#i almost never read something to the end because i hate endings

[beargyu313]

Let’s not do this again .ೃ࿔ *:･

⋆✴︎˚Summary: you’ve known Riki since you were little, but as the years pass they force you apart. You never knew running into him after two years would make you meet the worst version of yourself.

⋆⭒˚.⋆Word count: 13k

CW: This story explores messy, flawed characters—read with caution.

 *ੈ✩‧₊˚Tags: angst with happy ending, smut, childhood friends, brat tamer Niki, subtle degradation, cheating, blackmailing, possessive behavior, sex as retribution, jealousy, angry sex, fluff at the end

જ⁀➴a/n: This was way angstier than I intended idk what happened taglist: @mrsjjongstby

mdni smut ahead, masterlist

You have known Riki your whole life. Being neighbors meant you saw each other often. And all it took to spark a friendship was him sharing his candy with you on a cold September day.

You still remember it, as if it happened yesterday. First day of school, overcast weather, and your chest tight for no real reason.

After school ended you went to the playground. And your younger neighbor was already there. He didn’t understand why you were sad, but he knew he wanted to make you smile again.

He just sat down beside you and placed the wrapped sweet in your hand. Like it was obvious that he wanted to make you feel better. That he would.

After that, it was always just you two. Matching Halloween costumes. Staying up too late on Fridays. Trading secrets. You had other friends, but Riki always came first. He felt like home.

As you two got older, things shifted. But not in a sudden, dramatic way. It was slow. Soft. The kind of change you barely noticed — until one day when you kissed him, and it didn’t feel wrong.

On his 18th birthday, you two had sex for the first time. It wasn’t planned. But it also wasn’t a surprise. That was the thing about you and Riki, everything just sort of happened.

He’d touch your wrist a certain way, and you’d end up in his lap. You’d fight, and then you’d make out in silence.

You weren’t a couple. But you weren’t just friends either.

Then Jungwon came along. Same age as you. Same classes. Smart, kind, charming in the right ways. It made sense to date him. To say yes to something real. Something normal.

So you did.

And for the first time, Riki wasn’t there. He hated it. Tried to act indifferent. Played along at first. But you could feel it. The resentment. The anger. The disbelief that you’d actually leave him behind.

Because here’s the thing… Riki thought you’d pick him. He thought he was your endgame. But you didn’t. And he never forgave you for it.

But you still dream about his mouth sometimes. You still feel the ghost of his touch on your skin, especially on cold and foggy days that reminisce the early autumn weather.

And no matter how much time passes… you can’t move on. Even two years later, as you’re getting ready for a party you think about him as you look out at the blinking city lights hugged by the mist and fog.

You hug your bare arms, already wearing the backless ruby dress, matching with Jungwon’s shirt.

He steps out of the bathroom, his blonde hair impeccably styled into fluffy bangs. You force a tight smile as you look over him.

“Ready?” he asks you, holding his hand out.

You take his hand, “almost,” you say, spritzing the final beats of perfume and then you’re leaving.

The party was glamorous. Screaming Park Jongseong. Flashing lights, gold hues dominating the ballroom, at least five different types of wines to choose from, and you think you can even spot a champagne tower through the crowd of people dressed in fancy clothing. You grab onto Jungwon’s hand tighter as he happily leads the two of you to Jongseong. This is why you like Jungwon, he grounds you.

You’re still taking in the room once you reach Jongseong, you exchange greetings, let Jungwon take over the conversation with his lifelong friend, and then it’s like time freezes.

Right across from you, you spot him. Your heart beats harder in your chest as you stare. It can’t be him. Can’t be your Riki. This Riki was taller, broad shoulders, somehow intimidating. Which was weird because the Riki you remember always felt like home.

He still hasn’t noticed you. He was too busy smiling at a girl hanging off of his arm. Unknowingly your jaw clenches at the sight. What was worse even, you knew the girl.

Rei.

Sweet, kind Rei. She and Riki used to be classmates back in middle school. You never would’ve guessed this was Riki’s type. Selfishly you wanted, or hoped, he would chase the ghost of you in every girl he meets.

Same as you did, looking for traces of your Riki no matter where you were.

That’s when he spots you. And you quickly avert your gaze, cheeks burning at your shameful thoughts. You reach for comfort, for Jungwon – still in deep conversation with Jongseong – and he wraps his arm around your waist and you melt. A little. But it’s enough.

That’s when you hear what they’re talking about. And your blood runs cold.

“—still won’t tell anyone what the occasion is,” Jungwon is saying, laughing under his breath. “A little dramatic even for you, don’t you think?”

“Come on,” Jongseong grins, swirling his champagne. “I give you flowers, live music, gold everywhere — and you complain?”

“I’m just saying,” Jungwon tilts his head, “I’ve seen people throw royal galas with less mystery.”

“You’ll find out soon enough,” Jongseong smirks. Then like it’s nothing, he reaches into his jacket and pulls out a velvet box. Flips it open.

“Oh my god,” you breathe before you can stop yourself.

Inside is a ring. Elegant, shimmering. Oval diamond, flanked by two smaller stones.

Jongseong’s grin widens.

“So you’re—?”

“Yup,” he says, popping the ‘p’. “She said yes last week. Tonight’s just the warmup.”

Jungwon lets out a low whistle. “That’s what this whole thing is?”

“Soft launch,” Jongseong winks. “Dinner on Sunday’s the real reveal. Only close friends.”

You nod slowly, still a little stunned. That was the thing about men like Jongseong — everything was glossy, fast, and expensive. Even the life milestones felt like magazine spreads.

He notices your hand still looped through Jungwon’s, and his smirk returns, sharper now.

“What about you two, huh?” he drawls. “Two years and counting, right? When are you putting a ring on it, Mr. Romance?”

You force a laugh. “Don’t start.” And you can feel the bubble of anxiety growing again.

“Seriously,” he nudges Jungwon. “You gonna make her wait for a diamond or what?”

Jungwon chuckles. “I’m pacing myself.”

Jongseong raises a brow. “Yeah? Careful. Someone might steal her first.”

The words land strangely. Too pointed. You’re about to respond, to deflect, tease back but your gaze drifts again.

And across the room, Riki is still in your line of vision.

He looks happy. Or at least, he’s playing the part well. You watch as he leans down, lips brushing Rei’s ear, saying something that makes her giggle before she kisses his cheek. And you wish the ground would swallow you whole.

For the rest of the evening you can feel his eyes on you. You don’t see him look at you, but you know he’s watching you. His presence is like a dark cloud. Following you across the galla no matter where you go.

You can feel yourself getting drunk. Whether it’s on his attention, or the alcohol you don’t know.

Later, maybe an hour in, you see Jongseong cutting through the room, dragging Riki behind him. Jungwon straightens beside you, smile returning.

“Come meet my business savior,” Jongseong announces proudly. “Guy practically rebuilt the whole backend in a week. Couldn’t survive without him.”

Riki stands next to him, hands tucked in his pockets. His hair is a little tousled, jaw sharper than you remember, but he gives the same bored nod he always used to when being praised.

Jongseong gestures between them. “Jungwon, this is Nishimura Riki. Riki, this is my oldest friend in the world.”

Jungwon eyes him curiously, then tilts his head. “Wait... have we met before?”

There’s a beat. A flicker of something passes through Riki’s eyes.

And then, calmly he motions to you and your stomach swoops, “We used to be neighbors.”

Disappointment shoots through you.

“Oh—” Jungwon turns to you. “That’s right. You did say your old neighbor moved back to the city.”

You don’t remember saying that. Maybe you did.

You look between them, nodding softly. “Yeah. We go way back.”

Riki doesn’t look at you. He doesn’t need to.

But then Jongseong is waving over a waiter, and suddenly there are flutes of champagne being passed around, and someone’s asking what everyone’s drinking.

Without thinking, you grab a glass of Hibiki from the tray and hand it to Riki.

You don’t ask if he wants it. You don’t need to.

He takes it without hesitation. A soft hum of thanks.

Then, like nothing’s happened he says, “You still drink brut rosé?”

You blink. You’re holding that exact glass in your hand. Your cheeks warm.

“Guess some things don’t change.”

He smiles at that. Barely. Just a flicker. And still not once do your eyes meet directly.

You’re in a progressively worse mood as the week unfolds. Nothing obvious. Not the kind anyone can name. Not even Jungwon.

You still kiss him goodbye, still laugh when you’re supposed to, still hold his hand in public like it means something.

But your head’s somewhere else. Your body moves through the days like clockwork, while your mind stays circling back to a half-smile and a glass of Hibiki.

You lock the door to your bathroom. Turn on the faucet. Stare at your reflection. You swore you’d be fine. Swore he was the past. But your mascara’s starting to get smudged and your hands won’t stop shaking.

And worst of all you still want him. Not in memory. Not in fantasy. You want him now.

You bite your lip until it bleeds, desperately pushing down your arousal. But your thoughts keep betraying you throughout the week. Little things. Like if he has any new kinks, any new fantasies he wanted to try out. Maybe something Rei doesn’t want to do. But you would. You were always down for whatever he wanted.

An invitation comes a few days after the party. A private dinner hosted by Jongseong’s family. Only close friends and immediate relatives.

You don’t want to go. But Jungwon lights up at the mention.

“I think we should,” he says, smiling. “It’ll be nice. Just family, you know?”

You nod. Smile back. Pretend your stomach doesn’t drop.

The party’s held at a hotel you’ve only seen in magazines. Huge mirrored ceilings, white orchids adorning the room, the kind of ambient lighting that makes everyone look beautiful. Jongseong’s fiancée is radiant, warm in a way that’s clearly rehearsed, but still charming. Her and Jongseong’s parents sit near the head of the table. Jongseong’s sister flirts with a waiter.

You’re seated across from Riki. Of course you are.  You’re seated just barely enough to avoid conversation. Close enough to feel the weight of his stare.

The table is long, candlelit, buzzing with low conversation and vintage jazz from invisible speakers. Jongseong is laughing with his fiancée’s father. Someone makes a toast.

Rei leans into Riki’s side and loops her arm around his, she’s glowing in soft pink. Like a cherry blossom come to life.

You want to bite something.

It’s awkward between you and Riki. Too quiet. Eye contact too fast, too sharp. Every glance feels like a threat.

Rei is talking about something — her job? A skincare line? You’re not listening. You’re watching the way Riki cuts into his steak. The way he drinks water with his left hand. The slight curve of his mouth when Jungwon says something flirty in your ear and you laugh.

Riki doesn’t say a word, doesn’t flirt. But he keeps refilling your glass.

Twice. Three times. Brut rosé, always.

Your leg brushes against his under the table once. He doesn’t move it. You’re not sure if you’re even breathing. The room is suddenly too warm. Or maybe it’s you.

Still the dinner drags.

You excuse yourself to the bathroom.  You don’t expect him to follow. But the moment the door clicks shut, you hear it. Footsteps. Then the quiet lock turning.

His reflection appears behind you in the mirror.

You don’t turn around.

“You looked real domestic tonight,” Riki says, voice low. Flat. Like a dare.

Your breath catches. You grip the sink tighter.

“Still playing house? Even when I’m this close?”

You shake your head once. Not at him but at yourself. At this. You can’t look at him, not when your whole body’s already betraying you. His scent, his closeness… it was too much, too soon. You’re not ready to face him.

“I haven’t said anything,” you whisper. Your skin is flushed, something akin to nervousness (or arousal) building somewhere deep in your tummy.

“Yeah,” he murmurs. “That’s kind of your thing, isn’t it?”

He takes a step forward. You feel the heat of him now, not touching, but close enough to scorch. And even though there’s no touching, your body reacts like there is. Like it remembers what his breath feels like against your neck. What his fingers can do.

“You said you moved on. So did I,” he pauses. Smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes, “But wanna know something funny?”

You don’t answer. You already know it won’t be funny.

He lifts his phone. Swipe. Tap. Holds it just out of view, “Guess what I still watch when I can’t sleep.”

You turn your head just slightly and see it. A flash of movement. Your body. The sound of his name gasped like a prayer.  You flinch like you’ve been slapped. Heat rushes between your thighs. Your stomach sinks, and tightens.

That night. That angle. You know exactly what he’s watching. What you wore. How he looked when he came inside of you.

“Delete it—”

“Why?” His voice is calm. Dangerous, “You think you didn’t want the camera on you that night? You think I didn’t know exactly what that look in your eyes meant?”

You did, still do. You know exactly what he means. You remember the way you looked up at him. Mouth parted, eyes wide, begging without saying a word. You remember how it felt, being watched by him.

You turn to leave back to your boyfriend before you do something stupid. You try to push past him, but he’s already moving. Not blocking you. Just enough to remind you you’ll have to touch him to get out.

His hand grazes your wrist. Not by force, just subtle touch. It lingers like a promise.

Like a warning. You should pull away but your skin tingles from that one brush like it’s been lit on fire.

“You’re still lying,” he says softly, “Just not with your mouth.”

You flinch. Something in you twists — humiliated, exposed, wet. Your body still wants him. But your mind claws for a way out.

You snap your gaze to his, eyes sharp.

“I have to get back to my boyfriend,” you hiss. More bite in your voice than you intended. It echoes against the marble tile like a slap.

His face changes. Barely. A twitch of the mouth. But it’s enough to tell you you hit something raw.

He laughs once, bitter. Low.

“Yeah. That’s always been your line, hasn’t it?”

You blink.

“Run back to Jungwon when it gets too real. Just like before.”

Your jaw tightens. He doesn’t stop.

“You think I didn’t know you were using me? Letting me fuck you like that — whispering my name like I was the only one — and then going home to him?”

“Say it,” he murmurs. “Say you didn’t think about me when he touched you.”

Your breath hitches. His words hit you straight between the thighs… and that’s the worst part. You do still think about him.

And he knows it.

You shove past him this time, physically push the door open and leave before you say something you can’t take back.

You return back to the table, flushed. Your chest is tight as you try to calm your breathing. Jungwon places a hand on your lower back.

You startle. But smile. Too quickly, too rehearsed.

Riki joins the rest of you a moment later, leaning boyishly across his chair. He places an arm around Rei’s shoulder, looking directly at you.

But you don’t give him the reaction he’s looking for. Instead, your hand rests on Jungwon’s thigh and he clasps your fingers together as he tells you about the dessert that’s about to be served.

And as the sky outside turns to black everyone starts slowly leaving the hotel.

You’re in bed when your phone buzzes. Jungwon’s in the shower. You’re half-scrolling, half-asleep.

It’s a screenshot of that same video he was showing you in the bathroom. The photo is blurred. But unmistakably you, pink thong pushed to the side, exposing your wet cunt that’s gushing with Riki’s cum.

He didn’t add any caption.

you’re sick

Is what you type back, knowing exactly who this is from.

u like it.

Is what comes back, a second later. Then, another buzz.

go somewhere you can be alone

 before I send it to your boyfriend

You stare at the messages. But your feet are already moving. You slip onto the balcony, tightly wrapping the black robe around your shoulders. The cold wind cuts through you. You shut the door just as your phone rings.

You don’t hesitate as you pick up.

“I told you to delete it,” you snap. No greeting. No pretense.

A beat of silence passes between you before you hear the crackling on the other side. Was he smoking? Then, his voice cuts through the line, deeper and rougher than you remember him sounding on the phone.

“And you also said you loved me.”

Your breath stutters. You grip the phone tighter.

He exhales, something sharp behind it, “You think I sent that to fuck with you?”

He doesn’t wait for your answer, “I sent it because you’re mine. You always have been.”

Your lips part to argue, to say something cold. But nothing comes out. He hears it. The silence. The surrender.

His voice softens, but only slightly.

“Just spend one week with me,” he says. “Like before. No strings. And I’ll delete it for real.”

You laugh, bitter, “And Rei?”

He doesn’t flinch. “Don’t act like you’re any better.”

You stiffen. His voice is sharper now, no softness, “You were still fucking me when you started dating him. Or did you forget that too? Three months of you calling me baby, coming over at midnight, then going to brunch with him the next morning like your mouth wasn’t still swollen.”

Your stomach turns. Shame curls hot under your skin because he’s right. Because he remembers it better than you do. Because you never really stopped. You couldn’t. That’s why you had to leave.

He exhales into the silence slower now. Controlled. Cruel, “So don’t ask me about Rei like you’re innocent. You don’t get to moralize, baby. Not when you let me fuck the lie out of you for months.”

You feel it low in your gut, the feeling building the longer he taunts you. That horrible, aching twist of guilt and arousal, of memory and muscle memory. Like your body remembers every time you swore you’d stop, and every time you came crawling back.

“Does Jungwon know that?” Riki asks, so calm it could kill you. “That when he took you to your first fancy dinner, I was the one you called when you got home?”

Your mouth is dry. Your thighs press together, not because you want to but because your body’s already answering questions you haven’t asked.

“I thought you didn’t care,” you manage. “You’ve moved on.”

“Sure,” he says, too fast. Too sharp. “Me, Rei, we look good, don’t we? That what you wanted to say?”

You don’t reply.

“So why are you breathing hard into the phone right now like you want me to say more?”

You clench your eyes shut, grip the phone harder. You want to throw it. You want to drop it. You want to crawl through it. Anything to make it stop. To don’t’ make it stop.

“You kept that video,” you whisper.

“I did,” he confirms, without apology. “Watched it last week. And last month. And again the night before your anniversary.”

You gasp softly, shoulders curling inward. Shame coats your skin, thick and electric. But there’s no denying it anymore. You like his obsession with you. The confirmation that he was just as bad as you were was weirdly soothing.

“I told you not to make it so pretty,” he murmurs. “You think I was just gonna delete that?”

“You’re sick,” you say, but it comes out breathier and whinier than you intend.

“You liked it,” he says. And then, softer he adds, “And I know you still do.”

Your hand trembles. You press your fingers to your lips to quiet yourself, to swallow whatever sound might escape. You slide a finger down to your panties. Pressing down on your clit. You don’t move your fingers though, gaslighting yourself that this is okay. That you’re not about to masturbate while Riki’s taunting you with his deep voice and cruel words.

He lowers his voice. It’s barely a whisper now. “You’re still mine, even if you won’t say it.”

You feel your pulse stutter. There’s something dangerous about the quiet in his tone — not violent, not even angry. Just… sure. Like he’s not trying to convince you. Like he knows you’ll say yes. Eventually.

You press the phone harder against your cheek.

“I have a boyfriend.”

He lets that sit. Lets it rot.

“And I had you,” he says finally. “Every fucking version of you. Not just the good parts.”

You think about Jungwon’s hand on your lower back. How light it felt. Safe. Soft.

But it’s not what you ache for now.

“Where?” you whisper decisively.

A pause. And then, with brutal precision he answers – as if he’s thought it all out, “Hotel Majestic, on the top floor. Friday. Wear whatever you want, but no underwear.”

The line clicks dead.

And you’re left out in the cold, wind wisping hair all over your face. You sneak back into the warm bedroom and luckily Jungwon was still in some other part of the penthouse.

Throughout Monday and Tuesday you’re trying to stay composed. You’re soft-spoken, polite, and polished. You hold Jungwon’s hand a little tighter in public. Smile a little sweeter. Your makeup is perfect, your outfits more carefully curated than ever. You’re performing the role of the good girlfriend with a new level of desperate conviction.

But once you’re alone, you spiral. You can’t stop replaying the phone call in your mind over and over again. You’re easily startled. You zone out. You can’t stop anticipating and imagining Friday — his hands, his mouth, his voice.

He texts you on a Tuesday evening.

You’d stayed late at the office — some intern mixed up a calendar invite and your boss chewed through the whole team like wet paper. Your brain feels like it’s in a mush. You’re half-dressed out of your blazer, collar loose, wine-stained lipstick smudged, when your phone buzzes on the desk.

You glance over. Coupang Eats. You’d saved him under that name to avoid raising suspicion. Your stomach knots, low and sharp.

You unlock the screen. The message is already waiting.

Coupang Eats: u gonna wear white on friday

Your throat tightens. He doesn’t even say hello.

You: You don’t get to ask that.

Coupang Eats: didn’t think u’d answer didn’t think u’d say yes either

You: It’s just sex. That’s what you said, right?

Coupang Eats: sure. keep saying it if it helps

You stare at the text box. Thumbs hovering. You type ‘Don’t text me again’. But then you delete it.

You don’t send anything.

So he does.

Coupang Eats: u’ll be thinking about me either way might as well give you something real to touch yourself to

You turn your phone over and chuck it across the room.

The next day you’re jittery. Checking your – now cracked – phone over and over again. But he doesn’t text you. You don’t know if you’re happy or disappointed by that as you lay in bed next to Jungwon, staring at the ceiling. He’s warm. He always is. One arm thrown across your waist like you’re something precious. Like you’re not betraying him the longer this goes on.

And still, your legs are clenched tight together. Your breath uneven.

You check your phone again, around 3 a.m.

Nothing.

The next day you try distracting yourself. You fold laundry. Light a candle. Then give up pretending you’re not waiting. Your phone buzzes at exactly 11:04 p.m.

Coupang Eats: still thinking about the video?

Your stomach flips. You hate him. You hate him for knowing. You hate him for being right.

You: How long have you had the video?

Coupang Eats: long enough.

You: Why?

Coupang Eats: I like watching you when I miss you.

There's a pause. Long. You try not to breathe. But he’s typing again.

Coupang Eats: you miss me?

You: You’re disgusting.

Coupang Eats: and you’re wet, quit stating the obvious

You clench your jaw. You throw your phone across the bed like it burned you. But when you crawl after it again — your hand doesn’t go to the keyboard. Instead you open the gallery and click play on the video.

Your hand snakes between your legs. Just like Riki said it would.

You probably touched yourself more than you did when you were a teenager this week. And each time, you hated yourself for it. You’re consumed. It feels like Riki owns you. Again. You're ashamed that you still want him. It’s humiliating. And what’s worse, it turns you on.

On Friday Jungwon comes home with takeout and a new bottle of red. You’re pacing around the room, white dress on when you hear the front door open.

You greet him by the door, always the perfect girlfriend and he kisses your cheek, leaves his coat on the stand, and hums something low as he sets the table for you two.

Two plates, two candles, and the playlist you made him months ago still queued up from some night before. He lights the candles without asking. Like being with you has made him softer in all the right places.

“Surprise date night?” you ask, trying to sound playful. As if you’re not lowkey trying to rush out the door.

“You’ve been quiet this week,” he murmurs, brushing your hair off your shoulder. “I missed you.”

The words land in your chest like a bruise.

You pour the wine. Try not to shake. Try to smile. It’s real — the affection. But it feels like you’re loving him with your hands tied behind your back.

“Since when do you pour for me?” he laughs, eyes warm and teasing.

You smile, small. “You’ve had a long week.”

He hums. “You’re so good to me.”

Your stomach coils. Guilt, maybe. Or something worse — the part of you that wants to ruin it all.

He kisses your temple. “You’re gonna make an amazing wife one day.”

The glass nearly slips from your hand.

You don’t respond. Just press your face into his shoulder and nod like you believe it. Like that’s the version of yourself you want to be.

He doesn't notice. He leans in, kissing your jaw, his voice warm and low against your skin. “You look so pretty. Is that the dress I bought you?”

You nod. He beams like you just gave him a gift. You press your lips to his. Slow. Familiar. Gentle. But your head is somewhere else entirely.

The first message from Riki comes just as Jungwon is plating dinner.

Coupang Eats: tick tock.

You ignore it.

Jungwon sets your plate in front of you. Sits. Laughs about something his coworker said. Eats with one hand while he reaches for yours with the other. You let him hold it. Let him squeeze. Let yourself pretend this is enough. You don’t check your phone again until he leaves to get another wine bottle.

Coupang Eats don’t keep me waiting. again.

Your heart stutters. Then starts racing.

You: He’s almost asleep.

Read.

Coupang Eats: aww. such a sweet girlfriend want me to call? help tuck him in?

You bite the inside of your cheek. Hard.

He’s baiting you. Of course he is. And you hate that it’s working.

You: Shut up.

Coupang Eats: did he kiss you goodnight? did you kiss him back thinking about me?

You clench your thighs together. It’s not fair. It’s never been fair. And worst of all he knows it.

Jungwon comes back in a t-shirt and sweats, smelling like mint and dryer sheets. He drapes an arm around you on the couch, nuzzles into your neck.

“You’re warm,” he mumbles. “I love this.”

His fingers trace circles on your thigh. Not sexual just sweet. Just his. His version of forever. You feel him relaxing next to you. Melting into the couch as his breath evens out.

You leave a blanket on the couch. Place a kiss on his forehead so soft he doesn’t stir. The guilt is loud in your ears, but not louder than the pull. Your phone buzzes again in your coat pocket.

Coupang Eats: wear white.

And you already are. Because it’s not about being good anymore. It’s about seeing if he still burns.

You drive in silence. Not because you want to but because any music might make it real. The roads blur. Your hands grip the wheel tighter than they should. Every red light feels like a warning.

Jungwon’s scent is still on your clothes. Your lips still taste like the kiss you left on his forehead. And under all of it, you’re wet. You hate yourself for it. You hate how easy it is.

Your turn signal clicks. You’re five minutes away.

Your phone buzzes again in the passenger seat. You don’t even look. You already know who it is. You already know what you’re about to do.

The hotel hallway reeks of too much cologne and carpet cleaner. Room 912. You hesitate once, then knock.

The door swings open fast. Like he was already standing behind it.

He doesn’t speak.

You’re not sure who moves first, maybe him. But suddenly, you’re inside, your back against the door, his mouth inches from yours.

His voice is low, rough. “You wore white.”

You almost say for you. But you don’t. Because that would be too honest. Riki doesn’t care to wait for your answer. His big hands are on you as soon as the door locks.

"You missed this?" he gruffly asks, pinching your nipple through the dress as his hips grind against yours.

"I missed being treated like shit? No, thanks," you bite. But your body betrays you, chest pushed out, legs spreading to allow him access.

Riki's grip on your waist tightens, his hands find the curve of your ass. He hikes the short dress higher, exposing your ass.

His mouth is by your ear when he speaks, and you have to fight the urge to nuzzle into the crook of his neck.

"Funny. Your pussy says otherwise," he lowly says, fingers prodding by your clothed wet entrance.

You clench around nothing, groaning in what you hope Riki thinks is annoyance.

He doesn’t.

He roughly turns you around and wraps his hand around your throat. Just enough to make your mind go numb, enough so your knees tremble.

Your hands are pressed against the door, as Riki pulls your hips back. He has you awkwardly half-way bent as he bunches your dress around your waist. Expertly tucking and folding it in so it doesn’t slide down.

He harshly spanks you and you moan at the contact.

“Stand still, take what you came for,” he gruffly tells you.

“I didn’t come for you,” you spit out, moaning as he lands another fat spank on your ass. You feel it jiggle at the harsh contact.

"No? Then why are you shaking?"

You don’t reply. You can’t, not when his hands slide up your back sensually. He’s pulling you back against his body and you let him.

Riki wraps his arms around you and guides you towards the bed.

He doesn’t let you lay down. Gripping your hips when you reach the edge of the bed and pushing your head forward.

Doggy. Of course. That was always his favorite way to have you. He finds your lacy panties, slowly slipping them down.

"You still wear lace for me, huh? Or is this what you wear when you’re playing house with him, too?"

"Don’t flatter yourself," you tell him, refusing to feed his ego. But you can feel your pussy gushing, the substance dripping past your lips, making your thighs sticky.

"Why not? I’m the reason your thighs are shaking right now," he whispers as he hovers by your neck.

"Fuck you," you hiss as you bite down on your lip.

"You will. But not yet," he tells you, his hands on your ass. You feel him press his hips into you and glance over your shoulders.

He was still dressed and that only made you even more turned on. Oversized gray tee, black chrome hearts boxers.

Riki hisses as he lets your pussy stain his boxers. You feel him twitch as he humps you once, twice, three times.

Then he slips two fingers past your mouth. His larger frame allowing him to do so from behind. "Every time you lie to me, I’ll make you gag on the truth."

“Shuck yoh,”

Fuck you is what you mean to say but it comes out muffled with his fingers pressing down on your tongue. He has them in so deep you can’t even swallow, saliva pooling at the corner of your mouth.

But Riki only presses closer, his other hand traveling to your clit.

"You already did. That’s the problem."

He starts playing with your pussy then. Just the way you like, and each time you moan, the fingers in your mouth pull back a bit.

"You looked real proud, playing perfect girlfriend. Walking around like you’re innocent."

"I am innocent," you complain and Riki immediately slides his fingers deeper into your warm and wet mouth.

"Not after tonight. You came to this hotel just for me.”

"I had to. You said you’d delete the video if I did."

“Oh sweetie,” he mocks you, “you and I both know you’d be coming regardless of the video.”

That when he pushes you fully on the bed. He flips you around so you’re laying on your back.

He positions himself between your thighs, gaze locked on your glistening cunt.

You move up on your elbows as you watch him watch you. His eyes flick to yours as he pushes past your entrance.

He shows you no mercy as he immediately pushes two digits deep into you.

"Slower— I haven’t—" you gasp, back arching off the bed.

"You haven’t been properly fucked. That’s what you meant, right?" he darkly mocks you. But you see the ghost of smirk on his handsome face.

"Riki—" you whine, trashing on the bed as he roughly pushes in and out of your wet pussy. Loud moans and squelching noise fill the otherwise quiet hotel room and you really hope it’s soundproof.

But Riki is merciless, almost cruel as he taunt you, "No one else gets you wet like this. Say it."

"No one," you quietly gasp, gripping onto his hair as he presses a wet kiss on your clit. His tongue swirls and sucks on it, just enough to make your mind spin. He pulls back with a popping sound.

Your breath hitches when he says it—

“That’s my good girl.” Like he’s been waiting to say it. Like he knew you’d earn it eventually.

Your eyes drag up, greedy, as he pulls his shirt over his head. The muscles. The sharp cut of his waist. And then the tattoo—dark, bold ink sprawled across his side, crawling up his ribs like a warning.

You stare. Maybe a little too long.

“You like that?” he smirks, thumbs hooking under his waistband. “Thought about this when you were with him?”

