meet up point wearing your bikinis, swimmsuits etc. ready to have fun in the water.

„Now after 5 hours of math you all deserve to relax, have fun and if somehthings happens the life guards to my left will be right by your sides“ Bethany announces.

„Wanna go for a swim?“ Mike asks you „Nah, Imma sun bath I’m not really a water person“, he nods at you and leaves.

Laying down on the grass with your towel ready to get the sleep you didn’t get in the night.

Not long after you feel something touching your foot thinking it’s a bee you pretend to be dead not wanting to making it aggressive and sting you, when something touches your foot once again you slightly open your eyes and see a Jungwon staring at you and poking your foot with his toe? closing your eyes again,

„I’m trying to sleep what you want?“ „let’s swim“,

„no“

„yes“

„no“

„yes“

Before you could say no again Jungwon picks you up bridal style making you shriek „NO, Jungwon I don’t want to“

„Don’t care we’re going for a swim“ he says as he already walks into the water „Lemme at least take of my shirt I don‘t have something to change into when it’s drenched“, he looks at you „I know you’re lying you would just run away and don’t worry I have spare clothes“, groaning he knows you like an open book, asshole..

Still being carried he walks further into the water letting you slowly down your shirt totally drenched, sticking umcomfortable on your body.

„Wohoo so much fun“ you say full of sarcasm, him poking your stomach.

„So Mike?“ he asks literally out of nowhere blinking at him „Don’t tell me you brough me into the water to talk about him?“ „And what if I did?“ oh we’re getting bold now?

„Well what about Lissy?“, „I asked first“, „I’m a lady so ladys first, now spill“ you raise an eyebrow at him.

„well there’s not much about Lizzy she’s nice and funny“ looking at him irritated „She’s annyoing as fuck dude“, „and so is Mike“, „you didn’t even talk to him you can’t judge a book by it’s cover“, „well did you talk to Lissy before you judged her?“ he serious? „You little-“

before you could end your sentence you jumped onto him like a monkey, arms around his neck and legs around his torso startling him but still catching you wrapping his arms around your body protectively.

„something just tangled around my leg“ you look scared at the water, Jungwon's trying to see something and spots- „Y/n, it was just seaweed“ him grabbing into the water having seeweed around his fingers turning his face to yours which is really close to his leaning slightly back,

„well that was emberassing, we’re never going to talk about this again“ ready to untangle from Jungwon but him tightening his hold not letting you go, making you confused looking at him seeing his serious expression „wanna let go or?“

„How long will this continue?“ he asks, staring at him cluelessly „Huh?“

„Us lying to each other“, you have a guess about what he means but you try to dodge it „I still have no clue-“, him squeezing your waist making you nervous,

„Stop lying, I’m sorry to expose you now but when you once talked to Eunchae I accidently eavesdropped and heard you say things about me“ making your eyes bulge out turning your head to the left actually wishing to dissapear.

so that asshole knows that you’re in love with him..

„I’m actually really glad that I eavesdropped cause I always thought this was one-sided“ turning your head around looking at him shooked,

„Since when do you..?“

„First day of kindergarden..“ him grinning at you making your heart melt „..how could someone not fall in love when they get saved by their hero?“ making you laugh „you were really scared of that spider“,

him death staring you „you just were scared of sea-“ kissing him before he could talk further him melting into the kiss that was way overdue, hands on your waist pressing you onto him chest to chest, deepening the kiss slipping his tongue into your mouth, gripping his hair making him groan.

Once breaking the kiss you rest your head onto his shoulder „I’m so in love with you“ whispering against his neck giving him goosebumps kissing your cheek „god i’ve been waiting to hear that.“

-2 weeks later-

Math camp was finally over which means you could finally enjoy the rest of your holidays, you were glad that Jungwon forced you to go with him I mean who would have thought you would become a couple at the second day of this camp? well you didn’t.

„So you’re gonna pay for every milk shake I will ever have in my entire life?“ looking at him with happiness, you have an unhealthy obsession with milk shakes and the deal was Jungwon would pay for every milk shake you will have until you die „Of course a promise is a promise“ he answers-

„Oh look there they are“ Jungwon says seeing yours and his mother, picking you both up,

„And how was it?“ your mom asks while she hugs you „It was good“ you answer „You feel smarter?“ Jungwons mom asks Jungwon making you laugh „good joke“ Jungwon glares at you sticking up his middle finger at you.

Sitting in the car feeling tired you rest your head on Jungwon's shoulder saying hello to the dream land.

Jungwon's mom looks in the back mirror of the car glancing at Jungwon whispering „Are you finally..?“, Jungwon nodds and smiles at your sleeping state.

„You owe me 100 bucks“ Jungwon's mom states to your mom.

468 notes · View notes

fortunapre · 3 months ago

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𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒𖧞 definitely 16+ (suggestive and yeah), fluff, hot-hawt-hawt, fem-gender mention, Use on Y/n, swearing

𝐏𝐀𝐈𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆𖧞 oscar piastri x fem!reader

𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓𖧞 (scene iv) 3.4k

either i’m getting better at writing or i just really get carried away with…. certain scenes…

𝐀/𝐍𖧞 I love banter, you love banter, everybody loves banter! Really considering a tag list. BTW thanks to everybody who’s been liking the Pinterest-piece! I really enjoy making it and love that you do too!

Go Back? (scene ii) click here

Go Back? (scene iii) click here

𝐖𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐞�� 𝐀𝐟𝐟𝐚𝐢𝐫𝐬 𖧞 scene iv 𖧞 (𝐌𝐢𝐧𝐝-𝐅𝐮𝐜𝐤𝐞𝐫𝐬)

Wednesday, December 12th

I was just staring into the sky, not listening to anything going on around me. My sister was on another one of her rants about random social media drama, and I was nodding along like I was listening, but really my mind was elsewhere.

I don’t know when she stopped talking and realized I wasn't listening, but suddenly a loud sound made me jump. My sister had clapped her hands super hard, right next to my ear, breaking me out of my trance.

“Ow! What was that for?” I yelled at her and covered my ear like I was in pain.

“Because you weren’t listening to a single thing I was saying! Did you pay attention to anything I just said?” She asked, looking irritated.

I slowly pulled my hands away from my face and winced. “No…...” I answered honestly.

“Y/N! I was talking for at least 30 minutes!”

“Yeah, I know, I know. And usually, I'm interested in what you have to say but my mind is elsewhere today. I'm sorry.” I tried apologizing but she still looked angry. The biggest pet peeve of Her’s is when people don’t listen to her. And I’d just ignored her for half an hour.

She just huffed and turned away from me. She looked straight forward into the snowy view and sipped on her hot cocoa.

We were outside, cuddled in mounds of blankets and warm clothes, enjoying the beautiful winter scenery with a hot cup of chocolate.

“I really am sorry.” I tried again. At first, she didn't say anything and ignored me. Then, she turned back towards me and let a little smile show.

“I know you are, Y/n. I knew you weren’t listening. I saw you space out as soon as I started talking.” She said in a soft voice. I just winced again and laughed. We were both giggling quietly together at the situation and then stopped to take a sip from our mugs. “So then,” my sister began talking, shivering a bit before continuing. “What’s been on your mind?”

I wanted to tell her the truth, but I couldn't. I could only imagine the scream she’d let out if I said ‘oh nothing, I’m just overthinking about mine and Oscar's little not-so-little make out session yesterday, and what would have happened if you guys didn’t interrupt us. But really, I'm over-thinking the contradicting feelings and thoughts I have about him. And most of all, I'm angry at Oscar for completely ignoring me ever since last night.’

Basically, if I muttered a single word of the thoughts running through my mind, my sister would freak out. So instead, I answered with, “Nothing. I’m just trying to think of Christmas presents for everyone. You know how serious I take gift-giving.” I thought I’d dodged her questions, but her eyes squinted a bit, and I could tell she didn’t believe me. Instead of pushing it further, though, she just took a long sip of her drink then nodded.

The wind started to blow, and our fingers started getting numb, so we moved back inside and settled on the couch to watch a movie. We chose Love Actually, and chilled on the couch. It was still pretty early so everybody was still sleeping except for us.

Half-way through the movie, my brother walked out in his PJs with insane bed hair. Instead of talking he just sat on the sofa next to us and watched the movie.

A few minutes later, my brother and sister were talking on the other side of the couch, no doubt about the social media drama. I just sat by myself and finished the movie, almost drifting to sleep.

Before I could rest my eyes, I heard another person come down the stairs. I turned as much as I could to get a peek at who it was. But once I caught sight of familiar messy brown hair I turned back around. I sunk down into my blanket trying to hide my head from him. From what I could hear, he was making coffee or something in the kitchen.

“Morning. Oscar.” My brother greeted him, jumping up and over the couch to meet him in the kitchen. The two have always had some bromance since they’re around the same age and well…. not girls.

“Hey.” Oscar said to him. They started talking, but I couldn’t make out anything they were saying.

Once I saw my brother appear back in the main room, I let out a sigh, because that probably means Oscar went back to his room. But right after my brother, followed Oscar. I must have hidden well because once he rounded the couch and saw me, he froze. But not even a second later he snapped out of it and sat down. If I wasn’t already watching his every move, I would have missed it.

The twins picked a funny movie to watch, and the whole time, I stayed completely still. Oscar was less than an arm's length away and I’m afraid of how I’ll react if I touched him on accident.

Eventually, I couldn't handle it anymore. I practically jumped up and made my way to the kitchen.

As I was grabbing a Diet Coke from the fridge, someone came up behind me. I could immediately tell who it was by the sudden scent of spearmint and fresh pine filling my senses.

“What.” I asked frankly. I turned to face him, and he was in front of me, blocking my way out. I attempted to go around the kitchen island and leave that way but a few strides later and he was blocking my way again. “Hello, are you deaf? What do you want?” I repeated. I know I was being rude but it’s my defense mechanism with Oscar.

“Nothing, I’m just getting something in the kitchen and you’re in my way.” He spoke. He’s trying to aggravate me.

Safe to say it’s working.

“No. You're in my way. Move.” I tried. He only smiled and tilted his head like he was judging me.

“I'm just trying to get some water, Y/n. Why do you have to be so difficult?” He said, leaning closer and speaking lower. He kept that stupid smirk on his face and stood up straight, now towering over me.

“What are you playing at?” I asked through gritted teeth. Seriously, what is wrong with him? He’s being so annoying. It’s like he’s doing everything i told him I hated yesterd-

Oh. Oh.

“Oh my God!” I raised my voice a bit and let out a cold laugh. That’s what he was doing, he was purposely doing everything I said I found annoying about him. “Don’t be a dick, Oscar.” I scoffed and tried to shove his shoulder, but he stayed in place. I shoved through him again, as hard as I could, successfully getting through. He stumbled back a bit and put a hand to his shoulder like I’d hurt him.

He shook his head and poked his tongue in the inside of his cheek: a tell that he’s mad.

I started walking away, practically fuming smoke out of my ears, and made my way towards the stairs. This time, when Oscar tried to grab my arm to stop me, I pulled it out immediately.

I ran up the stairs away from him, but he just followed me up the stairs. I moved faster and quickly made my way into my room. Oscar almost followed me inside, but I quickly slammed the door in his face, stopping him. He didn’t try to come in at first.

Moments later there was still silence on the other side of the door, so I backed away and laid on my bed. I let out a big sigh and rubbed my forehead.

I decided to scroll on my phone and listen to music. However, every 5 seconds, there was a loud bang. At first, I tried to ignore it, but it kept going.

I watched a video, scrolled, then BANG.

Scroll, BANG!

Scro-BANG! I couldn’t take it anymore.

The sound was coming from the wall behind my head, which so happens to be the wall I share with Oscar, his room being next to mine. When we were younger, Oscar would play the loudest music or bounce a ball on the wall to annoy me. Right now, I'm positive he’s gone back to his immature roots and is chucking a ball at the wall to make me mad. I huffed and then jumped out of my bed and made my way out of my room. I tried to open the door next to mine but was met with a lock.

“OSCAR! LET ME IN” I knocked loud and quick on the door. When the door still didn’t open, I knocked louder. “Oscar, if you don’t open this door right now, I'm going to-”

“What? Kiss me?” The door swung open, and I was met with a grinning Oscar.

I almost choked at his words. I furrowed my eyebrows and looked at him with an incredulous expression.

“Wha..What?! I would never-”

“Ah, but you did. "He cut me off again. He was leaning against the doorway and tossing a ball in his hand, patronizing me. He was looking down at me with a smug expression, obviously proud of himself.

I scoffed and rolled my eyes. “If I remember correctly, YOU kissed ME.” I argued, shoving him for the second time today, making my way into his room. I turned around when I reached the middle of his room and placed a hand on my hip.

He slowly turned to face me, still leaning on the doorway and tossing the ball between his two hands. Once he faced me, I properly took him in.

He was wearing a black t-shirt that looks like it might have been left here from last year. Joining F1 meant he had to train more, so the shirt he was wearing looked a little tighter than it should be. He had a pair of jeans that fit him well; he must have gone shopping because they look new. His hair was neat. Not gelled, but probably combed.

“What are you doing?” I asked, talking about the incessant banging.

He rolled off of the door and stood up straight, walking slowly towards where I was standing. His sudden movement surprised me, so I backed away a little. But he kept walking towards me.

So, I backed away more. Instead of walking towards me again he just stayed in place. “Just playing catch.”

“With who, the wall?”

“Yeah.”

“Well stop.” I said and tried to take the ball away from him. He was quicker than me and pulled the ball away. I tried at it again but failed as he pulled it up and over my head. Prick. “Or play on a different wall, I'm trying to rest.”

“Nah.” is all he said.

“Nah?” I repeated. “Come on Oscar, drop this immature teasing and leave me alone.” I was getting tired of this very quickly. When he didn’t say anything, I gave up and made my way out of his room. Before I could leave though, he reached over and shut the door in front of me, trapping me inside.

Fully prepared to yell at him, I turned around but was met with Oscar standing right behind me. His arm was still on the door, next to my head.

He was staring at me, more specifically: my lips.

No. I won't. I couldn’t let him just kiss me whenever he feels like it.

“Stop…” I tried to sound demanding, but my voice came out barely above a whisper. I tried to push him away, but he stayed in place like a rock.

“I'm not doing anything,” Oscar tried to argue, but I was over him denying everything.

“Yes. Yes, Oscar you are! You can’t tease me and make me so incredibly angry but then turn around and look at me like…” I looked at his eyes. They were darker than normal and trained on my own with intensity. “...that. You can’t look at me like that. You're fucking with my head and frankly,” I scoffed. “It makes me want to punch you.”

He looked at me with the same intensity, never letting down. His arm still rested on the door, but his body was less rigid and slightly angled towards me. “Osca-”

I tried to tell him off again, but he started speaking.

“You’re fucking with my mind too.” He said quickly, looking away from my eyes. He dropped his head as he continued speaking. “Ever since…” he started but sounded like he couldn’t get the words out. “Ever since you got here, Y/n. You, and your voice and your eyes and those fucking shorts. Dammit.” He dropped his hand from the door, running it through his hair. I was just standing still, trying to understand.

He walked away from me, turning his back to me. “I don’t know what’s going on,” He admitted. “But I can't. Stay. away from you. Teasing you and making you angry is the only thing I know and fuck me if I don't crave every time your cheeks turn red when you're mad. Or when you roll your eyes, or when you fight back…” Now he was the one rambling.

I was trying to take in every word he was saying but his past actions and

current words weren’t adding up. Am I supposed to just rethink these past few days because his arguing and ruthless teasing has been because, what? He likes the way I ‘blush and get angry’?

My eyebrows furrowed and I shook my head. “Wait, what?” I asked. “I don’t understand, Oscar…”

Suddenly he turned back around and walked back towards me slowly. “Can you not? Try to understand, I mean.”

“What?”

“Y/n, I don’t even understand, alright? So don’t try to make sense of all of this right now.” His voice was low and quiet. His eyes were back on my lips and his body was closer than before.

“Ok.” I whispered. He was tilting his head lower, his breath fanning over my lips. My eyes fluttered and my skin heated up. Something about the look in his eyes and the warmth radiating off of him made every previous thought I had fly out of the window.

I know I just went on a rant about how we need to stop before it starts but for some reason, I don’t care anymore. I tilted my head up, brushing my lips against his, and sighing at the contact. My stomach was tumbling with need. I need him close.

“Fuck it.” Oscar whispered into my mouth as he connected our lips. I sucked in a breath as he finally kissed me, letting all of the built-up need roll onto my lips.

Our mouths met like they did the night before: deep and rough.

I don’t know what it is about arguments and them leading to us kissing. But this one felt different then the last. It felt full and needy. Instead of testing the waters, we both dived in, meshing together. He licked the corner of my mouth, sending me into a frenzy. I pulled him closer by the front of his shirt, backing me into the door. He put an arm on the door, next to my head to stabilize himself, while he pushed himself closer to me. The other hand was on my hip, rubbing slow circles on the skin right above my waistband.

I felt his tongue swipe against my bottom lip, so I opened my mouth slightly to let him in. His tongue tasted mine as we deepened the kiss. I flattened my palms against his chest and moved them up to around his neck. When I reached the hair on the back of his neck, I tugged lightly and moved up to further mess up the rest of his hair. He moaned into my mouth and pushed his hips into mine. My hips were flush against his, my back being pushed into the door. I let out a small noise at the friction and kissed him harder.

A familiar heat pooled in the bottom of my stomach, and I made what sounded like a whine as I unlatched our lips.

“Oscar,” I tried to speak but it’s like my voice was gone. I spoke breathy with desire laced in my tone. “Oscar, we have to stop.” I was saying the words, but I really didn’t mean or want them. And I think Oscar could tell it’s not what I really wanted because he licked a stripe up my neck and started kissing the spot between my ear and jawline.

I shut my eyes tightly and tilted my head back, to give him better access.

I gasped when I felt his teeth on my neck, do doubt leaving a mark. He sucked and kissed where he nipped and continued his way down my neck. I gasped his name, not to tell him to stop, but because of how good it felt.

He moved to the other side of my neck and let out a deep grumble that sounded like frustration. Before I knew it, Oscar bent down to grab the backs of my thighs and lift me up. I let out a small yelp and wrapped my legs around him. He pushed up back against the door and went back to my lips. Throughout the kiss, he and I pulled away to breath and speak.

“God, Y/n” he would say.

“Oscar, please,” I would answer.

With the new position, the heat between us grew red hot.

Oscar started pushing up, making his hips meet mine with friction I've never felt. Everything was rough and lustful. His lips, his hips, his hands, his chest, his voice. It was all too much.

I moved my hands from his neck to my shirt, trying to tug it up. He caught onto what I was doing and instead of helping me, he started walking away from the door, me still wrapped around him. He carried me across the room and sat on the edge of his bed, me now on his lap.

With his hands free, he grasped at the hem of my shirt and lifted it up and off of me. The refreshing cool air hit my skin but was soon covered by Oscar hands, splayed across each side of my ribcage. His touch was almost burning, and it made me only want him to touch me more. I put my hands on his shoulders and started moving my hips against him. He gasped and let out a frustrated groan, his hands left my upper half and instead held onto my hips, stopping me.

“Don’t.” he said through his teeth. “Don’t do that Y/n”

I was going to apologize, and he must have seen the worried look on my face because he spoke up. “No, it’s not you. It’s just that if you keep doing that, I’m not going to be able to stop myself.”

My eyes widened at this, and I was about to kiss him again, but a noise came from the other side of the room.

Oscar’s room door cracked open, and my sister poked her head in, and looked right at us. She saw me half naked on Oscar's lap, us both breathing hard and having so obviously been caught making out.

“Oh My God.” My sister and I said at the same time. She quickly made a show to cover her eyes with her hand and slam the door shut with the other.

My eyes were wide, and I was frozen.

I jumped off of Oscar and searched around for my shirt. I needed to talk to her before she said anything to anyone.

“My shirt. Where’s my shirt, Oscar?" I was breathing hard and was looking frantically.

“I don’t know, I kind of just tossed it.” He said, low. He almost sounded like he was in pain. I paused my searching and saw Oscar lean on his knees and run his hands through his hair.

“What. What’s wrong with you?” I asked, sounding mad, but I meant it genuinely.

He just chuckled and looked at me. “What do you think, Y/n? You were just grinding against me and then a second later you were gone. Obviously, I have a… problem… to fix now.”

My eyes widened with realization, and I blushed hard and turned away. I went back to searching for my shirt and eventually found it tucked under his bed. I threw it on and then ran out of the room, looking for my sister.

I saw her sitting on the couch, both hands covering her eyes. She looked like she was muttering something and shaking her head.

Oh, God how am I going to fix this.

Next (scene v) Click Here!

pinterest-piece (Winter Affairs moodboard)

#f1 #formula 1 #f1 x reader #fanfiction #oscar piastri #oscar piastri x reader #winter affairs ff

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bradshawssugarbaby · 1 year ago

Text

Timeless - III (Bob Floyd x Reader)

A/N: As promised, part 3 in time for my birthday (scheduled to post at the exact minute I was born bc why not)! It's not my finest work, but I'm relatively happy with it. Also, I done goofed and gave OC a name but tagged it as "x reader" - please feel free to just pretend the character's name isn't there, I just didn't want to write "Y/N" over and over and over again - it's written from the reader's perspective so I'm leaving it as "x reader" (also bc I'm lazy and like the parts to all match so).

pairing: Lt. Robert Floyd x reader

warnings/content: mutual pining, some angst, swearing, mildly steamy makeout sesh, Bob drops a bombshell on miss girl.

word count: 1.6k

one - two - three -

You blinked slowly as you tried to comprehend what Bob had just said. You looked at him in disbelief, letting out an awkward laugh as you felt your blood beginning to boil at his words. As much as you’d missed him, pined for him, and longed for him over the last decade, you were frustrated by the fact that this could have been avoided easily ten years ago if you or Bob had just swallowed your pride and said something to one another. While you knew you were just as much to blame on that part, it was Bob who walked away in the end, and in this moment, you couldn’t help but resent him for leaving you, then proclaiming he missed you for so long without ever so much as attempting to make contact. He at least could have asked his mother to speak to yours and provide him the contact information necessary to talk to you - you didn’t have that luxury, a) because he was often away at sea, and b) because he had left you without as much as a goodbye, leaving you under the impression that he didn’t want to see you. For some reason, hearing Bob’s admission made something inside you snap, you suddenly felt bitter and cold towards him for leaving you in the first place.

“You missed me? Do I need to remind you that it was YOU who walked away 10 years ago? Christ, Bobby, you didn’t even have the balls to come say goodbye to me before you fucked off,” you spat angrily.

“Listen, Krissy, let me explain,” Bob began, a pleading look in his eyes as he tried to calm you down.

“First of all, my name is Kristen. No one has called me Krissy in years. Not since you left. Secondly, I’ve been waiting, praying, hoping you’d call me. You don’t get to come back after years and hit me with this romantic “I’ve missed you so much” bullshit when you haven’t even as much as attempted to get ahold of me over the years. Do you know how many nights I spend crying when you left, wondering what the hell I did wrong to not deserve a goodbye from you? I thought I was finally over you too, and then you show back up here and remind me all over again just how fucking much I loved you. How much I still love you, and how no other man is ever going to compare to you,” You exhaled sharply as you finished ranting, shaking your head as hot tears stung your cheeks as they fell.

“Wait, you love me?” Bob frowned as he shook his head, his blue eyes welling up with tears as he looked at you.

“For fuck sake, Bob, out of all that, this is what part stuck with you? Not the part about me needing an explanation as to why the hell you thought it was ok to just abandon your best friend?”

Before you could continue ranting, you felt Bob’s lips crash into yours, his hands firmly grabbing your waist to pull you into his body. His grip on you was tight and passionate as his lips continued to kiss at yours, and you couldn’t help but moan softly as his tongue gently traced along your bottom lip, almost begging for entry to your mouth. You pulled away breathlessly and shook your head, looking at Bob with a completely bewildered stare.

“Care to explain that outburst, Lieutenant Floyd?” You raised an eyebrow at him and folded your arms across your chest, your gaze intense enough to make Bob worry he’d burst into flames if you didn’t look away from him.

“Listen, Kristen, I’ve always loved you. I assumed you just…didn’t.” He shrugged his shoulders sheepishly as he blushed, pushing his glasses up the bridge of his nose, “I wanted to tell you, I really did, but every time I got myself psyched up to do it, I’d chicken out and back off. And then I sort of tried to forget about you - threw myself into my naval career, made sure I was one of the best WSOs in the United States, got into Top Gun, I tried my damnest to forget you, Kristen. I really did.”

Bob let out a sigh as he shook his head, his blonde hair becoming perfectly tousled as it broke free from its uniform combed back look. He frowned at you before opening his mouth, hesitating before he spoke, his voice almost in a whisper as the words came out.

“I couldn’t forget about you no matter how hard I tried. I tried dating and throwing myself into my career, I tried forcing myself to see a future with other women, but no matter how hard I tried to force it, it just made me realize I wanted you more. Then I came home and found out you’d moved to New York from Mama, and I wanted to go there and see you - I’d fully planned on coming over here and asking your folks where you lived so I could go visit, try and convince you to listen to me and give me the chance I know that I don’t deserve, and then, as I was getting my coffee the other day, planning on how the fuck I was going to do this all, you walked in and complete threw me off guard, but I love it. It just reminded me more that…that this is the right thing to do, Kristen. I could leave the entire US Navy behind, just walk away and never look back, but I cannot in good conscience leave South Carolina without telling you how I feel.”

You sighed softly, shaking your head and frowning as your gaze met the floor, completely at a loss for words. You wanted so badly to stay mad at him for leaving without a word, but hearing that Bob had felt the same way you had for the last ten years, it made you soften towards him once again, another gentle sigh escaping your lips before you spoke, looking up to meet his cobalt blue eyes once again.

“Robert Floyd, are you saying that you love me as much as I love you?” You finally said, letting out a sharp breath that you hadn’t even realized you’d been holding in.

“I believe that’s exactly what I’m saying, Kristen.” He laughed softly, raising an eyebrow as he gently reached his hand out to touch your cheek, wiping a tear away with his thumb, “I never wanted to hurt you, Krissy. I just, I was a shy and awkward 18 year old who was in love with my best friend, and I didn’t know how to tell you. I was scared you’d reject me and I decided I’d rather live with the fact that you just didn’t know how I felt, than risk telling you and you shooting me down faster than I can shoot down an enemy aircraft.”

“For a smart man, you’re kind of a dumbass, you know that, Lieutenant Floyd?” You laughed and shook your head to rid your eyes of any remaining tears that threatened to fall.

“I know I am,” Bob grinned at you, leaning in to kiss at your cheek, just below your ear. As he pressed his lips to your soft skin, he murmured sweetly into your ear, “But, I’m your favourite dumbass, right?”

You felt Bob’s lips turn up into a smile against your cheek, his face hovering against your skin for a moment longer as he took in the familiar scent of your perfume, the same one you’d worn since you’d turned 16 years old. His hand found his way around the small of your back as his lips trailed across your cheek playfully. When he pulled away, he gently tucked your hair behind your ear and smiled.

“What happens now? Because, knowing how you feel now, I can’t leave for San Diego without us deciding what to do about it.”

As you were about to answer, you heard your brother calling up the stairs to you both.

“Hey, Ma says to hurry it up with the serving trays, and Dad says to stop fooling around up there like a coupl’a teenagers on prom night,” You could hear your brother’s laughter echoing from the bottom of the attic staircase as he spoke. Your sister’s giggle could be heard in unison with his, and you shook your head as you shot Bob a sympathetic look.

“Nice to see they haven’t changed in the slightest,” Bob laughed softly as he grabbed two of the serving trays and smiled before leaning in to give you a peck on the cheek, “I should probably head back to my Ma’s for dinner before she starts sending out a search party, but maybe after Thanksgiving dinner is over, we can talk?” His voice sounded hopeful as he spoke.

“Absolutely,” You nodded quickly, trying to stop your cheeks from turning bright scarlet red as he kissed you, “On one condition though,” you started.

“What’s that?”

“You promise to keep kissing me until you make me blush,” You smirked at him as you kissed his cheek, carefully straightening out his hair for him before sending him back downstairs to where your family was surely all discussing the possibilities of what could have taken place between you both in that attic.

#lt. bob floyd x reader #lt. robert floyd #lt. bob floyd #robert bob floyd #robert bob floyd x reader #bob floyd x reader #bob floyd #lt. robert floyd x reader #top gun maverick fanfiction

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beebeetheclown · 1 year ago

Note

Hey girl hey! I love your writing sm. I let my hormones take over and got this idea.. oops. I would love a story about where Kendall and reader (or female character) do it in a tall building in front of a huge window with the city down below. I just think it would be so hot lol.

Omg hi! Thank you for this request I love the idea :) Hope you enjoy <3

Working Late

One Shot: Kendall Roy/Reader, F/M

Warnings/tags: Contains smut, Kendall Roy x Reader, Kendall Roy x You

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

As much as you wanted to enjoy your night with having a hot chocolate and watching a movie alone, you were falling behind at work recently and needed to catch up. You currently were working at Waystar as an assistant. It was stressful at times, with the crazy Roy family losing their shit from time to time, other than that, the job wasn’t too bad.

You had paper work to fill out and sign by the end of the day. Your day was busy, you only managed to get it done now, at 10 pm.

You wanted to hand it in before the morning though, just to be safe from possibly getting in shit for handing it in late. You weren’t sure if anyone else would be in the office so late but it didn’t matter if anyone was there or not because you had your own set of keys. All you needed to do was go in quickly and drop your papers off then head back home. Easy.

When you arrive, at first the place is quiet. You made your way into the elevator and up into the main office rooms. When you arrive, you realize the main door is unlocked, meaning someone either forgot to lock up or someone was still here. You walk in and it’s almost dark everywhere except you notice one of the office lights is turned on.

You try to just ignore who ever was there, you didn’t feel like making conversation or letting anyone know you were coming into the office now to take your papers in. You make it to your work station and place your papers into the folder. When you turn in the lamp, you hear a voice coming from the other lit up room.

“Who’s that?” They call.

You freeze, “it’s uh just me.” You say awkwardly.

“Y/n?”

“Yes.” You admit.

You turn around as you hear footsteps and see Kendall Roy standing outside of his office.

“What are you doing here so late in the night?”

“What are you doing here?” You reply back.

He smiles a little, “doing work. you’re handing in your papers, aren’t you?”

Kendall was technically your boss. You didn’t know how to respond. You weren’t sure if he was going to be angry with you.

“Yeah, maybe.” You say quietly.

“Well good. You’re smart for bringing them here before the meeting tomorrow morning.”

“Yeah, I.. just like to be prepared.” You say awkwardly. You always felt awkward when talking to Kendall.

“Well, have a good night. I should uh, get back to my shit.” He replies.

“Why are you working so late?”

He sighs, “I have a lot of stuff to deal with.”

You could tell something was bothering him, he was upset and angry about something.

“Like what?” You dare to ask.

“Stuff that is too fucking hard to think about.”

“What do you mean?”

“I don’t know, it’s fucking pointless. Everyone here tells me different fucking things of what I should and shouldn’t do. People have told me different opinions on this thing I’m working on and I don’t know what to do about it.”

“Well, I think maybe you should just.. do what you think is best you know? They let you work on it, so you should be able to choose what you want.”

“You don’t understand it though honey,” Honey. He’s never called you anything like that before, not anything even near it. He’s only ever called you by your name. “People here aren’t on my side. That’s why everything I do is bullshit.”

He was upset now, he was showing it and he didn’t care. He just needed to rant it out to someone, you were the one there to listen to it. You didn’t mind it.

“I don’t think everything you do is bullshit.” You say.

“No?”

“No, to be honest, I think you’re the smartest out of all your siblings.” You say. You did just want to make him feel better about himself, but you weren’t lying, you really did believe in that thought.

A smirk appears on his lips, “you think?”

His deep voice was making you feel like your heart had dropped to your stomach, you didn’t know if it was because of how late it was or if you were actually starting to become attracted to him, either way, you wanted him.

“Yes.”

“Come here, give me hug.” He suddenly says. You just look at him and freeze in place, “fuck sorry, never mind. It’s stupid,”

You don’t let him continue his rambling and walk over to him and wrap your arms around him. It takes him a second to wrap his arms around you. You stay like this for a while until you feel that he was hard.

“Uh, Kendall?” You say shakily before pulling away.

He immediately knows what you’re talking about, “fuck. Sorry, I’m sorry. It’s just,” he can’t finish his sentence.

