#i could probably make this shorter but when have i ever done that

[viperify]

oneshots | ᴛᴏᴍ ʀɪᴅᴅʟᴇ X ꜰ!ʀᴇᴀᴅᴇʀ

☾₊⊹ To The Moon n’ Back.

Short Summary: This year you’ll spend another ordinary Valentine’s Day, all by yourself. Or that you think—until you receive a mysterious letter.

Warnings: 18+ only! soft impact play, brief fingering, semi-public sex, unprotected p in v, also this is kinda ooc!Tom bc how do I make this man engage in Valentine’s Day activities.

A/N: Happy Valentine’s Day!!! 💋🩷

wordcount: 2,4k

Tom Riddle does not do love.

So why is it that every time you walk past him, his heart beats just a little bit faster?

He’s done everything to distract himself—drowning himself in books, studying more than what is usual, even for someone called Tom Riddle.

Yet, you never fail to leave his mind. No matter how hard he tries, he can’t seem to get the thought of you—specifically your lips on his—out of his mind.

By sweet Merlin, that’s the worst part of it all.

──

It’s Valentine’s Day.

Safe to say—you aren’t interested in a relationship.

So it shouldn’t bother you that all of your friends are out with their partner. But it does, your chest tightening at the thought of spending another night alone on a day that’s meant to be celebrated with your loved ones. It’s always been like this though, they’ve had their fun, and you—well, you stayed behind.

You decide to head to bed early. Right after dinner, which was awfully boring with none of your friends around, you make your way back to your dorm. Or try to, at least. Because as soon as you turn the corner, someone bumps into you.

Not just anyone—Tom Riddle. Head boy, former prefect, top student in every class, teacher’s favourite, award winner… you could go on like this for hours. There is probably nothing in this world that he hasn’t achieved—except for finding a Valentine’s date, it seems.

“I am sorry,” you mumble as you crouch down to pick up a piece of paper he has dropped. And it’s really not that you wanted to know what was written on it—it must have been the familiar number that caught your eye—the number of your dorm to be exact.

Though slightly taken aback, you hand him the paper—or better—he rips it from your hands. For a moment when his lips part slightly, you think he might want to say something in return—maybe apologize for bumping into you—but nothing ever comes.

So you leave, shooting him a weak smile.

It’s not like you expected an apology from him. He has his close circle of friends, all of whom are from renowned pureblood families. Even if you wanted him to like you, look at you the same way you’ve looked at him for years, it wouldn’t change a thing. Tom Riddle was unreachable. Any girl that has ever been interested in ended up getting rejected, and you wouldn’t be one of them.

Yet, the rich scent of his perfume lingers, the way his eyes flickered to your lips for a brief moment imprinted in your mind. His hands brushing over yours briefly, feeling his warmth, the warmth you’ve been craving to feel on your skin—

You shake your head. You’re interpreting too much into it.

──

Tom curses himself for almost blowing his cover.

After hours of contemplation, hours of sitting in front of a blank piece of parchment, he finally writes something down.

My dear—

He scoffs. Pathetic.

Scrunching up the paper, he discards it on the wooden floor of his dorm.

I hope this letter finds—

Definitely not.

Please meet me at the Astronomy Tower tonight at—

Please? Who is he to beg? You should be the one begging for— fuck.

Twenty crumpled-up pieces of parchment later, Tom’s had enough.

He opts for something shorter.

Astronomy Tower. 9pm. Don’t be late.

Perfect.

──

You are tucked under your duvet, putting the romance novel you had started on the nightstand. It was only 8pm, but with nothing else to do, sleep didn’t seem like the worst option. Soon enough, your eyelids flutter closed, and you drift off to sleep.

Though, it isn’t too long before a sharp knock on the glass of your window wakes you. It’s your owl, delivering a letter. Quite an unusual time for you to receive something, yet curiosity gets the better of you, and you open your window to get it.

No sender.

Reluctantly, you tear the envelope open, and your eyes skim over the words written on the parchment.

“Astronomy Tower. 9pm. Don’t be late.” You whisper, eyebrows drawn together in confusion. You don’t recognize the handwriting as anyone's you know, and as soon as you wipe over the words, the ink smears, vanishing, leaving you with an empty parchment.

At first, you are quite unsure whether to go. There’s no name on the letter, and especially on a day like today, there will be stricter enforcements of the curfew rules. Though, knowing yourself, you would have probably gone anyway. Even on a day like this, the moon and the stars are the only company you crave.

So you change, folding your PJs neatly on your bed, putting on the first skirt you find—though as soon as you step out of your dorm, you regret your decision. Tonight is cooler than usual, a soft breeze brushing past your skin, having you shiver. It’s too late to turn around, though. So you make your way, walking the route you normally take when you sneak out past curfew.

As you ascend the stairs to the tower, a figure leaning against the railing catches your attention. Only when you take a few steps closer do you recognize who it is. The brunette curls are unmistakably Tom’s, and for a moment your breath catches in your throat, halting your movements. Knowing that he is most likely on his patrol, you turn around to return to your dorm, but as you do just that, his voice stops you.

“You came.” He remarks quietly, without turning around.

It is him.

“You wanted to see me?” You ask, crossing your arms over your chest. “Riddle, if this is some kind of—“

“Come closer.”

You walk forwards then, though reluctantly, and lean against the railing next to the brunette. It’s silent between the both of you for a while before he speaks up again.

“They fascinate you, don’t they?” He asks subtly, staring into the distance of the night sky. You follow his gaze, taking in the stars and moon on the otherwise pitch-black horizon. “You watch them each night when you can’t sleep.”

You turn your head then, looking at him briefly. You want to ask how he knows, yet you decide to keep it to yourself. Instead, you answer honestly.

“It’s a rare constant in my life. They help me calm down, especially after a long day.”

He gives you a soft nod in return, and silence returns between the both of you, left with owls howling in the distance. There’s still snow on the ground, and it must be below freezing temperature, because when another cool breeze brushes past you, you shiver, scrunching up into yourself.

“Why am I here, Riddle?”

Tom finally turns towards you then, a spark of something softer shimmering in his otherwise so strict chocolate-brown eyes, and he takes a measured step closer.

“You didn’t have any other plans tonight, did you?” He asks, in a way that’s implying he already knows the answer—because what does he not know—and you shake your head no.

“Then that is why.”

You part your lips to question him but are interrupted by his hand reluctantly reaching out, fingertips ghosting over your cheek, trying, testing, before his hand wanders to your neck. His thumb draws small, soft patterns on your jaw, and you tense slightly at the contact. He stops then momentarily, watching your softened expression, but when you don’t complain, he continues.

His gaze flicks to your lips, the air between the both of you growing thick with tension as he slowly leans in. Your surroundings fade into a blur, and before you know it, his lips are on yours.

Tom Riddle is kissing you.

The kiss isn’t what you’d expect of someone like him—it’s soft, tender, your lips moving in sync as his second hand rests on your lower back, pulling you closer.

Soon enough, he has you pressed against the railing, lips only parting from yours when a soft moan falls over your lips. A smirk tugs at the corner of his lips, then he goes back to kissing you as his fingertips trail up the soft skin of your thighs, stopping at the hem of your skirt.

“Okay?” He murmurs, waiting for a verbal agreement before turning you around, adjusting your position with a firm grip on your waist. He bunches the skirt around your hips, delivering a soft smack to the round curve of your now exposed ass.

A soft whimper falls over your lips, and you slightly lurch forward at the contact, but he is quick to reposition you, pulling you back to him.

It is most likely the choice of your underwear that has him go silent, fingers softly tracing along the lace of your burgundy thong, though he is quick to rid you of the last piece of fabric covering your lower body. Tom makes you step out of it, crouching down to lift your leg. You only faintly notice that he puts it in his pocket, and time to complain is sparse because his hands are back on your exposed skin within a second, cutting off your thoughts.

“You’re gorgeous,” he whispers, drawing a soft mewl from your lips, “even more so than I thought.”

Another gentle smack, and you feel his hand gently massaging your thighs before they wander up further. He doesn’t proceed—he waits, lingering there for just a moment.

“Spread your legs for me, sweetheart.” He instructs, his voice soft, and you obey, parting your thighs to allow him better access. A whimper escapes your lips when Tom fully presses himself against you, making you feel the problem you’ve caused him.

His hand leaves your thigh, traveling up until he reaches your already soaked heat, humming as his fingers swipe through your folds, collecting your arousal. One finger slips inside of you, his thumb rubbing circles on your clit, and you can’t help but buck your hips into his touch.

A second finger enters you, stretching, preparing you for him. You appreciate it—but all you want is to finally feel him.

“Riddle, please— I need you.”

His fingers withdraw then, hand wrapping around your throat instead, tilting your head backwards as you feel his hot breath ghosting over your ear.

“What’s my name?”

“Tom, God— please let me feel you, Tom.” You croak out, whimpering in defeat.

He lets you go then, the sound of him undoing his belt cutting through the night. “Good girl. Sounds so good when you say it.”

He casts a warming charm on you, a pleasant heat spreading through your body, and the next thing you feel is his tip nudging against your soaked entrance, slipping inside of you with a single, slow thrust. He groans when he’s inside of you completely—and it might be the most beautiful sound you’ve ever heard.

He’s told you to stay quiet—though that order is quickly forgotten when he sets a steady rhythm, fingertips pressing hard enough into your skin to leave bruises. He stretches you perfectly, filling you completely with every snap of his hips, knuckles turning white from how hard you are gripping the railing. The sound of your skin colliding with each thrust fills the air, accompanied by your moans and whimpers and occasional low groans from the man behind you.

“Spread your legs a little further for me, love.” Tom breathes, hand slipping between your legs once more as you do. Again, he finds your sensitive bundle of nerves, rubbing the bud in slow, circular motions.

As your moans grow louder, walls clenching around him, he angles his thrusts slightly differently, his tip brushing over your most sensitive spots inside of you.

“Oh— Tom, don’t— don’t stop, fuck—“

His palm lands on your ass once more, but this time you arch your back into his touch, thighs trembling at the electrifying sensations shooting straight to your core.

With one of his hands on your waist, pulling you back into the sharp snaps of his hips, the other wraps around your throat again, pulling you flush against his chest. Like this he is able to reach even deeper, tip brushing against your cervix with every thrust, providing you with the perfect mix of pleasure and pain.

“Fuck— squeezing me so tight. That good?”

You only manage a nod in return, eyelids fluttering close as you near your climax, walls fluttering wildly around his invading length.

“Open your eyes and look at the sky when you come, darling.”

So you do.

With one last high-pitched moan, you tumble over the edge, hot, white pleasure rushing through your veins as your cunt clamps down around him, his hands on your hips as they stabilize you when your knees are about to give in.

Soon after, your mind still hazy with the aftereffects of your own orgasm, he empties himself inside of you with a low groan, hips stuttering as he is buried to the hilt, making sure you take all of him.

Both of you stay like this for a while, catching your breath. Only when the warming effects of the charm he casted on you wear off does he pull out of you slowly, drawing a soft whimper from your lips at the loss. He fixes your skirt for you, takes care of his appearance before his arm wraps around your waist, helping you stand upright.

“I will need that back,” you say, pointing to the lace half hanging out of his pocket.

He tucks it away completely then. “Don’t know what you are talking about.”

You sigh, rolling your eyes, leaning back against the railing.

A slight smirk plays at the corner of his lips but fades as he studies you in the faint glow of the moonlight, his expression turning more serious.

“Did so well for me,” he says after some time, voice soft again, “Happy Valentine’s Day.”

You blink in confusion. Surely he didn’t—

“I wish you could see yourself the way you see the stars and the moon.” He goes on, tucking a strand of hair behind your ear. “You are worthy of love.”

You shake your head. “Tom—“

Before you can protest, he presses his lips on yours, cutting off whatever words you were trying to form.

“I want you to teach me,” he exhales then, wrapping his coat around your shoulders, “how to love. Teach me how to love you the way you deserve to be loved.”

this was requested by my lovely @riddleswhcre 🩷 thank you so much for requesting baby!! you already know I am not particularly happy with how this turned out, but I hope it was still somewhat alright. <3

[angstics]

might have more thoughts to add to your drag essay later but for now Big Yes ++ i also have been thinking about the way that Archetypes have been a throughline in basically all of gerard's art, from mcr's concept albums through (what i have seen of) his comic stuff and earlier illustrations and now very vividly in these tour costumes. which to me feels drag-adjcacent, so much of drag culture is about appropriating and camping up (pointing at, exaggerating, making absurd, celebrating) pop culture figures & cultural icons/archetypes. gerard's 2022 costumes are doing the appropriating but not so much the camping, with the exception of the casino king moment -- but camp has been such an important factor in almost all of mcr's history before this (whole books could be written about this). i'd say the black parade look at its peak with all of its liza/fosse influence was Bandleader Drag moreso than the cheerleader look was Cheerleader Drag despite the apparent crossdressing-ness of the latter. yknow?

this is from 21 days ago!!!!! im here now. this is exactly my point. the art form of drag is marked by exaggeration of gender presentation, which is often represented by pop culture figures because they are the arbiters of iconized (ie dramatized ie context-divorced ie CAMPY) femininity or masculinity. people do drag of celebrity performers like elvis or liza, archetypes like construction workers or show girls. one part of drag i didnt talk about is its appropriation of beauty standards -- breast enhancers, faux abs, accentuated glam make-up. there is no focus on beauty in gerard's 2022-23 costumes (are they costumes?) as ive said, theyre casual clothes. it cant be drag. the presentation isnt about accentuation, it's about something else.

it's fun that this point has been further proven by how nonchalant the office worker was. the drama wasnt in the outfit, it was in the gore. there's nothing gendered there. though someone who is typically seen as a man donning female conservative wear and therefore twisting that descriptor is interesting in of itself (as spittingout said)!!!! office drag makes fun of hyperfeminine conservativism. as casual clothes, the effect is different. the subtlety positions these outfits as normal -- which they are.

a while ago i wrote about how critics used the word "camp" incorrectly to detract from my chem being unironically good. i dont like the piece today. i honestly didnt realize that a lot of mcr music is enjoyed for its drama more than its content. my penchant for sincerely consuming everything blinded me. but i do like my classic approach to what makes camp camp -- how it's an intellectual's hidden gem, not something intended. i applied that to how ppl didnt understand the nonconforming looks of my chem past, making the looks camp objects (meaning objects that are highly dramatic because of their lost meaning).

these campy looks include the bandleader persona. the look is gendered by gerard's stage attitude -- the brooding, the aggression, the boxy stature. though the hair and clothing are non descript, they're read as masculine -- the idea that the lack of gender indicates masculinity is a big gender theory topic. even when the original hairstyle is a feminine pixie and the black parade jacket has a corset back, the fact they are, respectively, short and suit-like lands further from feminine readings. SOOOOOOOOOOO all this to say the bandleader is an exaggeration of agender-practically-masculine archetypes like fosse's emcee (a clown doing showman drag, doing showgirl drag, doing fash drag -- more likely to be read as masculine over feminine despite the make-up because clowns are agender, which we know as functionally masculine). wipes brow

another point u didnt talk about but just thought of. INTERESTING that the use of the word "drag" in three cheers ("they make me do push-ups in drag") is obviously synonymous with cross-dressing cuz it's supposed to be embarrassing, while the use of "drag" in black parade ("here's my resignation ill serve it in drag") is closer to the art form or at least empowered cross-dressing. also a fun pun! serve 👨‍💼 and serve 💅

[woso-dreamzzz]

Menor's Halloween

Alexia Putellas x Teen!Reader

Summary: The second of my Halloween-centric fics

Alexia grins as she looks at herself in the mirror, straightening out her skirt and putting the finishing touches on her makeup.

The family Halloween party has been a staple ever since her childhood, bringing the family back together every year without question.

It was basically a rule at this point, something no one could get out of and chosen to take place on a day when no one has an excuse to be elsewhere.

"Are you ready yet?"

It's Olga's first time at the party, unable to make it the past few years. She's gone fairly conservative with her outfit, a generic Halloween costume of a zombie cheerleader.

Alexia can forgive her though because originally Olga hadn't been able to come until her meeting in Madrid was cancelled last minute so she had to buy the unpopular costume from the store.

Alexia, on the other hand, has had her costume planned out for months with everything ironed to perfection.

"Ready!" Alexia calls out," I just need to find-"

"The bag is on the table where you left it last night."

Alexia grabs the bag from the table, swinging it over her shoulder before slipping into the driver's seat of the car.

Family events like this one normally end up with a lot of drinking and, while she wouldn't usually partake, Alexia's already planned to allow herself a few more drinks than normal.

Olga's decided to take up the driving home duty to let Alexia drink however much she wants.

"I'm nervous," Olga says, straightening out her cheer skirt and rubbing at her face - though she grows a little annoyed when the face paint rubs off onto her fingers.

"Don't be nervous," Alexia says," You've met everyone before."

"I know but...Halloween party seems more official."

"They'll probably already be drunk," She replies," And try to ply your with pizza. Or paella. Depending on if my aunt cooked or my uncle convinced her to order in."

"Sounds delightful."

"That's the spirit!"

Alexia knocks on the door, greeted by the slightly tipsy face of her cousin when it opens.

He giggles a little, a sure-fire sign he's been drinking. "I-I thought you were already here." He bursts into more hysterical laughter after that and Alexia gets the feeling that she's not in on the joke.

"And you've brought the wonderful Olga! Come in! Come in! Can I interest you in some pizza?"

"So Tio convinced her?"

"No. Mama cooked. Papa just ordered in anyway! Off you go now, Ale. I want to talk to your girlfriend!"

He pulls Olga away without another word and Alexia rolls her eyes.

"Gee, I love you too. Typical."

Alexia rolls her eyes fondly, easily losing her cousin and girlfriend in the crowd of family members either halfway to drunk or already firmly there.

A giggling hiccup has Alexia turning to see another one of her cousins by the fridge.

"I could have sworn you were already here," She says, giggling and Alexia sighs.

"Alright, what am I missing here? You're the second person to tell me that."

Her cousin giggles again, downing another vodka shot and shooting Alexia a drunken smile. "Just that I could have sworn you came with Tia Eli today. Though...you did seem a little shorter."

She giggles off before stumbling away but she's already given Alexia all the information that she needs.

She picks her way through her family members, stopping briefly to say hello to the aunt and uncle who are hosting and then her mother before finally seeing who she's been looking for.

"Is that my shirt?!" She demands," And my armband?!"

You turn around, eyes wide. An answer is on the tip of your tongue before you take in what she's wearing.

"Is that my skirt?! Are those my rackets?!"

"Don't change the subject!" Alexia says," You've dressed as me for Halloween?!"

"You dressed as me!"

"That's different."

"How?"

"It-It just is!"

Alexia takes you in as she steps back. You've got your hair done up in her usual ponytail rather than your regular braids. You've got her full Barcelona kit on along with the armband and her boots. You've even brought a football with you just in case people didn't realise who you were meant to be.

Alexia, on the other hand, had gone out of her way to dress like you. She's wearing one of your tennis skirts and your Nike shirt. She's got her hair in your usual braid with your Barcelona cap and even the gold shoes Nike gave you for your Olympic run. She's got a racket bag over her shoulder, full of the old rackets you'd left at home before your move abroad.

You seem to be taking Alexia in just like she's taking you in before nodding.

"Those are the replica shoes, right?" You check.

"Yeah. They cost a lot though. You're quite the superstar. That isn't one of my hattrick balls is it?"

"No, just one of the ones you leave lying around at Mami's."

Alexia nods. "Good. You look good though."

"Thanks, I practiced your haughty look a lot."

Alexia rolls her eyes. "I don't have a haughty look."

"You so do all 'I'm Alexia Putellas, captain of Barcelona, the best team in the world'."

"But I am Alexia Putellas and I am captain of Barcelona which is the best team in the world. I won the Ballon D'or twice, you know."

"Yeah, well I won all the Grand Slams. And the Olympics."

"Now, now," Alexia says," This isn't a bragging match. Because if it was, I'd win." She reaches for you, trapping you in a headlock and rubbing her knuckles against your head. "Which one of us has more awards?"

"Only because you're an old woman now. By the time I'm your age, I'm going to be the greatest tennis player in the world."

"Yeah," Alexia teases," Aim high."

You grin at her, shoving her away before trying to tackle her to the floor. She doesn't move an inch but you had been expecting that.

"I guarantee I can score more goals on you than sets you can win against me."

Alexia laughs.

"The garden's free. Want to test that theory?"

You grin. "Well, don't start crying when you lose."

[aangelinakii]

SOULMATE SCARS.

