#i am a fountain of content today boys | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

m1ckeyb3rry · 11 months ago

Text

Pomegranate Ink: XXIX

Series Synopsis: Unable to heal but willing to fight, with a fiancé in Kyoto and a last name that looms over everything you do, you accept an offer to study at Tokyo Jujutsu Tech. What you did not know was that your salvation and your ruination alike would soon join you at the school, neatly wrapped in the form of a boy followed by death.

Chapter Synopsis: A small glimpse into your mother’s past and how she came to be associated with the L/Ns.

Series Masterlist

Pairing: Yuta Okkotsu × Female Reader

Chapter Word Count: 8.0k

Content Warnings: angst, misogyny, naoya zenin, forbidden relationships, canon-typical violence, character death, original characters included

A/N: y’all…toji is TOO POPULAR for me to feel confident writing him 😭 if he’s ooc i’m sorry this is the only chapter he’s in so i am afraid you all will just have to deal with it. we will be back to the regularly scheduled y/n & co. shenanigans next chapter don’t worry

He was there again. Every day, she made a point to look and see if he was, and without fail, she always found him in some or another odd place. She didn’t really understand what he was ever doing, exactly, nor what business he had in the area, but she supposed it was a popular enough place that she could not find any suspicion in his presence.

It was more like a game for her than anything, trying to spot him, to pick him out of the crowd. Today, he was sitting on the edge of a fountain, flicking through a magazine too fast to actually be reading any of it. Almost as soon as she had noticed him, he tossed the magazine aside and got up, stretching like a cat and leaving the magazine behind to slide into the clear waters of the fountain.

She noticed it was one of the ones that had her face on the cover. It was definitely a coincidence — after all, nowadays more magazines had her face on them than not — but for some reason, she found herself flattered anyways.

There wasn’t much she could say about the man; it wasn’t as if she knew him or anything. He had dark hair. He generally wore casual clothing. He had an imposing presence but also a knack for slipping into the shadows, vanishing without a trace despite how much attention he naturally should’ve demanded. That was about it.

Sometimes, it felt like she was the only one who could even saw him. Everyone else’s eyes slid right over him, no matter where he was, and more than once she wondered if he was as much a figment of her imagination as those strange monsters she sometimes saw creeping about. Well, if that was the case, then he was the best hallucination her mind had ever conjured up, and she’d not complain about them quite as much if more of them resembled him instead of the grotesque, twisted beings that haunted her daily anew.

Unlike those other things, she actually even liked seeing him. On days when work was entirely too much and she’d have to go home alone and sit in her empty apartment and cry as she tried to eat dinner, those few seconds of admiring the man were the closest thing to real human connection she got. The man didn’t demand anything from her. He didn’t talk to her or ask for her autograph or shamelessly try to touch her. It didn’t matter to him that she was a famous model. He didn’t even know she existed, and she found comfort in that kind of anonymity. She was just a passerby to him, as he was to her.

“Oh, hey. Just so you know,” her manager said as she zipped up her coat and pulled on her shoes, “you should probably cut back on the calories. If you gain much more weight, it’ll be hard for you to get new jobs.”

She glanced at the portly man out of the corner of her eye, weighing the merits of telling him to follow his own advice before deciding it wouldn’t be worth it.

“No one else has said anything,” she said. The manager shrugged.

“It’s your own livelihood on the line,” he said. “But fine. Do as you please. It hardly matters to me.”

“You’ll never have another client as lucrative as me, so I’d say it does matter to you,” she said. He made a face at her but did not respond — likely he could not think of any sort of rebuttal. She sighed. “Alright. I’ll be careful.”

“Good,” he said. “You’re fine to walk alone again?”

“Yes, it’s okay,” she said, though more because she knew the manager did not have the time to drive her than anything. Her apartment wasn’t far enough to warrant hiring a driver for the short trip, and even though she was so famous, it would be fine as long as she kept her hood up and her head ducked. It was nice outside, too, with nothing more than a slight evening chill in the air, so all in all she didn’t mind.

As she waited for the crosswalk light to turn green, she noticed something undulating in her peripheral vision. With as much dread as resignation in her posture, she turned so that she could see the enormous winged serpent in full, gulping at its towering stature. It was the biggest one yet — did that mean that it was getting worse?

Even though her doctor said there was nothing wrong with her, she couldn’t stop herself from picking up on those beings’ presences everywhere she went. It was almost as if they were chasing her or something, though they took different forms each time. And despite knowing that none of it was real, she felt a jolt of terror with every appearance, every new way that her brain decided to torture her.

This one was the worst, along with being or perhaps because it was the grandest. It exuded an aura of awesome power, with feathery wings lining its scaled body, something blue and formless dripping from its mouth. Blood? Did this kind of creature even have blood to begin with, or was it something else? Poison? Entrails? She couldn’t be sure, but she had this sense that whatever it was, she probably did not want to know, would not like having that knowledge once she did.

The monster stared directly at her with eyes of a bright gold shade — though it was not the gold of the sun, never as benevolent or gentle as that; rather, it was a gold like dehydration, clouded and muggy like dog piss on a white carpet.

So transfixed was she by that stare, she did not notice the man until he was standing in front of the serpent, a knife in one hand, the other on his hip, like he was sizing up a typical situation instead of the most terrifying thing she had ever seen.

The monster screeched at the man in challenge, but this earned nothing more than a dry chuckle out of him.

“Thank you!” he called out over his shoulder. “I owe you, lady. You’ve just made my job a lot easier.”

“Me?” she said. The crosswalk turned green, but she did not dare cross, not when the man she always looked for was there in front of her, facing off against the beast of her own imagining.

“Yeah, you,” he said. “Man, I hate owing people. How about I promise to watch over you when I can and we call it a deal?”

“What are you talking about?” she said, bewildered.

“I don’t have any money, so don’t expect that!” he said. “This is the best you’ll get, so just be grateful!”

“I don’t care about money! Can you see that thing?” she shouted at him. “That’s what’s important to me! Can you see it? Is it really there?”

He was far enough away that she couldn’t discern if he reacted. A car honked at her, the driver opening their window and shouting at her to hurry up and move. It only drew her attention for a brief moment, but that was enough; by the time she looked back to the winged serpent and the man, both had vanished.

After that, she stopped being able to find him. She tried for a while, craned her neck and tilted her head, searching for him in the most random places she could think of, but she never saw him in the square again. What she wouldn’t give to see him lounging around by the fountain, pretending to read a magazine! Or sitting in the window seat at a cafe, sipping on a drink with a book open yet unread in front of him. It was more than just her earlier fascination — now, she had genuine reason to meet him. He was the first person who could see those things, too, and she wanted to ask him what it meant. She wanted to ask him what they were, if they were real, if he was real.

It was many months later that she saw him once more, and by that point she had convinced herself that she had dreamt his entire existence up in a flight of fancy. A handsome man that fought the demons plaguing her night and day? It was definitely something that only a desperate woman would think of.

No matter what position she twisted into, no matter how hard she smiled, the designer wasn’t satisfied. First, he claimed that she wasn’t truly embodying the essence of his line, then he bemoaned how she took all the attention off of the clothes and onto her face, and finally he just started coming up with random things to criticize.

“Your people are the ones who did my makeup!” she snapped when he started complaining about how her lipstick was too red. Ripping off the jacket she was supposed to be showcasing at the moment, she balled it up and threw it at his forehead. “You can just go ahead and find a new model, if you’re going to harass me like this!”

“Hey!” her manager said as she stormed out of the room, his short legs churning to keep up with her. “Hey, you’re ruining your own career here! Do you think you can just get away with a performance like that? You’re going to be labeled as a high-maintenance bitch from now on, do you get it? And no one likes to work with high-maintenance bitches!”

“Oh, go on and let them call me that,” she said, blinking back her tears so that her mascara did not run and give her a ridiculous, raccoon-eyed appearance on her walk back home. “I know that you agree with the assessment, so why are you even trying to act like my reputation is important to you?”

He got a commission for every job she did. That was why it was important to him. There was no other reason; if she stopped paying him, he would vanish, just like every other person in her life.

“The tabloids won’t just accept this,” he warned her. “This could seriously ruin your career. If you go back and grovel, he might consider forgiving you, but you have to be fast.”

“No,” she said. “I’m done for today.”

“You’re insufferable!” her manager said. “Alright? You’re an insufferable whore that thinks she’s special because she’s pretty. Well, there’s a million other pretty girls in just this city alone!”

“Work with one of them, then,” she said.

She knew he wouldn’t. He knew, too, so he just groaned as she let the door slam shut behind her, the only outlet she had for her irritation.

It was like her life was not her own. She was less model and more mannequin, her personal feelings a lesser concern for the people who only saw her as a poseable doll. To be sure, it was something to be expected from the profession she had chosen, but more and more, she was beginning to think that maybe she had picked the wrong career after all.

“It’s her!” someone behind her whispered.

“Are you sure?” their companion whispered back. She furrowed her brow, wondering what they could be discussing and hoping beyond hope that it didn’t have anything to do with her. She hadn’t had the time to go about donning her typical disguise, but she had been praying that it was dark enough out by this time that no one would pay her any mind.

It had been a foolish hope. She sped up her pace, the lights of the main road so close, never closer — yet never further, either. She just had to make it there. She just had to make it, and then it would be alright. Internally, she swore at her manager for not offering to drive her home, though of course she had been the one to leave before he could. Anyways, she wouldn’t have taken him up on it even if he hadoffered, so the only person she could really blame was herself, but it made her feel marginally better to swear at the man who, according to her, very closely resembled a swine.

“We’ll definitely get a good price,” the person whispered.

“Won’t people look for her, though?” their companion said. They must not have realized that she could hear them. She was almost running at this point, but the street never grew any nearer, not in any meaningful way. Just a few steps more. Just a few more, and she’d be okay.

“The kind of people that’d pay for her have ways to cover these things up,” the person said. “Shit!”

They weren’t even being discreet. Footsteps pounded on the concrete behind her as they realized they were running out of time, and of course neither of them were wearing heels, so they caught up with her in an instant, one of them clapping their hand over her mouth, the other grabbing her hands and holding them behind her back.

She tried screaming, but it was muffled through the first assailant’s clammy palm, and the second’s grip was too strong for her to break from, no matter how much she thrashed. They started dragging her backwards, so she dug her feet into the pavement, but it was two against one and she had never been that strong, anyways, so it was a losing battle.

“Alright!” the first person cheered. “We’re going to make out like kings after this!”

“Think we can retire?” their companion said. “It’ll be nice to not have to work much anymore.”

“Probably not,” a third voice said. This one was familiar, and her eyes widened when she heard the rough tones she had thought she made up to soothe herself in her panic. “You likely won’t even live much longer, if I’m being honest, so you can just forget about retirement at all.”

Two loud bangs, and then the hands on her went slack. She stumbled away from them, spinning around to see that both of them were on the ground, blood pooling from the twin bullet wounds in their temples. This prompted a scream from her, and she used her arms to cover her head in case she was next.

“You can quit it with that,” he said. It was the man, there was no doubt about it; slowly, she lowered her arms, peeking at him through narrowed eyes. He was standing there innocently, hands empty and face blank, entirely at odds with the two bodies lying by his feet. “I’m just paying you back for the other time.”

“What?” she said.

“Didn’t I tell you I’d look out for you when I got the chance, since you drew that curse out for me? I happened to be in the area and decided I’d visit you to settle the debt once and for, and look at that! I got the perfect chance to do exactly what I intended to,” he said.

Up close, the details of his face became strikingly evident. His eyes were a cutting green like bottle shards, and there was a scar on the edge of his mouth, lending him a dangerous appearance, though she thought he didn’t really need that for the effect. He looked plenty dangerous enough without it, so it was an addition that was more like an extravagance than anything.

“Who are you?” she said, taking off one shoe and pointing it heel-first at him like a weapon. “Answer me! Are you real?”

He grimaced. “Uh, yeah.”

This was at odds with everything her doctors had told her, so taking a gamble, she hurled the shoe at him. It hit his chest and bounced off, clattering to the ground into the puddles of blood he stood beside, crimson quickly overtaking the once-white leather. The man looked at her in disbelief, like he was more shocked than offended that she had dared to do that.

“You’re definitely corporeal,” she said.

“Why did you throw a shoe at me?” he said, phrasing it like a statement instead of a question.

“I was checking to see if you were actually physically here or if I was just imagining things again,” she explained. “Anyways, since it seems like you might really be a true person, what’s your name?”

“Why would I tell you that?” he said.

“I’m sure you already know what mine is,” she said.

“Yes,” he said. “Obviously. There’s not a soul in Tokyo that doesn’t.”

“Right, so it’s only fair that you give me yours in exchange,” she said.

“It’s not my fault that you wanted your name plastered on every billboard, news ad, and magazine cover in the country! That’s your own doing, so why would I owe you my name for it?” he said.

“So I can pay you back,” she said. “For saving my life and all. Would you prefer a check or cash? I can do either, but I’d need your name for it.”

At this, the man’s eyes grew starry. It was like that, usually; people would do a lot more for money than they would otherwise, and he was no exception. Especially because, if she was remembering their last interaction correctly, he did not have much of his own — it was an easy way to incentivize him.

“Toji Zenin,” he said.

“Toji,” she repeated. “Or would you rather I call you Zenin?”

“Toji is fine,” he said. “I’m not that fond of the Zenins.”

“Alright,” she said. “How much do you want in return?”

“You’re telling me to name my price?” he said. She shrugged.

“I can’t put a monetary value on my life, but I’m sure you can put one on your labor, so I’ll leave the negotiations up to you,” she said.

“I won’t turn you down, but for the sake of good business ethics and client relations, I’ll remind you that I did technically only do this because I was paying you back in the first place,” he said.

“Then consider it payment for telling me your name, and for being real,” she said. “What do you want? I can give it to you, no matter how much it is.”

“Getting paid for being real,” Toji said under his breath, like he couldn’t quite believe his luck. “Okay, I won’t argue with that. But, you know, being real is a difficult thing to do.”

“You don’t have to tell me twice,” she said. “Believe me, I’m well aware of the fact.”

“One such difficulty is that real people have to eat,” he continued.

“Tell that to my manager,” she said.

“Once a week,” he said, holding up his index finger for emphasis, ignoring her quips. “That’s how often you have to take me out for food. You will pay, but we will go to places of my choosing, and I will order however much I want. If one of us can’t make it one week, then we will go twice the following week.”

Her manager would definitely kill her. Going out to eat once a week without even getting to choose the location was a surefire method for losing that carefully maintained body of hers. But maybe that was why she agreed — she wasn’t all too fond of that body, the one that barely even belonged to her in the first place.

She held out her hand. “Deal.”

“Deal,” he said, taking it and shaking it firmly. “Give me your phone number. I’ll tell you when and where to pick me up for next week.”

She couldn’t deny that the first few times were awkward. Toji would eat whatever he ordered — which was always the fanciest thing on the menu — and then leave with nothing more than a stiff, routine ‘thank you.’ It didn’t offend her much; she was just happy to have some kind of company, and the one day a week they saw each other was often the only thing she looked forward to.

“Damn,” he said one day, dropping a magazine in front of her as she tried to read the menu she had been given by the waiter that had seated them both. “What’d you do to piss this many people off?”

“People don’t like it when you throw their ugly clothes at them and walk out during shoots because of their unreasonable demands,” she said, not even looking at the magazine. She knew exactly which one it was and what the contents of the article were; her manager had been right, unfortunately. High-maintenance bitch. She was in fact labeled with many names along those lines, and though it hadn’t impacted her work schedule too much yet, they all knew it was a matter of time before brands began refusing to work with her for fear of the negative press she might bring them.

Toji guffawed. “Is throwing things at people a common pastime for you?”

“I’ve only done it twice,” she said. “Do you think I’m any good? Maybe I’ll take up baseball once my modeling career ends.”

He considered this, likely thinking back to when she had thrown her shoe at him, and then he shook his head.

“You should probably stick with modeling for as long as you can,” he said. She laughed in surprised delight.

“Fine, then!” she said. “I’m sure you know best.”

“I’m sure I do,” he said.

“Typical,” she said. “Oh, and speaking of knowing…there’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you.”

“What?” he said, abruptly wary. She didn’t blame it; it definitely sounded like a different kind of confession when she started off like that, but that wasn’t something either of them were interested in. She hastened to make her point in order to clear up any misunderstandings.

“I think we’ve established that you’re real,” she said.

“I’m not really sure why that was ever in question, to be frank,” he said.

“You can see the monsters, too,” she said. “That’s why. I’ve never met anyone who can; my parents always thought I had an overactive imagination, and the doctors prescribed every medicine in the book but could never compe up with a solution that lasted. They always come back. But then you came along, and I thought I must’ve dreamt you up, too, because you were actually able to see that winged serpent, yet you’re real, which means that those things are, too.”

Toji was silent for a bit, mulling over what she had said, chewing on the appetizers that she had ordered for the both of them as he did so. She thought he might not answer at all, but eventually, he cleared his throat.

“Yeah,” he said.

“Yeah?” she repeated.

“Yeah, they’re real,” he said. “You’re not imaginative or insane or seeing things. You just have an extra sense that not everyone does.”

“Like you?” she said.

“Nope,” he said. “I don’t have it, either, or at least not in the way that you do.”

“I’m a little confused,” she admitted.

“Honestly, it’s not something you have to understand. Just be happy with what I’ve told you; it’s all too confusing to go over at one time, so I won’t bother,” he said.

“What about more than one time?” she said.

“Hm?” he said.

“You said it’s too confusing to go over at one time, but you don’t have to do it all at once. Every time we meet, you can tell me a little more, and in that way we can cover everything,” she said.

“I wouldn’t know where to start,” he said, shifting in his seat uncomfortably, obviously unhappy with the proposition. Ordinarily, she would’ve respected his wishes, but not this time. Not when he was her only chance at getting answers about the things she had been seeing for so long.

“One question. Answer one question of mine every time, and I’ll be alright with that,” she bargained.

“Only one?” he said.

“Only one,” she agreed. He nodded.

“You better think of good questions, because I’m holding you to that,” he said. “I don’t do work for free. One question is all you get, and only because you’ve been allowing me to get dessert, too.”

“I didn’t realize that dessert wasn’t included in the original deal,” she said.

“I wasn’t about to tell you otherwise,” he said. She could only shake her head in response, too amused to be irritated, not when she had more than enough money to afford it.

The next few dinners felt more like interviews, though this time, she was the interviewer instead of the interviewee. It was a pleasant change, even if Toji was a terrible person to ask questions to, only giving exactly what was necessary to answer and nothing more.

“So, what are the monsters officially called?”

“Curses.”

“Curses?”

“Why’re you so surprised by that? It’s a pretty obvious name for that kind of thing.”

Bit by bit, she learned more about the world of sorcery, though she was no closer to figuring out what kind of person he was. He was generally private and closed off, so once her curiosity about curses and techniques and jujutsu society waned, she began steering her questions in a different direction.

“Why do you not like the Zenins?”

“Buncha assholes.”

“Is that all?”

“That’s more than one question.”

He was even more dodgy about answering these kinds of inquiries, to the point that she could probably recite his entire family line by heart but was still no closer to knowing anything meaningful about him. It didn’t seem like those were things he was interested in sharing.

“I’ll ask you a question this time,” Toji said one day. “If you hate modeling so much, then why do you it?”

He had been privy to more than one session of complaining on her part. He wasn’t that talkative, and he was so far removed from the rest of her life that it was simple to tell him about whatever was on her mind and not fear retribution. He didn’t really care enough to go tell the tabloids about whatever she was annoyed about at the moment, and besides, she had at least picked up on the fact that his line of work was unsavory, which meant that he probably couldn’t go to any news source without ending up on the front page himself.

“It’s the only thing I’m good for,” she said, stabbing at a piece of lettuce with her fork. Toji raised his eyebrows at her. “I mean, obviously I’m good looking.”

“Obviously.”

“That was sarcastic, but I’m taking it as a compliment anyways,” she said.

“Go ahead.”

“Anyways, my entire life, people have only ever wanted to be near me for my beauty. I suppose I got used to it and figured I might as well get paid for it. You’ll pity me for it, but it’s not really a stretch for me to say you’re the best friend I’ve ever had,” she said.

“Me,” he said dubiously. “The best friend you’ve ever had.”

“Yes, it’s true. You’re the only person that talks to me as a person instead of just to my body or face,” she said. “You don’t think I’m automatically stupid because I’m pretty. You don’t think I automatically want to sleep with you because I happened to look your way. You don’t think I automatically do or am anything; you just treat me like you would treat anyone else, which I’m sure other people would be offended by, but I actually really like it. I don’t mind how short you are with me. It’s better that you’re true to yourself than being overly nice to me just because you think you have a chance at getting with me or something.”

“This is me being nice, by the way,” he said, pouting childishly. “But you’re right in that I don’t want anything of the sort out of you. I’m using you for your wallet, not your figure.”

“That’s fine,” she said, exhaling at the joke. “I don’t mind that. At least it’s something different than the usual.”

The nicest thing about Toji was that nobody ever seemed to want to take pictures of him. When she was sitting across from him, everyone left her alone, and she could have some peace, a break from the constant flashing lights that constituted the rest of her life. In this sense, he was her respite, the only chance she had to be a woman her own age instead of a celebrity constantly in the public eye.

She couldn’t help it. It was to be expected; what kind of person could spend so much time with someone else and not end up loving them? It didn’t matter that he was blunt at the best of times and downright cold at the worst. It didn’t matter that he was, as he had confided in her once, essentially an assassin, working in the underworld of jujutsu society after leaving his family behind. Maybe these things should’ve been warning signals, but for someone as lonely as her, they were easy to ignore in favor of the fact that he paid attention to her, that he didn’t care about anything but who she was.

“You know, you’re actually not too bad looking yourself,” she said one time, analyzing him with a trained, objective eye that was generally nothing but critical. He grinned at her.

“Only good thing those shitty Zenins ever did for me,” he said.

“You should thank them,” she said.

“Mm, no,” he said. “Thanks for the suggestion, though.”

“Then maybe I will,” she said. “In your stead.”

“Don’t do that to yourself. Meeting the Zenins is the last thing I want for you,” he said. Even though he tried to keep his same cold expression on his face, she detected the faintest twitching at the corner of his lips, the barest traces of a softer sort of smile than she had ever noticed on him.

“Are all of the clans as terrible as the Zenins?” she said. He had mentioned in the past that jujutsu society was run by a few powerful families; the Zenin were the extreme upper echelon, rivaled by only two other clans, but there were a few other families that had fair amounts of influence themselves.

“Is that your question for today?” he said. She hummed in agreement. “Well, on the whole, jujutsu society is like that, yes, but with some families, it just comes down to the leadership at the time. The family of healers, the L/Ns, are generally well-regarded, though. They’re known for being kind and just.”

“Healers?” she said. Even though it was a secondary question, he did not chide her for it.

“Yes, they can use something called a Reverse Cursed Technique to heal wounds and regenerate lost limbs. Using the power to that extent on other people is unique to their family, so they’re highly valued, but because none of them can fight, they have to stay humble or risk the wrath of the other clans. Due to that, they don’t do anything majorly out of line. The heir is our age, actually; he’s uptight as anything, though, so he dislikes me on principle and we never grew to be friends,” he said.

“That’s frustrating,” she said. “I wish they wouldn’t all treat you like that!”

“Like what?” he said. He was so tenured to it, she had come to understand, that it didn’t even impact him anymore. It no longer hurt him, what the Zenins and indeed all of jujutsu society had done to him, so he was typically surprised when it hurt her.

“Like you’re something less than all of them. You’re the best person I know, so how can that be?” she said.

“If I’m the best person you know, then you need to get out more,” he said.

“Maybe that’s true,” she admitted.

“Really, though,” he said. “I don’t know how I’ve given you this impression that I’m someone good and fair, but I’m really not. On the day we met, I killed two people in front of your eyes. Don’t you remember?”

“They were trying to kidnap me,” she said. “Why would I care if you killed them? It was definitely scary, don’t get me wrong, but I wouldn’t say you’re a bad person for it.”

“I’m an assassin!” he said. “You know that already! So stop thinking so highly of me, okay? It’s not right.”

“I can’t just stop because you tell me to,” she said. “I still do. I always will.”

“I have to go,” he said, standing up abruptly. “Work. Just got an alert that I have a new job.”

“Please be careful,” she said. “Come back safely.”

“You should be more worried about my victim than me,” he said. “No one would care if I died. People will care when he does.”

“I would care,” she said. “If you died, Toji, I would care.”

He looked down his nose at her, but the feigned haughtiness didn’t fool her anymore. There was something else behind his eyes, something like desperation, something like grief, something like an emotion she didn’t dare name.

“You shouldn’t.”

Things were different after that. He was different. Before, he was playful in his detachedness, teasing her at his leisure, accepting it when she returned the favor in kind. Now, he just sat there and answered her questions — as many as she could come up with, not just one — and gazed at her in that same mournful way, like he was waiting for the day that she, too, left him behind.

Or maybe not. Maybe she was just assigning explanations where there was none. She was certain she meant something to him, but she could be wrong. She had been wrong before, but this time more than any other, she hoped she was not.

“You haven’t asked anything yet today,” he observed as they stood outside of the restaurant. He held an umbrella over the two of them, and she was so close to him that they were almost touching, but they were not. If she moved even a little, they would be, but she did not dare move, not when the situation was like this.

“I’ve been thinking about what to say,” she said. “How to phrase it. That type of concern.”

“Just get on with it. I have to leave soon,” he said. He wasn’t really that patient, so she just bit her lip before deciding to, as he had so eloquently said, ‘get on with it.’

“Do you love me?” she said.

There was a moment when neither of them spoke, when the only sound was the steady rush of the rain all around them. The streetlights flicked on, illuminating his face, ensuring that she would never forget the way he looked at her in that one moment.

That was her answer. It didn’t matter what he said afterwards; his expression just then was the only thing she needed to know about him. There were so many things contained in that expression, longing and regret and admiration and love, so much love, so much that she was sure no one had ever felt that quantity for her before and would never again.

“No,” he said, his face settled into the same serious, disdainful mask once again. “Of course not. I do love your credit card, but that’s about it. You really do think highly of yourself, believing that you’re the object of my unrequited affections! I’ll give you another question, since that one was a dud.”

“Okay,” she said. “If I told you I loved you, what would you say?”

“You shouldn’t,” he said. “I’d tell you I’m not capable of it. You’d be wasting your affection on someone that would never reciprocate. Someone that would never even want to.”

“I see,” she said. “Then can you do me one favor? Please embrace me as if you were someone that would.”

The umbrella clattered to the sidewalk as he pulled her into his chest, holding onto her like she was the most precious thing he had ever gotten to touch. The rain continued to pour down, soaking the both of them, but she was actually grateful for it. It disguised the tears brimming in her own eyes as she clung to him.

“The L/N boy,” he said. “The one our age. I’ve found out that he’s infatuated with you.”

“Okay,” she sniffed.

“I’ll set you guys up on a date,” he said. “A proper one, where he can pay for you.”

“I don’t want to,” she said.

“He’d be better for you than anyone else. He’s respectable, and he’s wealthy. He’ll be a clan head one day. That’s the kind of person you should be making these declarations to,” Toji said. Not me. He didn’t say that, but she heard it, anyways.

“I don’t want him,” she said. I want you. She didn’t say that, but she fancied that he heard it, anyways.

“I think you’ve paid me back enough,” he said. “This is sufficient. We don’t have to keep meeting up anymore. You can save your money for something that really matters.”

“This matters to me,” she said.

“I’m not the kind of person that matters to anyone,” he said. “The inverse is true as well; no one matters to me. You’re no different.”

It didn’t feel like that was true when his harsh hands purposefully gentled themselves to brush the damp strands of her hair out of her face as she openly sobbed into his shirt, knowing that this was the last time they’d ever be like this. It didn’t feel like that when his cheek rested against her head, his arms around her waist, the umbrella rolling away, long forgotten. When he did those things, she could only wonder what kind of indifference this was, that it was so similar to an aching, all-encompassing closeness.

Many years passed before she saw him again. He didn’t show up on the date he set her and the L/N heir up with, even if she had been hoping he would at least come to smoothe over the introduction. It was fine, though. The date went well. The L/N heir was as charming and sweet as Toji had said he would be, and he readily explained every last detail of sorcery to her when she asked.

He paid for the meal, and then he asked her if she’d go to another one with him. For a moment, she considered saying no, saying that there was someone else, but there wasn’t. Not anymore. So she said yes.

When he asked her to marry him some months later, she said yes to that, too. They didn’t let her invite Toji to the wedding. She wasn’t too sad; she doubted he would’ve come, anyways.

After her wedding, she faded into true obscurity. It was like she had never been a model, had never been famous in the first place. No one recognized her when she went out - not that she really went out much, anyways, but on those few rare occasions that she did, she was just like any other person. It was the culmination of every single dream of normalcy she’d ever had, so why was there a lingering trace of unhappiness in her?

Anyways, the L/Ns were good to her. She’d eventually bear the next clan head, or so they said, so they waited upon her hand and foot. She never wanted for much, as everything she wished for, they provided; well, everything except for that one desire which she never dared to vocalize. The L/Ns, like every other clan, hated Toji. If they knew how deep the association between him and her ran, they’d probably hate her too.

Satoru Gojo was renowned for being a spoiled, bratty child that ran roughshod over every person that dared to watch him, so when she was stuck with the duty as preparation for having a child of her own, she found herself dreading the occasion somewhat. Yet when they finally met, she didn’t find him to be rude or nasty. He was just lonely, and this was something that she could relate to all-too-well.

“I’m the strongest,” he would remind her every time she refused him something. “You have to listen to me.”

“You’re only seven,” she would remind him in return. “That means I’m older than you, so you have to listen to me. How about this: we can make cookies together and you can have extra if you behave.”

“Alright!” he’d say without fail. He was surprisingly easy to persuade, not the kind to stick to his ridiculous convictions if anyone ever stood up to them. She supposed no one else ever had before, but she’d be remiss if she let a young child bully her. Her! He was nothing compared to her old manager, the one who had only stopped calling recently.

They were out for a walk one day when suddenly, Satoru turned, his blue eyes gleaming with interest, though she hadn’t heard anyone approach. Even if someone was there, though, she didn’t feel afraid; seven though he might’ve been, it wasn’t an exaggeration to call Satoru the strongest sorcerer of the modern age already. If it was someone with malicious intent, he would take care of them in a second and then ask her to make popcorn for him as a reward.

The man was standing there with crossed arms, obviously taken aback by the fact that Satoru had detected him. And even though it had been so long, she recognized him immediately, so then it was her inhaling sharply, something long-dead and long-buried deep within her stirring at the sight of his still-handsome visage.

Toji. His eyes met her own, searching for answers to questions that she could not yet name. He must’ve gotten what he came for, as the moment she blinked, he was gone, vanishing in that way he always did, too fast for her mortal vision to follow.