“It’s ok.” You reply. You pick at your nails and look at the floor, “it’s kind of hot.” You blurt out quietly. You immediately regret what you just said, he was your boss. What were you thinking? You had never felt like this with him before, sure you thought he was attractive, but you never actually took action on letting him know that.

You look up at him, nervous to see what his reaction will be. He’s smiling.

“Yeah?”

He didn’t even realize it himself, but when he felt upset over something, he always got more desperate to fuck someone. Like he needed to forget about it all and just fuck all of his problems out. He needed to hear the whimpers fall from a girls lips of how good he was.

“Yeah.” You reply softly.

“Look at you, coming into the office late just to flirt with your boss. How professional.” He teases.

“You’re the one with the hard on. You’re hard for your assistant, how professional is that?”

“Let’s just agree that we are both very unprofessional right now.”

“Fine, we are both very unprofessional.”

He brings his fingers to play with yours, you don’t pull back, you let him begin to intertwine your fingers together.

“Are we going to continue being unprofessional or are we going to be good people and follow rules?”

“I don’t know, the first option sounds kind of better.” You didn’t know what you were doing, you knew sleeping with him would probably end of having negative feedback and distract you from work. You didn’t care, you couldn’t just go home now, you were practically dripping.

“Yeah, I think so too.” He smiles.

The truth was, the two of you weren’t really thinking, you both felt tired, stressed, overworked and horny. Both of you hadn’t slept with anyone for a while, so that made things worse.

He suddenly kisses your lips, it’s a long kiss. You kiss him back, slipping your tongue in his mouth. You continue to kiss him roughly as he pulls you with him into his office. He shuts the glass door behind you even though it wouldn’t have mattered, the walls around you were glass and there was no one else around, it was just the two of you and the big city below you.

He pushes some things off of his desk and lifts you up so you’re sitting on it. He spreads your legs immediately. If you knew that this were going to happen, you would have worn something better, something prettier, better lingerie. But that didn’t seem to really matter, because he wasn’t focused on what you were wearing, he just wanted it off and on the ground. As your shirt is now off, the both of you work and removing his fancy jacket and his button up that was underneath. As soon as it’s halfway undone, he can’t continue and kisses you again. As soon as he unclips your bra, he pushes you down so that your back is now fully on his desk. He works on finishing undressing himself now. You become impatient and begin to bring your hand under your pants and touch yourself. Everything was moving so fast.

He still has his shirt on but it is half way undone, with his pants and boxers down almost to his ankles, he couldn’t wait any longer to finishing undressing and immediately pulls your hand away from yourself. You sigh out at the feeling of your fingers leaving you. He holds your hand down, pinning it onto the desk. You take that as a hint to leave your hands at your sides. He lifts your hips and takes off what’s left on you.

“Stand up.” He says lowly. You obey quickly, it was embarrassing, you would do anything he would tell you to do without hesitation. When you stand, your faces are close together. You swallow nervously and look up into his eyes. He just looks at you and tucks your hair behind your ear, admiring how beautiful you were before he turns you around so your back is towards him then he pushes you down so your stomach was now on his desk. He makes you spread your legs out again. His tip near your entrance made you sigh out.

“Look out my fucking window,” he says. Taking your hair in his hand, “you’re going to let all the fucking people out there know how you let your boss fuck you right here on his desk.”

You can’t reply with words, you just moan out at his words. You hear him tear open a condom. You knew now that this was really happening, that you were bent over your boss’s desk, allowing him to fuck you, no matter how wrong it probably was.

You feel his hands find their way to your hips. “You want this?” He asks to make sure that you really wanted him.

“Yes. I want it Kendall.” You breathe out.

“Good.” He says before he thrusts into you. He was definitely fucking his feelings out, his hips drove into you hard right from the beginning, giving you basically no time to adjust to him.

You can’t help but moan out at how good it felt. You didn’t care at how he was letting all of his anger out on you, you wanted him to. You wanted to help him let go of all of his anger and stress out into you.

He thrusts into you harshly a few more times before grunting and pulling out to pull your hair to make you stand up again. He turns you around and sets you down onto his desk, spreads your legs and thrusts into you again. You throw your head back and before coming back to kiss his lips. He puts his weight on you to push you down so you lay back down onto his desk. His lips don’t leave yours as he continues to fuck you.

“Let everyone in the fucking city hear you. Hear how slutty you are for letting me fuck you.” You cry out and wrap your legs around him. “There you go. Say my name, please. Say my fucking name honey.”

“Ken, fuck Kendall.” You manage to moan out.

He swears under his breathe, “again, say it again.” Hearing his name fall from your lips made him close to the edge. It’s exactly what he needed to hear to make his night stress free.

“Kendall.” You say, calling it out louder than before.

“Fuck, I’m going to-“ he begins. He does his best to last a little longer, so he can allow you to finish with him.

You were close as well though, so he doesn’t have to wait much longer before you’re clenching around him, letting pleasure come over you. You’re arching your back and have one hand gripping onto his shoulder while the other grips the edge of his desk. You hadn’t ever came so fast in your life, not even when you touched yourself.

He follows immediately after you, pausing inside you as he spills into the condom. As the both of your highs come down, you whimper out and relax your body. He pulls out of you and you immediately feel empty again, almost like you needed him again.

You sit back up and hop off his desk, standing up the best you could. It was quiet now, there was just the sounds of the fabric of your clothes being put back on and the sounds of your heavy breathes. The both of you didn’t really know what to say now that you were back in a normal mindset.

“I guess I’ll um, see you tomorrow.” You say, breaking the silence.

“Uh huh yeah, see you uh, see you tomorrow.”

You give him an awkward smile before stepping out of his office, heading for the exit door. It felt as if your mind was spinning, you couldn’t believe that what just happened actually happened. You wondered how he felt, you hoped it was a good feeling and not a bad one. You knew for a fact that it was a really bad thing that you just did, but it was definitely worth it and you would most likely do it again. You were wondering if he was feeling the same.

#kendall roy #jeremy strong #ao3 #fanfic #succession #fanfiction #kendall roy smut #request

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princehrry-writings · 2 years ago

Text

I posted 11 times in 2022

8 posts created (73%)

3 posts reblogged (27%)

Blogs I reblogged the most:

@fanfictionisalifestyle

@just-my-type-x

@princehrry-writings

I tagged 11 of my posts in 2022

#colby brock x reader - 3 posts

#harry styles - 3 posts

#colby brock - 3 posts

#sam and colby - 3 posts

#skye answers - 2 posts

#xplr - 2 posts

#harry styles x reader - 2 posts

#skye rants - 2 posts

#lizzy mcalpine song fic - 1 post

#when the world stopped moving - 1 post

Longest Tag: 43 characters

#it’s colby’s hand around nate’s neck for me

My Top Posts in 2022:

feeling very blocked at the moment and would love to hear some requests!!! let me know what you want to see!!!

2 notes - Posted June 17, 2022

happy valentine’s day miss skye 🫂💌

omg thank you��🥺🥺 happy valentines days!!!!!!!!!!!!

3 notes - Posted February 14, 2022

guys im in my colby brock era rn... so you're probably gonna see some stuff for him from me :) i'm working on a piece for him rn!!

19 notes - Posted November 11, 2022

Let Light Be Light

i've been on a lizzy kick and also experiencing college for the first time so this is what came of that.

warnings: BRIEF mentions of a serial k*ller, slight angst, fluff!!!!! mentions of family trauma

wordcount: 1894

masterlist

But my therapist says To just let light be light So I'm letting him stay around

I’m alone almost every night and I don't know if I’m processing right.

The days grew shorter and the nights colder. Y/n spent most of her time studying, trying to stay on top of her school work. Fall semester was in full swing and while she was sad to be away from home, she was happy to be allowed to think her own thoughts and feel her own feelings instead of everyone else’s. It was a breath of fresh air she didn’t know she needed until she took it.

Another late night at the library, nailing down her answers for her music theory midterm. She found that she loved the smell of old books and dust. Something about it made her feel so studious. She thinks it must be some kind of placebo effect or something because anytime she studies in the library, she feels like the information sticks better.

Her friends had invited her to a study session but she's never been able to focus in group settings like that. She had to figure shit out on her own growing up and that's been a running theme with everything she does in her young adult life. She does shit by herself. She’s never had anyone to lean on before so why would she start now?

That’s not to say Y/n doesn’t appreciate her friends because she does, but if something isn’t broken, no need to take it apart and put it back together.

It’s nearing closing time at the library, meaning it’s closer to midnight then she realized it was. It’s dark out and she forgot her pepper spray in her room, but her dorm isn’t too far away from the library. A 10 minute walk when she’s really moving, so she packs up and gets ready to head out when a voice stops her.

“Wait, you’re not gonna walk alone are you?” She turns around to see this boy, who she recognized from a few classes and he worked here, standing at the counter, lookin at her like she's about to jump off a cliff. He seems cute enough, more than she would ever admit to herself, really. He’s tall, long legs and arms, built muscles. His hair falls right above his ears and is curly, but not too curly. It’s very flowy from what she assumes is him running his fingers through it all day to keep it out of his face, and it looks really soft.

“Yeah…?” She says, wondering why he’s so concerned for her. She’ll be ok, it’s not a bad walk.

“It’s not safe… haven’t you seen the news? There’s a suspect for a murder case running loose on this side of town. His targets are college age girls. Let me walk you home?” His accent makes her a lot less annoyed than she normally would be by somebody telling her she can’t take care of herself.

“How do I know you're not him?” She quips, hoping he’ll give up so she can just go home. Well, as home as a dorm room can be.

He raises an eyebrow, making him more attractive than she thought a random boy in the library could ever be, chuckling a little bit and picking up his bag. She notices that everyone else is already gone and it’s just the two of them, and wishes just for a second that she didn’t listen to true crime podcasts because she’s a little scared he could actually be the murderer he just warned her about. But when he comes over and she gets a good look at him, she just can’t see him being a murderer. She couldn’t really see him hurting a fly if she had to be honest.

He grabs his bag and a ring of keys off the desk and pads over to where she stands.

“M’ Harry, by the way. Figure you should know my name before I kill you behind the library.” He smirks. Oh, so he’s funny too. Now Y/n really has to put up a wall. Funny guys are dangerous.

“I’m Y/n. Figure you should know the name of your latest victim.” She smirks back, matching energy but mentally she detaches herself because she can’t let herself form any sort of attachment to him.

“What hall are you in?” He asks, leading her to the front door and turning off the lights, locking the door behind them.

“It’s only like a 10 minute walk from here. I live in Greeley.” She answers quickly, shoving her hands deep into her pockets. Fall nights can be brutal but there's something that endears her to them. Something about the promise of the seasons changing, new beginnings, a fresh start. A cycle you can always count on. If nothing else, you always know that summer will turn to fall, and fall to winter, and so on.

They walk quickly, making small talk and learning little things about each other. Like Harry is in three out of 7 of her classes. He talks to her like they’ve been friends forever and she can’t figure out why he’s being so nice to her. Can’t figure out what he wants, not that she really has much to give in the first place.

Too soon do they arrive at the front door of her dorm building. He says goodbye with a charming smile that she has to consciously not blush at and she makes her way upstairs.

The butterflies win anyway, flooding her with a warmth she swore she would never feel again. She just met him today. What is she doing with herself?

Is this what it’s supposed to feel like?

Suddenly, Y/n sees Harry everywhere. She knows it's crazy to think he’s following her, but that’s what her brain tells her because why would she be seeing him everywhere all of the sudden. She definitely doesn’t think it’s because he’s all she's been able to think about since he walked her home from the library.

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54 notes - Posted November 4, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

I Feel Like A Hero and You're My Heroine

i'm back on my sam and colby shit after like 200 years

warnings: alcohol consumption, kissing, party, hella fucking fluff bro like omg

wordcount: 1093

masterlist

You had no idea how you ended up at this party. One moment you and your friends were having a girls night, getting tipsy and talking shit. The next moment, you're in an uber on your way to a house party.

When you pull up you still have no idea whose house this is, you’re just along for the ride. The music is loud and there's people everywhere, dancing, drinking. People out back are smoking, sitting around a fire.

You make your way through the crowd, finding the kitchen and deciding to make yourself another drink.

“Welcome ladies! My name is Colby, I’m one of the hosts. If you need anything or have any questions, I’m your man!”

You look behind you and see the guy who was talking to you and your friends. You were shocked, of course you knew who he was and you knew that your friends ran in the same circles as them but you never thought you would ever meet him or anyone doing what he was doing. After his little introduction, his eyes zeroed in on you, an almost imperceptible smirk appearing on his face.

“Hi!” He smiled, walking closer to you. You’re already tipsy so that makes it even easier to talk to him and flirt like you want to.

“Hey, thanks for the warm welcome!” You smile back, opening yourself up for him to invade your space. He got close but not too close. He didn’t want to make you uncomfortable but to you he couldn't be close enough. You felt a pull to him, like something had just clicked into place.

Maybe you're more drunk than you thought.

Colby smiled at the little giggles you were letting out, stepping closer when you draped your arm over his own, almost pulling him into you. Your friends were all standing around, watching the interaction and smirking, knowing a sober you would never be this forward.

“I’m Y/n by the way.” You smile up at him, putting on your best game.

“Nice to meet you Y/n.”

You two are glued to each other for the rest of the night, talking and laughing, getting progressively more drunk. You’re having the time of your life, the most fun you think you’ve ever had actually. Colby understood you in a way no one ever had before. The way he listened to your words, as slurred as they were at the moment, and the way he stared into your eyes as you spoke made you feel like you were the only girl in the world.

“I FUCKING LOVE THIS SONG!” You yelled out as Hero/Heroine by Boys Like Girls came on. It brought you back to your emo phase that you never really grew out of, you just learned how to style yourself better.

“YOU KNOW THIS SONG?” Colby yelled back at you, eyes wide, grime spread across his face.

“YEAH I FUCKING KNOW THIS SONG!” You jumped up off the couch where you had been sitting with Colby, grabbing his hand and dragging him up with you. You started jumping around and dancing, screaming the lyrics, and not giving a fuck who looked at you weird. Colby didn’t look at you weird.

That’s all that mattered.

He danced with you, pulling you closer to him.

“You caught me off guard, now I’m running and screaming. I feel like a hero and you're my heroine, do you know that your love is the sweetest sin.” You both yelled together.

Without thinking, Colby leaned in, pressing his lips to yours. You reacted before you knew what you were doing, pulling him closer to you. The kiss was needy, like he’d been waiting all night for this. His hands roamed your body, pressing you flat against his. Your arms wrapped around his neck, one hand threading through his hair, the other lightly cupping his cheek.

By the time he pulled away, you were both gasping for breath.

“Holy shit.” You whispered, opening your eyes and staring straight into Colby’s.

“I might be really drunk but I think I just fell in love with you…” He whispers back to you. You can’t tell if the blush on his cheeks is the alcohol or the dancing or if he's embarrassed but you find yourself leaning back into him.

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110 notes - Posted November 11, 2022

Get your Tumblr 2022 Year in Review →

#tumblr2022 #year in review #my 2022 tumblr year in review #your tumblr year in review

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fleurdov · 4 months ago

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this is like not a coherent analysis of the chapter at all! I just don’t have enough room in the tags for the things I usually say🤝🏾so first off THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR THE UPDATE??? IT WAS SO GOOD????????

can i just say the party scene had me stressed with okay like so obvious spoilers ahead but i waited a couple of days and it’s been clawing at my brain and i have to let out my thoughts how much Mc was drinking though like I was sweating thinking she was gonna miss the time to meet with San or somehow let it slip or something. I had to giggle when she was gonna go over to Jongho tho and her looking at Yunho is so real

Also the convo with hwa at the party where he said Mingi definitely wasn’t better off before hand, and how when we tried to leave he hasn’t been the same literally made me :( I know Seonghwa is like the worsttt but I trust him the most out of everyone here so it just makes me remember how this all started with Mingi, but also makes me think about that convo between San and him where Mingi says that he was never the target just a means to get to Mc and that makes me even more nervous. IM SO GLAD WE GOT TO TALK TO HIM THO, though it’s hard for me to trust his words too bc ya know Hongjoong.

nvm this had me on the floor sobbing like hello???? minus what he says about the insane man afterwards i choose to ignore that part but this convo was so sweet and i’m glad it was had bc I fear for him like everyday but also now that they are “made up” i’m even more scared

CAN I JUST SAY AS SOON AS SAN SAID HE HAD TO GO BACK MY STOMACH CURLED UP like I knew weren’t escaping but the idea of being alone????? it gave me ptsd to the corn fields like I actually went through it😭AND WHEN SEONGHWA KNOCKED ON THE WINDOW???? my soul left my body i had to literally take a moment before i continued because i knew things were about to not be good

“Why are you crying? Are you leaving?” He sounds so sad that your heart nearly shatters. You're leaving?” He asks again, “without me?”

shutuoshutuoshutupshutupshutup drunk seonghwa is making me upset and uncomfortable and i wanna hug him but i know it’s a trap but it’s such a good trap. and the fact that he says he won’t tell and repeating that we’ll both be fine if I just come back ALL WHILE CRYING??? this scene is heart wrenching was your goal to hurt my feelings bc my feelings are hurt right now. All i can think of this those characters analysis you’ve posted for Seonghwa about the parallels between him and mc and just knowing that it hurts to see this scene go down even more to me. And the fact that Mc knew that there was so escape??? perfection my soul is rotting.

“You glance at Seonghwa, who still has his back turned to you. He seems to be shaking, but you find it hard to believe that, even in this scenario, he would cry for you. This has to be part of it, right? Part of making you feel guilty?”

STOP(if you haven’t noticed i’m like in love with seonghwa idc if he’s the worst i love him so much)

Can I just say the way you write Hongjoong is brilliant! The scene where he’s about to drag you back through the woods to the barn is I wasn’t scared? but it definitely still felt like waiting for him to snap and that felt even worse? Ooo and Joong calling Mc selfish for self preservation is crazy bc the moral greyness of it all. I’ve found myself being like i don’t want mc to get san or anyone else hurt but then I remembered hey! they got her hurt they brought her here! and when you’re in this i need to escape mode it’s definitely hard to think unselfishly so for her to be called out on it but the most selfish of them all to manipulate at her at one of her lowest is just wowwwww

and before i rant about the ending scene oh my gosh I just- I imagine Jongho just tryna have his alone time and seeing mc and being like 🫥i don’t get paid enough

SEE okay Hongjoong is so good at manipulating that I literally had to pause and be like “no San didn’t kill Hanseul right???” Like bro had me questioning myself he’s so SICK also San calling him a psycho had me giggling cause that definitely was not part of the script

I’m still like in circles that Hongjoong told San to make this escape plan bc like one hand when San first proposed the plan that’s exactly what I thought was going on bc San was so devoted to Hongjoong? But after seeing Sans pov(granted i’m not sure what’s accurate anymore) I’m not convinced of his loyalty to Hongjoong so I chose to believe that he was in a way loyal and looking out for Mc in the best way he knew how I mean the dude is a cult member at the end of the day??? But also I DONT TRUST ANYTHING HONGJOONG SAYS HE LIES FOR FUN THIS WHOLE CULT IS LITERALLY JUST HIM LYING FOR FUn so I’m like??? I don’t believe that San truly is betraying us like this!?? But maybe I’m just foolish and extremely stupid. Like San hasn’t been cruel to us?? and to instigate a conversation on what we would do after escape the cult would be so freaking cruel???? I just i’m fighting between wanting to have some faith left in San because if I don’t that means Hongjoong really is right and I hate a world where Hongjoong is right!!!(Ive also looked at Characters pinterest boards you’ve made more times than I care to admit👉🏾👈🏾and i take those into account so it’s just hard for me to fully believe in san betraying us like this) But again maybe I’m delusional and if that’s the case then me and Joong are like this 🫱🏾‍🫲🏼

Was not expecting Mc to launch herself and beat San tho! Like girl wait!!! But also these men have trapped you here so at the same time? Go girl? But hongjoong is obviously satisfied with this so I feel so much dread and uncomfortableness and I feel so horrible for San even though I know I shouldn’t???? But I definitely feel horrible for Mc and I just wanna give her a hug

“You’re sure that he’s planning on strangling you, there’s a sweet little look in his eyes that tells you everything you need to know.”

OOOO THE GIRLS ARE FIGHTINGGGGGG(mc and hwa) this is so horrible give me 12 more of them! no but actually the fact that mc is just baiting whoever she needs to bait into attempting to off her makes my heart clench this poor girl. I hate it so much she doesn’t deserve this!!!! What I wasn’t expecting was San to start going in on Hwa though! Like if anything solidified San has some sort of messed up love loyalty to Mc it’s this and I dont(do) like it!

“Doesn't this make you feel good? Seeing what San would do for you? Even after it’s all over?” He whispers so close that his breath tickles your ear. “It could always be like this. Everyone could love you like this.”

“Love? This is love? Your ploy to upset Hongjoong by including Seonghwa failed. If there isn’t love lost between the two of them, then what on earth about this is love? Still, your heart skips a beat”

HONGjoong you’re a sick demented tiny man and i hate you and I hate that this is going according to your plan!

ALSO sEONGHWA AND SAN SOBBING IN THE BACKGROUND WHIKE HWA TURNS AWAY AND SLAPS HONGJOONG HAND AWAY?? Deserved on Hongjoong part but seonghwa baby boy please forgive me! But Then i have to remember that he is actually the worst!

and this man had the nerve to comfort and hug mc after everything. He is- He’s really good like in a way bc throughout this whole story mc has stayed strong in not giving him what he wants and not believing him but this scene just flipped ALL OF THAT?? And that is truly what’s so scary? Her finding his presence grounding and seeing that he’s right it makes me feel so much dread for the upcoming chapters. Like until this moment I never thought that Mc could be fully fully manipulated or turned by Hongjoong but now I fear it may be a possibility and now all of those warning from Seonghwa about the not ifs but when’s are starting to seem scarier now. WE LOVE A DOOMED NARRATIVE

OVERALL I LOVED THIS CHAPTER AND IM FLABBERGASTED!!!! Like I need to think more of the chapter and look make at my previous reblogs and interims to put together better thoughts but for now I just wanted to express how much I loved this!!!!!!!!!

san, seonghwa and joong at the end of the chapter

everyone read The Answer like immediately!

THE ANSWER: XXVIII

Kim Hongjoong doesn’t like the word ‘cult.’ He prefers ‘sect.’ pairing: ateez x fem reader genre: cult au, thriller, angst check warnings on AO3

← previous || next → || masterlist chapter word count: 14,305 chapter warnings: alcohol consumption

Your month drags on. Despite the heightened activity around the farm, nothing much changes in your day-to-day schedule. You wake up at the same time, listen to Hongjoong ramble for the same amount of time, eat the same meals with the same people, and eventually sleep at the same time. Even book club is monotonous, barely even happening— but that might have more to do with the fact that Seonghwa (who conducts most of your lessons) seems even less enthused about having to spend an hour talking to you than you are.

Which is strange— ish. Not that you expected much different from him, but you had thought that… or, well, at least, you weren’t feeling such a burning hatred for him anymore, so, maybe…

But that’s silly. Of course Seonghwa still doesn’t give a rat's ass about you, why would he? All you’ve ever done is be a pain in his side. Even when he’s… comforted you in the past… its been to relieve his own discomfort or guilty conscious, not to actually help you. Probably.

You truly have no idea. Seonghwa is an enigma.

In a way, though, you’re glad that he’s at least mostly off your case. Maybe due to your slight mental breakdown after seeing the… thing… Seonghwa seems to be less eager to poke fun at you. Not nice by any standards, but he’s certainly less devious around you.

Which also means that he hasn’t been prying into your personal life. Thankfully. With the secret of your escape looming over your every thought, it would be just like you to accidentally slip-up in front of Seonghwa and blow the whole thing.

Instead, he keeps things very formal. He doesn’t put his hands on you, he doesn’t stare at your face with that scrunched-up look, he doesn’t ask questions about you or your day or San or anything else. He talks to you about The Answer and lets you leave after.

Though the arrangement is a bit startling at first, you get used to it quickly. Hongjoong appears less and less at these meetings, not even making an appearance in the last two weeks of the month. You have no idea what he could possibly be so busy doing, but you’re not complaining.

Over the course of the month, there were several more rituals, similar to the tune of the one that you had participated in. Luckily, you were not called to participate in any of them, and no more— and your hesitant to even give whatever happened a name, but— Guardians appear to confuse and scare the everliving fuck out of you.

More and more, you find yourself absentmindedly reaching to touch the pins on the collar of your shirt, fiddling with them whenever your hands are free. You want to think that it has nothing to do with Hongjoong’s bullshit about the Sign protecting you… and it doesn’t! Not at all! That would be crazy! It’s just a habit. Like spinning a ring or twisting a necklace.

… You’ll go with that, anyways.

Occasionally, you still have nightmares about your encounter. What a horrible night that all was. Obviously, there still is nothing in you that can believe that Guardians are real. That would be silly. And insane. But it’s only natural that you’re still upset about the whole situation. Whatever had happened, it had scared the shit out of you. It affected you— it makes sense that your subconscious would be fixated on such a traumatic memory.

Right…? Or maybe you’re still actively thinking about that night and what the fuck had happened. Could it have been what Hongjoong said? Could he be right? Or were you blitzed out on some mysterious drug and everyone else was just lying about what they saw? Could Hongjoong manage that?

He probably could. It couldn’t be that hard for him to convince the entire cult into gaslighting you into believing that they had all seen the thing, too. But San… He wouldn’t lie to you about it, right? You find that very hard to believe.

Thinking on it, San had, of course, never outright said that he had seen the same thing as you— you had never spoken in detail with him about it… But he was disturbed enough to set your escape into motion, which must count for something. Maybe he had seen a Guardian and was terrified enough to run.

These sorts of thoughts dominate your month.

You had volunteered to help out with the harvest, almost pleading with San for something to do. You were sure that Wooyoung would take your help back in the kitchens, but Hongjoong denied you any opportunity that seemed to come your way. He wanted you with San, where he could see you.

Which is stupid, in your opinion. Hongjoong has the Followers, all of whom are incredibly devoted to him; any of them would give you up in a heartbeat if they saw you trying anything that you shouldn’t. He could assign literally anyone to watch you while you did a task, and it would achieve the same thing as having San at your side. But no. You were forced to rot in your apartment, glancing over San’s shoulder to his laptop on occasion, hoping to see something that could brighten your mood (or give you more information).

Most of the time, you watch out your window, hoping to snag another glance at Mingi. There are a few times when you can see him in the field, but the Followers make quick work of the harvest nearest the compound, and move farther and farther away as the month rolls onward. Sometimes, you swear you can see his hair in the distance, reflecting the sun so brightly. It gets harder and harder to remember why you fought. Why you were holding a grudge. Could you really blame him for having your best interests at heart?

Sure, he had been a little possessive and freaky, but, like, he was kind of telling the truth. And he was just trying to make sure that San wasn’t hurting you.

You’re probably just making excuses for him, now, as you miss his company. Here you were, a cult member, locked away in an apartment, all for him— and you don’t even have him. You can’t even speak with him freely. The irony isn’t lost on you.

Anyways, it doesn’t come as much of a shock when Hongjoong announces that the harvest is complete. Though the month might have been one of the longest of your life, watching the field workers get farther and farther away everyday at least gave you a sense of time passing. When even their tractors were tiny specks that you could hardly see without squinting, it was clear that the work was almost finished.

The announcement is met with much fanfare, though you’re not sure why. From what you make of it, Halloween is always the date on which the harvest celebration occurs. It shouldn’t be much of a surprise that the harvest is over, especially with the date looming so soon, but the Followers all seem overjoyed. Maybe they’re all just ready to relax after a long, toiling month.

That said, the day itself comes much faster than you anticipated. Hongjoong made the announcement of the end of the Harvest on the 25th of the month, leaving six days between the sermon for celebration and the actual ceremony itself.

Which left you with six days to finish your mental preparations for your escape.

San had refined your plan over the month, including making a timeline of the night and the places you should find yourself. He took over the entire plan, which you really couldn’t be more thankful for. His knowledge of the farm and the workings of the cult provided a level of security that you would have never been able to achieve on your own.

In essence, the plan remained the same. When the ceremonial party began at 6pm, you would have nothing to worry about… besides socializing for the next nine hours. Just follow the vibes, and you would be okay. San was sure that you would have free reign during the party, that you’d be allowed to be away from a higher-ups side once the alcohol was flowing. At three, you would meet with San near the front doors, trying to not be seen, and make your way into the woods beyond the compound, where San will have stashed your car in the days leading up to the ceremony (it was as he was telling you this that he admitted to having the keys to your car in his office this entire time).

Despite the simplicity of the plan, you figured that it would probably work. As long as you didn’t raise any suspicions in the coming days, and as long as everything went smoothly on Halloween, there was no reason to dwell on the possibility of it failing.

Another failed escape attempt was unlikely to be something that you would survive, you knew this. Even with Hongjoong’s delusional belief that you are someone important to him and his religion, you weren’t sure he could tolerate this level of disobedience— at the very least, it would be disastrous if you failed. At worst, you would be leading San and yourself to early graves.

Maybe Hongjoong’s twisted dependence on you would mean that he couldn’t kill you… But you weren’t going to count on it. He had threatened your life in the past, and you were quite certain that he meant it. He would be able to reason out a way that killing you made sense, if you pissed him off enough.

So. You simply had to make sure that you did not fail. Because you didn’t want to find out what Hongjoong would do with you if you did.

.・。.・゜✭ ⧖ ・.・ ⧖ ✫・゜・。.

Much like the rest of the month, the few days leading up to Halloween also fly by before you can appreciate the gravity of your situation.

Your stomach churns all morning. You chalk it up to nerves, the most obvious explanation for an upset stomach, but part of you wonders if there wasn’t something wrong with your dinner last night.

Hongjoong announces the party to be held that evening during the morning service, like San had said that he would. You wring your hands together at San’s side, avoiding Hongjoong’s eyes. There’s a small part of you that is so sure that he would be able to figure you out entirely if he got a glimpse into your eyes. You just try to focus on the activity at hand, listening to Hongjoong with an impassive look on your face.

You must do an alright job, as Hongjoong allows you to leave the chapel with San at the conclusion of the service. You’re even able to eat breakfast in peace, which actually does surprise you. Though Hongjoong had been exceedingly busy over the month, he still typically made time to freak you out most days.

But San and you are able to sneak away after breakfast, back to your apartment, without a word from anyone.

As soon as San shuts and locks the door behind him, he asks, “Are you still feeling alright? Up to this?”

You blink across the room at him, hardly needing a moment to assure him that you very much still are ready to make your escape. You ask if he’s feeling the same way, to which he agrees.

“Just a little nervous, I guess,” he explains, shrugging. “That’s normal, right?”

“Of course it is.” You’re sure that San is no stranger to Hongjoong’s wrath; you don’t need to wonder why he’s nervous. Once again, you’re struck by emotion as you realize what San is doing for you, what he’s risking and what he’s giving up.

He smiles. “What should we do, after we’re out of here?”

You sit down on the couch, thinking through your answer, “I think we should just show up on one of my friend’s doorsteps and freak the shit out of them.”

San laughs, rolling his eyes. “I meant more long-term, but we can do that, too.”

Oh… Long-term. You still hadn’t broached the subject about… well, blowing the whistle on this place again, ever since San flipped out when you suggested it. You certainly still planned on doing exactly that, and you really don’t think that you need San’s approval to do so, either. Like, if you escape and just let this be, aren’t you basically an accomplice to all of the crime?

The last thing you plan to do with your life is go to prison for Hongjoong, so you’re very much resolved in what you have to do… whether San agrees with you or not.

“Well,” you start, “when’s the last time you saw your parents? Where did you live before you came here?”

San sighs dramatically, making his way to sit next to you. “Sheesh, don’t remind me. They’re gonna kill me.”

“They’ll be happy to see you, I’m sure.” You think of your own parents, who will probably also be a little upset… but hopefully mostly pleased that you’re still alive.

San agrees with you easily enough about his parents, before adding, “Is this a bad time to mention that the Followers have been paying your rent since you went missing?” He asks, “So everything should still be there.”

You gape at him. “Are you serious? How?”

You know for a fact that your rent could only be paid through a pain in the ass portal with a very specific and strange ID and password.

He scratches the back of his neck awkwardly. “You had the info saved in your phone… so…”

Puzzled. You are puzzled. Why would they go to such lengths to just keep your shit in your apartment? You had long since assumed that your landlord had probably broken down the door and left your stuff on the curb.

