#i definitely rushed it a bit to get it out in time for Christmas so I apologize if it’s not perfect

[incorrectsibunaquotes]

In My Heart is a Christmas Tree Farm - Sibuna Secret Santa 2022 for @joymercerssecretgf

Summary:

Christmas at Anubis House was always a somewhat touch-and-go affair. It depended entirely on a number of rather fickle factors, but, that particular Christmas, stars aligned with the rest of the heavens to create an atmosphere just temperate enough for a jolly holiday to occur. Of course, like with anything at Anubis House, it was a bit of a quest to get there.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, CAITLIN! I was your Secret Santa, and I very much hope you like your gift! ❤️🎄🎅🏻

link: https://archiveofourown.org/works/43828077

Thank you, Evie @house-of-secrets, for hosting!!! ❤️❤️❤️

[queers-gambit]

Adore Her, Dior Her

prompt: ( requested ) what good is having all that money if he can't spend it on the woman he loves?

pairing: Mafia!Bucky Barnes x female!reader

fandom masterlist: Marvel

word count: 4.3k+

warnings: author foams at the mouth for Mafia AUs, overwhelming fluff, cursing, not edited.

"That's the one. That's one we should get!"

"You've said that about the past three dresses, Buck!" You groaned, smoothing your hands over the skirt. "We need to narrow this down, okay? The wedding's in a month!"

"Why did we even agree to go?"

You glared, "'Cause we love my brother and we're supporting him."

"But she's just so - "

"Jen. Her name's Jen."

Bucky nodded, leaning back on the cushioned chair, "Well, Jen's just wrong for him. Literally the definition of toxic."

"Does it count if they're toxic together? To each other?" You sighed, standing on the pedestal and turning to look in the three mirrors beside the dressing room.

"Of course it does," he stood, buttoning his suit jacket out of habit. He approached you, head cocking as he looked your body up and down to get the full view of the gown you tried on. "You're really okay letting him marry her? Turn this way a bit, baby, lemme see the front."

You scoffed, but took his offered hand and twisted on the small platform towards him, "You were there at Christmas, he doesn't listen to reason. So, if Daniel's convinced Jen's for him, as his sister, my only job is be supportive."

"They literally abuse each other," he pointed out.

"Well, he's not changing his mind. Okay? It's been three years, he won't budge, whenever someone brings up them breaking up, he goes into hiding - so, I don't know what else I can do," your hands slapped your thighs when you shrugged, "except just be there for him. Now, focus, please, help me narrow a dress down."

He shook his head as you turned to face the mirrors again, "Actually, you know what? I don't think anything in this store is for us."

The attendant perked up and scurried over, rushing, "Oh, well, we have a much larger selection in the back, Mr. Barnes - "

"That won't be necessary, Barbra, thank you, though," he nodded. "Doll," his hand planted on your waist, head over your shoulder as you still looked yourself over in the mirrors, "go get changed, I know where we need to go."

"Bucky, no, there's plenty of options here," you argued, twisting on the wee little pedestal to face him again. "We don't need to drop a stack on a dress - "

"You let me worry about the price tag," he smirked, leaning in to peck your cheek. "Just go change, pretty girl, c'mon. Step-to!"

You offered Barbra, the attendant, an apologetic smile as you shuffled back into the changing room; quickly stripping from the dress. When you exited in your street clothes, Bucky was tipping the aged woman for her effort in gathering your options, but the moment he saw you, his hand was extending to hold yours tightly.

"What was wrong with that store?" You asked when you stepped onto the noisy and busy street to approach the sleek, tinted car Bucky drove for day-to-day errands.

"We're not shopping at David's fucking Bridal."

"You literally drove us here," you laughed.

"Yeah, and then I had a much better idea," he smirked at you, unlocking the car and opening your passenger door. "C'mon, princess, just gotta trust me."

"Last time you said that - "

"That wasn't my fault," he groaned, cheeks flaring red in embarrassment. When you opened your mouth to retort, he rushed, "Aht, nope, don't say shit. C'mon, I'm taking you somewhere special so get that pretty ass in the car."

He grinned when you laughed and did as bid, feet safely inside when he closed the door after you were settled. Bucky easily jogged around the back of his car, New York busy this time of year as traffic flew past on the street and forced Buck slow. He dropped into the driver's seat, sniffling slightly.

"Reminds me," Bucky smirked as he pulled onto the street, "how would you feel about us going to Aspen this winter?"

You sighed, "Why?"

"You wanna stay in New York for Christmas?"

"Well, yeah! It's so magical."

"Okay, so, we can go over New Years?"

You sighed, "You know, we don't have to go anywhere..."

"Sweetheart," he cleared his throat, "I actually have some business in Aspen, this will just help determine when I schedule the meetings for."

"Oh," you nodded slowly.

He sighed, "I know my job isn't orthodox, but business is business, right, sugar?”

"No, yeah, yeah, I get it. It sounds kinda nice, maybe we can go skiing."

"You know how to ski?"

"No, but I'm sure someone in Aspen could help teach me."

Bucky grinned. The drive was full of easy conversation, neither you nor Bucky dwelling on his business dealings, always feeling as if it was taboo given his station in the Mafia. So when he pulled up in front of a designer store, you gawked. "Now, if we can't find something here - "

"Um, absolutely not," you laughed. "Bucky, I can't even afford to walk into a place like that!"

"Good thing I'm paying," he smirked. He assisted you out of the car, tossing his keys to one of his security guards who had been following in a separate, tinted vehicle. When you both entered the dimly lit store, you were blown away by the gorgeous minimalist design; warm lighting, open floor space, and racks of different clothing options.

"Ah, Mr. Barnes! Hello, hello, hello!" A new attendant greeted with more enthusiasm than you would've greeted any of your clients, approaching you two. She shook your boyfriend's hand vigorously, "To what do we owe this pleasure?"

Bucky wrapped his arm around your waist, "Looking for a dress to wear to a wedding."

She offered you a forced smile, telling your boyfriend swiftly with her teeth on full display, "You came to the right spot!"

"See?" Bucky smirked at you. "All right, Valeria, what's first?"

Valeria waved you both onward to a private changing room, offering complimentary sparkling waters, coffees, teas - even offering to go retrieve anything you two would want from the Starbucks down the block. Valeria took your measurements and dress size, making idle chit-chat with Bucky and making it obvious he was a regular in the store, then scurrying off to collect an armful of options.

"This is - wow," you nodded in impression, petting the material of the display dresses hung along the wall.

"Like it?"

"It's growing on me," you eased with a small shrug, hearing Bucky chuckle and for his phone to chime. You perused the place as he became glued to the little device, sat in front of the dressing rooms.

Valeria returned with another attendant carrying coffees. "Right this way, Mrs. Barnes," Valeria directed you into a changing room, missing the giddy look you sent Bucky over your shoulder at being called his wife. "All right, so," she sighed, hanging up the dresses she selected, "I think these are modest enough for a wedding, but still glamorous to turn a few heads."

You hummed, "They're kinda short, don't know if that's the energy I want to be giving off at my brother's wedding."

"They'll fit differently once on but we can always accommodate," she assured, pulling one from the hanger. "Here we go," she assisted you, zipping you in and looking you over. "Oh, it's just darling on you! Look at that, not a single hair outta place, right?"

You giggled lightly, "It's certainly pretty."

"Shall we show Mr. Barnes?"

You nodded, following her out to reveal Bucky sitting on a plush loveseat, sipping his coffee. His eyes widened when he saw you, nodding, "Oh, yeah. This is what I'm talking about."

"Hush, we're only buying one."

His eyes rolled, "I'll buy the whole damn store if I want."

"You don't own it already? Hm," you teased, perking your brows.

"Keep sayin' shit, I'll cut a check right now - "

"Bucky," you tisked, moving to the runway mirrors. "It's a little tight, isn't it?"

"It's snug," Valeria agreed. "Is there a color scheme for the wedding?"

"Um," you paused, "I'm not sure - I just know it's in winter, like, in a month."

"Maybe a pretty powder blue?" She looked to Bucky, who nodded. "Or how about a pale green? Like an olive tone?"

"She looks gorgeous in anything," Bucky smirked from behind you, taking another pull of his coffee.

"What about that brown number?" You asked, ignoring the way his compliments made you feel like the only girl he's ever seen in the world.

"You have a very good eye, Mrs. Barnes," Valeria nodded. She asked her coworker to go find your size, taking you back into the dressing room. You narrowed down the options without changing again, not wanting anything black or dark since it was a wedding and not a funeral. Though, you knew Bucky would disagree.

You showed your boyfriend a pretty little green dress, but he shook his head. "I thought the black was nice," he told you.

"I'm not wearing black to a wedding," you laughed lightly. "It screams bad luck to me, don't you think?"

"Think it's more of a statement, sayin' the entire event is a sham and they shouldn't be doing this," Bucky snickered, the other attendant, Laura, returning with a pretty brown dress. "That satin?" He asked, rubbing the material when it was presented to you both.

"It's very fashionable now," Laura nodded, "and it's not too dark."

"Since when is it a rule to not wear dark colors to a wedding? I miss the memo?" Buck leaned back to his seat.

All three women offered him a small look, you chuckling under your breath before Valeria was leading you back into the changing room. "If I may, Mrs?" She spoke softly, "I've known Mr. Barnes for a number of years but he's never brought anyone into the store. Then, one day, he tells me he needs a new suit because the 'girl of his dreams' had agreed to a date, and every time since then?" She smiled softly at you, "He's sang your praises. I'm very honored you're trusting me with helping you today."

"Oh," you blinked in shock, giggling nervously, "well, thank you very much, Valeria, now I know why his suits are always top of the line." She waved you off, making you add, "And for the record, I'm not Mrs. Barnes, guess that'd be his mother, wouldn't it?"

"Oh," her eyes widened, gasping softly, "oh, I'm so sorry, I didn't know, I just - he talks so highly about you - "

"No, it's okay, it's okay," you rushed, patting her arm. "I actually kind of like it..."

She hummed, zipping you into another dress, "You know, he's the reason my girl and I are together."

"Really? How'd that happen?"

Valeria chuckled, "He's very bold, your man. We were getting coffee one day, discussing his wardrobe for a business trip he had in Hong Kong, when my lady walked in. I went all silly and stupid, and Mr. Barnes just," she shook her head with a fond smile, "brazenly asked her out for me, in front of the whole shop."

"Oh, Jesus, yeah - sounds like him."

"Well, luckily, it worked, else I don't think he would've come back for my assistance. I was so embarrassed, you have no idea, but my lady - Charlie - thought it was charming and cute. Mr. Barnes hasn't let me live it down since. Says he demands an invite to the wedding." She met your eyes through the mirror, offering, "And I'd be really happy to give him a plus one, hmm?"

"You're so sweet," you whispered, turning to survey the dress. You spent the better part of three hours there, trying on dress after dress, nitpicking almost everything as you just weren't sure what to wear. Bucky wasn't much help, he just approved everything.

So, it was up to Valeria and Laura to help you; bringing out iPads and design books, trying to piece something together that best fit your comfort and the vibe of the wedding. You didn't want to look like a walking money bag since your family wasn't by any means wealthy, thinking it would be a slap to their faces since your boyfriend could spend his money without ever thinking about it. You didn't want to give your family any reason to talk behind your back.

"I like the brown satin," Laura offered softly, looking you over in the mirror. "But the blue is just wow, it really looks like it was made for you, doesn't it?"

"Yes, but I think the green compliments her eyes more," Valeria cocked her head in thought. "Are you wearing your hair up or down?"

"Up," you answered, trying to mimic the look by pulling your locks off your shoulders, "with thin jewelry, I think."

"Diamonds?"

"Pearls, if I can find a dress that looks nice with it," you smiled, seeing Bucky's reflection in the mirror watching you with a soft smile on his face; head titled in thought before his phone chimed again and warranted his attention. "Maybe we could try the pink dress?" You looked to the two women for an opinion.

"No," Valeria shook her head, "it washes you out. And pink in winter? Oh, sweetie, I'd lose my job if I let you leave here with that. Guess that means you'll have to come back in the spring, right?"

You grinned in response as Laura chimed in, "The green's actually really nice, but the brown looks much better with your body type." Then she turned to Bucky, prompting, "Mr. Barnes? Final decision - which dress?"

Bucky paused, musing, "Lemme see them all again, get one last taste. It's between the green and brown numbers?"

"Or the blue," Valeria nodded. "C'mon, sweetie," she offered her hand to help you off the wee runway you were perched on in front of the magnificent mirrors.

"You look sensational in them all, doll, how the hell am I supposed to choose just one?" Bucky teased, his canines on display from the broad grin that stretched his lips.

"You'll find a way," you answered.

"Awh, telling me Mr. Big-Tough-Manly-Business-Man who makes impossible decisions everyday can't choose a simple piece of fashion?" Valeria tacked on.

"You guys can't pick either!" He laughed, "And you do a helluva lot more shopping than I do!"

Laura, Valeria, and you paused to exchange looks, you pointing at Bucky and relenting in a drawl, "Touché."

When you were escorted back into the dressing room, Laura waiting outside the door for your privacy with Valeria, Bucky sat back on the plush loveseat and extended his one arm over the back of the seating. He smirked to himself, shaking his head as if in disbelief - but he was. Bucky was in disbelief.

How did a rugged Mob boss find himself here? Watching his girl like a private fashion show?

His whole life, all he knew was turmoil, pain, drama, and fear. He knew he would inherit his father's well-built organization after he passed and knew what this life would entail; having no preconceived notions about a quiet life. He knew he would have to be tougher than tough, adaptable, intelligent, and confident in his role as the head of the 3-6 Brooklyn Mob. Knowing the idea of a family was farfetched, knowing he'd never know the simple pleasures in life, that he would constantly be on the move - in-able to form real, sentimental, emotional connections. He knew, in this life, he'd remain alone for everyone's best interest and safety, indulging in a series of flings and one-off relationships that couldn't haunt him.

Yet they did. These encounters reminded Bucky how alone, how stranded, how isolated, how different he was. Instead of satisfying an unquenchable thirst, these fleeting partners became heavy anchors to Bucky's reality and reminded him that there was no such thing as love - nor was there any room or logic.

And then... He met you. Bucky's lips silently spread in a grin as he remembered meeting you at a bakery; purchasing the last slice of coconut cream pie to your absolute chagrin. He thought you were gorgeous, something ethereal and unobtainable; authentic, raw, and unfiltered - things his one night stands could never measure up to. So, he offered you the slice of pie if it meant giving him your number as currency.

After that, it was impossible for Bucky to consider ever being alone again because you were the sun; center of the universe that drew everyone into your orbit. He was smitten, content, excited to date you, turned on by the fact you had no idea who he was - a rare occurrence in the city. You were pure as fresh snow; sweet, kind, affectionate, attentive, and borderline overly empathetic.

Bucky knew he was in love with you after only a few weeks when he had shown up at your apartment, dripping in blood. You didn't panic like he feared you would, just checked up and down the hallway before yanking him into your home. You cleaned him up, tending to wounds, offering a safe space for him to relax in; making mindless conversation to help distract him from the pain he endured.

And now? Now, Bucky was sat in Dior, giving his opinion on your wedding guest dress; wondering how he allowed himself to get to this point of being domestic. Bucky wasn't a man to give his opinion on dresses, what color nail polish you should use, to send fresh bouquets of flowers every other week. Yet here he was, sipping too-expensive coffee, deciding between brown, green, and blue dresses that he never would've batted an eye at.

However, that was just the domino effect you caused in his life. You were sweeter than apple pie, becoming Bucky's one tether to reality that saved him from losing himself in this dark, criminal mindset he adopted. You didn't know it, but you had transformed Bucky from a brooding asshole into a boyfriend; someone you were proud to claim and never hid from - never shied away from. He admired the way you came to terms with his job, knowing it was a hard pill to swallow and yet noting the way you just accepted him as he was.

Bucky realized in that moment that he adored this new aspect of life after thinking it was impossible to obtain. He adored sitting here, offering opinions on dresses, his security left outside instead of hovering over him like a brutal reminder he was seedy. He loved having you to come home to, he loved being part of your mundane world - a person who went to weddings, who drank Starbucks, who asked her boyfriend his opinion about how she looked in dresses. Who thought bouquets of flowers were romantic, who baked him homemade cakes for his birthday, who worked overtime in order to afford his Christmas or birthday presents, who walked to the takeout place instead of paying for delivery.

All that you are, Bucky adored deeply; falling in love with you each and every single day. All he wanted to do was protect you, share his life with you, even pick out outfits for weddings you would attend. He knew if any of the men in his organization knew the extent of his affection, they'd surely weaponize it against him... Or at the very least, tease him relentlessly. Yet he never cared, knowing you wanted to be loved out loud instead of hidden away in a storage closet; but did care if it meant his enemies could use you to get to him. It was a risk, an occupation hazard for loved ones to become targets, but that only made Bucky so much more protective of you.

Laura glanced at Bucky and saw the fond smile soften to let his teeth trap his bottom lip, smiling at the Mob boss looking soft, content, smitten being there. She knew most boyfriends would never put this much effort into helping their girlfriends in the fashion department, thinking he must've been truly in love to look so at-ease. Plus his enthusiasm through the entire ordeal assured her that Bucky was genuinely enjoying himself.

Once again, you slipped into the blue dress and showed Bucky. He hummed and snapped a photo, asking you to turn this way and that. Then you tried the green dress, him taking another photo, and finally, you changed into the brown satin dress, facing Bucky for his final verdict.

Bucky hummed in contemplation, swiping through the photos. "You know what?" He asked, looking at you with a grin. "You look delectable in everything, I can't decide - so, let's just get them all."

"Bucky, no - "

"We'll take all three, Valeria, please," Bucky interrupted you.

You waited until the attendants left you alone with a knowing look shot in your direction to ring up the desired purchases, hip cocking and hands to your hips. With an underlying exasperation, you questioned, "What the hell, Buck?"

He grinned and stood, again, buttoning his suit jacket, "C'mon, princess, this is fun, right? Being spoiled?." His arms wrapped around your waist, looking down at you as if you hung the very sun that sucked him into your orbit. "What's the point of all my money if I can't spend it on you? Huh?"

"You can save it for a rainy day?"

He shrugged, "Not necessary."

"Maybe pay to send some underprivileged kids to go to college?"

"Well, there's a thought," your boyfriend mused, "but I already do that through the Stark Foundation. I sponsor a few scholarships."

"Okay, well, buying all three still doesn't help me decide what to wear," you chuckled, you mimicked his action and wrapped your arms tightly around the base of his ribs. Due to his height, your head had to tip backwards to meet his eyes with a small smile.

You could look at this gorgeous man all day, everyday if God ever permitted such an act. Why wasn't dating a paid activity? You'd be the top earner with the way you were absolutely enthralled with all Bucky Barnes was. And what an honor it was to earn his mutual adoration.

"We'll figure it out at home. Gotta get you moving in the material to make an honest judgement," he offered softly. "But you look gorgeous in all of them, baby, seriously. Like, drop dead gorgeous that makes every girl brim with jealousy. Shit, doll, you're gonna run the risk of outshining the bride."

You sighed, "Look, Buck, I appreciate what you're doing, but three designer dresses? Where the hell am I ever gonna wear them? What kinda event calls for overpriced fashion statements?"

Buck eased with a soft expression, "Guess I'll just have to take you out so you can put them all to good use, huh?"

"That's not a solution!"

"Is to me," he let a hand drift to roughly palm the meat of your ass cheek over the brown satin; another symptom of him being whipped, his comfort over public displays of affection. "Seriously, doll, how the hell did I get so lucky?"

"Hmm?"

"Just look at you, my girl," he chuckled lightly, "radiant in anything you put on. It's almost unfair, makes me wonder what I did so right to have someone like you I can call my own. I can't wait to show you off in those dresses, just look so Goddamn tantalizing. I mean, damn, baby, I'm gonna have to fight off men with my gun and the jealous women with a stick."

"You do realize we're already dating, you don't have to lay it on so thick."

"And you do realize being with you makes me the luckiest bastard in the city, right? Least I can do is spoil you, I've already got everything else I've ever wanted."

Your heart swelled at his words, sighing gently as your chin rested on his chest to keep your head tilted. Softly, you admitted, "I don't think you're the lucky one, pretty sure the honor's mine. I couldn't ask for anything more in a man - in a partner. I'm so fucking in love with you, Bucky, it honestly doesn't make sense."

He nodded, asking, "Know what else doesn't make sense?"

"What's that?"

"You refusing those dresses, I mean, c'mon!" He laughed, you groaning and releasing your hold; making his tighten to prevent you from escaping. "Those dresses look phenomenal on you, you really gonna reject my gift? C'mon, you know the rules, doll, if you adore her, you Dior her." You were ready to retort, but Bucky smiled, "For the record, I think you should wear the blue dress to the wedding."

"Blue it is," you smiled, lifting onto your toes and hooking a hand around the back of his neck to meet his lips in a scratchy kiss. "Thank you so much, baby," you whispered, feeling his lips spread against yours before he brought you back in for a much-more passionate kiss. "Hm!" You hummed, pulling away to scold, "But no more, all right? You spend too much money on me - I mean, who the hell needs three designer dresses?"

"You do," he whispered, "you deserve all of this, sugar, and I'll do what I can t'spoil you the way you should be. Might as well get used to it, I got no plans on stopping."

Your eyes rolled in good faith, excusing yourself, "Yeah, yeah, all right. Lemme get changed and we can - "

"Nah," he shook his head, petting the skin of your back exposed from the brown satin dress with his fingertips, "know what? Stay in the dress, I wanna take you out and show you off."

Your lips found his in a breath-sucking kiss, trying to convey your appreciation and giddiness over never having been spoiled like this in your entire life - feeling grateful, refreshed, and privileged for a man like Bucky in your life. Whatever greater force there was in this world, you thanked repeatedly for choosing you to love this man and for this man to love you. There was no telling what you did to deserve him, but blessed be those heavenly powers.

requesting rules and masterlist

MCU masterlist

[box-of-roses]

♡.﹀﹀Chapstick﹀﹀.♡

Characters: Tsukki, Kageyama, Hinata, Makki, Mattsun, Iwaizumi, Sakusa, Atsumu

Warnings: None that I can think of <3

Synopsis: What chapstick I think the different Haikyuu characters would use

Tsukki

Strawberry

Probably not one to just have chapstick on him at all times so he steals yours

When you first notice he’s been stealing your chapstick you can’t help but smile

Everytime you kiss it tastes like strawberries now because he’s started carrying his own supply of chapstick so you kiss him more often (not that he would admit that)

“Kei, have you seen my chapstick?” You ask as you start looking around the room. You were sure you left it in here. Not on the table, not on the couch…where could it have gone?

“Yeah, I have it right here. You really need to be more careful where you leave your things dummy.” He rolls his eyes and holds out the chapstick to you. You notice a sheen across his lips though and smile a little. 

“Did you use my chapstick?” 

“And if I did? What are you gonna do about it?” You laugh a little and lean into his face. 

“My lips are a little chapped if you don’t mind.” With that you kiss him and while he’s still in shock take your chapstick back. “You know if you wanted to use it you could’ve just asked.”

Kageyama

Milk Tea

He unlike some others on this list would keep chapstick on him

You’re the one who steals his chapstick

He gets the same flavor every time and goes to one specific store because it’s the only one that carries that flavor

“Tobi, take me with you!” You cling to him. He rolls his eyes and shrugs a bit to get you up and walking by yourself. 

“Sure, you can come with me. Maybe you can get some of your own chapstick while you’re at it.” He teases and gives you a smile. You shove him playfully.

“Then where would be my reason to kiss you?”

“Maybe you can just kiss your boyfriend?” He raises an eyebrow at you and opens the door to the store for you. 

“Nah! It’s more fun this way.” 

He gets jealous when you do in fact find a chapstick and stop kissing him when your lips get chapped

He 100% hides the chapstick so you have to come to him again

Hinata

Cake

Another one to steal your chapstick

It was a random one you had in your bag so you just gave it to him from your stash

Definitely only uses cake flavors now because it reminds him of you

Hinata looked around everywhere for the small tube of vanilla cake chapstick you had given him. He was upset that he couldn’t find it. Where was it? He looked everywhere before he gave up. He was sulking on the couch when you returned home. “Y/N, I’m sorry.” He sniffles.

You rush over to him and sit down in front of him. “Oh, Sho, what’s wrong?” You cup his face.

“I lost the chapstick you gave me.” You start laughing. 

“Is that it?” You smile and rummage through your bag before pulling out another chapstick. “I have more, you know.” You hand the chapstick to him. Birthday Cake. 

You noticed he liked the cake flavors so you kept a stash with you at all times incase he happened to lose another one

He found the chapstick he lost the next week, turns out he left it at practice

When you lose your chapstick though he’s there proudly offering the one you gave to him

Makki

Hot Coco

Got it on a whim

Now during Christmas time he stocks up because you told him you liked how his lips tasted once

This doesn’t mean he doesn’t like playing tricks on you though

Remember that trend where people were kissing their partners with lip plumper? Yeah he 100% did that to you

Makki smiled as his plan was coming together. You were going to come home any minute and he was the picture of a doting boyfriend. Sitting on the couch waiting patiently for you to return so you could give him a kiss. 

When you do finally walk through the door you smile and rush to your boyfriend. He’ll never get over how your face lights up when you see him. It’s probably one of his favorite things, that he can make you happy just by being there. You immediately go down to kiss him. After a few minutes though your lips start tingling. Your eyes narrow at him. “Makki. Did you put lip plumper on?”

“Are my kisses that electric to you honey?” He says with a shit eating grin on his face. Well, that answers that question. 

It’s okay though, you get back at him 

You two keep each other on your toes but there’s no denying that when you kiss him and taste hot coco you fall in love all over again

Iwaizumi

Mint

A traditional man

Not against changing flavors if you give it to him though

He always has one on him, a habit he picked up from Oikawa

Definitely teases you though when you first kissed him and recoiled because you weren’t expecting mint

You had finally worked up enough nerve to kiss Iwaizumi. You lean in slowly but once your lips touch you jump back. Your lips tingle and you’re not sure why. Iwaizumi starts laughing though. “My lips are so tingly!” You whisper-yell and put your hand over your mouth. It’s then that you notice the smell of mint. “Hajime! How could you,” you push him back a little. 

“Sorry my love! I didn’t know you would react like that!” This time though you’re prepared when he kisses you again. The tingling of the mint fades away quickly and it’s replaced by the warmth of his lips

As a result his kisses are cold and then warm

You learn to love the cold and find it refreshing, especially if he’s coming back from his morning run and you need a kiss to wake you up

Pair that with his mint toothpaste and you’ve got a recipe to wake you up and get ready for the day

Mattsun

Blueberry Poptart

He tries to find the weirdest flavors he can

He just also really likes the Blueberry Poptart flavor though so it’s the one he always comes back to

It’s a hard flavor to find but he thinks it’s worth it for the smile you make when you notice the flavor

Chapstick game with his collection

Mattsun thought with his collection of wacky flavors it would be fun to play the chapstick game. A good excuse to kiss you as much as he wanted to without any other reason. Of course you agreed so here the two of you were, sitting on your bed with chapstick splayed out on the blanket. 

“So, do you want to go first?” You ask as you look at all the options. Mattsun smiles and nods. 

“Yeah, sure. Close your eyes though. No cheating.” He could care less about if you cheated or not. He just wanted to kiss you for hours. Hence why he brought out his full collection of 60 different flavors. You were going to be here for a while.

It was the chapstick you were wearing on your first date when he kissed you (That’s why he comes back to it) 

You two also definitely play the chapstick game again whenever either of you want to kiss each other without a good reason

Sakusa

Cherry

Another simple man

He just wants his lips to be hydrated

Enjoys your smile when you kiss him and realize it’s cherry though

There’s nothing sentimental about it you just like the taste of cherry chapstick

Your first kiss wasn’t anything spectacular. The both of you were nervous but weren’t sure why. The two of you had kissed other people before so why was it so nerve wracking this time? Sakusa is the one who gets his head together first and cups your face. He pulls down his mask and smiles softly at you. “Are you ready?”

You nod your head with a shaky smile. Both of you lean in and it’s a very nice kiss. It’s gentle and you’re not sure why you were so worried before. The both of you pull away with a smile. “That wasn’t so scary. We were just being silly. Also, the cherry is nice. I like it.” You say and lean back in for another. He lets out a small chuckle and leans back in too. 

Will only try a new chapstick if you’re the one wearing it

If he really wants to try it he’ll give you a quick kiss before standing back up and acting like nothing happened

Atsumu

Fanta

Another weird chapstick connoisseur 

He just really likes Fanta so he keeps some on him wherever he goes

He has at least 6 of them at a time; One in his gym bag, school bag, pants pocket, jacket pocket, one at home on the counter, and one on the bedside table

Also on that enjoys the shocked look on your face

He had only just started carrying around chapstick after he learned your lips could get sunburnt. Needless to say when you kissed him goodbye that morning Fanta was certainly not what you were expecting to taste. He just stands there smirking as you lick your lips confused. “Is that…Fanta? Do you have Fanta chapstick?” 

“Guilty as charged.” He says and leans against the door frame. “Want another one?” You roll your eyes but pull him into another kiss. 

“Not what I was expecting but it’s not bad.” 

Switches it up with other soda flavors

Loves surprising you but that doesn’t mean you can’t surprise him too

You find a Pepper chapstick and rewrap it so it looks like the Fanta one

Payback for all the times he’s pranked you

I hope you guys enjoyed! Once again an impulse post 💀 let me know if you want a part two with different characters!!! <3

masterlist

rules

[reidswhre]

secret santa; spencer reid x fem!reader

summary: based on the gift that jim gives to pam on the “christmas party” episode on the office! basically a secret santa!

warnings: absolutely fuffly

a/n: it’s september so that’s means december. i love christmas and i would not stop writing about the office i’m sorry (not really) english is not my first language, let me know any mistakes, also remember that my request are open!

Christmas is that time of year when the world seems to pause in a sigh of hope and joy.

The streets, normally gray and monotonous, transform into rivers of twinkling lights that dance with the wind, as if the stars themselves had descended from the sky to accompany humanity in its celebration.

The air is filled with a cold that doesn't bother you, but rather invites you to embrace a little tighter, to seek the warmth of a fireplace or the soft glow of candles in the window.

It was definitely your favorite time of year.

And you were determined to bring that spirit to the BAU.

"Hello! How is everyone?" You rushed into the office, carrying a pumpkin latte for each of your coworkers. You went to every desk, dropping off their coffee.

"Hey, sunshine," Morgan smiled broadly at you. "What’s with all this cheer?"

"It's almost Christmas, Derek! I’m so excited." You beamed, handing him his latte. "This is the best time of year, of life, of everything!"

Spencer smiled at your excitement. He wasn’t particularly crazy about Christmas—not that he minded it. It was a nice season, sure, but nothing that kept him up at night.