You say nothing. But he sees the way your thighs press together. The way your lips part when he drops his boxers and steps toward you, cock hard and already leaking.

You swallow. And nod. Just once. Honest, finally.

He smiles, cruel and slow.

“Of course you did,” he says, voice low as he crawls on top of you. “Bet you fucked him with this image in your head.”

You’re trembling now. Not from fear. From the weight of it — the ache, the guilt, the unbearable want. His tattoo is right there, close enough to touch, and your hands rise almost instinctively, splaying across his inked ribs. He’s warm. Solid. Real.

“Say it,” he murmurs, bending slightly, his mouth ghosting over your jaw. “Tell me you thought about me.”

You exhale shakily. “I… did.”

He hums, pleased. His hand slides to your neck, the other gripping your thigh, forcing it open.

“And now you get to have me. Just like this. Just like you wanted.”

You don’t say anything. Can’t. Because the truth is lodged in your throat — hot and humiliating and dangerous.

He leans in until his lips brush your ear.

“Good girls shouldn’t lie,” he says. “And you’ve been lying for so long. Would love to punish you, but some other day. Need you too badly right now.”

Then, Riki is on you. Body on yours, lips on your neck.

He growls ever so slightly as he grips his dick and positions it close to your pussy.

“Been waiting for this, for so long,” he softly mutters and then he’s slipping in.

He was way girthier than you remember, the stretch pleasurably painful and you claw at his back. Your legs automatically wrap around his waist.

Riki continues pushing in, slowly stretching your cunt with his big dick.

"God— I forgot—" you whine in a strained voice. 

"No, you didn’t. You pretended to forget. Just like you pretended he was enough," he replies through gritted teeth.

"Stop talking about him," you whine, lips brushing against his shoulder.

"Why? You’re dripping around my cock while he’s asleep thinking you’re loyal," he mocks as he sheaths his dick fully into you.

You cry out at both the pleasure and his cruel words, "You’re a fucking monster."

He pins your wrists to the bed when you press your nails into his back. Harshly. His other hand goes to your throat, squeezing you in silent warning.

"Yeah? And you let the monster ruin you every time," he taunts you, his hands move to your legs – still wrapped around his waist – and he adjusts your position so they’re resting on his shoulders.

You’re folded like a pretzel, left to his mercy. And Riki knows it too.

He smiles down at you as if he won a prize and then he starts fucking you. His thrusts are intense. Deep and unrelenting as the fucks you as if he’s punishing you. He is.

Your sounds are a mix of gasps, whimpers and moans, “Please—Riki, please—”

“Yeah? This how you wanted to get fucked? To be ruined?”

But he softens just a bit, slowing down ever so slightly, “You miss how I break you open, don’t lie.”

He’s softer. But not sweet. His thrusts fueled by the betrayal, the jealousy, the ache. This is sex punishment for leaving.

And you understand that this is him establishing control. So you let him, hips tilting up to meet his rhythm, hands fisting in the sheets instead of pushing him away, your body falling into obedience before your mind can catch up.

And it’s only when he sees you break, after your moans start to sound like sobs — that his mouth lowers to your throat, planting a gentle kiss. Then another on the inside of your knee, a subtle crack in the armor. Always a reward.

“I always knew you’d come back like this,” he breathes into your neck, his voice a low growl. “Opened up. Begging.”

He slows down then. Just enough to make you feel him in a different way, the angle almost brutal. He stays deep inside of you and leans down so your foreheads nearly touch. Not kissing. Just staring.

“You think he can make you feel like this? Tell me who owns this pussy. Say it.”

And you do. Pleasure swirls in all parts of your body, you don’t even register the building ache in your thighs.

You’re nearly crying, choked "Harder— please, I want—"

"Want what? Say it," he tells you, nuzzling into your neck.

"I want you to ruin me."

"Already have," he growls, and then his hand finds your small clit. Peeking through the gap between you two.

He rubs you, not to fast, not too slow – but just right. You lock in place, the pleasure of his fat cock entering you, stretching you open and his big hands playing with your cunt too much.

"I c-can’t— Riki— it’s too—" you beg.

"You’ll take it. You owe me this."

"Please— I’m gonna—"

"Cum for me. Prove it still belongs to me," his voice is strained as he speaks. He can feel your tight cunt squeezing impossibly tighter around his dick and he groans when he hears your breathy voice.

"Yours— yours— fuck, I’m—" you say, trembling and not breathing momentarily as you cum.

You’re still trembling when he pulls out. Riki fists his cock, teeth clenched, eyes locked on you as he cums hard, messy, all over your bare skin like a claim.

Neither of you speaks.

For a moment, the only sound is your broken breathing, shallow, trying to come down. You reach blindly for something, maybe a sheet, maybe him and feel the mattress shift under his weight.

He doesn’t hold you. Not fully. He doesn’t even look at you as he tosses you a towel and lies back beside you, chest rising and falling.

But when you move closer, he doesn’t stop you. Your head finds his chest, and he stays still. Heart pounding beneath your cheek.

You close your eyes.

Silence stretches.

Then, just as your fingers start to relax against his ribs, you hear his voice low and steady, dangerous.

“You left me once.” A pause. “You won’t get another chance.”

You lay there for a moment longer, catching your breath on his chest. He still hasn’t touched you, not really. He’s just letting you cling onto him.

You speak first. “I should go.” Your voice is quiet. Calculated. You don’t look at him.

Riki doesn’t move. “Obviously.”

You sit up. Wipe the mess from your stomach. Slip your dress back on, not bothering to fix your hair. You’re still flushed. Still swollen where he broke you open. But your voice? Steady. Controlled.

“I live with him,” you say, reaching for your phone. “I can’t be gone all night. He’ll wake up.”

You expect silence. Maybe something cruel.

Instead, Riki laughs, it’s short. Bitter, “You think I give a fuck about Jungwon?”

You turn, fixing your earring in the mirror. “You did this whole thing because of Jungwon.”

He sits up now, elbows on his knees. His stare cuts through your reflection.

“No. I did this because you pretended you were over me.” He stands, walks up behind you, not touching. Just close enough. “And you’re not.”

You hate how your knees almost give.

You snap the clasp on your purse shut. “I never said I was.”

He steps in closer. “So stay.”

You swallow. “I can’t.”

Riki’s jaw ticks. Something in his eyes dims. “Right. Because you’re such a good girl now.”

You don’t flinch, but your heart does, “Better than I was with you.”

It lands. It hurts him. But he doesn’t stop you when you reach for the door.

You pause before leaving. Glance back once.

He’s watching you with that look again, the one that never says what he wants, only what he can’t admit.

“Text me when you get home,” he mutters. “So I know you didn’t crash or something.”

You stare, “You’re not my boyfriend.”

“No,” he calmly says. “I'm not, but you're still going to text me.”

You don’t respond. Just close the door behind you. But you don’t stop shaking until you’re halfway back home.

You wake up sore the next morning. The ache in your hips is slow and low and everywhere. Your body remembers before your mind does.

You're curled against Jungwon’s warm and familiar chest and his hand rubs soothing circles on your back.

“Don’t feel good today, Wonnie,” you mumble, barely above a whisper.

He presses a kiss to your temple. You flinch. Not enough for him to notice. But you feel it. The echo of Riki's mouth, rougher, crueler… it still burns under your skin.

Jungwon hums, his voice soft with concern, “You were tossing around a lot last night,” he says. His fingers trail down your spine. “I’ll make you tea. Go shower, baby.”

You do. Twice.

The water is hot enough to scald. But it’s not enough. You scrub behind your ears. Between your thighs. Inside your bellybutton. There’s still something on you. In you. His scent. His breath. The way he said mine like it was a curse and a promise.

You check your phone with wet fingers. One new message. A photo.

Riki’s hand, ringed and veined, fisted around something delicate and pale. Your panties. Twisted in his palm like a trophy.

Coupang Eats: forgot these.

You close your eyes. You bite your lip. And you save the photo.

And when you meet at night his mouth is everywhere, teeth against your thigh. His voice dark and amused, whispering to you what he’ll do next time.

This time, after you are done, you make sure to stuff your ruined panties into your coat pocket as you’re leaving.

On Sunday he simply texts you “come outside in 15” and you do. You slip out just as Jungwon get’s on a business call coming from overseas. You mumble something about needing air. He kisses your cheek without looking and you’re already halfway out the door.

Riki’s car is parked at the edge of the driveway. Engine low. Window down. He doesn’t say a word as you slip into the passenger seat. The smell hits you first — leather, smoke, cologne that clings to your skin even when he's gone. His eyes drag over you like he’s checking for damage.

You don’t greet him. Just say, “What if Jungwon finds out?”

He laughs, sharp and short. “You’re not worried about that,” he mutters, not even looking at you.

“I am,” you snap. “This is insane. We shouldn’t—”

But his hand is already moving, low between your thighs, and your body betrays you instantly. You flinch, it’s not from fear but from how fast your pulse spikes when he touches you like that. Like he’s entitled to it.

You climb into his lap anyway.

It’s cramped. Messy. Windows fog too fast, too loud, and you're fucking him in the front seat with your skirt bunched around your hips. Your back hits the steering wheel. He doesn’t care. Neither do you.

You tell him to be quick but the moment he’s inside you, time fractures. He grips your waist like a lifeline. You ride him like you’re drowning.

There’s no music. No words. Just breath and skin and the wet slap of your bodies colliding in the dark. You bury your face in his shoulder and his hands slide up your back like he’s remembering every inch of you.

Oddly, it feels romantic. Not soft. Not safe. But intimate in the way only ruin ever is.

He finishes with his mouth on you, not your lips — no kiss. Not yet. That would mean something.

When he pulls back, his eyes are still half-lidded, gaze fixed on you like you’re something carved out of sin. Your heart’s pounding in your ears. Your thighs are shaking.

You reach for your coat silently. Pull it around you like a shield.

“Next time,” he murmurs, voice low, “don’t wear anything. Saves us both the time.”

You slam the car door harder than necessary.

The next day you’re halfway through lunch with Jungwon when your phone buzzes on the table. You glance at it absently, thinking it’s work—until you see her name.

Rei: I’ve been thinking! Maybe we do a little double date? It’s been forever! 🥹 I think Riki’s been down ever since he saw you again. I wanna patch you guys up 😭💗

You choke slightly on your iced coffee.

Jungwon looks up from his plate, concerned. “You okay?”

“Yeah,” you say quickly, setting the drink down and wiping your mouth. You try to play it cool, but your fingers tighten slightly around the phone.

He squints, playful. “Who is it?”

You hesitate. Just a beat. Then force your best smile. “Rei. She wants to set up a double date. Us and her… and Riki.”

Jungwon’s brows lift. “Really?” He seems genuinely surprised, but not suspicious. Just thoughtful. “That’s kind of sweet of her.”

“Yeah,” you lie. “It really is.”

You feel his foot graze yours under the table. “I’d be down,” he says with a grin. “Maybe you two can finally patch things up.”

Your stomach coils. Not from guilt. From the irony of it all. Rei wanting to help. Jungwon wanting to trust. You’re smiling through your teeth like you’re not already branded head to toe in Riki’s touch.

You: Totally! Would be fun.

Rei: He needs this. He won’t say it but I can tell 🥺

You turn your screen off.

You haven’t even seen Riki today, and still it feels like his hands are all over you. The rest of the day stretches, thick and frustrating. No texts. No missed calls. Not even a sign.

You go home with Jungwon. Let him kiss your cheek. Let him laugh against your neck. Let him touch your waist with hands that don’t know better.

You wait. All day.

You shower. You try not to think about the marks on your skin, the ache between your thighs that never really left. You try not to check your phone every ten minutes.

By nightfall, you’re pacing.

Finally, just before midnight, your phone lights up.

Coupang Eats: rei’s breathing down my neck. can’t today.

That’s it.

No “hi.” No apology. Just dismissal dressed like explanation.

You don’t reply. You leave it on seen. You throw your phone on the nighstand and crawl into bed. You hate that it hurts. You hate that it hurts because you miss him.

You curl up, blanket pulled to your chin, and close your eyes like that’ll stop the heat from spreading low and slow inside you.

You don’t expect another text.

But at 1:13 a.m., your phone buzzes again. You grab it with more desperation than you mean to.

Coupang Eats: but ive been thinking about you the whole day

There’s a slight pause, and then he’s double texting you.

Coupang Eats: think rei’s starting to catch on. she asked if i’ve been seeing someone else

Another pause. You keep leaving his messages on seen.

Coupang Eats: anyway. i want your mouth tomorrow

You stare at the screen. Your body flushes instantly, pulse skipping. He always knows what to say to wreck you.

You read it again. And again.

Your thighs clench under the blanket. You should block him. You should throw the phone across the room. Instead, you place it gently on your nightstand. And smile, just a little. You never stood a chance.

Tuesday he’s ignoring you. Again.

You try to stay rational. You tell yourself it’s because of Rei. Because of guilt. Because of everything this already is. But that doesn’t explain why your chest tightens every time your phone buzzes — and it’s not him.

You last until midnight. You’re curled under your blanket, half-dreaming, half-angry, when your screen lights up.

Incoming Call: Coupang Eats

You step into the hallway and gently close the door so you don’t wake Jungwon. Then you answer without a word.

Silence on the other end. Not awkward. Not hesitant. Just… breath. Slow and steady.

“Riki?” you whisper.

Still nothing.

Your voice sharpens. “What’s wrong?”

Another breath. Then finally, his voice — low, worn, unsweet.

“You’re mad.”

You scoff. “You think?”

You can’t help the raising of your voice, “I waited all day for you yesterday. I sat next to him thinking about you, and you haven’t even—” You catch yourself. Bite down the whine in your voice. “—you haven’t said anything. Not even a text.”

“I’m not here to make love to you. You have someone for that,” he says, flat and final.

You flinch. Like he slapped you through the phone. Your throat tightens. You wait for him to say something else.

He doesn’t.

You end the call first.

You stand there in the hallway with your phone pressed to your chest like it might keep your heart inside your body. But it doesn't help. Not even a little.

Sleep doesn’t come easy. You toss and turn so much that Jungwon at some point bear hugs you and keeps you close to his warm body. And finally you’re able to relax enough to let sleep overtake you.

The double date is happening late afternoon today. You don’t mention the call — not to Jungwon, not to yourself. You just get dressed. Not in red because that’s too obvious. But soft. Romantic. A pink silk dress that hugs your waist and slips off your shoulders with every movement. The kind of dress that would make someone believe you’re innocent. That you belong to someone.

The date is happening in a cute, but luxorious sweet shop. The café is a pastel-hued dream. Soft pink walls, delicate white lace curtains, and dainty gold accents catching the light. Glass display cases are lined with perfectly frosted cupcakes. Vintage floral teacups clink softly against saucers, and gentle indie music hums in the background, mixing with the faint chatter of quiet patrons.

Rei and Riki are already sitting down by the window overlooking the entrance. Your heart squeezes when you see him. He’s dressed in a crisp, black button-down shirt with the sleeves rolled up just enough to reveal the lean muscle of his forearms. A subtle flash of silver chain is glinting around his neck. His shirt is tucked neatly into tailored charcoal trousers, sleek and effortless, like he stepped straight out of a midnight city skyline.

You make sure Riki sees you walk in first. With Jungwon’s arm around your waist, smiling up at him like you mean it.

Rei waves you over. She’s sipping on her drink, other hand on his thigh like she owns it. You slide into your seat across from them, perfectly poised.

Jungwon orders for you, as always. You rest your chin on your hand and glance at Riki just long enough to make it look casual.

He won’t look at you.

Not at first.

But you can see the tension in his jaw. The white of his knuckles on his water glass. He’s trying not to react.

Good.

Rei watches you. Not warmly. She senses something — can’t name it, but it’s there. Then she blurts, “Didn’t you two used to be, like, inseparable?”

Her tone is off. Maybe playful. Maybe not.

“That was a long time ago,” Riki speaks.

You shrug, smile too sweet. “We were kids.”

You don’t look at him.

Jungwon laughs, reaching for your hand. “Didn’t you say you had a crush on him in high school?”

Your stomach tightens. You throw your head back and laugh, “God, don’t remind me.”

This time, Riki looks at you. Dead on.

Then, slowly, his hand drops to Rei’s thigh. He leans closer to her and murmurs something — something that makes her smile and adjust her grip on his bicep.

You almost break. But you don’t. Instead, you slide your hand under the table and rest it on Jungwon’s knee. Riki’s gaze drops. Then sharpens. You can feel it burning through your skin.

Jungwon starts telling a story to break the tension — something light about his boss messing up an email thread. You fake-laugh, brushing your hand along his forearm.

Still nothing from Riki.

So you go further.

You lean into Jungwon’s ear. Whisper something that makes him grin and kiss your cheek. You giggle and sip your coffee, letting your lips linger on the mug.

Your phone buzzes in your hand.

You glance down.

Coupang Eats: Stop fucking smiling at him like you’re not going to be on your knees for me in 2 hours.

You excuse yourself. A moment later, in front of the bathroom stalls, you hear footsteps. You don’t turn around.

“So that’s how we’re playing it?” you murmur.

Riki doesn’t answer.

“She’s clinging to your arm like a trophy and you’re looking at me like you want to kill something.”

Still nothing.

You turn. Face him. He’s standing with his hands in his pockets, shoulders tight, breathing slow and shallow.

“She asked about us,” you say. “You really gonna sit there and pretend we were nothing?”

His eyes narrow. “You’re the one pretending.”

You raise a brow. “I’m just being polite.”

Riki steps closer. Still calm. Still composed. But you know the signs… the way his jaw clicks, the twitch in his brow. He’s unraveling slowly.

“You smile at him like he’s enough,” he says quietly. “But I know what you look like when you’re lying.”

You look up, but Riki’s already turned back toward the tables.

And you follow.

Because you always do.

You return to the table with Riki just a few paces behind, the silence of the hallway still clinging to your skin. Jungwon glances up from his cappuccino, expression tightening. Rei’s head tilts ever so slightly, like she’s trying to catch a whisper she just missed.

“Everything okay?” Jungwon asks, voice easy, but his hand slips off the back of your chair like he’s not sure if he should still be touching you.

You nod too quickly. “Just—long line.”

“Hmm.” His eyes stay on you for a beat too long. You know he doesn’t believe you, but he smiles anyway.

Rei's stirring her iced latte with her straw, the clink of ice loud in the delicate atmosphere of the café. The scent of vanilla and buttercream hangs in the air. Around you, couples laugh softly, forks clinking against pastel plates.

But at your table, the energy has shifted.

You take your seat, careful not to brush against Riki’s knee under the table. You don’t want to give anything away… except maybe in this moment you do. Maybe you want to be caught.

Jungwon reaches for the last macaron, brushing a crumb from your plate as he does. “Try this one, it’s raspberry.” His voice is soft. Familiar. And it makes you ache.

But before you can answer, Riki’s voice cuts in, sharp around the edges. “She doesn’t like raspberry.”

The table stills.

You freeze mid-reach.

Rei blinks. “Oh?”

You force a laugh. “I guess I… grew out of that.”

Jungwon sets the macaron down slowly. “Right,” he says, like he's trying to convince himself.

The tension spirals, thick and sticky as frosting. You try to redirect, compliment the café wallpaper, anything to smooth it over. But Rei’s already watching Riki too closely now. Her fingers trace the edge of her water glass. Her mouth presses into a thin line.

“So,” she starts, “you guys been seeing each other lately?” She phrases it light, like it’s casual. But her eyes are too sharp, scanning you both.

You smile like you’ve practiced it. “Not really. We ran into each other a couple of days ago. Unexpectedly.”

Riki doesn’t say anything. He’s staring down at his coffee like it personally offended him.

Rei hums, glancing between you again. “Weird. Riki never mentioned it.”

You sip your drink to avoid answering. It tastes like syrup and guilt.

Jungwon shifts beside you. He’s been quiet too long. Observing. Calculating. He reaches for your hand under the table—and you flinch. Just slightly. Just enough.

You see the flicker in his eyes. Something cold, unsure, tightening his jaw before he lets go.

Riki’s chair scrapes softly as he leans back. He stretches one arm behind Rei’s chair. It’s casual. Possessive. Performed. But when your eyes flick to him, he’s already watching you. And he doesn’t look away.

The silence stretches too long.

You glance at the time. Not late, but suddenly, it feels like you've been here too long.

Jungwon clears his throat softly. “We should probably get going. You have work early, don’t you?”

It’s a neutral out. A subtle offering. But the edge in his tone is unmistakable.

You nod too quickly. “Right. Yeah.”

You stand, smoothing the hem of your dress. Across the table, Riki doesn’t move. Rei offers a tight smile as she pushes her hair behind her ear, eyes flicking between you and Riki again.

“You two heading out too?” Jungwon asks, polite.

Rei shakes her head, “I think we’ll stay a bit. Riki’s sweet tooth hasn’t kicked in yet.” She laughs, light but forced. Riki doesn’t even blink.

Jungwon places a warm hand on your lower back, guiding you toward the door.

You don’t look back.

But still in the café, as you and Jungwon are leaving Rei watches Riki pick at a dessert he’s not even eating.

“You wanna tell me what that was?” she asks.

Riki shrugs. Doesn’t look at her.

“You couldn’t fake it for two hours?” she says, still trying to keep it light, but her voice is breaking at the edges.

He doesn’t respond.

She swallows. “You’re still in love with her, aren’t you?”

Still nothing.

Rei sits back, blinking fast.

“I hope she’s worth ruining everything.”

In the car you and Jungwon are barely halfway down the block before he speaks.

“You don’t like raspberry,” he says. Quiet. Not accusing. Just… unraveling the thread.

You stare out the window.

He doesn’t push. Not yet. He just lets the silence sit between you both, letting you feel the weight of it.

And when he parks the car outside his and yours penthouse, his voice drops lower.

“How long has this been going on?”

You blink. “What?”

He turns to look at you. Not angry. But hurt. And that’s worse. Way worse. You never meant to hurt him. You were just too blindsided by Riki. Like you always are. Everything is always too much with him. Too colorful, too loud, he makes you too ha-…

“Whatever this is between you and Riki,” he says. “You think I can’t feel it?”

You open your mouth. Then close it again.

He nods, jaw clenched. “I didn’t want to be right.”

You don’t say anything. Not because there’s nothing to say but because anything you could say would sound cruel. Or worse, dishonest. And you’ve lied enough.

The penthouse is quiet when you step inside. Not soft quiet — hollow. Like all the warmth Jungwon tried to build with you has finally leaked through the cracks. You trail in behind him, your eyes skimming over the small signs of his care… the flowers he replaced just this morning. The charger he keeps plugged in for your phone. The pink cupcakes you like in the fridge, even though he doesn’t eat sweets.

You should feel something. But you only feel heavy.

You sit on the edge of the bed. Your dress folds gently at your thighs. The same dress you wore to hurt someone. Or maybe yourself. You can’t tell anymore. Somewhere between the fucking, something in you blurred.

Across the room, Jungwon doesn’t move. He stands like he wants to ask for something, an explanation, an apology — but knows he won’t like the answer.

And maybe the worst part is… you wish he would yell. Or cry. Slam a door, something. But Jungwon is still himself, still his calm self and it only makes you feel messier. Uglier.

Your phone buzzes.

Coupang Eats: We should talk.

You lock it. Set it face-down on the nightstand.

Coupang Eats: Whenever you're ready.

Your hands shake slightly as you unzip the weekender bag. You don’t pack much. Just what you need. You tell yourself you’ll come back. That it’s not permanent. You lie to yourself the way you always have. Softly, sweetly.

You glance toward Jungwon once more. He hasn’t moved from his office. His back is to you now, one hand gripping the edge of the desk like he’s trying to ground himself.

You want to go to him. Say sorry. Say something. But you don’t know how to comfort someone while still choosing someone else.

So instead, you whisper “I’m staying at a hotel. Just for a while.”

He doesn’t answer.

You leave the keys on the credenza. The door clicks shut behind you.

And just like that, you become the kind of girl who walks away from a man who would’ve never walked away from you.

You last 5 minutes in the car by yourself before you’re shaking. Your vision blurs and you pull over. Your hands stay on the wheel, but your shoulders can’t stop shaking.

No noise escapes you, the kind of breathless crying that comes only after you’ve been thoroughly overwhelmed. You don’t even know why you’re crying. Because you hurt Jungwon? Because you left him? Because you chose Riki this time and you’re sorry for hurting him too? Because you don’t know if you’ve ruined it with him too?

You gather yourself slowly. Just enough to drive to the closest hotel.

It’s shabby. If you were your usual self you wouldn’t be found within 10 feet of it. But right now the small and dim room brings you comfort.

The lighting is yellow and uneven, the hallway carpet faded with time and secrets. But right now, the small, dim room wraps around and it's enough.

The walls are a muted pastel green, chipped at the corners, soft and sleepy. The heavy curtains are the color of oversteeped tea. The rug beneath you is old, scratchy in some spots and suspiciously soft in others — probably disgusting. But it’s warm. And it doesn’t ask anything of you.

The bedspread is stiff. The air smells faintly like cheap linen spray and leftover takeout from whoever was here before you. But there’s a strange comfort in how off it all is — like the room knows you don’t belong here, and it’s choosing not to care.

You drop your bag. The zipper’s still half open.

You lie down on the carpet, eyes fixed on the ceiling. The glow from the streetlights outside crawls in through the blinds in thin gold lines. You trace them with your eyes like they might lead you out of this moment.

But they don’t.

They just remind you that morning will come whether you’re ready or not.

Eventually, you sit up with heavy limbs and pull your dress off in silence. You throw on an oversized tee, one that smells faintly like Jungwon’s laundry detergent, and immediately hate it. You shrug it off your shoulders as if it burned you.

You flick the TV on, scroll through the channels until you land on one that only plays indie love songs and soft piano ballads. You try to sleep to it, but your brain won’t quiet down. The pillow feels too loud. The room feels too full of everything you left unsaid.

So you grab your phone.

The screen lights up with missed calls. Coupang Eats (3 missed calls) 11:08 PM. 11:42 PM. 12:17 AM.

You don’t call back.

Instead, your fingers start flying across the screen. You swipe through your notes app, scroll past voice memos and lists you never finished, until you find it: “Shared account pw 🫣🤐🤞”

The login still works.

The finsta you and Riki made when you were fifteen. No followers, no bios, no comments. Just a locked archive. You remember laughing about it back then, calling it your “burner for memories.”

The feed loads.

First photo you see is a blurry close-up of your pinky with his pinky wrapped around it. Captioned contract sealed.

Then you scroll past selfies at the convenience store, your faces mid-laugh, Riki sticking out his tongue. Then a video of him trying to teach you how to skateboard, failing miserably and pretending to die in the parking lot. You can hear your own cackling in the background.

The further you scroll, the harder it gets to breathe.

A picture from your sixteenth birthday. He’d made you a paper crown from receipts and straw wrappers. You wore it all night. He wrote in the caption ‘Queen of making me soft’. You’d replied ‘Ur weak anyway’.

You press the screen. Let the image fill up your phone. Let the ache press into your lungs.

He was your best friend before he was anything else. And now everything feels like too much.

You set the phone face down and finally let yourself cry. Quietly. Face buried in your arms. Not for Riki. Not for Jungwon. Just for the version of yourself who didn’t know how complicated love could get.

You fall asleep like that, head pounding, throat sore and dry and eyes swollen. And wake just as the sun is starting to paint the skyline yellow-

Bang. Bang. Bang.

Your heart leaps. You sit up too fast. The pounding continues, it sounds urgent, not frantic. Like whoever’s on the other side knows you’ll open. Like they’re sure of it.

You reach for the first thing you can find (your old hoodie) and slip it over your head as you stumble barefoot to the door.

You peek through the peephole.

Riki.

Hair a mess. Hoodie half-zipped. Jaw tight. His shoulders are hunched like he’s been holding his breath for hours. His eyes are ringed with exhaustion, skin pale under the hallway light. You open the door slowly.

Neither of you says anything at first.

He just looks at you. Takes in the hoodie. Your bare legs. The redness around your eyes.

You swallow hard. “How did you even find me?”

He scratches the back of his neck, avoiding your gaze for once. “Went to your place. Jungwon opened the door. Didn’t say much… just said you were staying at some hotel. That you left.”

He looks up now. “So I checked every hotel near the highway. Every cheap one I thought you’d never usually pick. I figured, you’d want to be somewhere that didn’t ask questions.”

You don’t respond. You can’t. Your chest tightens just seeing him there.

Riki doesn’t wait for an invitation. He doesn’t speak again. Just steps inside, shuts the door behind him with a soft click. Tosses off his jacket onto the nearby chair.

Then he walks over and pulls you into his arms.

No tension. No games. No hunger.

Just holds you.

You cave instantly, burying your face into his chest like your bones have been aching for this. And you cry. Again, but it’s not like last night, not quiet or restrained — but open. Loudly. Like a kid.

Riki says nothing for a while, just moves you both to the bed. His hand just runs slowly over the back of your hoodie, warm and careful. You can feel his heartbeat against your cheek.

Then, just barely above a whisper he tells you, “I told you I’d never stop choosing you.”

And that’s all it takes.

You let yourself collapse into him, fully.  His hands splay across your back, holding you close enough to feel every shaky breath. The kind of hug that says stay here. That says I’ve got you.

Time moves differently in his arms. You don’t know how long you stay there, pressed against his chest, legs tangled, hearts a little quieter now.

Eventually, your tears slow. You sniffle and wipe your cheek against his shirt, then freeze. “Sorry. I got snot on you.”

Riki glances down. “I don’t care.” He slightly pauses before speaking again, “I like when you ruin my stuff anyway.”

You roll your eyes, even as the corners of your lips threaten a smile. “You're such a freak.”

He pulls back just enough to look at you — his thumb brushing beneath your eye gently. “And you look ridiculous in that hoodie. It's swallowing you.”

“It’s yours.”

“Exactly.”

You both laugh. A small one. But real.

Riki presses a kiss to your forehead. It's gentle. No pressure. No expectation. Just warmth.

You sit on the edge of the bed while Riki disappears into the bathroom to splash cold water on his face. You hear the faucet, the clatter of the cheap soap dish. It’s quiet again, but this time, not lonely.

