#honorable mention for grilling | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

moonxknightx · 3 months ago

Text

♡˗ˏ✎*ೃ˚ : MEET THE FAMILY : :;

╰┈➤ ❝ [PAIRING] ❞ Logan Howlett x F!Stark!Reader

・❥・GENRE: Fluff :))

˚୨୧⋆｡˚ ⋆FANDOM: X-Men & MCU

ੈ✩‧₊˚ WARNINGS: None!

˚��· ͟͟͞͞➳❥SUMMARY: After your dad, Tony Stark, finds out you’re dating Logan, he insists the whole Avengers team meet him. Nervous but with Logan by your side, you head to the compound, with Wade tagging along. The Avengers are curious and a little skeptical, especially Tony, but Logan holds his own during dinner. He impresses the team with his confidence and clear care for you, even earning Tony’s reluctant approval by the end of the night. Despite the initial tension, Logan becomes a part of your chaotic family, and everyone accepts him.

Part 2

THE COMPOUND WAS QUIET. Too quiet. You'd been on edge ever since Happy had called you that morning, voice full of that awkward yet endearing nervousness he always got when delivering bad—or rather, inconvenient—news.

“Your dad knows.”

Three words that had set your entire day into a downward spiral of anxiety. Of course, Tony would find out. He had eyes and ears everywhere, despite you trying to keep things on the down low. And now, he had apparently told everyone.

Your boyfriend, Logan, sat beside you on the drive to the Avengers compound, eyes fixed on the road, completely unfazed. He was never one to be easily rattled. He hadn’t even batted an eye when you mentioned the entire Avengers team was going to be waiting to meet him. If anything, he just lit a cigar and shrugged, saying, "Not the first time I've been sized up by a bunch of superheroes."

Logan was like that. Unbothered. Calm in the face of impending chaos.

Unlike you.

You let out a deep sigh, clutching the steering wheel a bit tighter. "You know, we could just make a U-turn right now," you muttered, hoping, praying he’d take you up on the offer.

Logan chuckled, the low rumble soothing and maddening all at once. "Nah, darlin'. We’ll be fine. What’s the worst that could happen?"

"Logan, it's my dad. My dad, who, mind you, is Tony Stark. Genius. Billionaire. Overprotective father extraordinaire. I love him, but he’s going to grill you."

He smirked, one of those self-assured, slightly cocky looks that made your heart skip. "I’ve been through worse, trust me."

You were about to respond when a voice suddenly piped up from the backseat, startling you both.

“Hey, so what’s for dinner? I hope it’s not shawarma. I had that yesterday, and let me tell you, intestinal distress doesn’t even begin to cover it.”

“Wade?!”

The red-suited mercenary, Wade Wilson—aka Deadpool—grinned as he popped his head between the seats. "Who else? You thought I’d miss a chance to meet the Avengers again? Besides, I’ve got a bet with myself to see which of them cracks first. My money’s on Banner. Big guy’s got a short fuse."

You groaned. “Wade, you weren’t even invited.”

"Yeah, but you love me," Wade said with a wink. "Plus, I’m the one who introduced you two lovebirds, so technically, I’m responsible for all of this.”

Logan rolled his eyes, but there was a glint of amusement there. He had a weird, chaotic friendship with Wade that baffled you at times. Still, Wade had been the one to introduce you to Logan in the first place. After one of those typical Wade escapades where you'd found yourself smack dab in the middle of a multiverse-saving mission, Logan had swooped in, gruff and full of snark, but undeniably magnetic. You'd been hooked ever since.

"Alright, just... please don't say anything weird when we get there. This is already going to be awkward enough as it is."

Wade gave you a salute. "Scout's honor, kiddo."

When you arrived at the compound, Logan strode beside you, a protective yet calm presence. Wade, naturally, flanked the other side, completely unfazed by the prospect of facing a room full of Earth's mightiest heroes.

As you entered the living area, the first to greet you was not your father, but Morgan Stark, Tony’s precocious little daughter, who ran up to you with a big grin on her face.

"Hey, Morgs," you greeted, bending down to hug her.

Her eyes immediately shifted to Logan, who watched the interaction with a faint smile. "Is this him?" she asked, her eyes bright with curiosity.

You nodded, a little nervous. "Yup. Morgan, this is Logan."

Morgan looked up at him with wide eyes, studying him. Logan crouched down to her level, his usually gruff demeanor softening just a bit. “You must be Morgan. Your sister talks about you all the time."

Morgan beamed. "You’re tall."

Logan chuckled. “And you’re smart.”

Morgan grinned and then, in typical kid fashion, dashed off, satisfied with her judgment. "I like him!" she called out as she disappeared into the kitchen.

One down.

Then the rest of the team filtered in—Tony, Pepper, Steve, Nat, Clint, Bruce, Thor, and even Rhodey. They all sized Logan up in their own way.

Tony, of course, was the first to speak.

"So," he said, voice casual but his eyes sharp, "this is the guy?"

Logan straightened up, meeting Tony's gaze with that signature, unflinching confidence. "Yup."

Tony took a moment, probably running a full background check in his mind before nodding. “Alright. Dinner’s almost ready, but first, I think the team’s got some questions.”

Steve, ever the diplomat, stepped forward with a polite smile. “Logan, right? How’d you two meet?”

Before you could respond, Wade butted in.

“Oh, it’s a great story!” he exclaimed, gesturing dramatically. “So, picture this—alternate dimensions, worlds colliding, typical Tuesday stuff. I’m getting my ass handed to me by some bad guys—”

“I don’t remember it that way,” you interjected.

“Shh, let me have this moment. Anyway, I call in Logan here for backup, because duh, claws and healing factor, and then boom, sparks fly between these two.”

Natasha raised an eyebrow, crossing her arms as her eyes flicked between you and Logan. "Sparks?"

You opened your mouth to reply, but Wade was too quick. "Like fireworks on the Fourth of July. Or maybe that was an explosion—I can't remember."

Logan sighed, clearly used to Wade's antics by now. “We met on a mission. Wade was being a pain in the ass, as usual. Your girl here held her own, and I liked that."

Your face heated up at Logan’s praise. You noticed Natasha and Steve exchanging a look. Clint leaned against the wall, his arms crossed, lips quirking up slightly as if he was already sizing Logan up.

“Multiverse missions, huh?" Clint finally said. "That must’ve been fun.”

Logan smirked, locking eyes with Clint, both men now in some sort of unspoken stare-off. “Fun's one way to put it.”

Clint didn’t break eye contact but gave a slow, approving nod. “So you’re used to the crazy life. Good.”

Thor, ever the enthusiastic one, stepped forward next, looking Logan up and down. "Ah, a fellow warrior, no doubt!" He clapped a hand on Logan's shoulder, earning a slight grunt from him. “Tell me, Logan, have you faced a frost giant before? Or perhaps a horde of dark elves?”

Logan gave a half-shrug, completely unfazed by Thor’s boisterous personality. “Haven’t seen those specifically, but I’ve fought my fair share of things with claws, teeth, and bad attitudes.”

Thor laughed heartily, clearly impressed. "Then we shall have many stories to exchange!"

Bruce, who had been hanging back, finally spoke up. "So, uh... any anger management issues we should be aware of?" He asked it cautiously, but you could see the hint of a grin tugging at the corner of his mouth.

Wade snorted. "Banner, you're one to talk."

Logan just grinned, clearly enjoying himself. "Let’s just say I know how to handle myself.”

Natasha’s gaze sharpened. "I’ve heard about you. Wolverine, right? Healing factor, claws, indestructible skeleton."

Logan nodded once. "That’s me."

She studied him for a moment longer, then gave a small, approving nod. “Impressive.”

Tony, though silent for most of the interaction, was still sizing Logan up. You could feel the weight of your dad’s expectations hanging over the room. He wasn’t one to just roll over and let things be.

“So, Logan,” Tony said, leaning back with a scrutinizing look. “You’ve been around a long time. Done a lot, I assume. How exactly do you plan on handling my daughter?”

Logan didn’t flinch under Tony’s gaze. Instead, he gave a small, almost imperceptible smile. “She can handle herself just fine, Stark. But if you're asking if I’ve got her back? Always.”

The room went quiet for a beat. Even Wade had paused from whatever chaotic inner monologue he had going. The weight of Logan’s words, his seriousness, seemed to sink into everyone.

Tony’s eyes flicked to yours, and for the first time that night, his expression softened. A flicker of something—acceptance, maybe—passed across his face.

“Well,” Tony said, standing up and smoothing his shirt. “In that case, I suppose we should eat.”

As everyone began to move toward the dining room, you felt Logan’s hand slide into yours, giving it a reassuring squeeze. You looked up at him, relieved to see a small smile playing on his lips.

“They like you,” you whispered.

Logan shrugged, but there was a warmth in his eyes. “More importantly, they love you.”

You leaned into him slightly as you both followed the rest of the Avengers. And as for Logan? He had passed the test.

As the group settled into the dining room, the mood shifted slightly—less tense, more familial. The Avengers took their seats around the long table, conversations gradually picking up, but you couldn’t shake the subtle glances they kept throwing Logan’s way. It was clear they were still sizing him up in their own way.

Logan, for his part, remained calm. He was good at reading a room, better at letting things roll off his back. You’d noticed that about him early on—he had this way of commanding a space just by being in it, without the need for flashy words or grand gestures. Even so, you could tell by the way his hand remained close to yours that he was paying attention to every little detail. Watching, listening, judging.

Morgan was seated next to Tony, happily talking to Pepper about something she’d done at school that week, her occasional glance toward Logan full of childlike curiosity and approval. To her, Logan wasn’t an intimidating figure. He was your boyfriend—nothing more, nothing less. The simplicity of it warmed your heart.

Dinner was served, and Wade, who had somehow managed to squeeze in between Natasha and Clint, immediately started in on a loud, entirely unprompted story about a mission in Madripoor that no one really asked for.

“So there I was, pinned down by a mob of highly trained ninja assassins—yes, they exist, Steve—and I’m about to go down for the count when Logan here comes in with the whole snikt, snikt thing,” Wade mimed Logan’s claws extending with dramatic flair, “and saves my beautiful behind from a fate worse than death: losing my taco night.”

Steve sighed, rolling his eyes good-naturedly. “Right, because that’s clearly the priority in a life-or-death situation.”

“Exactly!” Wade pointed enthusiastically, as if Steve had just made his point for him. “This guy gets it.”

Natasha leaned back, smirking as she cut into her food. “So, Logan saved your life, and that’s how the two of you met?”

You chuckled, shaking your head. “Not exactly. Logan and I didn’t really meet officially until a little later. Wade just… happened to be there. Per usual.”

“Per usual, my dear?” Wade gasped dramatically. “You wound me. You wouldn’t have even met this tall drink of Canadian water if it weren’t for me!”

Logan gave a quiet grunt of amusement, though he didn’t say anything. Instead, he caught your eye, the barest hint of a smile tugging at the corner of his lips as Wade continued his rambling story.

Thor, who had been listening intently to Wade’s increasingly exaggerated tale, turned to Logan, looking genuinely intrigued. “So, Wolverine, your claws—are they forged of enchanted metal, much like Mjölnir?”

Logan paused, mid-chew, and raised an eyebrow at the Asgardian. “Not exactly. Adamantium. Strongest metal on Earth. Had it grafted to my skeleton a long time ago.”

Thor nodded, stroking his beard thoughtfully. “Ah, I see! A most noble addition. I myself am well-acquainted with weaponry of such caliber. Though I must admit,” he leaned in slightly, “I would be most curious to see them in action.”

Logan gave a low chuckle. “Maybe after dessert.”

As the conversation drifted on, Logan slowly began to settle in. Steve asked him a few more questions about his past—carefully avoiding anything too personal or traumatic—and Clint, always the quiet observer, seemed to be assessing Logan from across the table, eyes sharp but not unkind.

Tony, meanwhile, hadn’t said much since dinner started. He watched everything, listened to everyone, but remained quiet, only offering the occasional comment or quip. You knew him well enough to recognize that he was still processing. As much as Tony trusted your judgment, the whole “overprotective dad” thing didn’t exactly disappear overnight.

“So,” Tony finally spoke up, setting his fork down as the rest of the table quieted. “You’ve been through a lot. War, battles, more than most people could handle in one lifetime. And yet, here you are.”

Logan glanced at him, not quite sure where this was going, but he nodded. “Yeah. Seen more than my share.”

Tony leaned forward, elbows on the table, and his gaze sharpened, narrowing slightly as if he was putting Logan through one last test. “My daughter’s important to me— really important. You say you’ve got her back, and I respect that. But if you’re sticking around… you’re gonna need to know one thing.”

The room stilled. Even Wade had gone quiet, which was a rare feat. Logan met Tony’s stare head-on, not a trace of intimidation or hesitation in his gaze.

“What’s that?” Logan asked evenly.

Tony exhaled, his expression softening—just a fraction. “This family? We’ve been through hell. Lost people we cared about. We’ve had our world flipped upside down more times than I can count. And the thing is… when you’re in, you’re in. No half-measures. No walking away when things get tough. You stick it out. You fight for the people who matter.”

Logan didn’t blink. His gaze shifted briefly to you, then back to Tony. “That’s how I’ve always lived.”

Tony nodded slowly, almost imperceptibly. There was a weight to that moment, a silent understanding passing between them. Whatever final test Tony had in mind, it seemed Logan had passed.

Pepper, sensing the shift, smiled softly and placed a hand on Tony’s arm, quietly grounding him. “Dinner was wonderful,” she said warmly, breaking the tension. “I think we’ve had enough grilling for one night.”

Natasha smirked, raising an eyebrow at Logan. “You’ve survived the inquisition. Impressive.”

Logan shrugged. “Didn’t seem all that bad.”

Rhodey laughed. “You’re lucky. The last guy that showed up to date one of Stark’s kids? He didn’t make it past the appetizers.”

Tony snorted, shooting Rhodey a playful glare. “That’s because that guy showed up in a muscle car blaring AC/DC and quoting Shakespeare.”

“I thought you liked AC/DC?” you teased.

“I do. Not when it’s a first impression.”

Morgan, who had been quietly observing the back-and-forth, suddenly piped up. “Are you staying here tonight?” she asked innocently, looking up at Logan.

Logan blinked, clearly not expecting the question. “Uh…”

“Morgan,” Pepper began, her tone gentle but with that motherly undertone of “not now.”

“What? If he’s dating my sister, maybe he should stay!”

Wade, sensing an opportunity to cause more chaos, grinned beneath his mask. “Oh, I second that motion, mini-Stark! Logan here can bunk with me. I’ll show him my extensive collection of ‘80s action movies. It’ll be like a slumber party, only with more explosions.”

Clint nearly spit out his drink, trying to stifle his laughter, and even Natasha cracked a rare smile.

Logan, who had been stoic and composed throughout the entire evening, just shook his head. “Yeah, I’ll pass.”

You burst out laughing, and as you glanced around the table, you saw that, little by little, Logan was beginning to fit in with the Avengers’ chaotic dynamic. Sure, there were still guarded looks and unspoken tests, but your family—both blood and found—was starting to accept him in their own way.

As dessert was served and the conversation shifted to lighter topics, you felt Logan’s hand rest on your knee under the table, a small, reassuring touch that grounded you. You leaned into him slightly, smiling to yourself. Maybe this whole thing hadn’t been as bad as you’d feared.

By the time the evening began winding down, Logan was in the middle of an animated conversation with Thor about battle strategies, Wade was loudly recounting yet another exaggerated mission story to anyone who’d listen, and Morgan had fallen asleep in Pepper’s arms.

Tony, now more relaxed, leaned over to you as the others chatted around the table. “So… Logan,” he said quietly.

You glanced at him, unsure of what was coming next. “Yeah?”

Tony gave a small, reluctant smile. “I still think you could’ve given me a heads-up earlier, but… he’s alright. I guess.”

You grinned, bumping your shoulder against his. “Told you so.”

Tony chuckled softly, shaking his head. “Don’t get used to it.”

As the night wrapped up and the team slowly began to disperse, you and Logan lingered by the door. Tony walked up to Logan, offering his hand.

“Take care of her,” Tony said, his tone steady but genuine.

Logan gripped Tony’s hand firmly, meeting his gaze once more. “Always.”

With that final exchange, you left the compound with Logan by your side, Wade tagging along (of course). And as you drove away, your hand resting in Logan’s, you felt a sense of peace settle over you.

Your family had met him. He’d met them. And while it hadn’t been perfect, it was the first step in blending the two worlds you cared so deeply about. In the end, Logan wasn’t just a part of your life anymore.

He was a part of theirs.

🏷️: @twinky-wink @fidgetingbee @astarions-girl-dinner @layladestiny8 @birdy-bat-writes

If you want to be added to the Logan tag list, let me know!

#logan howlett x reader #wolverine x reader #logan howlett fluff #deadpool and wolverine #hugh jackman #hugh jackman x reader #x men x reader

1K notes · View notes

athenamikaelson · 11 days ago

Text

Klaus Mikaelson x Soulmate!Reader x Elijah Mikaelson Pt. 22

Word Count- 12.8k

Warnings-swearing, violence, mentions of bad parents, alcoholism, Mikeal and his abuse, self-loathing

Soulmates. What the hell are soulmates? Well, obviously I know what the definition of a soulmate is but what the hell does it mean in the supernatural world? Neither of the two Salvatores that drove me home last night were very chatty about it.

“Fables is what it is, Y/n.”

That is all Demon told me last night when he walked me to my front door. After I watched the two brothers drive off I stayed up for hours, actual hours, 5 to be exact, pacing my room waiting for Elijah to keep good to his word and come see me to explain what the hell happened tonight. But with the morning light streaming in my bedroom window, I realize that once again holding a man to his promise is never something I should do.

—

I stare blankly at the multiple unread text messages and missed calls from Elena. All morning she’s been trying to call me but right now I don’t have the energy to handle whatever she wants to talk about, especially since it’s probably something that everyone else knows and I’m the last one to find out, per usual.

When I haven’t been staring at my phone, I’ve been staring up at my white ceiling, replaying the events of last night in my head over and over again. Last night when I was up waiting for Elijah I researched everything I could possibly find on soulmates. But the more I read the more I started to freak the fuck out so I had to stop that for my own sanity. Which is ironic because I honestly don’t think I have any sanity left in me to spare.

“Damn, you look like shit,” Theo’s obnoxious voice comes from an open doorway.

“Leave, Gremlin,” I groan as I grab a pillow and hold it over my face.

“Nope, sorry,” I hear his voice and then the pillow is ripped away from me, “Your depression is stinking up the house and I don’t need it affecting me. So get your ass up. We’re going clubbing.”

I move nothing but my eyes as I look at my brother.

“We live in Mystic Falls. Where the hell would we go clubbing?”

Theo thinks to himself for a moment before tapping his chin, “Alright. Good point. See this is why we work, you're the brains,” He points to me, “And I’m the beauty.”

“Leave me to rot,” I groan and try to reach for the pillow and he swats my hand.

“Back, demon! Listen, get your ass up I’m hungry and I’m going to give you the honor of buying me lunch,” Theo declares like this is some great prize I’ve won.

“No thanks,” I grab my blanket and cover my face with it.

A moment later my blanket it being ripped off of me, “Y/n Y/m/n Y/l/n, I swear to the heavens above I will grab the garden hose and drench this entire room and yourself with it if you’re not in the car in 5 minutes,” Theo glares at me and then leans down and picks at a piece of my hair with disgust clear on his face, “Actually make that 10 minutes, you need to kick whatever family of rats is living in that mess you call hair.”

I go to complain but Theo shushes me, “I mean it! I’ll get the goddamn hose!”

I watch Theo dramatically stomp out of my room and I let out a sigh.

—

“I hate you,” I say to my brother as he holds open the door to The Grill for me.

Theo sends me a sweet smile, “No one could hate this face.”

I roll my eyes and begin to walk to an empty table when I notice Caroline and Elena sitting together at a table in front of us.

Shit.

I try to blend into the crowd but my obnoxious brother ruins that.

“Elena! Hey, Elena,” Theo’s voice booms throughout the restaurant and I instantly try to make myself as small as possible when I notice people turning to look at us.

“Theo, stop,” I hit my brother in the stomach but he just grabs my hand and pulls me along.

We get to the girl's table in no time, thanks to Theo’s sprinting, and Elena instantly sits up in her seat when she sees me.

“Hey, Y/n,” Elena smiles softly at me and I nod my head at her and then send a smile to Caroline.

“I’m sorry about your Dad, Caroline. Damon told me this morning,” I say softly to her and she nods.

“Thanks, Y/n. And I was going to tell you myself but I just forgot,” Caroline reasons, and Stefan’s words from last night come barreling through my head.

“Y/n?”

I shake my head clear and then try to pull a smile on my face, “Ya, totally. Don’t worry about it.”

“I’ve tried to call you,” Elena tries to get my attention and I don’t meet her eyes.

“Ya, I forgot to charge my phone last night,” I lie and she looks at me as if she’s not sure she believes me.

“Oh, okay. Um,” She goes silent for a moment before gesturing to the table, “Would you guys like to join us? We’re talking about the Mikaelson’s throwing their weird ball. Their mother invited me personally because she wants to speak to me about something.”

At Elena’s words, I frown in confusion, “Who are you talking about? Who are the Mikaelsons?”

“Wait! A party?! There’s going to be a party,” Theo’s practically jumping in place as he looks wide-eyed at the two girls.

Elena looks at me confused for a second before lowering her head, “The Originals. They’re the Mikaelsons. We got invites this morning to attend their ball tonight,” Elena frowns sadly, “Did you not get one?”

A tightness in my chest builds at her pitiful look and I am sent back to my childhood when I would be the only kid in class who never got an invite to any of the other kid’s birthday parties.

“Naw, we haven’t got anything,” Theo chimes in for me and I feel and lower his hand to wrap his pinky around mine, “Yet. But like honestly even if we do get invites, which we will because anyone who doesn’t invite the Y/L/N siblings are losers, we probably won’t go,” Theo says and looks at his nails as if the conversation is now boring him.

Caroline raises an eyebrow, “Why not?’

I can see Theo look over to me and then back to Caroline, “We’re going clubbing.”

I release a deep sigh at my brother’s words.

“You guys are going clubbing?”

Caroline and Elena share a look and then I can see Elena look up to me, “And you agreed to this?”

I look down at Elena and an annoying wave of embarrassment washes through me. Even though I know they’re not judging me right now there’s that back part in my brain telling me they know someone like me isn’t cool enough to do anything like that, which is why I agree.

“Yup. It’s how we bond,” I say, nodding and glancing at my nails. Mimicking my brother who I can see from the corner of my eye, has a huge grin on his face.

“So, are you two going to this dance?” I try to act nonchalantly.

Caroline shakes her head, “Hell no! It’s some twisted Cinderella fetish is what it is. And Klaus only invited me to piss off Tyler.”

Klaus. Invited her.

“Klaus?”

My voice comes out pathetic, weak, and strangled and I feel Theo squeeze his pinky against mine.

“Ya, he sent me a dress and everything,” Caroline says dramatically as if she doesn’t notice my change in demeanor, “It’s totally weird. Also,” Caroline looks at Elena, “Why does the evil witch want an audience with you?”

“Evil witch?”

Theo and I say in union and Elena looks up at us, “That was who was in the last coffin. The mother that Klaus killed…actually not so dead.”

I blink at what she says and feel my breathing speed up.

Elena looks back at Caroline, “I have no idea. There’s only one way to find out.”

Caroline sighs, “I thought you told Damon and Stefan that you weren’t going.”

Great so it seems everyone knows about this dance.

Elena nods, “I did, which is all the more reason why I need a drama-free bodyguard.”

“Well, I think a Salvaotre would look a lot better in a tux, and by that, I mean Stefan.”

“Fuck that asshole,” Theo snarls catching Caroline and Elena off guard.

“Theo, language,” I warn lightly but honestly don’t care enough to chastise him much.

Theo shakes his head defiantly, “Hell no. Elena, you can’t be seriously thinking about getting back together with the man who threatened to kill you and your best friend?!”

Theo’s uncharacteristic outburst seems to startle both of the girls and Elena shakes her head, “No, of course not. I can’t deal with any of the Salvatores right now. Whatever Stefan’s feeling, he’s channeling it all against Klaus and Damon… it’s not a good idea.”

Theo nods his head seemingly accepting her answer but as I stare at him something in his eyes tells me he’s not 100% convinced.

Caroline and Elena converse for another moment about Elena kissing Damon and I can’t help but feel like nothing more than a fly on the wall again, just like I did last year and every year before.

“Hey,” Theo leans down to whisper in my ear, “You good?”

I don’t meet my brother’s eyes because if there’s anyone in this world who could point out my lies it’s him so all I do is nod.

“Careful Y/n, Caroline, and Theo. It’s all well and good until she stabs you in the back,” A feminine British accent has me lifting my head and the sight of Rebekah surprises me.

“What are you doing here? I know your mom’s rules. No hurting the locals,” Elena accuses.

Rebekah glares down at Elena, “Get over yourself, Elena. It’s not all about you,” Rebekah tells her and begins to walk away but stops when she gets to me.

“Meet me outside in 5 minutes would you, luv? I want us to have a little chat,” Rebekah smiles at me and I for some reason find myself nodding.

All four of us watch Rebekah walk off over to Matt. Rebekah pulls out an envelope from her purse and hands it to the blonde boy.

“Even the busboy got an invite,” I can hear Theo practically snarl under his breath.

“Oh my God,” Caroline gasped, “She’s inviting him to the ball. Why is she inviting him?”