Well, you remind yourself, it actually hasn’t been that long. Though it feels like you’ve been on this farm for the better part of your life, it has really only been… what, two and a half months? Maybe your landlord would give you some leeway, but… no need to worry about it, you guess.

But why would they even do that? It’s not like your rent was cheap. What would they gain from keeping your apartment intact? The illusion of life?

That’s probably it, you realize. Just a front to make it look like you, in fact, weren’t a missing person. Part of you wants to freak out at San, realizing that he must be the person that orchestrated all of this, but you’re too far past that. If you start being mad at him for doing his job, you’re going to have to be mad about a lot of things. Things that you can look past for the fact of what he’s helping you do tonight.

“Speaking of my phone, can I get that back?”

San, relieved that you don’t seem mad, smiles. “I’ll grab it tonight.”

“Can’t I have it now?”

He hesitates at that, inclining his head in question, “any particular reason?”

You shouldn’t need to give him a reason, so you shake your head.

“It’s probably best to keep it where it is, in case someone goes looking for it.”

… Ominous. Who would be looking for your phone?

But he’s probably right. And it’s not like there would be much to do on it, anyways. You’re not going to call the cops now, not when your escape is looming closer and closer with each minute that passes. You can’t jeopardize it now.

.・。.・゜✭ ⧖ ・.・ ⧖ ✫・゜・。.

You’re a little surprised that dinner carries on as normal, without any extra fanfare. Though no one had mentioned one, you had kind of expected there to be another ceremony of sorts. But, no, dinner is normal. You sit with San and Wooyoung, the rest of the table almost awkwardly empty as the three of you eat in relative silence.

How is Wooyoung going to react when he wakes up tomorrow and you’re both gone? He’s going to be pissed. But, maybe, he’ll realize that you wouldn’t leave him here. Surely, after what he told you, he knows that you wouldn’t do that. You couldn’t have it in your heart to let him rot here, knowing what Hongjoong did to bend him to his will… or, at least, having an inkling of an idea.

Before you know it, Hongjoong is standing at the head of the room, commanding the attention of the cafeteria. The room falls into a hush, no one speaks as Hongjoong starts his speech.

“Everyone,” he addresses the room, “Loyal Followers of the Answer, it is with great joy that I officially conclude our harvest season.”

The room bursts into a polite applause, smiles shared around the tables as the Followers celebrate their leader’s message.

“Despite a rocky start, we were very fortunate to remain safe for the duration of the month.” Hongjoong, for the first time that day, finds your eyes. “I put my thanks in the faith of our Followers, those who kept our protections strong all month long. Though it may seem that there was no danger at all, this is only thanks to their courage.”

San reaches across the table to squeeze your hand, giving you a small smile.

“As always, we will celebrate our safety and our bountiful harvest— which Jongho assures me will last us through the winter and beyond— tonight. Everyone of age shall participate; I do not expect anyone to hold back on anyone’s account, especially not my own. This success is as much yours as it is mine.

“Please, imbibe freely, socialize freely, celebrate your victory over evil. We start now, and we will not stop until dawn.” Hongjoong grabs his glass from the table behind him, saluting the room with it before downing the amber liquid.

Again, the room applauds, though more raucously. Wooyoung excuses himself from your table, headed back to the kitchens. Soon after, Followers emerge with trays and trays of various specialty glassware, each filled with their respective (you assume) alcohols. Not long after, Wooyoung exits the kitchen with a rolling cart filled with, perhaps, more bottles of alcohol than you have ever seen in one place at one time (which was saying a lot, considering the bars you had frequented with Mingi in college).

Without anyone’s encouragement, Followers begin congregating at the front of the room, helping themselves to the multitude of drinks available. You’re even surprised to see that someone brought out a case of Coke, presumably for mixing. When was the last time you saw coke? They must’ve made a run into town recently, you realize, though it couldn’t have had the same importance as when San went.

You shrug it off. Not like it matters much, anyhow. San stands, offering his hand to you. You take it, graciously, prepared to get this night started.

.・。.・゜✭ ⧖ ・.・ ⧖ ✫・゜・。.

There is an attempt to pace yourself, considering that you’re going to need to be at least a little coherent later tonight, but… well… it’s been a long time. And you are well aware of the fact that you have, like, basically 10 hours. That’s enough time to get drunk and then sober, if you play your cards right.

So play them, you do. San sticks to your side like glue for the first couple hours, watching you carefully as you put away more than your fair share of drinks. He drinks, as well, but nowhere near at the speed or quantity you do. You’re vaguely aware that you probably should slow down, but why would you, when you’re surrounded by… like, tons of dudes that would protect you, and you include Hongjoong in that count.

By nine, you are positively drunk, blissfully unaware of the worries from the morning. What is there to worry about? You’re having the time of your life, do you even want to leave? Why would you leave? The thought makes you laugh, not surprisingly.

You flit around the cafeteria, having lost San a while ago. Or maybe it was only a few minutes ago… It doesn’t matter. You talk to a lot of people, introducing yourself and smiling when they tell you they know who you are. It almost makes you feel a little guilty, but it mostly makes you happy. So many lovely people know your name and your face and they know that Hongjoong thinks you're so important. How amazing! Tomorrow, you probably wouldn’t be able to repeat a single one of their names, but that doesn’t matter.

The time flies as you keep talking to new people, your mind completely distracted from the plans you have for later. You do slow down your drinking, eventually, though that’s more so due to the fact that you’re too far away from the bar table to bother going back to it than anything else.

More than a few times, you find yourself staring at Mingi, and, more often than not, he’s staring at you, as well. Maybe he’s worried about you…? The thought makes you blush. Mingi… Oh, Mingi. He looks so handsome tonight, too. His hair is still red, still bright, and his outfit is beautifully fitted to his bulky body. Phew. You almost need to fan yourself.

Eventually, sometime, you’re not sure what time, you end up talking with Yunho. He is clearly not even a little bit drunk, you might even say he was stone-cold sober if not for the glass in his hands. Though you thought that he hated your guts, he still seemed a little amused by your presence, a small smile on his face as he has to catch your forearm a couple times. The drunk part of you wonders if you could get away with feeling his biceps, he’s just so tall and so handsome, but even you know it would probably be wrong to feel him up.

You couldn’t repeat a word of your conversation to anyone, not even seconds after it happened; not that you think it particularly matters. After Yunho, you find Wooyoung and Yeosang, and you can distinctly remember thanking Wooyoung for the incredible selection, but… yeah, that’s about it.

While you’re about to go talk to Jongho, who looks like he could use some company, a hand wraps around your elbow, tugging you backwards. Not one to argue, you spin around, ready to follow whoever it is. Seonghwa stares down at you, an incredulous expression on his face.

“Hi, Hwa,” you smile up at him, grabbing his free hand with yours.

His expression morphs from confusion to disgust. “Do not call me that. How much have you had to drink?”

You shrug, swinging your conjoined hands back and forth. “Enough to have a good time. What about you?”

“Certainly less than that,” he tugs you back toward the cafeteria tables that had, apparently, been mostly moved out of the way at one point. “Trust me, you don’t want to bother Jongho tonight.”

You hadn’t planned on bothering him, just keeping him company, but you figured that Seonghwa wouldn’t see it the same way.

“What time is it?” You ask him, only remembering that you’re wearing a watch after the words leave your mouth.

“10:44. Got somewhere to be?”

“Nope,” you pop the p sound, following his lead as he ushers for you to sit down at the table.

Time continues to fly by, though Seonghwa isn’t as good of a conversation partner as the other people you’ve been spending your time with. He also doesn’t let you drink anymore, instead insisting that you drink water, refilling your glass every time you empty it. Lame.

As the minutes pass, though, you can feel yourself coming back to reality. You definitely aren’t sober, very far from sober, but the lights stop being bright and you stop being amused by everything that Seonghwa says and does pretty quickly. You also excuse yourself to the restroom more than a few times, though you dutifully return to the same table each time.

The night progresses, and you find yourself making eye contact with Mingi more and more. Like, seriously, basically everytime that you happen to look at him, he’s already looking at you. Besides the one time you look over and see him engaged in conversation with Hongjoong, you appear to have his rapt attention.

You try to look around the room for San, but there are so many Followers and it’s kind of dark and you’re still not in your right mind, so you give up pretty quickly. You have no idea what it is that he could be doing, besides preparing for your escape, so you just let it be. Better to not ask after him and then have the others asking the same questions.

Though he had stopped you from drinking, Seonghwa had not stopped himself. He paces himself much better than you had, but he keeps drinking as the night wears on, eventually starting to open up a bit more with you. He also lets you get another drink, which you happily allow yourself, as you start to feel much too aware of your situation once more.

“You know,” Seonghwa mutters, leaning closer to you, “this is, essentially, Hongjoong’s birthday party.”

You pull away from him, confusion evident on your face. “It’s his birthday?”

“In a week.” He sips his drink, grimacing at the taste. “But he doesn’t make a big deal of it on the actual day, so here we are.”

You’re actually rather surprised to hear this, and from Seonghwa no less. It’s strange that Hongjoong doesn’t want his birthday to be a huge thing considering his, you know, enormous ego and narcissism issue. Maybe he doesn’t like everyone knowing how old he is. Kind of takes away the appeal, knowing that he’s… how old is he? He can’t be much older than you, just given what you know about him and Seonghwa (who you know to be the same age). You’d ask Seonghwa, but it kind of seems like he wants you to ask, so you’re not going to.

Instead, you sip your own drink, trying to look like you’re thoughtfully processing and tucking this information away for later. Why would you ever need to remember Hongjoong’s birthday, especially after tonight? Your stomach rolls over as you have this thought, the reminder of your plan being truly nauseating.

“When's your birthday?” You ask instead, propping your elbow onto the table.

Seonghwa looks momentarily taken aback, but responds easily enough, “April third.”

“Far away, then,” you frown. Another realization hits you. “You’re older than Hongjoong.”

He shrugs, “Believe it or not.”

For whatever reason, this is, in fact, slightly disconcerting.

But you ignore that feeling, opting to look around the crowded room. Hongjoong himself is mingling with Yeosang and Wooyoung, both of whom look incredibly pleased to have their leader's attention. Wooyoung is not shy with his hands, clutching the Hongjoong’s arm close to his chest as they speak. Vaguely, you wonder if he’s feeling okay. You’re still not sure how he can be so loyal to someone that apparently had him… what? Tortured? Who even knows. Stockholm syndrome is a real thing, you guess. For once, Hongjoong doesn't sense your gaze, staying completely unaware until your eyes shift away.

Immediately, perhaps unsurprisingly, at this point, you make eye contact with Mingi. You hold it this time, tilting your head in question as if asking him if he needs something. He’s certainly acting like it, with all this staring, but he looks away from you, resuming his conversation with a Follower you haven't met before. Like everyone else, he still sports a drink in his hand, dutifully sipping it every lull.

“Princess, can I ask you a question?” Seonghwa speaks across from you, calling your attention back to him. You incline your head in the affirmative, and he asks, “Why did it take you so long to come after him?”

The question takes you off guard, probably for the fact that you wonder it yourself. You take another drink, looking down at the wood grain on the table.

“Too personal? I figured.” Seonghwa takes your silence as an unwillingness to respond.

“No,” you're quick to deny him, “it's not that. I just don't know the answer.”

As horrible as it sounds, the real answer to the question is simply… you were busy. Life happened. You didn’t have any reason to suspect that he disappeared due to malicious circumstances. Finishing university was your top priority— plenty of your friendships fell to the wayside as you wrapped up your degree. And, by the time you graduated, it didn’t seem pertinent. You always figured that, if you reached out, he would answer. Hell, his mom told you where he was, if she knew about this place, at least to some extent, you couldn’t blame yourself for not knowing what it would end up being.

If you had known the truth, you think, you would’ve come sooner. Of course you would have. There is no universe where you let Mingi go through this terror alone… though that’s essentially what’s happened since your argument and the rift in your relationship.

Whatever the case, it seems silly to worry about now. You're here. There were a few months where Mingi was here alone, and the idea of those few months horrifies you. Knowing that Mingi went through a Choosing ceremony without any kind of internal support system makes you feel sick… but, you have to admit, he did pretty alright. Sure, he's traumatized and changed and brainwashed, but at least he has friends and a purpose and, well, he seems happy… ish. There's nothing you could've done if you had been here earlier, so it's no use dreading on it. You still would've been kept apart, and there still would've been the same circumstances.

You take a look at your watch, sighing as it informs you that the time is 11:52 p.m., not nearly as late as you were hoping that it would be.

Seonghwa huffs at your non-answer, tucking his hair away from his face to stare at you harder. “Sometimes I feel like I can hear your thoughts just from watching your expression change. Mingi wasn’t better off before you got here, if that is what you were thinking.”

It wasn’t, but, like, that’s kind of close.

You shake your head, sliding your drink across the table between your hands. “It’s not that I think he was better off… Just that he did alright for himself in the meantime.”

His face twists, though you’re not sure what emotion he’s trying to convey. “Do you even remember what happened when you tried to leave?”

Your eyes meet his.

“He had you back for, what, two days, and then completely broke down.” Seonghwa glances back over at Mingi. “I don’t think he’s been the same since you did that.”

“You can’t guilt trip me into forgetting my need for self-preservation,” you say, hoping your voice doesn’t betray any sense of, well, guilt.

He rolls his eyes, looking back at you. “In case you haven’t noticed, Princess, you are very much still alive.” He mutters something else under his breath as he picks up his drink, taking quite a few consecutive swallows.

You mirror his actions. Hopefully, you can keep it that way.

.・。.・゜✭ ⧖ ・.・ ⧖ ✫・゜・。.

In a stroke of luck, Seonghwa let you keep drinking until you found yourself teetering between tipsy and drunk, again. He kept drinking, but he didn’t really keep entertaining you, instead wandering off to do his own socializing. You do try to keep yourself under control, though considering that it’s almost time.

You take a look at your watch, surprised to see that it’s already 2:15. Blinking through the haze of your tipsiness, it sure seems like 2:15 is an okay time to get a move on, right? Like, surely no one will notice if you slip out now instead of in, like, twenty minutes or whenever you and San had agreed he would grab you.

Plus, if anyone did notice, you could just say that you needed some air. It wouldn’t be hard to believe, looking at the state of you. You would quite enjoy a nice breath of fresh air. You could always come back inside if it felt like it was too early, or if you got a bad feeling. Surely it wouldn’t hurt to sneak off for just a moment.

In a brief look around the room, you don’t find anyone paying any particular attention to yourself. In fact, you can see Hongjoong and Seonghwa engrossed in conversation, about as far away as could be. Seonghwa’s hand rests on Hongjoong’s shoulder, a demure smile on his face as he listens to Hongjoong speak. Most of the other Followers in the room all seem significantly more drunk than yourself, with hardly a person meeting your eyes for any longer than a second.

No one will notice, you’re positive.

As you begin your attempt to shuffle your way through the crowd toward the hall, a hand grasps your elbow, stopping you in place, for the second time that night.

Despite the looks that he had been giving you all night, you’re still a bit surprised to see Mingi looking down at you when you spin around to see who the hand belongs to. Your plans to go get a breath of fresh air fall out the window at the sight of him. Why would you need fresh air when Mingi is standing in front of you? He has just about the same effect on you.

At first, he doesn’t seem to have anything to say, but, if you know anything about Mingi, it’s that he yaps when he’s drunk. And he clearly is, judging from the rosy tinge of his face and the awkward smile he wears as he looks at you, a smile that sends you straight back to college. It’s as if he’s completely forgotten everything that’s happened in the past couple months, forgotten the arguments and the anger and the time that has passed.

“Hey,” he greets you, having to raise his voice over the din of the party.

“Hey,” you greet him in turn, politely waiting for him to continue.

“Can I—” he stops, opting to lean his head closer to yours so that he can talk into your ear. His hand stays on your elbow, locking you in place (not that you would’ve moved away from him, anyways, being tipsy and all). “Can we talk in private?” He asks, his voice deep in a way that you had almost forgotten.

Nodding, you allow him to retract himself and lead you away, toward the hall that you had originally been aiming for. When the door shuts behind the two of you, the party sounds fade; the two of you isolated from the rest of the world.

Well, the two of you and a few other Followers that linger in the hall, but close enough. Mingi doesn’t seem bothered by their presence, and you really aren’t either. You’re sure that you haven’t had a truly private conversation with Mingi since before he went missing, given that he apparently seeks Hongjoong’s advice for everything. Anyways, the presence of a few stragglers doesn’t worry you.

Mingi drops your arm, awkwardly smoothing his dress shirt. “You look nice. Pretty.”

“Thanks,” you smile, leaning your back against the wall— partly in an effort to keep your balance. “What did you wanna talk about?”

He shrugs, observing the hallway like he had never seen it before. “Just wanted to talk. We haven’t talked in a looooooonnngggggggggg time.”

Part of you wants to ask him who’s fault that is, but that would be cruel, so you don’t. “It has been a while now.” You agree instead, glancing at your watch. 2:22… which is basically 2:25, which is basically 2:30… already. Nerves wash over you again as you clench your hands in front of you.

“If I’m being honest— and I always want to be honest with you, you know— Hongjoong said that I should talk to you because he thought it would be good for you to hear my thoughts about the situation and also because he said that he thought that you seemed bummed out that we haven’t been talking and that made me sad so I’m taking his advice and talking to you.” Mingi says after taking one deep breath, not stopping for a moment. “Also Yunho said that you still seemed kind of mad and I can’t take the thought of you being mad at me anymore so basically what I wanted to say was that I’m sorry.”

Blinking, a pout forms on your face at his explanation. He had been worrying about you and your relationship. You could’ve reached out to him at any point in the last month, but hadn’t out of fear that he was still upset with you. And here he was, apologizing.

“Mingi,” you wring your hands harder together, “it really isn’t important anymore. I stopped being angry a long time ago.”

He shakes his head, closing his eyes. “It is important, (Y/n), I don’t want this to go unsaid. I’m sorry for confronting you and acting like a douchebag, I’m sorry for scaring you, I’m sorry for questioning you about San, which was absolutely none of my business, I’m sorry for yelling and fighting him and ignoring you for weeks and sending San dirty looks whenever I saw him.” He pauses. “You probably didn’t know about that last one, but, still, I’m sorry.”

Your frown only grows deeper with each apology, your eyes starting to sting. You don’t want to cry, not when you’re sure that this night will steal plenty of tears already, but Mingi is making it hard. If you had known that he was beating himself up equally as hard as you had been, you would’ve apologized a long, long time ago. If you had known… isn’t that just the statement of your life?

“When you were attacked at the start of the month, I was terrified.” He swallows. “I wanted to be at your side, but Hongjoong wouldn’t allow it, and I was sure that you would be pissed if you woke up and I was there, so I left. But that solitude left me a lot of time to think, to think about who you are and what you mean to me.

“You might not think of me as your best friend anymore, but I value our friendship more than anything else in my life, (Y/n). More than Hongjoong, more than The Answer, more than all of this; you are what I thank God for everyday. If something happened to you, I don’t think I would survive it.” Mingi swallows again, harder, tearing up himself. “I’m so glad that you’re here. I know you still are on the fence about Hongjoong, but I need you to trust me when I say that he loves us and he lives to make us better people.”

Finally, you allow a few stray tears to spill onto your cheeks. Mingi’s confession is touching, truly, making your stomach do all sorts of gymnastics, but Hongjoong. How does he weasel his way into absolutely everything? Again, you’re struck by the thought that Mingi will be plagued by Hongjoong for the rest of his life. This… grip he has on Mingi won’t disappear overnight.

Thankful for the wall behind you, considering your dizziness, you lift a hand to wipe at your cheeks before responding. “Mingi, no matter what happens or how much we fight or if I’m here or not, you’ll always be my best friend.” You smile weakly, hoping that he doesn’t read too deeply into your words. “Nothing can come between us for long.”

Mingi wipes at his own tears, sniffling. “Can I hug you?”

Before you can fully nod your head yes, Mingi is pulling you away from the wall and into his arms, crushing you to his chest. You’re quick to reciprocate, wrapping your arms tightly around his waist, savoring the feeling. You hadn’t been able to hug him in ages, but his arms feel just like you remember them— if not a little bit more muscled. Inhaling deeply, you rub your face against his shirt, probably ruining the crisp-ness that he had been trying to preserve. His tears wet your scalp, but you don’t mind as you only squeeze him tighter.

The moment could not be more perfect; reconciling with Mingi fills your heart with such a certainty that you’re doing the right thing. Knowing that he isn’t upset with you, isn’t harboring any ill-will any longer reassures you that it will all be okay. He knows that you wouldn’t just leave him behind— he’ll know that you’re coming back for him (if he ever even finds out that you’ve left).

That is, of course, ignoring the bit of his speech where he encouraged you to stay and adapt to Hongjoong, but, like, whatever. It’ll be irrelevant in a few hours, now. He’ll be thankful, eventually.

But no moment can be perfect and last forever.

A throat clearing from behind Mingi calls your attention back to the world. The two of you separate, though Mingi puts a hand on your cheek as you pull away, wiping away your tears with a tight smile.

San looks behind Mingi’s shoulder, his face hard as he watches the two of you. You could almost chuckle at his jealousy, but the seriousness of the situation suddenly rises into your awareness once again.

“I'm sorry, Mingi, you'll have to excuse us,” San says, despite the fact that Mingi hasn't acknowledged his presence.

Mingi leans close to press a kiss to your forehead. “Thank you,” he says, quietly enough so that you're the only one who hears.

Nodding, you untangle yourself from his arms, taking a few steps towards San before offering your hand to him.

He takes it, offering no final remarks to Mingi as he pulls you further away from the cafeteria. Further away from Hongjoong and Seonghwa and Mingi and the rest of them. Closer to the forest and your car and freedom.

Your heartbeat picks up in your chest again. Had you lost track of time talking with Mingi? Were you running behind? Why does it seem like San is in such a rush to get you away? It’s almost hard to keep up with his stride, your boots feeling heavier with each step that you take.

Vaguely, you find yourself worrying over if Mingi will get in trouble for being the last one to speak to you. Surely not… How would he know what you were planning? There wouldn’t be a way for him to… unless they suspected that you had confided your plans to him.

Which you hadn’t done, but if they were desperate enough to need a scapegoat… No. Hongjoong wouldn’t go that far. He may never even find out that you had the conversation in the first place. Mingi might mention it, but he probably wouldn’t have the opportunity to in the chaos that is sure to ensue when your absence was realized.

They were bound to figure out what had happened easily enough; they wouldn’t have to interrogate your friends to come to the most obvious conclusion: that you and San had run away in the night, without outside help.

Before you know it, San is opening the front door, ushering you into the night.

As you had suspected, the cool air does feel amazing on your skin. Lacking a coat, you know that you’ll grow colder the longer that you’re outside. It’s almost November, now, the air is almost strikingly cold after the stuffiness of the cafeteria. Even the hallway had hardly felt relieving compared to this.

Taking a few deep breaths, you allow San to continue wordlessly leading you forward. If you weren’t still rather tipsy, maybe you would question his silence. But it doesn’t bother you very much, if you’re being honest. He probably just doesn’t want to risk drawing any unnecessary attention…

He had assured you that there would be absolutely no one outside of the compound at this point in the night, though…

But, still, he has his reasons, you’re sure. Instead of continuing to walk in front of the building, he veers dramatically to the right, walking the distance until you both turn the corner to round to the side and eventually the back.

Though you had never seen the woods at the back of the compound directly, you had known it was there. The ancient, old-growth trees loomed from behind the building, their leaves able to be seen from a far distance, even from the road. To actually be in front of them was a new sensation, a new emotion. The sight of their trunks startled you into realization.

This is real. You’re doing this. You’re running. You’re getting out of here.

San stops at the edge of the trees, finally turning to address you in a low voice, “You still want to do this?”

Nodding, you squeeze his hand in yours, bringing your free hand to grip your joined hands as well.

He looks at the dirt, kicking a loose pebble at his feet. “Don’t look too hard at anything you might see in these trees, (Y/n).”

However foreboding that is, you agree with his request, “I won’t take my eyes off of you.”

San allows himself a small smile, squeezing your hands back.

Whatever it is that San doesn’t want you seeing, you don’t think you ever had any hope of being able to see in the trees, anyways. It’s pitch black outside, the moon doing little to help you as you walk deeper and deeper.

You’re almost kind of amazed that he’s able to lead you so confidently. He must not have consumed anywhere near the same quantity of alcohol as everyone else. Which actually makes quite a bit of sense, considering you hadn’t seen him very much at all following dinner. What had he been up to? Was Hongjoong not suspicious of his absence? He must’ve made something up… explained it away…

More than a few times, you stumble over a tree root or loose brush, twigs snapping underfoot with each step that you take. San holds you steady, slowing his pace when you need it.

After what feels like forever, but is probably more like a couple minutes, you reach a clearing. At first, you think that you spot your car right away… but then you realize that you can’t be sure. In the clearing, there’s no fewer than twenty vehicles, of all makes and models and sizes. Some look like they haven’t run in years, a thick, dusty coat over their windshields that you can even see in the dark.

San doesn’t pause to let you take in the clearing for very long, however. He quickly pulls you along with him, between a row of cars, before you’re able to find your own. It looks just as you remember it, albeit a bit dirty. Your heart leaps as you realize what this means.

You’re at your car. Your car. It’s right here, right in front of you. You’re going to fucking get out of here. Holy shit.

San lets go of your hand, fishing into his pocket before pulling out the keys and handing them to you. “We don’t lock the cars, but…”

Clutching the keys in your hands, you can’t help but smile. “I can’t believe this is happening.”

He awkwardly mirrors your smile, glancing behind you before pointing it out. You turn to look, not all that surprised to see that the clearing opens to a dirt road, leading back off into the trees. “We’ll go that way. It meets up with the main road after a couple miles.”

Nodding, you turn back to your car, almost giddy as you approach the passenger’s side door. Gently, you pull on the handle, hoping the door doesn’t creak too loud as you do so. Thankfully, it’s no louder than normal, and you eagerly sit yourself down in the seat. San stands in the door, his hands resting on either side of the opening. “Ready, then?” He chuckles as you settle yourself into the seat, adjusting the recline to lay back.

“Let’s go.”

He gives you a thumbs up, pushing himself off of the car before patting at his pockets.

His smile falls, his face paling.

Your heart drops into your stomach, “What is it?” You ask, sitting back up. “Is something wrong?”

San blinks, twisting to look back the way that you came. “I have to go back.”

“What?” You almost shout, “Are you crazy? You can’t go back!”

He shakes his head, leaning down toward you. He grips both of your shoulders tight in his hands, looking in your eyes, “It’ll be fine. I will be right back, I promise.”

“San, no,” you gape at him, “what could possibly be so important?”

San closes his eyes, shaking his head at your question. “It’s hard to explain, I— Just, I,” his eyes open as he squeezes you one last time before dropping your shoulders. “I’ll be back, I swear.”

“Let me come with you,” you plead, attempting to grab one of his hands as he pulls away. “Don’t leave me here, alone, please, San.”

Shushing you, he shakes his head again. “You’ll slow me down. I swear, (Y/n), it will be fine. I’ll see you in a minute.”

He takes a step back, shutting the door before you can come up with a response. You’re too dumbfounded to even attempt to open the door again, too confused to try and follow. What could possibly be so important to him? What if someone finds you here? How are you going to explain that, huh?

But the possibility of that is so remote. No one knows that you’re out here, how could they? Even if someone notices your absence at the party, they’ll just assume that you’ve retired to your room, right? And even if they feel inclined to check, that’ll take a few minutes, in which time San should return to you and get a move on.

Still, you find it very hard to swallow your panic.

What if this is it? What if you die because San had to go back for something that he wouldn’t even tell you about? Your breathing grows shallow with each new terrible thought that invades your mind. You can see it now, Hongjoong walking into the clearing, rage in his eyes, knife in his hands. Making you grovel and beg and plead with him only to end it right then and there, anyways. San would come back and find your still-warm body, soon to join you in death.

You try to blink away the images that flit across your mind, realizing that your eyes burn as if you’d been crying. Your hand flies to your cheek, unsurprised to find it wet. Taking a deep breath, you do anything you can think of to distract yourself.

The air in your car is so stale, your months old air-freshener doing little to help the dry, bitter smell. You fumble with the glove box, pulling it open while praying that there is anything in it that can distract you from the horror of the moment.

Papers spill out as you indiscriminately pull everything out, ushering it onto your lap. You throw aside the car manuals and your outdated insurance, searching for just one thing, anything that could remind you of what you were enduring these terrors for.

A brochure for The Bean slides out, your own face smiling from behind the coffee bar. Adam can be seen in the background. It almost makes you sick, that horrible reminder of the life that you had been forced to give up. You keep sliding the papers around, cutting your finger in your desperation.

Sucking your paper cut into your mouth, you realize that you're not going to find anything in the glove box. You make a half hearted attempt to shove everything back inside before deciding that it's not worth it.

Tears still pouring down your face, you reach for the driver's side sun visor, flicking it down to reveal the photos you kept in the sunglass clip.

On top is a picture of Jungeun and yourself, embracing with your faces pressed together. You quickly slide it back, knowing for certain that you have a picture of Mingi in the stack.

Seeing the picture will wake you up, you're certain. It will give you the courage to keep going.

Finally, a polaroid emerges. It's the first picture you had clipped to the visor, a testament to how much time had passed before you started looking for Mingi. How had you waited so long? You pry the polaroid free, it having stuck to the metal after so long.

Though your hands shake, you don't really need to see the photo in detail to appreciate it. Mingi stands in the center, a peace sign next to his eyes. He's not smiling, rather giving you a sour look. He wasn't pleased to be the first test subject of his gift to you. The second photo was of yourself, taken by him, you remember. The third was a selfie of the both of you.

You don't have either of the other photos, but you have this one. Something compels you to protect the picture, to keep it on you, so you slide it into your waistline and pray that your pants don't distort it too much.

A knock on the window almost kills you on the spot, with the way your heart leaps into your throat.

The shock of who you see through the window makes you gag.

No sooner after seeing his face does he open the door, falling onto his knees next to the car to be eye level with you.

Seonghwa is drunk, much more drunk than he had been when you were with him earlier, you realize this very quickly with the way his voice wavers as he asks, “What are you doing?”

You have no response. You open and close your mouth a few times, but only choked sounds of fear come out.

He grabs your hands, holding them in your lap. “Why are you crying? Are you leaving?”

He sounds so sad that your heart nearly shatters. Your heart should shatter, now, knowing that escape is impossible. But you can only focus on Seonghwa, on his knees, in front of you.

His bangs brush his eyelids. “You're leaving?” He asks again, “without me?”

Seonghwa hiccups, frowning. The question is so absurd you can't pay any mind to it. Why would you bring Seonghwa with you? His forehead comes to rest on your thigh.

“Seonghwa, go back to the party,” you manage to get out, clearing your throat after.

“I can't,” he pouts, “Hongjoong is mad at me. I can't tell why.”

You think Hongjoong always seems a little mad at Seonghwa, but you're not going to say that to him now.

“Please, Seonghwa, go.”

He shifts his face and blinks up at you, his eyes reflecting the moonlight so prettily it almost hurts. “Come with me, then.”

Seonghwa gets to his feet, but he doesn't release your hands. They dangle between the two of you, the height different causing yours to float up. “We can fix this. Just come with me,” he says.

You're shaking your head before you realize it. “I can't go back. I can't do this anymore.”

Seonghwa bites his lip, looking around. “This isn't going to end well; please,” he looks back at you, “just come back with me. I won't say anything, Hongjoong will never know, we'll both be fine. We'll be fine. Nothing has to change.”

“I can't go back.” Your heart beats wildly in your chest, you can feel its thrum. When San returns, what will he do about Seonghwa? How will he possibly get past him? Seonghwa won't let you leave, but you have to. To what length would San go to get you free?

You don't want Seonghwa hurt. You realize now, staring up at him, that you care about him. More than you would've ever thought you would. Who is Seonghwa if not the ultimate victim? Is he not just a reflection of yourself?

“Get in the car, Seonghwa.”

He frowns again, pouting his lower lip. “I can't leave Hongjoong.”

“Yes, you can. Get in the car.”

You don't give a second thought to your proposition, nodding your head toward the back seat.

“I won't leave Hongjoong.” Seonghwa clarifies, dropping your hands. They smack down onto your thighs, stinging.

You'd question him, start yelling at him if you could. But you can hardly form a coherent thought and every word feels like risking the contents of your stomach coming up. Instead, you frown, looking down at your lap rather than at his confused face.