When he steps back out, his hair is damp and pushed back, and his sleeves are rolled to his elbows. He looks younger this way. Less like the person who ruined you, and more like the boy who used to make you laugh until your stomach hurt.

You curl your knees up to your chest. “I haven’t eaten since yesterday.”

He glances at the crusty hotel menu on the nightstand and lifts a brow. “Room service?”

You nod. “Please don’t judge me if I order pancakes and miso soup.”

Riki smirks. “That’s disgusting. I’m getting that too.”

Twenty minutes later, you’re sitting cross-legged on the bed with trays between you.

Miso steam fogs your lashes. The pancakes are a little dry, but Riki drowns his in syrup and makes a show of pretending it’s gourmet. You throw a rolled-up napkin at him and he catches it mid-air with his mouth. He’s so smug, it’s ridiculous (ridiculously endearing).

For a while, it feels like the world outside doesn’t exist. Like you’re not running away. Like this is just... the two of you again. Existing in a quiet pocket of peace.

“I forgot how easy it is,” you murmur.

Riki chews, swallows. “What is?”

“This. Us. When we’re not trying to hurt each other.”

He’s silent for a second, then reaches across the tray and tugs your sleeve. “Then let’s stop trying.”

After breakfast, you both stretch out on the bed. You lie back. He lies beside you. Not touching. Just breathing together. And after a while, without saying anything, Riki slips his pinky against yours.

You link it.

He glances at the clock. “It’s still early,” he says. “Wanna go for a drive?”

You turn to look at him. “Where?”

He smiles. Soft. Secretive.

“Somewhere we left a part of ourselves.”

A short drive later with the windows cracked and the morning sun warming the car you’re on your way.

You recognize the route before he even parks.

The overlook.

It’s stupid, really. Just a hill that peers out over the city, tucked behind an old park and some bike trails. You used to sneak up here after dark when you were both barely sixteen. It was the first place you ever kissed. On a hot rainy summer day. Hair soaked, heart pounding, shoes caked in mud. Neither of you ever talked about it much after — like it was a secret even from yourselves.

You stare at the familiar curve of the hill, the chipped bench still there.

“You remember?” Riki says as he kills the engine.

You nod slowly. “Of course I do.”

Neither of you says this is where it started. But you’re both thinking it.

He helps you out of the car like he always used to, like you’re fragile and treasured and something he doesn’t want to lose again. You sit on the bench, shoulder to shoulder, looking out over the skyline.

And when he takes your hand, he doesn’t lace your fingers together… he just holds it, palm to palm. Still. Soft.

“Do you think we could ever do it right?” you ask quietly.

Riki looks over at you. His lashes catch the light. His voice is a little hoarse. “Maybe not perfect. But honest this time.”

You nod. “I could live with that.”

And then, he finally kisses you.

Slowly. Gentle. The kind of kiss that makes time stretch like the world softens just to give you this. He kisses you like he remembers every version of you — the girl from next door, the one who used to steal his hoodies, the one who left him, the one who came back. Like he’s been holding his breath since the last time you touched and finally gets to exhale.

And you melt into it. Your hands slide into his hair without thinking, like it’s an old habit. He tilts his head just slightly, deepening it, and your heart stumbles because it’s not lust that makes you shiver — it’s how much you feel. The love. The passion. The yearning you’d been hiding from yourself.

There’s something unsaid in it. A hundred unsent messages. All the years in between. An apology. A promise. A beginning.

And when he finally pulls back just an inch, your forehead rests against his. Both of you a little breathless.

“I missed you,” he says quietly. “More than I should’ve.”

You don’t speak. You just kiss him again. Because saying it aloud would break you.

But he already knows.

You sit beside him on the old bench by the reservoir for the long time after that. Shoulder to shoulder, reminiscing together.

You glance at him. “It hasn’t changed much.”

Riki smiles faintly, eyes forward. “You have.”

You huff a laugh. “Thanks?”

“I mean it in a good way.” He tilts his head toward you, expression open now, so rare for him. “You always had all this light in you. You just… didn’t know how to carry it.”

You’re quiet for a moment. Letting it in. Letting it sting.

Then you nudge his knee with yours. “You were the first person to ever see me.”

[bambiihee]

FROM UTOPIA AND BACK ˒˒ 이희승 〔 TEASER 〕

♫ listen to the playlist here!

pairing。 » lee heeseung x fem!reader 𓄵feat。 the rest of enhypen, giselle and winter from aespa, lia and ryujin from itzy, yunjin from lsfm, named oc boyfriend

genre。angst, smut, porn with plot, unhappy ending

warnings。» explicit language and sexual content, drug use, mentions of marijuana and prescription pills, dealer!heeseung, good girl!reader, college au, fraternities and sororities, ex fwbs to ???, corruption kink, vaginal fingering, squirting, dirty talk, praise kink, cheating/infidelity, piv, unprotected sex, facefucking, facials, meanie!heeseung, semi-public sex, more tags to be added. everything is terrible and everyone sucks. current word count。9k (final wc ~ 25-30k)

teaser word count。1.3k

bambii's note。» now that i'm officially a third of the way through this fic, I wanted to share a little teaser of what's to come!! this fic is literally my fucking baby and I really hope you guys are as excited about reading this as i am writing it. let me know if you want to be tagged for when it releases! I'm not making any solid promises due to my event and the other fics I'm working on, but I'm really hoping to be done with this thing by mid to late august. I'm not comfortable setting an official release date until I'm much closer to the finish line.

If you were sober, you would be in full blown panic mode, but the weed is making it difficult to really care. It wasn’t as if you were missing some big test or anything, and Heeseung skipped class all of the time and no one ever batted an eye… and maybe, just maybe, you didn’t want this moment to end. You and Heeseung together in his car like nothing had ever happened between you, like everything was just as it was when you thought you had his heart. 

“This is what I mean when I say you think too much.” Heeseung shakes his head and lights thankfully not another joint but a cigarette. “Nobody cares if you don’t show up to a class or two. Just tell them you were sick or something if they’re really that nosy. Besides, we’re the only people on this side of the parking lot right now. It’s not like somebody’s going to see you.”

“I don’t know, Hee…”

“Come on, stay with me a little longer. Just until you’re sober. I missed you.” and there he goes again, with his big, sparkly Bambi eyes, gazing down at you like he needs your permission to breathe. You hate him, hate how manipulative he is and how good he is at it. You hate how confident you were that you could beat him at his own game, yet here you are, falling for the same old tricks like you never learned your lesson. 

“I haven’t missed you.” you mutter petulantly. It doesn’t sound believable even to your own ears. 

Heeseung grins like it was a compliment. “Oh, yeah? Jinyoung keeping you satisfied?”

He spreads his legs wider, to the point it’s almost obscene. You swallow hard and avert your eyes from his very inviting lap. Memories of being perched on that lap tug at you like unraveling threads, slowly breaking you down; grinding up against him in this very backseat, moaning into each other's hot mouths, sliding your hands along his built thighs when you got on your knees for him, only because the touch made him shudder. How easily he made you feel like you never had before, cocky and laidback and effortless as if he wasn’t even trying. How he would talk you through it, the words branded into your brain, ringing in your ears when you’re touching yourself at night. You’ve made yourself cum to the memory of what “good girl” sounded like coming from his lips. 

“He is keeping me satisfied, actually.” you insist. Somehow, you sound even less believable than you did before. “I’ve been getting out of my shell more now that we’re together; he keeps me from rotting away in my bedroom every day.”

“Are you sure? ‘Cause Friday night you looked fucking miserable.” Heeseung cocks his head, eyes glittering with mirth. “Anyway, that’s not the kind of satisfied I’m talking about.”

You stiffen, a rising heat flushing your neck and cheeks. “Heeseung.” you warn him, though it sounds more like a desperate plea. 

“I’m just asking. Is it wrong to be curious?” he croons, grin widening. It’s not hard to imagine the pitchfork and the horns, red and twisted and hiding underneath his equally red hair. “He must be fucking you right if you’re defending him this much.” 

“I’m not having this fucking conversation with you, Lee.” you wish you had more control over your voice, like Heeseung did. You wish you didn’t sound so cornered and weak. 

“Does he make you feel good? Better than me?” Heeseung leans in and his thick, musky cologne invades your senses, clouds your mind worse than the weed. The familiar, enticing scent works through you as if you were one of Pavolv’s dogs, notes of wood and amber with a hint of marijuana and cigarette smoke, so unmistakingly Heeseung that it makes your thighs clench. It reminds you of nights you used to spend with him, twisted together on his mattress, wearing his clothes like he and you were something more than… you weren’t even friends. Confidants, maybe. Business partners. Two strangers in a deal; you wanted his drugs and he wanted your body. 

He still wants your body. He tells you as much with his arms caging you against the headrest, heavy on top of you and staring you down like a predator. His sultry gaze sets your skin on fire, the heat settling deep in your gut. “Does he fuck you every night like I did? Does he make you squirt as easily as I can? Does he eat your pussy the way you like?”

You whimper and squirm underneath him, unable to meet his eyes. It’s agonizing just how easily he can turn you on, your belly fluttering with hot, sticky arousal from hardly anything at all. “You’re disgusting.” you spit at him, though you don’t sound nearly as angry as you would like. It’s just what Heeseung was hoping you would say.

He beams. “Oh fuck, he doesn’t, does he? Parades you around like a trophy but can’t even please you right— do you put up with it for the stability? Fake moaning in his ear so he feels like a man?”

You shake your head violently, too overwhelmed to speak.

“Can he even make you cum?”

You don’t stop shaking your head. 

Heeseung laughs, a sharp, startling bark directly in your face. He forces you to look up at him with his fingers gripped tight around your chin, his calloused fingertips digging into the fat of your cheeks. There’s a fire burning in his eyes, hungry and dangerous, all consuming with how the burning heat of his gaze overtakes your body. “I knew it. I’ve been listening to girls complain about how bad of a lay he was for years. Bet he talked big game, too. How long have you been having to finish yourself off after he falls asleep? Are your fingers even enough anymore or did you get some toys? Do you still think of me when you’re fucking yourself? Wishing it was me between those thighs?” 

“Heeseung, stop.” you plead with him again, but you make no move to stop him when his hand comes to rest heavy on your inner thigh. 

“Now that’s disgusting. It’s fucking criminal, having you like that and not ruining you.” he continues, warm breath tickling your ear and nose. The smell of ash on his lips tempts you for a taste. “You’re so fucking pretty when you’re falling apart. Used to make you cum until you couldn’t anymore, remember baby? Poor, smart girl all stressed out and needing me to fuck her stupid. ‘Til your sweet little head’s all empty and your pussy’s shaped like me. Fuck, that’s why you’re really here, isn’t it? You’re all pent up, seeking any kind of release— it’s not really my weed you want, baby. You need me to make you cum.” 

His hand slides higher, underneath your skirt and your sweater, pinky finger ghosting over the gusset of your panties. You want to fight him, push him off and away, but you’re frozen underneath his searing touch. Just the tips of his fingers and the ghost of his lips across your jaw is enough to get your pussy soaking, dampening your panties and making your hips twitch. Heeseung can no doubt feel the wet spot, growing bolder with two of his long thick fingers tracing the outline of your pussy lips. You grab ahold of his hoodie sleeve, clutching desperately to ground yourself and keep from grinding up into his hand. 

“We can’t,” you mewl pathetically, baked brain spinning from how fast your carefully constructed walls are coming down. It’s a shame. You spent months working on them.

Still, even as you deny him, you don’t try to stop him when he cups your hot, throbbing cunt in his palm and presses down, rewarding your gasp with a deceptively chaste kiss to your neck. “Just say it and I’ll give you what you want, princess. Tell me what you need from me.”

[theserpentsadvocate]

I do disagree, but mostly with the take on Mr. Bennet! (Hopefully this reads as enthusiastic conversation and not a lecture - I get very excited when I'm interested in things.) The reason his daughters have few options is because he's lazy and indolent and self-satisfied - it's explicitly stated that he never bothered to save any money because he assumed he would have a son (who could help him break the entail and provide more money to his daughters), and that even when he realized that wasn't going to happen, he just decided it was too late to start saving and didn't bother. All his daughters could have had much better prospects if he'd bothered to bestir himself, but he doesn't like bestirring himself, and he's selfish. (And it's not impossible for him to come up with a large amount of money, even if it means self-denial - when he finds out it isn't his brother-in-law who bribed Wickham to marry Lydia, he says that he's relieved because if it was Mr. Gardiner, he "must and should* have paid him", so it would have been possible for him to come up with (roughly) ten thousand pounds**, even if not all at once or right away. But that would take effort, and Mr. Bennet hates effort.)

*in this context 'should' means 'would' to Austen's contemporaries, not 'ought to'

**for additional context, this is Darcy's entire annual income, and I believe that he's the richest man in Austen save only Mr. Rushworth - he's very wealthy

I agree with you that Mr. Bennet is often portrayed as benignly neglectful, but in my opinion he's not - he's malignantly neglectful, and deliberately so, most obviously when he insists on letting Lydia go to Brighton because he just doesn't feel like putting up with her and his wife whining about it if he doesn't give permission. I don't doubt that he does care about his children, but that is almost never enough to take precedence over his self-congratulatory sarcasm (the part where he forgives Elizabeth for being right when he was wrong, when his decision nearly ruined their entire family, oh my god) and his reluctance to make an effort in nearly anything (he's repeatedly indicated to be slow and unreliable at answering letters, for instance). He certainly doesn't respect his daughters, even Elizabeth: he calls her 'silly' along with the rest of them, only deigning to say she has 'something more of quickness', and he dismisses and belittles her very serious and reasonable concerns about the Brighton trip. He's easy to like at first blush because he's funny and snarky and most of his targets (mainly his wife, also several of his teenage daughters) are ridiculous, but he's actually a very bad husband and father - especially in spending years insulting his wife in front of their children and also being mean to said children about their interests.

That said, I don't think Takashi Shimura is a bad choice. He does look seem like he could comprehend a lot of nuance of a really book-accurate Mr. Bennet. Personally I voted for Lionel Barrymore and I stand by it even though it's not popular, because he looks very Dad in that picture, and is there anything more Dad than starting off seeming like the most affable and intelligent person in the room and then slowly disappointing your favourite daughter as she realizes that your flaws are very real? (Some parents have greater flaws than others, of course, and some relationships bounce back easily once kids get used to seeing their parents as people - even Elizabeth's relationship with him seems to end as still a positive one. But Mr. Bennet's specific flaws are a lot larger and more significant than most people usually acknowledge.)

this is a poll for a movie that doesn't exist.

it is vintage times. the old hollywood studios, captivated by the electorate's previous casting of cinema classic dracula, have decided to celebrate jane austen's 250th by releasing an all-new vintage motion picture extravaganza based on her celebrated romance pride and prejudice. whoever is cast will impact the picture's tone and genre, so they are counting on you, the electorate, to deliver cinema magic.

you are the casting director for this star-studded epic. choose your players wisely.

This is one of many polls that will gradually drop over the next few weeks. You can find all the P&P polls under #pride and prejudice casting. If you need a reminder on who's who, here's the Wikipedia page listing the cast of characters. Thank you to everyone who suggested actresses for this poll!

previously cast:

Georgiana Darcy—Mary Pickford

Colonel Fitzwilliam—Albert Finney

Caroline Bingley—Joan Crawford

Charlotte Lucas—Mary Wickes

Aunt Gardiner—Beah Richards

Uncle Gardiner—Juano Hernandez

Mary Bennet—Dorothy Malone

Kitty Bennet—Hitomi Nazoe

Lydia Bennet—Dorothy Dandridge

Mr. Collins—Gene Wilder

Lady Catherine de Bourgh—vote here

Wickham—vote here

[dark-lord-of-awesomeness]

(Caution, a bit of a sad thought)

What if… In the fantasy world, everything is fine. The children are no longer children, but adults who happily visit Stan and Ford.

But at some point, something happens to Stan and Ford. The hair, previously almost matching each other, becomes brown on one of them. Stan has better eyesight, so his glasses do not fit him, or he almost never wears them… and, MOMENT, it turns into two small figures of ten (or maybe even younger) years old.

Stan began to lose his memories. Whether he has Alzheimer's , dementia or something else, but… he can no longer be the same, and therefore Ford, who corresponds to him, has also changed. (Or not, because the fantasies of others were able to keep him at an older age. Drama, another terrifying drama, how I love it).

Dipper and Mabel try, try very hard to make Stan happy, which is incredibly difficult in the face of his living fantasies, because he has no more mental boundaries. They want to see him healthy, without old man problems with breathing, back and other troubles that accompanied him in recent days.

And nothing can be done.

At all, because everything comes to an end. And Stan, contrary to common desires, is not eternal.

Therefore, in the end … He remains in a familiar clearing being him, an old man, meeting death. (as an old friend, an enemy, stepping into an adventure to which Ford, no matter how much he wanted, does not have access). And, as an idea, the embodiment of his worst fantasies, possibilities, oddities, cruelty. Which he erased with his brother. Which Stan hated, shaking a dark hand, engulfed in blue flame. Bill, who accompanies him on his last journey.

(For some reason I like the idea that one of his exciting and frightening creations could accompany him to the other world)

And, as an idea, Stanley remains. Little, ready to take Ford, when he is ready, on a voyage around the world. He is not Stan, a part of him, but not the man who created him…

Which is also sad, in a way.

And nothing remains the same.

It took me a few reads to get this, as Fantasy Land is what i call Princess Stan verse, but then i was made super sad.

Because Stan's not really a god, he's a human man, and he's going to pass away one day, naturally or not, and his creations wont be able to follow him.

Except Bill, who's existence he tied together with his own.

And one day the rest of Stan's creations will fade too, as the dimension stabilized and they became more real, more subject to the rules of the dominant dimension. And Stan might never be with Ford here, but Ford still has Stanley, young and waiting to go on their own adventure. Maybe back to a different version of Stanland, where there is no god to write their stories for them. Maybe someday they meet another pair of young twins, whose own real counterparts went somewhere they couldn't follow, and the four of them have their own fun.

And none of them will ever meet Stan again, or Bill. Bill and Stan are off, maybe in an afterlife, maybe reincarnated, maybe maybe maybe. Who knows?

Nothing stays the same, everything changes, and sometimes thats good, sometimes thats bad, but most of the time its just different.

[freyafrida]

rilla of ingleside, chapter twenty-two

ahahaha...ahaha...pain

The first few chunks of this chapter all feel like they're basically leading up to the reveal -- reflecting on how long the war has been and that Rilla's thankful that she's grown from it, despite the pain -- but of course, she hasn't really experienced just how close the war will come yet.

And think of all the Somme victories this blessed summer.

Ouch!!! Ouch!! I feel like this has to be ironic (from LMM's part), given how bloody the Somme fights were. (Cousin Sophia, for her part, notes how many men have been lost.)

"Yes, I had a letter from him in July," said Rilla. "He said that when he got word of his wife's death and of my taking the baby—Mr. Meredith wrote him, you know—he wrote right away, but as he never got any answer he had begun to think his letter must have been lost." "It took him two years to begin to think it," said Susan scornfully. "Some people think very slow.

honestly, you'd think the man would at least follow up after a few months instead of two years. Also interesting that Mr. Meredith wrote him? I guess as the town minister, that was maybe his responsibility to track down Mr. Anderson and write him?

but young creeturs had to be kept down. If they were not kept down society would be demoralized.

lmaooo so true Cousin Sophia

But so far nothing had touched the manse and the Ingleside boys. They seemed to bear charmed lives.

Also ouch! Although -- as mentioned, it's always kind of interested me that the manse kids are perhaps a little more wise to how harsh life can be than the Blythe kids, before the war -- interesting to think it might be the other way around after the war, where the Blythes have suffered the loss of one of their sons/brothers in the war and the Merediths haven't.

"Oh, let me work—let me work, Gilbert," she entreated feverishly. "While I'm working I don't think so much. If I'm idle I imagine everything—rest is only torture for me. My two boys are on the frightful Somme front—and Shirley pores day and night over aviation literature and says nothing. But I see the purpose growing in his eyes. No, I cannot rest—don't ask it of me, Gilbert."

Shirley mention! I wish we knew what exactly interested him about aviation -- it tended to attract people who either wanted to avoid frontline service (wrongly thinking flying was safer) or who were interested in flying because it was a new, experimental type of combat. The latter seems more like Shirley, and almost Gilbert-like of him (see also Gilbert's interest in new medical treatments). IIRC this point in the war was kind of when flying was transforming into an actual, standard type of combat, instead of being mostly reconnaissance (like the early war) or officials bolting guns onto planes and hoping for the best.

her thick creamy eyelids heavy with sleep

Once again with the thickness and creaminess of Rilla's eyelids, of all things. what is with this, LMM?

"I'm afraid he's sick," she said anxiously. She hated to go away and leave him. But no bad news came that day—nor the next—nor the next. Rilla's fear lifted.

noooooo :( I definitely know that feeling, where you let yourself be comforted that if something bad has happened, you'd know about it by now, and having that not be true is just devastating.

But Rilla Blythe shed no tears before the nightfall. When her father, his face grey and drawn and old, came to her that afternoon and told her that Walter had been killed in action at Courcelette she crumpled up in a pitiful little heap of merciful unconsciousness in his arms. Nor did she waken to her pain for many hours.

You know, I can't actually remember my reaction to Walter's death when I first read it :/ I'm trying to remember if it shocked me -- I feel like I might've spoiled it for myself by looking up the plot before reading the book, or maybe reading the end of the book first?

I do remember that I wasn't that upset, oops -- maybe because I'd already spoiled myself? -- but also partly because I was immediately like "well time to pretend this never happened and write fix-it fic :>" (I'd already gotten invested in several other book series that had legit upset me over what had happened to my fave characters so I'd already developed coping mechanisms by the time I read Rilla!)

At the same time, the line itself is so stark and plain -- even though I've fully been living in the denial of headcanon, rereading it is always a bit of a gut punch :( Also, heartbreaking details about Gilbert, grieving over his son and having to tell Rilla about it.

Also...this is super dark, and will maybe discuss further when Walter's actual cause of death is mentioned in the book but...given that families were often lied to that their sons were killed instantly (see All Quiet on the Western Front), and Monday howls for like six hours (midnight to sunrise), I wonder if mayyyybe Walter's death was actually quite prolonged.....sorry :/

glossary:

Readying Rilla bits -- mostly just typos and minor edits in this one:

The chunk about Roderick McCallum "diddling" (uh) the German censors wasn't in the original draft.

Cut mention of the telephone ringing in the afternoon (presumably to tell Gilbert about Walter)

[smilingformoney]

For the Love of Books

Chapter 13. Happy Ending

Sinclair/Betty (OC)

Summary: And they all lived happily ever after…

AN: I'm really sorry it took me almost a whole ass YEAR to get this final chapter out. This is largely due to the fact that I'm utterly incapable of writing pure fluff. Anyway here's Sinclair and Betty living happy ever after <3

All chapters here.

Read now on Ao3 or below the cut:

November 1991

“I’m getting more suspicious by the minute,” Lionel said warningly as Betty pulled up to her house and parked up outside. “If your surprise for me is your house, Betty, I’ve seen it before.”

“Oh, you are impossible,” Betty laughed. She got out of the car and, his eyes still narrowed, Lionel followed her, though it took him a moment to remember he had to open the car door himself.

“Why so suspicious, Lionel? Don’t you trust me?” Betty asked as he glanced around like he thought he might be attacked at any moment.

“More than anyone, but I hate surprises.”

Betty pushed the door open and gestured for him to follow her inside.

“Alright, alright, fine, I’ll fess up. I’m gonna cook you dinner.”

Lionel paused, frowning, halfway across the threshold. “Cook — dinner? For me? Why?”

“Because, you’ve been a really good friend to me. I know you keep saying buying the shop was a good business opportunity —”

“And it has been.”

“— but I also know you did it out of kindness.”

“Bullshit. Don’t go around making such accusations, Betty, it’ll harm my reputation. Now, does this dinner come with wine?”

“Of course it does, come on.”

Betty led him into the kitchen and pulled a bottle of red wine down from a shelf, along with two wine glasses. Lionel grabbed the bottle from her hands and looked at it appraisingly.

“Hm, not bad, I suppose. You couldn’t get an older vintage?”

“Well, if you don’t want it —”

Betty made as if to grab the bottle from him, but Lionel swiped it out of her reach.

“Ah-ah, I didn’t say that. Give me those glasses, I’ll pour. You were saying something about how great I am.”

Betty rolled her eyes. “I was saying you’ve been a really good friend. Helping me out with the shop, putting up with my pining, keeping me busy so I wasn’t just sitting home and crying every weekend…”

“Getting you and Sinclair back together, yes, yes, you’d be lost without me.”

“If that’s what you call having your driver kidnap me, sure. Woah, Lionel, that’s way too much!” Betty protested as Lionel handed her a wine glass that was way too full. “If I drink all that, I’ll be too drunk to cook.”

“Then drink it slowly, you inebriate. Cheers.”

Lionel held up his own far too full glass, and they clinked their glasses together.

“To unexpected friendships,” Betty said.

“To Sinclair overcoming his temporary insanity,” Lionel added.

They both took a drink, then Lionel said, “Speaking of which, I don’t hear incessant chattering. Is Sinclair not joining us tonight?”

“No, he’s got Goldie tonight. It’s just you and me.”

Lionel snorted. “The way the two of you talk about that dog, you’d think it was a child.”

“He is our child,” Betty said stubbornly. “Now, you stand over there and look pretty while I start dinner.”

Lionel frequently teased Sinclair for being a chatterbox, but he didn’t seem to realise how much he talked himself when he had someone listening, particularly when he was drinking wine on an empty stomach.

“So when are you moving in with Sinclair?” Lionel asked when he’d finished telling Betty a story about one of his secretaries moving away to live with her boyfriend in Paris.

“Oh, not for a while yet. We don’t want to rush things. That’s what led to him making the stupid decision he did.”

“Which one? Sinclair has made a lot of stupid decisions. Leaving you for Natalie was definitely the stupidest, on par with marrying her in the first place. I never bloody liked that woman, you know. Such a bore. And she was always putting Sinclair down. I think she knew she was inferior to him, but instead of trying to elevate herself to his level, she tried to bring him down to hers.”

“That is… a very good description of her actually,” Betty admitted. “You know, Lionel… are you aware of how the public see you?”

“As a very sexy and very mysterious man to whom they all aspire? Women want me, men want to be me, yadda yadda yadda…”

“If by that you mean aloof, out of touch and a bit of a manwhore, yes. But you’re actually quite perceptive.”

“Of course I am,” Lionel said, as if the idea that he might not be perceptive were offensive somehow. “You don’t get to where I am without being able to read people. So often - in business dealings particularly - people will say one thing and mean another. It’s important to be able to tell what they truly want. It’s a skill I excel at, yes, but it’s exhausting. That’s what I like about you, Betty. No bullshit. You don’t suck up to me, you don’t try to get me into bed, and I quite honestly believe that you don’t give a shit how much money I have. You’re direct. I find that refreshing.”

“Well, someone has to call you out on your bullshit, Lionel, or else your head will end up so far up your own arse you’ll be trying to come out the other end.”

Lionel roared with laughter.

“And therein lies my point! Do you know how many people in this world would speak to me like that?”

“Not enough, clearly.”

“Definitely not enough. I’d say you, Sinclair - though I don’t think he’d be so creative - and probably my ex-wife.”

“Well, I’m glad I can be of service, and I’m happy for my role in your life to be as the one that deflates your ego when it gets a bit too big. Someone’s got to remind you that your life is very much atypical. Watch, I’ll even have you voting Labour next year.”

Lionel snorted derisively.

“Fat chance. Do you want a top up?”

Betty glanced over at Lionel and saw that his glass was already empty. Hers, meanwhile, was hardly touched, as she was focusing on cooking the dinner.

“Knock yourself out. But please, don’t knock yourself out by drinking too much. If you do, you’re sleeping on Goldie’s bed.”

Lionel grinned as he poured himself another glass of wine.

“You know, I could get used to this. Getting drunk while someone cooks dinner for me.”

“You have a personal chef, isn’t that what happens every night?”

“Yes, but I pay him, that doesn’t count. You’re doing this to be nice. Ha ha!”

Betty snorted.

“And I’m starting to regret it. Look, I need to concentrate, can you go entertain yourself? Put the telly on or something.”

Lionel threw his hands up in mock surrender.

“Alright, alright, I know when I’m not wanted. Let me know if you need any help.”

“Sure, like you know how to hold a spatula.”

“Oh, no, I meant with drinking the wine.”

Betty hit him playfully with a tea towel. “Go on, get out of my way!”

Lionel wasn’t drunk, not really. It took more than a (very) large glass of wine to get him drunk. But he was able to relax around Betty, and the alcohol made him even more relaxed, so when they sat down to eat, he was able to laugh and joke throughout dinner without hearing his mother’s voice in his head reminding him to mind his table manners.

“God, this really was excellent, Betty,” Lionel said as he placed his knife and fork down on his empty plate. “No wonder Sinclair loves you. The way to a man’s heart is through his stomach, especially for Sinclair. If you keep cooking meals like that, I might just fall in love with you myself. Are you sure that wasn’t real beef?”

“I bloody hope not! It was in the meat-free section in Asda.”

Lionel’s eyes widened. “Asda?!”

“Sure. You didn’t expect me to go to Waitrose, did you?”

“Well, no, but… Asda?!”

Betty pointed at him and laughed. “Ha ha, you ate poor people food and you liked it!”

“No, I — I have no problem with that!” Lionel spluttered. “I just… assumed Asda was so cheap because its quality was poor.”

“I thought you were perceptive, Lionel? Waitrose isn’t more expensive because it’s higher quality. It’s more expensive because they know they can trick fools like you into overpaying for the illusion of quality. It’s all the same. Probably made in the same factories with different labels on.”

“Bullshit. If it were all the same, everyone would shop at Asda.”

“Really?” Betty scoffed. “You’d shop at Asda, with all the plebs? Face it, Lionel. You’re a snob.”

“I - well - I just appreciate the finer things, that’s all. I don’t believe you wouldn’t shop at Waitrose if you had the money.”

