#i cannot stay awake for more than a few hours and my entire body aches

[scorpiusmalfoylovesoscarwilde]

what do you mean my disabilities disable me 😟😟😟😟😟😟 what do you mean they aren't just funny little things that make me quirky and I can joke about 😟😟😟😟😟😟 what do you mean they're actually delibitating and prevent me from doing things 😟😟😟😟😟😟😟

[mandoalorian]

Like Father, Like Daughter [Maxwell Lord x F!Reader]

Summary: A 4 a.m. fiasco in which your newborn daughter wakes up the entire Lord homestead.

Word Count: 2800>

Rating: PG

Warnings: none! Tooth rotting fluff. Just a newborn baby that won’t settle, a big brother who wants to protect his younger sibling at all costs, and pure familial love. ALSO LADY LORD THE CAT MAKES A RETURN… She's the real trouble maker of the family.

Author’s note: This is SO self indulgent. I cannot stress that enough. I was clearing out my ask inbox and one of the most common requests I get is a) more Lord family and b) more Soft!Max... so here we are.

Masterlist

-—-—-—♡—-—-—-

No matter what, she just didn’t settle. It was three in the morning and you’d put her back down to bed only twenty minutes ago. Just as you managed to close your eyes and feel yourself begin to fall back to sleep, her cries erupted once more and echoed throughout the house. You had no idea how Maxwell could sleep through it. He was a heavy sleeper, and although he made you promise to wake him when you needed him to take over with the newborn, you couldn’t bear to. He was so busy with work and his career, the last thing he needed was to be up all night with little Aurora.

In practically every way possible, Aurora Lorenzano was like her father. It was funny, really. She was only three weeks old but you could already see the same mannerisms in her, that you did Max. She made a habit of shaking her fists or pointing her little tiny finger at you when she wanted something. She was loud, always wanting to make her voice heard. Her big brown eyes sparkled like starlight and you always wondered how you managed to create something so beautiful. She was a product of you and Maxwell and you swore that you had never loved anything as much as you loved her.

You rolled over and groaned into your pillow as you heard her scream with anguish. You were exhausted, and completely at a loss. You’d held her, fed her, changed her diaper -- what more could she want? You couldn’t remember the last time you got more than an hours worth of sleep, and even then it was broken up into intervals. You looked over at Max who was sleeping next to you, his chest rising and falling with every soft breath he took. And you envied him. This was ridiculous. Just for once you wanted to sleep. Just once.

“Max,” you said, prodding your index finger into his bicep. He didn’t move an inch. “Max,” you said again, a little louder this time, but even Aurora’s wails were overpowering the sound of your voice. You said his name a few more times but he didn’t even stir.

You sighed, climbing on top of your boyfriend and straddling his hips. You leaned over him and clasped his cheeks, squeezing them together. “Maxwell Lord!” you shouted in his face, and watched as his eyes snapped open and he bolted upright. His sudden movement knocked you backwards slightly but you couldn’t help but laugh at the way you had shocked him into waking up.

“What the hell are you doing?” He hissed, rubbing his tired eyes and shooting you a joking glare. “Why are you on top of me?” His gaze flicked from your face, down to your body, and his confused glance turning into something a little more sultry. He snaked his arms around your waist and gave your hip a playful squeeze. “You do know Aurora is crying, don’t you?” he quizzed, with an eyebrow quirked. You had to hold back from punching him.

“I know she’s crying, dumbass,” you spat back, rolling off Max and dramatically throwing the pillow over your face. “Please, please can you check on her? She’s fine. I know she’s fine. I’ve checked on her five times already tonight. But she just-- she won’t stop-- and I don’t--”

Sensing the way you were getting worked up, Max tore the pillow from your face and shushed you. He pressed a soft yet chaste kiss to your forehead. “Say no more, I’m on it.” he whispered, rolling out of bed.

You watched Max grab his robe and shuffle into his slippers as he padded out of your shared bedroom. Well, you were awake now. You sighed and closed your eyes, hoping that maybe, just maybe, you could earn a few more hours of deserved sleep.

Maxwell flicked on the amber night light in Aurora’s nursery, the dim embers burning bright enough to force Max adjust his eyesight in the darkness. “Hey hey baby girl,” he cooed, rubbing his tired eyes again and running a hand through his dark blonde hair. He peered over the side of the crib and his heart ached when he caught sight of his daughter, all snotty and teary eyed. “What are you crying for, huh? Why is my little princess crying?” he asked Aurora, using his thumb to wipe away some of her tears. She sniffled slightly, her eyes fixating on her father. “Tell daddy what’s wrong, and I promise you I’ll fix it. What do you need, hm?”

You could hear Maxwell talking to Aurora, ever so faintly. His voice always soothed you, so it wasn’t that much of a surprise to find it settling her as well. You smiled to yourself, counting your blessings. You had gotten so lucky with your little family.

Aurora made grabby fists and reached out to Maxwell, her big eyes glimmering with desire.

“Oh,” Maxwell hummed, catching her message almost immediately. He reached into the crib and picked up Aurora, nursing her in his warm arms. “You wanted to be held by daddy. Well, why didn’t you just say so?”

Aurora scowled and Max pinched her cheek. “Listen to me, my little princess. Your mommy does everything in her power to take care of you and protect you. We love you so much, but, you keep her awake all night. So let’s make a deal, okay Aurora? Let’s agree that from now on, you only wake up mommy once a night. If that. Can you do that for me?”

Aurora’s scowl deepened and she furrowed her eyebrows together.

“Don’t pull faces at me, young lady,” Maxwell chastised. Aurora’s face softened and she squeezed Max’s thumb. He couldn’t help but smile. “Okay, good. I knew you’d understand. See, me and you are on the same wavelength. We get each other.”

Aurora’s lips curled into a smile that matched her father’s, and Max continued to smooth out her hair. You had overheard that part of the conversation, and you wished that you could’ve only been there to witness the interaction. Maxwell made a habit of talking ‘business’ with Aurora. It was funny, but in a strange way, it was like she understood him.

Now that the crying had stopped, you figured you could at least try and fall asleep.

“Daddy?”

Maxwell crooked his head slightly and looked over at the nursery door, where his six year old son, Alistair was standing. “Hey buddy,” Maxwell said quietly, ushering Alistair to come over. “Why are you awake?”

“Aurora was crying,” Alistair mumbled, dragging his comfort blanket and one of his soft toys further into the nursery. “I brought her my comforter and my Ewok.”

“Your what--?” Maxwell asked, furrowing his eyebrows together.

“My Ewok.” Alistair repeated, offering no further explanation.

“Well Ali, that’s very thoughtful. Why don’t you put your… Ewok in her crib, and pass me your comforter. We can wrap her in it,” Maxwell instructed, and Alistair obliged. “Why don’t you wrap the blanket around her, hm? But be careful.”

Max lifted up Aurora ever so slightly so Alistair could fit the blanket around her tiny body. “I think she likes it.” Alistair grinned, completely chuffed with himself, and Max nodded his head in affirmation.

“She does,” he smiled, squeezing his son’s shoulder so he knew that his father was proud. “Now she knows her big brother will always look out for her.”

“I will daddy, I promise.”

The two boys spent a few minutes in comfortable silence, gushing and fussing over Aurora.

“Why was sissy crying? Is she alright?” Alistair pondered out loud, the concern clear in his voice.

“Yeah, of course, she’s fine. Look, sometimes we just need to be held. We just need to know that there’s someone out there watching over us. And that everything will be okay.” Max said softly, tracing his finger along Aurora’s delicate face. Alistair stayed quiet for a moment as he took in his father’s words. That feeling resonated with Alistair all too well. He knew what it felt like to yearn for the attention of a parent. And Maxwell understood it too. He had an awful relationship with his own father, which is why he swore to be the absolute best for his son and daughter. “Ali, could you do me a favour?” Max questioned, eventually breaking the silence.

“Yes.”

“Could you quietly go check on mommy and see if she’s sleeping?”

Alistair nodded and tip-toed out of the nursery and into your bedroom. Low and behold, you were finally sleeping. Alistair got a little too close to you, and pushed your hair out of your face so he could check to see if your eyes were closed. His brash movement (even though he’d tried his hardest to be gentle) woke you up. Alistair gasped when he saw what he’d done and smacked his hand over his mouth in disbelief.

“Oh no, were you asleep?” Alistair questioned, his dark eyes going wide. You yawned and nodded your head. “Did I wake you?”

You offered him a tired smile and pulled him into the bed so he could curl up next to you. “It’s okay Ali. Did Aurora wake you up too?”

“Yeah.” Alistair mumbled tiredly, nuzzling into your chest for comfort. He was immediately put at ease in your arms.

He’d never had a relationship like this with his biological mother, no matter how much he’d wished for it. But now he finally had you. You loved Alistair like he was your own blood and you treated him as your own since day one. You loved him unconditionally, just as much as you loved Aurora. Alistair was so thankful to have someone like you in his life and your bond with him was unbreakable. Maybe wishes could come true.

“She’s a little trouble maker.” you yawned and Alistair stifled a giggle.

“Like daddy.” he muttered and you grinned.

“Exactly. Just like daddy.”

After a few intimate moments alone with Aurora, Maxwell stood up. She’d settled down a lot and had even fallen asleep in his arms. Max didn’t want to put her down to bed though, at least, not yet.

Maybe he could bring her to bed. That would be nice.

Cradling Aurora, he carefully stood up from the oak wood rocking chair and padded out of the nursery, only to hear a series of thumping footsteps venture up the stairs.

Oh no.

The jingle of her pretty pink collar was unmistakable, as the fluffy white cat, Lady Lord, came bouncing up the staircase. She purred and circled around Max’s feet, rubbing her soft cheeks over his legs.

“What do you want?” Maxwell asked, glaring down at the kitty.

Lady just looked up at him and meow’ed, her blue eyes wide and awake. If she wanted anything, it was to be fed. She loved her biscuits.

“Lady, it’s almost four in the morning. You’ll have to wait until breakfast.”

She meow’ed again, this time louder, and followed Max by his heels as he walked along the corridor.

“I don’t care, Lady,” Max sighed. “We fed you before we went to bed and you’ll get something in a few hours. I’m not feeding you now.”

Maxwell swore this cat was like having a third child.

Lady wailed and raced past Maxwell once she sensed he was heading to his bedroom. Lady Lord jumped onto the bottom of the bed, by your feet, and curled up. She looked like a snowball.

You smiled to yourself as you heard Max approach. He tilted his head and frowned when he entered the bedroom and noticed you were still awake. His frown deepened when he saw that Alistair was laying next to you.

“I thought he’d gone to bed,” Max confessed, gently passing you Aurora so you could hold her while he discarded his slippers and robe. You smoothed out Alistair’s dark hair and watched him as he slept peacefully by your side. “And why are you still awake?” Max questioned.

“I was listening to the conversation you were having with your business associate-- I mean, your daughter.” you joked and Maxwell rolled his eyes, sliding under the covers. He took Aurora from your arms so he could nurse her again.

“She gets me.” Max assured you and you had to stifle back a laugh. You leaned your head on your boyfriend’s shoulder and looked down at the newborn.

“That’s great honey, but if her first words end up being ‘Life is good, but it can be better’, I’ll not be happy.” you quipped and Maxwell smirked.

In this precise moment, Maxwell swore that he had never been happier. He spent much of his life believing money and materials would satisfy him, but he was still left with an empty, gaping hole in his heart. He always wanted more, he wanted to try and somehow fill that void, but he just didn’t know what to look for. He was never searching for love, and yet you still found him. And you filled that hole in his heart. You completed him, and made him into a better man. He could never fault you for that, and he’d always be grateful for everything you did for him. Everyday that was spent with you and his growing family was a day well spent.

If he could change one thing, it would be that he realised this sooner. But you taught him that he shouldn’t regret anything. Yes, he had made mistakes, but so does everyone, and that doesn’t make him any less of a person. What inspired you the most about Max was that he consistently worked on himself and tried to better himself for his family. And you saw his progress every single day.

“Do you want me to take Ali to bed?” Max asked, kissing your shoulder softly.

“No, he’s fine here,” you replied quietly, feeling the utmost contentment with your family being by your side. “This bed can easily fit five people.” you acknowledged.

Maxwell’s eyes went comically wide at your comment. “Five?!” he wheezed, and you pointed your finger down towards the edge of the bed where Lady was sleeping. Max hadn't even noticed her joining. Clearly, it was a family event, at 4am in his bed. “She follows me everywhere!” Max exclaimed incredulously, shaking his head and scratching the back of his neck. Lady opened her eyes and glanced up at Max, recognising the mention of her.

“She loves you.” you cooed.

“She’s annoying.” Maxwell frowned, but you knew, deep down, he adored that cat. He had never been an animal person, and he wouldn’t have adopted Lady if it wasn’t for you, but he truly did love her. She was loyal and compassionate and despite the trail of cat hairs she left all over his three piece power suits, he wouldn’t trade her for the world.

“And you love her too.” you corrected him.

Max sighed and shook his head in defeat before returning to his previous statement. “You know, this bed might actually be able to fit more than five people. Maybe six. Or seven…” he trailed off, his free hand caressing your thigh as he sized up the double king-sized bed.

He wasn’t subtle. You could read him like an open book. You knew exactly what he was implying.

Your jaw dropped and you looked up at him with wide eyes. Max’s smirk only grew upon seeing your reaction. “Wait… are you saying we can get more cats?!”

And just like that, his smirk fell from his lips. “I--”

“Oh my gosh Maxie!” You squealed, wrapping your arms around him. Maxwell blinked as he tried to process what just happened.

“I didn’t mean--”

“How long had you been planning this?” Teasing Max Lord might have been one of your most favourite hobbies. If only you could snap a photo of his face at this very moment.

He said your name, slowly and looked slightly disconcerted.

You grinned and cupped his cheek. “I know,” you laughed. “I know what you meant.”

A brief silence filled the room.

“I do like cats…” Max told you eventually. You leaned over him and turned off his bedside lamp.

“Mhm…” you mumbled, rolling over so you were snuggling into him. He was still on his back, nursing Aurora.

“I’m just saying…” he trailed off, staring at the ceiling. “I think we’re pretty good at this parenting thing. And I like… having kids with you…”

You smiled in the darkness.

“Go to sleep Maxie.” you whispered.

“I just think--”

“Go to sleep.” you giggled, and you felt him press a kiss into your hair.

“Goodnight,” he uttered. “I love you.”

“I love you too.”

-—-—-—♡—-—-—-

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[master-sass-blast]

Care and Trust: Chapter One.

Part One, Part Two, Part Three, Part Four

Summary: "The shockwave hits second.

You’re strolling through Avatar Korra park, out on your lunch break. It’s a beautiful, late winter day; with the sun shining high up in the sky, it’s warm enough that you aren’t shivering like a frightened kitten as you amble along the plaza.

Several people gasp, and you look up in time to see a fireball pluming up over the docks.

And then the shockwave hits.

It hits your chest like an armadillo tiger; the explosion roars through the air, making your ears hurt. You go down, grunting when you hit the snow-covered knoll behind you.

You stand with a groan, brush yourself off, then start booking it to the nearest hospital.

Shit like this always demands all hands on deck."

AKA Plot Finally Happens.

Pairing(s): Lin Beifong x Reader.

Rating: T.

Word count: 2.1k.

The shockwave hits second.

You’re strolling through Avatar Korra park, out on your lunch break. It’s a beautiful, late winter day; with the sun shining high up in the sky, it’s warm enough that you aren’t shivering like a frightened kitten as you amble along the plaza.

(But, as they say, all good things must come to an end.)

Several people gasp, and you look up in time to see a fireball pluming up over the docks.

And then the shockwave hits.

It hits your chest like an armadillo tiger; the explosion roars through the air, making your ears hurt. You go down, grunting when you hit the snow-covered knoll behind you.

Cries pierce the air. Screams of panic, exclamations of disbelief, exhortations to call the police.

Yeah, you think as you eye the thick, black smoke that belches into the air, something tells me they didn’t miss that.

You stand with a groan, brush yourself off, then start booking it to the nearest hospital.

Shit like this always demands all hands on deck.

***

As predicted, the injury count is high.

You run the halls of Yue General, triaging the more serious patients until things slow enough that you can start checking the ones not actively dying. It’s a non-stop frenzy of gauze, saline, and bandage wraps until you can see the blue glow of your healing whenever you close your eyes.

By the end of it, your feet are practically dead and it’s nearly four in the morning.

You drag yourself onto one of the trams and let the teeth-shaking rattle keep you awake until you’re on your block. You count your steps until you make it to the front door, then let out a sigh of relief when you step into the building lobby.

“Elevator Out of Service. Please Use Stairs.”

You stare at the placard in front of the elevator bay in disbelief, then groan. Fuck my life.

***

The climb up to your floor is agony.

You’re huffing and puffing by the time you make it to your apartment door. You lean against it as you slot the key into the lock, then push inside.

Some distant, responsible part of you manages to turn the deadbolt before your brain shuts off entirely. You kick off your shoes, drop your purse on the ground, then shuffle over to the couch and flop down face first on it.

When you lift your head again, sunlight’s streaming through your living room window.

“Fuck.” You wince, then peel yourself gingerly off the couch. You cringe as your body protests, and rub your hand over the back of your aching neck. You glance at the clock, but the gurgle your stomach makes is more than enough to tell you that it’s past lunch time.

You sit up, then frown when you get a whiff of yourself. Antiseptic and B.O. Not a good combination on anyone.

You need a shower. And food. And a good round of stretching.

Nice, long, hot shower. You smile as you shuffle towards the bathroom. And then take out. Narook’s. With extra squid ink noodles. Your stomach rumbles again. And maybe Golden King’s… mmm, extra summer rolls… with sweet and sour dipping sauce. Yum.

***

You feel more human after showering. You change into sweats and a loose shirt, put in delivery orders at Narook’s and Golden King’s, then flip on your radio before dropping down onto your sofa.

It’s too early in the day for mystery shows, but the disc jockey’s still playing music requests. Smooth jazz --something with a rolling beat and brass--pipes out of the speakers, swirling around your apartment until the mental grime of the previous day starts to fade.

You sink back into your couch and hum along. You sigh and stretch, relish in the ache in your legs as tension leeches from your sore muscles.

The radio hums, then crackles. “We interrupt this broadcast for an announcement from the Republic City Police Department.”

You roll your eyes as an announcer rattles off a report about the explosion yesterday --site is secure, no risk of further fire or explosion, the city police are hard work, stay clear of the site, blah blah blah--then relax when your music starts playing again. Thanks for telling us what we already know. You close your eyes and let yourself drift. Why do they always shove that into every single press release? ‘We’re working hard to serve Republic City and ensure the safety of her citizens--’

Lin.

You gasp and bolt upright; she would’ve attended the scene. Hell, for all you know, she was one of the responding officers.

It’s probable, given her propensity for “hands on police work,” for not staying above the grime and grunge her officers have to work on.

Hell, it’s even likely. Given what you know about Lin, you’d be solid money that she’d rather work the explosion site than deal with the panicking politicians.

Is she okay? You chew on your lower lip as the thought circles your mind like water in the bathtub drain, swirling down and down into blackness.

You blink, and then your phone’s in your hand, and there’s hold music in your ear as the operator makes the connection. You gulp and palm your phone once the music stops and the ringing starts. Please don’t let this be a mistake, please don’t let this be a mistake, please don’t let this be a fucking mistake…

“Chief Beifong’s office. This is her assistant, Ryu, speaking. The Chief is not available at this time, but I can take your message and deliver it to her later.”

You blink at the sound of her assistant’s voice. “Uh… hi…” You swallow, then rattle off your name and callback number before Ryu can hang up on you. “I’m a, uh, friend of Lin’s. I was just calling because --y’know--the explosion--”

“I’m sorry, but the Chief cannot comment on an ongoing investigation--”

“I’m not calling about that,” you interject, pinching the bridge of your nose. “I’m her friend; I just want to be sure she’s okay.”

There’s a pause on the other end of the line, and when Ryu speaks again, she almost sounds… pleased? “Chief Beifong’s not in right now --but I’ll have her call you back as soon as she’s available.”

“Is she hurt?” you blurt before she hangs up on you.

Another pause. “As far as I know, no.”

“Okay.” You nod, gulp, then nod again. “Thank you.”

“Of course. Have a nice day.”

You eke out something similar, then put your phone back on the hook when the line goes dead. Your heart thuds uncomfortably hard in your chest, and you have to blink a few times before your brain starts working again.

You head back to your couch and jazz --but long gone is your relaxed, exhaustion induced stupor. Anxiety claws at your chest, threatening to snap your ribs and leave you bleeding. You inhale deeply through your nose, then force yourself to let it out slowly so your body calms down. She’ll be fine. She’s got, what, thirty years on the force? This is old hat for her. She’ll keep herself safe.

Still, if you spend the next couple hours watching your phone, that’s no one’s business but yours.

***

Your phone rings around seven in the evening --right as you’re shovelling leftovers from lunch into your mouth.

Go figure.

You half-scramble, half-try-to-not-choke over to the phone; you pick up the phone, try to swallow, then tuck the food in your cheek like a hamster when it’s apparent you’ve got too much in your mouth to swallow. Mom always said I ate like a pack of polar bear dogs. “Heffo?”

There’s a dry huff of laughter on the other end of the line. “I take it I caught you at a good time.”

“Lin!” You cover your mouth with one hand (even though she can’t see you) and alternate between chewing and swallowing. “I --I was ea’in ‘inner.”

“Sounds like you decided to do it all at once.” She chuckles when you grumble, then moves on. “My secretary said you called?”

“Yeah, around lunch time,” you say as you finally get your mouth clear.

“Where I’m presuming you had your mouth full of that meal, too.”

“Fuck you.” You grin when she laughs, then lean against the wall and cradle the receiver against your shoulder. “I just… wanted to check on you. With the explosion and all.”

“You heard about that.”

“The whole city heard it, Lin.” You sigh. “I worked the triage team at Yue General until four in the morning.”

“Shit.” Lin groans, and you can hear the creak of her leather office chair as she sits. “I thought you only did massage therapy?”

“They call everyone who passed a healing course when stuff like this happens,” you explain. “Besides, I had to pass an intensive injury treatment course to get my rehabilitation certification. I’m licensed to assist surgery teams, if need arises.”

Lin hums. “That’s a nice feather in your cap.”

“It pays the bills.” You manage a smile when she lets out a huff of laughter, but the anxiety that’s been circling your brain descends to your stomach. You swallow, then ask, “Are you okay?”

“Why wouldn’t I be?” When you don’t respond right away, her voice softens. “I’m fine. A little banged up, but nothing that won’t heal. I wasn’t there when the explosion went off.”

“Okay,” you murmur. You let out a shaky breath, then mentally kick yourself to stop acting like a worried girlfriend, dammit. “Well, if something doesn’t heal, you know where to find me.”

Lin grunts, then chuckles when you laugh. “Get some rest, kid.”

“Already am. You should do the same.” You roll your eyes when she starts grumbling again --about overtime and press conferences and departmental cooperation with the city’s fire brigade--then say, “Call me when you want to keep me up all night again,” and hang up before she can react.

It’s easy to picture her reaction. Open-mouthed, wide-eyed, with that hint of a grin that she hides by smirking.

You bite your lower lip; something warm and smooth settles in your lower gut. You laugh quietly to yourself, then turn and head back for the sofa. Alright, leftovers. It’s just you and me.

***

You’re in the midst of changing the sheets on your massage table when there’s a knock on the door. “Come in.”

The latch clicks, the door swings open, and the receptionist for the Northern Moon Physical Therapy Facility pokes her head into your “office” (which is really just the room you work out of, but it’s yours, and that’s what counts). “A call came in for you.”

You straighten, frowning. “Me?”

She nods. “A request for on-site treatment.” She looks down at the slip of paper in her hand and recites the information from the call. “Republic City Police Department, at one this afternoon. Long session booking. A woman named Ryu called it in.”