"So, because I’m super excited, I thought we could do a secret santa!" you told your teammates.

"What’s that?" Emily asked, looking a bit lost.

“You’re joking, right?” JJ stared at her in disbelief.

Everyone chuckled a little at Emily’s confusion.

“What? What’s going on? I don’t know what that is, guys,” Emily protested.

“It’s a game where everyone gets assigned a secret friend to exchange gifts with. And on the day of the exchange, you find out who your secret friend is, and you swap gifts based on their tastes, of course.”

Everyone turned their attention to Reid.

“The tradition of gift exchanges in December dates back to Roman festivals. ‘Who gives a gift gains prestige and creates an obligation in the recipient, who must somehow reciprocate the gesture, thus forging social bonds of hospitality, protection, and mutual exchange,’” Reid explained.

“Thanks a lot, Reid.” Derek laughed. “You just took the fun out of Christmas.”

“Don’t say that.” You lightly swatted Derek’s shoulder, scolding him.

“Anyway! Are you guys in? Please!” you begged your coworkers.

“Of course, sounds like fun,” JJ smiled at you.

“Good luck convincing Hotch,” Emily laughed.

“Are you kidding? He’s my best friend,” you scoffed with mock seriousness, making everyone laugh.

“I’ll tell Garcia,” Derek gave you a small pat on the shoulder, smiling at you.

You invited everyone to your house for a small dinner and to exchange gifts.

You were wearing a long-sleeve burgundy blouse, with a black skirt and tights, and your hair loose. You felt beautiful.

You had managed to convince Hotch; it wasn’t hard, he was really a sweetheart, just pretended not to be.

The gift exchange was planned, and you got Garcia. This made you extremely happy; you knew her well and had come up with a great gift for her.

She had been wanting a video game for a long time, but it was quite expensive, and she wasn’t willing to splurge on it.

How lucky that you were.

“Are you kidding!? I’m dying!!!” JJ screamed with excitement when she saw the watch Hotch bought her. Apparently, she loved it.

“It’s nothing.” Hotch gave JJ a small smile as she gave him a brief hug of thanks.

“Oh, cuties!” Garcia smiled.

“You know, I get to give a gift to my favorite cutie.” You approached Garcia.

“Shut up! Really!?” She squealed with excitement.

“Here you go.” You handed her a small box.

“AAAAH! How exciting!” With joy, the blonde with glasses unwrapped her gift.

“She seems quite excited.” Spencer, to your right, whispered in your ear.

“I hope so, because I won’t be able to buy coffee for a month,” you laughed.

Spencer watched you, feeling a bit nervous. He wasn’t sure if it was because he feared you wouldn’t like the gift he had for you or because you looked so pretty.

He didn’t believe much in Christmas magic, but lately, seeing you in those Christmas colors and scents, it definitely had to be magic.

“It can’t be, it can’t be, it can’t be!” Penelope repeated with euphoria when she saw the video game in her hands. “I adore you!” Penelope hugged you warmly.

“I adore you too, sweetie.” You gladly returned the hug.

“It can’t be, I’m going to play this at work all day.” The blonde said as she released you.

Then she remembered Hotch was in front of her. “I mean—no—you know—” She stumbled over her words.

Everyone laughed at seeing the girl struggling and started to spread out into their own conversations. So you decided to head to the kitchen for some chocolate.

“I’ll be right back, okay?” you told Spencer as you got up from your seat.

Spencer thought it was the perfect moment to give you your gift, so he followed you to the kitchen.

The truth was, he wasn’t thrilled about everyone seeing his gift. It wasn’t that he was embarrassed or anything, just… it made him a little nervous.

“I love the decoration.” Spencer commented on the decor in your kitchen.

“Oh, really? I love decorating for Christmas!” You smiled, this season truly filled you with joy.

“Yeah… sure.” Spencer smiled nervously.

“Are you okay, sweetheart?” You touched his shoulder, noticing he seemed a bit off.

“Me? Yeah, of course, it’s just that—umm—you know—I—” Spencer stammered. You looked at him puzzled, laughing a little.

“Here.” He handed you a box wrapped in red Christmas paper.

You gasped in surprise. “I’m your secret Santa?”

“Hmm” He nodded.

“Oh God!” You started opening your gift. You realized it was a large pink teapot. “It’s so pretty.” You smiled gratefully, you loved making tea.

“Yeah—well—umm, there are other things inside.” Spencer pointed to the teapot.

You looked at him curiously and opened the teapot. It was filled with small mementos of your friendship.

It had the ticket from the Redskins game you went to when you first met, the ticket from the first time you went to the movies, some colorful bands you used to braid Spencer’s hair from time to time, and many other things that reminded you of memories from your relationship.

This made you a bit emotional, causing your eyes to well up. “It’s so sweet.” You looked at him with misty eyes.

“Hey, don’t cry.” He whispered and used his thumb to wipe away a couple of tears rolling down your cheek.

“It’s just that—I don’t know, it’s so meaningful, it’s so sweet, Spencer, really.” You sobbed. “Thank you so much.”

“It’s okay, I—I thought you might not like it, I wasn’t sure if I should have just bought you the headphones you wanted.” He scratched his neck nervously.

“Are you kidding? This is perfect.” You set the teapot on the counter to hug him. You wrapped your arms around his neck and buried your face in his chest.

Spencer tensed a little but immediately returned the hug, soaking in your scent.

You pulled back slightly from the hug, not completely, so you were quite close.

“You know what could be the best Christmas gift ever?” He whispered against your lips.

“I have an idea.” You whispered back.

“Really?” He raised his eyebrows.

“Hmm” You nodded as you leaned closer to him.

“It’s good we have the same ideas.” He finished by pressing his lips to yours, in a kiss as soft and sweet as the first sip of hot chocolate on a winter morning. It wasn’t a hurried or stolen kiss, but one full of meaning.

As the kiss continued, the world stopped. The laughter and Christmas carols in the background faded away with the touch of his lips.

Christmas was definitely magical.

[marknee]

bts fanfics i personally think shakespeare would lose his job over in the 1500’s.

chapter i. ✷ chapter ii.

KEYS ON SEVERITY OF SHAKESPEARE’S STATE:

( ✮ ) — poor sod is on the floor. perhaps it’s shock?

( ♬ ) — he’s jealous he didn’t write this himself. well, it sucks to suck, mate.

( ✎ ) — currently handing him a tissue. give him a second.

( ♛ ) — both him and i lost our jobs. her majesty is ruthless.

THE SHAKESPEARE SERIES.

WARNING: keep in mind, some of these authors are very strict on the rule that no minors should read their work if they’re underage, and i will honour that. but, at the end of the day, i am not your parent. so, there’s that. but heed my warning wisely. any smut or 18+ content is highlighted in bold.

NOTE: without further ado, this are the fanfics that i think would cause shakespeare to lose his job: the first of many essays. let’s bring the guy to his knees. metaphorically.

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( ♛ ) THE BODYGUARD — by @rmnamjoons

!! bodyguard!namjoon x reader | 62.9k !!

bodyguard au, romance, smut, fake dating, slight angst if you squint, lil bit of violence.

firstly, we’re starting off strong. i present to you, the mother of all namjoon fanfics. and she’s a bad bitch. tbh, i feel like this fic needs a moment of silence just to relish in her glory. soak it all up. it’s essential.

this fic genuinely had me gobsmacked at how incredibly written it is. it delves into every detail and no aspect of the story is left dry. you can tell the author put their everything into creating this world you just submerge into. and it shows.

the world building is amazing, the characters are so thought out, and it feels like you’re just on this adventure with them and discovering their story as it plots out.

also, the build up to the smut? out of this world. that’s one thing i love about this fic: it doesn’t feel rushed. everything is very spaced out and takes it’s sweet time, so when you get to the chocolately nut of the ferrero rocher, it’s like gold and well earned. and you can enjoy it.

honestly, it’s been months since i read this and i think about it every day. i did do some research (for my own peace of mind) and this fic is longer than the perks of being a wallflower. and is it better? yes. sorry not sorry.

this work of art deserves to be read and loved. and i rest my case, your honour.

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( ✎ ) UNTIL THE LAST STAR FALLS — by @minniepetals

!! underworld lords!bts x shield!reader | 44.4k !!

reincarnation!au, poly!au, gods!au, unrequited love, minor character death, car accidents.

quick question — for science — how does one happen to lose all their memories without any sustaining any internal or external injuries? because the things i would do to read this again for the first time. and i do not use those words lightly.

this was my first ever ‘longer’ written fic. and if i’m being honest, i never really liked to read them because i have the attention span of a goat. but this fic lures you in from the very start and time slips away like smoke. to say, it definitely left its mark on me.

it’s so brilliantly written and you feel connected to the characters both mind and soul. you want the best for them, you want to save them, you actually want to crawl into the pages (or screen) and fucking help them out. and that sold it to me, i think. just the sheer love for these characters.

i balled when i read the last few sentences. i didn’t want it to end. i think i finished it at three in the morning and sent a voice note of me crying to my friend. tmi? well, now on my christmas list is 7 hot boys in the underworld who would risk their everything for me. and i, them.

worth every single second. trust.

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( ♬ ) WARM THIS WINTER — by @jamaisjoons

!! seokjin x reader ft. ex-boyfriend jungkook | 51.6k !!

christmas!au, vacation!au, angst, fluff, smut (18+).

one thing about solaris, is she never misses. if i could, i think i’d recommend every fanfic she ever put out, but that’s too much effort for me when you could simply click her masterlist. so, i’ll wait here for you to do that. make sure you come back though.

love. sure, there are hundreds- perhaps, thousands of fics on this app about it. so what makes this one different? well, that’s just it. the sorrowful honesty of love. knowing when it’s over, and when it’s blooming in the midst.

i’ve never been in love, but frankly, this fic really spelt it out for me. the pain, the joy, the lingering memories after everything is said and done. it’s all there. and it really settles in your heart as you near the end.

this work pulled on every single heartstring of mine, stamped on them, and then proceeded to sew anew for the future to bring its own miseries. and i enjoyed it more than i can say (or type).

give this a read if you need just that bit of spark in your life. and that bit of sadness, too.

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( ✮ ) STRIKE A CHORD — by @snackhobi

!! yoongi x reader | 15.8k !!

smut (18+), pianist!yoongi.

i don’t know what it is about this fic, but i come back to it whenever it pops up in my mind during my day. i’ll immediately unlock my phone and open this app, knowing i’ll feel better when the last word is read. and i feel content.

the atmosphere in this fic, if i may, feels as though you’re trapped in a warm, safe bubble with hazed music in the distance and soft light spilling through the thin layer of the bubble— not too dark, but enough to make you feel drowsy and peaceful. perhaps that’s why i return to it so often. i like how it makes me feel.

yoongi as an artist is already enough to make a person swoon, but as a pianist? i need a lie down. a cold towel to the head. just the whole characterisation of him in this fic needs a whole separate essay in itself, but you’ll understand my point when you read it.

forever a comfort fic, i think. and forever a comfort person. double whammy. case closed.

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( ✎ ) THE END — by @jimlingss

!! seokjin x reader | 31k !!

fifty percent fluff, fifty percent angst, loosely inspired by to all the boys i’ve loved before.

i say this with my whole chest: i have never underestimated the amount of emotions you can experience during a fanfic, until i read the end— both literally and metaphorically. shock horror.

this fanfic takes you through the adventure of the reader learning of what her future would commence if she were to marry either one of the six members. best part? she’s led through this rollercoaster journey by the ghost of kim seokjin.

first impression to such an offer? sign me the fuck up. i mean, what more could you ask for? however my final impression went a bit more on the lines of what the fuck just happened. very different ends of the spectrum, if you ask me.

i decided to hand both shakespeare and i a tissue after this great piece of art was finished because not only was i sobbing, he was on the floor knowing his romance play of pericles could never live up to such an incredible story.

this fic was a rollercoaster i would be delighted to get onto for another ride.

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( ✎ ) A UNIVERSE TO YOU — by @readyplayerhobi

!! soulmate!hoseok x reader | 41k !!

fluff, angst, smut (18+), soulmates!au.

shakespeare once said (according to google), “it is not in the stars to hold our destiny, but in ourselves,” and if this fic wasn’t a soulmate!au, i think i would’ve agreed in some sorts. but as it is, in fact, a soulmate!au, i’m obliged to disagree. it was destiny i read this fic, hand on heart.

i was not expecting this fic to hit me in the feels as hard as it did. as you can tell by the other works listed in this essay of recommendations, soulmate!au’s come up a lot. and with a lot of the same plots flying around on this app, it’s hard to make one stand out. but this author definitely has a gift.

everything was so richly created it made you feel full. of wonder, of love, and of want. it made you crave it for yourself. and that’s what i love about this fic. it just makes you feel… good. and with the unfortunates of life currently, it’s one to get your head stuck in for some temporary relief.

dream soulmate? he’s right here, people. just enjoy the story and all the feels that float around your body. go on.

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( ✮ ) BUNNY — by @btssmutgalore

!! jungkook x fem!reader | 46.5k !!

non-idol!au, camboy!jk, friends to lovers, smut, angst.

let’s start here: never judge a book by its cover. a quote by george eliot going all the way back to the 19th century, and one i would use to describe this series as a whole, and my first impressions towards it.

this series, although unfinished (i think), has exceeded my expectations of a good smut outlined by a good plot. the best of both worlds, if you might. i came out of this series deeply in awe of the writing and the clear imagery the author manages to create within your own mind.

additionally, bunny was the beginning for me in learning about the world of camboys and camgirls(?), but i was greatly surprised. often, people are unkind to the new and stick to what they’re accustomed to, afraid of what the unknown might bring — me, included.

but, i’m glad i took the risk because i received three great things in return: a beautiful fanfic, knowledge of something that was foreign to me, and an author whose work i admire and shall be returning to in the future.

perhaps what i’m getting at is this could be a lesson to all. take a risk of something unknown because who knows? maybe something great will come out of it, and you’ll learn something. i did.

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( ♬ ) SEOUL UNDERGROUND — by @hunniejimins (ao3)

!! namjoon x jungkook x f!reader | 300k !!

mafia!au, enemies to lovers, violence, slow burn, love triangles, mob boss!namjoon, smut, heavy angst.

it’s ironic really. i found this work by someone else’s recommendation, and now i’m passing on the favour and recommending it to you, dear reader. it’s funny how the world works.

this work is the perfect balance of fantasy and reality and i love it. you’re hit with the beauty and clouded haze of love before being smacked back into the world at the realisation the very person you’re in love with, is a mafia mob boss and his killer mate. a real fun-sponge, i tell ‘ya.

nevertheless, this book kept me up early morning and late evening reading. it keeps you hooked, wanting, and hungry for more.

it’s nothing less of a masterpiece.

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( ✎ ) CREAM AND SUGA — by @snackhobi

!! yoongi x barista f!reader | 14.8k !!

coffee shop!au, barista!au, fluff, nfsw (18+).

@snackhobi is mentioned twice on this list. though, can you blame me? it’s just a good thing shakespeare and this author don’t exist in the same century. it would be absolute carnage but nobody is ready for that conversation.

this author has a talent of portraying yoongi in the most irresistible way possible. i swear, i fall in love with him all over again reading. i wish you understood.

the whole misunderstanding section made me laugh because haven’t we all been there? the crushing pain and overwhelming guilt of having a crush on someone you can’t have. it’s all too real, seriously. been there, done that (unfortunately).

especially having the holidays just past, this is a perfect fic for a warm evening in, while the coldness of winter storms past outside. such a cute fic. love, love, love!

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( ♛ ) LOST AND FOUND — by @taleasnewastime

!! seokjin x reader | 21.2k !!

strangers to lovers, fluff, angst, sfw.

everyone says they have a fanfic that changed them, whether they’re being hyperbolic or brutally honest. and in my case, it’s a matter of both latter and former.

a couple months ago, i reached what i thought was rock bottom regarding my mental state and i took to my imagination to save me from the daily hell of my own mind. and this book was one i never really forgot about.

everything this author wrote within this fic was honest, heartfelt and very, very real. from the way you don’t just go up after going through something, but fall occasionally and sometimes feel as though you’re back at square one, to the way that there definitely is hope in the dark moments, and a light at the end of the tunnel. albeit a very faint one.

it comforted me in a way and reminded me of what i thought to be lost. fruitless, even. but sometimes, it’s books like these that open our eyes to things we’ve forgotten during times of turmoil: the simple goodness of life. and of people.

“if you’re going through hell, keep going.” winston churchill.

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( ✮ ) CANDYLAND — by @honeymoonjin

!! seokjin x reader ft. elf!jk | 13k !!

thriller, angst, fantasy, husband!jin, some cursing.

my mother is the biggest thriller fan. not that you needed to know that, but she is. and she’s not ashamed of it either. she’ll let you know if she’s reading a really good thriller in the moment. trust me, you’ll know.

me? not so much. i’m more of a sappy, hopeless romance, happy ending kind-of-sod — if you haven’t already guessed from this list. but there’s a reason this fic is on the list, too.

this fic genuinely kept me on the edge of my seat- uh, bed. the secrets of what darkness lingered behind the happy exterior of this adventure trip gripped my eyes to the screen, and lord, was it worth it.

throw a bit of husband!seokjin in there too? what more could you want! and written by @honeymoonjin? what a win.

let’s just say after this fic i added a few other thrillers to my basket. and happily reported to my mum i was a changed woman. okay, i’m exaggerating, but you get my point. it was incredible.

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( ✎ ) LILY LUCK — by @gguksgalaxy

!! yoongi x reader | 10.7k !!

soulmates!au, angst, fluff if u squint, very slight implicit sexual content, anxiety.

although this fic may be the shortest on the list, do not underestimate its power. it is still as mighty as the others— perhaps, even more so.

i think the main emotion i want to hone into concerning this fanfic is compassion. it sinks into your bones and surrounds your entire being like a unwanted hug. and you can’t even stop it.

the author does a good job of making you feel intense compassion for the reader — who so desperately wants to meet her soulmate. which makes the ending that much more satisfying.

this is for those who’re lonely, need a pick up, or those who’re hopeless romantics and believe in love belonging to fate, such as myself.

“expectation is the root of all heartache.” william shakespeare. talking of the devil, he would definitely cry over this fic. either of bubbling emotions, or the fact he didn’t write it himself. sucks really. for him, not for me.

© marknee, 2023. all rights reserved.

[yourdarlingalina]

is it new years yet? | jack hughes

synopsis: y/n's new years kiss is the last person she expected, her former fuck buddy pairing: jack hughes x fem!reader word count: 2.7k warnings: slightly steamy, heavy making out, mentions of sex, a bit angsty, not properly proofread is it new years yet? - sabrina carpenter

What's the best way to forget about your fuck buddy who broke things off with you a week before Christmas? Who you definitely don't have feelings for and who definitely didn't find out about said feelings by accident?

From a responsible person's point of view, it was the correct decision. I fell for someone who just wanted no strings attached sex. He doesn't want a relationship, and it is supposed to save me from being hurt even worse in the future. But I am not a responsible person. A responsible person wouldn't have been talking about their feelings with friends when they knew that the person they had feelings for was also in the same bar.

Which is how I ended up in my current situation. A glass of champagne in one hand while the other holds onto a random guy's shoulder as we sway and grind to the upbeat tempo blasting through the club's speakers. The best way to get over a guy is to get under a new one, right? At least, that's what my friends were telling me as they convinced me to go out with them for New Year's Eve.

"Start the new year off with someone new."

And start the new year off with someone new I will. The guy in front of me is decent looking, he's no Jack but he'd do. His hands were at least doing all the right things, one gripping my hip to pull me closer as the other was pushing my hair out of the way of my neck so that he could leave sloppy open mouthed kisses to my skin. Hands roamed down my body as I brought the champagne flute closer to my lips, this night would require copious amounts of alcohol if I am to make it to midnight. He pawed his hands down from my hips to my ass, gripping and squeezing in ways that should be making me want to push my body harder against his. His mouth trailing from my neck down to cleavage, nipping and sucking at the exposed flesh.

He was doing everything right to my body, but it just didn't feel right. I wanted it to be Jack who was brave enough to handle me this way in the middle of a crowded club, not ashamed to be seen with me, but it wasn't. He made it very clear that he only wanted me in private, with no one knowing that I was his on those nights and that he was mine, even if it was only for a short time. It was like he knew my body better than I did, knew what buttons to press to make me cry out his name. How he made me come undone again and again. The kisses that gave me full body shivers and touches that left my skin feeling like it was set alight.

I was not getting those feelings with the man attached to my body. He seemed like he'd be a great lover for a night, but not in the way I needed. Perhaps if I met him before everything, I could be happy with him but it felt like I had been ruined.

A party popper would end up becoming my hero of the night when one went off right next to my ear causing the glass in my hand to tumble down, splashing champagne on the man as it made its way down to shatter on the floor.

"Oh God! I am so sorry!" I profusely apologize as the man whose name I can't quite remember jumps away from me.

"It's alright, suppose I was gonna end up sticky tonight anyway. I'll be back." He shoots me a wink as he makes off in the direction of the bathrooms. I take the brief moment to escape to the bar, being careful to not slip on the alcohol or broken glass scattering the floor.

I push past the glitter and sweat coated bodies, pushing myself into a corner where I don't think my former dance partner will find me. One of the bartenders comes over to take my drink order not long after I get into my seat.

"What can I get for you?" The man asks quickly, obviously on the verge of losing it due to the new year's rush tonight.

"She'll have a vodka cranberry and I'll have a beer." A voice says from behind me, a voice I know extremely well. I didn't know he was going to be here tonight. Not a single person thought to mention that to me? The bartender makes a move to speak but the man behind me continues, "Brand doesn't matter, just whatever you have." The bartender just nods then scurries off to get our drinks.

I slowly turn on my stool to face him.

"Jack." I say, acknowledging him.

"y/n." He says back, sending shivers down my spine with just how he says my name. He moves closer, keeping me between the counter and his body. Leaning over his body almost touches mine, he keeps his eyes on me, his face getting closer, and for just a second I think he's about to kiss me, but his fingers wrap around the beer bottle that was placed on the counter and suddenly he's back where he was originally standing. "You seem to be having fun tonight."

"You've been watching me?" I blurt out before I could think. Instead, grabbing my drink, putting it to my mouth before I could say anything else.

"Hard not to when you're basically letting whoever that was fuck you in front of everyone." He bitterly spits out. He's jealous? He's not allowed to be jealous. He doesn't want me, I got that loud and clear.

"So? Why do you care?" His eyes snap to me. "I'm not yours, I never was." I break my eyes away from his, suddenly thinking about how interesting my drink looks. He smirks at my sudden movement, his fingers grip my chin and force me to look at him. His face is so close to mine again, I can feel his breath on my face, can smell the alcohol off his lips. He's intoxicating. I clench my thighs together at the small act. Even like this he still has so much power over me. I am undoubtedly his.

His eyes flick from my eyes down to my clenched thighs to my eyes again to the countdown clock behind me and finally back to my eyes. "Thirty minutes till midnight. Meet me on the balcony upstairs in fifteen?" He's asking but it comes out as more of a command.

"Why would I do that?" I push back. I can at least hold onto a little bit of my dignity during this. Can't I? Might be debatable.

"Because I made a mistake two weeks ago." He whispers against my lips. My eyes flutter shut, he's gone when I open them.

◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈   ◈

Fifteen minutes went by quicker than I would've liked for them to. I still haven't made up mind on if I should talk to him or not, but my body decided that I'd still go. I slowly made my way up, giving myself more time to collect my thoughts. I hadn't talked to him properly since that night.

It was a night out after a big win, Jack had invited me and some friends to go out with him and the team. Teasing remarks were thrown at me about how I look at Jack like I was in love. I never did hide my staring well. He had noticed too, how when he looked over at me, my eyes were already on him. Adoration was obvious in my eyes when they were on him. When I got quiet and didn't make any attempt to shoot down the accusations they all got loud. "You love Jack!" They shouted over and over. My cheeks flushed, embarrassment flooded up veins, I had to get away from it.

He heard. I turned to leave the group and he was behind me, eyes wide and jaw slack in shock. He was frozen, a deer in headlights. Me whispering his name snapped him out of his daze causing him to walk off in the opposite direction. I made the mistake of going after him.

"We said no strings attached." He said after the door slammed behind me, his back still facing me.

"I know." My words came out whispered, I was terrified of this. This was never meant to happen. Feelings were never supposed to happen. He was never supposed to find out that one of our few rules were broken.

"We can't continue like this." He finally turned and faced me. He showed no emotion, he was so goddamn hard to read. His blank facial expressions would be the bane of my existence.

"I know." I whispered again, the only words I could get out. I fucked up, by catching feelings, by continuing this when I knew I caught feelings. I tried to push them down and pretend that they didn't exist, but it just wasn't enough.

"I don't love you." I squeezed my eyes shut, feeling the tears start to well up and not daring to let them have the chance of escaping. I knew how he felt, but hearing it was a completely different feeling.

"I know." I sobbed out. He was gone by the time I opened my eyes.

Here I was, yet again, going after him. I somehow made it to the top of the stairs and through the crowd of dancing bodies. There he was, standing on the balcony, leaning over the railing and looking out at the Hudson. I stood there for a good minute, just staring at him, debating on if it was even worth listening to him. Did he really make a mistake or was he just feeling guilty that he didn't reciprocate my feelings?

"What was the mistake?" I finally ask.

His head whips around so fast that I almost think that he's about to give himself whiplash. A small laugh like huff comes out as I walk further out onto the balcony.

"I almost thought you weren't gonna come." His voice is softer, careful, like he was actually scared of the thought that I wouldn't meet him. I look back at the countdown clock on the wall, ten minutes to midnight.

"I like to be fashionably late." He lets a small laugh escape at my comment. God, I love that sound.

"You always have." He turns away again, hands gripping the railing, knuckles turning white from the tension.

"You still haven't answered my question." I say, waiting for him to finally tell me what the mistake was. Was he regretting ending us or how he spoke to me?

"That night." He starts to say before cutting himself off, lips pursed into a thin line.

"Yes?" I nudge his leg with the tip of my heel. He looks at me, eyes scanning my face like he's trying to read my thoughts. Trying to get any idea of what I'm thinking.

"I lied to you." No. "I said I didn't love you." No. "I lied." No.

I should be wanting to hear this, but I don't. I never thought I'd be the type of person to run back to a man just because he gives me a pretty apology and I will not start now, especially when I know it's not true.

"You don't love me, you just miss the sex. Don't worry, you'll find someone else to suck your dick." I move to walk away before I feel this hand come up to grip my arm. He was not going to make this easy for me. All I want to do is go home and crawl under my blankets, forget that all of this even happened in the first place.

"Please, just hear me out." I turn my head to look at him and goddamn those eyes that make me want to melt. He's looking at me so sweetly, I've never seen him look at anyone like this.

"Make it quick." I brush off his hand and lean back towards the railing.

"Oh come on, you know I don't do quickies." He attempts to make a joke, a playful smile pulling on his lips. It quickly fades though as he get serious again. "I broke our rule before we even made it." My head snaps up at his words. What?

"I loved you before we slept together that first time." He can't be telling me the truth. No, our first night together was a drunken mess that was just meant to be a one night stand. The relationship that came after was just mutually beneficial, he didn't have to worry about someone running to the tabloids and I got someone who touched me in a way I didn't think was possible.

"Stop lying to me." I choke out. I don't need a pity confession from him, especially when I just want to leave him behind next year which is in, I quickly check the clock, three minutes.

"I'm not!" He counters back just as the words leave my mouth.

"If you loved me you wouldn't have reacted like that." My eyes are brimming with tears, this is not how I wanted my night to go. I just wanted to find a new guy to kiss at midnight to make me forget about Jack.

"I never thought you'd feel the same." How he could think that is astounding. I don't think he realizes just how magnetic he is, and not just because he's Jack Hughes, hockey star. No, he was much more than that. A good friend, a shoulder to lean on, someone that listens when you really need it, a respectful person who makes you feel like you're floating when his attention is on you. "I'm not good at expressing my emotions."

"Yeah, no shit!" I nearly scream at him. "What do you expect me to do with this?"

"I want to start fresh next year." He admits, his eyes lock back onto mine. "If you gave me another chance, I promise, I won't fuck it up again." He's not lying, he's being genuine. I can see it written all over his face, the softening of his eyes, the breaking down of his walls. He's having a hard time even attempting to be vulnerable about this.

The shouting from the party starts to get louder. "Ten!" Maybe I should give him another chance. "Nine!" If I get hurt again then it's on me. "Eight!" He is who I want to be with. "Seven!" Why not? Is this not what I wanted just hours ago? "Six!"

"Kiss me." I tell him.

"Five!"

"What?" He sputters out.

"Four!"

"You heard me." I say, giving him a soft smile so that he knows I truly mean it.

"Three!" He shifts his body to be parallel mine. "Two!" His hands cup my cheeks. "One!" His lips meet mine as literal fireworks go off. "Happy New Year!" People shout around us. But my mind is just on him. As he's pulling me as close as humanly possible but it's still not enough.

My hands snake up with his abdomen, fingers gripping at anything they can. His hands move to my hair, to my neck, down my chest, caressing softly down to my hips, pulling and pleading to get as close as possible. My body was being set alight, the familiar feeling I've been yearning for. He's pulling sounds out from me that I've never made before. It's from the feeling that he's fully mine now, no hesitancy in his movements, he's confident and proud in what he's doing. 

My fingers move up to curl around strands of his hair, pulling his face fully flush to mine, lips melding and moving against each other at a fiery pace. We break away unfortunately to catch our breath, our smiling faces still touching, neither one of us making an attempt to move farther away. In fact, he's nuzzling his face even closer into mine, if that was even possible.

"What are you going to do with me now?" I ask against his lips, looking up into those beautiful, mind melting, ocean like eyes.

"Start the year off right, by apologizing in so many ways." He says then capturing my lips again before dragging me through the crowd of bodies, down the stairs, and out of the door.

[jjkamochoso]

Hii!! I love your headcannons they are so adorable 😭

Can you maybe do one "how the jjk men will confess"??

Have a nice day!! ♡♡

Oh my gosh thank you so much😭 I’m glad you’re enjoying them!! Here’s your request—I hope you like it!!❤️

JJK Men and How They Confess They Like You

Warnings: slight cussing in Inumaki’s

Yuji: confesses during movie night

Since he’s such a happy go lucky guy, I think Yuji would definitely not realize he had a crush on one of his friends until the realization randomly struck him like a freight train because he just really enjoyed your company and didn’t think too much about how close you were. He didn’t know he was going to confess to you tonight, but when his feelings for you dawned on him, he couldn’t hold back.