“Yeah, like they’d let me in. Now, do you still want dessert, even if the crumble’s from Asda? Not the apples, though, I got them from the market.”

on dessert? Please. Sinclair and I aren’t that dissimilar, you know. But here, let me clear the table. I do know how to do that, at least.”

Betty conceded, and while she got the apple crumble she’d made earlier out of the fridge, Lionel piled up their used plates and brought them into the kitchen.

“Betty…” he said thoughtfully, prompting her to look up at him as she portioned up the dessert.

“You are right, you know. I am a massive snob. And… I do need humbling sometimes. I get too big for my own boots. But being friends with you — it makes me feel normal. So many people look at me and only see what I have. They see my position, my title, my bank balance. But I’ve never felt that with you. You look at me and see what I am. And often that’s a snobbish arsehole — but you’re still here. So… thank you. For making me feel human.”

Betty smiled.

“It’s funny, I feel the same way about you. Some of my friends, they think you’re only friends with me because it’s good optics for you to be hanging out with a poor black girl. But I’ve never felt like that. Sure, I get self-conscious at your parties and events and what have you, but that’s because everyone else is looking at me and seeing the colour of my skin, my social status… my bank balance. You and Sinclair have only ever seen me as me.”

“That, my dear, is because you are wonderful,” Lionel said, already pouring himself another glass of wine, and Betty reluctantly let him pour her another one too. “I’d have to be an idiot to think any less of you for such superficial matters. And Sinclair, as I say, has made many stupid decisions. But meeting you and deciding he wanted to know you — that was one of the smartest decisions he ever made.”

Lionel raised his glass to her.

“To you, Betty. And to me. And to Sinclair, and Goldie I suppose, and this little family unit we’ve found ourselves in.”

Betty raised her glass in turn.

“To us. And to getting rid of that godawful wife of his.”

“God, yes! Good riddance to bad rubbish.” Lionel took a generous gulp of wine. “Now — show me how Asda does crumble.”

- - -

October 1992

Betty threw herself face-first onto the bed and groaned.

“That. Was. The. Worst experience. Of my life.”

The mattress sagged slightly as Sinclair joined her on the bed, wrapping an arm around her in comfort.

“C’mon, it’s not that bad! At least we had the movers. All you had to do was stand there and look pretty. Which you do brilliantly, by the way. And, hey, guess what!”

“What?”

“We live together now!”

Betty finally turned her head to look at Sinclair and smiled, her mood immediately perking up when she saw his grin.

“Yeah, we do, don’t we?”

“Let’s get some food!” Sinclair announced, bouncing to his feet from the bed. “Where do you wanna go? Or shall we order in? Maybe we should order in, it’s very important we figure out the best takeaways around here.”

“Sinclair, I know for a fact you already looked up which restaurants are nearby before even looking at this place.”

“Well, yes, but we’ve got to try them for ourselves! That reminds me, actually, the estate agent got some menus together for us, I’m sure I’ve got them somewhere…”

Sinclair began rummaging around in one of the boxes, and Betty knew there was nothing to do but to let him search until he either found what he was looking for or got bored and changed his mind.

Betty could hardly believe it had been a year already. When they got back together, they’d agreed not to rush anything, for Sinclair’s fear of repeating the mistakes he’d made with Natalie. One year, they’d agreed, then they’d move in together.

At first Betty had assumed she’d move in with Sinclair, but when he told her the house in Windsor reminded him too much of Natalie, they had to sit down and decide exactly what they were going to do. Although Sinclair’s instinct was to jump into a decision quickly, he had to remind himself that that was what had led him into a marriage to the wrong person.

Sinclair couldn’t move into Betty’s house, that was for sure. Although her modest house was roomy enough for two or even three people, Sinclair needed somewhere bigger. Not just because he owed a lot of stuff, or because he was used to bigger, but because his energy was so large that he needed space. He was just too much for a normal sized house.

They’d both have to sell up and find somewhere else, then. Somewhere bigger. But it had to be in London - although Betty was driving now, and even had her own car, she didn’t want to commute into the city every day. Sinclair agreed that he didn’t want to do the commute anymore either, as it ate into so much of his free time. So London it was.

Lionel referred them to an estate agent, and Sinclair lined up some viewings. Betty knew they were looking at bigger, and she knew they’d be fancy if the agent was recommended by Lionel, but she was still shocked when she walked into the first house.

She had no idea houses this big could even fit into London. It seemed unassuming from the outside, but inside there were, somehow, six bedrooms. Each bedroom had an ensuite, the master bedroom had a separate dressing room just for clothes which had its own ensuite - and no wonder there was so much more space than it seemed from the outside, because there were two lower ground floors below the street level, unbeknownst to the peasants passing by, which were home to two “staff bedrooms,” a separate living area for the staff, a pool, a gym, a cinema, a sauna, and a wine room.

“Sinclair, we can’t, it’s too much!” Betty gasped when the estate agent was out of earshot.

“It’s in our price range —”

More like his price range. Betty, with the five-digit equity in her house, would be contributing a tiny percentage of the seven-digit price range Sinclair insisted on looking at. He was almost as bad as his cousin sometimes.

“I know, it’s just… I mean, five floors? Staff quarters? A sauna? We don’t need a place this big, Clair. What would we even do with an extra five bedrooms?”

“Well, they can be guest rooms… and one day kids’ rooms?” Sinclair suggested, rocking on his feet. “Imagine how much fun it’ll be for them to have their own cinema in the basement! They can invite all their friends over for parties! Look, I know it’s bigger than you’re used to, Betts, but let’s just bear it in mind. We can look at smaller places too, if you want.”

They had, eventually, agreed on a townhouse in Chelsea. It was still far beyond anything Betty could have afforded on her own, and each of the six bedrooms did have an ensuite - okay, and there were dedicated staff quarters. And a library. A library was the only unnecessary extra they both agreed was definitely needed. But there wasn’t a cinema room when they already had a living room with plenty of space for a TV, and there wasn’t a gym that would never get used, or a sauna that would run the bills sky high, or a wine room that would stand empty because Sinclair (unlike Lionel) liked to actually drink the wine he bought.

There was even a garage, which was a commodity in London. And a rooftop terrace too, which Sinclair was very excited to host parties on. Betty, meanwhile, pictured the two of them sitting out there in the summer, each reading their own book.

Even more of a shock to find in a London house than the garage was a garden. It wasn’t the vast expanse that Sinclair’s home with Natalie had boasted, but it had plenty of space for Goldie to run around in, and when they one day had kids, they could play there too.

It was also half the price of the first house.

“I found them!” Sinclair announced, pulling his head out of the fifth box he’d opened. “I put them in with my shoes for some reason. Okay, do you want pizza, Chinese, Indian…”

“Babe, you know the answer’s pizza.”

“Yes, I was hoping you’d say that!” Sinclair grinned, picking up the pizza menus and jumping back onto the bed with her. “Okay, so we’ve got five options…”

Betty knew she had to stop him before he thought too hard about which pizzeria to order from and ended up in a decision paralysis.

“That one,” she decided, pointing blindly at one of the menus.

“Hey, you didn’t even look!”

“That one.”

Cottoning on to what she was doing, Sinclair laughed and promptly put the other menus aside before he could get distracted by comparing them.

“Okay, okay. What do you want? They have something called the ‘spicy veggie supreme.’ That sounds perfect. Peppers, olives, mushrooms —”

“Get it.”

Sinclair looked down at Betty, who was still lying on her front, face half-obscured by the pillow.

“Do you want me to turn the light down? We have dimmer switches now, remember!”

Betty nodded, so Sinclair turned the light down low, and stepped out into the hallway to order the food. Their landline wasn’t connected yet, so he used the mobile phone he’d bought for work. When he came back in, Betty was still lying on the bed, so Sinclair laid down next to her and wrapped an arm around her.

They’d both had a long and exhausting day. Even if they had movers to do the heavy lifting, it had been an emotional day too, with both of them saying their final goodbyes to their own houses. Fortunately they’d had the foresight not to get Goldie involved in the move, so he was at the dogsitter’s, and when they picked him up tomorrow he would no doubt be confused when they didn’t go back to Betty’s house, but they hoped he’d adjust to the new place.

Betty was tired and overwhelmed, Sinclair could tell, so he kept his mouth shut and let her curl up against his chest. When he’d bought his mobile phone and explained to Betty how the battery recharged itself by plugging in and absorbing energy from the plug, she’d compared it to the way she recharged herself by absorbing energy from him when they cuddled.

That had made Sinclair very happy to know that he, and no one else, was able to restore Betty’s energy. He definitely had more than enough of it, so he was happy to hold her and let her absorb as much of it as she needed.

He found it hard at first to keep quiet at times like this, when she just needed his presence and not his yapping, but he’d taught himself to keep conversations in his head when he needed to, so while he held her close to his chest in the dim light, his internal monologue chattered on about things they needed to do to get the house unpacked.

By the time the doorbell rang with the pizza, Sinclair had fallen asleep, and he was very happy to be woken up by Betty telling him the pizza was downstairs.

He practically sprinted to the kitchen, which was full of the wonderful smell of pizza so greasy that no amount of vegetables could make it healthy.

“We should make the most of Goldie not being here and eat it on the sofa!” Sinclair declared, picking up his pizza box to carry it through into the living room.

“You know, he wouldn’t be trying to eat our food all the time if you didn’t feed him under the table,” Betty reminded him as they settled onto the sofa with their pizza boxes on the coffee table. They’d brought a lot of their own furniture, so the sofa was already worn in with a dent where Sinclair sat, and no amount of lint rolling would ever get all of Goldie’s hair off the fabric.

“But he looks so cute when he begs!” Sinclair protested. “How can I resist those adorable puppy eyes?”

“Hm, I suppose I’m not one to talk. I can never resist your adorable puppy eyes.”

Sinclair grinned as he picked up the remote to switch the TV on.

“Can I maybe have a kiss?” he asked sweetly, batting his eyelashes as he gave her his best puppy dog eyes.

“You don’t need to give me that look, Clair, you can always have a kiss,” Betty laughed before giving him the kiss he so sweetly asked for.

Despite Sinclair’s protests that he wanted more kisses, Betty really wanted some food, so they each helped themselves to a slice of pizza before sitting back into the sofa together, Sinclair’s arm around Betty’s shoulder, just as a film began to play on ITV.

“I love it here already,” Sinclair decided.

Betty smiled at him. “Me too.”

- - -

April 1995

While the staff were busy setting up for Sinclair’s birthday party, Betty convinced him to come out to the nearby park with her to give them space. They brought Goldie too, who was now a very much full-sized golden retriever, and still as full of endless energy as he had been as a puppy, so when they let him off the lead, he bounded off across the park to sniff and pee on his favourite trees.

“I like coming here when it’s quiet,” Sinclair decided as he and Betty walked hand-in-hand through the park. “It’s peaceful when it’s quiet.”

“Peaceful? Quiet? Who are you?”

Sinclair laughed.

“I don’t mind quiet as long as it’s with you, Betts, you know that. I don’t need medicine to calm my noisy mind when I have you.”

Betty smiled. “Well, then maybe I’ll start accompanying you to work, then we won’t need to keep spending so much money on medicine.”

“No, then I’ll just get distracted by you! My mind’s only quiet with you because I can’t think of anything else except how much I love you. Which is loads, by the way. Oh, look, there’s some honeysuckle blooming!” Sinclair exclaimed, pointing out a cluster of pink and yellow flowers. “You know, in Victorian times, flowers had meanings to convey hidden messages — I think these meant devoted affection.”

“In that case…”

Betty bent down and plucked one of the honeysuckles from the ground and presented it to him.

“A token of my love, good sir,” she said with a curtsey.

Sinclair laughed as he took the flower from her hand.

“Why, thank you, milady. I shall treasure it.”

He kept the flower in his hand as they continued meandering around the park, his fingers absent-mindedly fidgeting with the stem.

“You know, I’m really glad I’m here with you, Clair,” Betty said thoughtfully. “I know it’s been a few years now, but… I still can’t believe it sometimes. Having someone as wonderful as you, the house, the dog… It feels like something that happens to other people, y’know? I never thought I’d have this.”

Sinclair looked at her and beamed.

“I’m so lucky I get to be that person for you, Betty. I know I’m not the easiest person to be with, and you’ve been so amazingly patient with me, through all the therapy, and starting my medication… I couldn’t have done it without you.”

“You’ve been patient too, Clair. I know how much effort it takes for you to avoid jumping into decisions. But I get impatient too, you know.”

Sinclair looked at her, puzzled. “What do you mean?”

Betty paused and turned to him, taking both his hands in hers.

“I mean… I know you don’t want to repeat your past mistakes. But I think we’ve waited long enough, don’t you? We’re past the point where it’s rushing things, and I don’t want to wait anymore. Sinclair, I —”

“Hold that thought!” Sinclair said suddenly, and he pulled his hands from hers.

“What —?” Betty began, but he was already turning away, half-running back towards the house.

“Don’t go anywhere!” he called back over his shoulder. “I just need to get something from the house!”

Betty sighed and folded her arms. She was used to Sinclair’s mind changing direction very suddenly, and he was getting better at not derailing the conversation, but sometimes his excitement at a new thought came on so strong and so suddenly that he didn’t know he was derailing until it was already done.

Could he not have held onto his thought at least until she’d finished proposing?

She would have stayed put as Sinclair asked, but across the park she saw Goldie squatting on the footpath, so she pulled a poo bag out of her pocket and went to pick it up before some poor unfortunate soul came and trod in it.

Goldie apparently saw this as an opportunity, and he proudly trotted over to Betty with a stick in his mouth that he’d found.

“You know, you’re supposed to retrieve game, Goldie, not sticks,” Betty said with amusement. “Unless I’m supposed to believe that’s a rabbit?”

Goldie bounded off again, and Betty quickly saw what had distracted him — Sinclair was running back, hardly out of breath, and Betty thought father and son looked particularly alike today as his golden-blonde hair bounced slightly as he ran.

Sinclair came skidding to a halt in front of Betty, and practically dove to his knees.

“Sinclair, what are you —?”

“Willyoumarryme?” Sinclair said in one breath, holding something up in his hands. It took Betty a moment to register it was a ring box, presenting a simple yet elegant - and, knowing Sinclair, probably far too expensive - ring set with, not a diamond, but a green stone that Betty suspected may be an emerald.

“Sinclair, I — did you —”

“Answer first. Questions later.”

Betty laughed incredulously. “Yes, yes, of course I’ll marry you, Sinclair! I was about to ask you myself before you ran off!”

Sinclair grinned. “I know, that’s why I ran off! I can’t have you be the one proposing!”

He pushed himself to his feet and took her hand to slide the ring onto her finger.

“Clair, is that what I think it is?”

“An emerald, yes. It’s your birthstone, and it represents renewal, and, well, you made me a new man, Betty. I was gonna do a whole speech, that’s why I hadn’t proposed yet, I’ve been trying to write it without it getting too long, but I just couldn’t condense down everything I — mmph!”

Betty interrupted him with a kiss, knowing that if she didn’t stop him now, an off-the-cuff speech was going to force its way out of him.

Sinclair wrapped his arms around her waist and held her tight as he kissed her, forgetting what he was going to say and forgetting the world around them — that was, until Goldie barked loudly, apparently frustrated that his parents weren’t paying attention to him.

They broke apart, laughing, and Goldie picked his stick up again, showing it to them as if to say, Why are you so interested in dad giving you a rock when I have a stick?

Sinclair took the stick from Goldie and threw it as far across the park as he could, and Goldie gladly bounded after it.

“You know, no matter how much I tell them otherwise, my friends are all convinced you must be as flashy and fancy as Lionel,” Betty laughed. “Half of them expect you to whisk me off to Paris or Rome to propose. Wait ‘til they find out it was ten feet away from a dog poo bin. And I wouldn’t have it any other way.”

Sinclair laughed. He grinned down at her, one arm still wrapped around her waist.

“Well, actually… I was gonna do it at Lionel’s country house. Somewhere pretty, but private. I can do it again there, if you want — or we could go to Paris, I’m sure we can use Lionel’s plane —”

Betty shook her head.

“No, this was perfect, Clair. You’re perfect. And besides, I think Goldie would be very upset if he wasn’t involved,” she added as Goldie bounded back up to them and laid the stick at their feet, wagging his tail excitedly.

She picked the stick up and threw it as far as she could.

“You’re right,” Sinclair said. “I don’t know how we’re gonna keep him from making the wedding all about him.”

“We’ll figure it out,” Betty said as she slipped her hand into Sinclair’s so they could begin meandering back towards the house. “We’ve figured everything out so far, haven’t we?”

“Yes, we have! And we’ll keep figuring it out, won’t we?”

Betty smiled and nudged her head against Sinclair’s shoulder affectionately.

“Of course we will, babe. You and me against the world, right?”

“Yes, you and me. And Goldie!”

“And sometimes Lionel.”

Sinclair laughed. “Yes, him too! I’m so happy I have you, Betty.”

“Me too, Clair. Now it’s time to make me your wife.”

- - -

August 1995

“Will you stop bloody fussing!” Lionel said irritably as Sinclair fiddled with his tie again, only to put it back exactly where it had been before. “It looks fine. You look fine.”

“I need to look more than fine, Li! It’s my wedding day, I need to look perfect. Betty needs to see me at the end of the aisle and think I’m the absolute best, most handsome groom she’s ever seen.”

Lionel rolled his eyes. “She already thinks that. She’s not going to change her mind. You’re just fussing over small details so you can feel some semblance of control.”

“I’m in control. Who says I’m not in control? Was it Betty? Does she think I’m out of control? Worse, does she think I’m a control freak?”

“Oh, snap out of it, Sinclair! She thinks you’re perfect. Here, have a drink, that’ll cool your nerves. Have you taken your medication?”

Sinclair gasped. “Oh my god, I forgot! I had so much on my mind this morning…”

Lionel handed him a glass of brandy. Sinclair took a gulp, and when he put the glass down, Lionel was already handing him a small plastic bottle and a protein bar.

Sinclair’s eyes lit up. “Wow, thanks, Li! What would I do without you? Wait, how did you get hold of my meds?”

“Betty. She thought you might forget.”

“She’s so thoughtful. She’s gonna be the best wife. She already is, really, this is just a formality.” Sinclair popped one of the pills into his mouth and washed it down with the last of the brandy, then tore open the protein bar. “One night without her and I’m already forgetting my medication. She’s gonna be an amazing mum, too.”

Lionel raised an eyebrow curiously. “Is there something you need to tell me?”

“Oh, no, she’s not pregnant! We’re gonna adopt. We’re putting our application in as soon as we get back from the Maldives. Then you’ll get to be Uncle Lionel!”

Lionel sighed. He couldn’t exactly say no to Sinclair on his wedding day.

“Well, it’s nearly time, we should get out there. Are you ready?”

Sinclair took a deep breath and steeled himself. He was absolutely ready to marry Betty; he’d been ready for about five years. Of all the life-changing decisions he’d ever made, this was the only one that he knew for sure was 100% right. But still, he was nervous. This might be his second wedding, but it was Betty’s first - and hopefully only! - and it needed to be absolutely perfect for her.

“I’m ready.”

- - -

All of Sinclair’s worries about the day going perfectly melted away the moment he saw her.

She looked like an angel walking down the aisle, the long white skirt of her dress just about grazing the floor and hiding her feet to give the effect that she was floating.

And her hair! Wow! Sinclair had wondered if she would straighten it, as she sometimes did for fancy occasions, but she was wearing her natural curls, one side pinned back with a flower tucked into it to match the bouquet she was carrying.

“You look incredible,” Sinclair whispered as she joined him at the altar.

“So do you,” Betty whispered back with a grin to match his.

Sinclair barely even heard the words of the registrar. He was too busy drinking in the sight of Betty looking absolutely perfect. And when the time came to repeat the vows, it took Sinclair a moment to realise he was supposed to say something.

They’d agreed not to write their own vows. Betty was too shy, and Sinclair wasn’t shy enough — any vows he wrote would turn into a speech, and he was already giving a speech at the reception later. Instead, they recited the standard wording, but Sinclair still meant every word of it.

Betty started tearing up as she spoke her vows, and that made Sinclair tear up too, and several guests followed suit. Lionel was an expert at holding in his emotions, even at his baby brother’s wedding, but it took a lot of effort even for him to hold it together as he watched Sinclair and Betty so openly weeping with joy as they were pronounced man and wife.

Once everyone was seated for the breakfast, Betty’s dad gave a lovely speech welcoming Sinclair into the family, and Betty cried again when he told her that his father, the very grandfather who’d left her his shop, would be beaming with pride to see her now — and that he was probably telling everyone and anyone who’d listen in Heaven that it was all down to him that Betty and Sinclair had ever met.

Next came Sinclair’s speech. As he stood up, a weary murmur rolled across the crowd as everyone braced themselves for the ultimate Sinclair speech. He just laughed.

“Don’t worry! I have it written down and Lionel has my permission to hit me if I go off-track. Lionel, my speech, please.”

“One moment.”

Lionel pushed his chair back and reached underneath the table with both hands. With a dramatic grunt, he appeared to lift something heavy — and the table rattled when he deposited on it an over-large book that looked like it belonged on the set of the Borrowers.

The crowd laughed, but no one laughed harder than Sinclair himself. He collapsed into his chair with laughter, and tried to grab onto Betty’s arm for purchase, but she was in hysterics just as much as he was.

“Do you have the second draft?” Sinclair managed to say eventually, once his laughter had subsided enough for him to get his words out.

“Oh, yeah, here you go,” Lionel said causally, and he pulled a notebook from his jacket pocket, which everyone hoped wasn’t filled from start to finish.

Sinclair wiped a tear from his cheek as he stood up again and opened his notebook. He sniggered as he caught another glimpse of the massive book, and decided he’d have to look away from it as he spoke, lest he fall into fits of laughter again.

He managed to keep it to a mere ten minutes — about twice as long as a wedding speech should be, and half as long as a Sinclair speech normally was.

He told their entire story, mentioning Natalie as briefly as possible. When he described his rush to kiss Betty on New Year’s Day, the audience gave a great big “aww,” and when he admitted to breaking up with her because of Natalie’s pregnancy, there was a brief moment of tense silence — broken when Betty booed loudly, causing the crowd to laugh again.

After describing all the good times they’d had over the last five years, Sinclair turned his attention to Betty.

“Betts, it’s no surprise to anyone when I say you’re the best thing that ever happened to me. Without you, I might still be stuck in a loveless marriage; instead, I’m here, entering a brand new marriage full of so much more love than I could have possibly expected. As a forecast analyst, it’s my job to know what’s going to happen, so you can believe me when I say that our future is going to be full of even more love and even more joy — and, yes, more difficulties, but I know that you and I will always face them together, and I can’t ask for a better partner to do it with. Thank you, and I love you.”

“I love you, too,” Betty replied with a grin, and Sinclair leant down to kiss her. As the crowd applauded, Lionel reached over and plucked the microphone out of Sinclair’s hand.

“Alright, that’s enough of that,” Lionel said as he stood up. “It’s my turn now.”

Sinclair broke the kiss as he laughed, and he finally sat down. Betty slipped her hand into his, and he stole another quick kiss before turning his attention to Lionel, who was looking out across the crowd with all the confidence of a man who’d tried marriage once and vowed never to try it again.

“May I just start by saying… fucking finally.”

- - -

February 2001

Betty had been staring at the letter in front of her for so long, she was hardly reading it anymore.

“I really think it’s a good idea,” Sinclair said for the third time. “Amy could do with siblings her age.”

“Two of them, though, Clair,” Betty said, also for the third time. “That’s a lot to take on. And they’re teenagers.”

“So? Amy’s a teenager.”

 “Yes, but she was a child when we got her. Kids are still… malleable. These two already have personalities, and they’ll have major trust issues. They’ve been in and out of foster homes for ten years. There must be a reason their placements keep breaking down.”

“Yeah, it says there, they both have ADHD,” Sinclair said, pointing to the second paragraph of the social worker’s letter.

Betty sighed and rubbed her face thoughtfully. “That might just make it harder…”

“Cindy says she thinks we’ll be a good fit for them. She hasn’t steered us wrong so far, has she?”

“I know, I just… it’s a lot to take on. And we’ve already got our hands full with —”

As if on cue, the baby monitor came to life with the sound of a baby’s cries.

“My turn!” Sinclair announced. He gave Betty a quick kiss on the cheek as he left the room and went upstairs to tend to the baby, leaving Betty alone with the social worker’s letter and her thoughts.

Amy, the first child they adopted, had been just eight years old when she came to them. Her parents had died, and with no suitable family available to take her in, she was put up for adoption — and around the same time, Betty and Sinclair finished the long application process to be potential adopters, and the social worker, Cindy, sent Amy to them almost immediately.

She was quiet, which was to be expected from a child who’d just lost her parents, but she soon came out of her shell as she adjusted to her new life. Sinclair had cried when, just under a year after adopting her, Amy had called him “Dad” for the first time.

The next two kids they’d adopted were babies; Oliver, who was now two, had come to them at six months, after a long struggle between social services and his drug-addicted parents. The court had finally determined that Oliver should be adopted and Cindy brought him to Betty and Sinclair just two months after they’d declared their interest in adopting another child.

The third child, Mary, had come to them as a newborn, her father out of the picture and her mother voluntarily giving her up for adoption. They had in fact been matched to her before she was born, and she was the only one Betty and Sinclair had been able to name themselves. She was eight months old now, and she was the one Sinclair was now tending to.

Sinclair was right. While she had plenty of friends at school, Amy didn’t have any siblings her own age. But when they’d told Cindy they were ready for another child, one a bit older than Oliver and Mary, they hadn’t expected her to come straight back to them with a pair of teenage twins who’d been in the system their entire lives.

Betty re-read Cindy’s description of them in her letter. The chequered history of placement breakdowns concerned her, but the reasons for the breakdowns all seemed to link back to their ADHD, which had only been diagnosed a few months ago according to Cindy, who hoped that placing them with a stable, well-adjusted family with prior experience of adoption and ADHD would enable them to find stable placement with them.

While Betty pondered the letter, Sinclair was carefully rocking Mary back to sleep. She’d grown so much since the day she arrived. Cindy had picked her up from the hospital to bring her to them, and Sinclair fell instantly in love with the tiny little bundle of joy. She was dark-skinned, and even at a few hours old was sporting a mini afro that threatened to rival Betty’s. She was much calmer than Oliver — though that might have been because Oliver was suffering from withdrawal — and Amy was already playing mini-mum to her.

Sinclair gave Mary a gentle kiss on the forehead as he put her back down, and when he straightened up, he saw Betty in the doorway, watching with a smile on her face.

“You’re a natural,” she whispered. “I can never get her to sleep that quickly.”

Sinclair closed the door behind him as gently as he could.

“I just ask her really, really nicely to get some sleep,” he replied softly. “She can’t resist anything I ask of her.”

Betty wrapped her arms around his neck and gave him an affectionate peck on the nose.

“Neither can I, it seems. Even when you ask to adopt two teenagers with ADHD.”

Sinclair’s eyes lit up. “You mean —?”

“Of course we’ll take them, Clair. Cindy’s right; we’re perfect for them.”

“Just like you’re perfect for me!” Sinclair wrapped his arms around Betty’s waist and held her close. “I love you, Betty.”

“I love you, too. And for once, the kids are all asleep, you know what that means?”

Sinclair gasped. “Do you mean we can…?”

“Sleep? Yes, I do.”

Grinning, Sinclair took Betty’s hand in his and led her down the hall to their bedroom. It was a rare opportunity that they could both get some sleep, and there was nothing Sinclair liked better than snuggling up into bed with his wife in his arms.

Once they were both ready for bed, Sinclair happily wrapped his arms around Betty as they snuggled up together under the duvet. He’d hardly closed his eyes when —

“WAAAHHHH!”

Oliver’s baby monitor lit up. Sinclair started to move, but Betty pulled him back.

“I’ll get him,” she grumbled.

Sinclair watched as Betty got back out of bed and pulled her dressing gown on. She was tired, she was grumpy, and yet she was ready to jump into action as soon as one of their children needed her.

His prediction, as always, had been right: she was the best mum, the best wife, and Sinclair would forever be grateful for the family they’d built together — and he couldn’t wait for it to get bigger.

[widojestonmain]

I was googling for good fantasy series where the books are all stand alones in the same universe with some of the same characters and people on reddit just kept saying you mean books that aren't in a series and I wanted to scream.

[shorlinesorrows]

just got the time to start the sunshine court and I'm Vibrating out of my skin

[lesbiansanemi]

I'm so tired

[luna-azzurra]

10 Quiet Ways Your Character Is Breaking Their Own Heart (And Pretending It's Fine)

These are the betrayals that aren’t loud. They don’t come with fireworks or screaming matches. These are the small, slow deaths. The ones that your character lets happen... while smiling politely.

» They say yes when they desperately want to say no. Every. Damn. Time. They show up when they're exhausted. They agree to things they hate. They make themselves smaller, softer, easier, because "good people" don’t make waves, right? (Spoiler: they're drowning.)

» They keep chasing people who only love them halfway. It's not even subtle anymore. They know these people leave them on "read," show up late, make them feel like an afterthought. But they cling anyway, spinning every scrap of affection into a story about hope. (It’s not hope. It’s hunger.)

» They refuse to believe good things are meant for them. They’ll hype everyone else up. They’ll believe in everyone else's dreams. But when something finally good lands in their lap? They’ll panic. Push it away. Tell themselves it was a fluke. (Because being disappointed feels safer than being lucky.)

» They’re waiting for closure that will never come. An apology. An explanation. A miracle where someone says, "You were right, and I was wrong, and I’m so sorry." They wait years. Decades. Lifetimes. But deep down, they know: some people never come back. Some stories just end without punctuation.

» They’re hoarding all their "almosts" like treasures. The job they almost got. The love that almost worked. The version of themselves they almost became. They replay those maybes like a greatest hits album. (Meanwhile, real life is slipping by while they mourn possibilities.)

» They’re performing a version of success they secretly hate. Look at the Instagram. Look at the LinkedIn updates. Look at the shiny exterior. It looks like winning. But every trophy they collect feels heavier, not lighter. Every promotion tastes a little more like ash. (Turns out, chasing someone else's dream is still losing.)