Your heart sinks into your shoes. Fucking dammit. “And my other appointments…”

“We’re redistributing them to the other therapists. It was an urgent request.”

Shit.

You sigh, then nod and grab your carry bag off a nearby office chair. “Let me pack up, and I’ll catch one of the trams.”

“They’re sending a car for you.” The receptionist smiles politely, then steps back and starts making her way back down the hall. “It’ll be here in fifteen minutes!”

You run your tongue over your teeth and do what you can to tamp down the aggravation simmering in your stomach. Well, on the bright side, I don’t have to carry the table the entire way.

***

Ryu meets you in the parking garage attached to the police department. She’s sleek, dressed in an impeccably pressed navy blue suit, and there’s not a hair out of place on her head.

In your loose slacks, pale periwinkle blouse, and slapdash braid, you can’t help but feel a bit… frumpy.

She shakes your hand --she’s got a strong, professional handshake--then escorts you through the garage. “Thank you for coming.” She opens a heavy metal door stamped with the police department’s emblem for you. “I’ll take you up to Chief Beifong’s office.”

Your jaw flexes as you follow her down a hall with an immaculately polished slate tile floor. “How’s she been? What kind of pain has she been in?”

Ryu looks at you over her shoulder for a long moment. Her eyes narrow contemplatively, but she turns back around before you can make anything of her expression. “I’ve been asked to let Chief Beifong explain things to you directly.”

Yeah, that tracks. You shift the strap of your carry bag onto your shoulder, then watch the floor counter as the elevator slowly rattles upwards.

[anamatics]

From your prompts list - 81. “I feel like I’m being stabbed.” / “How do you even know what it feels like to be stabbed?” - this is Winter finding out about the time Weiss got impaled lol

okay first of all, ow. Second of all, enjoy my vague handwaving in some Bees Schnees directions.

Curfew, 1.7k

October in Atlas means the sun doesn’t come up until nine o’clock in the morning and goes down just after three in the afternoon. Weiss, the last time she came home, found herself unused to the long nights after spending much of her year in Vale hating how each day and night was, roughly, the same length. This time, she’s used to it in a way that no one else is. Blake hates it, hates the darkness and the cold, snuggling up to Yang each night once she thinks Weiss and Ruby have gone to sleep.

The problem is that Weiss doesn’t sleep well in Atlas. She sleeps better here, safely locked away behind the academy walls, than she has in her nearly two decades of life living in this kingdom. Part of it, she knows, is that Winter is two floors up in the officer’s quarters. This is the closest they’ve been to each other at night since Weiss was nearly eleven and Winter left and never came back.

Weiss turns over onto her back and stares up at the ceiling for a long moment. There’s no helping it. She shoves the duvet aside, tugs on a discarded sweatshirt from the pile on the floor, and slips out the door.

The hallways of the academy are dimly lit at this hour of the night, and Weiss wanders up to the balcony that overlooks the parade grounds just off the mess. She sits there, staring out at the city that’s been her prison for so much of her life.

A dream amongst the clouds and the cold, Atlas glows blue and beautiful the scant moonlight that breaks through the cover. Weiss’s breath fogs the window. She presses her palm to the glass. The coolness is grounding, it lets her drift.

The pressure at her side, the near constant ache since they left Mistral, rears its ugly head. Weiss curls her arm around herself, fingers curling against the glass. Close your eyes, push it away. It’s just phantom pain. Yang has it too.

If she doesn’t think about it, it will go away.

Yang told her that. You gotta just power through, it’ll pass.

Weiss inhales. Exhales. Counts the breaths.

This, too, shall pass.

The sound of approaching footsteps fills the hallway. Weiss’s fingers twitch already halfway to twisting the threads of her aura together to form a glyph. She stares at the figure in the reflection on the glass, still foggy with her breath.

“Technically, there is a curfew for cadets.”

Weiss’s lips twist into a lopsided smile. “Good thing I’m not a soldier.”

She’s met with a hum of agreement. Winter approaches, stopping just outside of Weiss’s reach. “It’s nearly midnight. Why are you awake?”

“Couldn’t sleep.” Weiss tilts her head to look at her sister. Winter’s jacket is folded under her arm, her tie undone at her neck and three buttons on her shirt undone. She looks as wrecked as Weiss feels, dark circles under her eyes. Her hair is pulled back in messy bun, curling a bit as though she’s been out into the humid night air of Atlas this time of year.

Winter hesitates for a moment, before setting her jacket down on the bench Weiss is leaning against and settling down beside her. She smells a bit like smoke and a bit like booze and a bit like something Weiss cannot place. Perfume? No, that’s not quite right. Weiss’s eyebrows shoot up. Cologne?

A beat of comfortable silence fills the space between them. Winter’s thigh presses against Weiss’s. The traveler’s crease at the front of her trousers pulls flat as Winter stretches her leg out in front of them.

“So, why are you just getting in?”

Winter exhales. She definitely smells like cigarette smoke. “I had a social engagement.”

This is the sort of information that Weiss chews over, another piece of the secret life her sister’s lead since she left home. The one Weiss knows so little about, but the one she so clearly is still living. It is so alien, watching her sister interact with others – watching the easy way she speaks to Penny, the way General Ironwood trusts her implicitly and the Ace Ops clearly see her as a mentor. And yet Winter doesn’t seem to have friends outside of work. She seems to exist simply to work.

So it’s with some hesitation that Weiss nudges Winter’s shin with her foot, a teasing tone creeping into her voice. “You have a social life?”

“A… colleague asked me for a drink, catch up.” Winter shrugs, fiddles with her watch strap. Her eyes flick to Weiss, before they turn back to the shifting clouds over the city. “You haven’t been sleeping since you got here.”

And there’s no answer to that, other than the truth. Weiss pulls the sleeves of the sweatshirt – Yang’s sweatshirt that smells like Blake’s deodorant: earthy and crisp, like rosemary just pressed – and curls her hands around the fabric. “When I close my eyes in this place, it fells like all the air goes out of the room.”

“It was months before I slept soundly,” Winter confesses. Up close, Weiss thinks her eyes look like Mother’s at mid-day. Not quite all the way to drunk but not exactly sober. “I got caught out after curfew – one I had to mind – often because sleep wouldn’t come.”

“What did you do?” Weiss asks.

“Got a running habit.” Winter looks to Weiss. “And then some other, far less healthy ones.”

Nose wrinkling, Weiss hums. “You’d think you’d avoid it entirely, given how much it ruins things.”

Winter draws her knee up and wraps her arms around it. She rests her chin on her knee, eyes fixed straight ahead. She says nothing for long enough that Weiss wonders if she shouldn’t have said that at all. Her mind races, think for something she can say to fix it, when Winter says a non-sequitur, but one which recalls the original intent of her question. “There are restrictions as to who can access these premises, Weiss. With good reason.”

And as much as she wants it to matter, it doesn’t. He’s father, he can open any door, he can sniff out any lie. “It doesn’t matter.”

A warm weight settles over her shoulder and Winter’s fingers curl around her arm. Weiss leans against her, head tucked up under Winter’s chin like she did so often when they were children and hiding in some unused part of the house from Father’s rages.

“Sometimes,” the words are like sandpaper in Weiss’s mouth, “when I think about being back here, my heart beats so fast I feel like I’m being stabbed.”

“How do you even know what it feels like to be stabbed?”

Oh.

“Winter, something happened in Mistral.”

Weiss retreats from the warmth of her sister. She turns, sitting cross legged, and pulls her hand away from her side and tugs off the sweatshirt. The tank top she’s wearing underneath has already ridden up her stomach a bit and she tugs the hem up and looks away. Lets Winter see the scar. Lets Winter see her shame.

Eyes wide, Winter leans in, brushing her fingers against the raised skin at Weiss’s abdomen. With her hand there, Weiss is remined, yet again, that the scar is the size of Winter’s fist. “Weiss, this is…” Winter drags her eyes up to meet Weiss’s and her expression turns deathly serious. “What happened?”

“I looked away.” Weiss lets her tank top fall down back over the scar and pulls the sweatshirt over her head. “I was too slow and I looked away.”

“That wound would have – would have—”

“It didn’t.” Weiss knows her voice sounds harsh, but she refuses to admit what happened in that context. “But it was a close thing. If Jaune—"

Winter pulls her close again. “I should have stayed in Mistral. We could have delayed the withdrawal a few more weeks. I could have – I should have been there.”

There’s no reason for that, no reason for Winter to blame herself for this. “This isn’t your fault. I was the one who was too slow. I was the one who turned my back on Cinder Fall.”

“It’s my duty to protect you Weiss.”

“You said you wouldn’t always be around to save me,” Weiss points out.

“That doesn’t mean I shouldn’t get the chance to try.”

And Weiss has nothing to say to that, because there is nothing to say. Winter will always talk a big game, but still want to be there, still want to try to do the right thing. It’s lost time, it’s making up for a lifetime of silences like the one that stretches out between them. One that’s uncomfortable when they’re so used to trading comfortable silences as a currency for survival.

It’s nice, leaning against Winter like this. Where Winter can be a solid, tangible object of support. Weiss inhales, Blake’s deodorant and Yang’s shampoo mingling with the strong, crisp scent of her sister’s cologne. Cologne. It’s then the question bursts, unbidden, from Weiss. “Were you on a date?”

Winter freezes, body stock still.

“Why… would you ask that?”

“You smell nice.”

“Are you implying I usually do not?”

“No, I mean that it’s nice. Your um…” Is it wrong to say what Weiss thinks it actually is? “Your perfume is nice,” she hedges.

“Well,” Winter says at length. “It’s not mine – and I’m pretty sure if asked, you’d be told it was cologne.” Winter’s fingers tangle in Weiss’s hair and she rests her cheek against Weiss’s head. “Someday I’ll tell you about her.”

And though she’s burning with a desire to know, though the her throws Weiss to the point where she feels like the ground is shifting underneath her, Weiss lets it go. “Can I stay with you tonight?”

“If that’s what you want.” Winter gets to her feet and collects her jacket.

Weiss follows.

(Weiss is pretty sure she’d follow Winter to the end of the world.)

[harmonizingsunsets]

I'd Rather Go Blind & Let My Body Go Numb Than To Lose You Or The Weight Of Your Love

Prompt: Jealousy and all its cousins. Fanart Credit here.

Read on Archive here.

Anthony never thought he'd be the kind of husband who needs to know where his wife is at every moment of every day.

(To be fair, he never thought about being a husband much at all until the season he'd pursued Edwina only to fall maddeningly in love with Kate).

But here he is, sitting on the couch with his feet drumming loudly against the floor, staring intensely at the door.

On the table beside the couch sits a cup of tea, cold and untouched. Anthony had someone from the kitchens prepare it for him, but his nerves made him unable to stomach anything.

Anthony looks a mess. He'd been raking his hands through his hair for the past two hours. He'd also slapped his cheeks once or twice to stay awake.

His jacket lay discarded and wrinkled on the ground near the door. He feels guilty, knowing one of the maids would have to press it. However, he can't gather the desire to move from the couch and retrieve it. 

Instead, he's glued to the couch as he considers where Kate is. A hundred different scenarios run through his mind—each scenario worse than the last.

For the past month, Kate has been disappearing at night. He hears her footsteps tiptoeing past his study when he stays up to work. He feels the weight from her side of the bed lessen as she stands and departs from their bedroom when she thinks he's fallen asleep.

At first, Anthony questioned her about it. Kate would always make up an excuse about needing fresh air or going to see Edwina. But he knows her well enough to know when she's lying.

However, Anthony hadn't ever called Kate out on her deceit. He feared the truth, especially how it might crush him to hear it.

But he couldn't take the not knowing anymore. So when he heard the door close after Kate told him five minutes prior that she was retiring to bed, he made his way towards the front of the house. Anthony watched at the window as a carriage rode away. A hole had formed in his stomach, making him feel hollow. He then sat down on the couch so he could catch her when she returned.

Finally, after what felt like ages passed, he hears footsteps approaching the door. He quickly jumps up from the couch and makes his way to the foyer. When Kate steps through the door, her eyes widen.

"Anthony!" she exclaims in surprise, putting a hand to her chest to steady her breath. "You're up late."

"So are you," Anthony says, crossing his arms and blocking her way.

"I was only walking around to get some fresh air."

Anthony raises a brow. "Really, for two hours?"

Her eyes shift anxiously from his stare. "Has it really been that long?"

"Yes," he answers through gritted teeth, anger rising within him.

"Oh well, it was such a lovely night the time got away from me." Kate stands on her toes, kissing him quickly on the cheek. "Sorry for worrying you."

As she tries to retreat, Anthony's hand lurches out to grab her elbow, pulling her back to face him.

"I've had enough, Kate," he sighs tiredly. "Where were you?"

"I just told you, I was—."

"You've been going out for fresh air at odd hours of the day for the past month. You'd think you'd have your fill by now."

Kate fidgets. "Well, it hasn't just been out to get fresh air. I've been attending engagements. I have a life outside you and this household, you know."

"Oh, I know that, but your engagements don't usually take place after dark and don't require you sneaking out of the house to attend."

"Darling, everything is fine," Kate says, pulling her arm out of his reach and giving him a nervous smile. "You've probably been working too hard. Let's go to bed."

As she tries to walk away again, Anthony pulls her back. But this time, he holds onto both of her arms, forcing her to meet his eye.

"Kate, I know you—perhaps more than you know yourself, and I know when you're lying to me," he says, his voice turning softer—more fragile. It's as if he's a vase that could shatter at any moment. "What I don't know is why."

"I promise that what I have been going out and doing is not anything scandalous or dangerous." After letting out a long breath, a laugh bubbles from her throat in amusement. "Honestly, where I've been going to is nothing to fret over. You're acting as if I'm having an affair or something."

Anthony's heart sinks in his chest. No matter how ridiculous the prospect sounds, he can't help but whisper the question that's been plaguing his mind these past few weeks.

"Are you?"

Kate's mouth falls open, her face paling. "Anthony, how could you think that?"

"It's the only explanation I can think of," he says, stepping away from her and beginning to pace. "It explains why you've been coming back so late and being so evasive these past few weeks."

"Anthony—."

His legs go weak at the affection in her voice. Anthony falls to his knees in front of her and takes hold of her hands.

"Just tell me, Kate, I cannot bear it," Anthony says, hating the way his voice wavers. "I cannot bear the thought of you finding pleasure in someone else's arms. I cannot bear you leaving our bed because you'd rather be in another's. I cannot bear the idea of someone else touching you, loving you, or kissing you."

He brushes his lips against Kate's knuckles, causing her breath to hitch. Anthony pulls his lips away, but just so his fingertips can swirl circles on her palm. When his thumb skims over her pulse, he feels her heartbeat quicken.

"Most of all, I cannot bear the thought of you loving someone else." Anthony swallows thickly, feeling a lump forming in his throat. "I'd die right now if you told me all of this was true."

Anthony has always feared time. He used to compulsively reach into his pocket to grasp his father's watch. Each time a hand on the clock ticked forward, he felt as if an ounce of his soul got sucked away.

But since Kate came into his life, that fear has dissipated. Suddenly, he didn't spend each moment of his life calculating how much time he had left. Instead, Anthony began counting things other than seconds.

He counts the number of Kate's smiles. He counts the number of laughs they share next to one another at the table surrounded by his family. Anthony counts the number of kisses that were slow, stirring an aching feeling in his chest. He also counts each hungry and passionate kiss that sets every inch of his skin aflame.

Most of all, Anthony counts how many times he's lost count around her. He gets lost in the timeless and wonderful enigma that is Kate Sharma.

Anthony feels that fear of time creeping up on him again. But now, he's not afraid of time passing and leading to his demise. Instead, he's terrified that Kate's time of loving him has run out. Maybe, she's found a more deserving man to spend the minutes with than him.

When Anthony braves a glance up at Kate, he expects to see pity. But instead, he's surprised to see an entirely different emotion reflected in her eyes.

Love.

Pure, unconditional, steadfast love.

Kate gets down to her knees in front of him. But she doesn't let go of his hands, holding them tighter.

"None of that is true, Anthony," she says firmly. "I love you, have only loved you, and will only love you."

Her words release a breath of relief from him. But, he still can't help doubting this, not knowing how else to explain her odd disappearances.

Kate must sense his train of thoughts. She smiles gently, moving one of her hands up to graze his cheek.

"I love you so much that I've been waking up in the middle of the night so I can give you the perfect present."

Anthony blinks in confusion, feeling the room that had been spinning become still.

"What?"

Kate laughs, and she rests her forehead against his. "Do you know what tomorrow is?"

It hits Anthony like a whip. All the clues that he'd gathered up to form a horrible conclusion were, in fact, clues that lead to a more justifiable and pleasant one.

"Our anniversary," he answers dumbly.

"Yes," she nods, her face beaming with a giddy kind of delight. Anthony feels lucky that he gets to see it. Her expressions are free without restraint only when she's comfortable with someone. He's glad to be one of those treasured few. "We've made it a year, can you believe it? It seems like only yesterday, I was stepping on your toes at a ball, and you acted like a madman when I got stung by a bee."

Anthony frowns, his forehead creasing. "I did not act like a madman."

"You did, but it led us to where we are now," Kate says, pressing a tender kiss to his lips. "Married and happy."

"I'd like to think it would've happened with the bee or not."

"I'm not sure. You were quite thick-headed about how in love with me you were."

"Oh, I'm the thick-headed one?" he scoffs. "After the night you fell in love with me, you gave your approval for me to marry your sister. How thick-headed is that?"

"Well, I didn't think you'd ever feel that way about me," Kate defends, rolling her eyes. "But I know very well now that you do. You show me with every kind word, every touch, every…" her words drift, cheeks reddening, "Well, you know."

Anthony smirks. "No, I do not know. Please elaborate on everything I do to you that gives you pleasure in vivid detail."

"You're insufferable," she grumbles and puts her hands on her hips. "I have a good mind not to tell you the true reason for my disappearing and keep you stewing in jealousy."

"I don't think you'd like the result of my increased jealousy."

"I don't know, your scowl was fierce, and the fire in your eyes was quite the sight," Kate teases, tracing her thumb over his furrowed brows. "Very becoming, actually."

Anthony stands and pulls her up with him, leading her to the couch. "Why have you been disappearing?"

"As I said, our anniversary is tomorrow, and I was getting your gift ready," she explains. "It's almost midnight. Perhaps I can give it to you a little bit early. I had one of the servants waiting outside for my return. They came in through the back entrance and have already snuck it into your study to reveal as a surprise for tomorrow."

"How sinister of you, plotting with our staff against me."

"Nothing sinister about it. I asked, and they agreed to help me. Unlike you, they think I'm perfectly agreeable."

"Obviously, they don't know you well enough to fear the wicked inner workings of your mind as I do."

Kate stands, gracefully sticking out her tongue and making him laugh. Anthony follows her down the hall into his study. She makes him close his eyes. He feels like a fool, stumbling into the room with Kate chuckling behind him. But, he feels guilty for thinking Kate could ever be unfaithful and indulges her wishes.

He waits for a few moments, hearing her moving something across the floor, before he asks, "Can I open my eyes now?"

"Alright, you bloody impatient man, open your eyes."

As Anthony takes his hands away from his eyes, his heart stops in his chest. He gawks at the painting on a canvas stand in front of him.

"Kate," he utters breathlessly.

Kate chews on her bottom lip, hesitantly watching him observe the painting—no, "painting" doesn't seem like the right word for what it is.

It's a masterpiece, an almost perfect depiction of Kate.

The artist captured the exact fraction that Kate's lips tilt up when she smiles in amusement. Anthony often sees that expression pointed towards him when they're engaged in one of their bantering matches. The color of her brown eyes is just as deep in the painting. They're full of so much that Anthony still wants to explore even after a year of marriage.

In the portrait, Kate's shoulders are bare, the sleeves resting low on her arm. The bottom of the picture shows the scarlet bodice of her dress. But the most alluring part is how the brown curls of her hair flow freely down her neck, cascading like a waterfall.

Anthony has a strong distaste for her bonnets and how society demands she wears her hair up in public. Anthony loves running his fingers through her hair, which probably is why she posed for the painting with it down. That minx knew it would stir a feeling within him that no one else but her has been able to elicit.

"I hired Sir Granville to paint it," Kate blurts out, nervous from how long he's remained silent. "I wanted him to paint it in a private setting because it's a bit…."

"Breathtaking," Anthony answers.

"I was going to say suggestive, but breathtaking is a good adjective," Kate grins bashfully. She steps towards him, her eyes glowing through the dim light of the room. "It's a portrait for your eyes only, no one else's."

Anthony ducks his head. "I'm sorry that I thought you were...I just—."

"Foolishly got jealous of a person who doesn't exist? Yes, yes, you did."

He runs his fingers against the frame of the painting. "I have a mind to hang this in the common area, so everyone can see how lucky I am."

Kate's eyebrows snap together. "You wouldn't dare."

"Oh, wouldn't I?" he asks playfully.

"It might encourage some men to meet the woman behind the painting," Kate notes with a mischievous glint in her eyes, pretending to consider his proposal. "Who am I to oppose admirers?"

Anthony's smirk fades. "You wouldn't dare."

"Ah, there's that handsome scowl," Kate points at him in triumph.

He swoops forward, his arms going around her waist. "You're maddening."

Kate's smile widens as she looks up at him, looping her hands around his neck. "You love it."

"You're right. I do love you. And, I love this portrait," Anthony adds, bobbing his head towards the painting. "Perhaps I should hang it in here. It can serve as a reminder of what's waiting for me when I finish my work."

She leans up a bit on her toes, her hands traveling lower down his back. "You know, I could come down to your study to remind you."

Anthony begins moving his hands as well. As they skim up her body, brushing her breast, he relishes in the sound of her moan. Anthony leans closer, pressing kisses down her neck until he gets to just the right spot. Kate's fingers curl tighter onto his back as his lips apply pressure there, and her body gravitates further against him.

"You're far too distracting," Anthony murmurs against her skin. "Perhaps, the portrait is too dangerous to be in here. I'd get nothing done."

"Exactly." She leans her face back a margin, so Anthony can see that enchanting tilt of her lips the artist depicted. "Why do you think I commissioned the painting in the first place?"

"To torture me?"

"All is fair in love and war," Kate says, grinning at him. "And hasn't our relationship always been a bit of both?"

In response, Anthony kisses her deeply and thoroughly. The sound of his pocket watch ticking starts to fade away. It gets replaced with the sound of his heart, which beats for Kate more than himself these days.

[jeonggukingdom]

longing in tokyo (m)

pairing  ⟶ namjoon x fem!Reader

synopsis  ⟶ It has been just two weeks. Two bloody weeks of nothing but text messages and phone calls and, quite frankly, Namjoon can’t simply take it anymore. He needs you. And it’s exactly that firing desire that prompts him to call you in the middle of the night in the hopes of quenching his unyielding desire for you once and for all.

genre  ⟶ smut rating  ⟶  18+ 

word count  ⟶  5.407 words

warnings  ⟶ graphic depictions of sexual intercourse, masturbation, voyeurism, skype sex, dirty talk, namjoon calling you ‘baby girl’, excessive amount of cum, namjoon being quite the loud one because I have impulse issues.

author’s note ⟶ this fic has been written for the “Bulletproof Bingo” project created by @ficswithluv​! You can find the card I received here (click!) but to make things more fun and keep the surprise I blurred out all the songs except for the five songs in the same row that I’m going to write first ;)

song title ⟶ Tokyo - RM [ lyrics that inspired the story:  “Homesick babe, I just wanna, Stay right next to you, If I could choose my dream, I just wanna, Stay right next to you” ]

tag list ⟶  @heroesfan101

The city stretches before him in stunning colourful lights shining like stars under the night sky.

Skyscrapers upon skyscrapers surround him but it’s a rather beautiful sight at this time of day when the sun is long set but everything seems to still be lit up by it.

A city that never sleeps, a city that seems to grow right under your eyes, expand a little bit more with every single one of your heartbeats, an ever-changing city full of possibilities, surprises, memories to build and everything in between.

Tokyo.