“Probably to get this reaction from us,” Elena says and I fight the urge to roll my eyes.

“Or maybe she just wants a date,” I say under my breath and I hear Theo chuckle from beside me.

Caroline huffs in sits back in her chair, “What time is this stupid dance?”

At Carolie’s words my heart plummets. I’m not entirely sure why. I mean who cares that she was invited by Klaus? Was gifted a dress by Klaus. Is going to dance with Klaus. I mean who cares right?!? Not me!

“We’re leaving,” I mutter to Theo grab his hand and begin pulling him.

“Wait,” I hear Elena call to me and I sigh, “You’re not actually going to talk with Rebekah, right?” I shrug my shoulders and stare at her annoyed, “Why wouldn’t I?”

Elena looks at me like I’ve grown two heads, “She’s evil, Y/n! You can’t trust her,” Elena tries to reason and I raise my eyebrows in disbelief.

“Coming from the girl that quite literally stabbed her in the back.”

Elena blinks, shocked at my words.

“Why are you acting like this?”

“I’m not acting like anything, Elena. I’m just relaying the information that has been told to me. Just like everything else that happens in this town,” I smile at her sarcastically and then turn around grabbing Theo’s hand.

“We’re leaving.”

—-

“Damn, woman,” Theo says as I pull him out the door into the parking lot, “What’s got you in such a bad mood?”

I shake my head, “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I deny and Theo comes to stand in front of me with his arms crossed.

“You can pull that denial shit with anyone else in this town, except me bitch. You and me, came from the same womb so that technically means we can read each other’s minds. So whatever you’re doing,” He raises his eyebrow, “This self-sabotaging thing or whatever it is, you need to let me in.”

I stare at my younger brother and feel tears rush to my eyes. Theo must see them because the stern look on his face quickly turns to fear.

“Oh shit, tears,” He quickly shakes his hands, “Please don’t cry! I don’t know how to handle tears,” He shakes his head, “Other than my own!”

“Is there something wrong with me?”

My question seems to catch my brother off guard as he frowns, “What? Like your fashion taste? Sister we’ve already established this.”

I shake my head and push away from him, “Never mind, God, just forget it.”

“Hey,” Theo pulls me back by my shoulders so I’m facing him, “I’m sorry, okay? You know I can’t do emotion without humor and sarcasm. But, why the hell would you ask me that? Did someone say something,” Theo’s concerned eyes turn to ones filled with anger, “Because if someone did I’m going to kill them.”

I just shrug my shoulders, “It doesn’t matter. I already know the answer.”

I begin to walk over to the car but Theo once again stops me, “Hold on for a second and talk to me! Why the hell would you ever think something is wrong with you?”

I look at my brother and clench my nails into my palm, “Because there has to be,” I almost cry out. Feeling the tsunami of emotions I’ve been holding in for the past few weeks rush forward, “There has to be a reason why people don’t choose me. Why my whole life I’ve always been on the outside looking in. Watching everyone live their lives happy and free while all I do is watch and hope that one day someone will notice me watching and ask me to join. I need there to be a reason because if there’s not then…”

Theo watches me with a heartbroken expression, “Then what, Y/n?”

I wipe a stray tear off my face, “Then there’s nothing I can change. And it means that it’s just me,” I point to myself defeated, “That I was just born this way. Born to watch everyone else be the main characters in my own life.”

I stare with blurred vision up at my brother who looks defeated as he shakes his head.

“Y/n, no one thinks that about you. And I promise everyone feels that way every once and a while it’s normal,” My brother’s soothing voice only frustrates me more.

I shake my hands, “You don’t get it, Theodore! Other people may feel this way every once and a while, but,” I shove my finger into my chest harshly, “I feel this way all of the time!”

“Y/n?”

I turn to see Rebekah staring at me confused, and I quickly wipe the tears off my face. Rebekah’s face drops as she watches me and she instantly rushes towards me.

“Are you okay? Are you hurt,” She asks me look a mother coddling her child.

I shrug her away and nod my head feeling numb again, “Fine. Don’t worry about it,” I look at Theo grab the keys out of my pocket, and throw them to him, “Drive yourself home. I’m going for a walk.”

I turn around and can hear them calling after me but I don’t turn around.

—

Why the fuck did I walk?

Why the fuck did I throw a goddamn temper tantrum.

God, can I be normal for five fucking seconds!??

These thoughts run through my head over and over again until I realize I’ve made it to the Salvatore house. Which is still about a 15-minute drive, or a one-hundred-hour walk to my house. Fuck me.

I’m about to continue walking when a flash of red catches my eye.

I eye the car that Stefan tried to kill me in for a moment and then shake my head, “No, I couldn’t.”

I take another few steps and then feel a cramp in my thigh.

“Fuck it.”

—

I speed into my driveway and a laugh escapes my mouth.

I just stole a car. I JUST STOLE A FUCKING CAR.

I laugh to myself like a crazy person as I shift it into park and get out of it. I stand there admiring the stolen vehicle until I hear footsteps behind me.

“I see you’ve acquired a new vehicle,” Elijah smiles at me kindly and I fight the urge to punch him.

“I stole it,” I bite and walk past the Original and up my porch.

“Stole it?”

“Yup, stealing is when you take something that isn’t yours. Pick up a dictionary,” I snarl as I try to put my key into the lock but with my shaking hands I just keep missing.

Elijah is quiet for a moment before I feel him next to me, “Here,” He extends his hand, “Let me.”

I shake my head and keep trying, “Screw off.”

“Excuse me,” Elijah’s tone comes off as somewhat surprised and a little irritated.

“Telling someone to screw off means they don’t want you around,” I mimic my tone from before and I hear Elijah sigh.

“You’re upset with me because of last night,” He says out loud as if it’s some fucking revelation.

I finally get the key into the lock, unlock the door, and then open it.

“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” I step inside and try to slam the door in his perfect face but it gets stopped by his perfectly polished designer shoe.

“Elskan,” Elijah nudges the door open against my weight and I glare daggers at him.

“Stop calling me that,” I bite and he furrows his eyebrows.

“Please, let me explain,” He tries to reason with me and I shake my head.

“There’s nothing to explain. If you think last night is the first time I’ve ever been let down by a man, you are horribly mistaken. Now leave me alone.”

Elijah's free hand doesn’t move from the door and I realize he’s holding a big white box with his other hand.

“I understand you’re mad at me. You have every right to be. I hate breaking my word, most importantly when it comes to you. I just hope you’ll listen to me now when I tell you how sorry I am,” He says earnestly and I glare at him.

“You’re sorry?”

Elijah nods, “I never intended to stand you up last night but there were…complications.”

I blink at him unimpressed, “Ya, you’re dead mother isn’t dead. Whoopty fucking doo.”

Elijah’s posture stiffens for a moment, “You know?”

“I’m the last one to find out it seems, but ya I do. So I’m sure mommy dearest wants you home for your little ball or whatever so why don’t you get off my porch and go home, Elijah Mikaelson,” I snarl his last name at him and he frowns.

“I understand you need some time to think,” Elijah nods his head and brings the white box up, and gestures for me to take it, “I’ll be at my family's ball tonight. I would be incredibly grateful if you would join me?”

I blink at his question and try to fight back any emotions other than anger. Elijah nods when he realizes he’s not going to get an answer right now and then places the box on the porch swing next to us.

“I hope to see you tonight,” Elijah gives me one last look before walking off the porch.

You won’t.

—

He will.

FUCKING THEODORE.

“I fucking hate you,” I glare at my little brother as I put on the stupid diamond necklace Elijah gifted me.

Theo, who stands next to me in front of my mirror smirks, “You’ll thank me later.”

I shake my head as I struggle to latch the necklace, “Hell to the no.”

Theo tightens his tie and then rolls his eyes, “Whatever,” He shoots me a look and then laughs, “Here let me help you.”

I glare at him but still let him take the necklace and latch it behind my neck.

After he latches it Theo’s eyes stay on the huge diamond necklace that adorns my neck.

“How much do you think that cost?”

I look at the huge statement diamond that hangs in the center of a dozen tinier diamonds holding the necklace together. I feel the weight of the diamonds, against my chest and cringe.

“Too much,” I look at the huge off-white gown that is encrusted with lace and crystals that I’m wearing and pinch the bridge of my nose, “This is all too much.”

Theo smirks and straightens out his black suit jacket, “Elijah may be a scary old vampire, but you got to give him some props,” He gestures to my dress, “The guys got great taste. And expensive too,” He points to the matching diamond bracelet on my left wrist, “After today you can pawn the necklace and bracelet, make bank, and then you and I hit Vegas.”

I turn and glare at my brother who smirks at me, “Not happening. We’re going to this stupid dance and then tomorrow morning I’m returning all of this crap and never talking to any of the Mikaelsons again.”

I watch Theo nod slowly and raise an eyebrow, “Rrrrrighttttt. Sure, okay. Um, how exactly do you plan on doing that? Also, I thought you and Rebekah were friends?”

I sit down on my bed and strap on the nude heels that were also in the huge white box that carried everything Elijah gave me.

“I’ll,” I stop and blow out a breath, “I’m going to….”

Theo snorts and nods, “Ya, you do that, nerd.”

With a huff, I stand up and take a step to grab my shawl but I let out a squeal when I trip over myself and bump into Theo.

Theo grabs my shoulders and pushes me upright and then dusts off his jacket, “Dude, walk much?”

I roll my eyes and throw my shawl over my shoulders, “I don’t wear heels!”

Theo purses his lips, “Cleary, hoe.”

I shoot him a glare, “Tell me why I’m letting you drag me to this again?”

Theo instantly smiles brightly at me and throws his arms over my shoulder pushing me down the hall, “Because you got personally invited by one of the hosts, and it would be rude to not go.”

I turn my head and shoot him a look and he smirks.

“Ok, maybe I don’t really care about him. But, come on! It’s a party and if we don’t go people will talk about how we were the only ones in town not invited!”

I shake my head as Theo opens the front door, “But we were invited?”

“Technically, you were invited. My invite must’ve gotten lost in transit,” He says confidently to himself, “And also people won’t know we were invited unless we go. And we need a night out. Too much shit has happened and we need fun.”

I go to argue but Theo shushes me.

“Nope. No complaining,” Theo then looks down at Stefan’s red car that is still sitting in our driveway, “Also, where the fuck did that come from?”

I cringe and close my eyes, “I kind of…stole it away from Stefan.”

I open my eyes and cringe as I look at my brother’s mad face.

“Are you serious?!”

I cringe at his yelling, “I’m sorry, okay? I was worked up and mad at the dick so I-”

“Bitch! I’m not mad at you for stealing the damn thing,” He gestures wildly at the car, “I’m mad that you stole a fucking car without ME!”

I blink and then shake my head, “I’m sorry. Next time I steal a motor vehicle, I’ll alert you first. Alright?”

Theo wipes a non-existent tear off his cheek and then nods, “Fine. But I get to drive there.”

I shake my head, “Hell to the no.”

“Oh, so you’re going to drive in those,” Theo asks and points to the heels I’m wearing and I frown.

“Fine. But, if you hit anything it’s on you.”

—

Theo hit 3 mailboxes. Ran a red light. The car no longer has a front fender.

“Well,” Theo opens my car door for me and I step out shaking, “That was…fun.”

My eye twitches as I look at my brother furiously and outstretch my shaking hand. Theo doesn’t say anything but nods his head in defeat, placing the car keys in my palm.

“Never again,” I growl.

“Oh come on, it wasn’t that bad,” I whip around to the car that now has no fender, a broken headlight, multiple dents, and an uncountable amount of scrapes, “Okay, ya. Never mind that one is on me.”

I close my eyes, take a deep breath in and out, and feel Theo grab my arm.

“But at least we look good as fuck. Our parent’s gene pools do it again,” Theo says happily and then stops and cringes, “Sorry.”

I shake my head, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“You know… the fact that we don’t have the same father so your gene pool isn’t his gene pool,” Theo explains and I have to take another deep breath.

“Sarcasm, Theodore. I was being sarcastic.”

“Ohhhhh,” Theo nods and guides me up a huge staircase to the massive mansion that is covered in lights and beautiful decorations.

We stop as we wait behind three rows of couples and I feel my hand start to shake.

“Hey, it’s all cool,” Theo smiles down at me and I wish for even a second I could believe him.

“Next!”

Theo and I walk up to the security guard and he holds out his hand, “Invite?”

I look over to Theo expectantly and he does the same to me, “Please don’t tell me you left it at home?”

Theo shakes his head, “Bitch, it was your invite?!”

“But you’re the one that wanted to come!”

“Listen,” The guard catches our attention, “If neither of you have an invite I’m going to have to ask you to leave,” He says and points to the parking lot.

“Sir, my sister was personally invited by the Elijah Mikaelson,” Theo states and the guard rolls his eyes.

“Ya, I’m sure she was,” He says sarcastically, “Now leave or I’ll have you escorted off the property.”

“That won’t be necessary,” A British voice says and I look up to see the light-brown-haired younger brother of Klaus and Elijah. Kol.

Theo shoots me a look, “Please tell me you didn’t bag, another one!”

I glare back at him, “Shut up!”

“They’re with me,” Kol tells the guard and reaches out an arm for me to take.

I stare at him cautiously for a moment before I hear people behind me start to express their annoyance.

With my free hand, I grab Kol’s right arm, while still holding on to Theo with my right arm.

Kol smirks down at me as he leads Theo and me into a huge ballroom, brightly lit with candles and twinkling lights, “My family can be quite dramatic with these things,” I look up at him and try to not notice how attractive yet another Mikaelson sibling is, “But, with our whole family back together again, our mother thinks it calls for a celebration.”

“How rich are you guys,” Theo asks bluntly and I jab my elbow into his stomach.

Kol smirks at him, “Very rich.”

I hear Theo mutter something about rich bitches under his breath and I try to not laugh.

“Thank you for helping us get in,” I say quietly to Kol and he shrugs.

“No worries. I thought I’d get to you first before the wolves descend,” He says nonchalantly but I can feel myself shake again at his words.

Kol must notice this because his eyebrows furrow, “Why are you doing that?”

I shake my head, “Doing what?”

Kol raises an eyebrow, “You’re shaking and your heartbeat is incredibly loud,” He says as if the noise annoys him.

“She has anxiety dickhead,” Theo bites at the vampire and I thrash my head over to my brother.

“Theo! Don’t be a dick!”

Theo shrugs and eyes Kol, “He’s the one making you feel bad for something you can’t control. How are you a thousand years old and not know what anxiety looks like?”

I cringe in pain when I feel Kol’s grip tighten on my arm.

“Theo,” I pinch my brother’s arm, “Please go get us some drinks, non-alcoholic.”

Theo glares back at me like I’m crazy and quickly shakes his head, “No, I’m not leaving you alone. Definitely not with him,” He points at Kol and I inhale a quick breath.

I turn to look at Kol, who is looking at Theo as if he wants to rip him in two.

“Theo,” I bite harshly, “Go. Now.”

Theo’s expression drops as he turns his attention back towards me. He must noticed the nervous look on my face because he lets out a sigh and nods his head.

“Ok,” He looks at Kol once more, “I’ll be right back.”

I watch with bated breath as Theo walks away and disappears into the crowd.

“Friend of yours?”

Kol’s tense voice makes me tense.

I turn and look at him and see the dark gleam in his eyes.

“My little brother,” I say equally as tense, “Try anything and I’ll steal one of those fancy daggers from your asshole brother and stab you myself.’’

Kol and I watch each other for a moment before he slits his eyes and hums, “If you were anyone else I’d rip your ribs out and stab you with them…but since I don’t want Nik or Elijah daggering me again and locking me away for another one hundred years,” He looks down at me and smirks, “You don’t have to worry about you coming to any harm from me.”

I stare at Kol with wide eyes and rip my arm out of his hold and he raises an eyebrow and smirks at my movement.

“I notice you didn’t mention my brother in that,” I turn to stand and glare at him, “I may not be able to stab you myself but trust me when I say this, for some reason, Klaus and Elijah don’t like it when I’m upset and people who make me upset,” I pause and think back to Klaus threatening Stefan, “and someone harming my brother would really make me upset.”

Kol stares back at me and after a moment he nods, “If you keep this attitude up, you’ll fit in just fine with my family.”

I furrow my eyebrows, “I want nothing to do with your family.”

Kol smirks as if what I just said was the funniest thing he just heard, “Oh Darling, you don’t have any choice in the matter anymore. Fate’s already picked you.”

I shake my head confused, “What the hell is everyone talking about?! What the hell does fate have to do with anything and what the hell is a fucking soulmate?”

Kol’s eyes widen slightly, “Women never swore as much as you do before I was daggered.”

I glare at him and he laughs, “My brothers say I’m not allowed to tell you anything,” He pauses and shrugs, “Actually they said I’m not allowed to even approach you.”

I look at him and groan in frustration.

“But when have I ever listened to what my brothers say,” I look up and find Kol smirking devilishly at me, “What do you want to know, Darling.”

I feel a weight lift off my shoulders at the idea of finally getting answers.

“What is a soulmate?”

Kol nods to a waiter passing by and grabs two glasses of champagne, he gestures for me to take one but I shake my head and he shrugs. Then he downs both of them.

“Let me give you the shortened version because I’m sure my brothers have already smelt you when you entered the house, so I’m sure they’ll be finding you soon,” Kol makes a show of looking around the room and then back to me, “Soulmates mean different things in different cultures…but, in your case soulmates mean someone who is bound to you forever. Someone who is a part of you, someone who is you.”

I shake my head not understanding what the hell he’s talking about.

“There’s not much understanding behind what this means in the supernatural world. There’s been much speculation, but what I do know is that when we were turned, our souls were ripped out. That human part of us was taken away…but it had to go somewhere.”

I shake my head and laugh in denial, “So what, you’re saying that I have Klaus’ and Elijah’s souls in me?”

Kol sighs and taps his chin in thought, “Ya. Pretty much.”

I let out a laugh at his joke.

“That’s really funny. It's good to know you didn’t lose your humor while in your coffin,” I smirk.

My smirk starts to slowly fall though as Kol doesn’t laugh with me.

No fucking way.

“You’re not joking are you?”

Kol’s smirk drops, “I honestly wish I was, Darling. I wouldn’t wish that fate on my worst enemy.”

“Elskan?”

Of course.

At the sound of Elijah’s voice, I let out a sigh and turned to see Elijah pushing through a few guests to walk over to Kol and me.

“Oh, fuck me,” I say under my breath and I hear Kol giggle.

“Don’t say that too loud, or my brother will take that as a request,” Kol gests and I stare wide-eyed at him which makes him laugh again.

“I wasn’t sure if you would come,” Elijah says as he comes to stand in front of Kol and me.

“I didn’t want to,” I say.

Kol laughs again and I see Elijah turn his attention to his younger brother, “Brother, it appears you’ve met the lovely Y/n Y/l/N.”

Kol throws a hand over my shoulder making me jump and cringe at the feeling of a stranger's touch, “Yes, we’re practically thick as thieves already.”

Elijah’s eyes darken and narrow as he looks at Kol’s hand that rests on my shoulder, “So it appears.”

I bite my lip as I wait for Elijah and Kol to be done with their glaring at one another. Or more like, Elijah glaring at Kol and the latter smirking.

“Well,” I say interrupting them, “You two have fun…I’m going to go…anywhere else,” I turn to Kol who turns to me, “I would say it was nice to meet you Kol, but you are kind of weird.”

“Right back at you, Darling,” Kol says and smirks at me.

I don’t spare either man another glance as I try to push through the crowd away from them.

“Y/n,” Elijah’s voice calls from behind me and I roll my eyes, “Please wait a moment.”

With a sigh, I stop and wait a moment for Elijah. It doesn’t take him but a moment to stand in front of me.

“What?”

Elijah’s dark look is long gone and replaced with a smile, “You look positively breathtaking.”

I look away from him and nod, “Thanks. I mean you’re the one who picked out the dress so.”

“The dress, although beautiful, has nothing to do with the radiance that is you,” Elijah says as his eyes scour my face.

I look at him and finally get to focus on just how attractive he looks right now. Y/n he always looks good. Shut up. He’s switched out his usual suit for a black tux that hugs his chest perfectly. His dark hair is styled expertly letting his beautiful face to be put on display.

“You don’t look horrible,” I shrug, “I guess.”

Elijah’s upper lip twitches and he nods, “Thank you, I think.”

Elijah and I stand staring at each other for a moment before he clears his throat.

“I’m glad you accepted my invitation to be my date,” Elijah smiles and uck in a breath.

“Sadly for you, my man,” I hear Theo’s voice come up from behind me, “She’s actually my date.”

I let out a sigh as I feel Theo wrap his arm around my arm and tug me towards him.

I watch Elijah’s eyes narrow for a moment before he gives Theo a strained smile, “And you are?”

Theo smirks and puffs out his chest, “Theo Y/L/N. Pleasure,” He eyes Elijah, “I’m sure.”

I see the wheels turning in Elijah’s head and his shoulders seem to untense.

“You’re Y/n’s younger brother. Am I correct?”

At Elijah’s question, Theo nods his head, “The one and only. And let me guess,” He puts his free hand on his hip, “You’re the man who showed up on my doorstep this morning begging my sister to not kick him to the curb. Am I correct?”

I stare wide-eyed at Theo in disbelief, and then back to Elijah.

The Original stares at my brother for a moment and I wait for the backlash.

“That would be me, Theodore,” Elijah smiles, and I raise an eyebrow, “But, I‘m not so sure what your sister has decided to do with me. At least not yet.”

Theo whips around to me, “Well? What are you going to do with him?”

My eyes widen and I switch my attention from Theo to Elijah, who also looks expectant on an answer.

“Um,” I look between the two men and freeze.

Thankfully, someone entering through the door pulls our attention.

Not someone. Caroline.

Caroline is wearing a light blue gown that makes her look just like Cinderella and beautiful as always.

“Um, I’m going to go see Caroline,” I turn away from the two men and quickly begin to walk towards my blonde friend. For a moment I think she sees me as her eyes focus on something, but when I follow her gaze behind me I see her staring at…Klaus.

Oh.

Klaus, who looks absolutely earth-shattering, turns his attention from Caroline towards me and I feel my heart drop. The enlightened look on his face, the look he had when looking at Caroline, drops when he sees me. The blank look on his face makes a burning start in the back of my eyes and I quickly divert them from him.

With Elijah behind me and Klaus to my right, I quickly book it to my left, through a doorway, and run down a hall.

I run until I meet a dark brown door and I throw it open and go inside. As soon as I close the door I lean my head against it, close my eyes, and take a deep breath.

“You’re not supposed to be in here,” A British voice says.

“Fucking Brits,” I groan out and turn around.

The other Mikaelson sibling, Finn I believe, stands before me. His once long hair is cut shorter and he’s wearing a suit that matches his brothers.

“You’re Finn,” I say and he narrows his eyes at me.

“Yes and you’re the soulmate,” He says annoyed.

I eye him and he eyes me.

What the hell is up with the Mikaelson siblings and glaring?

“Is this your room?”

Finn eyes me for another moment before nodding, “Yes.”

I nod and then wring my shaking hands together, “I’m sorry for barging in. I just… I couldn’t be out there. Around so many people.”

He doesn’t say anything and I nod, “I’ll leave. I’m sorry.”

I turn around and grab the handle.

“Wait,” Finn’s voice calls to me and I turn around, “You can stay. Just don’t touch anything.”

I look at Finn and then nod, “I won’t. Thank you.”

I slowly walk towards a couch and sit down careful not to rip my dress. I look up to Finn, who is standing in the corner of the room looking more awkward than I feel.

“Do you want to sit with me,” I ask gesturing to the other couch across from me.

Finn looks up at me suspiciously and then shakes his head, “I shouldn’t. Mother wants me out with the others,” Finn says and then walks towards the door.

“I’m sorry,” I say to him before he can open it.

I see him stop, “You already apologized.”

I shake my head, “Not about barging in…About what your siblings did to you.”

I see Finn’s shoulders instantly tense up and he turns around with a glare on his face, “You have no idea what my siblings did to me.”

I reposition uncomfortably and then shrug, “I know that they left you in a coffin for almost your entire life or at least that’s what I’ve heard. I’ve never been daggered by one of my family members but…I recently was betrayed by some of my family,” I open and then close my mouth thinking of what to say, “So I just…I guess I know what it’s like to feel betrayed.”

Finn’s eyes drop and he looks away from me. I take a deep breath and then turn back to look at my hands. I wait for Finn to either leave or kill me for speaking out of turn. What I didn’t expect though was for him to walk over to the other couch and place himself on it with a sigh.

We sit in silence for a moment before he sighs again, “I don’t blame you for not wanting to be out there,” He looks behind me towards the door, “It’s too loud.”

I nod and then realize just how much worse it probably is for him than me.

“This must be a lot for you,” I say and play with the diamond bracelet I’m wearing,

“Being away from civilization for so long, and now you have to get used to everything. I wouldn’t want to attend a party either.’’

Finn looks up at me and his face contorts into one of confusion, “You’re peculiar.”

I let out a low laugh, “Trust me, I know. Pretty much everyone does,” I say and take a sigh.

Finn eyes me oddly for a moment, “What do you mean?”

I shrug, “I’m not a very popular person. At all. For some reason, people don’t like to be around me much. Not even my family it seems.”

I feel my face warm up at the embarrassment I feel for spilling all that to a stranger.

“You’re not the only one that feels that way,” Finn says breaking me out of my embarrassment.