“That was weird,” Satoru said. When she did not respond, he tugged on the end of her sleeve. “Mrs. L/N? Mrs. L/N, that was weird, right?”

Of course. Mrs. L/N. That was her, now. That was all she’d ever amount to. Mrs. L/N.

“Yes, it was certainly strange,” she said, for lack of anything better to say. Satoru crossed his arms, obviously satisfied with himself for identifying the oddness of the scenario.

“Don’t worry. I would’ve protected you if he tried to do anything!” he said, miming punching the air, ostensibly in her defense. She laughed and ruffled his hair.

“Thank you, Satoru,” she said. He beamed up at her.

“Do you think that that’s worthy of some popcorn?” he said. She shook herself off, knowing that she was no longer allowed to think about Toji. That time of her life had passed long ago, and it was foolish for her to linger on it in this way.

“Only if we get to watch a movie with it,” she said.

“Yay! Can I pick?” he said. “I wanna watch Star Wars.”

“Your wish is my command,” she said, saluting at him. “Lead the way, Jedi Knight Satoru Gojo.”

“Nuh-uh, I’m Darth Satoru, and you’re one of my Stormtroopers, okay?” he said.

“Yes, sir. Copy that!” she said. It was only a hunch, but she had figured some time ago that Satoru only got to behave like a child when he was with her, so she tried to indulge him as much as she could, never forcing him to act like an adult or a proper sorcerer or anything like that. It was probably why she was his favorite, why she kept watching him all of the way up until she realized she was pregnant.

Standing outside of the restaurant where she had last eaten with Toji, she thanked her luck that she had managed to slip away from the suffocating gaze of the L/Ns for long enough that she could come here. Ever since her pregnancy had been announced, they had been watching her like hawks, fretting over every single move she made, worrying that the slightest missteps might lead to her child being born a daughter — or, even worse, without the Composition that was their clan’s pride and joy.

She had only even escaped today because she pretended to have debilitating morning sickness. For all they knew, she was locked in the bathroom at present, hunched over the toilet, when in fact she had climbed out of the window and ran away so that she could sate her craving for the food that this particular restaurant served.

“I didn’t think you’d be here.”

Whipping around so fast it was a miracle she didn’t fall, her eyes widened when she saw Toji standing there, arms crossed and head cocked. She wasn’t sure what she was supposed to do now — embrace him? No, that would be inappropriate. Keeping her hands on her stomach to keep her grounded, she dipped her head at him.

“Toji,” she said. “I didn’t think you’d be here, either. I just got a craving, but I knew the L/Ns wouldn’t approve of food like this, so I had to take the initiative and get it myself.”

“Craving?” he said, and then his eyes flicked down to her stomach, the way it swelled under her loose shirt. His throat bobbed as he swallowed. “Oh.”

“Yeah,” she said uncomfortably. “Um, don’t worry. I won’t let them grow up to be someone who’s condescending or cruel or anything. If they ever meet you, or else someone like you, they’ll definitely treat you or them as an equal.”

“I wasn’t worried about that,” he said. “It’s L/N’s kid, isn’t it?”

“I am his wife, yes,” she said. “Of course it’s his.”

“Right,” he said. “I always — I always forget about that.”

“You were the one who facilitated it,” she reminded him. “I don’t see how you ever could.”

“Are you happy?” he said.

“Normally, I’m the one asking questions,” she said. What did her happiness matter to him? What good would it do if she told him she wasn’t, that she hadn’t been since the day they parted? She knew his answer already. He loved her enough to let her go, but not enough to change. Enough to know that who he was now wasn’t someone that deserved her, but not enough to become a version of himself that did.

“Won’t you just answer this one? For old times’ sake,” he said.

“Yes,” she said.

“Yes, you’ll answer it? Or yes, you’re happy?” he said.

“Both,” she said. “The L/Ns treat me well. Like a princess. I cannot complain.”

“That’s good,” he said, with some difficulty. “I told you it would be like that.”

“You did,” she said.

“Have you thought about what you’re naming the kid?” he said.

“I’m not sure what I’ll do if it’s a boy,” she said. “If it’s a girl, though, she’ll be Y/N. Like her ancestor who helped seal Sukuna.”

“Y/N,” he said. “That’s a pretty name. I’m sure she’ll be as pretty as her mother, so it’s fitting.”

“What about you? Have you obtained some measure of happiness?” she said. He chuckled.

“Did you think I would’ve? The answer is no, not really. But maybe I’ll earnestly try to find it now. You’ve inspired me a little, so I think I’ll make an effort. Thank you for everything…Mrs. L/N.”

She would’ve told him not to call her that, not ever, because it sounded wrong when he did, but it was a moot point. They never saw one another again. Actually, the next time she heard his name was also the last. It was when her husband told her, in the dull tone he had adopted ever since their daughter Y/N had proven unable to utilize Composition, that he — Toji, her Toji — was dead.

#yuuta x reader #yuuta x y/n #yuuta x you #reader insert #canon au #pomegranate ink #m1ckeyb3rry writes

17 notes · View notes

joy-of-life88 · 1 year ago

Text

Inked Temptation [a Damian Priest story] 24 A whole lot of you

Damian POV

The first thing I felt as I slowly began to wake up were my wife's lips on my neck. Gently she worked her way to my cheek and then to my lips.

"Good morning, baby girl. I like this way of being woken up." I murmured as I opened my eyes to look at her.

To my surprise, it was still pretty dark outside. Guessing it was only 5am or so.

"Good morning, love. I'm sorry to wake you up, but I just couldn't sleep anymore. I'm so excited." replied Ellie and I could feel the smile on my lips.

"Oh I know... I am too. But it's still a little early, don't you think?" I asked as I slowly stroked my hand down her back.

"Maybe a little... But you know how to distract me, mister..." she replied, letting her fingertips wander over my chest.

"You bet I do. After all, your great pregnancy hormones are my best friends right now. I'm surprised I'm even able to walk anymore, baby." I said as I put my free hand to her cheek and pulled her down to me.

"You're loving every second of this and you know it." Ellie spoke against my mouth as she swung a leg over my hips and then silenced me with her lips.

-------------------------

A few hours and very little sleep later, we were now on the way to our party. And by now I was at least as excited as my Ellie-Bell. Today was the big day when we would find out if our dream baby was a boy or a girl.

The pregnancy had gone by so fast up to here that it was hard to believe. But with our work and the fact that we were on the road so much, it was not to be expected otherwise. Only 5 more months, then we would be able to hold our bundle of joy in our arms. I was getting a little ahead of myself though. After all, we were still waiting for our little darling to make himself or herself known for the first time. It could not take much longer and I was so excited to feel how our baby moved.

And then, of course, there was curiosity. Ellie was firmly convinced that we were expecting a boy. So much so that she didn't even want to talk about a name for a girl. Even the name, the perfect name in her opinion, for a boy she didn't want to tell me until the party. Man, I could only hope that her instinct was right.

"Okay ladies and gentlemen. Ellie and Damian have a small pitcher of food coloring in their hands. The two of them will pour the color very slowly into the chocolate fountain with the white chocolate. And then we'll all see if we'll welcome a girl or boy into the family at the end of August. On 3! 1... 2... 3!" said my mother-in-law.

I felt Ellie's hand tremble slightly with nervousness. I was feeling the same way. I could hardly stand the suspense. Together we poured the contents of the pitcher into the chocolate. Slowly, but surely, the white chocolate turned the most beautiful shade of blue I had ever seen.

In other words, Ellie had been right. We are having a son!

I quickly wrapped her in my arms and held her close. I was so happy.

"I love you, wife." I said softly.

"I love you more. Thank you for our son." she replied as she took my face in her hands and gave me a long kiss.

"Alright my dears... Now that we know that Damian and I are expecting the most perfect little man, I want to tell you and especially Damian what name our prince will receive. When I first thought of this name, I immediately knew it would be perfect for our son. It is a name that honors his unique Papi.

Because our little one will go by the name.... Hudson Rico Priest. A piece of New York, a piece of Puerto Rico, and a whole lot of you, love. I love you more than I can put into words and I hope you love that name as much as I do." said Ellie.

With tears in my eyes, my family pulled back into my arms. This was one of the most beautiful moments in my life. And I had only the beautiful woman in my arms to thank. The mother of my son. The love of my life.

#damian priest #wwe #Wattpad #My writing #inked temptation

11 notes · View notes

darkx-the-dragon-kn1ght · 1 year ago

Text

Pokémon Reborn Screenshot Let's Play: Chapter 5

Welcome back once again! I hope the season has been treating everyone well, I’ve certainly been having a fun time, and it’s about to get even more fun because I’m back here to play some more Pokémon! Specifically this fan game! Because people still appear to be enjoying this playthrough, despite my nature as a casual player coming in to bite me on more than one occasion (I’m sure this will not change as the game progresses).

Last time, we didn’t get a ton of plot progression done (save for the very end, technically), but this time…

(Future Edit: Well, this time’s gonna be VERY different. Because this chapter is technically incomplete- it’s part of a double-feature! The first part of an exciting two-parter! What in the world am I talking about? Well, er- let me explain…)

(See, in this most recent play session, some MEATY plot progression happens, and I thought “hey, I’ll go a bit longer to give the people story stuff after two chapters of mostly filler”, yeah? But I severely underestimated just how big this story beat was…by like a lot. The number of parts for what would have been just this one chapter was building up, lot of images and screenshots, it would have exceeded the amount of links you’re allowed to put on one Tumblr post, and I think it was making Google Docs (where I write the rough versions of these chapters) and Firefox crash?)

(And if you think I could just leave the area, go to the Pokémon Center to save and exit, all that jazz, uh- I can’t. I think it’s one of those events where you can’t really leave the area until you’ve done what needs to be done, you can’t just leave and come back, if you know what I mean. And like- I wasn’t planning on leaving anyways, again, it was like “I’ll do this plot thing then close out the chapter”, but yet again!! I didn’t realize what I was making Xera walk into!)

(So, for both technical reasons and to make sure it wouldn’t take a month to get any new content to all of you, I made the executive decision to split this chapter into two- Chapters 5 and 6. Chapter 5 is going up today- obviously- but Chapter 6 will be finished and put together at a later date. But until then, at least, you’ll all have this to tide yourselves over with! Just keep all of these outside circumstances in mind if things and commentary seem a little more anachronistic than usual- that’ll likely explain why. Never let it be said I’m not transparent with readers about how scuffed this Let’s Play is sometimes.)

But before we can get to ANY of that- how about a recap of what did happen in the last chapter?

The chapter was set to a backdrop of the game’s first weather event in the form of Rain, boosting Water-type moves and weakening Fire-type moves- both a help and hindrance to the team.

Xera goes to Seacrest’s Garden again to catch Summer the Sunkern for the upcoming battle against local Electric-type Gym Leader Julia.

Going into a nearby apartment building, Xera sees a boy trying to heal an injured Skitty. She gives an Oran Berry to the boy’s grandma, who passes it on to her grandson to successfully heal the Skitty. Since the boy is too young to be able to raise a Pokémon himself, the grandma asks if Xera would be willing to take in Skitty, which she accepts. The Skitty is named Whiskers.

Xera explores the central area of Peridot Ward, battling Trainers and training up Summer and Whiskers along the way.

There’s a guy in one house who is willing to trade away a pink Pokémon of some sort for a Bibarel. We make a note of this for later, maybe.

Xera learns from a few NPCs that Jasper Ward- a ward of Reborn City that is Peridot Ward’s northern neighbor- has been completely locked down for unknown reasons.

In a nearby tunnel, Xera does parkour to obtain an item called a Data Chip. No idea what this is for right now.

Interacting with a murky fountain, Xera encounters Rain the Surskit…but catching her was delayed (i.e. we had to reset) due to a lack of Poké Balls during this initial encounter.

There appears to be conflict between Trainers on the “West Side” of Peridot Ward and those on the “East Side.” Xera goes through the west side first, battling those Trainers along the way.

Xera finds the woman with the disobedient Stufful again. Despite having several Common Candies by now, the woman will not use them due to the belief that candy is bad for Pokémon. No idea how to solve her Stufful problem in that case.

Next to an abandoned building, Xera finds a young man with mint-green hair interrogating a person in an armored suit. However, as Xera walks up to see what is happening, the suited man is able to escape the mint-haired person.

The mint-haired guy is named Fern, and he is this game’s third rival. Fern doesn’t take kindly to Xera interrupting his interrogation of the suited man, who he claims is the culprit behind the Grandview Station bombing. Blaming Xera for the culprit getting away, Fern forces her into a Pokémon battle.

Turns out, we’re underleveled for this! Fern’s team of Lv. 13-14 Pokémon does a number on Xera’s Lv. 11 team. Since I don’t want any of Xera’s Pokémon to lose to someone as arrogant as Fern, we reset so Xera can go do some more training before attempting to challenge Fern again.

And so, that’s where we are now. Our first priority is to head to the east area of Peridot Ward and challenge the East Side Trainers, which should hopefully get the party to where it needs to be so we can not only defeat Fern, but do so without letting him have the satisfaction of knocking out any of Xera’s Pokémon in turn. He’ll see- they’ll ALL see! EVERYONE’S GONNA SEE! So, without further ado, let’s get going!

(Future Edit: For this particular chapter, the split won’t really affect anything besides the stuff that usually goes at the very end- eh, you’ll see what I mean when you get there.)

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

Part 4

Part 5

Part 6

Part 7

Part 8

Part 9

Part 10

Part 11

Part 12

#pokemon reborn #pokemon reborn spoilers #pokemon fan game #pokemon reborn screenshot let's play

2 notes · View notes

ushiwakatrash · 3 years ago

Text

𝐍𝐨 𝐧𝐞𝐞𝐝 𝐭𝐨 𝐜𝐡𝐨𝐨𝐬𝐞 (𝘜𝘴𝘩𝘪𝘫𝘪𝘮𝘢, 𝘛𝘦𝘯𝘥𝘰𝘶 𝘹 𝘍!𝘔𝘢𝘯𝘢𝘨𝘦𝘳 𝘙𝘦𝘢𝘥𝘦𝘳) NSFW

Hey lovies! You may have noticed by now that I am literally in love with Ushi and the whole manager cliché thing so I love writing about him! This entry is for my 500 follower special. Thank you for all the support and enjoy reading! Sorry it took so long for me to write again, my mind hasn't been in a good place but I'm getting better! <333

(sorry if my 18+ writing isn't good, I'm still not used to it)

More content here >>> 𝓜𝓪𝓼𝓽𝓮𝓻𝓵𝓲𝓼𝓽 ♡

Word count: 3.5k

!Warnings!: NSFW, Smut, Degrading, Daddy Kink, manhandling, Dom!Ushijima, Switch!Tendou(?), Poly, cursing, 18+, Cursing, pet names

Ushijima and Tendou are bestfriends and like to share everything, including you.

MINORS DNI

SHIIIIRATORIZAWA! SHIIIIIRATORIZAWA!

Sounds of the school's cheer rang through the ears of everyone present in the stadium. This was the match to see who would triumph the Interhigh Preliminary Finals.

Everyone was on the edge of their seats as the heated battle juggled who had the upper hand. The rivaling team, as if it were already tradition, is Aoba Johsai yet again.

In the three years you've watched over the team, there wasn't a time where you lost against your rival school and just like today, you were sure the results would lean in Shiratorizawa's favor.

There was never a time you had doubted the boys. Especially your best friends.

An overwhelming sound of a ball hitting the ground rang as another monstrous spike was hit by the captain. As if waiting for your acknowledgement, he stared at you after landing with anticipation. Having figuring out their habits by now, you figured out what he wanted to hear.

"Nice kill Toshi-kun!" the faintest smile ghosted his face as he turned his gaze back to the court. Another point was scored but this time, Tendou completely shut down poor Iwaizumi's spike. He raised gun fingers at you which could mean 'this point's for ya!' or 'did'ya see how awesome I looked?!' either way, you copied his pose "Nice block miracle boy!!"

In this 5-point match, Shiratorizawa had triumphed two sets while Seijoh managed to grab one. The team huddled to discuss their strategy which was just mostly Washijo-sensei pointing out their mistakes in the last match.

It was their time to cool down and rest up a bit, so being the manager, you took care of what everyone needed. Their water bottles needed to be refilled so you got up and went to the nearest water fountain.

"Y/n." A deep voice called. "Would you like more water, Toshi?" he nodded and gratefully took the water bottle you handed. "If I score more points, will you cheer for me?" it was an odd question but you answered with no hesitation. "Of course! I'll scream your name loud and clear!"

He got flustered for a second after hearing your words even if he knew you didn't mean it in any other way. A low chuckle erupted from his lips. "All for me?" huh. Another odd question.

Nevertheless, you smiled brightly and hummed in response. Satisfied with your answer, Ushijima stepped closer and gently cupped your face with one hand.

His thumb softly rubbed your cheeks as he looked at you with soft eyes but still had the same stoic face. "Good girl".

Wait...what?

You blinked a few times, too stunned to even react. Your face started heating up and it took a few seconds to register what had happened.

A few water bottles accidentally fell from the bag due to the poor manager being so flustered.

Mentally cursing, you bent down and started picking up the fallen bottles. "You okay manager-chan?" "Oh Satori, could you help me pick up these bot-" the moment you looked up, the red head's face was centimeters away from yours. He wore a smirk as he slowly closed the gap.

Nervous, your eyes shut closed.

A nose bumped into your own and when your eyes opened, you could see the middle blocker picking up the things on the ground. "Don't be too clumsy next time Y/n-chan!" he started walking away like nothing happened.

Unbeknownst to you, his smirk got wider as he recalled your interaction with the captain he just witnessed.

All throughout the game, your head was a mess. Memories of what happened with Wakatoshi and Satori replayed in your head over and over. You did cheer for them (especially Ushi like you promised) but some could clearly see how out of it you were.

"Oi squirt, what's wrong with ya?! Maybe you'll be the one running laps when we get back!" the coach's voice made you jump in your seat. The other members snickered as Washijo scolded you.

Ushijima pretended to be nonchalant about the coach's reprimanding, but deep down he knew he was the culprit as to why you were so in your head.

Ah yes, the sound of another victorious match echoed throughout the stadium. The victors were of course, your beloved team.

What better reward to give than a hug from their beloved and absolutely gorgeous manager? Yamagata ran to bask in your warmth and the others followed suit. This had become a tradition every win, and even tighter hugs were to be given in the case of a loss-- which has yet to happen.

As if the captain had not done numbers to your heart moments ago, he bent down and grabbed you by the waist to pull you in into his chest. His chin landed on your shoulder and he whispered his thanks for cheering for him the loudest. Before breaking the hug, he purposely brushed his lips on the tip of your ear. He was clearly enjoying messing up your thoughts.

Tendou had no intention of losing to his bestfriend. His hand traveled down just a few inches above your ass and the other reached the base of your nape slightly raking up through the base of your hair as if he were to pull it.

This was your breaking point. You were hot and DEFINITELY BOTHERED.

"I-I have to use the restroom. Catch up to you guys in a bit!" you hurriedly rushed to a cubicle so you could calm yourself down. A familiar wetness started to pool down.

WHAT THE HELL ARE THEY DOING?! If this continues I don't know what I'll do. How could I even pick between the two?! A threesome would be impossible!

You couldn't believe what you were even thinking. Grabbing water in your hands, you splashed it on your face to somehow wash off the impure thoughts you were having about your best friends. Best friends for fuck's sake!

Straightening yourself out, you make your way to the bus and as per usual, take a seat next to the captain at the rear end. "You took your time." You give the olive eyed man a pout "Well uh, my tummy hurt? Yeah... it hurt!" being extra jumpy was not helping you hide the fact the events from earlier still lingered in your mind.

"Lend me your shoulder, I'm tired." Ah. The vulnerable Wakatoshi is here, only showing this side to you which made you feel a little more special than the rest.

His hand landed on your lap and his head fell on your shoulder. You tensed up feeling the light grip he had on your inner thigh. Today, he was driving you crazy for all the wrong reasons.

Unconsciously, your thighs clenched a little, remembering how this was one of the ways you got turn on. Terushima frequently did this when you were both still dating a year ago, and it always led straight to the bed.

That breakup story is for another day.

Since the Spring qualifiers were just around the corner, you had to become a tad more strict to the team and thankfully, they still feared you even if you were their cute little bean.

Tendou had his ways to get your attention. The male was obviously more than a head taller so it would be stupid of him to not use this to his advantage.

A swift hand grabbed the clipboard you were holding and to no surprise, it was the red head causing trouble for you again. Since this was no time to be fooling around, your patience ran on thin ice.

"Satori fucking quit it!" "Hmmm, what about a no?" both of your rowdiness slowly got the attention of the whole team. "I'll give it back for a kiss, whattdya say, cutie?" Heat crept up to your cheeks but you knew well enough he just wanted to get a reaction out of you.

"Kiss my ass, tori! Now give it back!" you were both getting disctracting and coach Washijo was about to give a piece of his mind until the captain took the matters in his own hands.

"Enough." His stern cold voice sent shivers down everyone's spine. A man of few words, but his words are definite. If only the ground would swallow you whole.

You glanced over at your accomplice and he shown the same reaction you did. Like both of you were at his mercy.

"S-sorry Toshi. I'll be good." You whispered so only he could hear it. Before you even realized what you said, it had already slipped. The smug smirk was now visible on his face as he looked at you. Good thing his back faced the team.

Wordlessly, he send a sharp glare to Tendou "...sorry cap'tn" Nodding contented, Ushijima went back to his stoic nature. "It's good you're both learning. Be good for me."

There he goes again, dominance oozing off of him that even got the guess monster to submit. Tendou's sure to get a good teasing once practice is over.

The ride to Sendai City Gym, where the Miyagi Prefectural Spring Qualifiers would be held, felt long. It didn't help that you were sitting next to Ushijima again, his head on your shoulder like last time, but his hands had a slightly tighter grip on the plush of your thigh -- a little further and he might even feel the heat coming from your pussy.

It was obvious you were bothered. Well, to Tendou at least. The bus stopped for a bathroom break and the captain had to go so only a few were left in the vehicle. The cunning red head took this chance to rile you up.

He inched close to whisper in your ear "Aw, blushing because of the capt'n manager-chan? How unfair" he then bit your ear earning a small quiet moan that surprised both of you.

"Y/n-chan! How naughty!" his smirk was so smug that you wanted to punch it off his face. "Satori, WHAT THE FUCK!" Unbothered by your sudden outburst, he shrugged his shoulders. "Not my fault you look cute, kitten."

Tendou went back to his seat just as the rest of the members started to board the bus. Ushijima noticed how flustered you were and how red your ears were. He sent a glance to Tendou who was already looking at him with the same smirk he had given you.

"Did something happen?" you just shook your head and kept quiet, still feeling the heat in your cheeks.

The bus arrived at the provided hotel, an expensive one in fact. Everyone had been given individual rooms so you finally had the time to cool off your head alone and maybe touch your wet pussy a lil too.

Your train of thoughts came to a halt when the coach called for the team to get off and grab their stuff.

The man beside you grabbed your arm to prevent you from standing. Leaning close, he whispered “My room later. Only if you want to spend more time with me” he finished it off with a nibble to the opposite ear Tendou attacked.

A soft whimper came out of your mouth, quiet enough for only Ushijima to hear. He felt ecstatic seeing the effect he had on you. “What do you say, (Y/n)?” Nodding was the only thing you could do. You were so red and flustered no words seemed to come out.

“Atta girl.” With a pat on your head, he stood up and left you looking like a mess.

You settled down in your hotel room, contemplating what time you would see your captain in his own quarters.

As if on cue, a text from him arrived.

He usually texted dry but something about the way he’d been acting the past few days made you quite excited to see him.

You already knew his room number since you were the manager so after freshening up, you went straight to where he was.

*knock*

“Toshi? Can I come in?” “Go ahead.”

You were greeted by literal eye candy. His broad shoulders and chiseled chest caught your attention as soon as the door opened. Not to mention his hard well-maintained abs.

The biggest blow was him wearing gray sweats. It would be impossible to miss the huge trace of his member against the fabric.

“Eyes up here, sweetheart.” Fuck. You got caught.

“S-sorry I was just a little distracted!” He smiled at your excuse then patted the bed. “C’mere and make yourself comfortable”

Once near his bed, he guided you to sit on his lap. Being so nervous around him, your position didn’t seem to process in your mind.

Sitting on top of his bulge made him harden. You felt it.

“Whadd'ya call me for cap— oh?” The door suddenly swung open revealing your other best friend. “My my, y/n. Getting comfy are we?”

"Tori? W-what are you doing here?" you felt small under their gazes. "Well, Wakatoshi over here surprisingly invited me to hang out first. Now, you answer me, angel. Why are you on his lap, hmm?"

"I-I...i-it just happened!" the red head smirked at you. "Better seat than the bleachers eh, Y/n-chan?~"

How much more would he tease you? You were already red all over. Feeling all shy, you shamelessly hugged Ushijima, head nuzzling his neck. With a whiny voice you complained to the man you were sitting on.

"Toshiii, Satori's being mean!" Ushijima smiled at your cute whines. "But don't you like it when he's mean, darling?" Not answering, you just snuggled closer to him.

"Y/n-chan, we know you like us but you're confusing. Do you actually LIKE like us, or are we just friends?"

Fuck. He just had to ask the million dollar question.

Lifting your head from Ushi's warm neck, you looked at Tendou "It's complicated Tori, I-I can't make up my mind."

Ushijima put a hand to your cheek and rubbed his thumb "Talk to us, baby. What's making it so hard to pick between us?"

"W-well, you're so sweet to me and you take care of me so much. You never let me have a hard time with the team and I like the way you're so goal driven when it comes to volley. It's endearing to see how your hardwork always pays off."

"As for Satori, he's playful and fun! He always cheers me up when I stress over things and he makes sure I don't feel left out during meetings and such..."

It was like you were already confessing, to two people even!

"So, you like us both. What's the problem with that?"

The woman was too stunned to speak.

"I can't like you both at the same time! That's just being selfish and unfair!" Tendou came loser and held you hand to his lips. "Ever heard of polygamy, babe? I'm totally fine with sharing you with Ushiwaka, 'sides, he's hot"

Ushijima couldn't be happier with the red head's words.

“No need to overthink things sweetheart, you can make him your boyfriend” he grips your face and pulls it closer to his “But remember I’m your daddy. Understand?”.

The sternness in his voice made you shudder. Tendou smirks at how meek you’ve become. No one has ever seen you so submissive.

You nod at the captain but the grip he has on your cheeks only tighten. “Words, Y/n.” “Y-yes daddy.” Good girl.”

The captain wasted no time and kissed you. Pushing his tongue to explore your mouth. His hands started roaming your body and found its way on your clothed breast, cupping and kneading it.

His other hand started stripping your gym shorts with your obviously wet underwear. Tendou, even not joining in all the action, was surely enjoying the show. He knew you were a freak. He felt it when you moaned from him biting your ear earlier.

"C'mere Tendou, give daddy a kiss." he gave the red head attention too. Now that your lower part was bare, he swiftly had his fingers wet with your slick and started rubbing your clit.

"A-ah fuck Toshi.." his other hand left your breast and started palming Satori's hard on. He had himself moaning into his kiss with the red head as well.

"Both of you, be good for me and strip. I'm gonna be a gentleman and deal with our girl here first. That alright with you, Tendou?" "Sure Wakatoshi, I'm gonna wait for my turn" he winked at the captain but it seemed as if Ushijima wasn't happy with him.

"Let me be clear. I'm daddy to you too, Satori. Now answer me properly." Satori couldn't refuse. He wouldn't even dare refuse.

"I'm gonna wait for my turn, daddy." "There we go. That's daddy's good boy. Now you, on the bed. Lie on your back." You did as you were told. Eyes hazy and desperate for his touch.

"Sorry, sweetheart. As much as I want to taste you, we don't have much time. I can put it in now right? I can't wait any longer." this has been the most talkative you've seen your captain but truthfully, his deep voice could play on repeat but you would never get tired of hearing him.

"Put it in daddy, please!" a deep chuckle left his lips as he stripped himself and lined his cock in your entrance.

He took you by surprise as he entered you in one swift thrust, not giving you time to adjust. But pleasure is always better with a lil pain, no?

"Ah fuck you're so tight baby. This pussy is mine, got it? Both of you are mine. Fuck!" he continued ramming himself into you, not waiting for you to get used to his huge dick.

He had a hand on your neck, squeezing it tight enough for you to not pass out. Your eyes were rolling to the back of your head due to the overwhelming pleasure.

"F-feels good daddy, more!" he happily complied to your wants, speeding up his thrusts even more, fucking you so deep that your cervix might be bruised at this point.

"So good for me...'s fuckin' tight for me..!" your mind wasn't even functioning anymore. Ushijima was breaking you and you loved every second of it.

"On fours, baby. Why don't you make Satori feel good too?" your eyes landed on the middle blocker who was currently getting a handjob from the captain while he fucked you.

Following orders, you got up and changed positions. Tendou aligned his throbbing cock to the entrance of your mouth and began to face fuck you.

"Look at this fucking slut. You gettin' off on being fucked in both holes? Ah fuck right there- you...ugh...fucking whore!"

Tendou would definitely bully you at times, but never call you names so...vulgar. Instead of getting mad at him, your cunt tightened even more around Ushijima, causing him to groan.

"Tendou, she seems to like how you talk down on her. Oh my, I never thought you were such a freak Y/n. You're squeezing me so hard"

Satori sped up his thrusts "I'm fucking close! Take it, bitch! Take it like the slut you are!" Ushijima was moaning and thrusting hard and fast, signaling he was close as well.

The salty taste of Tendou's cum started pouring down your throat as he buried his dick in your mouth, letting out moans and curses.

Ushijima then pulled out and stood up, continuing to stroke his thick hard member.

"Both of you, kneel." without hesitation, you and Satori were on your knees, looking up in anticipation of the captain's next command. "Open." Both of your mouths were wide open, tongues sticking out.

Ropes of Ushijima's cum splattered on both of your faces as he grinned seeing his this picturesque painting that will forever be branded in his mind.

Tendou turned to you and cupped your face, slightly licking stray drops of cum on your cheeks before shoving his tongue into your mouth so you both could share your daddy's spend.

To keep the memory forever, he pulled out his phone and motioned for you both to look at the camera. “Won’t you two smile for daddy?”

Without hesitation, you and Tendou both broke into huge smiles while obviously looking so fucked out of your minds.

*click*

“Starting today, both of you are mine. You’re both free to object if this relationship isn’t what you want. I would never force you into something that would make you uncomfortable.”

“No, I want it, want you and ‘tori daddy!” You sounded quite desperate but who would even give a fuck.

Tendou quickly seconded your remark. “Been through all this trouble just to get y/n, but I want you all the same Wakatoshi.”