There is just one thing this city can’t offer him and that happens to be the very thing he needs the most: you.

A deep sigh escapes his lips, his eyes closing as his body relaxes onto the little couch placed right in front of the huge window.

His thoughts inevitably drift towards you every time he allows himself to stop and rest.

He can almost hear your excited voice as you enter the room, he can almost see the stars shining bright in your eyes as you stare out the window, he can almost feel your hand tightly wrapped around his as you force him to go with you around the city despite the fact that he’s beyond tired.

A small smile stretches on his lips at that last thought. He would grumble, for sure, he would try to convince you to stay in, watch a movie or just chill together in your bed but in the end, he’d be walking right beside you in the busy streets, he’d be taking silly pictures with you in front of beautiful sceneries, he’d be tasting delicious food with you from random restaurants or street vendors.

He opens his eyes, pulls himself out of his waking dream and chooses to drown his bitterness in the glass of scotch in his right hand. Alas, dreams and fantasies, that’s all they are and he really should not be indulging in them, especially not at this hour of the night.

His body feels sore after the long day at work spent either stuck in a car or sitting down in an office and he can feel a dull ache starting to spread from the base of his sculpt up to his forehead and he should really stop drinking now and just go to sleep but he simply cannot.

No matter how hard he tries, tonight it just doesn’t work.

He misses you. Misses the sound of your voice, misses the tender smile on your beautiful lips, misses your shining eyes, misses the sensation of your body under his fingertips, misses the way you arch your back beneath him when he is making love to you, misses all the pretty whimpers that leave your lips in ecstasy whenever he hits that perfect spot, misses the way you quiver and call his name when you reach your high.

Damn.

It has been just two weeks.

Two bloody weeks of nothing but text messages and phone calls and, quite frankly, Namjoon can’t simply take it anymore.

Maybe it’s that insane desire and endless need that prompts his hands to grasp his laptop, turn it on and place it on the table in front of him or maybe it’s just the alcohol driving him his every movement.

The clock on the screen informs him that it’s past two in the morning and that should suffice to deter him, to pull him back from this love-drunk—or maybe actually drunk—state he is in but it doesn’t.

His fingers move before he can even consider stopping them—not that he really would, honestly—and then, he is calling you.

He is sitting there in front of the screen, sipping on the remnant of his scotch with his heart beating hard against his ribcage as if he were an adolescent about to ask the girl he likes out for a date and not your fiancée calling you because he misses every single thing about you.

The empty glass hits the table and he closes his eyes once more, tilts his head back against the edge of the couch and just waits.

You rest your chin on your knees, your lips slightly protruding forward in a little pout as you stare out your window, your gaze focused on the few people walking down the streets at this ungodly hour.

You can almost hear the loud talks, the waves of laughter, the drunken slurs of those coming out of clubs or dinner with colleagues and on any other night you’d be smiling at them, shaking your head as you catch some of their words in the silence of your apartment.

People-gazing, as you call it, is one of your favourite activities to indulge in during nights when sleep escapes you and other people’s lives seem just all that much more interesting than your own.

A little sigh escapes your lips as you shake your head. Tonight, not even making up lives and stories for those strangers down the streets seems to be working on the melancholy trapping your heart in a tight grasp.

Your eyes drift away from the world outside, fix on the laptop on the couch and the picture in the background: a photo of you and Namjoon, smiling happily towards the camera with ice-cream melting in your hands and on your lips.

A small smile graces your lips then but inside your heart, you ache a little more.

The yearning for him is almost unbearable tonight and you do feel guilty about this need to have him next to you, to feel his hands and arms tightly wrapped around you at all times.

Namjoon is a businessman and you should be accustomed to his absence by now but, alas, you aren’t and a part of you suspects you never will.

You are good at pretending, at putting a happy smile on your lips to reassure him that you are fine, that you can do well even when he’s not right there next to you but it’s not always the truth.

On most nights, you can’t even fall asleep properly without him by your side, without his scent enveloping you whole, without his warmth surrounding you.

You hug yourself tighter as a deep shiver runs down your spine, goosebumps gathering on your flesh as a cold breath of wind caresses your naked legs.

Your eyes drift away from the happy picture and fix on the open window instead. You can almost hear him, if you concentrate hard enough, yelling at you to close the damn window before you catch something and join him under the warmth of the covers.

The thought makes you smile but it is a bitter one.

God.

It’s been two weeks, just two weeks and yet you’ve never missed him quite this hard, you have never yearned for him quite this much.

You count down the seconds, the minutes, the hours that pass between each text, each phone call.

It feels like you are living your life on hold, just waiting for the crumbs he can throw your way to keep you going through the days until his return.

You lift yourself up, at last, close the window and then let yourself fall back on the ground once more with the pout getting deeper on your lips.

Tonight feels like one of those endless nights where sleep just refuses to come your way and claim you and every second seems to last an entire hour.

It’s when yet another sigh of frustration leaves your mouth that your laptop chimes, the familiar tune from Skype’s videocall snapping you out of your thoughts.

Your brows furrow as you slowly lift yourself up to fix your eyes on the screen. Who in the world would be calling you at two in the morning?

Namjoon.

Your heart throbs against your ribcage in an instant, your lips parting in surprise as you eagerly accept the call, your eyes fixed on the screen to catch even the smallest glimpse of him inside his hotel room.

Namjoon is right there, sitting on what looks to be a little couch with his head tilted back, his lips parted and his eyes closed.

His body looks relaxed, his legs open in what you would consider an invitation if he were standing right in front of you in the flesh and not inside a screen.

“Joon?” Your voice sounds small to your own ears, certainly full of all the uncertainty you feel but, judging by the way his body immediately tenses, you know he’s heard you loud and clear.

His eyes are on you in an instant, embarrassment written all over his features as he takes in the sight of you completely.

“Baby girl.” His voice is hoarse and deep and, mixed with the endearing nickname, it easily turns your blood into liquid fire, makes your insides boil and turns your cheeks aflame—all of which he must be aware of judging by the little smirk that graces his plump lips.

“I didn’t think you’d actually be awake. Can’t sleep?”

You nod your head a couple of times as your eyes linger on him, on every little detail of his features, on his body still trapped inside his elegant work clothes.

“What about you? Just got back from work?”

Namjoon heaves out a sigh, closes his eyes for a second before moving forward to rest his elbows on his thighs and take an even better look at you.

“Yeah, we closed our contract today and the guys felt like having some fun so we went out for dinner.”

You hum in understanding as you hug your knees to your chest once more, slightly rocking forward as you keep staring at his face. He is as handsome as ever but you can’t ignore the dark lines under his eyes or the bitter twist of his lips. Something is bothering him.

Before you can voice out any of your concerns, though, he speaks again.

“What’s keeping you up? People-gazing?”

You chuckle at the way the word sounds on his lips and your heart flutters as you watch him smile inside the screen, his eyes warm with love and… longing. The same type of longing that has you still awake, staring outside your window.

“Sort of,” you settle on replying as you force your eyes to drift away from his face and rather focus on the night sky out of your window, on its soothing effects on your melancholic heart.

“You look tired, Joon,” you say after a while and your lips turn downward as you hear him sigh, shuffle on his seat and you can almost picture the way he is massaging his temples, his eyes fixed on the ground and his bottom lip trapped under his teeth.

“Can’t sleep?”

“No,” his voice trails off, another long sigh moves past your lips and your eyes fix back on the screen to take in the pained expression on his features, “I keep thinking about you… the view from my window is stunning, you’d love it.”

He sounds sad, so impossibly sad it almost brings tears to your eyes. You miss him and by the look of things, he misses you quite as much, if not even more.

“Let me show you,” he says, lifting himself up and bringing his laptop with him to the window. In an instant the scenery before you switches from his lovely face to the stunning colourful lights outside, dancing in the night like neon fireflies.

It’s breathtaking.

“I knew you’d love it,” he whispers into the speaker and the heat on your cheeks intensifies, a little chuckle moving past your mouth as you nod towards the camera.

“I do. It’s so beautiful.”

“Yeah… but it can’t compete with you.”

Lame and corny as a line but damn, does it tug on your heartstrings the right way, damn does it make that stupid heart of yours beat faster in your chest, damn does it make your longing for him even deeper.

“Joon!”

He laughs at himself, at your expression reflected on his screen, at the absurdity of all of this—whatever it may be.

“I think I’m a little drunk,” he admits with another laugh and you can’t help but join him while shaking your head as he occupies the screen again, back on his couch.

You shift in your seat, hug your legs to your chest tighter and rest your chin on your knees as you stare at him, your fingers grasping each other to prevent you from reaching out and caress the screen like you would to touch his skin if he wasn’t seven hundred miles away from you tonight.

“Baby girl…is that my shirt?” He asks all of a sudden and you hide your face between your legs in embarrassment. Damn, you really hoped he wouldn’t notice.

This is one of your little secrets, one of those that don’t hurt anybody but that makes you feel shameful enough to still keep it hidden and close to your heart for extra protection.

“It is… I always sleep in your shirts when you’re not here. It helps me fall asleep.”

You do not tell him that it feels like he is embracing you if you concentrate hard enough, you do not tell him that sometimes you even wear his shirts outside to work just because it makes you feel like he’s still with you during the day. You do not tell him that sometimes you just walk inside your bedroom and spray some of his perfume around the house or on your pillow just to feel him closer.

You do not tell him any of that but somehow, it feels like in the silence that lingers between the two of you, you just did.

“Baby girl.”

“Mh?”

“I miss you so damn much. All of you.” His voice is low again, barely above a whisper, and it sends shivers up and down your spine, makes your insides twitch and the yearning for him grow stronger and stronger, so much so it is almost painful, “Damn, I really wish I could kiss you right now.”

You close your eyes, slightly part your lips as you imagine the sensation of his mouth on yours, the way his hands would embrace you, pull you towards him so that your bodies can touch, relish in each other’s warmth.

“I miss hugging you, touching you…” His voice trails off as you visibly shiver in front of the camera, your tongue wetting your lips as you slowly open your eyes once more.

You can’t take this anymore.

“I miss the way your hands feel on me,” you confess, your voice thick with love, yearning, desire and everything in between.

You wish you could run your fingers through his blonde hair, tug on the loose locks until he groans and tilts his head back to offer you his neck. You wish you could kiss and bite that soft expanse of flesh, mark it for everyone to see and then slowly inch down to his chest, the fine line of his abs, the happy trail of hair right under his navel that leads to the treasure right between his legs.

“What are you thinking about?” He rasps out and your eyes snap open, fix on the screen and on his dark gaze, his parted lips as he stares at you in that way that has you always squirming before him in anticipation for what he is going to do to you.

“You.”

You bite your bottom lip, tilt your head a little to the side to watch him better under your lashes as you let go of your legs, arch your back a little just so he can properly take in your figure inside his buttoned-up white shirt.

You wonder if he can see your turgid nipples peeking through the soft fabric even in the dim light surrounding you, you wonder if he can tell exactly how much riled up you are just at the thought of him touching you, kissing you, ruining you.

You let out a soft grunt of frustration as you tug on the shirt, let a few buttons fly open for him to take a peek at your chest.

“Kissing me everywhere,” you continue, your fingers trembling a little as you undo a few more buttons in front of his rapt eyes, “Touching me everywhere.”

“Fuck, you’re so sexy baby girl,” he hisses under his breath, his face inching closer to the screen so that he can see you even better as your fingers keep trailing down your shirt to open it up slowly, inch after inch before his eyes.

You can see the lust in his gaze even through the screen and in an instant you know, this is why he called. That deep unquenchable desire you felt in the pit of your own stomach all day, that yearning that has kept you awake to this hour, he feels it too.

You watch him get rid of his black jacket, toss it far away behind his back, in a portion of the room you cannot see through the screen.

You wet your lips, drink up the sight of his slack jaw as he stares at the way your chest rises with your heavy breaths, the way your hands caress your exposed skin, envelope your breasts to pull them together, the way your fingers tease the little turgid buds.

You hear his soft sighs laced with arousal as one of his hands flies between his legs to palm his growing erection in the confinement of his pants.

You watch his Adam’s apple bob up and down with every new bold movement of your hands, with every new inch of skin you expose to the camera and you keep imagining kissing that beautiful neck, lick and bite the golden skin and make him whimper your name in the silence of his hotel room.

“If only I was there with you,” you mutter under your breath and he grunts in frustration, his fingers wrapping tighter around his shaft in a way that looks almost painful but that, nevertheless, makes the blood rush to the pit of your stomach in excitement.

“What would you do if you were?” He asks, his voice low and hoarse as he inches backwards to rest his back against the couch, spread his legs wider for you to be able to see the outline of his turgid cock underneath the black fabric of his pants.

You take in a sharp breath, your fingers inching away from your breasts to favour the supple curves of your legs, the barely concealed sex between them and the arousal growing right there soiling your pretty underwear.

Heat gathers on your cheeks as you part your lips, the words dancing on your tongue before you can stop them.

“I’d slowly kiss your neck, inch down towards your chest…” you trail off as your eyes close for a second to imagine how it would look like under your attentive gaze, how it would feel like, “I would undo your tie just enough to allow my fingers to unbutton your shirt, reveal your chest.”

You open your eyes then and watch him follow your fantasies to perfection, his eager fingers caressing his skin like you wish you could do.

He yanks his tie completely loose, leaves it around his neck as he keeps unbuttoning his shirt just like you did with yours and you can’t take your eyes off of the sight of him like this, stripping before you with not a single hint of hesitation.

“I’d go down on my knees next,” you whisper, breaking the silence as he unfastens the last button of his shirt.

His muscles tense underneath your gaze and you wickedly smile at that, at the way he seems to shiver a little just at the sound of your words.

He licks his plump lips, relaxes his neck against the couch even more as if abandoning himself to your desires completely.

“I’d pull down the zipper next,” you bite your bottom lip as you watch his trembling fingers reach his pants and follow your instructions.

A trembling breath leaves his parted lips then, relief morphs his features for an instant and then his brows are furrowing once more as he palms himself through the fabric of his underwear, the gesture sounding like a plea towards you.

“Show me how hard you are, please.”

He whines at your words, rolls his hips into his hand once, twice and then, he is manoeuvring his erection out of his boxer briefs.

The sigh of contentment that leaves his parted lips drives one of your hands right between your legs to palm your womanhood and tease the covered flesh until a soft whine erupts from your mouth.

His cock stands tall before you, head tinted an angry red and slightly wet with pre-cum. You lick your lips as you imagine its bitter taste filling your mouth and Namjoon grunts at the sight of you like this, at the way you arch your back a little more, at the way you rock against your hand as if it were his teasing you like this, discovering you like this.

“Now what, baby girl?” He asks in a breath and you gulp down heavily, fix your eyes right between his legs and damn, all you can think about is riding him until he has no choice but to scream your name for everyone in Tokyo to hear.

“Ugh, Joon!” You whine, your eyes almost filling with tears in frustration. Your deep desires don’t seem quenchable with just a stroke of your hands accompanied by the sound of his voice and breathy whines. You want him.

“Tell me, baby girl, tell me what you would do to me,” his voice is thick, his hand still around his cock as he stares at you, his eyes boring into you with curiosity and desire and how could you deny him when he is looking at you like this, eagerly waiting for every single one of your words?

“I would ride your big cock right on that little couch in front of the windows,” your words are strangled, followed by a whine of frustration as your fingers press against your clitoris, circle around the little bud atop your panties.

“Show me,” he breathes out, his fingers slowly pumping his length as he shudders at the pleasure and the fine picture you’ve planted in his mind, “Show me how you would ride me.”

You lick your lips, pull your gaze away from him just enough to fix it on your couch and the cushions sprawled on its surface.

Biting your bottom lip you reach for the sturdiest one and pull it right between your legs. Your thighs brush against the fabric as you sit right on top of the cushion and tentatively rock your hips forward once.

A little whimper immediately moves past your lips and you fix your eyes on the screen to catch him staring at you, his jaw slacked and his hand slowly moving around his shaft.

You lift yourself up just enough to help yourself out of the soiled panties and then, you come crashing back down, grunt a little as if it were his length welcoming you back where you belong and not the softness of the little cushion.

With your eyes fixed on the screen, you start rolling your hips forward, one of your hands teasing your breasts while the other keeps you perfectly balanced on the cushion as you become more confident, more eager to feel the pleasure engulfing you whole.

“You’d look so good on my cock, baby girl.”

You lick your lips, roll your hips faster against your cushion while imagining him deeply sheathed inside of you, battering your walls, stroking your cervix, making you see the stars.

You whimper his name as you watch the thick trail of saliva fall from his lovely mouth to the tip of his cock, you watch him with rapt eyes as he spreads it around his shaft and palms himself harder, strokes himself faster to match up the rhythm of your hips.

If you imagine it hard enough, you can almost feel him underneath you and just the thought makes your heart beat faster, turns your breath laboured and your limbs more eager to reach that peak with him.

But no matter what, the cushion is not quite enough to have you scream his name, to have your body quiver and your toes curling.

You leave your breasts in favour of the little bundle of nerves right above your slit, you start drawing little circles on top of it, pressing down with your digits enough to elicit small whines out of yourself.

You hear him hiss at the sight of you like this, touching yourself so shamelessly in front of the camera just for him to see. A little smirk draws on your lips at the lust reflected in his gaze, at the way he pumps himself harder, faster.

His little breaths and sighs, his little ‘yeahs’ of satisfaction, his deep grunts and huffs, they all rile you further, prompt you to roll your hips faster and faster until the burning sensation between your legs becomes almost unbearable.

You tilt your head to the side, fix your eyes on your fingers as they furiously draw circles on your clitoris and you moan loudly for him, the sound awfully similar to his name and, just as loud, he responds and twists before the camera, angling himself as if he were trying to plunge himself deep inside your pussy.

“Fuck, I’m so close baby girl,” he whines as his muscles start tensing, his hips jerking towards his hand in search of that bit more of friction that will throw him off the edge and give him what he so desperately craved for.

“Me-me too, ugh,” you gulp down, thrust harder against the soft cushion and then you feel the wave of pleasure run through your limbs like liquid fire. Your vision turns white, your body quivers helplessly on the floor, your toes curl and a lewd moan moves past your parted lips.

Your heart is beating frantically against your ribs, your breath stuck inside your lungs as you completely let go before his eager eyes.

The orgasm seems endless, it coils between your legs, soils not only the cushion but the carpet underneath your knees as well and when it subdues it leaves you breathless, dizzy with lingering ecstasy.

It’s his deep groan that makes you snap your eyes open, fix them on the screen once more as he jerks harder in front of the screen, as he palms his balls through the fabric of his pants for extra stimulation.

He calls your name over and over again, so loud there is no doubt someone is going to hear him and that brings heat to your cheeks and down between your legs once more.

You watch him come undone on his hand in long stripes of white that much like your own juices seem to keep on coming and coming until his fingers are covered and sticky and his pants are ruined beyond recognition.

His chest is heaving, his eyes tightly closed as he tries to keep that blissful sensation close just a little bit longer.

You softly call his name then, smile towards the camera as his eyes pry open to fix on your lovely face.

“That was amazing, baby girl,” he whispers before his eyes move to the mess he has made of himself. A chuckle leaves his lips then, his head shaking left and right as he tries to clean his hand against his pants.

“I wish I could lick it off of your fingers,” you let the words slip out of your mouth and chuckle at the way his eyes turn as big as saucers, at the way his mouth opens but no sound comes out, at the way he gulps down heavily and then, finally, groans.

“Jesus Christ,” he mutters under his breath before wetting his lips with that tongue you wish you could have felt lapping your folds tonight.

“Clear your schedule for Saturday, baby girl.” He suddenly says prompting your brows to furrow in confusion.

“I have every intention of fucking you until neither of us can walk out of that damn bed as soon as I’m out of the plane.”

His words make you groan, prompt your hands to move between your legs once more and if you weren’t still sensitive you’d be touching yourself again right now, make yourself crumble before him once more and watch him get worked up all over again.

“Is that a promise?” You retort, a little teasing smile on your lips as you tilt your head to the side while spreading your legs wide for him just to taunt him a little bit further.

Every bit of shame you might have felt has long gone now and every single one of your desires is out, hanging right between the two of you.

“You can bet on it, baby girl.”

His hoarse voice makes you shiver, it gathers goosebumps on your feverish skin and it makes that deep yearning for him grow as intense as it was before his call. Will you be able to resist four more days without him, hanging on just the thought of him and his return and what he will do to you the moment his fingers can finally wrap nicely around your frame?

“Now, be a good girl until my return, mh?”

You bite your bottom lip, close your legs and draw your hands away from your core like the obedient little sub you usually are.

“I can’t wait to see you,” you murmur after a while. The lust has slowly subdued, suppressed by that melancholy that has kept you awake on most nights these past two weeks. It is not just the sex that you miss, no, you miss every little thing about him and by the way he looks at you, you know he yearns for you just as much.

“Just a few more days, my love.” His words are barely above a whisper, laced with the same emotions you feel deep inside your heart.

You hum in response as you slowly remove the cushion from between your legs. You ignore how sticky it feels, you ignore the lewd sound of the fabric as you shove it aside and then, you hug your legs back to your chest, rest your chin above your knees.

“You know I love you, right?” You say then, your head resting on your arms as you close your eyes for a second, fatigue finally taking over your body and mind.

Namjoon hums softly in response, his eyes tender as he takes in the peaceful expression on your features. His body finally relaxes as he watches you slowly drift away from him and enter the dreamland.

He watches you for minutes, slowly undressing himself and tossing everything on the ground for him to take care of in the morning.

“Baby, go to sleep,” he mutters under his breath after a while and you stir at the soft sound, a sheepish smile on your lips as you lift yourself from the ground and reach your bedroom with the laptop still open between your hands.

You put another one of shirts on making him chuckle and then, with his face close to the screen, you let yourself fall on the bed, right under the covers and hell, if you concentrate hard enough it almost seems like he’s right there with you, watching over you with his arms wrapped tightly around your frame.

Your eyes slowly close as he keeps whispering sweet nothings to you, so close to the microphone it almost feels like the sound is right inside your ears and just like magic, you fall into a deep slumber right before his eyes.

He watches you sleep for minutes on end as he crawls inside his cold bed as well and it is only when his eyes become heavy with sleep that he ends the call.

He falls asleep with a deep smile on his face and a contented heart in his chest and for the first time ever since he arrived in Tokyo, somehow, he feels utterly happy.

Copyright © 2020 by jeonggukingdom. All rights reserved. Do not repost, do not steal, do not translate without consent.

[bigwhispersbluebird]

Kiss me behind closed doors

How long can you keep a relationship hidden? What happens when the truth comes out and burns everything in its wake? Even the love that once felt enough. 

Relationship: Namjoon!idol x Reader!idol

Canon compliant, angst, hints of smut

Author’s note: Another two-shot. Angst cause I am a bitter soul nowadays

The moonlight peeked through the curtains of the window, striking his naked back directly as he slept soundly on the side of my bed he had claimed as his own. I watched the white light illuminate the dips and curves of his back as if kissing him just like I had when he had showed up at my backdoor like it was routine. 

And perhaps it was. Sneaking to each other’s places in the quiet of the night, stolen glances in a room full of people and text messages sent and deleted over and over again. 

As I sat on the edge of the bed, staring at his sleeping form, I tried to memorize his face. The dragon eyes that seemed so innocent like this, the high rising cheekbones melting into deep dimples on the corner of his lips which highlighted the sharp jawline that arched into a prominent Adam’s apple. I curled into myself, wrapping my arms around my knees that were pushed into my body and inhaled his musky and woodsy scent that I was covered in, my eyes still not leaving him. 

When I first met Kim Namjoon, we both were stripped bare of the fame, money and eyes of people that urged us to be perfect. We were both on separate vacations and happened to run into each other at a club. Recognizing him, I had bowed to him slightly from afar and that was it. But the next day when I walked into a small local bookstore located at the edge of an alleyway, familiar eyes, now hidden behind thick black rimmed glasses, were staring at mine. Small conversation about books and we thought that it would be the last time these chance meetings would occur. But it was like the universe had conspired against us, throwing us together in the same places at the same time and it was a test of restraint and patience; what we both lacked as the pull between us got stronger everyday as we learned more and more about each other. 