I look up to Finn and for a moment it’s like looking in a mirror. The sad look in his eyes is one I’ve seen one too many times when looking in my own mirror.

“You’re not what I was expecting,” Finn says as he leans back onto the couch.

I frown, “What do you mean?”

Finn eyes me, “You’re my brother’s soulmate. They’re both cruel and monstrous…yet you’re, peculiar.”

I shake my head, “What does that have to do with Elijah or Klaus?” Finn nods his head, “They said you don’t know anything about your soul bond,” He says to himself, “With souls being connected, the soulmates usually share personality qualities…yet you don’t seem monstrous like either one of my brothers.”

At his continuing insult to Klaus and Elijah, tension builds in my shoulders, “Then you haven’t seen me in the morning,” I joke but Finn doesn’t seem to get it. Or doesn’t find it funny, “Klaus and Elijah don’t seem that horrible. I mean ya they do bad things but, if anyone were alive for one thousand years then I’m sure they would also pile up their own bad deeds.”

Finn seems to be annoyed by my answer as he huffs and goes to stand up.

“Do you have a soulmate?”

Finn stops moving in his tracks and instantly looks at me, “Why are you asking?”

I shrug my shoulders, “I don’t know…Just wondering.”

Finn seems like he’s not going to say anything, but at least he sits back down.

“I think once I did,” Finn’s voice comes out so quietly I have to lean forward to hear him.

“Before you were daggered?” Finn doesn’t meet my eyes but he nods, “Sage. Her name was Sage.”

I frown at his saddened voice, “You loved her?”

I sad smile forms on Finn’s face, “I did,” He pauses, “I do.”

I feel my heart breaking for the man before me.

“Was she human?”

Finn frowns, “She was. Until she had me turn her so we could be together,” He pauses and takes a shaky breath, “I was daggered shortly after.”

“And what happened to her?”

Finn’s jaw tightens, “Well, it was over 900 years ago…I’m sure she’s…”

I nod, sadly, “Right.”

We sit in solemn silence for a moment before an idea comes to me, “How are you so sure,” Finn looks up at me confused, “That she’s dead.”

Finn shakes his head, “She has to be.”

I shake my head as well, “Finn, it was 900 years ago. She would be incredibly strong, one of the strongest vampires to date. I would be surprised if she wasn’t alive and if she truly loved you, I think she would’ve waited for you.”

Finn looks at me and I can see the wheels turning in his head but he still shakes his head, “It’s not possible.”

I laugh, “Dude, werewolves, vampires, and witches exist. Nothing is short of impossible here.”

Finn stops shaking his head, “Even if she was…there’s no way I could find her.”

I stay quiet for a moment until an idea comes to my mind, “I have a friend. She’s a witch, a really good witch. Maybe…I could ask her and we could find her. All three of us.”

Finn stares at me for a long moment.

“Why would you do that? Why would you do that, for me?”

I give Finn a soft smile, “I’m kind of peculiar.”

Finn’s solemn face changes for the first time since I’ve seen him. His sorrowful eyes look almost…hopeful now.

“I’d appreciate that. Greatly.”

Finn and I smile at one another until the door opening makes me jump.

“Finn,” A feminine voice says and I turn and see a blond older woman.

“Mother,” Finn instantly jumps up.

“Mother?!”

I jump up shocked and stare at the older woman who eyes me, kind of nastily.

“What is going on here,” She asks Finn suspiciously and he pauses.

“Um, Mrs. Mikaelson,” I say and she goes back to eyeing me, “Hey, Y/n,” I point to myself, “Finn and I were just discussing new-age technology. I heard he’s new to this era so I thought me and I could chat about it.”

I turn to Finn, “This was a good chat. Let’s meet…tomorrow. We can discuss how to send text messages.”

Finn eyes me oddly like he doesn’t know what the hell I’m talking about, but he still nods.

“Great! Well,” I turn back to his mother, “Pleasure to meet you…I guess. I’ll be leaving now. Bye, Finn!”

I quickly speed-walk past both of them and exit the room. I close the door and take a deep breath.

“Y/n?”

“Oh come on!”

I turn around to see Rebekah walking towards me. Just like all other Mikeaslons, she looks absolutely gorgeous. The green dress she’s wearing matches perfectly with her blonde long hair.

“Are you alright?”

I nod and start to walk by her back to the party, “Peachy. Just happened to run into your mother. Tense lady.”

Rebekah walks up next to me and smiles, “Yes, my mother is an acquired taste. Don’t let her get to you though, you’re a part of this family.”

I shake my head viscously, “No I am not.”

“Yes you are,” She says as we enter the ballroom. An incredibly crowded ballroom.

“Literally, am not.”

“Sure, whatever you say,” Rebekah laughs.

We both watch the crowd of people dance, laugh, and talk.

“My brother has been looking for you,” She says and I groan.

“Ya? Which one?”

Rebekah smirks, “Elijah, and Nik.”

“Well, I don’t want to see either one.”

From the corner of my eye, I see Rebekah smirk, “Unluckily for you, I don’t think you have a choice,” At her tone, I look over to her and she nods her head to her left.

I follow her eyeline and let out another groan at the sight of Elijah making his way over to us.

“God it’s like he has a tracker on me,” I say sarcastically.

“Honestly, I wouldn’t put it past either of them,” Rebekah replies.

We both watch as Elijah approaches us with a content smile, “Good evening, ladies,” Elijah says with his perfect accent, “Rebekah, mother wants us on the staircase,” Elijah turns his attention towards his younger sister and she rolls her eyes.

“Fine,” Rebekah says sarcastically then turns to me, “It was lovely to talk to you, Y/n. We’ll chat soon.”

I nod silently and watch as she walks towards the staircase.

“I’ve been looking for you,” Elijah’s voice makes me close my eyes.

“Doesn’t mommy want you on that staircase?”

Elijah’s jaw tenses and he rolls his shoulders, “Behave, Elskan.”

I purse my lips, “Don’t tell me what to do, Suit and Tie.”

Elijah’s tense expression lightens, “Suit and Tie?”

I shrug, “You have a nickname for me. I think it’s only fair I have one for you, as well.”

“Suit and tie,” Elijah says to himself as if he’s seeing how it sounds, “Hmm. It’ll need work, but it’s fine for now.”

I fight back a smirk at his words, “Fine. I’ll workshop it.”

Elijah and I stand there for a moment and I feel his gaze on me the entire time.

“What did you and my younger brother talk about,” Elijah asks with a hint of skepticism in his voice.

“Oh, nothing,” I look at my nails as if I’m bored, “Just the fact that I supposedly have your and Klaus’ human souls in me.”

I smirk as I watch Elijah instantly tense up, “My brother was told not to talk to you about that.”

“Well, no one else wanted to keep their word and talk with me about it. So, I’m glad he did,” I cringe, “Actually…I’m not sure. I still have no idea what the hell is going on.”

Elijah nods, “Once again…I apologize that I was unable to make it last night. You should’ve heard that from me and not from…Kol,” He says the name and I can clearly tell how pissed off he is at his younger brother right now.

“But I did,” I harshly say, “And I still don’t have any clue what to make of it. It doesn’t make any sense.”

Elijah sighs, “I know, Y/n. And I promise you, that I will tell you everything you want to know,” His eyes travel behind me and he sighs, “Right after I deal with my family.”

I nod, “Elijah, your promises don’t mean anything until you start living up to them.”

Elijah sends me a saddened smile and nods, “And I look forward to doing that.”

I nod and with a final smile, Elijah walks up a grand staircase to meet his siblings.

“Uh, if everyone could gather, please,” Elijah addresses the crowd of people standing below him and his family.

As I gaze at each Mikaelson sibling I can’t help but hate them all for how hot they all are. Like seriously, the most supernatural thing in this town is this family's good looks.

Elijah stands before his family, confident and strong; Below him, walking up the stairs, Finn stands with a scowl on his face. Even with the scowl, no one could deny how attractive the eldest brother is; Rebekah who stands behind Finn is a bright light compared to her brother’s darker exteriors; Kol who stands at the top step chugging his bottle of champagne looks so boyishly handsome it could make even the most confident girl blush; and last Klaus. The bitch-ass hybrid stands in the middle of all his siblings as if nonverbally telling all of us looking up at them that he’s the one that deserves their utmost attention and respect.

As if he could read my thoughts, the bastard’s eyes trail to me. The calculative look on his face doesn’t change as he stares down at me and I don’t care enough to hide the glare I know I have on my face.

“Welcome,” Elijah’s voice calls my attention once again and I trail my eyes away from Klaus to his older brother, “Thank you for joining us. You know, whenever my mother,” Elijah gestures to the older blonde woman making her way down the steps and I hate to say it but she’s also pretty hot. A shitty fucking person, but pretty hot, “brings our family together like this, it’s a tradition for us to commence the evening with a dance. Tonight’s pick is a centuries-old waltz so if all of you could please find yourselves a partner,” Elijah’s eyes land right on me as he talks, “Please join us in the ballroom.”

I debate on running away before anyone can ask me to dance but as I watch Elijah practically hop down the steps, dodge women trying to ask for his hand, all while having his eyes stuck on me I can’t help but only try to fight back the grin on my face.

“Elskan,” Elijah gives me a smile that makes me want to curl up into a ball and scream, “I would be ever so delighted if you would join me for this dance.”

I look at Elijah’s outstretched hand and cringe, “I can’t dance. Let alone, Waltz.”

Elijah smiles blissfully, “Then let me show you.”

I bite my lip thoughtfully as I stare at him for a moment before relenting, “Fine,” I point at him, “But if I step on your fancy designer shoes I don’t want any complaining.”

Elijah’s smile doesn’t change as he chuckles, “I’d happily have all of my shoes ruined by you if it meant I’d never have to have a different dance partner again.”

I roll my eyes, trying to hide the fact that his words are making me lowkey freak the fuck out. So all I do is place my hand in his and let him lead me to the dance floor where other couples are lined up.

“I’m going to fall and make a fool out of myself” I whisper to myself as “Give Me Love” By Ed Sheeran starts playing.

“I’d never let you fall,” Elijah leans down and whispers in my ear and I gaze up to him.

“You’re pretty slick with your words. Y’know that right,” I joke and he shrugs.

“I’ve been told this once or twice,” He squeezes my hand and I’m glad the music is so loud because if it wasn’t I’d be sure every vampire in this room could hear how loud my heart was pounding.

Elijah guides me forward as the music starts and I try to copy the woman in front of me as she glides forwards. We turn forward, directly in front of Theo who is dancing with Mayor Lockwood and I let out a small snort. The glare on my little brother’s face shows that he doesn’t seem to find it as funny as me.

“Wait,” I look over to Elijah only to find it already looking at me, “You said whenever your mother brings your family together you have a dance… that crazy lady has been dead for 1,000 years.”

Elijah smirks at my observation, “A little white lie never hurt anyone.”

I roll my eyes, “Says the man who can’t die.”

Elijah squeezes my hand and without warning he twirls me. Being caught off guard I trip forward but thankfully Elijah pulls me back into him and I grab onto his chest.

“See, I told you I wouldn’t let you fall,” Elijah, who stands a breath away from me, smiles.

“I hate dancing,” I say exhausted.

Elijah looks over to the other couples for a moment and I do the same.

Elena and Damon are three couples away, engaged in whatever drama is paining them today. Rebekah and Matt are next to them, and I can’t help but admit how pretty they would be as a couple. My eyes continued trailing over other couples randomly; I stop when my eyes catch the light blue of Caroline’s dress.

Caroline stands holding onto Klaus as they twirl around. They appear to be in the middle of a conversation and for some reason, all I want right now is to know what the hell they could possibly be talking about. I’d also like to know why the hell he invited her. I didn’t understand him. The man who one day grips my thigh like it’s his life source and the next won’t even spare me a glance.

I feel Elijah squeeze my hand and I instantly feel horrible for thinking about another man while in his arms.

“What’s plaguing your thoughts, my love?”

The nickname has me choking on my saliva, only making Elijah smirk.

“You’ve really got to pick one nickname and keep with it,” I say trying to act more annoyed than flustered.

“I’ve waited for you for too long to have my feelings confined to just one word.”

All reservations I had are now off the table as I stare wide-eyed at the man in front of me.

“Elijah…I,” I start but then a tightness in his lower jaw stops me.

“I’m sorry, Elskan. We have to change partners now. But, I promise we will continue this discussion,” Elijah says and with a pained look, he twirls me.

I’m twirling until a strong hand on my lower back stops me, “Hello again, Darling.”

I raise an eyebrow at the youngest Mikaelson brother, “Hello, Kol.”

Kol seems to be delighted with my lack of enthusiasm as he swings me in his arms. Where Elijah kept a tight hold on me, Kol seems to have more enjoyment in flinging me around the dance floor.

“So I’ve been thinking,” Kol says thoughtfully and I roll my eyes.

“Here we go.”

Kol rolls his own eyes at my comment but still continues, “So you need protecting, and I don’t want to end up with another dagger in my chest. So…we should team up.”

I frown at his words, “Who do I need protecting from? And why do you think I could stop you from getting daggered?”

Kol looks at me like I’m stupid, “Darling, please tell me you’re smarter than this.”

At my silence, Kol closes his eyes and sighs, “Bloody hell.”

Kol shakes his head, “Alright, you’re important to my brothers. This means their enemies are going to be coming after you; hence why you need protection. And to answer your other question…I’m willing to bet another one hundred years of my life daggered that if you were to bat those pretty y/e/c eyes at either one of my brothers they would move mountains to make you happy. So…”

At Kol’s expectant look, I nod in understanding, “If I tell them I don’t want you daggered…”

Kol nods happily, “Then I’ll stay handsome and perfectly unharmed.”

I consider about Kol’s words.

“You may have Elijah and Klaus’ protection,” Kol’s eyes go behind me to where Theo is dancing with Rebekah, “But your little brother doesn’t.”

I look at Theo who is currently talking a mile a minute with a smiling Rebekah.

“Fine. You have a deal. You protect me, and more importantly, Theo, and I’ll back up. I don’t think Elijah or especially Klaus care enough to listen to me but I’ll try.”

Kol smirks devilishly but then frowns, “You’re joking right,” He must notice my confusion because he continues, “Bloody hell, you really don’t see how they look at you?”

I shake my head and Kol nudges his head to his left and I catch Elijah watching us with an intense look. I quickly look back to Kol and he raises an eyebrow.

“See?”

I shake my head, “Okay…maybe Elijah and I are friends…but Klaus doesn’t give a damn about me.”

Kol’s mouth drops open and I loud laugh escapes his throat, “Bloody hell, luv. You really are oblivious,” Kol shakes his head, “Let me just say this…I’ve never seen my bastard of a brother look at anyone the way he looks at you. It may not register in that thick skull of yours but it’s true. This whole world could be burning down and my brother would not let a single flame come near you,” Kol shrugs, “He probably was the one who started the fire but what I say still stands.”

I stare at the youngest brother with my mouth hung open and he laughs, “I’ve enjoyed trying to knock some sense into, Little Doll. We shall talk more about our deal later on… Good luck,” He smirks evilly, and without a moment for me to say anything back he thrusts me into another pair of strong arms.

A strong masculine smell of something woodsy enters my nose and I breathe it in with a sigh.

“I didn’t know if you were going to show,” That British voice that I know so well enters my ears and I let out a growl.

“Of course, it’s you,” I open my eyes to find myself in Klaus’ arms.

Klaus gazes down at me and I shoot a glare at Kol who isn’t looking at me but has a smirk on his face, “That fucker.”

“Many people have the same reaction when it comes to my little brother,” Klaus says with a smirk and I just glare at him.

I turn away from him, look to my side, and watch the other couples dance around us.

“Don’t ignore me,” Klaus’ rough voice calls to me and I turn to glare at him.

“I don’t care enough about you to even care about ignoring you. Let’s just get this stupid dance over with,” I bite and he glares back at me.

“Fine with me,” He growls back.

“Good.”

We both huff and continue glaring at each other until his eyes fall down to my chest.

“Where is it?”

I glance down at my chest and shake my head at him annoyed, “Where the hell is what?”

“Your necklace,” He insists, “Where is it?”

I look down at my diamond necklace and then back up to him, “Are you blind? I’m wearing it.”

Klaus growls under his breath, “Not that one. The wolf one.”

I lean back in surprise momentarily, “Why do you care?”

“Because I want you to wear it,” He says as if it was obvious.

“Why the fuck would you want me to…” I stop talking when the answer hits me like a truck.

“It was…” I release my hands from his quickly and grasp my neck, “It was from you wasn’t it?”

Klaus tries taking a step towards me but with every step he takes I take one back.

“Don’t come near me,” I shake my head and feel my breathing picking up.

I quickly run through the couples dancing, not caring about messing up this stupid dance as I run through the doors and out into a low-lit garden.

I run a hand through my hair taking out the little pins I had holding my hairstyles together and let my hair flow freely. I kick off my stupid heels and throw myself onto the grass, the cold ground calming my hot skin.

I close my eyes letting out a deep breath and lay down, resting my head on the ground. I look above me to the bright moon overhead and the stairs that surround it. A wave of sadness washes through me as I look at it. I’d always related to the moon. Always felt like she and I were the same. Alone, even though they were surrounded by so many others. The brightly lit stars had each other, thousands of them to hold on to one another, but there was only one moon. Where the stars had their own light and color, the moon only shone because it had the sun shining on it.

I close my eyes and let a small tear fall down my face. As I’m laying there I feel a warmth come next to me and place itself on the ground beside me. I don’t have to open my eyes to recognize who the owner of the woodsy scent is.

“When I was a boy,” Klaus’ low voice fills my ears, “My father would beat me for never being the way he wanted. I could never hold a sword the right way, couldn’t hunt enough animals, I wasn’t man enough in his eyes. Even though I was surrounded by siblings, I never truly felt like one of them,” Klaus stops for a moment and I open my eyes to look at him. To my slight surprise, he was lying right beside me on the grass, his left arm lifted under his head and his eyes staring straight up at the sky, “The only time I felt like I belonged was when it was just myself and the moon. I’d spent most of my boyhood cowering, but…whenever I gazed up at the moon, I felt as though I was something greater. Better. It’s been over a thousand years and I still gaze up at her, remembering how that scared little boy held onto it like a lifeline.”

Klaus stops talking and we lay there together, staring up at the moon.

“I’ve been alone a long time,” I say softly and I can see him turn his head out of the corner of my eye, “When I was little, maybe 8 or 9 I’d cry to my mother asking her why none of the other kids wanted to be around me. She’d just tell me it was because I was too mature for them. I never really believed her though. When I was 10, my father started drinking,” I let out a sigh as the words came out of my mouth, “He’d get angry when he drank. He’d swear at me and my mother and do other stuff. He’d tell me that I deserved to be alone. That people like me…there’s something wrong with people like me. That went on for a few years before my father finally decided that starting a whole new family sounded like a better idea than being with his first one. He may have left but his words didn’t. My mother at first told me that what he was saying wasn’t true. That “hurt people, hurt people.” But as I got older and saw that everyone around me seemed to find their places with each other, and I couldn’t ever seem to fit in, I started to realize that maybe my…father… was right. It wasn’t up until about a year or so ago that I began to be one with the loneliness. Or at least I like to tell myself that. When Elena came around I saw it almost as a threat to myself. To what I was used to. Why, after 17 years did someone finally decide to see me? Having friends now makes me feel like a hungry dog. I got a taste of what it felt like to be fed, but it doesn’t seem to be good enough for me. That’s why it’s better for me to ruin anything that can have a hold on me…Even if it can take away that hunger.”

Klaus is silent for a moment and so am I.

“After I turned…the moon wasn’t the only thing that kept away the loneliness,” Klaus says and I turn my head to gaze at him and he turns him to gaze at me, “You were.”

I furrow my eyebrows, “What are you talking about?”

Klaus reaches a hand up and runs a finger along my face as if he’s memorizing every aspect of it.

“At first it was just glimpses. Colors. Almost like a memory that didn’t belong to me. But every night as I’d dream the images would get clearer. Until one night I was staring into the most exquisite y/e/c I’d ever seen. I didn’t know who they belonged to yet. But for the first time in my life, I felt seen. I’m a monster who has done monstrous things, but yet these eyes looked at me like none of that mattered. Like I had finally been accepted, monstrous bits and all. So every morning when I awoke I’d draw them. And every night I’d dream of them. It wasn’t for another 300 years that I would learn that the eyes belonged to the human part of my soul. And when I found that out, I was angry. Furious even. I hated the thought that the only way someone would ever look at me like I was deserving of being understood was if they were a direct result of me.”

Klaus stops and I can practically hear my heartbeat thumping.

“So I burnt the pictures. Hid anything that reminded me of those eyes and hoped to never come across them for the rest of my eternity. And for 1,108 years I had accomplished that…until one Friday afternoon, in a tiny high school where I locked eyes with that y/e/c. And everything I’d work for became nothing. It was like I was seeing everything for the first time. I was once again that little boy running from himself begging for someone to save him. Because I knew the longer I looked into those y/e/c eyes, the sooner I was doomed.”

Klaus grabs my chin and makes me look into his eyes, “You, Y/n Y/l/n have doomed for me for an eternity,” His eyes search mine, “And no matter how much I try to fight it, fight you, I can’t help but spend every waking moment hoping for you. Hoping for my promised destruction.”

I stare wordlessly at the man in front of me. I keep opening my mouth and closing it but I can’t seem to find the right words.

“I think I’m going to have a panic attack,” I sit upright quickly and clench my chest. I hear Klaus sit up next to me and clutch my shoulders.

“Y/n, just breathe,” He soothes and I think I am having a stroke because what the actual fuck is happening right now.

“I’m so confused.”

Klaus brushes my hair away from my face, “I know this must be hard for you. I didn’t plan on telling you like this…I actually didn’t plan on telling you at all. But when I saw that anger on your face,” he pauses, “Anger that was directed at me, for the first time in my life I felt sick. So I needed to tell you, that even if you may hate me…I could never hate you. And for as long as I live, you will never be alone again.”

I feel tears brim my eyes as I look over and up to him and shake my head, “If you feel this way then why did you invite Caroline? Clearly, you don’t feel the way you say,” I try to deny.

Klaus’s expression darkens, and he once again grabs my chin. “Do not for a moment try to tell me how I feel about you. The only reason I invited your blonde friend was because Elijah had already claimed you as his date. You can also ask your blonde friend, but the entire night all I did was ask her questions about you. I heard she can’t keep a secret for her life and so I picked her brain about you. If my older brother hadn’t gotten to you first…you would’ve been with me tonight.”

I try to process what he just said and I feel a panic attack come on, “I…I…but…I,” I continue shaking my head as I stand up and Klaus follows, “You and Elijah are just playing some sick joke on me right? As a way to get back at Elena? Mess with the mentally ill non-verbal best friend. Get her to hate herself for getting all flustered over two brothers! Fucking brothers!”

“I can assure you, Elskan. That is not the case,” I whip around to see Elijah walking down the steps into the garden.

I rub a hand over my face and start walking around in a circle as the two brothers stand next to one another, watching.

“I mean, come on! You guys have to see how crazy this is right? I mean what kind of whore gets feelings for brothers!”

Klaus and Elijah’s faces darkened and I hear Klaus release a low growl.

“Dont. Ever. Call yourself a whore,” Elijah takes a step forward and continues speaking with a deadly tone, “My brother has said his peace to you, and in due time I will as well. But don’t for a moment think that you should hate yourself for something that fate has put in front of you.”

I continue to stand there like a fish out of water, not knowing what the hell to say next. Thankfully, my saving grace comes in the form of a loud crashing sound coming from upstairs, capturing our attention.

“Shouldn’t we go check that out,” I point up with a shaking hand.

“Don’t for a second think that we won’t be discussing this further,” Elijah informs me and I have to fight back the weird feeling in my chest at his commanding tone.

I nod and Elijah comes towards me and reaches out a hand for me to take. Klaus steps forward and does the same. I stare at both of their hands and swallow my doubts as I place a hand in each and let them guide me upstairs towards the front door where my friends and their siblings are standing.

I quickly drop my hands from theirs as Elena turns towards me. Thankfully, it doesn’t seem she saw anything as she sends me a small smile.

Damon stands above Kol’s dead body with an enraged look.

“Fucking idiot,” I mutter.

“You’ve got that right,” My little brother says as he comes to stand next to me.

Damon looks over all of us before landing his eyes on me, “Pukey, we’re leaving,” Damon’s tone is harsh but something in his eyes makes my heart tug.

“She is not going anywhere with you,” Elijah says with a dark voice that has everyone looking at him.

I shake my head, “It’s ok,” I turn to Theo and hand him my *Stefan’s* car keys, “I’ll see you at home, okay?”

Theo looks at me like I’ve got two heads but still nods.

I look over to where Klaus and Elijah are practically seething and sigh.

“Let’s go, Freak,” I run over to Damon and grab his arm leading him away from everyone and out into the parking lot.

As soon as we’re out of sight from everyone I see Damon’s shoulders instantly drop and I turn to glare at him.

“You’ve seriously got the worst survival instinct, of anyone I’ve ever met,” I say with a hand on his hip.

“I’m never going to be the one,” Damon lets out with a shaky sigh and I instantly drop my disappointed mother act.

“What happened?”

I take a step closer to him and he shakes his head.

“Elena.”

I take a deep sigh and nod, “Of course.”

Damon lifts his head to look at me, “You look like how I feel,” He says trying to be sarcastic but I can hear the pain in his voice.

“I’ve had a rough night too, my friend. Movie night at yours,” I question as I wrap my arm around his, and his upper lip twitches.