» They forgive people who aren’t sorry. Not because they’re enlightened. Not because they’ve healed. But because it’s easier to pretend it didn’t hurt than to sit with the fact that it did—and that the person responsible doesn't care. (Some wounds scar better when you stop pretending they were accidents.)

» They punish themselves for still being soft. The world told them, again and again, that soft things get broken. And they believed it. So every time they feel too much? Every time they cry or hope or trust? They tell themselves they’re weak. Stupid. Embarrassing. (They're not. They're just still alive.)

» They downplay their own magic. They call their talents "lucky breaks." Their beauty "average." Their intelligence "no big deal." They shrug off compliments like they're dangerous. Because deep down, they've been taught that being remarkable makes you a target.

» They cling to the idea that if they just work harder, they'll finally be enough. They believe in meritocracy like it’s a religion. That if they hustle hard enough, self-sacrifice deep enough, burn themselves to ash perfectly enough, someone, somewhere, will finally say, "You're worthy now." (They were always worthy. The system is just broken.)

[butyoudidthis4what]

No Man's Land

Jack Abbot x f!Reader

5.1k || All my content is 18+ MDNI || C.W.: mentions of blood, mentions of guns and shootings, mentions of death/dying/coding, CPR, anxiety about partner's safety, Jack's traumatized, reader's traumatized, mentions of dissociation and compartmentalization, poor description of medical events, potentially incorrect medical descriptions/knowledge, very very light smut, angst, age gap kind of implied with Jack but not explicitly referenced, no use of y/n or related, not proofread, no beta, I think that's all but if I missed any please (nicely) let me know.

Summary: This is my Pitt-Fest-But-Not fic. Development of your relationship through vignettes of the past and conversations between Jack, Dana and Robby. There's a shooting where you work. Jack is at the ED when the dispatch comes in and is terrified when he can't get in touch with you.

A.N.: If my Robby reads like John Carter I'm sorry, except that a little bit I'm not. I feel like I'm struggling with my Jack characterization but can't tell if that's just me hating everything I do. This is my take on one of my fave tropes where reader is in mortal danger. I needed a physical location that could be associated with reader and settled on a courthouse, but what it is reader does there is not described. Probably (definitely?) needs a part two. If you get the nickname, thank you, I feel seen. If you don't I explain it at the end. This is absolutely something I would call him, in part to fuck with people who know his real name. I would love to know if you enjoyed and to hear any thoughts you'd like to share.

“He has a girlfriend,” Robby smirks at Dana. 

She blinks at him. “I’m sorry, I thought we were talking about Jack Abbot.”

“Oh we fucking are.” Robby stifles his smirk and forces his lips to remain closed and as neutral as possible. 

“You’re shitting me.” Dana’s incredulous look breaks Robby a bit and he starts to laugh, tries to turn it into a cough when both he and Dana look up to find Jack staring at them as he takes his snow dusted beanie off. He gives Robby a ‘really?’ look even though he knew Robby would rat him out to Dana the second Robby had dragged it out of him. 

Dana looks back at Robby. “Who? How did they meet?”

Robby holds up his hands. “You now officially know as much as I do about her.” Dana makes a noise of vague discontent but knows Jack well enough to know Robby is telling the truth. That’s all that’s been revealed. 

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

“It’s not worth it,” you whisper. Jack blinks and looks around, unsure if you’re talking to him. He has no idea who you are, has never seen you before in his life but it appears that you are in fact whispering to him in the middle of this bookstore. 

He raises his eyebrows. “It’s not?”

You shake your head, give him an almost conspiratorial smile. “No, he must have gotten a new ghost writer. It’s really bad in comparison to his other stuff. Save your time and money. I’ll give you a summary right now for free if you’re that curious.”

Jack smiles to himself a little bit as he sets the book back on the shelf. There’s something about you, your smile, the way you just randomly spoke to him. He’s drawn to you. An alarm goes off in some part of his brain telling him to ignore it, ignore you, he could get hurt. He pretends to weigh his options as he turns to face you fully. “How about for a cup of coffee?”

Your brows furrow in confusion for a moment. There’s simply no way this unfairly attractive man is asking to buy you a cup of coffee. “The summary?” You clarify. “That I’d give for free. You want it to cost a cup of coffee instead?” You let out a nervous laugh and some part of his heart aches because you’re so adorable. “I just want to make sure I understand before I potentially make an even bigger fool of myself.” 

“Yep.” He can’t help but laugh a little. “You give me the summary over coffee. Actually, you know what? You’re going to have to give me a recommendation too because now I’m going to have nothing to read.” He clicks his tongue at you. 

“Well,” you laugh out, all breathy as you try to pull yourself together. “You drive a hard bargain but I think I’m willing to accept those terms…” you glance at his name badge, “Dr. Abbot.” You give him a full smile and Jack knows then and there he’s totally fucked in the best of ways. 

“Jack.” He smiles at you as you both begin walking towards the café. “Call me Jack.”

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

Everything quiet enough after handoff, Robby walks out with Jack into the morning sun that does little to warm the breeze pulling leaves off the trees. “Any chance you can cover a shift on Thursday night?” Robby is asking, yes, but he knows it’s not really a question, Jack is always willing to work.

“Can’t.” Jack says simply, shrugging his shoulders. “Sorry.” There’s an expectant silence that hangs between the two as they keep walking.

“Care to elaborate?” Robby finally asks.

“No.” Jack turns and smirks at him. “It’s none of your and Dana’s business.”

“Ha!” Robby laughs. “So it’s her, it’s about her! The ever elusive girlfriend. Will we ever get to meet her? Or does she not want to meet us? Is she real?” Jack stops walking and gives Robby one of his looks. “Holy shit, is it someone here?”

Jack snorts at that. “No it’s not someone here. She’s not even in the medical field.” He sighs, half longing and half resignation of some kind. “She’s honestly dying to meet you guys, especially you and Dana, but I’m trying to protect her from this hellhole. It’s hard with schedules too, to find a time.”

“That’s such fucking bullshit,” Robby laughs. “Are you afraid to truly commit? Think bringing her here will make it too real?” 

It’s a valid question but one that Jack nevertheless resents. “No, actually, if you must fucking know Thursday is our one year anniversary. We have plans. So you’ll have to find someone else to cover. But I’ll bring her around soon,” he laughs through his nose to himself at your stubbornness, “if I don’t she’s liable to just show up one of-”

“A year?” Robby laughs, incredulous. “A fucking year? How the hell did you hide it for three months before I dragged it out of you?”

Jack ignores him. “Also, I’m moving to days. It’s better for us.” He’s so nonchalant about it, just states it like he’s saying the sky is blue, like it’s not going to make Robby’s eyes widen and mouth drop open like it does.

“I don’t,” Robby huffs a laugh, “I don’t even know where to fucking begin.”

“Then don’t.” Jack smirks, starts to walk again while Robby stays frozen, running a hand through his hair. “Go do some actual work.”

“I thought you found comfort in the darkness?” Robby yells after him. 

Jack slows and turns around but keeps walking backwards, one hand holding the strap of his backpack to keep it over his shoulder. He glances down at his phone and the photo of you that is now his wallpaper. He smiles to himself a little, yells back. “Guess I find it somewhere else now.”

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

You giggle, honest to god giggle and Jack could lose his damn mind as he nibbles at your collarbone. “You know if my anatomy class had been this fun, I might have become a doctor too.” 

You’re laying on your back in bed as Jack kisses your sweat slicked skin all over as you both come down from your last round. He’s taken to 'teaching you anatomy' like this, identifying different parts of the human body with his mouth.

“Hmm,” Jack hums against you. “I’m glad it wasn’t then. Fuck doctors.” He starts to kiss down your chest. 

“That has become quite the favorite pastime of mine, yes,” you smirk. “Fucking one specific doctor, actually.” 

“Getting fucked by one specific doctor more like it,” he murmurs into your sternum. He kisses laterally, lips hitting your breast and moving towards your nipple. 

“I think we’ve established what those are,” you moan softly as he takes your nipple into his mouth. You let your hands run through his salt and pepper curls that you adore so much. 

“Can never be too thorough.” You giggle at him again and can feel him smile against you. “But fine, you want something new?” You nod, let your nails scratch gently at his scalp. 

“Nipple,” he kisses your nipple and then down your torso to right above your belly button, “to navel is no man’s land.” He continues to lavish kisses on the soft skin of your stomach before looking up at you when you don’t respond. 

“I can’t tell if you’re fucking with me or not.” You eye him with mock suspicion. 

He laughs and it’s your favorite sound in the whole world, you swear. Well maybe second, only behind hearing him tell you that he loves you. 

“I’m not. Nipple to navel is no man’s land. It’s a real thing. It’s one of the worst places to get shot or stabbed because there’s so many organs that could be hit and the place we’d expect to get hit would depend on whether the person was breathing in or out at the time, whether their lungs were inflated or deflated. And we generally have no way of knowing. It can be difficult to get clear imaging.” He starts kissing lower, down below your belly button, rubbing his stubble along your skin to tease you as he gets lower and lower. “It’s never a good time. Lots of poor outcomes.”

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

It’s supposed to be his day off and yet Jack finds himself staring at the board and running a hand over his face. “It’s still so fucking weird seeing you here during the day and it not meaning something catastrophic has happened.” 

Jack turns to look at Dana. “I’ve been working days for a month now and it’s my day off.”

“You can go, we’re fine for now,” Robby nods at Jack. “Thanks for the brief assistance brother.”

“No, no,” Dana interjects, “he’s not allowed to leave until we nail down a time to meet his girl.” 

Robby raises his eyebrows and starts to tilt his head and open his mouth to agree with Dana. A dispatch comes through before anyone can say anything else and Dana grabs it, pinning Jack down with her eyes, daring him to leave before discussing meeting you. 

“Saved by the bell,” Jack huffs, taking his stethoscope off and starting to walk away. 

“Shooting at a courthouse,” Dana relays to Robby, “not a mass cas, just a few people, two a little iffy, one they’re already doing CPR on, a few caught in the race to get out. Two dead on the scene.”

It takes a few seconds for Dana’s words to truly register with Jack, but when they do his hearing fades to only a sharp ringing in his ear. This wasn’t happening. He’d been so reticent at the beginning of your relationship, waited so long to give in and define it and hand his heart over to you, terrified he’d lose you because of himself and who he was, his imperfections, his past, his trauma, his PTSD, his baggage, as he thought of it. He feels so stupid now, in the moment, not having worried about how he could lose you from a random act of violence, that in the moments he can’t be there to protect you somebody could come in and rip you from him. Just like that. With the pull of a trigger. 

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

“You know, I can confidently say this is the most unique date I’ve ever been on,” you tease Jack. 

“Hey,” he pants, “me teaching you CPR is a great date.” 

“It would be better if you took your shirt off,” you whisper and wink at him before letting your eyes linger on his arm. 

“If I did that you’d be so distracted you’d learn nothing,” he smirks at you, sweat glistening on his skin just a little. Just enough to drive you nearly feral for him. 

 “I think I’ve got the compressions part down, but I may need more help learning the mouth to mouth part.”

He rolls his eyes at you. “You’re ridiculous.”

“You fucking love it,” you shoot back at him, leaning into his space and bumping him with your shoulder. 

He can’t help but kiss you. “Yes,” the word is muffled against your lips, “yes I do.” He gives you a firmer kiss this time before he pulls away. “But really. You should know how to do it, just in case. It will help you feel in control in the moment if the need for it ever arises. You’ll know what to do.”

You bite your lip and smile at him. 

“What?” He eyes you with suspicion. 

You shrug. “Nothing, I just love you so much. Sometimes it overwhelms me, how much I love you.”

He can see it in your eyes, how much you love him, can almost feel it physically squeezing him like a tight hug. He’s really not sure what he ever did to deserve you or your love. “I love you too, Doll.”

“I love you more, Peter.” Your face pulls up into that usual self-satisfied and silly grin you get sometimes when you call him that nickname. It’s a recent thing. You’re calling him it more and more though, it’s becoming a natural way of referring to him. From anyone else he would hate it, hearing it between another couple would make him roll his eyes. But from you? He loves it more than you’ll ever truly know. 

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

Jack spins around.

“Jack you can still go, we’ve got it covered.” Robby looks at Jack for a minute and then meets Dana’s eyes as she looks to him after taking her own look at Jack. 

“What courthouse?” Jack asks. It’s quiet, controlled and clipped and almost missable in the chaos of the ED. He’s not looking at either of them, staring past them at a wall with a chest heaving more and more by the second as his face grows paler. 

He tries to keep it together. Dana will say the name and it won’t be your courthouse and he’ll go straight to your actual courthouse, grab you, take you home and never let you leave. A perfectly reasonable reaction, he thinks.

“Jack-”

“What fucking courthouse?” It’s louder this time, almost enough to pause the chaos of the ED. 

Jack’s voice drips with what sounds like rage to most of those who hear him but is unmistakably fear to Dana and Robby. 

Neither of them have ever seen Jack like this, this scared, struggling this hard to keep it together, truly raising his voice for anything other than to quiet down an unruly patient. His eyes find Dana’s and they’re glassier than she’s ever seen them, the intensity of his gaze making it painfully clear he’s hanging on every word and the wrong ones will shatter him. 

She swallows and opens her mouth and Jack knows what she’s about to say before she even says it. And she does. The name of your courthouse. 

“I’ll triage.” He says it before Dana has even finished, the words hollow and breathless and commanding all at once. He spins and starts off to the bay doors with nothing more. He obviously knows from the report Dana gave that they won’t need triage. He just needed to get out of there and try to create an excuse to stay in the ambulance bay. He knows Robby won’t let him, that Robby and Dana already know you’re at that courthouse, could be a victim. 

Robby and Dana share another look, So you work at a courthouse. This courthouse. “Fuck,” Dana mutters, “I really hope we don’t end up meeting her today.”

Jack’s hand dives in his pocket as he strides to the ambulance bay. He already knows in his heart that there’s not going to be a text from you saying that you’re okay. He hasn’t felt his phone buzz. He never even kept his phone on him until you. 

Even though he knew he wouldn’t have any messages, waking his phone and seeing none hits him like a freight train all the same, right in the chest. It threatens to bring him to his knees, make him sick, but he can’t. He sets it all aside. If you do come out of one of the ambulances he can hear in the distance you’re going to need him at his best. But what if you’re one of the two people dead at the scene? He has to shove that out of his mind too, can’t give into the complete panic that threatens to consume him. 

Disassociate. Compartmentalize. Do the job. ABC. Assess. Stabilize. Repeat.

His fingers fly across his phone automatically, calling you having become so routine. He prefers it so much to texting, hearing your voice, communicating more directly. “Call me,” he starts, “the second you get this message. Or fucking text me,” his voice breaks, “please. Fucking please.” He hangs up and calls again, knowing he’ll get your voicemail again but trying anyway because it’s all he can do. 

He’s helpless, powerless, he can’t do anything to try and save you and that threatens to swallow him whole. 

Your voicemail recording telling people to leave a message plays again and all Jack can wonder is if this is all he’ll have left of your voice in his life. Your voice on your mailbox, maybe some voicemails you’ve left him, videos, voice memos you’ve sent. All distorted by recording, not your real voice. He can’t remember what your real voice sounds like all of the sudden. What your laugh sounds like, how you sound when you’re sleepy or in the throes of pleasure or telling him you love him. God, did he even tell you he loved you the last time he saw you, when he said goodbye? 

“I need you to call me,” he says into the phone again, pauses. “I love you.” He takes a ragged breath in and speaks through his teeth. “I love you so fucking much, so you have to be okay and you have to fucking call me.”

He sends a series of texts asking you to call him or text him or call the hospital or do anything to let him know you’re okay, asking if you are okay, asking where you are as though you’re going to respond. He already knows you’re in the back of one of those ambulances because of fucking course you are, because he’s not allowed to have anything good in his life apparently. How could he be so stupid to think differently?  

“Hey, we don’t need triage for this. The numbers are controlled.” Robby walks out to stand next to Jack in the ambulance bay. “If you want to stay you can, but you can’t wait out here to see who shows up, you have to-”

“Yeah, yeah, jump on the first patient that pulls up, I know, I got it,” he interrupts Robby. 

There’s a silence as Robby passes him a gown and ties for him before he does the same for Robby. 

“Jack, if she’s in one you cannot-”

“Like fuck I can’t.” It’s just a statement. Cool and collected and a projection of indifference. It scares Robby more than if Jack had yelled. 

“No, actually brother, you can’t. I’m telling you right now. You’re not working on her. We don’t work on family, on significant others, and you would tell me the exact same thing. It’s too risky, you’ll be too clouded.” Robby watches Jack’s jaw clench and roll as he stares out at the street. 

He wants to argue that of course he’ll be clear, he’ll be focusing on saving you, he’ll have never been so clear in his life. But part of him knows that seeing you like that on his trauma table, your blood all over the table and him and his hands might make him freeze.

“Fine.” Jack whispers. “But if she’s,” Jack has to pause and take a shuddery breath. “If she’s gone or really going and it’s inevitable you have to let me in. You have to let me try to save her. You have to let me code her, Michael.”

He can taste the rising bile in his throat just at having to talk about coding you.

The first ambulance pulls up before Robby can respond and Jack’s on it so fast Robby’s surprised Jack doesn’t get smacked in the face by the door opening. 

It’s not you. It’s someone who is very much not you and is clearly one of the iffy ones. 

Disassociate. Compartmentalize. Do the job. ABC. Assess. Stabilize. Repeat.

Jack forces himself to go emotionally numb as he listens to the paramedic rattle off vitals and history, trying so very hard to focus on this, something he can do, even if it’s not for you. By the time they hit trauma one Jack’s fine and in full swing, running it like he would any other trauma. Nobody on the team in the room with him suspects anything is amiss.  

He hates the way he can’t see the other’s who come in, that he has to stay with this patient until they’re stable and can’t go looking for you. He chastises himself for not having brought you here before or at least having you meet Dana and Robby. They don’t even know what you look like, couldn’t identify you.

“Jack!” He glances at Dana who stands at the door as he preps for the chest tube. “What’s her name?”

He yells your name at her, impassive and stoic as he reaches for the scalpel, ignoring the looks everyone throws each other at the slightest tremor in his voice.

“I’ll look for her.” Dana promises. He doesn’t respond. He can’t. He’ll fall apart. 

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

The restaurant you’re at has to be the fanciest place you’ve ever been to. It’s the hottest place in the city and you have no idea how Jack snagged reservations here for dinner to finish out celebrating your one year anniversary. 

The lighting and low hum of other patrons talking to each other and glasses and silverware and plates tinkling is cinematic. You feel like the main character. But then that’s always how Jack makes you feel. 

“I got you something.” He pulls out a wrapped rectangular object. 

You click your tongue and tsk at him. “We said we’d do them at home! I didn’t bring yours!”

“I know. I have something for you at home too.” His eyes sparkle in the flickering candle light, a little smirk pulling up. “I didn’t mean for it to be a double entendre, but both are true.” You snort a laugh at him and take the gift from him. “Open it.” He’s still smiling, eyes still sparkling,  but there’s something there. He’s nervous. It makes you even more curious. 

You carefully unwrap the object until it reveals itself as a hardcover book. That same one Jack had in his hand a year ago and that you told him was bad and gave him a summary of over coffee. 

“Oh, Jack,” you say softly, eyes getting a little watery. It’s so perfect. So sweet and sentimental. The book that brought you together, that gave you each other. It’s almost like a physical representation of the foundation of your relationship in a way. 

“You have to open it,” he instructs you in a whisper.

You raise an eyebrow but do as he says. 

‘Move in with me?’ is written on the blank first page. 

You look between the page and Jack. “Is this?” You look back at the page and then up at him again. “Are you really asking…?”

He nods. “Move in with me. Or move somewhere with me, we can get our own place, it doesn’t have to be my apartment. We basically live together anyway at this point. Let’s just make it official, yeah? Wherever you want, you can decorate however you want. Just as long as it’s our place.”

You bring a hand to your mouth for a second before using your napkin to dab at the inner corners of your eyes to stop the tears from falling and look back at him. 

“You’re a romantic, Jack Abbot,” you hum all dreamily. 

“You better not tell anyone. Can’t have you ruining my street cred.” He smirks, but his expression and the way he fidgets show he’s still anxious. “So?”

You realize then you never actually answered him. Sniffling a little laugh and letting a few tears fall you give him his answer, voice thick and full of emotion. “Yeah, I think I’m willing to accept those terms. I’d love to move in with you… Peter.”

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

He hears you counting to yourself before he sees you. “One, two…”

It’s not loud, just said in a normal voice, softer if anything because of how you’re panting, but Jack is so on edge and so desperate to find you he’d subconsciously been listening closely to his surroundings, military training kicking in. His head snaps to you and he doesn’t even know what to think when he sees you being rolled in on top of a gurney, performing CPR that would rival the quality of his own. 

“Why is she..?” He hears Robby question the paramedic as you roll in. 

“She was performing them just as well as we could and it was better to just scoop and run,” the paramedic explains. “She must have had one hell of an instructor.”

“Peter!” You yell, without looking up, not sure if he’s still here. You’re so used to it by now that the nickname is just what comes out of your mouth as you look for him. He’d texted you to let you know he was going in for a bit.  

Jack could sob and the entire team in the room with him can feel a crushing tension shatter. Maybe he does get a little teary just from the sheer relief. He tells himself it’s sweat in his eyes.

“Yeah Doll?” He yells back, not giving a fuck about everyone hearing him call you Doll, and you calling him Peter, knowing full well he’s going to have so much explaining to do about this entire situation, the confusion in the room palpable. 

“I’m okay!” This time he does laugh to himself. 

“Yeah I’d say so,” he mutters, smiling. He’s still anxious to see you, get his own eyes on you, feel you with his own hands. 

It’s only about thirty more seconds before his patient is stable enough and he can rip his gloves and gown off and start putting fresh gloves on as he walks into the trauma room you’d been wheeled into. Normally he’d yell out for someone to talk to him or ask what they’ve got but not this time. This time he doesn’t even care about who’s on the table, only the person who came off it. Only you. 

You’re standing to the side now, watching Robby and the rest of the team work, impassive as pink tears stream down your face from the dried blood on it. You’re just so fucking overwhelmed by everything and now that you’re not doing CPR everything that’s happened is hitting you at once. 

Jack says your name as he moves to you, needs his hands on you. 

“Are you hurt? Were you hit?” He rushes out. His voice brings you back and you look up at him with wide, terrified eyes. He goes to look you over but you latch onto him, hugging him tightly, shaking a bit. 

“I’m fine, I’m okay, I’m, I’m sorry,” you start to rattle off, fisting at his scrub top and clinging to him like he’s the only thing keeping you tethered to reality. In the moment he might just be. 

He hugs you back just as hard, kisses the top of your head. He doesn’t care who sees right now, all he cares about is you. “It’s okay, you have nothing to apologize for. I’m just so fucking glad you’re okay. I thought… I thought you were…” He doesn’t have to finish, you know what he means. “I can’t fucking lose you. I love you way the fuck too much.”

You’ve been so wrapped up in each other neither of you have noticed that Robby’s patient, the one you were doing CPR on, has started to code again. “Abbot, need you here!”

You let him go, nod at him. “Go on,” you whisper, “I’ll be right here. I’m okay. I love you more.” Jack nods at you and walks over, jumping in and assisting Robby.

It’s once you’re out of Jack’s arms, away from his warm body and more grounded in reality that you notice how cold you are, how you’re swaying because he was supporting you far more than you realized, how lightheaded you are, how your abdomen and chest really fucking hurt. You chalk it up to the adrenaline wearing off and being sore from the chest compressions you just did. 

On the other side of the room an instrument tray gets knocked over, metal hitting the floor in a loud clang. It startles you, makes you jump and twist quickly to see what it was, if it was another gun, another shot. You feel something almost tearing, a sharp pain across your abdomen and lower chest, a feeling of sticky warmth against your shirt.

You sway a little, start to realize how much worse the pain is now. It’s bad enough that you can’t even make noise to express the pain. There’s no air in your lungs, you swear. You realize your lightheadedness is now much, much worse, that you’re shivering from how cold you are. Or are you just shaking? You can’t tell. It doesn’t make sense. The room isn’t even that cold. You shouldn’t be so cold. Not unless.

You pull your shirt up slowly and look down and run your hand over your skin and sure enough, there’s a bullet hole seeping blood, about half way between your nipple line and belly button, skin now covered in a dark bruise. 

You cough a little, it’s quiet. It starts feeling like there’s water in your lungs. Like you can’t get any oxygen in even though you’re in a room full of it. The metallic taste in your mouth is what manages to seep into what’s left of your consciousness next. You cough again, into your hand, and feel something wet hit your skin. Blood. 

It hits you. You’re drowning in your own blood. That’s why it feels like you can’t breathe. You’ve been shot. In a bad place, one of the worst places, Jack had told you that night. You get scared, feel your heart pounding. It feels like you’re dying. You don’t want to die, don’t want to leave Jack. You’d just finished moving into your new place together, were going to spend all weekend unpacking and painting and getting furniture where you wanted it. You were going to make your home.

Time. You were supposed to have more time together.

“Hey, Jack,” you slur softly, struggling to keep yourself standing. Luckily he hears you. Your use of his first name and the slur to your voice has him panicking again already. Time slows as he turns around to take you in, eyes going from your face and the blood coating your teeth and trickling from your mouth as you try and smile reassuringly at him, down to your torso where you’re still holding your shirt up just enough for him and everyone else in the room to see the bullet hole and bruising marring your skin. “I think, I think I’m not good, it’s not good.” Your vision tunnels so fast you can just barely see Jack’s expression of sheer abject unadulterated horror and panic as you get out your last words. “Nipples to navel… no man’s land.”

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

Peter. Peter Rabbit by Beatrix Potter. Yes, I worked in a bookstore through college.

Part Two is up!

[fireinmoonshot]

darling | robert reynolds x reader,

THIS CONTAINS SPOILERS FOR MARVEL'S THUNDERBOLTS*.

Pairing: Robert 'Bob' Reynolds x Reader Summary: You always call Bob darling in private... until you accidentally slip up and use the nickname in front of the rest of the Thunderbolts. Warnings: Mentions of food/drink, reader is mentioned to not be mentally ready for a relationship and has a bit of a moment at the end struggling with their thoughts/struggling mentally in general. Word Count: 1.3k A/N: Thank you all so much for the amazing response on my first Bob fic 🥹 For my second one, this was actually the first idea I had for Bob but it took a bit of workshopping to get right. I ended up being really happy with it. I love writing the Thunderbolts team dynamic. I also put a little easter egg in there for anyone that's read all my other Joaquín fics since February this year. I hope you all enjoy! 💗

Bob had been called many different things in his life. There had been a series of insults from his family and people he’d hurt during his time as an addict. Walker always called him Bobby, which he hated. Valentina called him by his full name, Robert. He had other names like Sentry and Void when he was using his powers. But none of those could ever come close to his favourite from you.

Every time he hears the word darling come from your mouth, directed at him, he thinks it might be the closest he’s ever come to true happiness. He wishes every time that he could bottle that feeling up and keep it for when the days are especially tough.

“Darling, can you pass me that book?”

“Darling, how are you doing after that mission?”

“Darling, do you need me to do anything for you?”

The only bad thing is the fact that you aren’t his. It’s a mutual decision, though, so he can’t be mad. You’ve been in mutual like for a while now. But both of you have known that entering into something serious when neither of you are mentally ready for something like that would just be foolish and end up with one or both of you being hurt. Your friendship always mattered more than the possibility of your futures together.

But the nickname still stuck and Bob was glad for that.

He never cared that it was just in private. In fact, he rather enjoyed the fact that it was just for the two of you. That, whenever he was alone with you, it was almost a guarantee that he was going to hear your voice speak that gorgeous word.

He cared for the rest of the team so deeply, but the moments when it was just you and him were his favourites. When you’d be laying together on the couch, both of you reading the same book and having to wait till you’d both finished the page before turning to the next one. When you’d be in the kitchen together, Bob washing the dishes as you plated up some kind of masterpiece for dinner. The quiet times, when everyone else was asleep and you and Bob would stay up trading memories like they were the worlds greatest secrets. 

The level of comfort he got in your presence surprised him, but he accepted it quickly.

It’s why, when you enter the room, he knows that you’re there. He relaxes almost instantly, just from sensing you getting closer. You reach out to rest a hand on his shoulder before you stop yourself, resting it on the top of the chair that he’s sitting on instead. 

There’s still a little hesitation when it comes to touch between the two of you. Both because neither of you want to cross the invisible line you’ve both drawn, but because of Bob’s powers too. He still isn’t fully in control.

“Morning, darling,” the word slips out before you can stop yourself. It’s so normal these days to refer to Bob like this, but always in private. Never in the dining room of the Watch Tower where every other member of the team is having breakfast.

Bob is none the wiser to your blunder. He gets that same starry look in his eyes as he always does when he looks up at you, standing behind him. He wants to reach out, wrap an arm around your waist and tug you onto his lap, though he wouldn’t have the confidence to do such a thing even if his powers weren’t an issue.

He always melts a little when he hears you call him darling. 

Across the room, you hear a groan.

“Oh, hell no,” Walker says, dropping the spoon back into his bowl of cereal. “You two are not doing that. Whatever is happening here, I don’t care, but we are not listening to you two call each other darling. Especially over breakfast.”

“What’s so wrong with a bit of young love?” Alexei exclaims, throwing his hands up in the air as he looks at Walker across the table. “This is good! Love heals the soul, there is nothing wrong with love!”

You frown. “Okay, who said anything about love?”

Alexei and Walker ignore you and continue to bicker.

You catch Yelena’s eye from across the room where she’s sat by the window, but she just shrugs her shoulders and goes back to staring out at the skyline.

“I would’ve thought you’d be all right with seeing affection, Walker,” Ava says, entering the room behind you. She’d obviously overheard the noise from the hallway. “You are married, even if you’re not together right now. Are you telling us you never called your wife something like that?”

“Yeah, but I didn’t make everyone else listen to me!”