“Ready to watch the movie?” he asked, a wide smile plastered on his face. You nodded and he started the film, snuggling into his seat. He didn’t know why, but tonight felt… different. When your fingers collided in the popcorn bowl, he was reluctant to pull away from your warm touch. He felt himself slowly move closer to you as the movie continued on. During a particularly gruesome scene, you found yourself yelping and shoving your face into his side while Yuji’s heart started beating faster than he ever thought possible. From that point on, Yuji understood that these feelings meant he had developed a huge crush on you. While the credits rolled, Yuji looked you dead in the eyes.

“Y/n, I really like you.”

“I’m here watching Human Earthworm with you, of course I like you too, Yuji.”

“Not like that,” he blurted, blushing slightly, “well, I mean yeah, I like you, but I also like like you. I think you’re really cute.”

“Well, you’re in luck, Itadori,” you replied to him, smiling softly and taking his hand. “I think you’re really cute too.”

Megumi: confesses accidentally

We all know Fushiguro can be a tad bit moody at times (and we love him for that!) and this attitude seeps into his love life as well. I can totally see him having a crush for a very long time and even taking that secret to the grave with him! However, in the heat of the moment of getting a bit frustrated with you, he accidentally tells you how he truly feels!

You and Megumi were polar opposites and you were extremely talented at getting under his skin. Of course, your teasing was all in good fun and you never took it too far (until today, that is).

“Aww, our little puffer fish is getting mad! You guys, we better watch out! The porcupine is gonna launch his needles at us!” You, Nobara, and Yuji were almost on the ground due to laughing too much while Megumi was royally pissed.

“Ugh! Y/n! You’re so frustrating, I don’t know why I love you!”

It got eerily quiet. Megumi would’ve loved the silence any other time except for the fact he just told you he loved you, out loud, in front of all his classmates. His face turned beet red as he hightailed it out of there, rushing to his room as fast as his legs could carry him. You and your friends looked at each other, all with wide eyes and gaping mouths.

“I guess this is the part where you go after him?” suggested Nobara and you agreed, chasing after Megumi. You took a shortcut across campus and beat him to his room, blocking the door so he had to face you.

“Megumi, wait,” you said, between pants from running so hard, “I’m sorry I made you bare your feelings like that in front of everyone but you have to know I feel the same.”

Yuta: confesses on a holiday

Yuta, imo, is the BIGGEST romantic! This lil lover boy would love to confess his feelings for you during the magic of any holiday you celebrate, no matter if it was Christmas or Greenery Day.

In the month leading up to your birthday, Yuta decided he finally wanted to confess his feelings for you so he began to plan out everything he needed to make sure the day was as special as you are. Enlisting the help of Maki, Panda, and Toge, he was able to figure out all of your favorite things, from food to colors to games, and went searching around the city to make sure he had everything he needed for the big day. When your birthday finally came and you had no plans, you were delighted when Yuta invited you to a game night at his room. When he opened the door to let you in, you were greeted with decorations in your favorite color, a spread of all your favorite foods, and your favorite board games were stacked up in the corner, waiting to be played. You were in complete shock when he presented you with a bouquet of flowers as well, a sheepish grin on his face.

“Happy birthday, y/n. I hope you like it.” He took a deep breath and then cleared his throat before speaking again. “I also wanted to tell you that I really like you. I’ve had a crush on you for a long time and I hope this isn’t too forward but I would love to take you on a date sometime if you’ll let me.”

You were trying not to cry as you took the bouquet from him and gave him a kiss on the cheek, his face tinting a slight pink. Yuta was the best gift you could ask for!

Inumaki: confesses with a boombox and a sign

Inumaki had it harder than anyone at the school with his inability to communicate in a conventional way and I feel like that would frustrate him a lot in his love life. I see him as the type of person to have lots of fun, though, and be super cheesy with his crush!

Inumaki couldn’t stand it anymore, he had to tell you how he felt. And by tell you, he was going to use words in a way he hoped you’d never seen before! On a warm Saturday night, you opened a text from Inumaki.

9:42 pm

From: Toge👅

u up? come to ur window

You had no idea what this was about but knowing Toge, you knew it’d be worth it. You sent back a “k😂” and were ready to open your blinds when you heard music blasting outside your room. Your window was opened in a flash and you were met with a sight you prayed never left your mind. Toge was standing there, a boombox held over his head and a shit eating grin on his face. Just like an 80’s movie, Peter Gabriel’s “In Your Eyes” was the song of choice for the evening. You were absolutely shocked by this declaration of love, but even more so when he put down the stereo and picked up some handwritten signs.

“I have a… major crush…on you… will you… go out… with me?” You read as he quickly shuffled through the pile.

“Yes! I will!” you yelled out, but he cupped his hand to his ear to gesture you to speak louder as the song was still blaring next to him. You laughed and rolled your eyes as you ran outside, turning off the music.

“Of course I’ll go out with you.”

Noritoshi: confesses as a secret admirer

Noritoshi seems like the type to never waste time on futile things like crushes, especially when his focus is on bettering himself as clan heir. However, if he does fall in love, I think of him as a secret admirer who anonymously confesses his feelings in notes.

Your heart quickened its pace when you noticed another neatly folded paper sticking out of your bag after packing up your things in the library. You had been receiving love notes from a secret admirer and you were over the moon about it! Written on the various papers had been poems, observations, and sweet words from which the mouth (or, I guess hand) is still a mystery to you. This time was no different as you unfolded a poem and a pressed flower. From across the room, Noritoshi stared you down, gauging your reaction to his letter. You seemed to like it! He felt his heart flutter and was torn between wishing this nagging feeling whenever he saw you would go away while also relishing in the idea that he was capable of being loved. He quickly turned back to his notes as he noticed you approaching his desk.

“Hey Kamo! I was wondering, do you know whose handwriting this might be?” you asked sweetly, handing him the note. He tried to act as nonchalant as possible as he skimmed it over, pretending to think. He shook his head.

“Nope. He seems to—I mean THEY seem to—really like you. I’m sorry, I wish I could help more but I’m studying at the moment.”

“Okay. Well, thanks anyway! I’m sure I’ll see you around,” you said, glancing down at the handwritten notes he was slyly trying to conceal. As you walked away, you smirked, knowing exactly who your secret admirer was.

Todo: confesses during a fight with a curse

I know this man has no hesitations and grabs life by the reins!! I think Todo would waste no time trying to gain your attention whenever he’s training or fighting a curse, hoping he could woo you with his wit and muscles. Since he’s able to get good reads on people, I could see him lowkey trying to confirm you liked him back before he asked you out to avoid any undue awkwardness (not that he’d feel any shame—I don’t think he has an ounce of that in his body). One day, while working on a particularly tiresome mission, Todo decided that now was the best time to confess his crush on you.

“Y/n-chan! I have an urgent question to ask you!” he yelled to you as you two were busy hitting the curse you were sent to kill.

“What’s wrong? you asked, concerned he’d hurt himself or something.

“Did you notice how perfect you looked before you left the house today?”

You faltered, stunned by Todo’s words. When the curse lunged at you, Todo switched places with you and landed the final blow as the curse finally lay dead. You shook your head in confusion.

“Todo, what are you talking about?”

“Y/n,” he said, in an uncharacteristically toned down voice, “I really like you. You’re a gorgeous person and I was wondering if you’d allow me to take you on a date.”

You released a sigh of relief, a huge smile on your face.

“I thought you would never ask! I would love nothing more.”

In his excitement, Todo picked you up and spun you around. He couldn’t wait to treat you like the royalty you are!

Gojo: confesses nervously

I know a lot of people think Gojo would be able to put on the moves to woo someone without a problem, but I think when it came down to truly baring his heart, Gojo would have a very difficult time. That’s why I see him as a nervous confessor. Not quite able to find the right words, but tries nonetheless.

Gojo had unique ways of showing his love for people he deeply cared about. One of those ways was flaunting his immense wealth. That’s how you, his closest colleague, found yourself invited to dinner with him at one of Tokyo’s fanciest restaurants. You were no stranger to Gojo’s jokingly flirtatious ways, but tonight felt different. It seemed like he was actually giving you genuine compliments, and every time you returned the favor, he would look away, a feeling of warmth spreading through his face and down his neck. Finally, when dessert came around, Gojo knew he couldn’t hold back anymore.

“Y/n, we’ve been friends for a long time, and I’ve loved every second of it. I just… I’ve been lying to you. And to myself. I…” He took a few deep breaths, trying to compose himself. You reached over the table to take hold of his hand and his heart was absolutely racing at the touch.

“Satoru, whatever it is, it’s okay,” you reassured him. He took in another swallow of air as he lifted off his blindfold to look you in your eyes.

“What I’m trying to say is, I’ve fallen for you, y/n. I hope you understand what I mean.” His bright blue eyes were shining in a way you’d never seen before but hoped you could witness time and time again.

“I understand you, Satoru, I always have. I love you too.”

Geto: confesses while out on a walk

I believe Suguru to be the suavest out of all the JJK men. As he got older, his air of nonchalance leads me to believe that if he caught feelings, he’d be quick to tell the person how he feels and would do so in a classic, mature way.

You had been part of Geto’s group of curse users for a long time and had been close with the leader himself for most of that time. One day, while you were training your cursed technique, Suguru was watching you with great interest. When you were finished, you were greeted with clapping hands and a big smile.

“Y/n! Great job as always. Come, take a walk with me,” he said, motioning you over to him. You obliged, taking hold of his outstretched arm. You two talked about random things you had dealt with throughout the week, feeling weights being lifted off your shoulders by being able to talk through these things with someone else. Geto was thrilled you had understood him and his worldview all those years ago because he felt like he finally had someone he could trust again. As you two made your way along the path, Geto stopped to pick a wildflower and presented it to you.

“I have lots of respect for you, y/n. I appreciate all the time we have spent together over the years and now I have something to confess. I believe I’ve fallen in love with you.” He gently brushed a piece of hair away from your face and placed the flower behind your ear. “Please let me know if you feel the same. If you don’t, I promise to never make mention of this again.”

You reached your hands up to cup Geto’s face, your thumb brushing over his cheekbone.

“I’m in love with you too… Suguru.”

Nanami: confesses over breakfast

Nanami is definitely another classically romantic man. I feel like he would be hesitant to tell you how he feels since the life of a jujutsu sorcerer is not easy and only ends in suffering, but eventually he would come to the conclusion that he’d rather live without any more regrets so he’d keep the confession simple with an act of service.

Nanami knew you like the back of his hand. He knew all your likes and dislikes, your favorite songs, what cat breeds you thought were the cutest. He also knew you were hopelessly, chronically late to work. As someone who respects the sanctity of time, he could never understand you (the biggest mystery was how a teacher who lived on campus could be late to work almost everyday), but he liked to help you out anyway. He would always pick up breakfast from his favorite cafe and leave it on your desk for you to enjoy. Today was a late start day for the school, and since he knew you so well, knew you wouldn’t have checked your email to see you didn’t need to come in at your normal time so when you came barreling in a minute before class started, you were greeted by Nanami sitting on your desk.

“It’s a late start day,” he said, a ghost of a smile on his lips. You groaned in frustration.

“Of course it is! The one time I’m here on time,” you grumbled, sitting next to him.

“You’re cute when you’re disgruntled,” Nanami said, blushing when he realized he said that out loud. You tilted your head at him.

“I’m only cute when I’m disgruntled?” you teased, “That’s too bad. I think you’re cute all the time.” Nanami couldn’t believe what he just heard. You actually liked him back? He gestured to the bags and two coffees that were laid out on another desk.

“I brought us breakfast. May I join you to see if I think you’re cute while you’re eating?”

Choso: confesses with a plushie !! ^^

Oh my GOD I think Choso would have no clue what to do when he realized he liked you so who would he turn to for guidance? Yuji of course! And I think Yuji would suggest buying you a plushie instead of Choso’s suggestion of a wedding ring (at least he’s passionate🤷‍♀️).

Choso decided to drop by your office at the Tokyo jujutsu school to tell you he liked you and give you your gift. He sat on the floor next to the door, the plushie being held with a death grip in his large hands. As soon as he spotted you walking down the hallway, he clamored to get up.

“Choso! Hi! I wasn’t expecting you! Yuji just got out of class if you want to go see him,” you said, giving him a kind smile. Choso was extremely nervous but trying not to show it.

“Actually, I’m here for you. Y/n,” he got down on one knee, thrusting the plushie toward your shocked face, “you are unlike any person I have met before. You have taken over every one of my thoughts and my heart is no longer my own—it belongs to you. Please, will you accept this token of my love?” The token in question was a dog plushie with a bone in its mouth that said “I ruff you!” You took the plushie from his hands as he looked longingly in your eyes.

“I really like you, Choso. Of course I’ll accept it.”

[starlightkun]

➠ word count: 21.3k ➠ warnings: cursing, once again everything i know about hockey is from the internet and only for this fic i’m sorry, a couple different blood/injury mentions, needle/injection mention and descriptions, mentions of other medical testing/settings, just chronically ill girlie things 🤪 ➠ genre: fluff, sooo much fluff they’re sooo in love tbh, a bit of hurt/comfort sprinkled in, established relationship, college au, hockey captain sungchan, chronically ill reader (chronic migraines), christmas-y for a couple scenes in the middle, sequel to buzzer beater ➠ extra info: this is the sequel to buzzer beater, which you should definitely read before this one so you know what’s going on! the reader in this has chronic migraines, which i have. when the reader’s migraines, experiences as a chronically ill person, and thoughts about being chronically ill are described, that is me writing directly from my own life. i am not generalizing the lives of all people with chronic migraines/chronic illnesses, but i am sending all my love to any readers out there living with a chronic illness, and here’s a reminder to go take your meds! ➠ author’s note: i’m sooo down astronomically bad for hockey player sungchan and i hope you all are too bc take a look at that word count lol. anyway have fun!! ➠ series masterlist | spotify playlist

You felt more giggle than human at this point, wrapping your arms around his neck and burying your face in his collar to hide it from him and get a moment to recover your aching smile muscles. He hugged you even tighter to him, resting his chin on your head.

i. i will give you my palm to help you walk through the hurtful, want to give you that calm that you have so long searched for

[sicheng: come get your mans]

The random text from Sicheng made you shoot up on your couch. Hockey practice was happening right now, you were expecting Sungchan to come over to your place after—and also to not be getting texts from anybody on the team at the moment.

[you: hello? what?]

[sicheng: no seriously come pick him up he took a puck to the face]

You rushed through the automatic doors into the rink, looking around for any sign of paramedics or— The rest of the team was still practicing, and there was no obvious bright red blood on the ice, that was a good sign, at least. Nobody on the ice seemed to have even noticed your entrance. Okay, so maybe not a huge emergency then.

Taking a couple steps down the hallway that led into the locker room, you called out, “Sungchan? Sicheng?”

“Yeah! In here!” Sicheng replied. “You can come in!”

Throwing the door open, you immediately saw the goalie standing over Sungchan, who was sat on one of the benches, holding a rag up to his face. The white towel was blotted with crimson blood, and you gasped.

“Sungchan!” You darted towards them.

Sungchan lowered his hand, and you could finally see some of the damage. The blood was streaming down from a gash on the right side of his forehead, by his hairline.

No black eyes, though.

He gave you a wincing smile, and you thankfully saw all of his teeth still there. “Y/N, hey...”

You looked down at him incredulously, “How did you even—”

“I’m okay, baby,” he reassured you, reaching out with his free hand to squeeze your forearm.

“That’s not what I said. Aren’t you supposed to be wearing a helmet and visor out there? How did you get a puck to your bare forehead?”

“I’ll leave him to you,” Sicheng declared, backing away from you two. “I’ve got to get back to practice.”

“I wasn’t on the ice,” Sungchan explained. “I was talking to Sicheng by the gate. Rogue puck, he ducked in time, I didn’t.”

You knew whereabouts on the rink he was talking about. The school’s rink was also used for ice skating for some extra money, and had a separate entrance onto the ice for those patrons aside from the entrance from the players’ benches. Since he wasn’t anywhere on the ice, Sungchan must’ve felt comfortable taking his helmet off.

“And you didn’t have your helmet on.”

“Well, yeah,” he admitted sheepishly.

“Open gate, no helmet, rogue puck to the face,” you summarized, taking the towel from his hand to wipe up a drop of blood that had been inching down his temple while you two spoke. It at least wasn’t bleeding as profusely as before, the blood starting to coagulate.

“Really, isn’t it Sicheng’s fault? For ducking? He had a helmet on, he would’ve been fine if it hit him.”

“Mm, of course. Blame the guy with better reflexes than you.” You tossed the rag into the team laundry basket in the corner. “Alright, get changed, I’m taking you home.”

“Okay,” he agreed with a great sigh, bending over to untie his skates, then immediately sat back up. “Woah…”

As Sungchan blinked quickly to get reoriented, you dropped to one knee in front of him to start undoing his laces. “Lightheaded?”

“A bit…”

“I don’t know if I should be hoping for blood loss or concussion.”

After you’d gotten his skates off him, he was able to change out of his uniform and into casual clothes on his own. Slinging his practice bag over your shoulder, you handed his gear bag to him, knowing that you wouldn’t quite be able to manage that yourself. Without even waiting for him, you grabbed his arm to wrap it around your shoulders and snaked yours around his waist, the memory of him getting lightheaded replaying in your mind.

As the two of you left the cold rink into the equally cold December air, you kept an eye on Sungchan for any signs of him needing medical attention beyond your capabilities. Aside from the injury itself, he seemed fine, just with a slightly jutted-out bottom lip as he kept his eyes trained on the ground in front of his feet.

“What’s the pouty face for?” You asked.

“I’m not pouting.” Sungchan resisted.

“Yes you are. You look like a 186-centimeter baby. What’s wrong? Other than your acute case of puck face.”

The pout become even more prominent as he mumbled, “It’s like you’re not even worried about me...”

“Ah, of course I’m worried about my Sungchannie,” you promised, pulling him even closer with the arm you had around his waist. You moved it up to rub his back as you leaned your head against him affectionately. “I’m just so used to seeing guys get their teeth knocked out and their noses broken at your games that when Sicheng said you got a puck to the face, that’s what I was expecting to see. I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to make it seem like I didn’t care. I was just relieved, is all.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah,” you nodded firmly. “Besides, I’m clearly worried enough to take you home and patch you up myself.”

“You are?” He asked hopefully.

“Oh yeah, I’ve got this first aid kit that’s about as big as you are. You’re going to be good as new, baby boy.”

His face finally cracked into a smile. “Why do you have a first aid kit that big?”

“It was the only one at the store that came with alcohol wipes. I need them for my monthly injection, to disinfect the injection site.”

“Right.” He squeezed your upper arm. “Of course, the girl that has to have an entire pharmacy in her kitchen.”

You nudged him with your shoulder teasingly, “And my Sungchannie, who has to take hockey pucks to the face.”

Once the two of you had arrived at your apartment, you immediately pointed to your couch. “Sit.”

Sungchan obeyed easily, plopping down without another word. He took off a couple layers now that you weren’t in the biting winter cold, setting them on the cushion beside him as you bustled over to your kitchen.

“My head hurts,” he announced, sounding downright pitiful.

“Really? Your head hurts?” You pouted at him, getting on your tiptoes to pull down your massive first aid kit from your cabinet.

“Uh-huh.”

“Aw, my poor Sungchannie,” you cooed, setting the huge first aid kit down on the coffee table and popping it open.

The apartment heating had kicked on, so you finally took off your heavy parka and overcoat as well, leaving you just in the base lounge clothes you’d been in before you’d hurried to get dressed with the urgent texts from Sicheng.

First, you tipped a couple of over-the-counter painkillers into his waiting hand, and he knocked them back with a sip from his water bottle.

Grabbing a couple alcohol swabs and boxes of bandages, you asked, “Okay, Hello Kitty, spaceships, or Pokémon?”

“Mm… What kind of Pokémon?”

“First gen. I think it’s mostly Gengars and Psyducks left in there.”

“A Gengar please,” he requested sweetly.

You fished a bandage out, pre-ripping the end of the packaging before setting it on the arm of the couch. Standing in between Sungchan’s legs as he was reclined back on your couch, you leaned over him, very gingerly brushing his hair back from his forehead so you could see the injury better. Thankfully, the bleeding had stopped between the rink and your place, all clotted blood and the start of scabs. Less thankfully for him, you were about to sanitize all of that. Gently turning his head so you could get better light, you tore open the first alcohol wipe and lightly touched it to the very edge of where you thought the wound started. Sungchan’s forehead wrinkled, but he didn’t make a sound. You continued at your task for another second before he finally spoke up.

“Y/N.”

“Sorry, I know it stings, but I’m almost done.” You promised. “I’d go faster but the lighting isn’t great in here, and some of it goes into your hair.”

“Don’t you think you’d be able to see better…” A pair of hands grabbed your hips, encouraging you closer, closer, down, down, until you were straddling Sungchan's lap, a knee on either side of him. “Like this?”

You were about to make a retort, except this tragically did get your own head out of the way enough to stop casting a shadow where you needed. So instead, you looked down at him with an eyebrow raised.

“How injured are you, really?” You questioned, pink-tinged alcohol wipe still in hand.

“So injured,” he fake-whined, settling his hands on your thighs.

“I’m sure.” But you made no move to leave, instead leaning in and getting back to work cleaning up the area.

Sungchan provided no more obvious distraction to you as you did so, seeming content to just smooth his thumbs over your clothed thighs and trace shapes there with his fingers. When you were finally able to see where the skin was split, you frowned, using your fingers to part his hair and inspect how far back it went.

“How long do I have, Doc?” He joked.

“You’ll live, but the bandages aren’t going to help the part that’s in your hair,” you forewarned. “That means be gentle when shampooing while its healing.”

“Sounds complicated. What if I mess it up? I think you should do it for me,” he suggested with a smirk, fingertips playing with the hem of your sweatshirt— well, really it was his sweatshirt, but he’d forfeited it to you some time ago.

“Is there something about getting injured that just turns you into a horndog?” You scoffed. For emphasis, you pinched the sliver of skin on his stomach that was exposed where his own t-shirt had ridden up above the hem of his pants and boxers.

He sat up then, forcing you to lean back to avoid smacking faces, but he just chased you forward until you were nearly nose-to-nose.

“No, there’s something about you being so worried and taking such good care of me that makes me want to show you how much I adore… you… back...” He punctuated the last three words with kisses that went up your neck to your jaw.

You looked up at the ceiling, as if pretending to consider this reason. But the happy smile that was working its way across your lips clearly gave away the fact that your mind was already made up. You snaked a hand between the two of you to push him back against the couch by the chest and hold him there.

“Alright, but at least let me put this Gengar bandage on you first, hm?”

ii. you are so beautifully, so brutally out of comprehension, and how lonely i was in the before and after

With a sigh, you rolled over in bed and checked the time. One hour until Sungchan was supposed to pick you up. It felt like somebody was slowly squeezing your head in some kind of medieval torture machine. There was no way this migraine was going away before your date. When it’d come on within thirty minutes of you waking up, you were hopeful that it’d pass and you could still make it, but clearly you had no such luck.

You sullenly drafted your text to him.

[you: hey, channie, im really sorry about this. i know we were supposed to go skating this afternoon but i’ve got a migraine, so i have to cancel]

Of all the dates that you had to flake out on. Sungchan had been really excited to take you to the rink during one of their open skate times, to share something he loved with you, and you were looking forward to it too. While you weren’t the best at ice skating, you were going to have the captain of the hockey team with you, so you hadn’t been too terribly concerned about your safety. The way his eyes had lit up when you said yes in the first place. God... you felt awful. In the back of your mind, you knew that you were just going to reschedule but still, it just made your head hurt worse to think about.

Ten minutes later, and he had texted back.

[channie: do you want some company?]

[you: ah, you really don’t have to. i’m sure you’ve got other things you need to do]

[channie: 1. i already cleared out my day for you 2. i want to be there with you and 3. i’m already outside]

You smiled at the harsh, painful light of your phone screen, reading the third bulletpoint over again as you typed your response.

[you: spare key under the fucked up looking gnome]

The door to your bedroom was slowly opened just a few moments later, and you wordlessly rolled over in bed to make room for Sungchan to slip under your blankets with you. You rolled back over practically on top of him and buried your face in his chest, happy to have something else to block out the light aside from your blackout curtains. He wrapped his arms around you, pressing a kiss to your hair. The corners of your mouth quirked up fondly.

“Hey...” You mumbled a greeting.

“Hey,” he murmured. “How bad is it?”

“Not as bad as the one from Halloween,” you reassured him, throwing an arm around his waist. “No lobotomizing or anything. Just... hurts.”

“That’s... good, I guess.”

“You put my key back under the gnome? Or did you bring it in?”

“Put it back. Also why do you have that fucked up looking gnome?”

“I saw him on clearance and he was just so horrible, I had to have him. So now I hide my spare key under him.”

You didn’t know if Sungchan had found your answer satisfactory, or just decided to leave the topic be for your migraine’s sake, but he said nothing more. His arms shifted a bit tighter around you, and you could sense his sour mood without even needing to see his face.

“What’s wrong?”

“What?”

“My Sungchannie…” You said in a hushed, teasing sing-song tone. “You make a terrible cuddle buddy when you’re this tense.” You poked his stomach for emphasis, which was solid as a brick wall. “What’s wrong?”

“Sorry, sorry.” He readjusted again, and you did feel his muscles relax a little under you. “You’ve got a migraine, you shouldn’t be asking me what’s wrong.”

“Well, we already know what’s wrong with me. So, what’s wrong with you?”

He let out a deep sigh. “It’s weird. When one of the guys gets hurt on the ice, I can see where they’re hurt and either slap a bandage on them myself or take them to someone who can. But when you’re hurting, my girl... I can’t do any of those things. I hate it.”

“Just you being here makes me feel better, Channie.” You squinted one eye open so you could reach a hand up to gently stroke his cheek. “I promise.”

“If you say so.”

Despite his melancholy words, he turned his head quickly to give a fleeting smooch to the tip of your thumb before you dropped it back down to lay the hand flat on his chest.

“And... ‘your girl?’” You asked slyly, wishing that there wasn’t a thick hoodie between his bare chest and your hand in that moment, as you were sure you would’ve been able to feel his heartbeat jump under your fingertips.

His eyes widened minutely as his head tilted in confusion. “Are-Are you not?”

“No, I am. Definitely.” You contentedly squished your cheek against his front.

“And I’m your guy. Right?”

“As if that could even be a question,” you giggled, the words punctuated by a yawn. “Yes.”

“Good,” he breathed out in relief, and you finally felt him truly relax underneath you. “Uhm, I’m keeping you up, sorry. You should go to sleep.” He pressed a kiss to the top of your head, “My sleepy girl.”

“Mm, okay. Goodnight,” you mumbled, rolling over in his arms and letting your thoughts fully drift away.

“Love you...”

Sungchan continued staring down at you as your breathing evened out. The words seemed to have come out of your mouth as naturally as your breaths, and he fought back the urge to shake you awake again so he could say them back to you. Instead, he brushed your hair away from your face, planting a couple gentle kisses on your temple before scooting into his spot as big spoon for today and settling in for the duration of your sleep.

“I love you too,” he murmured into the crook of your neck, letting his own eyes close as he replayed the memory of you saying it first.

You woke up not even knowing your own name.

After taking a few seconds to properly come to and get reoriented from your migraine nap, you turned to your other side, immediately greeted by Jung Sungchan with such a tender look on his face that you had the breath knocked out of you.

Finally, you coughed out, “Hi...”

“Hey,” he smiled softly. “Sleep good?”

“Mhm... What time is it? How long did I sleep?”

“A few hours, it’s almost eight.”

“Cool, there goes my non-existent sleep schedule.”

He laughed quietly. “How are you feeling?”

“Better. I mean, blegh, but no migraine. Just... eugh.”

“The way you classify feeling good and bad fascinates me,” he commented.

You shuffled onto your back, staring up at your ceiling. “It’s all relative. One of my good days looks different from another chronically ill person’s good days. Same with my bad days. And no two abled people’s good and bad days look the same either. I mean, before I had migraines, I wasn’t out there being a hockey superstar like you. So yeah, right now I feel blegh and eugh, but in comparison to before my nap, that’s pretty good.”

“Huh.” Sungchan flopped onto his back too. “I mean, I guess I kind of knew that but... never really thought it through like that.”

“It’s a working theory,” you shrugged. “I’ve only been like this for... a little less than four years? And I’ll have these for, you know, the rest of my life. So, I’ll continue to refine it as time goes on.”

“Oh. Huh.”

“What?”

“You’re really going to have migraines for the rest of your life?”

“Yeah. Unless some miracle cure is discovered in my lifetime. It’s a lifelong condition.”

“That’s… damn.”

You let out a chuckle. “It took a while for it to sink in for me, too. When my neurologist mentioned it at my first appointment, it was like, whatever, but now four years later… yeah, it’s really starting to sink in that this is my life.”

“Woah…”

“Anyway, I’m sorry again about ice skating. I know you were really excited for it.”

“Don’t worry, we’ll go another day,” he promised. “Thank you for letting me be here, with you.”

You pushed yourself up to sit cross-legged, and put your hand over his that he’d been resting on his chest. “Thank you for coming, Sungchan.”

His face scrunched up. “What’s with calling me that? Am I in trouble?”

“Don’t tell me you’re one of those guys…”

“One of what guys?”

“As soon as they get a nickname or a term of endearment they won’t answer to their government name anymore.”

“It’s not that, it’s just… it feels like I’m in trouble. Like, am I not your Sungchannie anymore? Am I not baby or baby boy to you anymore? I’m no longer Channie?”

“You’re not in trouble,” you told him, slotting your fingers with his. “But… as a literary student, I understand the importance of diction and the symbolism of names.”

“Yeah, exactly.” He nodded firmly.

You snickered, leaning down to press a kiss to his forehead. “Thank you for being here with me, my Sungchannie.”

He caught the back of your head with his other hand before you could sit up all the way, guiding your lips down to his. It was a sweet, lingering kiss, which neither of you moved to deepen nor rush. When his hand fell from your hair, you straightened back up, smiling down at him fondly.

“Well, are you ready for dinner?” You asked. “I was thinking frozen pizza and very quiet movies. Unless you can’t stay the night.”

“No, I can stay.” He nodded, propping himself up on his elbows. “That sounds great. Whatever you want.”

��Perfect.”

You climbed out of bed, taking a second to get to your feet before heading for your bedroom door. Sungchan was still under the covers, though, seemingly lost in his own thoughts. You stopped at the threshold of the door, turning around to look at him.

“Channie?”

“Hm?”

“By the way…” You paused, letting silence descend for a couple seconds as he patiently waited for you to finish. “I love you.”

You immediately darted away towards your kitchen, laughing as you heard him scrambling to get out of bed and chase after you.

“Hey, come back!” He cried out, and you swore you heard the thud of an elbow or a knee bumping into a piece of furniture or a doorframe. “I need to say it back to you! Baby!”