“You called me your friend.”

I roll my eyes and let him lead me to his car, “Shut up.”

455 notes · View notes

honeyedmiller · 1 year ago

Text

Ring | Joel Miller

pairing: husband!joel x wife!reader

warnings: tommy’s being a little shit lol, marriage, reader is unintentionally oblivious for a bit, no outbreak, reader is depicted to be shorter than joel, au where ellie is joel and reader’s adopted daughter but she’s only very briefly mentioned, smut (bathroom quickie), slight jealousy, no use of y/n. 18+, minors dni.

word count: 2k

synopsis: Tommy teases Joel about you and him having marriage problems when he notices you aren’t wearing your ring.

quick one shot in honor of 700 followers??? oh my god?? i love u all sm thank you!!!

this was honestly kinda poorly written. forgive me :’)

“Hey big brother, what’s up with you and your girl?” Tommy asks, brows furrowed as he leans up against the counter next to Joel.

“Hell are ya talkin’ about, Tommy?” Joel continues to chop onions for the barbecue you guys were throwing today.

“Are you guys, I dunno, having marriage problems?” Tommy quirks a brow, and Joel halts his movements. He sets the knife down on the counter while averting his gaze up to his brother, expression clearly displaying pure annoyance.

Tommy might’ve bugged the shit out of Joel, but he knew he had good intentions. So why the hell would he be asking this?

“What makes you say that?” Joel crosses his arms over his chest now, waiting for Tommy to spew some bullshit at him.

“She’s not wearin’ her ring.” Tommy shrugs, and Joel’s permanent furrowed brow lines deepen even further.

“The hell she ain’t. She always wears her ring.” Joel argues back.

“Go see for yourself big brother.” Tommy gestures outside, where Joel pushes past him and slides open the glass door to find you at the cooler talking with some random new guy from the neighborhood. Joel noticed that he was trying to flirt with you, and being the naturally kindhearted and welcoming person you were, you didn’t catch on.

Joel also noticed that Tommy was right—you weren’t wearing your ring.

If there was one thing that Joel learned from you over the years you’ve been together and three years married, it was how to properly communicate his feelings. He used to be so closed off and would bottle everything up, letting stuff bother him until he became so distant.

You weren’t having any of that, though, so you sat him down one day and told him that you needed proper communication between you both. You were a saint with Joel, being so patient and kind to him as he was trying to unlearn his previous ways of shutting himself out from everyone around him when he didn’t exactly know how to communicate something.

Some days were harder than others, but ever the sweetheart you are, you never rushed him or got irritated when he couldn’t exactly seem to form his words to you. You just held him and kissed him repeatedly, letting him know it was okay and he could take his time.

This time around, he didn’t seem to have a single bit of a problem telling you what he was feeling. So, he walked up to you and wrapped his arms around your waist, kissing your temple to show the man that was so clearly interested in you that you were taken.

“Hey darlin’.” Joel rasps into your ear, kissing your shoulder afterward.

“Hey baby. This is Dominic. He’s new to the neighborhood. Dominic, this is my husband, Joel.”

Joel sported a shit-eating grin when Dominic’s body went rigid at the word husband. Joel stuck his hand out to him, and Dominic apprehensively shook his hand. Joel’s grip was firmer than it regularly was, and Dominic flinched in the slightest.

“Thanks for keeping my beautiful wife some company while I got stuff ready for the grill.” Joel’s voice dripped with sarcasm, and you looked up at him with a quirked brow.

He offered you a tight-lipped smile when his gaze met yours, clearing his throat. “Can I steal you for a minute, baby?” He asks, arms possessively wrapping around your frame. You nod, confused as to why Joel was acting a bit strange suddenly.

He intertwines your hand with his, and you excuse yourself from Dominic as Joel led you into the house and up to your bedroom.

“What’s this about, Joel?” You question as he closes the bedroom door, locking it behind him.

“Where’s your wedding ring at, baby?” He asks, looking down at you. A glint of something flashes across his eyes, but you couldn’t put your finger on what.

“‘S in my jewelry box. I didn’t wanna lose it helping around the backyard today or swimming if I did, so I knew it would be safe in there instead. Why?” Your curiosity is piqued.

Joel slowly maneuvers himself past you and over to your jewelry box, opening the top of it to firstly find your wedding ring neatly placed.

He takes the ring out of the jewelry box and walks over to you, grabbing your left hand to slip it onto your ring finger once more. Right where it belongs, perfectly fitted. He brings your hand up to his mouth, kissing your knuckles softly.

“Tommy’s bein’ a little shit, as always. Came into the kitchen with assumptions that we were having ‘marriage problems’ because you weren’t wearing your ring.” He tsked, shaking his head.

You rolled your eyes and scoffed.

“Y’gotta stop letting Tommy get into your head, J. I love you, I’m yours, and I’m not going anywhere.” You reassured him, and his lips curled up in the slightest.

“I know baby, I just can’t help but feel jealous when I see another man flirting with my woman.”

“Jealous? Of who?” You were puzzled at Joel’s confession, resting a steady hand on his warm chest.

“That new neighbor. Dylan or whatever the fuck his name is.” Joel spat.

You had no idea Dominic was even flirting with you. You thought he was just being friendly. Fuck, maybe Joel was right. Maybe you are oblivious sometimes.

You wrap your hands around the back of his neck, pulling him down so his lips envelope yours. One hand of his is splayed over the small of your back while the other rests on the outside of your thigh, rubbing small circles into your exposed skin. The dress you were wearing today was just another distraction for Joel and a reminder that he needed to behave himself or else the whole neighborhood would hear you saying his name like a prayer on Sunday morning.

Joel’s cock stirred at the thought, and he groaned into the kiss. You pulled apart from him and moved your hands down to his chest again.

“C’mon cowboy, people are gonna wonder where we’re at.” You grin, going to the bedroom door to unlock it. You were about halfway down the hallway before Joel tugged you into the bathroom on your right side.

“They can wait.” He closed the door and pressed you up against it, locking the lock before smashing his lips to yours.

There was so much hunger behind his kiss. You felt slick start to pool onto your panties, the want in your core licking a flame up your body. You moan into the kiss, gripping the back of his head to mold yourself even further into him. It was nothing but teeth clashing, lips smacking, and fervor for one another as the kiss continued.

“Gotta make this quick, babydoll.” Joel finally broke the kiss as you softly whined, and he turned you around to move you in front of the wide mirror. You met his gaze through the reflection, nothing but hunger in his eyes.

He lifted up your dress and pulled your panties down your legs in one swift motion. His middle finger wasted no time in collecting the slick arousal between your legs, causing you to moan softly.

“Always so ready for me, baby.” Joel chuckled darkly as he brought his middle finger up to suck your arousal off of it. He looked you right into the reflection of your eyes as he did so. The sight was nearly pornographic.

You bite your lip and plead with your eyes; please please please just fuck me, Joel.

His middle finger made its way back down to your slick cunt before he pushed it into you, pumping languidly. He curled his thick finger to hit the spot that drove you wild, and you found yourself gripping onto the counter for dear life. You decided, though, that his finger just wasn’t enough in this moment.

“Please, J. I need you.”

“Need you too, baby.” Joel got the message clear as day, unbuckling his belt and undoing his zipper and jeans button in record time, pulling down the fabric along with his boxers. His painful erection sprung free, and he lined himself up with your throbbing, aching cunt.

He easily found home in you as he sunk to the hilt, groaning at how good you felt around him.

“Be a good girl for me and tell me who you belong to.” Joel’s voice was dark, teetering on the line of possessive. You found it hot, though.

“Y-Yours, Joel. ‘M all yours.” You can barely say your words as he starts to rock his hips, deliciously stretching you out every time his hips collided with your ass.

“That’s it, baby, mine. No one else’s. Perfect little pussy is mine, you’re mine, mine.” He gritted into your hair, pulling you back against him by your waist as he rocked his hips up into you. You leaned your head back on his shoulder, moaning his name softly.

“Gotta be quiet, baby, can’t have anyone hearin’ us now.” Joel kissed you sloppily to hide your lewd moans, hips snapping up into you.

“Fuck, Joel, feel s’good.” Your words start to mesh together like you’re absolutely cock drunk.

Joel bends you back down over the sink and gently wraps his hand around your throat, forcing you to look up into the mirror as he pounds into you from behind.

“So fuckin’ beautiful. Takin’ me so well, sweet girl. Been teasin’ me with this little dress on all day.” Joel lets go of your throat and slides his hand down to your front, rubbing your clit in fast, circular motions.

You barely have time to process that your body is about to give into Joel’s expert touch. You squeeze your eyes shut, jaw falling completely slack as you let out an accidental loud moan. Joel didn’t even stop you that time, because he himself was already on the brink of an orgasm.

“Cum with me, my love.” Joel groans into your ear. You both let go and just let it happen, praying that the music playing in the backyard is loud enough to cover your wanton moans as you both come down from your orgasms. Joel was reluctant to move out of you at first, but he couldn’t take the way you were clenched down on him anymore.

You were so fucking intoxicating and if it were his choice, he’d gladly be buried into your sweet, warm cunt all of the time.

Reality trickled back in around you both as he pulled out of you with a groan, both breathless and panting. After readjusting and redressing himself, he grabbed a washcloth from the cabinet above the toilet and wet it, wiping down the excess of his remnants on the apex of your inner thighs. He planted a kiss on the back of your thigh, pulling your panties up on you as he stood back up.

He helped fix your hair and readjusted you so you looked almost completely normal, albeit your face felt hot and you had a post-fuck look on your face.

He brought you into his chest, wrapping his arms around your shoulders as he kissed your hair.

“I love you, baby.” He murmurs softly, rocking you for a minute.

“I love you too.” Your reached your left hand up to hook onto his forearm that was wrapped around you, giving it a squeeze. Your ring glinted in the sunlight that pooled into the bathroom window, and Joel smiled happily.

“We’ll continue this later tonight, baby. Maybe Sarah and Ellie can spend the night at a friend’s house tonight.”

Your lips curl into a smile at his suggestion, and you lean up to kiss his cheek.

“Let’s get back out to the party.” He pats your ass and opens the door, coming out after you. You make your way down the stairs, Joel hot on your trail.

Tommy gives Joel a knowing look of ‘I know exactly what you two were up to.’

Joel scoffs at Tommy and grumbles as he moves past his younger brother.

“Marriage problems my ass.”

tag list: @party-hearses ; @nostalxgic ; @ilovepedro ; @bastardmandennis ; @tinygarbage ; @cool-iguana

#joel miller #joel miller one shot #joel miller imagine #joel miller imagines #joel miller smut #joel miller au #joel miller fanfiction #joel miller fic #joel miller x female reader #joel miller x wife!reader #joel miller x f!reader #joel miller x afab!reader

1K notes · View notes

woahjo · 9 months ago

Text

The People We Became (Bakugou x Reader)

masterlist | ao3

Pairing: Bakugou x Reader

Summary: Zombie Apocalypse Au.

The world fell apart almost a year ago and you refused to go with it. Left alone and to your own devices in a world full of monsters, where the dead come back to life, you believe that maybe surviving isn't living.

When Katsuki finds you alone in the woods and on the precipice of collapsing from exhaustion, he decides to bring you back to the house his group calls home. Against your better judgement and hesitancy to become attached, you decide to stay. In this world, everyone has lost someone. No soul is spared the violence, and you start sleeping with Bakugou Katsuki to dull the ache. Somehow, peace finds you anyway, but not without sacrifice.

Chapter Content Warnings: fem!reader, gender neutral pronouns, strangers to lovers, violence typical of zombies, blood, gore, romance, slow-ish burn (for the emotional stuff), angst, kissin', questions of identity, loss, grief, graphic depictions of death and/or violence, mentions and descriptions of starvation/exhaustion typical of an apocalypse setting, very slight implications of possible sexual violence typical of an apocalypse setting, derealization, depersonalization, weapons (guns, blades, and traps), loss of identity

All content warnings can be found on ao3 with the rest of the series.

Word Count: 14.4k — 53k total on ao3

A/N: it's finally done... i'm sweating. i screamed. i cried. i bled. you know the drill. i am posting this a little differently than my other fics and series. only the first chapter will be posted here on tumblr (this post), with the rest of it broken up into chapters and posted on ao3.. purely because it was originally meant as a one shot and i don't like posting chapters on tumblr. it's not built for that and im tired. anyway, im nervous this is my new baby and im pretty sure my soul is somewhere in here. if u read this, pls come tell me what you think.. it fuels me. enjoy, cry, sweat, or whatever else you do when you read. as always, thank you and i love you.

Two hundred and seventy six. It’s been two hundred and seventy six days since the world completely went to shit. You don’t really count the initial outbreak. The initial outbreak was relatively contained once people found out about it. You quarantined. You stayed inside. All it really took were a handful of idiots. Someone selfish. Someone who panicked and ran instead of facing the world honorably, and that was it. It only took days to lose almost every semblance of a normal life and a week to lose everything else.

The light of your fire is dim, embers burning low as you sit in a foldable chair beside it. The chair is from a friend, someone you’re not with anymore and who went somewhere you couldn’t follow, and you've got a metal spatula in your hand. You're not sure why you grabbed it when you fled, but panic does weird things to the mind. You absentmindedly wonder why you’ve brought it along with you all this time. There’s no logical reason for you to tote the thing around. A friend had told you how strange it was that you thought to toss it into your bag and continue carrying it. This, along with a few other oddities, are all you managed to take from your house when the world fell to ruin. Everything else are things scavenged along the way or from people you'd met, joined, and lost.

Maybe it’s because the spatula is somewhat normal, like somehow when you cook the game on your makeshift tin over your shitty fire, you can pretend you’re in your kitchen. A smash burger sounds good right now, with grilled onions on a brioche bun like the ones from the place by your apartment.

The night is near silent and trees creak and crack like the hulls of great ships under heavy pressure, but the birds don't sing and nothing in the crowded wood you're taking shelter in makes a sound. Well, except for you and the gentle crackle of your fire.

It’s easy to miss the noise that used to irritate you when the world goes quiet. You used to hate the sounds and lights of passing trucks when they’d cross on the street below your apartment window. Now, you’d do anything for the familiar comfort. The world is so dark and quiet, like it’s holding its breath and waiting for this to be over. The silence is almost too much, so loud that it hurts your ears. You huddle closer to the fire, craving its quiet sound. Focusing on it lessens the anxiety of the other noises. The ones you don’t want to hear.

Your head is on a swivel. It has been for months. Ever since the outbreak, ever since the dead rose and began consuming and infecting the living, you've kept watch. A paranoid, never ending cycle that you suppose—if left on your own—will burn itself out. You swallow thick and return your attention to the fire, watching the tree line just in front of you for any hint of movement or monsters.

A branch cracks just behind you. A swift sound, followed by rapid footsteps. You stand, quickly turning your head, only to see a figure a few feet away from you. They move quickly and the dancing light of the fire obscures their features from view. Their eyes, most importantly. You can always tell if someone is dead or alive based on their eyes and the sounds that their joints make. In this light, should this stranger have that milky white film over them, you wouldn't be able to tell.

You make a small noise, something between a whimper and a shout, as the person comes to a stop in front of you and holds a flashlight directly into your face. You squint, panic in your veins as your eyes adjust as best they can to the sudden assault. It takes you a moment to realize that there is a gun pointed directly at your forehead. The living. This person is alive. You're not sure yet if encountering one of the dead would have been worse.

"Shut up and drop your weapon," he says in a hurried voice. It's aggressive and threatening. It comes from deep in his chest, like somehow fear has gripped and mutilated it into something violent.

You raise your shaky hands to your head quickly at the order, screwing your eyes shut in the beam of the flashlight.

"It's not a weapon!" you shout, voice cracking. "It's a spatula. It's a spatula."

The words are rushed and heavy, fear seizing your chest as you look down the barrel of the gun. The flashlight turns off, sending you back into the dark. Your eyes fight to adjust, catching the firelight that glints off of the barrel, and you begin to makeout the man’s features. He's big, blonde under the grime, you think. A man, not the best thing to encounter alone at night in times like these.

You see him hesitate for a moment, eyes darting between you and the silver kitchen item in your hand. You drop it quickly, hoping to appeal to his humanity.

"Do you have a weapon on you?" he questions, voice a little less urgent.

You shake your head in response and then shakily look beside the chair, choking out the word “ground”. There's a knife there and a pistol with no bullets. You're a poor shot and you had run out of ammo the previous week. He glances at it, the gun still raised at you, and sidesteps to grab the two items. When he does, he cautiously lowers the weapon and you start to lower your trembling hands.

Then, as if struck by some realization, the man stomps towards the fire and you jump as he does.

"The fuck are you doing lighting a fire this late?" he says angrily, opening the clip of your pistol. "And with no fucking bullets. Those things may be dead, but they can still fuckin' see. That's a good way to get yourself killed."

He stomps out the fire as he talks, urgently stamping out what's left of the low-burning logs.

"I didn't think there were many in the area," you justify, furrowing your eyebrows as you step away from him.

"And that's a risk you want to take?" he says indignantly. You wonder briefly what business he has worrying about you.

"What do you want?" you snap, "My food? Weapons? Life? What is it?"

The man scoffs, "Jesus, none of that. I don’t want your shit."

You narrow your eyes and take a step back. One thing this world has done is remove trust from every chance encounter, and that was already hard enough when the place was sane.

"Not all people who camp out in the woods are good," he says. "But I sure as shit didn't expect to find someone like you alone lighting a damn fire. Stupid."

"There were others," you say indignantly, like somehow that makes it better. "Force of habit, I guess."

The man pauses for a moment as understanding passes between the two of you. It's a relatable feeling. Everyone has lost someone now.

"Got a name?" he asks.

You hesitate in giving it to him and the pause causes him to roll his eyes. “You want me to call you Idiot-with-no-bullets instead?”

You give him your name and the man nods as if he likes the sound of it, turning it over in his head before inhaling.

"I'm Katsuki," he furrows his eyebrows. "You're alone?"

You nod, swallowing down the grief that pushes at your throat.

"Wasn't always," you respond, "but yeah. Now, I am."

He nods his understanding.

"Come with me."

"Where?" you say instinctively, a defensive edge to your voice. Katsuki looks at you as if you’re stupid, or maybe it's pity, like you're a wounded animal. Probably both.

"Where the fuck do you think?" he retorts. "We've got a camp a little ways from here. I saw your fire from the watch post we have stationed."

You look at him like he's a little crazy for even thinking to bring you. Kindness, especially the selfless type, is so rare now and you find it difficult to believe that he’s willing to take you there at no cost.

He scoffs and rolls his head over his shoulder. "Look, we've got men and women," then he pauses. "Used to have children. We're not gonna hurt you. World's gone to shit, do you really wanna keep at it alone?"

He's probably right. You've been alone for weeks now, exhausted for longer, and though your common sense tells you not to go off with a strange man in this kind of world, the promise of rest is far too tempting. You nod and glance back to your camp. A measly collection of supplies haphazardly put together. You suppose that it doesn’t look so promising.

"We'll come back for it when it's light," he says. "I don't know about you, but I'd rather not spend longer in these dark ass woods than I have to."

"Okay," you say. The presence of another person both sets you on edge and makes you feel the press of fatigue even more. A gun's barrel on your nose followed by the promise of safety and you're going with him? You must be stupider than a horror movie protagonist. "Do you take in a lot of strays?"

Katsuki looks over his shoulder and you think you see him smile a little at the phrase.

"If that's what you want to call it," he says begrudgingly. Then, with a softer tone of voice, barely noticeable with the quiet whisper you both have been speaking at. "I'm sure the others won't mind one more."

You nod a little and follow him through the wood, stepping over obstacles. Your eyes have adjusted to the dark, but you feel unsteady on your feet. Everything you’ve ever learned about this world tells you that maybe you shouldn’t go with him. What if they’re dangerous? It’s easy to lie about women and children, about a community that doesn’t exist. Or worse, it’s easy to fool yourself that where you are is good, but you don’t know yet if he’s the type to delude himself. He doesn’t seem it.

The two of you walk for what feels like forever, even if it is only a little over half a mile. Your feet have been aching for days and every step you take feels like a blade into the heel. Katsuki seems steady, his gun secured at his hip and a large knife in his dominant hand. He doesn’t have the flashlight out, but he seems sure-footed and takes every step in stride, as if he’s too heavy to be swayed by any missed step.

As you move, you can barely make out his back in the white tank top he wears. You use it as a landmark, following the glowing white as it catches the light from the moon. Like chasing a ghost through the trees.

Then, the wood eases up. The trees grow sparse and the suffocating humidity of the forest eases into a more breathable, open-air breeze. Katsuki steps out into a clearing. It’s relatively small, for how large the world is, but it’s some of the most open space you’ve seen in a while. The feeling of stepping out into the tall grass, where you’re both visible to any wandering thing, sends a rush of fear through you.

By the edge of the clearing, there’s a small house with a short steeple. It almost looks like a Christian church, but you get the sense that it’s likely a barn. That must be the watchtower and you wonder just how good the view of the forest is from up there if Katsuki managed to see the light of your fire. How many other people had seen your fires over the weeks and not made it out to confront you? How close had you come before to safety or annihilation?

"Hey!" a girl's voice calls. "He's back!"

In the near distance, you can see a large and dimly lit house. It looks a little worn down, but soft and hardly noticeable light emanates from it in a way that makes it seem inviting.You can’t make out its exact silhouette and night blurs just how broken-down it is, but you can tell that people live there in the same way you can tell when someone has just left a room.

Someone runs across the field to you both. It looks like a man and a woman, maybe around Katsuki's age. They move quickly through the tall grass and for a moment, the urgency that they move with frightens you. You worry that your presence will ignite some protective sort of panic. You linger back, letting Katsuki grow a little farther from you as they call out to him.

“Yeah, yeah," he half-shouts, no longer seeming to care about keeping quiet. Guess that's what happens when there's a group. "I found the fire I mentioned."

The two come to a stop in front of him, resting their hands on their hips as they catch the breath they lost.

"We started to get a little worried," says the girl. She's pretty, with big eyes and curly hair that looks like it probably used to be dyed. "You've been gone for a while."

"Well, I'm back," he says.

"And you brought a friend," the other man says, sounding shocked. His tone is noticeably kind. The boisterous type of kind and when he smiles, you can see that he has sharp canines. His hair is straight, sticking out in different directions, and tinged with red in this light.

"More like an acquaintance," Katsuki says. “I found them in the woods with a fire and an empty clip. Felt like their blood would be on my hands if I didn’t bring them back.” The red-haired man gives him a telling look and Katsuki scoffs in response and turns to the girl. "Get them settled, Mina, will you?" The girl called Mina nods and Katsuki takes off toward the house without another word.

"You're lucky," she says, pausing when you flinch as she steps closer. "You're gettin' the last solo room in the place. Kirishima, is it set up?"

Kirishima shrugs his shoulders. "You'd have to ask Izuku. He'd know all about that, but I can go check."

Mina shakes her head and turns her attention to you, giving you a quick once over with her eyebrows pulled together.

"You must be tired.”

When you nod, she gives you an empathetic smile and motions for you to come with her. "We'll fix that. You hungry?"

"What do you think?" you manage, saliva pooling in your mouth. "Do you have food?"

"Plenty," she smiles. "not quite enough for leftovers just yet though, don’t tell anyone."

You smile awkwardly. Who on earth would you tell?

"Sounds like a good deal," you say.

You follow Mina up to the house. Around it, there are a few parked cars. They look like they could pull out at any moment, and through the dust covered windows, you can just make out supplies in the back seats as you pass. In the distance, you can see the fuzzy silhouette of the barn you’d assumed was a watchtower in the dark of the field and you figure that maybe it used to be a place to keep livestock.

Mina doesn't say much to you as you pass through the field, and when you walk into the door, the first thing you notice is a large group of people seated at a dining table. They all look up at you when you enter and it's with a bit of shock that you register their faces as healthy. Well, healthier. These people live well. Something stirs in your chest, both anxiety and excitement at the thought of possibly having found somewhere safe. They blink at you for a moment, exchanging looks that all end up landing on Katsuki.

"This is the group. Well, most of us," Mina says pleasantly and with a light huff. "That's Izuku, Denki, Ochako, Sero, and you already know the handsome guy on the end there. Kiri's probably checking to see if the room is half decent.." They all greet you with a glad murmur. "Group, this is..."

She looks at you expectantly. When you tell them your name, you can't help but look at Katsuki who already knows it. He raises his eyebrows unconsciously and turns his attention to the glass in front of him.

There’s an awkward pause as you stand in the doorway, suddenly conscious of just how dirty you must look. Remnants of an older world, you suppose. No one really worries about things like that anymore.

“Uhm…” you search for something to say, but your people skills seem to have left you.

“You’re okay,” Mina says lightly. “Plenty of time to get to know you when you’ve rested and had something to eat.”

Mina sits you down at a chair that she pulls in from the other room. It doesn't match the other ones in the dining room, but you suppose no one is really thinking of the decor in their house anymore. It's only now that you realize the house has electricity.

"You have power?" you say incredulously, looking at the center light in the dining room on its low setting.

"Mhm," Mina hums as she sits down next to you and spoons a helping of vegetables onto your plate. "It's got a generator. We got lucky finding this place. I don't think many of us would be alive if we hadn't."

Those listening in the group nod their affirmation.

"It draws from well water too," she adds. "With the right care, the place practically runs on its own. Hard work but what isn't nowadays?"

“Like you do any of the heavy lifting," Sero scoffs across from her.