Bucky, who has been watching everything the whole time from the corner of the room where he’s sitting, coffee in hand, huffs out a laugh. “You guys think this is bad? You should be glad you’ve never spent time around Joaquin Torres when he’s away from his girl.” He shakes his head and takes a sip of his coffee, not bothering to explain any further about the new Falcon. 

You take advantage of the moment of silence that Bucky has caused to attempt to fix the situation. “Okay, no more talking about love or who is and isn’t allowed to call each other nicknames. Can we just drop it? It was a slip of the tongue!”

“Only if you explain why you said it,” Walker says.

“No,” you reply, pulling out the chair next to Bob’s and sitting down in it. It’s all you offer in way of an answer to Walker and he seems to surprisingly give up on fighting you on it. 

You glance over to see that Bob is still looking at you, his eyes glistening and a small smile on his lips. The sight of it makes you smile as well. “I am never calling you that in front of the others again… even if it was just a slip of the tongue, that was mortifying.” 

Bob smiles again and nudges a drink that’s sitting in front of him over towards you – he’s prepared your favourite and had it waiting for when you arrived. You try to ignore the feeling that rises in your stomach at the small act of kindness. 

“But when it’s just us?” He inquires.

“You know it’s different then.” 

You pick up the drink and take a sip of it before leaning back in your chair. Walker and Alexei have started bickering over something else. Yelena is still looking out the window, Bucky is in the corner with his coffee and Ava is exiting the kitchen with a drink of her own. It’s a fairly mundane kind of morning for a group of people meant to be the ‘New Avengers.’

There’s a sudden feeling that rises in your chest at the thought of your new status as an Avenger. It’s uncomfortable, unwelcome. You still don’t know how you feel about it, even many months later. It should be a good thing, but then why does it fill you with dread?

Bob can see the change in your expression and he’s quick to act. He reaches over and taps the table in front of you to get your attention. You pull your eyes away from the window, where you’d been staring, and meet his eyes instead. They instantly help to calm you.

“Quiet time?” Bob asks, nodding towards the door that leads into the hallway.

It’s like a code word between the two of you. When one of you needs to get away from the others or you start to get a little too wrapped up in your head. Two words that put you instantly at ease. 

You nod and Bob wastes no time in standing up from the table. You follow him, leaving your drink in the dining room and walking out of the room with him, ignoring Walker as he calls out, asking where you’re both running off to. 

“Thank you, darling,” you mutter, once you’re just outside the room.

Bob turns to you with a small smile on his lips. “Always.”

[ireverie]

girls goon too

pairing ↠ stepbro!sunghoon x (f) reader x stepbro!heeseung

genre .. warnings ↠ smut, stepcest, unprotected sex, oral (m receiving) / face fucking, virgin! reader, dubcon

summary ↠ sunghoon can't take it anymore. you just won't stop gooning in your bedroom for all the world to hear, and he's tired of it. he's pretty sure all you do with your spare time is watch porn. heeseung suggests that he just jerks off, but his morals won't let him; until he decides that he can't hold back anymore. he has to shut you up.

wc ↠ 5.3k

a/n ↠ nohyuck version of this fic originally posted on my blog revehae. i am not plagiarizing myself. this is my apology for missing my friday night drabble post. as always, feedback is appreciated!

don’t like it, don’t read.

“she’s doing it again,” sunghoon grumbled, walking into heeseung’s bedroom. only because the door was ajar, though. he knew the sight he’d walk in on if it was completely closed would be worse than what you were surely doing.

heeseung snickered, eyes fixed on his computer. “what’s the occasion? sixth-month gooning anniversary?”

sunghoon scoffed. he didn’t know why you did it. he thought jake was bad, but you were next level. “i thought surely she would give us a break for november.”

“and she did,” heeseung quipped, moving his mouse. “for all of three days.”

that was true. for the very first three days of november, the house had been relatively quiet apart from heeseung’s shouting when he was losing. then, on the fourth day, it was back to hearing your annoyingly perfect fucking moans in the afternoon.

and god forbid your parents would be coming home late. you were relentless on those days, touching yourself to no end. sunghoon couldn’t stand it. he hated minding his business, trying to rest or work or do anything that didn’t require thinking about the sounds you were making as you persistently edged yourself.

but he couldn’t help himself. sometimes, he could hear your moans even when you weren’t there, and that was when he knew he was finally losing what little bit was left of his goddamn mind. 

heeseung, on the other hand, didn’t seem as miffed. sunghoon was certain his brother could hear the noises you were making down the hall, but he was sitting here without a care in the world, typing an email to his professor of all things. which made no sense to sunghoon, considering he knew how much heeseung liked noisy sex.

“okay, i’ll bite,” sunghoon said, crossing his arms. “how in the hell are you okay with this?”

heeseung shrugged, trying and failing to suppress a smirk. he was well aware of the fact that sunghoon always got worked up when it came to you, which was fair. you were the biggest minx this world had ever known. “well, first of all,” heeseung started, snickering again. “there’s a thing called jerking off. i’m sure you’ve heard of it. it’s really popular amongst guys we know.”

sunghoon looked almost scandalized. “i’m not jerking off to my stepsister.”

“then, you’re an idiot,” heeseung retorted. “she’s given us enough material until new years. of the year after next.”

“it’s wrong.”

heeseung rolled his eyes. “you’ve got such a stick up your ass, like a proper princess or something.”

“i’ll beat your ass, hee,” sunghoon warned. 

heeseung threw his hands up. “i’m just saying. i’m not telling you to stick her in a washing machine, bro. but the answer’s obvious. just jerk off. you know you want to.”

sunghoon sighed. had he thought about it? obviously. but he couldn’t shake how wrong it felt, even if you made him perpetually horny. “i want to smack the shit out of you right now, but i haven’t done it yet.”

rather than recoil, heeseung laughed. that asswipe finds humor in everything, sunghoon thought to himself, irritated. “and i commend your patience, man,” heeseung replied. “but it’s only making you more frustrated when you could just bust a nut and be happy.”

sunghoon was thinking about it now. well, he had thought about it countless times, but he had never allowed himself to stoop that low. you were his younger stepsister and it was his responsibility to take care of you. not picture your face as you moaned and imagine how you would feel, tight and sticky and creamy as you wrapped around his…

heeseung broke the silence, musing more so to himself, “maybe we should put her in the washing machine.”

sunghoon’s eyes flickered. “what the hell, man?”

“my bad,” heeseung replied, although he didn’t look very apologetic. “i was just thinking out loud.”

fuck, now sunghoon was picturing that too. your house had one of those washing machines that opened from the top, not the front. too many times had sunghoon seen you struggle to take your clothes out, dangling over the washing machine and nearly falling inside. he would offer to help, every now and then, but he liked watching you climb the washing machine just to get your clothes from the very bottom.

it was much more realistic for you to get stuck in it then the kinds of washing machines in porn. 

heeseung broke the silence again, still thinking. it was his greatest skill and simultaneously his worst habit. “if you’re so against it, why haven’t you just asked her to shut the fuck up then?”

that was a good question. sunghoon wasn’t the kind of guy to shy away from an altercation, not with friends and not with family. he had certainly never shown heeseung any mercy. he loved his brother, but he was annoying as all fuck.

“i see,” heeseung said, smirking. see, annoying. “it’s because you don’t really want her to stop.”

sunghoon sighed. “yeah, fine. i don’t want her to stop. happy?”

heeseung burst out laughing. always laughing, always scheming. he was going to get a stocking full of coal for christmas. “i have an idea.”

“oh, god,” sunghoon groaned.

heeseung finally pressed send on his email and turned around in his desk chair. “hear me out. we should fuck her.”

sunghoon gawked in disbelief. then again, none of heeseung’s ideas were ever truly brilliant. “you’re insane,” he murmured.

“thanks,” heeseung chirped, the insult rolling off his shoulders. “just sleep on it.”

“you know what? sure,” sunghoon replied, walking out of his brother’s room and shutting the door. he didn’t want to hear another word.

he went about his day like everything was normal, going on a walk so that he didn’t have to hear you, eating dinner and watching netflix in the living room to ignore the fact that you existed altogether. and then he went to bed.

sunghoon couldn’t fucking sleep. on it, over it, under it. he couldn’t sleep whatsoever. 

it wasn’t like you were just loudly moaning all day long, that would be absurd. but every now and then, there would be a whimper you’d let slip. sunghoon could tell that you were actually trying to be quiet. but this was one of those nights where your parents wouldn’t be back and you were taking advantage of that. again.

sunghoon decided that he was at his breaking point. the need for you was too goddamn strong and he was tired of pretending that he was better. he couldn’t ignore it anymore. he couldn’t fight it, suppress it.

he threw the blankets off his bed and went to heeseung’s room, the door closed this time. he knocked on the door and called out, “stop jerking off and get your ass out here.”

sunghoon heard a groan, one of the disgruntled sort. a few seconds later, heeseung opened the door, a scowl on his face. “what the hell, man? your voice ruined my nut.”

it was sunghoon’s turn to laugh. he clasped a hand on heeseung’s shoulder. “don’t worry. you’ll be in the mood again in no time.”

heeseung lifted a brow. “are you saying what i think you’re saying?”

sunghoon nodded. 

“we’re gonna teach her a lesson.”

“we’re gonna put her in the washing machine?”

sunghoon’s smile instantly dropped and his hand fell from heeseung’s shoulder. “why the fuck are you both so addicted to porn?” he asked.

the excited shimmer in heeseung’s eyes died a little. “no, i was… i was just kidding. let’s go.”

sunghoon sighed and started down the hall to your bedroom, deciding not to argue heeseung on that. it would be a waste of valuable time.

sunghoon knocked on the door and called out your name. “can we come in?”

there was audible shuffling as you called back, “just a moment!”

heeseung glanced over at sunghoon. “so, how we doing this?”

sunghoon looked calm, collected. as if fucking his stepsister was something he did on the regular. “just follow my lead.”

you opened the door, a towel thrown around you. but your skin looked damp with sweat, not water. your face was a little flushed. it was obvious that you were naked. “um, can i help you guys?” you asked, somewhat breathless. 

sunghoon looked you up and down subtly. heeseung, on the other hand, was damn near ogling you. the former repeated, “can we come in?”

“um, i guess,” you murmured, stepping out of the way so that they could enter your bedroom.

heeseung closed the door behind himself, not that there was anyone to worry about. it was only the three of you in the house at the moment. 

sunghoon glanced away, looking for traces of what you had been doing. he found them very quickly; your laptop shut on your bed, the blankets messily thrown on top to conceal the damp spots in your sheets, and your shirt and shorts on the floor by your bed, implying you were only in your underwear.

“is there something you guys need?” you asked, a bit annoyed at having been interrupted. 

sunghoon walked towards your desk where your laptop probably should have been, though he saw something fearful flash in your eyes. his brows furrowed, but he didn’t inquire about it. he would figure it out on his own. “do we have to need something to want to visit you?” sunghoon asked, a small smile on his face. “i haven’t seen you all day long. we just wanted to make sure you’re still alive.”

“oh, that’s… very sweet of you,” you murmured. “as you can see, i’m perfectly alive and breathing.”

“yeah, you’re breathing a lot,” heeseung commented. 

sunghoon chuckled. he moved away from your desk and instead towards your nightstand, noticing your eyes still watching him like a hawk. “relax. what’s got you so worked up?”

“i’m not worked up,” you lied, eyes darting between him and your bed. 

that was when it clicked in sunghoon’s brain. the bed. you didn’t want him to see the bed. he chuckled again, sitting down on top of it. “are you okay? you look a little… flushed.”

“yeah,” heeseung chimed in, moving your hair out of your face. you jolted. you had been paying so much attention to sunghoon that you failed to notice heeseung had creeped up behind you. “and sweaty.”

you released a shaky breath. you were nervous, but you couldn’t tell them that. because then they would start asking questions. “i’m okay, guys. you can go.”

“why are you trying to get rid of us?” heeseung asked, leaning in a little too close. “it’s almost like you’re hiding something.”

“what are you watching?” sunghoon asked, grabbing your laptop. 

your eyes widened in horror. “no, wait!” you exclaimed. you tried to stop him, but heeseung was quick to pull you back against his chest. 

sunghoon opened your laptop, being met with a twitter porn browser. he feigned surprise. “oh, wow,” he said, merely blinking. “wow.”

“what is it?” heeseung called from the other side of the room. 

sunghoon turned the laptop to face you and heeseung. “guess she’s really into… creampies, sucking dick, and doggy style.”

your face was hot with embarrassment and you thrashed in heeseung’s arms. “this is an invasion of privacy! you guys jerk off, don’t you?”

“jerk off? sure. watch porn for hours on end? no, i don’t,” sunghoon answered, setting your laptop down. he moved your blankets out of the way, revealing a few damp spots on your bed. “how long did you have to sit here for this to happen?”

you felt very exposed at the moment. like your deepest, darkest secret was steadily reaching its way around the whole world. “i’m not that bad,” you murmured, shy. 

heeseung laughed. he tugged at the towel and brought his hand to your chest, pinching your nipple. “not that bad? you almost gave poor sunghoon over there an aneurysm with how enticing you’ve been.”

your whined when heeseung squeezed your chest, tearing your gaze away from sunghoon to look up at him with wide eyes. “what are you doing?”

“fuck. yeah, that’s what i’m talking about, princess,” heeseung groaned, pressing himself against your ass. “those sweet sounds have been driving him mad.”

any other moment, sunghoon would have narrowed his eyes at heeseung and called him disgusting. but this was different. sunghoon didn’t care about what was right or wrong anymore. maybe he never truly had. what was certain right now was that any desire to behave in a morally acceptable manner was outweighed by the desire to fuck you brainless.

“bring her over here,” sunghoon said, shoving your laptop of the way to make room. 

heeseung grabbed your waist and led you towards the bed, pushing you towards his brother. sunghoon grabbed your chin, smoothing his thumb over your cheek. “gooning isn’t healthy,” he told you straightforwardly. “you know what you need?”

you glanced at him, fretful. the towel had completely fallen at this point, leaving you solely in your water, just as sunghoon had pieced together. “what?” you whispered.

“a fuck,” sunghoon replied unabashedly. “you’re so damn touch-starved. always complaining about how you want a boyfriend, but you never go out, because you’re too busy playing with your clit.”

your face was hot. honestly, they hadn’t given you the opportunity to cool down. but you had to admit that he was right. compared to how much you touched yourself, you didn’t go out enough.

“have you ever even had sex?” heeseung asked, running his hands up your thighs. 

you wanted to hide so fucking bad, but that clearly wasn’t an option. “no,” you replied, ashamed.

sunghoon snickered, because apparently that was funny. “obviously,” he said, moving his thumb to your bottom lip. “this pretty body has gone untouched for too many years, that’s all. once you get fucked, you’ll be as good as new. worked for jake. didn’t it, hee?”

“yep,” heeseung chirped, nodding. “he was the biggest gooner i’ve ever seen. jay had so many roommate horror stories. then, we got him some pussy, and he’s all better now. actually goes outside and gets light that isn’t from his laptop.”

“so, what do you say?” sunghoon asked, turning your head back to him. “want something other than your fingers inside you?”

your heart racing. were you really about to agree to getting fucked by your stepbrothers? when it was over, you could blame it on the fact that you genuinely were touch-starved and desperate for a release for all this pent-up frustration.

and because you really, really needed to come after having avoided it for hours, you nodded your head.

“words, princess,” heeseung said, his hands still gripping your thighs as he thought about how soft they were. “say it. say, ‘i want you to fuck me, heeseung.’”

you swallowed, but you weren’t going to disobey. “i… i want you to fuck me, heeseung.”

“jeez, you don’t have to beg. i’ll do it,” heeseung replied, playful as ever. “and because it’s your first time, i think we should do missionary. is that okay, princess?”

“that’s… fine,” you murmured timidly. it didn’t really matter to you how he fucked you. you just wanted someone inside you. 

heeseung was beaming, like he had prayed for this day and it was finally happening. “good. and if you ever want me to fuck you on all fours, you know the way to my room.”

the way heeseung was looking at you was entirely overwhelming, so you glanced over at sunghoon instead, though he was also watching you intently. “what about… you?” you asked. 

sunghoon chuckled, thumb sweeping over your lips. “i don’t need to fuck your pussy. i’ll leave that to heeseung. i just want to fuck this pretty little mouth that’s been keeping me up at night.”

heeseung, growing impatient, tugged at your panties. you lifted your hips, watching him drag them down your legs. “jesus,” he murmured. “they’re fucking drenched.”

“they better be,” sunghoon replied with a chuckle, stepping out of his pants. “long as she’s probably been wearing them.”

heeseung spread your legs, wanting to get a good look at the treasure hidden between them. he moaned at the mere sight of your pussy, dripping with arousal. “fuck, you don’t even need prep,” he mused.

as if you couldn’t get any more embarrassed than you already were. they knew exactly what to say to make you want to hide your face beneath a pillow and hopefully suffocate to death.

despite his declaration about you not needing prep, heeseung couldn’t help but drag his tongue along your folds, which made you gasp in surprise. it wasn’t a tentative lick, either; he was confident and unreluctant. you were clearly sensitive, but he didn’t seem to care, eager to suck and lick at you.

“heeseung,” you whimpered, involuntarily trying to close your legs. he swore his dick twitched when you said his name like that. 

all the while, sunghoon was stroking himself beside you, half hard. for the first time thinking about you at the same time that he touched his dick, and god, he really should have done it sooner. just the thought of you made his blood pump harder. 

heeseung pulled back after a moment or two when he was finally sated. “sorry,” he apologized, completely inauthentic. “just wanted a taste.”

sunghoon tapped your cheek. “open up, baby.”

you slowly opened your mouth, wide enough for him to push inside. which sunghoon seized the opportunity to do as soon as it presented itself. he was impatient now, tired of waiting. you had tortured him long enough with those pretty noises; it was time you paid him back for tolerating your horniness.

“fuck,” sunghoon cursed upon feeling the warmth of your mouth around his cock.

heeseung snickered. it was amusing to him that only a few hours ago, sunghoon said he was insane for suggesting that they fuck you. and now here he was with his cock down your throat. a few hours could truly change a man, for worse and for better. “how’s it going?” heeseung asked.

sunghoon closed his eyes, trying to go slow before he started fucking your throat with a purpose. he didn’t necessarily want to hurt you, but damn, he was getting pretty damn close. “how do you think?” he retorted.

you watched sunghoon as he slowly moved inside your mouth, though his patience was obviously dwindling by the second. part of you wanted to see what it would look like when he lost it all, but the other dreaded it, uncertain whether or not you could handle it.

you were still a virgin, after all. in the important and unimportant ways. you had never been fucked. you had most certainly never had your throat fucked until this very moment. the furthest you’d ever gone with a boy was a little bit of groping while kissing and even that was awkward.

heeseung licked his lips, appreciating that they were coated in your arousal. “taste so good, princess,” he said, dropping his hands down to his shorts.

you would have gawked when you glanced down and noticed the dent in them, even if it weren’t for the fact that your mouth was preoccupied. when did he get so hard? 

heeseung started to undress himself, pleased now that he had gotten a taste of you and eager to be inside you. he was quick to shed his shorts and the layer underneath, unafraid to show just how desperate he was. for him, it was easy to accept his attraction to you and even easier to act on it now that he had your consent.

he climbed onto the bed, grabbing your thighs again and spreading them apart. he gave them a few affectionate, departing kisses and sat up to grab his cock, bringing it between them. “say ‘goofer gooner’ if you’re ready,” heeseung joked, knowing you couldn’t speak.

you furrowed your brows, but you couldn’t even focus on his nonsense because sunghoon was noticeably forgoing all restraint. could you blame him? your mouth was warm, alive, and everything about you seemed to drive him straight through the brink of insanity. 

“you know, sunghoon,” heeseung started, gazing down at the little distance between your bodies. “you were right. i’m already in the mood again.”

you had that effect on him, on them. heeseung knew he probably should have fought it better, but he truly saw no point. it was easier to fold and surrender to the fact that he found you infuriatingly sexy, despite your tendencies. and with nothing more to say, he slowly but surely pressed himself inside you.

heeseung tipped his head back, already moaning like a bitch and he wasn’t even fully sheathed inside you yet. “holy fuck,” he said, his grip on your thighs tightening.

you whimpered, the sound muffled by sunghoon’s cock as his balls slapped against your chin. you immediately pulsed around heeseung’s cock, clinging to him like now that he was there, you would never let him go.

“holy fuck,” heeseung moaned again, stopping for a moment as if the breath had been completely sucked out of him. “so fucking wet, my dick just slides in.”

he was damn near flabbergasted. maybe there was benefit to you gooning for hours on end, a benefit that he got to reap. he had never seen anyone this wet before, much less felt anything this wet, and it was taking a toll on him. his head was already reeling.

“okay,” heeseung said, more so to himself. he was adjusting. “okay. fuck. i’m gonna move.”

and he did, growing more and more mesmerized with every thrust of his hips. his mouth hung open, moans of your name and explicit curses dangling from his lips with a shrill touch to them that only made you even more aroused.

to say nothing of the sounds sunghoon was making, almost directly in your ear. he was so close to your face that you could explode. he was finally moving comfortably, fucking your throat with a rhythm that almost made it hard to breathe. 

though you had no intention of making him stop. you had fantasized about making yourself available for this purpose many, many times. not necessarily to your stepbrother, but well, it wasn’t like you were discriminating. especially not when he sounded so goddamn sexy and his face was tensing the way it was in pleasure.

it was strange, but you found yourself going from solely craving the experience to wanting to pleasure them. and it would appear that you were doing a fantastic job without hardly even trying, all things considered.

heeseung was gripping on your thighs for dear life as if without the support, he would get blown away into the eighth dimension. or maybe drown in how wet you were, gushing around his cock, if not for him using your soft thighs as an anchor to keep him afloat.

“this sweet fucking pussy,” he sighed, losing himself in the vice of you. he had set a pace too, fucking you without intention of stopping. with every fiber of his being, deep and hard. “i could fuck you forever.”

you could sit here and take it forever. you had never felt so full in your life. your fingers hardly did the job, always reaching just shy of where you needed them instead of completely offering you the satisfaction you’d long craved. and here heeseung was handing it to you on a silver platter.

the only problem was that you felt slightly overwhelmed with so much happening at one time in two different holes. you didn’t know who to pay attention to; sunghoon fucking your throat with a vengeance, eager to gain something out of your mouth for once, or heeseung railing you to kingdom come, making you feel hot everywhere.

you found yourself trying to juggle both, eyes flitting between them, moaning around sunghoon’s dick at heeseung’s angled thrusts and throbbing around heeseung at every guttural groan that slipped from sunghoon’s mouth. you couldn’t help yourself; it was too goddamn arousing.

sunghoon noticed how fucked out you looked, eyes rolling back to another timeline, and it was doing unimaginable things to his cock. you looked better than he could have ever imagined and he knew that he wouldn’t be satisfied until he left you hoarse and rasping.

with that thought, he grabbed your hair to push you down and started to fuck your head against the mattress rather roughly, which caught you by surprise. you tried to take it, you really did, but it was overwhelming. you could barely breathe.

“take it,” he hissed, holding your head in place. you looked pretty like this, struggling to keep up with his hectic movements.

your eyes were watering as his cock went too deep for you to handle, and you started gagging. sunghoon moaned, but pulled your head off him to let you relax for a second, a string of saliva connecting your mouth and the head of his cock.

“breathe,” he said, letting one hand run through your hair almost tenderly.

you nodded, willing yourself to relax. all the while, sunghoon marveled at how pretty you looked with saliva on your face and tears strolling down your cheeks.

“you guys okay up there?” heeseung asked from between your legs, having noticed the action. 

“we’re fine,” sunghoon answered on your behalf. he moved his hand from your hair to your cheek. “you ready?”

you nodded your head. you couldn’t shake the urge to really make him proud, to satisfy all his inappropriate cravings. it was the least you could do when you had been tantalizing him for months on end.

“good girl,” sunghoon whispered, guiding his cock back to your mouth and this time using your hair to push your head onto his cock as he fucked your throat.

you moaned at the pet name, because something about the way it sounded coming from him made your head spin. maybe you were just horny and in dire need of a fuck like he’d said. maybe after you came, all of these feelings would wear off, and you would feel somewhat sane again. 

but you couldn’t deny that you were somewhat indulging in your fantasies here. you didn’t necessarily hate the the way sunghoon was treating you, even if it was a little beyond your limits and more than a little rough. but limits were just boundaries you’d yet explored.

heeseung was a different situation altogether. your pussy was still sensitive from the hours of playing with it and you were already about to come much before him. there was a familiar heat in your stomach and festering throb of energy in your core, only more intense than you had ever experienced.

but heeseung recognized it, even without being able to hear your sweet moans of his name. he could see it in your body language and it flattered him in a way; he always felt proud when he lasted longer than the person he was fucking, especially without necessarily even trying to finish them quicker.

“she’s gonna come,” heeseung pointed out, grinning. “come for me, princess. come on this dick. you know you want to.”

it was like he your voodoo doll or something, because merely seconds after those words parted from his mouth, you were shuddering and tightening around his cock with climax, your eyes rolling to the back of your head and your toes clenching.

heeseung let out the pitchiest moan ever when you throbbed around him repeatedly. words could not describe how good it felt, but sounds could. and the sounds he was making were sensational, only contributing to the mind-numbing pleasure wrecking you from within.

“goddamn,” heeseung said, mesmerized by how hard you came. it was probably warranted after hours of resisting.

but the other thing on heeseung’s mind was how much wetter your pussy sounded, sticky with your release. he whined, literally going mad. he knew that his own orgasm wasn’t far out and just the squelch of your cunt could easily finish him off.

sunghoon was facing a similar predicament, fucking your mouth without restraint and not letting you escape his thrusts. “fuck, i’m gonna come,” he groaned. “swallow it. or don’t. it’s your sheets.”

the last thing you of all people cared about was having your sheets ruined. at the moment, you were more burdened with how sore your throat felt and how overstimulated your pussy was being fucked despite having already orgasmed. it literally felt like you’d had the soul fucked out of you.

you didn’t even know it was possible at this point, but sunghoon’s hips went faster. it was a brutal but steady pace, which was somewhat admirable. he was trying to get himself there, right over the edge, knowing release was only seconds away.

with a few more smacks, sunghoon released down your throat with the sexiest groan you’d heard, one that claimed every award. when you’d milked him of every drop, his hands tight on the sides of your face, his grip on your head slacked and he slowly pulled your mouth off him.

you swallowed what you could, but he had came so goddamn much at once, it was borderline ridiculous. what you couldn’t take dripped down your chin, blending with the saliva from the messy fucking.

heeseung glanced up at you and the sight of your cum-stained face triggered something so primal in him that he knew he wasn’t going to last another minute. “princess, where do you want me to come?” he asked breathlessly.

“inside,” you replied with maybe half your voice, if even. it hurt to speak. the sound pleased sunghoon.

the thought of coming inside your pussy had heeseung levitating and was the last push he needed to bring himself past the cusp of ecstasy. his hips stuttered as he came inside you, crying out half of your name, leaning on top of you as he buried his load inside your warm, wet, gushing, sticky hole.

a satisfied hum escaped you when you felt his cum seeping inside your pussy. why did it feel so good?

“d-don’t move yet,” you whispered, because it was all you could muster.

heeseung glanced up at you, recognizing the look of pleasure on your face. if he had the energy, he would tease you about how you wanted to feel him cum inside you, but he needed to catch his breath. so he answered with a nod.

sunghoon whistled. this had gone better than he’d hoped. “well goddamn. you’re just a virgin slut aren’t you?”

heeseung chuckled breathlessly. “she took that shit like a champ. i’m impressed.”

sunghoon kissed your forehead. “you did so good,” he whispered, caressing your cheek with his thumb. “i’ll get you some water in a second.”

you nodded, appreciating the tender side after all that had just happened. your heart felt a little lighter than usual, despite its racing. you had so many questions, but you didn’t want to strain your voice. was it normal to feel like a different person after having sex for the first time?

heeseung was going to pull out, but seeing the look on your face, he decided to stay nestled inside you for a little longer. “you okay?”

you bobbed your head. “i’m good.”

heeseung snickered and teased, “whoa there, batman. what have you done with my sister?”

you rolled your eyes, but giggled. sunghoon joined in on the laughter, but he added, “don’t speak. you’ll make it worse.”

heeseung sighed contentedly. knowing that you wouldn’t say anything in response, he decided to tease, “our little gooner.”

you glared at heeseung wordlessly, conveying a lot of different things with your eyes. 

sunghoon translated playfully, “i think that means ‘fuck you.’”

“again?” heeseung joked. “what can i expect from a gooner. but hey, i guess girls can goon too.”

[lacedcompulsion]

FLATLANDS

Hotch sends you and Spencer to Iowa to conduct a death row interview with an inmate. Thing is, there's not much to do in Iowa but fuck.

pairing: spencer reid x bau!reader

tags/warnings: 18+, wc: 5.9k, whew, smut, porn w plot, piv sex, unprotected sex, drunk sex, oral sex (both receiving), fingering, soft-dom spencer ish, biting, praise kink, this is so self-indulgent muahahaha, discussions of a case, but nothing too bad it's canon typical stuff, iowa hate idgaf!!, drinking/getting drunk, i think that's it!

notes: this is likeeee. one of my first times writing longer smut. also i did in fact say i would re-upload old re-worked fics before posting anything new but alas! i am a liar! here is something brand new! i spent like. 9 straight hours on this yesterday. and it is currently almost 8 am and i just spent all night finishing it up instead of sleeping. ALSO i am in fact a philosophy major (future barista moment) and my fics get soooo. philosophy-esque. like. every single time. i'm sorry... i am who i am.

If you had to remove one state from the contiguous union, it would be Iowa. 

You’re standing in a rusty hotel room, which, according to Hotch, is the best they could do to accommodate you. And Spencer. He’s one room over. Your feet vibrate against the rug. You tell yourself it’s the thought of him, one wall over — thinking, sitting, reading, whatever he’s doing — and not some rare kind of bacteria you’re going to catch from the stink of this place.