— matching wounds.

summary : ever since you were young, strange bruises and scars have been emerging all along your body. surprisingly, you weren't extremely clumsy, so you had no ideas as to where they came from. sure, a couple bruises might be okay — they don't even hurt anyway — but when you wake up with autopsy scars along your chest, it's time to tell a professional. what happens when you meet someone with the same scars as you?

note : description of blood and injury so just be aware of that if rhat stuff icks you out

when blood began dripping from your arm in the middle of drinks, your night got a little darker.

even in the darkness of the poorly-lit bar, a juke box in the corner ringing an old fleetwood mac song, one of your friends could make out the slash of a great cut peeking out of your shirt on your upper arm, a long, cool dribble of blood slipping down your flesh.

"holy shit—"

despite being used to plum-coloured bruises and scars from out of nowhere, you weren't much of a bleeder — or, at least, whatever strange power from above had cursed or blessed you with this.

someone grabbed a napkin and dabbed you up, but the damage was already done; scarlet spatters stained the white short sleeve of your shirt, and it stung to peel away the fabric from the fresh wound.

normally they didn't hurt, but something about this one was different. maybe you were asleep half the time they happened, so you only got the aftermath the next morning when you undressed for the shower.

needless to say, you weren't feeling like glasses of wine and gin and tonics anymore tonight, and bid your friends farewell before slipping into the nip of the gotham night.

as you rounded the corner down your block, after one of your shorter walks home, you glanced back down at your arm, goosebumps rippling along the flesh. now when you inspected it, beneath the illumination of the streetlamp perched above you, it almost looked as though your torn, sticky flesh was welding back together, starting with the edge of it.

no longer did it sting, but it was certainly sensitive against the biting breeze, and your pace quickened.

by the time you were opening your front door, light from the corridor spilling into your flat, the wound was only half-open. but also something was different.

in your apartment, i mean, like something had shifted.

steps careful and quiet, you slot your keys between your fingers as you edged further into your flat, turning the handle to make sure no noise came when the door met its hinges once more.

the couch had definitely inched slightly to the left, and the shading atop your lamp was crooked. perhaps the couch was less easy to notice, but when you lived here every day, you'd almost bumped into it before noticing — but the lampshade was undeniable.

something groaned from the bathroom, where, when you peered towards the door, had a sliver of white light peeking through the cracks in the hinges. the sound of like when you suck air in through the gaps of your teeth came after, and you knew then and there: someone was in your home.

for safe measures, you plucked one of your kitchen knives from its block and crept toward the bathroom; now, the scuff of a boot against the tiles.

once you were outside, but with enough distance to be able to make any split-second decisions, your voice edged up your throat, a croak at first, before you could find your footing.

"whoever's in there, show yourself," you stated as firmly as you could, though the waver in your tone was apparent to any trained ear. "or— or i'll call 911."

shit, you probably should've done that first, investigated later — but you'd already spoken, and there was no reversing it.

a pained cough came from behind the door, and your mind immediately went to the worst: there was a killer behind there, purposely staying quiet so you'd open the door and they'd jump out and kill you in your own home— oh, you're opening the door anyway.

but what you found wasn't any killer of the sort; just a guy.

a shirtless guy.

tons of supplies you didn't even realise you had in your house were scattered about the tiles around him, where a pair of thick tactical pants-clad legs lay spread apart weakly. one of his arms hung limp at his side, his hand sitting palm-up upon his thigh helplessly.

but what else you noticed... moving up his toned chest, flesh littered with scars and scratches, was one long scar you recognised all too well. the mere sight of it caused the painless mark along your own torso to throb — which it had never done in the years you'd had it.

starting just below each collarbone, sloping down to his solar plexus, and straight down his stomach to his navel.

a mirror image of what lay just below your shirt now.

but you had never had an autopsy, and, by the look of it, neither had this guy; sure, shadows curved below his eyes and grime littered his cheekbones and forearms, but this man was very much alive.

glinting in the light, your eyes caught a metal needle dangling by his limp arm. you followed a red thread up, up to the bulb of his shoulder, where a half-open wound lay, somehow simultaneously oozing with red and crusting with it.

mouth running dry, you tore your stare away, dropping the knife and taking your hand to tug at your stained sleeve.

although much less bloody, the cut you'd found at the bar was the exact same.

with shivering fingers, you took a ginger step forward and encouraged yourself to look back to the black-haired man leaning against your bath.

"you... you..."

it wasn't much, but it was all you could muster.

seemingly unaware of the connection you'd just made, the man averted his eyes, looking back to his wounded flesh. "sorry, i didn't realise you'd come home – thought the place was empty," he mumbled.

that didn't matter now.

perhaps it should've, really, but not when... well, you saw it.

similarly, the keychain dropped from your grip, and you edged closer to the man, whose expression twitched in alarm.

"can i see that? your arm?"

as you lowered down to a crouch, the man's green eyes followed warily, his previously parted lips thinning, but he didn't move away.

eyes lingering on him for a few more beats, you turned your attention to the red-hot gash embedded in his flesh. "what happened?" your fingers found the eye of the needle, conscious not to touch too much of the red that plagued it.

the man watched your careful movements, as you lined up the prick with his torn skin and slowly pushed it through. he was unflinching, apparently more glad to just be able to sit back and not worry about himself for once. "bad knife. really shitty as you can see."

"yeah, i can see." mentally, you snapped at yourself, for you'd been unable to leave the bitterness from your tone, and the man's expression only looked on quizzically.

your fingers left the needle, allowing it to swing against his arm as it had done before when you found him, specking him with little lines of his own blood. in one swift action, you tugged up your sleeve, revealing your own half-open wound, the seared edges of flesh linking miraculously together.

the man's dark eyebrows knitted together and he physically drew himself back slightly. "shit, what'd you do there?"

"i didn't," you snapped back — not mad at him, per se, but more so the situation: this man was the reason for your horrific wounds, ones you never felt, but were cursed with the burden of. "you did."

a scoff came from the man's lips. "yeah, right..."

no, he was right. he didn't need to say anything; you were crazy.

"have you ever... i don't know, woken up with a bruise you don't know how it got there?" you pushed, eager to plead your case.

he made an attempt to shrug, but winced and ceased the movement. "doesn't everybody?"

so he was one of those difficult ones.

he comes into your apartment bleeding everywhere, and has the audacity to have an attitude. he wasn't even welcome.

"my point is," you huffed, "yours are the same as mine."

you extended a finger at his chest. "this. i have this.

it was now that he finally looked convinced. well, not entirely, but that look of judgement softened into something more commonly identified as confusion.

you tugged at the hem of your shirt, and rose the fabric slightly to show where the end of your autopsy-type scar ended — just above your navel.

when he looked at you now, it was like trying to figure out if you were dead or alive. or maybe if he were dead or alive.

"what, so..." he began after a few silent beats. "so we're connected, or something? you get my scars, i get yours?"

that's certainly what it seemed, but you shrugged anyway; there was no way to know for sure.

lips pressing together, you leaned forward to resume sewing up his wound, unable to fathom the way your own scar seemed to stitch itself up, too — no thread, no needle.

what a strange way to end your night...

[auclairedetoru]

Hi! I saw your requests were open and I wanted to see if you could write something fluffy with Levi and a reader that’s shorter than him 🥺

Maybe something where he’s doting on them? I adore the idea of a cold Levi who’s soft for his partner and I’m part of the minority of people who is actually shorter than him lol. I see a lot of fics describing the reader as taller but not enough for the other shorties out here 🙂‍↕️

Finally. The end of the day.

Levi lets out a loud sigh as the door of his bedroom closes behind him. His head leans against it and his eyes close. After hours of training, meetings, monitoring, and doing a shit ton of paperwork, he's finally back to the comfort of his bedroom at exactly midnight.

He lifts his head back up and looks around the small space, an unfamiliar (to others at least) smile spreads on his face when his eyes land on the sleepy yet smiling person sitting on his bed.

“Welcome back home, Levi.”

God, their sweet voice makes him melt into a puddle every time. He can't believe he gets to call such a precious person his partner, he considers himself a very lucky man.

“I'm sorry I woke you up, my love.” he says gently as he takes off his jacket. They shake their head and watch him as he tries his best to take off the belts wrapped around his body as fast as possible, “it's okay, darling. I wasn't sleeping, you know I can't without you.”

Levi cups their face after he is done and leans down to press a soft kiss to their forehead. People would lose their mind if they saw the way he acts and talks to them, in fact, only the people he's closest to in the survey corps (which is very few) know about their relationship, it wouldn't even cross people's minds that the strong and stoic captain who doesn't care if he hurts anyone's feelings is dating the sweet and gentle nurse who once cried with a soldier while trying to stitch him up.

“Did you have a good day today? Any of those brats bothered you?” he caresses their soft cheeks with the pad of his thumbs, mesmerized by the way the light casts a warm glow on their face. They lean into his touch, their eyes closing in relaxation. “everything was okay. Jean and Eren even teamed up to help me carry the new supplies stock and put them on the high shelves for me.”

He chuckles softly and pulls away from them so he can quickly change into more comfortable clothes. He used to sleep in his uniform, belts and all, just in case something happens and he couldn't waste his time putting everything back on, most of the nights he didn't sleep to begin with, but ever since they started sharing the same bed, not only did he find himself falling asleep but he also invested in some soft night clothes so he can cuddle with them without any restrictions.

“Still refusing to use the stool I got you?” he smirks as he starts changing his clothes. They've been dating long enough for them to not care about being naked in front of the other.

“I don't need it! The boxes were just heavy!”

“Hmm, sure you don't,” he teases as he gets under the blanket on his side of the bed (which is obviously the one on the near the bedroom door) and pats his lap with two hands. They huff, followed by a small, almost inaudible "I'm not that short", yet they don't hesitate to straddle his thighs and nuzzle their face in his warm chest. He wraps his arms around their body and presses a kiss on top of their head.

“if you weren't so short you wouldn't be able to fit in my arms all snuggly,” he looks down at their face and smiles at the adorable sight of their cheek pressed firmly on his chest, probably so they're able to hear his heart beat, they told him before that it's their favourite sound, “look at you, you could fit in my pocket, I could take you everywhere with me.”

They look up at him with the sweetest look on their face, their pretty eyes soft and affectionate. He wishes he could freeze this moment and stay like this forever, no titans, no fighting, no heartbreak, just him relaxing with his beloved in his arms.

“Can I stay in your heart instead? I think I'll like it there more.”

Levi lets out a shaky sigh. He's not one to get emotional, he can't even remember the last time he cried because it's been so long, but at that moment he feels a tug at his heart strings and a lump form in his throat. He never thought he'd ever have someone who loves him unconditionally, who would stay up till the late hours waiting for him because they want him to be the last thing they see before they close their eyes, whose presence felt the closest to what he heard others describe as home, who looked past the walls he has up and saw someone worth all their patience.

“You know I can't have you stay anywhere else. I love you more than I've ever loved anything in my life.”

“More than tea?” they teasingly raise an eyebrow making him chuckle.

"Yes, my love. More than tea," he replies, gently brushing a strand of hair away from their eyes.

“More than cleaning?”

"now I don't know about that...”

“hey!”

Levi laughs loudly, a deep and hearty sound he never imagined would come from him before he met them. Their melodic giggles join his, filling the air with a positive energy he only experiences around them. At that moment, he feels his heart fill with a great amount of happiness, a feeling he always thought he didn't need, but now can never live without, and it makes him realise that he is now complete.

In the past, he thought that when he'd feel complete he would let go of everything, even life itself. But now, the thought of being separated from the love of his life terrifies him, and for the first time, he wants nothing more than to continue living and breathing, even if it means fighting those ugly monsters every single day.

Is life easy right now? No, Eren Jeager is still a big pain in his ass, and the whole situation with the titans keeps getting worse and worse, but now he gets to come home to moments like these, and they simply make everything better.

I lost the plot and didn't make this very focused on short!reader but it's there nonetheless! I love soft Levi who's a totally different person around his love 💕

[weaselle]

Let's talk chef knives

somebody in the comments on a cooking post is talking to me about knives and i figure, why not make a whole post about it

I worked in restaurants for two decades, and that means i was mostly too poor to buy expensive knives.. but i did learn EXACTLY what i was looking for in a knife, and eventually i did spend about $150 on one.

Now, you can easily spend $500 or more on a chef knife if you are the kind of person who cares about having the chef knife equivilent of a porche or lamborghini and i don't think many of you are looking for that, so I'm going to tell you what i looked for in my really-good-but-not-too-expensive chef knife

First of all, you don't need that block set of knives you see in like every kitchen ever. You know, this thing

You don't need that. Listen, theoretically each of those knives has a specific thing it is used for, but in all the restaurants i worked at, 99.9% of the stuff i did was done with one of these

We didn't go looking for a specific kind of knife, we just used one of these -- often a bunch of those were all that was provided. I uh, i didn't work at a lot of high end restaurants. But even in the nicer ones, most of what we used was a chef's knife.

So. In my opinion, instead of spending $100-$200 on a bunch of kind of shitty knives, spend the same money on one really nice chef knife, and a wetstone or some other sharpener you feel you can use. But really, like, just look at a wetstone tutorial on youtube, it's not hard, and it will make your life better.

NOW let me tell you what i looked for in my knife

This is the knife i use. It's a six inch Zwilling Pro

if you shop around, you can probably find it for close to 100 bucks. It's not Fancy™, it's just Quite Good. You can, if you want, find a chef knife for a couple grand, and that plastic-handled one in the first pic will run you less than ten dollars, so, this is a pretty good price point, on the low side of middle, with a knife quality on the high side of middle. If you take care of this knife, it could last you your whole life

Now let's talk about specific features I was looking for. First, inb4, metal quality. Zwilling is a good company, so the quality of their actual metal is pretty decent, and that's all you really need to know -- if you're getting your knife from a known decent knife company it's probably good enough quality. In this case Zwilling uses forged high-carbon German steel, which are some good key words to look for. That's all i have to say about that.

Now there are four specific things i was looking for that led me to choose this specific knife

1

Depth. This refers to how far the heel of the blade juts out from the handle (the heel of the blade is the part of the blade closest to your hand). When you have the blade resting with the edge flush against the cutting board, you want there to be plenty of room for the hand gripping the handle without knocking your knuckles against the board. A classic pinch grip doesn't need much room, but that's not the only grip you'll ever use, so give yourself some decent knuckle clearance. But not TOO much. Too much and your blade will kind of feel like it wants to flop over on its side when the edge hits the board.

2

Length. As an edgy 20 year old in restaurant kitchens, i always went for the biggest knife i could find, but because you're going to be using your chef's knife for everything, you actually want it short enough to use as a paring knife or whatever. The shorter the blade, the more control over the tip you have. Me, i never really need anything longer than six inches. I was a little bit worried when i first got it, but i've never wound up wishing it was longer.

3

Weight. Even though it's just about as short as a chef's knife can be, my knife has a good amount of weight to it. A somewhat heavy blade helps with chopping, and provides a good balance for other knife skills. When you are chopping and slicing, a decent amount of weight helps a lot. It doesn't have to be heavy heavy, but when you pick it up, it should definitely feel like a chunk of steel, not like a pressed aluminum toy. Plus, some of the weight will come from thickness, and a thicker blade will stand up to more sharpening and last you longer too.

4

Bolster Shape

If you look at the Zwilling Pro's bolster, it has a bolster that is sort of beveled into the heel of the blade with a nice curve. Right right, what's a bolster, hold on, here's the anatomy of a knife

on this knife, you can see that where the bolster meets the blade it makes basically a right angle where it goes from thick to thin. This is distressingly common in chef knives

now look at the bolster on the Zwilling Pro

and here's a similar bolster shape from a different angle

First of all, the bolster is diagonal, which is the right shape for me to hold in a classic grip. Every chef has their own grip, but it's always a variation on pinching the blade just above the bolster, and a diagonal bevel works better for my grip.

And just as important to me, it might be hard to tell, but the metal curves from the thickness of the handle to the thinness of the blade instead of using a right angled edge to go from thick to thin. This curve sort of follows the movement your knife makes against the knuckle you use to guide the blade when you do this

I tend to use the deepest part of the heel a lot, and, depending on what i'm doing with the knife, my grip can often be nearly off the blade it's so far back, so i have a tendency to knock a straight bolster directly against my index knuckle. Just a little, but after a few dozen times in half a minute it starts to irritate my finger. A curved bolster like on the Zwilling Pro sort of glides to a stop against my guiding knuckle instead of banging into it, provides a comfortable pinch, and makes my life in the kitchen better.

That might not be true for everyone, it's just important to pay attention to how you use a knife, especially if you find yourself thinking something like "it would be better for me if this part of the knife was different in this way" or "this knife would be easier to grip if it was shaped like this instead" or "i wish the shape of this knife didn't mean this was always happening" or whatever. Could even be how your knife fits in your dishwasher, just pay attention to what works and doesn't work for you personally so you know What you're looking for. But you for sure want to look at the Depth, Weight, Length, and Shape.

So. There you have it. Some things to pay attention to when selecting a knife that may allow you to get a good knife for yourself without spending tooooo much money.

[angelnthsnow]

The Party & The After Party

pairing: toto wolff x f!driver!reader

summary: after winning your first formula one race in your first year in the category, you don't think the day can get any better. fortunately, your boss has other plans for the night.

word count: 3.9k

warnings: age gap? it's never mentioned but it's there obvi, boss x employee, use of y/n, cursing.

author's note: i must say my friends have gotten me into formula one, but it's kinda hard paying attention to the cars when this man exists. i wrote this nonstop in the middle of the night, it's shorter than usual but i couldn't get the idea out of my head, so enjoy! i promise i'll post smth nfl related soon lol k bye!!

In your first year as the first female F1 driver, you had done the impossible. Standing on the 1st place of the Monaco Grand Prix podium, adrenaline pumping through your veins, you looked down at everyone who had ever doubted you. Years of resisting attacks, sexist remarks and the constant need to prove yourself, you felt like you could finally breathe. By your side, stood two of the greatest drivers the sport had ever seen, Lewis Hamilton, your teammate, in P2, and Max Verstappen, in P3.

Your eyes wandered through the vast crowd that chanted your name from below, searching for the man who had made it all possible, your boss, Torger Wolff, the first person who took you seriously. Being a woman with hopes of getting into Formula One was exhaustingly hard, but everything started to change when you won the F3 Championship, a few years ago.

Paul, your teammate at the time, had told you that a certain team principal would come to the race that day, and although you kept telling yourself to not get your hopes up, every single attempt to do so went downhill when you saw the Mercedes team principal walking through the paddock like he owned the place.

To you, Mercedes was everything. Besides being one of the most modern teams, you also realized soon enough that Toto was probably the most open-minded out of all the other TPs on the grid. It was sad, of course, having such a little percentage of people who would be happy to see a woman in a position that was so dominated by men, but still, it lit up a flame in your chest, a string of hope you clung onto whenever you felt like giving up your dream.

That day, with him on the bleachers as you drove fearlessly around Spa-Francorchamps, you won the F3 championship, putting you on a watchlist of drivers that could get into F2.

Ever since that day, the austrian had kept an eye on you.

He saw how fiercely you fought to have a place, to have a voice and to be heard in a space ever so dominated by the opposite sex, and it didn't scare him, not one bit, he admired it. When you stood on that podium earlier, he didn't even bother hiding a smile, taking pictures and videos and chanting your name with the rest of the team as Lewis and Max sprayed the ridiculously expensive champagne on your back as you laughed.

That's why today, hours after winning your first ever F1 race on your first year in the category, he still couldn't get off the high he was on. He had finally gotten the confirmation he so desperately needed, not because he didn't believe you could do it, but because he was eager to prove everyone else wrong, to rip the smugness out of every single man who told you you didn't belong there.

At least that's what he had told you earlier through the radio before the lights went out, prove them wrong. He just didn't know you fought to reprimand a sob as you tried to concentrate in the lights that stood just above the Albert 1st Boulevard.

Now, Toto's eyes scanned every single corner of Jimmy'z searching for you, only to find you on the dance floor, pornstar martini in hand as you swayed to the beats of Empire of The Sun's We Are The People.

You had a smile on your face that could lit up a whole room, and he couldn't be prouder. Soon enough, your eyes met his and you chuckled, making a peace sign to point at your eyes and then at his as the line got lost in your eyes blasted through the club's speakers.

Even at distance, you could see him rolling his eyes and chuckling at your playful gesture, but still, he came closer, until the only thing in his field of vision was the visibly drunk version of you.

"You look happy." he leans down and forward to yell in your ear, making himself heard even if though the loud music made it hard to.

You squirm at the proximity, but brush it off by taking another sip of your drink. "I'm on top of the world, Toto. I don't think I've ever been happier." You yell back and he resists the urge to fight back a smile, presenting you with his pearly whites.

As one of the neon lights hit your face, he's forced to take in all of you. The version of you you'd put up whenever he'd tell you he had an important meeting he needed you to attend, or whenever you were needed to put up a show, like today.

You wore a black strapless dress, the one you'd seen a few weeks prior to the Grand Prix at Elie Saab's display window while you were on your daily night walk through Monaco. It was mesmerizing, with a shimmery type of fabric that would definitely make sparks fly if a bright light shined over it. You had thought of buying it, for days, really, but decided against it because party dresses were never a much needed piece of clothing in your wardrobe. Well, that until you told Lewis about the dress, and when you arrived at your apartment a few hours after the race, there it was, on a hanger hanging on the curtain rods.