“You can't leave Hongjoong, either,” he says. “Even if you run, he'll find you, always. You'd come back on your own, you won't know how to live without him anymore.” He tells you this eerily flat. “Just come back with me, he doesn't have to know about this.”

Seonghwa is speaking nonsense. Even your flurried mind understands this.

“Please.” He begs. “(Y/n), please.”

You shake your head.

He squeezes his eyes shut, shaking his head as singular tears run down his cheeks. “I'm sorry. I tried to help you, I did.”

Seonghwa turns away from the car as the sinking feeling in your stomach solidifies into a rock of dread.

Of course, you knew what it meant to see Seonghwa out here. There was never any chance, not after he had found you. If he knew where you were, Hongjoong did, too. Surely, he wouldn’t risk you getting away. He would drag the moment on, though. Making Seonghwa come here, making him plead with you, what sort of torture was that? What was the point? Isn’t he just going to kill you, now?

Why is it that, when Hongjoong enters the clearing, you aren’t scared? You hardly feel anything. You knew this was coming. You knew that this would happen, didn’t you? There wasn’t any other possible ending to this night. You wanted to believe that it was possible, that you could escape, but it was futile. It was never a possibility. Even with San’s help. You knew it, deep down.

Like Seongwha said, there is no getting away from Hongjoong. You were foolish to think that you could, and you know it, now.

Instead of watching Hongjoong approach, you watch Seonghwa slink away. He doesn’t go far, stopping to rest his head against the roof of a car a few down from your own. You can imagine how good the cool metal must feel.

You snivel, wiping at your eyes as Hongjoong stops in front of you, standing where San had stood, where Seonghwa kneeled. He’s silent. You don’t look up at him, instead focusing on his hands as they hang at his sides. They’re empty, though clenched into tight fists.

“You have ignored every. Single. Opportunity. I have given you.” He emphasizes each word. “Chances I gave you to make the right decision.”

It’s not even worth your energy to respond, is it? Obviously, you should’ve known that the various conversations you had over the night were warnings. How else would everyone manage to bring up something that would make you want to stay? And Seonghwa…

How humiliating.

“I’m disappointed in you.” Hongjoong says, and it’s so much worse than if he had been screaming and violent. “I thought you were starting to fit in.”

You glance at Seonghwa, who still has his back turned to you. He seems to be shaking, but you find it hard to believe that, even in this scenario, he would cry for you. This has to be part of it, right? Part of making you feel guilty?

Looking at him is a mistake, though. Hongjoong harshly grabs your chin, forcing you to look up at him. “Look at me when I'm speaking to you.”

You still have no idea what to say to him. It all seems so stupid, in retrospect.

It's only as you look up at Hongjoong that you start to wonder where San is. If you asked, you'd surely get your ass handed to you. But the terrible feeling in your stomach only gets worse. What if he comes back to this scene? How will he react? Poor San, he was so desperate for you. How will he feel, with the plan destroyed? Does Hongjoong know the depth of his involvement?

So, you break your silence. It couldn’t get much worse, could it? “Where is San?” You ask.

Hongjoong lets go of your face, but only to bury a hand in your hair, yanking you into standing. Instinctively you bring your hands to his, crying out in pain. He only smirks, releasing his grasp on you.

You collapse onto your knees, catching yourself with your hands at his feet. Your nice pants, they're dirty, now, you catch yourself thinking. Like that's the biggest issue right now.

“Where is San?” He repeats your question, spitting the words out like they leave a vile taste in his mouth.

Reduced to a heap at his feet, you can't bring yourself to look up at him. This night has turned up just as your last failure had. You're not all that surprised when Hongjoong's boot comes down on your hand, though not hard enough to hurt. “Look at me.”

You do. From even further beneath him, he looks more Biblical than ever.

“Who do you think told me where you were?”

Ah.

Of course.

That makes sense.

Your face contorts, though with what emotion, you’re not sure.

You want to think that there might be an explanation, one that doesn’t involve San betraying you to a homicidal maniac, but you know that there isn’t. Instantly, you know.

He never meant to help you. He never cared about you. He had laid a pretty trap for you, at Hongjoong’s request, and had sprung it just as planned.

And he couldn’t even be here to see the fruits of his labor. Pathetic. Your mind swims with everything you had told him, everything you confessed to him, the times you had been warned about him. You fought with Mingi over him, you defended him to Mingi.

“Yes,” Hongjoong smiles down at you. “All of this has been planned since the day I made you live with him.”

You nod up at him, realizing that he must want something else from you.

“You must understand, (Y/n), that I control everything. You can’t trust in anything besides this fact.” Hongjoong kneels to meet your eye line, inadvertently crushing your hand under his foot as his weight shifts.

Gritting your teeth, you suck in any sound of pain that threatens to escape. The last thing you plan on doing tonight is letting Hongjoong realize the depths of your pain.

He tilts his head in question. “Do you have anything you want to say to me?”

Even in your haze of emotions, you can hardly resist spitting a few choice curses at him. “Fuck you.”

He grimaces, though he’s clearly not actually affected. “Not what I was thinking, Princess, but I’ll give you a pass.”

His hands are suddenly gripping into your shirt at the shoulders, yanking you onto your feet. He hardly allows you to catch yourself before he begins dragging you across the clearing, away from your car, into the trees, away from your last shred of dignity.

There isn’t a single thing on your mind as he pulls you through the trees and eventually back around to the front of the compound. He’s groveling under his breath, probably cursing you out in any and every way that he knows how. And you deserve it. You deserve every stumble of your feet, every tear burning your cheeks, every horrible thing that Hongjoong can fling at you.

You failed. Not only yourself, but everyone stuck here in this cult. You’ve utterly failed. No one is going to be rescued, no one is going to be saved. You cling onto Hongjoong’s blazer as he guides you to the barns, having no idea what could be waiting for you there.

Maybe this is it, huh? Maybe he has finally realized that you’re more trouble than you’re worth. For a second there, it had looked like he was going to keep you alive, but maybe not. That was probably just wishful thinking. He’s probably delivering you to Jongho, too disgusted to even deal with you himself.

Hongjoong releases you to throw open the barn doors. You have to catch yourself on the siding to remain standing, but Hongjoong quickly returns his grip on you, hauling you further inside the barn.

It’s the animal barn. He walks you into the center aisle, dropping you unceremoniously. You fall into a heap at his feet. Again.

You can hardly hear Hongjoong over the general animal sounds, but especially over the oinking of the pigs. “I’m going to leave you here,” he starts, glaring down at you. “When I come back, you’re going to still be in this building.”

Sniffling, you nod in agreement.

He scoffs. “You’re lucky, (Y/n), very lucky. If you had made it even an inch down that road, what do you think would’ve happened to you? To Mingi? Haseul?”

There isn’t anything for you to say. The pigs fill the silence.

“Selfish. Utterly, disgustingly, selfish.” Hongjoong spits. “Stay here— before you try and lure anyone else to their certain deaths.”

With that, he turns on his heel and exits the barn, shutting the door behind him. The overhead lights remained on, but you barely even found yourself capable of caring. The dark wouldn’t make any difference. You failed.

And Hongjoong was right. You are selfish. Even though you knew the truth about San’s intentions now, you hadn’t known before. You had thought he was risking his life to help you, and you had been fine with it. What was wrong with you? Why is this just occurring to you now? Had you really been so desperate as to involve another person? What’s the matter with you? Have you no shame? No consideration? Were you such a narcissist that you would put your freedom above someone’s life?

Your heart beats rapidly in your chest as you wipe your cheeks with your hands. The sensation is calming, allowing you to take a few deep breaths as you collect your bearings. As hard as it is, you should try to keep your head on straight… there’s still no telling how the night will end, and something tells you that it’s far from over.

One thing you know for certain, though, is that you cannot do this again. You can’t. No matter what. Something else will have to give. There is no more escape. There is no more saving yourself. How the fuck could you, after this?

Standing, you brush your hands off on your pants. Hongjoong hadn’t said anything about not moving from the spot. Might as well look at the animals. Animals can be calming, right? Therapeutic? Maybe?

Wishful thinking.

Your tears keep flowing, but you find your breathing to be coming back to your control. You stumble with your first step, but quickly regain your balance, tottering over to the nearest animal pen— which happens to be the pigs.

This is where you had confronted Jongho about Haneul. How long ago was that, now? That horrible confrontation lingers as you grip the metal fencing keeping the pigs in place. The bar is cooling, demanding your attention. You realize now that the air itself, though warmed by the animals' presence, is getting rather chilly, as well.

Tugging your sleeves lower over your hands, you peer down at the animals. Some of them are sleeping, but most of them aren’t. Each sow is separated from the next, in neat, orderly rows. Last time you had seen them, there weren’t individual pens. Jongho had been feeding them in one huge, disorderly mess. It had been rather disgusting.

You had also fought with Mingi, that day. About so many things that just seem stupid, now. What was there to even be mad about? Mingi is just Mingi. You can’t fault him for being a victim.

And the fact that he was just looking out for you, and, in fact, turned out to be absolutely correct.

As you turn to walk to a different pen, the feeling of the polaroid at your waist recaptures your attention. Stopping in place, you fish it out of your waistline, cupping it in your hands.

Thankfully, it doesn’t seem to be damaged. You stare down at it once more. It couldn’t have been more than thirty minutes since you had put it in your pants, and, yet, here you are. Completely changed.

Mingi’s face frowns up at you, but your eyes catch on something outside of the photo. Your own expression melts into a frown as you lower your hands, shoving the picture back into your pants.

Wiping your tears again, you kneel down to the ground next to the pen.

What had caught your attention was a scrap of white, so starkly bright against the packed dirt floor of the barn.

You reach out to grab it, suddenly overcome with an even worse feeling of dread. Your scalp goes cold, a shiver spreading across your body as you touch the… fabric.

Fabric.

Blinking your tears away as fast as you can manage, you pull, feeling your stomach drop as the piece grows into a cuff. Buttons and all. A white cuff.

There’s nothing that you can do to stop yourself from thinking the thoughts that come— attacking you at nearly instantaneous moments.

It’s Haseul’s. This is from Haseul’s shirt. What did Hongjoong say would happen? About the pigs? The pigs? Haseul? This is Haseul’s shirt? It can’t be. She’s in her room. She’s been in her room this whole time. This could belong to anyone. This could’ve been cut off of anyone’s shirt. It doesn’t have to be hers. It could be anyone’s. Why would it be hers? It isn’t possible. San said she was fine. He failed, but she was fine. Hongjoong said she was fine. Mingi said— what did he say? Did he say something? Anything? It doesn’t matter. San said—

“You shouldn’t be in here,” a familiar voice calls from behind you.

You fall onto your butt, forgoing your pants. They were ruined, anyway. Clutching the cuff in your hand, you don’t even reply to Jongho’s warning. Your breathing is out of control, again. Each breath you take is tighter, harder, less satisfying, more panic inducing. The fabric in your hand burns with the tightness of your grip.

Jongho grabs your shoulder. “Can you even hear me?”

A fully-fledged sob leaves you as you look up at him.

His eyebrows furrow in some emotion— probably disgust— as he frowns at you. “Get out of here.”

Shaking your head, you try to say even a single word about Hongjoong telling you to stay here, but you can’t get anything out. If anything, you cry harder, shaking your head back and forth and back and forth and back and forth, shutting your eyes as tightly as you can.

This cannot be real. This can’t be happening. It can’t be Haseul’s shirt. Even if it is, it doesn’t mean that she’s—

No, you won’t even think it. You just keep shaking your head. It can’t be. It cannot be.

Jongho’s hand leaves your shoulder.

“This is your punishment, (Y/n).” Hongjoong’s voice booms from behind you. It’s so shocking that you open your eyes, spinning around in the dirt to face him. He’s not alone. Seonghwa and San are with him, both of them looking incredibly uncomfortable.

Seeing San doesn’t relieve you at all. Seonghwa’s face is puffy, his clothing disheveled and dirty. Neither of them look at you, instead looking at the ground in front of them. Jongho remains at your side, seemingly caught in the wrong place at the wrong time.

You don’t know what Hongjoong means, though. Or, rather, your mind completely refuses to see what is in front of it until it is irrefutable. There is still hope, now. There is hope. The cuff doesn’t mean anything until Hongjoong says that it does. There is nothing in you that can accept this until…

“Haseul is dead.” Hongjoong says. “And San killed her.”

The wind is completely knocked out of your lungs as you fall onto your hands, heaving.

Though you can’t see San, you can hear him. His protests are immediate, “What? Hongjoong, why would you say that? I didn’t do that. I didn’t even touch her. I swear, (Y/n), why would I lie—”

“Not to mention that he orchestrated your entire escape attempt at my request,” Hongjoong’s voice cuts through San’s pleas to be heard.

The reminder calls you back into your body. Hongjoong had to say it in front of San, you realize, he had to make sure San knew that you knew of his betrayal. You look up at the three men in front of you as you gasp for air. The cuff lays in the dirt before you, momentarily forgotten.

San is gaping at Hongjoong, his hands outstretched as if he was in the middle of trying to reach for you. “Are you fucking crazy?” San barely squeezes out in his apparent anger.

“I am, in fact.” Hongjoong replies, though he doesn’t bother to address San. He smiles down at you instead, watching your facial expression change from one of despair to one of hatred.

Your eye twitches as you stare at San, who starts to plead for you to hear him out once more.

“I swear, (Y/n), it wasn’t like that! You heard him! He’s crazy! He only has something to gain if you don’t trust me, right? Why would I ever do that? I love you, you kno—”

San had been crouching down to your level as he made this speech, which was probably a horrible idea. Using your hands as your leverage, you launch yourself at him, toppling him over into the dirt.

Pinning him to the ground with your weight, you stare down at his (very surprised) face.

It takes you all of five seconds to realize what you couldn’t in the past month.

Hongjoong is right. Again.

Your tears drip down onto his own face. San tries to speak, but evidently can’t think of anything to say to you.

Hongjoong laughs at your side.

You pull your hand back, bringing it back down and slapping San as hard as you can muster across his face. The smack rings through the barn, your hand stinging all the way up your forearm.

San tries to clutch his cheek, but your knees keep his arms at his sides, and he instead looks up at you, stunned.

“Say something.” You demand, finding your voice.

He opens and closes his mouth, grasping for anything to say. “He’s lying to you— I swear it, I had nothing to do with Haseul, and I would never set you up, I would never, you can’t trust him, can’t trust anything that he says, (Y/n), really—”

You hit him again. This time, he exclaims in pain as you feel your hand go numb. Seonghwa flinches in your peripheral vision and Hongjoong laughs once more.

“Fuck you.” You blink, more tears falling. “Fuck you.” You lean back, freeing his arms, which immediately come up to rest on your waist. “Hit me.”

San’s face contorts, confused, “why would I hit you?”

Absurdly, you smile. You smile wide. “Hit me. Do it.” You hit him in the chest, though lighter than you had his face. “What? Are you a coward? You can kill my best friend, but you can’t hit me?” Your voice raises, reaching a shrilling quality. “Come on! Hit me! Do anything!”

San’s hands remain holding your waist, not moving.

“Hit me so that I don’t fucking kill you! Hit me to show you at least think your miserable life is worth living! Hit me! Hit me! Hit me! Hi—”

“That’s really enough, (Y/n),” Seonghwa’s voice cuts in as he grabs your arm, keeping you from landing another blow to San’s chest. “You’re being childish.”

You scoff, but it devolves into a laugh. “Childish? I’m being CHILDISH?” You wrench your hand out of Seonghwa’s grip. “Tell me, Seonghwa, please, how is someone supposed to react in this situation? What is the normal reaction? Enlighten me, please!”

When Seonghwa doesn’t respond, you stand, turning your full attention to him. San’s hands easily slide off of you, though you remain hovering over him. He finally starts cradling his red cheeks.

Seonghwa looms over you, his back to Hongjoong as he stares over his shoulder at you. You feel guilty for lashing out at Seonghwa, somehow, but it doesn’t stop you from fanning the flames. There’s nothing that could stop you, not in this moment, from bringing anyone else to your level.

You make eye contact with Hongjoong, who has his arms crossed nonchalantly, an enormous smile on his face. You imagine that this night is just going peachy for him. Just how he wanted it to. Maybe, just maybe, you can ruin his fun.

At Seonghwa’s expense. You hardly feel bad about it, though, as your eyes snap back to Seonghwa’s.

“Without turning around, take a guess. Is Hongjoong watching you, his perfect little whore, or me, the spoiled brat who doesn’t behave?”

Seonghwa sneers, a small laugh escaping him. Of course, he plays right into your hands. He exhales one shaky breath before grabbing your shoulders, using the grip to shove you as hard as he can, sending you falling back to the floor. You practically land on top of San, your legs resting over his waist, but you can only laugh.

Seonghwa falls onto his knees in front of you, crawling until he can reach your legs. He grabs you by your calves, pulling you off of San until you’re practically underneath himself. You’re sure that he’s planning on strangling you, there’s a sweet little look in his eyes that tells you everything you need to know.

And you’re excited, you want him to kill you, you realize. Your laughing becomes intermixed with your sobbing as Seonghwa puts his weight on your stomach, the fury in his eyes blazing harder with each sound you make.

Before you can truly get your way, though, San is grabbing Seonghwa by the back of his shirt, using all of his strength to pull him off of you. You hear the fabric rip as Seonghwa sprawls onto his back in front of you, and San takes the same position that Seonghwa had just had on you.

You can’t find it in yourself to sit up, so you opt to just turn your head until you can see San. Vaguely, you can hear the sound of him hitting Seonghwa as you had just pleaded with him to do to you, and this only makes you cry harder.

You turn your head in the opposite direction, and you’re greeted with the image of Hongjoong, still sitting contentedly. He glances down at you, but he doesn’t betray anything.

“Can’t you just kill me?” You whisper to him, hoping the others can’t hear it, “won’t you please just kill me?”

Hongjoong frowns, then, slowly rising to his feet to come to your side. He holds his hand out, waiting for you to take it.

You don’t at first, opting to continue looking pathetically up at him. From this angle, with the blurriness of your tears and the extreme perspective, Hongjoong really does look… ethereal. Angelic. Godly. Whatever the word is. You take his hand, allowing him to heave you into a sitting position just in time to see San land the punch that you’re sure breaks Seonghwa’s nose.

It’s only in this moment that you realize San is screaming at Seonghwa, mostly incomprehensible phrases of anger. Seonghwa is trying to fight back, his hands clenching onto San’s shirt, slapping at his shoulders and face, thrashing underneath him, but San is too pissed to let any of it stop him.

Hongjoong squats at your side, resting one of his knees on the floor. He doesn’t drop your hand, instead using it to pull you closer to him. He puts his face next to yours, making sure you’re watching the scene unfolding in front of you.

Love? This is love? Your ploy to upset Hongjoong by including Seonghwa failed. If there isn’t love lost between the two of them, then what on earth about this is love?

Still, your heart skips a beat.

You had completely forgotten (or, maybe, ignored) Jongho’s presence until Hongjoong turns to give him some sort of look that must tell him to stop whatever is going on. In the next moment, Jongho is resting a hand on San’s shoulder, barely having to pull at him to get him to cease his movements.

Seonghwa turns his face toward you and Hongjoong, blood pouring from his nose and split lips.

A sob escapes him, this time, before he turns to face the other direction.

You really hadn’t meant for Seonghwa to get hurt from this. You just wanted to goad someone into giving you what you wanted, and he was easiest. You avert your eyes from him, wanting to give him the privacy he clearly desires.

Hongjoong doesn’t care. He drops your hand, standing to go to Seonghwa.

You look at San and Jongho. San is also sobbing, his knuckles torn to shreds in his lap.

You don’t feel bad for him. You don’t feel anything for him. You’re sure the upset will come in the next few days. The bomb will drop, the emotions will explode, but now, in this moment, you couldn’t care less if he lived or died.

Frankly, you couldn’t even care less about your own life. Haseul is dead. She’s dead. And she’s never coming back. You’ll never see her smile again, never text her that you’re bored at work, never hear her complain about her parents arguing again. Her parents. Her own parents. They’ll never see her again, and it’s your fault. Entirely.

You look back at Seonghwa and Hongjoong just in time to see Seonghwa slap Hongjoong’s hand away from him, groaning as he turns his body to fully face away from his God.

That can’t be a good sign.

Hongjoong sighs, crossing his arms over his chest before turning on his heel to come back to you.

Great. Just what you wanted.

“Is she really dead?” You can’t help the question, squeezing your eyes shut as they fill with more tears.

Hongjoong sits beside you, taking both of your hands in his this time. “She is.”

“For how long?” You don’t open your eyes.

He takes a few seconds to answer, as if contemplating whether you should hear the truth or not. “She died the day she arrived.”

You’re not sure if this is the best or the worst news that he could’ve given you. You’d believed lies for weeks, but at least she hadn’t been suffering the entire time, like you pictured.

“Was it really San?” You still had a hard time believing it. Could San kill? Had you really shared a bed with him for over a month, not knowing that he had killed Haseul himself, believing that he hadn’t?

“No,” He admits, letting go of one of your hands, using his newly freed hand to rest on your cheek. You open your eyes, feeling your lips quivering with… every emotion on this goddamn planet. Anger. Fear. Sadness. Whatever. “Jongho killed her, and humanely at that. But San helped with the mess. I didn’t want it to be like this, (Y/n), I warned you.”

And what could you say. He warned you. Very plainly. And you had disobeyed him. And look at what it cost.

Hongjoong moves his hand away from your face, using it to wrap around you and pull you back into a hug.

There's nothing to do anymore. Nothing to say. You cry into his shoulder, finally wrapping your own arms around him in acceptance.

He rocks you, there, on the ground. “It might be hard to understand now, (Y/n), but everything I do, I do for you.”

You nod. “Please don't make me see him again.”

Hongjoong knows who. He strokes your head, smoothing your hair, “Of course, love. Of course.”

Though you know that this is all because of Hongjoong, you still find his words comforting, his embrace grounding. You squeeze him tighter to you, appreciating the feeling of having at least one person on your side. He’s right, he’s so right, you can’t trust anyone else, not when this is how it turns out.

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#all these words and i said nothing of importance so forgive me i just be talking to walls #all that being said i’m most interested in knowing why hongjoong chose Mc? like what made him change his narrative and choose her and how #was he so sure it would work out????#also i say i hate him and i do but the fact that he hugged mc definitely makes me😌#also why was san being punished? like i understand san was mc punishment but wasn’t mc sans punishment as well or did i make that part up in #my head #bc if the punishment was that joong knowing san would fall for mc knowing that this inevitable hatred from mc would happen then that’s #high key brillant of him😭#OH ALSO realizing that jongho face twisting up in disgust idk if it was disgust at all but i remember he wanted to be there when mc figured #out hanseul was gone and he got his wish THAT SICK LITTLE-

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brokemypen · 2 years ago

Text

Senior Skip Day Pt. 2

Pairing: Eddie Munson x Reader

Summary: Part 2 to this, please read it if you haven't. It's the perfect day for Eddie to take his best friend's virginity.

Warnings: Smut!! Minors do not interact!! Reader is a virgin (obvi), fingering, protected sex, Some dirty talk, swearing, Eddie is gentle and sweet in this, very fluffy ending.

Word Count: 2.9k

A/N: ((This is not my gif, all credit goes to the owner.))

All right here is part 2 for those that wanted it. I see Eddie as being the perfect man for this scenario, so I absolutely adored writing this and can't wait to make more. I'll take any suggestions. <3 -P

Tags for those that commented: @url0calwh0r3 , @boomhauer , @marvelsmylife

“When and where?” He said, never letting go of your hand.

“Um I-” You were shocked by his statement. Was he serious? Was this actually happening? “Really?”

“You don’t know how long I’ve been dreaming about this, y/n.” He declared. “I’m actually honored that you want me to be your first.”

“Dreaming?” You questioned, perplexed that he said it that way.

“Do you remember when we first met? You were this dorky kid, teeth full of braces, eating lunch all by yourself. I knew from that moment that I wanted you in my life. I just got lucky that you turned out to be this amazing girl that reads comic books with me, and lets me rant about the dumbest shit in the world.” He breathed, letting go of your hand to sit on the picnic table with you.

He was facing you, a smile still on his lips. Reaching over he pushed the hair in your face behind your ear, pushing your face up to look at him.

“I’ve liked you for a really long time.” He was searching your eyes, looking for signs that you understood. “So I’ll ask again, when and where? Because I’m ready.”

The two of you chatted in those woods for quite some time, working out all the details. It was decided that today was the perfect day. It was like magic, not a care in the world about school, or life, or anything. Just you and him and the possibilities. You decided to go back to his trailer. His uncle was on the road for the next few days for work and you guys would be completely alone.

You entered his bedroom, the air conditioning made it freezing, which was perfect because your nerves already had you sweating. It smelt faintly of weed and his cologne, a dreamy smell that you were already in love with.

Eddie closed the door behind, carefully walking towards you. “We can stop at any moment, okay? Don’t feel pressured.” He whispered to you.

“I want this, Eddie. I’m okay I promise.” Yes, you were incredibly nervous, but who wouldn’t be? He was perfect and this felt perfect. Like the timing was completely in your favor.

He reached to you, cupping your face in his hands to pull you in for a kiss. He was soft and gentle, but the kiss was still deep. You felt electricity flow through you as he moved his lips with yours. A feeling you were not expecting. Sure you kissed plenty of guys, but nothing felt like this. It was intoxicating. All you wanted was to feel closer as you wrapped your hands in his hair, kissing him back.

He separated from your lips to catch his breath.

“Wow. I’ve wanted to do that forever.” The pause was short because he went right back to your lips.

He took his jacket off as his lips worked their magic, your hands getting even more tangled in his wild mane. You felt his hands move to your hips, pulling you to him even closer. There his hands trailed up and down your body, just the way you had imagined. He caressed your waist and your back. You could feel him toying at the clasp of your bra.

You let go of him to take your shirt off, giving him better access. His mouth dropped when he saw your black bra underneath. His eyes took you in as he did the same, slowly reaching for the hem, he pulled his shirt over his head, throwing it somewhere on the floor. Your mouth dropped too. Sure you saw him shirtless plenty of times, and while it made you flustered then, this was different. In this small moment you felt like you could call him yours.

He went back to kissing your lips, slowly walking you backwards to the edge of his bed. There you plopped down, shuffling yourself up the bed as he crawled over you. You gasped as you felt him kiss just above your belly button. He continued, working his kisses up to your neck, where the sensation made you moan.

“No one’s ever touched you like this, have they?” He chuckled against your skin.

All you could do was shake your head, pleading with your eyes for him to continue. He took the hint and continued, licking a strip from your collar bone to your jaw, which made you shudder. Your head was spinning as you felt his teeth lightly sink into your neck, earning another moan from you. He was sucking a spot into your neck, taking his time on the one spot. You noted that you’d have to hide that later, but you didn’t care.

As he continued, his hands slid under you to mess with the clasp of your bra again. This time popping it open and tossing it over your head. He sat up to look at you, which started to make you feel self conscious. You started to cover yourself when he grabbed at your hands.

“You’re so beautiful.” He whispered to you. “Do you want me to keep going?”

“Yes.” You sighed, laying your hands at your sides, giving him the green light.

Eddie took his time exploring your tits. He kissed, and licked, and gently nipped at each one. Your breathing was shallow and he was getting several whimpers out of you. He could tell just how much you were enjoying this so he took a chance. He gently wrapped his lips around the sensitive bud, while his fingers toyed with the other one. He began sucking just like he was on your neck, making you almost jump out of your skin. He looked up at you, continuing to the other one to do the same. Always making sure that you were okay. You were practically a puddle by the time he stopped.

Slowly, he worked his way down, leaving wet, open mouthed kisses all the way down till he met the top of your jeans.

“Can I take these off?” He eyed you, waiting for a response.

You nodded, urging him to continue.

“I need a verbal response, sweet girl.” He said sternly. You thought your heart was going to stop when he said that. Staying completely still, you could tell he was serious so you responded, your voice a little shaky.

“Yes, Eddie.” You bit your lip, the anticipation pooling between your thighs.

That was all he needed, slowly unbuttoning and pulling the zipper down on your jeans. He kept his eyes on your face the entire time, looking for any sign that you weren’t okay. Your jeans met the same fate as the rest of your clothes, lost to the sea of his bedroom floor. You didn’t mind, all you could think about was Eddie’s hands touching you and as the thought crept into your mind, he did just that.

He laid both hands on your thighs leaning right above your clothed core. You could feel your heart beating there, racing, waiting to see what he would do next.

“These are cute.” He teased, gesturing towards your polka-dotted panties.

“Shut up.” You giggled.

And he laughed too before his fingers tugged at the waistband, pulling them down your legs. Then he crawled back up your body, his face right above yours. He laid to your side as he dragged your face in to kiss you again. His fingers gently pushed your thighs open to touch you. You gasped when they finally worked their way through your folds. He used two fingers to glide them up and down, circling your hole and then sliding up to your clit. His fingers were calculated, giving you just the right amount of pressure. He kept up the motion, moving your juices around as he did.

“God, you’re soaked.” He smiled into your mouth, his words making you blush.

He saw this and smiled even more. “You’re so cute.” He whispered, bringing his lips to yours again.

As his fingers continued gliding through your folds, he licked your bottom lip, urging you to open your mouth. That’s when his tongue entered your mouth. The gesture not as weird as you imagined it to be. He was gentle and moved his tongue in small flecks. You moaned into his mouth as you realized you actually liked it.

He pulled away to look at you, his fingers now only circling your entrance. After a moment he slowly slid a finger in. You were used to the feeling as you had already done so to yourself, but his finger was a bit bigger than yours. You gasped, but not because it hurt, but because the stretch felt good.

He slowly pumped his fingers into you, adding more length each time until you were adjusted. That’s when he added a second finger. Your eyes tightened, but it still didn’t hurt as he worked them in you, pumping slowly, never taking his eyes off you.

“Does that feel good?” He whispered to you, watching your head fall back with pleasure.

You were speechless, only being able to nod and buck your hips with the pumping of his fingers as he went faster.

You were a moaning, whimpering mess, practically writhing on his fingers as you tightened around them. He felt it too, and knowing it was a sign of you being close, he started kissing your neck again. His fingers with the added stimulation brought you to the edge, as you held on to his forearm for dear life. The sounds of his fingers pumping into your wet core filled the room. That along with your soft moans were music to his ears.

“That’s it, baby, let go. You’re doing so well.”

You looked so beautiful as he watched you come undone, pulsing around his fingers, and writhing on them. His jeans felt so tight as he worked you through your orgasm, kissing your face when you were coming back down.

You were breathing heavily as he slid his fingers out of you, bringing them to his mouth. Your eyes grew wide as he tasted you, something you were not expecting. It wasn’t something that he even acknowledged when he turned to you.

“You okay? Do you need a minute? Do you want me to stop?” His questions were so endearing. He was so kind and gentle, just like you had imagined. It made your heart melt and only made you want him more.

“Please keep going, Eddie. You’re making me feel so good.” You sighed, needing more.

Eddie wasted no time pulling off his jeans and boxers, his hard length hitting his stomach. You desperately wanted to taste him, to let him experience the pleasure he just gave you, but as you reached for it, he stopped you.

“No, baby, not today.” He eyed you as you pouted. “It’s not that I don’t want you to. I just want the focus to be on you, okay?”

You nodded, allowing him to take the lead on things. And you weren’t gonna lie, you wanted him bad, maybe next time wasn’t such a bad idea.

Eddie leaned around to grab the pack of condoms on his dresser, opening it with his teeth, and slowly sliding it on. Your stomach dropped at the idea of what was about to happen, but you knew you were in perfect hands.

He made his way back over you, kissing your lips again. “Are you sure you want this? I promise I’ll be gentle, but don’t forget you can stop me at any time.” He assured you.

“I’m ready, Eddie. I really really want this.” You nodded as you said it, gripping his head to pull it down to kiss you again.

As he did so he made his way between your legs, pulling them over his hips so you would be comfortable. You could feel the head of his cock poking at your entrance, but he wasn’t pushing yet. He was taking his time on your lips, and then moving those kisses to your jaw, then down to your neck, adding to the hickey that was already forming.

That’s when you felt the stretch as he slowly slid into you. You choked on your moans and gripped his hair. Your moans turned into whines as it began to sting a little. He leaned his head back up to kiss your face, stopping to allow you to adjust.

“I know, I know, it’s okay. I’m right here, baby.” He whispered to you in between his soft moans.

He was trying to keep it together, but he couldn’t help it. You were gripping him so tightly. You felt so warm and so wet it took everything in him not to slam his hips into you.