Hotch sent you and Reid here for a death row interview. One of the inmates, having spent the past seventeen years as a self-proclaimed monk, decided he was done with silence. He answered the bureau’s request for an interview in a letter addressed to Hotch’s desk, written in red ink. It’s your first prison interview — you usually wear the bad guys down before they’re locked away forever — but Spencer has done one or two, he said. You think it might be more.

You’d never been to Iowa, never had a case here. You’re not great with time off, even worse with real vacations. You don’t look out your window for fear the corn fields have gotten closer since you last peeked through the curtains. You swear you can see twenty miles out; the flatness makes it easy to mistake the horizon for something that never, ever ends. 

You’re picking at the skin of your fingernails, toes curled as they still rest but resist against the carpet, when there’s a knock at your door. You don’t check, because you’re not really fearful. It might make you a shitty FBI agent, but you doubt anyone is tracking you down in Iowa. (Iowa. It gets worse each time you think it.)

“Hi,” Spencer says, lips pulled flat. Flat. You think of fields. Corn. Emptiness. Your stomach churns then lurches when you think of your own bed in your own home in a state that has real hills and mountains and trees. 

“Hi.” 

“Thought you might want to look over the file before tomorrow?” He frames it like a question, and you offer a soft smile at his hesitancy before opening the door to let him in. He turns his body to the left to avoid making contact with you as he accepts the invitation and walks on through.

Your bed is still made, your suitcase resting on top of it. He scrunches his nose before recovering.

“I’m not a germaphobe, like someone we both know,” you mock.

“Maybe you should be.” You laugh. You’ve been his teammate for three years now, and it still gets you when he decides he can lighten up and make a joke.

He looks around, still awkward in the yellow tint of the hotel lamp, then decides to sit in the desk chair in the corner.

“You look so ominous,” you say, shaking your head as you pull the file out of the nightstand. 

“Why is your casefile in there?”

“Where do you keep yours?”

“I never put it away.”

“Checks out,” you say, raising your eyebrows and sitting criss-crossed on the edge of your bed, facing him.

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Gary Foster,” you read off the top of the page, ignoring his bait. “Killed twenty-three women in his basement. His wife never knew.”

“Or claims she didn’t know,” Spencer corrects. 

“You think she did?”

He shrugs. “It doesn’t really matter what I think.”

You glance up at him to find him staring intently at the file in his hands. He’s gripping onto it like it’s all he knows. You store your observations away in your head under a tab titled Perhaps Ask Later. 

You’ve gone over this file a dozen times. It’s virtually seared into your memory. Still, you let him tack off the rest of the information to you, compile the intensive profile Hotch gave you into a bullet point list. 

“He’s gonna focus on me,” you say once he reaches a lull in speech.

“Because you’re a woman?” he confirms. You nod. “Maybe.”

You tap the file a few times with your fingers as a yawn creeps up your throat, threatening to escape. Spencer seems to get the hint before you even let it out. 

“We’ve got a long day tomorrow,” he says before standing. He takes a step forward before turning around and tucking the chair back into the desk. You smile at the politeness. “See you tomorrow?”

“Is that a question?” you tease as you lead him to the door. “I promise I won’t jump out of the window.”

“There’s not much out there.”

“No, there isn’t.” He fumbles with the key for the door across the hall. You wait for him to open it before you start to close yours, the way you would after driving a friend at home. “Night.”

“Night,” he says, though the latter half of the word is muffled by the shut of the door. 

The room is barren again. You open the curtains now that it’s nearing total darkness outside.

It takes six more hours for you to drift off into sleep.

– 

Your hand is immediately on your temple when you awake, rubbing at the budding headache you know will consume you once you get up. This is the punishment you get for allowing yourself only three hours of sleep.

The sunlight hits your bed in fluttering intervals of perfect warmth and scorching heat. This time, when the hindmost rolls around, you force yourself up and place your feet on the ground. You hold your tongue to refrain from releasing a long string of fucks and shits and realize your hand is still refusing to move from its spot rubbing circles in your face. When you make your way to the bathroom, you realize the bed is so hard you’ve left no indent. 

The sting of the shower is pelting, boiling enough that it feels purifying. After a night spent in sheets you’re sure dozens have sweat through, it’s more than welcome. The heat is the perfect substrate for the anticipatory dread of today’s interview. Speaking to monsters as if there’s a hint of human behind the stitching has never pulled at you in the right way. 

If anything, it’s slowly pulled you apart.

The outlet in your bathroom is broken so you’re forced to dry your hair sitting on the carpet of the room, right next to that window that stares out into nowhere. You feel itchy just sitting on it. You swear the fibers are pressing into your skin, merging with your skin. 

The file is open on the floor in front of you, and you use your thumb to wipe the water falling from your damp hair. The pages already begin to curdle like the feeling in your stomach. 

You put your hair in a ponytail, then worry it’s too sexual — because you’ve absorbed the profile and you know what earns a check on this guys list —- so you take it down and let it rest on your shoulders again. Your knees crack when you stand up and your hip tenses up like it might, too, when you slip your legs into your pants. 

There’s a knock on your door and you mutter fuck as you balance your time between finishing the rest of the buttons on your blouse and stumbling to the door.

“I need a couple minutes,” you say, before you say hello. You leave the door open as you retreat farther into the room. “You can wait in here.”

You squeeze your feet into your heels — half a size too small, and in your head you call the saleslady who insisted on that being necessary for this brand a word that would make your grandmother sour — and peripherally watch him step into the room, hands stuffed in his pockets. 

“You ready?” he asks. You can feel his eyes on your unmade bed. 

“Mhm.” You glance in the square mirror facing the bed and smooth out your clothes. 

“I mean for the interview,” he says after clearing his throat.

“My answer remains.”

“Cool.” He says it in the way that feels fraudulent, but is really just the way he speaks, you’ve come to realize.

“Are you ready?” you ask back, muffled by the file placed between your teeth as you fumble around your desk for your car keys and room card. You make eye contact with him as you head for the door.

“Don’t really have much of a choice, do I?”

“Stand up straight,” you say, holding the door open for him as you both step into the hallway.

“What?” he mutters. He does it anyway.

“He’s gonna zero in on you if you seem to lack confidence.”

“Right.”

It’s silence between you two in the hallway, the elevator, the lobby, and until you’re pulling out of the parking lot. There’s overgrown wheatgrass in the field to your left and plowed corn crop to your right. The furrows stretch on until the curve of the earth swallows them up.

The sky is dull, slate-colored, and bears striking resemblance to something that could wipe you clean. Grain silos whir by every couple of minutes. These people really own a lot of fucking land. Every few miles, a new one, along with a rusting tractor or collapsing barn or crop that looks about ready to dry up and blow away. It gets predictable after mile seven. 

The prison doesn’t appear so much as it settles into your vision. It’s low to the ground, sprawling, gray. A scar pressed into the ground. 

You feel like Spencer the way you’ve completely memorized the profile. You flash your badge at the gate, sign some kind of form and drive into a parking lot that feels as far from the prison as your hotel was.

Spencer lingers in the car two seconds after you get out. He’s nervous, and he’s trying not to show it. You don’t want to mention it, but you need to be on the same page, so you don’t stop your lips from unfurling.

“You’re doing that thing again.”

“What thing?”

“The anxious math,” you say. “You’re calculating the probability of saying the wrong thing before we even walk in.”

“That’s-” He seems to think better than arguing and redirects his sentence. “That’s not entirely inaccurate.”

You give him one of those closed lip smiles. “He’ll spot it in five seconds. He feeds on nerves like that. First, he’ll comment on your hands, because you fidget when you’re trying not to.”

“You sound like Hotch.”

You scoff out a half-laugh and choose to ignore the comment otherwise. “And he’ll ask how long you’ve known me. If we’re sleeping together. He won’t say it like that, of course. He’ll be crude. He wants to gauge what version of you shows up when you’re off-balance.”

“Why would that knock me off balance?” he asks. The hesitancy has stolen his tone again.

“You fluster easily.”

“Do I?”

“Mhm. You blink three times, touch your collar, and then deflect with statistics. You did it the first time I challenged you during a case.”

He tuts then holds the door of the prison open for you. “You’re profiling me.”

“Of course I am,” you say, then turn your head over your shoulder, waiting for him to walk back up beside you again. He’s close behind you, so close you can almost feel his breath on you. It makes you feel warm. “So will he.”

You greet two more guards inside before shaking hands with the warden. He thanks you for coming with that grim look on his face that everyone in this field seems to have permanently etched into the creases of their skin. The prison is colder inside than it has any right to be, as if the concrete has learned to hold onto every winter it’s ever survived. 

“Still nervous?” you whisper to Spencer. 

He smiles, shakes his head no. 

Good, you mouth.

You pretend not to notice his eyes fixate for a beat longer than necessary on your lips. You lick them in response. When he meets your eyes again, you pretend not to notice that something undecipherable is hidden behind his lids, too. 

—

Foster smiles when you walk in. He doesn’t look at Spencer. You let Spencer pull your chair out for you, which immediately catches the guy’s attention. You think of still water, use it as a guide for being calm.

“Well,” Foster says. He hasn’t dropped the smile from his face. “They sent a good-looking one.”

“We, the FBI, are really grateful you chose to cooperate with us,” you say. “You know, in your final days.”

“Hm.” He turns to Spencer, finally. “She yours?”

You don’t look at him, and you will him to ignore him, to start asking him the standard questions. What’s your name? What year were you born? 

“She’s her own,” he says instead. It comes out even and flat. 

“You hesitated,” Foster says. His smile shows his teeth, now. “I suppose that’s not a crime.”

“No,” you agree. You open your file and lay a picture of his mugshot on the table. You can tell he was expecting photos of one of the women whose life he stole away. “But murder is.”

Spencer clears his throat and nudges your ankle with the tip of his shoe. You give him no reaction, but the next time you reach for the file, you let your fingertips brush against his wrist. 

—

“That wasn’t awful,” Spencer says when you step out, though he says it like he’s releasing one big breath born out of a collection of accumulated air trapped in his lungs. 

Foster did say something crude. You’d prefer not to repeat it, mostly because you’re not sure if Spencer was blushing or if he was just hot. 

The prison was freezing, you remind yourself. Then you shove the thought back down. 

“It wasn’t great,” you say. “I wish I’d pushed him further about—”

“Stop,” he says. His hand is on your bicep now. “Don’t overthink it, you did great.”

“Okay,” you say. “Don’t profile me, now.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

The walk back to the car leaves you sticky and hot. You note, aimlessly, that Iowa gets hot enough if you let it — if you stay long enough to let it swelter.

“Our flight’s not till the morning,” you groan, slamming the car door shut.

“Not a fan of Iowa?”

“In how many languages do you know how to say fuck no?”

“Twelve," he says. His eyes flit to the ceiling. “No, fourteen.” 

“Ridiculous.” 

—

You crash as soon as you get back to your hotel room. You sleep for what feels like two hours but you know is way longer than that, and when you finally peel your eyes open you’re sweating. You’re clinging to your sheets, and you consider yourself bed-ridden as you roll over and check your phone. Hotch has sent you three messages asking for updates. Your stomach twinges with guilt for not answering, though you figure he probably moved on and texted Spencer.

Spencer.

You feel bad. You had ditched him, retreating to your hotel room the second you guys got back. You wonder what he did, if he got food, though there’s not much to do in Iowa. In fact, there’s nothing to do in Iowa. 

You slip out of your clothes and take a quick rinse-off in the shower. Your hair is still wet when you adorn yourself in a gray t-shirt and sleep shorts and creep over across the hall. Your fist raps against the door three times, then twice more for good measure. 

“Hi?”

“Hi,” you say, inviting yourself in as you push past him. It’s identical to yours, but everything’s on the opposite side. “Nice room.”

“Much nicer than yours.”

“Oh, for sure.” You clap your hands together, then flop down on the bed. “So, whatcha been up to?”

He nods his head at a book on the nightstand. You stretch over and pick it up. The History of Iowa’s Small Towns.

“Little on the nose, isn’t it, doctor?”

“It’s interesting.”

“Your mind amazes me,” you whisper, then place it back on the nightstand.

“Have you eaten?” he asks.

“I’m not really hungry,” you say. When he quirks his eyebrow, you add: “Really, I can’t eat for, like, at least two hours after I wake up.”

“You were asleep?”

You nod. “Couldn’t last night. You didn’t think I just ditched you, did you?”

He shrugs. “I wouldn’t have minded.”

You place a hand over your heart. “Well, doctor, I’m just plain offended.”

He smiles, real, genuine. “I didn’t mean it like that.”

“How’d you mean it?” you ask. You move up on the bed, as if it’s your own, making space for him to sit next to you. 

He sighs, like he really doesn’t want to indulge in this conversation, but his lips pry open and you know he will. “Morgan always says I ramble too much.”

You shrug. “What’s much, anyway?”

“Well, if you’re not hungry,” he starts, lifting himself off the bed and over to the mini fridge, “are you thirsty?”

“My, my.” You smile, teeth and all. “I didn’t know you drank on the job.”

“Not technically on the job anymore, am I?” He holds up a little bottle. “It’s not exactly a martini, but it’s all I’ve got unless you want lukewarm ginger ale.”

You accept the bottle with mock ceremony and open it the second it’s in your hands. “Guess federal per diems only cover motel whiskey. Honestly, this is probably the classiest thing happening in Iowa tonight.”

He laughs softly, twisting open his own cap. “From what I’ve read, and seen, that’s a low bar.”

You raise yours. “To meeting the bar.”

He tilts his head, scrunches his nose. “To stepping over the bar with minimal effort.”

You both take a sip. It’s terrible. You make a face.

He sees it and raises an eyebrow. “Too refined for hotel whiskey?”

“Just surprised it didn’t come with a warning label,” you say, setting the bottle down on the nightstand. “Or a tetanus shot.”

“Don’t worry,” he says, taking another sip of his. “I’m sure the Iowa Department of Health is on it.”

You nod solemnly. “They’re probably just as fast as the Wi-Fi.”

That gets a small smile from him. He sits on the edge of the bed, a little closer than before, but still careful. He’s always so careful.

There’s a lull, full of quiet until the nighttime air-conditioning kicks on and you’re too tired to pretend anything really matters for a while.

“You ever drink from the mini bar before? Like, during a case?” you ask eventually.

“Only when I expect to be stranded somewhere like this.”

“Smart,” you say. 

He glances at you, amusement tugging at the corner of his mouth. “Can’t profile your way out of a cornfield without it.”

You hum in agreement. “I’m not sure if that’s depressing.”

He shrugs, taking another sip. “Probably.” His hand falls to his side, dangerously close to your thigh.

You accept another one. And then another one. You’re sure he’s going shot for shot with you, but you can’t really tell because your head is full and everything’s hazy and suddenly this bed is so, so comfortable. 

You lie back, legs still dangling off the edge, and stare up at the popcorn ceiling like it might reveal state secrets. “Did you know Iowa had one of the highest populations of covered bridges?”

Spencer blinks. “Iowa doesn’t.”

You squint. “It doesn’t?”

“No,” he says, amused. “That’s Madison County. Which is in Iowa. But it’s a specific — actually, nevermind. I’m not sure either of us are in a state for nuance.”

You wag a lazy finger at the ceiling. “I knew that.”

“Sure,” he says, and leans back beside you with a soft thud, hands crossed over his stomach. “Next you’ll tell me Iowa invented jazz.”

“It didn’t?” You cant your head to the side, a smile playing at your lips. 

“God, no.”

You sigh dramatically. “And here I thought this trip was educational.”

He turns his head just slightly toward you. His breath is hot, hotter than it was earlier, and his words are all slurred. You think you might sound the same but don’t keep yourself in line long enough to actually check. “You’ve learned a lot. For example, you’ve learned not to trust the minibar.”

“And that your idea of a good time is reading municipal histories.”

“I sensed you were captivated.”

You pull an arm over your face. “Do you always get this cocky after drinking?”

He tilts his head like he’s genuinely thinking about it. “I think I just feel safe knowing I’m not the only one embarrassing myself.”

You haul a leg up to bend into the bed with you and nudge him with your knee. “You’re not embarrassing. You’re weird. Like, in the good way.”

He doesn’t say anything for a moment, but you can hear the smile in his voice when he finally says: “Thanks. You’re weird too.”

“Weird and drunk.” You repeat the word drunk a few more times, drawing out a different syllable each time. “Spencer?” 

“Hm?”

“Don’t let me fall asleep here.”

“You say that like I have any control over you,” he murmurs. Your breath catches. Neither of you move.

You peek at him from under your arm. “Are you flirting with me?”

“What?” 

“Whatever. Then don’t speak with that— that tone. Or I’ll start to think you’re flirting with me.”

“I’m not really flirting with you.”

You let the arm drop, but not to the mattress; it finds its way to the sleeve of his shirt, playing with the fabric. “Not really or not yet?”

“That depends,” he says, voice dropped low to a whisper. “Would yet be a problem?”

You roll onto your elbow, looming over him. “Guess we’ll have to find out.”

It lands like a match.

“What are you doing?” he asks. Your lips are the closest they’ve ever been.

“I don’t know.” Your eyes move to where his hand has started to creep onto your thigh. “What are you doing?”

He moves first, but only barely. His head tilts up, lips parting like he’s about to ask a question. 

He gets his answer in the shape of your lips.

Your hand finds the edge of his jaw, fingers skimming up the side of his face. He’s warm. Still flushed from the whiskey or maybe just from you.

You’re kissing, you think. You. Spencer. Kissing. It should make you pull back. You work with him. This is strictly forbidden — that should definitely make you pull back.

But then his fingers press into your hips, grounding you, and you shift, and you’re straddling him before you’ve thought it through. It’s automatic, desperate, like the tension finally cracked open and all that’s left is the pull.

“Still not on the job?” you murmur between kisses, breath brushing his lips.

He shakes his head. “Not even a little.”

He starts to kiss you deeper, like he wants to memorize it. You wonder if he is. Your hands move up under his shirt, and his breath slips, just for a second. Just long enough to make you smile into his mouth.

There’s nothing quiet about any of this. Just heat. And want. And finally.

You roll your hips once as a test. When he tightens his grip on you, you have half the mind to do it again, and again, and again. 

Suddenly, all you can think of are your clothes on the ground and him inside you. 

“Fuck,” he mutters. You release his lips from yours.

“Fuck?”

“Shh,” he hushes, trying to silence you, but you’re already laughing.

“Oh my god, Dr. Spencer Reid, esteemed supervisory special agent, holder of three PhDs, just said fuck.” You whisper the last part, hand clutching at your chest.  

“Will you please resume what we were just doing?”

“My fucking pleasure.”

“Jesus,” he squeezes out. Your hands remove themselves from where they were resting under his shirt and head to the waist of his pants. You watch his chest rise a little quicker, fall with a little more readiness. His hands release your hips and come up to grip your wrists. “I say fuck one time and I’ll never hear the end of it.” 

“Maybe we can put it in another context.” You unhook your legs from their desired place around his hips and scooch yourself down his body. Your fingers, which were just barely, ever so delicately toying with his waistband, curl into both the cotton of his pants and his boxers and tug down at once. He helps you, hips coming off the bed just enough for you to drop them both to his ankles. 

He’s already hard, and your mouth is already hollow, already anticipating something to fill a long-lasting void. You say his name, but it sounds off, because your mouth is already imagining itself wrapped around something far less innocent than words.

His hand comes up to your face, brushing your cheekbone, and the feeling is too soft to name but impossible to ignore. You feel as though all the heat in the room has gotten sucked between your legs, and it pools low, desire biting at the edges of restraint.

“You don’t have to,” he says, watching you spit in your hand. You roll your eyes before wrapping the newly wet hand around him. 

“I’m going to. Just stay like that.” 

You stroke him softly, just a few times before spitting on the tip and working it back down. He whispers your name like its wax, made to melt. You’re not thinking and your voice is velvet when you ask him how long it’s been since he’s been touched like this, the way he deserves to be. Too long, comes his response, and you vow to yourself to show him what he’s been missing.

The next time you bring your lips up to release more spit, you reach down and kiss it. Just the tip, and just ever-so-slightly. You’re not sure he noticed at first, so you do it again, this time more pronounced, and then he’s removing his hand from your face and bringing it up to your hair. His grip is firm enough to anchor, not enough to command. 

When you open your lips more, he tightens his grip. When you make your way down, syrup-slick and mouth dripping of sin, he coils his want at the nape of your neck and pulls. You moan around him, which earns you another tug. 

“That feels good,” he whispers. “So fucking good.”

You’re drunk enough that the praise feels more than trembling and temporary. You take it for more than it probably is and pick up your pace.

He lasts not a minute longer before he’s guiding you off of him, and you couch as you come up for air. 

“I don’t want to finish yet,” he mumbles.

“No?”

“No.” He pulls you up off the ground, one hand on your wrist and the other still in your hair. “Wanna take care of you too. Do you want that? Yeah? Lie down for me.”

You do as you're told, nodding along the way, agreeing fervently and with little free will. You’re drooling, enough that it slips past your lips. He brings his index finger up to your face, collecting it on the pad of his finger and pushing it back into your mouth. Instinctively, you suck. He groans, low, a noise you never would have expected to hear from him, and it makes you shut your legs, thighs rubbing together slightly as you try to fight the feeling festering around your limbs.

He kneels before you, the same way you had with him. “Is this what you want?” You nod. “No, use your words.” He pries your legs open, blows between them. 

Your back is coming up off the bed, enough for him to bring a hand up and grab your waist again. “Yes.”

He wastes little time attaching his mouth to you, tongue everywhere, while his fingers leave bruises in your side. One of your hands is gripping the sheets so hard you can feel your fingernails digging into your palm even through it. This can’t be real, you think, because nothing real feels this good. And this feels so, so good. 

You feel fucked out and he hasn’t even put anything inside of you. It’s just his tongue swiping against you, swirling around your clit, sucking your clit, kissing your clit. You can’t think. At some time you stop being aware of what he’s doing and just let him do it.

His hand leaves your hip and you feel it pulse, throbbing at the loss of harsh connection. Then, he forces your fist to open, to release the white fabric, and he locks your fingers together. It feels intimate, more intimate than his mouth on you, and if you were sober you might have shrugged him away. But you’re not. You’re drunk. Very drunk. So instead you hold his hand harder.

His free hand is trailing along your thigh, and when you glance down at him his eyes are closed, and he looks content, satisfied, and you’re not sure you ever want to unfold from this position. He uses his other hand to trail up and down your thigh before his errant fingers find their way farther up your legs. 

When he slips two inside you, both at once, no warning, you mewl.

He detaches his mouth from you, like he wants to focus solely on finger fucking you. When you glance down at him again, he gives you a perfunctory smile before focusing back at the task he’s chosen to take up. He’s practically gift-wrapping your orgasm. 

“Right there,” you choke out when his fingers curl at the exact right moment in the exact right spot. You don’t announce that you’re coming, but Spencer is a genius. You’re sure he can figure it out. Everything comes undone in waves, the way seafoam spits back into the sand before dissipating, carrying itself back out into a vaster part of the water. 

“Good job,” he says. He kisses you. You can taste your slick on his lips.

“Spencer.”

“You’ve said that already.” You’d laugh if you weren’t so unraveled. “I’m gonna fuck you now, okay?”

“Mhm.”

“What did we say about using our words?”

“To… use them?”

“You’re so smart,” he says, and you can hear him breathing in the way that means he’s trying not to laugh as he presses scattered kisses across your cheek, jaw, lips. “Can you speak up and show me how smart you are?”

“I want you to fuck me.”

“Knew you had it in you.” One of his hands is pressed into the mattress next to your head, and the other is absent from your body. When you finally open your eyes, you look down to see him lining himself up with you.

There’s a pinch in your throat as you feel him ease himself inside, slowly, deliberately, like he’s scared you might crumble and break beneath him. You won’t, which you assure him by using one hand to grab onto his bicep and the other to rest on his hip, guiding him all the way inside of you. 

"I got so mad, earlier," he says. "When he was talking about you like that."

"I'm sorry."

"Don't apologize," he whispers. "Don't fucking apologize."

The heat is back, swirling in your stomach, rushing up your chest like every vein you have has replaced blood with feverish fire. Spencer throws more gasoline on it when he slides almost all the way out, then pushes himself back in. You’re quiet, and even the air around you seems to have hushed itself. 

When he finds a rhythm, he takes advantage of it. Fucks you a little harder, just enough that you can’t close your mouth, can’t quiet yourself even when you try. You’re trying to tread carefully, but you don’t have it in you to not tip your chin up and search for a kiss. You move your other hand to wrap around his forearm, the one right next to your head, and you can’t stop yourself from digging your nails into the skin when he gives you one particularly hard thrust.

“Do that again,” you whisper.

“This?” he asks, though it’s more of a mock. He does it again, this time a little slower. You feel like crying, because you have no other outlet for what exactly it is you’re currently feeling. When he does it again you have no choice but to squeeze your eyes shut. He kisses you again, idly, like you’ve got all the time in the world. You’re not sure you have more than five minutes in you before you pass out. “You feel so good.”

“Needed you.”

“Yeah?” he says. Your words seem to have made him snap his hips against yours a little harder. 

He uses one of his hands to grab under your thigh, then pushes your leg up. You let out a broken moan you don’t even register as your own until he stretches you farther apart and you do it again. You’d be embarrassed if you weren’t clawing at an indescribable edge. You feel ripe. Nothing holy is coming for you. You arch your back like it might. 

"Mine." He says it while looking down at you. He says it with his chest. He says it like it's an absolute.

You bring your hand to the back of his neck and make him kiss you. Once for the thrill, twice just to feel the burn of it really settle in. 

Then you come. And everything else does, too. It’s unraveling. Not fingers but friction, not skin but static, not breath but flood. The room is slipping sideways, hips first, mouth second. you forget your name or maybe you give it away. There's no shape to anything, to the sting between your legs, only pulse — wet, reckless, existing in the hollows of your thighs. When he bends down and lets out a sound that sounds suspiciously like your name, your teeth catch on his shoulder like a warning. He doesn’t flinch. You bite down harder.

Nothing makes sense for a while except the sound of the air-conditioner. 

Spencer says something. Then again. Then, he taps your cheek twice, says your name until you come to.

“Hm?”

“You okay?”

“‘m okay. Are you okay?”

He laughs. It’s quiet and hoarse and still warm. “Yes ma’am.”

“Hmmmm.”

“Hmm what?’

“I like that. We’ll use that ‘nother time.” You let out a heavy sigh as he chuckles. He slips out of you and you suck in a breath that catches in the pockets of your teeth, cold and shocking against the roof of your mouth.

“Sorry.” You shake your head and hope it conveys that he has nothing to apologize for. He rolls over next to you. “You should pee.”

“Pee schmee.”

“I think I’m gonna retract my previous statements about your high level of intelligence now.” You smack him with your hand and laugh, hearty and probably too loud.

“I’m still drunk,” you say after a few more moments of silence.

“I think that’s how that whole drinking thing works, yeah.”

“Do you regret it?”

“No.” His answer comes quicker than you were expecting.

“Okay. Me neither. Just checking.” You blow hair out of your face, and when that doesn’t work you bring a palm up and use the strength of four fingers to wipe it away from the sweat gathering in satin sheets across your skin. “I hate this room.”

“Me too.”

“I don’t hate you,” you whisper.

“Well,” he whispers back. “I don’t hate you either.”

“Do you wanna maybe… I don’t know. Not be on the job tomorrow morning?”

It might just be the alcohol, but his expression is soft and lush, like when dawn’s light shudders through early morning fog. 

“I would like that.”

[parfaitblogs]

in a world of boys, he's a gentleman ❀ s. reid x reader

in which your night out comes to an end, and your boyfriend has to try to keep your wandering hands off of him. 

pairing: spencer reid x fem!reader genre: fluff tags: alcohol consumption. reader is drunk. reader is a brat. spencer is so exasperated. but he loves you so bad. age gap probably. suggestive content. word count: 2.1k a/n: oh my god i miss having a man to pick me up and love me when im drunk #thisshouldbeme final boss level 1000. simple fun fluff i love when he's nice to us i should do this more often. circa summer 2024 ass title i'm rebuilding spencer reid tumblr brick by brick. 

You were never meant to be this drunk. 

Truly, you had grandeur plans for it to be a one and done night. Entertain the birthday girl — your best friend — with your presence and take care of her, for it is her night, and then go home and pass out early enough in dark green sheets and the sound of your boyfriend sleeping next to you. 

You'd even told him about these plans. 

Instead? He's staring down at his phone with a locked jaw, and four different messages from you glaring back up at him. Incomprehensible, if he weren't as smart as he were. If he weren't as attuned to you and your mannerisms down to the way you text. A man who doesn't even like texting, and he's memorised how you do. 

Something about him picking you up, maybe, if he wants. Another thing about you finding him pretty. Another with a photo of the — and he quotes — really good vodka coke the bartender made you (he's certain it tastes the same as the last three you mentioned drinking). Finally, a photo of you in the bathrooms, arms around your best friend, grinning at the mirror through your phone, showing off your outfit to him. As if he hadn't memorised, documented, the way the skirt looked on you when you left hours earlier. 

When he doesn't reply to a single message, you call him, and endearment for you grows, for he can hear the pout on your lips as you speak into the phone. 

"Why're you ignorin' me?" you mumble, which isn't much help considering how loud the world around you is, your voice nearly drowning out. 

"I'm not, honey," he says. "I only just checked your messages. I was about to respond."

"Liar. You're ignoring me. You hate me."

"I can assure you I don't," he's amused. He's so stupidly amused, you want to kick him for it. You don't. You can't. Instead, you let him keep sweet talking you out of your predisposed anger. "Are you having a good night?"

"Yes!" you brighten almost immediately. "Did you see the photo I sent?"

"Of your outfit? Yeah, angel. You look pretty," he's practically perfected how to talk to you when drunk. You're oblivious to it, always too intoxicated to register he is extra nice when you're barely able to hold yourself upright. 

"Thank you," you reply, and he can hear the fluster. "Look prettier in—in person."

"I know. I saw you before you left, remember?"

"Oh. Yeah," your cheeks heat, and you roll your bottom lip between your teeth. The bricks are a juxtaposing cold against your back. Rough, too. Oddly comforting. "Are you busy? Am I keeping you from somethin'? S'that why you were ignorin' me?"