The day before I had to return back home, a knock on my door had startled me because I knew who it was before I had even looked through the peephole. I often go back to that day. What would have happened if I had not opened the door? What if I had not let him utter all the things I had ached to hear? What if I had not let him pull me to him and close the door behind us? What if I had not let him stay the night? Or on all the nights that followed?

Maybe then I would not be sitting here on my own bed, afraid to fall asleep because that would mean losing time that was already running out. 

In Seoul, Kim Namjoon was RM, the leader of BTS, and I had no right to have him as a lover in my bed every night knowing well that the moment everyone found out that he was dating a controversial solo artist, everything would crash, burn and crumble into ashes at our feet. 

“We should stop”, I would say between fervent kisses getting deeper every time and he would kiss me more deeply, digging his long fingers in my hips agreeing, “We should”, but neither of us would stop, we could not. 

I don’t know how long I just sat in the same position on the bed but when a notification on his phone illuminated the screen and showed the time, I was brought out of my thoughts. The sun would be out soon and it was wise for him to leave before that. That was the norm after all. 

But as I inched closer to him, his hand reaching out in his sleep for mine, the bitter and sad part in me ached to stop being wise and smart. I wanted to let him sleep through the night and the morning. I wanted to wake him up with a good breakfast made out of the tons of groceries that I would shop for every month, only to toss them out the next. I wanted him to sit with me as we did everything and nothing at all. 

But I could not be selfish with him. 

And so, I softly tried to shake him up awake, “Joon, it is almost morning”.

Groggily, he replied, “What is the time?”.

“It is almost 5″.

At that, he immediately opened his eyes and jolted himself awake- getting up and searching for his clothes. Like routine, I got up from my place and helped him, handing him his shirt as he slipped on his pants. I watched him get ready, mask in place and a dark baseball cap lowered on his head, covering most of his face. Through the entire commotion, he had not spared me a single glance. If he had, he would know that with each article of clothing that he draped on himself, I felt like he was ripping it off me till I was completely unsheltered and cold.

When he was finally dressed, he slipped on his coat and made his way to the backdoor and I tiptoed behind him, opening the door before he could to check if anyone was outside. The area of my house was secluded and not many celebrities lived there either hence, we both barely went to Namjoon’s place. Like always, no one was around and I nodded at Namjoon. 

That is when he finally noticed, me and all the giveaways of a disturbed night in my eyes. He knew what was the cause of this and I saw him try to form words that would offer me some comfort. The great Namjoon, who would write meaningful lyrics on a spur and give speeches on massive platforms seemed so vulnerable, standing at my backdoor trying to wonder if words could be of any help and a part of me ached for him. 

I reached forwards, clinging to his massive body, my neck wounding around his neck, inhaling him. “I know”, I whispered in his ear and felt his arms tighten around me. The embrace did not last long and he kissed me one last time before he ran towards the street where he knew his driver would be waiting for him. 

Once he disappeared from my sight, I closed the door and slipped to the floor. The house suddenly felt vacant, even I felt vacant without his arms to touch me and his fingers to graze mine. 

I knew he was going through the same turmoil. When we both had gotten together, we knew it was not going to be easy but we both were prepared to adapt to however the circumstances would be. But after five years of hiding and sneaking, horrible rumors and no sight of any change in our situation in the near future had made us question how long could we keep this up for. I was exhausted and so was he. We would have pulled back a long time ago had not we been crippled by our feelings for each other. 

While the distance would torture us, it was during our breaks and vacations where everything would fall back into place and we would be reminded why we chose this. But I wonder now if those days of peace are worth breaking a piece of me every time he leaves.

*****

“Namjoon, is everything okay?”

Yoongi and Jin had watched for quite some time that Namjoon was disturbed. As the leader, he would barely show any signs of pain or weakness but it was quite evident that he was not in the right state of mind. Not to mention, his songs were now melancholic and painful, as if saying what he could not utter himself. 

“Of course”, Namjoon said a little too quickly and Jin quickly interrupted, “Don’t even try. We won’t believe you. So why don’t you just tell us”.

Namjoon lowered his head, finally letting the weight on his shoulders crush him and his hands  came to cover his face. 

“Is it Y/N?”, Jin asked hesitantly and Namjoon could not help but let out a sarcastic laugh. “I wish it was. I really wish it was her who was screaming and fighting with me about our situation. I wish she would stop opening whenever I knock on that damn door. Instead she lets me watch as she gets hurt everyday”, he was now screaming but he did not care. “You know how many times I met her in the last six months?”, not awaiting an answer, he continued, “Not once unless it was to stand at her backdoor at midnight so I could kiss her and sleep with her because I am scared that without these asshole-ish reminders of us, she will up and leave.” 

The room stayed silent when he stopped speaking, the only sounds audible were of his heavy breathing as he tried to compose himself. 

“She deserves better than a late night rendezvous. This is the woman I have loved for years for fuck’s sake!”.

“Namjoon, you people are not in an easy situation”, Jin tried speaking, “these few hours are all you both can afford and we know that it is difficult but this woman is enduring all this for you, for this relationship that you both have. How about this? As soon as we are done with the promotional activities, take her somewhere”. 

“And after that, hyung? Back to this?”, the question rendered Jin speechless. 

The room was quiet again. 

“Announce it”.

Yoongi was the one to break the silence. 

“What?”, Namjoon asked, genuinely confused. 

Yoongi sat straighter, leaning a bit more towards the younger one who sat across him. 

“Announce your relationship with Y/N. Whatever happens, we will handle it. I know that the general public does not like her a lot but most of our fans will be fine with it. About the rest, we will manage it. How long will the anger stay?”, Yoongi was talking as if it was the easiest thing in the world and the person in question stared at him like had lost his mind. 

“It is not that easy...”, Namjoon spoke up but was interrupted by the oldest. “Yoongi is right. Five years and on your way to the sixth. You people have endured enough and I know that you both deserve a fair chance at happiness. You know that so many people have dumped us because of the life we live but she has stood by you through it. It is high time that we all do this for her. And for you.”

“But...”

“No buts. I know that you cannot imagine losing her so it is not like we are making a casual relationship public. Just trust us. We will handle everything.”

Namjoon knew in his head that all this was easier said than done but as his older members kept talking, he could not help but accept that this was the right thing to do. You deserved more than just being fucked by your boyfriend in the late hours of the night and then left all alone. You did not deserve to have BTS pass you by in public because you were controversial when behind closed doors, you would share homemade meals and inside jokes. 

It was not going to be easy, but he would do it. For you. For him. But little did he know, that his well kept secret would soon be revealed to the world, but not in the way he could have ever anticipated. Not in a way that would forever end what you both had. 

[velvetthunder1999]

All the time on Earth

Part 31 - Lonely

Summary: Even though you and George are on good terms, you feel deserted and lonely. When you sneak out with Fred to get away for a bit, George is mad at you for risking your life

Warnings: Angst, swearing(?)

(Also, I’m sorry but I’ve decided not to tag people - it’s just too much work. Feel free to follow me; I only post this story and you’ll see every time a new part comes up :)  )

Word count: 5.5K

George Weasley x Reader // Fred Weasley x Reader (platonic)

Masterlist

It had been three weeks since George had walked out the door into the rain. For a good four days you had hoped that he’d come back and you could settle everything. But he hadn’t shown up. According to Bill, the twins were fine, their shop was always crowded with customers and they seemed relatively okay.

However, you couldn’t help but suffer. You kept replaying the whole awful conversation in your head, cringing and feeling ashamed. You knew you had rightfully become angry; George’s decision was just as insane as they come. But on the other hand, you also knew that you had made a mistake when you had started shouting at him. Both of you had been wrong, and now both of you were suffering because of it. Well… you hoped it wasn’t only you who had been suffering for the past few weeks.

You had to wait twenty nine days to hear the familiar pop again. You had been mindlessly flipping the pages of a book that you had read three times now, when the sound of someone apparating came from the garden. You looked at the clock; it was too early for Bill and Fleur to come home. You stood up so suddenly your chair almost fell over. You drew your wand and raised it so that it was pointing at the door.

Someone knocked. Then a voice, a voice that you had thought you’d never hear again spoke.

“It’s me. My name’s George Weasley, you call me ginger boy when you want to be cheeky. I call you witty, because you always have to have a comeback to whatever I say and because you’re never afraid to tell me when I’m acting like a true git —”

You opened the door and George fell silent at once. He looked skinnier than the last time you had seen him, and his hair was a bit longer as well. He was looking at you, his face stuck in an uncertain expression, his eyes in doubt.

“Hey,” he whispered.

“Hey,” you whispered back.

The two of you were staring at each other, not sure what to say. Then George casted down his eyes and cleared his throat.

“Can I… can I come in?”

“Sure,” you said and stepped to the side. As he walked past you, you could feel the scent of the shop on him. Fireworks. Your stomach clenched and you closed the door.

“I…,” he started, forcing himself to look into your eyes. “I wasn’t sure if I should come.”

“Why?” you asked, maybe a bit more coolly than you had intended. “Because you might be followed?”

“No,” George shook his head. “Because I wasn’t sure you’d want to see me.”

“Oh. I see.”

Both of you fell silent again. You didn’t know what to say, where to start. You opened your mouth and then closed it. You were staring at your own two feet for at least a minute before you gathered enough strength to look up again.

“George —”

“Y/N —”

You cut each other off and met each other’s eyes again. You couldn’t look at him for long; his gaze was burning an aching hole in your soul. He looked lost, scared, uncertain; he looked like an abandoned child. He suddenly seemed much younger than he actually was.

You tore your eyes away from his face and saw his hands by his side. He was constantly making his fingers into a fist then releasing them again, clearly drawn by anxiety. You sighed. You were sure that in this moment both of you felt the same way.

He had hurt you. Yes. But you had hurt him just the same. You wanted to tell him how sorry you were… you wanted him to know that you had run after him into the rain… that you were still insanely in love with him and that fighting was stupid… You wanted to let him know that he was your everything and not having him around had driven you mad… and you just wanted him to know how much you’d missed him. But words seemed to fail you. You didn’t know how to say all those things… Not when you still had that miserable argument between you… Not when he had said he didn’t want to visit you in the future.

But you didn’t want to fight anymore.

You stepped forward, your eyes still fixed on his nervous hands. Slowly, very slowly you reached out, touching his fist, gently asking his fingers to loosen the fist and to hold onto you instead. And they did. With a sudden breath of air his hand welcomed yours and finally you were strong enough to look into his eyes again.

“I don’t wanna fight anymore,” you whispered. He nodded.

“Me neither, I’m…” he was desperately looking for the words. “Witty, I didn’t mean what I  said —”

“I know,” you said reassuringly. “Me neither.

“I am so sorry,” he said, his head hanging low. “Really, I was… I was a horrible, disgusting prat, who —”

You stood on your toes and wrapped your arms around his neck. Even though the last couple of weeks were rough, you didn’t want to hear him bashing himself.

“Let’s just… Let’s just figure out something, okay?” you said while hugging him. When he put his arms around you as well, the warmth left by his touch was coursing through your body like electricity. It warmed you. “Because I really missed you.”

“I missed you, too,” his voice cracked. You hugged him tighter. “These weeks without you… It was absolutely dreadful. Even more when I realized that it happened because of me.”

“That’s not entirely true…”

“Yes, it is,” he said firmly. “You were right… about the stupidest idea I’ve ever had.”

“Then let’s come up with something,” you said as you let him go, but stayed close while looking deeply into his eyes. “Let’s have a plan, let’s figure out a schedule… Anything. Anything is better than not having you around.”

He didn’t answer at once. You saw doubt on his face. Before he could had come up with anything, you cupped his cheeks and talked in a very gentle manner.

“Love… You saw how these three weeks were… Dreadful as you said. It’s clear that… we need each other. I need you…”

“And I need you, too, but it’s dangerous —”

“I know, love,” you said, still watching your tender tone. “But I think we’ve reached a point where we simply have no other option but to accept the risk. Because this… this isn’t a life. What you’re suggesting is going to kill us both.”

“I can’t loose you,” he said miserably. “If the risk is too high, I cannot…”

“So we’ll make it as low as possible. Seeing you once a month is still better than not seeing you at all.”

“Once a month?” he said. “That’s…”

“Awful, yes. It’s…” you were only now realizing what it meant. “It’s horrible, but… would you be okay with that?”

You stroke his jaw with your finger. He took his time, thinking.

“Or even Fred can come and visit me once in a while,” you added with a weak smile. “I miss him as well.”

George chuckled. You took it as a good sign.

“Yeah, I’m sure he’d be delighted.”

“So is that a yes?” you asked carefully. George kissed your temple and murmured against your skin.

“Yes. Once a month.”

Once a month. Even though it was more than nothing, your smile still wasn’t completely honest. When George left that afternoon, the promise that you’d only see him four weeks later made you want to burst into tears again.

——

And so, weeks had passed. The schedule seemed to be working, it didn’t draw much attention and George said the members of the Ministry and the Death Eaters (which were basically the same thing at this point) did not seem suspicious. If anything, it made you at ease at least.

Every two weeks one of the twins showed up to spend one hour with you, keeping you company, telling you everything that had been happening in the world. And every time they left, they took a piece of you with them, eventually making you feel deserted and empty. You spent almost all your time in your room, barely going outside, not seeing the point since you’d already knew the garden and the small segment of the beach inside the protective charms like the back of your hand.

When you were not listening to the radio listing all the names of people who had disappeared or died, you tried to sleep. Your idea was that if you woke up late and went to bed early, two weeks would pass incredibly fast. However, since you were doing nothing other than worrying, mostly you just lay awake in bed, staring at the dark ceiling, trying to avoid your anxious and miserable thoughts. Oftentimes you grabbed your crystal necklace, letting George know that you were thinking about him; then, you waited to see the crystal turning its color, giving you small doses of relief that George was okay, too, and he didn’t forget you, regardless of what your damaged brain suggested.

Then the weather started to change; the wind was cooler, the days were shorter. December had arrived, marking the beginning of the fifth month that you had spent in hiding. You could count on one hand how many times you’d seen George. By this time you felt both physically and mentally sick. You had nothing to look forward to. Only one hour from George and one hour from Fred per month.

Today was one of those hours when you didn’t feel totally depressed, and it was only due to the fact that Fred was sitting at the table next to you, cutting up a blueberry pie that Mrs Weasley had made. He was rather cheerfully talking about something and nodged you with his elbow when you weren’t paying attention for the second time now.

“Oi!” he said, shoving pie into his mouth. “I’m talking to you.”

“Sorry,” you said and started picking your pie with your fork. You wanted to eat it but on the other hand you knew your nervous-all-the-time stomach couldn’t handle it.

“What’s gotten into you?” asked Fred, eyebrows raised.

“Am I a burden?”

The question burst out of you before you could had stopped yourself. Fred looked taken aback.

“What the bloody hell are you talking about?”

“I just… Never mind.”

“Hey…” he gently put his hand on your shoulder. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing.”

“Sure, that’s why you just asked me if you’re a burden.”

“I meant…” you sighed and put down your fork. “I know I’m not good company. Nothing has happened to me in the last five months.”

“And?”

“And I’m sorry if this obligatory visiting is starting to annoy you.”

“Merlin, Y/N, something’s really gone wrong in your head,” he said in disgust. “You really think I don’t like to see you?”

“I don’t know.”

“Blimey. Did you ask my brother the same thing?”

“No.” “Is it just me, then? Do you think I’m not your friend anymore?”


“It’s not that!” you snapped.

“Then what?”

“I… Forget it.”

“Tell me.”

He was leaning quite close, completely ignoring his pie before him. There was something in his eyes that let you know that he won’t judge you. You turned your head away, picking at your pie while you talked.

“It’s really hard, you know. I know that I’m lucky, and I’m grateful, but… everything is hell out there and I just really wish… I really wish I could do something. Help.”

“You’re helping by staying safe,” said Fred seriously. “By staying alive. I know it’s hard, staying here. I’d gone crazy, believe me. Not leaving the bloody house for months. I’m really proud of you.”

You snorted.

“For what, may I ask?”

“For holding on,” said Fred with a shrug.

“Yeah. Thanks.”

“Have you told George this?”

“Not really.”

“Why?”

You mumbled something about not wanting to bother him. Fred frowned.

“Well, that’s just stupid. Why would you bother him?”

“I’d rather just enjoy the time he spends here.”

“Y/N…”

“So how’s the shop?” you asked. You didn’t want to talk about your issues anymore and Fred, after staring at you in doubt for a few seconds, let you change the topic.

“Yeah, the shop’s good. Lot of customers. We’re quite busy.”

“That’s nice.”

“It is. We’re working on some new stuff, they’re quite amazing, you’ll see.”

“I wish I could see it. Or just see the shop again. Or just go for a walk, really.”

“Well, take your coat, Y/N, I’m taking you out,” said Fred jokingly. You chuckled.

“Can you imagine? Would be kinda crazy.”

“Yeah,” Fred smiled to himself. “Crazy.”

You locked eyes, staring in silence. You knew you were thinking the same thing.

“It… It would be crazy, though… wouldn’t it?” you said, asking for reassurance.

Fred tilted his head from left to right, thinking to himself.

“Yeah… It would. Unless…”

“It wouldn’t.”

“It’s kinda dangerous though…”

“Yeah, we shouldn’t…”

“Or should we?”

“Well…” you started carefully. “I mean if… we’re careful and everything… disguise ourselves, maybe…”

“Stay only for a little while,” nodded Fred. “Find a nice place…”

“A muggle town, perhaps? Where no one knows us?”

“Yes… Yes I think…”

“That should be fine.”

You were staring at each other again. You dared only to whisper.

“Are you serious?”

“Y/N… take your coat.”

You jumped up from your seat with a sudden wave of excitement. You were going out. You were leaving the house! You were going to see something else than these walls and the ocean!

“We need to get back before Bill and Fleur do.”

“Yes,” agreed Fred. Then he drew out his wand. “Now, come here.”

He examined you from head to toe, then indicated at your face.

“Would you like your eyecolor to change? Or your hair?”

“Should we do both?” you asked. “And I think we should change you as well.”

Ten minutes later you stepped out of the house as someone unrecognisable. Your hair was pink as Tonks’s, your eyes a strange color of purple. You had told Fred about muggle contact lenses, he was only willing to change your eyes to an extreme extend after that. You were wearing a big puffy jacket with green boots, and a scarf that said “Oxford University”.

“I have never heard of this place,” said Fred.

“Well then, great. We’re supposed to be muggles, right?”

He was now blonde, his brown eyes changed to blue. It felt weird to look at him, but the way he talked to you made it obvious that he was still Fred.

“Well, then, woman,” he said with a grin. “Are you ready?”

You looked at the ground as if you could see the invisible border. Your insides were shaking with excitement. You took Fred’s hand and closed your eyes.

“I’m ready.”

He took one step, pulling you with him. Your boots barely touched the ground when you felt yourself twisting in the air, having your lungs begging for air, then it was over and you felt yourself standing on concrete instead of sand. You opened your eyes.

“Where are we?”

You were standing in a dark alleyway between the back of two shops. On your right were some dustbins, on your left lay the street, illuminated by the setting sun.

“It’s a muggle town, er, village more like. I forgot the name but I remember dad bringing us here once when we were little. He wanted to show us the muggles.”

“I see.”

“Ready?”

“Sure,” you said but you couldn’t move. It was so surreal. It was so exciting and nerve-racking. You couldn’t believe it. Fred chuckled, smirking.

“Come.”

He grabbed your hand and started pulling you towards the main street. When you stepped onto the sidewalk, your mouth opened to the sight. The cars were bathing in the orange light of the sunset, a man and a woman were riding a bycicle on the icy road, laughing. Shops were all around the place, offering tea, coffee, bagels and scones. A nice little sidewalk with stairs led to a small lake across the road. Children were skating on its surface.

“You like it?” asked Fred, still grinning. His breath was like smoke in the cold December air.

“I love it. Thank you.”

“No problem, love.”

He bought two hot teas with honey, then you two started walking towards the lake.

“How come you have muggle money on you?”

“You never know when you’ll need it,” shrugged Fred.

You made your way down the stairs, now walking in the snow, sipping the tea. You found an empty bench not far from the lake, where the sun still warmed your faces but you could also keep your distance from the muggles.

“What are they doing?” asked Fred, indicating at the children on the ice.

“Skating,” you said. “You don’t know about skating?”

“Well, look at them,” he said with a funny tone. “Seems useless to me.”

You giggled.

“Just because it’s not quidditch…”

“It doesn’t make any sense —”

“It doesn’t mean it’s not entertaining!” you laughed. Fred frowned in mock outrage.

“Are you laughing at me?”

“Yes, yes I am,” you rolled your eyes jokingly. “Wizards.”

He didn’t say anything but from the corner of your eyes you saw him smiling to himself and shaking his head. He then turned back towards the children. You took a sip from your tea.

“How does it feel being a blonde?” you asked.

“It felt normal until you brought it up.”

“Sorry,” you chuckled.

“Does it look strange to you?”

You looked at him. You squinted.

“It’s your eyes, more like. Not what I’m used to.”

“I’m still handsome I hope,” he smirked. You laughed.

“Everyone can dream.”

“You’re naughty,” he said. “I know I’m not as handsome as my brother.”

“Yeah?” you asked, quite surprised at his statement. Then he raised his head, closing his eyes with satisfaction.

“Now that I’m blonde, I’m more handsome.”

“Yeah, you are,” you said, then covered your mouth. Fred’s eyes burst wide open.

“Did you just —”

“No!” you squeeked. Fred nodded vigorously.

“Yes, you did! You said it!”

“No, I didn’t! I didn’t mean it like that!” you tried to save yourself but the damage was done. Fred laughed joyfully.

“Well, well, dear Y/N, the day finally arrived…”

“Oh, shut up…”

“The day when you admit the truth…”

“Oh, God,” you chuckled painfully.

“Oi, Y/N, what would George say to this?”

“Oh, shut up, you,” you said between laughs and hit him playfully on his shoulder. “You’re never gonna let me forget this, are you?”

“Never,” he said, beaming. “I’ll tell it to my grandchildren one day, let them carry on the story of this fine day, let the future know…”

“Oh, my God, just stay quiet now,” you laughed.

The sun was hanging low now, and the air was getting even colder than before. You’d drunk your last sips of tea and now you were playing with the paper cup, folding it in your hands. Fred was watching the children with interest, every now and then a small smile appeared on his lips whenever a kid did something funny. When the last beam of orange sunlight disappeared behind the hill, and the kids started to leave, Fred looked at you with a soft expression.

“I reckon it’s time to go.”

“I know,” you said. You’d been preparing for this moment the minute you two had sat down here.

“We can come again sometime,” he said gently, seeing your sorrowful face.

“When I’ll see you in a month?” you asked miserably. You turned your head away. You didn’t want to see his pitiful expression.

He didn’t say anything. Still staring at the lake, he put one arm around your shoulders and pulled you into a gentle hug. You let out a shaky sigh.

“I don’t wanna go back,” you whispered into the silence.

“I know.”

You raised your head a little, looking at him. He turned to you, his eyes meeting yours.

“Thank you, Fred.”

“You’re welcome.”

His lips curled into a sweet smile and even though he was blonde, even though he had blue eyes, you recognised him under his disguise. You recognised his mannerisms, the way he looked at you, the way he talked to you, the way he hugged you. All of it made you feel really melancholic.

“Take me back, please,” you said, accepting that there was simply no other way.

You stood up from the bench and walked back to the street, passed the shops and got back to the alleyway from where you started off. You offered your hand to Fred, but he refused to take it. Instead, he placed his hands on both side of your face.

“It’s gonna be okay, Y/N, all right? You’re gonna be fine. I promise.”

Seeing how intense he was, you nodded. You wanted to believe him. You wanted to believe him so bad.