You couldn’t run very far, sliding across your kitchen tile on your socks before skidding to a stop in front of your fridge. Sungchan came barreling around the corner right after you, wild-eyed, clutching his elbow and out of breath.

“No fair…” he whined. “You got a head start and I hit my funny bone on your door.”

“Your legs are like twice as long as mine!” You pointed out. “I think that’s just equity.”

“And my funny bone?”

“I’m sorry about your funny bone, baby boy. Want me to kiss it better?”

“In a second.”

“Alright,” you giggled, waiting patiently for him to finish his point.

“You know what’s not equitable?” He asked with his hands on his hips, slowly advancing towards you.

“Aside from you busting your funny bone on my door?”

He’d gotten you in arm’s reach, seizing you by the waist to pull you into his chest again. “You saying it to me twice now without giving me an opportunity to say it back.”

You laughed and wriggled around in his grasp as he held steadfast to you.

“So not fair!” Sungchan complained teasingly, showering your forehead, nose, and cheeks in kisses.

You felt more giggle than human at this point, wrapping your arms around his neck and burying your face in his collar to hide it from him and get a moment to recover your aching smile muscles. He hugged you even tighter to him, resting his chin on your head.

“Maybe it’s a good thing you’re not an athlete, you don’t play fair,” he chastised you. “Being so unbelievably cute while I’m trying to prove a point here.”

With another loud smooch to the top of your head, Sungchan let you go, removing you from him and holding you at arm’s length by the shoulders. You raised your eyebrows as you eyed the several kitchen tiles of space between the two of you.

“Very romantic, Channie.”

“Ahh, well I can’t think when you’re so close to me!”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry. However you need to.”

“No, you’re right, come back here.” He pulled you flush to his front again, cupping your cheeks to tilt your face up to look at him.

You looped your arms around his waist, offering him a sweet smile. “Hi.”

“Hi,” he echoed, stroking his thumbs over your cheekbones. Sungchan looked over your features fondly, his lips twitching as he was clearly trying and failing to suppress a giddy grin. “I love you. I love you. And, I love you.”

You chuckled at him having to say it the third time, as your whole body buzzed with joy. Yeah, your insides were never going to un-mush at this rate. They’d been long gone since your first date.

“I love you too, my Sungchannie.” You gave him a gentle kiss, feeling him smile against your lips.

iii. i hear the secret whisperings of the world in the curves of all your bursts of laughter

Sitting in a stadium seat at the ice rink one afternoon, you watched the team’s practice as you waited for your boyfriend. Well, half-watching the practice. Now that the semester was over, you wanted to catch up on your personal reading list with the free time.

A sudden bang on the barrier in front of you made you startle and look up from your book. It surprisingly wasn’t Sungchan, but two other players—23 and 24.

You slowly waved at Jeno and Yangyang before turning your eyes back down to your reading. That just started up more fervent banging on the plastic and indistinct shouting from them.

“Oh my God! What?” You yelled back, tucking your bookmark into the pages.

Their words were indistinguishable though, because of the barrier, distance, and the fact that they were talking over each other.

“Hold on!” You huffed. Standing up and picking your way down through the rows until you were directly in front of them, you asked, “Okay, what? One at a time.”

“Are you coming to movie night tonight—” Jeno started.

“—at the Puck Pad?” Yangyang finished.

Your brow furrowed as you stared at their shining eyes as if they had just said a normal thing to you. “I’m sorry, the what?”

“Movie night?” Jeno repeated.

“You seriously think that’s what I’m confused about? I know what a fucking movie night is, Jeno,” you rolled your eyes. “What the hell is the ‘Puck Pad?’”

The two of them exchanged a look before Yangyang spoke up, “Where your boyfriend lives? The house that me, Sungchan, Ten, and Sicheng all rent.”

“The team is having a movie night there tonight!” Jeno reiterated. “We were just wondering if you were coming too.”

You blinked at them. “I’ve never heard Sungchan, Sicheng, nor Ten call the house that. Are you sure it’s not just you, Yangyang?”

Yangyang ignored your question with one of his own, “Are you coming?”

“Yeah, Sungchan mentioned some movies at his place tonight. I’ll be there.”

“Awesome!” They said in unison.

“So… the Puck Pad?” You asked abruptly as Sungchan came out of the locker room, your arms crossed and head tilted.

His elated smile dropped off his face as a bewildered look of confusion took over, and his arms fell down to his sides from where he’d been holding them out for a hug. “What…? Who told you about that?”

“So you do call your house that?”

“Look, we joked about that like once or twice when we moved in last year. It’s not like there’s a sign up or anything.”

“And you didn’t want to tell me about this because…?”

“It’s lame and makes us sound like a bunch of losers.”

“But you are.”

“Unh!” He held a fist over his chest as if he were grabbing some invisible weapon that he’d just been stabbed with. Clutching onto your shoulder with his other hand, he slowly started leaning more and more of his weight onto you as he made more fake noises of pain. “Oof! Oh God… Oh, that hurt, Y/N… My own girl… Ugh… Agh…”

Giggling, you had to change your stance to keep the both of you up as he was fully slumped against you. You let out a grunt of exertion as you readjusted to push on his chest and prop him back up into a somewhat standing position.

“Channie, get up!” You complained as he just flopped back over on you, bringing another bout of laughter from you as you struggled to keep the both of you up. “Channie! Seriously, you’re such a baby! Just a big loser baby!”

“Yeah, but I’m your big loser baby, right?” He teased, supporting just enough of his weight to be able to look you in the face as he pouted at you pointedly.

You pinched his bottom lip just a bit meanly. “Yeah, and you’d better not forget it. Now can we go? You do know that the team has been staring like the whole time waiting for us, right?”

The guys were all crowded up by the automatic doors in a huddle, in various stages of pretending not to watch and very obviously looking and snickering among themselves. Donghyuck and Yangyang were in the latter, the two underclassmen feeling rather brave tonight as Yangyang yelled out first.

“Come on, loser baby! We’re waiting!”

“Yang, it was big loser baby, actually,” Donghyuck corrected him facetiously.

“Right, of course,” Yangyang nodded seriously. “Come on, you big, stinking, whining loser baby!”

Sungchan straightened up, all humor drained from his features as he snapped his fingers and pointed at them. “Shut the fuck up.”

“Are you ready to go, Channie?” Jeno joined in.

“Don’t fucking call me that!” The captain shot back, grabbing your hand as he started leading the way over.

“Seriously, guys,” you spoke up once you had joined the pack of hockey players heading out of the rink. “Don’t call him Channie, please.”

Sungchan’s house—The Puck Pad—was a close enough walk that on nights like this, where the team would hold movie nights or other team events after hockey practice, the players would all leave their cars at the house beforehand and walk over. So you all had a roughly twenty-minute walk back there now, a gaggle of hockey players, their practice bags, a couple gear bags, and you.

“Why not?” Donghyuck fake-whined.

“Well for one, he asked you not to. That should be enough,” you retorted. “And two, that’s my nickname for him. Come up with your own instead of stealing mine.”

“Since you asked so nicely, okay.”

“Thanks, Hyuck.”

A phone alarm suddenly went off just a moment later, and you calmly turned it off from your watch before rummaging through the tote bag on your shoulder.

“Evening?” Sungchan asked knowingly, watching as you tipped out one pill after another into your palm, then grabbed your water bottle.

“Mhm.” You confirmed before knocking them back in several rounds. The two of you were thankfully towards the back of the group, so they didn’t notice when you had to stop and start every time you had difficulty swallowing your sips of water.

When you closed up your tote bag, took his hand in yours, and continued down the sidewalk at a brisk pace intent on catching up with the others, a frown cut across Sungchan’s face. “Aren’t you supposed to take those with food?”

“Forgot to restock the go bag with snacks yesterday. I’ll live taking one dose without it,” you shrugged. “Besides, we’re going to be at your place soon anyway, I’ll eat there.”

Sungchan reached into his practice bag, fishing out a slightly misshapen protein bar, “Here. Sorry, it got a little crushed.”

“Oh, you don’t—”

He tore open the wrapper with his teeth, then pushed it into your hand that wasn’t holding his. “Y/N, eat it.”

“Alright. Thank you.”

At The Puck Pad—which you were learning, it turns out, the entire team calls the house when nobody else is around—you ended up being pretty glad for the protein bar Sungchan had given you on your way over. You only ate half of it before you got to the house, but the guys were so disorganized that it wasn’t until almost two hours after you’d arrived that everybody was finally settled in the living room with popcorn, candy, pizza, beer (soda and water for you), and a movie playing on the TV.

You and Sungchan had a plush, reclining armchair to yourselves, tucked cozily under a blanket. Sungchan had an arm around your waist holding you close to him as the other moved between his plate that was balanced on the armrest with a stack of pizza slices, and the small end table where your drinks sat. You were happily curled up into his side, head resting in the crook between his shoulder and his chest, and your legs in his lap as you propped your own plate up on your knees to eat from.

The guys had picked a horror movie first—one without jumpscares, as both you and Mark hated them. Blood, gore, body horror, or psychological thriller didn’t faze you, but under no circumstances could you handle jumpscares. Mark, on the other hand, didn’t care for horror movies in general and would only tolerate them if everybody else wanted to watch it. His hard line was jumpscares, though, which you two could agree on. So everybody had checked over multiple websites to be sure that this specific movie definitely didn’t have any jumpscares. Just lots of blood, as you were now finding out.

“Gross, dude…” Mark muttered under his breath from the couch. When you looked over at him, you could see his arms crossed over his chest as he stared at the screen with a curled lip of disgust.

“Ugh, he had all those frogs inside him?” Yangyang pretended to gag, not looking away from the screen for a second.

“Good thing Hendery already went home for the holidays, huh?” Ten laughed, tossing a piece of popcorn into his mouth from where his head was pillowed in Sicheng’s lap.

Chenle, who had also been invited, snorted with amusement. “Hendery would be climbing the fuckin’ walls right now.”

“I’m with Mark, this is fucking nasty.” You shook your head, turning to bury your face in Sungchan’s chest. “Let me know when there’s no more frogs doing gross stuff to people’s internal organs.”

“You can pick next, baby. Promise.” Sungchan wrapped two arms around you. He leaned in even closer to you to whisper, “Please pick something not scary.”

Once the horror movie was over, you proudly picked a Christmas rom-com, making sure to get one that had the perfect balance of a low critics’ score and high audience score on Rotten Tomatoes, was at least as old as you, had a low budget, and starred two famous actors that hadn’t gotten their big break as of filming.

When Jeno tried to grumble, you merely stuck your tongue out at him. “‘Tis the fucking season, Jeno!”

“Oh, fuck yeah! Christmas movie!” Yangyang cheered through a mouthful of pizza, walking back into the living room with a newly filled plate of slices. “Jeno, did we already have this one on our list?”

“List?” You asked with facetious innocence.

“Jeno and I marathon shitty Hallmark Christmas movies every year when we go to his parents’ place on break,” the junior explained, plopping down into his spot next to his friend. “He keeps the list in the notes on his phone, so I wanted to make sure he checked it off if we had it on there.”

While your immediate instinct had been to tease Jeno like the other guys were doing, something Yangyang said caught your attention instead.

“Wait, Yangyang, you go to Jeno’s parents’ place on break? You don’t go home?”

“My parents don’t live here. I’m originally from here, but we moved abroad when I was a kid. They still live there. The holiday break we get for hockey is too short to make it all the way out there.” He shrugged, taking another huge bite of pizza. “Jeno’s family is super cool. His mom about lost it when she heard that I’d be staying at school for the holidays my freshman year, insisted Jeno bring me home. So I go every year now.”

“And you two binge Hallmark movies together,” Chenle cooed, pinching their cheeks in unison. “The bestest of fwiends.”

Jeno shook his head and rolled his eyes, but there was no denying the bright grin on his face when Yangyang talked about staying with his family, or when he snuck his phone out to open the notes app and covertly check something off on a list that you couldn’t quite read from the other side of the room.

The movie ended up being actually a really good laugh. Both intentionally and unintentionally. Some of the jokes still held up after all these years, which surprised you, and also, the movie was just funny bad sometimes, which was even better. You found your cheeks hurting from how much you were laughing by the end of it, and surrounded by similar smiles on your friends’ faces. Which made it all the more enjoyable. The ending was the perfect amount of cheesy, sweet, funny, and satisfying, and felt like the perfect way to finish off your own night.

As the credits started rolling, still with a smile lingering on your lips, you turned to Sungchan, only to find him already gazing fondly at you.

“Oh. Hi…” You squeaked softly, completely caught off guard.

“Hi, baby,” he murmured back. “Good pick, by the way.”

“Not too scary, I hope.”

“Well, I had my girl there to protect me from that terrifying small-town baker and the down on his luck yet equally terrifying single dad, you know.”

The rest of the guys were having a debate about the next movie to watch—Pride and Prejudice (2005), Donghyuck’s idea vs. The Amazing Spider-Man (yes, Andrew Garfield), Mark’s idea. A debate that was expeditiously devolving into a very loud argument, so you weren’t particularly worried about them hearing the quiet, playful conversation that you and your boyfriend were having in the couple of inches of space between your heads.

“Always happy to protect my guy from the horrors of cheesy rom-coms,” you quipped back. “Anyway, I think I’m about done. Unless you want to watch whatever they end up picking?”

Sungchan shook his head minutely. “Apparently Hyuck’s been watching that movie like every day since this girl in his Brit Lit class rejected him like two weeks ago—”

“You need a better fucking coping mechanism than Keira Knightly, dude!” Mark’s exasperated voice rang through the living room.

“Would you rather I take up heroin, then?” Donghyuck screeched back.

“No! What the fuck is wrong with you?!” The frat president groaned. “I meant like Tinder or something!”

“Oh, really great advice from my Big here! I should go get myself an STD or 7 because he doesn’t want to watch one movie with me!”

“It’s not one movie, this is the fifteenth time this month, Hyuck! And you know we have condoms in the house, man! Use them!”

“And that’s our cue,” Sungchan declared only to you, nudging you towards the front of the armchair.

You scooted off his lap, getting to your feet and stretching as your boyfriend spoke over the still-bickering Nu Chi brothers. “Alright guys, we’re done for the night. See you.”

A couple of the spectators gave you two ‘goodnight’s, but everyone else was still locked into Mark and Donghyuck squabbling match as the Little was now fake-sobbing into Sicheng’s arms about how his Big couldn’t care less about him and his safety and maybe he should go get every single sexually transmitted disease if it’ll make Mark’s life easier. Mark turned towards the closest wall and started banging his forehead against it as you and Sungchan headed up the stairs.

The Puck Pad was three floors and an attic. All of the shared family spaces were on the first floor: the kitchen, living room, dining room, laundry room, and a half bathroom; the second floor had two bedrooms and one bathroom, currently inhabited by Ten and Sicheng; and the third floor had two* more bedrooms and one and a half more bathrooms, occupied by Yangyang and Sungchan. Being the captain, when divvying up the rooms, the other three just kind of shrugged and gave Sungchan what was technically the master bedroom. It was at the end of the hallway, and while it wasn’t that much bigger than the rest of the bedrooms, it was the only one with an en suite bathroom. You would hesitantly call this a four bedroom house, as you were pretty sure that Yangyang’s room wasn’t actually supposed to be a bedroom. At least not when the house was built. The layout of the bathrooms had been your first clue, with there being just a half bath for him to use—he had to either go down one floor to use Ten and Sicheng’s shower or into Sungchan’s bedroom to use his shower—and the fact that the doors (yes, doors, plural, he had two doors to his very normal-sized bedroom, one of which was the actual entrance and exit from the hallway and the other, which was in an interior wall, could not be opened, despite having a handle and hinges) looked like they had been added decades after the frames had been built. You were stumped as to what the room could’ve originally been, but you were confident that it wasn’t a bedroom, at least. It was something that puzzled and mystified you every time you came over.

Donghyuck and Mark were either done with their spat, or the sounds of it couldn’t carry at the way up here. Either way, you were going to be well onto your way to dreamland soon as you settled down for the night with Sungchan, having done your nighttime routine, changed into your pajamas, and gleefully climbed under the covers.

“Are the other guys staying the night?” You asked Sungchan as he readjusted his pillow next to you to get comfy.

“Don’t know,” he said. “Usually they will if they drink a bit too much, or if they just don’t feel like going all the way home then having to come back this way for Saturday morning practice.”

You made a noncommittal noise, still ruminating over your half-idea in your own mind as you laid there with your eyes shut. The mattress and the sheets shifted beside you as Sungchan curled up behind you, resting a hand on your waist.

“Why are you asking?” He questioned curiously.

“Hyuck…” You sighed, placing your hand over his and slotting your fingers together. “Worried about him, is all.”

“It was some girl in his class that he’d talked to like once in the whole semester. He’ll be okay. Donghyuck’s just got to get the dramatics out of his system first.”

“Even so… Even if he’s just a bit bummed or whatever… Isn’t that what friends are for? To make you feel better when you’re bummed out?” You mused.

“Yeah, I guess so. That’s what Mark’s been trying to do, and he just ended up watching Pride and Prejudice fourteen times.”

You let out a soft burst of air, a quiet chuckle, at that. “Taking one—or, fifteen—for the team.”

Sungchan’s chest shook with a couple silent laughs.

“But really— Can you bring him back here after morning practice tomorrow? I want to take him out. Get his mind off it.”

“Yeah, sure. We can do something.”

“Ah, Channie, I was kind of thinking just me and Hyuck.”

“What? Why?”

“Because you guys pick on him.”

“He picks on us!”

“Baby?”

“Alright, alright,” he relented. “I’ll bring Donghyuck back after practice tomorrow for your little friend date.”

You turned your head to be able to press a fleeting peck to the tip of his nose. “Thank you, baby.”

“But I’m making you breakfast. You two will have to figure out something else.”

In the morning, you were faintly aware of an alarm going off early before it was quickly shut off and you rolled over in bed, burying your face in your pillow. Beyond your eyelids, it was still absolute darkness. You could feel the shifting of the mattress beside you and the press of a gentle kiss to your temple as you quickly sank under the calm waters of sleep once more.

You were half-awoken again some time later, a faint light streaming into your consciousness as the covers shifted once again, and a presence enveloped you from behind that hadn’t been there before. Letting out a peaceful sigh, you listened to the sounds of yours and Sungchan’s breathing as they eventually synced up, and you drifted back off without even realizing it.

Fluttering your eyes open, you groaned softly against the bright morning sunlight. After a couple seconds of squinting and blinking, your eyes had adjusted for the most part, and you rolled onto your other side. Sungchan smiled at you fondly as you rubbed at one of your eyes.

“You awake?” He asked quietly.

“Yep, ‘m up,” you offered a bleary thumbs up. “Just don’t make me solve any differential equations or whatever the fuck. Actually, don’t make me do that when I’m at full capacity either.”

He laughed softly, cradling the back of your head to pull you forward and press a kiss to your forehead. “Good morning, baby.”

“Mornin’ Channie,” you said back, punctuated by a yawn. “How was practice?”

“It was good. Donghyuck’s playing video games in the living room with Yangyang, by the way.”

“Good, good.”

“I think that was our smoothest Saturday morning yet. Were you able to go back to sleep okay?”

“Oh, yeah. I don’t even remember waking up at all, really.”

“Success,” he grinned.

You momentarily closed your eyes again, enjoying the peaceful moment as you let your body slowly work towards fully waking up. Sungchan gently stroked the backs of his fingers up and down your arm, and you relaxed even further under his touch.

“I like waking up next to you,” he admitted softly. You squinted one eye back open to look at him as he continued. “Doing it twice in one morning… I think that’s the most I’ve ever loved somebody.”

Shooting up just to push him back against the mattress, you held him there by the shoulders, your grip so tight it probably would’ve hurt if he wasn’t already used to much worse on the ice. He looked up at you with wide eyes.

“Are you trying to kill me, Jung Sungchan?” You accused. “Saying stuff like that to me first thing in the morning, I could melt into a puddle and never re-form! My heart could explode!”

“You don’t think my heart feels like it’s going to explode when I wake up and see you next to me first thing in the morning?” He huffed back. “That just sounds like equity, baby.”

“You don’t know the meaning of that word.”

“Maybe so…”

With a final shake of your head, you let go of him and fell onto your back next to him. He propped himself up on an elbow on his side so he could see you, the beginnings of a pout on his face.

“And what’s that pout for?” You teased, already with a sneaking suspicion.

“Oh, nothing…” He picked up one of your hands, dropping a line of kisses to the back of it and up your wrist and lower arm.

“Okay,” you played along with a smile on your face. “Because I was just thinking that I’ve been awake for a whole five minutes with no good morning kiss. But if it’s nothing, then—”

You couldn’t even finish your sarcastic dramatics before Sungchan had captured your lips with his in a sweet but intense kiss that pressed your head back into the pillow just a little bit. Curling your fingers in the hair at the back of his head and grabbing a fistful of his t-shirt with your other hand, you pulled him even closer, wanting to just be able to melt into each other completely like it felt like your mouths were doing.

Another alarm suddenly went off in the bedroom, different from the one that had gone off in the wee hours of the morning, and you broke the kiss for just a second to snooze it on your smart watch.

“Oh! Your meds.” Sungchan immediately looked over towards his dresser where your go bag was sitting safely.

“I snoozed it; I’ll take them in a few minutes,” you reassured him, grabbing his face to pull his lips back to yours.

He indulged you for a few seconds until you reached a natural break for air, where he instead pecked your cheek before sitting back on his feet. “I’ll grab them for you, I don’t mind.”

With that, he clambered off the bed and over towards the dresser.

It was impossible to get mad at him though as he so eagerly went to help. You were instead filled with such an overwhelming fondness and joy, unable to do much but smile tenderly at him. “Oh, Channie… thank you.”

“Morning, morning, morning,” he muttered to himself as he rooted through your tote bag to pull out the various pill bottles. “That’s… half of this one, one of these, and… one of this? Oh, and you just added this one, too. And your blood pressure cuff.”

“A-plus, Nurse Jung.” You beamed up at him as you sat up in bed, getting in the correct position to take your vitals with the cuff.

He came over to you, dropping your meds in your waiting palm. You looked over the colorful pills momentarily, pleased to see that he’d gotten it exactly correct. After taking them with your water that was on his nightstand, you held out your hand for him to give you your cuff. But instead, he undid the Velcro and went to loop it around your wrist himself, brows furrowing as he concentrated on the task at hand.

“How’s that?” He asked once he had it secured.

“It’s a little too close to my hand, actually, but good first try.” You undid the band, scooting it to the proper position. “It should be a little further above my wrist bone.”

“Okay. Got it.”

The two of you were silent as you waited for your cuff to take your blood pressure and heartrate, the only sounds that of your breathing and the usual ones of the device in operation. After the final beep and deflation, you brought your wrist down from your chest to look at the screen.

“Is that good?” Sungchan asked, focused on the results as well.

“Well these are my pre-dose numbers. And they’re actually a little lower than normal,” you explained, typing them into your health record on your phone with your free hand. “Only by 10 points, but that means that depending on the post-dose I’ll probably just have to keep a closer eye on my numbers today.”

“So now we set a timer for 30 minutes.”

“Yep,” you did so with just a couple more taps on your phone. “And in the meantime, you make me breakfast like you promised.”

“On it.” He smooched your temple, his hands tentatively reaching towards your wrist. “Can I take your blood pressure cuff off you now?”

“Of course.”

He gently peeled off the strap with a rip of the Velcro, standing back up to put it away in its case. Holding the cuff in its hard carrying case in one hand, he offered his other out to you, and you gladly took it, getting it to your feet.

“Hold on a sec…” You muttered, squeezing your eyes shut as you got light-headed for a moment, bright lights flashing in your vision.

“I got you, baby,” Sungchan murmured, pressing his arm to yours and grabbing your other shoulder with his hand—he must have set your cuff down or put it in his pocket.

Once you felt stable on your own two feet again, which took just a few seconds, you blinked a couple times, then smiled up at him. “Okay, ready.”

Downstairs, you could hear video game sounds as you emerged into the kitchen, accompanied by the muffled shouting of three voices. Yangyang, Donghyuck, and that last one had to be Ten, it wasn’t nearly deep enough to be Sicheng. You sat up in the corner of their kitchen counter to watch Sungchan as he cooked, occasionally in the way, but he never asked you to move, and you never offered. It was a simple breakfast, but nothing could beat the proud, happy grin on his face as he held your plate out to you.

“It looks great,” you told him, patting his cheek. “Thank you, Channie.”

“Anything for my girl,” he replied, absolutely beaming as he leaned in to give you a soft kiss. You could feel the curl of his smile against your lips.

The two of you had just taken your first bites sat at the kitchen table when Yangyang and Donghyuck wandered in.

“Something smells good,” Yangyang announced, his eyes immediately landing on your food.

You protectively pulled your plate closer to yourself.

“There’s plenty left in the fridge to make your own,” Sungchan replied, pointing towards the kitchen.

Donghyuck plopped down in the seat directly next to the one that you and your boyfriend were jointly occupying—you were on Sungchan’s lap. The sophomore stared longingly at your breakfast.

“Didn’t you guys already eat?” You asked. “You had morning practice.”

“That was forever ago.”

“You’re not stealing my girlfriend’s food, you ungrateful little shits,” the captain glared at the both of them. “Go make your own if you’re so hungry.”

“First Mark wants me to get chlamydia, now you want me to starve,” Donghyuck bemoaned. “Will I ever have a good role model in my life?”

Sungchan fixed you with a pointed look, but you could only giggle at your friend’s dramatics.

“Daddy issues much, Hyuck?” You ruffled his hair, earning loud cackles from Yangyang, and distant laughter from Ten.

Donghyuck stared at you with a dropped jaw as you heard a couple dumbfounded sputters from Sungchan behind you. The younger player recovered quickly, though.

“What gave it away? My unhealthy attachment to older male friends that I see as reliable, or my ‘I Heart DILFs’ shirt?” He retorted sarcastically.

“You do wear that shirt a lot,” you jested back easily. He owned no such shirt to your knowledge.

“And here I thought I was being subtle.” He clicked his tongue in feigned disappointment.

“As a trainwreck,” you nodded. “You and Yang either go get your own food or shut the fuck up, okay?”

Donghyuck stood up from his chair, giving you an overzealous salute. “Yes, ma’am.”

Yangyang went to follow his friend with a shake of his head. “Mommy issues much, bro?”

You couldn’t contain your laughs, tucking your face back into the crook of Sungchan’s neck to muffle them just a little bit. He wrapped an arm around your waist, holding you even closer to him. You kept laughing, even as he gently brushed his lips over the crinkles at the corner of your eye.

iv. because life is beautiful but life is work, so full of joy, so full of hurt

“So tell me about her,” you prompted Donghyuck as soon as the front door shut behind you two.

“What?”

“The girl that you like. Tell me about her.”

“Sungchan said you wanted to take me out to get my mind off it.” He regarded you suspiciously. “And everyone else is telling me I should just move on, stop moping and thinking about her all the time. Don’t know how talking about her more is really going to help that.”

“I heard that she was in one of your classes this semester and you two talked once. But if you’re this broken up about her… sounds like there’s more going on,” you shrugged. “If you want to tell me, I’m all ears. I know you feel like you have to ham it up for the guys all the time, make them laugh and stuff. But you don’t have to do that for me, okay? You don’t owe me entertainment in exchange for tolerating your presence or something. I’m hanging out with you right now because I want to.”

“I talked to her twice, actually. Not counting when she rejected me,” he began abruptly. “We were in the same Brit Lit class this semester, she sat in the seat in front of me. On the first day of class, she turned around to hand me the syllabus and accidentally bumped my water bottle. She smiled, apologized, and handed me the stack of papers and that was that. It’s so not me but I just, I couldn’t talk to her. It’s not just that she’s pretty—I mean she is, like the most beautiful girl I’ve ever seen—but she’s so smart too. Whenever she’d answer one of the professor’s questions, she’d say something about the story that I would’ve never thought of in a million years. And like, the professor would be impressed too! But every single time I tried to hype myself up to say something, literally anything to her, I’d end up panicking and not doing it.”

“What was the other time? You said you talked to her twice, outside of when you asked her out. What was the other time, after the syllabus?”

He grimaced. “Ugh, right. I was walking across campus from the library to the parking garage one day. I was supposed to be meeting up with Mark at his car to hitch a ride back to the house. I had one of my sticks with me because I was taking it home to retape it, just sort of slung over my shoulders while I waited at the crosswalk. And it was dark, and I heard something behind me, whipped around to look, and ended up knocking her right in the eye with the butt of the stick.”

“Oh no,” you hissed sympathetically.

“I kept apologizing, but since I didn’t have my gear bag on me, just my bookbag and weapon, I didn’t have anything to patch her up with. She had some tissues in her bag thankfully… but I felt so horrible.”

“Aw, Hyuck, it was an accident. I’m sure she knows that.”

“And I felt even more horrible when I saw her in class a couple days later with that same eye black and blue.”

“Ouch…”

“And then on the last day of class, I caught up with her in the hall after turning in our finals, and I finally did it. I finally asked her out. And she said no.”

You let out a forlorn sigh, looping your arm with your friend’s. “I’m sorry, Hyuck. If it makes you feel any better, I think she’s missing out on a really great, sweet guy.”

“That doesn’t really help, but thanks, I guess.”

“I think it’s good to go ahead and be sad for a little bit, if that’s what you’re feeling.”

He let out a cynical chuckle. “I think my sadness is a bit of an inconvenience for the guys.”

“That’s not true,” you reassured him. “They’re just worried about you. You’re usually this big, unstoppable ball of sunshine. It’s like when one of you gets hurt on the ice, right? One of your teammates will slap a bandage where it hurts and you’ll keep playing. They don’t get why the bandages aren’t enough this time.”

“I don’t know if ‘ball of sunshine’ is a phrase that any of them of would use to describe me.” The corner of his lips twitched. “But thank you, Y/N. I didn’t really know what to expect when Sungchan told me that you wanted to hang out with me 1-on-1 today, considering you don’t really know me like you know some of the other guys. Like, I don’t think we’ve even been alone in a room together before, you know?”

“Huh. Yeah, I think you’re right.”

“Now I get it, though.”

“Get what?”

“Why everyone thinks you and Sungchan are gonna get married.”

“What?”

“Not like, now, but that you guys are going to, you know, make it, or whatever. Soulmates or something.”

You quirked up an eyebrow at the underclassman. “You believe in soulmates, Hyuck?”

“Yeah, I think I do. And I’m only telling you this because I don’t think you’ll call it stupid.”

“I don’t think it’s stupid. I think it’s sweet,” you reassured him, patting his shoulder. “A jock with a romantic streak, very swoon-worthy.”

“That how Sungchan got you?” He teased, elbowing you in the side lightly.

“Something like that.”

“Hmph.”