As much as your looks prevented Toto from thinking about anything else, he couldn't help but notice how huge your pupils were, so big that it felt like your iris' were long gone. That and the fact that your sclera had shifted from white to a more reddish color.

He shifted on his feet, unaware of how to proceed. Were you.. high? Was that even a thing between sportspersons? Deciding on it being a matter that shouldn't be handled in front of the city's most congested place as of today, he mutters a "come with me" in your ear, putting a hand on your lower back as he guided you away from the crowd.

When he finally stops, you find yourself in a more private, smaller room with a few sofas and armchairs. He then proceeds to ask you "You've taken something. What is it?"

You laugh at his sudden concern. The answer was clearly a big red yes written in all caps, but part of you couldn't help but feel slightly ashamed at yourself. You had done it, yes, but now you felt sort of guilty, because the last thing you wanted was to damage his or the team's image. You shake your head, trying to to keep those thoughts away. It was just a party, a party for you, with only selected people being allowed in, it wasn't like you'd wake up to your name on the news.

"Come ooon.. don't be such a party pooper!" You slurred.

Toto was shocked by your reaction, part of him wanted you to celebrate as you wished, after all, you had just fulfilled a dream, but the other part, the responsible boss part craved an explanation, he didn't want you to cause any harm to your already fragile media image.

"Are you serious? You're the star of the entire team today! We have thrown a party just for you and you're getting off on drugs?" He says, lowering his voice on the last word as he crosses his arm.

"It's just a blunt, Toto. I swear I'm fine." Your laugh echoes throughout the small room as you grab his big arms, uncrossing them. "Don't get so serious on me." You look up at him through your lashes.

Toto gives you a stern look before a smirk creeps up on his face. The anger and seriousness fades away in an instant as he realizes the situation wasn't that serious. He sighs and looks at you with a sly, yet curious look. "How many? One, right?"

"Just one, sir." You say mischievously, holding your pinky finger up before kissing it to symbolize a promise.

Toto is taken aback as you kiss your pinky finger in a sarcastic manner, although he doesn't say anything. He looks at you with the same sly look as before. "I see... and have you done this before?"

"Who hasn't, duh?" You furrow your brows, flashing him a backward smile.

'He hasn't, of course. That's Torger Wolff we're talking about' you think to yourself as you look up at him. The soreness of your muscles and the pain of being on your feet for so long getting to you.

Sometimes it was kind of annoying having a conversation with your boss due to the fact that you had to look up the entire time, and countless were the times you found yourself with neck pain after hours of chatting. This conversation would surely be added to that imaginary countless list of yours, because even today, with high heels that could make you look six feet tall, he still looked way too big.

Toto chuckles before getting a playful look on his face. "Oh, really? I highly doubt the star of my F1 team has ever smoked a blunt before, although you do seem very knowledgeable about this." He moves closer to you, looking down at you as he speaks, his voice low and husky. You wondered if his neck ever went through the same problem yours did when you two talked, causing you to chuckle.

"I do?" You lift one eyebrow, narrowing your eyes. "Well, I must say.. the star of your precious F1 Team has done a lot, Mr. Wolff." It comes off more flirtatious than you intended, but you pay no mind to it. You try to take a step back, but end up slipping on the hem of your gown, the high getting to you later than ever.

Toto immediately rushes to you and catches you mid-air, wrapping his arms around your torso.

"Is that so?" Toto says, his voice now raspy and face close to yours.

You exhale deeply, relief from not having made an absolute mess out of yourself filling your body. If you had fallen, your dress would probably be completely torn apart and headlines would have a field trip with it.

He is still holding you, his hands burning on your back.

"Yeah.." You close your eyes, getting away from Toto's embrace as you regain balance and straighten yourself.

Toto steps back as you do so, although he does want to reach out to hold you again. Instead, he settles for engaging on more double entendre conversations with you.

His eyes are full of admiration, your body is more visible in this dress than it has ever been, and he makes a mental note to thank Lewis for the gift. He recalls the moment you two shared a few minutes ago, the way you swayed and jumped with the music like you were the only person in that dance floor would never fail to amaze him.

"You truly do look like a notorious celebrity in this dress, don't you?" He finally says, a hint of shyness in his tone, although the look in his face is stern.

"You could thank your other driver for that." You joke, trying to hide the butterflies that swarmed in your stomach.

"I certainly will." he smiles, his gaze softening as his eyes meet yours. They're still red, but it starts to grow on him.

Looking at you like this, completely wasted, happy and carefree, he couldn't help but remember the afternoon you two had met, when he started to be so sure you'd be by his and Lewis' side on a race weekend one day.

Now, there you were, in front of him, with a trophy standing somewhere back in your apartment. "I'm so proud of you." he finally says, not because he thinks you should hear it, but because it's all he wants to say to you after today's events.

You look away from him shyly. You had heard it before, specially from him, but every single time felt like fireworks in your belly. Him being proud of you was capable of putting you on a whole another level, it was just another signal that you had made it, that you had proved you were capable, even to those who were always so sure you definitely were.

You try to hide a smile as you mutter a simple thank you, because in this state, visibly high and drunk, staring at the man who had made it all possible, it's all you manage to say.

He smiles back at you, and your mind almost short circuits when he steps closer, not stopping even when you can feel his breath close to your face. That's when you realize he's about to hug you, and you just let him.

It's genuine, simple yet abnormally meaningful. His big hands rest crossed on your lower back as he pulls you closer, making your cheeks rest on his suit covered chest. You almost feel like crying, because how could you not? You had it all now, a place in the sport you so desperately craved to have since you were a kid, a win, an amazing teammate and an even more amazing boss, who believed in you through your entire career.

"You've done it." He says quietly as if you're a wild animal that would run away at any abrupt movement or sound. "I can't even imagine how you feel."

On cloud nine, that was the most appropriate answer.

"It's like nothing I've ever felt." you say, arms hugging his chest. "Thank you for always believing in me, you have no idea how much you've done for me." you sniff, clearly on the verge of tears.

"It's nothing compared to what you deserve. You're one of the greats, Y/N. The whole world's gonna know you name." he says, causing the tears you so eagerly fought to keep off to fall rapidly on your cheeks. You sniff, opening your eyes to see that a small wet circle had formed on Toto's shirt.

"Shit, sorry." You laugh awkwardly as you take a step back, desperately trying to dry your tears with your fingers before they ruined your makeup too.

"Hey, it's fine." He steps closer again, bringing his thumb to your face as he continues your job of drying the tears you had shed. Once he's done, his hands linger there for a bit longer than they needed to, stroking your cheeks. You thank the Gods for whatever the hell he was on today. "You do look pretty when you cry, though I must say I prefer the way you look on top of a podium, with champagne drenched hair and a first place trophy in hand."

You roll your eyes, as if it was possible to fall even more in love with him. It had become stupid at this point, really. Clearly the two of you had something special, to say the least, going on, but none of you were courageous enough to come clean about this.

"You aren't a bad view from up there as well." You shoot back, earning a smile in return.

The shameless and obvious flirtation to whoever watched from outside continued for a few minutes, until Toto insisted that you should go back to your party, and although at this point you had decided to give up the celebrations to look at him for the rest of night, there he was, once again with his hand on your lower back, guiding you through the crowd back to where he initially had seen you. Doesn't take long for you to get lost in the music, dancing like there was no tomorrow. Toto had excused himself to greet other team members and sponsors, fulfilling the ultimate boss role even at parties, and stealing glances from you every now and then while talking to someone.

A few drinks later, the club was getting more empty by the minute, the clock almost hitting 4:30 a.m. Your makeup was already lightly smudged, your black Louboutins long gone in the corner you once laughed with your friends. As you thanked the remaining people for coming, Toto showed up again, startling you as he came from behind, putting his right hand in your shoulder.

"Seems like the party has reached an end." he says, making you look up at him. His face was fairly red, and by the way he slurred his words, you could tell he was somewhat drunk. His hair was messier than earlier and the tie that was once a fancy bow was now untied, resting around his neck, a nice combination to his slightly unbuttoned shirt.

"Unfortunately. I hope you had fun, though." you reply, turning your attention to shake some of your guests' hands.

"It's always fun with you around." He says as he smiles to the same people shaking your hands.

You crookedly smile, turning around to walk to your table. As you do so, he follows.

"Do you need a ride? I saw you coming in with Bradley, but he already left," He watches you as you walk through the empty club, employees cleaning the floor of what was once the party of a lifetime. "guess parties aren't really his thing." He chuckles.

"I don't wanna make you take me home now, it's late and you're probably very tired."

"Oh, please, it's Monaco. Not like I'm going to be driving for hours." He replies, earning you a laugh. You and Toto lived pretty close to each other, but you'd drive past his building before getting to yours, so you truly didn't want him to make a huge detour just because of you.

"Fine," you smile, grabbing your sparkly clutch. "just please tell me you came with your 300sl roadster." You say and he chortles, rolling his eyes.

The Mercedes 300SL Roadster owned by Toto was probably one of your favorite cars in his collection. Hell, in anyone's collection. It's such an incredibly classy vehicle you couldn't resist its charm.

"I did." He says, and you let out a slightly loud yes! as he grabs your scarpins, laughing at your reaction. The way the smallest things were capable of making you happy always made him smile. Even after closing a multi-millionaire deal with your team, some things would never fail to make you excited, such as being driven home in a car you've always wanted.

The both of you start to walk towards Jimmy'z's exit in a different sort of haze, like the two of you were in your own little world together, laughing and exchanging inside jokes. The dry warm Monaco summer air hits you as soon as you step out, and soon the vallet comes driving Toto's car, opening the door for you to get in.

As the both of you get in, he starts driving, the sound of the car's engine echoing throughout Princesse Grace Avenue. Duke Dumont's Ocean Drive in the radio as your hair flies due to the speed in which Toto's driving. Now and then, he casually glances at you, smiling at the way you still manage to dance even when sitting on the passenger's seat.

Despite being a race weekend, the city seemed awfully quiet and empty at this time. Soon enough, he takes a turn and you're finally in Larvotto, which meant in a few seconds he'd be pulling up at your home. However, before he had the chance to, you saw the sun rising in distance, its warm light gleaming in the sea water.

"Toto, look!" you point to the horizon, and he slows the car down to follow your gaze. "It's so beautiful.."

"Indeed it is.." he says, and you can tell by his tone he's got a change of plans coming. When you realize, he's parking the car in the shore, exiting the vehicle to open the door for you. "Come on, let me give you a real after party."

You smile, because there was no way the day could get any better. You were sure you'd wake up later convincing yourself this had been a dream. Taking your hand, he pulls you out of the car, and after you close the door, he runs towards the sea, fingers intertwined with yours.

In this moment, you force yourself to forget about all of the implications and concerns that could come at you. In this moment, it was just you and Toto, not a Mercedes driver and the Mercedes' Team Principal. To anyone else who'd catch a glimpse of the scene, the both of you looked like stupid, reckless teenagers in love.

Sitting on the sand, you try to catch your breath, stomach hurting due to you not being able to stop laughing. You lay your head on his broad shoulders, hands holding his arm.

Suddenly, he feels the need to confess, "I'm always so happy when I'm around you" with the german accent getting heavier as it always did when he was drunk.

You smile, "Me too."

A beat, and then, "You're the most amazing woman I've ever known."

It comes lower than he intends to, but he's also never felt so nervous around someone as he does now. You thank the heavens for the fact that he's not looking at you, you look like a kid stupidly in love.

"You don't need to say that," you sigh. "you've already told me you're proud of me for today."

"I know. I'm not saying it because I feel the need for it to be said, but because I truly think that." he replies. "Ever since that day in Spa, you've proven to be an extremely fierce, fearless, wonderful driver and an even more amazing woman." You roll your eyes at his compliments. "I mean it, Y/N." He grabs your attention just by saying your name, making it all even more real. "Mercedes is extremely lucky to have you, and so am I." he looks at you, his face closer than ever as yours rest on his shoulder.

"You have me?" You say, looking at him through your lashes.

"I like to think I do. Do I?"

"Utterly." You giggle, your eyes glowing just by looking at him.

His hands go to cup your face, and the last thing you'd expect from him happens. At first, his lips brush over yours lightly, as if he's asking for permission, testing the waters to see if he's allowed to go further. When you don't protest, he deepens the kiss, sweeping you off your feet.

The both of you laugh, and you hide your now completely red face in his chest. "You have no idea how long I've waited for this." you say, feeling his body hairs stand on end.

"You have no idea how long I've waited to do this." he says, and you shed a tear on his partially shirt covered chest. "Are you crying?" He asks, and when he hears you sniff, he takes it as a yes. "Hey, don't cry. Look." he lifts your chin up, making you stare at the scene unfolding in front of your eyes.

The sunrise looked like a piece of art, with pinkish and yellow tones coloring the sky. Toto puts an arm around your shoulders, pulling you closer. You could now add having him at your list as well.

[noellefan101]

Nick-Names - Genshin

Characters: Xiao, Scaramouche, Venti, Lyney, Albedo, Kaveh, Thoma, Diluc, Childe, Heizou, Kazuha x GN reader

Warnings: a lot of cheesy and weird nicknames, if you dont like some for a specific char you're welcome to send me your ideas, could be modern au, established relationship

(you can clearly see that i prob put in an OC, so im so sry, but some i just also really head-canon as the "would rather date a loving person than be loving" if you get what i mean)

Summary: both of your pet names for each other, some silly some sweet

Note: you can really tell where i had no ideas for nicknames. and ik i use both 'pet names' and 'nicknames' but im just kinda stupid and didnt care to change stuff when i was already done with it. also i may just have a problem but why does princess sound 10x better than prince, no matter your gender, anyway love youuuu

Xiao

He will always say what is on his mind, and he did the same thing when you brought up using pet names. he wasn't very fond of the idea, and sometimes he still isn't(depending on the situation). but he has gotten used to it more over time, like when you burst open his door and to talk to him while using the most absurd nicknames he´s ever heard of.

__

Pet names for you: lovely, qinxing, [shorter version of your name](sry people with short names, i fell ya)

Pet names for him: babe, baby, cutie, dove, birdy, my alatus

Scaramouche

Will never admit he likes being called weird things by you, EVER. if he did then he was drunk and he was totally lying. and that counts with calling you stuff as well, he would rather die than admit he doesn't just call you that bc you wanted him to.

__

Pet names for you: idiot, princess/prince, dear

Pet names for him: smoochi, love

Venti

He was probably the one who suggested the idea at first, like two days/weeks (seconds) into your relationship. i also think he already had at least one nickname for you when you were "just friends", in the crushing phase, and has some for all his other friends as well(prob also his teachers if school au, lul).

__

Pet names for you: windblume, cecilia, [insert the cheesiest thing you can think of], my love

Pet names for him: venni, my dear, sweetheart, my bard

Lyney

He would be over the moon if you gave him a nickname, and would instantly be looking like a tomato too. would increase its usage by tenfolds if you said you liked one of his nicknames. you cannot stop him even if you somehow got 'Father' involved.

__

Pet names for you: babe, mon trésor, mon amour, beautiful

Pet names for him: sweetie, amour, lyn

Albedo

He didn't really see a use for it at first, finding it kind of useless. but sooner or later realized how happy you looked when he had somehow slipped up and called you 'love' when he needed your assistance. and later just didn't bother to stop.

__

Pet names for you: love, my cecelia, my dear

Pet names for him: 'bedo, lovely, (my) genius

Kaveh

He LOVES nick-names, probably made one for everyone in the friend group(yk alhaitham, tighnari n cyno), and would be delighted to make some up for you.

__

Pet names for you: beloved, lovely

Pet names for him: baby,

Thoma

He really wanted to try using them, yes he calls Ayato and Ayaka my lord and my lady, but its just not the same as calling your lover something sweet. and good luck if you don't like it, he's keeping those names forever.

__

Pet names for you: babe, sweetheart, baby, sleepyhead, lovely

Pet names for him: babe, love

Diluc

He honestly wasn't a fan at first, he hated it even. but of course, you being you, insisted on using names for him, and encouraged him to at least try to use some for you. so he kinda got into routine with it.

__

Pet names for you: my love, my dear

Pet names for him: dear, red head, love, my hero

Childe

Of course, he would use nick-names and such, he uses nick-names for the traveler and paimon, so of course he would be using such with you. honestly how could he not, especially when you're looking all cute cuddled up in his hoodie.

__

Pet names for you: my love, beloved, cupcake

Pet names for him: ginger, ma strong man(only for teasing purposes), hubby

Heizou

He'll almost never call you by your actual name, he didnt even when you two were just friends, only in the most serious of times would he do that. so it was no surprise that when you actually started dating, they could only become sweeter and cheesier as time goes by.

__

Pet names for you: princess/prince, baby, beautiful, (my) sunshine

Pet names for him: hei, zou-zou, babe

Kazuha

He loves it bc no matter what you call him he'll be happy. and he makes sure you have "some" as well, and i guess he just can't stop coming up with more, and they're always more cheesy than the last. you don't know how he does it, but maybe its just his poetry skills coming through.

__

Pet names for you: dove, (my) love, sweetheart, sweetie, my dear

Pet names for him: kazu, dear

thank u for reading whatever this thing is(totally not a filler bc i habe been working on that streamer au for too long), luv ya-Masterlist

You are welcome to reblog and like any of my posts, but you CAN NOT translate, copy or hate on anybody for liking my posts

[kneelingshadowsalome]

God the idea of Simon having a s/o that's like wayyy shorter than him something like 5'5 is doing things to me. This man is 6'4 something and he's HUGEEE AF, like i think it would be a turn on for him, having his babe so small underneath him. And i don't even need to get into how probably big he is down there too? The struggle to take him in everytime but the afterwards is a pure bliss. Ugh.

Like, i agree with what you said, this man is an epitome of masculinity. And the need and want to take care, love and protect his mate. <3 <3

Mmm. Mmmm.

Ok I'm just gonna leave this here.

Original photo: @ S0CIALHUNTER on Twitter

This is not a Drill

Word count: 2.2 k

Tags/warnings: SMUT 🔞, a dash of fluff, size kink (obviously), size difference, swearing, premature ejaculation, penetrative sex toy. F!Reader.

A/N: Gaahh. No poetry this time. Just pure filth. Enjoy 🍽

This might just be one of your better ideas.

You've done this in secret for two weeks now, hoping by the time he arrives, you'll be able to surprise him with how well you've trained yourself to receive him.

If you can take a large toy so well, day after day, it should help with taking him in more easily too. Right?

As in, take in the biggest dick you've ever had and, god willing, will ever have.

You're actually quite proud of yourself. Not only does this thing keep you juicy, but it also makes you thirst for him even more. The need to have something even bigger inside you, the knowledge that he can provide that bigger thing, makes your lips purse, makes your walls throb as you remind yourself that tomorrow, your man will finally come home.

…Except that the stealthy fucker has chosen to arrive a day early. You don't even hear him before he's at your bedroom door. Fuck his profession, fuck all that experience in sneaking around, even with all that mass��

He comes in just in time to see how the said dong comes out, slick with your wetness.

Oh shit–

"Well. What do we have here?"

He looks at the brutal object in your hand, then raises his eyes to you – flustered you, lying all naked and throbbing and flushed on the bed. He can barely hold back a smile, but it's his eyes that laugh with an amused gleam.

"Careful or you'll hurt yourself with that thing."

That's some cheese coming from someone who's even bigger than the crude thing in your hand…

"You said you'd come tomorrow," you mewl as your excuse. He cocks his head a little, raises an eyebrow.

"Disappointed?"

"No, of course not, but–"

"You want help with that?"

He gives a side eye to the toy still in your hand. You blink a few times, then reach to set it somewhere, anywhere – the bedside table has to do, but you're too clumsy, and the toy drops to the floor and rolls at his feet.

Jesus, could things get any more embarrassing?

He examines the sorry thing with a stare that says How pathetic. Because even if to you, it's gigantic, it's nothing compared to what he's got in those pants. And he knows it too.

"Now ain't this convenient. I can go straight in, right?"

"I– I'm not sure," you breathe with anticipation.

"Let's give it a try then."

He doesn't even wait for your admission, which would only be a blaring, blazing Yes please sir. He doesn't trouble himself with undressing, merely crawls to the bed and over you.

He pulls back only to get himself out of those jeans, and it always looks like he's drawing out a massive weapon. Even in his hands, which are fucking huge, the cock looks like an oversized beast. He's fully hard, too, probably started to gather blood there the minute he saw you on that bed, puny and shy and caught red-handed.

And he's as impatient as can be: finally, there's a chance he can drive that cock right in, that he doesn't have to warm you up for half an hour with mouth and fingers and hear you cry when it still takes a few tears and some swearing as he guides it inside.