"That's not fair," Katsuki adds with a slick smirk, "you know damn well none of our vegetables would be so well socialized if she didn't use them like a damn diary all day."

The group laughs a little and Mina rolls her eyes and sits back in the chair. You avoid looking at anyone, shoveling the food into your mouth. You’re salivating an almost embarrassing amount, struggling to eat at a normal pace. There’s something about food cooked inside, about the way food tastes when you can smell it wafting in from the kitchen.

"Don't worry," she turns to you, as if you’re at all concerned with the implication that she doesn’t do much work, "they know we’d hardly have vegetables at all if it weren't my job to tend them. I used to garden quite a bit before all of this."

Sero tosses her a sideways glance and you get the sense that maybe it isn’t just her doing it.

"Mina does a lot of the garden stuff," Ochako pitches in, her voice hesitant. "We all sort of just do what we can."

You can’t really keep up with the conversation and instead just blink at her for a moment before turning back to your food. Maybe that’s rude, but you don’t have the energy to consider it. There’s food in front of you. Food that doesn’t taste like it’s been poorly slaughtered or rotting in a cabinet for months.

The group at the table with you shifts back into what you feel is their normal conversation and you watch them through your peripheral. You can’t relax yet, maybe you never will. Always on watch with your guard up.

They pass the dishes around the table, plates going from hand to hand over mismatched sets of silverware. The action feels strange to you. Your chest squeezes at the thought. Just a few weeks ago, you’d done this around a fire with the people you loved. You’d passed a too-hot-to-touch pot around a circle of friends, laughing quietly at the little moments of joy you could find. It feels far away now and jealousy rouses beside hope as you sit.

“So, where did you come from?” Izuku at the end of the table asks.

It takes you a moment to realize that he’s talking to you and there’s an edge to his voice that has everyone at the table sitting up with curiosity. You stare at him for a moment, exhausted and defeated and unable to muster the words.

“Leave them be,” Katsuki says, looking up from his plate. “They just got here. They’re probably freaked out.”

The table goes a little quiet, a hush falling over it. You look around as glances are exchanged before Mina stands up quickly and quietly claps her hands together.

“I think,” she says with an awkward laugh, “it may be time for bed.”

Mina turns to you. “I’ll show you where you can sleep.”

You nod, standing up and turning to the group with furrowed eyebrows. You want to thank them, to tell them that you’re grateful for the meal and their kindness, but the words don’t come. Instead, you meet Katsuki’s gaze, grateful for the intervention, but suspicious at such forthcoming kindness. He scoffs a little and turns away.

—

“It’s just up here,” Mina says as she guides you through the house.

You pass rooms with their doors ajar. They are lived in, with unmade beds and glasses of clean water on nightstands. It’s like something out of a life gone by, with a few less amenities. You can imagine a family moving through this house. Girls in school uniforms calling through the halls about a stolen hair clip. Now, you picture these people doing that. Living and not just surviving.

“The bathroom is across the hall,” she says. “You can take a shower if you want. I’ll leave a towel and some clothes in there just in case.”

You nod.

“No worries if you don’t,” Mina adds in a whisper. “When I first met everyone, I didn’t undress to bathe for days so… take your time. We won’t be offended.”

She shuts the door behind her when she leaves and you stumble back onto the bed, shocked by just how soft it feels after spending weeks on the floor. It’s not much, but it’s nicer than anything you’ve experienced in the last nine months, and there's a working shower. You haven’t had a shower since everything fell apart and the layer of grime on your skin is so thick that you can feel it. You haven’t felt safe enough to properly wash since you’d lost the rest of your group, only stopping to rinse your body in streams you pass if the thought occurred to you. The idea of running water and a shower is near euphoric.

You probably shouldn’t. It may not be wise to shower tonight. You still don’t know these people or what they’re capable of, but the temptation of being clean is too great and as soon as you hear Mina close the bathroom door and walk away, you hurry across the hall on the balls of your feet.

The bathroom looks old and the sink is white porcelain, eggshell now with a lack of care. The shower has a bathtub in it and though it’s cloudy, there’s a mirror over the sink where you catch the first clear glimpse you’ve had of yourself in weeks.

You don’t know who you’re looking at. The person in the mirror is nearly unrecognizable. Their eyes are wide and frightened, wild like an animal’s, and their face is covered in a layer of grime that looks like it can never be washed out. Their hair is unruly, sticking out in some areas and matted down with blood in others. This is a person you’ve never seen or met before. Someone you would have avoided only a year ago if you’d ever encountered them.

You reach up to touch your face, running your hand over the dried blood that has made a home on the underside of your jaw. How long has it been there? Have you always looked so unwell? So sick in mind and body? The promise of a shower grows unbearably pleasant.

The knob squeaks when you turn it, screeching as the pipes hum and clang to life. Water spits out in a few bursts before raining down from the faucet and hitting the back of the tub in a steady thrum. It sounds a little bit like music to you, constant and heavy, and it gives the impression of normalcy as you begin undressing.

The fabric of your clothes sticks to your skin, peeling from your body in an unbearable and disgusting way. You don’t look at your body in the mirror. In fact, you avoid it entirely. Not recognizing your face was enough, but your body—a part of yourself you never really recognized—would drive you over the edge.

Then, you pull the shower curtain back and stick your hand under the water, stepping into it fully with a deep sigh. The water is lukewarm. They probably turned off the heater to conserve power and allow the main generator to function for longer. That’s fine. Beggars can’t be choosers and everyone is a beggar nowadays. Besides, it’s warm enough outside that the water isn’t too cold as it is. In the winter, you probably wouldn’t be able to shower and the pipes might freeze entirely until the following spring.

There’s a normalcy that you settle into as you wash your body. You return to muscle memory, running your hands over your skin and scrubbing the grime out. It’s simultaneously like the first shower of your life and as if you’ve been doing it every day. You return to a state of pleasant, familiar humanity as you wash away dirt that has built up for weeks. You feel as it pours off of you, see it run down your body onto the porcelain of the tub and swirl down the drain. It’s dirt and dried blood that has been caked onto your skin. You worry that even after washing, it will leave a permanent mark.

The person in the mirror when you get out of the shower is in stark contrast to the person who went into it. They’re someone that you recognize. You could almost convince yourself that nothing ever changed. Your water-soaked skin is so familiar to you, that you could be getting out of the shower and dressing to go to work. If it weren’t for the look in your eyes, you could have fooled yourself. Something undefinable has changed in you, something that you will carry with you forever. You glance at yourself in the foggy mirror and think that there is no going back.

The house is quiet when you dry yourself and open the bathroom door. You step across the hall on the balls of your feet, careful not to make any noise, and when you push the bedroom door open, you do a visual sweep to make sure that it’s safe out of habit.

Your body is exhausted. You are so thoroughly tired that you think you could collapse at any moment, but when you sit down on the bed in your fresh clothes, you find yourself restless. This place is new to you and you’re unsure if the safe feeling is your mind playing desperate tricks on you or the real thing. The lamp by your bed is on, casting a yellow glow across the bedsheets and the dark wood furniture. Come to think of it, you didn’t get a good look at the house when you came in and the thought starts to bother you as you stare at the closed door to the hallway.

Someone could be behind it. They could be waiting for you to lay down, to sleep, before doing something awful. You almost feel guilty for thinking this way about them. They’ve fed you, given you a shower, given you fresh clothes. Luxuries you weren’t sure even existed anymore, yet you’re sitting here doubting them, wishing you had your pistol or knife.

The bedroom door creaks as you open it. You wince, nervous that you’ve disturbed the quiet peace of the house and that everything will come crashing down as quickly as it seemed to come together. The hallway is dark, save for some light coming from under two doors at the end of the hall. One of them turns out as you creep past it to the stairs, and you hear the distinct sound of box springs squeaking as someone crawls into bed. You let go of the breath you’d been holding, straightening up as you relax into the late-night environment.

The house looks old even from the inside. It gives the impression of having once been dirty and in near disrepair. There are dust stains and dull spots that no amount of scrubbing could get out. You can almost picture how this place may have looked when they found it and it’s entirely possible that it had been abandoned before the actual outbreak. Someone run out of their home for lack of money. What a trivial thing now.

The stairs are sturdy, probably held together so well by the foundation of the house, and they’re made of dark wood. They’re steep too, the kind that a baby or old person might trip over, and you hold the railing to calm the shaking of your legs as you slowly feel your way down. You can see the light on in the kitchen from around the corner, spreading out onto the floor of the old fashioned drawing room. Dishes clink in the kitchen, like someone is washing them, and you jump a little at the noise as you creep around the corner.

Kirishima is standing at the sink with his back to you, whispering something to someone beside him. The expanse of his back is broad, moving every time he goes to run his hand over the dish in front of him. Then, he turns to look at you and you see Mina pop her head around the corner.

“Oh,” Kiri says, “did you need something?”

You shake your head. “Not really, I just couldn’t sleep.”

Kiri nods sympathetically as if he knows the feeling. “Well, you look like you feel a little better at least.”

You pad over to where he’s doing the dishes and Mina offers you a soft smile and a knowing look. It all seems so normal. Doing the dishes, whispering quietly as they do. Something about it screams a kind of humanity you haven’t experienced in a long while, even with your last group.

“Are you sure we can’t get you something?” Mina says, furrowing her brows.

“Why are you all being so nice to me?” You ask. “You don’t know the first thing about me.”

“Is there some reason why we shouldn’t be nice to you?” Kiri says over his shoulder.

“No,” you shake your head. “I just think it’s reckless, that’s all. I could have been anyone.”

Kirishima and Mina exchange a look. They glance at each other, like they’re debating on saying something, and then Kiri turns and rests his palms on the back of the sink. He looks at Mina.

“We don’t usually decide to do this so quickly,” she admits. “We’re friendly, but nobody’s that friendly anymore.”

Kiri nods his agreement and you listen quietly, trying to determine if they plan to toss you back out into the woods in the morning.

“But, Katsuki doesn’t usually bring people in,” she continues.

“He’s a little more closed off than the rest of us,” Kirishima adds. “He’s a good guy, just takes a while to warm up, is all.”

“Mhm,” Mina says.

“What does that have to do with me?” you ask. “This is nice and all, but I’m sure you get why I’m wary.”

“He’s a good judge of character,” Kiri adds earnestly. “He doesn’t bring people in often, but when he does, he’s usually right.”

You nod, not quite understanding. Sure, you don’t plan to do anything terrible. In fact, you’re content to accept their kindness and stay, if they’d let you. Anything is better than being alone, but their blind trust in one man’s judgment of character makes you uneasy.

“He was alone for a really long time,” Mina adds. “A lot of us were. I got lucky meeting Kirishima early on, but Katsuki’s luck was a little less fortuitous.”

“So you all just… happened upon each other by chance?” You ask.

“Yeah, pretty much,” Mina says. “It was me and Kiri for a long time. Just the two of us. We’d found Izuku and Katsuki together a while later, but they didn’t seem to like each other all that much. We still haven’t really figured that out, especially because they’re so close now. Ochako and Sero ended up cornered together by accident. We found them just before we found this place, and Denki just sort of showed up here one day and promised to fix the generator in exchange for safety. That was months ago. We’ve been like this since.”

“So you’re all strays,” you say and Mina laughs a little and looks at Kiri.

“Sure,” she says. “We’re all strays. There were others too. Shoji. Jirou. She was Denki’s girlfriend.”

“I’m sorry,” you say with a frown. It feels pointless to apologize for the dead, if you get caught up in it, you’d be apologizing forever.

“Don’t be,” Kiri adds. “But best not to bring her up. It was pretty recent and Denki’s only just started to get over it.”

You swallow thick and nod a little.

“Anyway,” Mina says, “we can’t really explain it. We just trust him. We trust Katsuki. That’s all.”

“Hm,” you hum, understanding that to a degree.

You trusted the people in your group. If they believed in someone, you were willing to as well, so you suppose you can understand a little where they’re coming from.

“What are you talking about,” Katsuki rounds the corner, walking into the kitchen and putting his water bottle under the sink.

“Nothing really,” Mina says.

Katsuki furrows his eyebrows and then looks at you. He gives you a once over, taking in your new clothing before scoffing lightly.

“Don’t you look cozy,” he says. “You get settled?”

“When can I go get my stuff?” You ask.

“Someone’s eager,” he says through lightly gritted teeth. “Didn’t I tell ya we could go in the morning? Besides, what’s there really to miss in that lot of junk?”

“Katsuki!” Mina quietly chides.

“I have things I care about there,” you say. “Things I’m not ready to lose.”

Katsuki blinks at you for a second before swearing under his breath. “We’ll leave when you get up in the morning.”

“You don’t have to come with me,” you say, frowning a bit at his sour attitude.

“Like hell,” he scoffs. “What if the dead are waiting back there for you?”

“I made it this far on my own,” you respond.

Katsuki nods for a second. “I’m going. Come find me in the morning.”

He walks off and around the corner. You hear him go up the stairs, followed by the distinct click of a bedroom door shutting.

“Don’t pay too much attention to that,” Mina says. “It’s past his bedtime.”

“You’ll get used to him,” Kiri adds.

“Right,” you say, swallowing down your frustration in favor of trying to be appreciative of the help. You sway on your feet a little and then steady yourself. “I’m going to go to sleep. Thank you for the meal and the bed.”

Mina and Kiri nod, but you don’t stick around to hear a response. Fatigue creeps up on you. It ambushes your senses and you go from feeling dream-like to delusional in a matter of moments. You make your way up the stairs, your body feeling heavy as lead, and wobble your way into the bedroom they’re letting you stay in.

When your head hits the pillow, you’re out. The world around you fades to dark and just before you sleep, you swear that you can hear the sounds of cars passing on the highway. A busy night, Saturday maybe, and people go about their daily lives outside of the window the way that they always have. They live, never the wiser to just how quickly things fall apart and how little it takes for our humanity to leave us.

—

Mornings in this place are boisterous. The sun coming through the lone window in your room wakes you up and you can hear the calls of busy people getting to work outside. There are voices from the porch out front that your window looks over and though you can’t see them, you get the sense that they’re having a pleasant conversation.

As you rouse, you come to the realization of just how exhausted you’d really been. They probably saved your life by bringing you to this place, feeding you, and offering you a bed. In hindsight, it’s easy to see just how little you had left in you. You get the sense now that you’d been running on an empty tank for days, slowly coming to an inglorious, gruesome, sputtering stop.

Things seem a little clearer, like the sunlight is somehow less bleak than it had been the days previous and you feel a little bit like you have a new lease on life. There are no big emotions, no swells of hope or humanity just yet, and you dread the moment you are rested enough to let grief consume you. Right now, you can’t feel it, but there is a fear in you that as you get to know these people who live relatively beautifully in an ugly world, it will weigh you down so much that you’ll never be able to outrun it.

You wonder if they’ll let you stay. They very well may not, even with the way they were talking last night. Strangers are more dangerous than they’ve ever been and if they ask you whether or not you’ve killed someone, you refuse to lie to them. Sitting up on the bed, you mull over the very real possibility that you could be back out there on your own again in a matter of days and you don’t even have that many good acts under your belt to plead your case. You’re just a person and you’ve done what you needed to in order to survive. Now, you’re not sure if that’s enough.

You swallow thick, wandering over to the mirror on the dresser. It’s fogged, though less than the bathroom mirror, and you can make out your features a little better than you could last night. You feel a bit more sane, though you still don’t recognize the frightful and distrustful look in your eyes. Like a wounded animal. Inside your head, you acknowledge that you are completely different from the person you were two hundred and seventy seven days ago.

The voices grow louder as you climb down the stairs, more secure on your feet than you felt last night. You can hear them talking about the generator, as well as a name you don’t recognize.

“He should be back by now,” a woman says. “Shoto’s never gone longer than a day or two, max.”

“We shouldn’t jump to conclusions,” another woman says with a worried bite in her voice. Mina, maybe? “We’re only a few hours into the day. He probably got holed up somewhere.”

“Someone needs to go look for him,” a man says.

“And what? Risk getting yourself killed?” the first woman says. “No, it doesn’t make sense. We need you here.”

“You’d rather we leave him to die on his own?”

“No one’s fuckin’ dying.”

You recognize Katsuki’s voice.

“He’s perfectly capable of going on a gasoline run,” he continues. “He’s done it before.”

“I should have gone with him,” says the same woman.

“On that leg? You wouldn’t have made it halfway to town, let alone there and back,” his voice raises a little. “Don’t be stupid. He’ll be back.”

You clear your throat and step around the corner. The group turns to face you quickly at the sound, their eyes wide for a moment before relaxing. You can’t sneak up on anyone nowadays.

“Sorry,” you say, “I didn’t mean to eavesdrop. Is everything okay?”

It’s not your business, but you ask anyway, wondering for yourself about the safety of Shoto.

“Fine,” Izuku says, shaking his head. You recognize him to be the one who'd vouched for going after their friend. Katsuki takes a step away from the broad man as he says this. “Nothing for you to worry about. Did you rest?”

Izuku smiles gently at you, his chest inflating a little at the question. The movement broadens his shoulders and you realize that he stands almost a head taller than Katsuki. You look briefly between the two of them before nodding.

“I did,” you say. “Thank you.”

“Nothing wrong with a little hospitality now and then,” he smiles and you can’t help but furrow your eyebrows at the distinct hesitance in his voice.

“I don’t think we’ve met,” the woman standing across from Izuku says. “I’m Momo. Sorry I wasn’t there to meet you last night. I’ve been a little under the weather.”

You introduce yourself to her and glance down at her leg. Her ankle is swollen and wrapped in a bandage. Her sneaker laces are untied at the top to make room for the swelling and you can see that she’s guarding that side of her leg.

“Is it…?” you grimace, taking an instinctive step away from her. You almost feel bad for it, but sometimes good people make bad decisions when loved ones get bit.

“No,” she says quickly, “no, it isn’t. Caught an edge in an old chain link fence on the property a couple days back.”

Momo smiles slightly at you as if to reassure you. She’s really beautiful, with thick dark hair pulled back into a somewhat messy ponytail. Her eyes are bright, like she’s engaged in lively conversation, and you find yourself feeling a little sad for her. She’ll need medicine soon, if they can get it. Infections set in easily these days and you get the sense that even she knows that she may not have long without it. Maybe that’s something else their friend Shoto set out to find.

“I assume you’ll be wanting to go get your supplies?” Katsuki says, cutting the conversation short. Maybe he could sense the sour turn of thoughts.

“Ready when you are,” you respond with a nod.

Katsuki glances at Izuku, who gives him a slightly disapproving look.

“Someone get them something to eat,” Katsuki says. “...I’ll get my shit ready.”

“Fig jam…” Mina mumbles as she motions for you to follow her to the kitchen.

You oblige her, not exactly jumping to turn down a meal. She walks you into the kitchen and opens up a cabinet, where she pulls out a jar filled with a dark and seed filled paste. It’s a jam, sealed in a jar that looks older than what’s inside of it. The seal breaks open with a pleasant pop.

“This stuff is so good,” she says to you over her shoulder, pulling out a package of crackers that have likely gone stale. “You won’t believe it.”

She spreads the jam on a few crackers and sets it in front of you on a plate, pushing it across the counter towards you.

“It’s fig jam,” she says with a smile. “Homemade.”

You look down at the plate, your mouth watering at the prospect of something sweet like this. It’s been so long since you've had fresh jam. It could be as long as 10 years. You don’t think you’ve had it since you were a kid, when jam came easily and you preferred the processed brands at the supermarket to the ones your mom used to make sometimes.

You raise the cracker to your mouth and stuff it in with little grace. The sweetness spreads across your tongue as soon as you bite into the stale cracker. It fizzes and pops almost, the sugar melting across your tongue as the seeds crack softly between your teeth. The smile that hits your face is completely involuntary and though you know that nine months ago, this jam wouldn’t have been much, today it is something extraordinary.

Mina nods a kind of girlish agreement, like the way people used to when they had their friend try something at their favorite restaurant.

“We got here in the fall. I want to say late October or early November?” she offers. “We were starving and there wasn’t enough food to feed all of us. By that time there were like… nine of us.”

You listen as you eat your crackers.

“This place was in such an awful state,” she laughs. “I mean, really terrible. But, it was big and there was a fig tree in the back. A little thing, probably only a few years old and it had fruit on it. We ate so many of them that if the world were normal, we’d have sworn off of them forever. When we realized that the house actually had some old food in it,” she interrupts herself “-nothing good, canned stuff mostly- we decided to jar up the rest of the figs so that they didn’t rot.”

She smiles at you like it’s a pleasant memory, but you can only think about how hungry they must have been. Your stomach growls as you eat.

“I know it doesn’t sound like much,” she says, “but for some reason it’s a really nice memory. Honestly, we’re lucky we didn’t die.”

Mina laughs a little.

“I mean,” she continues, “we didn’t even clear the area before we started pulling at the figs and throwing them into our mouths.”

You tilt your head at her and furrow your eyebrows with a small smile.

“You’re really forthcoming with information.”

“You just seem a little hesitant, is all,” she answers.

“Can you blame me?”

Mina shrugs her shoulders but doesn’t really offer an answer. You assume it’s because she can’t, because Mina has the same doubts everyone carries with them in this world. All of the what ifs people would think about before they slept have become more prevalent than anyone would have ever liked.

“The jam is good,” you say, trying to be friendly in the same way she is. “Even if it is months old.”

“Things keep well in jars,” Mina defends softly, smiling a little as she gets another out of you.

This place feels like a little slice of paradise. A blessing from whoever lived here before and kept a garden stocked with vegetables. From someone who lived in an old house with stables and well-water, who kept canned food past its expiration date. It feels almost too good to be true, like these people live in a bubble bound to pop.

“You ready?” Katsuki thuds into the kitchen with an empty backpack slung over his shoulder.

You turn, startled by his sudden appearance and nod as you quickly finish chewing the last cracker. Katsuki furrows his eyebrows as he watches the way you scarf it down.

When you stand from the table, Katsuki turns on his heel to make for the front door and you follow with a light step. Mina says something about staying safe, but you don’t respond, glancing once over your shoulder at the girl.

It’s strange, the world has made you wishy-washy and uncommitted. You never used to be like that, never so distrusting as to second guess someone’s kindness the moment your back is turned to them, and you’re certainly not the type to be friendly one moment and closed off the next. Now though, you find that doubt creeps in easily through cracks and any foundation that didn’t exist before, seems to be swallowed before you can finish building it.

Katsuki leads you back across the small clearing you’d come through the night before. It looks different in the day, almost romantic, and it lacks any of the ominous feeling it had the previous evening. He steps over mounds in the dirt from moles and gophers that have made lawns their new home and you try to mimic his steps, sinking occasionally into a particularly soft patch of dirt. Every now and then, Katsuki glances behind him to check that you’re still there and you offer him a forced smile that he never returns.

You catch up to him when you hit the trees, sticking close at his side like something will come and take you away if you’re not. It’s unintentional, but you don’t have a weapon on you. Your knife is back at your makeshift camp, along with the unloaded pistol and your trusty spatula.

“How do you know where we’re going?” You ask in a whisper.

Katsuki tosses a look at you over his shoulder. “I’m good with directions.”

His tone is clipped, like he’s pissed about something, and your expression sours at it. Sure, you get it but it irritates you to some small degree. You hadn’t asked him to come along. In fact, you’d have been fine getting back here to collect your stuff on your own. You’d have asked for a knife and set out without a second thought, if only because being alone in the woods with some guy was less preferable than doing it by yourself. Of course, some guy also probably saved your life, but you’re not quite ready to relinquish your trust completely.

“Thanks for coming,” you decide. A peace offering.

Katsuki doesn’t answer and you furrow your brows a little bit. You wonder if he’s always been like this or if the end of the world brought on the loss of his manners.

Then, he stops, taking you by the arm and pulling you down beside a bush. You gasp and he puts his hand over your mouth to silence you. There’s the urge to bite him, to catch the fleshy bit connecting his thumb and pointer finger between your teeth and bite down till he bleeds, but you stop when you catch what he’s looking at.

Two of the living dead crouch by a tree, clicking their tongues as they eat something just out of sight. You furrow your eyebrows, eyes widening at the horror of it. For some reason, seeing them always brings about a round of momentary shock. You’ve yet to let go of the hounding thought that they used to be people and sometimes have to reorient yourself to the world you’re in now.

You catch Katsuki’s eye behind you, his calloused hand still clasped over your mouth, and nod your head. It’s a silent communication that you’ve seen what he has and he removes his palm from your face to grab a knife tucked into his belt, passing it to you quickly.

The two infected haven’t noticed the two of you yet, but they will soon, if only by the smell of your flesh which has yet to rot. You hear Katsuki let out a breath, as if to calm his heart, and do the same. There’s time to look at them like this and you’re struck by how human you can pretend they are in your head. Well, you suppose they were human once, now they’re a disease using someone’s skin as a mask.

Infected people aren’t quick, that’s one thing to be grateful for. Back when the outbreak first started, the CDC had released information on what to look out for in those who might have contracted the virus. The first was obviously a bite wound from another infected person, but you can tell from other symptoms. Early symptoms are average. Body aches, fever, lethargy, and delirium. All things you might see with a nasty flu. Then, infection of the wound site, twitching, foggy eyes—like low-grade cataracts—that develop within a matter of hours or days, severe disorientation, aversion to food, insomnia, with the final symptom being a coma that no one ever wakes up as themselves from.

These are the symptoms that people are conscious for. The ones they feel. The sickness that people tried to nurse others back from. There is no coming back though, not alive at the very least. The virus attacks the nerves throughout the brain and body, that’s what causes the twitching and convulsions. It’s what ultimately kills us, and it's what they think causes the bodies to come back.