“This isn’t the end for you,” you said knowingly.

“I know, I know. Just feels like it.”

“I get it. Next time you want to watch Pride and Prejudice fourteen times, you can call me up, okay? Give Mark a break.”

“Careful, I might take you up on that.”

“Wouldn’t offer if I wasn’t serious. But for now, arcade?”

His eyes lit up at you finally revealing where the two of you were going. “Oh hell yeah! I’m so going to annihilate you at air hockey!”

“Don’t count on it,” you warned. “Sungchan’s taught me a few things.”

“Hey, baby, I’m back—” Sungchan skidded to a stop in the threshold of his bedroom, bag of delivery food in hand.

“Hey, Channie,” you smiled up at him as you were sat against his headboard. Donghyuck was curled up on top of the blankets by your legs like a cat, his head in your lap as you gently played with his hair.

“I was gone for like a minute,” your boyfriend gestured to the sophomore with bewilderment. “Does he just have a sixth sense for when you’re alone?”

“I told them they could join us for a movie.”

“Them?”

“Yo, you mind, bro?” Another voice piped up, Yangyang ducking under your boyfriend’s arm to walk in. He flopped across the foot of the bed, partially on Donghyuck’s legs.

“Oh, hey, Sungchan,” Jeno almost sounded surprised to see the captain in his own room as he followed his teammate in, laying down on his front with his arms and head resting on Yangyang’s back, and his feet up by the pillows.

“Well, I didn’t order enough for all of you,” Sungchan sighed, climbing over Jeno to settle into the empty space left beside you. “And no filching off Y/N, Donghyuck. Go downstairs and get your own food if you’re hungry.”

Hyuck tried to protest, “But—”

“Two of you don’t even live here, be grateful I let you eat as much as I do from our fridge, you’re not also getting the dinner that I bought for me and my girlfriend.”

“Fine. I’ll text Mark to bring snacks.”

“Mark, too?!”

Walking back with the guys to the Puck Pad after the last hockey practice of the calendar year, there was an elated buzz in the air now that the athletes were all finally on their own winter break. They were going over their plans for their short break: Jeno and Yangyang were going to Jeno’s parents’ the next day, Ten and Sicheng would both be leaving for their own homes tonight, meanwhile Mark and Donghyuck were both from the area, so they were staying at the Nu Chi house and just meeting up with their families on the holidays.

Realizing that you and Sungchan hadn’t really talked about your holiday plans yet, you peered up at him, about to ask, when suddenly your head started feeling light. You furrowed your brow, trying to blink away the momentary confusion as whatever you were about to say had slipped from your mind. Your head didn’t feel right on your body, but you couldn’t put your finger on what exactly it was.

Sungchan took just one look at you before letting go of your hand to instead grab your upper arm to steady you. His other hand went diving into the pockets of the practice bag in front of you, fervently searching for something.

“Dude, what the hell are you doing?” Jeno, the owner of the bag, whipped around to look at him incredulously.

“Where’s your snacks?” Sungchan was fumbling into another pocket now.

“Ate them already. I’m bulking.”

“Dude, bad idea,” Ten snorted.

“Shut up, Ten!”

Sungchan had started ransacking another teammate’s bag, and successfully pulled out a sports drink this time.

“Hey, that’s mine!” Yangyang protested.

Your boyfriend stopped and sat you on a bench nearby, cracking open the drink. “Y/N, here.”

“Bad idea to what?” You squinted your eyes up between Ten and Jeno curiously.

“Why does she need—” Yangyang was still complaining.

“Jeno’s been talking to Sugar n’ Spice,” Donghyuck answered your question, mischievous glint in his eye.

“Who—” You mumbled, but got cut off by the bottle being pushed against your lips insistently.

“Y/N,” Sungchan’s stern voice refocused you, and you obliged, taking a small sip of the sugary drink.

Ten continued filling you in, “Sugar n’ Spice and Everything Nice. One of Johnny’s old girlfriends.”

Jeno crossed his arms with an indignant huff, “They were not—”

“And who are you really going to believe? Johnny or her?” Donghyuck retorted.

“You didn’t even go here when they—”

“Guys, shut the hell up!” Mark finally snapped at all of them, gesturing to your general unwell demeanor.

“Oh shit dude.” Yangyang’s eyes widened.

“Yeah.”

“Bro, she does not look good,” Jeno stated the obvious.

“She’ll be fine in a minute,” Sungchan replied, holding the bottle back up to your mouth. His voice was firm but gentle as he instructed you, “Y/N, drink some more.”

“Anyway, Jeno, no matter how much you bulk, it’s not going to make up for the inches you’re missing. Height or otherwise,” Donghyuck taunted nonchalantly.

“Lee Donghyuck, I’m going to break your fucking nose, come here!” Jeno lunged for the underclassman, only making him yelp and dart away.

“Don’t—!” Mark’s warning was cut off as Jeno chased Donghyuck down, his voice fading out as he sighed and finished quietly, “...Cause any permanent damage...”

“You okay, Y/N?” Sicheng asked, as you took a couple more small sips.

You nodded. “Just a bit low, uhm, blood sugar. I’ll be okay.”

It always took you a few minutes to realize when you were low on your own, but Sungchan could tell with just one glance at you—it made you wonder what you looked like when you got like this.

Back at the Puck Pad that evening, you had already said your goodbyes to Ten and Sicheng; and Jeno, Donghyuck, and Mark were upstairs in Yangyang’s room allegedly helping him pack. Judging by the video game sounds you could hear from the bottom of the stairs, they had gotten a little distracted. Sungchan and you had settled down in the living room to watch a movie, and with the fog lifted from your mind, you were able to remember what you were going to ask him earlier.

“Hey, Channie?” You picked your head up from his chest to be able to look at him. He was laying on his back across the whole couch, you snuggled in on top of him.

“Hm?” He looked from the TV to you.

“What are your plans?”

“Oh. Well…” He paused the movie, his hands coming to settle on your lower back and sneaking just under the hem of your (his) hoodie to trace spirals into your skin. “Our lease ends after graduation, and Yangyang’s been talking about looking for a place with Jeno, and Ten and Sicheng are probably going to get their own place. I know we haven’t talked about it yet, but every time I try to think what I’m going to do, I just imagine that we would move in together.”

Your dumbfounded silence encouraged him to go on, his voice sounding far away and dreamy.

“Like, I don’t know, being able to wake up next to you everyday, and sleep in on the weekends with you with no practice. Cooking breakfast for you every morning, even just grocery shopping together. It’s all I can think about, really.”

You finally choked out, “I-I meant for the holidays. Like, visiting family, being in town…”

His cheeks started flushing. “Right. Sorry. I’m visiting my family on Christmas Day. What about you?”

“Me too.”

“We should spend Christmas Eve together, then.”

“Yeah, sounds good. New Year’s, too?”

“Of course. Who else would I kiss at midnight?”

A fond smile spread across your lips, and you tilted your head up to give him a peck. “Of course.”

“So, uhm,” he cleared his throat awkwardly. “The other thing I mentioned?”

“What are you doing after graduation? Made a decision about that PhD program?”

“Yep… more school,” he sighed.

“Me, too.” You pulled a blanket up over you two. “I think… Yeah, we can move in together. I’d really like that.”

He pressed a kiss to your forehead. “You make me so happy, baby.”

“You could just move in with me? To my apartment?” You suggested as a grin spread across your face. You were getting giddy already imagining it.

Another forehead kiss. “I would love that.”

“You make me really happy too, Channie,” you murmured, your fingertip tracing mindless figure-eights into the front of his shirt.

“I love you so much.” He cradled your face with two hands with a tenderness that made your heart ache to be a part of him in a way that you could never physically attain.

You leaned in to touch your nose to his. “I love you, too.”

Christmas Eve was just a couple days later, and instead of walking in the park amongst the freshly fallen snow, or touring the elaborate lights put up in the rich neighborhood nearby, or baking Christmas cookies while watching cheesy Christmas movies, or any of your other cute Christmas plans with Sungchan, you were bedridden with a migraine. A bad one.

You let out a soft whimper as tears welled up in your eyes, both from the pain and from pure frustration at having something else ruined for you because of these stupid migraines. Ice skating you could reschedule, but you couldn’t take a rain check on your first Christmas (Eve) together.

Sungchan curled his arms around you tighter, a steady pressure across your back. “It’s been two hours,” he murmured as quietly as possible.

“I don’t want my stupid fucking medication that isn’t fucking working,” you practically spat out, the first tears slipping down your cheeks.

“I’m so sorry, baby.” Sungchan pressed a gentle kiss to your shoulder, careful to avoid your scalp, which currently felt like it was on fire in addition to your usual squeezing and stabbing migraine pain. Side effect from a new rescue medication your neurologist was having you try. Safe to say it wasn’t a winner.

At the distress in his own tone over his usual regrets of seeing you hurting but not being able to help, you finally broke down into open sobs. Clenching your eyes shut tight, you clung to his arms. Your chest shook with every breath as you quietly wailed, burying your face in your pillow. You couldn’t bear to turn around and see the angst on your boyfriend’s features.

“Oh, baby,” he whispered, his voice cracking. “If I could take all your pain away and put it on myself, I would. God, I’m so, so sorry.”

You could hardly talk past the solid, hard lump in your throat, at first letting out a couple more strangled sobs as your tears and spit ruined your pillowcase. When you finally blubbered something out, your voice was distraught and despondent, “Why can I never… never have nice things? Why does it feel like the world is so big and nothing can go right and it all hurts so much… and I’m just so small and my body and my brain are… so broken?”

“I don’t know, baby, I don’t know,” Sungchan replied desperately, fully weeping with you into your shoulder now. “You don’t deserve this. I’m so sorry.”

You eventually fell asleep, but unlike your typical migraine naps, this one didn’t bring any sort of peace to Sungchan’s mind. Usually the naps were a good sign, you would wake up without the migraine and be relatively all better. But you’d never cried yourself to sleep during a migraine before, and having to hold a bawling you in his arms while he couldn’t do anything but apologize for being absolutely useless had left him shaken up. He didn’t think he’d be able to nap with you this time.

Sungchan didn’t dare move, keeping watch over you as you slept as if he could keep anymore pain away. He could still hear the echo of his heart breaking into a million pieces the moment you’d started crying.

Your head still fucking hurt. But this was a different throbbing than before, and was definitely from the heavy crying you’d done earlier. You groaned, covering your eyes and sniffling.

You could hear Sungchan’s breathing next to you, but he didn’t say anything as you rolled over to bury your face in his neck. Letting out a deep sigh, you found that you were dried out, unable to summon more tears. Finally, you spoke, “What time is it?”

God, your throat was dry.

“Six forty-five…” he replied softly.

“Well, Merry Christmas, Channie,” you grumbled.

“Merry Christmas, Y/N.”

“Do you think it’s too late to go see the Christmas lights?”

You could feel him tense up under you.

“Are you sure? You don’t have to make yourself do anything for me, baby,” he reassured you, rubbing your back.

“I want to…” You insisted. “I just… probably need my earplugs. And sunglasses.”

“Of course, whatever you want.”

“And then we can come back and do eggnog pancakes?” You asked hopefully. The migraine had started right before Sungchan could start cooking this morning, so you weren’t able to enjoy your promised festive breakfast prepared by your boyfriend.

“Sounds like a plan.”

“And then presents.”

“Like I said, anything my girl wants.”

And so Sungchan drove you around in his car with the radio off, your sunglasses on like it wasn’t dusk right then, and earplugs in to drown out the sounds of passing traffic. The two of you were silent through the whole ride, communicating solely by squeezing the other’s hand that was laced with yours over the center console, pointing at any lights and decorations that either of you particularly liked, and smiling and nodding in acknowledgement.

When you got back to your apartment, you took off your sunglasses and earplugs to plop yourself down at your kitchen table while Sungchan once again brought out ingredients. He hummed Christmas carols while he cooked, and you rested your cheek in your hand to watch him fondly as he bustled around.

Your head was still throbbing, and you winced as you pulled your hood up and gathered your knees to your chest. As Sungchan opened the fridge to put the eggnog away, you saw him pull something else out, a familiar box.

“When is your injection?” He asked quietly, holding the container up.

You scrunched your nose as you brought out your phone to check your calendar. “It’s… oh shit, today.”

“I’ll leave it out to warm up.” He set it on the counter before going over to your stove and setting a timer for an hour.

You were supposed to wait at least 30 minutes after the medication left the fridge to inject it, but you liked to wait closer to an hour or two to make sure it had fully come to room temperature, to reduce any injection pain.

The pancakes were ready soon, and Sungchan and you ate them on the couch, the odd bits of conversation floating around between bites.

“So what are you and your family doing tomorrow?” Sungchan rested his chin on your shoulder.

“Oh, dinner’s at my parents’ place. I’ll pop over to Chenle’s family’s Christmas, too. They’re just across the street,” you hummed. “We don’t do a lot, but everyone comes over, so it’ll be a packed house.”

“That’s nice.”

“What about you, Channie? Any Christmas traditions?”

“You’re eating it,” he said proudly. “My dad always makes eggnog pancakes on Christmas morning. Then we go to my grandparents’ house for the day.”

You couldn’t wade through the slop that your mind was covered in to be able to aptly express how you felt about Sungchan sharing one of his family’s Christmas traditions with you, so instead you turned your head to press a long kiss to his cheek, squeezing his forearm appreciatively. He seemed to get the message, and moved his head to be able to kiss you gently.

“I love you, Y/N,” he mumbled against your lips. Then, pulled back just enough to look you in the eye. “I’m so glad we got to spend today together.”

You couldn’t help but bite down on your tongue bitterly at that. “Yeah, I love you too, Channie.”

“Hey, what’s wrong?”

“My stupid migraines ruined our day! Again!” You turned away from him, dropping your face in your hands.

Immediately, one of his large hands rubbed your back while his other came to rest on your knee. “Baby, baby, my day wasn’t ruined.”

“We didn’t get to do anything how we wanted, and all I did was cry and make you cry!” You felt your eyes growing wet again. “And I’m fucking crying again!”

“I really do wish you hadn’t spent all day in pain,” he admitted. “You deserve to have the perfect Christmas Eve like all the cheesy rom-coms you like. But please don’t feel like you ruined my day or anything. I spent the whole day with my girl, which is a perfect day in my book.”

You wiped at your face messily, looking over your shoulder at him. “You really mean that?”

“Of course.”

“Even though I made you cry on Christmas? …Eve?”

“Well, it wouldn’t have been fair for you to be the only one of us who did.”

That finally made you chuckle, and Sungchan gave you a soft smile in return as he pulled you into him. You wrapped your arms around his waist, enjoying his warmth.

“Thank you, my Sungchannie,” you mumbled. “For being the most wonderful boyfriend in the whole universe.”

“The whole universe?” He repeated skeptically.

“Yep. Not even a competition.”

The kitchen timer went off then, and he gave you a final shoulder squeeze and peck to your temple before standing up and heading into the kitchen. He returned with your medication and stupidly large first aid kit. Popping the first aid kit open, he dutifully started pulling out an alcohol wipe, then an antihistamine. Sungchan had been around for your last injection by happenstance, and watched your every move carefully, so you weren’t surprised that he was able to get everything ready now.

“I don’t need that unless I break out,” you tried to point out. You weren’t allergic to the medication, but sometimes you got hives around the injection site within the first day or so just from it making your skin more sensitive.

“Baby, you always break out,” he insisted, presumably remembering when you started reacting less than an hour later last time, and all your stories about other post-injection reactions.

“No, there’s been like… a couple times I haven’t.”

He pointedly set the antihistamine down with the alcohol swab, then held up the bandage options for you to choose from.

“Mm… Sanrio,” you nodded to your newest addition. “I want a Kuromi.”

He fished out a bandaid with a Kuromi pattern on it, setting it aside. You broke the seal on the medication box as Sungchan walked into the kitchen. At the sound of running water, you looked up curiously, watching as he thoroughly washed his hands to the elbow like he was about to scrub in for an operation.

As he sat back down beside you, he held out his hands. “Can I do it?”

You froze, freshly opened box in hand. In the nearly two years that you’d been taking the injectable, you’d always done it yourself. Even your first demonstration dose at your neurologist’s office you’d done on your own to learn how to operate it. It had never occurred to you to ask anybody else to, really. Technically, the directions said you could, but you lived by yourself, had always been alone.

“If you’re okay with it,” Sungchan added after a couple beats of silence. “It’s fine if you want to do it yourself. I get it. You’ve just had a really long day, I want to help.”

“They say someone else can do the back of your arm…” You looked down at the small card of directions that you picked up out of the carton, a diagram highlighting all the possible injection areas. “But I want to be able to see it. So you’ll still have to do my thigh.”

“Okay.” He nodded seriously, accepting the box as you handed it to him.

He took a moment to study the instructions very carefully, and you opened the bandage in preparation. When he set the directions down and picked up the alcohol wipe, you rolled up the leg of your shorts and readjusted in your seat.

“I usually do it here.” You pointed to a spot, and he wiped the cool material over the area thoroughly.

Next, he grabbed the auto-injector from the box, pulling the cap off the end and dropping it back in the carton. You consciously tried to level your breathing as he paused to read the directions one more time. Sungchan pinched your skin and pulled it apart until it was properly taut.

“Do you want a countdown?” He asked.

“No, but hold on, I need to relax my muscle.” You flexed and eased your thigh a couple times, letting out a deep breath. “Okay, good.”

You kept your eyes focused just off to the side of the injection—you’ve never been able to watch needles go in you that you weren’t operating yourself, but you couldn’t fully look away this time. So instead, your gaze was on Sungchan’s forearm, the auto-injector enough in your peripheral that you could tell if something were to go wrong.

He pressed the blunt plastic tip against your skin. As requested, you had no countdown before the near-simultaneous click of the pen and prick of the needle came, followed by the stinging pain of the medication being pumped into you. You let out a slight hiss, already counting in your mind. The built-in indicator that meant the injection was over was displayed on the pen already, but you noticed that Sungchan kept holding it there until you reached your fifteen-count in your head. He had remembered from when he watched you last time, and must have been counting himself. The directions said to leave it in until the indicator showed, about 15 seconds, but you always liked to count to 15 seconds just in case, something you’d mentioned off-handedly last time.

As soon as he took the injector out and tossed it in the box on the table, you watched as a dot of blood and clear fluid—medicine—welled to the surface. Sungchan rushed to pull the bandage out, applying it to the site, catching the drop just in time before it fell down your leg. He gingerly smoothed down the ends, Kuromi smirking back up at you two.

Sungchan took the empty auto-injector into your bedroom, and you heard the telltale sound of it clanking into the plastic sharps disposal bin you kept under the bathroom sink. When he came back, you were already picking up the trash and closing up the first aid kit.

“Don’t forget your antihistamine,” he reminded you, holding out the tablet and your water bottle.

With your hands full, you leaned forward to take a sip from the straw of your bottle, then opened your mouth like a baby bird for him to drop the pill into. You swallowed it with slight difficulty, but he seemed content that you’d taken it, at least.

After everything was cleaned up, you meandered back into the living room, stopping in front of the couch to inspect the injection site with a pout.

“Is everything okay, baby?” Sungchan sat forward, brow furrowed with concern.

“Hurts…” You whined, flopping down next to him. “It didn’t use to burn after like this, but ever since my neuro upped my dose last month… it hurts.”

“Aw, I’m sorry,” he pulled you closer to him with two arms around your waist.

You made a small ‘humph’ sound, habitually poking at the injection site. Ow, dumbass.

“Thank you, baby,” Sungchan mumbled into your neck. “For letting me help you.”

The genuine relief in his voice made you smile to yourself. You knew how cut up he was every time he couldn’t help during your migraines, and at first you didn’t get why he wanted to do your injection this time. After all, this was the same guy who had you come with him to get his blood drawn for his routine drug testing by disguising it as an ice cream date then suddenly remembering that he had to stop by the student health center on the way there (and jumped at your offer to come back with him to hold his hand instead of waiting in the lobby). But in his mind, doing your injection must’ve been the best he could do to help prevent you from hurting again like he’d seen today.

“Why are you the sweetest boy ever?” You whispered, kissing his hair.

Sungchan let out a muffled giggle. “Ever?”

“Ever.”

“Mm, I don’t know,” he hummed playfully. “Think I was born like this.”

“We’ve got to make sure you don’t go out in the rain, or you’ll melt,” you teased.

“I mean what I said the other day, you know. Just didn’t want to scare you… but I really do think this is the most I’ve ever loved someone. I know it hasn’t been that long, and it always feels like I’m rushing stuff with you, but it just always feels right. Everything always feels right all the time with you.”

“I knew what I was getting myself into when you said ‘I love you’ on our second date,” you reminded him, fond smile flitting across your lips.

“I thought we agreed to never talk about that again,” he grumbled.

“You’re right, I’m sorry. But you were so adorable when you tried to pretend like you didn’t.”

“You were wearing my hoodie and had whipped cream on your nose and you were just so… perfect,” he defended himself, trailing off into a dreamy sigh. He smooched your cheek loudly. “Still are.”

You laughed, squirming a little bit at the sudden attack of affection, but not moving away as he peppered more overzealous kisses to your face. You instead cradled his cheek with one of your hands.

When he’d finally stopped to rest his chin on your shoulder again, you responded a bit more seriously to him, “I love you too… a lot. I don’t really have any romantic metric, to be honest. Migraines have sort of made it hard to date… or inconvenient, at least. But you need to know that I really do love and appreciate you so, so much, my Sungchannie.”

“I know, baby, I know,” he nodded just the slightest against you, gently rocking the two of you side-to-side.

You grabbed one of his hands to play with his fingers, slightly calloused from the weightlifting you knew was part of his mandatory hockey conditioning. Hockey season was already halfway over. His last season. You couldn’t imagine Jung Sungchan not playing hockey.

“Channie?”

“My girl?”

“I know we already talked about moving in together after graduation, but… What are you going to do after hockey’s over? I kind of can’t picture you not on the ice.”

You could feel him take a deep breath, and his free hand came to join the fray as it found one of your wrists. Specifically, the one that sported a thick blue and orange paracord bracelet with five plastic alphabet beads on it—2-7-J-S-C—that every hockey player made their freshman year. Sungchan gave you his not too long ago, on your one-month anniversary.

“I don’t know,” he whispered, as if he couldn’t make himself say it any louder. “I’ve tried to think about it too and… I can’t. I’ve been playing since I was a kid. I don’t… really have anything else. Just school, hockey, and you.”

“We’ll find you a hobby or two,” you promised, squeezing his hand. “Maybe you can take piano lessons again.”

He chuckled, letting you gently curl and uncurl his crooked pinky, the one he had broken that made him stop playing in the first place. “I don’t know… I think that might be gone for me.”

“If it’s something you really liked, you should do it,” you insisted. “It would just be for fun. I think it’d be nice, if you found the right teacher.”

“Well…”

“If you want to, Channie. I’m just brainstorming here.”

“Hockey season’s not over yet,” he pointed out. “We can circle back around in the summer.”

“That’s true, that’s true,” you agreed. “You should be savoring every moment right now, not letting me make you prematurely existential. I’m sorry.”

“You’re forward-thinking, baby, I appreciate that.”

“But it’s your last season, you don’t need me reminding you of that all the time.”

“Then why are we still talking about it, hm?” He said, mischievous smile on his face.

“We’re not! We’re not!” You held your hands up in surrender. “It’s present time! I swear!”

Sungchan laughed as he leaned in to press a kiss to your temple.

“Hi, Mr. Zhong!” You were beaming as you walked into Chenle’s house the next day, immediately being wrapped in a bear hug by his dad. “Merry Christmas!”

“Y/N! It’s been too long, too long,” he complained as you went to hug your best friend next, who had also come to greet you.

“Merry Christmas, Y/N,” Chenle hugged you tightly.

“Merry Christmas, LeLe.”

Letting go of your friend, you turned back to his dad, who was still waiting for a response, his hands on his hips.

“I’m sorry, Mr. Zhong,” you bowed your head in apology. “We just get so busy with school and—”

“Yeah, Y/N’s been really busy with her new boyfriend!” Chenle announced loudly, making sure that every occupant in the whole house could hear him.

“Y/N! You have a boyfriend?!” Mrs. Zhong called from the kitchen.

“Boyfriend?!” Mr. Zhong echoed in shock, his eyes going comically wide.

You were already smacking Chenle on the head and pinching his ear furiously. “Zhong Chenle, you little— I’m going to kill you!”

Chenle jerked out of your grip and ran away, you hot on his heels. He ran right into the kitchen, where his mother and several aunties immediately swarmed you.

“Y/N!” Mrs. Zhong grasped you by the wrist, pulling you over towards the stove where several things were cooking. She grabbed a spoonful of something from a bubbling pot and held it out towards you to try. As you leaned forward to taste it, she asked, “So, who is this boyfriend Chenle is talking about?”

“Is he handsome?” Another woman asked.

“Does he hold the door open for you?”

“What’s his name?”

“Does he know how to cook?”

“Do we know him?”

“Does he have a job?”

“How did you two meet?”

“Show us a picture!”

You choked on the rather delicious spoonful of soup that you’d just taken as you heard Chenle’s cackling laughter in the background. Wiping your mouth, you turned around to shoot him a glare before answering some of their questions.

“His name is Jung Sungchan, he goes to the same college as Chenle and I. We actually all had a class together a few years ago,” you started off slowly.

“Pictures, Y/N!” One of the aunties insisted.

“Yeah, Y/N, show us pictures!” Chenle repeated. “Or I will.”

“I will end you,” you said through gritted teeth as you pulled out your phone. Flicking through your gallery, you found a few that you really liked.

They were from his last home game, and these in particular were taken by Taeyong, as it had been the game against their league rivals, which drew in the graduated Nu Chi brothers and team members. You pulled the first one up, him still in his uniform as you had gone down to congratulate him right on the ice. He was towering over you even more than normal in his skates, an arm around your shoulders as you wrapped both of yours around his waist, the two of you smiling at the camera. As you went to show the picture to everyone, your skin started growing hot with the ‘ooh’s and ‘aah’s that sprang up among the women.

“He plays hockey for our school, he’s actually captain.” You grew even more embarrassed as Mrs. Zhong zoomed in on Sungchan’s face.

“Chenle,” she looked up at her son with squinted eyes. “Is this your handsome friend who brought you home when you were drunk?”

“Mom, that was one time three years ago,” he groaned, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Chenle,” she said sternly.

“Yes, that’s him.”

Her face broke into a lovely smile. “Oh, I liked him. Very polite.”

“Yeah, I know, Mom. You still talk about it.”

“When was this?” You asked your friend with bewilderment. The two of you did everything together, including getting embarrassingly shitfaced as freshmen. Or, Chenle would get embarrassingly shitfaced and you would watch, thanks to your migraine meds.

“There was a Nu Chi party, after the Halloween one…” Chenle explained, and you appreciated him leaving out the details of the Halloween party in front of all these people. “Long story short, I didn’t realize how strong the punch was. Sungchan gave me a ride home.”

“Very polite, very handsome,” Mrs. Zhong nodded approvingly. She swiped to the next picture for you, this one of Sungchan kissing your cheek as you laughed and grabbed his jersey.

They all tittered and made various comments and approving noises, and you quickly turned your phone off and put it away bashfully.

“So, yeah… that’s him,” you finished awkwardly among their disappointed noises of you taking away the photos.

“I like him.” Chenle’s mom patted your cheek before turning back to the stove. “And if he gives you any trouble, you know Chenle will…”

“Mom did you see him? What do you think I could possibly do?” Chenle retorted. “He literally carried me in here over his shoulder, I don’t think I could really defend Y/N’s honor if it came to it!”

“Chenle…”

“Fine, Mom!”

v. i sat across from you, reading ulysses; and whilst i tried to project some intellect i’m not convinced i knew what it all meant, but i did know that the words were so pretty

“Have I ever told you how pretty you are?” Sungchan mumbled, resting his head on your shoulder.

You giggled, brushing some of his hair from his face. “Hmm, a couple times.”

“What?!” His head snapped back up, distress on his features. “Only twice?! God, what kind of boyfriend am I?”

The two of you were back in the team’s favorite dive bar, this time after the last home game of the season. It had been a smashing victory—in addition to the seniors’ last time to play a game on their home ice—meaning that everyone, including all of the long-graduated players and Nu Chi Tau brothers who had shown up, were celebrating extra hard tonight. You’d driven your car specifically to allow Sungchan to let loose for the occasion, hence his currently more-than-buzzed state.

He’d pulled you into his lap at the corner booth you were sitting at some time ago, morphing into the lovey-dovey cuddle monster that he always was when tipsy. Not that he exactly kept his hands to himself when he was sober either, but as soon as alcohol entered the equation, it was like he thought he’d die if he weren’t holding you at all times.

“I was playing, baby, you tell me that all the time,” you reassured him.

“Oh, good.” He breathed out in relief, going back to snuggling up to your shoulder. “Because you’re sooo pretty. Like, the prettiest person I’ve ever seen.”

“Thanks, Channie.” You kissed the top of his head. “I think you’re pretty, too.”

“You do?”

“For sure.” You traced the line of the bridge of his nose. “My pretty boy.”

He hummed contentedly, but didn’t say anything more, letting his eyes flutter shut.

Ten, Taeyong, and another graduated Nu Chi brother, Kun, came over to your booth then, sliding into the seat across from you.

“Is he asleep?” Taeyong gestured to Sungchan.

“No, just a cuddly drunk,” you explained with a fond chuckle.

“‘M not drunk…” Your boyfriend protested.

“Tell that to the victory shots you were doing with Hyuck, Jeno, and Yangyang an hour ago,” you snorted, pushing your glass of water over towards him. “Here, some water, Channie.”

Kun offered out the half-eaten basket of onion rings that he’d walked over with. “Have some of these, too, Sungchan.”

“Sweet, thanks!” He grabbed a couple and stuffed them in his mouth happily.

“Thanks, Kun,” you smiled at him. “He didn’t drink on an empty stomach, so we should be ready to go in a bit. I want him mostly able to walk on his own two feet before we leave, though. Carrying a drunk Chenle and drunk Sungchan would be very different experiences, I feel.”

They all snickered, and you looked over at where your friend was currently pulling all of the cash out of his pocket to bet on a pool game between Johnny, Jaehyun—a former hockey player who had graduated last year, Jungwoo, and Yuta—former hockey player and Nu Chi brother, from the same cohort as Johnny. It looked like Dejun was running the betting pool, collecting Chenle’s money in addition to Hendery’s, Mark’s, and Hyuck’s.

“I feel like we should do something about the gambling happening over there…” Taeyong sighed, having been looking in the same direction as you.

“Probably,” Kun agreed, though neither of them made any move to get up. They simultaneously took swigs of their drinks.

“Y/N, what did you think of the reading for Direct Study?” Ten asked you, resting his very pink cheek in his hand.