But the toys are no help, it seems. The massive head of his cock disappears in you, alright… But that doesn't mean it feels safe or sound.

"Oh, no. No, no."

He halts, hovering over you with just the tip inside, pulsing wildly.

"No?"

Ugh, why did you have to pick the biggest colossus of a man to be your fuck buddy for the rest of your life?

"Just… slowly, ok?"

"Yeah. Yeah."

He swallows and gets back to it, more slowly this time, and the spread is delicious – but it's also blinding, and you always have to remind yourself to keep breathing.

You just need to relax; it can fit, it has been there dozens of times before…

"Fuck, you're– you're even tighter down here," he groans with a dry throat and a heavy accent that makes you instantly clench around him.

It appears that you have only managed to train your inner muscles with that ridiculous dildo.

So much for trying to coax yourself open with toys…

He feeds more of that thickness in, in, in, until his balls make contact; they press against your flesh while your pussy hugs him with a perfect O shape. You bite your lip and hold your breath, and you're not the only one gaping at the scene in mild shock and admiration.

"Look at that…"

He doesn't even bother to tone down the drunken arousal in his voice which always drops down a few notes when he's fucking you. But every now and then, it's tinged with concern. How the hell can you even take him fully in?

He glances your way with the smallest smile playing at the corner of his mouth, muscles taut with anticipation. The man simply can't wait to ruin you.

"You ready?"

No…??

You give him a frail little nod and some high-pitched, broken whimpers from your mouth.

"Uh-huh?"

He chuckles, then withdraws, slowly… But the next thrust is not that gentle, and your brows knit together in pleasure and pain. Well, it's not exactly pain, just… It's a little too much. If the angle was even slightly off, it would hurt. The wetness no doubt helps this business, but you still find your teeth sinking into your lower lip again – he starts to roll his hips, fuck you with experimental thrusts that, blessedly, don't plunge too deep.

You feel your inner walls both accommodate him and tighten around him; greedy, like it's no problem at all to have far too big a shaft stuffed down there. And not just crammed, but plowing: back and forth like you're a toy, too.

"What in the bloody hell have you been doing…"

He detects the tense muscles that pull him in every time he reaches the base. You're too small for him; that fact was established long ago. But added with the clenching and throbbing pulse of your cunt, a fervor that tries to suck him like he's a fat stick of candy cane makes his jaw gradually fall open. The man looks like he's going to pass out.

"Were you doing that shit for me?"

You smile and flutter your lashes innocently, all the while a giant is trying to work his giant cock in you.

"Yup. Welcome home, I guess?"

He looks at you, not with mirth, but with reproof. You're playing with fire, toying with a sharp blade, and teasing a man of his size might not be the best of your ideas.

But that's exactly what you are; a goddamn tease. You just can't help it. You know he gets an equal kick out of this setting: of you being so small. Anyone is small compared to him, but you're small compared to anyone. Next to him–not to talk under him–you look like a helpless doll.

And perhaps that's what this is all about: perhaps one of these days, you want him to wreck you.

Use you.

Even the very thought makes your cunt wrap around him again. Massive thighs at least twice the size of yours force your legs wide apart as he goes deeper – so deep that you can feel those balls again, hefty slaps against you as he tries to bury himself inside a place he's not meant to fit.

You always wonder what you look like under him, disappearing entirely under a dark shadow and hundreds of pounds of muscle. Spreading your thighs to offer too tight a slit to what's practically a monster. It must always be forced inside with sweat, patience, and needy grunts. How insane it must look for that thing to disappear inside you again and again until you're loaded with him… His cum never stays inside before you reach the shower, but the feel of it running down your thighs is absolutely glorious.

You notice he slows down the pace, which is odd. Normally, he's fucking you with abandon at this point.

"What's wrong?"

He huffs above you, chest swelling with shallow, alarmed breaths.

"Wrong? What's right, more like…"

He resumes with a thrust or two, looks down to where you are joined, and lets out an aggravated groan.

"I'm sorry, I can't…" He draws back as if to pull out completely, and you whine a complaint. A decision is made right away; he sinks back inside, fills you again and again, until…

"I think I'm gonna cum," he informs with apologetic alarm.

Oh.. Right.

… Already?

"It's ok… it's ok," you sweep your hands up his back, clutch him to make it known that he can collapse like a tower upon you, and you would only feel enthusiastic about getting buried under the rubble.

Use me.

Just fucking take me.

The look on his face is a rare glimpse behind the walls of a remorseless soldier: something primal but vulnerable, something fragile that only you are allowed to see.

"You can use me," you whisper, and it's like a spell that calls upon disaster.

"Ah, Christ…"

It takes only a split-second before he accepts your offer in full. You're planted in the mattress with starved thrusts, his thighs and chest spread you open until he's drilling you in an almost 90 degree angle. You're concerned for the bed's capacity to take this sort of plowing when you should perhaps worry more about your poor abused pussy.

It's such a heaven that your jaw falls open, too. You're dreamy and helpless under him while he's far from feeble. He looks like thunder above you, especially when you're looking at him like he's a demigod.

Like you're in love.

Which you are… And he knows it, even without that adoring bimbo stare you give him.

"Gonna–cum. Fuck, I'm gonna–"

You can almost see the sweat breaking, can feel the cock inside you jolting even when there's no room for it to do such a thing.

"Fuck–! "

It swells inside you as he cums with a painful groan. The orgasm seems to just last and last, and you realize with horror and thrill that the guy hasn't had a wank in days. Work has been a bitch, then, and you get to pay for it – a punishment you suffer with glee.

He gives you his all, squeezing you between arms that feel like a too tight cage, crushing you with a chest that feels like a compression machine burying you under an iron weight. Hard thighs press against yours until you're spread open for him to be buried in to the hilt.

And you know it gives him hell that he finished before you: it's on par with a failed mission, you suppose. Your mission, however, was a success. The body around and over you is coiled tight, but the tension gradually leaves. Obviously it makes him feel even more heavy.

He finally goes slack against you, just like you wished, and you almost squeal while getting imprisoned by a heap of heaving muscles. He's catching both breath and the remains of his pride as he lies there on top of you. The cock inside gives an occasional pulse, but you're forever hungry.

This man should be illegal…

You know you won't be left stranded for long, and seeing him so utterly done gives you enough satisfaction for now. You can wait for him to finish you in other ways.

"You're fucking dangerous," he huffs in your ear while trying not to crush you completely with his weight. He's gathering his strength in the solace of your neck, and you smile like you're on drugs.

"Does that mean you like me..?"

"What do you think," he snorts humorlessly on your skin, but you know he's more than happy. "'Welcome home'... Bloody hell, woman."

"I'm glad you're here," you laugh and place a hand on that broad back to caress him gently.

"Yeah. You can keep that toy."

"Perhaps I'll finish myself with it," you chirp to annoy him a bit more. Another triumph: you have to suppress a laugh upon hearing him groan.

"Now give me a bloody minute…"

Poor man. The thought that you feel just too fucking good to him, so good that it makes him lose control, gives you such a high that it's just sinful. The thought that a stoic goliath like him is rendered weak on top of a small, harmless woman is more intoxicating than a wine glass filled to the brim.

You pet the back of his neck and know he's probably tired from work and wants to sleep. You wouldn't object to falling asleep too while he's holding you.

"How about we give it another try after a nap?"

Your offer makes him rumble softly, contently; the man's ready to drop but also thoroughly enamored. Your heart skips a beat from pure happiness.

"Mm. You always have the best ideas."

[chrissv4mp]

¡ YOU MADE ME HATE THIS CITY ! — CHRIS S.

chris masterlist & taglist // main masterlist

summary: you're not happy with chris. all he does is make you sad, and you're done with it.

pairing: chris sturniolo × fem!reader

warnings + topics: cursing, arguments, crying, chris is an asshole, driving under the influence, drinking, chris can drive in this one🗣, etc.

authors note: idk, basically how i feel when i'm with my bf anyway i'd listen to this album for a lifetime if i had to🗣🗣 I DIDNT KNOW HOW END THIS SOO sorry if the endinh is shit💔💔

word count: 4.9k

"when i'm away from you,

i'm happier than ever."

a laugh came from your throat as you grabbed taras arm, leaning on her for support as you both laughed your asses off at a joke told by nick.

he only smiled softly, trying to contain his own laughter as he watched his two friends. the taller boys eyes land on a guy across the room, and then he speaks, "hey, i'll be back. stay safe, and please don't go with any guys that look like creeps?"

you nod, and tara just smiles at him, "we won't, we're just here to have a good time. go get that man, nick!"

nick smiles, shaking his head as he looks away, turning his back to the both of you as he begins to walk to the other side of the building. tara turns to you again, tilling her head at the... sad look on your face?

"hey, what's wrong, babe?" her tone is soft, and she frowns slightly when you shake your head with a weak smile. your eyes meet hers, and she can tell somethings not right.

"there's clearly something wrong, y/n. come on, you know you can tell me anything. did someone do something to you? cause i swear on my life i'll beat their—" your eyes widen and you quickly cut her off with a nervous laugh.

"no, no, there's absolutely no need for that, tar," you give her a reassuring smile as you reach for her hand, running your thumb over her soft skin as you continue, "this is just the happiest i've been probably... all year?"

the shorter girl smiles, but then as your words hit, she feels another rush of sympathy for you, "well... i'm glad that you're having fun, but, you gotta let yourself be free some more, y'know?"

you nod, and then she continues, "go out with your friends, i'm free most of the time. and if you wanna be alone, then go do something for yourself, girl. i'm sure chris would also love to hang out with you."

he wouldn't, though. he didn't even come around most of the time, only texting you when he needed something and coming home just to sleep. hell, most of the time, he just slept over at some persons house who neither of you knew. he made you feel like you weren't lovable, always complaining about little things and then blowing up when you tried to defend yourself.

that's why you dreaded coming home after every hangout. you hated coming home to chris, just for him to yell at you and make you feel shitty. you really wish you could explain it better, the feeling he gives you. fuck, you even wished it was fake, the feeling of pure happiness whenever you weren't around the boy.

but everybody else's relationships are like this, right? it's normal, you tell yourself. everything chris has done to you is completely normal. you think. he hates when you think because he always say that your mind works in interesting ways. he always say that you have a terrible mindset, undermining your way of thinking.

"yeah. chris." you mutter, flashing tara a smile before you go to stare at your intertwined fingers, you don't even realize how hard your gripping her hand until she winces, "shit. i'm sorry."

she just shrugs, a reassuring smile on her face as she squeezes your hand. as she looks up at your face again, she frowns, "y/n..."

her mind wanders back to your last words, the mention of chris' name the one thing that set you off and made you act out, "it's him, isn't it? what's he doing to you? is he treating you badly?"

you want to tell her yes, you want to fall into her arms and just cry. all you want is to spill all your feelings out right now, to scream and scream over and over again, but you can't. you didn't want chris' reputation to go down the gutter, you really didn't want anything bad to happen to him, even if he did treat you like garbage. even if he treated you like actual shit, you still wanted a happy life for him, he was the one person who showed you love. the first person who actually cared for you.

but, as the years went by, he just... chris just drifted away, he got too caught up into fame, money, and girls especially. girls who weren't you and girls that looked completely different, it was like you weren't even alive most of the time. he treated you like you weren't his girlfriend.

"no, it's not him," another sad smile, and your voice almost cracks as more bad thoughts come to mind, "it's never chris."

tara notices the subtle change of tone, and only then does she reach her free hand out to rest on your shoulder. the bar stools were close enough together that your knees touched, and tara only pulled you closer to her. when you were finally in her arms, you let out a shaky sigh.

then, she hears you whimper. and now you're full-on sobbing into her shoulder, tears streaking down your face as you cry quietly. your body trembles, and you feel as if you let your of your best friend, you'll fall and never be able to get back up.

her hand comes up behind your back, rubbing it in a comforting way as she coos gentle things into your ear, her other hand coming up to your hair and stroking your h/c locks softly, "i know, i know, babe. just let it out, i'm here, okay?"

tara can't help but frown at your saddened state, eyes shutting closed as she continues to comfort you. her lips part again, and you feel a sense of relief wash over you as the words leave her mouth, "you can stay with me for tonight, and for however long you need."

"give me a day or two to think of something clever,

to write myself a letter

to tell me what to do..."

the only sounds in the room are your gentle breathing, and the loud screaming of chris on the other end of the phone. your index finger is wedged between your teeth as you bite down on your nail nervously, your eyes darted around, not knowing where to stay as you listened in to your boyfriend.

"where the fuck were you last night, y/n?" chris tries to contain himself, and you can hear his footsteps pacing back and forth on the hardwood floors of your shared bedroom, "why didn't you come home, i—y/n, what were you doing and where are you right now?"

a shaky breath leaves your lips, and you finally let your hand swing back to the side of your body, gripping the phone tighter, "i'm at taras house, chris. i just—i'm gonna be honest, and please don't get mad—i just need a few days away from... you."

you hear chris scoff on the other end, and you begin to speak again before he starts to blow up, "well, not you, specifically," yes, it was indeed him specifically, "i just wanted to get out of the house for a little... maybe a day or two, and then i'll be back, okay?"

"i knew when i asked you to

be cool about what i was telling you,

you'd do the opposite of what you said you'd do..."

you both knew chris wouldn't care, he didn't give a single fuck if you weren't around, but for more than 24 hours? that's where he drew the line because he knew that when you were around your sensible, smart friends, you would make bad good decisions. you would make decisions that would effect yours and his relationship, and he didn't want that because he needed to have somebody under his control.

he hated the idea of having no control. even if it was only one person her could control, he still had it, he still had somebody wrapped around his finger that he could get to do whatever he pleased.

"wha—y/n, what?" chris sighed, running a hand through his messy hair, "the fuck do you mean? you're coming home tonight, and if you don't i—"

"and i'd end up more afraid..."

chris cut himself off as he began to think. he shouldn't worry about you. fuck your friends, he would always find a way to get you back, so why was he begging you to get home?

a sigh was heard from behind the phone, and you raised an eyebrow in confusion, "nevermind, whatever, go fuck around. see you. bye."

then, the three beeps sounded in your ear. you scoffed, your heart aching at the fact that he didn't even he loved you. he always told you he loved you before he hung up... until a few months ago. you didn't know what went wrong, or where along the line something broke your bond. nothing happened that you could really remember.

"bye." you whispered, shutting your phone off and throwing it on the guest bed before you fell onto your back and landed on the silk sheets. a loud, exaggerated sigh left your lips as you dragged your hands down your face in frustration.

what was this boy doing to you? and why were you letting him do it? you didn't know how to answer the first question, but you had an idea for the second. maybe you liked the thrill.. or maybe you were just hanging on so tight you could never let go. if you let him go, the indentation of that metaphorical rope would still be there... and you'd have to live with the memory of chris. you could never live with yourself knowing you possibly hurt him.

"you clearly weren't aware that you made me miserable..."

but then again, if you let it go, the marks would fade soon, and then you wouldn't have anything to remember. it wouldn't be a constant reminder of chris and how he treated you. so, maybe you just had to let go and take your time to heal, hang around the right people or maybe even just take time for yourself.

a knock, and then two. you opened your eyes, sitting up and being met with the sight of tara leaning against the doorframe, "hey, can i come in?" you nod quickly, needing the distraction to get your mind off of chris.

you didn't even realize her moving closer until you felt the bed dip beside you, your head turning to meet taras eyes as you smiled softly. she returned the same smile, and then began to speak, "how are you feeling?"

no words came out of your mouth for a few moments as you tried to gather up all your emotions and try to put them into one word. but how could you if you were feeling almost all of them?

"i don't know." your voice was quiet, shy almost as you looked down at your lap. tara stayed quiet, letting you think for a moment as she stared at the side of your face, "i feel... angry, sad. gosh, i feel everything and i can't even fucking explain it, it's just so—"

a hand on your shoulder made you relax, and you stopped mid-sentence as tara rubbed your shoulder softly. your mouth shut, and you turned your head to look at her again, "you don't have to feel anything yet, y/n. i'm not gonna tell you to calm down because i would be livid if somebody said that to me, so, i'll just tell you this..."

"close your eyes and take deep breaths. take a moment to gather your thoughts, and then talk to me, okay?" her voice was gentle, quiet, and comforting. the mix of her touch made your entire body relax, and you smiled at her.

you nodded, turning your head back to face in front of you and then closing your eyes. inhale through your nose, count to 3, then exhale through your mouth. inhale, count to 3, exhale. over and over again until you were finally put back together, mostly. one final deep breath, and your eyes were open again. you turned back to your best friend, and she just smiled at you.

"i feel like shit, tar," your voice threatens to crack, but you don't let it, taking another deep breath before you begin to speak again, "this entire thing with chris... fuck, it's just so exhausting and it makes me feel horrible. i'm just chasing after him constantly, seeking his approval only to get disappointment and anger from him. it's like he doesn't even care about me, tara.."

you finally crack, and tears begin to well up in your eyes as you sniffle. tara frowns, squeezing your shoulder softly as she sees your state, "he doesn't deserve you, hon, seriously. i see the way you look at him, and he just gives you nothing in return. he treats you so horribly, i can't even—fuck. you just need to let him go, babe. and i know, it's gonna be so fucking hard at first, but you just have to push through that,"

"i'll be here the entire way through. you know i always have your back, even when you're in the wrong sometimes," you both chuckle at her small joke, "you deserve so much better than that dick, and i'm not just gonna sit here and watch from afar as he continues to break you down. you're gonna get through this, and i'm gonna make you forget he was even born."

you giggle at her choice of words, but you know what she's saying is right and that you need to listen to her, "okay."

tara smiles at you again, "okay. well, tomorrow we plan, and in the upcoming days we bring this fucker down."

your eyes widen and you put your palms up, shaking them in a protest, "woah, okay, we're not bringing anybody down, we're just getting me out of this hell-hole he put me in. is that clear?"

the shorter girl shrugs, a mischievous smile on her face, "same thing."

the phone buzzes on your nightstand, and you lean over to see who it is. chris' name pops up in bold letters at the top, his contact picture smiling brightly at you as he gives a thumbs up.

you came home just this morning, deciding that you would be fine to stay with chris for a little longer. you didn't want tara to deal with your shit. she didn't deserve to be wrapped up in this whole thing, and you didn't want to be seen a bad friend.

"hello?" you mutter, sitting back against the headboard as you cross your legs, preparing yourself for whatever stupid shit your boyfriend would say this time.

you didn't even know why he was calling. it was late at night, and he never called you. well, unless it was for a favor or something stupid. wasn't he supposed to be at a party with his "friends?"

chris giggles behind the phone, a dumb smile on his face as he stares at your through the screen. his hair is messy and his eyes are insanely red. was he seriously high right now? "hi—hey, y/n/n,"

"you call me again, drunk in your benz,

driving home under the influence..."

you gave him a smile, your eyebrow raising in confusion as you start to speak, but he cuts you off, "okay, i know what you're gonna ask, and don't worry, i'm calling you for—uh.. a good reason, mm'kay?"

"chris you're fucking high, don't lie to me." you sigh, squinting your eyes to see where he's at. it was dark, but you could make out that he was in his car. there was an open beer can in his cup holder, and only then did the realization hit you, "chris, what—christopher! what is that?"

the brunette looks down beside him, and he takes one hand off the wheel to grab the half-empty can, "it's beer, duh." he giggles, and you watch as he takes a sip of it before putting both hands back onto the steering wheel, "don't worry 'bout it, mamas."

"you scared me to death, but i'm wasting my breath,

'cause you only listen to your fucking friends..."

your eyes widen, and you furrow your eyebrows as a wave of—god knows what—washes over you, "chris, what the fuck do you mean 'don't worry about it?' you're driving drunk, you idiot!"

chris giggles at your outburst, eyes trained on the dark, empty streets of los angeles. he turns the wheel back and forth, driving a little over the speed limit just to get you on your toes. it works, and you swear you feel your heart stop. you don't even know what to say. you want to curse him out, gosh, you want to scream at the top of your fucking lungs but you know that'll only give him the satisfaction he wants.

how could you stay calm, though? he was pushing you so hard, you were bound to fall and break, "CHRIS! what the fuck—stop driving like you're fucking stupid, get off the road."

he doesn't listen, though, and you watch as he ponders his choices. he could either do what you say, continue to mess with you, or really test your patience. he smiles deviously and goes with the third option, "hm, there's a lot of mud over here, y'know?"

you don't even know how but your eyes widen more, breath catching as you squeeze your phone in your hands. your mouth is agape, and you feel tears prick in your eyes as his phone starts to shake. the car is moving faster now, and chris is grunting softly as he makes a wildly sharp turn, "chris!"

the phone falls to the passenger seat with a quiet thud, and chris screams loudly. you can't see him anymore. all you're met with is a black screen. a quiet sobs leaves your throat, and your eyes dart around the empty to screen for something, anything. did you just lose your boyfriend?

another cry, and now you're sobbing your heart out as you try to breathe properly. your free hand comes up to clutch the fabric of your shirt, trying to ground yourself as you make an effort to speak, "wha—no, no, no... chris?"

nothing but silence and the quiet hum of the car engine, not that you can hear it over the volume of your breathing. you can't even speak anymore, so shocked to the point that you freeze in fear. how were you gonna explain this to matt and chris? how were you gonna tell them that you could've stopped this from happening? how could you?

your heart aches, and your mind runs wild with all the questions that you'll have to answer. where is he? what happened? why did he do it? why weren't you there? why couldn't you help him? what the fuck is wrong with you? so many questions that you didn't have any answers for, "chris, please—i can't... fuck, i can't—"

laughing. he's laughing. wait, he's laughing? your eyes widen again, and you gasp, "oh my gosh, chris. chris oh my fucking—are you okay?"

he still laughs even as he grabs the phone, and as you finally see him, there's nothing wrong with the boy at all. there's no cuts, no broken glass or skin, no blood. you're grateful, but also confused. your mind wanders to endless possibilities, and you land on one you pray isn't true.