Most infected will crack when they move. It’s the cartilage breaking down as the bones grind together and crack as they’re weakened from the marrow out. They twitch like rabid animals, unable to keep masterful control of their bodies because they are run like puppets from the brain stem. You don’t know if they think. If somehow the people they used to be are still in there, unable to stop themselves from consuming and spreading the virus to others. All you really know is that they twitch and click, functions of the brain that still remain. Tiny impulses sent through the synapses. You imagine it to be like the way you twitch when you sleep, an arm here or a leg there, the way someone might call out with their voice to a room with no one in it.

Maybe the infected think they’re dreaming. A nightmare that they never wake up from, like those of us who have to put them down. You could see it as a mercy from that perspective. You have an easier time rationalizing putting a knife in someone’s skull if you convince yourself that they’re silently begging for it.

Katsuki shifts his weight and looks at you. He mouths the words no guns and you nod, briefly wondering where the fuck he thinks you could have gotten a gun from.

Then, you kick off and run with Katsuki towards the infected. They don’t really have time to begin moving towards you both. You’re faster than them, but you hear the crack of their legs as they stand from their crouched positions, pulled in at the idea of their next meal.

Katsuki takes the farther one, sinking the knife into the soft spot of its temple with relative ease. You switch yourself off and take the one closest only a few moments later, sending your blade through the top of its skull. That happens to you when you have to do this. You turn yourself off for a bit, just so that you don’t have to remember the way it feels to hit the soft part of someone’s brain. You didn’t used to do that, only starting when you realized that there’s no going through this world anymore without it.

Katsuki wipes the blood on his pants. It’s brown, no longer oxygenated, and the area around you begins to reek. You notice, but for some reason the smell of decomposition doesn’t register in your brain and you continue on behind him.

There are a few beats of silence, save for twigs breaking under your feet, before Katsuki speaks up.

“You okay?” It’s barely above a whisper and you wouldn’t have caught it were you not listening for the distinctive crack of human bones.

“Yeah,” you say, continuing forward.

The campsite rounds into view and in this light, with your full night’s sleep under your belt, you can see just how pitiful it looks. A tent that you’d hastily put up before nightfall, the remains of your stamped out fire, the folding chair which has since been knocked over, and your weapons on the floor covered by a few leaves disturbed by the wind.

You snatch them up and move to grab your backpack out of the tent. The inside is shitty too and your torn sleeping bag hadn’t even been rolled out yet. You pick up the bag, returning to the folding chair as Katsuki begins to take down the tent. The polyester and nylon blend zips together as he makes quick work of folding it. Then, he kicks some dry brush over the remains of the fire, like he’s covering your tracks.

“The next person that comes through here might not be alone,” he says plainly. “And they may have more bullets than you did.”

“Right,” you respond. Your voice sounds a little far off and you settle your backpack on your shoulder in one quick motion.

“Got everything?”

You nod, following him as he heads out in the direction you both came from. The two of you pass the bodies of the infected you’d killed. The smell has permeated the air, lingering like how it does in cities, only less pungent. Their fogged eyes stare blankly at nothing, expressions plain and unreadable. You pass and try not to think much about it.

Katsuki is a few feet ahead of you and he doesn’t glance back to make sure you’re following. You could leave now and never get attached to these people. You could head off in another direction and never have to think twice about it. No more worrying about who you could lose, about who’s next to become one of the sick masses. Just you by yourself. Then, when you finally kick the can, someone else can put you down the way you did to those strangers.

Is there really a point to it anymore? To community or living in general. No one is as they once were. Does that make it fantasy to live in their beautiful bubble? Could you even find it in yourself to pretend again, to make nice and play house in that place? They saved your life, sure. They fed you, clothed you, bathed you, but for what point? Tomorrow, you could end up back in the woods, lighting fires with twigs you found in the brush, paranoid that someone would find you or the fire would spread.

You watch Katsuki’s back as he moves, shoulders shifting with each step. His shirt is stained, white turned eggshell from the wear and tear of time. It seems so off to you that he looks relatively clean, like he lives well.

Fear strikes you as you realize that your rambling thoughts have merit. Anything you fear now has become real and loss is so tangible to you that you can squeeze it in your hand. They could turn you out. Tomorrow night you could begin the starve and step all over again, moving from place to place, talking to yourself, filling your hours with paranoid thoughts like these that plague you when you’re alone. Is that worse than loss? If you’re alone long enough, you’d probably forget what you’re missing. Losing anyone else could make the wound fresh. For now, the hunger wins out.

Katsuki jogs ahead of you to get to the house. Momo is on the porch waving him in and he hurries up the steps and bursts through the front door. As you approach, you can hear voices, some of which are relieved, others hurried. When you enter the room, you find a man standing there whom you’ve never seen before, Shoto maybe.

“A plus one,” the man looks up, tilting his head at you in an odd way.

“Katsuki’s,” Kiri says with a low smirk.

Shoto’s eyes widen as he peers at his friend, clutching what looks like an injured shoulder. Katsuki just huffs his irritation.

“Well, that’s rare,” Shoto says.

“What’s rare?” Katsuki spits. “They were in the woods with a fire. What was I supposed to do? Let ‘em die?”

“Maybe,” Shoto says, a light smile creeping onto his features. Then, he turns to you. “What’s your name?”

You give it to him and he nods his head, tilting it at you again.

“How long are you staying?”

You’re not sure how to answer that question. In fact, no one is, and it feels like more of a test than it does a genuine inquiry. Kiri and Mina exchange a glance and Katsuki tosses a somewhat dirty look towards Shoto. Ochako gives Shoto a knowing glance and Sero and Denki shift uncomfortably on their feet. Then, Momo clears her throat, spurring Izuku to say something.

“Shoto,” he says. “You’re probably hungry, you should eat something and lay down. Ochako? Could you take a look at his shoulder?”

“Sure,” the girl says softly, giving a closed mouth smile to Shoto as she takes him by the arm.

She glances at you as she passes, almost like she’s too embarrassed to look at you fully in the face. You suppose this is what happens when people are forced to think about whether or not they will potentially leave someone else to die. It’s like the trolley cart question and though in this case there is always the possibility of a better outcome, it’s not likely in this world.

“Just until I’m rested,” you add with a small tilt of your head. “A few days.”

Shoto looks at you over his shoulder and gives you a small smile. It’s funny, you can see kindness there. His actions aren’t kind, but you can feel that he has kindness in him, though his rudeness stems from something different than Katsuki’s, you think. Like he’s strange in some way.

“I’ll start on dinner,” Sero says. “Kiri, give me a hand.”

The group disperses and you head upstairs without speaking to anyone else. A few days to rest and then cut the first people you’ve spoken to in weeks loose. What sort of idiot gives up something like this to avoid a little awkwardness? Not that you necessarily had your mind made up. You wonder briefly if you’ve just sealed your own tomb.

—

After dinner, you go upstairs to sleep after eating as much as they would offer you. Your stomach has ceased its constant growling and the shakiness that comes with hunger has receded almost entirely into the background. The bed is soft, with a slight dent in it from whoever slept in here before. The thought unsettles you that they’re probably dead now, but you try to push it from your mind as you steel yourself for what comes within the next few days.

You had volunteered yourself to leave. To what? Save yourself the embarrassment of pleading? Did you even want to plead? Why are you regretting not asking to stay? These people don’t know you, what trust can you have built with them in only a few days? Your skin crawls at the expanse of possibilities in front of you after so many weeks without any.

You think that if you let yourself walk away, you’ll probably die. You’re out of bullets and don’t know where to find any food except by luck. You can try to catch prey, but prey hides whenever infected are around, and they’re everywhere nowadays. It’s spring, water wouldn’t be a problem, but running water has its clear comforts. Then, there’s the possibility of loss. You’d come to care for these people if you stayed, you know it.

You furrow your eyebrows and look at the ceiling. There’s really no choice to be made. You’ll let them make it for you, even if you don’t know them. It’s their house and you won’t walk in uninvited or try to take it. You’re not about to become a monster just because the world is full of them now.

The darkness grows and your eyes drift to the dim light wandering in under the crack of the door. Hushed voices whisper in the living room, you can hear them. It’s a heated discussion, lively, but deliberately quiet. It’s been hours since everyone went to bed, yet you get the impression that many people are chiming in. You’re too nosey to leave it be.

You open the bedroom door silently, turning the cool knob with a wince as it clicks out of place. When you peer into the hallway, every upstairs bedroom door is open with the room empty. The light is coming from down stairs and around the corner, and you can see shadows move as you inch closer to the source.

You pause at the top of the stairs, knowing that they creak, and crouch by the bannister to listen. You’re out of sight. The only way they’d know you’re listening is if you made a sound, but you won’t. You’re good at being quiet.

“We don’t even know them,” someone says in a rushed whisper. “We don’t know what they’ve done before.”

“Everyone’s done things they’re not proud of now, Shoto,” a woman adds. It’s Mina. She’s spoken enough to you that you recognize her voice.

“I agree with Shoto,” says another woman, her voice higher pitched. She sounds guilty and her voice is tight as she speaks “We have no clue who they are. They could be dangerous.”

“You mean like me, Ochako?” A man adds. “I could have been dangerous.”

The group grows quiet for a moment.

“No,” Momo says. You recognize the cadence of her voice. “Shoto might be right, Denki. It’s been nearly six months since you got here and the world has changed a lot. We don’t- we can’t know for sure.”

“Can we really know anything for sure?” Another man adds, Kiri.

“What about you guys?” Shoto says, presumably to the rest of the group.

“I don’t know.”

“I’m hesitant, but I don’t know either.”

“Jesus,” another man with a baritone voice, harsher than the rest. That’s Katsuki, the first voice you’d heard of the group. “You guys make me a little sick.”

“That’s not fair,” Ochako says.

“No,” he interrupts. “It is fair. You guys want to… what? Send them back out there to die?”

“It’s not like that,” Shoto says.

“It is like that,” he says, raising his voice and then lowering it back to a whisper. “You didn’t see them when they got here, Shoto. They- they didn’t look… shit. The rest of you, you saw them. You really want to send them back out there to fuckin’ waste away? I don’t know about you all, but I won’t do that to a person.”

There’s a pregnant pause.

“Katsuki’s right,” Izuku says with a bit of conviction, like he’s finally made up his mind. “Sending someone out there alone is a death sentence. How does doing that make us any better than the people we’re trying to protect ourselves from?”

“What if there are more of them?” Ochako says quietly. “What if they’re not alone?”

“Trust me,” Katsuki says, “They were alone.”

“But what if they’re not?” She insists at a whisper, a bit of shame creeping into her voice. “What if people come for us?”

“See?” Shoto says gently. “There are so many what-ifs.”

“That works the other way too,” Mina adds.

You don’t listen to hear the rest of their conversation. They’re going to run themselves in circles debating about you. They’ll go around and around and land on whichever argument ends with the most votes. They’ll convince each other of one thing and it will happen totally out of your control.

The bedroom door shuts with a low click that makes you wince again. You think about the people who went to bat for you and the people who didn’t. You don’t blame those who opposed. You’d have probably reacted similarly if your old group were still alive and you understand very clearly why they do it. One person’s stupid reaction can be catastrophic and they don’t know enough about you to be certain that you’re not one of those stupid people. It’s how the world went to shit in the first place and though nine months ago you’d have surely condemned someone for making the same decision, you know that fear has warped humanity beyond comprehension. You didn’t get it until you lived it.

Still, Katsuki’s humanity feels intact somehow, more so than yours at least. His response is something you probably never would have said under the same conditions and you can’t help but feel some sort of fondness bloom in you for him. Call it connection, gratefulness for his willingness to stick his neck out for you, a trauma response. You still feel it. Mina and Kiri had said that Katsuki was a good judge of character and that’s why they were willing to back him. You wonder briefly if maybe Katsuki sees something in you that you don’t recognize in yourself anymore, or maybe something you don’t expect other people to recognize. What is it that he wants so badly to protect?

Someone stomps down the hallway, heavy boots against the old creaky floors. You hear the steps recede down the hallway, maybe a door or two down, before it shuts quickly. The sound makes you wince and you listen as the house grows quiet and then hums quietly with the sound of others coming upstairs a few moments later. Someone pads to the end of the hall, pushing the door open.

You hear a woman’s voice, so muffled that you can’t make out what she’s saying. Then, you hear the sound of a man’s affirmation before the bedroom door shuts and the visitor moves back down the hall to a separate bedroom. Information passing through the house.

Someone is moving around in a room below you and you figure that there are probably bedrooms downstairs as well. From the outside, you’d never guess that the place could house ten people. Inside though, the bedrooms are small. That’s probably why so many can fit. You’d guess that the place used to have multiple generations living in it, or maybe even rented out rooms to people for a few months. It sort of has a boarding house feel to it, like many people have come and gone even before people stopped staying in one place.

That’s a good thing to call it, the boarding house. It certainly has that sort of feel to it, many of its spaces undeniably communal.

You turn over in the bed, facing the bedroom door. The lights have gone out completely now and the house is quiet save for the occasional creak or thud from someone preparing to sleep. It’s been a long while since the sounds of living have been so prevalent near you. You’re eased by the sounds of the house settling, a familiar reminder of what living used to be. Your group had been on the road long before you lost them and the comforts of an interior are almost overwhelmingly nostalgic. You’re better rested to notice it now and shutting your eyes, you savor the feeling.

—

“Need some help?” You say.

Denki turns around, grease smeared across his nose where he likely wiped it with his dirty hands. He’s holding a wrench in a glove so tattered that it hardly counts as a glove anymore. He looks startled, amber eyes widening before he uses his forearm to brush stray hairs out of his face. The rest of it is pulled up into a messy ponytail, revealing the moist back of his neck.

“Oh, sure,” he says, a bit surprised. “Do you know how generators work?”

He crouches back over the machine and you step up behind him.

The machine is rusted near the bottom and between the exposed winding pipes. Its paint has chipped away, leaving the weather-damaged metal open for you to see. On the side, a fan-like piece spins slowly in circles and the machine whirs and sputters softly as it… generates power, probably.

“Not quite, but an extra pair of hands is always helpful,” you say softly, passing him a tool he’d been reaching for. “Did it break?”

“No,” Denki says, “but it’s probably on its last legs. The thing’s almost as old as we are, probably older, so it’s good to tune it up a bunch.”

You hum your agreement, tilting your head as you stand and watch him work.

You’re not necessarily comfortable with Denki, but he feels like a safe person for some reason. Maybe it’s because he’s got a sort of ditzy, non-threatening vibe to him. You can almost distinctly picture him tripping over his own feet and something about that makes you feel considerably safer than someone who wouldn’t. That and he was the first person you’ve come across this morning who you don’t think distrusts you too badly.

“Are you dodging something?” Denki smirks up at you from his crouch.

“Who on earth would I be dodging?” you snort a bit defensively.

“Shoto,” he says with a light smile. “He put you in a tight spot the other day.”

“Yeah, well,” you say, glancing over your shoulder. “It wasn’t anything he didn’t have a right to ask.”

“Right, but it sure was rude, huh?”

Denki laughs to himself a little and you’re surprised by how easygoing he is. You subconsciously begin to categorize him with Mina and Kiri. The dichotomy of this group baffles you a bit, but you can certainly see all nine of them as a collective. Tightly knit and well acquainted with the habits of others.

“Oh!” He exclaims, “I have something you can do for me.”

You tilt your head.

“There’s a bucket over there,” he says, pointing absentmindedly to a shitty plastic bucket against the side of the house. “We use the water from the creek as coolant. It’s not factory grade, but it does the trick. You wanna go fill it up and bring it back for when I’m done tuning this thing up?”

You furrow your eyebrows, not sure where the creek he’s talking about is.

“The creek is just over there,” he points behind the house to the edge of the treeline. “I know you can’t see it from here, but if you walk in a straight line, you’ll hit it. Katsuki should be down there too, so you can use him as a landmark.”

When you don’t immediately answer, Denki whines a little.

“I mean,” he says, “I’d go myself, but-”

“I’ll do it,” you laugh a little and Denki seems surprised that you do.

“Really?”

“Yeah,” you shrug. “I’d like to pull some weight at least while I’m here. Plus, I offered.”

Denki mumbles his pleasure and you walk to the bucket without another word and set off in the direction Denki pointed. You’re much more willing to go out to the treeline now that you have a knife back at your side.

The walk to the trees is longer than it looks, like how sometimes the horizon looks like something you could reach out and climb up onto. The walk stretches with each step you take and you become a little more understanding of why Denki didn’t want to do it himself. But the walk is actually pleasant, the warmth of mid May collecting evenly on your skin as the humidity grows more intense with the sun.

You wonder what Katsuki would be doing by the creek. Maybe he’s fishing, or crouched over himself sharpening an arsenal of knives that you think he might keep in a roll attached to his belt sometimes. You’re not sure why, but Katsuki sort of has that expression to him. He’s handsome, but the scowl projects something hostile that makes him seem unapproachable.

As you cross through the middle of the clearing, you could almost imagine that this is a normal day. Humidity collects on your skin, making you sweat a little as you dodge gopher holes and soft spots of dirt. It almost feels like summer camp, if it weren’t for the looming idea that you’re contributing to something you may not be a part of. Denki’s attitude though, has you hoping for a more favorable outcome, if you want to call it that.

You’re only a few steps into the line of trees when the earth dips into a sand-lined ravine. The trees leave room for the sun to beat down on warmed rocks, making the area seem brighter with their subtle reflection of the light. The noise of the creek drowns out the sound of your footsteps and you shuffle toward where the earth flattens just before the water starts. A little ways to your right, you can see Katsuki sitting on a rock in the sun, his hands dipped into a large bucket. You narrow your eyes as he pulls what looks like a cloth out of the water, rubbing the fabric together before dipping it in the cool water of the creek.

As you approach, you realize what it is that he’s doing. It’s laundry. On the other side of him, you can see a bin of what look like dirty clothes and water-soaked clean ones. Talk about misjudged character.

“Katsuki,” you say as you approach him, the bucket still empty in your hand.

He squints up at you, shifting his face so that it's in your shadow.

“You’re still here,” he says plainly, returning to his task.

“Clearly,” you respond, watching as he runs his fingers over the next piece of clothing in the bucket.

“Why are you down here? Did Denki pawn the generator water onto you?” He says, like he’s somewhat frustrated. “He does that shit to anyone he can.”

You shrug your shoulders and continue to stare at him.

“Are you just gonna stand there?” He huffs out.

“You’re doing laundry.”

“Yeah?” he furrows his eyebrows and looks at you. “So?”

“Nothing,” you say. “I just didn’t expect that.”

“Yeah well,” he stops for a moment like he’s struggling to find the words. “It needed to be done. Figured I might as well.”

“How progressive of you,” you joke with a straight face.

He looks at you out of the corner of his eyes and sighs, not justifying your comment with a response. You find yourself smiling a little bit.

“If you’re going to linger, sit down and do it,” he says. “You’re creeping me out.”

You oblige him and sit down on a rock next to him, far enough that you’re not touching, but near enough to hear him if you speak in a low voice. For some reason, you feel a sort of kinship with Katsuki. You’d thought longer than you’d like to admit about his willingness to vouch for you and find that you want to live up to his expectation of your goodness, even if it’s not what you believe yourself to be anymore. Maybe it’s because you’ve slept well the past few nights and feel more like yourself, but there’s a certain casualness to conversing with him that you enjoy. He’s not looking at what you could be, but rather what you’re showing him that you are. His lack of doubt in that is something you find relatively attractive.

You watch his arms out of the corner of your eye in between gazing at the treeline and the sky. Your field of vision catches on them, his sleeves cut short to expose his biceps, a bit muddied near the elbows where the mud has begun to stick.

Katsuki doesn’t seem all that bothered by your presence, but now and then you’ll catch the sideways glance he gives you, almost like he’s trying to figure out exactly why you’re lingering.

“How long have you been with them?” You ask, more as a way to fill the silence.

Katsuki’s hands pause as he thinks about answering, then, they continue their steady pace.

“A decent amount of time,” he says. “I met Izuku first, probably in November just before Mina and Kiri. The rest came later.”

You furrow your eyebrows.

“No offense,” you start, “but you don’t really seem like the group type.”

“And you don’t seem like the type who’d be alone,” he retorts, like your statement was stupid.

You press your lips into a tight line, not really knowing how to respond.

“Sorry,” he says, shaking his head a little.

“Were you?”

“What? Was I sorry?” He furrows his eyebrows at you.

“No,” you shake your head. “Were you alone? Before Izuku.”

He goes silent. You’ll take that as a yes, but you regret asking a little. It had just slipped out. If someone were to ask you something like that, you’d probably react the same way. That’s just as well, you don’t really need to know him like that anyway.

You wonder briefly if anyone does. He seems closed off, but Mina and Kiri spoke about him a few days prior like they knew him well. Well enough at least to allude to a history you’ll likely never be privy to. Then there’s Momo, who whispers little things to him that he answers in kind. Curiosity gets the better of you, if only to tease.

“Do you have a girlfriend?” you ask and Katsuki’s response is to rest his elbows on his knees and let out a dry laugh.

He turns his head and looks at you from the side. “And what the fuck are you asking me that for?”

“Just curious,” you say. “Is it Momo?”

“Momo?” He makes a sour face at you. “Yeah, right.”

“She’s pretty,” you say.

“Sure is,” he responds dryly. “If you’re into the mom type.”

“What? You’re not into moms?” You grin a little and Katsuki furrows his eyebrows at you.

“So you do have a personality,” he scoffs a little.

There’s a pause. You haven’t felt this in a while. The feeling of bonding with someone new, compatibility on the human level that feels nearly instant.

“I’m kinda serious though,” you say, tilting your head down to catch his eye. “Do you?”

You’re leaning a little closer to him now.

“You seen any nice restaurants to take a person out to these days?” he questions, clearly a little frustrated with you in the way someone gets when they’re a bit amused.

“You don’t have to take someone out to a restaurant to fuck them, you know?” You laugh a little.

Katsuki’s lips part and he swallows like his mouth has gone dry.

“Yeah, well,” he starts, looking away from you. “I’m a romantic. Sue me.”

He’s just full of surprises, isn’t he? You find that you’re captivated by this feeling, this humanity, that exists in him. It’s something alive between you both, something left behind from the old world, and you crave it the same way you crave food.

Katsuki continues scrubbing the clothes, rubbing the fabric together and then dunking it in the bucket before plunging it into the freshwater creek. You’re not sure why you do it, but the next time he looks at you, you kiss him.

It’s not as if you like him, but it’s something to feel. Some remnant of the butterflies you used to feel on dates and the kiss makes you feel like you could be close to human again. You pull away almost as soon as you put his lips to yours and you can tell that the expression on your face is one of surprise.

Katsuki blinks for a second, looking at you with his brows knitted together. The expression doesn’t leave him as he places a wet hand on the side of your face to kiss you again. It’s an anxious kiss, confused and slow but—like someone riding a bike for the first time in years—it quickly becomes something familiar. Muscle memory that you both let yourselves sink into.

You can feel his expression as he kisses you, something between confusion and desire, like his own actions are perplexing. You feel the same way, hesitant, but reaching in the dark for the promise of some sort of normalcy. You want to feel like a person again. You haven’t felt it in so long and you push yourself against him as the ache swells in you.

The two of you continue like this for a moment, Katsuki’s fingers pressing lightly into the skin of your neck. You moan softly as his tongue slips into your mouth, taking a sharp inhale at the sensation of skin on skin. The sound of the creek drowns out the clicking of your mouths, but you can feel the way he hums into your mouth. They’re little sounds, involuntary ones driven by the nervous, desirous feelings inside of you both.

Then, Katsuki pulls away, swallowing thick as he takes his bottom lip between his teeth for a moment. You appreciate the way they look. They’re swollen, anxious to continue and keep forgetting where you really are. He drops his hand from your face with a sigh and almost seems like he comes back to himself. You do the same, moving back into an upright position.

“Denki will want that water soon,” he clears his throat and motions to the empty bucket by your feet.

“Oh,” you say, laughing a little. “Right.”

You stand, dusting off the back of your pants and dunking the bucket into the water. It sloshes, the liquid hitting the back of the plastic with a satisfying elastic sound. You begin to walk away without another word, heading down the way you came to climb up the gentler part of the slope.

“Hey,” Katsuki calls softly. “You should stay. We talked it over last night. You can if you want to.”

The last part, he says facing the wash, his hands moving as if he hadn’t said anything at all. You don’t respond, knowing that the obvious answer is already yes.

Dread settles in your stomach. It’s an icky, swirling feeling that threatens to make you double over. You climb up the bank, the water in the bucket sloshing as you move through the trees and enter the clearing. The feeling doesn’t dissipate, growing as you leave the cover of the trees. You probably wouldn’t have kissed him if he’d asked you that earlier.

The boarding house comes into view and you can see Denki sitting beside the generator, conversing with who appears to be Shoto. They turn and Denki waves you down, Shoto turning away and starting around for the front of the house.

Denki jogs to meet you, taking the bucket from your hand. You flex your fingers as the weight is removed, wincing a little at how stiff they feel.

“Jeez, what took you so long?” Denki laughs and with your new information, you understand his willingness to be friendly with you a little better.

“I asked Katsuki for his life story,” you respond dryly, following him back to the generator.

Denki looks over his shoulder and laughs at you. “Did he tell you?”

You pause for a moment, watching as Denki unscrews something and pours the water in.