“Oh, I thought it was fantastic!” You lit up. You and Ten both had Dr. Son for a Direct Study course this semester, and he was letting you two collaborate since you had such similar tastes in literature—you had a feeling  your professor also liked having only one reading list and being able to meet with the both of you at once instead of separately. “I’ve always loved that author, though. The way her short stories can either be a quick read or you can really sit and take your time with them to absorb and peel back as many layers as you want.”

“You’ve read her before?”

“I recommended her to Dr. Son a while ago, actually. I read another one of her short story collections and sort of fell in love. I’ve been working through her whole body of work on my own time, but I hadn’t made it to this one yet, so I’m going into it with fresh eyes like you. I’m excited to see what you’ve been getting out of her works.”

“I think her diction is really fascinating.”

“Yes!” You gushed. “You can tell she takes her time with which words she’s using. Oh, I just love it.”

“You’re doing the Master’s in Literary Theory and Critical Analysis next year, right?”

“Yep! Picked my classes a couple weeks ago.”

Your friend flashed you a wide grin. “Thank God. There will be someone else competent.”

“Yeah, I’m doing Lit and Crit, and this one—” you patted Sungchan’s head as he was still shoveling onion rings in his mouth “—is going for his PhD in molecular biology.”

“Woah.” Ten’s eyebrows shot up.

“And what are you going to do with that, Sungchan?” Taeyong asked curiously.

“Fish,” your boyfriend answered absentmindedly through a mouthful of food.

You couldn’t help but laugh with your whole chest at his answer, even as you went to cover his mouth. “Chew and swallow before you talk, Channie. I think you just spat crumbs on poor Kun.”

The older man was flicking a piece of an onion ring off of his arm, giving you a strained, close-lipped smile.

Sungchan spent a considerable amount of time chewing his food, then washed it down with your water before giving a more cognizant answer. “I’m going to study a disease in a fish.”

“Molecular biology with a minor concentration in marine biology,” you corrected yourself and clarified his answer a bit more. “He’s joining one of his professors’ research teams.”

“Congrats, Sungchan,” the former Nu Chi president told him sincerely.

“Yeah, dude, wow,” Ten blinked, laughed, then shook his head. “You know, I don’t even know if I knew what your major actually was this whole time.”

“Seriously?” You snorted. “You two have been teammates for four years, and have lived together for two years.”

“I mean, I knew he was a STEM major,” Ten tried to defend himself. “But past that… yeah, I had no clue. It’s just sort of you know, when you think of Jung Sungchan, you think of hockey. He’s the hockey captain. I mean, does anybody really know Mark’s major?”

“I—”

“Not you, Taeyong, we know he was your Little.”

You opened and closed your mouth a couple of times, but found yourself drawing a blank. After all this time of getting closer to the team, you had sort of prided yourself on being friends with and knowing all of your boyfriend’s teammates on some individual level as people. But frustratingly, all you could think up for Mark was that he was Nu Chi president, center on the hockey team, and had been in your Comp I class a few years ago—a Gen Ed credit.

“Well damn,” you said bitterly.

“Exactly.”

After a beat, Taeyong spoke up quietly, “Music Theory. He likes producing music.”

Ten, Sungchan, and you all let out a chorus of ‘ohh’s at this revelation. You looked over at where Mark was spectating the pool game—from a vantage point of leaning tipsily against Johnny’s side when he wasn’t shooting, and against Jaehyun’s side when Johnny was shooting. You watched with amusement as he got passed back and forth, happy to see him being taken care of for once instead of taking care of all his friends.

“I should go swap out my Little’s drink for some water,” Taeyong announced. It was then that Hyuck must have made some comment to Mark, as Mark shoved his friend away with a loud complaint, his tone sounding rather embarrassed. “And my grand-little too…”

Dejun, Hendery, and Chenle were spectating their drunken spat in fits of giggles. Dejun and Hendery both reached for their drinks again, and Kun shook his head.

“I should do the same for my own demons before they get to that point,” Kun stood up with Taeyong.

Ten followed them out, “And I’m not going to third wheel. Bye, you two!”

“Bye, guys,” you gave the three of them farewells. “Congrats again, Ten.”

“Thanks, Y/N,” he beamed down at you genuinely.

“Oh, Kun!” You called for him before he could get out of earshot.

He stopped a turned to you with an inquisitive eyebrow raised.

“Thanks for the onion rings, by the way.”

“You’re welcome.”

“I have one more favor to ask: Can you cut Chenle off too?” You requested. “And I’m not sure how you all are sorting out DDs tonight, but—”

“I’ll make sure he gets home safe,” he promised. “You two have a goodnight.”

“Thanks. Goodnight!”

Looking between Sungchan and the empty onion ring basket, you then checked the time on your phone.

“Alright, are you ready to go, baby?” You asked him quietly.

He nodded with his whole upper body. “Am I going home with you?”

“Yep. I’m taking you back to my place, and our classes all got canceled tomorrow for Spring Break, remember?” You shouldered your tote bag. “So we get to sleep in.”

“That’s my favorite thing.”

You giggled. “Sleeping in?”

“No, waking up with you,” he wrapped both his arms around your waist again. “And giving you a good morning kiss, and cooking breakfast for you, and helping you with your meds and your cuff.”

“I have a feeling I’ll be getting you meds in the morning tomorrow,” you quipped, pecking his forehead. “But I think mornings with my Sungchannie are one of my favorite things, too.”

“Sounds like a perfect match to me.”

“Hard to argue you with you there,” you snickered. “So are you ready to go? The sooner we go home and go to sleep, the sooner it’ll be morning, you know.”

“You’re so smart, baby. My girl’s the smartest ever…”

Pushing yourself out of his lap, you pulled him out of the booth after you and onto his feet. He immediately looped his arm around your shoulders, and you kept a hand on his chest and an arm around his waist to steady him as you started towards the exit. At the door, the two of you stopped to give the whole bar a final wave and call goodbye to anybody who heard you. You got a loud, raucous chorus of yelled and slurred goodbyes in return before you headed out to your car.

Back at your apartment, you made him change out of his clothes that smelled like the bar and into some of his that he kept here, then got into your own pajamas for the night before flopping into bed.

“Okay, question,” you announced as he laid his head in your lap, throwing an arm across your legs as if you were going anywhere.

“About?” He asked, his eyes fluttering shut and a content smile coming to his face as you started playing with his hair.

“How do you think you made it to the top two in Phantasmagorical Phriday this year? I mean, I’ve been thinking about it, and I’m not trying to be mean, Channie, or like, a Lit major elitist or anything, but Chenle and I have both been studying this stuff for four years now, right? Hendery has at least taken professional writing classes and some other stuff for his Comm degree. I think. But, no offense, you STEM majors aren’t exactly lauded for your excellent prose. First year, okay, we’re all brand new at it, and Dr. Son actually did real workshopping with us on it. But after that, we were essentially just getting coffee together once a month and then sending him a short story.”

He squinted one eye open to peer up at you curiously. “Do you think I bought off Dr. Son or something?”

“Bought off our professor so that you would almost win? Sounds like a waste of your money. Maybe bought off Chenle and Hendery to write shitty stories this year and better your chances? But you knew I was so morally upstanding that I wouldn’t take the bribe.”

“Oh, definitely. You’ve cracked it,” he snickered, closing his eyes again to enjoy your fingers working through his hair.

“I mean… Do you have a secret poetry journal in here somewhere?”

“No. You just kind of are being a little bit of a—” he was cut off by a loud yawn “—Lit major elitist, baby.”

“Mm?” You tilted your head with a confusion, perturbed frown on your face.

“You think that every STEM major just gets their Gen Ed humanities credits and never picks up a book again for the rest of their life.”

“Well…”

“Am I wrong?”

“It’s not like I’m out here balancing equations for fun!” You tried to defend yourself. “I got my science credits and never looked back.”

“I took a few more creative writing and literature classes sometimes,” he shrugged. “Whenever I had a spare slot in my schedule, or needed a couple credits of whatever to keep my scholarship for the semester.”

“Yeah, student athletes, you guys have to be full-time in order to keep your scholarships.”

“Mhm. Sometimes all the classes I needed for my degree that were happening in a semester didn’t uhm, didn’t make the minimum credits, so I needed another class or two.”

“Why lit classes? And writing classes?”

“Baby, it’s literally what you’ve been studying for four years and you’re acting like you can’t understand why anybody would be interested in it,” Sungchan pointed out, pinching your thigh.

You swatted his hand away. “No, I’m just trying to understand you.”

“Did I really act like I hated Dr. Son’s class that much freshman year? I did all four years of Phantasmagorical Phriday.”

“No, you didn’t seem like you hated it or anything. I just thought that you would’ve used the extra slots for easy classes. PE or something.”

“Yeah, Coach was always trying to get me to take his classes.”

“But you just really like writing and lit classes that much?”

“Why is this so surprising to you?”

“Well— I just kind of feel bad that I keep leaving you out of all the crit lit conversations that Ten and I have,” you admitted guiltily, not intending to leave him out of all your fun conversation with his teammate about books in your lit classes, but he never seemed all that interested; nor had he read any of the books, to your knowledge. “Do you want to borrow books or read along so you can talk with us about it?”

“That’s okay, baby,” he told you, reaching up to pat your hands that were already on top of his head. “Honestly, I like listening to you talk about all this stuff more than I ever liked the classes themselves.” After a beat, he absentmindedly added, “I would kind of pick them half-hoping you had signed up for the class, too.”

You tilted your head curiously. “Really?”

“It was more like a little daydream that I had. That I’d walk in on the first day of class and you’d be sitting there and recognize me and smile at me and ask if I wanted to sit with you. Then, you know, we’d swap notes, be study buddies, and I would finally get the courage to ask you out,” Sungchan sighed, nuzzling his cheek against your thigh in an almost nostalgic and bittersweet way.

“Channie…”

“That was really embarrassing to admit. I thought I was going to die without telling anybody that, especially you,” he mumbled, his voice becoming more muffled as he turned his head to fully bury his face in your lap.

“You are a bit tipsy, baby,” you reminded him gently, stroking the back of his head.

He turned onto his back to fully look up at you, taking a slow blink before adding emphatically, “And I just love you so much.”

You grabbed him by the sides of the face to look him in the eye very seriously, but couldn’t hold it for very long, tender smile coming back to your features almost immediately.

“I love you too,” you affirmed, and he was once again beaming, grabbing your hand to presumably kiss your knuckles, but he missed a bit and kissed the back of your wrist instead. “Can I ask you something?”

“Of course! Anything for my girl.”

“Your girl wants to know…” You said your words slowly and enunciated to make sure he understood. “On the first day of Dr. Son’s class, do you remember how you felt about me then?”

Specifically, you were thinking about the second game of the season, when you’d learned about Hendery and Chenle’s bet from freshman year. Hendery swore he could tell Sungchan had a crush on you from the first day of Dr. Son’s class, but you had your doubts. Mostly because you yourself couldn’t even remember looking at Sungchan on the first day of class, much less even talking or, God forbid, flirting with him—literally anything that would warrant him apparently outwardly crushing on you.

His face immediately scrunched up. “Mmm…”

“It’s okay baby, I know it was a long time ago, and you’ve had a bit to drink—”

“No, I remember, I remember. I’m just afraid you’re going to think I’m a creep…”

“More of a creep than signing up for classes in my major hoping I was going to be in them?”

“I’m sorry!” He rushed to apologize, his features immediately turning distraught as he half-sat up in his haste to say sorry.

“Shh, shh, my Sungchannie, it’s okay, it’s okay,” you quieted him, squeezing his hand that he was still holding and stroking his forehead, encouraging him to lay down again. “I was just teasing you, I’m sorry, that was mean of me. I think it’s cute, I promise.”

“You think I’m cute?” He asked with a heavy pout.

“Baby boy, I’m in love with you. Of course I think you’re cute.”

The corners of his mouth pulled back into a small smile. “Yay…”

“So? Will you please tell me?”

“M’kay…” He huffed and readjusted again, this time to rest some of his weight on his shoulder as his head was still pillowed in your lap. “I remember everything about that first class, you know? The room number, where we were all sitting, the Phantasma Phour…”

“Really?”

“Third flour, 3104.”

“I thought Gothic Lit was on the second floor?”

“It was on the third floor only for the first week then it got moved to the second floor for the rest of the semester.”

“Huh. Good memory.”

“I remember because the third floor of the Lang building is always super hot, but I didn’t know that because it was our first day. I wore my new hoodie from the team because I was so proud to be on the team, but I didn’t have another shirt on under it because I heard the Science building was always cold from some other Bio majors, so I thought I wasn’t going to have to take it off. So when we were in Dr. Son’s class that first day, I couldn’t take the hoodie off, even though it was like a billion degrees in that room…”

“Oh, oh no, Channie.” You attempted to coo sympathetically through your chuckles.

Sungchan sighed, pulling your hand back to his hair. “Anyway, Dr. Son had us in that Socratic circle, remember?”

“Yep, I remember.” You nodded, obliging to his whims easily and playing with his hair again.

“I was right next to the door, because I just wanted to get in and out of there. Hendery ran in a couple minutes late, and he ended up next to me. You and Chenle sat together at the front, a few seats away from Dr. Son’s desk, right next to the window. I just remember thinking that you were really pretty, with the window kind of giving you this little halo of light.”

“Baby, how is that creepy?” You chuckled. “You thought I was pretty.”

“You don’t remember what happened in the rest of that first class, do you?”

“What? What happened?”

“Dr. Son had us do an icebreaker with a partner…” He trailed off leadingly.

“Channie, I’ve taken so many of Dr. Son’s classes at this point, I can’t even remember who I was paired up with for that one,” you tried to reassure him.

“It was me.”

“Oh.”

“So not only was I a sweaty mess in that hoodie, but I had to be a sweaty mess while talking to this really pretty girl.”

“Channie…” You looked down at him, guilty for not remembering this at all. Though maybe it was for the better if he was apparently such a mess? Maybe that would soothe his distress over “embarrassing” himself in front of you.

“I thought Dr. Son was going to have us ask the normal stuff, name, major, year, you know. But it was Dr. Son, so of course it wasn’t normal.”

“Of course.”

“He made us ask all that, and made us ask each other something we were afraid of, and something we wanted. It wasn’t going to be shared with the class, just with our partner. I didn’t want to embarrass myself in front of you, pretty girl that I knew nothing about other than your name, that you were a freshman, and a Lit major. I really wanted to impress you, but I couldn’t come up with anything super deep. Do you know what I said?”

“No…” You confessed, tone already apologetic as you held his gaze. “I’m so sorry, baby, I don’t remember any of this.”

“S’okay…” He yawned again. “I said the truth. I was afraid of not being as good at hockey as I thought I was, and that I wanted to be team captain one day.”

“Those were good answers. It was the truth, not some philosophical lie. And look at you now, baby boy,” you told him strongly, patting his chest before going back to stroking his head.

“Mm… Back then you just kind of had this look on your face that wasn’t really dislike or even boredom or anything but just sort of like… that was exactly what you were expecting me to say. I felt like I’d just put myself into the dumb, self-centered, sports-obsessed jock archetype in your mind and I’d never be able to get out. Because then you answered and I wanted to smack myself for giving such stupid answers and wearing that stupid hoodie.”

“What did I say?”

“You were afraid of what the outcome of your brain MRI was going to be. And you wanted to hurt less.”

Your jaw dropped in mortification. “Oh my god… Sungchan, I’m so sorry I just dumped all that on you literally the first time we met. I…I had a lot going on then, with my migraines. I had just started seeing my neuro like a month before classes started, she ordered the MRI as a just in case thing, but it still made me so freaked. My appointment to go over the results was after my classes that day, I literally couldn’t think about anything else. All I remember about the first day of freshman year is that appointment, getting the clean results. Holy shit, don’t tell me I dropped that on you and left you hanging about whether or not I was fine?”

“When I saw you on Wednesday actually laughing and smiling with Chenle, I was hopeful. I didn’t want to ask you in case it wasn’t good, though, and you were just trying to distract yourself or something. So I caught up to Chenle after class a while later and asked him. After Dr. Son started the Phantasma Phour stuff. He didn’t tell me about your migraines, just said that the results were clean.”

“Ah, Channie… None of that was creepy.” You promised sweetly, pressing a kiss to his forehead.

“This is the creepy part…” He mumbled, gaze turning downwards. “Jeno saw me when I was talking to Chenle and invited me to the Nu Chi Halloween party that year, Chenle too. And Chenle brought you, and you got a migraine.”

“I didn’t realize you were there too. Did you see me screaming my head off?”

“No. I was trying to keep Jeno distracted.”

“Jeno?” You echoed, confused.

“Jeno said in the locker room…” Another yawn. He rubbed his eye. “He said he invited Chenle because he knew Chenle was going to bring you, and he wanted to sleep with you. But he didn’t think you would’ve come if he had invited you himself.”

You pursed your lips thoughtfully at this new revelation. “Huh…”

“I was keeping Jeno distracted with beer pong and stuff, but he finally slipped away, I guess at the same time you got your migraine. When he told me the next day that he was giving up on fucking you because you’d punched him in the face and he ‘knew better than to stick his dick in crazy,’ I thought you decked him for coming onto you and just admired you even more.”

“Not quite,” you laughed, remembering the bloody nose he’d nursed all night in the same room that you were nursing your migraine and Chenle sobered up. “But this story does add a whole new layer to my friendship with Jeno… Does Chenle know about this?”

“I don’t think so. Or Jeno would have gotten his nose broken again, right?”

“Probably.”

“Are you mad?”

“What would I be mad about? You having a crush on me? Our mutual friend wanting to fuck me one time three years ago?” You snorted, cupping his cheeks to get him to roll over and look at you again. “Baby, the only person I could possibly be upset with here is myself for not even giving you a second look in that class three years ago. Because then I could’ve had my Sungchannie this whole time.”

“Noooo…” He whined, shaking his head zealously. “I should’ve actually done something instead of just pining like a loserboy.”

“But you’re my loserboy now.”

His eyes widened. “You think I’m a loser?”

“Of course. My prettiest, cutest, sweetest, loveliest—” you punctuated each adjective with a kiss to his nose “—loserboy that I love so much.”

“I love you, baby.”

“I love you too.” You smiled down at him. “Now, I think that’s plenty of tipsy confessions for one night. It’s time for you to sleep, my Sungchannie.”

As you started readjusting to lay down next to him on the mattress, he grabbed you and pulled you into his chest like a teddy bear.

“You didn’t want to, right?” His voice was right under your ear.

“What?”

“Sleep with Jeno?”

You lowered your voice conspiratorially, “I’m going to tell you a secret: I couldn’t tell any of the Nu Chi guys apart for the longest time. Didn’t even know Jeno’s name until I broke his nose. To me, they were all just gross frat guys who probably didn’t know how to wash their dicks.”

“Should’ve kept it that way,” he grumbled, holding you even tighter.

“Oh? You want me to unlearn all of our friends and acquaintances names?” You teased, wrapping one of your arms around him too.

“Can you?” He asked hopefully.

“Not quite how it works, I’m afraid,” you clicked your tongue. At his tipsy whines starting back up again, you hushed him once more, “Shh, it’s okay. I might know all their names, but none of them get to be baby boy.”

“Oh. Yeah.” He agreed, and you could hear the smug smile in his voice.

“You need anything else from your girl? Or will you finally let her sleep?”

“Kiss?”

“Of course.”

Tilting your head up, you pressed your lips to Sungchan’s. He hummed contentedly against your mouth, unhurried in his motions as he met your every move. You sleepily kissed him, entirely unaware of time, but finally pulling back when your lids were getting too heavy to properly open back up. Blindly giving one more kiss to the corner of his mouth—it felt more like the side of his bottom lip, honestly—you settled your head back on his chest.

“There you go, Channie.” You yawned, pushing your face further into him. “Goodnight… I love you.”

“Goodnight, baby,” he was mumbling too, presumably also on the brink of falling asleep. “Love… you…”

vi. whilst i make space for all the parts of me that i do not want, i let them be, as minds twist through the fractured expanse of our being

“Okay, thank you,” you forced a casual nod to your doctor as she entered in a few more things on her computer.

“The ladies up front will schedule everything when you check out,” she offered you a kind smile. “Do you have any more questions for me today, Y/N?”

“No, no, just uh… need to get everything scheduled, you know.”

“Alright, well it was good to see you as always,” she stood up, leading you towards the door of the exam room. “And I’ll see you again soon. Have a good day.”

“You too.”

You went through the motions of checking out and scheduling, adding the next appointments to your phone calendar with the receptionist at the front desk, then shuffled out to the parking lot. Your mind was still reeling as you got into the passenger seat of Sungchan’s car.

“Hey, how’d it go?” He turned in his seat to ask you. It was just one of your normal check-ups with your neurologist today, and with the hockey season over, Sungchan had the time to take you to and from the appointment, promising to take you out for dinner after. You didn’t have much of an appetite anymore.

Your gaze was locked on the dashboard in front of you. Your jaw clenched as you tried to battle back the tears that threatened to well up and just answer him.

“They’re getting worse again. Increase in- in frequency and severity,” you finally choked out. “My neuro wants to get a blood panel and brain MRI done again. She says we probably just need to adjust my meds again but—”

“A brain MRI?” Sungchan echoed in disbelief.

“Make sure there’s nothing in there that’s not supposed to be in there. It’s always clean, but every single time, the what if… it’s scary,” you admitted, your voice getting smaller as the tears finally came, spilling over onto your cheeks and down into your lap.

“Oh… oh baby,” his voice softened as he reached over to take your hand.

“And even if everything, all of that fucking shit is clean. It just means that my stupid fucking meds have stopped working and my stupid fucking body isn’t working like it’s supposed to and I have to do it all over again. Trying out more medications that’ll do God fucking knows what to me until we find the new perfect concoction that keeps me a semi-functioning person. God dammit!” You spat out, slamming your other hand down in a fist against the dash. “Ow, fuck, that hurt. God, fucking stupid…”

Sungchan grabbed both your hands with one of his, keeping them in your lap as he wiped at your tears with his free hand. “Baby, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“No, I’m sorry,” you blubbered. “That you got me and that I’m—”

“Stop it,” he cut you off sternly, with the harshest tone he’d ever taken with you. “Don’t you dare start apologizing for this. I wouldn’t let anybody else talk about you like that around me, and you’re not going to either.”

“God, yeah, okay,” you nodded and sniffled. “Thanks, Channie.”

“When is it? The MRI?”

“I-I have it in my calendar somewhere.”

“I’ll go with you,” he promised, cradling your chin in his palm to get you to look at him. “Whenever it is, I’ll go with you. And when you go get the results, okay? Car, waiting room, exam room, wherever you want me, alright? But you won’t be alone.”

You bit your bottom lip, squeezing his hand tight with both of yours. “I’d really like that. Thank you.”

He leaned across the center console to press a kiss to your forehead. “Anything for my girl.”

➠ next | series masterlist | blog masterlist

[jarofstyles]

hey lovely, don't wanna bother u bc you specifically put ceo but those harry pics are making me think dad's friend! harry. like maybe he is married or not. just... dirty thoughts. he is looking very very dilfy.

ACTUALLY UR CORRECT because it does also give that vibe…. So I got a bit out of hand and made it filthy.

Patreon

Warnings- age gap, daddy kink, teasing, bratty y/n, name calling/ degrading… it’s dirty but if u want more I’ll definitely continue lol

——

It was always the things she shouldn’t want. Chocolate after midnight, peeking in on Christmas gifts, looking over someone’s shoulder as they texted. Y/N knew she had a taste for things that should not be- but she had definitely taken the cake when it came to the man sitting next to her at the dinner table.

In all fairness, she hadn’t been the only one looking. It was his gaze on her legs that she noticed the first night they were introduced that she had her interest peaked, but it had been nearly impossible for her to leave it alone. Not when he was such a staple in the family dinners they had, the parties her parents threw, hell- he had even joined them at the very lake house they were at now. It was indeed Harry’s lake house that he had offered up for them to use for their annual summer vacation, her father gratefully taking the opportunity. He was just blind to the reason why.

Fucking your father’s best friend was probably one of the worst things you could do, but when they looked like Harry? She doubted many people could blame her. She’d always been into older men and seeing one as successful and charming as the man to her left, it wasn’t hard to give into the temptation. There was guilt there, of course. There was always the knowledge that this wasn’t exactly right and it would hurt feelings. But she wanted to be selfish for once.

The first time they’d said it was one and done. Get it out of their system. The second time they’d called it a mistake. The third they’d blamed alcohol and a wedding. By the forth they’d stopped making excuses. Now she knew the man’s tattoos, knew the spot on his neck he liked to be kissed, she knew his favorite position to fuck her in and that he had the most talented tongue she had ever experienced. She was becoming an expert in all things Harry right under the nose of her parents, who saw him as their great friend.

Her fingers ran over his thigh as he spoke, calm as ever while he sipped his bourbon. He didn’t spare her a glance as they trailed to the inner thigh, her other hand bringing the wine glass to her mouth and her tongue being greeted by the tart bite of the notes in the blend. Harry had gotten this with her in mind, she was positive. Not too sweet.

They were talking about something she, quite frankly, didn’t give a fuck about. They were in two different businesses but somehow found some way to talk about stocks or something like that. Y/N didn’t particularly care as long as Harry kept giving her cute little gifts like the diamond tennis bracelet he’d brought her when they first arrived and he snuck her into his bedroom.

They weren’t alone on this vacation- their little friend group of a few men and their wives and grown kids were at the table too, but her focus was on Harry. His rolled up sleeves and hair freshly cut, cropped close tot he sides and growing a bit longer at the top. A perfect amount to run her fingers through.

She knew she was getting into trouble when her fingers brushed his semi hard prick laying under his trousers, a smirk kicking up the side of her mouth. He gripped his glass a bit tighter, eyes cutting to the side discreetly to give her a look. Y/N didn’t move her hand, instead running her fingertips over the bulge and pretending to be engaged in the conversation.

Of course she was going to pay for this. But the rush made her even more wet. Doing this in front of people, being bratty because she wanted his dick inside of her two fucking hours ago and this dinner was dragging on, she was aiming for him to give in. Her ass would be sore tomorrow but she would love each stinging slap and yank of her hair.

“Cut it out.” He mumbled, hiding his lips with the glass. The words were quiet enough, just for them. The conversation continued around them and no one was the wiser, oblivious to the hand palming over the older man’s cock under the tablecloth.

“Make me, Daddy.” Her soft whisper purred, eyes glittering with mischief. She’d signed her own punishment papers there, watching his own gaze darken before shooting back the rest of the drink that was meant to be sipped and savored. Giddiness shot ip her spine as he ripped her hand off, stretching slightly in his chair before saying he needed to call it a night. There was the unspoken promise that laid under his words, the secret message in his tone that meant for her to follow.

It didn’t take her long to scurry up the stairs and find the master bedroom, slipping inside the dimly lit room- only to be grabbed roughly from behind, a gasp leaving her lips as she was pressed against the door. The click of the lock was quiet, his labored breathing against her ear making her grin widely as his cock pressed into her ass. “You just had to be a fucking brat, didn’t you?” He growled, wrapping her hair around his fist and tugging back so she arched into him. “Gagging for it that much, touching me right in front of your family?” Lips ghosted her neck, making her shudder as the sting in her scalp made her whimper. This was exactly what she wanted, what she deserved. “Dirty whore. Fucking cockslut.”

The degrading words were spit in a way that would make the normal girl want to tear up, but Y/N knew she was exactly what he described. She was a cockslut just for him. “What are you going to do about it, Daddy?” The slightly delirious giggle left her as if she wasn’t about to be fucked brainless, but she loved every fucking second of this. Harry didn’t treat her like a little girl. He treated her like a woman, gave her the things she needed. He fucked like a real man should, something she knew no one else could replicate for her. “Are you going to fuck me with them just a few doors down? Don’t think you’re going to make me scream loud enough to get caught…” her mouth dropped as she felt his teeth graze her throat, wishing he could bite down. Not here, not when she had to wear her summer dresses and tank tops.

“No. I’m going to shut you up.” Y/N didn’t have a chance to react before fingers were shoved into her mouth. The two long digits hooking over her teeth, prying her mouth open as she whined, feeling him grind his thickening cock over her ass. She had wanted this so badly, the neediness of her weepy pussy only reacting to him. Her own fingers never did it justice. He’d ruined her in ways she hadn’t expected to ever be ruined, but she wouldn’t change it for the world. “You aren’t going to make a fucking sound unless you want your father to know how disgusting you are. Like to call me Daddy with my cock pounding your perfect little holes.” He hissed, breath washing over her ear as he pressed her further into the door. “So you’re going to shut the fuck up and lift that pathetic excuse of a dress up so I can slip into the sloppy cunt and make sure you keep your hands to yourself tomorrow.”

[moremaybank]

AIN’T A LONELY CHRISTMAS SONG — j.m

pairing: dad!jj maybank x mom!reader warnings: sexual innuendos (sort of), jj being a tad mistletoe obsessed, your daughters get into a tiny disagreement, mentions of pregnancy, i think that's it author's note: so i was trying to stay away from using names, but it was getting repetitive saying your older daughter and your younger daughter over and over so i gave them names. hopefully you find them cute LOL. also, this isn't technically part of my holiday event, but i wanted to write this to sort of kick things off ♡︎ naughty or nice ! ౨ৎ

“C’mon, pretty girl. It’s getting hard holdin’ on like this. You sure it’s not too big?”

“We just need to finesse it a bit. Nudge it a little to the left ‘n then we can slide it in.” 

Beads of sweat started to form on JJ's forehead. His muscles were starting to cramp and he had to hold his breath to make sure he didn’t physically combust. “Okay, baby. How ‘bout now? ‘M I good?” 

“Yeah. Okay. You’re good.” 

With a collective heave, JJ pushed while you pulled, but the oversized tree seemed determined to resist. Then, after numerous strategic twists and turns, you managed to get the tree inside of your shared home. Needles of pine littered across your wooden floors like confetti. 

JJ chuckled as he looked at the slightly dishevelled tree. “Well, you said you wanted the entryway to look memorable, right?”

You sent a glare his way. “Not what I meant, J.” 

Soon, you heard the pitter-patter of tiny feet against your stairs, followed by two adorably shocked gasps. Your older daughter Avery sprinted down the steps, her little sister Elle hot on her trail as they rushed over to the two of you. 

“Woah! Big tree!”

“Big tree,” Elle echoed in agreement. JJ crouched down, scooping her into his brawny arms and lifting her so she could get a better look. She reached out, her small fingers brushing against one of the branches and she retreated with a curious and excited squeal. 

“Yeah, I think Mama went a little overboard. You agree?” 

Avery clung to your side, her arms circling your hips as her chubby cheek smushed against your thigh. Big blue eyes gleam as they stare up into yours. “I think it’s perfect.” 