"oh my gosh, you should see your face right now!" he smiles, throwing his head back against the seat as he holds his stomach, "i got you so fucking good, hah! look at you, you're even crying."

and you were right. anger and disgust are clearly shown on your face now, and more tears begin to run down your cheeks, "what?"

why was this funny to him? was he seriously that fucked up to joke about literal death? chris just continues to cackle, "it's a prank, baby. now, calm down, don't start throwing a fit."

"i don't relate to you,

i don't relate to you, no."

you can't even describe how betrayed and angry you feel right now. maybe you were keen to the idea of bringing him down. no other girl should have to deal with his bullshit. you scoff, a bewildered smile on your face as you begin to speak.

"calm down? you're telling me to calm down, chris?" your smile fades as you continue, eyes darting all around his face through the phone screen, "you are so fucked up. you're brain is so fucked up, chris! what the hell is wrong with you?!"

chris just rolls his eyes, huffing quietly as he steps on the gas again. he tries shutting you out, but with how loud you're being, he really can't, "it's not even that big of a deal. not my fault you're always so sensitive, grow up!" he raises his voice, eyes on yours through the phone.

you couldn't believe this was the boy you once loved, screaming at you and telling you that you're the sensitive one, "i'm sensitive? you're getting mad at me for something you did, you asshole!" you yell, voice cracking at the end of your sentence.

chris groans, eyes squeezing shut as he slams on the breaks and punches the steering wheel several times. the horn beeps loudly, startling you for a quick second before you get used to it, "would you shut you're god damn mouth?! all you do is fucking cry and whine about everything!"

"yeah, i wonder why?" you scoff, not even giving him a chance to speak before you hang up the phone and let your hand fall to the side. you just want to throw the device at the wall, let all your anger out on something. on someone.

"'cause i'd never treat me this shitty.

you made me hate this city!"

"gosh, you are so insufferable!" chris yells, hands running through his hair before he tugs on it harshly. he turns his back to you, walking away a few steps before turning back, "what is your problem with me, y/n?"

your cross your arms over one another, letting your head tilt to the side as you take a step forward, "my problem is that you don't do shit for us, chris. you don't even try to keep our relationship running. i'm the only one who does, and you don't even care, do you?"

"you can't even look me in the eyes anymore. you aren't the boy i once knew, and i don't think you'll ever go back to him. you make me feel like shit every single day, chris!" you sigh, tears threatening to spill from your eyes again, "i can't do this anymore if you're not gonna love me like i love you. i'm not gonna deal with your problems anymore!"

chris stays silent, head pounding from all the stress and the alcohol he had earlier, "you'll come back."

you let your arms flail to the sides before coming up to rub at your temples, eyes fluttering shut as you sigh, "that. that's what makes me feel so... angry."

"you never listen! and you always think the odds will turn out in your favor, but they won't. that's not how life works, and we both know that. you just make it seem like you hate—" chris groans at your words, opening his mouth to speak, no, yell.

"like, i hate you? yeah, well, maybe i do, y/n!" chris' eyes are wide, and he looks like a rabid animal as he steps closer to you, "have you ever thought of that, or are you too in love to see it? god, i despise you!" it's not true, and he knows that. you know that.

"then why do you still call me baby and mamas? why do you even bother coming home each week and lying in bed next to me, huh?" a sigh leaves your trembling lips, and you finally look up at him, "you can act like you hate me, but you don't. you just want that power. you want me to come crawling back to you tomorrow."

"never told anyone anything bad.

'cause that shit's embarrassing, you were my everything

and all that you did was make me fucking sad!"

"don't waste my time, chris, i don't need you to come at me for something that isn't my fault. i'm over it!" you yell, and then you feel the rain.

it beats down on both you and chris as you stand in silence for a few moments, taking in the tense atmosphere as you stare chris down and he stares at the ground. he really was the pathetic one, and he had the audacity to call you that?

you can't even tell if the droplets running down your face are tears or just water from the rain, but you don't care about that, all you care about is getting an explanation from chris as to why he was doing all this to you.

he huffs, and then you begin to yell over the hard rainfall again, "so, why? why are you doing this to me, chris?! why even waste your own time on me when you could be fucking other girls?"

"you don't even need me, so why?" you cry out, clutching your now soaked t-shirt, "what's the point, huh?"

chris finally looks into your eyes, and now you can see his lower lip tremble and tears in his blue eyes, "because you're the only one who actually cares about me." it's fake. he's done this before, and now you're actually aware of how many times he's guilt-tripped you like this.

you shake your head, running a hand through your wet hair to get it out of your face. you weren't a kid anymore, and he should know better than not to try this stupid again, but he still does. the first time he did this, it resulted in shutting out both your mom and boy best friend, and then it continued. every other time this happened it always resulted in throwing someone out of your life, but not this time.

"don't try to make me feel sorry for you, chris!" you scream, and now you don't even care if the neighborhood hears. you needed to let these screams out or they would build up until you broke, resulting in you lashing out on someone, "gosh, i fucking hate you for doing this to me! you ruined me, christopher!"

chris looks down again, and now he feels the shame coming down on him, "fucking look at me!" but he doesn't, he keeps his head down and kicks a nearby rock.

you don't feel bad anymore because you know he deserves it. he lets you scream at him because he knows he deserves it. neither of you was in the right headspace in that moment, but you both didn't care. chris would forget in a few days, and you wouldn't. how could you forget after 4 years of this?

the brunette takes a few steps forward, hands reaching out to cup your face, and you huff angrily. your hands are on his chest the moment he's in your face, and you shove him back harshly.

"you ruined everything good,

always said you were misunderstood,

made all my moments your own..."

"just fucking leave me alone!" you scream louder than before, and chris takes a step back with wide eyes. his eyes are finally making contact with yours, and he sees all of the emotions in them now.

the rain seems harder now, and chris wipes his face with the back of his hand as he steps back to his spot, staring at you from afar as he watches you breathe heavily and cry. you've been waiting to get those screams out, chris knew that well. he knew that he treated you poorly, but he... didn't care, actually. he had the world in his hands and he could replace you in an instant, so why did it hurt just that little bit?

tears are now running down his cheeks, and he sniffles as he looks away. he wasn't gonna let you see him when he was the most vulnerable. he couldn't. chris just sighed shakily as he looked back down at the ground again, tucking his hands into his soaked pockets.

you're still staring at him, and when you hear him chuckle quietly, you furrow your eyebrows. he walks away.

"yeah, go try to find someone better than me, bitch!" he yells over the rain and then jumps into his car, quickly backing out of the driveway and sleeping down the road.

you feel like you're suffocating as you watch him leave, and you swear your knees will give out if you don't move or do something. how could he leave after that? how could he leave after he told you that you were the only person who cared about him? if it was true, he wouldn't have left. if anything he said was true, he would've stayed and comforted you, he would've tried to bring this relationship back into the light. but he didn't because it was never true.

your lips parted, and you squeezed your eyes shut as you screamed again. your throat would definitely be sore in the morning, but who cared right now? you needed this, and you weren't gonna let it boil over until you took your anger out on someone who hadn't done anything. you didn't want to turn out like chris did.

@livialifesblog

[the-100-days-of-junkan]

Day 90

Alright. So you might be thinking, pondering, desperately contemplating to yourself a simple question.

“JEM. WHAT THE FUCK??? WHY????” And I hear you, I get it, it’s a lot to take in out of nowhere and that’s the point. Sit with me, peer into the biohazard that is in my brain as I explain to you why in the name of all that’s good I made a fucking Music Video.

So last time on the 100 Days of Junkan, for Day 80 I got very silly and animated a gif of Junko and Mikan kissing. And as I keep saying over and over again, every 10 pics I wanted to go BIGGER. And maybe this is just the brainrot causing all of my mental functions to degrade past the point of no return, but the only way up at this point was in fact a music video.

But surely I couldn’t. I mean, I only have that single gif as experience with animation! How the fuck could I try and put myself through a process that I have absolutely no experience making something as ambitious as a Music Video! I’ll have to do something else. But then.

I had a thought, a small thought, an evil little thought that wormed its way into my head and didn’t leave.

“Okay. But wouldn’t it be really funny if you sent a full Junkan music video to Val without any warning?” That was it. I was beaten, I couldn’t counter that. The sheer comedic shock value of keeping my wonderful oomfie, the one who has helped motivate me through this entire project, who has given amazing responses to all of these pics as I made them, completely in the dark over this, and then finally with no context, or warning, or even a hint, dropping a fucking music video on her lap and running away like I’m pranking someones god damn doorbell. It was too much, even moreso considering I could do the same with ya’ll! 

You! My varied followers, the silent and the vocal, or even better the random fucking people who have been staring in confusion as the Junko and Mikan tag got flooded with art of these two kissing out of nowhere for like three fucking months. I had an opportunity to send everyone into surprise and confusion because why the fuck did I make a god damn music video??? How??? It was too fucking funny to pass up!

This is easily the most fucking bizarre thing I’ve done for the entire event! Did any of you think this was the path this would go down?? Did any of ya’ll see that I made a gif and think “Surely this scrawny white bitch also made a Music Video.” I doubt it! But if you did, my undying respect goes to you!

So here we are. A Music Video. A fucking Music Video, one which I now have to talk about. It took a full fucking page just to get to the point where I actually talk about it and this took me THREE MONTHS TO MAKE, spanning from May 8th to August 1st! 

So here’s what I’m gonna do. First, I’m gonna talk about MAKING this fucking thing, and then when I finish that I’m going to switch over to talking about the actual contents of the music video. This is going to get really messy and will probably go into tangents, but ya’ll have hopefully coped with the knowledge that this is going to be a lot of words by the time you hit the end of this sentence. (Future Jem here! I think this was actually shorter than Day 60) So without further delay-

The Making of Snow Fairy, a Junkan Music Video. Yes. Really.

So the first step of this was obviously, The Music. What song would I use for this? Well initially the plan was to animate something using the song “Everything You’ve Ever Dreamed.” And if that name sounds familiar, yes, it is the song that Val’s fic was named after. Now the idea wasn’t to adapt her fanfic into a music video (or at least it wasn’t the idea for more than 5 minutes). I was simply going to use this song to make a music video depicting a romantic journey with these two. So why not this song?

IT’S LIKE 6 FUCKING MINUTES. Not to jump ahead of myself here but I can’t make it any clearer for ya’ll, that Gif from Day 80??? That was it. That was all I had going into this. I didn’t do any other practice, I didn’t make anything else like that gif. I made that gif, took like two weeks to make Days 81-89, and jumped into a music video. And yes, that’s fucking stupid, but you’ve all learned by this point that I don’t make sensible choices. I draw women kissing, scream, and feel endless euphoria- I got so off topic already, sorry.

Anyway that’s a 6 minute song and I had very little experience, even I knew that wasn’t gonna be viable without driving my head into the wall from stress. And while the idea of me dialing it back sounds unheard of given my track record, I did in fact scale back massively.

So I pondered, and eventually came to a quite frankly obvious answer.

(Sorry I could only find an AI Upscaled version with interpolation)

Snow Fairy, the first opening of Fairy Tail, AKA, my favorite piece of fiction. And Snow Fairy is my favorite anime opening of all time, if not just straight up my favorite song ever. The fact that it wasn’t my first thought is a shock. Though that still brought on some questions.

Firstly. What version? Because yes I actually had options. I could either use the original song in Japanese, or the english cover by LeeandLie. I was close to picking the original version by Funkfist, but there was two issues. One, because it was in another language that means I would have had to taken the time to put in subtitles and keep them properly timed, which would have just been one more thing on an already massive workload. The second reason is also why I went with LeeandLie’s version, I just like the translation for the lyrics a bit more. At least in terms of how well I think it works for a Junkan Music Video. So we had the cover of the song I was gonna use, next question.

Full Song? Or the intro edit? Because the version used in the anime is obviously much shorter, and not just that actually includes the very end of the song pasted to a much earlier part of it. So if I wanted to use the shorter version I would have needed to actively edited the song.

After much thought I chose to ask my friend (and now current girlfriend) Yves to edit the song to match the intro version of Funkfists cover and worked from there. Because even if I would have loved to use the full song, that’s around 3 minutes, which for essentially a beginner sounds like fucking torture.

So I had a song around 1 minute and 28 seconds to work with. Much easier- WRONG. WRONG IT WAS STILL PAINFUL. WHY DID I DO THIS- Anyway.

We had our song! Now we had to make the actual video!

Step 1, I actually made a Storyboard, this is the smartest thing I will do during this entire process.

As you can see from this lil joke doodle I made during the process, I didn’t even start the actual video before I had realized I had made a massive mistake, however I was of course going to persevere. The Storyboard took about, 2? 3 days? This is mostly because I had other work to prioritize, and I had to make sure I got this pretty solid. Here it is!

(The file name for this has the phrase "Why god Why" btw)

As you can see it’s very, very professional. 

You can also see there were a few things cut or changed, and even stuff that wasn’t there in the first place. That’s because even if I was going into this with more of a plan compared to other parts of this, I still really had no idea what I was getting into nor how to do it. The scene of all the girls doing their hair was cut because it just seemed like an awkward space filler to try and mimic the actual Snow Fairy Intro animation. In hindsight I do wish I kept it or found a replacement rather than just extending the following scene. And yeah that scene had to be super extended so I could actually time things properly.

As for the scene at the end, the various art pieces flashing in the background (which I will talk about later) were done because I realized without them I had way too much dead air in the scene. I then took advantage of it to show a montage of time passing in the scene itself, of the things that differed from the storyboard that’s the one I’m happiest with.

Storyboard has passed so now I have to talk about making the video itself, i feel like i’ve said some variation of that sentence like 5 times now.

So do you want a fun fact? THIS WASN’T SUPPOSED TO BE ANIMATED! This was supposed to be an Animatic, and even that might not be the right word. This was supposed to be basically a storyboard with hints of motion, say for the intro with Monokuma which I always planned to properly animate given his simplistic design. Everything else was supposed to be much simpler.

And then I kept. Accidentally. TRYING TO ANIMATE IT. I DON’T KNOW HOW YOU EVEN DO THAT BY ACCIDENT! And like sure, none of it really gets as meticulous as the Monokuma, but I still ended up learning way more about animating things properly during this project because I just couldn’t help myself. It was always “Well just one more frame to make it look right. One more frame. Okay just another- Oh no.” This is the depths of hell this ship has dragged me to, and even if I haven’t had a chance to fully make use of what I learned here because I’ve been busy, Junkan somehow made me into a fucking animatory at least to the degree of a hobbyist. IF YOU TOLD ME THAT A FEW YEARS AGO I’D THINK YOU WERE LYING! Because if you asked me before this year about my opinion on animating, I’d tell you something around the lines of-

“God I wish I could, but I just don’t have the patience for that y’know?” I GUESS THAT DOESN’T MATTER WHEN IT'S A NICHE SHIP?? Mind you this was still when I was under the impression I was going to get backlash for all this, I didn’t care but I certainly thought it would come to me. The hold these two have on my brain is downright COMICAL.

And I’m sorry if I sound like this is me complaining at all, because I’m really not, I just get more excitable and whacked out during these more high effort projects. This ship has brought me immense joy on its own, and making this project despite the exhaustive work it took to do so has been so fulfilling in part thanks to being able to see the joy my work has brought all of you. I wouldn’t trade this for anything.

But you gotta fucking admit, this isn’t fucking normal right?? None of this is normal! And I don’t mean that in a “We’re all weirdos for liking this” kind of way I mean that in a “What the fuck is going on with me specifically” kind of thing because what is ANY of this?? I re-learned how to write (loosely at least), learned how to actually paint in my program, have developed a deeper understanding of both myself and how to portray expressions, have just generally gotten better at drawing cause of this, memorized these fucking designs almost perfectly (almost, i know there’s some small details of Junko’s design i leave out and Mikan’s apron can be a challenge at times), learned how to animate, LEARNED HOW TO MAKE A MUSIC VIDEO ON ONE GIF OF EXPERIENCE, made angsty shipping art for the first time, and god fucking KNOWS what else that I’m forgetting. And that’s ignoring that by this point we’re edging so much closer to me being able to say “I’ve drawn Junkan 200 fucking times” any god damn day now. 

If this isn’t abnormal human being behaviour, it at the very least has to be really fuckin funny behaviour, right?? Am I just overthinking this?? 

Oh god, right, the main topic. Sorry about that it’s just been eating away at me the sheer absurdity of this project when I really step back and think about it.

Anyway making the vid, I did have a LOT of help from my girlfriend @sunmellows, who actually does have animation experience. She’s more versed in using sprites to animate, but a lot of the techniques could be carried over to what I was doing here. That segment of Mikan and Mukuro running along past a bunch of characters? She helped me so much to get the walk cycles perfect for that.

She also helped me make sure I could actually show this fucking video to people, because fun fact. I made this on an absolute piece of shit laptop! And at first it was relatively fine when I exported projects. But when I got to the point of being actually close to completion? Oh my god not only did it take hours, it just didn’t even work. It would basically KILL my laptops performance to the absolute limit until I would eventually have to force restart the thing. Which thank god didnt’ corrupt the fucking file. So when it came to the final export, I handed off the file to her and she graciously exported it out of clip studio, and then made some minor edits to the timing of the animation in a video editing program.

This is also why, much to my constant irritation, there are still a few animation errors in this because if I fixed them, I’d have to re-export the entire video. And sure, my current laptop is 10 times better and might not try to invent a new form of agony trying to manage it, but also i’m not waiting like 2 or 3 hours for that to happen. No matter how painful it makes rewatching this video. Cause i don’t actually like rewatching this one usually, I’m very proud of it but as I’ve said in the past I am a vicious perfectionist when it comes to my work, so its hard for me to ignore every issue and oddity in the video.

I was fucking losing it by the end of this, I was pulling late nighters for like a week while trying to work on the last few scenes and fix up whatever I could, which was hard because I lacked a convenient way to just watch the whole video in good quality and speed, since playing it in my art program resulted in constant stuttering and made it impossible to tell if it would really look like that, and again, trying to export it made my laptop hate me. But on August 1st I finished it, I had to stay up till 6 AM to do it but I did in fact, fucking do it. I passed it off to Yves, she exported it after some technical difficulties, and now we’re here. 

It was, wild, trying to keep this a secret. And i’m not just talking the 3 months I had to keep it quiet to Val (Though that was difficult but VERY worth it yes), but also keeping it secret up till this point. I don’t even know how many fucking months I’ve had to keep this quiet so none of you would find out about it, I’ve been anxiously waiting to see everyone's reactions to this fucking video, and at the time of writing we’re on like, Day 76. I still have so much more time I need to wait! I’m probably gonna be a nervous wreck the day this actually goes up!

Would I ever do this again? God I fucking hope not! (the answer is yeah someday)

I should actually talk about what’s IN the music video now, shouldn’t I? Will be mildly difficult because that’s probably gonna require a lot of rewatching, and as I already said looking at this music video does make my perfectionist brain scratch bad a bit.

Okay so Monokuma.

So originally the plan for this was for the vid to be a much closer 1-to-1 of the actual opening version of Snow Fairy, and while it did eventually evolve into more of its own thing (both functioning as its own slightly more unique intro for Junkan but also just becoming a more normal music video) the one thing that i always wanted for this was to recreate the first few seconds of the intro but with Monokuma. When this was meant to be significantly less like, animation-y, he was gonna be the only part I went fully into.

It was a real pain in the ass but this guy was basically my crash course on properly animating thanks in part to his simple design. He’s also brought much laughter to my girlfriend! On discord i have this part of the vid saved as a gif, and completely divorced from the context of the music vid it just looks like a silly as gif of Monokuma flying away. Like where the fuck are you going dude??