“Okay,” you said, and offered your hand once again. This time he took it and you felt the familiar twisting and turning again.

You felt the salty air first, but you refused to look around just yet. Behind your closed eyelids you saw the village in the orange light, and the lake with the children. You wanted to hold on to it for as long as you could.

“Oh… Shit.”

Hearing Fred’s tense voice made you open your eyes. Every inch of your body winced in fear. In the backyard of the house stood George. He was facing you, staring, waiting.

“Oh, no,” you said. You couldn’t even imagine the scolding you were about to get. “Oh, shit.”

“It’s okay,” said Fred and gently grabbed your shoulder. “Come inside the charms.”

You stepped inside, keep staring at George in the garden. He didn’t move an inch. Fred saw your anxious face and leaned closer.

“I’ll talk to him, okay? I’ll…”

“No,” you shook your head. “It’s… I’ll do it.”

You started walking, nervously biting your tongue. As you got closer, you could make out George’s expression. His face was pure rage and he was panting. You had never seen him this angry.

When you were only a few feet away, Fred stepped forward.

“George, before you start —”

“Shut up,” answered George, not taking his eyes off you. His voice was ice cold. Fred frowned; he didn’t let it end here.

“Now, listen —”

“I said,” George’s voice was shaking from the restrained anger. “Shut up.”

“It’s okay,” you said hastily, recognising that nothing could be done. You turned to Fred. “Go. Go home.”

“What are you —”

“It’s okay, Fred,” you said. “Really. Just go.”

Fred looked quite uncertain. He was staring for a few seconds, then he seemed to accept your request. He turned to George again.

“Don’t be so hard on her.”

“Leave.”

Fred fell silent, but you could see that he was about to say some nasty things to his brother. Instead, he waved his wand, turned back into his ginger self and walked towards the border. When he stepped outside, he disapparated at once. “What’s this?” said George in a cold tone, pointing at your purple hair. Your voice was really high as you answered.

“Disguise.”

“Disguise,” said George after you waved with your wand and turned back to your normal self. “You two planned this out nicely, didn’t you?”

“We…”

“How could you?” he yelled and suddenly the words got stuck in your throat. You wanted to disappear. “Do you have any idea what I’ve gone through?”

“I…”

“One hour! We agreed on one hour! What do you think was going through my head when Fred didn’t come back after one hour?”

“I don’t know,” you whispered. His fury scared you.

“You don’t know? Try again!”

“That…” your eyes started to fill up with tears. “That something’s wrong.”

“Brilliant answer, Y/N. And how do you think I felt?”

“I d-don’t know.”

“Answer me.”

“W-worried.”

“Oh, worried is not even close. But let’s continue. When Fred didn’t appear another hour later, what do you think I thought?”

You shook your head in tears. George continued, cruelly.

“Nothing? Then how do think I felt when I came here to check if everything was all right but I saw the empty house instead?”

“I don’t know,” you mumbled. Tears started running down your face.

“I thought you were dead!” yelled George in rage. “I thought you were murdered! Would you like to be murdered, Y/N? Look at me! Would you?!”

“No,” you sobbed. George didn’t care.

“Then how could you be so irresponsible, Y/N? How? Do you have any idea —”

“We were c-careful!”

“I don’t give a damn!” he roared. “I would’ve never thought that you would be so careless, so imprudent to risk your own life! Don’t you listen to the radio? Don’t you hear how many muggleborns are killed? Or — do you think it’s just a game, do you think I come here only once a month as a joke?”

“No…”

“I was worried sick!”

“Don’t tell me you wouldn’t have done the same!” you shrieked. “The famous George Weasley would have just stayed put for months, wouldn’t he?”

“I am not the main target of the whole fucking Ministry!”

“That’s not my point!” you cried. Finally, you found your voice. “You have no idea what’s it like, being here, not doing anything all day but listening to the radio listing all the people who disappeared or died! You call that a life? I don’t have a life! I am locked up here, and yes, I should be grateful and I am grateful but I’m suffocating here! And I can’t feel anything but guilt, knowing that while others are on the run I still don’t appreciate enough to have my own room and sleep in a bed every night! You know what’s the worst? Everyone, every single person, you included keeps telling me to hold on until the end, until the good times come but… George, when will the good times come? For how long do I have to stay in hiding? A year? Five? Or ten? What kind of life is that? And I can’t do this anymore… I can’t… I don’t… I don’t know what to do and… I’m lonely, I’m so miserably lonely, I’ve seen you four times in five months and…. and… who says we’re gonna win? Who says it’s a guarantee that we’re gonna get our lives back? Who says You-Know-Who’s gonna loose and I won’t have to stay inside for ever?”

You sat down in the sand, trying to muffle your sobs. You couldn’t believe the amount of times you had cried in the past months. You felt yourself on the verge of insanity. Not because of the crying, no. Because of all the things that made you cry.

You felt a hand on your knee as George sat down, too. His voice was low.

“Why haven’t you told me this?”

“I’m telling you now,” you sniffled. You hid your face into your hands. George tightened his grip on your knee.

“You still shouldn’t have gone out today.”

“I know. Don’t punish F-Fred for it. It was my idea.”

“I’m gonna have a word with him, don’t you worry.”

“But it was —”

“I don’t care. Y/N…” he let out a groan. “Y/N, you have no idea what I felt when I saw the empty house. When I thought… I’ll never forgive you for this. Never.”

“I k-know.”

“Good. Now, listen to me because I’m only going to say this once. Everything’s going to be all right.”

“Oh, shut it,” you sobbed. “You keep saying that but nothing’s all right.”

“I trust Harry.”

“That doesn’t mean he’s gonna succeed.”

“I trust that he will.”

He spoke with so much confidence, with so much strength that it made you feel even weaker than before. You knew you were only a shadow of your normal self and yes, while George was here, telling you all this, you could almost believe it. But he was going to leave as always, leaving you alone with your thoughts again only to appear a month later. You couldn’t handle it anymore. You needed him.

“Stay,” you said suddenly, barely louder than a whisper.

“What was that?”

Your lip trembled as you looked him in the eye.

“Please stay.”

“Y/N…” suddenly his face changed; he looked extremely remorseful. “You know I need to go back.”

“Please…” you begged, tears running down on your cheeks again. “I’m begging you.”

“Love…”

“Please…” you grabbed onto his jacket. You knew you looked absolutely pathetic. You didn’t care. “Just for tonight. Please.”

He gently wiped your face. His touch made you shiver.

“Y/N, I… I can’t…”

“Don’t…” you sobbed. “Don’t leave me alone…”

He was fighting an internal battle. You took his hand, desperately pleading.

“Please… Please, George…”

He took his time examining your face, brushing a piece of hair out of the way, then cupping your cheeks. His touch was so warm, and you missed it so much… Then he kissed you, gently and carefully and you knew that this was goodbye, that this was his way of letting you go without words…

“I need to go home,” he said and you cried. “But… But I’ll come back.”

“W-what?” you said, not believing your ears.

“I’ll come back tonight, okay? But I need to go home first. Talk to Fred, arrange a few things…”

“No,” you started shaking your head. “No, you… you’ll promise but you won’t come back…”

“I promise you I’ll come back,” he said, looking deeply in your eyes.

“No…”

“Do you trust me?”

You didn’t answer. You shook your head in despair.

“Do you trust me?” he said again, more firmly.

You wanted to. You wanted to trust him so bad.

“Yes,” you lied.

“Trust me,” he said with another soft kiss. “Only tonight, okay? This is an exception.”

“Sure,” you mumbled. It didn’t matter. You knew he wouldn’t come.

“Okay,” he said and he stood up. He helped you up, too. “Go back into the house, all right? Don’t leave, you understand me?”

“Yes,” you said, barely audible. He cupped your cheeks again.

“Do you understand?”

“Yes,” you said again.

“Good. Now go.”

You kissed him goodbye, stretching the moment for as long as you could. Then you turned away without meeting his eyes again, and wiping yours, you walked into the house. You could hear the sound of disapparation and you knew that he was gone.

And you waited. Because even though you knew he wasn’t coming back, even though you knew that he had promised only to make you calm down, you couldn’t help but hope.

When Bill and Fleur came home and you had dinner, you stayed awfully quiet. You felt sick and tired, you were exhausted and drained. More than once you caught yourself staring out of one of the windows of the house with tears in your eyes. Finally, around nine o’clock you couldn’t take it anymore and went to bed.

And you waited. Constantly wiping your wet cheeks you waited. Being disappointed after every passing minute you waited. Every now and then you looked at your necklace but it wasn’t glowing. George wasn’t thinking about you. He wasn’t coming back.

Around one in the morning you felt the tiredness taking over your body; you could barely keep your eyes open. It was really hard to accept the truth. You kept dazing off and jerking awake again, just to realize that you were alone, maybe more alone than you had ever been. And this feeling travelled through your body, poisoning every inch of you, and you were hurting, more than you had ever been hurt before.

But then, something happened. You were on the verge of sleeping again, when you heard footsteps on the corridor outside your room. You didn’t dare to move. It was Bill. You were sure. Maybe it was morning already and they headed for work again.

Your door creaked. You raised your head at once and saw a tall, ginger figure entering the room. In the dark, only with the moon shining through your window, he looked like a heavenly presence. You weren’t even sure if he was real or you were dreaming already. But then you decided that you didn’t even care.

He moved. He kicked off his shoes, he took off his jacket. He moved the covers and he climbed into bed next to you. His firework scent filled the room, embracing you, filling up the hole in your soul. He wrapped his arms around you as you moved to rest your head on his chest. You took a deep breath and closed your eyes. Everything seemed to fall into place. You felt his fingers in your hair, gently brushing your face. And after four months of lonely nights you finally heard him whisper again:

“Sweet dreams.”

[prurientpuddlejumper]

A Lipless Face That I Want to Marry, Ch. 8

<- Chapter 7 | Chapter 9 ->

Summary: Frederick alone. 

2,163 words

How many days had he been in the hospital? There had been at least one more surgery since you left. More blood transfusions.

It all bled together without you there. There was nothing to distinguish one day from the next except the tedious procedures—a blood test to see how his kidney was holding up, some new skin here, a z-plasty there. He was a little bit glad you were not there when they grafted his penis with a stretchable mesh of skin. God forbid he got aroused while that was healing. He laughed at the thought, as if your absence was just temporary.

The sun outside his window told him whether it was day or night, but the stretches of hours he was knocked out under anesthetic and pain meds made it impossible to know whether it was was from the same day, or if he had slept until the next one. Without your schedule to ground him, it was pointless bothering to find out.

At least you were not always touching him, asking him about his feelings. Staring. He could feel the pressure of your gaze on his face, dancing like jabbing needles across his barely-healed skin. He hated it. He had some peace and quiet now.

It did not feel real yet. It seemed so certain you would be back—you had become such a steadfast presence in his life for the past three years, he never imagined you could leave it. Not forever. It did not seem beyond taking back.

But as much as he was in denial, he knew what he said could not be taken back. One cannot break off an engagement, tell their fiancé to move out, and expect things to ever go back to normal.

He didn’t need you. You always hated his preening, the sophisticated circles he traveled in. You wanted him this way—destroyed and disgusting, unable to pass in decent society. He was not sure if he really believed that, or if he just needed a reason to hate you.

A nurse could bring him the phone. All he had to do was press the nurse call button and Pamela would come running, and he could call you. He could apologize. If he reached you before you got rid of the ring, before you packed your bags, he might be able to convince you to stay.

He did not call.

***

The sun was down, whatever day it was. There was still fluorescent light shining in from the hallway, enough to dimly light the room. Frederick lay awake. Parts of his back ached from lying in the same position too long, and it had been too long since a nurse came and shifted him. He shifted himself, what little he could, and the heart monitor climbed frantically with the feeble effort of a few inches. His tight scar tissue pulled like he was wearing too-tight denim over his whole body, and his more recent stitches stung. He was so weak. So pathetically weak.

The sun was up again, some time later. Frederick eyed the small stack of mail for him at his bedside table. You were always the one who read to him. But he did not need you.

He pressed the nurse call button, which had been rigged with tape and a wooden tongue depressor into a large switch he could push more easily with his limited dexterity. He pushed down on it and it buzzed so loudly he swore, a throb of pain shooting through the back of his skull. Part of the jury-rigged switch caught on the gauze mitten wrapped around his hand and left the switch stuck on in a continual buzz. He swore again, more fiercely, and jerked his hand until the makeshift switch snapped, and the call button fell off the edge of the bed. “Fuck, fuck, fuck, FUCK!”

Where the hell was the nurse? If this had been an emergency he could be dead by now.

In his last physical therapy session, he had been able to reach nearly as far as the bedside table, with assistance. He reached for an envelope, and his mittened hand made it all the way to the edge of the bed before bumping against the metal railing that prevented him from rolling out. That was it. All at once, every latent frustration came out at that goddamned railing in a primal scream. He punched the metal—barely a twitch with his atrophied muscles, but enough to sting his tender fingers and draw another enraged shout. His breathing came in heavy, choked bursts, and he began to sob.

When finally a nurse showed up—his favorite, Pamela—she didn’t make any humiliating sympathetic comments about the tears wetting his face. He asked if you had called or tried to visit.

You had not.

***

The dead at least have the luxury of being done with what they lost.

The sky was dark, nearly black with clouds, though Frederick suspected it was day. Heavy rain pummeled against the window, and it gave the room a cold, dreary cast. He wondered if there was a way he could kill himself. To be done. It would have been easy in a hospital, if he had use of his legs and hands—he could tamper with his morphine drip, or find some anesthetic… the options were limitless to one who knew what he was doing with medical equipment.

The one person who never manipulated him into danger, the one person who stood beside him, the one person who loved him completely for everything he was, he had thrown away. Was it worth it staying alive for revenge alone? He was never going to get better. Not completely. He would be trapped in this scarred, aching body for the rest of his life. If he died, his will left all of his money to you. Then you would be free.

But he was Doctor Frederick Chilton, damn it! He did not give up. He did not give up after Abel Gideon tortured him, or after being framed for murder and shot. Every time he fell, he held his chin up, and rose higher. This whole incident brought him notoriety, a spotlight he would take advantage of to bring him greater fame than even Hannibal Lecter himself. Forget national bestsellers, this time he was thinking movie deal. In a few years, he would be walking again, he would have a new face, lips. He would have everything back.

Except you.

He could never get back the one thing that already felt like a hole in his life, and would feel like a gaping sinkhole when he finally returned home and you were not there. His comfort. If you were coming back, you would have done it by now.

Every time he angrily demanded you leave, you would always slink off with your tail tucked, but crawl back all sweetness and forgiveness the next day. This time was different. He said so many unforgivable things. But he had to go that far, he told himself—he had to break things off.

He was so bitter, and angry. He was never the easiest man to live with, and now all of his compassion had been burned out of him. You didn’t deserve to keep running back to a cruel, bitter man out of loyalty, to be smothered inside a dark hospital when you were meant to be in the sun. He knew exactly what Chiltons could be like, and he never wanted to put you through that. If that was the nightmare he was turning into, then it was better for you to be far away, not married to it.

But, oh, to touch you one last time…

***

Another day. He thought about calling you again, if just to hear the sound of your voice. But what would be the point? You could have called him. Clearly you wanted him out of your life.

A nurse knocked tentatively on the door. Not one of his usual nurses.

“You have a visitor, Mr. Chilton. They said… they’re not sure if you want to see them?”

He perked up immediately, so eager to respond, “Of course I do!” that he didn’t bother to correct the nurse about his title. His face fell when a young black woman walked in, carefully tapping a long white stick across the ground. “Oh. You.”

She stopped in her tracks, a timid expression of guilt written on her face. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be here...” she stammered, turning around.

“No, no, no. Come in, come in, Reba McClane,” he pronounced her name pointedly. “I wanted to speak to you anyway.”

“You did?” She began searching her way closer to his bed.

“Naturally. For my book. An interview with the Tooth Fairy’s lover.”

Her tentative smile quickly turned into a scowl. “Freddie Lounds already offered to tell my story.”

Frederick scoffed. “Tell me you are not considering that libelous TattleCrime gossip rag. I am a distinguished, respected author—what I could do with your story is far—”

“I told her the same thing I’m telling you: I do not want my name associated with that man. My entire life is already tainted. I won’t talk about him anymore. I only came to apologize… it seemed the least I could do. You’re the only one of victims left alive to apologize to.”

“You forget to count yourself,” Frederick corrected with uncharacteristic empathy. “We are both his survivors.”

Reba’s shoulders relaxed a little at that. “I wasn’t sure you’d see it that way. A lot of people, they think I knew. Or that I must be a monster to have loved a monster like that. I can’t blame them… I don’t know what to think of myself anymore.”

“There is no accounting for taste.”

Reba and Frederick settled into a surprisingly comfortable chat. She unburdened her guilt—she thought she had sensed someone else in the room that night, and knew something was off, but didn’t call the police—and Frederick magnanimously forgave her. Dolarhyde would have killed her and slit Frederick’s throat on the spot if she tried to be a hero. He chose not to call out for help, knowing that. They talked about love, and the deep vein of anger they both shared. Perhaps it set Frederick at ease that she was blind. If she stared, it was not with any regard to his face. 

Then she went to the window, to stand in the warm light streaming through the glass, and knocked over a vase of plastic flowers. He snapped at her, his voice raising with violence so out of proportion to the offense, she wasn’t sure whether to apologize or yell back. After scrambling to find to the vase on the floor, she settled on dryly calling him an asshole.

Nobody had called him out so bluntly since before he was hospitalized, and it made him smile, as best as his cheeks could manage. “You remind me of someone,” he said.

Reba pondered why his voice was so fond at the memory of someone who called him an asshole. She wondered what the flowers meant. “Was this the somebody you were hoping it was when I walked in? Who—”

“Nobody important.”

“Really? That’s not what I’m hearing.”

He sighed grumpily. Then just sighed. “You told Dolarhyde you were not so damaged that you were incapable of love. Do you still feel that way?”

“If you’re looking for relationship advice, I do not believe myself qualified to give any,” she said, reading him like braille. “But I’m not going to give up on the goodness in people. Everybody has a darkness deep down, but not everyone’s darkness is murdering families. I survived Dee, and if I can do that… I can find someone whose darkness is a little softer. Soft enough to live with. I have to believe I can still love—that he didn’t break me. I hope he didn’t break you, either.”

***

Another day. He ruined everything with you.

The first question Frederick asked when EMTs found his still-smoldering body—rasping it over and over until someone understood—was if you were safe. Had Dolarhyde gone after his family? But of all the things that the Red Dragon had taken from him, you were the one he had destroyed all on his own.

Finally, after two weeks of resisting, he could not bear it anymore. When his physical therapy session ended, he quietly, firmly, with fragile pride, asked the nurse to help him with the phone. He dialed your number, and she held the receiver to his ear as it rang.

It rang.

It rang.

It went to voicemail.

Frederick leaned into the receiver as your friendly, guileless voice instructed him to leave a message. It must have been recorded before everything, back when you were so happy all the time. It had been ages since he heard you sound like that. He wondered if you would be happy and carefree again soon, without him.

• ● • ━━━━━─ ••●•• ─━━━━━ • ● •

Tags: @beccabarba  @caked-crusader @itsjustmyfantasyroom @thatesqcrush @dianilaws @permanentlydizzy @eclecticreader2020  @mrsrafaelbarba 

[sp00kymulderr]

Hold on to these words (Ezra x Reader)

Warnings: Anxiety, depression, insomnia - not mentioned explicitly but clearly referenced. 

Pairing: Ezra (Prospect) x Female!Reader

Word Count: 1,314

Summary: ‘So when sleep just won’t come, and you’ve got no occupation but nibbling at the fruit of the melancholy tree, hold on to these words, hold on to me’ (Again the Night - Jason Webley)

A/N: This is pretty personal and self-indulgent, but I thought I’d share it here for anyone else who might want to read it. I also haven’t really edited this, so I apologise for mistakes. 

It takes weeks for Ezra to convince her to spend the night, all but begging on his knees for her to stay til sunrise at least so they can enjoy each others company for more than a few hours. Perhaps she does not realise how taken he is with her, how she makes his heart beat louder with every moment of her presence. Ezra is dizzy with adoration; faltering in his speech every time she smiles, knots in his stomach every time she deigns him with a kiss.

And yet even when she does agree to his pleas, letting him wrap around her on the bed that knows all of their sins, she hesitates when he offers her the warmth of his chest to lay her head upon. The beat of his heart echoes in her ears and something in her eyes tells him she is wary of his care. He asks her what she needs, a simple question made grand in his usual purple prose, but she simply kisses his wrist where his hand strokes her cheek and tells him she has everything she needs here. She does mean it, doesn’t she?

Ezra falls quickly to sleep, more so than usual, holding her to him in a way that comforts him so deeply – she makes him feel complete, somehow, and all he wants is to return the favour but she always holds back. She keeps part of herself secret; it took some time to figure that out but when he did it was so obvious to him he felt foolish for taking so long to realise. One day he’ll know the words to tell her it’s okay, but for now she stays with him and that is enough.

He sleeps so deeply, his body curved around hers. He sleeps and there’s a gentle snore coming from him that she listens to, finds comfort for a moment in it. She always presumed he would talk in his sleep, continuing the ceaseless ramble of delicate words that left his mouth at every moment. His ardent locution was the reason she became besotted with him in the first place, but the peaceful sound of his breath in the deep of night is even better. And everything feels fine, for once, until it isn’t. Until the room is pitch black and everything is still and she lays awake as the familiar ache starts again in her chest.

Ezra stirs when the warmth is gone, as soon as his unconscious mind notices the cold bed he’s jolting awake with bleary eyes and a disappointment heart. He doesn’t blame her for leaving if she felt he asked for too much, he wants her to be comfortable. But he thought their relationship had finally progressed and now he is deflated from his misunderstanding. For months they have been fiery and wild with each other but he truly believed they had both agreed they wanted more than that.

Turning to the side, he sees a dull light and blinks to dilute the sleep in his eyes. He feels his entire soul rise in relief when he notices her face illuminated by the communications pad in her hands, where she sits on the stool besides the window. For a moment he doesn’t move, but she lets out a sound so forlorn his heart lurches and he has to follow it towards her. Twisting in her seat at the sound of movement, she watches him come close with weary eyes and a forced smile.

“Sorry” she whispers “didn’t mean to wake you. Go back to sleep”

He spy's on the pad that it’s 4am, soon the sun will be in the sky again. He knows at once she hasn’t slept, her tearful eyes give the game away.

“Sweet stardust, there is no need for your penitence” he responds, the term of endearment eliciting the smallest of smile – but true this time.

He kneels besides her, the cool hard floor unpleasant again his bare knees but nothing akin to the heartache at seeing her like this. Tentative, Ezra reaches for her and when she doesn’t shy away let’s his hand fall on the bare, warm skin of her thigh. A gentle squeeze. They sit like that it silence before she puts down the pad and joins him on the floor, back resting against the wall and pulling him close to her side so she can speak quiet.

“I’m sorry” she repeats, and he shakes his head again but doesn’t say a word. She continues quietly, lacing her fingers with his. “My heart is full with love for you, Ezra, but my head is...my mind is a playground for thoughts that stain and mar everything. They come out at night, so I don’t sleep much. They come out at night and they ruin everything. I don’t want them to ruin us”

She turns her head and buries it against his shoulder, wetting the fabric of his t-shirt with fresh tears.

“I don’t want them to ruin us” she repeats, voice muffled against him “so I didn’t stay, but I wanted to and I still want to. But Ezra, I can’t burden you with me. I’m...I’m broken. I can’t make you take on my broken mind and my empty soul because you’ll always have to help me more than I ever had to help you. And I know you’ll say you don’t mind, but one day you’ll resent me for not being complete”.

Ezra feels a shattering at her words, a sorrow that he hadn’t realised what caused her to keep herself from opening up to him as he had to her. Her pain rips through him and he wants to stop it from hurting her ever again. She is the sweetest stardust in this and every galaxy to him, but vicious words swim in her mind and tell her she is too much of a burden for anyone else to carry. He hates it, lets out a ragged breath and feels a wrath at the thing that makes her feel this way.