Instead, he waited for your body to relax before continuing. Whispering how good you were doing as he added more and more of his length, stopping to let you adjust each time. He did this until he bottomed out, pausing again to let you catch your breath. The entire process did hurt a little but Eddie was being so gentle that it didn’t last for long. He actually made you feel full in the most delicious way, it made your head spin.

“Please move, Eddie, it feels so good.” You cried, moving your hips slightly to urge him on.

Eddie moved, pushing his hips at a slow pace as you whimpered and cried underneath him. He thought his heart was going to explode when he heard you whisper his name in a sigh. Once he thought it was okay to do so he sped up a little, moaning as your walls fluttered around him. Usually he was slightly embarrassed to moan the way he was with other people, but he felt so comfortable being vocal around you that he just let things slip.

“Feel so good around me, baby, so good.” He whined, picking up his thrusts even more.

You clutched his back, biting into his shoulder, earning a groan from him. Eddie put his face to your shoulder, moaning in your ear as his hips stuttered. Being as close as he was he put his hand between the both of you to work your clit. He was sat up more at this point. His eyes went from his hand to your face as your orgasms were hurdling very close together.

You both were whimpering and moaning. Your face twisting, as you bit down on your lip. The sight of you made him lose it as he shot his load into the condom.

“Fuck, I’m cumming.” He continued cursing and groaning as you tightened around him, very close to your second orgasm of the night.

He continued rutting into you, and rubbing your clit in fast circles until you fell apart around him, screaming his name. Your nails were digging into his back marking it up in a way he couldn’t wait to look at later. He slowed the circles on your clit, working you through it until your body relaxed.

He then slid out of you, causing you to hiss as you were a little sore. He plopped down next to you on his back, breathing heavily.

“How are you feeling?” He sighed, cupping your face to look at you.

“Good. It hurt a little, and it was intense, but I’m okay.” You felt great actually, like you were floating, it was euphoric, and most of all you felt loved and well taken care of.

That was until you realized it didn’t stop there. Eddie got up, running to his bathroom. You could hear the faucet running, and then he came back. A rag in one hand and a glass of water in the other. He set the glass on the dresser and then made his way back to you. You winced as he brought the rag between your legs.

“I know, I’m sorry.” He said patiently, cleaning you up.

He sat the rag on the dresser as well, before picking the cup up. He sat on the edge of the bed, kissing your lips softly before bringing the cup to your lips, urging you to take a sip. You did, taking a few swigs, realizing you were actually very thirsty. Once you were done he set the cup back down and brought his attention back to you.

“Alright, I’ll be right back. I’m gonna grab some clean clothes and then I’ll put a movie on and we’ll just relax and cuddle, okay?”

And you did just that. He came back with one of his shirts and a pair of boxers for you, similar ones snug around his hips. He also brought the snacks you too had meant to eat in the woods and a few vhs tapes, all of them being slasher films.

Once you were dressed, and the movie was picked out, he put it on and laid next to you. He raised his arm up so you could lay against his chest. He pulled you in close to him, covering you both with his comforter.

The two of you then spent the rest of the night laughing at the cheesy horror and stealing small kisses from each other. You were in complete bliss with him, like maybe this could turn into something more between the two of you.

“Best senior skip day ever.” You whispered, before shortly falling asleep in his arms.

#eddie munson #eddie munson x reader #eddie munson smut #eddie munson imagine #stranger things #stranger things 4 #stranger things smut

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sebastianstansqueen · 2 years ago

Note

Hello! I just started reading ——- as hoping you could do this request (it’s absolutely fine if you don’t) but I had seen this tik tok where this girl explains that she’s never seen a story where a sunshine gets emotional and everyone expects sunshine to go someone but sunshine BOLTS to the grumpy character and sobs into them.

idk if any of that made sense but it made me think of a sunshine reader x bucky so if you have any time to write it i would love to read it but if you don’t that’s also fine

here’s the link to the tik tok

https://www.tiktok.com/t/ZTR9eNfko/

Title: Sunshine

A/N: Tell me what you think, feedback is always appreciated, if you want to be Tagged, either send an ask or comment on this or click on Taglist open.

Wordcount: 732

Warnings: Sad Reader, and protective Bucky, fluff

Masterlist // Tagglists

Taglist: @cherryblossomsky - @babylooneytoonz - @wonderlandfandomkingdom - @miraclesoflove - @amelia-song-pond - @leyannrae - @avengerlex - @pineprincess - @nik2writes - @dorothea-hwldr - @rosie-posie08 - @scxrletrecsmarvel -

You had been sad for the last few days, because your neighbors had your dogs taken away, and now they lived with your parents, but you went into work your heart hurting and you were in the human resources department, and you may or may not have started a small in work relationship with Bucky, and no one knew, so no harm no foul. But you were hurting all you wanted was to go find him and talk it out.

“You're dating Y/n from HR aren't you?” Tony smirked talking to Steve.

Steve side eyed the man. “No.”

“Oh I get it you don’t wanna get your little girlfriend in trouble.” Tony said still smirking and he walked away. Bucky heard the whole thing while just smirking at how wrong the ‘genius’ was, and he couldn’t help but laugh to himself.

You just tried to continue even though you really just didn’t want to and so your boss came and talked to you. “What is going on?” She asked as she sat across from you.

“It’s really nothing, I promise.” You shrugged as you typed up a report.

She looked at you. “What is it?” “It’s stupid.” You sighed.

She huffed. “Y/n, we literally take care of the avenger we make sure they are mentaly healthy enough to just go and save the world, and you aren't acting like you, usually you are happy go lucky and a ball of sunshine, so what is going on?”

“My neighbors called animal control and had my dogs taken away as I was at work yesterday, and there with my parents clear on the opposite side of the city basically in nowhere land.” You ranted.

“Take a break I don’t care for how long but take an hour to a two hour long break.” She sighed, getting up and leaving. You sighed out of your computer, and headed to the Avengers common room to find Bucky.

Bucky had been his ‘usual’ moody self that day, just waiting till you get off from work, just to head over to your house and watch a movie and cuddle, but the elevator dinged opened, you walked in and of course every Avenger had to be in the common room at the moment, Tony kept his eyes on you waitin for you to go to Steve because of the sad look on your face, everyone on the team liked you, your kind and soft hearted, along with you brought baked goods to them more often than not.

Your eyes scanned the room, looking for one person, Bucky looked at you with furrowed brows he saw the sadness you were holding in your eyes. You briskly walked towards him, he pulled you into a tight hug, and you let out all of your feelings and started crying into his shoulder. What both of you didn’t see however was the shocked look on the whole rest of the team's face, and Bucky just whispered things along the lines of ‘it's okay’. What no one knew except Bucky himself was he already grew protective over you so once you told him everything that had happened in the last 24 hours he wanted to go to your neighbors house and demand they take back their complaint about your dogs. He also loved your Pitbull and German shepherd Named Pepper and Lulu, and he’d do just about anything to get you to smile. That night he went home with you, and once you fell asleep he went and talked to your neighbors and came down to an agreement, that you could bring your dogs back from your parents as long as while you were at work they went with you and he talked to Tony who agreed that Lulu and Pepper could stay with the team.

So that night Bucky drove the almost two hour drive to your parents house, they loved him he was glad that he could still make an amazing impression on parents, and he told them about the agreement that he made with your neighbors and he brought your dogs home that night once they walked through the door, the jumped on the couch where you’d fell asleep, and they licked your face until you woke up. You smiled wrapping your arms around both of your ‘babies’ as you called them, and your smile grew bright once again.

#bucky barnes x reader #buckybarnes #bucky x reader #bucky x reader fluff #bucky fluff #bucky barnes fluff #sad #bucky x reader sad #bucky x you #bucky x y/n #bucky barnes #bucky x sunshine!reader #marvel #bucky x reader fanfiction #protective!bucky x reader

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strwbrryblues · 2 years ago

Text

drunken words are sober thoughts

Pairing: Bang Chan x Fem!Reader

Genre: Exes to Lovers AU, Non-idol AU, Angst, Hurt/Comfort

Warnings: Talks about insecurities, Alcohol intake (please drink responsibly!)

Word Count: 2.7k

Synopsis: Drunkenness can either trigger one to make a mistake. You can say yours was a blessing in disguise.

A/N: Hello! Back with another short fic! I'm still not done with finals, maybe a week or two more, but I'll leave this fic here because so suddenly, I thought of this trope when I saw a post on twt 😭

Anyways, your thoughts about the story are welcome as always! please 🙏 i really do love getting feedbacks about my writing, it really helps me as a writer 😭 if you're too shy, my anon ask is always open! (i just recently fixed that one so yeah, I hope it's functioming well 😭) I'm just too busy sometimes to reply, or just I don't know what to reply, but I really do love all the comments and reblogs with texts or tags 🥺

But yeah, I hope everyone's doing well! I f you need someone to talk to I'm always here! I don't mind rants or small talks! 💗💃

“Another shot for the beautiful lady!” Chan hollers at the top of his lungs. You giggled, the sight of his never disappearing dimples sent your heart soaring. He’s as endearing as ever even when you’re both drunk as heck.

“Hyung, come on, you’re both drunk.” Changbin tries to stop you two from downing more alcohol, but the older just waves him off.

“Oh, don’t be such a killjoy, Binnie. We’re not harming anyone!” He bellows out. Changbin sighs deeply as he pushed away Minho’s head from his shoulders.

“You too, Minho hyung. Don’t you have work tomorrow?” Changbin sighs in defeat from Minho’s drunken state, who was very much a clingy-and-affectionate drunk.

“Hehe. I have a day off tomorrow,” the older man giggles as he continues to pester Changbin.

You watched and sighed contently. You barely had time to fool around like this anymore due to workload. Ever since getting a more stable job, you’ve had lesser time to spend for yourself.

“What’s got you smiling, honey?” Chan rests his chin on the palm of his hand, as his elbow rested on the dark oak table. He gave you that beautiful smitten smile, with an all too loving gaze, and it sent your heart into a frenzy of endless thrumming.

“Just…this is beautiful,” you crossed your arms on the table. After doing so, you rested your head on your crossed arms, looking back at Chan from your position. “I haven’t had the time for myself recently. It's nice to be with you guys.” You closed your eyes, feeling the numbing headache that’s caught up from your drunken state.

“We can always hang out whenever you want, baby.” Chan whispers, sneaking a hold of your hand that peeked out from your crossed arms.

There was a moment of silence that hang itself over you two. In your own space, with your eyes communicating as if you were connected once more. Before it broke in itself after Changbin finally called out to his other older friend.

“Agh! Hyung you have to go home!” The younger whined. Sadly, being the only sober one had its pros and cons. He was smart not to drink and suffer the consequences of his actions by hangover, but he had to witness all this shit and be the responsible one.

“Come on~ Just one last drink,” Minho whined as well. Throwing his hands anywhere to express his distaste for not getting more alcohol in his system.

“Chan hyung, go home with Minho hyung. I’ll fetch you both a cab. I’ll take care of noona.” He was begging at this point.

But Chan shook his head. “No! I’ll go with Y/n! I have to show her something.” He shook his head childishly, jutting out his lips as the pouty tone was evident in his voice.

Changbin looks at him worriedly, and a bit heartbroken; almost as if he was about to cry. And to be honest, he’s been that way since the start of the night. “Hyung…are you sure?” He asks, eyes nervously meeting Chan’s, as he fiddled with his fingers.

Chan only let’s out a hearty laugh, “of course! I can take care of myself and Y/n!” He takes full hold of your hand, intertwining them together and pressing a short kiss on the back of your hand. It sent you reeling with butterflies once more.

“If…if you’re so sure then…” Changbin pulls out his phone, albeit unsure, still. “I’ll phone a cab for you two, then.” He says, dialing for a cab as he watches you two with an aching heart, and worried mind.

The cab arrived, and Changbin made sure to get you two safely inside, before he went to his car, dragging along a drunk and half asleep Minho.

The ride was silent, after having Chan give the directions to his studio to the driver. He had his arms wrapped securely on your waist. There was comfort in the silence the loomed over you, and you relished being in his arms. It wasn’t a full cure, but it at least eased some of your headache.

Soon after arriving the destination, Chan had dragged you with him to the building. It was a miracle the staff had let you two inside despite how drunk the two of you looked. But Chan was thankful, because he didn’t want to miss this opportunity to show you what he’d been working on in his studio.

Ushering you inside the cramped space and familiarity of his studio, you settled yourself tiredly on the leather sofa that sat behind his desk.

“You’re going to love this, I promise you.” He giggles like a school girl. Opening up his laptop, and then going for the window where he earlier saved and closed his work. He taps on the play button, and turning up the volume just right.

He turned to you in his swiveling chair as the instrumentals started playing. The intro was calm before it progressed to a more upbeat tone. It’s resembling those of summer songs, and it quickly made you smile. Despite being mot a fan of the hot season, you agreed that most summer songs were fun and worthwhile.

Chan grins at the reaction he’s receiving. “You always love summer songs,” he says, swaying a bit as his drunken self invites you to a dance. You accepted, of course.

The two of you swayed to the music, enjoying how upbeat the music was. It brought you good vibes, despite the song lacking lyrics. The song soon ends end he was quick to go back to his seat, which left you confused.

He regrets moving quick, triggering the his headache from excessive drinking. “Hold on,” he grunts and holds onto his head. You rushed to his side, but also regretting as a wave of headache consumed you. You just held his hand in consolation.

“We both got headaches,” you blabbered out. And you don’t know why, but being drunk has lead you to find it funny. Soon, Chan was laughing along with you.

After recovering from the throbbing pain, Chan opened another file, and after clicking the play button, he sat beside you on the sofa as well.

This one was a big contrast to the upbeat, summer song from earlier. It was mellow, and smooth. But the tune was…sad.

Chan leaned back on the couch, almost slouching. The music played as he stared at the ceiling. You copied, leaning back as well and just staring upwards, however with eyes closed—savoring the instrumentals.

But then you heard a voice—particularly the one in the demo—along with Chan humming. You tried to make out of the lyrics, until you realized the song was directed at you. The lyrics a solemn anthem of what Chan had been feeling for months. And just like that, his words sobered you up.

And then he spoke.

“She’s beautiful.” A pause.

And you turned to him, waiting.

“She was my whole world…She still is. I guess I was just stupid to let go…or that, she never deserved me in the first place.” You were confused on who was referring to. Was it a different woman? “We had a beautiful boy and yet, I don’t know what came over me to just give up.”

You know now it was you he was talking about. Perhaps him getting so drunk have made him forgot he was talking to you, about you.

“Lady, was I a bad husband? She…I broke her heart, and it hurts so much seeing her that night when I told her.” That’s right, you two have been divorced for about half a year now. Suddenly, the joy and warmth that you felt earlier with him has been replaced with the overwhelming feeling of sadness and heartbreak. As if you were reliving the night he asked you for a divorce.

“I really was a bad husband. I hurt her, thinking that my career would only hindrance our relationship. But in truth, I really just gave up on my whole world for my stupid career.” He was sobbing all so suddenly, and you can’t help but do so as well, only quietly as you turned away from him.

“Lady, you don’t know how much I regret doing it. That day at the court, I was so close to crying. I wanted to stop everything but she just looked so angry. I made her mad and hurt, and I just felt that…I had not right to take it all back after putting her through so much…”

You remembered vividly as if it was only yesterday. You were feeling a lot of things, to be honest. That day, more than hurt, confusion, and sadness, you were mad. Angry. Mad and angry at how he chose to gave up on your love. On Jeongin.

Oh, God. Dearest Jeongin. Your poor son sobbed to no end as if he’d physically lost his father. He was too young to understand the concept of divorce, and yet he was pushed into it at such a young age. And although visits were allowed, Jeongin had been a lot more reluctant about everything since then because of it.

“I don’t want to let go, and yet…I feel that all I’ve put her through, was enough of a reason to say that I’m not enough for her. I really wasn’t enough.” The music stopped, and the only sound present was of his sobbing and the rustles his clothes made with every movement.

Your breathing was getting harder to control, as your nose clogged due to crying. You wanted to stay silent but it was hard to do so. And so you eventually let out the sobs that you held back, tears freely flowing but you were still turned away from Chan.

The man perks at the sound of your sobbing, and only then did his mind register once more that it was you who he is with. “Y/n! Love, why are you crying?” He was quick to wrap his arms around you. You don’t know if he was really too drunk to even process everything, to the point that he forgot where your relationship currently stands.

He cradles you in his arms, and for the first time in months, you felt at home. Safe. Despite the underlying problem that you shouldn’t even be doing this with your ex husband. That you shouldn’t be in his arms. And yet you feel like being selfish. Just this one time, and maybe then you can move on.

“Shh, it’s okay, baby. You can let it all out. You know you always have me. You can always run to me and lean on me, my love.”

How it hurts you to the point that your crying was almost mixed with the anguished screams. His words should have been bringing your comfort, but with the way he’s speaking those broken promises was too much for you.

“No! No!” You started to scream. “You gave up on us! How can you say those words when you left me?” Those months of grieving for him never seemed to have left. And the stress that piled up finally reached its breaking point. And two broken souls in a cramped room, with no other form of outlet, it truly sucks to be on the receiving end for all of this sword like words.

Chan gripped tightly on his hold on yours, as if the weight of the situation has now fully sobered him up. “I’m so sorry. I’m so ashamed of myself. I regret ever hurting you. I don’t even know how to put it into words. But…those first nights after the proceedings in the court, I—”

Chan choked out the sob once more. He was heaving deeply, and then letting it all out by crying. It hurts him to think about the nights you weren’t in his arms. Those sleepless nights where he had to be tortured endlessly with the thoughts of the consequences of his actions till day breaks. It was a lot of burden for him to carry.

“There was so much regret, Y/n. I didn’t think being away from you was going to affect me, especially when I thought it was the right thing to do. I should’ve taken it all back the moment I saw your face when I brought the topic of divorce.” He’d spoken each word, sentence, slowly as he can. Choosing the right ones so as not to fan the flames of hatred.

You silently cried, still. But you wanted to give your word as well. “You should have talked to me about what you were feeling.” You fisted his shirt in your hold, tightly, before speaking once more, “what was the purpose of our vows? Our bond? Everything—if you’re just going to decide for yourself?” You felt exhausted from crying, slumping in his embrace.

You just…wanted nothing, at this point. There was no use in being so mad at him to the point of holding a grudge, especially when he’d been transparent with you now about his thoughts.

“I know…I was wrong. I wish I could just, go back in time and slap some sense into past me…” Chan heaves out another heavy sigh. His breathing finally going a bit more stable than before. The uncomfortable position of being huddled together in a seated position was catching up to him, so he laid down on the couch, dragging you along.

“That’s a great way to put it. But, at least we’ve learned our lesson. I may have had a part in all of this, if you say that you were reluctant to open up to me about it…so I’m sorry too, if I’ve done something to make you feel like I’m not worthy of knowing what’s on your mind…” You sincerely voiced out. You just know that you may have played a part in this divorce.

Chan hushed you, bringing your closer to him, as if your weight on top of him wasn’t enough to close the distance. He stroked your back comfortingly as he spoke, “no, no. It wasn’t any of your fault. It was me overthinking, and compulsively making a decision…” He admitted, staring back into the ceiling.

There was silence that loomed over the two of you. Both of you finally ceasing the tears and just being in each other’s presence. Chan taking one of your hands in his, intertwining them together as his other hand rubbed comforting patterns on your back.

“Let’s start over.” You broke the silence. It was enough for Chan to halt all his movements, as he shifted underneath you to just look at you properly.

“Start over?” He asks almost dumbly. It made you chuckle, finding it endearing as you often see him give you this look of curiosity and confusion when he gets lost in the conversation.

You nodded, but spoke so as well to assure him. “Yeah.” You rested your cheek on the back of his hand that was in your intertwined hold. “We can work through ‘us’ properly this time. We’ll talk about anything and everything. We’ll make it all work.” You gazed into his eyes lovingly.

Chan was elated to hear it. But then his insecurity resurfaced again. “But…what if I messed up agai—”

“No.” You cut him off. Not wanting his insecurities do all the talking for him. “You won’t. Because like I said, we’ll go through it together. We’ll make it work, because we’ll help each other out. We’ll be there for the other. And I’m here for you now, telling you that I’ll stay with you.”

Chan stays quiet again, almost as if he’s going to cry again. But you spoke once more, “ we’ll work out your insecurities, but for now, don’t worry about anything. Okay?” You asked, staring gently straight into his eyes.

Chan nodded. He understands it well. He understands, that his soul is shaken with how steadfast your were. But most of all, he was relieved, and happy. He felt the heavy weight in his heart, finally lift off. His heart growing lighter as he felt you press a kiss on his forehead.

There was peace and lightheartedness as you two got caught up in your conversations. Chan, despite having visits to see Jeongin would still bombard you with question about him. He wants to know even the most mundane of things about his wonderful son.

You talked for hours until you can’t, and the sun has risen up. And despite having been drunk, you just both know you’ll get a clear memory of what had all happened, because you two were sober enough, and your hearts wouldn’t let you forget that something as beautiful as this has happened.

#stray kids imagines #stray kids scenarios #stray kids x reader #skz imagines #skz scenarios #stray kids fluff #stray kids angst #skz fluff #skz angst #bang chan x reader #skz chan fluff #skz chan angst #skz x reader #skz chan x reader

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bebetae · 3 years ago

Text

repeat until death | na jaemin

genre: smut, angst, best friend’s brother au

pairings: jaemin x f. reader

word count: 13.2k

synopsis: How do you prevent a tragedy? If you knew the events that would occur beforehand, would there be anything you could do to stop it? You used to believe in destiny, back when all it entailed was love and happy endings, but now you were skeptical. Because the world couldn’t possibly write something so cruel.

rating: 18+ NSFW WARNINGS UNDER THE CUT

here it is! my submission for the Star Cross’d collab under @neosmutcollective. please make sure to check out the other works as well! tracking is under the #nscstarcrossd tag.

warnings: death, tragedy, loss, depression, anxiety, kissing, language, unprotected sex, creampie there are many potentially triggering topics in this fic, and it is meant for mature audiences. please do not read if you are easily affected by mentions of death and the process of coping with it.

There were three rules to being Na Jaeyoung’s best friend.

One, you can never unfriend her.

Two, you cannot lie or keep secrets from her.

Three, and maybe the most important of them all, you are not allowed to fall in love with her older brother. Na Jaemin is off limits.

Off limits until you can’t hold yourself back. Until life and death separate a promise made before you could even fathom how hard you could fall for someone else. They say the right people will always walk into your life, and you liked to believe that you were destined to meet the Na’s.

But you never knew it would come to this. They always talk about when they come in, but never when they walk out.

“Mom, we’re home!” Jaeyoung called through the front door, kicking her shoes off. You’d both been friends for so long that it felt like a second home now. You even knew where all of their dishes sat in the kitchen cupboards. Before you could even think about making your sweaty self presentable after the sweltering walk back to her neighborhood, a figure walked in from the kitchen.

“She’s not here,” Jaemin said, passing the two of you with a homemade brownie in hand. “Oh, hey Y/n,”

“Hi,” you managed to force out, flustered. Jaemin always made you so embarrassingly nervous.

Jaeyoung rolled her eyes from beside you.

“Okay, then don’t bother us. We’re going to my room,” she announced. Jaemin cared so little, he didn’t even respond as he collapsed onto the couch. Jaeyoung grabbed your hand and dragged you up the stairs, huffing so quietly you couldn’t hear it over the deafening beat of your heart.

Her room was silent when the door closed. It didn’t stay like that for long.

“Do you like my brother?” Jaeyoung blurted out, her accusation making you pause. How did she know? Were you that obvious? If you were, then did Jaemin see it too?

Jaeyoung didn’t let you respond before she continued.

“It’s so annoying,” she complained, dropping her bag onto the floor by her desk before sitting into the chair. “It’s like I can’t have any friends without them liking Jaemin. You know what Hina told me? She said that Luna only invited me to her birthday party because she was hoping I would invite her to mine. So she could see Jaemin,”

The longer Jaeyoung ranted to you the guiltier you felt. In sixth grade, her juvenile problems overshadowed any measly little crush you had.

“I’m sorry,” you whispered, your eyes cast down in shame. A part of you wondered why it was such a crime to like someone, but apparently she had control of your feelings concerning her brother. Your mind strayed to one of the two rules she had established back in elementary school.

You can’t keep any secrets from her.

“Yeah, I like him. Not a lot though. You know Sungchan? He got cuter over the summer, don’t you think?”

You always said all the right things to her, even if they weren’t true. But lies were okay, if they covered the ones that would make her upset. Rules weren’t concrete like that.

“Just promise me you’ll stop liking him. Promise me you’ll always be mine, not his,”

She added another rule that day. One you would never come to understand.

“I promise,”

Between you and Jaeyoung, she was always the popular one. So much so that some people knew you not by name but simply ‘Jaeyoung’s friend’. Just like she was known as ‘Jaemin’s little sister’. There was no label for him, though. He was at the top of the food chain.

It was a dynamic you had grown used to over the years, and while it used to bother you, it didn’t cross your mind much anymore. Until today.

“Prom is tonight, Y/n. You seriously don’t have time to find a date,” Jaeyoung chastised, sitting on the worn pink rug on her bedroom floor. You were sprawled across her mattress, face down into the sheets in defeat.

“I know, Jaeyoung. But it’s not like I have that many guys pining over me to go with them,” you replied, your words muffled. This sad predicament had been on your mind for so long that you didn’t have the energy to cry about it anymore.

“It’s okay, you can just tag along with Jaehyun and I if you want,” she chirped, her mood significantly brightening at the new topic of interest.

Right, because I totally want to third wheel to prom with my best friend and her hot, college sophomore date.

“Maybe I just won’t go,” you sighed, flipping yourself over and onto your back. Jaeyoung’s ceiling was suddenly the most interesting thing you’ve ever seen.

“You’ll change your mind,” Jaeyoung sighed, flopping down beside you. “I know you will,”

She was wrong. For the most part, you guessed.

Two hours and a constant internal debate later, you were sitting on Jaeyoung’s bed watching her as she shimmied into her dress and observed herself in the mirror.

“It’s a bit scratchy, but I can handle it,” Jaeyoung commented, twirling her body around. Your snug sweatpants and the unoccupied dress hanging from her closet were a firm reminder of your decision.

“Beauty is pain,” you joked, a smile plastered onto your face. Her excitement excited you, and that was enough. “What time is he going to pick you up?”

“Ten minutes from now,” she replied, glancing at the clock. Jaeyoung reached up and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, something she always did when she was nervous. You’d met Jaehyun before, and although he wasn’t necessarily her boyfriend, you had a feeling that would change once graduation came around. You had an inkling Jaeyoung was going to be in for a romantic summer.

“Well, you look beautiful, Jaeyoung,” you sighed. Your best friend turned to look back at you, her dolled up eyes sparkling.

“She sure does,” a voice spoke.

It was hard not to recognize him, even from a glance. You’d committed his entire being to memory from afar all these years. Jaemin stood in the doorway, his black hair tousled messily like it always was. He was smiling widely at his sister, who had gasped, with a singular, measly balloon floating above his head reading ‘PROM!’. Your heart froze as you watched him enter, giving Jaeyoung a big bear hug as he laughed.

Jaemin was back.

“I thought your flight got delayed!” Jaeyoung cried incredulously, but Jaemin only shrugged as he backed away.

Why didn’t Jaeyoung tell you he was flying in today?

“It looks like I made it just in time,” he shrugged. He glanced at you, confusion subtly flashing across his face. Jaemin looked like he was about to say something, maybe greet you, before a voice rang up the stairs and the doorbell chime echoed through the house.

“Oh no, he’s early!” Jaeyoung cried, scrambling to shove a few essentials into her small handbag before dashing out the door. She didn’t spare you a glance in the midst of her frenzy.

You and Jaemin both watched her leave, and the room fell under a cloak of awkward silence. You could feel his stare from across the room, and you knew how odd this may have appeared. You looked down into your lap, hoping he would just leave. He did the opposite, though. Shocker.

“Are you not going?” Jaemin asked, his eyes watching you though he didn’t move a hair closer. If anything, the answer was pretty obvious. Your silence was answer enough, and he sighed before leaving the room altogether. Good job, Y/n.

You wished you could say it wasn’t always like this, but there was no Jaemin if Jaeyoung wasn’t involved. In a way, it was his sister’s doing, but you didn’t know how to handle being around him. And so you were always the awkward little-sister's-best friend with a veil of girlish sheepishness you could never shake, her old words ringing through her head over and over.

“Promise you’ll always be mine, not his,”

You weren’t sure how long it had been, and the entire night could’ve passed when Jaemin walked back into the room and you nearly voiced out loud how much you wanted him to leave you alone. You were upset and vulnerable right now because of this situation and the last thing you wanted to do was cry in front of him.

So you continued looking down without a word.

“Y/n,” Jaemin spoke with caution, hesitation laced through his words in a tone you had never heard from him before. Especially because you were always around him when he was around his family, you’d always seen the lax, nonchalant side of him. Jaemin never seemed to care about anything.

But you lifted your head slowly, finally looking him in the eye, and he was pleading.

He was wearing a simple black tuxedo, his hair the same mess it always was. It didn’t complete the look, but it was so uniquely him that it didn’t matter much.

Jaemin was holding his hand out to you.

“Would you like to go to Prom with me?” he whispered, your eyes darting between his face to his hand to his clothes, with barely the capacity to comprehend that this was actually happening.

“Jaeyoung wouldn’t want me to,”

You hated that that was the first thing you thought of saying. You could see in his expression that he felt the same. Jaemin kept his hand out stubbornly, his eyes boring into yours.

“I don’t want you to miss out on this, Y/n. And if you going out to have fun on your prom night can’t spare Jaeyoung’s feelings, then I’m willing to take the fall with you,”

He’d been back in town for less than two hours and he’d already made a ruckus. Jaemin knew this might blow up in his face, but when he looked at yours and saw the pain behind the mask made for his sister, he knew he wouldn’t be able to walk away without regret.

And so you placed your hand in his, and committed your favorite crime.

It was hard to say you were fashionably late when it was clear in your appearance that you had just thrown on your dress and slapped some minimal makeup on your face. You hadn’t had time, though, so you hoped everyone would be looking at Jaemin instead as you clutched his arm on the way inside. His parents had gone on one of their biweekly evening walks, so Jaemin saw it as a perfect opportunity to snatch the keys and race off with you in their car.

The gymnasium looked completely different, decorated to be like stepping foot into another realm outside from the darkly lit parking lot outside. The theme this year was Under the Stars, very cliche, but it came out much better than you thought it would. And before you could admire the atmosphere any longer, you were interrupted by a familiar face.

“Y/n! You’re here. I was beginning to think you weren’t showing up, especially when Jaeyoung showed up without you,”

Luna was this year’s class president and prom coordinator, and although she always alluded to positivity, you could see through her sometimes. Like now, in particular, as she glanced at your date and nearly let her grimace slip through.

“Hello! You’re Jaemin, right? Jaeyoung’s brother. I’m actually a really good friend of hers,” Luna introduced, although you both knew she knew exactly who Jaemin was. But, Jaemin being Jaemin, he introduced himself obliviously. Despite the anxieties of the consequences of running into Jaeyoung, you couldn’t help but stand there proudly holding onto Jaemin’s arm. For what it’s worth, every girl would be jealous of you tonight, even if you were one of the hopeless piners yourself.

“Now, if you’ll walk over here and stand on this X, yes, perfect, we’ll be taking your picture,”

Luna pointed at the man standing behind the camera and signalled for you two to smile, and you twisted your body awkwardly in his hold. You were sure you looked frazzled from behind the lens but Jaemin threw out a playful “Cheese!” that brought laughter out of you. Luna clapped her hands together and snatched the copies from the photo printer. You watched her observe them for a second before Jaemin took them from her, missing the squint in his eyes.

Jaemin handed one to you and looked down at the other, bringing it closer to his face under the dim lighting. Jaemin’s heart melting smile was on display, a strand of black hair in his eyes, and beside him, encased in his arms, you were smiling widely with your eyes scrunched up in laughter.

“Oh no, I look horrible,” you whined, trying to snatch Jaemin’s copy away, but he was already giggling and stuffing it into his pants pocket. You groaned as he grasped your hand in his.

“You look cute,” Jaemin giggled, turning to lead you deeper into the crowd in time to miss the lovesick look on your face. You turned to wave goodbye to Luna, but she was already gone.