The captain raised a brow “Wakatoshi?” The middle blocker immediately knew his fault. “I meant daddy, I want you too daddy.”

With a sly grin, Ushijima caressed his cheek and gave him a kiss on the forehead “Thats right. My Good boy.” he coos. He gave you a kiss after, too.

If there wasn’t a match soon, you would all have another go, but it could always wait. “Let’s continue this later. We have a match to win. Won’t you cheer for us again, baby?”

—

WINNER: SHIRATORIZAWA

There they stood in all of their glory, winning their first match. You were watching in the back with a big smile and teary eyes. Your two new boyfriends looked at you and gave such handsome smiles.

Pride filled your chest, for once again, your boys did it.

877 notes · View notes

ppersonna · 4 years ago

Text

out of my league - knj | 01

you were out of my league. got my heartbeat racing. if i die, don't wake me, cause you are more than just a dream - out of my league, fitz and the tantrums

✹ summary- Kim Namjoon was never supposed to find out about your years-long hopeless crush on him. And he most definitely was not supposed to find out about it in front of all your coworkers in a company-wide meeting.

✹ rating- explicit/18+/nsfw

✹ pairing- kim namjoon x reader

✹ word count- 6.6k

✹ genre- angst, smut, comedy

✹ chapter warnings- swearing, descriptions of sex, sexual content, namjoon being a sexy flirt, jungkook being a himbo, awkward conversations, jimin being a protective bff

✹ a/n- hello and welcome to this fic thats lived in my google docs for almost a year now. without @ladyartemesia @xjoonchildx @untaemedqueen and @chimoona, i would never have posted it. i truly owe so much of my brainstorming and creativity to their incredible brains and thoughts and ideas. i love them very much! i hope you enjoy this first chapter! please feel free to message me, talk to me abt anything!! im always here to chat. ILY!

MASTERLIST

Kim Namjoon was never supposed to find out this way.

You planned to confess your undying, unerring love for your coworker at a better time, a classier place. You would wear a dress that highlighted your features, hair cascading down your back, makeup done to perfection and spritzed with expensive perfume. You’d confess, he’d confess right back, and you’d live happily ever after.

You’d also dreamt that Kim Namjoon would have the slightest inkling of who you are before he finds out about your year long crush. He might know you as the mousy girl in the office who doesn’t talk and doesn’t contribute much other than some crunched numbers and apparently the best coffee brewer in the office. But you’d prefer he knows you well—your favorite colors and movies and foods, what makes you happy and sad; things future husbands should know.

You very much did not think it would happen in a company wide conference, full of over five hundred suit-wearing executives. You did not think it would be done by the office bully, Chungha, who carefully takes over the mic and speaks the words clearly as she presents awards of recognition.

“Congratulations to Kim Namjoon for 5 years with the company, over $4 million in revenue, and the object of ____’s lust and affection. I’m sure you two will have the happy life she’s written in her journal about. Make sure you celebrate with her today!”

The room is silent, so silent you could have heard a pin drop from a mile away. Your face is cherry red and you wish the earth would open up and swallow you whole. Your heart feels like someone has ripped it in half and you stare in horror at the girl smirking at the front. Is this what it feels like to be backstabbed? Namjoon looks perplexed—confusion written on his face as he gestures around to no one in particular like he’s saying ‘what the fuck was that?’

Awkward coughing and clapping begins and Namjoon stands to receive his award, a fine wooden fountain pen, and chances a glance around the room. He easily spots you, with your wide, frightened face. His look remains passive, not hinting what he’s thinking behind those stormy eyes, before he turns and sits back down at the table with his buddies from his department.

You seriously contemplate quitting your job. You could find a new one easily, right? Just stand up and tell your boss you quit and you’re out of there before Namjoon ever sees you again and you’ll never have to face the mean girl who’s ratting you out.

As much as the idea rolls through your head, you know you won’t do it. You love your job, love the security and finances it provides you, and you love to look at Kim Namjoon, all day every day.

You don’t understand where things went wrong.

( one month ago )

It’s 9:03 am. You finish brewing the coffee in the small staff kitchen and sigh at the aroma of the freshly ground beans. Coffee is your favorite meal, favorite time of day, favorite snack, and preferred beverage. You drink it constantly. You’re known as “coffee girl” at work, mostly because no one really bothers to get to know you beyond that. You drink coffee like it’s a devoted religion. You could drink a cup right before bed and still sleep like a baby. It was, put simply, your drink.

The office workers deem you to be the one to make the pots of coffee every morning, claiming you were the ‘best’. You didn’t mind—you preferred to make your own coffee regardless—but you believe your coworkers are trying to pass off the twenty-minute job to someone lower in the office hierarchy. And you were one step above the interns.

The coffee machine chimes to let you know it’s hot, and it’s ready for you. You eagerly pour a mug, a large one, and smile as the waft of freshly ground beans (by you, of course) fills your senses.

You nearly knock the cup out of your hand as Kim Namjoon strolls into the office, eyes set on the coffee.

You feel your throat swell up, like he’s an allergen and you’re caught without an epi-pen. Butterflies swirl in your stomach and you can’t stop staring at him. He pays you no mind, tired yet determined to pour a cup of coffee and get back to his office.

You stand in the small kitchen, clutching your coffee like a lifeline, and pray to god you don’t do something stupid.

Namjoon pours his mug, and you watch his muscular hands grip the coffee pot. He pours a hefty amount of cream and sugar into his cup—it appears even perfect male specimens have their faults.

Your eyes dance on his face before they tango down his body. You wonder what he looks like in the morning, crawling out of bed with mussed hair and a sleepy smile painted on his face. He’d look at you and tell you you’re the most beautiful girl and kiss you deeply despite morning breath. Maybe he’d take you to the shower to press you against the tile as he fuc-

“Oh!” it startles Namjoon to see you, and the coffee in his hand swishes violently. “Didn’t see you there. Sorry!”

Your heart melts. He’s the picture of kindness and politeness. You recognize it’s been a few seconds and you still haven’t replied.

“It’s fine!”

“Great coffee, by the way,” he smiles. His teeth nearly knock you out cold with their brilliance. “Have a good day.”

He turns and exits the room without so much as a glance back at you. Your knees feel weak.

Kim Namjoon talked to you. He complimented you. He told you to have a good day. It’s the best and most significant conversation you’ve had with your secret crush.

You definitely file that away for another day when you need to reminisce on his compliment, and you scurry out of the kitchen towards your desk.

Park Jimin is waiting dutifully at your desk when you arrive, a smug smile still slapped over your features as you sip at your coffee. Namjoon spoke to you today—how lovely.

Jimin quirks an eyebrow.

“What’s got you so perky this morning?”

You’re normally quiet and passive, avoiding eye contact or any semblance of emotion on your face.

You look up at the blonde bespectacled boy. Park Jimin is the closest thing to a best friend in the company. He’s who you spend time with at lunch, see on weekends, and text often. You suppose he’s the closest thing to a best friend you have in your entire life.

You send him a smirk and lean in close to whisper. “Namjoon said hi to me today!”

Jimin sends you a pitiful look and pats your shoulder. Your best friend is well aware of your secret crush and while he thinks Namjoon is a nice guy, he thinks your crush is a little hopeless. He’s the most popular guy in the office, often has dates lined up every weekend. Jimin hears the way he and his friends talk in the break room. The man is definitely not hurting for female attention.

“Oh, honey,” he sighs, unenthusiastically. “That’s great.” He can’t help but feel a twinge of sadness over how excited you’re getting from a simple ‘hello’ from a coworker.

“I know, right? Anyway, lunch today?” You ask as you settle down into your cubicle.

Jimin pushes his glasses up his face and nods. “Of course! That’s why I came by this morning. I wanted to let you know that Jungkook from marketing will join us.”

You make a face, disgust etched in the lines creasing your forehead.

“Why?”

Jungkook is well known in the company. He’s a loudmouth, a player, a clown, and everyone’s favorite comedian. He’s just not your favorite.

“Don’t be rude,” Jimin admonishes at your grimace. “He asked to join and well—he’s cute. I can’t say no to him.”

“Oh Christ, Jimin,” you groan. “Not you too! Don’t tell me you have the hots for the serial fuckboy?”

He blushes lightly and shrugs. “Maybe I do! Be nice to him today or I’ll eat all your chocolate ice cream I know you have at home.”

You stick your tongue out, petulantly. “Fine, now let me get to work or else Seokjin will be up my ass.”

Jimin smiles and kisses your cheek before he scurries away, back to human resources.

It feels as if barely any time has passed. You’re working hard, running calculations and updating spreadsheets. You have an eye for numbers, and losing yourself in an equation is just another day for you. You’re shaken from your cheerful place by a vibration from your phone, and a text alert popping on the lit screen.

jimin 12:01 pm- it’s lunchtime!! you better get your butt out here!

You smile and text back an affirmative reply, then move to grab your lunch from the company fridge. Gliding down the steps leading to the fresh outdoors, you meet Jimin at the lunch tables in the grass.

Jimin is sitting with Jungkook. You can recognize your best friend by his hair and glasses, and Jungkook by his obnoxious laughter.

“Hi,” you murmur as you sit down and open up the brown bag lunch you’ve brought.

“Hi!” Jimin is excited to see you, and just a pinch over eager to be sitting next to Jungkook.

“You know Jungkook, right?” Jimin asks, a harsh look in his eyes that reminds you to be on your best behavior.

You nod as you pull out a bag of grapes. “Oh, yeah, hey,” you smile. “I’ve seen you around.”

Jungkook delivers you a signature smirk and you feel yourself roll your eyes internally. “Yeah, you’re Coffee Girl, right?”

You pout and glare down at your brown bag lunch. Will you ever become more than just Coffee Girl?

“Yeah, I suppose that’s me.”

Jimin clears his throat to dismiss any awkwardness.

“So, Jungkook, I hear you like working out? ___ likes to work out too. She drags me to the gym sometimes. Maybe we could all meet up sometime?” You don’t miss the hopeful lilt in his voice. Jungkook does.

“Oh, yeah?” He narrows a sexy look at you, rather—a look he thinks is sexy that you find off-putting. “What do you do at the gym? Little cardio sets with 5 pound weights?”

What an asshole.

“Sometimes,” you state as you take a bite of the homemade salad you handcrafted last night. “Most of the time I’m lifting heavy. I can bench 275 and deadlift 300.”

Jungkook looks taken back. “What, really?” He sounds breathless. “You lift more than Namjoon-hyung.”

At the sound of the love of your life’s name, you pause. Your face heats quickly and Jungkook smirks. Of course, he recognizes this and not Jimin’s obvious flirting.

“Why are you blushing?” He asks. “Did I say something?”

You’re quick to dismiss things. “Um--no. I just um,” you’re grasping at straws. “I’m hot.”

Jimin is trying not to laugh, hiding his mouth behind a petite hand.

Jungkook tilts his head. “It’s not even sunny today.”

You gulp. “Yeah, I must be hot. With a fever. M-malaria… probably.”

Jungkook snorts.

“You have malaria? Bummer.” He picks at his nails. “I thought for a moment you had a thing for Namjoon.”

“No!” The retort is quick, too quick for normal conversation, and it gives you away.

“Aha!” Jungkook points an accusing finger at you. “You have the hots for him, don’t you?”

Your features melt, and Jimin tries to assuage the situation. “Jungkook, please don’t tell anyone,” he pleads.

Jungkook smiles at you. “That’s so cute. It’s like a little nerdy freshman crushing on the senior class president.”

You bury your head in your hands, suddenly unable to stomach any food.

“Jungkook,” Jimin’s tone becomes more firm, authoritative. “I’m asking you this as a friend. Please, don’t say anything.”

Jungkook holds his hands up to prove his innocence and waves his proverbial white flag.

“Secret is safe with me,” he promises. “But it’s cute. I know him really well, you know. I could try to hook you two up.”

You blanch, unsure if you want Jungkook saying anything about you to the man of your dreams.

“I’m good, but thanks,” you offer meekly. “I’m not feeling well. I’m going to head back to work, okay?”

Jimin frowns, knowing you’re feeling like a cornered animal, and nods. “Feel better, babe,” he sighs.

Jungkook watches as you leave and turns to Jimin. “Man, he’s way out of her league.”

Jimin slaps the boy in the chest. “Be nice, asshole, that’s my best friend.”

Jungkook promises to be nice, and Jimin is blissfully unaware that others are listening and that the man beside him is easy to persuade.

( present day )

The company-wide meeting adjourns soon after what is likely to be the most embarrassing moment you’ve ever lived through.

You’re grabbing at your things and trying to run out of the room, desperate to get out before anyone sees you or talks to you or laughs at you.

A hand grabs at the coattails of your suit jacket and you’re pulled backwards with a yelp. You turn to seek your captor and find the concerned face of your best friend, Jimin.

“Are you okay? What the fuck just happened?”

Jimin’s concern makes it all real. Until now you could pretend you were in a fugue state, totally dissociated from reality. Now, you realize that everyone in the entire company is aware of your crush on Kim Namjoon.

You can feel your bottom lip wobble, tears threatening to spill. Jimin murmurs an ‘oh shit’ and drags you out of the large room and into the nearest bathroom. He pushes you to sit against the sink and passes you toilet paper to dab at your eyes.

“I don’t know how she found out!” you cry. “God, I feel so stupid and embarrassed.”

It incenses Jimin. He’s holding it back to ensure you’re okay, but in reality, it’s an HR nightmare waiting to happen. He’ll find who did it and punish them accordingly.

They will suffer.

“It’s okay, babe,” he pulls you into a hug. “Everyone will forget about it soon. They’ll think it’s just a lame office joke, okay?”

You nod, feeling the slightest bit comforted by his words.

“How could she find out, Jiminie?” You ask with a sniffle. “You’re the only person who knows.”

Jimin sighs and shakes his head.

“I don’t know, but they’re dead. I haven’t told any-... oh, my god,” Jimin stops suddenly. You look up at him to catch what he’s thinking.

He growls and balls his fists.

“Jungkook knew.”

You let out a sob and bawl your eyes out into the tissue you’re holding. Jimin holds you tighter while he conjures up a hundred different ways to hurt someone and make it look like an accident.

“Don’t worry,” Jimin sighs, trying to comfort both you and himself. “I’m HR. I have to handle this. I’ll make sure they get what they deserve.”

You feel a sting of pain for Jimin. He’s been hopelessly doting on the man who spilled the beans for a few months now, even got to take him on a few dates. It was still nothing serious, but Jimin was clearly smitten.

“I’m sorry you have to do that, Chim,” you whisper. “I know how you feel about him.”

“Yeah, well,” he swallows thickly. “You’re more important than any asshole.”

Jimin holds you tight for a few minutes longer, before you clean yourself up and steel yourself. Ignore everyone, Jimin encourages. Just get to work, he says. Then you can go home and we’ll drink wine and forget about it all, he promises.

You replay his words in his head like a prayer as you walk down the corridors and towards your office. Everyone in the hallways stops to stare at you. They lean towards their friends and whisper. You hear snippets of their gossip, like “Namjoon” and “out of her league”. It drives the sharp blade lodged in your chest even further. It threatens to collapse your lungs and break your ribs.

You make it to your desk safe and sound and bury yourself in work and forcibly ignore the gawking and the stares.

Just make it home. Just get through the day. You’re almost there.

You could do this.

You nearly make it the entire day before running into the one person you didn’t want to see, Kim Namjoon.

At the end of the day, you’re taking the stairs down to the parking garage instead of the elevator. The elevator is too busy, too many people, and you’re trying to avoid the stares and giggles at your expense. The stairs are always deserted and you figure it’s your safest bet.

You can nearly hear the wine calling your name at home. A delicate glass of Sauvignon Blanc and some chocolate ice cream and a good cry—it sounds like the best and only way to unwind after the worst day you’ve ever had in your life.

The chanting of your name gets louder and you wonder if you’ve finally lost your mind—if you’re actually hearing your wine bottles all the way at home talking to you.

No, wait. The voice is real, and coming from behind you. You turn around to face who’s calling you and nearly faint at the sight.

Kim Namjoon stands on the landing above you, one strip of stairs between you.

“Hey!” He seems glad he’s caught you. “I’ve been calling your name for a minute.”

You swallow and search for an answer.

“Sorry, I’m-.. I guess I’m just a little out of it today.”

Namjoon grimaces.

“Yeah, about that…” he begins as he takes the steps down to be on equal ground as you. Your heart is spinning wildly. He’s so close to you. He’s talking to you. On any other day you’d be erupting towards the sky like a firework. But today isn’t any other day.

“I feel like I should apologize,” he states. “I don’t know what happened. I didn’t plan it or anything.”

Damn him and his kindness. Damn him and his cute, awkward smile.

“No, no,” you assure. “I know you didn’t. You don’t have to apologize.”

It’s hard to make eye contact with the man. You want to, know it’s important in intense conversations like this, but the thought of him seeing you—really seeing you makes you ache inside.

“It was a really shitty prank,” he begins. “I’m sure you don’t even know who I am, let alone have a crush on me.”

For the millionth time that day, your face heats to a near boil. You stammer and you’re sure you’ve blown any chance at even thinking about a date with Namjoon.

“Oh, uh, right,” you seek an answer, beg your brain to pick something to say that doesn’t make you sound stupid. “I do.”

“You do what?” He’s confused and you widen your eyes at what just left your mouth.

“I do know you! I mean, I do have a crush on you! Oh, fuck,” you shove your face into your hands. “Please, ignore that. I need to go. Sorry!” You don’t give him a chance to reply, you book it out of the stairway as fast as your heels will take you.

Today was the worst day you’ve suffered through in your life.

The next few days aren’t much better.

Not only are you “coffee girl”, you’re now also sarcastically called “Namjoon’s girl”. As much as you hate your initial title, you’d prefer it to the new one they throw at you as you walk by.

Jimin rats out Jungkook and Chungha to the bosses. They get two weeks probation and they have to write you apology letters if they wish to keep their permanent files clean of any reprimands. It’s a slap on the wrist, and everyone involved knows it. Jimin is furious and wants the boss to reconsider. You tell him not to push it. You’d rather this be over and everyone to forget it even happened. Jimin unwillingly agrees.

You’re working at your desk, earphones shoved in your ears to diffuse the gossip in the room, when you feel a tap on your shoulder. You turn and are greeted with the face of Judas Iscariot himself, Jeon Jungkook.

“Hi,” he sounds sheepish, cheeks reddening.

You narrow your eyes at him, sharper than steel. “What the fuck do you want?”

He winces, knowing he deserved that. “Well, I just wanted to apologize. I know they told me to write you a letter, but it seems too impersonal…”.

You can’t believe Jungkook is sucking his ego up and actually coming to you to apologize. You thought he’d for sure be the one to cop out and send a shitty letter.

He continues.

“I just wanted to let you know that I’m sorry that all went down. I didn’t mean to tell her. She got me drunk and said she saw me eating lunch with you and Jimin. I think she was jealous or something and it slipped out. I know that’s not an excuse. I fucked up your trust and Jimin’s trust. But I just wanted you to know I didn’t do it to be an asshole. She sort of duped me.”

You pause as you take in the man’s apology. He didn’t have to come to you in person. He could have easily taken the shitty route and half-assed a letter to you. But he didn't, and he owned up to his mistake. God dammit.

“I appreciate your apology, Jungkook,” you sigh and you see his body visibly relax. “I’m still mad, but I guess the anger is at her for doing it in the first place. I’m sorry she tricked you.”

He breathes a sigh of relief and kneels down beside you. “I’m really happy you believe me. I was worried you were going to kick me in the nuts.

“I won’t lie, I thought about it.”

He smiles with you, and you feel like this is the restart of a friendship. “I definitely deserved it.”

You shrug and smile. “Jimin would kill me for hurting you. He might even kill me for thinking about hurting you.”

Jungkook’s smile drops at the name of your best friend. Yikes. Looks like there’s still trouble in paradise.

“I think you’d be in similar company with Jimin right now. He’s not speaking to me.”

You let out a breath through your nose. “Yeah, he’s a little protective of me.”

“For good reason,” he admits. “You’re like a cute little flower. A cute nerdy flower.”

“Jungkook,” you warn. “I just forgave you after I was humiliated in front of the entire company. I’d be careful with calling me nerdy right now.”

“Fuck, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean it in a bad way.”

It’s hard to stay mad at the boy, no matter how much you dislike his reputation around the office. The fact that he humbled himself enough to seek you out and apologize is proof enough to you of his character.

“It’s okay, Jungkook. I forgive you,” you smile. “Thank you for apologizing.”

He rubs the back of his neck anxiously as his cheeks flare red.

“Yeah, it felt pretty shitty to just… do anything else. Plus, you seem really cool.”

“You seem great, too, Jungkook.”

He smiles and pulls you in for a hug, catching you off guard. For the fuckboy type, he’s surprisingly sensitive and soft. You like that about him.

“I’ll see you around, okay?” He says as he pulls away from you.

“Maybe you should apologize to Jimin, too?”

His smile drops, but he nods anyway. “Yeah, maybe I’ll go find him now.”

“Good luck,” you offer with a pat on his shoulder.

With a sad smile, he turns and heads down the hallway towards the HR department. You pray Jimin shows mercy to the handsome boy.

A few weeks go by, and you’re sure that everyone has forgotten about you and your most embarrassing moment to date. You make the coffee, you calculate the numbers, everyone ignores you. Things return to relative normalcy.

Until it doesn't. The moment you think you're safe is the moment your guard comes down and everything falls apart around you.

It's when you're in the staff kitchen, grinding fresh beans to brew a second pot of coffee, that it happens.

The kitchen is fuller than usual. You normally try to wait until the lunchtime crowd dwindles and leaves to make your second pot, but you're so desperate for the caffeine that you can't find it in you to care.

You trudge into the kitchen with your handy coffee mug clutched in your tired hands and head towards the cupboards to grind up the beans.

There's a few groups of coworkers lingering in the room, and as your grinder whirs the beans around into a powder, you chance a look around to see who's among the crowd.

Your eyes flick immediately to where a hearty laugh erupts. It makes your heart still in your throat. Namjoon sits with his usual crowd of friends, hand gripping a homemade sandwich while the other assists him in telling his story to his friends. He pays you no mind—why would he?—and you can't help but stare at the way his dark brown hair lays perfectly against his forehead, and his eyes crinkle so cutely at the edges when he smiles.

You nearly forget about the coffee grounds—you're snapped out of your Namjoon-induced trance when suddenly a woman's laugh echoes around the room.

"Look at her," the voice states.

You peer up and see a girl you vaguely recognize. Is she from Marketing? Or perhaps Sales? You’re not sure, but she’s staring at you with a sneer.

“She’s so weirdly obsessed with Namjoon. It’s so creepy.”

Your face turns cherry red and you’re sure your lungs stop functioning. The air your body needs to breathe freezes and your chest aches.

Namjoon turns to look at the girl before he looks and sees you grasping your coffee grounds tightly.

“Chungha was right—it’s so weird. Namjoon, you should talk to HR about this!”

Namjoon turns back to the gossiping coworker and frowns. “Can you leave it alone? She wasn’t even doing anything.”

The girl huffs and crosses her arms over her chest and looks back at Namjoon.

“How can you stand to be in the same room as her? She clearly thinks she has a chance with you.”

Her words come out like a bite. She punctuates her point with a harsh laugh and the group around her mumbles and chuckles in agreement.

You’re desperately grabbing at anything you can, wanting to leave as quickly as possible before you’re embarrassed further.

“Well, she does!” Namjoon replies loudly, annoyance written in his features. “I was actually going to ask her to dinner this weekend in private, but since everyone is so fucking interested in my love life, I have to do it publicly.”

The room falls silent, and your favorite mug falls out from your hands and shatters on the floor. All sets of eyes stare at you while yours widen with disbelief—you don't even care that you’re standing in a pool of old coffee and shattered ceramic.

Namjoon stands and heads over to you, bending down to pick up the shards of your coffee mug. You take a few stunted breaths to kneel and help.

His eyes peer into yours. They’re warm—a chocolate brown color that makes you feel safe.

“What do you say?” He asks with a smile so gentle it nearly breaks your heart. “Will you let me take you out this weekend?”

You’re gaping like a fish and the surrounding room is silent—bated breath waiting for your reply.

“Yes, I would l-love that.”

His smile turns even brighter, and he stands to throw the broken mug away.

“I’ll email you the details, okay?”

Your head nods dumbly without thinking. His eyes sparkle as he smiles at you, and he extends his hand down to you to assist you off the floor. As your hand slips into his, you can’t help but feel how soft and strong he feels. You wonder what his hand would feel like caressing your face, smoothing down the expanse of your bare back, running down the length of your body.

The thoughts shake out of you as he winks and kisses your hand gently, causing the gossiping coworker to grunt her disapproval and for murmurs of shock to echo around the room.

“I’ll talk to you later, doll.” Namjoon winks at you before he grabs his sandwich and leaves the room, gesturing to his crew to follow along.

The place on your hand felt warm where his lips once lingered. You no longer cared about the angry glares from the rest of your coworkers. Your heart beats wildly in your chest, and you leave the kitchen nearly floating on cloud nine.

Email from: Kim Namjoon

Sent: 3:06 pm

Subject: Hey good lookin ;)

Hey!

Just wanted to see how you are! I’m sorry about what happened at lunchtime. That was super petty and uncalled for. I really wanted to ask you out, and I hope I didn’t embarrass you too much by doing it in front of everyone.

I was wondering if you’d like to go out this Friday night after work? Say around 7? If you send me your address, I’ll pick you up.

Let me know!

Xoxo, Joon

You’re sure if you weren’t sitting in your tiny cubicle, you’d be screaming your lungs out.

The second the notification of the email came through, direct from the man of your desires himself, your body froze.

You re-read the message, over and over and over.

The winky emoji, the xoxo, the nickname ‘joon’. It’s all so much and makes the grin on your face threaten to split your lips in half.

Your fingers press the “FWD” button and you quickly send the message to Jimin, before you stand demurely, attempting to give off an air of professional confidence. You need to talk to Jimin, now.

As soon as you’re out of the eyesight of suspicious coworkers, you bolt down the hallway towards Human Resources. Your high heels click loudly on the tiled floor, but the sound doesn’t even register in your mind. All you can think about is Namjoon, the email, the press of his lips on your hand, the way his smile made you feel as if you could fly.

The door to HR swings open with your tight grip around the doorknob, and you open your mouth to call to Jimin, the lone employee, when you’re startled by the sight ahead of you.

Jimin sits on the edge of his expansive desk with his arms thrown around Jungkook’s neck and is clearly engaged in a deep, sensual kiss. At the sound of the door opening, they quickly break apart, with matching cherry red blushes on their cheeks and mused hair.

“Oh, shit,” you gasp.

The men are silent and you can’t help but giggle after a moment passes. “I’ll take it you two made up?”

Jungkook flashes you a dopey grin, one that gives you an answer, while Jimin smirks haughtily.

“Jungkook and I were just discussing, umm… his 401k.”

Jungkook looks at the blonde boy for a moment, confused, before he gets it. “Yeah! Totally. Retirement. Love to t-talk about it?”

You laugh out loud and walk towards the couple.

“I’m sure it was a titillating discussion,” you tease. “I have good news though, if it’s okay to interrupt this retirement planning session.”

Jimin nods and Jungkook rubs at the back of his neck awkwardly. “I guess I should leave?”

“It’s okay,” you smile. “I trust you.”

Jungkook smiles as if he’s just won the lottery. He looks between you and Jimin, face pure and excited like a puppy.

“What’s up?” Jimin asks as he moves to sit down at his desk.

“I forwarded you an email. Read it.”

Jimin nods and logs on to his posh computer, scrolling and clicking before narrowing his eyes and reading.

“Oh, my god.” Jimin’s face is shocked—it's written all over his features. “Namjoon asked you out?!”

Jungkook’s child-like grin turns into one of shock himself. He runs around to stand behind Jimin, eyes seeking over the words of the email.

“Well, hot damn,” Jungkook whistles. “He asked her out.”

Jimin exchanges a look with Jungkook, one that you’re not sure you can read. It quickly slips your mind, however, as you’re more focused on the task at hand.

“Can you come over tonight after work and help me pick out something to wear?” You ask excitedly.

Jimin smiles at you, a touch of sadness in his eyes, before he nods.

“Of course, babe,” he assures. “We’ll make sure you look nice and hot for the date with Mr. Kim.”

“Thank you!” You squeal as you wrap your arms around your best friend. He hugs you back before you scurry out of the office and back to your cubicle, itching to reply to the message.

Jimin sighs as the door to his office closes behind you.

“Kook, please don’t tell me he’s going to break her heart. He’s asking her out to make himself feel better about this, isn’t he?”

Jungkook slips his hand into Jimin’s and squeezes.

“I’ll find out, baby.”

Jimin smiles and nods appreciatively at the boy, before leaning up and kissing him.

Jungkook smiles against his lips, and is determined to ensure the young HR specialist never hates him again, even if he has to go behind his hyung’s back to ensure his new boyfriend’s happiness.

Jungkook has one mission now, and that’s ensuring Namjoon takes you on the greatest date known to man.

He grills Jimin with questions about what you like over dinner one night. Jimin finds it endearing that Jungkook is so eager to rectify his mistakes, but he still can’t help but worry that Namjoon is doing this to save face—not because he actually likes you.

“So, what does she like doing?” Jungkook asks as he spins his pasta around his chopsticks idly.

Jimin smiles as he takes a bite of the ramen Jungkook has thoughtfully prepared for their stay-at-home date.

“I’ve told you already! She’s easy to figure out.” Jimin pats Jungkook’s hand gently. “She loves cooking and baking, working out, daydreaming about Namjoon.”

“Cooking, hm,” Jungkook looks thoughtful as he takes a bite. “I think Namjoon can work with that. I’ll let him know!”

Jimin tries to hide the anxiety brewing in his stomach. He’s had to plaster on a fake smile for you while you tried on different outfits, wondering which will be the one to finally convince Namjoon he is the one for you. It’s hard to fake it around his boyfriend, too—but something tugs in his stomach that flares the cynical side of him.

Namjoon went from not knowing of your existence, to watching you get publicly embarrassed in a matter of minutes. While Namjoon isn’t a terrible guy, Jimin knows he doesn’t like anything to tarnish the gentleman reputation he’s built in the office. And as much as Jimin likes him, and surely likes his friend Jungkook, he can’t help but feel skeptical.

Jungkook hurriedly pulls out his phone and types away, letting his elder friend know of what he’s found out. Jimin swallows his food, and his pride, and hopes to god his growing cynicism is wrong.

Friday comes slower than you’d like. You wake up every day during the week, one day closer, and your eagerness hits peak levels. Namjoon sees you in the hallways during the week and winks at you, hands shoved in his tight slacks that make you salivate.

He emails you again Thursday afternoon, confirming things and getting your address. You reply in nanoseconds, uncaring how overeager you come off.