For the remainder of the first bit I wanted to include Hope’s Peak and Jabberwock island since they’re the most iconic locations in the series, granted, jabberwock feels very irrelevant in a non-despair AU but shhhh. The LOGO! I wish I had the actual thing in my files but I guess I just never thought to save it as it’s own thing. And I’m too scared to open the actual file for the music video to just copy paste it out of there because fun fact, the whole thing is ALL one file. Tip from the Ametuer here, don’t fucking do that.

I’m still really happy that I managed to find the actual font for the Fairy Tail logo to make this with, equally happy that I also managed to sneak in one more reference to Val’s work again! It is once again the tattoo design, because I just can’t help myself y’know?

After that we hit me actually doing this and for a brief moment you get to see it actually be about as slide-showy as I had initially planned on before I decided I was gonna learn how to do a proper run cycle and that took like two fucking days i think. Very proud of it though, Mikan and Mukuro’s little runs were very fun to animate and I like the stupid ass slide I made Mukuro do. I actually wanted to make a stupid animation of her rail grinding using those frames, clearly I didn’t. 

Oh also yeah this style was reused for the cover of the Day 60 Comic, partially because I wanted to retroactively sprinkle bits of this animatic into whatever prior posts I can, partially because i really could not think of an actual cover for that comic. 

So since I was trying desperately to make this seem like the opening to some kind of Junkan Series (and again that concept for the vid dies out real quick) I decided to just include as many other characters as possible during these running scenes. Not only because it would be very fun to draw some of them in this fucked up chibi style I started doing on the fly, but also because then I could insert like three whole ships that I like. We got the Ruruseiko, the Tokomaru, the Ikuzonobuki because hey someone had too.

Fun fact there was supposed to be a little pop up of Mukuro with heart eyes in the corner when Sayaka and Ibuki showed up, but I either scrapped cause I couldn’t make it look right with the limited frames I had, or I accidentally hid all of its layers and couldn’t find it. I can’t remember, this project turning out as well as it did is quite frankly a miracle.

The train scene I don’t really remember why I did like, full linework and shading for that while the rest of the fuckin vid is just sketches. I guess it was fully still animation so it wasn’t that big of a deal. Drawing the very silly little shots of them going by the train was a lot more fun though, I also used it to reference a few more pieces from the past!

The first shot of them with Angie was a reference to the Day 70 Piece, since I always kinda headcanoned (yeah headcanoning my own art, that makes sense) that it was Angie who made it. Then we got Day 82, which at the time of writing this hasn’t been posted! Flashback to whatever day that Karaoke pic with the Ikuzonobuki trio was on for the shot of Junko watching Mikan sing.

And then after that is the Flatwoods monster part, which is the really fun one because I have no idea if I’ll have drawn anything for that by the time this gets released. I really want to though because I love the Flatwoods Monster and I love Junkan, so why not combine them! Alas, I’m working on the December 24th comic as I write this so I might not have time to make that on time. 

Yasuke and Tsumugi! I’ve given my thoughts on them before of course, I think during Day 60? My brain at this point just felt very inclined to include them in this, Yasuke especially.  Even if just as a very small cameo I kinda just associate these two with Junkan? Admittedly it’s mostly because of Val’s fic, I won’t act like that isn’t just the blueprint for everything in the junkan portion of my brain. 

I also used this opportunity to once more make up for the fact that I had drawn so very little kabedon content in this whole project.

After that this probably becomes the cheesiest thing i’ve ever made. The scene of Mikan looking sad was another scene directly based off of the original opening this all based on. After the spin transition I put a little too much effort into was supposed to be a shot of Junko doing Mikan’s hair while Mukuro and Sayaka try to do the same with Ibuki. If I remember the timeline of events I realized I couldn’t make this scene last until the next scene on the storyboard without dragging it out, so I was gonna try adding other little vignettes of antics. However in a rare act of self care I decided to not make this any harder on myself and just scrapped it, skipped to the next storyboard, and extended it out to fit the time. Do I like this in the longrun?? Ehhhhhh, personally I think I shoulda just sucked it up and just added some smaller shots, but miraculously I have people who care about me and would probably prefer it if I didn’t destroy my body for a music video, so I probably made the right choice.

Those outfits look kinda familiar! Whether because I was struggling to think of a new outfit, or because I had just drawn a kabedon, I decided to reuse the outfits from Day 74! Junko’s was a pain in the ass to animate! Never again! Also I colored the Boba to match my pride headcanons for both of them, Mikan being bi and Junko being pan. One kiss and another god damn spin transition i put too much effort into making look good, and we’re at the last scene.

And there’s a mildly fun story for the art used in the background. Like I already said, they were added last minute because the scene would be dead air without them. However I could have done more little clips and vignettes and not fully drawn art pieces. So why did I do fully drawn art pieces?? I was starving, of course. 

You all know my rule that I’m not allowed to draw any Junkan before the current one on the project is finished, correct? Well guess who wasn’t able to draw any normal junkan for like 3 months because I had to focus on making a music video. I can reread a bunch of fics or stare at art forever but the desperate and violent urge to make more and add to the pile so my brain feels nice is insatiable, especially with the rate I was making these previously before the music video began production. 

Sooo, making some last minute assets seemed like a pretty good excuse to finally draw something fresh. And it was a fucking blessing on my brain at this point.

I tried to do a runthrough of their relationship up to this point, flashing back all the way until their first encounter. Was this a thinly veiled excuse to realistically include a halloween pic? Yes. But hey, that last shot was always planned so on some level I have to be justified in my actions. Let’s talk about these pieces one at a time.

First up, hey, that kinda looks familiar. That’s right, assuming the stars aligned and allowed me to gain the strength to draw the December 24th Comic all on time (I’m 17 pages in at the moment send past me your strength, time travel is real if I say it is), then you might notice that I just took the outfits for this winter-y art and featured them in the story! 

So I did in fact draw the Halloween art first and realized I could probably do something vaguely interesting with a timeline of events, so I realized it would probably be best to put the winter art BEFORE October, because I like to dream of a year where I can celebrate Halloween and not freeze to death. It just also happens that it kinda conveniently fits the current time! Since this is releasing in winter! A miracle.

This ones pretty simple obviously, I unfortunately have nothing impressive or interesting to say on the art itself, more just stuff surrounding it.

Now the Halloween Art. Well i also don’t have a lot to say there either but god dammit i’ll sure as hell try!~ 

Listen I wasn’t fully confident that I would have the project done in time for Halloween, and as I’ve probably said before (or at least implied), while I could certainly draw more art on my own time after the 100 days were ready, until this was a public thing and the world was made well aware of my obsession, I couldn’t post it. It is extremely good luck (and also burnout) that I was able to get this done in time to actually post during October, so I did get to draw Halloween Stuff! But when I was making this?? I saw an opportunity to say “fuck it” and draw something spooky with these two, my favorite holiday and (probably) my favorite ship?? Yes please!

As for designing their halloween outfits I sure did fucking wing it! Yeah no thought process, just spooky as fuck. 

Though something interesting about this art that my girlfriend pointed out is that the way I shaded and colored it matches up a lot with my older art. Since I’m not gonna drag through my old gallery to find good examples the best way I can sum it up is that my coloring style back in the day was a lot more candy colored. If that makes sense? More saturated colors I guess? Whenever I look at pieces like those and this I just think of a bowl of colorful candy. 

I miss drawing like that, I don’t know what changed. It’s hard to go back, but maybe i’ll try.

The next shot might seem familiar, but not to any of my other pics, but rather a fic! When writing my Vampire Junkan AU I decided that I wanted to do an Aquarium Date for one of the bigger chapters, because as we all know, Fish and Vampires go together like chocolate and peanut butter. When writing it I was thinking of when I wanted to do the big kiss scene, and this art came to mind! So while it’s not very 1 to 1, I tried my best to recreate it through words.

Why did I draw aquarium art in the first place? I wanted to draw a sunfish . . . I’m a very simpleminded woman in most cases y’know?

The next image was actually even more last minute than the other 3, cause even with those I didn’t have enough to cover the timeframe of the scene. Soooo, Junko giving Mikan a flower.

Maybe this was her confessing? Asking her out? I haven’t thought about it enough. 

And after so long we’re finally back to me just ripping straight from the original opening this is based off of, and in the original its a very sentimental memory for one of the main characters. So pretty early on alongside the Monokuma bit I knew I should have that specific last flashback be their first meeting. I think this is like, my 4th or 5th time depicting a first meeting between these two? It’s always fun to do, and the one in this music vid I think you can tell was decently inspired by Kayleen’s “Smile” Fic, albeit not a direct adaptation and with like, 2% more whimsy. 

And a proposal!! We all crack eventually and there was only so god damn long I could stop myself from depicting one, and what better place than an ill advised music video? Also the gleam of the ring just made for a really good transition out of this and I’m still shocked by how well I was able to make it look. 

And that’s it! I feel like I didn’t talk about this one as much as I thought I would?? Granted I think this is still one of the longer rambles I’ve gone on, but given the jump in scale I thought this’d be a bit more, excessive?? 

I already said earlier but for as, fucking agonizing as this was, I will probably, someday, try to do another animation like this. Hell I’m collaborating with my Girlfriend on a VS Project right now and I’m hoping to at least do small bits of actual animating on it. Which I think I can do??

As for music videos, welllll I do have two in mind, one is Vampire Junkan (though not in the way you think), and the other doesn’t specifically focus on Junkan but it sure will have a Billy Joel song. 

So what’s up next??

Well I’m just gonna say this now, Day 100 does not go higher in scale than this, I won’t say what it is but its like, normal. Day 99 should be fun though! As for 91 through 98? Well! We’ve got 8 days of Fanfics! I didn’t write anything don’t worry. I made 8 pictures based off of 8 fanfics, with only one repeat author! There’s reason for that though you’ll see. There’s some direct adaptations of scenes, covers for the story, and like, something more based off the vibe, it’s hard to describe. You’ll see.

Gonna try my best to sing the praises of the fics themselves though I worry that I won’t be able to adequately sing the praises of these stories to the same degree that I did on Day 60, so hopefully I can at least convince ya’ll to give them a read yourself!~ 

Here’s hopin ya’ll enjoy the results!

As always, Reblogs, Comments, and Little Notes in the Tags are appreciated!~ They always make my day!~

[glassartpeasants]

How to Love .03

Trafalgar Law x F!Reader

Warnings: Fluff, angst

A/N: Sorry that it's shorter then normal but i can not tell you how hard i had to grind to get this shit out.

music playlist

~~~

“Law? You alive?” Soft fingers could be felt gently skimming against Law’s forehead, making him lean into their warmth before his eyes snapped open.

Jumping up, Law looks around his room before seeing you kneeling down beside his bed. His heart slowly calms before finally finding the words to speak. “(Y/N)? What are you doing in my room?”

“Well, good evening to you, too.” Rubbing his eyes, Law looks at you with a confused look.

“What? Evening?” Turning to his alarm clock, he sees it’s 8 am.

“We had a power outage due to an unexpected storm last night. I thought you might have already fixed your clock, but I was wrong.” Law jumps out of his bed and opens his curtains to see a beautiful sunset staring back at him.

“Why didn’t you wake me earlier?! What time is it?!”

“It’s currently 6 pm. Also, I thought you were actually trying to catch up on sleep.” Standing up, Law looks at (Y/N) in bewilderment before pacing around.

“I have stuff I need to do! Shit, I need to pay bills.”

“Done.”

Stopping in his tracks, Law stares at you. “What?”

“I said done. I paid them.”

“I also made a sheet with finances on everything I know we’ve spent at least together in the last month. I didn’t go through your mail. Went grocery shopping and cleaned the entire house. I did save some financing things so we can go through them together.”

“I-”

“I did everything.” A silence covers Law and you as you both look at each other.

“Why?”

“You always work so hard! I don’t think I’ve ever seen you sleep in once since I’ve known you! For a doctor, you think you’d take care of yourself more.” Law watches as you cross your arms.

“I…Thank you.” Law says in almost a whisper. “But never let me sleep in again.”

“But you look so refreshed! Even if you got wild bedhead.” You tease. Law grumbles before trying to flatten his hair, only for it to bounce back. You can’t help but giggle.

“Maybe if you take a shower, it’ll fix it.”

“Alright. Now get out.” You can feel Law push you out of his room before closing the door.

“What? No ‘Thank you for waking me up (Y/N)?’” You say sarcastically.

“I would have said that if it wasn’t 6 pm!” His voice rang from behind the door.

“So ungrateful!” You chuckle before walking away towards the kitchen. The smell of dinner is too much to resist.

As soon as Law heard you walk away, a loud crash and curse left your lips.

“Fuck! Bepo, no!” Law quickly put on a decent shirt before running out to the dining room. His jaw dropped as he watched you holding Bepo, who had a whole grilled fish in his mouth.

“Spit it out! How dare you eat my fish, you asshole! I thought we were cool!” Law was speechless, so he watched his cat and roommate fighting over fish.

Turning your head, you saw Law just standing there. “Law! Help me! Little shit has my food!” You get a good grab on the fish, and just as you think you’ve gotten it, Bepo takes another bite.

Law can’t help but stiffle a laugh as he watches you fight with Bepo. When you finally lost grip of the fish, Bepo made a break for it, which led you to begin chase.

“Damnit, cat! Give it to me!” Law hears you yell from down the hall. Chuckling, Law moved to what used to be the dinner you made. Paw prints everywhere as well as nibble marks from Bepo’s teeth. White cat hair covering every inch of food.

“He’s never jumped on the table and ate our food before. What’s gotten into him?” 

He could hear you stomping and cursing your way back to the kitchen, telling him that you were unsuccessful in your mission. When you entered the kitchen, you stood beside him and looked at the mess Bepo had reduced dinner to.

“Looks like he ate good tonight.” Law chuckled, trying to lighten up your now-soured mood.

“He probably just gained all the weight we’ve worked so hard for him to lose! Why would he do this? He’s never done this before!” You whine. With a frown, you begin to clean up the ruined dinner.

“This fucking sucks. I spent so long on this dinner for you, and he came along and ate it!” Law’s eyes widen upon hearing your words.

“You made it for me?” Law watches you stiffen before going back to normal posture.

“Yeah, I did. I wanted you to have a stress-free day, but Bepo decided to be an asshole and destroy dinner!” You sigh as you throw away the destroyed food before putting the dishes in the sink to wash.

“I don’t wanna order takeout 'cause I know you don’t like fast food. I just…” You sigh as you try to figure out what to do.

“Takeout is not that bad. We can order something and watch TV…together?”

Feeling your heartbeat pick up its pace, you gulp before answering. “You sure? I don’t wanna force you to eat food you don’t like just to cheer me up.”

“I’m sure we can find something. I think Olive Garden delivers?”

“Olive Garden, huh? Never took you for a pasta fan.” You joke, trying to lighten up the mood.

“I’m a sucker for restaurants who put actual effort into making their food.”

You laugh. “And our old classmates said you weren’t funny.”

“What? Who the hell said that?” Law’s offended tone made you smile.

“Doesn’t matter. You're a doctor making big bucks and saving lives while they're cleaning Mcdonald's bathrooms for quick cash.” Law couldn’t help but feel a slight smile tug at his lips from your words.

A laugh escapes Law’s throat. “I guess if you think so, that’s all that matters.” Law pauses as soon as he realizes what he’s said. Yet he doesn’t see how his words bring a smile to your face.

~~~

You can’t help the smile that sticks to your face as you work endlessly to fulfill customers' orders. Your mind is running with the thought of Law and his smile.

“What’s got you all smiley?” Killer asks you as he cleans the counter.

“What? Am I not allowed to smile?”

“You are, but that’s not a regular smile you got on your face there.” His words make you stop in your tracks as you snap your head in his direction.

“You have someone on your mind, don’t you?” You can practically hear the smirk behind his mask.

“You don’t know what the hell you're talking about, Killer.”

“I bet it’s Law, huh? Doesn’t shock me. You’ve been his roommate for about five months and went through a breakup together.” You hit Killer in the arm.

“Shut up! What if someone hears you!” You whisper with a burning face.

“Afraid he’s gonna show up and hear me saying the truth?”

“Killer, if you don’t shut up, I’m going to murder you.” Killer only laughs as he looks at you.

“Yeah, okay (Y/N). Whatever you say.” You huff as you look down at the clean coffee machine in front of you. Killer’s words bouncing in your skull. You didn’t want to admit it, but maybe Killer was right. Perhaps you were falling in love with him again.

“I did have a thing for him in college. Before dating Eustass. I ended up falling for him during our time together working on that project.” Killer stops cleaning as he looks at you. Silent but wanting to hear your words.

“I don’t know what it was about him, but by the end of the project we were grouped together for, I had ended up falling for him. Hard. It took me a lot of convincing, but I thought that maybe he liked me too.”

“Did he?”

You stay silent before answering. “ I guess not because my best friend asked him out, and he said yes.” A deep pang shot through your heart as you remembered.

“She had told me afterward that she liked him since we started college but never told me until I talked to her about asking someone out. I didn’t say Law’s name, but he was the one I was talking about.” Sighing, you grip the counter.

“Her telling me she’s liked him since we started college broke me. How could I try dating the man I liked for a whole semester while my friends liked him from the beginning? It broke my heart to hear him agree to be her boyfriend. Having her bring him around was like torture the first few months.”

“While I, of course, never acted out of place with Law while he was with (.....), I only managed to get over him when I heard him say ‘I love you’ to her. That was when I knew I had lost. After a few months after that at graduation, I begin to date Eustass. After that, we slowly stopped talking and only saw each other when it was with (.....). Until five months ago.”

“When you caught Eustass and (.....)?”

“Yeah…When I caught them.” Your heart burns at the memory, but not as bad as it had been before. What used to be a stab in the heart now felt like a bee sting.

“How am I supposed to tell him that I’ve fallen for him again? What if he doesn’t feel the same? How am I supposed to live with him? Not to mention, ruin a friendship.”

“I suppose that does complicate things.”

“I don’t understand. How come this has to happen? It’s like the universe is doing this to fuck with me. Shoving something in my face that I want something I can’t have.” Killer stays quiet as he listens to you speak.

“It’s easier just to shove them down before you end up hurt.”

~~~

“Is that a smile on our grumpy doctor's face? What’s got you all happy?” the charge nurse teased Law.

“Your the second person to tell me that, and it’s annoying me.” The nurse chuckled.

“Oh, please, Law. Everyone can see you’ve got something on your mind, or is it…someone?” The nurse watches as Law tenses, and his cheeks dust pink.

The nurse squeals. “It is!” She claps her hands in excitement. "You have to tell me! I promise I won’t tell anyone!”

“No! I’m not telling you anything!” Law whisper yells.

“Aw, why not? I could give you advice!”

“I’m not telling you about my personal life! So stop asking!”

Huffing, the nurse gave up. “Fine! But here, there is a 3rd-degree burn case in room eight. Says a new co-worker turned up the coffee machine too high, and when it accidentally spilled on her hand, it scalded her.” Law snatches the clipboard and narrows his eyes at the nurse before making his way to room eight.

Opening the door, he expected anyone but the person before him. “(Y/N)?!”

“Hi, Law,” you chuckle nervously. “I didn’t know you worked in the ER.” Law can hear the nervousness in your voice. His eyes scan your body before seeing your bandaged hand. He carefully grabs your hand and looks at it.

“How did this happen?”

“A relatively new co-worker put the coffee temperature too high, so when I went to pour it and accidentally spilled some on me, it got all over my hand and burned it. I didn’t think it was that serious initially, but Killer made me come in. And now it turns out I have a third-degree burn.”

“Does it hurt?”

“No. Not really.”

“Well, you're an idiot for not coming in sooner.”

“It didn’t hurt other than the initial pain of being burnt!”

“That’s cause it burnt away your nerves!” Your shocked expression told him all he needed to know. Law sighs as he examines your burn. 

“It’s definitely a 3rd-degree burn; you're gonna have to keep it bandaged and change it at least once daily. It’s not big enough to need surgery, but it’s still gonna scar. Drink a lot of fluids. I’m prescribing you an antibiotic to prevent infection.”

“Alright. Good thing I live with you. You can help me with it all.” You say with a smirk, causing him to roll his eyes but with a smile. 

“But forgetting about me, how’s your day going? Did you drink your fluids?”

“I’m the doctor, and you're the patient. Don’t try that with me.” Law chuckles.

“You seem to be popular with the ladies' Law. A lot of nurses are looking at you from outside the room.” Law’s head snaps to the doorway to see a few nurses sticking their heads into the room through the doorway.

“I’ll be back.” You giggle as Law walks away and out the door.

Leaving the room and closing the door, Law turns his head to the nurses. “What are you doing?!” Law whisper yells at them.

“She’s the one that's got you all smiley, isn’t she?!” The nurses squeal.

“No, she isn’t! She’s just my roommate until she finds a place she can afford!” Law tries to defend himself, but the pink that swarms his cheeks tells the nurses everything.

“She is! And you're even roommates with her! That’s perfect! Come on, you have to ask her out on an official date!”

“That’s not happening! God, you people are so nosy!”

“What’s stopping you-”

“I’m not her type, alright?” Law snaps, causing the nurses to hush.

Running a hand through his hair, Law sighs. “I’m not her type, so even if I did like her, she wouldn’t say yes.”

“How do you know?”

“I went to college with her. That’s all your gonna get.” Law runs a hand through his hair.

You rotten his brain and wormed your way into his heart. Somehow, in the semester-long project he did with you all those years ago, he ended up gaining feelings for you. There was just something about you. The way you laughed, your smile, how you always seemed as happy, the list could go on.

He was sure you liked him too. How you looked at him couldn’t be anything other than it, right? You’d scoot closer to him when you both worked on the project—texting him about things other than the project. Bringing him food you had made.

He wanted to, oh, how he desperately wanted to ask you out. So when he got a note on the desk he always sat on had a note that said to meet him at the park, he was so sure it was you. It had your handwriting and everything. It had to be you. And when he saw (.....), your friend instead of you, he was shocked.

She had told him that you had written the note for her cause she was too scared to do it during school hours. She had even joked about a double date with you and a guy you were thinking about asking out. He felt his heart break when he heard it. Did he really jump to conclusions and think you liked him when you could have just been friendly?

All these thoughts ran through his mind that day. He didn’t know why at the time, but he did say yes to (.....) asking him out on a date. Possibly to forget the pain he felt? A distraction? He didn’t know.

But now, those feelings he thought were snuffed out reappeared stronger than ever. He wanted to be with you all the time. All he could think about was you. Even worse than college. His dreams were filled with images of you. He heard your voice when you weren’t there. Almost everything reminded him of you. He could look at a cloud and somehow be reminded of a memory you two shared.

Ever since you moved in as well, his diet has gotten relatively healthier. While he still drank coffee and energy drinks nonstop, you always ensured he ate. Hell, you’ve even started making him lunches to bring to work two months ago when you found out he usually didn’t eat anything during his shift. He couldn’t help but chuckle cause with every lunch came with a terribly drawn Bepo picture on whatever color sticky note you had. Each one he kept in his desk drawer.

“Law! What do you want for dinner?” You yell through the rooms door to Law, causing him to be pulled from his thoughts.

“Just roommates, huh?” One of the nurses asked with a smirk while the others held smug grins. They could easily see through the stoic doctor's facade. 

“Just roommates.” Law glares before entering the room to answer your question.

“I give it another month before he caves.”

“I say two. He seems to be pretty worried about his friendship with her.”

“True, I say three, though. Gotta give him time to boil in his feelings for a little longer.” The nurses converse with each other as they try to sneak peeks at the doctor and the cause of his smile.