Sobbing, she holds on to him and apologises again and again, her hand twisting the fabric on his other shoulder – the one that no longer has a limb attached.

“Perhaps we are both incomplete, and this is why we chanced upon one another? Perchance it was so we could put together each others fragmented pieces with parts of our own? When we made acquaintance I was a wretched man, mourning a loss that made me feel no longer whole. You taught me how to exist again. I still carry that weight, but you took some of it for me and made something exquisite from it. Likewise while I cannot completely relieve you of your encumbrance, I can seek to lessen the load and I will... It is the very least I can do.”

She lifts her head, finally, and though her tears still run the smile on her face in sincere and the light in her eyes reflects the love in his. He has never been more sure that they were meant to find each other than right now, each going through a form of hell to find some solace in the others embrace.

“Thank you, Ezra. Thank you” she mutters, clinging to him. She is certain she will still feel scared, alone, unsure – that might be her lot in life, but knowing now that he won’t turn away from her pain makes the sting a little less unbearable.

“I love you, stardust” Ezra finally says, weeks later than he had planned but it’s right and real.

When the sun rises they choose to ignore the morning duties for once, climbing back in to the soft bed. He keeps her close to chase the thoughts away as she sleeps in his arms for the very first time, and surely not the last.

Tag list:

@pascalisthepunkest​ @immundusspiritu​ @keeper0fthestars​ @pedropascalito​ @amarvelousmandalorian​ @engineeredfiction​

[royallyprincesslilly]

Title: Christmas, Missions, Snowed In, Oh My! {Steve Rogers One-Shot}***

Steve Rogers x Avengers Reader

Warning: Heavy Cursing, Smut, NSFW, Blood

Words: 4.9k

Summary: Everyone on the Avengers and in your circle knows you CANNOT stand Steve Rogers. Steve isn’t losing any sleep over it because he can’t stand you either. Everyone completely understands this and makes sure the two of you are rarely on missions together. Unfortunately, a mission during Christmas leaves only the two of you to handle it. This does not help matters at all!

Note: Next up on Christmas With Lee is this amazing request from @sonjashuterbugjohnson I hope you enjoy this!

***Loosely Edited/proofread***

❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️

“Unfuckinbelievable!”

 Your shout echoed around you, bouncing off the snow-covered trees and the mountains behind you. The anger you felt was indescribable. This was not the way you wanted to spend Christmas. You wanted to be inside, with several bottles of whiskey and a fire, music, and food from your favorite restaurant. You did not want to be here wherever the hell you were with no whiskey, not even an ounce of alcohol, no fire, or music or food at all.

 You’d been walking four hours and still, everything looked the same. All you could see was white snow, snow that was more than three feet high. Snow that was cold, wet and getting into places it should not be. You kicked the snow pile in front of you sending frost and flakes in the air for it blow right back at you in your face.

 Behind you, there was a stifled snort. You felt big enough to take down a polar bear. Turning around there he was with the most annoying smirk on his face. it was a smirk he tried to hide but he did a shit job of it. the wind blew again and knocked you over into the several feet of snow. You sank into it screamed. Instead of getting up you just laid there. Then you heard it again, this time he had the balls to laugh. You’d had it. pulling yourself up you glared at him.

“What the fuck is so funny Steve!?” He raised his hands and shook his head as he approached you with his hand held out offering it to you.

 You couldn’t believe this, you were in this shitstorm, well snowstorm because of him and he had the nerve to laugh and offer you help. You slapped his hands repeatedly then scuffled around the snow nearly drowning yourself in the process. Finally, when you stood up you were covered in snow.

 “That was unnecessary,” Steve retorted with little to no emotion in his voice. Typical, you thought.

 “Unnecessary? You’re unnecessary! Your whole existence is unnecessary! What is the point of you!?” Your anger was bubbling to the top. Everyone knew when you were angry it was not a pretty sight. You had a bad temper.

 “Well, I am Captain America. I was created to be the beacon of hope and goodness in a time where it all was fleeting,” he responded. Your lips rose in a disgusted scowl. You wanted to throw a snowball in his hairy face, then sweep his legs out from under him so he could get another face full of the stuff. Shrieking out you turned your back and continued trekking through the endless snow.

 “You’re ridiculous! This is all your fault!”

 “I’ve apologized Y/N. What more do you want?”

 “You to have been severely disfigured in that crash would have been nice!”

 You heard his huff but ignored it.

 “I mean if you knew you couldn’t have taken over for five minutes why did you say you could? I should have listened to my gut and just put on autopilot. I don’t know why I even allowed you to take over.”

 “Maybe because you don’t allow me to do anything. I’m not your solider, we’re on this team together.”

 A groan escaped you. You hated being on the same team as him. You hated him!

 “I wanted to help.”

 “I didn’t need your help; I could have done it myself. If I had we wouldn’t have crashed in the middle of god knows where in this fucking snowstorm! God, why are you even here!”

 He didn’t respond. It was a good thing. If he would have said anything else you probably would have turned around and decked Captain America in his supposedly perfect super solider face. you continued walking and stewing in your anger. It was enough to keep you warm for now, but you knew you’d be frozen soon, or bleed out.

 Another hour or two passed with you walking aimlessly. You used the device that mapped the terrain before you and calculated which route was best and most plausible to take you to civilization. You were almost sure it had been damaged in the crash but right now it was the only thing you had.

 “Y/N.”

 Ignoring him you continued forward.

 “Y/N.”

 Rolling your eyes, you focused on the device in your hands.

 “Y/N! Stop now!”

 Oh, hell no, you thought as you reared around with the only bitch look.

 “Who the fuck do you think—”

 “Shut up. Look!” You looked down but saw nothing. You lifted your foot and saw the clear sheen of ice.

 “Shit.”

 “Exactly. I can hear the rush of the water. Come,” Steve ordered.

 Your defiance was in prime form right now, but you also had common sense. Slowly you walked back toward him but on your third step, you heard the loud crack which forced you to pause. Steve’s eyes were wide as he scanned around you. After a few moments, his eyes returned to yours.

 “It’s going to break. From the sound of the water I’m guessing, for the most part, it’s not controlled by a current, but you will drift.”

 “Fuck, fuck, fuck! This is your fucking fault!”

 As soon as the words left your mouth the ice underneath you broke, and you plummeted into the below freezing water. Thankfully you’d been able to catch a mouthful of air before your fall. You tried to grab onto anything you could but there was nothing but water around you and ice above.

 You reached your hands up hoping to break through the ice, but it was solid above you. you began to panic sensing your imminent death. You had maybe a minute of breath left. Your limbs began cramping up from the coldness of the water, your movements and attempts to push through the water to counteract the chaos was futile. Just as you were beginning to blackout a pair of strong arms yanked you up out of the water and onto your back. You coughed trying to rid your lungs of water and take in air at the same time.

 “You’re okay. I got you.”

 Your choughs continued until your chest hurt and throat burned. When they quieted and you got some semblance of calm in your body you realized you were lying back between his legs with him behind you. Rolling from him to a nearby tree you leaned against it and glared at him.

 “It’s my fault, I know.”

 “Damn right it is!” He nodded, stood and approached you with his damn hand held out again.

 “Take it.”

 Before you even thought about it you heard a growl and saw a wolf pounce onto Steve taking him to the ground. You sat there completely dazed as to what was happening. Steve groaned and rolled around with the wild wolf wrestling it in the snow. For a few moments, you lost them in the mountains of snow. Slowly you stood. Most of you was frozen.

 “Stay—back!”

 Steve grunted and shouted loudly. His shout echoed around you. It was so loud some of the snow fell from the treetops to the ground around you. The growling was so loud you were almost certain Steve was a goner. After a few seconds, you heard a yelp, then a loud snap and then silence as the growls stopped. All was quiet and still; you didn’t know what to expect. Steve crashed through the snow with blood on him. His blonde hair was a mess and he was panting. He looked like he’d fought a wild wolf and won. For a second you forgot your hatred for him and just marveled at him standing there like a triumphant Olympian. You didn’t recognize the feeling in the pit of your stomach, so you ignored it which allowed your anger to return.

 “This is your fucking fault!”

 “Jesus Christ Y/N!” His shout was loud, and you could have sworn you saw anger behind his steely eyes.

 “Let’s keep moving, where there is one wolf the pack is close by.” He walked to you his intent clear to help. You pushed off the tree and walked ahead before he got a chance to get too close.

 Another hour passed and your movements were tortuously slow, as was the ache by your torso. You’d refused Steve’s last twenty suggestions to walk with him so he could help keep you warm. You refused to let him touch you, refused to go anywhere near him. Part of you knew it was stupidity, survival skills said hate and anger would get you killed, emotion was the enemy in life or death situations. You were clinging hard to your hate and anger.

 It was the reason why you collapsed into the snow before you. Steve was beside you in seconds.

 “You’re so stubborn!” Without explanation, he began lifting you into his arms.

 “Let me go. I can—walk.”

 “You can’t even stand.” He attempted to lift you again, you groaned out in pain. He caught it and scanned you.

 “What’s wrong? Are you hurt?” He began checking your body for injuries beginning at your head, then arms, skipping your torso to look at your legs. When he didn’t see anything, he unzipped your suit then saw the bloodstain soaked into your undershirt.

 “Y/N.” His voice was soft but filled with worry. Steve put his fingers to your pulse point and waited a few moments.

 “You’ve been bleeding out this entire time!”

 He zipped you back up, stood and pulled you into his arms. Then he took off running through the snow. You felt the first few meters but after a few minutes, you stopped feeling the jerk of your body in his arms. The heat of his body wrapped around you began penetrating through your suit. Being a serum enhanced super solider really had its perks.

 “Stay awake, Y/N. Stay awake.”

 His voice sounded far away but you heard it. Soon you heard the breaking of wood and the sounds of footsteps on wood. He was still speaking but you didn’t hear anything he said. You felt taps on your cheek and your eyes fluttered open. He was blurry but he was there.

 “Stay with me. Don’t give up on me. You hear me!”

 As you drifted in and out of consciousness small details registered. The smell of alcohol, the sound of wood breaking or being ripped apart, the warm glow of fire dancing across a ceiling, the softness of something that felt like an animal, a hard piece of wood being put into your mouth then excruciating pain that went on for far too long. Every time you came to the pain was still present, so you passed out again. This process felt endless and you had no idea how long it went on for.

 “Don’t leave me. Stay here beautiful. Stay and bother me.” The voice was echoed, slurred even but it was the last thing you heard.

 When you opened your eyes the tightness and pain in your abdomen had you groaning loudly. 

“Fuck me!” The scuffle of feet echoed around you then there he was. Steve Fucking Rogers. He looked different, a lot more rugged, and worried.

 “Y/N.” His face focused and you groaned again.

 “Oh my god. What happened?” You tried to sit up, but Steve stopped you.

 “Stay down. You’re going to pop the stitches.” Your eyes bugged and you really tried to sit up then. Sensing you were not going to stop Steve helped bring you to a slouched position. You looked back realizing you were leaned against a wooden headboard. For the first time, you realized you were in some sort of cabin.

 “Where the hell are we?”

 “Some cabin. After you collapsed about forty minutes later I found it. I was able to get a fire started, melted some snow for water, found a pretty archaic first aid kit and coupled it with the basic one in the suit and stitched you up. You’ve lost a lot of blood. I wasn’t sure you’d make it. I had to give you a transfusion.”

 Again, your eyes bugged. “A transfusion?”

 He looked sheepish. “You’d lost too much blood Y/N. I had to give you some of mine.”

 You looked to your arm and saw the makeshift transfusion needle and cord, but it was no longer hooked to him. a slew of things ran through your mind, but you couldn’t speak any of them. You were in shock. You knew it.

 Fifteen minutes passed without a word. You remained still looking around, taking in everything you saw. The mess of medical supplies, the firewood, the top of Steve’s suit on the floor, plenty of bloodied clothes and bandages, the fur on the bed that you were laying in and your clothes on the floor. When you realized that you looked over your body. Your top half was bare, as was your bottom half.

 “What the actual fuck Steve!” His eyes snapped back to yours then he stood and held his hands high in surrender. He knew what you’d just noticed.

 “Why am I naked!?”

 “I didn’t look. I had to get you out the wet clothes, you were hypothermic. I had to get you warm and get to the wound. I swear I didn’t see anything.” You hugged the fur blanket to your body as you glared at him. The annoying thing was that you believed him. He was that self-righteous, that good and pure that he wouldn’t dare sneak a peak or cop a feel while you were unconscious and incapacitated. It made you want to vomit then kick him in the balls.

 “I would never dare compromise you like that Y/N.” You closed your eyes and shivered.

 “You’re still hypothermic.” He approached and you gave him an evil look.

 “Stay away from me. This is all your fucking fault. It’s your fault we’re even here!”

 “For fuck’s sake Y/N. I know, I know, I know! I know it’s my fucking fault. I know I should have spoken up and said I couldn’t take over. Kill me for wanting to impress you, show you that I am not some incompetent fool or whatever you think of me to make you hate me so much. I’ve taken every horrible thing you’ve said to me for hours, years, I’ve taken it, gritted, bared it, I listened to your complaining this entire time, I withstood your stubbornness. I ignored all of it but fuck Y/N!”

 You were shocked. Not only had he just expressed some sort of emotion that wasn’t chivalry, or politeness but he’d cussed. Steve “watch your language” Rogers just cursed, three times. As you looked at him you were filled with something strange. You couldn’t put your finger on what it was but again the pit of your belly responded. He looked angry, what more he looked emotional and flustered.

 “What more do I have to do? I’m trying to save your life!”

 You held your head high refusing to fall for it, refusing to feel bad for him. Rolling your eyes, you turned your back to him and laid down while breathing through the pain you felt. You gritted your teeth as your body shook with the deep chill you still felt. You would not cave. You lost consciousness again.

 When you opened your eyes again the cabin was still glowing warm with the fire. You could hear the crackling of the wood as it burned and smelled the smoke it gave off, it smelled like pine and it gave the cabin a Christmas like scent. You also noticed the hard body that was behind you. It made you stiffen. Slowly you turned and saw Steve behind you with his arms wrapped around you. The heat from his body was delicious and with the fire, it worked to take all the cold from you. You could feel your feet and other body parts. As you were going to pull away you stopped. His smell took over. He smelled like the pine of the wood, but also like whiskey and the outdoors. It wasn’t a bad scent; in fact, the smell made your belly flutter.

 Slowly you turned to face him. he was asleep. He looked peaceful as if he hadn’t slept in days and now that he was, he had no cares. You could tell he was still clothed which spoke volumes. He was still being the perfect gentleman. you trailed your eyes over his face then looked away when you felt your edge fading. Rolling back to your back you took several breaths. The stitch job on your abdomen was still tight, every move you made almost made you blackout. You could feel your strength returning though which made you feel so relief.

 “Why do you hate me so much?”

 “You’re just a hatable guy.”

 He didn’t respond but you heard the sharp intake of breath. Closing your eyes, you shook your head.

 “In the real world people cuss, they throw tantrums, they have uncontrollable rage, they get shit-faced drunk, they lose control and have premarital sex sometimes with more than one person at a time, they are not perfect, they are not little robotic super soldiers. You live in this completely unrealistic world in your head. In the five years I’ve known you I’ve never seen you throw a tantrum, never seen any uncontrolled rage, or even seen you get shit-faced drunk, I’ve never seen you lose control or god forbid have premarital sex. I have only seen this perfect, self-righteous, polite, happy to serve, whatever it takes, I can do this all day, put my life on the line guy. Until this trip, I’d never even heard you curse.”

 “Some would call that being the best of humanity,” Steve filled in. you scoffed.

 “I would call it pure and utter bullshit. You are not real Steve. You are—a test tube. It is impossible to work with you or live up to you because you’re a false ideal made in a lab. Would it kill you to say shit once in a while? Get so fuming angry that you punch a hole in a wall, and not just knock a punching bag off its hook? What about have a drink, of four, have a hangover, or try for one even if you can’t get drunk because of that medical cocktail in your veins that is now in my veins? Would it be so bad to not be so perfect, show some humanity or even god forbid fuck someone? Jesus just fuck up!”

 You were not standing and close to the fireplace holding on to things to not topple over. He was still in the bed. He looked as if he were thinking, looked as if he didn’t know what to say.

 “So, you’re saying you want me to fuck up and hate me because I’m not reckless, or irrational, or emotional?”

 “Do you feel emotions, Steve? No one knows. Bucky was missing, your best friend it didn’t look like it phased you except as a nuisance. You woke up after a hundred years, everyone you knew was dead or dying, you didn’t react, you just suit up and went fighting again. Do you feel anything?”

 He was up with the quickness and walking to you. backed to the fireplace not thinking about the fire there. Steve pulled you to him. “Do I feel Y/N? You’re kidding me, right? Of course, I feel. I feel everything, I’ve always felt everything, but I do not have the luxury of throwing tantrums of refusing to help save the world because guess what, that is what I was made for.”

 “Fuck what you’re made for. Be human. Have a human emotion, do a human action. You’re over a hundred years old and you’re just some glorified lapdog of SHEILD and the government that fucked you over!”

 Before the words were out his lips crashed to yours. You were stunned and unable to move as his lips moved across yours. It didn’t take long for your body to react to him and kiss him right back. Through your anger and annoyance, something else shined through, something else that Steve soaked up. You felt his tongue delve into your mouth and you moaned. Steve’s arm wrapped around you pulling your closer holding you right where your tailbone ended.

 Neither of you slowed or paused the kiss continued and became even more frenzied. The hand that was holding the fur blanket to your body moved allowing it to fall to the floor. You dug your hands into his hair groaning when you felt the pain the stretching produced. Steve was there to hold you up. You lifted your leg against him, and his free hand gripped up and lifted it and you higher into his arms. You wrapped your legs around him and kissed him more passionately. Steve moaned and turned back toward the bed. Once there he laid you onto the mattress and hovered over your body. He broke the kiss and kissed your neck then your shoulder and back to your neck to suck your flesh into his mouth.

 You moaned and slightly arched, not enough to cause yourself pain though. Steve went lower to your breasts then ran the flat of his tongue across an already pert nipple. You moaned and hugged his head to your body. It didn’t take you long to get lost in the pleasure he gave with his mouth. He went lower over your stomach carefully avoiding the fresh wound there. When he got to your pelvis he placed soft kisses along your skin as he spread your legs. The first feel of his lips between your legs had you gasping loudly in the tiny cabin.

 “Oh my god.”

 Steve kissed, licked, and sucked your sensitive bud as he set a dizzying pattern. It was a pattern that your body could never get used to, a pattern that kept you guessing, a pattern that made goosebumps prick your skin. When your hands rested at the top of his head Steve moaned on your sex and slurped onto you. The new sensation made you whimper and drop your thighs back to meet the bed. Again, Steve moaned on you which set you off even more. It felt so good. You didn’t know how much stress you’d been under the last few years let alone since the crash. Steve was at the root of it all, right now he was at the root of your pleasure.

 Steve sucked your clit into his mouth, and it was the straw the broke the dam on your desire. Suddenly an orgasm tore through your body sending your thighs clamping around his head holding him in place. Steve moaned and sucked more forcefully. Your high-pitched moans echoed in the cabin. When Steve pried your thighs apart he looked up at you and traveled back up your body with kisses. When he made it back to you, you claimed his lips in a searing kiss and moaned when his tongue fought for dominance over yours. You lifted the shirt he wore and pulled it off then trailed your hands down his smooth skin.

 The man was like a baby’s ass, smooth and soft. You sat up and kissed his neck and down his chest across each perfect pectoral muscle and down each and every single one of his abs. He was the perfect male specimen. He was made with perfection in mind. Steve stood at the foot of the bed giving you complete access to his body. You pulled the rest of his suit down his body until his manhood flopped free. You almost gasped. He was packing and you shouldn’t have been surprised. Wasn’t it a side effect of the serum, didn’t it make everything bigger? You bit your bottom lip as you admired his length. Steve didn’t move a muscle. Closing your mouth around his need. Steve groaned every inch you slipped into your mouth he shivered. When he was mostly into your mouth he groaned loudly and gripped the top of your head.

 “Mmmm.” Pulling your head back you slowly brought your lips to the tip of his cock then sucked on it.

 “Shit!” You smiled on him and dipped your mouth lower taking him in again. This time you were able to accept his full-length something you could tell brought him deep pleasure from the way he held your head onto his hardness.

 “Mmmm, Y/N!”

 Getting tired of the slow pace you sped up and fully enjoyed every moan, shiver, groan, grunt and whimper you drew from him. after less than five minutes Steve was thrusting himself into your mouth and down your throat. Every connection with the walls of your throat had him fist your hair until he pulled back from you letting his spit slick need bob between you. Steve kissed you again, but you pushed him to his back then climbed on top of him. When you rose onto your knees you locked eyes with him. He looked vulnerable and drunk off of desire and need. You’d never seen him like this before and you really liked it. this was not the Steve you’d known all these years. As you slowly slid onto his need his mouth dropped open, his head arched back, and his eyes rolled to the back of his head.

 “Fuck! It was a loud shout, it vibrated off the walls and you heard some of the snow fall outside. It turned you on immensely, so much that you intend to slowly guide him into your body, but you were now unable to go slow. As his wide girth stretched you his superior length filled you. soon you were rotating your hips on him and groaning every time his cock nudged your g-spot.

 “Mmm, fuck!” Your pants did not stop or slow down and when your hips picked up the pace to bouncing on his need, Steve’s hands were there to squeeze onto your hips. The force of it made you groan. Steve suddenly pumped his hips up into you sending a new set of pleasure waves.

 “Steve, yes!” Once the words escaped you were on your back with Steve taking control to snap his hip forward. His repetitive actions built a steady friction that you knew would bubble over any minute.

 “Shit, yes, yes, yes, right there Rogers. Right fucking there!”

 “Mmmm Y/N, you feel so good. So good!” The pitch in his voice was high. Forgetting the wound on your abdomen you pulled him to you and kissed him. His body collided with yours knocking the wind out of you, but you didn’t care, with he was doing to you felt too good.

 Steve went to your ear and kissed it. “Of course, I feel Y/N, I feel what you’re doing to me right now, what you’ve always done to me. Do you feel this?” He slammed his hips forward feeding you all of him. You grunted and clenched around him which made him grunt as well.

 “Fuck!” You smiled again and nodded, you couldn’t lie, you felt everything right now.

 “Mmm, fuck yes, yes,” was all you could muster, you felt your release building.

 “You make me want to lose control which makes me hold on harder to it. You bring out these human emotions I’ve buried for those hundred years.” Steve’s thrusts were getting sloppy and you knew he was close. He squeezed his eyes shut and groaned. The sweat rolling down his body made him look like a God and it turned you on even more.

 “Fuck Steve yes, make me come, I’m gonna come!”

 Your moans merged together creating a symphony of their own. You dug your nails into his back when you felt your release wash over you like a wave of fire. You shrieked out and clenched around him. Steve grunted and groaned and bucked his hips as he released everything he had. 

 “Fuuuuck!” Steve collapsed next to you and the two of you panted.

“Oh my god, that was incredible—you were incredible,” Steve rambled. You smirked, pinched your lips and looked at him.

 “You’re not so bad yourself Cap, once you let go.”

 There were three knocks, the two of you stilled.

 “Eh-em, Cap, Y/N—um, rescue is here.”

 “Do you still need that rescue? From the sounds coming from in there sounds like you’re good,” Tony chided.

 Your eyes were closed. This was never going to be forgotten. You would be teased about your hot hate fuck with Captain America in some abandoned cabin forever.

 “Y/N is injured. She needs real medicine,” he announced.

 “Ready when you are. By the way congrats on your first time,” Tony added. Your head snapped to Steve.

 “This is your—I was your—. You looked away and tried not to focus on any of it.