By the time your alarm clock rings on Friday morning, you’ve already been awake for 4 hours.

All you can do is daydream about the date, the way his hand fits into yours, the warmth of his eyes when he smiles at you.

It’s what fuels you through work.

You hope to god the numbers you’re attempting to work during the day come out right, because your mind is elsewhere for more than most of the day. There isn’t enough coffee in the world, but also your body feels as if you’ve overdosed on caffeine already.

The clock eeks towards 5:00 pm and you’re bolting out the door at 4:56 to head home and get ready for your date.

Jimin attempts to meet you before you leave, but your desk is cold and empty by the time he gets there.

He sighs and heads back towards his office to gather his things, waving bye to various coworkers as they file out of the corporate building.

He turns the corner towards his office but stops in his tracks as he sees Namjoon’s back to him, phone pressed to his ear.

“Baby, I’ll come over later tonight, okay?” Namjoon speaks into the phone.

Jimin feels his heart fall into the pit of his stomach. He retreats and hides behind a wall, ear carefully peeled to listen to the tall man’s conversation.

“I’m going on this date with that chick from work,” he sighs. “It won’t last more than a few hours. Poor girl has a crush on me and you know the usual assholes won’t leave her alone.”

Jimin bites his lip and clenches his fist. Namjoon thinks he means well, but he knows his suspicions have been confirmed, and he’s torn inside. He wants to tell you, to warn you not to get too invested in the man, but he also has no interest in popping the bubble you’ve been in since the day he asked you out.

Jimin lets it simmer for now. He decides he’ll monitor Namjoon and cut things off if it appears the man strings you along for fun.

Namjoon finishes his phone call with a promise to see whoever is on the other end of the phone later that night, and Jimin quickly pulls out his phone and fakes a conversation with no one when he hears the man approach.

“Oh, Kookie,” Jimin giggles, leaning against the wall casually. “I can’t wait to see you tonight, either, babe.”

Namjoon walks towards Jimin and makes eye contact with the HR specialist.

“Bye, Kook! See you tonight, baby.” Jimin finishes up the fake phone call as Namjoon arrives next to him, and he plasters on his best fake smile.

“Congrats on you and Jungkook,” he speaks sincerely.

Jimin hates how nice he is, hates that he’s a nice guy who gets too wrapped up in his own good looks and reputation.

“Thanks, Namjoon,” Jimin smiles uneasily. “You too! Have fun on your date tonight.”

Namjoon’s face lights up and Jimin desperately wishes he could go back in time to 30 seconds ago, before he heard the conversation, and believe that Namjoon truly wanted to date you.

“Thanks, should be fun, huh?” He winks and nudges Jimin, before he waves a goodbye and continues out the door.

Jimin pulls his phone out of his pocket and dials the number of his boyfriend.

“Hey, baby. We’ve got a problem.”

tag list! - @jimidol @aretha170 @dearbambideer

#kim namjoon smut #kim namjoon #bts smut #bts fics #namjoon smut #out of my league #knj #knj smut #rap monster smut #JOOOOOOOOOONie

1K notes · View notes

taelme · 4 years ago

Text

Enemies-to-lovers!Changbin

request: Hiiiii I read you bangchan enemies to lovers au and I swear if I could like a post more than once I'd like that one a MILLION TIMES I'm wondering if maybe you could write an enemies to lovers au for changbin pretty please? 🥺🥰 genre: enemies-to-lovers!au (again, not Super extreme, low-key clash bc they’re both stubborn), film club president!Changbin, childhood penpal!au (fluff, very mild angst, they bicker a lot, kind of cheesy bc changbin’s a sap and we know that) pairing/s: Changbin / Reader (ft some skz members) word count: 17k+ tw: mild coarse language (they say shit a lot LOL) a/n: THE ANON WHO REQUESTED THIS...IM PRETTY SURE you waited months for this so thank you for being so so so patient!! I decided to try something a little different from my usual style but idk if it’s That Obvious, but its more structure wise I guess, but nonetheless, I'll be getting a little busier soon so I’m not sure If I'll be able to put out Full one shots for the next few months but I'll try my best w those little shorter ones maybe! (I'll have to see how Tired I am) also p.s I love this gif thank u to whoever made it but changbin is blonde in this fic bc of Personal Reasons

To: my penpal Y/N

How are you?

I had a good day today. Sorry if the paper is crunchy I am writing this on my bed because my mom thinks I am already asleep. Today I went out with my mom and we went to the park and ate some sandwiches at the park. We had a picnic but with no juice because my sister finished everything. And then we went to the toy shop after lunch. I saw a keychain of a camera and bought it for you because you like acting and cameras can take a video of you acting.

This is a picture of me next to the wishing well at the park, you cannot see it but i’m making a peace sign. I threw a coin in the well and made a wish that your audition will be good. I know you will do very well because you practiced a lot for it. That’s all. I’m a bit tired now. Goodnight, or good morning if you are reading this in the morning. Or afternoon.

I hope i’ll be hearing from you soon, Binnie.

“So, do you wanna keep them? If not I can chuck them together with the rest of your old things,” your mom began, already reaching over to take the letter from you.

Your eyes widened just as quickly, shaking your head quickly as you gripped the envelope and its contents behind your back away from her reach.

“No, no. Don’t throw them away,” you said sternly, softening your gaze when you noticed the way her eyebrows had raised in amusement, embarrassment washing over your features.

“I’ll keep them. Gimme the box.”

Your mom set the beaten looking converse shoebox down onto the table, shaking her head at you as a small chuckle escaped her. Mental note to transfer the letters to a smaller (and more durable) box.

“Alright, alright,” she waved her hands at you in dismissal, “hurry up or you’ll be late for school.”

She shut the door behind her with a light thud, leaving you to stare at the grainy polaroid your childhood penpal had sent you when you both were only eight and still exchanging letters every week.

Inhaling deeply, you shoved the polaroid picture back into the envelope, slipping it into the box of envelopes before getting up. You figured that was a box you wouldn’t have the time to delve into when you were already keeping Jisung waiting.

Driving as fast as you could (or as fast as you dared to) within the speed limit, you’d reached your campus soon enough. It wasn’t that long of a drive and it would be even shorter (walking distance to be specific), when you move into your apartment nearer to campus in a few days. But that didn’t change the fact that you were running late now, spotting Jisung standing by the fountain with a sour look on his face that had only deepened once he’d spotted you.

Before an utterance of apology could leave you, Jisung had pursed his lips, stretching out his hand that held your cup of drink, a small hint of a smile playing at his lips.

“I’m starting to wonder which one of us has worse time management,” he sighed deeply, shaking his head with feigned disappointment as he glanced at his nonexistent watch on his wrist.

Jisung was one to talk, for sure. His crumpled looking shirt over baggy cargo pants and a hat to cover his head of messy hair told you his journey to school wasn’t exactly ‘leisurely’ either.

You rolled your eyes, taking a sip of your drink and sighing at the taste, “it’s definitely you. I was only late today ‘cause my mom was showing me my old stuff she found in the storeroom.”

Jisung waved you off, “fine, whatever,” he fished his phone out of his pocket as you started walking towards the auditorium for a class you were both dreading.

“Oh, shit, Hyunjin says the professor’s already in class, we should hurry up.”

Quickening your pace, you were glad to have reached before your professor had started, Jisung directing you towards where Hyunjin was seated at the side of the auditorium, giving him a small nod as you sat down.

Not that Hyunjin noticed anyway, the said boy busy with messaging someone on his phone with a frown on his face.

“What are you doing?”

Jisung peered over Hyunjin’s shoulder, frankly not wanting to focus on the lesson as the professor played a video on boring business things he figured he could just ask you for later.

Hyunjin sighed, setting his phone down onto the table and pushing his laptop open further, going to his email with quick clicks on his trackpad, “gotta send the scene for the auditions later to Changbin.”

“Oh, for that film thing?” Jisung asked, earning a nod from Hyunjin, whose eyebrows furrowed as they remembered your presence.

“Y/N should audition,” Hyunjin nodded his head towards you, his mention of your name distracting you momentarily, but you’d brushed it off quickly as you tried to take down whatever your professor was rambling on about.

At your lack of response, Jisung nudged your shoulder with more force, “hey, did you hear what Hyunjin said?”

You tore your gaze reluctantly from your professor as your fingers finished typing whatever you had left in your memory, the confused look on your face prompting Hyunjin to take over.

“We’re having auditions later for the movie the film club’s gonna be making,” he started, nodding slowly as his eyebrows raised, “I was saying you should join, you’d be good for the role.”

You narrowed your eyes at Hyunjin, “what’s it about?”

Jisung huffed, “some cheesy penpal shit, the last I heard.”

Your quirked an eyebrow at that, Hyunjin rolling his eyes.

“Something like that, but it’s not super romantic. They’re childhood penpals who meet again in the future but they don’t end up together, I don’t know how to explain it to you as well as Changbin can, but will you come anyway?”

You scrunch your nose as you consider his offer.

Was there anything you needed to prepare? You didn’t even know exactly what you were signing up for. Or much less anyone in the film club. Well, other than Hyunjin, of course.

“Is there any script I'm supposed to prepare with?” you asked, making Hyunjin’s eyebrows raise, his lips parting in realisation.

“I’m pretty sure it depends on what role you want…” he trailed off, making you scoff.

Not being able to help the laugh from escaping you, you narrowed your eyes at him, “you sound like you’re not even in the club.”

Hyunjin flashed you a sweet smile, “you know what? I’ll just send you what I sent Changbin. You can just prepare with that! Penny’s role!”

Jisung snorted, his hand coming up in a poor attempt to stifle his giggles.

“Penny? Is it because...she’s a pen pal?”

You pressed your lips into a firm line, finding it awfully amusing as well.

Hyunjin frowned, scrunching his nose up in distaste, “we couldn’t think of anything better, okay?”

You huffed, lower lip jutting out in a small pensive pout. You didn’t have much going on in terms of school productions as of now, anyway, you guessed there would be no harm in showing some support for Hyunjin.

“What time are the auditions?”

“They start from lunchtime until like five,” Hyunjin tried his best to recall, looking at you with his best pleading gaze.

Sighing again, you nodded, “this is my only class for today.”

Hyunjin was practically beaming now.

“Perfect.”

===

“I don’t like it.”

Hyunjin sputtered over his sip of coffee, an incredulous expression on his face, attracting looks from the other film club members in the dance studio. Excusing himself, he’d made his way outside, oblivious to the squeals and stares the girls waiting to audition were directing towards him, settling himself in the middle of the field outside the dance studio.

“What do you mean, ‘you don’t like it’?” he asked you again, his eyebrows furrowed as curiosity took over him.

You sighed, rolling your shoulders back as you nodded at one of your teachers you were walking past, your grip relaxing on your phone as your arm had started to get tired.

“I mean, I read through the script, and something about Penny’s character just doesn’t sit right with me,” you told him, “it just… doesn’t make sense for her to come to that conclusion when she’d been having a perfectly good time with the guy before that, you know?”

Pausing, you’d waited for him to respond, his silence prompting you to continue with your elaboration.

“Okay, I’ll put it this way,” you started, adjusting your grip on your laptop in your arm, “If I were a reader, or like, a viewer in this case, I would wanna be able to pick up on these small moments or signs that Penny is actually thinking about her relationship, do you know what I mean? Because now the way it looks is that she’s just a plot device meant to hurt him, and that there’s no exploration of the development of their relationship at all.”

Hyunjin let out a deep sigh, “Okay, I know, I know, but the thing is… this was Changbin’s idea, and I don’t know if you’ve heard—I mean, you probably have, but… nobody really questions him.”

You hummed, following Hyunjin into the school building and tugging your coat tighter around yourself, the cold air in the building shocking you as you entered.

“Yeah, I get that, but you’re forgetting that I don’t have the same relationship with this Changbin guy that you guys do. I don’t mind telling him that I have a problem with it. I don’t wanna be acting out some two-dimensional love interest character if I can help it.”

Hyunjin grimaced, not seeming to be too keen on your insistence, “I really think it might be a little late for him to change the script.”

“It’s never too late.”

“Well to Changbin it could be!” Hyunjin insisted, making you roll your eyes, a small chuckle leaving you.

You huffed, “I still think the audience deserves a better film with better crafted characters.”

Hyunjin let out a sound in between a sigh and a groan, “Okay fine, you just have to make sure you get the role, and then you’re free to argue with Changbin all you want. Deal?”

“Deal,” You turned the corner and spotted Hyunjin standing in the middle of the field, already making his way back to the dance studio.

“Okay,” he spoke before you could end the call, “I gotta go, see you later.”

You didn’t expect there to be so many people at the auditions, mostly girls and just a handful of guys. Though you seemed to piece the uneven ratio together when you saw the not-so-furtive stares the girls would cast in Hyunjin’s direction whenever he’d peek his head out from the crack in the door to call the next person in.

You recognized one of the guys who’d come in later than you, one of Jisung’s upperclassmen friends whose name was Minho.

“Didn’t think i’d see you here,” he gave you a small smile as he took a seat next to you.

Shrugging in response, you let out an awkward huff of laughter, not used to talking to him about anything other than his cats and Jisung’s whereabouts.

“Yeah… well, Hyunjin asked me to come, so I figured I might as well,” you fiddled with the slip of paper with the scene printed on it, “not like I had anything better to do, anyway.”

Minho nodded slowly, leaning closer to you and dropping his voice to a murmur, “I’ve never seen any of these girls before.”

You huffed, “I’m pretty sure most of them are here for Hyunjin.”

“Oh yeah, makes sense,” Minho hummed, a small lilt of amusement to his tone, “where is he, anyway? He told me he would be here—”

Minho’s question was answered when the girls beside the both of you had erupted into harsh whispers and murmurs, tapping each other excitedly as Hyunjin could be seen through the window panel in the door, looking on seriously as one of the girls inside the room was auditioning.

You huffed, gesturing to the window.

“Found him.”

Inside the room, Changbin was distracted.

He knew he had a certain image in his head about what he wanted ‘Penny’ to be. But whatever the girls that had auditioned so far had been showing, that dramatic ‘i never loved you!’ emotion, that wasn’t exactly it. And it didn’t help either that they struggled letting go of the dramatics when Chan would prompt them to try a different angle.

Hyunjin cast a (mildly concerned) look at Changbin, trying to gauge his expression, figuring the pointed look Changbin had sent his way was enough to say he didn’t think this girl would be shortlisted.

“Who’s next?” Chan leaned over in his seat to peek at the clipboard of names of signups, Changbin leaning back in his seat and pushing the clipboard towards him, not finding it in him to be able to be more hopeful about the next person.

“Oh, Y/N,” Chan hummed, nodding with an impressed expression on his face, the name catching Changbin’s attention, “that’s cool, didn’t think they’d audition.”

“Y/N?” Changbin echoed, something about the name awfully familiar to him, yet not being able to make the connection in his memories yet.

So for now, he’d simply gestured to Hyunjin to signal that he could send the next girl in, Chan sweetly thanking the girl that had just auditioned as she left the room.

Making your way into the room, you scanned the ‘panel’ of judges.

You recognized Chan, the said pale-faced boy looking even more tired when he’d yawned as you made your way to the centre of the room. He came to your school productions often since he and Felix were friends, and Felix was always involved in some way or another. The other boy, though, you didn’t think you’d seen before.

The two of them seemed to exude completely different auras, with Chan smiling warmly at you and gesturing for you to come closer while the other boy sat with his arms folded across his chest, frowning at you as though you were a code to decipher.

“Hey, didn’t expect to see you here,” Chan broke the silence first, giggling.

You shook your head, “honestly didn’t think i’d sign-up either.”

You pressed your lips together in a tight-lipped smile, rocking back on your heels as you glanced at the boy next to him again, “I actually only heard about it from Hyunjin this morning,” you admitted, Hyunjin flashing Chan a grin from behind you as if to say ‘you’re welcome’.

Changbin cleared his throat, making Chan perk up.

“Right, sorry. So, we’ve obviously met but this is our club’s president Changbin,” he gestured to the boy sitting next to him.

Changbin nodded curtly, bringing his hand up to run it through his bleached hair and shoving his cap back on his head with habitual movements.

Now you were starting to understand why Hyunjin was so intimidated by Changbin, always having heard stories about him but only now being able to put a face to the name.

Nodding slowly, you gave him a smile, “nice to meet you, I’m Y/N.”

Changbin had to stop himself from faltering, his breath hitching when he realised why your name was so familiar.

After all, it had been the first candidate before they’d decided to go with ‘penny’. He wondered how cruel fate was to have brought you, someone with the same name as the person he’d practically based this story on, to be auditioning for the very role.

You tried not to be offended by the way Changbin had simply nodded at you, straightening up in his seat, “and you’ll be auditioning for the role of…?”

Would it hurt him to smile?

You inhaled deeply, trying to hide your amusement as you answered him, “Penny.”

Changbin nodded, Chan humming as he looked up from his copy of the script to give you another reassuring smile.

“Alright, whenever you’re ready. I’ll be taking the lines of the male lead,” Chan told you.

You understood that the scene was some sort of scene where the two romantic leads have some sort of confrontation, and you did your best to get into what you imagined Penny would be feeling, Chan reading the line asking if ‘penny’ had even loved him at all. Dramatic was the word to describe it, really.

You softened your gaze, unintentionally letting it rest on Changbin but deciding to let it stay there, executing your lines all the while trying to ignore the way Changbin’s stare was unnerving you, making you want to prove to him that you were a good actor even though he hadn’t questioned your acting skills.

Hyunjin had been watching the exchange closely, Changbin’s grip on his pencil loosening as he’d let the pencil fall softly against the table.

Changbin wondered if it was some sort of coincidence, because whatever ‘it’ was that he’d been looking for in Penny’s character, you’d managed to convey almost perfectly.

And it was clear that Chan had felt the same way as well, since once your audition was over, the smile on Chan’s face was nothing but beaming.

Once you’d left the room, Hyunjin telling you that they would contact you by the next morning, Chan had turned to Changbin, the same stupid smile on his face.

“That was great!” he nudged Changbin, the younger boy still recovering from the shock of the coincidence of it all, managing to muster a small huff in response.

“Yeah,” Changbin reached over to grab his water bottle, prolonging his silence as he took a long sip, “I don’t think we’d even need to see the rest.”

Chris scrunched his nose up, grinning, “but you know we still will, of course. Just in case.”

Changbin sighed, glancing at the clock, agreeing with Chan even though he knew he’d already had his mind made up.

“Yeah, just in case,” Changbin mumbled, looking out the window and seeing you talk to Minho, tearing his gaze away and rolling his shoulders back.

“Okay, send the next one in.”

===

To: Binnie

How are you?

I’m okay. I like the picture you sent me of you using your scooter. My mom says you look nice. I think so too.

Today I went to the museum and I ate an ice cream for lunch. I don’t have a picture of it but it was a Strawberry ice cream.

I just finished reading your letter. Sorry to say it using a bad word, but i think what your sister did was stupid. I think you should still tell her to ask for permission to use your scooter. But if she still does not listen, maybe you should tell her again. Because my mom always tells me that if I want something, I have to ask for it. So you should do that. Maybe she does not know you don’t like it when she plays with your scooter. Or, you could buy a new scooter. Here is some money so you can buy a scooter. I drew you $50 because that is a lot of money. I hope you have a good day when you read this.

Till next time, Your penpal Y/N.

You weren’t the world’s kindest human alive, you had your petty moments. I mean, there were so many songs and literature and movies that highlighted that idea that no human was perfect, right? But you tried your best, surely.

So, you’d gladly complied when Hyunjin asked you to grab extra cups of coffee for Chan and Changbin (as reluctant as you were. You were strapped for cash as it was).

You figured that was the least you could do before the trouble you were about to cause the both of them. But hopefully, if office etiquette was anything to go by, the simple gesture would show that you were kind, and someone who appreciated the offer given to you, as much as you hated the superficiality of your character.

However, when you showed up at the room, you were reminded that Changbin wasn’t just anyone. And while Chan made his appreciation known, Changbin… was the same as ever. Intimidating, and very hard to read. The sight of it almost made you want to take back his coffee.

He wasn’t wearing a hat today. Instead, he’d let his blonde hair (which looked darker since the last time you saw him, or maybe it was just his dyed-black undercut) fall messily over his forehead in a slight side part.

His black shirt did nothing to hide his physique, every movement of his coming across as a subtle flex, making you have to remind yourself time and time again that you weren’t exactly here to fawn over him.

He would lean back in his seat, scrolling through whatever he was looking at in his phone with one hand, his other hand draped over his stomach and propped underneath his elbow to support it. The way he would look made it seem as if he was almost oblivious to the world around him, only paying attention to what was on his phone until he would laugh at something Chan said, Chan being the only person you’ve seen that managed to elicit seemingly uncharacteristic giggles from him.

Though it wasn’t as if you were given much time to get used to it. The moment Chan had murmured something in his ear, his expression had switched back to ‘strictly business’.

Chan straightened up, looking around the room with his eyebrows slightly raised in question, one hand adjusting the braided leather bracelet around his wrist

“So, shall we get started then?” Chan asked, gesturing to Changbin before typing away at his laptop.

Changbin took his cue, getting up from his seat and making his way around the table to the front of the room, pulling the overhanging screen up to reveal the whiteboard.

“So, first of all, we’ve finalised the actors playing the characters,” he gestured towards you and Minho, “Minho as Soobin and Y/N as Penny. So, we can start shooting about next week. I would say we’re working with a pretty loose deadline because we don’t have to submit it until a few months from now.”

Changbin rolled his shoulders back, his body language seeming fairly relaxed although his expression remained serious nonetheless, “but that doesn’t mean we should slack, obviously.”

His statement elicited a small groan from Hyunjin, who muttered a ‘figures’ under his breath, making you stifle your giggles for Changbin’s sake.

“But we will start with maybe going over the script once through, go over the technical stuff after we get any issues with the flow out of the way.”

He looked as though he were going through a mental list of things to cover, his gaze flickering momentarily to Hyunjin, as if his face would give him answers to the invisible question in his head.

“The people in charge of the props, have you started preparing the letters?” Chan stepped in, earning a shake of the head from the two girls sitting next to Hyunjin, making Changbin wave a hand dismissively in their direction.

“They could start on that after we confirm the script,” Changbin leaned over the table to grab his cup of coffee, proceeding to take a long sip from it.

“Alright, let’s start then.”

Changbin took the empty seat he was standing next to, pulling his laptop closer to him to pull up the script.

Throughout the reading, you tried to keep your comments to yourself, you really did. It just fascinated you how fearful the team was of Changbin (well, aside from Chan), the way everyone seemed to bite their tongues or withhold their comments caused a permanent frown to be etched on your face.

It didn’t make it any better that Minho seemed to have no problems with the script, not even when you’d occasionally leant over to whisper to him and ask if he found that part a little weird or a little abrupt. But you held your tongue for now, (and also because of the side glance Hyunjin would cast your way whenever you would let out a small sigh), you wanted to give Changbin the benefit of the doubt, figuring maybe if he read through his script again he’d realise how one-sided it was.

But thankfully, when you were reading out the lines where the two main characters had ended their date, and on a particularly high note for that matter, it seemed the opportunity to voice your concerns about the script was presented to you when Changbin had spoken up.

“Okay, since the next scene onwards will be where their relationship breaks down, any questions so far?” He asked, though his tone didn’t sound like he was really asking for feedback. But, hey, an opportunity as an opportunity, wasn’t it?

You cleared your throat a little too harshly, raising up your hand as you leaned against the table to be seen better, “uh, actually, me? I mean, I have some feedback actually.”

Changbin looked at you curiously, his gaze landing on you with slight surprise, as if he hadn’t expected it to be you of all people. There was a slight hesitancy evident in the way he paused before giving you a short nod, prompting you to go ahead.

You smiled, ignoring the way Hyunjin had sighed deeply a few seats away from you, dreading the chaos that could have come with people like you and Changbin bumping heads.

“Well, it’s not really specific to this scene. It’s kind of about the whole flow of the plot in general…” you fiddled with the corner of the page you were on, “but I was thinking it would be better to show more of Penny’s point of view? You know, because when I was reading it it just felt a little… weird for them to suddenly break up if everything seemed to be going fine.”

Changbin narrowed his eyes at you, looking back down at his computer with a simple dismissive shake of the head, “That’s not necessary, they’re going to break up anyway.”

The room had fallen silent, everybody seeming to have taken that as a ‘end of the conversation’ kind of line, already beginning to bring their attention to the next scene.

You frowned, unable to control your expression as you made your dismay obvious, casting a desperate look to Hyunjin who honestly looked as though he would pay you not to pursue this.

“But that’s not the point,” you spoke, getting Chan’s attention as he looked at you, silently urging you to continue, “you wanted to show their relationship, right? So, shouldn’t you show… both their parts in the relationship? Since it’s not like this is told in Soobin’s point of view.”

Changbin pursed his lips, “the point is,” he brought his cup of coffee to his lips, taking a small sip before continuing, “their relationship was superficial so it doesn’t matter.”

You mirrored his expression. The way it sounded was that he was just trying to convince himself that it didn’t matter.

Your frown deepened, quick to respond to him.

“That’s the thing, if you’re so insistent on them breaking up, why don’t you just make their relationship lead up to that? The way they’re interacting up to this scene makes viewers think they’re just going to end up together,” you tried to reason, hoping Changbin would understand where you were coming from.

Minho took that opportunity to excuse himself to the bathroom, and as you gave the rest of the film club members a once-over, you hated the way they were all looking at you as if you were cussing Changbin out instead of just giving him constructive feedback, or just voicing your thoughts for that matter.

“Well, not everyone gets a happy ending, I guess.”

He was practically avoiding your message at this point, making you grow more frustrated.

“Okay, look, what’s your intention behind making this film?” you asked, watching carefully as Changbin huffed, looking fairly amused at your insistence, which only served to irk you more.

“Simple,” he shrugged, “to show people like you that not everything that seems so perfect ends up perfect in the end.”

Your lips parted, scoffing, resisting the urge to get up from your seat as you heard Minho re-enter the room.

“People like me?” you echoed spitefully, “okay, fine, whatever. But as you said, if that’s the point of your discourse, shouldn’t your message be to tell people that they can work through things like this instead of just giving up and leaving like Penny did?”

Changbin was annoyed now. To him, you seemed too idealistic to understand his reasoning behind the story. He wondered why it had to be you that was telling him this, you were the only one that was trying to find problems with his story, that he’d based on his own life for that matter.

“Well what if she did, huh? What if Penny did just up and leave with no warning?”

You rolled your eyes, hearing Chan struggle to stifle his laugh, your exchange with Changbin being just about the most excitement he had in the whole school year.

You resisted the urge to roll your eyes, “which is why I'm saying that your job as a storyteller is to shed some light on the reason behind that. Then your story wouldn’t be about showing how things don’t turn out the way they seem, it would just be telling you, but not showing you. You could just ask literally anybody to hurt Minho—”

“Soobin,” you heard Minho correct from beside you, making you huff, scrunching your eyes shut tightly before opening them harshly.

“—Yes, Soobin’s character, and it would be the same? The story wouldn’t show me anything other than the fact that it was Soobin’s fault he ended up that way. He didn’t question anything that happened, he just let it happen to him,” you sighed again, clenching your jaw, “Penny isn’t anything other than some 2-dimensional plot device designed as an excuse for Soobin to sulk about how cruel love is.”

Changbin scrunched his nose up, his brows knitting in annoyance as he stared at you, a silence falling again in the room. Changbin was about to interject when Chan had decided that would be a good time to step in.

“C’mon guys, let’s… calm down a little. We’re talking about penpals here, not the king’s lover betraying him.”

You cast Chan a questioning look at his example, making him shrug, continuing, “we’re running a little overtime anyway, we can just continue discussing this another time.”

Just like that, the rest of the film club members seemed eager to leave, either rushing for their next class or just not wanting to be in the same environment as an irritable Changbin.

Chan directed his gaze towards you as you were getting up from your seat, slinging your bag over your shoulder.

“I’m sure Changbin will keep your points in mind, don’t worry,” he reassured you just as Changbin chimed in with a ‘no, I won’t’ behind him, leaving the room promptly afterwards, leaving you free to let out the frustrated groan you had been withholding.

“Thanks, Chan. Sorry I kind of made you guys overrun your time,” you sighed, watching Hyunjin making his way to you with wide eyes.

Chan shook his head, holding his laptop securely in one arm as he let out a burst of giggles.

“No, don’t apologize! I should be thanking you, I didn’t think about your point until you mentioned it just now,” he murmured, “but again, sorry about Changbin. He’s just a little… protective of his work.”

Hyunjin let out a low whistle from next to you, “Extremely.”

You nodded, shrugging, “It’s alright, I get it.”

Chan flashed you a smile, his hand reaching out to give your shoulder a reassuring squeeze, “Thanks, again. See you around.”

Leaving the room with Hyunjin, you ignored the way he’d begun to chuckle to himself, “honestly, in this whole time i’ve been in the film club, i’ve never seen Changbin actually… argue with someone.”

You rolled your eyes, kicking at the stray pebble “well if he continues like this, you’re gonna be seeing a lot more of it.”

“You sure seemed like you were having fun, though, weren’t you?” Hyunjin was being sarcastic, knowing he was just doing this to dissuade you, his tone eliciting a scoff from you.

You shook your head.

“You know for a fact I wasn’t. But it wouldn’t sit right with me if I just kept my mouth shut like you and the rest of your film club goons,” you shot him a pointed glare.

Hyunjin pressed his lips into a firm line, holding his hands up beside his head in surrender, prompting you to continue.

“If I want something done, I’m gonna ask for it. It’s as simple as that.”

===

To: my penpal Y/N

How are you?

Was your audition good? Thank you for the money. But $50 is a lot of money so I don’t think I should spend everything, my mom says I need to save money. Thank you for telling me what I should do, but in the end I didn’t buy another scooter. I did this because we were learning about needs vs wants in school and I think the scooter is a want. My teacher says this means I don’t really need it. But needs are things like colour pencils and pens and paper so I can write letters to send you. Maybe your mom tells you you cannot buy so many stickers because the stickers are a want and not a need.

Anyway, I think I can just let my sister take my scooter. Maybe I will just get another scooter for myself when I am older and I have more money.

I hope I will be hearing from you soon, Binnie.

As you said before, you weren’t perfect, but you surely did your best. But days like this you wondered if people like Changbin even tried.

After your interaction with said stubborn being during your meeting with the film club had put you in a bad mood, you were currently seated with Jisung in a booth at a popular burger outlet outside school, thankfully having managed to get a place in the midst of the anxious afternoon crowd. And even more thankful that you could eat your lunch in peace where you were very much away from Changbin.

“What did you say to him, again?” Jisung hadn’t bothered trying to hold in his laughter as he was almost shouting over the noise of the crowd, making you huff as you bit into your burger.