“Nope,” you say. “Not a thing.”

Click Here to go to the second chapter and find the rest of the series on ao3. The remainder will not be posted on tumlbr, but please feel free to reblog!

#bakugou x reader #bakugou katsuki x reader #mha x reader #bakugou smut #bakugou x reader smut #mha smut #bakugou fanfiction #mha fanfiction #my hero academia #bakugou katsuki #apocalypse au #tw.violence #tw.blood #tw.loss of identity #tw.derealization #tw.depersonalization #tw.exhaustion #cal.writing #char.bakugou

870 notes · View notes

absurdthirst · 5 months ago

Text

Fireworks {Frankie Morales x F!Reader}

Rating: Explicit

Word Count: 7.7k

Warnings: Dirty talk, premature ejaculation, oral sex (male and female receiving), cum eating, riding, breast play, mentions of IUD, mentions of pregnancy, mentions of breeding kink, family planning

Comments: Seeing Frankie Morales again at the cookout thrown by your sister and her husband, you discover that you the crush you have on the Delta Force operators isn't as one sided as you previous thought.

🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸HAPPY 4th of JULY!!!!!! 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸

Co-written with @storiesofthefandomlovers

**Follow @absurdthirst-writes and turn on notifications to stay up to date on all new fics.

|| MasterList || Frankie Morales MasterList ||

Click Keep Reading only if you have read the Rating and Warnings and understand the warnings may not be complete to avoid listing spoilers. As AO3 says 'creator chooses not to use warnings'. You also agree that you're the right age to be consuming anything here.

“Ohhhhhhh say can you seeeeeeeeeee!” Loudly and off-key, Ben Miller shouts/sings the national anthem for only the hundredth time because it’s the only day he can get away with it. Fourth of July, the nation’s birthday and it either invokes ad nauseam tales of valor or over exuberant patriotism. In Benny, and the other members of Delta Force’s A Squadron, it’s both. A day to get rip roaring drunk, party like they might not live to see the next day and generally raise hell. “Give it a rest, Benny!” Frankie shouts over the music that is blaring through the outdoor speakers that Santiago ‘Pope’ Garcia had set up in his little backyard oasis. “You sound like a cow giving birth!” He adds, laughing and taking another sip of his beer when the youngest of the Miller brothers shoots him double fingers.

Santi chuckles, “Maria’s sister will be arriving soon so you better be on your best behavior.” He warns and Frankie sits up a little. Ever since Pope introduced Frankie to you, he’s always had a crush. It’s ridiculous but he didn’t really get to make a move when you were busy being the maid of honor and he was the best man. So many people joked with him about getting you in his bed the next of the wedding but Frankie was a gentleman. What he doesn’t know is that you have a crush on him. Ever since you first set eyes on Frankie, you have been like a schoolgirl with a crush and it’s so bad your sister has teased you mercilessly. Your sister answers the door after you arrive with homemade cherry pie and apple pie in hand and she ushers you in. “Frankie is here.” She smirks and you roll your eyes, “it’s been like 2 years. He doesn’t like me like that.” You warn Maria who scoffs and sets the pies down. “Santi thinks he does.” You snort, “Santi just wanted his best friend to be his brother in law.” You raise your eyebrows and she huffs before guiding you outside to see the guys.

As soon as your name is said, Frankie’s head pops up, almost embarrassingly fast. Santiago catches it, but that’s because the bastard was watching him in anticipation. His eyes widen when he sees the flirty little sundress you are wearing, cock twitching in his shorts. Thankful he wasn’t just wearing swimming trunks like Benny was.

You greet each man, Tom over on the grill flipping burgers, until your eyes meet Frankie’s and your heart stutters. God, he’s so fucking handsome. “Hi Frankie.” You smile, trying to not show how flustered you are by the matching grins of your sister and brother in law make it clear that you’re not acting as cool as you want to. “Beer?” Santi offers and you nod, “Frankie, why don’t you get her a beer?” He asks his best friend, eyebrows raised slightly.

He knows what Pope is trying to do and he appreciates it while hating it at the same time. You’ve shown no interest in him, so why is he trying to push the two of you together? You seem nervous around him. “Come on, we’ll get you a good beer.” He promises, holding up his Corona with a lime wedged in the neck. “Not that Miller Lite shit the others are drinking.” Benny scoffs because the last beer Frankie had drank was a Miller and he had just switched to the Corona.

You chuckle and follow him into the kitchen where the beers are in ice to avoid the hot summer heat. You set down the pies you made and Frankie groans, “is that cherry pie?” He asks and you nod, “yeah. My grandma’s recipe.” You tell him and he leans down to smell it. “Fuck, that smells delicious.” His words make your stomach twist with arousal, imagining him between your thighs saying the exact same thing. He grabs a corona and opens it with ease, grabbing a slice of lime to shove in the top. “Thanks. Happy 4th. Thank you for your service.” You toast him with a soft smile, clinking your glass bottle with his after he grabs his drink.

He doesn’t really like when people just thank him for his service, but he feels proud when you say it. Maybe because you are more aware of what he does because of your sister. “It’s hard flying a helicopter and having women throw their panties at me because they don’t know the difference between rotary and fixed wing.” He jokes.

You giggle, hating how girlish you sound but that’s what he does to you. When he was Santi’s best man, you dreamed about him sweeping you off your feet on the wedding night, keeping to the tradition of the maid of honor and best man but he was a gentleman and that, you can’t deny, made you pout in disappointment. “I’m sure you struggle every day.” You mock jokingly before you try to push the lime into the beer but it’s too big.

He shrugs, not willing to comment on that because it would be disrespectful. “Haven’t found a keeper yet.” He admits, knowing the woman he really wants is completely out of his league. You are gorgeous, smart, funny, and responsible. No way you would fall for a trigger puller like him. “What about you? I was surprised when Maria said you were coming alone. Thought you were seeing someone, that it was serious.”

You frown, “seeing someone? I’ve been painfully single for way too long.” You snort and finally manage to push the lime into the beer. Frankie frowns, “I thought - your cousin Danielle told me you had a boyfriend and he was away on business during the wedding events?” Frankie tilts his head and it’s your turn to frown, “boyfriend? I - no. Why would - oh. I know why. She has a crush on you. Told us allll the time about how cute you are but why would she say I had a boyfriend?” You don’t put two and two together, annoyed at your cousin for lying about you.

Frankie rolls his eyes and sighs, putting two and two together. “I fucking know.” He growls. “Pope was busting my ass about making a move on you at the reception.” Frankie confesses, “she must have overheard the night of the cookout.” He remembers her being annoying and constantly ‘checking on them’ while the guys were outside. The bridal shower had been a family co-ed event for everyone. “She told me later that day.”

“Told you what?” You ask, stomach twisting that Pope was telling him to make a move. You wonder if he wants you like you want him or if he is being polite and he actually told Pope he wasn’t interested in you. “Told me that you had a boyfriend and she - she was interested in me.” You deflate at that, wondering if he hooked up with your cousin and that’s why he hasn’t made a move. You take a sip of your beer, “well, she’s beautiful.” You murmur, glancing down at your pies on the counter.

“But she’s annoying as shit.” Frankie snorts. “No offense.” He adds because she is your cousin. He takes a sip of his beer. “I told her that I wasn’t interested, because I’m not.” Frankie doesn’t like to play around with that shit, because he knows how stressful his job is in a relationship and he doesn’t toy with the women he dates.

You nod, chuckling, “yeah. She’s annoying as shit. I love her but all she wants is to get married and have a kid. I don’t even think she cares who the guy is. Insert man here.” You gesture and take another sip of your beer, “I wondered why she hasn’t been around since.” You hum, “so…have you been seeing anyone?” You ask, curious and mentally preparing yourself for heartbreak because you don’t want to keep fantasizing about him when he could be taken.

Frankie lifts a brow, very interested in the way the conversation has come back to him. “Nope.” He answers truthfully. “Haven’t really felt like it.” He’s had a couple of one night stands, but no one that he’s wanted anything more with. “But I can’t believe you are single.” He admits. “Guys where you live must be blind idiots.”

You chuckle, shaking your head, “I guess I don’t put myself out there enough. Maria is always telling me to get out in bars and meet someone but it’s not my scene anymore. Did that in college and now? I just want to find my person and settle down, spend nights watching movies with take out and make out on the sofa.” You confess with a giggle before you inhale deeply, deciding to take a leap. “I met someone but I don’t know if he likes me too. It’s hard to read him when he’s hiding behind a cap.” You confess, looking up at the hat on his head.

The Standard Heating Oil hat is a constant when he’s not in uniform, a family business that he had no interest in joining when he joined the Army. He reaches for it now and shuffles it back and scratches his longer than regulation hair and settles it back down. “Hat’s just an accessory.” He flashes you a grin and shuffles a little closer. “I bet the man you’re talking about has always thought you were amazing and wanted to take you out.” He hums.

Your heart pounds in your chest as you look at him with surprise in your eyes and a smile on your face. “Well, I’d love to go out. Anytime, Morales. Just name the time and place.” You command and he nods, his hand finding your waist. “Could’ve been dancing during the wedding reception if I knew you didn’t have a boyfriend.” Frankie sighs and you take a chance to reach up and cup his cheek, “better late than never.” You murmur, stroking his stubbled cheek with your thumb.

Frankie’s eyes dip down to your lips and he licks his own without even realizing he’s doing it. Leaning in slightly to kiss you, your lips barely touch when the door opens. “Food’s ready!” Benny shouts out and grins when he sees Frankie. “Go Cat!” He slams the door and turns back to the group out in the yard. “Maria! Frankie’s kissing your sister!”

You chuckle against Frankie’s chin. The kiss is short and sweet, your heart pounding from the brief touch, but the moment has passed so you slide your hand down to Frankie’s neck. “Let’s get some food, Catfish.” You declare and he nods, knowing that he will need to kiss you properly another time where you won’t be interrupted. You make your way outside and everyone is smirking, making you roll your eyes. “Shut up.” You say to your sister and she holds her hand up, “I didn’t say a word.” You snort, “you don’t need to.” She’s been your sounding board for your previously unrequited crush on Frankie.

Frankie moves over to Benny, slapping his back harshly and squeezing the other man’s trap. “Thanks, asshole.” He hisses, even though he’s not too mad. The two of you are on the same page at least and his heart thumps when he looks over at you talking to your sister, even as his cock twitches. “Guest bedroom has fresh sheets.” Pope offers with a shit eating grin. “She’s staying there anyway, but I’m sure you wouldn’t mind christening the bed.”

You grab a hot dog and sit with your sister, talking about your extended family, and you tell her about Danielle and what she said to Frankie. “God, she’s - she’s too much. You mean to tell me she stopped you getting laid on my wedding night?” Maria scoffs, “well, you get the last laugh. The sheets are clean in the guest bed if you wanna have the best man stay tonight?” She smirks and you fluster, “I mean…I wouldn’t say no if he asked.” You confess, “he’s - God, I can really see a life with him. Is that too much?” You ask your sister who looks over at her husband and smiles when he winks at her from across the yard. “Nope. I know exactly what you mean.”

Benny and Pope are giving him hell, ribbing him relentlessly while Will and Tom laugh and egg them on. “Yeah, yeah.” Frankie rolls his eyes, but he’s laughing right along with them after relaying the entire story and feeling extremely confident now. “It’s better that we found out now.” He adds and they are encouraging him to go for it now. “Let her finish her hot dog.” Pope suggest. “Yeah, no deep throating Kong over here until thirty minutes after you’ve eaten.” Benny snorts, having seen Frankie naked more times than he could count. Frankie shoots him a bird.

You see the boys joking around and Maria playfully rolls her eyes. “Boys.” She scoffs and you chuckle, helping her with the plates once everyone is done eating. When you’re back in the kitchen, you look up as Frankie comes in to grab another beer. “Tom is a good griller.” You compliment his captain and Frankie nods, “he is. Always has been. Even when we were out in the middle of the desert, the asshole could grill up something on a fire.” He chuckles and you giggle, “I think later I should really thank you for your service. Show you my…appreciation for your sacrifice for our great nation.” You reach out to trail your nail down his chest, scratching his chest slightly.

“Mierda.” Frankie hisses, cock twitching again. Your boldness is sexy and he loves how you go after what you want. “I didn’t really want to watch fireworks anyway.” He admits with a smirk. “Overrated.”

You grin, loving that he is enthusiastic and not rejecting you. “I said later. I want to see some fireworks first in the sky and after, I want to see them when you make me cum on your tongue.” You declare boldly, leaning in to kiss his neck.

He groans, smirking even wider when you pull back to grin at him. “I see the rumors of my talents have been justifiably spread.” He jokes, sending you a wink. “You’ll see fireworks and then you’ll see stars.”

You giggle and step back when Tom walks into the kitchen to grab another beer. He playfully rolls his eyes at your proximity to Frankie, “can you two at least wait until after the fireworks? I bought like three packs. Benny is banned from letting off fireworks.” He reminds Fish who nods and reaches for your hand to squeeze it. You snort and ask “why?” and Frankie sighs, “well, Benny is great with a M4A1 but nearly burns his dick off with fireworks.” You nod in understanding and Tom takes a gulp of his beer, “you gonna come outside and help set up?” Tom asks and Frankie nods, squeezing your hand before he heads off to help Tom. You are anxious for later, knowing this would seem fast to most but you’ve wanted Frankie for nearly 3 years.

“Man, are you sure about this?” Tom asks seriously as the two of them walk outside. “This is Maria’s sister, if shit doesn’t work out….” He trails off, looking over at where Pope and his wife are sitting in one of the loungers, making out. “Yeah I know.” Frankie has thought about that a few times. His best friend would be honor bound to break his kneecaps. “But I think she’s worth it.”

You clean up some dishes, setting them aside to dry while the boys set up the fireworks. You head outside to find Frankie and Tom stepping back from the set up in the back of the yard and you see Pope sitting on the lounger with your sister between his legs, his hands caressing her thighs. “Get a room!” You yell at them playfully and your sister shouts back, “I have one upstairs.” You chuckle and walk over to Benny, “you think this is a good decision? Me and Frankie? I feel…I really like him but I don’t want him to break my heart.”

Benny snorts, nearly choking on his beer. “Fish?” He asks, pointing over to Frankie. “The man has it bad for you. Thinks moon beams shoot out of your ass and shit.” He jokes, trying to reassure you at the same time. “He’s pined for you. One of the reasons he hasn’t really dated. Said that he had already found the woman for him, but she was taken.”

You cover your smile with your beer, pleased that his friend said that. “We wasted time because my cousin lied but I don’t want to waste another second. I really like him and I - I want to see where it goes.” You confess just as Frankie comes over. His arm wraps around your waist to pull you against him and you smile, leaning into his side while Tom sets the fireworks off.

Frankie likes your weight against him as you both look up into the sky. “Enjoy the show.” He murmurs in your ear. “It’s just the first one of the night.”

You grin and nod, looking up at the sky as the fireworks begin. It’s gorgeous and your eyes widen at the display. “Wow.” You gasp and tilt your head, resting it on his shoulder to look up at the sky in awe.

The moment is completely perfect as he watches the fireworks as they burst overhead. Neighbors around the house also start shooting bursting bombs of color and light into the air, making the entire neighborhood light up. The display will go on for hours. “Happy Fourth of July.” Frankie hums.

You hum, lifting your head to look at him and he turns to look at you. His eyes flick down to your lips and you lean in at the same time he does. His nose nudges yours for a second, giving you a chance to back away, but when you don’t, his lips press against yours. You tilt your head to deepen the kiss as the fireworks explode over your head.

Frankie tightens his hold on you, drawing you closer while your tongue slides against his and makes him moan. He likes a woman who’s willing to initiate. His hands sliding up and down your back before he palms your ass possessively.

You whimper into his mouth, your hands sliding up to grip his neck and his hat is pushed back on his head as he kisses you thoroughly, squeezing your ass until you feel him starting to harden against your hip. The group notices and starts to cheer, making you fluster as you pull back from Frankie’s mouth.

“Get a room.” Santi snorts, grinning at Frankie before he waggles his brows at you. Tom chuckles and rolls his eyes. “Just don’t run off to get married.” He warns playfully. Frankie huffs and shakes his head. “You all suck.” He teases. “We are going to go upstairs now.”

You ignore the way everyone smirks as Frankie takes your hand and guides you through the yard into the house where you switch to guide him up the stairs. It’s a house Frankie knows well. He worked on it with Santi after he bought it, helping to update it. You giggle as you make your way upstairs and squeal when Frankie smacks your ass through your sundress. You find the door to the guest room and open it, pulling Frankie in behind you before you shut the door.

“So now we are alone.” Frankie smirks as he pushes the lock on the door knob and looks over at you. “And we aren’t nearly as drunk as we would have been at the wedding reception.” He adds. “That dress was killer though.”

“Thanks. I told my sister I’d only be maid of honor if I got to pick my dress.” You tease and make your way over to the foot of the bed after you kick off your sandals. “You looked so handsome in that suit. Wanted to rip it off of you but shit…Danielle ruined our good intentions.” You chuckle and take a step closer to him, “but we are here now and I want you, Frankie. I want you to touch me.” You plead, sliding your hands along his chest.

“Shorts and a t-shirt are just as good as a suit?” He asks jokingly as he pulls you closer again. “Although I like this dress too.” He slides one hand down to dip under the fabric. “Easy access.”

You smile when he caresses the back of your thigh and you lean in to kiss his clavicle on display above his t-shirt. “Shorts and t-shirt. Suit. Whatever you’re wearing, you are sexy, Morales. No two ways about it.” You murmur as you kiss along his collarbone.

“You’re sexy.” He finds the zipper to the sundress and drags it down. Eager to feel you under his hands. “Wanted to bend you over the wedding party table and fuck you right there.”

You let him pull the zipper down and you lower your arms so he can push the thin straps from your shoulders, letting the dress drop to the floor. “God, imagine that. Fucking me instead of making your best man speech.” You joke and you’re glad your dress didn’t require a bra.

“Woulda been great.” He moans when he peels the dress off you and sees your tits. “Fuck.” He hisses. “They are fucking pretty.” He compliments. “I want to suck on them when you ride my cock.”

“We can do that, baby. I just - shit - I just need you to touch me.” You plead, having spent so many nights imagining him touching you, inside of you, it’s almost unbearable to wait another second and when his hands squeeze your tits, you sigh in relief. “Yes. Please Frank.” You beg, your hand finding his hat so you can toss it onto the dresser.

“You are so goddamn pretty.” He murmurs softly, cupping your tits and pinching your nipples. “Do you want me to fuck you? Or eat you out first.”

The fact that he’s asking you what you want has your pussy clenching around nothing and you are impatient. You want him inside of you. “Fuck me first.” You demand, reaching for the hem of his shirt, “I want to see all of you.” You whine, pulling his shirt over his head when he lets go of your tits.

He is smirking at your impatience and eagerness, letting you reach for the button of his shorts. “Strip me down, baby.” He encourages. “I want you to touch me too. Imagined how good you would feel. How fucking perfect.” He groans. “You don’t know how often I thought about you while I was jerking my cock.”

You unbutton his shorts and push them down along with his briefs and he kicks them off while your eyes widen at the sight of his thick cock. “Probably as much as I touched myself thinking about you but fuck, I never imagined you’d be so…big.” You confess, reaching out to wrap your fingers around him.

He groans at your touch, rocking his hips forward and twitching when you squeeze him. “Don’t think I’ll fit?” He asks playfully. “I think I’ll fit, but I know you’ll be the tightest little pussy I’ve ever fucked.”

You never knew he was such a dirty talker but you fucking love it. You moan and squeeze him again, guiding him by his cock back towards the bed and you let go of him as you fall down onto the bed and he follows you. He grabs your waist and lifts you up higher until you’re settled on the pillows. “Hi.” You murmur with a smile as he kneels between your spread legs.

“Hi.” He slides his hands up and down your thighs before he wraps a hand around his cock and starts to pump it. “You look so fucking pretty spread out for me, baby.” He leans down and presses his lips to yours while he settles into the v of your hips and lines up to sink into you inch by inch.

You cup his cheeks and lift your legs higher as he pushes into you, stretching you out. It’s a pinch without foreplay but you love how he’s stretching you out. “Oh God.” You gasp against his lips and he leans back, stopping. “You good, hermosa?” He asks and you nod, “yeah. Just overwhelmed. I never - didn’t think this would actually happen.” You confess softly, caressing his cheeks.

He nudges his nose against yours and kisses you softly. “I didn’t either.” He admits. “But it is happening and you are taking me so well. You feel so fucking good around my cock.” He is still inside you, praising you and loving how you clench down around him.

He pushes the rest of the way into you until his cock is nudging your cervix and you inhale deeply, closing your eyes at the way he feels inside you. “Fuck me, Morales.” You demand playfully and he shifts his hips, making you moan, your head tilting back against the pillow at how good he feels.

He chuckles and slowly pulls back, watching your body arch as you try to draw him back in. “Remember you asked for this.” He warns, another firework exploding above the house muffles the sound of your scream when he snaps his hips forward again.

He starts to fuck you in earnest and you cling to him, mouth open as you cry out his name in pleasure. It’s so fucking good. His hand squeezes your tit and you cover his hand with yours, making him squeeze again. “Oh shit. You feel - it’s so fucking good.” You praise him as he rocks into you.

It’s not the romantic, gentle time he probably should have been trying to focus on. This is raw, needy. Years worth of wanting being burnt off with the harsh snap of his hips and the groans when he’s buried so deep inside you that your walls clench around him. “You’re a fucking dream, baby.” He moans your name and kisses your neck. “Blowing my mind, fuck- I’m already about to bust.”

You moan at the fact that he’s so worked up. You’ve reduced this grown man to almost cumming like a teenager and that makes you clench around him, getting close. “I don’t care. You can cum. It’s safe. I have - fuck - I have an IUD. You can cum inside me.” You promise and caress his shoulders as he hunches over you.

That does it for him. He hasn’t even thought about birth control when he normally is an ‘always wear a condom’ kind of guy. The thought of filling you up as his hips stuttering before he pushes deep, painting your walls with ropes of his hot, sticky seed as he groans your name and apologizes over and over.

You stroke his back, enjoying the warmth of his cum filling you up. You sigh, closing your eyes and you know that he will make this up to you. You lower your legs from his hips as he comes to a stop and pants into your neck.

“Fuck, I can’t believe that I did that.” Frankie pants, pulling back to look you in the eyes as he kisses you. “Now, I’ll show you that I can make you cum on my tongue at least.” He promises, feeling a little embarrassed about his quick performance.

You shake your head, “it’s okay, baby. I’ll take it as a compliment. Just means you liked my pussy.” You tease, sliding your hands up to tangle in his hair as you lean in to nip his jaw playfully. “We have more times ahead.” You murmur, knowing that he won’t always do that.

“Shiiiit.” He snorts, shaking his head. “I have to take care of my girl.” He nudges his nose against yours, feeling on top of the world that you want to be with him. He smirks after one more kiss and starts to drag his mouth down your body as he moves towards his goal, determined to make you see stars like he had promised.

You watch him as he pulls out of you and starts to kiss down your body. You moan when he wraps his lips around your nipple, biting down on the bud until it’s puffy and you are squirming beneath him. “Fuck, Frankie.” You moan, already feeling his cum welling up to leak out of you. “Do you want me to - to clean up before you - you know.” You ask, wanting to see if he wants you to clean his cum first. Some men don’t like tasting themselves.

Frankie grunts, shaking his head as he suckles on your tit before pulling off of it. “Why?” He asks, lifting a brow. “I’m just going to make you messy again when I make you cum and then fuck you like I should have the first time.”

You moan when he starts to kiss down your stomach, “some men don’t like it.” You answer and he rests his chin on your lower stomach, “I’m not some men. I don’t give a fuck if you’re full of my cum. I’m going to make you cum.” He promises and you whimper when his breath hits your slicked up folds.

The pearlescent liquid that is starting to drip out of you doesn’t bother Frankie. He uses his thumbs to pull your folds back, exposing your sensitive clit to his hungry gaze and he moans when he sees your cunt clench, pushing more of his cum out. “Fuck, that’s a gorgeous sight.” He groans, looking up at you while he lowers his head down to suck your clit into his mouth.

His mouth is hot and wet as he sucks on your clit and a soft gasp escapes your lips at the sensation. “Fuck. That feels good.” You murmur, stroking your fingers through his hair as his dark eyes watch you from between your thighs.

Frankie has never been a passive lover. He doesn’t take and not give in return. Even the one night stands left his bed unable to tell anyone that he had been selfish or didn’t try to make sure they had a good time. You, he especially wants to enjoy this, he wants you to love it. To be addicted to it and him in turn. The same way he is already addicted to you. He flattens his tongue against your folds and tastes the two of you combined with a moan.

You moan at the way he laps at you, tasting his own spend from your pussy, and you love the way his hands squeeze your thighs as he pushes them further apart to accommodate his wide shoulders. "Shit." You hiss in pleasure when he pushes his tongue inside of you.

He chuckles into you, aware that you are both shocked and awed by the fact that he’s willing to devour you so thoroughly. It makes it even better, his spent cock twitching as he feels your walls pulse around his tongue. Moaning at how good you are being for him. He can hear the cheers and the fireworks outside, but he’s focused on you, nothing else matters right now as he laps at your cunt.

Your head tilts back as his nose nudges against your clit and your chest heaves as the pleasure makes your spine tingle. The way he’s devouring you like a man starved has your mouth falling open in a silent moan.