 Ten minutes later you were dressed and hobbling to the quinjet with Steve following close behind with a hand at your back. Once aboard Nat and Wanda helped you to a seat where Vision was waiting to assess you. Once you laid back and Vision took a look at your wound Steve approached.

 “How’s she doing?”

 “Pretty good form you have here Cap,” Vision said.

 “Thanks, it was hard as shit to do. I was sure I fucked it up.”

 All eyes swarmed to him in pure shock. You just smiled.

 “Language!” They all shouted in unison.

 He smiled and looked to you before he winked. 

“Ho, Ho, Ho, Merry Christmas Y/N.” You felt all heated and flustered. You had no idea what you’d just pulled out of Pandora’s Box.

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

TagList:

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[absintheum]

day 1 - brioni

ohSundown left the shore warm. You were always awake to watch the last rays of natural light, as the day approached it’s end and the night blended into it. You remember reading lines of a poem describing the moments of shift between the light and dark, but you can’t recall the exact words. Something about the rose-tinted fingers of the aurora and the tentacles of darkness holding gently onto the metaphorical hand. You never understood what the point of that poem was.

The moments in which you were alone on the shore were getting fewer and farther, between your self-imposed seclusion in your secondary hive and the quicksand pits that were beginning to engulf all of the shoreline of the island you called your first home. That and your sleeping habits’ change due to natural aging. Quicksand, you had learned, was one of life’s few certainties among taxes, death and the feeling of existential dread felt as you looked into the horizon at dusk, from a wave riding board placed strategically, so it would float on the may- or not yet- be quicksand. There was something cathartic about it. You couldn’t place it, nor name it, but there was a feeling worming its way inside of your pusher. It was a mixed feeling, which left notes of bitterness in your mouth and sweetness in your throat. You could never tell if it was positive or not.

After the sun had sunk below the line of ocean you called horizon, you got up, not bothering to brush off your wetsuited dress the sand that would be soon washed away by the saltwater. You had been clever in your youth: no matter the quicksand season and moment of cycle, you had installed a few paths of low-density wave riding boards. You had 8 sweeps of experience in not being dead via the sand; you were the unsinkable. The occasional piece of no troll’s treasure that would wash ashore couldn’t say the same.

Some, you had rescued out of curiosity and sparks of environmental awareness, while some were already so buried in that you couldn’t be bothered to dig them up. The quicksand giveth, the quicksand gaveth. That was the law of quicksand.

The sea floor was no exception: the conditions in the place you decided to construct your primary hive was just so perfect that in the correct season, the underwater floor itself could be dangerous (if the many sea lusii, including your own, weren’t already making the area a bit too cozy). Said season wasn’t due to kick in for a quarter at least, to your estimate. You’d take the smidgeon of added safety to dive in, swimming to the depths that allowed your favourite anemones to grow. The dive was always your favourite part of the day, it freshened up your mind and reminded you that you were alive, in one way. It was peaceful, to soak underwater and to allow your gills to breathe. To allow your fins to expand and contract to aid in your movements.

Your webbed hands had grown calloused from picking them- it stang, but you’d endure it. Compared to your medousoid lusus’, it was the gentle touch of a quadrantmate. The anemones you picked were more than what you’d have gotten last time, they filled the space in your arms as the gentle sting spread from your fingers and palms to the skin of your forearms. You sucked it up, the air of the night would be cooling enough. In two hours’ time, your skin would be good as new. In a way, it was similar to the practice of urchincupunture: eventually, you’d develop a resistance to the toxin and your skin would stay tense and smooth. You couldn’t eat the sea urchins needles, however.

Once the amount satisfied you and the sting became uncomfortable, you sprang upwards, to the surface. The shore had cooled down significantly, and so had the air. Your sore and slightly flushed skin felt relief, where it could. You ran on the boards and back inside, there was still work to be done before you could take a breather: anemones don’t milk themselves yet. You wish that was a saying, but you seemed to be the only user, despite the attempts to lure your friends into using it.

As you deposited the bounty of the dusk onto the table in the sliving room, you shook your arms, as if movement would soothe the dull ache (it didn’t, but it felt as if it was right to do so). You recounted the amount on your fingers and in your head and attempted to open your shelltop and almost jolted in a sudden wave of pain. How you managed to forget each time, it was above you.

You tried opening your shelltop again, using your teeth as leverage and your chin to guide the cruisor across the screen and open a flashing notification on a text box, and your voice to text before you even tried to think about typing.

--- hibisquisiteNatterer [HN] is bubbling to cnidarialClone [CC] ---

HN: v^v^ heeeeeyyyyyy bubble boo ^v^v HN: v^v^ are you awake yet? you should be, but in case you’re not ^v^v HN: v^v^ i miss you so much! the pile isn’t the same without you!! but!!! there is a new friend waiting for you!!!!! CC: ŒŒ== i’m awakŒ plŒnty and swanky CC: ŒŒ== i miss you tŒrribly too! just rŒsist thŒ wŒŒk, i’ll bŒ back soonŒr than a fresh bottlŒ of anŒmonŒ milk HN: v^v^ one entire week!! one week is too long!!! its an entire perigree’s time!!!!!! HN: v^v^ also i swear.. you... and your obscure figures of speech…… HN: v^v^ pale for you…. nonetheless…. but you do rip a shred of my soul when you mention it… CC: ŒŒ== i’ll sŒŒ to it pŒrsonally to throw it into a dronŒdustry standardizŒd papŒrwork shrŒddŒr whŒn i get thŒrŒ

You are a girl of simple pleasures. You love to torment your pale girlfriend with insufferable phrases nobody will use and she loves to call you “bubble boo”. You cannot deprive each other of this and you’re living for it.

HN: v^v^ sigh!!!!!!!!!!! ^v^v HN: v^v^ one week is an acceptable wait….. afterall…… HN: v^v^ ….. bubble boo…… HN: v^v^ >;D

What, are you supposed not to swoon?

CC: ŒŒ== palŒ for you too <> CC: ŒŒ== but i supposŒ that you’ll think again, for thŒrŒ is a dad hold on i’m ta- shit no dŒlŒtŒ dŒvlŒtŒ CC: ŒŒ== fuck nO WAIT CC: ŒŒ== SHIT HN: v^v^ are you on s2ht???????????? ^v^v CC: ONŒ MOMŒNT PLEASŒ

You disable the speech to text, again, with your chin. Your dad is awake and wants to be fed and you have to cut the chit-chat short. It was a good coincidence, however: your secret surprise of a gift can keep it’s title for another day. As the window is closed, you sigh. Dad knows it’s the day you leave again, this time for almost a perigree. He’d come with you, when you were younger, but you were well past the age of needing a chaperone to your love visits. Can’t blame a girl for wanting to enjoy the freedom of what is left of their fun years before the lacrosse bat of being hurled into space swung you into space.

At least feeding time was fun.

Your dad hunted for itself when it wanted to, but you also enjoyed looking from the glass walls of the uppest lower floor as the feeding brine was poured into his designated block  from a specifically designed pipe, and the thousands of tiny little crustacean were consumed. It made his mostly translucent body gain a faintly coloured tint between the violet of your blood and the purple of the caste below it. In a spark of childish genius, juvenile you had decided that the quickest way to make way to the lower floors of your primary home into the airlock of your submarine secondary one was going to be a slide, spiraling downwards. It was a bad decision and sometimes you’d bring a book to read until motion sickness kicked in. The stairs were added in a second moment, as you matured a sense for interior design and a taste for not being hurled face-first into the steel walls of a submarine. That last part was solved with padding the area of presumed landing.

Landing face-first into plush and pillow is way more pleasant.

Remembering you left the key item for the event upstairs isn’t. Begrudgingly climbing up enough sets of stairs to give you quads for days wasn’t either.

A second slide gave you time to contemplate that maybe you should have rethought the design of this slide entirely and not have taken it a second time. A second thump that accompanied your arrival at the plush landing station confirmed your thoughts.  A look at the clutched anemones confirms they are still intact, and relief  accompanies that. Their sting has subsided, finally they can be refined as your recipe intends. Your submarine is fully equipped and furnished, ready to leave at the snap of your fingers. You’re ready to depart and from the windows of the piloting chamber, the dark depths look into you. You look up and back into the dark night waters. You can barely make out the speck that is supposed to be the green moon. You flip the autopilot switch on and let the whirring of machinery soothe the loneliness.

[laur-rants]

Transfiguration -- Ch 1: Awake

Fandom: Doom Rating: Mature, because violence against demons Pairing: Sam/Slayer [eventually] Summary: The Slayer has beaten the Icon of Sin, but the work is far from over. There is still much, MUCH to be done. Notes: Yeah. I said I’d write Doom fanfic. Why? Because it’s gay to travel between dimensions and realms just to meet back up with the demigod you helped create, and are determined to save humanity because of him. Anyway enjoy I don’t know what I’m even doing with this. *throws it into the void* AO3 Link Next Chapter

---------- "There is a common saying among the peoples of humanity; 'history is written by the victors.' It is one of their species's constants, a phrase found across the divides. Thus, it can be gleaned that regardless of realms, of region, that history is full of lies. Only those who lost their respective battles yet still managed to survive those considered to be the holders of the more accurate accounts of events. But how many survivors never tell the truth? How many live in fear, unable to share the knowledge they have born witness to?

"I refute being a fearful survivor. Though the 'victors' may say otherwise, I was advised to disappear by the Father himself, to run from my own species in order to save it. The words of prophecy have been set into motion; there are coming events even he cannot stop. I have seen the future, infallible now. The battle is lost, but not the war.

I am Samur. I am the holder of the witnessed truth. I will profess it to you as long as I am alive, and as long as I am able.

Father, if you are listening, please have mercy on my consciousness."

-- Book of the Maykr Samur, pt 1

When he wakes up, it is not in the bed he fell asleep in. He stares up at the bright white of a too-clean ceiling, hears the steady beep of machinery and -- voices, there were voices nearby. Too many for him to still be in the lonely fortress he calls home, a fact that is enough to clear any fog clouding his mind. In one swift movement he's sitting up, his body aching and protesting this sudden change in verticality but he ignores the pain entirely, legs swinging over the side of the bed in an effort to move.

One of the earlier voices shouts, clearer and sharper now-- definitely real and not like the fabrications he's used to. He ignores them for now nonetheless; more urgent is the machinery yelling at him from the bedside. He frowns, pulling off cords and sensors, highly disapproving of the medical gown he's found himself in. Damnit, where the fuck is my suit, he thinks, even as a doctor with black hair and green eyes behind jeweled glasses rushes over to put a hand on his chest and try and push him back down to a prone position.

"Ah, sorry, mister Slayer, sir," the doctor fumbles, trying and failing to even budge the man, the wall of muscle staying stubbornly in place. The aforementioned Slayer watches her take a step back, purse her lips, then push against him, a little more insistently. "I really need you to lay back down. You're already starting to bleed through your bandages."

He blinks and looks down through the smock; most if not all of his upper body was bandaged and wrapped. A particular wrapping on his left arm was indeed bleeding, the pain barely registering even as the splotch of red grows, spreading fast through the fabric. He lets out a small noncommittal noise (causing the doctor to jerk back suddenly in surprise) as he starts to unwrap the bandages himself. A group of nurses and medical staff immediately crowd into the room, urging the Slayer to please stop, to let them handle such work.

Sure enough, as the medical staff peel away the sticky fabric, a nasty gash is revealed, running from the top of his bicep to the underside of his arm all the way to the armpit. It had been sutured shut but as the Slayer had stood up it had easily popped open and was now bleeding freely. He looks to the rolls of soaked bandages, looks to his seeping arm, and appears... apologetic, of all things. The doctor sighs, gives the man known only as the Doom Slayer a quick look over, then fetches new bandages and sutures.

"You're probably wondering why you're here, and have a lot of questions." She looks over to him, expecting some sort of response-- but when he says nothing or doesn't refute her words, she clears her throat, pushing a lock of hair behind an ear. "Or perhaps not. Either way, we received a distress signal, and found your ship. You were in a rough state, possibly connected to the recent fight with the Icon of... Sin…"

She trails off as she sees the Slayer's face harden like stone. She coughs lightly a second time, the color rising to her cheeks. "Apologies. The original transmission was sent by Dr. Hayden himself, so ARC forces immediately responded -- but we did not expect to find you in an alien ship bleeding out on the floor, nor did we expect to see it powered by the Crucible, or to hear Hayden communicating from--" The doctor continued on, but the Slayer was far past the point of listening. Instead, his brow furrows, trying to recall what had happened post attack.

The fight itself had been a blur. The demons had fallen before his wrath and Dr. Samuel Hayden had been in his ear, egging him on until the end, when finally the Icon was there, the only obstacle still standing. It was only so long before the huge titan of Hell itself was falling to his might. He had stood tall, victorious, fueled by rage and adrenaline. And then Hayden had portaled him back... but from there, his memory begins to blur. How had he been injured, exactly? Surely he had at least made it back to his room before--

"Slayer? Sir?"

His eyes flick to the doctor and again his gaze is enough to make her flinch. His fist clenches before relaxing again. He sighs. He closes his eyes, steadying himself, before tilting his head at her in question.

Her throat clears. "You zoned out, my apologies. I wanted to let you know that your stitches are fixed and you're rebandaged. We recommend a few days bed rest -- you may not feel the pain and you will not die from the wounds but--" her eyebrows go up, shaking her head in mild disbelief, "--regardless of your perceived immortality... you are human and you need rest. Now. Do you have any questions?"

The Slayer scowls at her, and the longer she waits for an answer the deeper the scowl grows. Eventually he rolls his eyes, then gestures to his body. She seems to get the hint.

"Oh, your suit?" He nods. "It is in the other room, currently being cleaned. We can bring it in here if you'd like?" The Slayer nods, then crosses his arms --carefully, so the doctor didn't have to re-stitch his arm a third time. "I can also assure you that your ship is secure; Hayden made sure of that, and he is also currently working with ARC scientists to repair the parts of his body that were broken."

As the woman talked, her face grew more flushed, and she continued to avert her eyes. It was at this point that the Slayer realized her voice was familiar. He scrutinizes her, unblinking, head tilted, arms still crossed, before he finally clears his throat, prompting her to stop any rambling she was currently involved in. She squeaks and her cheeks go a bright red, but it is enough to stop her momentarily.

"Oh! Do you need water? Can you speak?"

Not to you, lady, is what he would've said, but instead he simply thinks it to himself while managing to shake his head in response to both. He sighs, sitting back. When even was the last time he was in a hospital? It was more than a lifetime ago, on a different Earth, in a different realm, with different doctors with similar agendas looking him over, wondering his secrets when he argued that he had none to give.

Now he had too many secrets and a vow of silence keeping him from spilling any of them. Not that he'd want to, anyway. And definitely not to this doctor in over her head.

"Of course, of course. Well, ah, if you need anything, my name is Dr. Elena Richardson. Feel free to call if anything, anything at all, is needed." She pats his arm awkwardly and it clicks in his memory; the audio logs. Good Lord, it was her. He gives her a brief nod and smile before looking away and she backs off, blessedly leaving him alone.

He sits there.

Then, less than a minute later, Slayer decides he's been sitting long enough.

Lost in thought, he swings his legs over the side of the bed, taking in the surroundings more fully. His room was isolated, a few monitors tracking not only his vitals, but a few other things, such as blood type, foreign bodies, a chart detailing his wounds. The room smells too clean, like when someone needs to disinfect every inch of every surface, but at least it wasn't tainted with the smell of blood and corruption. At least, not yet.

Or perhaps, not anymore.

Perhaps there was a reason for the burning scent of bleach in his nose, after all.

His fingers tap against the mattress, keeping time with an unheard beat, but then the tempo quickens to impatience. This was not going to be a place he wanted to stay, and certainly not for a few more days, let alone a few more hours. He looks around, glances at the ceiling and windows, checks his condition, and plans.

------

In a different room, in a different part of the complex, in a very different condition...the body of Dr. Samuel Hayden awakens.

Well. Perhaps awaken is not the right word. Waking up implies the lack of a consciousness, whereas Hayden has always been quite aware of his surroundings. For the past seven years or so he's been vaguely aware of scientists watching his body, was even roughly aware of the Doom Slayer as he pulled the remnants of his body away from ARC tech, tossing him unceremoniously through a portal onto the fortress ship the Slayer called home. Things became much clearer and sharper after connecting with the ship and drawing power from it; however, there was a difference between living within the confines of a ship's mainframe for the better part of a month, and being within a body that now fully functioned, with joints that bent when he willed them to. Having a robot chassis did make life complicated sometimes… but being able to return to functional legs years after they'd been ripped off, was definitely a bonus.

With the return of his fully-functioning cyborg body, the sleek black-and-white frame towering 3 feet over the next tallest person, he did feel conscious again for the first time in years-- so if that counted towards "awake", then the word was fitting for his current mental state after all.

"Thank you, Simon," Hayden says, refitting his right arm with his left, his blue LED blinking bright inside his skull. The bald doctor, overseeing the reattachment of the arm, just nods, fixing his glasses. "I think for now, that'll be all. Keep studying the ship while you can; if it can help rebuild me, it can help rebuild others."

His voice was deep, warbled, slightly digital; like it was still getting used to speaking from the chassis, and not from the ship's internal comm system. Nevertheless the scientist didn't seem to mind. He just responds with "of course, sir," and heads off in the direction of the door, passing many other scientists deep in their work as he does so. Hayden rubs a wrist and, --as a few ARC scientists flit around him, removing cables and wires full of man-made Argent-- he takes his first steps with his new pair of legs.

"We have much to do," Hayden states, with an air of authority and urgency. "With the Icon of Sin dead, we need to move towards eradicating any remaining demonic forces before those in space can return to Earth." He turns to the nearest scientist, a woman with bushy red hair and freckles. "How is our guest holding up?"

"Richardson has reported that he is awake and responsive, but we do not know how long he will tolerate being subject to more tests. He's already popped sutures simply by trying to get up."

Hayden tilts his head. "How long ago was this report?"

"An hour ago now." She checks her notes and then looks up at the towering cyborg. "Why?"

As if on cue, an alarm goes off. Hayden looks over, checking a nearby monitor: as suspected, it's from Medical Bay H. The redhead looks incredibly concerned, her eyes going wide.

"O-oh," she says, as a hulking form of muscle and sinew, dressed only in a medical gown, struts past a security camera. The subject looks around then walks up to a nearby doctor, tapping them on the shoulder before "borrowing" their key card lanyard. He uses it on a nearby door, tossing the lanyard back to doctor before entering the room and surveying the object of his desire: a powerful space-faring suit of alien make and design.

Hayden sighs. Of course. He turns away and walks towards the door.

"Sir?" Says the scientist manning the security camera. "Should we… can we… stop him?" There was a futility to his tone; everyone here had a right to be concerned. Even if the humans in ARC weren't corrupt or demonic, the collateral damage the Doom Slayer could cause was well-documented. The hole Mars now sported was evidence enough of what he was capable of.

"Invite him to see me in Complex Wing B, room 235. Don't try and stop him; I can guarantee you won't be able to." There's a dark chuckle there, a dry amusement, but Hayden shakes his head anyway. He continues his trajectory, leaving the room where had been reassembled, opening up a comm line with the Slayer directly.

"Long time no see, so to speak. How about we meet, face to face, one more time? There's much we need to discuss."

[clairenchanted]

wild sage; ocean spray; the earth in the high, dry summer. 

a few things you remember, in no particular order. / previous. 

o1. the room is dark and quiet with every thing that made it alive petering into nothing in the growing night. the television screen has gone to the complacent blue of the movie menu, and it spills insubstantially over kate’s face. it makes her face soft where it’s pressed against her arm and where her arm is pressed against ray’s. the shadows cast by ray’s hair grow darker, but he bleeds into light in the glow the further down his face is illuminated. 

you cannot see victoria. she is sleeping on your shoulder. your back is against the legs of the bed, and you are on fire where she is draped against your side, you are on fire in every place that she touches you and you hold her unintentionally upright. you don’t understand what it means, to feel so blindingly alive in a room so dark and still. you don’t understand how you have not burned down the bedsheets at your back, the carpet under your thighs, the delicate and infinitely breakable form of her cheek her elbow her knee jammed up into yours. 

it’s too quiet and far too loud. you sit for hours trying tread the water of your desperation, aching to understand why you are so acutely aware of your body. you don’t fall asleep. 

o2. you look at your reflection in your sister’s mirror. you try to understand what you look like in her sweater, turning a little to catch the light in the slivery threads that slip through the seams almost unnoticed until you see them the right way. emma shifts on the bed. you hear the way sheets shift under her. you wait for her to say something; the tension in the silence wraps around your throat and begs for your voice. 

deep maroon. you wonder if it’s too dark for you. 

i don’t know, she finally says, with the precision of a scalpel. 

what don’t you know? you don’t ask. 

a little more silence. you think about how short golden hour lasts, and how much you’ll blend into the shadows of the basement as the party lasts so much longer. 

she sighs. i don’t think it fits you right. 

you don’t know what to say to that, or why you want to say anything. but the chord wraps tighter and you scramble to find the release: can you argue? do you want this? does it matter? what could you possibly need help with? 

you look at emma’s reflection over your shoulder in the cool glass. your lips part; you don’t say anything. you take off the sweater and give it back. 

o3. no one says anything on the ride back home from the police station. you stare out the window of the SUV and idly note the landmarks that pass by. you don’t remember the questions you answered, and you never asked about the paperwork that was filled out. you turn the memory of your father on the phone over in your mind for as long as you remember to -- something about forms, something about documents -- and then it’s gone. 

the pitcher sage is growing. it’s april, so this makes sense. you know something about pitcher sage, or maybe you remember something, but the thought ebbs out to sea. you can’t smell them from here anyway, and you’ve never been anything but neutral towards plants. 

when you get home, the foyer feels a little larger than you thought it was. maybe the ceilings are higher. something hot presses against your elbow; by the time you turn, emma is already a few paces ahead. you catch only the tail end of her look, the last pointed hook of it, before she is gone up the stairs. in the distance, echoing in this too big and meticulously kept foyer, the slamming of her bedroom door is the only sound. 

your mother is wearing all black. she stands a few feet away from you at the crossroads where the living room branches off from the stairs. you watch her, cataloguing the things about her that stand out: her perfected waves frizzing at the ends; her lipstick smudging just at the corner of her mouth; the front of her dress is wrinkled. you don’t know why these details whisper to you, and you don’t know why you should care. 

o4. when you and victoria are nine, you realize the true extent of your power. it’s a hot day -- it’s too hot in a way that it never really gets in california, all sticky with rare, heavy storm clouds gathering on the horizon. every time you shift in the sand, it burns your skin where it’s bare. it hurts. the back of your throat burns and it’s stupid -- it’s just a stupidly hot day -- but the moment your face turns red and your eyes sting, there’s a sticky, familiar hand on your shoulder. 

c’mon, she says. she takes your hand and helps you stand. i think i have enough for ices. 

she doesn’t, and you want to cry because victoria is so nice and it feels so unfair that you’re just fifty cents short. your throat aches; you want to yell, even though it’s useless and selfish and bratty. even though you know better. it’s hot and it’s not fair and you just want to eat ices with your best friend in the whole world so you can stay out here and not go back home. 

aw. the ice seller guy probably isn’t as old as your parents but he’s old to you. you wonder if he’ll get mad at you both, but something breaks in his expression and he hands v’s money back to her along with two little ices, lemon and cherry. don’t worry about it, girls. 

this is a magnificent superpower, but you both whisper to each other that you need to be careful with it. you laugh when v’s lips turn bright red as she eats, and then you can’t stop laughing just, just because. 

o5. the hallways are packed with the throng. you marvel at the fact that you haven’t been trampled yet; you dread it, you dread its certain coming. you press yourself against the back of lockers, hugging your books to your chest. room 205 must exist somewhere but it doesn’t exist here and you don’t know which way to go. 

more important things don’t exist here: the ocean spray, the smell of pitcher sage, the tang of lemon ices from the boardwalk. the burning heat of the august sun and victoria next to you. you knew this would happen once high school started -- you’re right and for a moment, anger lashes up your chest and into your throat. how dare the world be so large and loud and so lacking of anything that you can cling to and understand with each intimate breath. how dare the world do this to you, how dare it take you here without your permission and ask you to deal with it. 

you manage to make it to english just as the bell rings. you sit in the back row, and you spend half the lesson curling notebook paper around your pencil. 

o6. there has never been a bigger deal than the junior class trip. your grades have been immaculate -- straight a’s, a glowing report card, a need for nothing more at the fall’s parent teacher conference -- and you find yourself with a signed permission slip and a check for mr. chester. 

we have basically two full days, v says solemnly, the two of you leaning over her spiral edged notebook. so we have to plan strategically. if we start with skiing, we’re not going to have time for anything else. 

you picture mammoth mountain’s snow capped peaks, soaring high above the hot desert valley below. you picture leaving the heat-packed sand behind, forgetting the dry earth. you think of cute hats and gloves and scarves, and try to imagine what it feels to look at your own outfit on your own body with approval. with excitement. maybe you’ll manage it -- maybe you’ll leave the constant, gnawing anxiety behind in southern california behind for a weekend. 

okay, you say, imagining v’s face red with the cold -- the tip of her nose, the tops of her ears. you smile to yourself and look at the notebook. do we have any time to hang out in the lodge? 

absolutely not, she says primly, everything under control. this is a once in a lifetime thing until we get into some fabulous east coast college and we can go skiing all the time. 

in between classes. 

sure, sure. now look, if we do snow tubing and ice skating first, we have the whole second day to figure out the skiing and snowboarding trails. 

you picture spinning in concentric circles over and over, hands linked, gentle guitar-heavy music wrapped around the scene. you nod. 

sounds great. 

we also have to sit with felicity for like, most of the time. 