“I said it’s funny that he was talking so much shit about the main couple when he’s dedicating his entire movie to them,” you drawled, your annoyance returning as you recounted the spat you had with him during the small meeting you had with the film club just before lunch.

Jisung’s shoulders shook as he laughed, fumbling with his drink as his eyes shut tightly, giggles leaving him and seeming as though they would never end, “and that’s what you said word for word?”

You nodded, reaching over to press the lid of Jisung’s drink down firmer before he could spill it all over himself.

“I know you’re friends with him but I really don’t know how you work with this guy, he’s as stubborn as stubborn goes,” you huffed, taking another bite into your burger as Jisung’s laughter had died down, though his smile had only lingered.

“You’re worse,” he snickered, earning a glare from you.

Jisung remained unaffected, “Look, he’s honestly fine once you get to know him,” he tried to reason, sounding as though he were trying to convince a child to make friends, “I mean, we’re all still kind of wary around him when he’s in a mood but honestly, if not for the way you guys met, I’m pretty sure you two would get along well. He seems like he’s your type.”

Your eyes widened, scandalised at Jisung’s implication.

“The only thing he has in common with my exes is being annoying, okay?” you rushed to push away the curiosity of what Changbin would be like as a boyfriend. Curse Jisung and his stupid implication.

“And plus,” you continued, hearing the doorbell chime for what sounded like the thousandth time to signal yet another entry into the diner that was now overflowing with people asking for take-out, “it’s not like he’s been very nice to me since I got involved with his stupid short film.”

Jisung sighed, his gaze momentarily distracted by something behind you, making you wave your hand in front of his face to keep his attention. He’d glanced back at you, an almost dazed look in his eyes before he’d given you a small smile, taking a bite out of his burger and not waiting to finish chewing before he answered you.

“I honestly think that he just needs a little more persuasion. Like, take this for example, something similar happened with him and Chan when they were composing something in the past, and trust me, if you don’t give up now, i’m pretty sure he’d agree to come to a compromise or something,” he gave you a shrug, his gaze returning to whatever was behind you (probably someone cute, you figured). You couldn’t say you blamed him; almost all your conversations revolved around you and Changbin’s squabbles these days.

You pursed your lips, narrowing your eyes at him, “you really think he’d be willing to rewrite his script?”

Your tone was skeptical, already imagining how Changbin would simply tell you to keep dreaming if you’d brought up the proposal to him.

At Jisung’s lack of response, you’d frowned slightly, seeing him turn back to you calmly as his smile widened, giving you yet another shrug.

“Maybe you can ask him yourself.”

If there was any feeling one would get just before something bad was about to happen, that was definitely what you were feeling now.

You didn’t dare to tear your gaze away from Jisung as you watched him turn his body, his hand coming up in a wave that had only turned into a hi-five, his behaviour only adequately described as boisterous as he welcomed the people you were hoping you wouldn’t have to see for another week until the next film club meeting.

Well, Chan was fine, you were simply referring to Changbin.

“Oh, hey, Y/N! Didn’t know you and Jisung were friends,” Chan gave you a sweet smile, gesturing between you and Jisung as he spoke.

Jisung chimed in with a nonchalant “Best friends, actually,” which had only made you shoot him a glare.

“Might have to re-evaluate that,” you muttered, turning back to Chan and Changbin to give them as warm a smile as you could muster.

“Are you guys eating here too?” you asked.

You were oblivious to the way Changbin’s gaze flickered from your face to the food in your hand, and then back to Jisung, looking perfectly unaffected as he joked with Jisung about something you didn’t quite catch.

“Well, we wanted to, but, you know, with the crowd and all we probably won’t be able to get a seat,” Chan’s gaze was pitiful, to say the least, making Jisung raise his eyebrows, and that sinking feeling within you had only intensified as his next sentence left his lips.

Jisung had barely glanced at you as he held onto Changbin’s hand.

“Well, our booth’s actually meant to seat four people, so you guys could squeeze in if you want,” he offered.

Changbin quirked his eyebrow, skepticism written all over his features, though mostly directed towards you, “you guys really won’t mind?”

You glared at your burger, scrunching your nose up as you avoided Changbin’s pointed gaze.

Jisung scoffed, giving Changbin a loud smack on the arm, “of course we won’t, right Y/N?”

He turned to you, giving you a smile you could only describe to be devious (and fairly amused).

“Yeah,” your voice took a pitch higher unintentionally, “go ahead,” you murmured, scooting into the booth to make space for them.

You took another bite from your burger, watching out of the corner of your eye as Changbin took a seat next to Jisung, Chan excusing himself to retrieve both their orders.

“Funny that you showed up, actually. Y/N and I were just talking about your short film,” Jisung spoke, earning a pointed glare for you, as if daring him to continue (and you should’ve known that wasn’t going to faze him at all).

“Oh, were you?” Changbin drawled, his eyebrows raised and a slight smile playing at his lips, “I’m sure Y/N had a lot to say about that.”

As you were about to speak, Jisung had interjected with a little giggle, “she did.”

Changbin didn’t seem to take Jisung’s comment as an answer, simply keeping his gaze fixed on you, prompting you to produce an answer of your own. You ignored the knowing look Jisung gave you.

You sighed, “maybe I wouldn’t, if someone just took my suggestions.”

Changbin had let out a small huff at that, leaning back in his seat with his arms folded over his chest as Chan returned to the table with his and Changbin’s food, casting curious glances between the three of you seated at the table.

“Hope you guys didn’t fight while I was gone,” he joked, making you sigh, and you missed the pointed look he cast Changbin’s way when the boy had scoffed, “what were you guys talking about before I came?”

You shrugged.

“We were talking about the short film,” you told him, “kind of.”

Chan had perked up at that, turning to you as he handed Changbin his food, “oh yeah, I wanted to ask if you had more feedback about the scenes.”

You nodded, “I do, actually.”

Changbin’s gaze lifted from his burger to look at you as he sighed, “what is it now?”

You huffed, “It’s not that bad. I was just wondering if the content of the letters were gonna be read out during the scene? ‘Cause if it is, then maybe we could kind of make it a little more relevant to their personalities or something.”

“Will that be hard? What do kids even talk about in their letters?” Jisung laughed.

Changbin’s lips parted slightly before pressing them into a firm line.

“Well, they’ll be like 9 when they’re exchanging letters, I suppose, so I guess they’d at least know how to have a conversation… ” He sounded almost hesitant, making you wonder why he made talking about childhood penpals seem like such a complex thing.

You thought about your own penpal, Binnie. You were about that age when you were exchanging letters with him too, figuring you could give some insight on that until Jisung had intercepted.

“At that age all I did was talk about hot wheels, to be honest. Much less talk to girls,” he snorted, making you scoff, using your shoe to nudge his leg under the table.

Chan, who had been silently thinking, had straightened up abruptly.

“Wait,” Chan’s eyebrows lowered, frowning slightly as his lower lip jut out in a slight pout. He directed his attention to Changbin, pointing his index finger towards him, “didn’t you used to have a penpal?”

You had to stop yourself from making your shock too obvious, your eyes widening as your gaze became nothing but accusatory. How badly did his penpal experience go for him to be so cynical about it now?

Whatever it was, the newfound information made you curious as to exactly how much of the story he’d changed, more importantly, how much he’d retained.

“You?” you couldn’t help yourself from blurting, though Changbin remained unamused.

“Yeah, I did,” he bypassed your incredulous stare, answering Chan simply.

Jisung hummed, bringing one hand up to fiddle with his ear piercing, not having expected Changbin’s response.

“Oh, well, what was it like, then?”

Changbin shrugged, resting one of his forearms on the table to support himself, his other hand reaching down to pick up a fry, “was nice. We would exchange letters every week. Talked about a lot of things, sent each other pictures, you know, all that stuff.”

“Do you still keep in contact with them?” Chan asked, genuine curiosity in his voice, not having heard much from Changbin about this penpal in the entire duration of their friendship.

Changbin shook his head, “nope,” he popped the p, picking up his cup to swirl it around noisily, the ice rumbling as it got tossed around in the paper cup, proceeding to take a sip from it as the rest of you looked on curiously at him.

“Well, why not?” you dared to ask, a million different possible reasons running through your mind.

Maybe they did something to piss Changbin off, or maybe they got into a big fight (which also made you wonder how heated fights could get over snail mail), or maybe one of their parents disapproved of the other. The possibilities were endless as you anticipated just why 8 year old Changbin would’ve cut ties with his penpal. And maybe, you were enjoying the dramatic aspect of it a little more than you should’ve been.

But something about the way he replied felt restrained. Maybe you were reading into it too much, but he almost sounded evasive. But, of course, you chose to ignore (suppress) it for now, watching intently as Changbin had once again shrugged, an air of nonchalance to his gestures as he met your gaze.

“Just… grew out of it, I guess.”

You huffed, memories of your own penpal making his response sting.

You don’t think you ever ‘grew out’ of talking to binnie. You remembered how frustrated you were when you’d stopped hearing from him after he moved, and every letter you’d sent to his new address had only been returned back to you. Maybe he grew out of it, but you wouldn’t have left it like that if you had a choice.

You rolled your eyes at his response, something in your response seeming to have irked Changbin.

“What?” he snapped, making you hesitate just the slightest bit, deciding to bite your tongue and shake your head.

“Nothing.”

Chan let out a huff of laughter through his nose next to you, shaking his head at you goodnaturedly.

“Forgive us, you always seem like you have something more to say,” Chan spoke, apparent ‘damage control’ for Changbin’s abrasiveness.

“Wait, so, you’re really not gonna have a happy ending?” Jisung frowned.

“Well, Changbin and I were talking about it after the meeting that day, we figured since we have time we could afford to change the script a little,” he hummed, turning to you, “you know, since it could be a chance to kind of send a more hopeful message like you were talking about.”

Your eyes widened, your hand almost reaching out to touch Chan’s arm but realising you were still holding your burger, “really? You’re open to changing it?”

Changbin’s gaze flickered momentarily to you, observing your posture, noticing how open and comfortable you seemed with Chan, the sight alone enough to make him scoff. Call him a cynic, but he couldn’t tell if this was you acting or not just to get your way.

“There could be another meeting for you to discuss and work on the script together, but yeah, we’re alright with changing it.”

You turned to Changbin, a hint of distrust in your stare, making him huff again, putting down his drink on the table with a little too much force.

“He said it, not me,” he told you, pressing his lips firmly into a tight line, “you wanna change my script so badly? Fine. But your ideas better be worth changing it for.”

Jisung scrunched up his nose as you turned back to Chan, not wishing to look at Changbin’s face any longer, leaning over to whisper to Changbin, “you two don’t like each other very much, do you?”

If he was caught off guard by Jisung’s statement, he didn’t show it.

Changbin shrugged, picking his drink back up, “they started it.”

At the sound of his accusation, your eyes narrowed, turning to glare at Changbin, thankful for Jisung nudging you under the table before you could retaliate with a comment of your own. Chan simply casting you an amused look, his eyebrows raised in a silent question of what you were about to do.

You shook your head.

Whatever, you pushed your annoyance away in your head, as long as Chan was there during the rewrite meeting, you’d hopefully still be able to maintain your sanity.

Or at least, that was the hope that you were holding on to until that night when you’d gotten a text from Chan.

Chan 11:17pm - hey, i gave changbin your number if you don't mind... you know, since you guys have to discuss to rewrite the script and all -

You’d almost sat up from your bed in shock, frowning against the harsh light coming from your phone and the contents of the text, the latter obviously making you more disgruntled.

11:17pm - won’t you be discussing with us?? Why not just make a group chat??? -

Your heart was pumping with anxiousness as you awaited his reply, something about the sound of the clock ticking putting you in an even more anxious state, your heart almost sinking as texts from him and Changbin had come in at the same time.

You looked at Chan’s first.

Chan 11:18pm - oh i didn’t tell you? All script writing is done by Changbin. I’m just in charge of the other elements like props and directing and whatnot -

You shut your eyes, suddenly wishing you could travel back a few seconds back in time and not have checked your phone when Chan had texted you. Bringing your fingers across your screen reluctantly as you typed a reply to him.

11:18pm - ohhh hahaha right i forgot, thanks chan -

Now for the bigger menace at hand. You swiped over to Changbin’s message, your finger lingering on his chat as you decided to stop being petty and just open it.

seo changbin 11:18pm - just so you know, i’m doing this only because Chan asked me to. we can go over the changes at my house. is saturday okay with you? -

You pulled your notifications bar down. Tomorrow was Friday, and from what you knew you were pretty much free on Saturday. Fortunately or unfortunately for you.

You took another deep breath as you typed out your reply to him. For your own sanity, you tried to ignore the way he felt the need to clarify that he wasn’t doing it for your sake.

11:18pm - saturday’s fine. What time?-

Resisting the urge to go offline when you saw him come online, you felt as though you were in some sort of staring contest through your phone as you watched him type, his message coming in quickly.

seo changbin 11:18pm -1? We could order in and discuss -

You sighed, it wasn’t enough that he had to take away one peaceful lunch from you today, but yet another one on Saturday.

11:19pm -okay text me your address-

Another sigh left you when you read that the address he’d sent you was just a few blocks away from your apartment. Maybe he lived alone too; most of the apartments here were occupied by college students looking for affordable rent and shorter travel time.

seo changbin 11:19pm - don't be late -

You scoffed, shoving your phone back onto your bedside table as you slumped back against your pillow, burying your head into your pillow and kicking at your blanket that covered your feet uncomfortably.

Fine, if he wanted to be that way, that was fine by you. You would just do this for the sake of the short film. Yeah. That’s all it would be.

===

“Let’s make this quick and painless for the both of us,” you blurted the moment Changbin had opened his door to let you in, glad to see he was donning an outfit similar to yours (sweatpants and a t-shirt), your previous worries of being underdressed dissipating instantly.

He let out a sigh, his hand coming up to run it through his hair, his hair messy and sticking up at one place awkwardly, looking as though he’d slept on that side for too long.

“Hello to you too,” he grumbled, shutting the door behind you as he gestured to the living room.

You glanced around his rather plain apartment as he led you to the living room, his laptop resting on one of the cushions of the sofa, soft music verberating from the device.

“What food do you want?” he asked, earning a thoughtful frown from you as you set your things down on the floor next to the sofa, taking a seat on the other side of it.

“Fastest delivery would be if we order from that Chinese food place nearby, right?”

Changbin’s eyebrows quirked up in intrigue, “I was thinking of that place too,” he handed you his phone, letting you order what you wanted before handing it back to him.

It was otherwise silent between the both of you as you waited for the food to arrive, neither of you quite knowing how to break the silence. The tension slowly made you grow increasingly fidgety as time passed.

Changbin had sat down on the floor next to the coffee table, resting one hand on his soft rug as he pushed a stack of papers towards you, drawing your attention away from your soft copy of the script on your phone as you realised it was a hard copy of the script.

“Just use this, i’ve got a copy on my laptop,” he mumbled, making you nod, accepting it from him as you flipped to where you left off.

Changbin glanced at the clock, in disbelief that only 10 minutes had passed and yet he found himself feeling jittery at your silence. Turning his gaze towards you, he let out a small sigh.

He had expected you to say something by now, or let out some snarky comment about something he wrote. Your silence was unnerving him, it was almost as if he wanted you to say something, especially with the way you were scribbling notes beside the pages with a mechanical pencil he didn’t even recall seeing you take out.

“Which scene are you at?” he blurted, his anxiousness getting the better of him, making your head shoot up abruptly, surprised at his sudden outburst.

“Uh,” you glanced back down at the page, “I’m at the part where they find out they used to be penpals,” you told him.

“Okay,” Changbin murmured, thinking about where to go from there, momentarily distracted when he’d heard the doorbell ring. Pausing, he’d stepped out momentarily to retrieve your food, the rustling of bags getting louder as he neared the table.

Setting the food down on the table, surprising you when he’d pushed the food towards you, your surprise hadn’t gone unnoticed by Changbin.

“What?” he scoffed.

You shrugged, “nothing, just didn’t know you were capable of doing nice things,” you told him, a sarcastic lilt to your tone.

Changbin inhaled deeply, shooting you a patronizing smile as he broke his chopsticks, “anyway, I think we could start from there, since that’s kind of the turning point of their relationship.”

You nodded, pulling your food towards you as you began to eat.

“I was thinking,” you spoke, pausing to chew on your food, “this part has a lot of unanswered questions, like… I wouldn’t just let it go so easily if I found out someone was my penpal that I grew apart from. I felt like they should’ve had a bit more of a confrontation there.”

Changbin hummed, shocking you when he’d leant closer to you to look at the script, making you push it towards him, a small huff leaving him at your action.

“What questions do you think Penny would ask, then?” he asked you.

“I don’t know, maybe why they stopped talking in the first place?” there was a hint of sarcasm in your tone, making Changbin look at you over his mouthful of noodles.

“I told you already, Soobin grew out of it—”

You grimaced at his answer, your chopsticks halting before your mouth momentarily before you shovelled your noodles in with annoyance, “I don’t believe that.”

“I used to have a penpal, and I can guarantee you, the reason why we stopped talking wasn’t because we ‘grew out of it’,” you told him pointedly, having to stop yourself from growing too riled up about it, Changbin tensing up at your revelation.

Bringing his glass of water to his lips, he let his gaze wander around everything but you as he thought, curious as to what your penpal experience was like. Finally meeting your gaze, he almost sputtered over his water with how much he wasn’t paying attention to his actions, the only thing on his mind being to get his words out.

“You did?” It was pathetic, really, that that was all he’d come up with after such a long pause.

You nodded.

“Yeah, but it doesn’t matter, the story isn’t based on my penpal, it’s based on yours,” you attempted to draw the attention away from you, unsettling feelings of sourness building within you at the thought of how you left things.

“So, think. What would you be curious about?” you prompted him, seeing him purse his lips, a certain dazed look tinting his gaze.

Swallowing his mouthful of food, he looked at you as he thought. He would want to know if they were still passionate about acting, he would want to know how their family was doing, he would want to know if their personality had changed, if they were still the assertive ‘go after what you want’ character that had encouraged him so much. Or maybe, just how they are.

Changbin’s lips parted, shaking his head slowly, “... so many things,” he murmured.

An unexpected tension fell between the both of you, Changbin’s eyes meeting yours with a sort of unspeakable thoughtfulness, as if he was still thinking about your question.

You broke eye contact first, “write that, then. Who knows? Maybe they’re both as curious as the other.”

“You’re one of those glass half full people, aren’t you?” he huffed, making you click your tongue in annoyance.

“And what? You have no glass at all?” you retorted.

“Would you still be… curious too? Even If it didn’t end well?” he asked suddenly, a stupid question, Changbin thought, but still something he felt compelled to ask in the moment, as if he wanted the confirmation that you, someone with a penpal experience as well had shared the same sentiments as him.

You nodded, “of course I’d be. I could hate you and still be curious about you,” you shrugged.

“Me?” Changbin asked, making your eyes widen, the tension dissipating slightly as you shook your head vigorously, your hands coming up to wave at him dismissively.

“No no, not you. I meant-” you stopped yourself, glaring at him, “I just meant it as an example.”

And for what you were sure was the first time, Changbin had laughed, beginning to feel a bit more comfortable around you, his eyes forming narrow slits and the apples of his cheeks rounding slightly as he grinned, soft breathy giggles leaving him.

“Alright, I get it. It’s not a secret that you don’t like me.”

You huffed, not being able to help but feel the need to reassure him, “you’re not… that bad I guess. Jisung talks you up all the time.” you said, unsure why you felt the need to reassure him that you didn’t have a burning hatred for him, “you’re just stubborn as hell.”

He scoffed, “I could say the same about you.”

You quirked an eyebrow at him, reaching over to flip the page, “glad to know we’re on the same page, then.”

“Now that you said it,” Changbin began, moving on quickly from your bickering as he shoved his empty food packaging aside, “I do think Soobin would be curious about the things they talked about in their letters.”

You perked up at that, eyebrows raising, “That reminded me, I actually still have some of the letters from my penpal when we were younger, if you want I can loan them to you for some inspiration or something.”

Changbin nodded, flipping over to another page before pausing to type something on his computer, “yeah, actually that would be useful.”

You continued to look at the script for what had become hours, the both of you deciding it would be easier if you each assumed one of the character’s voices, speaking on behalf of the characters as you discussed. Coming up with a ‘what would soobin/penny do?’ process.

All the while during this discussion, Changbin had been scribbling down in his beaten up journal, the sides of the spine of the book peeling off when he’d set it down on the table, making you grimace.

“Do you think Pe—”

“Why don’t you just get a new journal? This one’s making such a mess,” you blurted out, frowning at the way the little brittle pieces of God knows what material covered his notebook had fallen onto the coffee table, making him tear his gaze away from what he was writing, looking at the mess on the coffee table you were gesturing at and letting out an amused huff.

“Oh, didn’t notice,” he smiled, “but that won’t be necessary, this journal’s been serving me fine.”

“It’s literally falling apart,” you pointed out.

“And you’re literally exaggerating.”

You scoffed.

“I mean, look at it, it’s such a hassle to use, since you have to keep cleaning up whenever you do so much as touch it,” you reasoned, seeing him shake his head.

“I don’t need a new journal, I’m perfectly fine using this one,” he told you, making you scrunch your nose up in distaste, Changbin looking at you with amusement heavily laden in his smile.

It seemed that there was something about the hours of bouncing off ideas and bickering that warmed the both of you up more, not feeling as wound up or hostile towards each other as you did a few hours ago, bonding over a shared want for the short film to be good.

“What?” he asked, leaning back against the sofa and resting his arm on one of the cushions, his other hand grasping his fingers as he awaited your response.

“You sound exactly like my mom,” you had a sour look on your face, continuing, “I bet you’re one of those needs versus wants people.” You huffed in amusement, shifting in your seat as you flipped through the scene you were about to discuss.

Changbin’s lips parted in shock, a breathy huff leaving him, “and what’s that supposed to mean?”

You shrugged, “You know, those people that decide on buying things through the concept of needing it or not.”

Changbin rolled his eyes, “yeah, like any other normal person.”

“It’s so boring! Ever heard of the concept of treating yourself?” you huffed, gesturing wildly. You were clearly very passionate about this.

Changbin shook his head, the smile lingering on his face, “I’m starting to understand why you’re Jisung’s friend. Sure, a treat once in a while is understandable, but i’d rather not waste my money on things I could do without.”

You huffed, a deep sigh leaving you, recalling a conversation you had with Binnie about his scooter.

“What’s up with boys and this need versus want thing? My penpal said the same thing even though he was only eight,” you mumbled, a small breath of laughter leaving your lips, leaving Changbin frowning at your statement.

Maybe other kids just talked about the same things he did with Y/N? He brushed the thought aside.

“He did?”

Changbin’s voice came out more hoarse than he’d intended, the intent in his stare making you falter momentarily, forgetting what you were doing just for a second.

Thankfully, you’d snapped out of whatever trance you were in, shaking your head dismissively, “nothing, it doesn’t matter.”

Changbin tilted his head at you, narrowing his eyes as he contemplated whether to pursue it or not, watching closely as you busied yourself with flipping pages just to look busy, even though the inside of your mind was spinning with an indescribable feeling that came with convincing yourself that the drift between you and your penpal was merely circumstantial.

You chewed on your lip, hating the way it felt as though your stomach was churning as you remembered the disappointment you felt when your letters had stopped getting sent through.

You were young, surely you shouldn’t blame yourself, you believed that. Your finger fiddled with the corner of the page, staring at Soobin’s dialogue.

‘Did our conversations even mean anything to you?’ the dialogue read, and you inhaled deeply as your head lifted to look at Changbin, your abrupt movement almost making him flinch in surprise.

“Why did you really stop talking to your penpal?” you sighed, curiosity getting the better of you. Though at this point you weren’t sure if it was curiosity or simply reassurance. Maybe even closure. All of which you needed to satisfy.

Changbin knew you weren’t going to accept his ‘grew out of it’ statement for an answer, deciding to be honest with you, you know, for the sake of the short film.

“I just… stopped hearing from them,” he began, heaving a sigh of his own as he shifted in his seat, picking at the imaginary dust on his sweatpants, “guess they had nothing to say.”

You couldn’t lie about it, you felt relieved. A part of you began to understand why he’d painted Penny’s character out to be like that, or furthermore why Soobin had seemed so affected by the revelation.

“Nothing to say…” you echoed, as if trying to wrap your head around his reasoning as well.

A small huff of amusement left him, though there was a hint of bitterness in his smile.

“I wouldn’t have minded, you know.”

He took his lower lip between his teeth, letting it go and you watched as the blood rushed back into his lips, looking redder than before.

Your eyebrows knit into a frown, “Wouldn’t have minded what?”

Changbin met your gaze, giving you a resigned shrug, “hearing it,” he continued, “nothing, everything.”

You could almost feel your heartbeat slowing down, the tense silence returning in the room and making you feel like you couldn’t breathe. Now that was some dialogue.

“Oh,” you broke the silence, your blank expression reading pure shock, your reaction catching Changbin off guard, “write that down, that’s such a Soobin thing to say.”

Changbin couldn’t do anything but laugh, shaking his head at you, “how opportunistic of you,” he teased, though he wrote it down nonetheless.

Maybe you being here was good, Changbin thought, it reminded him not to take himself too seriously sometimes.

===

To: Binnie

How are you?

I hope you are not still sad about your friends. I would tell you not to listen to them but i know that’s difficult sometimes because you can hear everything they say. But they were being very mean so they are not nice people. I don’t agree with what they said, because i think you are very nice and you have a nice smile. I don’t think you are scary. Sometimes my mom tells me i should smile more so people think i’m happy but I think you should just smile if you are happy. If you are sad then you can be sad. It is not a bad thing. I’m your friend because you’re nice to me and I like talking to you. If they’re going to be mean to you then they’re not your friends. If they do that to you again you can tell me their address and I will go and tell them myself!

Till next time, Your penpal Y/N

You’d shown up on the filming set on the first day absolutely buzzing from head to toe and ready to go (though, when you told Jisung about how you felt he’d insisted it was because of the lack of substantial sleep and the cans of energy drink you’d both drank the night before while he was helping you prepare your lines), but it seemed that everyone on the set was more tense than ever.

You found Hyunjin huddled with a few of them next to the sound cart, deciding to approach them to ask where Changbin was, having bought a coffee for him along the way.

“Hey,” you called, Hyunjin jumping in shock as he turned, his hand over his heart as he winced at you.

“Why do you move so quietly!” he groaned, making you dismiss him with a wave.

“Did something happen? You guys look stressed,” you took a step towards them, possible reasons fluttering around in your mind but none seeming quite appropriate for the context you were in. Maybe the semester’s GPA results were out?

“Whatever, do you guys know where I can find Changbin?” The boy next to Hyunjin, a freshman by the name of Jeongin had sucked in a sharp breath at your question, making you grow even more confused.

“He’s… a little tense these days, so I’d suggest being a more careful around him,” Chan explained, earning nods of agreement from the film club members.

Your eyebrows raised, confusion showing in a slight pout on your lips. You didn’t remember him behaving out of the ordinary when you’d seen him the day before.

“Where’d he go?”

“He’s over there,” Chan pointed towards where the camera was set up and true enough, you saw Changbin seated at a bench there busying himself with his phone.

Nodding, you’d made your way over to Changbin, discomfort growing within you at the stares you were getting from the club members (some of which you didn’t even know the names of) as you made your way towards the blonde haired boy. It was a wonder why they all avoided him like the plague.

Changbin seemed to have sensed your presence, looking up from his phone and giving you a small wave as you reached the bench, sitting down next to him and holding out his cup of coffee.

Accepting it gratefully, he’d given you a nod.

“Thanks,” he glanced at your hands, “you didn’t get one for yourself?”

You let out a small burst of chuckles, “nope, figured it wasn’t the most logical thing to do since i’m already pretty alert from last night’s energy drinks.”

Changbin sucked in a sharp breath, clicking his tongue in teasing disapproval, “I figured as much, Jisung was way too hyper when I met him at the studio.”

Your expression was sheepish, “I’d say I was sorry but it was... important.”

Changbin huffed, “It’s alright, as long as you’re taking care of yourself.”

Before you could react to his statement, Changbin had acted as though he hadn’t said anything, an amused smile playing at his lips as he tore his gaze away from you, looking forward as he took a sip from his cup, “ready to film today?”

You nodded, regaining your bearings, trying not to think too much of his words.

“Pretty much, you?”

Changbin nodded, “yeah, even though we still have a little bit of the script left, I would say i’m pretty confident.”

You glanced behind Changbin, spotting Hyunjin looking at the both of you with sheer disbelief, making you roll your eyes, turning back to Changbin, angling your body on the bench so you could hug your knees to your chest, looking at him curiously.

“Are you feeling okay?”

He nodded, looking at you with confusion written in his features, clasping his hands around his coffee cup as he rested his hands on his lap, “yeah, why wouldn’t I be?”

Maybe it was just his resting bitch face.

“Smile,” you commanded, nodding your head when he’d looked even more confused.

You watched in amusement as Changbin had laughed, shaking his head before looking at you with an all too sarcastic smile, his hand coming up in a peace sign next to his cheek, a smile unknowingly making its way onto your face at the sight.

“Okay now, don’t smile,” you continued.

Changbin had let his smile fall, looking just the same as he did when you’d shown up, making you press your lips into a firm line, a slight knit in your brows as your eyes narrowed.

Turning his head, he straightened up.

“Cool, Minho’s here,” he said, getting up and holding a hand out to help you up.

“Thanks,” you muttered, not expecting him to turn around and give you a smile.

“Let’s go, Penny.”

It was strange to you that there was something that felt so familiar about his smile, it reminded you of something that made you feel nostalgic. You liked seeing him smile. Changbin had a nice smile.

You brushed the thought away, nodding as you took his hand, letting him help you out.

“What, so you guys don’t hate each other anymore?” Jisung groaned later on that same week when you’d told him about the exchange you had.

He lifted his head from where he lay on your bed, “God, with you guys it’s like everyday’s something different.”

You quirked an eyebrow at him in amusement, “well… that’s because it is, isn’t it?”

You spotted the box of letters from your childhood penpal hidden beneath a stack of novels you had yet to unpack, your eyes glistening with triumph as you reached into your storage closet, fishing it out with a grunt.

“Come to think of it, Changbin hasn’t said anything about you since that day you met him to rewrite the script,” he murmured thoughtfully.

Heaving a sigh as you got up from your squat, you closed your closet, “which day? We met up a few times for the script.”

Jisung perked up at that, sitting up slightly and supporting his weight with his elbows.

“You did? Why am I only finding out about this now?” he scoffed.

You rolled your eyes, walking over to your desk to set the box onto it, “I told you about it, you just forgot.”

Making your way over to the bed, you flopped down onto your belly next to Jisung, looking at him curiously as he frowned at you. His mention of Changbin had made you curious.