Frankie groans, unwilling to pull away from your cunt to encourage you, so he just makes sounds as he doubles down on your pussy. Wanting to see you come apart for him as his cock starts to harden again.

His tongue pushes deep, lapping up his cum combined with yours, and you whimper, getting closer as he nudges your clit with his nose again. “Fuck, baby. You’re gonna make me cum.” You moan and he works his tongue faster, sending you over the edge.

He absorbs your sounds, loving how they muffle through your pussy and your walls flutter wildly as your body arches. Sucking your clit into his mouth and pulling on it while your body shakes and he wrings every drop of pleasure out of you that he can until you are pushing at his head. He lets go, licking at you softly just to feel you convulse with aftershocks and he chuckles quietly. “Now we’re even.”

You chuckle breathlessly, eyes closed as you enjoy the way he makes you feel, and you sigh in bliss as he kisses his way back up your body. You drag him down to press your lips to his, not caring about the combined taste on his tongue as it tangles with yours. You slide your hand down between you, wrapping your fingers around his hardening cock. “Lay down.” You order, letting go of him to push on his chest.

He rolls onto his back and reaches for you. “You want to ride?” He asks, helping you as you swing a leg over his waist and straddle him. The next barrage of fireworks starts to burst, lighting up the bedroom and he grins. “There’s a show to compete with.”

You smirk, sliding down his body until you’re kneeling between his legs. His cock is still half hard so you wrap your fingers around him and take the head of his cock into your mouth. You love the way he groans and his mouth falls open as his dark eyes watch you.

“Fuck.” Frankie hisses, wanting to close his eyes and enjoy the feeling but he wants to watch you more. Knowing that this is so much better than his wildest dreams about you. “Fuck, baby, that mouth.” He groans. “I knew you would look so pretty with my cock in your mouth. So fucking pretty.” He reaches down and caresses your cheek, feeling the jaw move as you take him deeper.

He hardens more in your mouth and you love that, tasting the tang of your arousal lingering on his skin and you whimper around his cock as you start to pump what you can’t take into your mouth.

“Fuck, I want you to ride me.” Frankie whines. “Want to see your tits bounce while you ride my cock. Want to watch you.” He pants and curses again. “Mierda- that tongue of yours.” He hisses when you press your tongue against his slit. “Ride me, baby. Please ride me.”

You want to deny him and make him cum down your throat but you want to cum on his cock. You moan and release his cock, a string of spit keeping you connected until it breaks as you shift to straddle him. You reach down to grip his cock, positioning him at your entrance after you lift up to sink down onto his length with a moan, fireworks still exploding outside.

“Fuck!” He rocks his hips up and grabs onto yours as he groans. You are perfect around him, looking like a goddess as you are taking his cock deep into your body. “Perfect, baby. Fuck, you are so perfect.” He reaches up and drags you down for a kiss.

You moan into his mouth, loving the way he feels even bigger in this new angle. “Fuck.” You pant against his mouth and rock back onto him. Your hands sliding into his hair as you slide your tongue against his.

Frankie holds onto you, adoring you with his hands. Cupping your tits and squeezing them as you slowly start to rock. Rolling your hips and squeezing your cock. “Fuck, baby.” He moans into your mouth breathlessly.

He loves the way you rock back onto him and you caress his chest as you kiss along his jaw. He feels so good inside you. “Fuck. You’re so good, baby.” You gasp, hitting something good inside of you.

“That’s it, baby.” Frankie encourages, holding you up and ducking his head so he can take a nipple into his mouth. Doing exactly what he said he wanted to do.

You rock back onto his cock, shifting back to sit up and you grab onto the headboard to start bouncing on his length. His eyes burn into yours and you watch him as your thighs start to burn but you ignore it and focus on the pleasure.

He watches, completely entranced by the sight of you riding him like he was a prized bull. Your fingernails dig into his chest and make him hiss in pleasure at the sweet sting as you brace yourself over him. “Fuck, fuck.” His eyes dip down between your thighs and he watches your lips drag over his shaft, making his toes curl when you clench down around him.

You are lost in the sensations, mouth open and whimpers escaping as you move faster, grinding down onto his cock, and your hand slides down to rub your clit. Frankie’s hand immediately knocks yours away and you whine until he picks up where you left off, rubbing your clit and you pant, “I’m so close. Shit. Keep going. Just like that. Just like - fuckkkk.” You wail, freezing on top of him as your walls clamp down on his cock while you soak him.

Frankie growls when you clamp down on him, soaking his cock and he braces his feet in the bed to rock up into you. Chasing his own release again while you shake and whimper, riding out your high. “Fuck, baby. Love it, love you.” He blurts out, knowing that you might not believe it, but he does love you.

His confession, even though it could be the best of the moment, makes you choke out, “love you too. Fuck, Frankie. Loved you since - since the engagement party.” You confess, wanting him to cum inside you again. “Cum for me. Please. Want to feel it again.” You beg, squeezing his cock in your walls.

He gasps out, holding tight to you as his cock drives up into your grasping walls over and over. “Fuck- you- you’re perfect.” He rambles, turning his head to press his lips to yours as his entire body tenses. Another thrust buries him deep and he’s moaning into your mouth as he falls over the edge again, cock pulsing deep inside you.

You pant against his lips as he stiffens beneath you, painting your walls again, and you caress his cheek, “so good. That time was - wow.” You murmur, relaxing above him as he slides his hands along your back down to your ass to playfully squeeze it.

“Had to make up for the first time.” Frankie jokes, even though it obviously hadn’t bothered you. He kisses you softly and sighs. “You’re amazing.” He has always thought so. “And I meant it. It’s too soon to say something like that, but I don’t just like you or want to sleep with you.” He admits. “I want to have a relationship. See where this goes.”

You caress his chest, “Frankie, we have known each other for four years. I think I’ve been in love with you for three of those. It’s not rushed and it’s not some fling. I want a relationship with you. I love you and I am all in if you are.” You murmur, leaning in to kiss his chin.

Frankie hums and shoots you a grin. “That sounds perfect to me.” He comments, just as the last barrage of fireworks quiets down and cheers are heard around the neighborhood. “Everyone agrees too.” He jokes, happy to finally be here with you and sharing how he feels.

****

“Thanks.” You say to your sister after she hands you a beer. “No worries. Bet you’re glad you don’t need to breastfeed anymore.” She grins and you snort, “yeah. I love him more than life but sometimes I just wanted a beer without having to pump and dump.” You confess, looking over at Santi and your husband, Frankie, as they talk. You have your son on your hip and he’s eight months old now. Santi and Maria’s daughter runs around chasing Uncle Benny, the lively two year old giggling while Tom grills and Will sips his beer overseeing the food.

“You know, Santi and I have thought about trying for another.” Your sister admits, grinning at the squeals of joy as her daughter is scooped up by Benny and he blows raspberries against her tummy. She shrugs slightly. “You having Marcus gave us baby fever. Especially Santi.” She rolls her eyes playfully, amazed that her sexy husband is so enthralled by the idea of getting her pregnant again. He loved her body while carrying their daughter and loves the changes that had brought to her post baby body.

You chuckle, leaning in to kiss the forehead of your baby as he babbles away on your hip. He will want to be crawling around in a minute but you want to hold him for a little longer. “Well, I’ll be honest…I kind of want another one too. Frankie is such a good dad and I just - we got pregnant by surprise with Marcus and we wanted him as soon as we found out but I kind of want to get pregnant knowing we are trying.” You tilt your head, “does that make sense?”

“Perfect sense.” She promises, knowing you better than most. You want to wonder if every time your husband cums inside you if that is the time you create another life together. “It’s the anticipation and fun of trying.” She smirks. “I think that your husband has a breeding kink that might come out.” She teases playfully.

"You think so?" You smirk, looking over at Frankie as his gaze meets yours and he winks at you from under his ever present hat. "I like the idea of that. If we both try, we could be pregnant at the same time." You tell her and she grins, "how freaking amazing would that be? So, are we doing this? Telling our husbands to knock us up again?" She asks and you nod, "hell yeah." She giggles and reaches for Marcus, "lemme hold my nephew for a bit. Go tell your husband what you want." She smirks and you let her take your son into her arms and you sway your hips as you walk over to Frankie who is now alone as Santi walks over to Maria, cooing over the baby. "Happy 4th, baby. Thank you for your service." You murmur as you lean in to lick his ear.

Shivering, Frankie groans and turns his head to press his lips to yours. “I love when you thank me.” He teases, remembering the very enthusiastic blow job he had gotten on Veteran’s Day, even though you were still pregnant and weren’t always feeling sexy. “This is our anniversary.” He reminds you with a grin, loving the re-telling of the story every year when the fireworks start. Every year the tales of your screams are even more exaggerated, but he doesn’t dispute Benny’s telling of the story. “I love you more now, if that’s possible.”

You reach up to cup his cheek as he wraps his arm around your waist to pull you closer. “I love you so much.” You murmur, leaning in to kiss him softly and he chases your lips as you pull back. “I have something I want to talk about.” You confess, sliding your hand down his chest. “Yeah?” He asks, brow furrowing in curiosity. “I want another baby.” You admit, biting your lip to wait for his reaction.

Frankie is honestly surprised, thinking that you would want a year or two before talking about another. “Are you sure?” He asks, wondering if his pride in Marcus and being a dad has somehow pressured you into thinking that he needs another kid now. “Yeah.” You grin and shrug your shoulders. “Maria and I were thinking that you and Santi could get us pregnant and we can go through it together.” He glances over at his best friend and your sister as they play with Marcus and he has to admit that it would be fun to share the expectant dad role with Santi. “Only if you’re really wanting another baby now.” He murmurs. “You are the one who has to go through everything.”

You nod, “I want this. I want us to enjoy trying for a baby. Marcus was a surprise and I want us to actively try and know that when you’re filling me up, it’s to knock me up.” You explain, “we have been using condoms anyway since I didn’t bother with another IUD after Marcus. We could start trying tonight.” You suggest with a smirk as you press yourself against him.

You can feel his cock twitch when you’re pressed against him, so Frankie doesn’t even deny that it sounds good to him. “I’ll burn the damn condoms.” He vows, hating wearing them, but he wasn’t going to push you towards a different birth control. He just loves feeling nothing between you. “You want a Fourth of July baby, baby?” He smirks back at you, leaning in to kiss you again.

You nod, wrapping your arms around his neck to deepen the kiss, your tongue sliding into his mouth. You moan when his hands slide down to squeeze your ass through your shorts, and you ignore the cheers from your friends as Frankie devours you. “Guessing you said yes too, huh Fish?” Santi smirks as he walks over with Marcus on his hip. You step back from Frankie and take your son from his godfather, “you hungry, baby?” You ask and Marcus squeezes your breast, making you laugh. “Come on, let’s get you a snack.” You coo to your baby as you carry him into the house to get a snack for him.

Santiago slaps Frankie on the back and laughs. “Fuck, we are in for it now.” He jokes, smiling broadly at the adventures to come. “First one to get their wife pregnant has to buy the rounds throughout the pregnancy.” He tells him, making Frankie snort. “Pendejo.” He huffs. “You just want me to buy the drinks.” He won’t give a shit about it though. Proudly will buy the drinks since he’s a lucky fucking man. He’s got the woman he wanted and the life he never imagined he would have, all because of the Fourth of July.

#pedro pascal #frankie morales #frankie morales x reader #frankie morales x you #frankie morales x f!reader #frankie morales fanfiction #frankie morales smut #frankie morales imagine #triple frontier #triple frontier fic #frankie catfish morales

335 notes · View notes

dramaqueer-commie · 10 months ago

Text

yeah matfighten could be the best tvshow ive ever seen in my life and its not even on tv

Not a single moment from a single cooking show will ever compare to when in Matfighten (The food fight, Swedish cooking show created by our biggest YouTubers), they were tasked to make some type of snacks and a guy built an entire fishing dam and then just gave the judge store bought snacks and bribes

No image will compare to this

#scratch that #it is the best tvshow ive seen #another honorable mention #the grill episode #where he made chilli con carne #on a grill #and didnt lose

10 notes · View notes

rhey-007 · 11 months ago

Text

Viva Las Vegas!

Fernando Alonso x driver!reader

Summary: What happens in Vegas stays in Vegas... But not this time.

Warnings/Tags: female reader, mentions of hate comments, mentions of racist comments (literally just a mention nothing specific), fluff... I guess that's it : P

A/N: I FINALLY FINISHED SOMETHING JXVSHHEHRHBRBT I'm so happy haha

So this fic is based on this ↓ request. I hope I lived up to your expectations TwT I honestly think it's a cute little fic and I love the inserts :3

Wordcount: 2925

*:..｡o○✨○o｡..:*

You sighed in relief finally leaving the F1 studio after you finished filming Grill the Grid for Las Vegas. You loved doing those, it was a lot of fun but the filming was always the last part of your job for some days and after so many activities before, you were sometimes too tired to think of any answers.

Unfortunately for you, Lando and Carlos approached you the second you left the building, huge smiles plastered on their faces.

“Hi Y/N! How was filming? “

The younger one asked enthusiastically at which you just shook your head.

“What do you need? Cause I’m sure you do need something... “

“Well... We're going to a party to start off this amazing weekend and we were thinking that you might want to join us”

The Spaniard explain making you sigh. They could see you were tired but you never said no to them so they tried their best to convince you.

You could use some party and alcohol after the previous weekend when you crashed your car on almost the very beginning of the race, causing you to be upset and quite nervous ever since.

“Lewis will be there too. Literally everyone will be there! Even Fernando! “

Ah yes... The Fernando card. The forbidden card the boys knew would get you worked up to whatever they wanted.

“Fine... But you have to pick me up! “

You huffed agreeing reluctantly then walked away to get ready. You were going to some club so you decided to put on a thigh length, sparkly lavender dress, some black heels and golden jewelry with some soft makeup.

Lando and Carlos whistled at you as you approached their car and immediately said after you got in.

“Ooooh Fernando’s gonna loooove that~”

Rolling your eyes at their comment you kicked Carlos’ seat so he would finally drive away.

The party was full of Formula workers and drivers, the boys were right, everyone was there. It was hosted in one of Vegas' clubs, one you had no idea about but were glad you decided to join and discovered that magical place.

Carlos and Lando left you just after you walked in so you sat alone by the bar, waiting for Lewis to notice and join you but he was too occupied by the girls.

You sighed heavily ordering a drink and almost spilled it when you felt a hand on your back. You turned around to see those beautiful hazel eyes shining in the colorful lights and a huge grin you oh so loved.

“Hi gorgeous~”

Fernando said sitting down beside you, his hand not leaving your back radiating pleasant warmth.

“Well hello there Mr Alonso~”

You smiled widely at the older man as he checked you out. The light purple dress matched your dark skin perfectly driving the man crazy.

“The guy you dressed so beautifully for is really lucky”

“Oh there is no guy. Unless you want to be him~”

You teased sipping your drink, making a soft, barely visible in the lights blush appear on his face. Fernando noticed you started to get bolder and bolder with your flirting which made you even more attractive in his eyes. He loved confident women.

“I would be honored. May I have this dance then? “

Quickly finishing your drink you grabbed his hand and pulled him onto the dance floor where you had a great time the whole night. You felt eyes on yourself the whole time, knowing damn well no one will let you forget about this till the end of your life. But you couldn’t care less, just indulged in the moment.

The next day you arrived to the Vegas circuit for the grand opening a little hangover with your grid bestie Lewis.

The two of you drove through the paddock on his electric scooter, one earphone in each ear’s listening to Eminem, with Lewis’ chin on your shoulder. You looked like a couple and to some acted like but in fact you considered each others siblings.

Lewis was not only your teammate but also the only person you felt comfortable talking about the racist hate comments you received, as he understood you the best. Being a black woman in an European men dominated sport was not easy. You got a lot of backlash and negative opinions from some fans, coworkers and FIA staff despite being one of the best drivers on the grid.

The only group that fully accepted you were your fellow drivers. They saw you as a precious gem, a little sister they had to defend at all cost, even though you weren’t the youngest.

The one individual that thought otherwise was the oldest one – Fernando Alonso. He didn’t see you as a little girl but as a woman, a very beautiful and gorgeous woman, the object of his desires, that's why he spent the whole previous night by your side, unable to deglue - a thing the whole paddock knew.

So when he noticed you and Lewis pass by his blood boiled. The man knew Lewis was nothing more than a brother to you but couldn’t help the jealousy accumulate inside of himself whenever he saw the two of you together.

“Fernando saw us”

Lewis murmured at which you just shrugged.

“I don’t like how he's looking at you... “

You rolled your eyes with a sigh. After having this conversation with Lewis so many times you already had enough. The man didn’t approve on your behavior relative to each other. He deemed the Spaniard was too old for you, considering your 12 years age gap.

Lewis just wanted the best for you, the best for his little sister and he knew you could do so much better than Fernando. He even arranged you multiple dates with guys he thought would be perfect for you, but you always dismissed them all sometimes not even showing up to the date to Hamilton’s displeasure.

You knew he just wanted good but you found it annoying and unnecessary.

“You’re exaggerating, as always... If you don’t like it so much you should’ve looked after me yesterday and not pick up chicks... “

You remarked before hopping off the scooter and walking in to the Mercedes garage.

Fernando clearly flirted with you whenever he had a chance, so you weren’t surprised seeing him beside your platform along with someone from media filming the whole thing, blowing you a sweet kiss and sending a wink just before you and Lewis were launched for your presentation.

Hamilton shook his head disappointed hearing your giggle. He was opposed to your little ‘relationship’ or whatever you could call it but you couldn’t care less.

Fernando was a really handsome man and your age gap wasn’t something you worried about. The thing that actually worried you was his flirting. As much as you enjoyed it, the man was flirting with literally everybody earning him a status of a womanizer, which drove you crazy.

You wished you were the only one he flirted with. Little did you know that with you he meant it, he really meant it.

By the time the elevator lowered you down the Spaniard was gone. You figured he must have gone to do the interviews, to which you were escorted just after stepping out of the lift.

Later that evening you were sitting in the recording room you rented and recorded your podcast where you talked about working as an F1 driver and answered your fans’ questions. Most of the questions were about your work, some about the relationships with other drivers while some were just mean comments.

When something like that happened you usually just hung up with that person mid their sentence and answered another call as if nothing. You tried not to worry much about hate comments but had to admit that some really got into your brain and heart.

After 3 tiring hours you were almost by the end when someone asked you a very interesting question.

“Well... I was wondering... What do you think about Fernando flirting with you?”

You chuckled softly remembering all the times Nando flirted with you, how your cheeks flushed and the world seemed to stop leaving only the two of you in motion. You wouldn’t admit you loved it, but you truly did, sometimes even fantasized about it.

“You know... It’s not like he’s only flirting with me. I saw him flirt with Lance... Mark... I’m sure you saw those clips too. Fernando’s just a flirtatious guy”

“But what if it’s genuine?”

But what if it’s actually genuine?... You could only wish it was... He'd been doing this for a very long time, yet he never actually invited you on a date, that’s why you doubted it.

“If it was, he would’ve asked me out a long time ago. Unless he’s shy and tries to do it right now through you!”

You joked before thanking the girl and moving on to another person. Good thing it was the last one, because after the previous call the only thing you wanted to do was to drown yourself in your foolish fantasies.

“Last but not least – anonymous. Bring it up!”

“Would you be mad if Fernando actually tried to ask you out through somebody?...”

That voice... You could recognize it everywhere as it lingered behind Fernando almost always. Lance’s scared voice sounded in your earphones making you laugh. You never though Nando was actually too shy to ask you to a date himself, considering his shameless flirting and a status of a womanizer.

“Yes! Is he there with you?”

Silence fell on the other side before quiet bickering could be heard, then Alonso’s voice filled your ears.

“Hi...”

“Hi stranger. Is there something you would like to ask me?”

You smiled widely awaiting his response, legs jumping like crazy from excitement, teeth biting hardly into the bottom lip as the seconds felt like hours.

“Well... Uh... C-can you turn around?”

Frowning you did as he asked, turning in your chair to meet his silhouette waiting outside your glass office with a huge bouquet of field flowers – your favourite. You felt your heart melt at the thought that he remembered such little details about you. You gasped seeing him, that beautiful smile graced his face as he watched you turn back around.

“Couldn’t you just play along!? It could have been so romantic!”

He whined making you shake your head in amusement. You could not believe... The man always made you happy with just him being but this time you felt like on cloud 9.

“So?... What do you say?”

You sighed heavily thanking your audience before quickly dropping everything off and leaving the office.

“Do I have a choice?”

Asking playfully you grabbed Fernando’s arm and greeted his wingman.

“So where are we going?”

Lance dropped you off at one of the most expensive restaurants in Las Vegas, even though you told Fernando some beer and fries in a random bar was enough when he told you where you were going.

You were a little skimpy, coming from not so rich family and always felt chest pain when buying expensive things or when someone bought you something.

Alonso knew it well but he wanted to give you the whole world so since that date he had been showering you with presents, not letting you complain about the price nor giving them away.

“Fernando?...”

“Yes?”

“Please be honest... Why did it took you so long to ask me out?...”

You asked after you ordered your food. That question occupied your mind since you started to flirt with each other. You thought that if that womanizer actually liked you, he would’ve asked you on a date a long time ago, which slowly made you lose faith in the chemistry between you two. The man sighed heavily gathering his thoughts before he responded.

“Well... I have to admit I was scared... I have a big, toe curling crush on you since we’ve met but I guess I was just scared that such a beautiful, smart and young woman won’t take a liking in an old man like me... Even though you were flirting back I just wasn’t sure... “

He confessed. You smiled reassuringly and captured his hands in yours.

“Oh Fernie... You could’ve tried... The worst that could happen would be me rejecting you but I could never... You’re too handsome and wise for me not to fall for you. And don’t you ever again dare call yourself old. Because you’re not. I don’t mind your age and neither should you worry about our age gap. It’s not that big after all...”

“12 years is not a lot?”

Fernando asked with a chuckle earning one back. The man loved hearing and seeing you laugh, especially when he caused it.

“It’s not! I know worse cases!”

You laughed along the man. You’ve spent the night enjoying each other’s company, hoping the day would never end.

You woke up to the smell of fresh coffee and breakfast. You slept in his hotel room, in his bed but nothing happened between you two. Fernando loved you too much to rush anything sexual, prefering to just shower you in sweet kisses and goodnight hugs.

“Buenos días princesa~”(good morning princess)

The man soon walked in, a wooden tray full of food and two mugs of dark liquid in his hands. He sat down beside you and waited for you to sit up before he placed the tray in front of you.

“I’ve made you some breakfast. Your favourite. Chocolate pancakes with strawberries and bananas and caramel latte macchiato... Which I had to order from Starbucks downstairs as I am unable to use the coffee machine. Too complicated for my old mind”

You smiled happily and placed a sweet kiss to his lips before taking a sip of your coffee.

“Mmm... Thank you... You know me so well”

“Of course I do. I’m your one and only after all”

The man grinned before settling down beside you and joining you in eating. The morning passed by too quickly and soon you drove with Fernando to the paddock. Fortunately no paparazzi noticed you yet.

For the rest of your stay in Vegas, Alonso took you on dates, always to a different place thinking of different activities every time. You felt like he was what was missing in your life as you always felt a part of you lost until that evening.

The media quickly caught on to your romance, writing an article after an article about your relationship. The whole grid started to call you an old married couple the moment they found out, being very happy for you two just as the whole F1 community.

The only one who was still opposed to it was Lewis, but with time Fernando has managed to convince him he wasn’t so bad and treated you right.

Soon the 2023 season finished, that meant that in some time the F1 social media team was going to organise a Secret Santa gift exchange.

You wondered who’d you get, secretly hoping for Lewis, it would’ve been the easiest task ever as you knew well what he craved.

Unfortunately you drew Yuki and decided to buy him some food and sweets as it was the safest gift you were sure he’d like.

You weren’t the only one who drew someone other than they wished to. Fernando drew Esteban but wanted to get you, so he started to run around the paddock asking every driver if they got you.

Eventually he traded with Kevin who was more than happy to take Esteban, he just couldn’t think of a gift for you, whereas Fernando had his gift bought for you way earlier which waited in his apartment for the exchange.

When the day came, the social media staff caught you after an interview and you started to film your bit, which was the last one.

You sat down by the table and greeted the fans before taking the present the interviewer gave you. You smiled the whole time as you unwrapped the paper, a small black box emerging from it.

Opening it you revealed a beautiful gold ring with a shining amethyst in the midle. Looking confused at the ring you felt someone’s hand on your shoulder.

You turned around rapidly to see Fernando on his one knee in front of you, a soft smile plastered on his face as he looked deep into your eyes.

Tears started to fill yours when you finally understood what was going on, an awkward chuckle escaping your lips.

Some might thing it was too early as you only dated for a month but it felt like you've been together for those 2 years of flirting. Besides, Fernando felt like you were the one. No. He knew you were the one and you knew he was the only one for you too.

You shook your head not believing and hid your face in your hands.

“Fernando. Alonso. Diaz... You’re impossible”

You said soon, pulling your hands away from your face and smiling widely at the man.

“Is that a yes?”

You didn’t say anything instead quickly putting the ring on and throwing yourself at the man, you both falling to the ground with happy giggles and applause from the people surrounding you.

Grabbing his cheeks you kissed him passionately, not caring even a little about the cameras filming you, you wanted this moment captured and the whole world to see it.

It was the best month in your whole life...

*:..｡o○✨○o｡..:*

I hope you liked it! Let me know if you have any ideas for future fics! 💞

283 notes · View notes