It was still hard to fathom that you were here with Jaemin, even as he caught the eye of everyone you passed to reassure you he was the one leading you through the sea of bodies. You couldn’t help but feel insecure. And as Jaemin stopped near the back corner of the venue where there were less wandering eyes, he noticed that something was off.

“What’s wrong?” he asked, leaning back against the blue paper-covered wall and finally letting go of your hand. His infectious smile was beginning to fall.

“I’m sorry you have to go to a highschool prom with your sister’s best friend,” you sighed, joining him in leaning of exhaustion and shame. Your eyes were scanning the crowd, subconsciously searching for the sister in question, but soon your vision was obstructed and you found yourself staring into the same intense eyes you knew too well.

“Who was the one that dragged you here?” Jaemin questioned, his tone frustrated. He was trying to convey something to you for you to understand, and clearly you didn’t seem to get it. His arm was supporting his body on the wall behind your head, caging you in. “I wanted to bring you here, Y/n. Whether you’re very happy about it now or not, I know you will be tomorrow morning. And if not then, then when college starts. Or maybe even 50 years from now when you’ll start realizing that you don’t owe Jaeyoung anything anymore,”

The last sentence came out without Jaemin even thinking about it, and it shocked the both of you. Jaemin huffed, his head dropping toward the ground.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean that,” he sighed.

I just don’t want you to hide from me for a lifetime.

His subconscious had a palm to his mouth. Jaemin said it, almost.

“You know, the whole point of a school dance is to, well, dance, right?” Jaemin suddenly chirped up, his head raising once again, his demeanor shifting in seconds. Your sudden anxiety from the suggestion distracted you from the change.

“I can’t dance,” you whined, trying to withstand the force he was tugging you toward the dance floor. Not only did you not want to embarrass yourself with your lack of skills, you also didn’t want to leave the security of the corner you were in. Being out in the open like this left too much room for Jaeyoung to spot you.

“Too bad. Dancing is just moving to music, and I’m pretty sure you can move, Y/n,” Jaemin argued.

Yeah, Jaemin did actually want to get you to dance, but he also wanted to get himself out of that little moment before he said something really stupid.

The DJ was playing an upbeat, lyricless song that most of the dancers were jumping along to, and you silently wondered how the girls could possibly get in the air in their heels. You were wobbling enough as it is.

Jaemin took both your hands in his and spent twice the effort dancing for the both of you, pulling you along to the beat. He admired the way your dress shone under the fluorescent blue lighting. A smile was slowly beginning to creep up your face, and that was enough.

Two songs in and your walls had been torn down by Jaemin, your body moving carelessly along with his as he showed off all his questionable moves. He had you laughing hysterically, body hunched as he mildly impressed you with his body rolls and overexaggerated facial expressions. He sent you a final wink as he bowed with the outro of the song, laughing in that endearing way where he would clap his hands like a seal.

But then the music changed. The lights dimmed and everything slowed for a moment, the night winding down to an end. It was the moment everyone had been waiting for. The slow song.

They changed it abruptly and without warning, as if they wanted to see how everyone would react. In your own little world, you and Jaemin’s eyes met, and even with the racing anxiety in you, there was nothing stopping you from wrapping your arms around his neck. Jaemin had the ghost of a smile on his face, his features trying to be serious as he snaked his hands to the dip of your hips. His hands were big as they ran rampant on your curves, sending chills up to the top of your head.

With your growing confidence tonight, and the way he didn’t hold back with his grazes, you found it in yourself to touch his nape, your fingers hesitating to reach into his hair until he tilted his head to the side and leant into your touch. He hummed as you wound your fingers through the soft strands, his head knocking forward until your foreheads touched, his eyes closed. Your breath caught in your throat and you were sure he noticed, but he didn’t say anything as you continued the slow sway to the piano in the background.

This may have been the closest you’ve ever been to Jaemiin. It was quite amazing, really, that you’d known this boy all this time, yet the history books of you and him were blank.

“Aren’t you glad you came?” he asked, his eyelashes fluttering. You could barely find it in yourself to respond, not when he was in front of you like this. You were on a one way trip down the hole in your heart designated for him and your unfeasible infatuation.

“Yeah,”

Below your restricted line of sight, Jaemin smiled bigger than he had all night, because all he wanted for you right now was to be happy. To enjoy one of the last moments of your senior year with him, wait, without Jaeyoung. Just for the night, or even just for a moment, something could finally be yours to keep.

And for a moment, you forgot about Jaeyoung, and Luna, and everyone else really but Jaemin. He was all you could see, feel, you were surrounded by him and it was inescapable. After tonight, you’d never want to go back to the way things used to be.

But you’d never had a choice before, so why did you ever think that would change? Because you were in love, and you were naive. You thought you were invincible, and that everyone else around you was, too.

“You’re fucking kidding,”

You shot away from Jaemin so fast he barely had time to register it, his tight grip on your waist trailing with you until he stumbled a bit forward. Your eyes somehow tracked her down immediately, your guilt-ridden face finding Jaeyoung’s just a few feet away. Even with your best friend right in front of you, all you could comprehend was the music still playing and how upset you were that you didn’t even get to finish the song.

“I must be imaging this right now,” Jaeyoung scoffed, her eyes wild behind her pretty face. Was she really this upset?

“I brought her here, Jae,” Jaemin cut in, stepping a bit in front of you. It was the first mistake made that night.

“No, no, really. This is all a joke, right?” Jaeyoung cried, looking between the two of you. Betrayal was written across her face and you should’ve known this would happen. Jaeyoung was nothing if not true to her beliefs. If you thought for a second that she would be happy for you, seeing you enjoying the night instead of wallowing alone, you were wrong.

You were so fucking wrong.

“You promised,” Jaeyoung whispered, her initial anger fizzling. Despite how happy you felt before, and how little you understood her resentment, you still found the guilt setting in as you realized how upset your best friend was over this. You never knew the consequences would be to this degree, because all this time, you’d complied.

“Calm down, Jaeyoung,” Jaemin muttered, observing the influx of attention towards her little scene. Mistake number two.

“Give me the keys,” Jaeyoung demanded. You glanced at Jaemin, doubting if he would really do it.

You didn’t notice then that she was alone. You didn’t realize then that Jaehyun wasn’t with her anymore.

“Give me the keys, Jaemin,” she said again, her tone calmer yet sharper than before. Jaemin reached into his pocket and placed the car keys in her hand.

It was the final nail in a coffin that shut in silence. You should say something. Why couldn’t you say anything to her?

But would you have sacrificed your happiness for her? For the umpteenth time? You’d never know. No one would. Because Jaeyoung stormed out before you could even try to defend yourself. You stepped forward to follow her, but Jaemin grabbed your arm and pulled you back. He shook his head at you, and you listened. Maybe that was the third mistake. Strike out.

They say the right people will always walk into your life. But they never talk about when they walk out.

Jaeyoung walked out that night, and whether it would’ve been for good or not on any other day, it was for good that night. Because destiny was cruel.

The call came an hour later. You wished it never did. Your shoulder was brushing against his as you sat on the curb of the sidewalk when Jaemin’s phone rang.

“Jaemin, are you and Y/n still at the school?” his mother spoke, Jaemin’s phone on speaker as you both looked at each other. It was the last time you’d ever meet his eyes without seeing your monsters. If only you knew then to engrave it into your memory.

You didn’t know anything that night. It was heaven just a moment ago, why did things have to change?

“Yeah, why?” he asked. She sounded so distraught, you already knew there was something wrong. You just never thought it would be the truth.

“She’s--” her voice got caught in a sob, choking her.

“Who? Jaeyoung?” Jaemin spoke, his voice getting more frightened each second that passed as you both waited for her to find her voice again.

“She’s been in an accident. You need to come home,”

The phone dropped to the ground. What a cruel, cruel world it was.

“Come on, Y/n! We don’t have much time!” Jaeyoung called to you, her long legs taking steps that dwarfed your own. You had your growth spurt a bit later than everyone else, and in the eighth grade, that made you significantly shorter than your best friend.

Your hand was clasped in hers as she dragged you through the crowd. She knew where your families were, waiting for the two of you to come back from a trip to the ice cream stand. People were standing, some settled on blankets atop the grass, everyone looking up toward the town’s clocktower. You two had one minute.

“Jaeyoung, over here!” It was Jaemin. He was in ninth grade at the time, and to you, that meant he was officially out of your league. High schooler Na Jaemin was too cool to hang out with a middle school girl. Especially if she was his little sister’s best friend.

“Did you get your ice cream?” your mother asked the two of you, and you both gave a thumbs up in unison. The gesture was followed up with a chorus of synchronous, girlish giggles just as the countdown began.

10!

You and Jaeyoung missed the first number, but now you've caught up.

Jaeyoung nudged your shoulder.

She pointed at the colorful lights above your heads.

A chill breeze blew past, and you held your jacket tighter around your body.

Jaemin playfully reached over to try and cover Jaeyoung’s eyes.

She slapped his hand away with a laugh.

Jaemin stole a glance at you, your wide eyes scanning the dark sky in anticipation.

You didn’t notice.

Jaeyoung wrapped an arm around you and held you close.

Fireworks exploded before your very eyes, a flurry of cold fire and blazing color. You’d never seen something so beautifully chaotic, the noise ringing through your ears. If you could dream long enough, you would stay in this moment forever.

But dreams weren’t forever, and no matter how hard you tried to run towards them, you would only look back and see a world where Jaeyoung was no longer there.

------------------------------

Nothing felt like anything anymore. It was all a blank void in which you lived without really being alive. Everyone pitied you. That might’ve been the worst part. You didn’t want their pity, you just wanted her back.

You wished it were some miracle story, the ones you hear in the news where the teen girl gets hospitalized and makes an earth shattering recovery, one where people send their thoughts and prayers to her and it actually works. You could think about that night, all those weeks ago, but it was too painful. So you didn’t.

It was a story so heartbreaking you played it over and over again in your head. She swerved away from a deer in the road. The car was reported to have wrapped around a tree trunk. Jaeyoung died upon impact.

She always loved animals. More than anything, she had wanted to be a veterinarian. Fuck animals. They didn’t deserve her. And fuck deers, while we’re at it.

Graduation passed by unceremoniously. You didn’t attend, and you only heard the stories. They showed her picture, apparently.

Fuck them.

You slept whenever you could. It was the only way you could escape the world you didn’t want to be a part of anymore. You felt her absence everywhere, even in your dreams. You didn’t go by her house anymore, her car sat still in their driveway, the clothes she had forgotten still sat in your drawers. But despite how frozen her reality became, it didn't mean shit to everyone else’s reality.

You almost envied her. Almost, but you would never say it out loud. You could barely even think it. But, she really was lucky in her own morbid way. She didn’t have to stay behind and harness the pain you felt. The pain her parent’s felt. And, you were sure, the pain her brother felt.

Jaemin hadn’t been around since that night. It’s been days now.

The days turned into weeks, the weeks to months, and soon enough all your classmates were flying away on airplanes while you sat in the room you were a part of now. You were just another pillow on the bed.

It’s just a gap year. People take a year off before college all the time.

Avoiding was all you did now.

You found ways to cope. Besides wasting away in your room, you found a new passion for puzzles. It sounds boring, sure, but there was a certain calm you got out of putting the last remaining piece in its place, completing the picture in just the way it was destined to. There were no mistakes, no broken edges, and no pieces lost. It can’t go on without a single piece. Not in the perfect world of puzzles.

In your small town there were little places to turn to. Little people to talk to without them knowing. Jaeyoung’s accident was one of the most detrimental things to happen this year, and thus, it trailed you no matter where you went.

But today, you decided to be brave. For Jaeyoung.

You didn’t know what sparked the idea or the motivation, but you got yourself up off your bed and grabbed the keys from the tired, hardworking hanger. They hadn’t left their place in months.

What you didn’t anticipate was the fear of getting inside a car. Muscle memory failed you as your hands shook around the car, pushing your keys inside and shifting the gear. It was now or never, you told yourself. You’d already asked your mom to pick up the bouquet for you, so that left only one stop. And off you went.

The thing you hated about going out now was seeing the bustling lives of the world around you. It didn’t make sense how your world could be falling apart at the seams while everyone else seemed fine. Well, not fine, maybe stressed about the coffee line in the morning, or rushing on their lunch break, but it was all the little things. The kind of things that didn’t block your airways everytime you thought about it. Thought about them.

You focused your eyes straight forward, concentrating on getting yourself to your destination. The engine’s low hum was mesmerizing, the soundtrack to your journey outside again. Strangely, and sadly, a car ride would never be just a car ride anymore.

When you made it to your destination, you pulled to the side of the road and let your car run for a while as you calmed yourself in your seat. You hadn’t even taken your seatbelt off yet, considering simply driving off and never coming back.

But then you thought about your best friend, and you knew you had to get out of your car. Whether you wanted to or not.

The winds were high today and the sun was already making its descent in the later half of the day, trees stretching beyond you on either side. They were tall, haunting pine trees that looked more alive the longer you paid attention to them. And on the right shoulder, just beyond the road in a divet you would’ve never noticed otherwise, was Jaeyoung.

Well, just her face on a big poster staked into the ground.

You were content staring down at your bunch of white roses as you approached, your feet tiptoeing around the mess of flowers and notes nestled in the grass. You wondered how many people had visited the spot in the past months. You wondered who they were. If they really knew Jaeyoung like you did.

Condolences, Fly High, We’ll Miss You. Cards you would find in the grievance section of the card aisle in the grocery store. Right next to the Happy Birthday and 50th Anniversary messages. Maybe they could play music, too.

Your card was in your head. Written in your heart, but not ready to be shared. You’d come here with this grand plan to pour your heart out to her, if she was listening, and if not, to the tree trunk standing proudly oblivious to the tragedy.

But all you could do was set the flowers down nicely, and walk back to your car.

“Y/n, honey,” a voice called from outside your door, and you shut your laptop screen playing the show you knew you wouldn’t finish. It was your mom as she opened the door and peeked through the crack. “Your father and I are going out to dinner tonight with the Na’s. If you--want to come, then you’re fully welcome to,”

You didn’t miss the hesitating pause in her sentence, and while they tried their best to act like everything was normal, you knew your parents were growing tired of your detachment. Just because Jaeyoung’s parents lost their daughter, didn’t mean they had to lose theirs too.

“Maybe,” you replied. She clearly didn’t like your answer. “Is Jaemin going to be there?”

“Would you go if he was?”

What a loaded question. Would you? Why did you even ask? A part of you, more than you cared to admit, wanted to blame him. If only you hadn’t let him convince you into going, if only he hadn’t given her the keys and let Jaeyoung drive when she was so upset. If only he wasn’t so addicting.

But you still thought about him. Everyday. You wondered how he was doing, when he was going to leave for college again. There were a lot of things you wanted to say to him, and for him to say to you.

“I’ll let you decide. We’re leaving in an hour,” was the last thing she said before your mom closed the door once again.

When was the last time you went out to eat? Was it your cousin’s birthday dinner six weeks ago? You thought so. It would be a lie to say you really wanted to go.

But you knew you should. Your pain must’ve been nothing compared to what Jaeyoung’s parents felt, and that was enough to get you out of your bed.

“It’s so nice to see you guys,” your dad greeted, sitting down beside Jaeyoung’s father as you and your mother followed suit. The couple had gotten to the restaurant a bit earlier than the three of you, already seated at the table.

Two empty chairs remained. No one said anything about it.

“It feels like it’s been forever,” her mother said, and it was the truth. It had been forever. You used to see them every week.

If you tuned everything out and shut your eyes, it’d be just like any other night. Jaeyoung would be sitting beside you, playing with her straw wrapper as the adults talked about college tuition and politics. Maybe Jaemin would’ve been there too, studying the menu for far too long trying to settle the indecisiveness in his head.

But that’s what separated you from the adults. They got straight to the point. No sugarcoating, and no avoiding.

“We’re holding the funeral in two weeks,” Jaeyoung’s dad spoke, a cloud of grief looming over the table. “And we’d like to ask you all for some help in the planning,”

“Of course,” your mom agreed, immediately. So composed. So compassionate. Your parents were here to be there for her parents, not for you.

You sat silently as they discussed. They talked about the budget, the venue, the list of attendees. It would be a smaller service, consisting of family and friends. The dress code wouldn’t be black, they didn’t want it to be sad. It was to be a celebration of life.

“And, if it’s not too much to ask, Y/n,” At the mention of your name you finally drew yourself back into the conversation, having pushed it further aside the longer it dragged on. “We’d like you to speak at the service,”

Your heart dropped. That was quite possibly the last thing you’d ever want to do. How would you ever be able to stand up in front of all those people, all of whom knew Jaeyoung, and force words out of your mouth? What would you even say? Would it be appropriate to apologize, because that’s all you’d ever wanted to say to your best friend since that night. That you were so fucking sorry.

“I can’t,” you whispered, before you could even think about replying. Your parent’s faces dropped.

“Y/n, they’re asking you for this one thing. Jaeyoung would want you to speak--”

“I’m sorry,” you muttered, standing up from your seat. You’d only made it to the complimentary bread. Looking back, you were surprised you even sat there that long. You couldn’t stand the looks in their eyes.

You weaved through the tables, dodging waiters and heading out the back exit. You didn’t know where you were going. Anywhere from there.

“Y/n?” a voice called. You hated how you recognized it immediately. You ignored Jaemin’s calls as you fled, away from the truth and away from the boy who would always remind you of her. Your ears were ringing when he grabbed your arm.

“Where are you going?” he asked, and he cupped your face in his hands and forced you to look at him. When did you start crying? You only realized when the image of his face came back blurry through your tears.

You ripped your face away from his touch. It burned your skin. But not like it used to, no. This wasn’t a good burn. Your skin was in pain and all you wanted to do was escape from his flame.

Jaemin must’ve been around the back of the restaurant for a while. Your eyes darted to the place where he had been standing beside the door, a bottle of some cheap, drugstore alcohol sat open on the ground. You frowned in distaste. For the split second he let his guard down as he noticed your judgement, you turned on your heel and walked away once again.

“Y/n, y/n wait,”

Fuck. You stopped, but you didn’t turn around. His voice had grown small now, defeated, and he was pleading with you this time. He wasn’t ordering you, he wasn’t scolding you.

“Just let me drive you home, please. I drank two sips from that beer, I promise,”

“Why?” you cried, your face scrunching in pain out of his view. He knew how painful this was, right? “I really don’t want to right now, Jaemin,”

“I can’t-” he paused, and you glanced over your shoulder to see the tears in his eyes. “I can’t let you walk away without knowing you get home safe. Not anymore. Just let me drive you home,”

The car ride back was silent, the tears drying on his cheeks as they flowed down yours. Jaemin got a new car, you noticed. You both didn’t address the half empty pack of beer in the backseat.

When he pulled into your empty driveway no words had been exchanged still, and you surely weren’t going to say something first, so you got out and didn’t look back. Only when you closed the front door shut did you hear his engine run once again.

Car rides were never just car rides anymore. It was the first time you’d seen Jaemin in three months.

Jaemin couldn’t stop thinking about you. Not for a second. And that was the undeniable, heartbreaking truth.

He thought about turning his car around that day he dropped you off. Would you have answered the door if he knocked? Would you have nursed his heart like he wanted you to?

He dropped out of college. It wasn’t his proudest moment, and his parents definitely weren’t happy about it, but in a way, he could see the relief they felt with him in the house again. Jaemin didn’t know if they would’ve been able to handle an empty house. That wasn’t to say he was always home. Jaemin spent his nights out late these days, with no company. He was always alone, doing something useless with his time, because who was there to tell him to get on with his life?

He blamed himself a lot, when things got really fucking bad. And then he’d feel like the air was gone around him, and he couldn’t breathe. Jaemin knew he did a lot of things wrong that night, but it was done now. Now, he had a new problem on the horizon. You.

He didn’t even know what the hell he had been caught up in not to call you. Jaemin knew he should’ve checked up on you, and that’s what made him regret it even more.

He tried to drown it out with the alcohol, but he’d grown immune to it by now.

He didn’t expect to walk into his house four days later and see you sitting there in his living room. Was he dreaming? He heard voices from the kitchen, one he recognized as your mother’s, but all he could see was you. Your eyes were squeezed shut and your hands were in fists by your sides, and Jaemin felt a rush of anger through him. The adults could be so clueless sometimes. How could they not see you here, suffering?

A vague voice in the back of his mind told him that maybe he shouldn’t have, but he stormed up to you and grabbed your arm. You were jolted up by the contact, but Jaemin ignored it as he pulled you up and toward the door.

“Where are we going?” you hiccuped, eyes looking everywhere but the lonely car in the driveway. Jaemin was silent in his anger, leading you toward his car near the sidewalk and guiding you in.

He drove to the first place he could think of.

Him and Jaeyoung would come here a lot when they were kids, a field on the western outskirts of town. It was where they held the annual fireworks show to mark the beginning of each new year. It was empty this time around, which Jaemin wanted.

He didn’t wait for you as he got out of the car and strolled a few steps forward, scanning the endless sight of grass before him. You followed him moments later, sticking your side to the door of his car as you watched him, waiting. He had brought you here, and you wanted to know why.

“Why aren’t you going to college?” he asked. You swallowed, your body caving inward as the wind blew past you. You barely had legs to stand on anymore.

“Gap year,” you answered, short and simply. You hated that he sounded disappointed when he was standing here on a September evening too. “There’s nothing out there for me anymore,”

“You should’ve left this town,” he murmured, so quietly you wondered if he was really talking about you anymore. Regret was laced in his voice. Frustration simmered in you. If he was so knowledgeable on what’s good for you, why couldn’t he figure it out for himself?

“There’s nothing out there for me anymore,”

Jaemin sighed, leaving his distant position to round the car. He didn’t look at you as he approached you, but soon he was right in front of your face and you couldn’t ignore now how hurtful your words must’ve been.

And then his arms wrapped around you, and you felt even worse.

“I know you don’t mean that. I know you’re upset right now,” he murmured, his mouth near your ear and his cheek brushing against your hair.

But the sun was setting and the light was washing away, and you knew your parents must be wondering where you went.

“Don’t move,” he whispered, clutching onto you with his hair over his face and tears in his eyes.

“Jaemin, I have to go,” you croaked, your mind begging your body to move. But no matter how much you willed it to, it couldn’t. It was your heavy heart rooting you in place.

“Can’t we just stay like this?” he asked. Jaemin sunk into you. He always had a fear of falling. “Can we start over?”

“It’s getting dark,”

“I think darkness is beautiful. Our fears stare us straight in the face but we can’t even see them. The sky could fall to my feet and I wouldn’t know it,”

Pretty profound words from the boy who never really showed emotion. You realized you didn’t know much about Jaemin, and it crushed you.

“But would you hear it, you think?”

“I don’t think so. I’d like to think our worlds would decay in silence,”

------------------------------

You were lying awake in your bed, the night growing older and the silence ringing in your ears. You jolted in shock when something hit your window. You knew who it must’ve been before you peered out to look, hoping you were wrong yet begging that you were right.

Jaemin stood in front of your one-story window, peering inside with tears painting his cheeks. You opened the window and allowed him inside, no questions asked as you accepted that this was the way things were now. Days can be so good until one bad thought and they’re ruined.

Jaemin stood in your room awkwardly, looking around. The endless stack of puzzle boxes caught his eye, but he didn’t say anything about them. You realized it was the first time he’d ever been in here. You closed the window shut again, and was then pulled by the arm abruptly. Your face was dangerously close to his now, and now you had a few questions.

“Why are you here, Jaemin?” you asked, wanting so badly to touch his cheek, but you refrained. He was silent for a while before he thought up an answer.

“I wanted- needed to see you,” Jaemin responded, his eyes cast down like he was distracted by something. “I hate being alone at night these days,”

You didn’t know what to think of that. Was he always with people at night? Other girls?

You were intensely aware of his fingers grazing your arm, his touch blazing a path down your skin. You wanted to tell him to stop, his fire burning a bigger hole in your chest, but you didn’t want to. Not when he was right here, looking at you like that.

You both knew he was using you, pushing all feelings aside for distraction, but neither of you cared.

His lips were on yours in an instant, fierce and hungry and not like how you imagined your first kiss with him at all. His hand covered the back of your head and pulled you impossibly closer, breathing you in like you were his lifeline. Maybe you were.

“Tell me this is okay,” Jaemin panted between kisses, never long enough to really get the words out. Now that he got something he couldn’t seem to get enough.

“It’s okay, Jaemin. Keep going,”

He didn’t need to be told twice.

Jaemin led the both of you blindly to the bed disregarding your parents upstairs. Your back landed onto the mattress and you bounced a bit into his chest, his body pressed flush against you.

Your lips were so sweet, Jaemin was drunk on them. His heart was racing just as fast as yours, shocked by the gravity of the situation despite being the instigator. His brain was spinning and his actions were justified by the ache in his heart and the longing he had for you.

Your arms were linked around his neck when his hands slid underneath your thin tank top, groaning at the smoothness of your skin. Fuck, your heart was about to burst out of your chest.

Both your shirts were gone in a rush, your hands searching for a touch as you ran your fingertips down the length of his torso. You felt him shudder beneath you, a heavy breath releasing harshly out his nose. His lips traveled down to your neck, and you wondered if he could feel your pulse under your skin. Jaemin nibbled lightly behind your ear, reveling in your whimpers. He traveled down even further, taking one breast and descending his mouth onto it. You brought a palm to your mouth trying to cover your moans, and Jaemin had the capacity to smirk up at your reaction. His tongue lapped over your nipple slowly, sensually, before moving onto the other side.

Your back lifted up off the mattress, into his touch, one of his arms scooping underneath your torso to pull you up and support your arch. Your fingers threaded through his hair, pulling and tugging to keep yourself grounded.

“Jaemin,” you whispered, pulling a bit harder on your head until he looked up at you. “I want to feel you now, please,”

Jaemin had been trying to hold himself back, take his time and test the waters, but it took that one plea for him to unleash his desires.

“Fuck,” he growled, kissing you softly, your lips sticking together. He nipped your bottom lip slyly before leaning back a little.

Jaemin sat up and tore his pants and underwear off in one go, turning over to help you out of your flimsy shorts. You were both bare now, the dim moonlight flooding in through your window to cast glowing shadows across your bodies. You both stayed still there for a moment, taking the other in. Regret didn’t hit either of you until now, staring the situation in the face, but you surely weren’t going to stop when you’d already gone this far.

“Condom?” he asked, but you shook your head.

“Are you clean?” you asked. “I’m on contraceptives,”

“I’m clean, I promise,” Jaemin replied, soothing your worries and reaching down to pet your head affectionately. “Are you ready?”

“I’ve been ready for a long time,” you joked, and Jaemin chuckled lightly, looking down at his length. He stroked it a few times, shifting his hips down as you felt the tip poke against your entrance. You were aware of how embarrassingly wet you’d gotten from so little interaction, but Jaemin groaned at the feeling.

“You’re so fucking wet, all for me,” he murmured, sinking slowly into your inviting entrance. You whined at the stretch, his thick length stretching you out. Your body was quite inexperienced with sizes as large as his.

“You’re doing great for me, baby,” He let the pet name slip, but it hung low over both of your heads. Once Jaemin bottomed out, you both sighed in sync.

“You’re so big,” you whispered, and Jaemin leaned down closer to your face to place a feather-like kiss to your lips. His forehead rested against your own, his breathing ragged as he held himself back from pounding into you. “You can move now, Jaem,”

Jaemin’s warmth pulled away from you again and relocated to your hips, his large hands gripping your body roughly as he thrusted slowly in and out. There was no noise in your room apart from the heavy breathing and lewd squelches of your entrance, Jaemin glancing down entranced by the sight of his cock slipping in and out of you.

“You’re so beautiful,” he sighed, under his breath like he didn’t mean for you to hear it. Your sweaty palm was still covering your mouth, but Jaemin tugged your arm down and released your open mouth to the cool air. He wanted to hear the effect he had on you.

Jaemin was beginning to speed up, his grip tightening its hold as he pulled your hips down onto his every time he thrust forward. You felt him everywhere, deep in your stomach like he was becoming a part of you.

“Jaemin, fuck,” you moaned, your hands coming up to grip your breasts trying to level your floating brain. Jaemin’s eyes darted to the sight and widened, his lip tugging between his teeth harshly.

“You have no idea how long I’ve wanted to do this,” he admitted. “Wanted to fuck this tight little pussy for so long. So fucking long,” He punctuated each word with a harsh thrust, hard enough to push you a bit further up the bed like he was trying to prove something.

Jaemin was trying to show you that he could make you feel good. That he wasn’t always going to make you feel shitty, even when it wasn’t intentional.

“Are you close?” he asked breathlessly. You hummed in affirmation. Jaemin slipped a hand down to your pussy, his thumb reaching out to rub harshly against your clit. You sucked in a breath, not daring to breathe with the risk of crying out. You let it out slowly, a squeaky whine coming out instead.

You were thrashing around underneath Jaemin, your walls pulsating around his cock. His eyes closed and his eyebrows furrowed, grunting softly as you orgasmed around him.

“Fuck, fuck, fuck,” he groaned, his pace unfaltering as he chased his own high. 30 seconds later he buried himself in your walls, his cum shooting deep inside of you. Your walls were still clenching around his softening cock, muscles in your body twitching sporadically as you came down from your orgasm. And as you came off your high, the closer you got to the ground. To reality.

Jaemin was in your room right now, the mixture of yours and his cum leaking out of your entrance and onto the sheets. It was real, the fact that you had just fucked Jaemin. You weren’t sure if this was right for either of you emotionally, but it felt so fucking good. You and Jaemin were self destructive.

------------------------------

“I’d like to thank you all for attending our celebration of life. Tonight is a special night, one that my husband and I wanted to share with you all,”

You sat in the lawn chair frozen, eyes fixated on Jaeyoung’s mother as she stood bravely before the crowd, using her time to address all the guests. Tonight was the night of Jaeyoung’s funeral, and while you were supposed to speak, you haven't planned anything specific. You decided it would be best to speak from the heart.

As her mother continued with her speech, swallowing through the pain as she spoke about her daughter, many sniffles could be heard amongst the crowd as she began to tear up as well. She had spoken to you about it earlier, when you had arrived early to help set up, about how she hadn’t wanted to cry during her speech. She wanted to keep things lighthearted, but that was impossible.

Her son wasn’t even here.

That’s right, Jaemin still hadn’t shown up. You were upset that he had left you alone here in the front row, but you were even more upset that he was letting his parents down. You didn’t ask them where he was, because they surely didn’t know. And it would be no use to bring it to their attention that he wasn’t here, they were fully aware.

But you pushed it to the back of your mind, because tonight wasn’t about him. It wasn’t even about you and him, in the same sentence, it was about Jaeyoung. And it was about letting go of all the pain and leaving more room for reminiscing. Now it was about spending time with the people who knew her, who she lived on through in their memories.

“Now, before we get to the burial, I would like to ask Jaeyoung’s best friend and sister at heart, as we always called her, up to the stage to give a few words,” She was dabbing her tears away with a soft fabric as you stood and approached the pedestal, and she gave you a solemn pat on the shoulder in comfort as she made her way back to her seat.

It was right then that you wished you had at least made an outline of what you wanted to say beforehand. You were frozen now that you were looking out at the sea of familiar faces, but you clasped your hands together and decided to go for it blind.

“If you knew Jaeyoung, you knew me as well. I was always with her, afterall. Next to her, on the phone with her, and even in the little necklace she’d always wear around her neck. I had gotten it for her for her 14th birthday, a photo of us tucked into the metal,”

You reached your hand up and felt the cool metal beneath your fingers, toying with it nervously.

“There are a lot of things I thought I had wanted to say to you all tonight, but I’m realizing now that it was all so negative. And I don’t think that’s the story Jaeyoung would want me to tell, so I’m kind of changing my plans right now. Please bare with me,”

Everyone was watching you with pity and expectancy, waiting for you to catch your quickening breath.