“He… really hasn’t said anything about me?” you dared to ask, regretting it almost immediately when Jisung had taken the opportunity to twist your words.

Jisung’s expression had changed to one that you were all too used to, how his eyes would give away that he was thinking of saying something to tease you, his lips curving into a slight smirk.

“Why? Do you want him to be talking about you?”

You wrinkled your nose, a small panicked scoff leaving you, “yeah, right. Don’t get too carried away there.”

Jisung prodded further, leaning closer to you as he drawled, “well, why not? I mean, you said it yourself, you guys are on pretty good terms now, aren’t you?”

You purse your lips. The film club had been nice enough to give you a month longer to work on the script, you and Changbin ending up getting carried away and doing the whole thing over. And of course, within that month, you interacted with Changbin in some way or another almost everyday.

It could be meetings at his or your apartment, or spontaneous phone calls when one of you thought of an idea and you’d felt inspired to discuss it (even if you were on your bed tucked into your sheets when it happened most of the time), sometimes it was even just simple texts checking up on each other and asking what the other thought about the updates.

Nonetheless, you’d grown used to Changbin’s presence, finding that after that meeting at his house, it was like it had softened the both of you up to each other, especially when you realised your perception of Changbin was all wrong and that really, he was as soft as softies go.

You gave Jisung a shrug, tugging the neckline of your shirt down, feeling as though the room had gotten hotter, “I mean, yeah, I guess. He doesn’t annoy me as much as he used to.”

Jisung let out a chuckle, the laugh bubbling out louder as he continued.

“You know if you tell me you like him now, I won’t make fun of you.”

“You’re lying.”

“So, you do like him?” His grin widened, making you sputter for a better response, figuring you’d dug your own grave with that one.

“Don’t stir shit,” you narrowed your eyes at him.

Your reaction had only tickled him even more, clutching his belly as he sighed, “I knew it. Remember? I told you he was your type!” his tone was triumphant, making you regret fuelling his suspicions.

“Yeah, I’m sure you’re very happy about that,” you huffed, turning away from him and burying your face in your soft sheets, your hand coming up next to your head to smooth over the fabric.

You felt Jisung’s hand on your arm, his expression grim.

“Wait, so am I really right? You like him?”

You shrugged his hand away, though he hadn’t budged, giving up soon after.

“I mean,” you enjoyed your last moment of peace before you decided to reply to him, “he’s cute, I won’t deny that. And he’s become a lot nicer to me… he’s fun to talk to? I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little attracted to him.”

Jisung snickered, “that’s cute, but gross. I can’t believe you like Changbin.”

Trust him to only get that out of whatever you’d just told him.

You turned to give him a wide-eyed look of disbelief, “oh, please, you were the one that kept fluffing him up to me!”

Jisung had simply shrugged, unfazed by your outburst, a small sound of hesitation leaving him.

“I would say I did a minimal amount of fluffing. I just called it before the both of you realised.”

You grit your teeth, “fine, enjoy your moment. But one word about it to Changbin and you’re dead. Got it?”

Jisung’s eyes widened, his hand coming up to mimic zipping up his lips.

“Got it.”

===

“Cut!”

You turned to cast a desperate look to Chan, the said boy looking apologetic as he called for a stop again. You watched as he leant down for Changbin to murmur something in his ear, Chan nodding before making his way over to you and Minho.

“We’re thinking maybe you could try that scene again but maybe with just a little more… in the moment? Maybe try not to rush through it,” Chan suggested to Minho, making the said boy groan.

“Sorry, it’s my fault. It’s just- we’ve been filming for hours, if I wasn’t so scared of Changbin I would’ve—”

“I know,” Chan reassured Minho, giving the both of you a small smile, “hopefully we can get this scene done quickly and then we’ll all be free to go, hmm?”

You nodded, letting Chan make his way back to where the monitor was as you got back into position with Minho.

Changbin watched intently as you and Minho acted out the scene again, something about the way Minho was delivering his lines seeming so unaligned with the picture Changbin had in his head. Was it the lines that weren't doing it for him? Was it because Changbin couldn’t quite tap into the emotions of the character in this scene?

He wasn’t sure what exactly it would look or sound like to be in love, but whatever ‘Soobin’ was showing, sure wasn’t what Changbin wanted it to be.

After you’d finished the scene, the film club members had waited anxiously for Changbin’s greenlight on whether they were free to go, all of them anxiously looking on as Chan went to talk to a few of them at props.

You taken the liberty of making your way over to where Changbin was, seeing him intently monitoring the scene that you’d just shot, the reason behind why he’d made you and Minho run through the same scene 15 times starting to become clear to you.

“That’s not gonna help you make it better, you know?” you spoke, shoving your hands into your pocket and scrunching your eyes shut as you braced against the cool wind that was blowing your way, the trees rustling loudly as Changbin’s head shot up, the frown remaining on his face.

“What?” Changbin figured he came off as a little too annoyed, but he stayed unwavering nonetheless, wanting to know just what you thought you knew about him.

“You know, I watched an interview once, and this actor said something that was so true,” you began, taking a seat next to him, feeling his gaze on you before you continued, your gaze falling on the image of you and Minho on the monitor, “he said that playback makes scenes seem a lot more dissatisfactory.”

Changbin’s frown deepened, “I don’t get it, just spit it out.”

You rolled your eyes, though you couldn’t help but smile, “I’m trying to give you advice here, okay? As I was saying, be in the moment. Not everything’s gonna turn out like how it is in your head.”

You inhaled deeply, a slight shiver running down your spine at how cold you felt, taking a hand out of your pocket to tap him on the arm.

“Now can you wrap it up and call it a day? The rest of them have been dying to go home but they’re too scared to tell you.”

Changbin hummed, “They are? Why?”

You nodded, seeing Changbin already making to stand up and call for the rest’s attention, with you taking the opportunity to lean over to him and mutter, “Dunno, maybe they just haven’t figured out what a softie you are yet.”

Changbin attempted to press his lips together firmly to contain his smile, though eventually giving up and letting the soft smile be shown on his face as he dismissed the club members, the rest of them already having started shifting their equipment back.

You’d decided to help them shift the equipment while Changbin talked to Chan about something, trying your best to ignore the way the weather seemed to be getting chillier as all the equipment had started feeling cold to the touch. Mental note to start wearing warmer clothes out after today.

“Thanks for convincing Changbin to free us,” Hyunjin sighed when you were coming down the stairs after locking the club room, making you huff.

“He’s not some dictator, you know. You guys could just ask him next time,” you reasoned.

Hyunjin scoffed, “I’d much rather keep my life, thank you very much.”

Rolling your eyes, you pulled out your phone as you thought whether to text Jisung if he’d wanted to meet for dinner.

“You’re so dramatic,” you told Hyunjin, “I told him and I got to keep my life.”

Hyunjin scoffed, “that’s cause he—”

He stopped himself abruptly, eyes widening for a split second before he shrugged, “that’s cause you fight with him all the time, it’s different.”

You saw a text come in.

Changbin 8:14pm - do u wanna go get dinner? I’m done talking to Chan -

“Speak of the devil,” you murmured, erasing your drafted text to Jisung and replying to Changbin to say that you would wait at the quad.

Changbin 8:14pm - i was thinking of eating some cold noodles -

You grimaced at the thought, Hyunjin pulling you out of your thoughts, “are you waiting for Changbin?”

You nodded, sensing his hesitancy to let you wait there alone, “you go ahead, I’ll be fine, he’s already on his way.”

Hyunjin frowned, turning to see Changbin from afar already making his way over, Changbin having spotted the both of you and given Hyunjin a wave.

Waving back, Hyunjin nodded, “alright, I’ll see you.”

Tugging your jacket tighter around yourself, you folded your arms, hoping Changbin would hurry up so you could finally go somewhere with heating.

Though once he’d met up with you, you were a little confused when he’d gone a completely different direction than you’d expected, leading you to a traditional restaurant that served mainly soups and broths instead.

Don’t get me wrong, you were thankful for the warmth of the restaurant, of course, but just a little confused about why he changed his mind.

You let him order for the both of you, looking curiously from where you were seated facing him, leaning back in the wooden chairs as Changbin ordered from the older lady running the shop.

“I thought you wanted to eat cold noodles?” you scanned the menu in search of the item, confusion increasing when you found nothing of the sort.

Changbin shook his head, “figured you might wanna eat something warmer,” he admitted, making your lips part in surprise.

“How’d you know?”

Changbin didn’t know how to explain that it was because he’d kept looking at you during shooting and he didn’t miss the way your hands would clench and unclench the fabric of your clothes, or how you’d fold your arms more and shake them out in between takes when you thought no one was looking.

“… just a wild guess.”

You brushed his comment aside, the both of you talking about your upcoming classes or complaining about readings that had yet to be read, the sheer boiling temperature of the stone pot making heat rush to your cheeks and spread through your body, thankful for Changbin’s wild guess.

Leaning back in your seat with your hands over your stomach, you sighed at how full you were feeling, already anticipating your food coma as you let yourself zone out staring at the label of Changbin’s bottle of soju.

“Are they really scared of me?”

You’d dragged yourself out of your daze (reluctantly), your lips pursing, “sorry, what did you say?”

Changbin averted his gaze, fiddling with his fingers under the table. Smoothing his thumb over the soft skin at his palm, his tongue poking at his canines before he looked back at you, meeting your gaze with a certain determination.

“The film club people,” he repeated, “are they really scared of me?”

You shrugged, “yeah, I guess. Like, they talked about it before… I guess it’s because you have that serious expression on a lot so they might take it the wrong way.”

Observing his expression, his lips had parted, a blank expression on his face, “I have a serious expression?”

You couldn’t help but laugh, tilting your head at him, “I think It’s just your resting face. They’re kind of wary of how they act around you during meetings, you know, which is why they had that kind of reaction when I first spoke up about the script.”

Changbin let his grip around his spoon relax, whatever rice he’d scooped into it dispersing into the soup.

“Then why aren’t you scared?”

You almost snorted with how immediate your laughter had bubbled out of you, a bout of chuckles leaving you as your shoulders shook lightly.

“Because,” you waved your spoon slightly, “there’s nothing to be scared of.”

Changbin’s blank expression had prompted you to continue.

“I have no problem with you being assertive about what you want,” you explained, “I mean, if it were my script, i’d probably be equally, if not more, assertive about how I want it. But that’s a good thing about you. You don’t just… shut up if something doesn’t sit right with you. That’s something I’ve always thought was really important.”

Call him crazy, but Changbin couldn’t adequately describe how your words had done more in spreading a giddy warmth in his chest than the food ever could.

He wasn’t always like this. If anything, he’d wanted to say that he’d pushed himself to be more assertive after countless conversations with his penpal about not being afraid to speak up for what you want.

Though he’d always been scared of whether he’d be doing a disservice to the people he worked with if he chose not to speak up, he was glad that you reminded him just why he started doing it in the first place.

Penny’s character in his head had started to look more and more like you. And he was glad.

“You wanna hear something crazy?” You blurted.

You didn’t know where you were going with this. It was a spur of the moment kind of thing, really. You just knew that saying what you said to him had triggered a sense of what you could only describe as love within you. If you knew anything about it.

“What?” he asked, the smile on his face making you stop in your tracks. How could he remind you so much of someone, yet seem so much like a mature, upgraded version of them at the same time?

You couldn’t possibly tell him that you were starting to be kind of glad that you didn’t meet Binnie, because you felt like you were looking at him right now. And childhood penpal or not, you were so much more smitten with the one sitting before you.

“Nothing,” you breathed, “nothing, sorry, forget I said anything.”

Your revelation reminded you that you’d brought your old letters from Binnie for Changbin to tap on for inspiration to write the last scene, shutting your mouth and turning to fish the box out of your bag.

“I just remembered, you asked for these right?” you pushed the box towards him, seeing him pick up the box gingerly (as though it were that brittle old notebook he uses), placing it into his bag.

“I’m assuming they’re the letters from your old penpal?”

You nodded, “but don’t laugh when you read them, okay? He was really nice to me.”

Changbin huffed, his tongue peeking out to wet his lips, “yeah, yeah, no promises.”

After you were done with your dinner (Changbin paying for it as a supposed ‘thank you’ for being patient during filming), you’d prepared yourself to fight against the cold night breeze as you stepped out of the restaurant before Changbin, not having expected to feel a warm weight being draped over your shoulders.

“I don’t know why you decided to come out without a coat when you know now’s usually when the weather gets colder,” he tutted his tongue, feigning disapproval, not giving you any time to be shocked at his gesture.

He stood in front of you, tugging the coat tighter around you as he met your gaze, giving you a tired smile.

“I’ll walk you back to your apartment.”

You bit down on your lip, your racing heart and panic making the best reply you could come up with to be a mere, “didn’t peg you to be so gentlemanly.”

To which Changbin shrugged, a small smirk playing at his lips.

“I can be pretty romantic if I want.”

You were gonna get whiplash at this rate.

That same night (or day, 3am was a fine line), you’d received an email from Changbin of the last scene for the film, reading through it and having to stop in between for breaths and water breaks because you had no idea Changbin was capable of encompassing such romantic sentiments in a scene.

Looking at what he wrote, you would never have thought he was the same person that kept arguing with you about happy endings going to shit.

Changbin had written the scene in a burst of inspiration, having felt an almost uncomfortably foreign giddiness within him after returning home from your dinner, feeling even more motivated when he’d watched the film footage they’d shot earlier that day (unconsciously rewinding more than once to watch you act) deciding to just go with whatever he was feeling and write down the scene he had in mind.

And if anyone was asking, no, he totally didn’t picture you as Penny and himself as Soobin the entire time while doing so.

By the time you were done, it was almost an hour later, the aftermath of reading his scene making you pick your phone up and send him a text.

4:02am - did something happen? What’s with the lovey dovey script? Did someone finally change their mind about Penny? -

Not long after, Changbin’s reply came in, feeling thankful that he’d only decided to open your box of letters, or more accurately his letters, after he was done with the scene, something about what he found putting him in an all too thoughtful mood.

Changbin 4:04am -let’s just say... i took your advice-

===

“What do you think, Changbin?” Chan’s voice had snapped Changbin out of his daze, the latter looking at Jisung with a shrug.

“I would say you’re just short changing yourself if you didn’t talk to her. I mean, you said you liked her, right? So what are you waiting for?” Changbin sounded almost impatient, his tone eliciting a grunt from Jisung.

“Yeah, you say it like you’re not the one hiding your hopeless crush on Y/N.”

Chan’s eyes widened, not having expected Jisung to say it so blatantly.

Changbin sputtered, looking at Chan for help only to be met with giggles.

“I’m sorry, dude, it was really quite easy to tell.”

Changbin wanted the cushioned booth to swallow him whole, scrunching his eyes tightly shut in a wince.

“Whatever, that’s not the point,” he waved Jisung off dismissively, “we’re talking about your love life here.”

Jisung pursed his lips, shaking his head, “it’s not fun anymore, I wanna talk about yours.”

Changbin glared at Jisung, “i’m not having this conversation with you.”

“Good, ‘cause you should be having it with Y/N.”

Chan raised an eyebrow at the younger boy, humming in suspicion.

“Why do you sound like you know things...”

Jisung shrugged, raising his hands to give a dramatic shrug, “Do I? I guess we’ll never find out since Changbin ‘isn’t gonna have this conversation with me’.”

Chan turned to Changbin, who currently looked as though he would rather die than be here right now, “actually, what are you waiting for?”

Changbin brought a hand up to massage his fingers on his temples, a resigned sigh leaving him.

“I don’t know, I’ll probably not do anything until the showcase. I still don’t know how exactly I wanna go about it.”

Jisung snickered, “you’ll be fine, seriously.”

“Yeah, whatever, I’ll just enjoy whatever time I have left to think about it till the showcase. Now back to your issue… ”

But obviously, Changbin didn’t use his 3 days of buffer time very well.

He was lucky the atmosphere of the showcase and the unexpected crowd of people had prolonged the time until he’d be in a situation where he’d feel compelled to talk to you about it. Whatever it was.

You hadn’t noticed, obviously, the way Changbin had been keeping himself busy talking to guests and teachers that had shown up, people from the media and publications club. You were too busy being whisked away by your own friends and a already slightly tipsy Minho who thought it was a good idea to pregame drinks before the afterparty later on.

It’d only been when things started calming down and people were actually watching the film that you’d been put in a position where you had no choice other than to think about the boy seated in front of you tapping his foot incessantly on the carpeted floor of the auditorium.

Once the show was over, you’d leant forward, about to congratulate him when you’d both been whisked up by one of the teachers-in-charge, pulling you together with Minho onto the stage to answer questions from the audience.

The questions were fairly simple, most of them from the media and publications club trying to get technical details for their article, allowing you to zone out from where you stood on the stage, letting Changbin smoothly answer all the questions they could possibly throw at him. It wasn’t like Minho was in any position to answer them, tipsy and zoned out of his mind.

It was only when you’d heard him fumbling around with his words that you looked up from the spot on the wall you were staring at, turning to look at Changbin with an embarrassing amount of concern on your features.

“I’m sorry can you repeat the question?” you’d spoken into the microphone, hearing someone that sounded almost identical to Jisung asking how he got inspiration from the story.

You looked at Changbin curiously, as if silently asking if he needed you to step in, only to have him look at you with a blank expression, his mouth opening and closing as he fumbled for an answer.

“Oh, well, I’m sure I can answer this on behalf of Changbin,” you began, “we’d worked on the script together, and it was inspired by a lot of things, like our experiences with pen pals as well as movies like ‘you’ve got mail’.”

Changbin’s shoulders slumped with relief, nodding towards you as a silent thanks, the moment cut short when you were once again whisked away into different crowds to take pictures or to carpool to the afterparty.

Though you were bored 10 minutes into the party, Minho having gotten drunk before you could even get past your second drink, you’d let Changbin have his fun. You figured it was a good thing that he was being recognized for his efforts, even if he didn’t look like he was enjoying the attention very much. He needed it, you supposed, to be forced to see how much people enjoyed the work he made.

But you didn’t stay to see it too long, adjourning to the porch of whoever’s house you were in to enjoy an environment away from the loud music and too many people you didn’t know.

“Already bored?”

You’d jumped at the sound of Changbin’s voice, his footsteps loud against the wooden porch as he took a seat next to you on the swing, holding out his bottle of soda to you, “do you want some?”

You shook your head, seeing him shrug, “suit yourself, then.” He took a long sip of his soda, sighing afterwards.

A tired smile on your face, you let out a deep sigh, “didn’t expect you to find me here so quickly.”

“How could I not?” he laughed, shaking his head, “In case you didn’t notice, I was suffocating in there, figured I deserve a break.”

“Good job, though, I’d say you handled everything well…” you started, your smile growing, “... though there is one thing… I didn’t think you were the type to struggle with public speaking.”

Changbin’s lips parted in shock, scoffing, “shut up, I don’t usually.”

“Sure, you don’t,” you teased, bringing your hands to your sides to support your weight, letting your legs lift off the ground as Changbin used his feet to move the swing gently.

You leant back in your seat, enjoying the silence you were able to get out here as compared to the chaos going on within the house, noticing how tense Changbin seemed, his posture anything but relaxed as he’d let out sigh after sigh, tapping his rings against the seat of the bench absently.

“Relax,” you chuckled, “it’s already over.”

Doing the opposite of relaxing, Changbin simply stopped moving the swing, angling his body to face you more as he fished in his blazer pocket for something, pulling out an envelope from his jacket, “I have uh… something for you.”

Holding it out for you to take, your gaze fell on the colourful envelope, the little strawberry stickers you remembered using your savings to buy as you frowned at the address written on the envelope in your old messy ‘princess handwriting’.

Your gaze darted from the envelope back to him, “how did you… how do you have this?”

“I have it,” he began, letting out yet another sigh, “because you sent it to me.”

If it could, your heart would’ve stopped in that exact moment.

“Read it,” he prompted when you’d stayed silent, your hands moving urgently to open the envelope, your heart feeling warm when you pulled the paper out, already being able to see the ‘To: Binnie’ written with your favourite scented marker.

To: Binnie

How are you? I’m fine. I am writing this very late in the night because I finished my rehearsal for my school play in the evening and I just finished taking a bath. I have to be quick or my mom is gonna scold me for not sleeping yet. I wanted to tell you that you should sign up for the competition. Which is why I have to mail this to you A.S.A.P as possible because you said the sign up closes in a few days. I think that you should just try it out, even if you don’t do well. Because then at least you can say that you gave it a try and you had fun. I saw this on a tv show, and they said if you don’t try, you will never know if it will turn out well, because you didn’t try.

So I’m telling you to try!!!!! Just try your best and have fun. I think you will do well.

Till next time, Your penpal Y/N.

“So this is me… trying… it. Whatever it is,” he sounded out of breath, almost, and your heart had begun to pick up speed at how it seemed as though this would be the time where he would confess his feelings to you (if Soobin and Penny were any guide to go by).

You should’ve known Changbin better by now, though.

“Thank you… for helping me with the film. You know, for giving me crap about it because I know that that wasn’t really what I felt. I was just… bitter, but for some reason, you giving me shit about it kind of reminded me why I liked being friends with my penpal- or, I guess, liked being friends with you, so much in the first place.” he was looking at you more confidently now, straightening up as he continued.

“It wasn’t because you gave me fake money to buy a scooter, or anything,” he laughed, “it was more because you were someone that was friends with me for who I was? You were kind, and you were honest.”

Changbin fiddled with the envelope in his hands as you tried your best to contain your smile.

“And you were especially supportive, you know, in your own argumentative way.”

You let out a huff of breathy laughter at that, your hand coming up to touch your necklace, finding something else to fiddle with to contain your anxiousness.

“I’m glad, though, that I didn’t know you were that Y/N,” he told you, “because I already grew to like this Y/N so much, that… finding out was just… a pleasant surprise.”

For the first time since you saw the letter, you’d spoken, a breathy, “me too,” leaving you, embarrassing you to no end.

“I’m glad it was you,” you murmured, averting your gaze, not having expected Changbin to have reached out a hand towards yours, hovering just momentarily before making the decisive action of grasping it gently.

“Me too.”

“So are you gonna explain why my letters—”

“Shh,” he shut his eyes, the smile on his face making you give in almost instantly, “don’t ruin it.”

===

“I didn’t know people even still sent letters these days,” Jisung snorted, sipping on his coffee that he’d just gone downstairs to buy, “here, you have one, but there's no name.”

You frowned, picking it up and finding the handwriting of your address awfully familiar, feeling as though you’d definitely seen it scribbled on a specific brittle old notebook before.

You flopped onto your bed, opening the letter as Jisung resumed playing whatever game he was busy with on your desktop computer.

Thankful for the distraction, you’d quickly unfolded it, scrunching your nose at his choice of pen name.

To: my penpal Y/N

This letter may just be over a decade overdue, but I wanted to firstly say I’m sorry for making you wait so long. That letter about my film competition, that was the last one I received from you, and one of my favourites. I figured it out, by the way, I gave you the wrong address. Phonics was a very tricky thing for my eight year old stubborn self that refused to cross check with my mom.

I figured sending you a letter was best, you know, since you know I'm not the very best at public speaking, or just speaking in general sometimes, I doubt I'd be able to say as eloquently what I wanted to say to you in this letter.

I wanted to give you a few updates. Firstly, I met someone in my film club. Well, technically I auditioned them for my short film so there’s no one to blame for the trouble they caused other than me. I didn’t like them that much at the beginning. I thought they were just trying to impose their stupid happily ever after beliefs on me, someone who thought I was a big bad cynical bitter man that didn’t believe in love stories.

As you probably guessed, they challenged me (a lot), and waiting to see them started to feel like the days where I would wait to hear my mom tell me that a letter came in for me, even better actually. They reminded me of the qualities in myself that I was always afraid of showing, and they reminded me what was so good about being unapologetic for who I was sometimes, because they accepted all of that, (but not without giving me an shit about it first, of course).

But i’m thankful, I’m thankful because I really grew to like them a lot. I liked how I could be comfortable being myself around her, and I liked how they would support me when I needed it, but also to correct me when I need to be corrected.

They were real, and I liked that, a lot.

So, the point of this was that if they ever happen to receive this, you know, (because I totally didn’t know your current address, obviously), I hope they know that I’ve grown to like them very much, to like the personality that i’ve come to know, and that i’m very excited to grow to know (and like) even more.

I’ll be seeing you, Binnie.

#changbin #seo changbin #seo changbin au #changbin au #changbin fluff #skz changbin #skz au #skz #stray kids scenarios #stray kids #stray kids au #stray kids fluff #enemies-to-lovers!changbin #on track #stray kids imagines #skz imagines #I love changbin

1K notes · View notes

erensproudsimp · 4 years ago

Text

Confession

Jean kirschtein x reader Oneshot

⚠ Sexual Content Ahead ⚠

Summary : You didn't want to admit your feelings to Jean in fear of losing him until tables were turned.

"I wonder how much everyone changed after all this time", you said staring at the moving landscape through the windshield.

"I'm pretty sure there's a lot to catch up with friends you haven't met since one year", Annie replied from the driver's seat.

"I bet Historia and Ymir must be dating by now", you chuckled.

"That wouldn't be much of a shocker to me to be honest", Annie added face straight at the road.

It's been one year since your friend group graduated university and because everyone was preoccupied with their individual lives, y'all didn't have the opportunity to meet up. Until today as Jean had organised a party at his mansion. The thought of his name made your face feel hot. For as long as you can remember you've always felt a certain type of way towards that horse face.

"Thinking about him huh", Annie said noticing the redness on your cheeks.

'Wha- what do you mean? No I'm not thinking of Jean", you responded frantically looking away.

" I didn't say a name though." You could see Annie smirking in the corner of your eyes.

"Don't you think it's high time you tell him about your feelings? Who knows he likes you back too and besides you two would actually make a pretty good couple looking back at how both of you were with each other," Annie suggested.

"I don't know about that, Annie, you know I fear rejection", you said dejectedly while reminiscing at the good old days when all you and Jean did was tease the hell out of each other and pull pranks with Sasha and Connie on teachers and the others.

Soon after you reached a grand gate.

"Open up horse face it's me and y/n," Annie said over the radio.

"Yeah yeah and don't call me horse face!" Jean scoffed on the microphone. Hearing his voice made butterflies errupt in your stomach. It was the first time you were coming over his house and damn the boy was rich rich as you looked at the magnificent well-kept garden enriched by a fountain in the middle face-to-face with stairs leading to the three story illuminated building.

When you reached inside, your eyes fell on Mikasa who was lounging on the couch. Shrieking you threw yourself on her, "Oh my god! Oh my god! Mikasa It's been so long!"

"Ahaha! Welcome y/n! I missed you too now stop crushing me," Mikasa coughed from the impact of your bodies colliding.

"Did someone get hurt? Why was there a scream?" Eren inquired coming from what seems to be the kitchen with Armin.

"Oh its just y/n", Armin said as you ran and jumped on him making both of you fall down laughing, "Armiiin! I missed you so much!"

"What's all this commotion about?" Connie asked revealing himself accompanied by Sasha who was savoring a pizza, a quizzical look on her face.

"Gosh I missed you guys so much! where are the rest?" you asked a tear in your right eye.

"Reiner, Berthold, Marco and Jean are setting up the projector to watch a movie and Ymir and Historia haven't reached ye-", Eren was cut off with the arrival of said people.

"Hola amigos! We have news for you all!" Ymir shouted while hugging Historia, "We're finally going out with each other!"

"Tell me why am I not surprised," Annie said as Historia blushed and Ymir just frowned at her words. Just at that moment Jean entered the room alongside with the boys making everyone invited present in the hall.

All the blood in your body rushed to your face as you saw Jean being a totally different person from last year. He grew a goatee on his face and his hair was longer too which seemed to be a mullet. He was wearing a casual grey hoodie and sweatpants yet this was so hot to you.

Your voice was stuck in your throat when you tried to say a word to him but either ways the monent the came he announced that everything was ready for the movie. He didn't even acknowledge your presence or make eye contact with you. It felt odd as you two were so close and he barely looked in your direction.

Everyone proceeded to go to the cinema hall which was located in the basement. You took your seat between Annie and Mikasa and Jean was right behind you. In a few the movie 'Attack on titan' started. Fifteen minutes in and you had already finished all your popcorn so you got up to fetch more from the kitchen. While going out you noticed that Jean and Marco were not in the hall but you choose to ignore it to go fetch your food. Right before you entered your destination you heard two voices coming from a room. You usually don't eavesdrop but the sudden mention of your name intrigued you to do so.

"It's now or never Jean who knows after how long you would finally see y/n again", you heard Marco said to Jean.

"I don't know Marco this seems like a bad decision to me", Jean continued.

"How would you know about that Jean? You think you know how y/n truly feels but you may be wrong you know ", your heart skipped a beat after hearing this.

Did this mean it was what you were thinking?

"Marco, I think it's for the best I don't tell y/n how I feel about her/them", Jean mumbled. So that's why he's been ignoring you. This confirmed your thoughts and under the shock you lost your footing pushing the door you were leaning against open. Jean saw his life flash in front of his eyes when he realised you heard what he said.

"You know what, I am letting you two alone to talk", Marco said taking his leave giving you a reassured look before closing the door behind him

You looked at Jean with soft eyes while he turned his back on you with his hand on the back of his neck. You noticed that the tips of his ears were red and before you could say anything he spoke up.

"So you heard what I said huh, would you please forget about it? I don't want to lose you because you're aware of my feelings for you", Jean said looking down with his back still facing you.

"Jean look at me", you asked him but he refused to do so which resulted in you walking to face him but he still looked away.

You grabbed his face to make him look at you. Jean was expecting you to reject him but instead you pressed your lips against his. His eyes widen at your action and he kissed you back more roughly when it hit him.

You pushed him to the bed as you sat on his lap continuing to makeout with him. His hands roamed around your body from your waist to finally grab your ass and give it a little squeeze.

You pulled back with a string of saliva connecting your mouths and looked him.

He looked at you thinking if only you knew how beautiful you were in his eyes.

"Does this mean you return my feelings?" Jean hopingly asked.

"Who kisses their best friend without feelings moron?" you smiled at him bopping his nose.

At this instant your mouths collided with each other again. Your hand reached down to peel his hoodie off his body and goddamn he was hot. You ran your petite hands against his hard muscular chest and abbs as Jean was looking at you adoringly.

Suddenly he grabbed your chin and attacked your neck with kisses. He ran this tongue on the skin while he unbuttoned your shirt to reveal your red bra. He went down from your neck to your collarbone leaving hickeys behind. A sharp pain followed by pleasure made you purr. He skilfully opened your bra with his one hand while the other was in your hair pulling it.

As your undergarment fell to the floor his jaw dropped at the sight of your perfect boobs in front of him. It felt like a blessing that he was witnessing you in this state. While he was busy gawking at you, you took his big slender hands and placed it on them. His cheeks took a bright red colour.