You broke out into a smile, smoothing out some of the frizz on the top of her head. “Me too. Daddy just doesn’t see our vision.” 

JJ rolled his eyes at that. 

—

Soon enough, Christmas music swirled through the air, and the sweet fragrance of your festive candle made your home smell like its own winter wonderland. 

JJ used his manpower to retrieve all of your decorations from your basement, earning a sweet but fleeting kiss from you before you lugged it all over to the tree.

Boxes upon boxes of ornaments and other decor littered around the room, messily so as your girls dove in with eagerness. Their decorating skills were definitely…questionable, but neither of you could deny how adorable they looked as they overflowed the tree with everything they could find. 

JJ instantly recognized that caliber of enthusiasm, knowing that his gorgeous girls had no doubt inherited it from their mom. The woman of his dreams had passed on everything he loved about her to their children, and it warmed his heart. 

“Look at this, babe,” you said, peering at your husband over your shoulder. 

JJ abandoned his place on the couch, crouching down beside you to get a look at what you were showing him. It was an ornament, a very worn one. Inside laid a picture of the two of you, huddling together with bright, toothy grins and Santa hats on your heads. You couldn’t have been more than twelve years old at the time. Your parents had invited JJ to stay over for Christmas, knowing full well that Luke wouldn’t try to give him much of a memorable day. They’d gone over the top, getting double the amount of presents and matching pyjama sets for the both of you. You’d crafted gingerbread houses (in which JJ had tried to make a competition out of it and lost severely), drank copious amounts of hot chocolate, and watched Christmas movies until you slumped together on the couch in deep slumber. 

JJ smiled fondly. Those times were so precious to him, then and now. He’d just started to recognize that he was nursing a crush on you, and being with you at your favourite time of the year only made him fall for you more. Sure, he was just a kid in middle school. But that didn’t mean he was too young to realize how much adoration he held for you in his heart. 

“You were so cute,” you gushed, turning your face to him so you could kiss his cheek. “Baby JJ.” 

He arched a brow. “You sayin’ I’m not cute anymore?” 

A laugh bubbled from your throat. “Of course not. But look at those cheeks. So squishy.” You pinched one of his cheeks, maybe a tad too hard, and he shoved your hand away, massaging the soreness away. 

“Ouch, baby.” 

You leaned in to plant another kiss on the apple of his cheek but were interrupted when a sudden and spirited fight broke out between your daughters. Both of your heads snapped toward them, your shared bubble of love now popped. 

“I want the star!” Elle insisted, clutching onto the golden tree topper with all her little might. 

“No fair! You did it last time!” Avery’s arms crossed over her chest and she stomped as her tantrum began to surface.

JJ, sensing the inevitable meltdown about to ensue, intervened with his signature, charming grin. The one that had convinced you to marry him and had managed to give you two beautiful children. “Alright, ‘lil ladies. There’s no need to fight. You can both do it together, yeah? Can you do that?” 

JJ’s hands reached out, tickling each of their sides and watching their twin frowns dissolve into smiles. Giggles filled the air and warmth bloomed in your chest instantly. 

“Okay, Daddy,” Elle spoke, giving in to her favourite person in the world. Her eyes drifted onto her sister. “‘M sorry, Avey.” 

“That’s real nice of you, Ellie,” JJ praised, kissing her temple. Then his gaze moved onto her sister. “How ‘bout you, Aves?”

Your eldest nodded, now looking bashful. Avery, ever the sweetest (despite her occasional outbursts), caved in the moment her little sister’s nickname for her hit her ears. “I’m sorry too. We can be a team.”

Your smile grew larger, making your face sore.

You and JJ had been through it all together. From friends to lovers, and everything in between. He’d plucked his heart out of his chest and handed it to you on a silver platter without thinking twice about it. The power of his love was almost surreal. But the most magical thing you got to witness while being with him was watching him transform into an amazing father. Sure, he was a goofball who was constantly bouncing off the walls with all that energy pumping through his veins twenty-four-seven, but when it came to your little girls, he was a natural. Hell, your theory was proven to be right yet again when he handled that impending tantrum with just the flash of his smile.

“What are you lookin’ at, goof?”

JJ’s voice broke you out of your daze. He was standing now, each of your girls propped up on both of his hips as he carried them. Avery and Elle eyed you curiously while their hands both held the golden star.

You gave him a shrug, walking over to them. Your arms wrapped around all three of them as best as you could manage. “You’re all just so lovely.” 

JJ burned to kiss you. He almost did. But when Elle whined about how her arm was getting tired from holding the tree topper up, he was returned to reality.

The kiss can wait, he thought.

“Alright, my little star commanders. Let’s do this thing.”

He carefully stepped up onto the stool sitting in front of the large tree, and with a team effort, Avery and Elle strategically placed the star at the very top. They clapped and cheered together, high-fiving in victory once JJ stepped down and back to let them admire their work. 

“Nice work, babies. You killed it.”

—

You passed through the living room and into the kitchen, taking note of the mistletoe that your husband had sneakily hung in the doorway. You shook your head, smiling to yourself as you headed over to the cupboard to grab some mugs and the hot chocolate mix. As you waited for the milk to warm up, your eyes landed on the alternate entrance into the kitchen. More mistletoe dangled from the doorframe. You knew without a doubt that you’d find it in every entryway that adorned your home. 

You made all four cups, completing them with dollops of whipped cream and chocolate shavings. You placed them on your wooden tray, but before you could pick it up and bring it to your family, strong arms wrapped around your frame. The owner’s chin dropped onto your shoulder after leaving a kiss there. 

“Hi, Mama,” he rasped. You could hear the mischievous grin in his tone. “These look amazing.” 

“I figured we deserved something sweet for all our hard work,” you responded. You turned around in his hold, your hands running up the lengths of his arms and coming to a stop on his shoulders. “Nice job with the mistletoe, by the way.” 

He shrugged casually, but his smirk only grew wider. “Can’t be out here wasting any opportunities. Y’know I can’t live without your kisses.” 

“Mhm.”

“Hey. ‘M serious. Gotta be prepared.” JJ pulled something from his pocket, and his arm raised over your heads. “See? Prepared.” 

You laughed softly, leaning up to peck his lips. “You don’t need to carry that around. I’ll kiss you any time you want.” 

“That a promise?”

“The biggest promise, Maybank. Those lips are mine.” You granted him another kiss, this one languid and loving. “Now let’s go check up on our troublemakers. It’s way too quiet in there.” 

—

The four of you settled in on your couch, the fireplace glowing and providing a coziness to the room. You all found refuge under one of your thick, fluffy blankets, with both girls plopped in yours and JJ's laps. The soft, golden cast of the lights on your tree illuminated the room enchantingly.

Avery nestled against JJ, her head resting comfortably on his chest, while Elle found a cozy spot in your hold. The familiar tune of Where Are You, Christmas filled the room, Cindy Lou Who’s sweet voice carrying out the lullaby that seemed to put everyone at ease. 

As the plot unfolded, the Grinch was giving a dramatic monologue at the annual Whobilation festival in Whoville. Even with all the chaos ensuing as the he burned the town tree and destroyed the celebration, Avery’s eyes drooped, and Elle’s rhythmic breathing told you that she was already fast asleep. You shifted her into a more comfortable position gently and looked over at JJ. His eyes were fixated on the sleeping girls, a soft smile playing on his rosy lips. 

“I’ve dreamt of nights like this.” His voice carried in a whisper, careful not to wake the kids up. 

“Yeah?”

He nodded, his expression clear with contentment. “Yeah. When I was younger, I’d just sit ‘n imagine what it’d be like to have a home, a family…all of this. Luke never gave me any of that.”

His arms tightened around Avery, who curled into his chest further in her sleep. “Never thought I’d have this, y’know? Never thought I’d get to call you my wife — I still can’t believe I get to call you that, by the way. Or have a real home, a real family. I love you guys more than I ever thought I could.” 

“We love you. The girls are crazy about you, ‘n so am I. We’re so lucky to have you, baby.” You extended your arm toward him, placing your hand on his shoulder and giving him a comforting squeeze.

He shook his head. “Nah. I’m lucky. You made this real for me. I never thought I deserved any of this, but you never stopped trying to convince me that I could have it all. This is all ‘cause of you, pretty girl.” 

“It was a team effort,” you assured him. “The house, the girls. Our life. This was both of us.”

“When you talk like that, it makes me wanna give you another baby.”

You bit your lip through an uneasy smile. “I don’t think it’s gonna take that much work…”

His blonde brows pulled together in confusion. “Huh?”

“I’m pregnant.”

JJ’s eyes widened once the words sank in, showcasing a mixture of surprise and overwhelming joy. His smile was so bright that it gave your decorated tree some tough competition.

“Really?” He whispered, breathless.

You nodded, your smile mirroring his. He’d always had that effect on you, always had such contagious enthusiasm. “Yeah. Looks like we’re getting our dream again.”

With a lack of better judgment, JJ let out a whoop of excitement that echoed throughout the room. He had temporarily forgotten about the peaceful slumber that had taken over your girls. “Fuck yeah!”

You giggled softly, placing a finger on your lips and shushing him. “Shh. You’re gonna wake them.”

He half-ignored your words, leaning in to kiss you deeply. “‘M sorry,” he mumbled against your lips. “‘M just excited.”

“It’s okay, babe. I’m happy you’re happy.” 

Your head tilted, resting on his shoulder. You settled further into the couch, feeling the warmth of the joyful news you’d just shared. JJ swore to himself that he didn’t think he could get any luckier, but in a matter of mere moments, he learned that he was wrong. Your family was expanding, and there was more love to be shared. Love he didn’t even know he had in him. Each time you have a child, it grows more and more, yet it still shocks him every time it appears on his doorstep.

JJ’s head rested against yours after he kissed your hair. If this was how he’d live out the rest of his days — surrounded by the beautiful family you two had created together, he’d never want for anything else. His dream came true, now four times over. 

TAGS: @taintedxkisses @findapenny @bmo-bri @princessbetsy123-blog @slytherhoes @rafetopia @poppet05 @lyndys @adoreyouusugar @f4ll-for-you @tell-me-when-ur-ready @bbycowboi @jjmaybankisbae @enhypens-hoe @loverofdrewstarkey @earth2starkey @angelofcigs @koalalafications @aerangi @cantstoptheimagines @maybanksbabe @sarah5462 @drudyslut @lvvrgrl @dancinglikeaballerina @somerandos-world @peachpitlover @sya-skies @emmalandry @urbestieboo @thatsthewaythechrissycrumbles @gillybear17 @abbybarnesstuff @lovelyxtom @camelliaflow3r @runningfrom2am @rcbuttercup @redhead1180 @luversgirl @thejuleshypothesis @scarlettocean @subconsciouscollapse @vivian-555 @violetmacher @drewstarkeyslut @hoeforstarkey24

[sycamorelibrary754]

Merry Christmas

Summary: It’s the most wonderful time of the year. You and Natasha are off to the annual Stark Christmas Party. Little does the team know that a special surprise awaits them.

Genre: Fluff

Pairings: Natasha x reader, Avengers x reader (platonic).

Word Count: 2.7k

Warnings: None

A/N: This is part 2 to Happy Thanksgiving! I recommend reading it first, but it can be read as a stand-alone story as well. I hope you enjoy!

“Be down in a minute, malyshka!” Natasha called from the bedroom. 

You were standing in the cozy kitchen, savoring spoonfuls of creamy peanut butter straight from the jar, drizzled with rich chocolate sauce. You jokingly referred to it as your "homemade Reese's." It was your first pregnancy craving, prompting Nat to rush to the corner grocery store at 2 am to procure the duo of ingredients.

"No worries!" You were all set for Tony's yearly Christmas gathering at the compound. Clad in a stunning green Sequin-Lace Halter Twist-Neck Jumpsuit, your tiny baby bump added an extra glow to the outfit.

Natasha's arrival was announced by the confident click of her high heels. A few moments later, she appeared in a stunning, sleek red midi dress with a scoop-back design, perfectly accentuating her figure.

"Wow, Nat, you look absolutely stunning in red. It's definitely your color," you complimented.

Her smirk grew as she put on her earrings, 'So, you're choosing it over the black?' she teased.

"I never said that, did I?" with a cheeky wink.

"Is the little one loving the homemade Reese’s?" she said, grabbing her clutch.

Absolutely!" I exclaimed, setting aside the tempting chocolate and peanut butter. "How about we whip up some delicious fudge tomorrow?

"Is it because the baby has such a sweet tooth?" Nat playfully teased.

"Absolutely," you giggled coyly.

"Whatever the baby wants, I guess," she said as she enveloped you in a warm embrace, then leaned over to plant a tender kiss on your belly.

"Are you ready to drop the baby bomb tonight?" Patting Nat's head affectionately.

“I'm feeling a bit nervous," she confessed, standing upright. "I remember how everyone reacted when they learned about Clint's family. I can't help but wonder how they'll take this news.

“They will embrace their roles as the wonderful aunts and uncles they were meant to be,” you said, grabbing your wife's hand. “Plus, announcing it with the Christmas crackers is a cute idea.”

"I hope so," she whispered before planting a gentle kiss on your lips. 

Can you believe Yelena still hasn't spilled the beans?” you asked.

"Oh, that's because I warned her that if she told anyone, I would make her run with me every morning at 5 am until the baby is born," Natasha explained.

“Well played,” you replied, high-fiving your wife. 

Thank you," she smiled. "Now, come on, let's go and get into the holiday spirit.

*^~^*

As you drove to the compound, the snowflakes delicately blanketed the landscape, creating a picturesque scene of holiday cheer. Each house you passed was adorned with shimmering Christmas lights, casting a warm, enchanting glow upon the neighborhood. You reached out to hold Natasha's hand, your fingers naturally intertwining as she pressed a tender kiss to the back of your hand, savoring the moment.

Upon your arrival at the compound, a rush of inviting warmth enveloped us as you both stepped into the lobby. Natasha brushed the delicate snowflakes from your hair and coat, her caring touch bringing a sense of comfort. Together, you made your way onto the elevator, where the voice of FRIDAY greeted us, creating a tranquil atmosphere as we continued our journey.

“Ladies, Merry Christmas, and welcome to the annual Stark Christmas party!”

“Merry Christmas, FRIDAY. How’s the party so far?” You asked as the elevator hum carried you up to the living quarters.

“The festivities are in full swing. Mr. Stark is treating the guests to a medley of lively and heartwarming Christmas carols,” FRIDAY explained.

"Of course he is," you chuckled.

“He only plays that baby grand after a few drinks," Nat added. "After our month-long covert op in Romania, we flew back, and he decided to mark the occasion with a tipsy performance of ABBA’s Dancing Queen.”

"Ah, I can't believe I missed it!" you groaned, pretending to be disappointed.

As the elevator doors slid open, the vibrant red and green decorations instantly caught your eye, along with the magnificent 12-foot-tall Noble Fir Christmas tree that stood proudly in the heart of the common area. It was evident that Pepper had poured her heart into adorning the tree, carefully draping it in an array of colored lights and delicate silver and gold ornaments. The festive ambiance filled the air, evoking a sense of warmth and holiday cheer.

"Look who's here - the Romanoff's have arrived!" Clint cheered as his kids eagerly ran over to greet you and Natahsa.

As Nate leaped into your wife's embrace, you welcomed Lila and Cooper with warm hugs. Each time you saw the Barton kids, it became apparent that they had grown a little more. Banner and Cho made carrying a child that would be a combination of both your and Natasha's genes possible. Observing the striking resemblance of Clint and Laura's children to their parents, you eagerly anticipated discovering which traits your little plum would inherit from each of you.

Natasha leaned in and planted a kiss on Nathaniel's cheek. "How's my little namesake?" she grinned. "Have you been practicing those punch and kick combinations I taught you?

"Practicing the what?" Laura asked, raising an eyebrow.

“Oh, nothing,” Natasha flashed a sly smile as Nate burst into laughter.

"You both look amazing! The green and red combination is really working for you," Clint said.

Thanks! I have to say that your Christmas sweater is quite lovely. I really dig Rudolph's glowing nose." You don't see that very often!” You teased.

“Hey, the Barton’s are the cream of the crop when it comes to ugly Christmas sweaters.”

“Clearly,” Nat stated.

"I’ll take your coats," Cooper graciously offered.

"Wow, thank you. What a gentleman," you said as you handed him yours and Natasha’s pea coats.

Looking around, you spotted Wanda adding the final decorations to trays of delicious Christmas cookies. You put a hand on Nat’s shoulder and motioned toward the kitchen. She gave you a quick nod as you meandered over to the counter. 

"Wanda, Wanda, Wanda... What do we have here?" you inquired with a sly grin.

Y/N! It's so good to see you," she exclaimed, her arms wrapping around me in one of her signature warm and comforting hugs that I always loved. "This is my parents' famous Christmas cookie recipe," she proudly announced, holding up a worn and stained piece of paper. "I managed to convince Tony and Pepper to let me take charge of the desserts this year. So, we've got batches of freshly baked cookies, the decadent Viennese torte chilling in the fridge, and the pumpkin pie just coming out to cool on the counter.

Wow, you've been keeping busy," you said with a smile. "Is there anything I can do to lend a hand?

"Sure, you can take a cookie and go mingle. I'll be finished in a few minutes," she said, handing you a delightful cookie shaped like Santa. As you bit into it, you were amazed. It was the most delicious cookie you had ever tasted.

"Wow, Wanda! This is fantastic!" you exclaimed excitedly.

"That's exactly why I'll always champion homemade goodies over store-bought ones. Now, come on, go join the fun," she said, playfully shooing you away.

You turned around to see your wife, elegantly positioned by the fireplace, conversing with Steve with a champagne glass. As you began crossing the room, Kate and Lucky, adorned in festive attire, intercepted your path.

"Y/N! It's been ages! How have you been?" Kate exclaimed, her face lighting up with excitement.

"Hey, Kate! It's great to see you and Lucky enjoying the party," while giving the Golden Retriever some affectionate pets.

"Kate joyfully exclaimed, "Yes, say hello to Santa Paws and Mrs. Claus!" Sadly, we can't seem to find Yelena. She's our dedicated elf." Kate glanced around the room with concern.

Wait, Yelena is actually dressed as an elf?!" Your eyes widened in surprise. "Oh, that's fantastic.”

“Yeah, if you see her, will you send her our way? We’re supposed to take the photo for our holiday card tonight,” Kate explained.

"Nothing would make me happier," you said with a smirk and a hand resting on Kate's shoulder.

You bid farewell to the young archer and her loyal pup before rejoining your wife.

"Hey detka," Nat greeted, gently wrapping her arm around your waist.

"Y/N, I was just telling your wife that she needs to find her holiday spirit and come Christmas caroling with us next week," Steve stated.

"Natasha singing? I'm not convinced that would do wonders for the community's morale," you quipped.

Nat giggled at the remark, "Says the woman who performs one-woman tributes to Harry Styles in the shower?"

“Hey" you interrupted, "I'll have you know that my performance of Sign of the Times has been receiving high praise.

A moment later, Tony and Pepper joined your little group, with Morgan walking alongside them.

"Hey there, Romanoffs! You've got to taste this amazing Hot Buttered Rum," Tony exclaimed.

I adore Hot Buttered Rum, but I'm in the mood for some sparkling cider tonight," you explained. "I bet Nat would enjoy some, though. Don't you think, sweetheart?”

"Sure," she said, grabbing the glass from Tony's hand. Steve looked back at you curiously.

As you looked down at Morgan, who was sitting on the cozy ottoman next to the crackling fireplace, you couldn't help but feel a deep connection. Ever since you discovered that you were expecting a baby, your heart has been inexplicably drawn to children in a way you had never experienced before.

"Hey there, cutie!" you exclaimed to the young Stark. "You're looking lovely tonight," as you crouched down to her eye level.

"Thank you, Aunt Y/N," she said with a big grin.

“Are you getting excited for Christmas?" you inquired. "You're at the top of Santa's nice list this year!

“Really?!” Morgan squealed.

"Definitely! I have a feeling the man in red will bring you some amazing surprises this year," you winked.

Hey, did you hear that, Daddy? Aunt Y/N just told me that I'm at the very top of the nice list!

“I sure did, squirt. I didn’t realize Aunt Y/N was so tight with St. Nick,” Tony said, eyeing you coyly.

"Of course, we're on a first-name basis. I'm amazed you're not," you said with a smirk, looking at the billionaire. You had a strong bond with Tony, treating him like a brother, but you couldn't resist teasing him.

Trust me, Mrs. Romanoff," Tony said with a smirk. "I'm way closer to Santa than you are.

“Do you have a direct line to the North Pole?” You countered.

"Are you getting milk and cookies flown in from Holland? You know those are his absolute favorites," Tony remarked, giving you a knowing look.

"Alright, that's enough," your wife said as she touched your shoulders from behind. "You both know Santa. You both have giant egos. Merry Christmas," Nat mocked. "Come on, Tony, let's grab some hors d'oeuvres for our better halves. I'll be right back, detka," she said, leading the billionaire toward the kitchen.

You couldn’t help but admire Natasha as she walked away. Looking back over her shoulder, she smiled at you with all the love in the world. You just about melted right there in front of the fireplace. Snapping out of your love daze, you noticed Pepper grinning at you.

“What?” you asked.

"Oh, nothing. I just can’t help but notice how glowing you look tonight," Pepper said as Morgan pulled her away towards Clint’s kids, while Steve strolled away to join Bucky in conversation with Rhodes.

"Hey, psst... psst!" a voice suddenly whispered.

You suddenly spun around just in time to see a styrofoam snowball hurtling towards your face. With lightning-fast reflexes, you snatched it out of the air smoothly.

"Good catch," a Russian voice exclaimed.

"Yelena, where are you?" You glanced around, but couldn't see my sister-in-law anywhere.

"Over here!" she called out, peeking from behind the towering seven-foot snowman beside the pool table.

"Aww, you look absolutely adorable as an elf," you giggled.

Yelena's voice was barely audible as she uttered, "If you weren't pregnant with my niece or nephew, you would be hanging upside down from the rafters right now."

"Do you know that Kate and Lucky are looking for you?" you asked.

“Why do you think I’m hiding behind the enormous snowman? Kate Bishop forced me to dress in this saccharin American Christmas costume, and now she wants photographic evidence of it.” Yelena said.

"Because she loves you, silly," she said with a smile, arms crossed over her chest.

"Dinner time, detka. Let's go," Natasha called out and then abruptly halted, bursting into laughter at the sight of her sister.

“Tred carefully, sestra,” Yelena threatened. 

Nope, I'm loving this. Isn't this the new mission suit attire?" she said, playfully tapping the bell hanging from her elf hat. "Maybe we can convince Stark to level up this outfit with some Widow Bites action.

“Do you have a death wish?” Yelena sneered.

“Come on, you adorable elf, it’s time for dinner,” you say as you place an arm around your best friend’s shoulder.

*^~^*

As you sat next to your wife at the elegant Astoria Grand Giovani dining table, the soft touch of Natasha's hand sent a gentle warmth through you. You turned to her and caught her shy smile; her cheeks tinged with a rosy, festive blush.

Pepper rose from her seat beside Tony at the head of the lavishly decorated holiday table. With warmth in her voice and a genuine smile, she addressed the gathered guests. "Before we savor this delectable holiday spread, I want to express our deep gratitude for every one of you being here," she said, gently clasping Tony's hand. "Every person in this room understands the preciousness of life, and we cherish every moment together. We want you to know how much we love you, and we wish you all a Merry Christmas."

"Cheers!" Thor exclaimed a few seats away, raising his glass as clinking filled the table.

The festive Christmas feast brought an abundance of delightful dishes to savor. The centerpiece was a perfectly roasted turkey, surrounded by tempting trimmings. Freshly baked bread, creamy mashed potatoes, and garden-fresh vegetables, delicately roasted and complemented with balsamic vinegar, graced the table. Laughter filled the air as the group indulged in cheerful conversation and shared a medley of lighthearted, albeit incredibly corny, jokes.

As the evening progressed, pregnancy mood swings began to intensify. Amidst the gathering, a wave of emotion washed over you as you and your extended family relished the holiday season together.

"Y/N, are you alright?" Carol's eyes held a deep sense of concern as she gazed at you from across the table.

Oh, yeah," you say, dabbing at the corner of your eyes with a napkin. "I'm fine.

"The holidays always tug at her heartstrings," Natasha covered, resting her head on your shoulder.

After your delicious dinner, you assisted Wanda in setting up the dessert spread. Placing the Christmas cookies in the center, you carefully arranged the Viennese torte and the pumpkin pie on either side. As the evening progressed, you passed around coffee and dessert wine; all enjoying the company and the sweet treats.

The room was filled with the cozy warmth of full bellies and slightly sleepy eyes as the group relaxed in the living room. Soft, enchanting Christmas music filled the air, creating the perfect backdrop for the kids' lively discussions about their Christmas wishes and what they hoped Santa would bring them this year.

"Alright, Kate Bishop, let's hurry up with this photo. I can't wait to change into my pajamas," Yelena declared as she reluctantly rose from the couch.

You got it! Stay right there. Come here, Lucky," Kate called out as the dog happily bounded over. "Vision, could you snap the photo for us?

"Of course, Ms. Bishop," he said, confidently taking the Canon EOS R-50 from the archer's hands.

“It is customary to say cheese before a picture, but since it is Christmas time, perhaps you should say mistletoe?” Vision inquired.

"Just take the picture, you overgrown toaster," Yelena said dryly, a hint of impatience in her voice.

Kate's voice echoed through the room, 'Mistletoe!'

"Hey, we're getting one of these cards, right?" you eagerly looked at your wife.

“I had Kate put us down for two,” she smirked.

*^~^*

As darkness descended, you leaned back and rested your tired head on Nat's comforting lap, feeling the soothing sensation of her fingers gently running through your hair.

Natasha glanced at her watch, noting the late hour. "Are you ready to drop the baby bomb?"

"I'm as ready as I'll ever be. I'll grab the Christmas crackers," you declared, getting up from the sofa.

"Hey everyone, Y/N and I have a surprise for you," your wife nervously announced as you handed out the gold and silver novelties to the team.

"Christmas crackers? Seriously? I was expecting something a bit more extravagant… Oww!" Tony complained as Pepper playfully pinched his arm.

You smiled nervously, your heart racing as you reached for Natasha. The snap of the festive crackers echoed merrily across the room. Clint's eyes lit up as he was the first to reach inside and carefully remove the tiny gift from the cracker. The little round ceramic white ornament, delicately tied to a vibrant red ribbon, appeared in his hand, reflecting the warm glow of the holiday lights. Lila, Cooper, and Nate, their faces filled with excitement and curiosity, eagerly huddled around their dad to get a glimpse as Clint slowly turned the ornament to read the inscription, a moment of joy and togetherness shared by the entire family.

"Uncle Clint?" he read, looking up at Natasha in complete shock.

Sam couldn't believe it and shouted, "No way!"

As Wanda, Carol, and Kate gazed upon their unique ornaments, they couldn't help but shout a collective scream of joy. Each ornament proudly displayed its name, followed by the cherished title of "Aunt."

Thor exclaimed, 'This is joyous news!'

Pepper jumped to her feet and wrapped you in a bear hug, while Laura did the same with Natasha.

“How far along are you?” Wanda asked.

“Almost three months,” Yelena cut in.

"Wait, you knew?! Why didn't you tell me?" Kate yelled, slapping her girlfriend on the arm.

“Because I want to sleep in!” Yelena shouted.

"Nat, I'm thrilled for you," Steve exclaimed, gently kissing her cheek.

Bucky enveloped you in a warm embrace, planting a soft kiss on your head.

"Are you ready to take on the role of Uncle Bucky?" You lock eyes with him.

His face froze in sheer panic, like a deer caught in the headlights. “Oh my God.”

“You’ll be great, Buck,” you chuckled. 

Bruce and Helen wrapped Natasha in a warm, heartfelt embrace, simultaneously holding her close from both sides.

Helen turned to you with a look of relief. "Now that everyone knows, we can openly discuss your pregnancy," she said. "Have you been taking your prenatal vitamins regularly?

"Don't forget, you've got an appointment on Friday," Bruce said.

Without a second thought, you replied, "Yes and yes," as Natasha leaned in to gently kiss your cheek, followed by another on your belly.

Tony swaggered up to you with his trademark smirk playing at the corners of his lips. Bracing yourself for one of his classic Stark one-liners or a cheeky joke, you were entirely taken off guard when he unexpectedly enveloped you in a comforting and heartfelt hug.

“Congratulations, Romanoff,” Tony said. “It looks like you do know Santa best.” 

[pholla-jm]

What's A Mistletoe?

IMAGINE: WHAT'S A MISTLETOE? ~ LUFFY X READER GENRE: FLUFF WARNINGS: LUFFY BEING SNEAKY ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

You decide to help Nami decorate the ship for the holidays- Christmas to be more exact. 

While Nami was putting up little decorations around the room, you decide to hang up plants, like wreaths, poinsettia, mistletoe. 

Small talk was made here and there. Until your captain rushed into the room. 

“(Y/n), there you are!” He shouts while observing the plants that surrounded you. “What are these?” He asks. “Just some plants.” “What for?” 

“For Christmas, dummy.” Nami says and you just giggle. “Yeah, they’re for Christmas. These plants are usually known to be around during this time.” 

Luffy nods at your words. He then picks up a small green plant with a bundle of red berries. “What’s this one? Can it be eaten?” 

You grab the plant from him, worried that he would try to eat it before you could answer. “Yeah, definitely not. It could poison you.” Luffy laughs, “then what’s it for?” 

“Well it said that when two people are under the mistletoe, you are supposed to kiss. It’s just an old myth. Don’t worry about it.” 

Luffy just blankly stares at you, not a single thought behind his eyes. You could tell that your words went through one ear and out the other. 

You sigh, “okay Luffy. Go do something else and once I’m done, I’ll play a game with you.” 

A large smile paints his face, “okay!” He shouts before running off. 

“You have a lot of patience for him.” You just chuckle, “yeah. I don’t know how I do it most of the time.” “Well you’re a saint.” You laugh, “Thanks. I’m going to hurry up so Luffy doesn’t come barging in again.” “Good idea.” 

You quickly finish up the decorating and went to go find Luffy. While walking around the ship, you saw some mistletoe hanging around. They were in the most random places, which left you confused. 

You don’t remember placing them there, so who would’ve hung it up? 

“Who did this…” You question yourself as you look up at a mistletoe. 

“(y/n)!” You hear Luffy shout. You look away from the small plant to see your captain running up to you. “Hey.” You were still a bit distracted from all the mistletoe around you to notice that the both of you were standing underneath one. Together. 

“Aren’t we supposed to kiss now?” Luffy speaks up. “Huh?” “You said that if two people are under it, then they have to kiss.” 

You blinked, a bit surprised that Luffy was actually listening to what you said. “Yeah, I did say that.” 