“Jaeyoung and I came in a pair. There was no Jaeyoung without Y/n, and no Y/n without Jaeyoung. It’s heartbreaking to think that it’s just me now. But, Jaeyoung has always been there for me, navigating this world by my side even when she had her own problems, her own highs and her own lows. If I could speak to her again, she would probably tell me to get up and learn to live without her, because she’s been trying to get me to do that all my life. It’s selfish for me now to put everything on hold, I realize, when all she’s wanted for me is to follow my dreams,”

“Sometimes, when the monsters creep out from the closet, I see the void in the world she left. But my one mistake is never finding anything to fill it with. Just like she would want me to. We can’t leave our shadows dark, even if what we might find scares us. Someone told me that darkness is beautiful, but I disagree. I think the light is what we need before it consumes us. Where would we be without the sun? Or the moon, or the stars? We should be frightened by a falling sky, or we would never live our days like it could happen someday. A life without fearing death is a life without value,”

“And so, I dedicate my days to Jaeyoung. To my best friend who loved animals and loved this time of day, with the sun hiding behind a sliver in the trees. To Jaeyoung, who loved the smell of her car’s air freshener and hated mine. I dedicate my life to her because she never got to live hers, and if there’s nothing else I could give her then at least I can give her the satisfaction of watching her best friend flourish down a path without forgetting where she came from. Right, Jaeyoung? I won’t cry anymore. I’ll take care of myself, of your family, and of your memory. This isn’t a goodbye but a farewell, to the best friend I could have ever asked for,”

You didn’t remember saying any of that once you exited the stage, your feet carrying you past the applause and out of the venue before you could see the tears mixed with smiling faces. If you needed closure, you needed to do one more thing.

Ring. Ring. Ring.

The number you have called is not available right now. Leave your message after the beep.

Beep.

“Jaemin,” you sighed, collapsing onto the bench in front of the building, letting your feet rest in your uncomfortable heels. You weren’t sure what you were expecting from him anymore. “Jaeyoung’s service ended. You weren’t there,”

Obviously. You just didn’t have anything else to say. You stayed silent on the line for a while, racking your brain for something better, maybe expressing your frustration with him, but no words came, so you simply hung up.

You didn’t go back inside. You didn’t think you could handle the sight of them lowering the casket into the ground.

So you drove, and drove, and drove, until you passed places you recognized from before and the night wasn’t young anymore. The headlights were blinding, making it hard to see much of anything. You were driving without purpose and without a destination, so distracted by the thoughts in your mind to even realize where you were.

You were on the street you’d driven a hundred times before. Half a block away was your school. Well, your old school. You’re an alumni now.

You sure as hell didn’t want to stop by, especially in the dead of night, but there were another set of headlights in the parking lot, and you were too curious not to give it an extra look. And for the single second you devoted your attention to the trespasser, you realized who it was.

Why the hell was Jaemin in the school parking lot on the night of his sister’s funeral?

You made a last minute, screeching turn left in through the curiously open gate. You didn’t even bother to park between one of the designated lines and shot out of your car with the engine still running.

“Jaemin?” you called, the dim yellow lamp posts scattered around doing nothing to aid your vision as you squinted to get a better look. You could see the shadow of his body resting against the hood of the car, and you approached cautiously.

“Is this what you’ve been doing this whole time?” you chastised, picking up one of the empty beer cans from the painted metal surface and tossing it to the ground. There Jaemin was, drunk and silent, alone while you just lived through possibly the hardest thing you’ve ever had to sit through.

“I didn’t want to go,” he stated simply, shrugging off your disappointment like it was nothing. You could tell he wasn’t sober, his cheeks tinted pink and his words slurring a bit. But there was little evidence in the empty cans that he was completely shitfaced, although you speculated his emotions were drunkening him all on their own.

“You were supposed to be there. For your parents, for Jaeyoung,” you paused, fighting the urge to snatch the newest can from his hand and throwing it to the pavement. “You were supposed to be there for me,”

Jaemin’s nonchalant attitude faltered a bit, his shoulders slumping deeper into his gaping chest. He had been staring out toward the gymnasium across the stretch of concrete, the building so familiar yet the core memory of it in his mind played through the extravagant decorations and aura of that night. It didn’t look as lively anymore, as if it knew it was too soon to get things up and running again.

“Why are you doing this, Jaemin? What are you trying to prove? That you’re better than everyone else? Or that you can’t cope? Whatever it is, whoever you are, this isn’t the Jaemin I know,”

You hated that you thought of how his hands felt on you.

“Maybe you don’t even know me, what about that?” he argued, his tone growing defensive.

“You’re saying it like it’s my fault! I’m sorry I’m such a big inconvenience for you, but you don’t have to care about me anymore,” you shouted. You were too upset and overrun with emotion to realize how hurtful it sounded. “Jaeyoung is gone. There’s nothing tying you to me. You don’t even have to know me,”

“Are you fucking serious?” Jaemin asked incredulously, his eyebrows furrowed as he turned and approached you. You regretted it now, now that you weren’t just staring at the back of his head. Jaemin was right in front of you now, for you to see the pain in his expression.

“What if I told you it was never about her when it came to you? What if she was the only thing holding either of us back?” He was mad now. “Don’t forget I’ve known you just as long as Jaeyoung has. And even though I didn’t get to know you, like really know you, I saw you in your best moments. Do you know how hard it is to watch a girl smile everyday and eat candy until her stomach hurts and sing until she’s out of breath? I was young, Y/n. I didn’t get to see those moments in other girls like I saw in you. I was impressionable. I had a boyish crush that you just can’t shake. I know how she felt about the idea of you and me, but fuck, how can you expect me to keep fighting for her when you’re the one standing right in front of me?”

“And for months, I only wished for one thing. I wanted so badly to take the silence in her soul and put it into mine. I didn’t want to do anything. I couldn’t get out of bed, I couldn’t call my parents and let them know I’m okay, I couldn’t even open my damn eyes. Is it so selfish of me to have found a reason to stay? Does it make me unworthy of love? Of loving you?”

The influx of information was too much. You found out so much in so little time, and the only thing you could do was cry.

Hard, broken sobs right in front of him. Jaemin’s shield was gone in an instant.

“I’m sorry,” he croaked, stepping forward and pulling you into his chest. He hated that it was too soon. Jaemin hated that the right thing to do would have been to give you space. To give you time and sit on his feelings like it would be forever until he could tell you. He tore you right apart. “I’m sorry, Y/n. Please don’t cry, forgive me. You’ll always have a place in me,”

You weren’t really sure why you were so emotional. Shouldn’t you have been happy? You finally got what you wanted. Jaemin reciprocated your feelings. And whether everything seemed heightened right now, for the both of you, you could still tell that somewhere inside of him, he meant what he said.

But you backed away regardless. He smelled too strongly of alcohol, and no matter what he said, it didn’t change the fact that he didn’t decide to give Jaeyoung even the time of day. You wiped the tears away and spoke directly to the boy in front of you, broken pieces and all.

“You know that’s too painful, Jaemin. For the both of us,”

Jaemin couldn’t handle the sight of you walking away. He was numb yet his body felt like it was being electrocuted.

“Don’t go,” he begged, his footsteps wavering until his knees hit the ground. You turned with the little pity you had left in your heart. “You’re half of me now,”

Jaemin let out a sigh when he heard you come back. But you stopped just short, your hand reaching out to him.

“Give me your keys. Call someone if you want to get home, you’re not driving drunk,”

And then you drove off. Jaemin had a knack for letting go of people in his life, even when he didn’t have to.

As if your days couldn’t get any worse, you ran into possibly the last person you’d ever expected to see the next morning in a flower shop down the road.

“Jaehyun?” you gasped, eyes locking with the boy behind the cashier. He was wearing a green apron, a part of the uniform, with a name tag pinned to his chest with neat handwriting scrawled across the front. He was similar to how you remembered him, nothing had changed much.

“Y/n, wow. Uh, welcome?” You both chuckled at the awkward greeting, before it went quiet as the elephant in the room grew.

“I, uh, heard the funeral was last night,” he commented. “I’m really sorry,”

You’d heard that one countless times before, but it meant something more coming from the college boy. He was with Jaeyoung that night, until he wasn’t.

“Whatever happened that night, with you and Jaeyoung?” you asked. Jaehyun’s face darkened and the mood shifted. Even though you were learning to grow comfortable talking about her, you forgot others might not have moved on so easily.

“I had gone to go get her that stupid milkshake she likes from Hank’s, the one with about 100 grams of sugar,” he sighed. “She was going to come along with me, ditch the fun for a late night date, but then this girl had approached her and said she saw you and, well, her brother there together,”

You nodded in acceptance, urging the boy to continue.

“I could tell she was so upset, but she always tried to hide things like that when she was with me. I had gone for her drink in hopes it would make her feel better when she went off to look for you. I really did like her, you know. I was planning on asking her out that night, properly,”

Jaehyun’s story was sad but beautiful, the perspective of the boy Jaeyoung was head over heels for, who just wanted to make her prom night that much more special.

“Are you here for Jaeyoung?” he asked, blinking his tears away and gesturing to the flower displays. You nodded, and he held up a finger signaling you to wait as he walked toward one of the shelves.

“She told me one time when she visited me during my shift that she always loved tulips. I teased her about it then, wondering why it wasn’t roses or carnations or something, but she insisted that they were the best flower,” Jaehyun walked back over and handed you a flowing bouquet of white tulips, fresh and picture perfect. “It’s on the house. Don’t be a stranger, okay?”

“Thank you, Jaehyun,” you sighed, walking out of the store with a greater passion inside. All the missing puzzle pieces were beginning to fall into place.

Apparently, graveyards were empty on a typical Wednesday afternoon. You nodded politely to an elderly man sitting on a bench down the stretch of sidewalk, making your way to the lot you were looking for.

For being a place of burial, the scenery was quite beautiful. Everything was green and well kept, colorful flowers and objects littering the expanse of the field as the sun shone bright and blazingly down on the marble. On the edge of the field was a forest, similar to the ones surrounding the rest of the town’s perimeter, trees standing proudly in the open landscape.

Na Jaeyoung

Forever remembered as a loving daughter, sister, and friend.

Her brand new headstone was spotless, the earth before it clearly disrupted as it now took the time to settle back into place. There was a framed photo of her leaning against the stone, dozens of flowers placed down with candles arranged around them. You set your tulips at the foot of the beautiful, chaotic mess, your heart warming at your contribution.

“Hey, Jaeyoung,” you began. It was a lot easier speaking to her directly, in private, than in front of all those people last night. “I came as soon as I could. Could you tell? I barely got ready this morning,”

It was a lot harder to speak without getting a response.

“I saw Jaehyun today. He’s still thinking about you. He was a good one, JaeJae. He’s probably my favorite one out of all your escapades. Oh, and my 19th birthday is coming up. Yours is, too, soon after,”

Small talk ways over. There’d been something nagging at you for weeks now, something you could never quite place, but now that you were here, heart to heart, it was all clear in your mind.

Rule number one, you can never unfriend her.

“I’ll visit you all the time, I promise,” You knelt down low until you sat, your legs crossing in front of you on the grass. “And even if I’m away, I’ll make sure to check in on your parents. They’re doing better now, Jaeyoung. Your mom is doing so well. Your dad has been talking about retiring so they can travel more. And Jaemin-”

Rule number two, you can never lie or keep secrets from her.

“Jaemin isn’t doing so well. I don’t know what to do about it, Jaeyoung. It’s a bit complicated between him and me,”

You paused and forced the tears back. If you didn’t cry over Jaeyoung, you definitely weren’t about to cry over her brother.

“But I think I really like him. I want to see him everyday and talk to him, make sure he’s okay. He’s really torn up over all of this, and I think he’s blaming himself too much. I don’t want to lose him too, but I’m not sure if I even have him,”

Your heart was pounding like she could hear your confession. You hope she could, no matter how much it still frightened you.

“I know how you felt, feel, about us. But I can’t help it, Jaeyoung. These days especially, he reminds me of you. He’s all I have left of you, and I’m starting to plant these seeds in my head that maybe things can work out between us. Dangerous, isn’t it?”

The wind was beginning to pick up, the clouds moving quickly overhead until the blocked the harsh, beating sun.

Rule number three, you are not allowed to fall in love with her brother.

“I think I love him, Jaeyoung,”

It was your first time saying it out loud. It felt like the earth shattered for a second, so quickly no one would realize it, but you felt it. Because in your world, it had shattered and reassembled so many times you recognized the feeling of crumbling apart.

“And I’m sorry if it upsets you, I’m sorry I let you drive off that night. I should have said something to you, anything, even if they were my words now. I love him. I love Jaemin. I hope you can be happy for me,”

“Because you’ll always be my best friend, regardless. I’ll always be the one making sure of it, though. I love you too, Jaeyoung. I love both of you, and I wish things were different. But right now, with the way things settled into place, all I can do is sit here and offer myself up to you. I miss you, Jaeyoung, but I know I’ll be able to move past this with you in my heart,”

A rustle of motion broke you out of your one sided conversation, pulling your attention away as you looked up searching for the source of the movement. You looked behind you first, down the pathway to see if someone else had come to visit, but it wasn’t a human.

In the distance, under the line of tree trunks and over the hill, stood a beautiful spotted doe.

It’s ears were perked and you tried to stay silent, careful not to scare it away. It was about fifty feet away from you, it’s body calm as it sniffed around at a patch of grass beneath its feet. A small smile spread across your face and you felt the connection in your soul.

It left as quickly as it appeared, dashing off elegantly back into the forest. It was almost as if it were never there.

“Hi Jaeyoung,” you whispered.

Jaemin didn’t mean anyone any harm. If anything, he was dead set on making his own life miserable, because he deserved it.

But if he really did want to keep you by his side, how many chances would it take before he got it right? He let you down that night, he knew that. But even now he still, selfishly, wishes you had stayed with him. Even if all he could offer you was his own pathetic heart and unspoken words.

When he biked down to the empty field again, he let the air slip in through his open mouth. This field may look bare and plain now, but on one night during the year it was a place of new beginnings. Jaemin came here often, hoping he would get out of it what he used to.

Maybe if he hoped for it enough, he could get some good luck on his side for once. Jaemin was skeptical, to say the least.

But when a car pulled onto the grass behind him, he thought he was dreaming.

Here you were, always managing to find him at his worst of times, and wait, was that his car?

Jaemin turned and met your eyes, his dull ones staring into the flames on your own. He was so convinced you were about to start lecturing him, yelling and punching like he deserved. That’s why he almost fell to his knees when you opened your mouth.

“I love you,”

Wait, was Jaemin sure he wasn’t in some fairytale wonderland? He’s been going crazy enough these days, the possibility wasn’t too far out of reach.

“No, you don’t,” he replied dully. And even though it discouraged you a bit, you grit your teeth and continued.

“No, Jaemin. I’ve learned that there’s a difference between loving someone, and wanting to love someone. I don’t want to, but I love you,”

You could see the way his eyes widened in the sunlight, tired shadows and ghosts of tears haunting his features. But he still looked so handsome standing there, like he always did. If you squinted, gave your vision a bit of assistance to blur his image, he was the same boy you grew up with. The same boy you fell in love with all these years.

“Did you hear me, Jaem?” you cried, a maniacal smile on your face as every little piece of lead weight lifted off your shoulders. “I love you,”

The corners of Jaemin’s lips were beginning to crack up, a smile slowly making its way onto his face. You swore there was a twinkle in his eyes.

“Damn it, Y/n,”

Jaemin took large billowing steps toward you, a smile on his face as he cradled your face in his hands and smashed his lips against yours. You both collectively sighed.

Finally.

You intake oxygen and feel it flow through your lungs, but you haven’t truly breathed like this since the moment you found out she couldn’t anymore.

You’ve been thinking about it a lot, that maybe it’s better in a way that you'll die someday. One day Jaemin will be gone and you’ll be gone too, just like Jaeyoung. And even if having forever with him sounds perfect on paper, if you could love him until the end of time, your days together would mean nothing. Death only brings value to your love.

We die for moments like these. If we lived for them, there’d be no point in losing everything one day. And at last you knew that your story had come to an end. The timing was all wrong and the universe waits for no one.

thank you for reading! If you follow me and keep up with my updates then you know i’ve been having a hard time recently in my own private life, but this fic was something i was determined to get done and i did it! I’m very proud of myself and this fic and i hope you all enjoyed it. there may be a lot of errors because i didn't proof read this lol.

~ kat

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imaginesxthevamps · 2 years ago

Note

Hi! Can I request an angst imagine where Brad thinks reader is a gold digger but realize too late he was wrong and then asks for forgiveness, with a fluff ending pls🥺

Thank you!

Expensive stuff | Brad Simpson

Word count: +/- 4.1k

Date: 16/09/2022

Proofread: yes (mistakes can still be there)

Warnings: angst, violence/fighting, swearing/cursing

Tags: Brad Simpson, The Vamps, imagine, xreader, one shot, fanfiction, angst, request, fluff ending

A/N: Here you go love! I've made this one kinda long so I hope you enjoy :)

I guess it's clear that I love writing angst ;)

______________________________

You and Brad have been together for over a year now. Everything in your relationship has been going like a dream. Both of you are utterly happy. You and Brad never felt love so strong like this. Though it's Brad that started doubting your relationship a few weeks ago. There is something in your behavior that changed what caused his doubt.

It started when you asked if he could pay for a very expensive necklace but he never saw you wearing it. A few days later you asked Brad to pay for an expensive dress for a certain party. The next thing he noticed is that you became less affectionate. You rejected Brad more and more when he wanted to have sex with you. It's making him insecure as it seems to him you don't care about him anymore. It seems like you only care about his money and nothing else. He is afraid that you're using him.

You're sitting in your bed with your laptop on your lap. You're looking for a new phone as yours just broke down. You sigh when you see the prices. There is just no phone that meets all your requirements that is affordable. You need one that is suitable for use in your free time and work.

"Hi baby", Brad says when he walks into the bedroom.

You hear him but because you're so busy you don't think about answering him.

"Y/n?", Brad says harder.

You look up from your laptop.

"I'm so sorry baby, I heard you but I was just busy", you answer him.

"With?"

"Looking for a new phone, but there is none that fits in my budget"

"Why do you need a new phone?"

"Because mine broke down earlier today, I already had that one for four years"

"So now you want me to pay for it?", Brad sighs.

"What? No, I could never ask you to buy something this expensive for me. I know I need a phone with some more expensive features for work, I can't ask you to pay for it"

"You sure? Cuz you already let me pay for that necklace you btw never wear and that dress which you only wore for that party", Brad says in an annoyed tone.

"What? That necklace was not for me, it was a birthday present for one of my friends. I agreed with our friends that I was going to buy it but I didn't have the money and yeah I needed that dress for the same birthday party"

"Excuses"

"You think I'm lying?", you can't believe what he says.

"Of course you are. I know your type. The first months everything goes well and then you only care about the money. You don't care about me anymore. You always say you'll pay me back but I never saw that money again. You only want me to buy expensive things for you. I bet that your phone isn't even broken", Brad rants in anger.

"What the fuck?! Is that what you think about me? That I'm a liar and a gold digger? That I only care about expensive things?"

"Don't say it's not true, you've been ignoring me for weeks. You're not even affectionate anymore. You don't even want to have sex anymore"

"Wait, because I don't want to have sex I suddenly only care about your stupid money? Wow, I never knew you would be so short-sighted"

"Short-sighted? Please, this has been going on for weeks"

"The reason I didn't want to have sex is that I'm stressed. I've been stressed for weeks about work and all my money problems. The reason I asked you to pay for these stupid things is because I didn't have the money. And yeah I feel embarrassed about it and yeah I don't want that my friends know that. You god damn know how I work my ass off. I'm sorry I'm not famous or some superstar who earns the big money.", tears are streaming down your cheeks now., "And btw I paid you the money back yesterday but you couldn't care less to check that first before accusing me"

"As if", Brad just simply answers.

"You know what? I don't need your stupid money or you anymore. We're done!", you turn around and leave the bedroom.

In a rush, you take the most important things you need and you storm out of the apartment. The door slams shut behind you and you storm to the elevator. You aggressively hit the buttons in an attempt to let the doors open more quicker.

When the doors finally open you don't even wait to step in until other people had the chance to get out. Everyone in the elevator gives you an annoyed look while you push the button to go to the ground floor. You don't care to look up to them. All you do is stare at the floor as tears are brimming in your eyes.

You make your way to the underground parking lot of the apartment. Luckily your car isn't parked far from the entrance. You take your keys out of your bag and you open your car. The lights of your car light up and you walk straight to it.

When you're in your car you don't hesitate a moment to start it and leave the parking lot. Outside the rain is pouring down and you can barely see anything on the streets. The rage you feel inside is making you drive faster than you're probably allowed to. Flashes of the fight you just had with Brad are rushing through your head. You turn the music louder to try to block these thoughts out.

After a 20-minute drive, you park your car before the house of one of your friends. You hope she will let you stay maybe for a few days until you've figured out a solution. You knock on her door and after a few seconds, she opens the door.

"Y/N? What happened?", she asks worried.

You're standing there with tears all over your face, your eyes red and your mascara running all over your cheeks.

"Brad and I broke up", you bring out in between sobs.

"Oh dear, come here", she pulls you in a hug.

Your friend lets you in and lets you sit on the couch. She sits down next to you, laying her arm around you.

"Do you want to tell me what exactly happened?", she asks carefully.

"Brad and I had a fight".

You tell her the whole story. Why he got mad and what he thinks of you. It hurts to go over these past events but it's also a relief that you can tell it to someone.

"I'm sorry to say it but Brad acted like a dick. You two are together for so long and now he pulls this? He has to know by now you're not like that", your friend says to you.

"Thanks, Lucy, for letting me stay"

"Always sweetheart, do you want to take a bath to relax?"

"Maybe that's not such a bad idea"

***

Brad stands paralyzed in the bedroom while he hears the door slam shut. He still has to process what just happened. He never thought you would react like that. He thought you would be angry but not that you would break up with him.

Brad walks to the kitchen where he sees your phone laying on the countertop. He tries to turn it on but it doesn't work. The screen stays pitch black, not even the name of the brand lights up.

"Damn it!", he curses to himself.

You didn't lie about the phone but that doesn't mean you didn't lie about the other things. Brad continues doing what he normally does, hoping you will return later that night. But little did he know you wouldn't return for a longer time...

***

After you get out of the bath you put on a pajama Lucy brought you. You look at yourself in the mirror and hate how you look. Your eyes are red and puffy, you look like a mess.

Lucy has made you some hot chocolate milk and some cookies when you come downstairs. She is sitting on the couch with a blanket around her.

"I thought that might cheer you up a little bit", she smiles.

You smile back and sit down. You pick up the mug with hot chocolate milk and take a sip. The temperature is just right to drink. You take one of the cookies and take a bite. It's only now you notice how hungry you are. It's already quite late in the evening and you didn't have dinner.

"Are you a little bit okay?", Lucy asks.

"To be honest not really, I mean you don't break up with your boyfriend every day"

"Oh, baby. I know Brad messed up big time but you're already together for over a year"

"I know, but if he can't trust me, if he really thinks I'm after his money, I can't be together with him"

Lucy nods understandably. Her phone beeps and immediately she takes it from the couch.

"Is that Con?", you ask panicked.

"Yeah, he wanted to come over but..."

"You haven't told him about me and Brad right??", you don't let her finish her sentence.

"No, I said I'm having a girls night. But to be honest I think sooner or later he will know it from Brad"

"I know, he is just going to tell everyone that I'm a gold digger"

"Hey", Lucy lays her hand on yours, "don't think like that. Maybe Brad will see how wrong he was"

"Too late, he hurt me, a lot"

*** 2 weeks later ***

You haven't seen Brad for a few weeks now. It wasn't easy as you stayed thinking about him. You thought he would look for you but he didn't. He didn't even care to call or send a text. You thought he would've figured out that you weren't after his money.

You're still living with Lucy. Connor knows what happened from Brad. He told all the band members when they were at the studio. Connor didn't know what to think when he saw you at Lucy's place after the meeting. You told your version and Connor immediately showed you his support. He said that Brad made the greatest mistake in his life and so do his other friends. Brad is just too stubborn to actually admit he is wrong.

***

It also wasn't an easy few weeks for Brad. In the first place, he was angry. Angry about what you did to him, that you didn't return to him. But he started to doubt his actions later. He is scared that he is wrong and that he messed up everything. Deep down he is scared to lose you after everything.

To drink his sorrow away Brad goes to the nearest bar in town. He hangs his jacket up on the coat rack and walks over to the bar. It's very crowded, the space is not so big but it's filled. People are celebrating the end of the work week as it's Friday. They are laughing and having fun. Only Brad is the one who doesn't look happy.

"What can I offer you handsome?", the bartender smiles.

"A gin tonic please, with a lot of gin", Brad answers simply.

"What brought you in such a bad mood?", the girl asks.

"Don't want to talk about it"

"So that means it's the girlfriend who did something, isn't it"

"I said I don't want to talk about it"

The bartender stays silent now and just serves Brad his drink. He takes a big gulp before putting the glass down again. The big amount of alcohol is burning in his throat, though it doesn't make him feel better.

"Can you pay for your drink?", the bartender asks.

Brad nods and takes his wallet out of his back pocket. He takes his card out of it and pays for the drink. Then he gets his phone and opens his bank app to see if the money is transferred. When he sees the interactions he can see that you paid him 200 pounds.

"This is the last money I had to pay you", you've added as the caption.

He scrolls through the history and sees you've given everything back he paid for you. She gave you the first amount three weeks ago.

"Fuck"

Brad puts his phone away. In the corner of his eye, he sees a man entering the bar. He is drawing his attention and then he sees it's y/n's boss. He walks straight over to the bar.

"Aren't you y/n's boss?", Brad asks bluntly before taking another sip from his drink.

"Ehm yeah, well I was, I fired her"

"What? When? Why?"

"You're asking a lot of questions buddy"

"So, answer them"

"I fired her a month ago because I felt like it. She was annoying me and I would never get her into my bed. She wasn't fun. I didn't say it to her, I fired her because of "savings within the company" you know"

"Fucking dick"

"And who are you now? Her brother?"

"Her boyfriend"

Brad is boiling from anger and punches the man in his face. Everyone at the bar is looking at what is happening. Before Brad can act the man punches him back right on the cheek.

"Fucking hell, who do you think you are!", the man says angrily.

Both of them get up and they end up in a fight. Some people are even enjoying the scene. Brad has to endure a few punches and scratches. The man that used to be y/n boss is stronger than Brad. Someone pushes both of them off each other. Brad falls to the ground and the man is looking at him with a big grin on his face.

Brad stands up and takes his jacket. He leaves the bar and gets into his car. He leaves the parking as fast as he can. The tires are squeaking. His cheek is burning and he is tasting blood which means his lip is bleeding.

When he is far enough from the bar Brad pulls over. He looks at himself in the mirror. His cheek is red, and his nose and lip are bleeding. The blood is dripping on his shirt. He has scratches on his neck.

Brad needs to see you. He was so wrong and he feels so bad for it. He hits the steering wheel with his hands out of frustration. There is only one place you could be and that's at Lucy's place.

***

"Do you think it's a good idea to also invite James, Kirstie, Tristan, and Sarah?", you ask Lucy.

"Y/n honey, it's your birthday, it's not because you broke up with Brad that you can't invite your friends"

"They are Brad's friends too"

"Yeah so, then he shouldn't have acted like a dick"

You smile at her while putting down some snacks on the countertop. Lucy has put some drinks in the kitchen. There is some beer, wine, and some stronger alcohol like whiskey, vodka, and gin to make cocktails with.

It was mostly Lucy's idea to throw this party. You didn't feel like throwing a party after everything that happened with Brad. A lot of your friends are coming and you're grateful for that. But Brad's friends are also coming and it feels so wrong not having him too. They became your friends too but it feels strange. A few weeks ago you thought you would celebrate your birthday with Brad but now he is not even coming to your party.

"Hellooo y/n, you still here?", Lucy waves a hand before your eyes.

You didn't even notice she said something to you. You were so lost in your thoughts. You only notice now that you have a bottle of gin in your hands and you're staring at it. Brad's favorite drink.

"Forget about him y/n, tonight is all about fun", she rubs your arm in a reassuring gesture.

The guests start arriving around 8 pm. Lucy lets them in and offers them a drink. Everyone has brought you a little gift. You're so happy to see everyone. For the first time in weeks, you can forget about Brad and actually have fun with the people you love the most.

"So how is the birthday queen enjoying her party?", Connor lays an arm around your shoulders.

"It's amazing, you and Lucy organized this so well. Thank you for everything", you hug Connor.

You hear the doorbell ring but you don't pay attention to it as you already see Lucy walking towards it. Maybe some guests are late.

***

When Brad rides into the street of Lucy's apartment he sees a lot of cars parked on the side of the street. Light is burning in the apartment. It's very crowded in the building.

"Shit, it's her birthday", Brad curses when he sees the date on his smartwatch.

He has to park his car a big end from the apartment. Brad gets out and locks the car. At a fast pace, he walks to Lucy's apartment. He can hear the music coming from there, indicating that they are having a party for your birthday.

Not long after Brad presses the doorbell Lucy opens the door. He can see on her face that she is not amused by his visit.

"Brad, I don't remember inviting you, nor does y/n"

Brad steps closer and the light from inside the building reflects on his face. Now Lucy gets a clearer view of his face and she looks shocked. Brad looks like a mess. His hair is a mess, his curls are hanging on his face. There is blood on his face and shirt. His cheek is turning a shade of blue.

"Please Lucy, let me talk to her. I don't know if she will ever forgive me but I have to try", Brad is desperate and the damage of the fight is kicking in.

"What the hell happened to you?", Lucy asks, still shocked about how he looks.

"I uhm tell that later, I have to see her please"

Lucy gives in and lets Brad in. She follows behind him. When he enters the living room everyone notices his presence. Everyone looks at him, shocked to see how battered Brad looks. You can't believe what you see. This doesn't look like Brad.

"Y/n, can we please talk?", Brad asks you in front of everyone.

"What happened to you?", you ask.

"I uhm, I got into a fight with your boss"

Everyone is even more surprised by this answer. They know Brad can lose his temper from time to time but he would never fight.

"Can we talk please, I know I've made a mistake", Brad begs you.

You can only nod and you start to walk away. Brad follows you while everyone is still staring at him. You decide that Lucy's bedroom will be a quiet place to talk. Brad closes the door when he enters the room after you.

"Do you have any idea how much you hurt my feelings by accusing me like that?", you start the conversation.

"I know, I realize that now", Brad says.

"How could you even think after a year, a fucking year, I would be with you for the money?"

"I know I was wrong, I don't know why I thought it. I was so convinced of it and I'm ashamed now. Maybe it's because I'm scared that people use me. I know it's not an excuse but I can't think of anything else"

He steps closer to you and takes your hands in his.

"I know I made a big mistake and I want to make it up to you if that's even possible and if you let me. I'm just so sorry and I hope you can forgive me"

Brad bends down on one knee while still holding your hands. Tears are brimming in his eyes.

"Please y/n forgive me for what I did, I just don't want to lose you. You're the most important person in my life", a tear is escaping his eye and rolls over his cheek.

You also feel the tears coming up. You want to forgive him but he has hurt you so much.

"I don't know if I can forgive you right now, I need some time. But I don't want to lose you either B, let's just take it slow", you say and Brad nods.

He gets up and hugs you tight.

"I missed you so much baby", he whispers in your ear.

"I missed you too, just never do this to me again", some tears fall down your cheeks.

You hug Brad even tighter. You can smell his familiar smell and you feel safe. God, you missed him and now he is finally back. It's still hard to forgive him but you know eventually you will.

"Let's clean your face up because you look awful", you smile at him.

You take his hand in yours and lead him to the bathroom. You say to him that he has to sit on the countertop next to the sink so you have better access to his face. In one of the drawers, you take a washcloth and make it a little bit wet. You wash the blood off his face. When you go over the little wound on his lip he makes a painful face.

"I'm sorry if it hurts", you say.

"Don't worry about it"

"Did you really fight with my boss?"

"Yeah, I saw him in a bar and I asked if he was because I recognized him"

"Why did you get mad at him?"

"He said he fired you"

You swallow the lump in your throat. You know he would find out eventually.

"And he also said he did that because he was bored of you and he wanted you in his bed"

"What?! That bastard"

"Why didn't you tell me you were fired?"

You look down, not knowing what to say. Your hand drops from his face but Brad takes it with his hand.

"I was ashamed I guess, I felt like I was nothing, he made me feel nothing. I hoped if I applied for some jobs and got accepted that I just could say I switched jobs."

"You know I would never have judged you"

You look into his eyes.

"I know, I just hoped I never would have to tell you and that I would find a new job in a week. I have been applying for weeks now but it's always that I have not enough experience"

"I know it can be hard to find a job, and I would have understood that you had money problems"

"I'm sorry"

"It's not your fault, maybe we have to promise to always tell each other everything "

He caresses your cheek with his hand. You can't stop looking into those beautiful brown eyes. His face is inching closer to yours and his eyes are fixed on your lips. You can see in his eyes how desperate he is to kiss you.

"I can promise that", you whisper.