~~~

“Law, hurry up! It’s about to start!” You yell to him. The sound of his footsteps rings throughout the apartment, letting you know that he heard you.

“I’m coming. I’m coming. Give me a second.” Chuckling, Law sits down next to you on the couch. 

“I’m so excited! I can’t believe they’re making a Sora: Warrior of the Sea show! You know what that means, right?” You squirm in your seat in excitement. 

Putting his feet up, Law looks at you. “ What does it mean?” He says with a smile.

“That means every Thursday we get to hang out and watch a new episode! Doesn’t that sound awesome?” You can feel your heart beating out of your chest from happiness as you smile brightly at him.

Law looked down at you and felt his heart leap. You were so excited to be near him. Telling him how you couldn’t wait for it to be a common occurrence. Despite him telling himself not to go down this road again. He couldn’t help but imagine how it’d be if you two were an actual thing—feeling your warmth against his cold frame, holding you close. Laying down next to you at night, hearing your soft breaths. Being able to admire your calm features as you sleep. And even feel your lips against his.

Law could see you sitting next to him, so close your thigh touched his. You didn’t seem to notice or care, which made his heart beat in his ears. He couldn’t even pay attention to the show, as he was more focused on you and how close you were to him. There was an itch inside him, telling him to do something. Now would be the perfect time to make a move, even if it was small. So, taking a breath, he took the risk.

Law moves his arm up slowly before laying it behind you on the couch. His heart beats rapidly, as he pretends not to notice he’s done it, giving you quick glances to see if you’ve noticed anything. So far, to him, you haven’t

But you noticed right away.

You were screaming internally with excitement and nervously biting your tongue. Could it mean he liked you too? Was it an accident? Either or made your heart beat against your ribs. Your head spins as you try to act cool and not show how excited you were to have him so close to you.

If he had made a move, then who were you to ignore it? So, with an internal deep breath, you lean back against his arm. His warmth makes a shiver run across your spine. It felt as if your face and body was on fire from his skin touching yours. You curled your toes in your socks as you tried to contain a steady breathing.

You take a swallow the lump in your throat as you decide to take a jump of hope. With a sharp intake of breath, you lean closer into Law, placing your head on his shoulder. His cologne flooding you like a calming aroma. In his arms felt like a dream come true. Laying against his shoulder as his arm laid behind your head. 