You grinded on his thighs feeling him getting harder. He let out a soft grunt feeling this sensation. He was sucking on one nipple and pinching the other one which made you throw your head back in absolute bliss.

Jean then advanced into helping you take off your pants leaving you in your panties. The more this man undresses you the more mesmerised he was by your figure. He slid his fingers up and down your cunt feeling how wet he made you when he barely even touched you.

"Would you sit on my face? please", Jean breathed with eyes filled with lust. You felt your clit pulsating at his request and you knew Jean could feel it too on his thigh. You nodded with your flushed face unable to say anything out of embarrassment.

He laid down on the bed as you took off your panties. Climbing on him his hands grabbed your waist guiding you right above his mouth. He ran his tongue through your folds making you lose your breath. He held you still so that you wouldn't move away while he was eating you out. He flicked your bud then inserted his tongue into and out you. You held onto the bed counter for support, your hair falling on your face.

"Jeannn", you moaned as you began riding his face. Jean was delighted let his tongue flat to let you pleasure yourself on him. Moving up and down you ravished this sweet feeling coursing through you. Soon after your legs began trembling signaling you were reaching your climax.

"Go ahead cum on my face please y/n", Jean pleaded and you did as he told. He felt your juices ran down his neck as he was savoring the taste.

"This is the best dinner of my life," he panted as you got off him. Your heart was beating so hard against your ribs as though it would come out.

You returned to your original place on his lap. You helped him take off his sweatpants watching his hard member spring free.

"Are you okay with this?" Jean asked.

"I've waited years to be able to do it so hell yeah I am," shifting yourself on his lap to make his dick right outside your entrance, you slowly inserted it in you. Feeling the neediness grow bigger Jean couldn't take it and pushed you down completely making his dick disappear in you. You bit his shoulder to help you bear with this immense pleasure.

"Fuck y/n you feel so good", Jean moaned being wrapped with your tight walls.

Pulling back from his shoulder you looked at him in the eyes as you rode him, your foreheads touching each other. Your boobs were bouncing from your up and down movement making you look so erotic to Jean. With time you picked more speed and was moving quicker. Jean was losing his mind at this. Your bodies blended into one. Jean bit his lips and grabbed your thighs so hard it was leaving marks. Your lips connected into a sloppy yet passionate kiss.

"Shit y/n I'm reaching my limit"

"Let's cum together Jean"

Jean was thrusting his hips into you out of instinct. The room was filled with the heavy breathing of both of you and the dirty sound of your ass and his thighs clapping.

Your body freezed as you let everything out of you and felt Jean's hot liquid inside of you. You screamed his name against his chest. Removing his dick from you, you sat on his lap looking into each other's eyes.

Suddenly you heard the door open revealing Eren outside.

"Oh my god I'm so sorry!" the poor boy appologised closing the door as fast as he could.

Jean and you broke into a laughter being happy that one of two finally confessed.

End.

Thank you for reading. :)

90 notes · View notes

nemuitoka · 4 years ago

Note

What are your favorte jshk fanfics? also where do you like reading them the most?

Hi Anon!!! today is the day I can finally answer this question😈 ahaha you know how much I enjoy making fic recs so 👀 Let’s go!!!

To answer your second question first, I like reading them on AO3 the most! Mostly because I get almost unlimited number of characters to rant in the comment section........... 😆but also the tagging system is very helpful.

Okay, now to the fun part of this ask😏

You said JSHK, but I mostly read Hananene ones so all of my favs include that pairing... as I already did a fic rec here of my favs, this list will continue that one, so please check that one first hehe ((I apologize in advance..., I would love for people to recommend me some mitsukou ones tbh... I’m really lost when it comes to other pairings orz))

If I’m completely honest with you anon-san, my favorite JSHK fic right now is the one Roxanne ( @istoleyourboat ) wrote based of my art and her snippet:

Star-Crossed and Falling- Where Stars Go to Die by lilaflo

Hanako is Princess Nene’s personal knight 👀. A tale of forbidden love. They slowly fall in love as they exchange a series of gifts, one that includes a pair of matching earrings that remind them of their love when they’re apart. Also, jelly Hanako of Nene’s suitors😏... Oh, but nothing lasts forever and those sweet moments will come to an end when they have to face their cruel reality, in this world, they don’t get to choose neither their battles or the ones they love.

Now more of Roxanne, because I seriously enjoy her work so much (I’m sure everyone knows by now lmao sdkj)

Night of the Phantom King by lilaflo

This one is a spooky one. Nene’s regret for never realizing who she truly loves takes her to mourn her deceased friend Amane and cry on his grave in a Halloween night, then suddenly the Phantom King comes to take her away👀 & he looks suspiciously familiar... Beautiful world building btw, also the ending is just, excellent.

12 Year Romance by lilaflo

Amane meets Nene at the Tanabata festival, she’s older than him, but he falls for her instantly, fast forward, Amane is now in middle school, he’s a troublemaker, & gets constantly into fights, but he swears the new school nurse looks familiar... he then realizes it’s her and thinks it must be fate!!!... This one hits close to home bc I’ve been in this situation irl, so I can confirm all of Nene’s struggles are real (and ofc how a love with an age gap should be handled the correct way, this fic really teaches you many life lessons hahaha)

took a sip then another sip, then you turned and said to me by chivalrousamour

This autor has a bunch of good JSHK fics!! I recommend you check their AO3 out, bec you may find something you like for sure! But, this is my absolute fav from them. Nene is a mangaka, celebrating the finishing of her long serialized manga, while Amane is a delivery boy who happens to find her in a very questionable state in her house👀 (it’s all family friendly ofc, anon, I’m not a slimy pervert like some ghost boy)

Maid for Each Other by corologs ( @corologs )

Courtney has this amazing College AU collection series that I encourage you to check out!!! But Maid for each other is my fav!!! So it’s the Yugi twins birthday, and it’s Tsukasa’s turn to choose where they go to celebrate it... you can already tell where this is going... (let the chaos begin) & as the title said, it involves maids!!! (it has Kaicho wa maid sama vibes if you liked that anime~~)

If I Could Tell Her by corologs

What if the picture perfect arc plan was successful??? Well, this fic explores this idea, and it’s very interesting to read. I like how Amane and Hanako are two separate people here.

the horizon tries but it’s just not as kind on the eyes by sincerelyand ( @sunlightinourheadlights )

(Oh my sweet Karen, she writes such good fics, so go check her AO3 out as well!!) Amane and Yashiro are friends that share an apartment (& they were roommates-- OMG they were roommates), even if Amane has its complains, because Nene can be a handful sometimes (and in denial of her true feelings as always, are we even surprised at this point?) he loves her dearly anyways😭.

for real, this time by sourlemoncandy ( @sour-lemon-candy )

Did somebody say fake dating AU?????? Because hell yeah I did asajj I loved reading this so much!! Nene and Amane are childhood friends, and Nene overhears some girls talking about Amane and how one of them plans to ask him out... but she senses these girls are up to no good so she... well, you gotta read it to find out more~~ it’s no fun If I tell ya everything hehe... so go go go!!

lemon cream by sourlemoncandy

Amane and Nene, just two good friends having a road trip and sharing donuts... what could go wrong?? 😏 seriously, I loved this fic so much!! Instant fav! Also makes me wanna try some good sweet donuts...

Trip Down Memory Lane by insipidenvy ( @insipidenvy )

This fic is so sweet. I have such a huge attachment to it, because I read it when I really needed some fluff in my life hahaha. It’s sort of a collection of memories between Amane and Yashiro’s relationship over the years. So heartwarming... if you need the fluffs you’ll enjoy this very much!!

The Radish Princess and the Toilet Prince by insipidenvy

This is my favorite fic from insipidenvy!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! You know how I am a slut for Royalty AUs so that’s why!!!!! Also Toilet Prince!! hahahaha such a good nickname lmao. I love how they bond over their insecurities, it’s very relatable tbh.

Between Wind and Water by WingSongHalo ( @wingsonghalo )

My beautiful Wing always delivering the good Hananene content, as she should!! This fic is so fun to read!! I laughed so hard at Nene and Hanako being awkward with each other!!! So you know how Hanako is super clingy with Nene, he’s always touching & hugging her, but this time something weird happens and he’s so distant~~ Nene doesn’t want to admit it at first, but she misses his clingy ghost boy~~ you’ll have a good time reading this for sure!

The Monster's Bride by Hammsters ( @uglierdaikon )

Have you heard about the myth of Cupid and Psyche? Well this fic rewrites it in a very Hananene way <3 hehe I loved it so much (as I’m a huge fan of mythology~) To sum it up, Nene is fated to marry a monster that lives in the mountains so she’s devastated... to her surprise, her husband is far from what she expected... she only had one rule to obey and well... we all know how reckless Nene is so... you go find out what happens next now!! hehehe

Morning Reflections by FalalalaLa ( @miss-sternennacht )

So you’ve heard of Hanako watching Nene sleep, but what about Nene watching Amane sleep???!! this fic offers you this and so much more fluff <3 Also Nene remembering how they met and how their relationship evolved during the years, aww <3

Cursed Coin by DaikonSenpai ( @daikonsenpai )

There’s a school dance, Yashiro’s supposed to be dancing with Kou (since she can’t go with Hanako, which causes him to be jelly~~ and bitter), but she loses a coin Aoi gave her for good luck so she goes out and searches for it on the last place she saw it, the school fountain. Suddenly Hanako spots her, what’s she doing outside??? is she drunk or something?? what happens next you may find out when you read it~~~

Between Love and Hope by Baronesscmd (SweeterThanYourDarkestSin) ( @baronesscmd )

Oh to be Nene and get to sleep between the Yugi twins... God really has favorites uh... ISTG, this collection of fics is so cute. I love how Nene loves the twins so much in this AU, they have their little cute family. She ofc is in love with Amane, but their relationship with Tsukasa is so tender... it’s mostly this trio having fluffy moments together to heal your soul... if you need some, you’ll get it here for sure hahaha.

Ghost of You (And All the Futures We've Forgotten) by Indigo_Floof milkteamoon ( @indigosienna , @spades-queen )

So anon you may have been wondering, well this bitch likes fluff only???? how about some angst for a change, uh? DAMN, OKAY THEN, here you have some angst to rip your soul out and wish you never sent me this ask in the 1st place, bec of the emotional damage this fic will leave you sdajjsa, also if you liked “Erased”, you’ll love this fic too!

Hanako of the Opera by zxrstan

Finally, but not less important, me being annoying about Hanako of the Opera & POTO AGAIN!!!!!!!!!!!!! This fic is based of the AU Aidairo created mostly, it’s really fun to read if you didn’t get much of what was happening during the Hanako of the Opera event, it has a nice ending also! very satisfying I must say.

AAAAND THIS IS THE END OF MY ALL TIME FAV LIST OMG;;;; Kudos for me for searching through all my damn AO3 and Google Chrome history (from both my PC and phone, since I am a FOOL and forgot my AO3 password so I read a lot of these in the past as a guest before recovering my password LMAO, please be patient with me omg, and also if you see me bookmarking them now, you know why 😭)

Kudos to all of my writer homies as well, I love and appreciate all of you so much!! you have no idea! 💖

I hope you find this list useful, anon!! Thank you for sending me this ask and have a wonderful day!

Ps. Please everyone feel free to add more fics to this list if you want! this is all my personal picks, but I’m aware there are a lot more fics that I haven’t read and deserve as much recognition as the ones I listed!

227 notes · View notes

hopelesshawks · 4 years ago

Text

Physical Fatality Part 9- Cruelty

18+ Hawks x fem, pro hero!reader

Summary: You’re a rising star in All Might’s agency. Hawks is the darling of Endeavor’s. By virtue of your job descriptions, the two of you are supposed to hate each other, or at the very least be cautiously neutral. For a long time that’s exactly what the two of you did. You stayed out of each other’s way and formed little opinion of the other. One fateful night at an HPSC gala changes all that. Based on the album Hopeless Fountain Kingdom by Halsey.

If you don’t want to see Physical Fatality content blacklist #hopelesspf

This story will have multiple NSFW parts so it is 18+ ONLY minors dni

Warnings for alcoholism

Masterlist

“No Hawks.”

“Why won’t you at least let me explain?”

“Because I suspect your explanation for why you ripped my heart out despite, supposedly, still being in love with me is going to piss me the fuck off and we have a red carpet to walk in a few minutes.”

“You always have an excuse for why we can’t talk. We never see each other at work anymore-“

“Hmm, I wonder why? It’s almost like someone’s bullshit got me kicked off the task force.”

“Not my point. I would talk to you at your place but your roommate stops me every time!”

“I always did like Mina.”

“Jesus you’re fucking impossible. I just want to make things right!”

“Then maybe you shouldn’t have fucked them up in the first place.”

“I can’t change the past.”

“And I can’t deal with my feelings for you on top of trying to salvage my fucking career.”

“So you admit there are still feelings?”

“How is that your takeaway from that sentence?”

It’s been about three days since the article about you and Hawks dropped. You are about four minutes from a heart attack and you think Hawks may be a maniac but he doesn’t know it. Your ride to another bullshit HPSC event stops and your door is opened to reveal a red carpet and a hoard of paparazzi awaiting your arrival. You and Hawks had just been fighting in your limousine but they don’t know. They can never know. So Hawks steps out and carefully smooths out his designer suit before reaching a hand down to help you out of the car. You take his hand and gracefully step out in your equally designer shoes and dress. You smile at each other as if your love is pure and uncomplicated. You smile at the paparazzi as if they aren’t the bane of your existence. You smile as you make your way into the event as if you aren’t literally dreading it. It honestly makes you feel nauseous. But this is the reality of modern day hero work. It’s as much about image and politics as it is about saving people, no matter how ridiculous you think that is.

You wish Bakugo and Midoriya were here so you’d at least have some uncomplicated friendly faces but they’re probably off doing actual hero work. You get the honor of shaking the hands of wealthy donors to the HPSC and interacting with heroes you’d probably recognize if you hadn’t been black out drunk at the last ranking ceremony. “I’ll grab us drinks,” Hawks sighs in a rare break the two of you have between meeting people. “I think that’s the first smart thing you’ve said all night,” you reply. He resists the temptation to roll his eyes as he tells you he’ll be right back and walks towards the bar. He isn’t gone long before you hear a deep voice behind you say, “I heard you were removed from the task force.” It takes everything in you not to launch Endeavor through the window as you turn to face him. “Unfortunately yes. All Might felt it was unwise for me to be on a task force with someone I was romantically involved with,” you reply as professionally as possible considering you’re still trying to figure out if the satisfaction of yeeting this prick out the window would be worth getting fired. “So I guess your little plan backfired on you then,” Endeavor says smugly. “My little plan?” “Your plan to use Hawks to climb the hero charts and gain insight into my agency.” You stare at the man in front of you and blink at him a few times. “I’m sorry can you just say that one more time?” you ask dumbfounded. This throws Endeavor off for a moment but then he clears his throat and repeats, “Your plan to use Hawks to-“ “Ok yea no that’s what I thought you said,” you say cutting him off. “I know this may be hard for you to hear but uhm, not everything is about you,” you sigh exasperatedly. “I am aware but-“ “No, no. Shut the fuck up, no but’s. There was no plan. I was just dumb enough to fall in love with your stupid ass Golden boy. Some of us are actually content just saving people regardless of some dumb, arbitrary ranking.” “Oh.” A pause. “What the fuck do you mean oh?” “I don’t owe you an explanation and you should watch how you talk to me.” “No one is paying attention to us right now, I’m not watching shit.” “Regardless you risk causing a scene.” “Oh my god, did you share your little theory with Hawks?” you press, and the sheepish look on his face is answer enough but then Hawks returns to your side, two drinks in hand, looking between you and Endeavor curiously. “Am I interrupting something?” Hawks asks with a raised eyebrow. “Babe could we talk privately for a moment?” you ask with a saccharine tone. “Uhh, sure,” Hawks replies. Next thing he knows you’re tugging him away from Endeavor and out of the banquet hall.

It pains him to realize how like and unlike this is to the first time the two of you met. The sly look Kamui Woods gives him as the two of you pass by makes him a little nauseous in all honesty. Probably because if he hadn’t fucked up so royally then maybe the two of you would be sneaking away for the reason the other man thinks right now. Instead he’s sure he’s about to get an earful because of whatever Endeavor had said to you. Eventually you tug him into a supply closet, using your quirk to find and flick on the light switch before closing the two of you into the tight space. He realizes it’s the first time you’ve been this close to him without a camera or another person nearby. “Hawks,” you start and and it hurts. It hurts every time you use his hero name when the two of you are alone. He misses the way his real name sounded on your tongue. He misses the fondness you used to have in your tone when you used it. He misses the way you’d sometimes shorten it to ‘Kei’. He misses it so much so that without thinking he interrupts you to say “Don��t call me that when we’re alone.” You ignore the interruption and that hurts too. “Did you break up with me because Endeavor told you I was just using you?” you ask him and all the air rushes out of his lungs. Finally you knew what he’d been trying to tell you for the past few days since everything went to shit. “Yes, that’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. I never stopped loving you (y/n) but I got scared and I’m so sorry. I never should have listened to him,” Hawks sighs and it feels like a weight off to finally tell you. “So it wasn’t that you didn’t love me,” you start and Hawks feels his broken heart starting to put itself back together, “it was just that you didn’t love me enough to have faith in me.”

Wait, what?

No. No, no, no this isn’t how it’s supposed to go. Everything was supposed to get better once you found out the truth behind the break up. So why, then, do you look so distraught? “No, baby, no that’s not it,” he tries to assure you but you shake your head. “Isn’t it? You love me but not enough to hear out my side of the story before you dumped me. You love me but not enough to ignore the words of a man I’ve never had a full conversation with prior to today,” you point out. “I was just scared. He threatened my career and I just-“ “Just what? Hawks I can count on one hand the number of people who have genuinely had faith in me. That makes it really important to me. I thought I could count you as one of them.” “Hey, that’s not fair. I have faith in you but if you were in my shoes you would’ve made the same decision.” “And what shoes were those exactly?” “The shoes of someone hearing a man they’ve known and trusted for years tell them all the reasons why they’re an idiot to trust the woman they just met a few months prior.” “I didn’t realize I gave so many reasons for you not to trust me.” “That’s not what I meant and you know it. As dumb as I think the rivalry is it’s no secret that the lower ranks in both our agencies still believe in it and up until a year ago that was you.” “You could’ve asked.” “Maybe so but he also pointed out that there’s no way you couldn’t have fucking known who I was considering I’m the only hero with bright red fucking wings on my back,” Hawks grits out and as if on cue his wings are flaring and puffing up in the small space as if to emphasize his point. “Oh....” you trail off.

You have to admit he has a point on the last one. Sure, he could’ve asked. But Hawks never knew how problematic your drinking habits could be. Once the two of you got together you started getting sober so you hadn’t seen a reason to mention it. If he had asked you directly you don’t know that you would’ve been able to tell him the truth and that would’ve seemed to confirm Endeavor’s theory. “Yea, ‘oh’,” Hawks says and you almost wish you could hear more resentment in his tone instead of resignation because you are still so, so angry with him but you’re starting to see his side now and you hate it. At least if he resented you there wouldn’t be as much guilt for the blind rage you’d channeled his way. “That’s the one piece I still can’t make fit to be honest. Why’d you pretend not to recognize me?” he asks and if you didn’t still love him you’d probably give a half assed lie and be done with it. But you do, and he sounds so fucking heartbroken that you decide he at least deserves the truth. “I never gave a shit about the hero rankings. Who cares if you’re number 1 or number 50 as long as you’re saving people, y’know? So I never watched the ranking ceremony on tv and the one year I went in person I got black out drunk beforehand because Monoma was finally in the top 10 and he was being absolutely unbearable and I knew he’d continue to be for the rest of the night. So I drank and now I don’t remember any of it. I literally don’t know what any hero I haven’t directly worked with looks like. I know the names but couldn’t match them to faces for the life of me. Even with your ‘bright red fucking wings’. Bakugo actually gave me shit for it when I realized who you are,” you explain. “Would you have told me all that if I had asked you then?” he asks. “Probably not,” you admit. The kiss afterwards is unexpected but not unwelcome.

Hawks doesn’t consciously decide to kiss you. It’s just one moment you’re admitting you may not have been able to dispel his concerns and the next he’s reaching for you. He doesn’t regret it though. The moment your lips touch it’s like a missing piece of him has slotted back into place. It quickly grows heated and his hands find their way to your waist to reel you in closer and closer until there’s hardly any space between the two of you. He’s missed this so much it’s been a physical ache and he pours every bit of that pain and regret and heartache and love and hope, such agonizingly desperate hope, into the kiss, praying it will convey even a fraction of what he’s been feeling the past few days. Praying that maybe he can reach you and the two of you can go back to the bliss you enjoyed before he let Endeavor get in his head and ruin things. But then he feels wetness on his cheeks and when he pulls back to look at you he realizes you’re crying. “Why are you crying Love?” he asks as he reaches both hands up to cup your face and wipe the tears away. “Because if you feel even a fraction of what I feel when I kiss you, I don’t know how you could ever think it was fake,” you confess and it shatters his heart all over again. “(Y/n), I-“ “I wanna go home.” “Ok, I’ll fly us back to mine and we can-“ “No Hawks. My home. My apartment. I need... I need time.” “Ok.”

The two of you sneak out of the event. The tabloids will likely be flooded with headlines about how you and Hawks are so madly in love you had to sneak away for a supply closet tryst only to realize that wasn’t enough and decide to just bail on the event entirely. They’ll be wrong, of course, but it’s better they run that than the truth. Neither you nor Hawks says a word as he flies you to your apartment. Only once you’re standing in your open doorway does Hawks pipe up. “I have to leave tomorrow for a mission,” he says. “Task force?” you ask, although you’re not sure if you want to know the answer. “Yea. Task force,” he confirms. “Oh.” “Yea.” “Ok. How long will you be gone?” “I don’t know but at least a week.” “So I get a week’s break from the circus,” you say and part of you knows it’s a cruel thing to say, but another part of you says it’s only cruel if he actually cares for you as much as he claims to. “Yea, I guess so,” he says and he sounds so goddamn sad. You’re hurting him. You’re hurting him and you wish you could make yourself stop but you can’t. “Goodnight Hawks,” you sigh and then you close the door before he can respond. He stands staring at the closed door for a long while. You can tell by the shadow underneath the door. Eventually though he sighs and you hear him walk away with heavy, defeated steps.

Which is crueler: Him hurting you unintentionally because he never gave you the chance to explain? Or you intentionally breaking his heart the way he broke yours? You suspect you won’t like the answer so you go to the kitchen to grab a drink and try and forget you even posed the question in the first place.

You told Hawks his time away would be a break. In actuality it was agony. You went to work and then you went home. Bakugo and Midoriya were getting worried but work kept them busy enough you could avoid their questions and their concern and their judgment for the most part. “Why don’t you just talk to him?” Midoriya had asked one day. “She doesn’t owe him shit,” Bakugo had scoffed. “Maybe not,” Midoriya had acknowledged before turning back to you to say “but that doesn’t change the fact that the two of you love each other and you’re the one who decided to fake the relationship to the press. Even if you guys don’t start a real relationship again the least you could do is make sure you aren’t actively making each other miserable.” “I’ll think about it,” you had replied, but you decidedly didn’t think about it.

It’s been two weeks now since Hawks went away. You miss him. You wander into your kitchen, grab a bottle of Cabernet, open it, and are turning to lock yourself in your room when you nearly bump into an unfamiliar man with blonde hair with a single, lightning shaped black streak. “Who the fuck are you?” you ask once you’ve recovered. The man looks shaken by the question and a tad bit intimidated. “I’m, uh, Denki. Your new roommate? Mina introduced us the other day. You said hi, told me not to let Hawks in if he shows up, and then locked yourself in your room,” he explains sheepishly. You have zero recollection of this. You were probably drunk when it happened. “Oh... Well I’m (y/n) in case I forgot to mention it before,” you awkwardly introduce yourself before stepping around him. “See you around I guess,” you call over your shoulder before going back to your room and locking the door behind you.

You’re about halfway through the bottle of wine when it hits you what a sad sight this is. You’re wasting a perfectly good Saturday sitting at home alone and drinking by yourself in your locked room. The press would have a field day if they knew. You go to take another swig from the bottle, you’re far too sober to deal with everything you’re feeling right now, when you suddenly hear the sound of your lock shifting. You dismiss it at first as Mina trying the door to come check on you, but then it suddenly swings open to reveal Denki kneeling on the ground with a bobby pin looking accomplished and a nervous but determined looking Hawks standing behind him. “I thought I told you not to let him in,” you find yourself saying as you try to process what’s happening. Denki shrugs. “Seemed like you two could use a good chat,” he says before walking away. Hawks steps into the room and closes the door back behind him. “We need to talk. For real this time. I just.... Please give me a chance to explain or, or, to just prove to you that my feelings are real or something. Anything. Please,” he begs. Hawks has always been able to play you like a violin, hitting just the right notes to get your stubborn ass to bend, even if he doesn’t seem to realize it. A voice in the back of your head reminds you it’s doubtful he realizes considering all you’ve done is treat him cruelly since that tabloid came out. He deserves some of your ire. He doesn’t deserve all of it. “Don’t you think this is a conversation that should be had sober?” you ask, raising the half empty bottle of Cabernet for emphasis. “You just got off work a little while ago which means that’s the only bottle you’ve been working on. We both know it takes way more than half a bottle of wine to get you drunk,” he points out and he’s got you there. You’re out of excuses and honestly he probably does deserve a conversation. After all, Midoriya wasn’t wrong. You had no good reason to continue to deny Hawks at this point.

“Fine, let’s talk.”

Author’s Note: THIS HURT ME TO WRITE BUT WE OUT HERE. Hawks and (y/n)’s relationship is so complicated at this point and it’s interesting to write but it’s also hard and painful to write because you want them to be happy and in love but there is so much outside of them now that is involved in their relationship. Anyway suffer with me ig 🥲❤️

Taglist [open]: @akkaso @cathy8taffy @eeppff @iikillerkitteh @pixelwisp @pokesosa @lildockel @bread0nhead

#hopelesspf #hawks #wing hero hawks #hawks x reader #hawks x y/n

56 notes · View notes

anxiousbean33 · 4 years ago

Text

The Black Sails

This is my first story and I hope yall like it! @sitting-around-and-fantasizing wanted a tag so here ya go!

I changed the title, just note that this has nothing to do with the tv show i just thought it was a cool name lmao :P

Word count - 1217

Summary -

Certain people get jewelry that gives them magic. Each person has their own specific power that causes them to gain different abilities. When Ivory becomes queen of her kingdom she starts a war with everyone else. This is the Story of the Hero's of Old fighting against the Kingdom of Darkness.

“DAD! MUM!” the 9-year-old screams, “I DON'T WANT TO GO TO SLEEP”

“UGH! Can you shut up!” his brother shouts, throwing a pillow at him, “Just go to bed!”

“MUM!!!”

“Hey, you two calm down,” their mother says walking into the bedroom. “How about I tell you a story, and then you lay down and go to sleep, deal?”

“But Mum! I’m 16! I’ve read almost every story in the fairytale book, either you have read them to me or I read them myself.”

“It's a good thing that this isn't a story from the book then.” She says while looking at the full moon, “This is a story about The Dark War and the Heros that ended it. Unless you don't want to hear about them, I could just leave and go…”

“NO!!” They shout

“MUM!! TELL ME ABOUT THEM I WANNA BE A HERO AS WELL!!”

“Ok, I will tell you two,” she states while picking up the younger of the two boys, “But only if you promise to go to sleep after, got it?”

“Ok Mum!”

“So two years ago Princess Ivory took over her kingdom, changing it from what was once a beautiful kingdom filled with people dancing and festivities, to the Kingdom of Darkness…”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“There are too many people taking advantage of our kingdom!” she screamed at her advisors, “They have no idea the challenges we do to keep them safe! They flood the streets and make constant noise! I give them my protection and in return, they give me these STUPID GIFTS!! I say instead of showing them kindness, and giving the other kingdoms our resources, we do the opposite… we show them just how powerful we truly are.”

“My Queen, are you sure about this?” Ivory's advisor warns, “If we do this, it could end badly for everyone.”

“I am positive. These other kingdoms are nothing without our protection. Get the soldiers. We are going to war.”

“On it, my Queen.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“We need to do something… Her army is approaching, we know how to wield magic and fight without it, we can try to fight against them”

“What about the kids though?” If we do this, my angel, they could be put in danger.”

“We haven't shown anyone our magic, you can shift and I have my wings. We could keep our identities secret and leave to fight at night. If we don't do anything, they could get hurt more.”

“You’re right. But we can't do this alone, we must find more people. You stay here, and I'll fly and check the other kingdoms for fighters. I should be back by next week, if I’m not, something bad has happened to me.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“So who did you say you were again?” the pink-haired man asked while bandaging his wounds from the fight.

“You can call me Lady Death. I am here to recruit you to help join me and my angel in the fight against Ivory and her kingdom.”

“Well, Death, I am perfectly content with how I am now. I don't need you or Angel. None of us do. Hypixel is a place with lots of skilled fighters now I’m sure you know this, but what you don't know is that almost everyone here is willing to fight you and take your circlet and figure out just who you are. Luckily for you, I’m interested, and they won't try to attack you with me on your team.”

“Really? I thought it would take more persuading than that?”

“Yea well Simons been bugging me for ages, saying ‘you need to get out more’ and ‘you need to take the dark kingdom more seriously', so why not help ya out. Call me Blade. It's a pleasure to work with you and Angel.”

“Hey Blade!” another fighter shows up, “Oh my bad, didn't know you were talking to someone. I came to ask if you wanted to fight, but I'll come back in a bit.”

“Wait, Shooter! Do you wanna join me, Death, and Angel? Were gonna stop the dark kingdom nerds.”

“Yeah sure, lemme get a couple of things first. I’ll probably bring GB as well.”

“Ok Shooter, Blade, bring GB and meet me at the fountain tomorrow, we will then head to the base.” Lady Death then turned into her crow form and flew away.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Hey, shithead, have you heard about the revolutionaries?”

“Can you stop swearing in front of our brother...”

“He's asleep, Cap. He can't hear us.”

“.... You called me Cap… You haven't called me that since we were pirates… Oh, god, you're thinking about joining the revolutionaries, aren't you?”

“You know me so well Cap! I think it's time we show that dumb queen that The Captains mean business!”

“What about-”

“We can let Dream take care of him while we are gone. It wouldn't be the first time, he would understand.”

“Ugh… There is no stopping you, I’m coming along to make sure you don't do anything dumb.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Hello! I am Lady Death, and I would like to say thank you all for showing up here today. When me and Angel planned for this, we honestly expected it to be just us and Blade, but thank you for comping.” She then sits back down by Angel, glad that everything is working out.