-- felicity? you wonder sharply. felicity? you ask gently. 

she’s been making eyes at jake for like, the entire semester. she chews the words, deliberate and hard edged. something’s up. keep your enemies close, gus. 

you are cold. you are very cold. you breathe through it and look at the schedule printed in v’s spiky, flowing script. oh. i didn’t realize that was still a thing. 

it’s not anything. not yet. but i’m not going to let something just -- just happen between them. you know how i feel about jake. 

do you? you should. you should know everything about v. you watch the notebook, and you tell yourself you’re not cold. right, sorry. 

no worries. v waves a hand like it’s not a big deal. like it’s not important. that’s okay. it’s okay. just help me, okay? 

this is part of your world now: the smell of books, the off white lighting, the hallways of your same old high school. but it suddenly feels very, very large again and you don’t know how to form the words. 

okay? she asks idly, not looking at you. 

you nod. 

o7. three days after you all come home -- from the funeral by way of the police station -- your mother opens the door to your room. it’s past midnight. you blink at the sudden light, waiting until her silhouette resolves into something familiar. 

she jumps a little when she sees you. you don’t understand why. 

my god, she says. why are you awake? 

you don’t know, so you don’t answer. 

you watch her as she stands there, eclipsed by the low light in the hallway. part of you wonders, briefly, why she’s here, but then in the next wave the curiosity is dragged back out and you are left alone in your bed. 

she finally moves. you don’t know how long it took her. she presses the door behind you until it is still open but only just. she crosses the room. she stands by the side of your bed. she sits, so close to the edge you think she might fall off. she reaches out and you blink when heat -- searing, brilliant, entirely strange -- covers the back of your hand. you feel her flinch, and you look down at her hand then back up at her face. 

-- august. there is something rough in her voice that you don’t remember -- catching, steely, ragged. rusty. she reaches forward, pressing a hand to your face. her eyes are wide, brows up. she looks as if she’s searching for something, but you don’t know what it could be so you say nothing. 

in one motion -- sharp but fluid -- she wraps her arms around your shoulders. you don’t move, but you don’t feel the need to pull away. august, she says, as if there is something to excavate in the depths of your name. august. please, can you -- please? 

you don’t know what she’s asking, so you cannot answer. 

in shattered pieces, she pulls back. she looks at you, one hand still on your shoulder. her expression pinches more, still at her eyes and lips. august, can you please say something? 

what? you try to ask, because this seems like the most logical question, but you try for the sound and it rasps in the back of your throat, stinging with seawater. you grow colder. you try again, and nothing comes out. 

your mother’s expression draws darker. she lets go of your shoulder. coldness rushes in to replace the burning warmth. i don’t know why you’re being like this. i don’t know why i try. 

you don’t know either. there’s nothing you can say as she gets up and leaves, closing the door behind her. 

[wingsofhcpe]

BSD Rarepair Valentine’s Week- Day 4

hosted by @bsd-rarepair-valentines-week​

pairing: hawmitch

rating: T to be safe

prompt:

saint ♡ desperate

“I cannot let you burn me up, nor can I resist you. No mere human can stand in a fire and not be consumed.”

-A.S. Byatt, Possession

Nathaniel often liked to just watch Margaret while she slept.

Even after the whole ordeal with Fyodor had been over and done with, he had found out he had trouble sleeping at night. There were nightmares, almost constantly; pain and fear and above all, the souls of the people that Fyodor had made him kill, damning him to eternal Hell with their otherworldly, ghastly cries.

Oh, Nathaniel knew he was going to Hell of all his unpardonable sins. But for the time being, he was alive, in a world that was neither Heaven nor Hell; only what one made of it by themselves. And as such he was willing to make the most of it, especially while the angel that was Margaret Mitchell was by his side.

So during those haunting nights when sleep eluded him, when even closing his eyes just for a moment caused blood and horrors to flash behind his lids, he stayed awake, ever vigilant by the side of his sleeping beauty. Focusing on Margaret’s beautiful face instead, his fingers often gently touching her long brown hair -always gentle, always careful not to wake her. And so he remained, until the early hours of dawn, when the blush of the oncoming daylight began to break through the darkness of the night. Only then would Nathaniel sleep, submitting to an exhausted, dreamless slumber he could no longer postpone.

Tonight was the same as always; hardly past 2 AM, with Margaret deep into sleep and him laying ever vigilant by her side. She looked so calm and untroubled, peaceful in a way she rarely seemed while awake. Nathaniel longed to join her in the land of dreams, yet he feared that would bring him nothing but nightmares and agony. He just didn’t feel brave enough to face it all just yet, even if his entire body ached with the day’s Guild-related duties and his eyes burned with the need for even a few minutes of rest.

But Nathaniel simply ignored it all. Instead, he continued to look at Margaret, his anchor to this unforgiving world. She seemed so enchantingly beautiful, and innocent, when asleep, as if she was a fairy-tale princess put under a wizard’s spell. Her breath came out soft and steady, one arm folded under her head while the other rested atop her stomach underneath the woolen blanket. Her hair was splayed around her saintly face like a honey-brown halo of the most unique angel. Nathaniel smiled to himself a little; he’d never regret trying to save her, even after everything he’d gone through. He’d sell himself to Fyodor all over again if needed be. Even if his soul was doomed to rot in Hell, he’d make sure to preserve Margaret’s heavenly radiance.

So absorbed he was into those thoughts of love and sacrifice, that he barely noticed Margaret’s eyes fluttering open (perhaps having sensed his devoted wake). Her rosy lips immediately formed a pout, and she turned to her side to be able to look at him.

“Still awake…?” She mumbled tiredly, still somewhat suspended in her previous sleeping state. “What time is it?”

“Shh… don’t worry about that. Go back to sleep my love.” He pulled her gently into his arms and placed a kiss on the top of her head.

“Well, you’re not sleeping.” She snuggled against him, getting comfortable and enjoying the warmth. “Care to tell me why?”

Nathaniel tensed a little, holding back an uneasy sigh. He wasn’t a good liar in the first place, and Margaret had a knack for sniffing out all of his excuses without the slightest bit of effort.

“…Nightmares.” He whispered eventually. “But don’t worry. I promise I’ll be fine.”

“Mhm… Liar.” Predictably, Margaret didn’t buy it. She sounded worried, too, which made Nathaniel feel all the more heavy with guilt. “C’mon… if you get nightmares I’ll be there for you, okay?”

Nathaniel allowed himself a small sad smile. “I know dearest. I trust you.”

“But?”

“But…” He sighed. “I’m scared.”

Margaret adjusted her position a little, in order to be able to look at him properly- her deep violet eyes glinting with concern.

“Darling… Don’t be.” She murmured as her hand came up to caress his face tenderly. “It’s not real. None of it is. Only us.”

“Only us…” Nathaniel repeated quietly, if only so he could make himself believe in her words. “God, Margaret…”

He clung to her, burying his face in her hair, desperate to feel her there with him. To know that she was real, and not one of Fyodor’s sick and twisted mind games.

“I need you…”

In response, she nuzzled his neck and kissed him gently.

“And I’ll always be here for you.” She searched for his hand underneath the covers. Squeezing it into her own as soon as she found it; her fingers carefully tracing the numerous scars that marked his palm.

“You deserve happiness, Nathaniel. You’re a good man.” She continued. Her voice might have been quiet, but she hoped the sheer emotion lacing it would make clear how much she truly believed what she was saying.

“I…” No, he could not believe it. Not yet at least. It was all too recent, his crimes and sins too raw and his wounds too fresh. Perhaps though, he could at least try. He could attempt to forgive himself, if only for Margaret’s sake.

“It’s because of you, Margie.” He managed eventually. “You’re my saviour.”

“And you mine.” She granted him her most loving smile. “And I will never stop reminding it to you. So… please. Try, for me. Try to face your fears, and I promise I’ll be with you through it all.”

Nathaniel didn’t speak, only held her tight against him; his heart clenching and his eyes almost brimming with tears with the intensity of his love for her.

“For you… I’ll try my best, my angel.” He murmured, not letting her go. In return, Margaret wrapped her arms around him as well, so that their bodies were tangled into one single heap.

“I love you. That will never change.”

“Love you too.” He couldn’t help but smile at last, full of affection. “Will you go back to sleep now, my princess?”

She faked a frown. “Only if you do.”

“I… Okay. I promise.”

“Good.” She hummed out a laugh, kissing his cheek. “G’night darlin’...”

She was easily asleep a few minutes later, as if she’d never even woken up; and Nathaniel was once again left alone with his thoughts. He’d promised he’d try his earnest, though, and even if it scared him he intended to honour that promise. Her words had wrapped themselves around his heart, to the point he might have almost started to believe them. He trusted her after all. More than anything in this life, an on to the next one.

Maybe, that trust would prove enough to be his redemption. After all, if one could save his soul, that could be none other than his darling, his beloved Margaret.

[realm-sweet-realm]

What have I done?

This is chapter two of the body swap to the death au. I really like this one and hope you do, too.

---

It was day two, and now was Henry’s time to begin implementing his plan. As far as confidence went, he felt good. Physically, he felt as weak as a man thirty years older; like his legs were struggling to handle his weight. He’d felt kind of off the day before, but not like this. Joey’s note hadn’t mentioned anything about physical illness.

Well, hopefully it wasn’t anything that would need attention. Henry burst into the recording studio and announced, “Good morning, everyone! I trust that you’re all doing an efficient job? Well, that’s great, because I have lots of changes to make and they need to be made by the deadline. Essentially, scrap the whole episode. We’re doing the next episode in our queue instead this week!”

An almost goofily large on his face, Henry approached Jack, trying not to limp, and trying to read everyone’s expressions. “Jack, we’re going to need you to write a new song. Something... 4th of July based.” The puffy-faced pout was very Bertrum Piedmont-like, but that could have just been because they had somewhat similar faces.

“Sammy, you’ll be collaborating with Jack,” Henry had expected at least a little annoyance that Sammy, an award-winning and (in Sammy’s mind, at least) chronically under-appreciated composer, was being treated as less important than Jack. Instead, Sammy just nodded indifferently. Not much of a hint.

“Allison, you can stay where you are. The new lines are ready for you to start recording, and I’m sure the song won’t take long.” Indifference. No hints. Darn.

“And Alice? Well, there’s no bit parts for you in the new episode, so I’ve put your shows and meet-and-greets back on the table. Your first show is this afternoon.”

Oh, Thomas did not like the sound of that. “Oh, I’m sorry,” he cooed in an exaggeratedly girly voice. “I’m going to have to go home sick. I could handle recording some lines, but shows are just too much for me right now. I have a fever.” Goddamnit, of all illnesses to fake, he had to go with the body producing too much heat. Still, he walked out, keeping his temper under control until he was just outside their view and could finally slip out of this idiotic persona. Maybe he’d stay home for the rest of the week. He sure as hell wasn’t singing. Even disregarding his desires, Susie seemed like a nice girl and it would probably ruin Susie’s reputation.

“And if anyone thinks there will be any trouble meeting the deadline, arrange to meet in my office,” “Joey” finished. Of course, they all would. And then Henry could test them further.

One person even took him up on the offer that day: “Sammy,” who had asked to meet him in his last available time slot that day.

When “Sammy” entered, he closed the door and smiled as though he’d barricaded them in. Henry’s pulse quickened.

“Alright, I’ll make this quick. I’m not here about the deadline, and I’m not here to figure out your identity, either. In fact, I’ll tell you mine if you can do one little thing for me.” Sammy walked over and sat on Joey desk.

Henry was flustered. “What? What do you want?”

“Take me to “your” home. I know “you” have secrets you’re hiding.”

Henry had some ideas, but didn’t feel sure of a single identity yet. He needed that identity to stay alive. “Sure,” he answered.

“Sammy” smiled. “Wonderful. But no identity until I’m satisfied, understood?” Allison leaned over and stroked “Joey” under the chin. She loved this. She was getting high on this. Getting the upper hand on Joey, flustering him by letting her seductive side out to play, and getting to learn his secrets? Impulsive and stupid this might be, but she must have been dreaming.

“Please don’t touch me,” Henry said, brushing her hand away. “I suppose we can leave now, since you’re the last one I’m meeting with.”

They set off. On the way there, Allison was tempted to make fun of Joey’s limp, as she’d wanted to do for ages. She figured she ought to dial back the meanness, though. As fun as this was, this wasn’t actually Joey. For all she knew, she could have been bullying Jack, or Susie, or Tom. Yes, from then on, she’d be kind to “Joey.”

Joey lived in the penthouse of one of the apartment buildings downtown, and surprisingly enough, Henry hadn’t found anything out of the ordinary there. Then again, he hadn’t exactly been looking, let alone hunting like “Sammy” was. The first thing he did was to go through every room, quickly checking every door until he came upon one that was locked. “Your keys,” she demanded, putting out her hand for them. Henry handed them over. After every key had been tried, “Sammy” handed them back and immediately marched to Joey’s bedroom and began going through the drawers.

“Uh... can you have a little respect for his privacy?” Henry requested.

“Sorry. Not until I have a key.”

Resigned, Henry obeyed his aching legs and sat down on the bed as “Sammy” continued to turn the room inside out.

“Aha! This drawer has a false bottom! Lemme just unscrew this, and...”

How on earth was Henry going to explain to Joey why his furniture was dismantled? He was pretty sure that “Sammy” had either lost it or was up to something, but he was too tired to stop him.

Allison lifted up the plank, which had been held in place by a single screw. It was a lighter colour than the rest of the desk, and underneath it was a bottom that matched the rest of it. Slowly, she turned the board over to reveal exactly what she’d hoped for: a taped-on key.

The key fit the lock perfectly. What was on the other side of that door was enough that she was almost scared to go in alone. “Joey, you need to come see this!” she called before entering.

The room was about the size of a guest bedroom, and in fact did have a bed shoved into a corner, with a lamp and a few other items of furniture piled onto it. In the other corner, the carpet had been pulled back almost halfway across the room to reveal concrete floor with three pentagrams drawn on it and a few smaller symbols in between them. There was a bookshelf as well, halfway filled with big, black, unlabelled books. The other half of it was occupied by jars, containing dried plants, unidentifiable red and black fluids, and other items that Allison couldn’t identify. On a nearby desk was a cage filled with at least a dozen live rats, many of which were currently feeding on a dead rat. The desk also contained several more jars of indeterminate contents, and a diary with the words “ritual log,” written on the front in Joey’s extravagant handwriting.

“Oh, Joey, what have you been doing...?” “Joey’s” voice came from behind her.

“Sure you don’t want to back out now?” Allison asked, eyes trained forwards. This was more than she ever dreamed of finding.

“No.” Henry said. The note hadn’t said anything about pets, or, as the rats seemed to be, specimens. Henry had heard them squeak, but he’d just assumed that the place had a pest problem. Whatever Joey was hiding, he was willing to let them go without care for a week to keep it hidden.

“Alright. Then let’s find out,” Allison said, making a beeline for the ritual log. “Interesting. It seems like he uses the same spell every day or two.”

“Which one?” Henry asked, but Allison was engrossed, flipping back, looking for a specific date. When she got to it, well, its entry didn’t shock her, but it was upsetting. And it needed to be shared.

“I’m taking this home,” Allison stated, and made her way to the door.

“Sammy, I can’t let you do that! I don’t even know who you are!”

“Are you strong enough to stop me?” Allison nearly snapped, attempting to push her way past him. As it turned out, he was. Barely.

“Can’t you just tell me what this is about?”

“No. I don’t know who you are.”

“It seems to me that this is more important than that. I’m Henry Stein. And you are?”

“Susie Campbell,” Allison replied. Allison had planned on saying that since the walk over. This way, she was not only protecting herself, but as a bonus, she was protecting Susie, should Henry try to find her. Plus, after the fool she’d made of herself in his office, well, no one else would have been believable.

“Can I see the book now?” Henry asked.

Allison opened it to the proper page.

April 20th, 1941.

Ritual: creation of ink creature (soul in forefront, failure)

Details: Sammy Lawrence and I had Susie Campbell meet us in the studio after hours. She had consented beforehand and is a skilled actress, so instead of burying her soul under the essence of a cartoon character like in previous rituals like this, I decided to let her essentially be an ink-skin actress. We used chloroform to get her unconscious and began the ritual in book 3, page 219. However, she woke up before we could complete the ritual as Sammy and I wasted too much time arguing. (Note: next time make much stronger chloroform. Susie is very light, and even she wasn’t out very long.) We had already begun the chant and could not stop until the ritual was complete, so we had to slit her throat while she was awake.

There were further complications when a bit of film was twisted in the machine, and Susie came out as a nondescript ink blob. Her level of consciousness in this form is unclear. I think that the trapped demon in the machine must have had its will entirely extinguished at this point- if it were still conscious, it might have asked what I wanted when the reel made it unclear. It’s just a cog in the machine now, just as planned.

Allison turned the page.

April 20th, 1941.

Ritual: creation of an ink creature (soul in forefront, success.)

After I had fixed the film reel, we repeated the ritual described on the last page. She emerged from the ink machine a perfect Alice Angel, and physically unharmed. Her corpse was embalmed and then disposed of in the sewer. This was highly successful: she should be doing shows within a matter of days. Unfortunately, I cannot foresee anyone else consenting to this ritual, so I will have to continue with the older variant of the spell.

“Oh my God,” was all Henry could think to say. “I mean, I knew he’d killed-“ his eyes fell on “Sammy” with absolute pity for a moment, then fell to the ground, “but I didn’t know that he was killing people who hadn’t agreed to it. The way he’s writing, you’re not the first or the last.”

“You see? We have to turn this in.” Allison forced a tearful tone into her voice, as Susie might have if she were reading about her murder. “We have to give it to the police.”

“Absolutely. But... can we do it at the end of the week? I mean, if they arrest me, I’m going to die. I need to find at least one more identity. But I promise, I’ll hand him over, Susie.”

“Thank you,” she croaked before turning to leave.

“Oh, uh, one more thing-“

“Yes?”

Henry gently stroked Susie’s arm. “This is only if it won’t be emotionally hard for you. But since you’re in Sammy’s body, could you bring me that picture of your dead body? You know, as evidence?”

“Of course,” Allison said. She was happy to get out of there. To think that just a couple hours ago, she’d been engrossed the mystery of all of the secrets that she’d just sensed beneath Joey’s skin. But none of it was worth it. Not if it required hurting people. But... what if not all of those spells did require hurting people? What if there were some simpler, less violent, but still fantastic spells that she’d just missed her chance at finding? She tried to block out the thought, and the hunger it aroused in her. It was a struggle, at least she had her special revenge plan for Sammy to look forward to.

Henry stayed in Joey’s dungeon for quite a while after “Sammy” had left. The first thing he did was to look for a specific date in the book: the day that he and the others had been forced to watch the memories. He found it:

March 24th, 1941.

Ritual: summoning of a benevolent demon. (failed disastrously) (success?) (status unknown)

I used the spell found in book five, page 34. According to it, a benevolent demon is easier to control than a malicious one, but can only fulfill tasks that don’t require hurting others. Their purpose is apparently to be a more approachable lure into the occult than malicious demons- a gateway drug of sorts. They are not in any way actually benevolent. The demon appeared as a small, purple blob. Thinking up a task for him was difficult, as I am well on my way to having most of what I could want through my own doing. I thought of having it make Bendy cartoons more popular, but that seemed too big and risky. Perhaps when I have had more experience with benevolent demons. I asked him to reignite my friendship with Henry. (It’s not as though he could have made it worse, so it was relatively riskless.) It nodded, then squeezed through this tiny scratch in the pentagram that was meant to contain it, and disappeared. It escaped before I could bind it to me. I can only hope that it leaves me alone, now. It was supposed to just be a trial.

Update: I think it did what I asked. Maybe I did bind it to me? I hope so- that would mean it’s back in Hell.

Henry put down the book, feeling exhausted. He should have felt shocked. He should have felt... well, anything. But it was as though that part of him was used up.

He got up and performed that one spell that Joey was apparently performing every other day. It was a strength spell, and it involved spilling a few drops of his own blood on a rune drawn onto the floor. Henry could feel strength return to his legs, and a fair amount of energy flow into him. So, Joey was sick, and self-medicating with satanic magic. Why not?

Apparently, it hadn’t been a mistake that the rats had been eating a dead rat: that was a planned part of their diet, and many were being kept preserved in a jar. Henry dropped another one in along with some rat food.

Henry just wanted to go to bed after that. His body felt so... wrong. Foreign. He didn’t even want to think about Joey, and he was seeing him every time he looked down at his own, scarred hands.

Maybe he’d feel better once the lights were out.

Henry didn’t sleep at all that night. His mind was too full, mostly of the thought that the whole reason he was back in New York was because of a trick pulled by a demon. Henry had had to fight Linda to get her to agree to moving back to here. The kids were already settled in with their current school, the whole family had friends in Florida, Henry had a good job, and so on. She’d accused him of a mental breakdown for wanting to leave that all behind to work with Joey Drew. But that was after he’d seen those memories that he and Joey had shared, and how he’d almost needed him back then. That was after he and Joey had had their talk, and had offered to make him the co-owner of Joey Drew Studios. “We could even change its name!” he’d said. Most importantly, he’d promised that this time would be different.

Had it been different? Well, Henry wasn’t being overworked like he had been in the 30s, and he wasn’t hearing as many complaints about Joey anymore (Though that was partially because he was the head of a company with hundreds of employees, not the two dozen they’d had in the beginning, he figured). He hadn’t been given any actual management tasks yet, but Henry had only been there for a couple weeks and wasn’t in any rush with that anyhow. He might’ve pressed the issue if it had gone on much longer. Their relationship was also a lot more equal now that Henry was older and more self-assured. And yet, his first thought when doing a Joey impression had been to make an idiotic, selfish, unreasonable decision with a big smile on his face.

Had things really changed? Well, now he supposed it didn’t matter. At the end of the week, he’d take the evidence to the police, and try to keep his own thoughts away from the question.

He hoped that whoever was in his body was doing well by Linda. After all he’d put her through by moving here, their relationship definitely didn’t need more weirdness. She probably really did think he was breaking down right now, unless whoever was playing the role was doing an incredible job of it. Five days. Five days, and hopefully he’d be able to patch things up with her. Hopefully he’d at least get the chance.