Even though the you told yourself that you wouldn’t fall for Law or act on your feelings, sometimes it’s okay to lie. Even if it’s to yourself.

~~~

Taglist:

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[erwinsvow]

have you ever written something where shy reader is too anxious to tell someone they got her order wrong or tell the lady at the nail salon she didn’t exactly like the color/shape

no but omg this is soooo real

getting your nails done was always fun—though sometimes, you leave with something completely different than what you came in wanting.

you found it hard to speak up to anyone, your nail tech included. instead you'd nod politely and smile sweetly when they were doing your nails.

it was just nails—it didn't matter if they were a little shorter than you wanted, or if the pink was a little more bubblegum than baby. they looked pretty and you avoided someone getting upset with you—you considered it a win-win situation.

and it was beginning to work itself out—you had discovered your favorite nail lady, the one who always understood what you wanted and didn't make you nervous when you'd show her the picture you'd brought for inspiration. and going today, you were expecting your appointment to be with her—like always.

until you found out she was home sick. normally you'd wait—but you were at the salon today specially since you were going to a party with rafe tonight, and the idea of going with your bare and currently very ugly nails seemed completely out of the question.

and even worse—rafe had brought you. you didn't want to turn to him and tell him to take you back home, not when he'd driven you all the way here and agreed to sit with you even though you're sure he doesn't want to.

so you suck it up—you show the new tech your photo, a pretty pink and white french tip with some bows and flowers, and hope for the best. she's doing fine, it looks like the picture for the most part.. except your nails are looking more square than round, and it's a little too long for your taste. she's about to start painting, telling you to go wash your hands.

you get up, heart thudding uncomfortably. you hate this about yourself—hate it worse than anyone else could. the nail lady couldn't care less if you ask for them shorter and rounder, but you can't bring yourself to do it. instead you stare down at your nails in the sink and feel like you might start crying.

rafe has a sixth sense—he can always tell when you're feeling upset. you don't know how he does it, just that he does.

all he had noticed was that you had stopped smiling back at him every few minutes about half way into the second hand getting done—and then just now, when you got up, you didn't look at him on your way to the sink.

rafe follows you there, a hand on your shoulder to turn you around. he's got a candy in his mouth, plucked from the bowl they keep near the entrance.

"what's wrong?" he comes out a little raspy, his tongue red.

"nothing," you reply, too quickly. you look up at him with your watery eyes, trying your hardest not to cry.

"c'mon, kid. what is it? someone say something?" he asks, turning around to where you were sitting and the two techs in the vicinity.

"no, no. nothing. it's just-" again, you hate this. you don't know why it's so hard to find the words, why they just don't want to come out. you swallow it down.

"what? you gotta tell me if you want me to help," he says, quieter, leaning in a little. you feel better immediately when he says it, but you still can't look up at him. you stare down at the too-long, too-square acrylics.

"it's not.. exactly what i wanted. i don't know how to tell them. i don't want them to be upset-"

"is that it?" rafe asks, and you look up quickly, eyes getting teary again. is he mad at you too now? your expression gives you away, lips turning into a sad pout. "baby, she doesn't care. they get paid either way. gotta ask for what you want."

"but i don't want her to-"

"s'okay. i'll tell her. c'mon. don't cry, it's fine."

you follow rafe back—cheeks burning with embarassmnet. bad enough that you can't ever speak up for yourself, now rafe is involved and he probably thinks you're some kind of child-

"stop overthinkin'. it's easy for me to tell her, it's harder for you. so i'll tell her, okay?" looking up at your boyfriend, your ears ring a little. you hear him talk to your tech—you see his mouth moving, maybe making out shorter and she likes round, okay?

you can't hear anything, it feels like there's music in your ears. the tech nods and smiles at you, fixing them and before your very eyes, your nails look exactly how you wanted them to. rafe pulls his chair closer to yours, a hand on your knee.

his words keep repeating in your head—stop overthinking. and like always, you listen to rafe.

[lovingseventeen]

braiding svt’s hair 

a/n: wholesome, but also some crack i guess LOL 

seungcheol: 

✿ agreed without giving much thought to it 

✿ up until you had to pull a few strands a bit tighter because they were shorter

✿ “HE-hey!” he half-yells, remembering that he doesn’t ever want to raise his voice at you 

✿ “sorry cheol” you say, still too fixated on getting his braids done to notice how sulky he’s getting 

✿ “enjoy this now, it’ll be the last time” he says, a very noticeable pout in his voice 

jeonghan:

✿ bros beautiful 

✿ he had no problem letting you braid his hair because he did have his hair in a braid before when it was significantly longer 

✿ his hair is medium length currently, so you don’t have to pull too hard for him, and you give him this style that has two braids that meet at the back of his head

✿ “can’t believe this suits you so well, hannie” you tell him as he looks in the mirror, his fingers gracing his hair so elegantly

✿ “ay, c’mon no one’s prettier than you” he replies, coming to place a kiss on your cheek 

joshua:

✿ he actually usually braids your hair when you ask him to 

✿ one day you offer to braid his so you two match 

✿ naturally, he’s agreeing 

✿ he’s so smiley when you match - ofc you have to take pictures together 

✿ it definitely becomes his new lock screen 

jun:

✿ would never say no to you 

✿ tilts his head back when you start tugging, “baaabe” and you have to tell him to hold still 

✿ gives you a thumbs up afterwards because he doesn’t look bad, he figures

hoshi:

✿ ofc you gotta braid your babygirl’s hair 

✿ he feels so dainty after you give him two little braids  

✿ keeps forming a “v” with his hands to frame his face LOL 

✿ highkey, he looks good though, would probably eventually ask you to actually try styling his hair and he’d give his stylist a reference photo in the future 

wonwoo:

✿ also rarely says no to you 

✿ he sits patiently on the floor as you sit on the couch because of his height 

✿ “wonu you look so cute” you gush, cupping his cheeks after giving him a little crown with his braids 

✿ he smiles in return, “as long as you’re happy” 

woozi:

✿ you’re running your hands through his hair as he plays a song guide, he likes when you do this 

✿ you’ve been noticing his fringe has been getting longer, “you want me to help get your hair out of the way?” you ask 

✿ “could you?” he replies, sitting up to make it a little easier for you 

✿ you do a little braid that will keep some of the shorter strands in place, freeing his forehead 

✿ he checks your work when you finish, surprised at the little braid but thankful nonetheless, placing a kiss to your hand 

✿ “thank you, i’ll try to wrap this up soon” 

dokyeom:

✿ “‘kyeomie, would you let me braid your hair?” you asked in boredom one day 

✿ he’s nodding, already trying to find where to sit to make it easy for you, “where do you want me?” 

✿ you giggle, telling to sit on a stool and that you’ll stand 

✿ highkey loves it when you finish, his eyes crinkle when he smiles “i feel pretty” 

✿ you almost can’t believe how adorable your boyfriend is, “that you are” you smile back :’)

mingyu:

✿ also a WHINER 

✿ you’re not even pulling his hair the way he’s claiming 

✿ he’s gasping and whining at every tug regardless of how much force you’re actually using 

✿ “babe!” he whines when you actually give him one tug ✿ becomes so pouty even when you finish his braid without pulling hard 

✿ he’s bringing a hand to his scalp and there’s a very obvious pout on his lips going, “why do you hate me” 

✿ you jokingly roll your eyes, “you know for such a tall man, you’re a baby” 

✿ he doesn’t care lmao, he’ll use you ‘hurting him’ as an excuse to be clingy that day 

minghao:

✿ his hair is starting to get longer but management says he isn’t allowed to get it cut yet 

✿ has been opting for a half ponytail recently but he also wants something different 

✿ “do you know how to do something to tie my hair back?” he asks you

✿ you do this little braid that keeps his main fringe out of his face and sort of just tucks it behind one ear 

✿ your boyfriend looks very elegant when you finish, slightly feminine but it’s never something that bothered him 

✿ kisses the side of your head as a thank you 

seungkwan:

✿ doesn’t tell you that you’re actually hurting him 

✿ he just sits there quietly so you had no idea that you were pulling a bit hard

✿ you only find out when you find him looking in the mirror after and wincing as he touches his scalp 

✿ “seungkwan, is the braid too tight?” 

✿ “yeah” as he looks away PLS 

✿ “you should’ve told me!��� you exclaim, immediately feeling bad. you take his arm to get him to sit as you quickly take out the elastic and undo his braids

✿ “i’m sorry, baby” you tell him after, kissing the top of his head 

vernon:

✿ you actually end up braiding his hair for fun because he fell asleep in your lap 

✿ he actually only notices when he goes to the bathroom when he wakes up and sees himself in the mirror 

✿ walks back out to you with eyebrows raised as he points to his hair

✿ “i got bored?” you offer 

✿ “okay” he replies simply, he keeps them in anyway because there isn’t an urge to take them out 

✿ soon realizes that he appreciates his hair being out of his face 

✿ might ask you in the future to give him one braid at home because he likes it 

dino:

✿ is HURT that YOU hurt him 

✿ “baby-baby wait” he whines, a hand coming up to touch his scalp 

✿ “it’s not that bad i’m almost done-” you tell him as you pull again

✿ dino lets out this yelp before you tie an elastic at the end 

✿ “did i do something to you recently?” he genuinely asks, “because i’m sorry, whatever i did, i get it” 

✿ take the braids out soon pls 

[heliads]

Hi I was wondering if i could request for Peter Hayes where they have a rivalry going on even though she’s super sweet and one day he gets doused with that memory erasing gas and she volunteers to look after him for the time being and while he has no memory he’s just really nice to her and confused and they fall in love with each other. And one day he somehow randomly gets his memories back but he pretends he doesn’t because he’s afraid she’ll leave him until he accidentally slips up and he has to confess that he’s in love with her and was afraid she’d leave him if he had his memory back and went back to his normal self please and thank you :)

ooh it has been WAYY too long since i wrote for divergent!! let's go

'missing link' - peter hayes

masterlist

The boy knows it shouldn’t be like this.

He feels– strange. Not right. It takes him a moment to realize that might have to do with the fact that he’s crumpled on the ground, and another moment to discover with startling unease that he does not remember ever falling. Nor does he remember what room he’s in, how he got there, or anything else for that matter. Where there should be memories, there is just a blank gray wash in his head, a slate wiped clean of countless experiences.

It should terrify him, the boy thinks, but for some reason, he isn’t reacting to it as he should. Never mind the fact that the boy is not aware enough of who he is to know how he should or should not react to things; finding oneself in a strange place with no memories is grounds for panic, regardless of who he was before all this. A strange calm persists over his mind nonetheless; it’s unnatural, like he’s been sedated or something. You know what that’s like, a voice whispers in the back of his brain. Who the hell is he to be familiar with such a thing?

Before the boy can make a decision as to what he should do, the sound of running footsteps right outside the door jolts him back to reality. Seconds later, a trio of people all dressed in varying shades of black skid into the room. They stare at him. The boy stares back at them. They all seem equally confused as to what is going on, which is weird because as far as the boy is concerned, he’s the only one with gaps in his memory. Surely someone here should have a clue.

One of the three newcomers steps forward, a girl with mousy brown hair. Her black t-shirt has a low neck which reveals a tattoo of three birds against her collarbone. “Peter, what the hell have you done now?”

The boy glances behind him, but there’s no one else in the room, so he assumes Peter is supposed to be him. “What?”

Bird Tattoo looks confusedly at her two friends. For some reason, the expression feels familiar. Maybe this girl spends a lot of her time unaware of her surroundings. It’s probably annoyed him in the past. “We heard a loud noise and wanted to see what was going on. Of course you’re here, that explains things. What did you do?”

“There was a noise?” Peter asks. He doesn’t remember hearing anything like that, but that’s hardly new to him by now.

Immediately, he knows it’s the wrong question. The confusion in the trio’s expressions shifts to genuine alarm. A new girl starts talking, shorter than the rest but by no means less unhappy with him. “Yeah, it was super loud. There’s no way you missed it.”

“Oh,” he says, because they seem to expect him to answer.

Short Girl furrows her brow. “Did something happen? You seem weirdly quiet.”

Peter peers up at her. “Why would you say that? Do I know you?”

Short Girl’s face flashes with anger, but when it becomes clear that Peter isn’t just messing around, her jaw drops. “Oh, no. I think he got into the memory gas.”

The third member of their trio has been silent this whole time, but the final man sucks in a low breath now. “That’s bad. That’s really bad.”

“Memory gas?” Peter prods hesitantly.

“Yeah,” Quiet Guy says, “I see one of the canisters has been tampered with. Your memory has been erased. It’ll probably come back later, but for now, you won’t remember who you are. Or any of the rest of your memories, for that matter.”

Peter stares at him. “Why the fuck would memory gas just be lying around where someone can stumble upon it? What kind of place do you guys live in?”

���You live here too,” Bird Tattoo interjects, “And besides, it isn’t just lying around. This room was locked, I think you broke in. This whole sector is off limits.”

“Then why are you here?” Peter points out.

The trio exchange glances again. “We have to do something about him,” Bird Tattoo says at last.

“Kill him?” Short Girl asks hopefully.

“I would prefer not that,” Peter interjects, earning him three identical glares.

Quiet Guy tilts his head to the side, thinking. “Stick him with someone else. Give him to Y/N. She knows him better than all of us, she’ll figure out something to do to get his memories back.”

Short Girl scoffs. “Yeah, she knows him because he hates her the most. I’m not so sure that’s the best plan.”

“Do you have any other ideas?” Quiet Guy asks, and when both girls are silent, he takes that as his answer. “Alright, we’re taking him to Y/N. End of discussion.”

He offers a hand to Peter, who accepts the offer of help, although this only seems to make the three strangers more unsettled. Evidently, whoever Peter normally is with his memories intact, he doesn’t trust a lot of people. Given how shifty these three are, though, maybe that’s for the best. He follows the trio through strange, dark hallways and up flights of stairs until they’re in a long corridor lined with doors. Living quarters, his mind tells him, although he has no idea where that information came from.

Quiet Guy picks a door and knocks. A few moments later, a girl appears. “Hey, Four,” she says casually, “What can I do for you?”

Quiet Guy– Four, what a weird name– grimaces at her words. “We need you to babysit someone for us.”

“Hey,” Peter protests from the back of their little group.

The sound of his voice calls Y/N’s attention to him, and immediately her expression changes. Whatever friendly demeanor she had worn before is gone now, locked up behind a wall of unreadable blankness. “What’s going on here?”

Bird Tattoo glances behind her in the hallway, even though there’s no one there. “Can we come in?”

Y/N nods, holding open the door for them all to file into her apartment. Maybe he’s just overthinking, but Peter swears she looks at him the longest as he passes. The moment in which their eyes meet feels like it spans several years instead of just one second, but then she blinks and looks away to lock the door behind them and he’s lost his anchor, spinning out into a great sea of mystery once more.

Only once the door is locked and they’ve all moved comfortably away from hearing range of anyone still out in the hallway does Y/N return to them, arms folded across her chest, and ask, “What have you guys done?”

Bird Tattoo shoots a shifty look Peter’s way before speaking. “We found Peter down in some back hall. We think there was an incident with some memory gas. He has no idea who he is.”

Y/N’s jaw drops. “He doesn’t remember anything? Tris, tell me you at least took him to the med wing to get checked out.”

Tris shakes her head imperceptibly. “If anyone knew, they wouldn’t just ask Peter why we were down there, they’d ask us, too. It’s a restricted section.”

Y/N’s lips purse. “So you’re saving yourselves? Awfully brave, you guys. True Dauntless material.”

All three of them look guilty at that, which makes Peter decide immediately that he likes this Y/N girl quite a bit. Four speaks up at last. “He won’t be seriously harmed, I’ve seen this stuff used before. It’ll probably take a few days to a week before he regains all of his memories, but he won’t suffer any brain damage.”

Peter stares at him incredulously. “There was a chance I could have brain damage and you didn’t tell me? I’ll kick your ass the second I remember how.”

Y/N presses a hand to her lips to hide a smile. “That’s enough of that. Tris, Christina, Four, I’ll figure out what to do. You guys can go back to whatever breaking and entering you were doing before this.”

Short Girl, who must be Christina, places a grateful hand on Y/N’s shoulder. “Thank you so much, honestly. We owe you for this.”

“You really do,” Y/N reminds her, and escorts the three of them to the door. 

Once it’s just Peter and Y/N in the room, silence descends upon them both. Peter isn’t sure if he should be speaking or not; he doesn’t remember enough about himself to know if he’s a talker, so he waits to say anything until Y/N walks back to him. 

She glances over him for a second, then sighs. “I’m going to do a medical check. I can’t believe none of them bothered to do one. I think Four was right, you’re not injured, but it can’t hurt. Do you remember how you were exposed to the memory gas?”

“No idea,” Peter says truthfully. “All I know is that I woke up on the ground with no idea who I was.”

She stares at him for a moment, then nods slowly. “You really are different, aren’t you?”

Peter cocks his head to the side, confused. “What do you mean?”

She laughs, although it’s not a happy sound. “The Peter I know would never admit a weakness so freely. You’d answer that question by threatening to stab me. Certainly not with the truth.”

Peter wrinkles his brow. “I sound like an asshole.”

This time, Y/N’s laugh is more genuine. “You kind of are, but we all let it slide. You’re one of the best fighters Dauntless has. If you talked as much as you do without any skill, we’d beat you up for it, but you can back up your sarcasm. Doesn’t mean we don’t try to fight you anyway.”

Peter watches as she retrieves a medical kit from a cabinet, then has them both sit down opposite each other so she can shine a light near his eyes and see how his pupils respond. “What kind of place do we live in if we fight each other all the time? Is this a military base or something?” Peter asks. 

They’re close enough that their knees are touching, which is a strange thing for him to notice, but he gets the feeling that his brain is used to looking for small things like this when it comes to her. His mind automatically focuses on the soft pressure of her hand against his temple like it’s the only thing that matters in the world.

“Something like that,” Y/N answers. “Our city is divided into factions. You’re in Dauntless. We’re the brave ones, the fighters. We keep everyone else safe, but mainly we just try to prove ourselves to each other over and over again.”

There’s a bit of resentment in her tone, which Peter latches on to immediately. “Do we prove ourselves to each other?”

She huffs out a quiet laugh. “Constantly. In order to make it into the faction, you have to go through initiation, which is intense. We were always the top two, always switching off for the top slot. Four led our initiation, he said he’d never seen two people so close. We graduated last year, but you’ve never let go of our rivalry.”

“But you have?” Peter asks.

She shrugs, clicking off the flashlight and returning it to the med kit. “I don’t really care. I’ll fight you when you challenge me, but it doesn’t matter like it did in initiation anymore. You’re no longer an enemy. You seem to think differently, but that’s just my opinion.”

“Do we not see each other anymore? I thought we would have been friends. Isn’t that why the Stiff brought me here?”

Y/N arches a brow. “Interesting nickname to use. I thought you didn’t remember who they were?”

Peter pauses, frowning. “I don’t. It just came out, I guess. What does it mean?”

“It refers to Tris’ home faction, Abnegation,” Y/N responds at last. “You often tease her about it.”

Judging by the sour note in her voice, Y/N isn’t a fan of that. Peter makes a mental note to not do that again. He hadn’t meant to, really, it had just slipped out. Probably like muscle memory or something. What Y/N had said about their rivalry sounds familiar, just like the stuff about Dauntless. It’s like everything he knows is being held behind a massive wall. Peter can catch glimpses of it through chinks in the foundation, but he cannot see it all. Not yet.

Y/N stands up, looking away from him. “You should get some rest. I don’t know if you know the way back to your quarters or where you put your key, so you can crash on my couch if you want.”

Peter frowns. “Is sleep recommended after being subjected to memory gas?”

“Yeah,” Y/N comments wryly, “but mainly, it’s the middle of the night.”

She pulls the shades away from her window to prove her point. Peter glimpses a dark midnight sky outside before the blinds fall against the glass again. Strange, he’d had no idea it was nighttime. The dark halls of Dauntless made it impossible to judge the time of day.

“Sorry for keeping you up,” he says.

Y/N’s expression softens when he apologizes. Again, he gets the feeling it’s not something the other him did all that often. “You didn’t know,” she says at last, and disappears into a room that must be her bedroom. As the door shuts behind her, it occurs to Peter that she never answered his question, the one about if they were friends or not. He doesn’t think so, not based on her description of their rivalry, but wouldn’t she have just said that they didn’t hang out, then?

Peter feels so keyed up after the memory incident that he’s certain he won’t be able to sleep, but he’s hardly closed his eyes before unconsciousness pulls him under. He dreams of dimly lit hallways and large rooms with high ceilings. There’s a girl there too, she’s laughing with friends. Peter wants to be in that circle, making her smile like she is right now, but he somehow knows deep in his gut that she won’t want him there, so instead he asks her to fight, or he says something cruel as he passes. It isn’t right, but it keeps her looking at him, and a curl of something hot up his spine tells him that’s worth it anyway.

The wrongness of it torments him all night. When he wakes up, the brief ghost of her hands floats before his eyes, but it vanishes in moments, and a matter of minutes later Peter finds that he cannot remember a single thing he dreamt of all night. For some reason, this absence hurts him more even than the greater loss of everything else he knew.

Peter had hoped that his memories would return when he woke up, but this is not the case. He tells Y/N as much when she appears out of her bedroom, but she just shrugs and tells him that memory loss patients usually take longer to remember everything. He’ll probably start recalling bits and pieces, but nothing major, not yet.

They decide to leave the room and go to Peter’s place so he can grab some clean clothes. Hopefully, the familiar place will jog his memory, but seeing as it took like an hour for Peter to remember that he put his door key in his back pocket, the odds are slim.

They walk together down the halls, Y/N murmuring the names of people they pass under her breath if he’s supposed to know them. It’s going great until they round a corner and find themselves face to face with a tall, imposing man who makes Y/N’s face slacken with panic immediately.

The man stops when he sees the two of them. “Peter, Y/N. Good to see you two up so early this morning, there’s lots to be done. Peter, were you going to check out the security division today? They say they’ve fixed their camera issue, but I’m not too sure I trust them to do it properly.”

Y/N’s back is perfectly straight, and the only sign that she’s uneasy is the slight widening of her eyes when the man asks them a question. Peter keeps his expression neutral, and an answer appears on his tongue before he even thinks about it. “Not today. I think I’m actually going to shadow Y/N, I want to see the new trainees for myself. The cameras should be fine to delay a little, Max, I supervised their installation just a few weeks ago.”

Y/N blinks in surprise. She’s not the only one confused by Peter’s quick response, he has no idea where that came from, but the man– Max– seems to accept it, so that’s all he can ask for. They part ways soon enough, and once Max is out of earshot, Y/N turns to Peter.

“What was that about? Since when do you remember his name? Or my job?”

“I don’t,” he argues, “It just came out, I don’t know. What do you do with the trainees?”

“I lead initiation. Took over after Eric Coulter decided to switch careers to pursue faction leadership in earnest. I met Tris and Christina because they’re our year, but Four and I teach the trainees together, which is probably why he suggested coming to me instead of anyone else.”

For some reason, hearing this sends a sour spike of resentment through Peter’s gut. “So Four is the reason he sent me to you? Not the two of us?”

“Who knows why Four does anything?” Y/N grumbles. “Could have been anything.”

It’s not really the answer he wants, but he’ll let it go for the time being. “Wait, when do you have to lead the trainees? Are you late?”

She shakes her head as they continue walking. “Four takes them in the early morning, I join them later in the day. I’ll probably head over in an hour or so, but I want to get your quarters sorted out first.”

They reach Peter’s apartment soon enough, but it doesn’t trigger any cascade of memories. He just stands there in the central room and the first thought that comes to his head is, it feels empty. Y/N’s place had seemed more alive, but maybe that’s because she was there. 

“Can I stay at your place?” Peter asks suddenly, “I don’t know if something will happen and I don’t want to be taken by surprise.”

Y/N’s brow furrows, but she nods. “Sure, no problem. Just until you get your memories back.”

“Of course,” Peter agrees, but he swears that it feels like a lie as he says it.

After changing clothes and grabbing some stuff to take back to Y/N’s, they head back again. The journey is easier this time, Peter feels less lost. He remembers the turns and doors of the Dauntless complex faster than he had before. Maybe Four is right and everything will come back over time, but progress is slow going at the moment, and he can’t help but wish it would be faster.

Soon enough, Y/N’s leading him out again, this time to head to initiation. Peter mainly just lurks in the back of the room, pretending to be observing the students as Y/N leads them through some sparring drills. Four is there too, and they exchange some silent glares before Y/N comes back to Peter and he pretends like nothing had been the matter at all.

They walk together, taking a slow lap around the training room. Every now and then, Y/N will call out advice to a pair or shout at someone to stop messing around. Once they complete a circuit, she pauses for a moment, watching the two initiates who were scheduled to fight first in the ring. They both seem evenly matched, and if Peter were to wager a guess he’d say that they’re probably among the top few trainees in the rankings.

Glancing back at Y/N, he notices that her eyes have gained a far-away look. “What’s on your mind?” He asks softly.

She shakes her head slowly, a half-smile rising to her lips. “Nothing. They just remind me of us.”

As Peter watches, one of the initiates manages to throw the other to the ground and pin them there. They count to five, and then the other initiate taps the mat to yield. The winning trainee releases their opponent, and they both crawl off to their respective groups.

Peter cocks his head to the side. “Did we ever let each other go so easily after a fight?” He has faint memories of punching someone until they stopped moving, of pleas for surrender being ignored. Peter has the faint and nauseating idea that he might be a terrible person. No wonder Y/N had looked upon watching over him as a burden. No wonder they all did.

“Never,” she whispers back. “Neither of us walked away unless we were both bloody.”

“That’s because you were the only one who was willing to go all the way,” Peter argues, although strangely enough he doesn’t feel like he’s the one saying it. Instead, past him is reaching through his mouth to speak it, totally ignoring whatever Peter’s plan is now.

Y/N looks at him, startled, but whatever memory Peter had briefly encountered is gone, and he stays silent. She does too, and when they leave training that day, Peter cannot be sure if the outing was good for either of them.

Peter crashes on her sofa again that night. He’s not entirely sure that he really needs to stay there, but the thought of leaving her to go back to his empty apartment is immediately shut down by his brain, so he decides against it. He has another dream of something, something important, but again, he does not recall it when he wakes. His cheeks are wet when he opens his eyes, but he doesn’t remember crying. There is a lot that he does not remember.

It’s still early when Peter wakes, so he has time to pull himself together and get changed before Y/N comes out of her room. Once she’s up, she makes breakfast for them both, and they stay out on her pathetic excuse for a balcony while they eat. It’s really no more than a glorified fire escape, but there’s enough room for them both, so it’s good enough for now. They’re leaning against the wall of the building. Their shoulders touch listlessly. It nearly destroys him.

The days repeat like skipped tracks on a broken record. They wake, they stay together, they sleep. Y/N relaxes around him more and more; it kills him that he is someone she would have to fear, but he’s getting the feeling that there is no one to blame for that but himself. Peter remembers a little more every day, but not enough.

And then one morning they’re both up at the same time, and the windows have been flung into let in the warm, rosy light of dawn. Y/N is laughing at something he said, and it occurs to Peter that this is perfect. That she is perfect. That maybe he doesn’t ever want his memories to return, because when that happens he’ll have to go away, and Peter doesn’t want this to end, not ever.

Perhaps his mind has a sick sense of humor, because it’s only when Peter discovers that he doesn’t want his memories that they finally break down the wall and surge back into his mind. He almost doubles over from the force of them, a million words and pictures swarming his head. His name is Peter Hayes. He was born in Candor but chose Dauntless in his Ceremony. He’s one of the best they have, on a fast track to being a faction leader. Everyone here is terrified of him, and those that aren’t afraid hate him more than they hate the devil or death itself.

There is only one person who does not check those boxes, and that is Y/N. Peter knew it from the very first day, and when he couldn’t make her fear him, he started up the rivalry, but even that wouldn’t make her hate him. He could never make her break, but he tried. It twists his stomach to think of how he tried. At the end, she was the one who won, and he left initiation realizing that he would never be able to let her go until the day he died. 

He attempted to forget her, but nothing worked. He even got a job far away from initiation when he heard she would be a training leader because he had to cut her out of his head in every way that he could. The scalpel is bloody, but the obsession is rooted deep, it keeps growing back. One night he realized that he loved her, and that was the point of no return.

Peter Hayes does not fall in love. He is cruel and calculating. That’s why Dauntless needs him like a shattered bone needs to destroy every bit of muscle and sinew around it. Peter knew that he had to fix his heart before it fell even further, so he slipped out to the sectors of Dauntless where no one was supposed to go except the faction leaders. He knew how to cover his tracks, he’d tampered with the cameras ages ago when they were set up and he could freeze the live footage whenever he wanted. No one would have been there. No one would have known.

No one would have seen him when he slipped inside. Peter knows Dauntless got a shipment of memory gas a couple of days ago. He knew where to find it, and he knew that only a little bit would be enough to make him forget that his feelings for Y/N had ever existed. All it would take was one breath of the stuff, and then it would be over.

It hadn’t been that easy, though. The canisters were unwieldy and difficult to operate. There had been a problem with opening them; Peter had unscrewed the valve more than he’d thought and it had all come out at once. He remembers barely being able to close it in time, and then the effects of the gas had pulled him over and he’d crumpled to the ground, knocking over a few boxes while he was at it. The sound had alerted the other intruders in the area, namely Tris, Christina, and Four, and then he had lost the last of his memories and woke up with no idea who he was.

The reality of it all makes his mind reel. Peter had known it all this time, but it had been kept secret from him by his own mind. He has always loved her, and the truth of it was more than he could handle. He’d tried to separate himself from Y/N by using the memory gas, but that had just flung him more decisively in her path.

He straightens up slowly. Peter isn’t sure how long it had taken for his memories to return, but it must have shown in his appearance, because Y/N is starting to look at him strangely. “Everything alright, Peter?”

She’s asking about him. She genuinely cares about how he’s doing. This never would have happened before. It won’t happen again if she thinks that he’s back to whoever he was before the memory loss. Peter has to cover his tracks perfectly, then, and what that requires is a perfect lie. Fortunately for him, he’s got more than enough experience in that field.

“Yeah,” he says smoothly, “Just swallowed water the wrong way. I love nearly suffocating to start off my mornings.”

He expects her to laugh as he says it, like she usually would, but instead her eyes narrow. “You’re lying.”

Peter stares at her. “No, I’m not. In what world was that a lie?”

“In your world,” she argues. “It was too easy. You never admit things about yourself that freely. You can lie perfectly, but you don’t know how to be honest. It unsettles you. Now, tell me. What happened?”

Peter stares at her, and she meets his gaze steadily. This is it, then. This is the end. She won’t want to be around him anymore, not once she knows that the burden of watching over him is no longer her responsibility. “I remembered,” he whispers at last, “I remembered everything.”

Her eyes widen. “Everything?”

“Everything,” Peter confirms. “Every time I hurt you. Every time you tried to be kind to me and I shut it down.” His voice cracks on the last syllable. “Why’d you let them stick me with you if I was this terrible to you all this time? I have been awful to everyone around me.”

“But you weren’t,” Y/N says quietly. “Not to me. Not now. You’ve been nice this whole time. I thought that would stop when you got your memories back, but it didn’t.”

A brief pain flashes across her eyes, and then she clears her throat, studiously looking away. “I suppose you’ll want to leave now. Do you know why you lost your memories, or was that just an accident?”

“It wasn’t an accident,” Peter tells her on impulse. “I wanted to forget that– That I loved you, Y/N. I knew it and it nearly killed me, knowing you’d never feel the same way. I tried to make myself forget it so I wouldn’t have to hurt like that anymore.”

Y/N’s gaze snaps back to him. Her eyes are wide, and when Peter slowly walks closer to her, he thinks they’re both waiting for something, some great sign that what they’re doing is right. When he kisses her, he knows it’s right. He knows that it’s all he’s ever wanted. As it was at the start, so it will be at the end:  the two of them until forever.

requested by @tianna8320, i hope you enjoy!

divergent tag list: @rogueanschel, @with-inked-solace, @gods-fools-heroes, @23victoria, @manyfandomsfanvergentreblogs, @imwaysthelastchoice, @drinking-tea-and-be-obsessed, @crazyhearttragedy, @alex-1967s-blog, @aoi-targaryen

all tags list: @wordsarelife

[mullty]

-Spoilers for Call of Duty Black Ops 6 Ahead.-

Bro I literally teared up. I am honestly only playing for the character that is Frank Woods. I grew up with Alex Mason and his story and recently I've gotten back into it as an adult. I love the arc we have sort've been on with Alex and Frank. They are so special to me and I could go on forever about them- but enough about me-

So Far there are two moments that I've just loved and been incredibly sad at. The shorter one, that you will probably barely notice, is when we are back at the mansion-manor?, home? house?-

We, as Case, are next to my new favorite person maybe ever Felix. The rest are near a fire they have and before Adler radios in with bad news, you hear the end of a funny memory Frank is sharing with the team.

So far, I have felt that even though we have the same Frank Woods, he is a very obviously subdued version of him. It's felt like... I don't know. Do you know when you're pretending you are normal and cracking jokes but you're so exhausted and you'd rather not say anything but you don't want anyone to ask you anything. I do think he's like making an effort but this whole situation starts off with Adler who we later learn is the one being blamed for Frank's "Condition" and the deaths of Alex Mason and Jason Hudson. I wouldn't want to be reminded of that dang mission ever in my life but suddenly Adler is back into the mix and suddenly it's all about Panama and Mason and who Frank once was- and I think it's a lot for him. He's older. He can't fight. He can't move as he once did. Now, he has people he is mentoring. He's staying back while they go. He had built a wall around these people because this isn't forever and he didn't owe them a sob story. Anyway- so yeah it's a big deal that he's sharing a story with them because it's a story about Alex. It's not confirmed but all we hear is something in the realm of (I'm paraphrasing)

"Yeah, we are in D.C. now- Not Alaska." Which prompts a laugh from the people there.

Now. Let's put on our thinking caps on and try to remember who in the game is canonically Alaskan.

ALEX MASON. HE'S TELLING THEM ABOUT ALEX AND A FUNNY STORY ABOUT HIM. BECAUSE FRANK KNEW HIM. FRANK KNEW HIM AND KNEW ALL SIDES OF HIM and Alex wasn't just some coworker that survived getting brainwashed and was basically the best soldier there ever was.

Alex was his best friend. They mention it multiple times in the story.

Frank lost his Best Friend. Most of all, he feels it was his fault because he pulled the trigger.

He let his walls down and he's letting these people in to know someone so important to him.

The next moment is when we go up to talk to him and ask how he's doing. I think there is a visible change in him. He feels lighter.

He talks about enjoying the "thing they have going on." They don't take orders from anyone and they're kind of their own paramilitary group in a way. No hidden agendas just stopping the bad guys. and Case responds with, "You don't have to go back to Langley."

And why would he want to go back there let's be honest.

And THEN HE RESPONDS WITH "I haven't told anyone this but with Mason gone, I wanna look after his boy... Bring him up."

And what had me in this scene isn't that he is going to raise David, We know he ends up doing that.

BUT how much Frank has come to terms with letting go.

Frank obviously to some degree enjoyed his job. I don't know how long he did it for but, he is still involved back at the C.I.A so we can see that he didn't want to be left out completely.

And he gets a taste of that back.

He has found something that works for him and allows him to continue on this path. But. BUT.

"With Mason gone, I wanna look after his boy."

He's going to leave it behind for David and Alex.

He's not going to leave David alone. ALEX WENT BACK TO THAT LIFE despite having PROMISED his son that he was done. because of frank. Frank needed him and Alex saved him.

A lot of fans point at Frank and Alex and say Gay lovers.

and like yeah what about it.

But also I think what the writers are going for is the most devasting option is that these guys are Best Friends and that's so much worse.

Idk if any of ya'll ever had a best friend, but there are moments when you question if God made them just for you.

Because the closeness you feel in your soul and the Love that is the same Love and Loyalty you reserve only for Family outpours to them as well. And they aren't family but they're someone who knows the most inner parts of you. A best friend is someone who loves you back just the same.

I honestly believe that there was nothing Frank could've ever done that would've turned Alex away from him. Frank was blinded by revenge and accidentally killed an innocent girl, but Alex remained by his side.

It just killed me because Frank could've kept going, Idk if he retires after COD 6 something tells me he does, but he doesn't.

David needs him. He needs to keep Alex's memory alive and I personally headcannon that Frank mentions Alex all the time. Like it's rare if you don't hear about Frank's best friend Alex in a whole week because that was Frank's best friend and he was a Badass.

Anyways there might've been more for me to say but it's late .

(Excuse typos and anytime I type in caps it's because I'm yelling.)