"No," he replies. "I'm waiting for you to be ready to come home. Is that why you're calling?"

"Mm-mm," you shake your head, giggling to yourself because you remember he can't see that. He doesn't know why you're laughing, but he smiles at it nonetheless. "Jus' wanted to hear your voice. Miss you."

"I miss you too, honey," he says, and you can hear that smile in his voice. 

"What're you doin' then?" you ask, staring at the door to the club you had deserted, keeping an eye out for your friends to emerge. 

"Reading."

"Reading what?"

"Sofia Petrovna," he tells you, and, as if he can see the way your eyebrows furrow, he adds, "Russian novel by Lydia Chukovskaya. I'll find a translation so you can read it, I think you'd like it."

"You should jus' read it to me right now," you mumble, crouching down to the floor, resting your head on your knees. "Translate for me."

"You most certainly won't remember a thing I'm saying. Where are your friends?"

"In the club. It got overstimulating," you tell him. 

There's a pause on the other end of the line, and an excuse about how you can actually see your friends still — you can't — manifests on your tongue, preempting the scolding he's no doubt formulating. 

However, two simple, stern — but not too scary — words kill the faux reassurance immediately. "You're alone?" 

You hesitate. "...No?"

"Can you go find your friends, please? I don't want you outside alone."

"Yes, sir," you stand back up. His jaw clenches, biting back his reprimand. He doesn't have the energy to lecture you about the dangers of being this drunk alone, and he's sure you wouldn't appreciate it anyways. Or remember it. "I will call you back later! Bye! Love you!"

He continues to hear from you for the two hours following. A photo once you find your friends to assure him you're safe, a mistyped message about how you love him more than anything in the world, another asking if he's mad at you when he doesn't reply. Eventually, you're calling him again, chatter from the smoker's lounge you'd disappeared into loud, but he can faintly make out you asking him to pick you up. 

He finds himself in an empty enough street just a block away from the last club you told him you were going to, waiting. 

There were people everywhere, just past the corner of the street. Girls with their bags hanging limply down by their calves, fast food paper bags held up to some of their mouths. Never his scene, but he's shown up enough for you since you started dating to know what he's looking out for. 

He can see you before you spot him, but when you do, he can't fight the smile at the sight of you brightening up in an instant. Distantly, he hears you call his name, pointing him out to your friends and stumbling towards the car. 

"Hi!" you collapse against the passenger's seat door, window open and waiting for you, as you lean into the car. 

Recognising the offer for what it was, he leans across the console to kiss you before you can start drunkenly accusing him of not loving you. Or whatever you can come up with to start a baseless, completely harmless argument with him. 

"Hi, honey. Good night?" he asks as you finally pull open the door, settling into the seat with a sigh, head nodding as you peel your shoes off of your feet and curl up. 

"I think so," you murmur, hair covering your face as you drop your head, and a yawn stretches your mouth open. "I'll tell you all about it t'morrow."

"Can't wait," he muses. 

"You never answered me," you then say — which is generous, considering he could barely make out a word — looking over at him. "'Bout if you're mad."

"I wasn't mad," he reassures you. "Just worried. Thought we talked about not being out and alone when you're this intoxicated?"

"Yeah. I know. Sorry."

Tomorrow, as it turns out, follows a quiet drive home for you to collect your thoughts, and his helping hands at removing your makeup and getting you into the shower. A year old promise that he will always force you under the water before bed no matter what protests you come up with.

Now, here you are, rambling his ear off animatedly on the edge of the bathroom sink, as he brushes a wet comb through your hair. 

He's listening intently, soaking in every word you were saying about your night out, even if it entirely made no sense to him. Your attempt at stringing together your night's events was poor at best, and he's pretty sure you've re-explained four times that you went into then night with fake names and backstories to try and fool everyone.

"And then we went to... um... I forgot the name. But it was free entry, so we went in, obviously, and this guy bought us drinks because of the birthday sash she was wearing, so that was awesome. That was the vodka coke I sent you, it was so goo—can I have a kiss?"

Your request catches him off guard, and the comb clatters to the basin beside you when his hand drops from your hair. 

"Is that all you want?" he hums, leaning forwards. His lips brush against your own, and you smile.

"Yep. Just a kiss," you chirp, slouching your shoulders so you could look up at him with wide eyes you know all too well he can't deny. "Please?"

You just had to ask so nicely, and he was left with very little choice in the matter in the end. 

He kisses you for only a second, aiming to pull away and successfully get you into bed before you can take this any further. 

Ever so sneaky, though, you catch your fingers into his hair and tug him back into you, legs hooking around his waist to keep him locked. His hips knock the cabinets, but he's distracted by your lips back on his to fully register the hit. 

"Honey," he mumbles against your lips. A warning, you think. It sounds it. 

You don't listen. 

Instead, you inch closer to the edge of the basin until he's forced to roll his hips into yours to push you back, saving you from falling off. 

You whine, and the sound has him coming back to reality, deftly pulling away from your lips. You protest, quietly, and he's forced to tangle a hand in your hair to tug your head back, keeping you away from him.

"No," he says, firmly. If you were sober, maybe you'd back down under the demand. Then again, if you were sober, he wouldn't be saying no to you. Instead, his tone of voice only makes your smile widen, and your skin tingle. 

"It was just a kiss," you protest, slipping off the sink once he steps back, letting him guide you like a lost puppy back into his bedroom. "Spencer?"

"No it wasn't," he says, hand on your back as he navigates you over to his bed. "We've talked about this."

He sits down before you, and despite the scolding, lets you climb over him into the bed anyways, hips straddling his waist as he lays back on the bed. 

"Just a kiss. I promise," you affirm, breath warm against his lips. 

He gives in, as he always does, and lets you kiss him again. 

Hips square above his, chest pressing on his, fingers ruffling the sheets beside his head. You kiss him until you're out of air, and convinced he's drunk enough on your taste to let you go further. 

He isn't. 

"Behave," he quips when your hand drops to his waistband, his fingers catching your wrist and lifting it back up. You're too focussed on the way his hand fits around the joint to argue. 

"I am," you huff, tilting your head with a lopsided grin. "Didn't do anything!"

"Brat," he pinches your hip, and you squirm, bursting into a fit of giggles. "Go to bed."

"Can't. You've got me caged up on top of you," you jut your chin out. "Maybe you're the problem."

"Yep. Sure am," he confirms, letting his arms around you go slack, just to watch you fall off his chest and to the mattress beside him. "Sleep."

"Or what?"

He pushes air out of his nose, but it's all too difficult to stay frustrated with you when you're staring up at him with the hugest smile on your face. You know exactly what you're doing — and he's just letting you.

He thinks he will forever.

He pauses in choosing a response. "Do you want me to be nice when I wake you up tomorrow?"

"Depends," you study him, eyes narrowing; drunken skepticism. "What's your version of nice?"

"You're a smart girl. Figure it out," he kisses your nose, "and go to sleep."

"Are you being suggestive?" you sit up abruptly, and his palms find comfort in his face, running down it. "Spencer."

"I'm not answering that. Go to sleep, honey."

"I can't. Why would you say that? You're such a tease. Oh my God. I hate you," you moan, dramatically falling back down to the bed, head finding the space between his shoulder and his neck. "Do you promise?"

It's like he knows you're giving up, for his voice has dropped into a drawl, exhaustion he'd been expertly masking coming out as he speaks. "Promise what?" 

"To wake me up nicely?"

"If you're good and go to sleep now, yes."

"Pinky promise?" his eyes are now closed, but you still search his face with keen interest. He smiles. He can feel it. 

"Pinky promise," he affirms, and he finally — finally — fully relaxes as he feels you curl into him. "Goodnight, honey."

"G'night, Spence."

[shockercoco]

Peas in a Pod

Elias 'Stack' Moore x reader

Warnings - swearing, fluff, reader’s nickname is Pea

Word count - 4814

a/n - this was supposed to be posted like two weeks ago after I saw the film, but I couldn't figure out an ending lol. I'm currently out for the summer so hopefully more time for imagines, but no promises. I hope you enjoy and thanks for reading :) Part 2 out now!

Summary: After years have passed since the twins left town, you figured your feelings for one of them had dissipated and you had moved on, but that doesn't seem to be the case.

“I know that ain’t Pea I see,” you hear a voice say from behind. 

It’s a voice you haven’t heard in years, but it sounds just as familiar. You’re looking at the selection of produce in front of you, but you freeze at the sound. It only takes you another moment to turn around to reveal Stack standing there before you. 

You had been a friend to the twins ever since you all were children. You spent most of your childhood ignoring the chores your mama had instructed and hanging out with the twins instead. 

As you all got older, the boys started making a reputation for themselves, and of course your mama would tell you to leave them alone, but you never stopped. The twins weren’t that bad. Well, at least not around you. 

You would be lying if you were to say you never had feelings for one of them. After spending the majority of your life with them, it became inevitable and you found yourself developing feelings for the more eccentric twin, Elias, but everyone called him Stack.

It wasn’t a secret that you were closer to Stack, though everyone just figured it was because of Smoke’s more quiet and laid back demeanor. You never told anyone about your crush except for Mary, one of your close friends, and of course she encouraged you to confess, but you never did.

When the twins left home after their father’s death, you weren’t mad at them. How could you be?  You were happy for them. You knew what they had to endure, and you were just glad they took the first chance they had to live out their dreams.

You also thought your feelings for Stack would fade over time, but that doesn’t seem to be the case. 

“Stack? Is that really you?” You question, your eyebrows raised at the man in front of you. 

Stack’s hands are tucked in the pockets of his dress pants, which match the rest of his nicely tailored suit. A hat sits atop his head as he stares back at you with a handsome smirk on his face.

“Yes ma’am, it is,” he nods. He removes his hat as he takes a couple of steps closer towards you.

Stack was definitely in shape before he left town, but that doesn’t compare to how he looks now. You’re taken aback, but before you end up staring too long, you clear your throat to say something.

“I almost didn’t recognize you with that giant bush sleeping on your lip,” you joke, referring to the thick, but neat mustache growing above his lip.

You can’t help the small smile that spreads across your face as you hear him chuckle.

“That’s real funny. I should be the one surprised, though. I mean, look at you. You finally grew into that forehead of yours,” Stack smirks.

You scoff. “How dare you,” you playfully say as you fold your arms across your chest, your tone light.

“No, how dare you. The ladies happen to love how I look, especially the mustache,” he grins proudly, rubbing his fingers over the facial hair.

“What are you trying to say, that I'm not a lady?”

A loud laugh leaves Stack this time. 

“Well, if the boot fits,” Stack says, holding his hands up in surrender. He knows how much you hate him saying that. He watches with a smile as you roll your eyes and shake your head at him. “I’m just playin’, Pea, you know I’d never say such a thing.”

Pea was a nickname you had become stuck with after meeting twins. One day while the three of you were out playing as children do, an older woman that everyone knew from the church had pointed at how you all resembled peas in a pod. 

After that, Stack had decided to call you ‘Pea’ once as a joke to which you just brushed off. Somehow, though, the nickname stuck and ever since then everyone refers to you as Pea. 

Hearing that name come out of his mouth after these years makes your stomach flutter and your skin heat up, which only makes the hot summer sun feel worse. The sweat on your skin suddenly feels more prominent with Stack’s eyes on you.

You start using the hand fan you were holding to try and provide yourself with some relief.

“What brings you back in town, Stack? I know it isn’t just some friendly conversation.”

“And why can’t it be?” He asks, furrowing his eyebrows. You give him a look calling his bluff, and he easily quits the act. “You still know me well, I see.”

“Unfortunately,” you smile.

“Smoke and I are openin’ our own juke joint. We figured we split up so I can recruit some entertainment while he handles some other business. Tonight is the openin’ night. That is, if we get everything situated in time.”

Your expression contorts in confusion. “Juke joint? Where?”

“One of the abandoned barnhouses not too far from here,” Stack responds, motioning in what you assume is the direction of the barn house.

“Where the hell did you get the money to buy all of that, and who was dumb enough to take it?” You ask, lowering your voice as you look around you.

“You know how those folks are—all they care about is the cash. It wasn't a problem.”

“And they just took your money like that with no questions asked?”

“Oh, the man asked questions,” Stack nods, “he just didn’t get the answers he wanted.”

The two of you are quiet for another moment, both work for the other one to crack, before you both burst into laughter.

“Still the same after all this time, huh?” you ask once you both settle down, although, it’s not really a question.

“I’m not changin’ for just anyone,” Stack responds, shooting you a wink.

Before the two of you could continue catching up, someone else runs up behind Stack calling his name. You didn’t notice how much the two of you were stuck in your own world until Stack turns away from you, breaking you out of the trance.

“What the hell do you want, Sammy?” You hear Stack ask.

Your eyes widen as you move to look around Stack’s frame, but your confusion turns into surprise as you take in the young man standing in front of him with a guitar hanging from his neck. “Sammy? As in lil’ Sammy? As in Preacher boy?”

When Sammy finally notices your presence, he gives you a shy smile and a tip of his hat. “Oh, Pea, what are you doin’ out here?”

“I should be asking you the same thing? Does your mama know you’re all the way out here?” You raise an eyebrow at him.

“She knows I’m with the twins, that’s all that matters,” Sammy says.

“I’ll take that as a no then,” you give him a look.

Sammy opens his mouth to say something else, but Stack hits the back of his head before he could continue. Sammy lets out a yelp as he looks up at Stack, while one of his hands rubs his head.

“You better have a damn good reason for comin’ over here and interruptin’ us.”

“Slim’s gettin’ tired of waitin’. He said to hurry up before he changes his mind because he’s getting older by the minute. He also said that there’ll be plenty of time to talk to pretty women t’night,” Sammy explains, glancing at you for the last part, but it goes over your head.

You follow Stack’s eyes when he looks over to Slim in the distance, a harmonica in one of his hands and a bottle in the other. Classic.

Stack mumbles something that you can’t quite hear, before telling Sammy to run off and that he’d be over in a second.

“I usually wouldn’t listen to a drunk, but he’s right. Daylight is wastin’ and I got some other things to take care of before tonight,” Stack admits. “You’ll be there, right?”

Oh.

“And what if I had plans?”

You don’t.

Stack laughs. “Oh, really? What plans?”

“You say it like you don’t believe me,” you raise an eyebrow.

“Oh, no, no. I’m just curious about these plans.”

“I’m a grown woman, I don’t have to tell you anything,” you huff.

“Fair enough, fair enough,” Stack nods in agreement. When he realizes you aren’t going to say anything else, he continues. “C’mon, Pea, it’ll be worth it. There’ll be good food and drinks along with good entertainment.”

“I take it that Sammy and Slim are part of that entertainment?” You ask. 

You tear your eyes away from Stack and to the small crowd beginning to form around the musical pair. Even from a distance you can hear Sammy’s powerful voice accompanied by Slim’s skilled fingers playing his harmonica.

“You know I only like the best of the best,” Stack smirks. “So, what do you say, Pea? It’ll be just like old times.”

“Hm, I don’t know. It’s not safe for a lady at night,” you say.

Yes, you do want to go, but parties were never really your thing. You usually chose to stay home when someone asked you, especially when the twins would try to encourage you to sneak out when you were kids.

“And I’ll make sure you’ll get home safe, there’s nothin’ to worry about. C’mon, I know Smoke is bringin’ Annie, don’t make me be the only one without a date.”

“Oh, so that’s why you want me to come, so you won’t be alone?” you give him a look.

“Of course, why else would I want you there?” he plays along, trying to keep a straight face, but fails.

“There’ll be plenty of other women without a date there to keep you company.”

“Yeah, but that don’t matter if I want you to be the one keepin’ me company,” Stack tells you.

And just like that all of those feelings that you thought were gone resurface, fluttering through your heart and stomach.

You hesitate for a moment, before finally giving him an answer. “I guess I could come. Besides, I want to be there to see if this juke joint of yours fails.”

“Now, that’s just wrong.”

~

Later that night as you’re getting ready, you can’t seem to calm your nerves. It’s just the twins—it’s just Stack. 

And it’s not like it’s a date anyways because why would it be? Or maybe it is? No, Stack just invited you so you could keep him company and so the two of you could catch up. But, why do you specifically need to keep him company?

You’re checking your appearance in the mirror, stuck in your thoughts as you turn from side to side,, when Mary walks into your room already dressed and ready to go.

“By the time we get there, the damn party will be over. What is the hold up?” Mary throws her hands up for dramatics.

“Would you relax? The party doesn’t start for, like, another 30 minutes, and we don’t want to be too early do we?” You tell her, looking at her through the reflection in the mirror.

“I just figured you’d want to be early in order to have as much time with Stack as possible.” Mary smirks at the glare you give her. “I mean, it’s been so long since he’s last been in town, aren’t you excited? I would be.”

“I don’t know if that’s the word I’d use.”

“Why, what’s wrong? Don’t tell me you're nervous.”

Your silence is enough of an answer. You fiddle with your dress and adjust yourself in order to avoid looking over at Mary. Mary scoffs and walks over to stand next to you as you look in the mirror.

“Oh come on, you can’t be serious. There’s no reason you should be nervous over that man. You guys have been friends since birth-“

“Not birth, it was more like-“

Mary raises a hand to cut you off and finally makes you face her. “You know what I’m trying to say. You guys have practically known each other since the beginning. Stack knows everything about you and you know everything about Stack—well, that is excludin’ whatever the hell the twins have been doing these past couple of years.”

“That’s exactly my point,” you throw your hands up before taking a step back and placing your hands on your hip. “I mean, yeah, we’ve written to each other while he’s been away, but it’s been a while since we’ve actually talked face to face. It seems like he’s still the same, but if he’s not? What if he actually has changed?”

You can feel your nerves picking up at the thought of talking to Stack tonight and all the possibilities of how tonight will go.

Mary knows you like the back of her hand, and your overthinking doesn’t go unnoticed. 

Mary rolls her eyes. “Please, that man is exactly the same as he was the day he left here. Besides, you saw him earlier today, were you nervous when you were talkin’ to him then?”

“Well, not really, but I didn’t exactly have time to be. He snuck up on me while I was shopping and we just started talking.”

“Exactly, the two of you are so close that you started talkin’ like nothin’ has changed. Believe me, everything’ll be fine, and when Stack sees you in this dress, he’ll fall to his knees to propose. If he doesn’t just come and find me so I can handle his ass.”

You snicker as you walk away from Mary to finish getting ready. She follows right behind you.

“Relax, Stack is not going to pick me to propose to out of all the beautiful women in this town. Not to mention all the women he’s probably encountered during his travels.”

“A girl can dream can’t she? Just suckin’ all the fun out of my night.”

-

The noise from the juke joint can be heard all the way down the road, the sounds only getting louder and more clear as you and Mary approach. Your heart speeds up in both anticipation and nervousness as you take in the scene. 

Dozens can be seen either arriving on foot or by car, their excitement obvious from miles away. The land outside the farmhouse is packed with vehicles and it’s obvious there will be many more given the constant flow of traffic.

Cornbread’s eyes widen in surprise as he watches from the entrance as you and Mary walk up. He greets you with a smile.

“You two look gorgeous, but I’ll be damned, Pea. What brings you here? I know this ain’t your kinda scene,” he points out.

You playfully point at Mary, “You’re looking right at the culprit. She convinced me to come.”

“I shoulda known,” Cornbread shakes his head in amusement, but then his expression shifts to confusion as he looks at Mary. “Wait a minute, ain’t you married? What are you doing out this late?”

Mary folds her arms across her chest. “I could ask you the same, don’t you have a family to take care of?” Mary asks while folding her arms across her chest.

Cornbread puts his hands up in surrender. “Stack offered me a good amount of cash to be here tonight, I’m not turnin’ that down.”

“And I don’t blame you. Now, are you going to let us come in or are you going to leave two ladies stranded outside all night?” Mary questions.

Cornbread lets out a laugh, but quickly moves aside to let you both in.

The dusty, rundown appearance of the barnhouse from the outside is a completely different vibe from the atmosphere on the inside. 

Slim is playing his heart out at the piano at the front of the room while people laugh and dance to the music. Lights are hanging from the ceiling, illuminating the space as guests move around freely. The mouthwatering smell of freshly fried catfish fills the air along with the smell of sweat and alcohol.

“Wow, the twins definitely outdid themselves didn’t they?” Mary admits as the both of you take in everything.

“They really did,” you murmur mostly to yourself, your mind still stuck and amazed at how Smoke and Stack pulled this off.

“We can’t start dancing without a drink,” Mary smirks.

“Yeah, you can, it’s easy,” you say.

Mary gives you a look before saying, “Well, if you’re going to talk to Stack, you’re gonna need a little something in your system.”

You open your mouth to object, but you decide against it.. Alcohol does loosen you up, which would help you get through the night.

When Mary doesn’t hear a response, she pulls you towards the bar. After Mrs. Chow hands you both your drinks, the two of you decide to linger at the bar.

“Is that Lil Sammy over there flirtin’ with a girl?” Mary asks you. 

You turn to look in the direction of Mary’s eyes to, sure enough, see Sammy flirting with a woman—a woman who looks a little bit older than him.

“Isn’t she married?” Mary continues.

“Well so are you, but you’re still here tonight,” you say. 

This makes Mary whip her head back towards you and send you a glare, one you pretend to ignore as you take a sip of your drink and pretend to be really interested in the guests dancing to the music.

“Yeah, that’s what I thought,” she says after you don’t respond, before a smile grows on her face.

Suddenly you hear a gasp come from behind the bar, catching your attention and making you turn around. You see Smoke, Stack, and Annie come from a back room.

“Am I seein’ things or is that really Pea standin’ in front of me at a party?” Annie smiles, her hands on her hips.

You playfully roll your eyes. “No, you’re not seeing things.”

Annie makes her way from behind the bar to give you a hug, and after she pulls away, Smoke comes up to do the same. The way Stack looks you up and down as you hug Smoke goes unnoticed by you but not by Mary as she watches with a smirk. Stack notices Mary’s eyes on him and quickly clears his throat.

“I’m glad you came,” Stack says, smiling at you as he comes up to hug you last.

“Well I couldn’t miss the famous Moore twins’ big grand opening,” you beam, motioning to the large crowd that has formed. Smoke smiles at your compliment. “I don’t know how you guys pulled it off, but everything looks great. I’m impressed.”

“Nothin’ is too out of reach for us,” Smoke adds with a nod. Stack claps his brother on the back as a sign of his agreement.

“Alright, enough of this lovey dovey shit. Let’s get this place poppin’ like fish grease and get it started for real!” Stack exclaims with a smirk.

Stack walks over to Sammy, pulling him away from the woman he was talking to and motions to the stage. As Sammy joins Slim at the front, people begin to gather around to listen. 

Now, you knew Sammy was talented, but watching him sing his heart out and play the hell out of his guitar gave you goosebumps and made you emotional.

It was obvious that you weren’t the only one who felt this way as you notice everyone’s expressions change as they begin to cheer and clap while they move their bodies to the rhythm. Close friends, couples, and singles make their way about the room.

Much to your dismay, Mary pulls you into the dancing crowd. You’re uncertain of what to do with yourself at first, but after seeing everyone in their own world, the body movements just come naturally. 

You watch with admiration and a smile as Smoke grabs Annie to join him for a dance. Even after all of that time apart, Smoke and Annie still seem to be as in love with each other as the first day they met. The little bit of alcohol you have on your system does make a difference.

Your eyes wander just a little bit to the right and you see Stack dancing with two women. It’s no secret that the twins are attractive, but oh how you wish for just one night where women didn’t climb all over them—mainly Stack.

After a while, you become overheated and overstimulated with all the hot bodies surrounding you. Once you tell Mary that you’ll be back, you leave to find a place to take a breather.

You come across a set of stairs and somehow find yourself overlooking the inside of the entire building. 

You catch sight of Mary from your spot and laugh to yourself at how easily it is for her to find some stranger to dance with.

Eventually, someone else makes their way up the stairs and stands next to you. Your nostrils become aware of him before your eyes do.

“Too much goin’ on down there?” Stack asks as he leans on the railing and takes in the view.

“Just needed a little break,” you shrug, your eyes still on the crowd below you. “What about you, don’t you have some guests to entertain? This is your place after all.”

“As an owner, I have people to do the entertainin’ for me. I just make sure there are no problems,” Stack responds, the smirk evident in his tone.

There’s a moment of comfortable silence that grows between the two of you. Earlier you were stressing on what would happen once you saw Stack, but here he is, and your heartbeat is still somewhat calm.  

“How’s everything, Pea?” Stack asks, breaking the silence. 

“Oh, you know, just getting through day by day and taking things slow,” you shrug.

“What are you up to these days?” 

“Helping my mama out with the shop most days. When I’m not working I’m running errands around town or helping others out.”

“How’s the shop and your mama doin’?”

“Mama’s great. Her happiness really comes from the shop and being able to have a safe place for people to come back to over and over again. We’re still getting plenty of customers, and we’ve recently renovated it.”

Stack nods along. “That’s good, that’s good. How are you doing though?”

You raise an eyebrow at him. “You already asked that.”

“I phrased it differently this time, though. First time was more of a casual ask and this time I wanna know what’s really goin’ on with you.”

You’re slightly taken aback by his forwardness, until you remember that this is how Stack has always been.

Stack turns his body to face yours, keeping an elbow on the railing. “Come on now, Junebug. It’s been a long time since we’ve sat down and talked down and talked, y’know?”

“Is this really the time to be having a conversation like this?” you ask.

Stack is quick but genuine with his reply. “For you, there’s always time.”

The nerves the alcohol had been holding back, finally hit you with full force after hearing his words. Your heart rate begins to pick up, and you’re suddenly extremely aware of the high temperature in the building. 

You wish you had brought a fan with you.

Stack’s eyes never leave yours as he waits for an answer, not even when you hear a glass bottle break somewhere in the crowd below you. 

You give him a shy smile, but you have to tear your eyes away from him.

“I’m fine, really Stack. You know, you never told me exactly how you got the money for all this.”

Stack scoffs. “I know you didn’t just try and change the conversation.”

“It worked didn’t it,” you laugh. Stack shakes his head in disappointment, but he can’t help the laugh that slips out.

“That’s alright, Pea. There’ll be plenty of time to talk since Smoke and I aren’t goin’ anywhere anytime soon.”

Your heart flutters.

“Really?” you ask, and you wish you would’ve been able to stop your voice from changing pitch. 

Damn.

“Just admit that you missed us,” Stack smirks.

“I don’t know, I mean, I feel like everyone’s life has been calm without you and Smoke being here to terrorize everyone.”

“That was one time! Plus, Jimmy had it comin’. I can’t let anyone steal from us and just walk away without a scratch,” Stack throws his head back as he laughs.

“Well, yeah, but that doesn’t mean you had to chase him all over,” you join in, beginning to double over in laughter. 

“It was either me or Smoke, and that boy Smoke was fumin’ when he found out, so it was better that Jenkins dealt with me instead of him,” Stack snorts.

“Whew, I remember that day like it was yesterday. Y’all had the whole town confused with Jimmy running by screaming bloody murder.”

“And I hadn’t even done anything to him yet!”

You clutch your stomach as you try to collect yourself, wiping the tears from your eyes as you blow out a breath. Stack does the same alongside you. 

“I really did miss you, y’know,” Stack admits.

And there goes your breath.

“Of course you did, why wouldn’t you,”you say, causing Stack to smile, “but I’m sure you and Smoke had plenty of fun on your adventures with seeing new places and meeting all those new people. You didn’t meet any women after all this time?”

“There were a few women, but none of 'em kept me interested.”

You roll your eyes. “Oh, yeah, I forgot who I was talking to for a second. No one is good enough to tie you down, right?”

Stack pretends to think to himself for a second, before speaking, “Well, there is one person that I’m thinkin’ about.”

Your heart drops so low it almost hits the first floor of the barnhouse.

You clear your throat and keep your eyes in front of you. “And does this woman know that you like her?”

“I don’t think so.”

“What makes you say that? I’m sure you’ve made your flirting pretty obvious.”

Stack has never been one to keep his feelings to himself. If he sees a lady he likes, he’ll pursue her and most likely succeed.

“She’s on the shy side, so I don’t think she realizes. She keeps to herself and thinks others don’t notice her.”

Who has he been hanging around with? Didn’t he just get back in town. 

“I’m sure she does.”

“Nah, I don’t think she does,” Stack shakes his head with a sly smile. “You wanna bet?”

“I don’t have anything to bet, but sure.”

“How about if I’m right and she doesn’t know, then you have to dance with me,” Stack smirks, raising his eyebrows at you.

“And if I’m right?”

“What would you like in return?”

You contemplate for a moment. “For you to tell me in detail how you got the money to afford this barnhouse.”

Stack rolls his eyes. “You’re on.”

“So, who is it?”

Stack turns toward the railing once again, a teasing look on his face. “You sure you just don’t wanna know because you’re jealous?”

“You think you’re funny, huh?”

Stack chuckles in response, before going quiet. Then, there’s a moment of silence where you give him a look as you wait for an answer.

“You.”

You.

You feel your heart stop. “Me?” you ask, not fully believing him yet. Stack gives you a nod, and you try to look for any sign of lying on his face, but you can’t find any. “Stack, be serious for a second.”

“I am, Pea.”

All of a sudden, the music being played in the background just sounds like noise. You feel nauseous, relieved, confused, and happy all at once. 

“What the hell do you mean?” you ask. Your voice is quieter now as you look up at him. 

Before Stack could give you an answer, he’s interrupted by a voice from down below.

“Yo, Stack, come on down he-!” Sammy shouts, but cuts himself with the look that Smoke shoots at him. 

Stack clenches his jaw and whips his head towards Sammy. “Sammy, I’m gonna come down there and beat your ass. You need to learn when to read the room. Matter o’fact, I should come down there and break that damn guitar.”

“But you gave it to me.”

“And now I’m about to come take it away,” Stack replies causally. He makes a move to turn and walk down the stairs, but stops himself to look at you. “We’ll finish this conversation later, I promise,” he tells you, before giving you a quick wink and continuing down the stairs.

Then you hear, “Don’t run now, Sammy.”

Mary’s eyes meet yours from below, giving you one of her signature smirks. 

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