“Hey Death, me and Shooter have worked on some battle plans, but imma need to know what people's strengths and weaknesses are, so we can figure out where to place people. I already know about the Captains & GB, but I don't know anything else.”

“Well Blade, I'm Eret, and this is Bomb. Our strengths are…”

The hero’s spent months planning, some staying up full nights to try to get a plan figured out, all whilst battle raged through the towns. Eventually, after around a year of planning and trial and error, the heroes were able to gain a plan that was able to take down Ivory.

The plan consisted of GB, Shooter, & Bomb working to take care of the guards on the left. While the guard’s flood to protect the left side, the Captains are sent up to take down the communications tower. Eret and Death would then head to the prisons to break out everyone who Ivory arrested. Letting Blade and Angel fly to the top of the castle to fight the Queen.

--------------------------------------------------------------------

“Give it up Ivory” Blade snarls, “You lost.”

“I would rather die than surrender.”

“Just kill her. She is not worth our mercy anyways Blade.”

“You got it, Angel.”

------------------------------------------------------------------------------

“Once Blade killed the queen, the people in the kingdom were set free, some were angry, but most were happy that people were able to travel freely. Although Lady Death, Angel, Blade, Bomb, Shooter, The Captains, and GB were never seen again, it is said in times of need one would see Death as a crow and The Heroes of Old would follow her to fight for the people once again.” closing the book the mother looked up, “Goodnight boys, sleep well.”

After looking once more at her sleeping children, she whispers to the moon, “That's incorrect… Blade would lead first. He is the one with my circlet and Angels brooch.” As Lady Death went to sleep, she missed the sirens, signaling to the people that the Smp Kingdom was under attack.

#this is just the prologue #there will be more stuff in the actual first chapter #but this would be like 7 years before the actual story will take place #you just kinda need to know the background in order to understand ya know #technoblade #philza #mumza #wilbur soot #tommyinnit #captain sparklez #captain puffy #kingdom of darkness au #fanfiction #mcyt #dsmp au

23 notes · View notes

meeko-mar · 4 years ago

Text

Today, in plot ideas I have while I'm half asleep in the morning;

(sorry it starts off a bit sad, warning for Character death)

After Katsuki reunites with Izuku and AM and the final battle gets started for real, Shigaraki/AFO uses Decay to kill AM. In front of BOTH boys, who watch in Petrified horror, knowing they're unable to stop it. And as he's dying, All Might reaches out to them, and as the cracks and dust of decay crawl steadily up his body and towards his outstretched hand, he tells them BOTH

"Midoriya...Bakugou...I'm SO proud of you." All Might's hand is the last thing to disappear into dust.

Boys go into rage, Katsuki BARELY holds Izuku from going completely self-sacrificial. But they fight the fight of their young lives and eventually win.

Afterwards, they're being put up in some sort of hotel or safe house or something as the world tries to adapt around them.(because in the entire fight/finale, UA was pretty wrecked/destroyed by Shiggy/LOV too)

Middle of the night, Izuku knocks quietly on Katsuki's door, and it's clear he hasn't been sleeping well, if at all, since the battle. He's wearing a hoodie over his face so no one stops him if he runs into anyone else. He apologizes for waking Katsuki up but...

"I don't wanna be alone right now. Mom's asleep, too, and...she wouldn't really get it..."

Katsuki pulls him in without a word and sets him on the bed, stares him right in the eyes, and demands to know if he's been eating. Trick question, he can tell he hasn't, and he starts making something at the stove in his kitchenette. Izuku sits in silence on the bed, soft green eyes just watching Katsuki as he works, almost as if he's scared to take his eyes off him, as if he might lose him too.

Slowly, with Izuku now getting some soup in his stomach, they start talking about AM, they hadn't really had the time to process the loss TOGETHER in private yet, what with all the debriefings, and other people demanding their attention during recovery, and of course, parents wanting time with their children who just fought a war against the LOV.

Izuku of course blaming himself for not neutralizing Shigaraki sooner, or that even though he won the day from the LOV, he still couldn't save one of their most important people, and Katsuki cursing and telling him it wasn't his fault.

They continue talking and crying together for a while, and eventually, they finally share the first real, deep hug they'd ever had since they were toddlers. Izuku of course is crying like a fountain, and though he wants to make a big deal about his shirt getting soaked, Katsuki doesn't, because Izuku needs this... And it doesn't escape him that he himself is sniffling and furiously wiping his own face repeatedly.

Withdrawing from the hug, and their combined grief, Katsuki commands, "It's 3 in the morning. Lie the fuck down and go to sleep." To which, Izuku finds a small, broken smile and nods, settling his weary head onto one of Katsuki's pillows, making sure to scoot far enough over to let Katsuki in as well.

Katsuki makes sure Izuku is warm and asleep before he lets himself pass out on the bed next to him.

Kirishima, and the rest of the Bakusquad behind him, tries to visit Katsuki the next morning but gets the door promptly slammed in his face because Izuku's still getting some much needed sleep.

"Come back later, assholes. And keep your stupid voices down!"

And honestly, he's still pretty drained as well. He climbs back into bed and settles in for a late morning, as Izuku breathes softly, close enough by Katsuki to feel his breath. He looks at the freckles that are steadfast anchors for his gaze, under the shadows under his eyes that seem to show the strife Izuku had been through in the past several months, light scars still littered here and there from the battles... and the untainted wisps of green eye lashes. He ruffles a hand through some green locks, and Izuku sighs contently in his sleep.

"Tch. Stupid nerd."

---

Don't worry, Katsuki shot a quick text to Inko in the morning, letting her know Izuku was with him down the hall. <3

Out takes(for fun):

Kirishima: *peeks in past Katsuki*

Kirishima: HEY WAIT is that Midoriya in your bed---?? 👀👍

Bakugou: **SLAM**

DekuSquad: *comes looking for Izuku later that day* We heard Midoriya was with you?? Is everything ok?? You're not messing with him are you??

Bakugou: HEY, fuck off, You all kept me from seeing him last time, and he ended up fucking LEAVING US ALL. SO NO, I GET MY TURN WITH DEKU THIS TIME. **SLAM**

Izuku: hmmm what's going on? I just hear a bunch of slamming doors?? *sitting up in bed, rubbing at his eyes*

Bakugou: ...You ASSHOLES, you woke him up!!!

Everyone outside: 🤦‍♀️🤦‍♂️

#bakudeku #katsuki Bakugou #Izuku Midoriya #let them GRIEVE #part of why I'm not wary of the sudden quick pace the manga is taking #I'd like these slow moments to let the characters BREATHE and PROCESS #ahhh #also yes bakugou needs to have his turn with midoriya im sorry those are the rules #last time that they denied him access to midoriya #he hecking LEFT #you can't tell me that Kacchan won't go OUT OF HIS WAY to make sure he gets to ACTUALLY SEE izuku after the next huge battle #jesus just save some time and put them in the SAME HOSPITAL ROOM NEXT TIME FR #I love dekusquad do not get me wrong #bnha spoilers #I don't like doing that to AM #I must atone for my sins #lol

14 notes · View notes

pinkprimrose05 · 3 years ago

Text

GX Month Day 18: This Wasn't in the Rule Book

@gxmonth

Ao3 Version Link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/33473653/chapters/83310418

Why yes, it's prompt bending time! Wish this day came a bit later into the month so it was closer to the release date of Duel World ARC-V but, oh well, what can ya do? ...Oops, looks like I spoiled the chapter. Yes, this year's AU prompt also doubles as a celebration of ARC-V coming to Duel Links, and it's probably the one prompt I'm most excited to write because hoo boy I've been waiting for this moment for sooooo long! 8D

~~~~~

"Manual Reboot Successful. Initiate Sign-Up Process? "

"Initiating Sign-Up Process. Establishing Connection...Please Enter WORLD_ID."

"Response Recorded. Initiating Connection to WORLD_ID SERIES6..."

"..ERROR. Failed to Connect to WORLD_ID SERIES6. Continue Sign-Up Process and Retry?"

"Response Recorded. Continuing Sign-Up Process."

"Response Recorded. Aborting Connection to WORLD_ID SERIES6...Connection Aborted"

"...Sing-Up Process Completed. Initiating Log-In Sequence..."

"ERROR."

-----------

Yuuma sat by the river, waiting for something big to happen.

He knew he wasn't support to be there. Tour Guide hade explicitly told everyone to not get close to the Gate during new world maintenance, but being his curious self, he guiltlessly ignored the warning. Why? Because of the aforementioned new world, of course!

From what he knew about it -which wasn't much, but Juudai-senpai had been rambling about all the different Duelists, Decks and weird game mechanics that they might see for two weeks straight and that sort of gave him a general idea-, this new world thing was a pretty big deal in Duel Links, and with it being so covered up, Yuuma was all too hyped to see what it was like for himself, consequences be damned.

He'd tried world-switching to no avail, as he sebsequently found out that the game wasn't only staggering log-outs, it was also staggering travelling through Duel Worlds for however long he was stuck here. He'd tried asking everyone he knew about it over his D-Gazer too, but that didn't work, and neither did begging a sleepy Kaito to try and hack the game for more info..

..Which led back to him sitting by the river, kicking his legs back and forth as Emperor's Key swayed in the morning breeze, dangling from the string in his hand while he kept waiting, waiting, and waiting some more...

"Yuuma?"

"Eek!" The Xyz Duelist practically jumped five feet into the air upon hearing his name being called, thoughts racing in frantic circles as he turned to see someone approaching...then immediately relaxing when he realized exactly who that someone was.

"Three!"

Michael Arclight smiled, waving gently as he tottered to the river bank and sat down next to Yuuma, who sighed in relief at knowing he wasn't in grave trouble for getting caught near the Gate. The two traded greetings, then settled into silence as they gazed at the horizon, at the clear sky and rising sun of their Duel World's landscape. If it were him, Michael would be content with just staying like that and admiring the view, but the ball of excitement next to him wasn't about to share that sentiment anytime soon.

"Sooooooo..." Yuuma began "What are you gonna do today?"

"Hm? What do you mean?" His friend gave him a puzzled look, and Yuuma made a broad gesture with his arms in response, as if that was supposed to mean something.

"You know, about the, uh, the new world? Are you gonna visit that? Duel people there? I don't know what to expect from it to be honest, it's the first time for us and I'm reeaally excited and also curious and I can't wait to see what will happen...but we can't find out anything before the maintenance ends, and it looks like it's gonna take a while and I'm getting bored so, what are you gonna do?"

Michael hummed thoughtfully, glancing at his Duel Disk "Well, I was thinking of waiting until things settled down before doing anything about all of this. A game this big can get quite unstable with such a huge update, you know? That's why I came here anyway, and..." the pink-haired Duelist blushed faintly "..I may or may not have decided to ignore what Guide-san said about the Gate in the process. Please don't tell anyone I was here?"

"Don't worry, my lips are sealed." Yuuma said, mimicking a zipper sound as he ran two fingers along his lips for effect "No one will ever know of your super classified one-time incident of breaking the law...not that that law made sense anyway. I mean, COME ON..."

Michael giggled, listening as Yuuma launched into a full-on rant about how meaningless them 'closing' the Gate area was. He wasn't exactly wrong though; if it was about as dangerous as Guide said, surely there would be some obstacle or lock to stop people from getting too close, right? Surely she wouldn't just count on everyone to not be reckless enough to ignore her, right? Unless...

Unless the error she's dealing with here might cause serious backlash if she tried inputting a new command that also interacts with the Gate, in which case-

Any other thought that would have followed that trail instantly vanished when the Gate suddenly exploded with blue light, and in that moment, Michael's world went quiet.

-----------

"Unacceptable! This is unacceptable! I have a fucking job interview in two hours, how am I supposed to get ready in time for that??"

Yuusei sighed, running a hand through his already mussed hair for what was probably the eighth time in thirty minutes. Tour Guide's sudden announcement of an emergency maintenace -one that somehow overlapped with the new world's- had put everyone on edge, even more so after they found out they couldn't log out until it was over. As a result, every single Duelist currently in the 5D's World had gathered at the Deck Editor and unanimously decided to wait out the maintenance period there...but some of them weren't particularly happy about being stuck in the game for however long it took.

Chief of those was Jack, who kept pacing next to the table Team 5D's and co. clustered around, all while throwing several uncharitable insults at Guide, Isono, Kaiba, and basically everyone affliated with the Duel Links staff.

"Why do they have to keep messing up every time they launch one of those new words?? I swear, if I see any of those little-"

Carly instinctively covered her ears when the Resonator Duelist let out a particularly nasty swear, and Crow shot him a miffed glare from behind. Yuusei sighed again, then slowly pushed himself out from his chair to rest a hand on Jack's shoulder.

"Jack, please go get a cup of coffee and cool down." He said in an uncharacteristically pleading, tired tone "We're all stuck here, we all have important things to do, and some of us haven't slept for twenty-six hours. It'd do everyone a lot of good if you stopped yelling at empty air for a while."

Jack crossed his arms and huffed, but forced himself to simmer down regardless.

"...Fine. I'll go get myself some coffee and 'cool down' or whatever, but not because you asked me to, it's because I need some fresh air." And with that, the former King of Duels strode out of the Studio, coat flapping dramatically in a gust of wind before he went completely out of view.

"Good riddance." Crow let his head drop on the table with a low thud, raising a thumbs-up in Yuusei's general direction, and while he normally wouldn't agree with that sentiment, the Synchro Duelist was currently grateful for the calmer atmosphere of the place, now that Jack was gone. He slid back into his chair, hoping to get some shut-eye to compensate for staying up for all of the night before...

"Guys, we have a problem."

...Or not. Yuusei looked up in time to see Bruno -No, stop it, that's Antinomy- dropping in the chair between him and a barely conscious Kiryuu, the computer in his hands flashing with several warning signs overlapping on top of strings of code, which kept appearing and disappearing at a seemingly random pace. This, the noiret decidedly thought, peering intently at the screen, definitely doesn't look good.

"The energy output is spiking around the Gate area and the ones close to it." Antinomy explained to no-one in particular, his usually passive face set in a stressed frown as he clicked away at the keyboard "It appears that whatever issue that caused this emergency maintenance has gone completely out of control, and while we don't know exactly what that means, compressing so much energy in a certain area, no matter how broad..."

"...is bound to make it blow up." Yuusei concluded, eyes widening as his mind caught up with the implication behind that "This means the Duel Studio and everyone in it will be affected if anything happens to the Gate."

Antinomy nodded "Exactly. It could be that someone is trying to log in, and that's why I'm asking you to go and- dammit!" He swore, fingers moving across the keyboard at a far more frantic pace when the computer let out a series of long, loud beeping sound. Yuusei was pretty sure he got whiplash from how fast he turned to see what was going on-

-but before he could register more than the word "ERROR" bolded in blue across the screen, he felt a shock of static, and then...nothing.

-----------

"Automated Reboot Successful. Log-In Sequence...Complete."

"Connecting to WORLD_ID SERIES2...Connection Successful."

"Linking with.."

"..Sakaki Yuuya."

-----------

The first thing he felt when he came to was a gentle breeze tousling his hair, rays of sunshine lighting up his eyelids, and droplets of water spraying his face every couple seconds. It wasn't raining, that much he gathered, which meant that he'd most likely spawned near a fountain or a river, since there was no trace of the salty scent of seawater in the air.

Yuuya opened his eyes. Sure enough, there was a fountain to his left, its marble structure adorned with a ring of green leaves that carried all kinds of colourful flowers, water flowing from it center and from the sides. Pushing himself up, the tomato-haired Duelist looked around, taking in the rest of his current surroundings, and the first thing that caught his attention was a huge, round portal thingy that hovered in the air, with glowing lines of blue circuitry running through its silvery white perimeter.

That must be the Gate, he thought that's how I came here.

A bit further ahead was what seemed to be another portal, but this one was rectangular in shape, unlike the Gate's circle, and it was completely blue as well. Yuuya watched as the portal rotated in place slowly, the other side of it coming into view with the label 'Duel School' appearing on top of it. Curious, he reached out a hand to touch the portal...

...only to pull back immediately when the pixels forming it fizzled and crackled with electricity, shocking him.

"Ow ow ow ow ow!!" Yuuya clutched his stung hand with the other, hissing in pain at the contact before letting go of his hand. He sucked in deep breath then slowly exhaled, wiping the tears that formed at the corners of his eyes before turning away from the Duel School to keep walking (and to will away the sick, fleeting memory the shock had sparked for a moment).

Yeesh, that wasn't a great first interaction... he grimaced, waving his hand in the air in hopes that it would calm the stinging pain down But that doesn't mean I can't find something good if I keep looking. I wonder where all the other Duelists are.

The path he was walking down split into two at the end. Yuuya turned around, chancing one more look at the admittedly beautiful yet strangely desloate area he started in. He chalked its emptiness up to it being quite early in the morning...but then again, it wasn't morning for everyone around the world, so maybe it was just that the area was mainly used as a terminal, which would explain why he was the only one there...

Wait.

He shouldn't be.

Switching his Duel Disk on with a quick swipe (which was an honestly stupid action in hindsight because damn his hand stung hard from that), Yuuya dialed the very first contact on his list, running the hand with the Disk strapped to it through bi-colored bangs and pushing them out of his face as the device rang once, twice, three times. Where was everyone else? He, Yuzu and Gongenzaka had logged in at the same time, and Sora had told them he'll jump in right after, so why was he the only one to come out of the Gate?

*Din-di-di-din, din-ding...Din-di-di-din, din-ding...Din-di-di-din-*

"Hello."

Yuuya blinked, then did a double take at the soft, young voice that came from the other end of the call. That...that wasn't Yuzu. He swallowed.

"..I'm sorry, who am I talking to?"

A few moments passed before the voice replied "My name is Sera. You must not recognize me, but please don't worry, the owner of this device is safe and sound, and if you wish to talk to her, she is here with me."

The line went silent then. Well, almost silent; Yuuya could hear bits of chatter and the sound of someone fiddling with the Duel Disk...before said someone decided to blast his eardrums full-force, like she always did.

"Yuuya! Where the heck are you?!" Yuzu cried out, and he found himself smiling at the familiar loudness "I've been looking for you everywhere!!"

He winced when her voice cracked on the last word, hand running through his hair again as he laughed nervously "Sorry, sorry! I...honestly don't entirely know where I am yet. Thought we'd start at the same place, but I guess we didn't..." He glanced around for any sort of landmark to pinpoint his position, then remembered where he came from at first and settled on that "Um, can you see the Gate? I'm standing close to it."

There was a beat of silence, then an audible sigh. "I see," Sera muttered at length "Sakaki-san, I think you have logged into a different Duel World than the one Hiiragi-san and I are in at the moment..because we're standing right in front of the Gate."

It took a full ten seconds for Yuuya's brain to register that, and when it did, all that came out of his mouth was a drawn-out "Whaaaaaaat??"

"...You skipped the rest of the tutorial, didn't you?" Yuzu's voice carried a hint of amusement and fondness, before assuming a more serious tone "Okay, look. If you check your Duel Disk, you'll find two arrows in a circle at the top left corner. Click that, and you'll get a list of the five different Duel Worlds in the game. Sera said that something happened before we came here that stopped everyone from travelling between those worlds, and apparently there was a sixth world that we were supposed to log into but didn't...anyway, the highlighted name will show you the world you're in. I'm in the fourth one right now..."

Yuuya listened as Yuzu explained what happened to her after logging into the Duel World, following her instructions all the while. A quick check told him that he was in the second world, the one labeled 'Duel World Series 2'. He nodded along his friends' words, and when she finished, he took yet another look at his surroundings.

"Alright, gotcha, I'm in the second world." He said, and it was then that he decided to head left "I guess I'll go take a look around the place, see if I can find out where everyone else is, and wait until we can all switch to the same world. It's great to hear you're alright, Yuzu. Take care!"

"Hey, that's my line!" She quipped in response, and Yuuya could practically hear the playful grin on her face "But seriously, I'm glad to know you're doing fine too. See you later, Yuuya."

And with that, the line went dead. Not even bothering to turn his Disk off, Yuuya broke into a quick jog, humming a cheerful tune to himself and grinning widely as he started rhyming the tune to his steps. Yuzu was fine, she was okay, they'll find each other soon enough and meet up with their friends, and they'll have tons of fun exploring the game, just as they planned.

Yeah, that's the spirit!

He only slowed down when the smooth, metallic path turned into dirt, patches of grass growing randomly in the way and on the sides, as well as a pair of trees and a few stray daisy bushes. A huge structure that felt so very out of place loomed ahead of him, its futuristic design and neon blue lines contrasting sharply with the simple greenery surrounding it, despite only being separated from that by a ring of gray tiles at the end of the dirt path. Upon closer inspection, there appeared to be a floating label above it that spelled out the words "Duel Studio", and a sliding door that opened on its own when Yuuya came close. The Pendulum Duelist stepped through-

"Ack!"

-and promptly crashed into a blur of black, stumbling backwards as a result. Leaning on the now-open door for support, Yuuya nursed his head with his free hand, letting out a small sigh before he looked up to check on whoever it was that he bumped into...and froze when he locked eyes with them.

That shade of gold was...familiar.

Yuuya's eyes widened, and the brunette facing him mirrored the action for a split second, before his shock faded into a passive scowl that clashed with his fluffy, Kuriboh-like hair. Yuuya opened his mouth to say something, he wasn't sure exactly what, but the taller male turned back to the Duel Studio, subtly motioning for him to come along, and whatever it was that he wanted to say went out of the window.

"Follow me." His voice -slow, deep and clear- carried a distinctly authoritative tone as he strode ahead, and after a moment of apprehension, Yuuya found himself trailing behind. The guy looked like he knew where he was going, and didn't exactly seem opposed to talking to him, which meant he could possibly get some answers to the pile of questions building up in his head, and well, weird gut feelings aside, that was actually a good thing.

The two sat at a round, red table in a distant corner, and then just...stared at each other. Yuuya waited for the Kuriboh-haired Duelist -at least, he guessed he was a Duelist, judging by the strange custom model of a Duel Disk on his left arm- to say something, anything, but nothing came out, and he wasn't sure exactly how to start the conversation, so...he kept waiting.

"............"

And waiting.

"............"

And waiting.

"............"

And waiting.

"............"

And then decided that was enough waiting. "Umm...are you even gonna say anything?" Yuuya asked after a full four minutes, half expecting to get no response..

..but the guy actually rolled his eyes at him, like he'd asked a stupid question or something "What are you expecting me to say?"

Huh. Okay, this man was kinda bad at conversing. Yuuya held back a sigh, plastered on a smile instead, and tried again.

"Hmm, how about an introduction? That sounds like a good start." He held out a hand "Nice to meet you, I'm Sakaki Yuuya. And you are..?"

The brunette's stared moved to Yuuya's outstretched hand, then back to his eyes...and then he sighed, holding his own hand to his temples as he mumbled something in a foreign language Yuuya couldn't make out (but assumed was an exasperated statement, based on the tone of what came next).

"Dear Lord, why is it that every single one of them turns out to be a child?"

"Huh?"

"You can see Duel Spirits," He said, pointing at Yuuya. It wasn't even a question, just a factual statement he threw as casually as someone discussing the weather forecast "and you most likely have a special bond with at least one of your cards, that may even go as far as your very soul being bound to it. Is that correct?"

A few moments passed in silence, and then: "How did you-"

"I knew that was the case. Listen to me, Sakaki Yuuya; I do not know the exact extent of your knowledge about the nature of this world, or that of the darkness you possess, but know this-" gold eyes narrowed dangerously, and Yuuya flinched in spite of himself "Duel Links is not just a game. There are greater forces behind the creation of the Duel Worlds, ones that can tamper with your memories and thoughts, even call back beings that were supposed to be gone forever and link different dimensioms. Your status as a Legendary Duelist means you are directly involved in everything that might happen in the new world, so proceed with caution, or prepare to deal with the consequences."

Yuuya reeled back in his chair, face going white. He stared down at his pendulum, gripping its dimly glowing crystal tightly in his hands -had it been doing that for a while? He had no idea. His head was starting to feel light, his throat got all choked up, and he was sure he'd be shaking if not for how tense his muscles were. What- what had he gotten himself into? If he'd known it was more than a game, if he'd known they'd be thrown in the middle of crossfire again-

Deep breaths, Yuuya, deep breaths.. He told himself before he got too lost in thought, inhaling sharply. Calm down, let it out slowly, relax.....yeah, there we go.

"Why are you telling me this?" The teen asked once he was certain his mini-panic attack was over, and he must've been imagining things because he could swear he saw a ghost of a smile on the other's face when he replied.

"In all honesty," he began slowly, the edge to his voice almost completely gone "I have had enough interdimensional conflict to last me a lifetime, and I would really rather not deal with any more of it if I can. I assume you understand where I'm coming from here?"

Yuuya hummed absently, and that seemed to be a satisfying answer to the brown-haired Duelist, who pushed himself out of his seat and turned to leave, but not without allowing himself another final sentence.

"Very well then. For your own sake, as well as everyone you may care about, I hope you're actually smart enough to follow my warning. Until we meet again...or not."

And with that, he walked away, disappearing behind the staircase to the right. As soon as he went out of sight, Yuuya let his head fall down on the table with an unceremonious flump!, making some inchoerent noises when the sound of some lady announcing the end of the 'Maintenance Break' blasted over the intercom above his head, and he became distantly aware of other voices and some footsteps sounding not too far from him.

*tap*

Alright, so he and everyone else have basically jumped into yet another grand scheme that caused conflict across different dimensions, but this time the stakes weren't as clear as in the Interdimensional War.

*tap-tap*

The thought was admittedly daunting, and he was a hundred percent sure no-one he knew would like to go through something like that again..

"Oi."

But on the bright side, it seemed that they weren't the only ones dealing with this sort of thing, which meant they could easily find many allies in the different Duel Worlds...yeah, if they kept an eye out, they should be all right-

"Oi!"

Yuuya's head snapped up when he realized someone was calling out to him, and when he looked up, he was greeted with the smiling face of..

"You again??"

..the same Kuriboh-haired Duelist?

"Sorry, what?"

Yuuya did a double take. Yeah, no, that wasn't him; the eyes were colored soft brown instead of hollow gold, and he was wearing a red jacket instead of a black robe too- Yuuya mentally scolded himself for overlooking the differences (but also found it somewhat funny because, you know, he had to deal with this kind of confusion more than once before).

"Nevermind, I think I confused you for someone else. My bad." He gave the red-jacketed brunette a sheepish grin, gesturing at the empty chair opposite to his, then watching as he placed his also strange custom model of a Duel Disk on the side of the table before sitting down himself, fiddling with the device all the while. Even the way he composed himself was different; this guy felt far more lax and chill compared to the other one, and it made Yuuya relax a bit in turn, the silence that stretched between them feeling more comfortable.

"So, let me guess..." Red Jacket began a bit later, leaning a bit forward with a curious glint in his eyes "You're one of the new kids?"

A small nod "You can say that, I guess. I'm Yuuya, and you?"

"Yuuki Juudai. Pleased to meet you, kiddo- wait, I can call you kiddo, right?"

"Sure, unless you're somehow younger than me, which I doubt because of the..height difference."

Juudai smiled again "Aight, kiddo it is then. I gotta say though, I'm impressed you managed to switch worlds that fast. Took me a whole week to realize that was even a thing."

He laughed, and Yuuya chuckled with him. "Actually.." he said afterwards, rubbing the back of his neck with a small, bashful smile "A friend told me about it, and I couldn't even use it when I first arrived. Something about an error happening with the new world and shutting down the whole game, I think? Yean, that locked out the switch thing for a while, and it stopped everyone from logging out too."

"Woah, for real?"

"Uh, yeah."

"Damn," Juudai slammed a hand down on the table "you sure had one heck of a first day, kiddo. Guide must be freaking out with all of this going on."

Yuuya blinked, confused "Guide?"

"Oh, you don't know her?" The older teen asked, quirking an eyebrow "She's, ah, the Duel Spirit of Tour Guide From the Underworld. Pretty much the one who manages this place, since the actual owner doesn't give a shit about the shenanigans happening around here, and she also runs the Duel School. You can go hit her up if you have any questions about the game; she's a great help for new players."

"A Duel Spirit..." Yuuya echoed quietly, stare moving down to the Deck slot of his Duel Disk. He closed his eyes for a moment, then looked up at Juudai and asked "So anyone can interact with them here? The spirits, I mean."

"Of course! It's part of the game's charm, y'know?" He answered, throwing a wink at Yuuya before continuing "Being able to hang out with all your monster friends, even if you might not see them in real life..I don't think anyone would pass up on something that cool."

The younger Duelist smiled at that, hand subconsciously touching the top of his Deck, which earned him several happy murmurs and a particularly loud roar as well "Yeah, that does sound pretty cool. I gotta try it sometime later."

"You totally should." Juudai agreed, taking out his own Deck and shuffling through it as he added "In the meantime...would you like a good ol' tabletop Duel? My old-ass relic of a Disk is being particularly laggy today, and I heard you had this cool summon mechanic with the backrow zones- what was it called again? Pendant? Pending?"

"It's Pendulum Summoning." Yuuya clarified, tentatively taking his Deck out of its slot when Juudai did the same "And uh, sure, I can show it to you if you want."

The brunette's smile turned into a wide grin as he whipped out a pair of folded game mats from his pocket and placed them on his and Yuuya's side of the table, putting each of their Decks on the far right before punching a fist in the air "Heck yeah! I'm finally the first to Duel the new kid with the new cards, this is gonna be a lot of fun!"

"Definitely!" He nodded, his own smile widening as he drew his starting hand with a little more flourish than necessary for a tabletop Duel- not that he really cared, what mattered at the moment was that, even if he was going to have to fight again later down the line, he was going to enjoy Dueling to the maximum as long as he could. No use worrying about the future, all he came here to do was have fun, and fun was he going to have.

Watch out, Duel Links, here I come..!

"LET'S DUEL!!"

~~~~~~~

THE END, finally. This, for whatever reason, took me three weeks to finish alongside the other prompts (okay actually Yuuya's POV slipped from me and I barely managed to end it where I did), and I couldn't even make it on time ffs. There goes my plans to deliver all chapters on time...but I at least hope you enjoyed reading. ...Oh yeah, you may have noticed by now that I left some loose ends here and there (like the conclusion of the chapter for the residents of Duel Worlds ZEXAL and 5D's, AKA those poor souls who got a mass reboot error and received no answers as to why), and to that I say...nothing. Yeah, you gotta wait a little while longer to see what happened to them after the reboot. That said, I shall now take my leave and return to the land of Ao3, see y'all on...someday by the end of the month, I guess.

#gxmonth2021 #yugioh gx #yugioh zexal #yugioh 5ds #yugioh arc v #too many characters to tag

4 notes · View notes