"I've missed you so much", Brad says in a hoarse tone that causes goosebumps on your skin.

Softly you feel his lips touching yours. It lets the butterflies in your stomach go crazy. You push your lips harder against his so you can taste him better. You bite a little on his lip as you know it makes him go crazy. A small moan is escaping his mouth. He pulls himself out of the kiss. You see him rubbing his lip. Blood is dripping on his finger. You just made his lip bleed again.

"Oh no, I'm so sorry", you put a hand before your mouth in a shocked manner.

"It's okay baby", Brad starts laughing which makes you laugh too.

He takes your hands in his.

"Happy birthday love"

"Thank you"

"I'm sorry I don't have a present"

"That's okay, you being here is the best present I've received today to be honest"

"I'm glad", Brad smiles and puts his arms around you, and pulls you closer.

"I'll buy you a present tomorrow"

"You don't have to"

"I've been the worst boyfriend ever, of course I have to"

"That's true"

Both of you start laughing and Brad kisses you on your forehead. Maybe you didn't forgive him today but in the end everything will be fine and the both of you will come stronger out of this.

______________________________

The Vamps requests are open

#brad simpson #bradley simpson #bradley will simpson #the vamps #connor ball #tristan evans #james mcvey #sari writes #brad simpson imagine #brad simpson fanfiction #brad simpson one shot #brad simpson x reader #imagine #imagines #fanfic #fanfiction #one shot #x reader #sari blogs

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islandofsages · 2 years ago

Note

Hi! Could I request Albedo (or anyone else if you prefer) x artist male reader.

The scenario being someone came into their studio before hours and painted over some previous sculptures the reader did or the stranger messed with an incomplete sculpture. The reader sees what's happened and rants to Albedo and seeks comfort from him.

🦇

summary: in which empathy holds you close.

characters: albedo x artist male reader

tags: relationship not specified, canon compliant, hurt/comfort, fic format

warnings: embracing, reader is sad

author's notes: damn 🦇 anon your timing is impeccable i was literally writing an albedo comfort fic wtf are you spying on me?? jokes aside that's why i was quick to finish this aside from wanting a request for so long LMAO anyways i hope you like this <3

edit: i forgot to mention that i gained some inspiration from vandalize by one ok rock LOL ive been dabbling in so much sonic content lately pls

word count: 1.0k

FEM/FEM-ALIGNED DNI. YOU WILL BE BLOCKED.

You can feel the weight of the world resting on the top of your shoulders, and yet you muster up the strength to make your way to Dragonspine - with your usual posture too, instead of a more slouched-up one although all you want to do is lie down. Even now, you have no idea what you’re not curled up in a blanket and sobbing silently into your sheets. Perhaps you just need a shoulder instead of a blanket.

You don’t know who did it - it didn’t seem to matter at the time anyway - but the damage has been done and your head is in ruins; just like how your work in progress was ruined by some unknown harlot. You know not whether the perpetrator truly intended to vandalize your heart by leaving such a mark or if they were forced to - but, again, it matters not. Your heart is in pieces and here you are, seeking the doctor who could hopefully aid you in piecing them back together.

When you finally reach his little lab, a surprising sight greets you; the chief alchemist is currently pondering something, his right hand cupping his chin and his eyes shut tight. That itself is not surprising but rather, it is the absence of the Spark Knight. You see this as a sign and make your way deeper with a relieved sigh. With all your leftover strength, you walk over to where he is standing.

“Hey, Albedo,” you greet him. At first, he doesn’t notice you and barely hears your greeting, though you don’t blame him - you’re barely making the effort to really assert your presence. At that point, you are an eidolon, transparent and lacking. Plus, he seems to be very immersed in whatever he’s thinking of or imagining. You can’t help but wish that you are in his thoughts. Finally, after a few moments, he opens his eyes and his arm casually falls to his side when he sees you.

“Oh, (Y/N). What brings you here?” Even hearing him say your name slightly melted away your worries. But it was not enough to wipe the frown off your face. You sigh tiredly for what seems like the umpteenth time today. You find it hard to let out everything in your mind though you possess the words. While you answer him with your silence, he drags a nearby chair and offers it to you. You let your weight drop you down on the seat.

“Did something happen? You may tell me anything - I will listen to you,” he speaks - so many generous offers today, you think to yourself. But it’s not strange, no; rather, you just don’t think you deserve such kindness. You mean, you are apparently horrible enough to deserve having your work and heart being vandalized in such a manner. You shake your head in defeat. Why did you come here in the first place? Is this not futile? Is this not pathetic?

“...I don’t wanna be a burden to you, Albedo,” you merely say. Ironically so, because you came here to seek comfort and yet here you are pushing it away. Is it not strange, the way human beings work? Is the fear of being a burden to someone else really the reason why you don’t want his help? You vaguely recall someone saying that this is a type of mental resistance…

“But you are a burden to me. And so is everyone else who has the honor of existing.”

“Huh?” His answer catches you off guard. He always had such a calm disposition and acted like a caring older brother to others…to think that he thought so all this time. You feel your melancholy deepening though you are not surprised - Albedo has always been quite the blunt and honest person. You appreciate him for that fact at least.

“Even our names carry weight - how could one not be a burden? Is it not a gift to have your load be felt by others and to leave a mark of your existence? Is it not an insult to have no freight?” he elaborates and you feel your muscles relax; you didn’t even notice you were so tense, especially because you felt like you’ve been slumping all over the place. For the first time that day, the corner of your lips quirk up slightly. Tears threaten to escape from the corner of your eyes.

“Tell me, (Y/N). What happened?” he reiterates, his tone growing gentler with every syllable. You can no longer take it; tears stream down your cheeks. He fetches a handkerchief from a table nearby and, once he’s sure you’re comfortable, he wipes your tears away. He rubs your back as you choke on hiccups and shallow breaths. You try your best to speak.

“Someone…my sculpture…it’s ruined…” you confess in between sobs and instinctively lean into Albedo, your head on his shoulder. He continues to rub circles on your back with his left arm while his right arm pulls you closer to him; an embrace you needed oh-so-badly.

“We’ll find whoever did such a thing to you,” he assures you. Though you want to tell him that there’s no need to put that much effort into such a small incident, you lack the energy. All that crying has left you more vulnerable and exhausted than usual. It took so much of your strength to let all that out, you find it funny that some find it a sign of weakness to cry - this was the strongest thing you did so far.

You let out a low “Mm” in response and shut your eyes, ending your small breakdown there. You can feel Albedo stroking your hair and you relish in his warmth. Deep somewhere within your heart, you don’t want him to know that you’ve been sculpting his figure - that is why you were hesitant to let him investigate your art studio. But his touch has proved that there is nothing to fear, nothing to be shy about. Especially when a portrait of you sits in a hidden corner of his little lab. You two have already memorized each other’s every little facial detail.

Just as art is a form of love, love is also a form of art.

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cjsinkythoughts · 4 years ago

Text

Not Your Captain

Pairing: Bucky Barnes x Avenger!Reader

Word Count: 1695

Warnings: Falcon and the Winter Soldier Spoilers!!!!! Lots of Angst in this one, guys, lotta feels, some Fluff to counterbalance it, but mostly Angst, Cursing

A/N: This is Part Two to my previous FATWS writing, His Only Contact. FATWS SERIES STERLIST HERE! This one is from Reader’s perspective and gives you a bit more about Reader’s backstory. There will be multiple parts coming out in the next day or two based just on this new episode because damn. It was loaded! Due to this and my workload this past week, I haven’t been able to post the first chapter of my College!AU, Erased From the Stars, but I promise it’s coming! This’ll be my main focus for the weekend though! Expect more parts in the next 24 hours! I’ll be making a masterlist for this particular project in that time, too! Taglists are open! Please contact me if you want to be tagged! Thank you and please enjoy, loves! (Not beta’d, so sorry for mistakes!)

AGAIN: SPOILERS UNDER CUT!

The moment you saw it on TV, you knew you had to get to Bucky. You weren’t planning on leaving until the next day, but there was no way you weren’t going. So you caught the first plane you could from the base you were staying at.

You’re feelings were all over the place. Steve had been your best friend for more than the past decade. You were the one there when he first woke up. You were the one to help him get situated. You were the one to help him whenever he needed, to go over to his little place in DC when he was having problems, like the time he thought he was having an asthma attack when it was an anxiety attack or when you had to help him find a new phone after he accidentally broke his.

You were that close to falling in love with him. But life went the other way and, in a weird twist of fate, almost as if the universe wanted to spare you of the heartbreak it knew would come if you gave your heart to the dashing captain, you ended up tripping over your own feet for someone else.

Someone you would never tell.

He was the last thing you had left of Steve and you couldn’t ruin that because of your stupid feelings. And you couldn’t ruin the relationship you had now because it was working. He trusted you, more than anyone else. He trusted you because Steve trusted you and you wouldn’t dare break that trust.

You just hoped, with everything going down in relation to the shield - to his legacy - that you’d be able to keep that promise you made to yourself.

You were in front of his door early in the morning - around four - hesitating to knock. It didn’t take long for him to respond the moment your fist did meet the door.

He looked…tired. You wished, oh how you wished, that you could do more. Anything more. He insisted you helped him plenty already; he claimed he never had nightmares when you were by his side. But it wasn’t enough. Not for what he’d been through. You felt as though you were merely putting a bandaid over a bullet wound.

His chocolate locks were short, above his ears. You could remember how hesitant yet eager he was about doing it. It was difficult to not cut his ear off because he kept moving in anticipation. You would know: you cut it. Those blue eyes that made you trip in the first place were outlined by thick lashes, dark ebony bags beneath them, making the azure pop. He was shirtless, as he usually was when sleeping (or at least trying to sleep), his dog tags resting against his sternum.

You could tell he hadn’t been sleeping. His eyes were bloodshot as if he was watching TV for too long and his hair was less messy than it would be if he actually slept.

The moment his eyes found yours, his plump, chapped lips turned up into the grin he reserved for you and he was pulling you in. Your reaction was instantaneous, your arms slipping around his waist, your chin resting on his shoulder as he found home in the crook of your neck.

He was touch deprived. You knew this, but you never brought it up. Especially considering you were one of the only people he touched willingly. You didn’t want him thinking he was broken, more so than he thought he was already. And you definitely didn’t want to push him into fixing himself. So you didn’t tell him, even though you were pretty sure he knew, and you just let him take the lead.

Sometimes it meant he grabbed your hand in large crowds, or tucked you under his arm when he was threatened. Other times it meant laying his head in your lap when he was tired late at night, or a soft hug in greeting.

Hands slowly tracing his spine, fingers dancing up and down his back, you gave a small smile when you felt him practically purring in your embrace. You could never decide if he was more puppy or kitten. You used to make jokes about the three of them, Steve, Bucky, and Sam, being like a puppy, kitten, and bird that you had to reluctantly pet sit for a friend. You would give almost anything to be joking around like that with them when you went to visit Bucky in Wakanda with Steve.

“Buck?”

He hummed. You didn’t want to pull back, you wanted to stay connected with him for as long as possible, but you had to talk. You didn’t want to talk about it, because that would make it more real, but you had to. You had to.

“Have you seen the news recently?”

His eyebrows furrowed, his lips pulling down. “What happened? Is it Wanda?”

You looked down the hall, your lips pressed together tightly, before nodding inside. “We have to talk.”

He nodded, stepping back and pulling you inside. Seeing the makeshift bed on the floor against the far edge of the sofa made you inwardly sigh, but you didn’t say anything about it. Steve was the same way at first.

“Is she okay? Did you find her? Where-”

“It’s not Wanda.” Turning, you faced him, trying to control your own anger at the situation, knowing it wouldn’t help him any. “It’s…it’s about Steve.”

Those spectacularly blue eyes narrowed, bottom lip being sucked in between his teeth. “What about Steve?”

You gestured for him to come closer, holding out your hand in offering. He took it and followed you as you led him to the couch. A cleared throat and a deep breath later found you gently explaining what happened to him. That the government had taken back the shield and had given it to someone else. A ‘hero just for America’. A ‘new Captain America’.

You could see his features harden with every word, his jaw ticking dangerously, his chest heaving and his nostrils flaring. You squeezed his hand as you finished. “He’s got meetings and stuff with senators and governors. They’re taking him on a tour this week. They-they want me to meet him, considering I’m the last of the original seven. Active on Earth, at least.”

The tears that started forming in his eyes made you swallow your own emotions down thickly. He didn’t need your hatred of this wannabe to fuel his own. He needed your support and comfort. He needed to know you’d be by his side through this.

“Are you?”

You blinked, not expecting his first words to be that question. “Am I what?”

“Going to meet with him?”

“I-I…” You stopped talking, knowing that if you continued you’d end up ranting about how he wasn’t your captain. How he could never be your captain. Debating answers, you decided on a simple, blunt reply. “No.”

“Why…”

Running your thumb over his knuckles, you leaned over slowly to press a chaste kiss to his bare skin and blood shoulder. “Take your time. Collect your thoughts.”

He responded to your words by taking a deep breath, clenching his eyes shut, his jaw so tight you feared he might chip his teeth. It was a tense minute before he said anything, the room being filled with his harsh breathing. “You said he gave them the shield.”

“What?”

“Yesterday. You told me he gave up the shield. They put it in the Smithsonian. But you just said they took it from him.”

“He did give it to them, but-”

“Why?” His eyes snapped open, his features twisting into ones of frustration and resentment. “Why’d he give it to them?”

You shook your head, knowing Sam didn’t mean for any of that to happen. He had called you a few weeks ago to ask about your opinion on the matter. You told him that Steve trusted him, and you trusted Steve, so if Sam thought that was the right thing to do…you trusted him. “It’s not Sam’s fault. Don’t be mad-”

“Don’t be mad?! Don’t be mad?!” Bucky shot up, ripping his hand away from yours, making you bite your lip and hang your head as he paced in front of you. “Steve gave it to him! And he just gives it away like he’s regifting a shitty frisbee as a Christmas present! And you don’t want me to be mad?! Are you fucking kidding me, Y/N?!”

Cringing at the use of your name, which you rarely hear fall from his lips, especially in vexation like just then, you looked up at him, eyes pleading. “Bucky, I get it. I do. I’m mad, too. I’m-I’m furious. But you can’t blame Sam. Please. He just - he’s trying, Buck. Just like me. Just like you. We’re all trying.”

Bucky’s shoulders fell as he stared at you, eyes darting from feature to feature as he studied your face. Before you could say anything else, he was on the floor in front of you, in between your legs, arms wrapped around your waist and face pressed into your stomach.

You could tell he was holding something back - something big - but you wouldn’t push him. You never did. Displaying feelings was always hard for him, even in the early 1900’s; Steve used to tell you stories when you were looking for him after the fiasco in DC. Bucky grew up being the oldest of four and the only boy. On top of that, his best friend was a scrawny, stubborn, punching bag of a boy. According to Stevie, neither of them really learned how to cope or how to deal with feelings. And it showed. Boy, did it show.

Instead of getting on him and asking what was wrong and begging for him to talk to you, your fingers tangled in his hair, nails scratching his scalp, as you sat back to make the position more comfortable for him.

“Stay with me. I need you.”

You leaned down to press a soft kiss to his head, nodding into his hair. “I’ll stay. For as long as you need me, Buckaroo.”

Taglist (OPEN):

@happygoreading, @thatsdarwinism, @satellitespidey

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cazimagines · 4 years ago

Text

Perfectly exasperating

Synopsis: You really disliked Zemo, but one person you disliked more? John Walker. After bonding over how you disliked him with Zemo, you have the unfortunate situation of running into John. He flirts, insults, and hurts you and Zemo is ready to put him in his place.

Word Count: 3.6k

Warnings/Tags: Use of swear words, John Walker being a dick, soft Zemo, protective Zemo

Author’s note: I was not intending this fic to come out as long as it did. This was one of the ones I had been putting off to write other stuff till I finally pulled myself around to writing it and ended up getting really into it. Funny how that happens.

Masterlist

Sequel

Part 3

Part 4

“Would you care for a Turkish delight?”

You bite the inside of your mouth in annoyance, refusing to even look at him. Instead of forcing your eyes to focus on a spot in front of you, not moving them in the slightest. Zemo waited for a few moments before sighing and turning away from you.

“You’ll eventually have to talk to me, y/n” he exclaims as he walks over to the kitchen side of the room. You were sitting in the safe house Zemo had provided. There wasn’t much to do, just sit and wait till the funeral started. Zemo sought to communicate to you to keep you two occupied, but you didn’t want to talk with him, so you didn’t. You just sat on the settee, staring at the sofa opposite you while Zemo walked around looking through the cupboards for food.

You were pissed when Bucky revealed he broke Zemo out of prison.

The avengers had been your family. Whenever you needed them Steve would be there to offer you advice, Tony there to make you laugh. Nat there to beat up whoever required it. Everything was wonderful in your life. For once. And he had ruined it.

He caused the family you loved to split, hate each other, and that left you alone. So alone. Losing both Tony and Steve made you more mad at Zemo. He robbed the last years you could have spent with them, so yeah, no wonder you refused to talk to him.

He loved to annoy you, though. Any moment he got he was beside you, creating sarcastic remarks about what was happening, trying to joke around with you. Trying anything to communicate with you. The worst of it was when he insisted you had to be his date on the mission in Mandripoor. Feeling his arm wrap around you, a kiss to your temple, the smell of his cologne flooding you, drawing you in. It pissed you off knowing how easily you fit into the role of his date. Yet you knew deep down why. Every time he made a snide remark, you had to bite your tongue to stop making one back. Every time he tried to joke with you, it took all your effort not to snort. You hated him and everything he does, yet you could sense a fondness growing for him, just a slight one, in the deepest corner of your heart. Left there to be locked away. Never acknowledged.

“So, the new Captain America, huh? What’s he like?” you hear Zemo ask, leaning on the counter of the kitchen table, his eyes burning into the side of your head.

You feel bile rise to your mouth as he spoke.

John Walker.

John fucking Walker.

If you hated Zemo, you despised John Walker. Just thinking of him brought a scowl to your lips. Steve meant everything to you. He was a father figure to you. He stood for all you believed in. He was your hope, your light in the darkness. And John Walker seemed to tarnish it. You wouldn’t have minded him if he was a different mascot for America. If he became America’s new hope. It was the fact that they called him Captain America. That he had the shield. The title belonged only to Steve. He claimed he wasn’t trying to replace Steve, but that is what he was doing. Him being called Captain America felt like a spit on Steve’s memory. People would forget him, everything he did for the country he loved. They would only focus on John Walker, and you detested that.

You didn’t blame Sam for giving away the shield, unlike Bucky. You could understand why he did it. That shield held such a responsibility, such a legacy it seemed impossible to ever live up to. No, you blamed the people who took the shield away from the museum. Without Sam’s permission. They should have asked Sam. But of course they didn’t care. They didn’t care at all.

“I see by your reaction that your impression of him isn’t a pleasant one,” Zemo says, bringing you out of your thoughts and back to reality.

“Have you met him?” he asks

You try to hold back your opinion, but John Walker made you so frustrated, you knew if you didn’t rant about him you would burst.

“Yes. He’s a dick,” you spit out

Zemo quickly straightens up, surprised you actually answered one of his questions.

“Oh? Are you finally speaking to me.” he inquires, walking around the kitchen counter towards you.

“Don’t push your luck” you mutter, side eyeing him as he sits down opposite you. Sam and Bucky were out leaving you alone with Zemo. At the moment you were all waiting till the funeral. Zemo claimed there were a few hours to kill before everyone had to gather. Sam and Bucky decided to check out the town, make sure they knew it well in case a situation occurred where we had to dash. They had forced you to babysit Zemo.

“No, no, I like to hear you talk. Please, if talking about how this new Captain America is a dick is how I get you to speak to me, then let’s continue.” Zemo says, pouring out a glass of whisky for you and him. He holds the glass out to you, an eyebrow raised. You sigh, grabbing the glass out of his hand and drank, feeling the warmth creep up your throat. Zemo chuckles as he watches you, leaning back on the sofa, his arms resting on top of it.

“My, my. The man must be terrible if just the thought of him is making you talk and accept drinks from me,”

“He’s so infuriating! He thinks because he is Captain America he can stick his nose in other people’s business!”

“Ah, so he is one of those people. Doesn’t understand boundaries. How rude,”

“And get this, he got annoyed at us! Telling us we should stay out of his way when he is the one getting in our bloody way!”

“No” Zemo fake gasps

“Yes!” you exclaim, going into a rant, “I can’t even bear to call him Captain America. He doesn’t deserve to be called that. His actual name is John Walker. He claimed he wasn’t trying to replace Steve, but that is exactly what he is doing! And how he talks to me as well. He’s so condescending, treating me as if I am a kid while trying to compliment me and act like he’s all that in front of me,”

Zemo’s eyes narrow and he places the glass down on the table between you two, “You mean he flirts with you?”

“If you could call that pathetic excuse flirting. I suppose. It pisses me off though,”

“I can imagine. He sounds nothing like what Steve was. Nothing like his legacy,”

It was your turn to narrow your eyes, watching Zemo curiously. “I assumed you hated Steve”

“I never hated him. No. I can admire what he stood for, I just find unrealistic. All superheroes are flawed. Innocents will consistently be collateral damage while superheroes are allowed to exist.”

You stare at Zemo, amazed. Not realising the silence you were making. You had always thought he hated Steve. It always seemed that way. Yet he didn’t? Knowing he didn’t hate the guy you always viewed as a father figure mattered to you. And you don’t know why.

Zemo stared back at you. He was studying your eyes, trying to figure out what you were thinking. He didn’t realise what he thought about Steve would have affected you, but it appears he was wrong.

“Don’t worry y/n we’re back and guess what! We found your fav-” Sam shouts, opening the doors of the room and strutting in but he pauses, noticing you and Zemo staring at each other from the sofa’s. “What’s going on here?”

Zemo is the one to pull out of the eye contact trance, smirking as he looks over at Sam, “We were just discussing John Walker.”

Bucky who had followed Sam in grounded at hearing Zemo utter that name. “Perhaps you two would like a drink and join us in considering how much of a dick he is?” Zemo asks, raising his glass to them.

A few hours later you walked down the street following Zemo to find his associate. You didn’t appreciate how secretive he was being, but you understood it. He had many people who wanted to get him, and the second he wasn’t useful to us. He would be doomed.

“It’s too dangerous for you guys to be pulling this shit” you hear a whiny voice shout. Peering up, you notice John Walker and his sidekick ‘Battlestar’ or whatever jogging down the steps towards you.

“Ah! How did you find us now” Bucky shouts with his arms raised, striding towards them.

“Come on. You really think three Avengers can walk around Latvia without drawing attention,” his friend responds.

“No more keeping us in the dark,” John mutters angrily

Zemo, who you were walking besides, turns his head to you, “I understand what you mean by infuriating”

You chuckle as John looks angrily between you two, “You can start by telling us why you broke him out of prison,”

“He did that himself technically” Bucky replies, and Zemo grins at you, as if bragging about it.

“Aw, this better be an unbelievable explanation-” John Walker exclaims, reaching up to you.

“Hey take it easy before it gets weird,” Sam suggests, interrupting John.

“I know where Karli is,” Zemo reveals to John Walker, his seductive accent sticking out from the rest of them. He tries to walk past John. You, Bucky and Sam follow, but John stops him, placing a hand on his chest.

Zemo glares ahead, disgusted at John for even daring to touch him.

“Well, where” he says, getting into Zemo’s face

“All we know is, it’s a memorial so we are going to intercept her there,” Sam adds, trying to defuse the tension.

Zemo grabs John Walker’s hand and pushes it off him, striding forward again, and you jog to catch up with him.

“See why I call him a dick now,” you whisper

Zemo smirks, looking back at you, “Yes. He’s perfectly exasperating”

“What? No. Wait. No! No! Stop. Hold on. Stop. Okay?” John exclaims running forward and stopping you all in your tracks again after something Sam had said. “I think we are way past reasoning with her”

Zemo just stares ahead, fed up with John while you groan in annoyance. Not being able to even bring yourself to look at the man in front of you.

They argue for a few moments while you and Zemo stand idly to the side, Zemo glances at you rolling his eyes making you giggle. You smack his arm slightly trying to get him to stop making you laugh, but that only makes Zemo chuckle along with you. Eventually they calm John down but he glares over at Zemo, “We will deal with you later.”

“I’m sure it will all come to an agreeable conclusion” Zemo says, gesturing with his hands. He walks ahead, searching for his associate while John Walker moves beside you. You try to pick up your pace, but he keeps up.

“So working with a criminal now. Not very avengery like. I thought Zemo hated Steve. I wonder what Steve would think of you working with him,” he mutters peering at you.

“Need I remind you-you are also working with him now,”

“Come on, darling, don’t be like that,” John responds grinning, placing his palm on your back.

“Get your hand off me” you growl scowling at him

“Most women would fawn over me” John cockily resorts, still not removing his hand

“She asked you to remove your hand” you hear Zemo state, glancing over you see he had stopped walking forward, turned around and was now glaring at John. “Do I need to remove it for you?” he says angrily.

John frowns at Zemo. Finally, taking his hand off you and striding up to Zemo. Zemo tilts his head, his jaw clenching in fury as he stares at John.

“You are nothing but a dirty criminal. Don’t think for a second you can talk to me like that,”

“I will when you are being rude and disrespectful towards a lady,”

John scoffs, peeking over to you, then back to Zemo. Everyone else was standing to the side, not sure if they should intervene or not.

“What did she suck you off or something?”

Chaos ensured.

Bucky and Sam had to leap forward to stop Zemo from launching onto John while Battlestar had to hold John back. “Too far man, too far” he muttered to John

Zemo was snarling at John, his teeth bared in rage. His hair had fallen loose from their usual position and was hanging down over his forehead, giving him a more wild look. The vein in his neck stood out, twitching. His eyes were raging with fire as he looked at John. He kept trying to push past Bucky and Sam to get to John, but eventually gave up knowing it was futile.

You were standing at the side, shocked that John would have the ego to say something like that and at Zemo’s rage towards John for saying it. John adjusts his head. Not looking you in the eyes, but looking in your direction. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t of said that”

Pulling your senses together, you walk up to John, glaring at him. “Yeah, you damn well shouldn’t have. You’re a dick. Nothing like Steve. You never will be,”

John wrinkles his nose in anger, frowning at your remark. You walk over to Zemo now that Bucky and Sam had let go of him. You give him a nod, showing your appreciation, and he nods back, though still glaring at John.

“Who I choose to associate myself with is none of your business. Who I choose to suck off is none of your business. Perhaps you can go fuck yourself and learn a bit of decency,” you spit at him.

A brilliant thought crosses your brain for another way to twist the dagger of your dislike into John. You reach out and grab onto Zemo’s hand, clasping it.

The action causes everyone to turn wide eyed to you. Including Zemo. He glances down at your hand in his then back to yours, surprise in his gaze but he immediately covers it up turning back to John smirking. He turns to behind himself, then back to the group.

“My associate is up ahead,”

You all turn to look forwards and see a little girl staring at you. Walking forward again, gripping his hand, Zemo nods to the girl as you all approach.

“Hello my friend,”

He holds out some money, a lot by the looking of it, and says to her, “This is for your family”

The girl hastily snatches it, obviously in need of it, and you can’t help but feel your heart warm a bit, seeing how kind Zemo was being to her.

“Can you show us the way?”

She beckons with her hands and walks forward. Zemo looks back at you, nodding to make sure you were okay, then follows her.

“What the hell” John murmurs from behind.

Following the girl, she leads you to a building. She turns, pointing inside a doorway, and runs inside not to be seen again.

“Karli’s in there,” Zemo tells the rest of the group. Sam replies and heads inside to talk to her while John suddenly grabs Zemo’s arm and yanks him against the machine on the wall.

Zemo moans as he is shoved into it, the hard outer piece hitting into his chest roughly.

“Hey. You’ve got ten minutes” John shouts to Sam as he takes out a pair of handcuffs and attaches them to Zemo.

“Really” Zemo mutters as John cuffs him to the machine.

“Then we are doing things my way,” John declares ignoring him

“Aggressive” Zemo jokes, though from his eyes you could still see the anger he harbors towards John.

He twists his head to watch John stride forward, staring at Sam, then back to him. “But I get it”

You wander over to stand by Zemo as you wait for Sam to talk to Karli.

“This day has brought a lot of changes. This morning you refused to say a single thing to me and now just moments ago you were holding my hand,” Zemo speaks quietly to you.

You shoot him a glare, “I did that to agitate John,”

“Sure, that was the only reason” but you knew from his eyes he didn’t believe you. They sparkled with amusement as he looked down at you.

“That cuff must bother you” you mention glancing over at them.

“I don’t mind. I quite enjoy cuffs, in the right setting of course,” he quips.

You turn on your side, looking at him, your lips curling into a smile. If we are going to play that game, you thought.

“Oh, what setting would that be?”

Zemo’s smile deepened, enjoying seeing you play along, “I’m sure you would like to know”

“Do you have to do this here!” John exclaims, glaring at the two of you. You quickly step back from Zemo, forgetting that you two had company. Your eyes snap to Bucky’s with worry, but he wasn’t looking at you. He glared at the ground, not seeming to care what was happening between you and Zemo.

After that Zemo tried to engage you in conversation again but you effectively ignored him, going back to how you were treating him earlier, which you knew was frustrating him.

John was looking down at the shield, then squeezed the bridge of his nose with his fingers, panting. Both you and Zemo glanced up, watching him cautiously. You glanced at Zemo and he stared back, confirming you were both thinking the same thing about Walker.

He got up and started shuffling towards the doorway. Both you and Bucky eyed at each other for the first time with the same recognition in your eyes. You leave Zemo’s side to walk over to where John was.

“No, no, no. This is a bad idea,” John mutters as he paces around. Zemo watches him like a hawk while you and Bucky stand side by side, arms crossed.

“It hasn’t been ten minutes, John. Sit tight,” Bucky replies.

“Don’t do that. Don’t patronize me,” he spits back, pacing around.

“He knows what he is doing,” you reply

There’s silence for just a moment. You watch as John turns towards you and walks fast, hitting his fist against the shield, “I’m going in”

Bucky walks forward and places his hand on John, stopping him from moving further.

He tries to antagonise Bucky, trying to make him guilty for what could happen to Sam. And you could tell his words were influencing him.

“You will not be going in till ten minutes are up,” you state sauntering over to them

“Oh, so the whore has something to say,” John spits out

In the back, Zemo growls, tugging on the cuffs that connected him to the wall. You feel the outrage prick up on you as John’s remark.

“Don’t call her that” Bucky says, glaring at John

“She’s been openly flirting with the terrorist over there, so yeah, I think it’s appropriate to call her that,” John bites back

You rush forward, attempting to punch John in rage, but he was able to sidestep you and brings the shield up, connecting it harshly to the side of your head. Pain soars across your face as you fall down onto the ground. You groan, your eyesight going dark around the sides and black patches covering parts of what you could see.

“BASTARD” you hear someone shout with a beautiful accent. From the floor, you can’t make out much of what is going on. Someone with a metal arm attacking another guy. A man with a shield being attacked by a man in a trench coat. It was all too confusing for you. You just wanted to sleep.

You could feel yourself fading in and out. Your eyes begging to close. You could hear shouting. Someone talking.

Your head was raised. Someone was holding it in their hands. Your vision is blurry but as they get nearer your eyes could focus on them. Beautiful brown eyes, messy brown hair, cute thin lips. It was him.

“Y/n!?” Zemo shouted at you, “Y/n stay with me”

“My head hurts” you mutter to Zemo as he lifts you up, placing you against the wall. Slowly your eyesight came back, and you could see your surroundings. Only you and Zemo were left.

“Zemo, where is everyone?” you ask turning your head, but in doing so it makes you feel incredibly dizzy. You groan as Zemo places a hand on the side of your face to stop you moving.

“They went after the Sam,”

“I need to help them!”

“No, you need to stay here and recover,”

You look over at the wall then back to Zemo, “How did you get out of the cuffs?” you ask

“Ah well…” Zemo says and glances down at his hand, your eyes follow and widen seeing his hand, bruising covering it, his thumb sticking out at an odd angle.

“You broke your hand to get out!?”

“Well, I couldn’t let him get away with saying those things and hurting you,” Zemo mutters, smiling slightly but you could see the pain flickering in his eyes, “I gave him a well-deserved punch in the face”

You chuckle at the thought. Leaning forward, you kiss him lightly on his forehead, a gesture of you wanting to ease his pain. You move back just in time to see him looking at you, surprised, before your vision faded.

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