Luffy grabs your cheeks, pulling you into a messy kiss. The softness of his lips took you aback. He pulls back before you could even process what happened. Your brain had short circuited, and you wondered if this was the actual Luffy. 

“That was fun!” He laughs because of the dumb look you had on your face. 

“Wait…” You whisper finally connecting the dots, “are you the one that hung up the mistletoes?” He nods, “Yup!” “Why? I already hung one up.” 

“The more mistletoe there is, the more chances I get to kiss you.” 

Your cheeks burned a bright red from his words. Your heart was beating like crazy and your thoughts were all jumbled. 

Luffy burst out laughing, “you look funny all red!” “You’re too much sometimes…” You whisper to yourself. 

Luffy steps back, “I’ll see you later.” He says. 

He didn’t have to say it, but you knew what he meant. 

He was definitely going to catch you underneath a mistletoe again.

[laurenairay]

Carving pumpkins - B. Boeser

Summary: it’s your first Halloween with Brock and you want to do something fun to mark the occasion.

The tenth and final of my Autumn & Halloween blurbs! Ending on a high note with this ball of sunshine (with a fun bonus at the end!)

Word Count: 473 words.

Tagging: @fallinallincurls @starshine-hockey-girl @lam-ila @kurlyteuvo @tonyspep

@cixrosie

~

“Are you busy today babe?”

Brock looked up from where he was putting lunch together, face instantly warming with a smile.

“No, just whatever we’re doing today,” he said simply.

Perfect, just what you wanted to hear.

“Do you think, maybe, after we’ve finished eating we could pick up a couple of pumpkins?” you asked hopefully.

“Pumpkins? Uh, sure, why not?” he mused.

You could tell he was humouring you so you figured it was probably best to get your thoughts out in the open.

“I thought it would be nice to carve pumpkins together. For our first Halloween. I know it’s dumb but it could be fun,” you admitted.

Brock’s smile faded a bit, and he quickly shook his head. “It’s not dumb. Not even a little bit. And it’ll definitely be fun!”

“Yeah? You don’t mind?”

“I don’t mind at all. I can’t remember the last time I carved a pumpkin. Can’t always guarantee I’ll be around, you know? And I hate the thought of coming back from a roadtrip to something rotting on my front porch,” he said, grimacing slightly at the end.

Okay yeah he had a point there. And it only made you more determined.

“Lunch, then pumpkin shopping, and then pumpkin carving. Let’s do this,” you grinned.

~

“I’m not going to lie, the guts are way more slimy than I thought they’d be,” Brock said, pulling a face that made you laugh.

“I’ll separate the slimy stringy bits from the seeds later – roasted pumpkin seeds are such a good snack,” you mused.

“You have the best ideas,” Brock grinned.

You felt you heart flutter as he leaned forward and pecked your lips in a kiss, trying to keep the heat from rushing to your cheeks. Even after all these months, the way he handed out compliments like that still affected you so much each time. Not that you were complaining, not really.

“Do you know what you’re going to carve?” you asked, wiping your hands clean and dry on the dish towel you’d brought over.

“Hm, something easy? I was thinking something like Jack Skellington from Nightmare before Christmas?” Brock suggested.

“That’s such a good idea!” you grinned.

“Not too simple?” he said, wincing slightly.

“No, not at all. It’ll look really effective with a candle in too,” you nodded, smiling.

Brock smiled warmly back at you, pecking your lips in another kiss before leaning back to pick up a small pumpkin carving knife.

“I can do this. I can totally do this,” he murmured, mostly to himself.

“I believe you,” you teased.

“Laugh all you want baby, when these turn out amazing I am absolutely showing these off to the team. Maybe even Instagram,” he shrugged, unperturbed.

“Well damn, I’d better come up with a good design myself then,” you mused.

Brock just laughed.

~

[lipstickmarks]

Modern Aedion headcanons

— Modern!Aedion Ashryver x fem!reader

Author’s note: I LOVE AEDION BARK BARK BITCH

Warnings: mentions of protests, mention of danger at pride, mentions of violence, mentions of being arrested, mentions of absent/neglectful parents, nsfw, smut, semi-public sex, finger sucking, male masturbation, food, periods, teasing, overstimulation

he likes all music. like ALL music. if you’re roadtripping it, he’ll go from sabrina carpenter to metallica to 2000s r&b to dierks bentley in one playlist and he will know every single word

had a bit of a ho phase before you so whenever you go anywhere, you almost always run into an ex-hookup of his. but you’re so not threatened bc aedion makes it obvious he only has eyes for you. if anything, you tease him about it

yall go to pride every year and Aedion is that person who’s on high alert and making sure everyone is safe, especially you. no taking drinks from randos, no getting too close to really rowdy crowds or lame ass protestors

he loves watching contact sports, not for the athleticism so much but for the rush he gets when two people collide. he’s a war general at heart in every universe so he wants to see someone get the beat down!

he would be ex military, probably coast guard and then work as a rescue EMT for people who get lost in mountains and snowstorms

his love language is quality time and physical touch but he loves to spoil🤭 but it won’t be assorted chocolates or flowers. He’ll buy you a whole ass new mattress or a 6-month SoulCycle membership. He doesn’t really give a shit about little things and he’d rather express his love to you by taking care of big expenses (try to stop him from buying you a car, I dare you)

loves a good old fashioned make out sesh

lets you play with his hair anytime you want. he has done heatless curls, curl creams, he even let you dye it aqua blue to match his eyes. Aedion is the definition of a down ass bitch and he will try literally anything, especially if it makes you happy. the fact that he gets to sit and have you play with his hair and touch his neck for an hour straight is just a bonus!

has a slight temu addiction

if you don’t have good parental figures, best BELIEVE he will let gavriel know and that man will treat you like his own flesh and blood. offering you advice, fixing your car, helping you move in/out of places, he will come over and barbecue steaks for you and aedion without even asking and he always always always makes sure you’re taken care of and that you feel loved. you get presents on your birthday, valentine’s day, christmas, but super dad gav takes it a step farther and gives you presents for EVERY holiday. sometimes it’s a stuffie and a card from “your father-in-law” even if you and Aedion aren’t married yet and sometimes it’s a $200 gift card to a nice restaurant so you and aedion can have a night out. gav will even walk you down the aisle if you don’t have someone to do that

Even if you do have good parental figures around, Aedion still wants Gavriel to be a part of your life. He’s just so obsessed with you and wants you immersed in his family as much as possible. The three of you even have a group chat where he wishes yall a good morning/night ever single day 🥹. Aedion is very much Gav’s little lion cub and a daddy’s boy at heart. The two of them spend lots of quality time together so naturally, you become a part of that too.

he has inattentive adhd and cannot stay still for the life of him. he’s always walking around, forgetting stuff, and struggles with stationary hobbies. if you’re a reader, good luck trying to get him into whatever you’re reading. he’ll try for you but he would rather be snowboarding or jumping rope or making dinner, something with his hands and body

he LOVES food trucks

if you’re a swiftie, he absolutely attended eras with you. he is in his red era but his favorite albums are fearless and tortured poets. he goes crazy for “fearless” and “the black dog” (likes songs he can scream to)

he’s definitely been arrested at a protest and for getting in bar fights defending your or Aelin

fav disney movie is tarzan but if he’s in his feels, then it’s lion king (reminds him of gavriel)

cannot sing. thinks he can. ruins karaoke night for everyone

keeps a picture of you in his locker at the EMT station. if anyone teases him for it, he cusses them out

posts lots of pictures on instagram of his family, views from the mountains where he lives and works, and you. once you two start dating, his feed is 90% you

not picky with food at all. going out to eat with him is the easiest thing ever and he always lets you pick but if you’re not up to it, he’ll choose for you (he somehow always manages to pick the best place)

the first time you got your period while you two were together, he had a minor freak out because he wasn’t prepared. from that point on, he always kept extra pads and tampons at his place

holds you so close when you’re in public areas. if you go to a concert or music festival, he’ll hold you with your back to his chest and his arm slung around your chest to make sure you’re safe and secure with him

he prefers fun, activity based dates to quiet dinners but if you have a preference for them, he will of course honor that. whatever makes you happy is enough for him

if you want to paint your house, he is on it. you don’t even have to ask. you’ll text him at 10pm “the feminine urge to paint my walls ballerina pink” and he’ll show up at your house at 6am the next morning with paint, primer, rollers, and a tarp.

loves taking couple pictures with you. he’ll spend an entire hour after dinner in the parking lot doing whatever poses you want and he’ll let you fuss as much as you want. whatever makes his girl happy.

NEVER forgets to post you for national girlfriends day or international women’s day/month

if there’s a concert you really wanna go to, he’ll stay in digital queues to help you double your chances at getting tickets

always loses the idgaf war. he gives a fuck so hard all the time about everything

loves to kiss you by holding your chin in between his forefinger and thumb. it always makes you melt and he can practically see your toes curl when he does it and he loves getting reactions like that out of you.

he likes salt and vinegar chips. always fighting for his life at aelin’s house when he opens up a bag of them because everyone rags on him for it

at first he was annoyed that people compared him to thor but when you ran your fingers through his hair and said it was hot, he changed his tune like *that* (you two went as thor and jane for halloween that year)

loves it when you play with his muscles, especially at the gym. he gets flirted with a lot at the gym and he loves it when you go with him so he can keep his hands on your hips and while you fix his headphones for him or take cute pictures in front of the mirrors and spot him when he’s lifting weights

favorite shows are That 70s Show, Game of Thrones, and Family Guy but he’s also a hardcore disney girlie when he wants something low-stress to watch and he is NOT shy about it

NSFW

he likes to fuck sitting up with you leaning against the headboard and him facing you and then slowly lower you onto his back so he can hit deeper 🙂‍↕️

fell to his knees when you gifted him a boudoir photoshoot

he will fuck you anytime, anywhere. If you come visit him at work, he’ll fuck you in the closet and stick his fingers in your mouth so you don’t scream his name and get caught

not opposed to toys but he really does prefer to be a one-man show. he knows how to please you and is convinced his fingers, tongue, and cock are better than any toy on the market

He may not like toys but he loves lube and massage oils. You two don’t necessarily need it because Aedion is a hardcore ‘your pleasure > mine’ kinda guy. He gets off on getting you off and you’re always sufficiently wet before slips goes inside you. That being said, he just likes to play with the lube, experiment with different flavors and textures, etc. If they have ones that heat up. GOOD FUCKING BYE. he will torture you with that shit and tbh, you’re better off calling in sick to work the next day bc you won’t be able to walk anyway.🙂‍↔️🙂‍↔️

jacks off to voice notes of you touching yourself whenever he’s away and then sends you pics of the aftermath 😔 “look what you made me do, babe…”

really into biting. he doesn’t pinch your skin or leave teeth indents (unless you ask him to) but he loves to nip and nibble, it’s something primal within him

if you ever try that tiktok trend of walking into a room naked and casually asking him a question, expect to have his dick inside you within 3 seconds and to be fucked until you’re shaking and overstimulated and can’t remember your own name 🤷🏻‍♀️

he can be a little cocky/arrogant if he’s ever in a dominant mood. Not mean necessarily but he will taunt you. “Oh, sweetheart, I think you brought this on yourself. Teasing me all day, tsk tsk tsk. I don’t think you deserve to cum yet.”

Follows you around like a pathetic puppy in Victoria’s Secret. If you try and tease him by skipping the lingerie and going straight to the body spray, he will pout at you like “where’s my treat, baby?🥺” until you laugh and give in. Then he buys you the skimpiest sets they have.

you always send him nsfw tiktoks. Sometimes it’s things you wanna try, stuff that turns you on, and sometimes it’s edits if your celebrity crushes because you know talking about it bugs Aedion and gets him all riled up and in the mood to give you a proper fucking when he gets home. “Henry Cavill can’t fuck you like this, my love.”

doesn’t like to fuck you in his car. he’s an artist, he needs room to do his thing. he will, however, tease you in his car. hand on your thigh, drawing little circles on your inner thigh. reaching over to fasten your seatbelt and “accidentally” grazing your tits.

oh speaking of tits

one handful at all times. he is always touching you. if you’re cuddling on the couch, his hand is def up your shirt. it’s not always in a sexual way, he just loves to touch ‘em! when you show him your outfits, he’ll run a finger down your sternum and over the curve of the top of your breast (especially if it’s something low cut)

always lets you set the pace. he can be more dominant if that’s what you like but no matter what, he always lets you decide how far you go and what you do and what things you try out

the only hard no’s for him are degradation, impact play, anything involving weapons, (he would NEVER be able to hurt you, even if it was for kink) and also nothing involving multiple partners. he likes all his attention to be on just you.

he likes to cockwarm after you’ve finished. he loves the feeling of collapsing onto your chest and cuddling for a bit and just keeping himself sheathed in you. it relaxes him

always puts a hand on your back or your ass when he’s passing by you, especially if you two are in the kitchen cooking together or something. most of the time, he just leaves his hand there. “Aedion, your hand is on my butt.” “It was an accident.” “It’s still on my butt.” “It’s still an accident.”

he’ll make out with you in public, he doesn’t care. A little PDA never hurt nobody 🙂‍↔️

loves to have you leaning against his chest with two fingers inside you, edging and teasing you for hours

He. Loves. Morning. Sex. It is his absolute favorite. There is nothing this man loves more than waking up and pressing kisses to your neck and jaw until you’re awake and ready for him. Lazy sundays where you two get to sleep in and slowly make love for hours are his favorite. He doesn’t care about morning breath or bed head or anything, he’s just obsessed with having you in his bed and being able to sink inside you with a happy sigh first thing in the morning.

[miraclewoozi]

[ 05:55 ] - c.hs

pair: vernon x fem!reader.  w/c: 2k content: pwp/smut. (MINORS DO NOT HAVE MY CONSENT TO INTERACT). married au. christmas drabble. warnings: swearing. bad jokes/festive innuendoes throughout. smut tags UTC.  notes: yes this is several days late. no i am not taking questions.  notes 2.0: at the time of writing i am stuck in a very grim post-xmas limbo (see: entirely too full of cheese and also regret), however i remain down horrendous for this loser so here we are. enjoy. <3

smut tags: spooning -> forking. fingering, nipple play, talk of spicy dreams incl. a blowjob. piv sex. breeding kink (see: hills i will die on). creampie! cockwarming. it’s all very domestic. barely proof read. please let me know if i have forgotten anything.

Soft lips against the shell of your ear accompany you on your return to the land of the living, several hours earlier than you’d ideally like to be awake and definitely long before the sun decides to make its own face known. Your room is dark and the air is bitterly cold, even wrapped up under your bedsheets, even tangled in the arms of your husband. 

But you don’t need to be able to feel your toes, nor see six feet in front of you to know exactly why you’ve been woken up this early. All you need to be able to do is hear, and there’s certainly nothing wrong with your ears at this ungodly hour. 

“Morning,” Hansol murmurs huskily when your hands place themselves over his, low on your stomach beneath your sleep shirt. “Happy Christmas, baby.”

“Happy Christmas,” you say back, smiling serenely, your brain still fogged with the last wisps of your retreating slumber. The tone of his voice alone is a dead giveaway to what he wants, but you decide to play with him a little first anyway and feign innocence. Lazy mornings like this where neither of you are in a rush to get straight out of bed are a little bit of a treat, so who are you to not indulge him? “Why are you awake?”

It’s no secret that your partner likes to sleep in whenever gets the chance, but with a toddler in the room down the hall and a demanding job that has him leaving home before sunrise, most days, that’s something of a rarity now. He answers you silently, pressing his hips into your backside and you feel him — all of him — thick and hard and warm against the flesh of your ass. Ah. Just as expected. A warm chuckle escapes you and you move to turn over in his arms, but his strong hold traps you in place and you just wiggle back against him instead.

He barely stifles a groan and, still laughing, you roll your eyes.

“S’that a candy cane in your pocket?” You ask, feeling him shuffle down a fraction and rut against the seam of your thighs over and over, quiet grunts betraying the pleasure he tries to conceal. Close enough to feel your core’s heat, yet separated enough from it to only feel more frustrated. “Or are you just happy to see me?”

Hansol laughs despite himself into the smooth skin of your neck, shaking his head. He slides one of his hands up from your stomach to your chest, his warm fingers finding and dragging around one of your nipples with practiced accuracy. 

“You can find out,” he says, feeling goosebumps raise on your skin as the bud hardens under his touch. “If you want.”

“Why don’t you tell me what got you all worked up, first?” You ask. 

Morning wood is one thing, but to make him initiate all this? It must’ve been something really special. He proves you right as he pinches at your nipple, his other hand dipping below the waistband of your pyjama pants, his blunt nails dragging down your belly. You bite your lips to prevent yourself whining. 

So sue you. It’s been a while. 

“Had a dream about you,” Hansol says, peppering kisses down the side of your neck. You arch your back, simultaneously pressing your ass against his clothed cock again and your chest harder against his hand. “You were all dressed up for me. In this pretty little red outfit — you know the… sexy Christmas ones? With the white fur along the skirt?”

You nod, dropping your hand down to where his fingers are stroking, mercilessly slowly, against the cotton of your panties. To where he’s giving you hardly anything. On purpose. You shunt his wrist down a little, feeling him smirk into your skin. Finally though, he starts to thumb over your clit and you gasp appreciatively at the relief. “Oh yeah? And what was I doing?”

“It’s just funny you mentioned candy canes,” he tells you, rubbing at you a little faster. “You were suckin’ on me like I was one.”

You groan a little at his description, feeling your cheeks heat up. Arguably, this shouldn’t be sexy at all, but his rough morning voice and the way his skillful hands are working you up to a soaked, wriggling mess already has you flustered. You’re convinced nobody else in the world could turn a line that corny into auditory foreplay.

Leave it to you to marry the world’s biggest dork.

“All the way back into your throat,” he goes on, finally now slipping past the barrier of your underwear. He dips between your folds, dragging through your arousal before he moves his sickened finger back to your clit. “Dressed so naughty, but I’d have put you on the nice list for sure.”

“Enough with the damn—,” you snort, but your amusement dies and you clench your jaw as he starts to play with your other tit instead. You have to be quiet; you can’t afford for this to end before either of you manage to get off. Not now. But it’s so difficult when he knows your body better than he does his own. “You know she’ll be awake any-… oh.”

“Then get these off,” he whispers. He opens his palm fully then, pushing your thighs apart and pressing just the tips of two of his fingers against your hole. All the while, he fights to try and push your pyjama pants down with his other hand. 

He fails, naturally, but you come to his rescue and slide them down over your hips for him. He joins you again in an effort to kick everything all the way off though, sliding one leg between yours and stamping a little impatiently at your sleepwear with his foot until they’re bunched up at the end of your bed. His boxer shorts, meanwhile, don’t even make it to his knees; as soon as he can pull himself free of their confines, he does, stroking along his length as you open your thighs for him. 

He presses his lips against the curve of your shoulder while he settles into position behind you. Then, it’s just moments before you feel his head dragging through your slick in place of his fingers. 

“Okay?” he asks, lining up with your entrance and pushing forward just enough that you feel the familiar stretch of his intrusion.

“Please,” you nod, grabbing the sheets in an attempt to anchor yourself, to hush the moans he always draws out of you. Hansol slides into your cunt slowly, pressing until his cock is buried all the way inside you, until his hips rest completely against your ass. Your whole body shivers at the feeling. 

He barely moves for a little while, letting himself get used to the sensation of your walls hugging him for the first time in… weeks? Months, even? Too long, is the only real answer. His hand lays over your hip as you relax it and your thighs come back together, making you squeeze a little tighter around him. He fills you up so perfectly, too. So much that you feel warmth creeping to each of your extremities already. So much you can’t keep your mouth closed no matter how hard you try. 

“Missed you,” you sigh, laying your hand on top of his, threading your fingers through the spaces between his own. He brushes his thumb over the side of your hand soothingly. “Missed this.”

“Me too,” he agrees, slowly starting to turn those cute accidental jerks of his hips into real thrusts. But he doesn’t move quickly. Not at all: quite the opposite, even; he fucks into you slow and deep, making sure you feel every inch of him on every single stroke. 

It continues on much the same, but you’re not sure how long for: kissing your shoulders, your neck, the back of your hand when he lifts it up to his lips, breathing hot and heavy on your slowly warming skin. He murmurs sweet little praises. Rolls into you, dragging the tip of his cock against the sweet spot inside once he finds the angle that makes you hiccup your next breaths. He loves you, he makes love to you: quietly and intimately, and you’re so lost in this rarely seen, sweet, needy side to your husband that you barely realise you’re inching closer to your high until he’s the one to tell you you are. 

“Close?” he asks, with a new rough edge to his voice that has nothing to do with the sleep his fantasies woke you both from. It’s not a question, despite the little lift he says the word with. He knows what it feels like. He knows you. 

“Mhm,” you nod, swallowing back another whine as his hand dips between your legs again. “F-… yeah. Just like that—”

“I know, sweetheart,” he hums. “God, m’so lucky to have you. Feels so good.”

Your brain floods with static and it’s a miracle you even hear what he says next. He’s a man of few words (though one of many grunts) in the bedroom, but when Hansol starts getting overwhelmed in his pleasure, he babbles more than anyone you’ve ever met. You do hear him, though. Loud and clear. 

“Gonna put another one in you,” he says, hushed but still undoubtedly desperate. “Wanna give you another baby— oh, you’re gonna look so pretty. Can I? Please—?”

And if his fingertips rubbing tight circles against your puffy clit, or his cock spearing into you with unsteady, shaky movements, or his throaty moans of your name hushed by the skin of your back weren’t enough to get you there? This is. You squeeze your eyes shut and cry around your fist as it hits, as ecstasy pulses through you in waves that never seem to end. 

“Yes,” you gasp in the midst of it all, as he keeps asking — no, keeps begging. “Please, ‘Sol—”

“Fuck,” he groans, then, letting his own high wash over him and he starts to spill ribbons of white into your hot pussy. “You feel so fucking-… ah—”

He squeaks the words out. Right into your ear, fanning hot breaths down your now slightly sweaty neck. Even when he’s spent and stops rocking into your hips, he keeps rambling. “Thank you, shit, thank you—”

You don’t hear him swear much anymore. Not since you had your first baby; the suddenness of it makes you giggle, and the resulting clamp of your walls around his twitching length makes him hiss as he comes down. But he doesn’t pull out of you, even when he starts to soften. You realise after a few seconds what he’s doing, though.  He’s keeping you plugged full of his cum; he’s not going to let any of it go to waste. (You both know it’s starting to dribble out of you down the sides of his length anyway, mixed with your own wetness. Neither of you are too worried about that right now.)

He meant it, then. All of it. Your stomach twists in delight as he taps your waist and you look back at him, an eyebrow raised.

“Make me a promise?” he asks, sweaty forehead pressed into your shoulder, still trying to catch his breath. 

“Anything.”

“Let’s never leave it that long again,” Hansol whines. You can’t help but flutter around him again, this time at the mere thought of him being so desperate to fuck you more often. He lets out a slightly pained laugh, overstimulated.

“I promise,” you agree, feeling all of a sudden like your bones are made of lead. You could fall back asleep like this, quite happily. 

But, you realise with a sigh, someone didn’t take care of the milk and cookies on the kitchen counter before they crawled into bed last night. That’s about to become your problem.

“Good,” he nods. “We’re gonna do this every day ‘til you have another one, okay? Twice. And extra on weekends.”

“Mhm, sure we are.” You laugh, finally now feeling him pull out of you with a kiss to your temple. (Twice a day is his upper limit, and both of you know that. But it doesn’t hurt to play along.) “In that case, I’ll save your special gift for later.”

tysm for reading!!! likes, reblogs, comments & feedback are, as always, super appreciated.<3

[gojos-thot-patrol]

please can i get headcanons for gojo,geto and nanamis love languages please! thank youuuu

But of course you can Anon!! I read this request and instantly got ideas, so thank you for the ask <3 without further ado,

Now Presenting...

Starring: Satoru Gojo, Suguru Geto, Kento Nanami, and a bonus Ryomen Sukuna ;)

The Touch Starved,

Satoru Gojo

PHYSICAL. TOUCH. Gojos love language is physical touch, no I’m actually not taking criticism at this time <3

“But Narrator! He always has his full body condom (infinity) on!” I hear you yell. And Yes, dear reader, that’s the point.

He’s spent so much of his life unable to let anyone get close. Touch is inherently an act of trust, and he doesn’t touch anyone.

So the first time you hug him, and he actually lets himself experience intimacy, he actually turns into a puddle and melts in your arms.

And that shit is basically coke, he’s had a taste and he can not get enough.

When you’re driving he’s touching your thigh, you’re going to sleep he’s cuddling you close, you’re taking a walk he’s holding your hand, watching a movie on the couch and his head is in your lap. You get the idea, if you’re around he’s touching you

If you really want to make his day, offer to play with his hair. There is a 40% chance he’ll tear up about it.

Honestly, I genuinely feel like he’d be a little bit annoying about it. Random hugs and kisses constantly happening, it would be hard to get anything done, I’m not gonna lie

He’s kinda like a cat! The moment you try to get any work done, he’s crawling into your lap and you gotta work around him.

Hold on, wait, where's my cat meme-

It’s Him.

I’m being serious, cup his face like that and watch him turn to putty.

Moral of the story: Gojo just wants to be held

Man is never defeating the Baby Girl allegations

The Sickeningly Sweet,

Suguru Geto

WORDS OF AFFIRMATION, BABYEEEE

Suguru was born with a silver tongue in more ways than one and he knows how to use it.

“You’re breathtaking, you know that?” “How did I get so lucky to have someone as magnificent as you?” “My darling is so talented, what ever will I do when the world learns to appreciate you as much as I do?”

He’s going to single handedly raise your self esteem, watch him. He is going to pour honeyed words over you like a warm, safe shower

….Look, I’m not good with words, BUT HE IS! You get what I’m trying to say!

He would leave little notes for you to find around the house with sweet little messages. Just to give you a little dopamine rush, ya know?

He definitely sends you random texts throughout the day letting you know that he’s thinking about you and missing you.

God help you on any holiday that could possibly call for card giving. Valentine's Day, Christmas, your birthday, your anniversary, He’s going to write you a card, and it’s going to make you cry. It’s a personal goal of his.

Doing simple household chores has never felt more rewarding tbh.

Like, yea, you’re going to do the laundry anyway. But having him tell you how thankful he is for you and how much he appreciates it really makes getting through the task easier.

Would writing a song for someone count as acts of service or gift giving?...

Doesn’t matter, he writes songs for you, there I said it.

He’s 100000% The type of boyfriend that points out how attractive you are Every. Single. Time. He sees you in any state of undress. Prove me wrong, you can’t. Doesn’t matter if he’s seen it 101 times before, He’s going to call you hot.

Honestly he’s a major confidence booster.

Ngl, part of me thinks I’m giving him too much credit but oh well LMAO.

The Always Helpful,

Kento Nanami

Nanami is giving me Acts of Service tbh.

Like, he’s 1000% the “I will make you breakfast in bed” kind of husband material, and that is an act of service if I’ve ever heard it. 

Honestly, He just wants to do anything he can to try and make your day a little bit easier.

If that means doing the dishes even if it’s technically your turn, then so be it!

Doors might as well not exist to you when you’re with him, he will open them all

“I noticed your water bottle was empty. I got you another one.” “I know you’ve been stressed lately, I made your favorite for dinner tonight.” “Here, let me get that for you.”

He was made to be a caretaker tbh.

You can read between the lines there as little or as much as you’d like

If he catches you doing a chore, he’s going to find a way to help, sorry I don’t make the rules.

You’re washing the dishes? He’s drying and putting them away. You started cleaning the living room? Perfect, he’ll clean the kitchen. Oh, you washed the laundry? Looks like he’s gonna fold it and put it away.

He wants you to feel like you’re in a partnership. I genuinely don’t think he buys into this traditional idea that one partner makes money and the other takes care of the home front. Homemaking is a team effort god damn it!

It goes both ways though. If you really want to make him feel loved, a warm home cooked meal is the way to this man's heart.

He’s going to make the next meal to show his appreciation though.

 Someone put this man in a maid dress tbh.

I need me a Nanami tbh lol

The Ever-Present,

Ryomen Sukuna

OKAY sooo here’s the thing. It’s fuckin Ryomen my guy. Love languages almost require conscious acts of love, or to at least ya know admit you’re in love. In that sense, Ryomen doesn’t have a love language; he actively mocks the concept of “love languages” as humans refusing to accept the fact that their emotions are all just chemical reactions in their brain designed to make them want to fuck.

That being said, it's Quality Time. 

Ryomen’s love is always quiet. It’s him sitting in the same room as you while you read, casually talking with you while you do chores, or insisting on being in the garden while you tend to it because “It’s my (his) garden, I’ll be here if I want! Don’t think I’m here for you.” He absolutely is there for you.

His biggest act of love is letting you sleep in his room with him. That's quality time by definition my guy.

He genuinely gets so jealous when you spend time with other people because that's how he defines love. It's the person you want to spend time with (Don’t ask him about it, he won’t admit it) so you spending time with other people means you love them. And he can not handle the idea of you loving anyone that’s not him.

Remember when I said Satoru was like a cat? I take it back, Sukuna is like a cat. He wants to be in the same room as you but the last thing he wants is to be perceived by you.

He just wants to watch you read your book and not be grilled as to why he insists on being with you all the time. He’s clearly just, uh…enjoying the fireplace! Duh! Foolish mortal, why would he vie for your affections?...so, uh..whatcha reading?

He will never admit it, but his favorite thing in the world is to sit in the garden with you, listening to you talk about flowers while he pretends not to care.

This is followed closely by holding your close to him at night, whispering words of affirmation to you you will never hear when awake. 

I think that spending quality time with you is the only way Sukuna knows how to show love. I think he often gets overwhelmed by physical affection. He’s not used to it, and he didn’t immediately take to it the way Gojo did. Words of affirmation are out because he’s not a wordsmith unless he’s making threats. Can’t do acts of service because his ego would never let him do a favor for anyone else, and he can’t find any gifts that feel worthy of you- none of them feel right. So, Quality time it is.

Words may fail him, but he’s aware of how he feels. And the soft intimacy of listening to your favorite music with you, watching you hum along and dance makes him feel so viscerally raw, that it’s almost enough to make him admit there maybe more to love than just chemicals making you want to fuck. 

Should I just write a fic at this point? Maybe because GOD I am a fucking sucker for soft Sukuna. Yes I am aware I am part of the problem, I do not care, give me 2 weeks. I can fix him!

Just imagine stargazing with Sukuna for a second. Imagine listening to the crickets chirp off in the distance, both of you are aware that it goes against everything he’s ever said for him to be out here with you, and both of you know better than to acknowledge that fact. You know you’re not supposed to love him because he claims he will never love you, but as your hand meets his, and you watch him tense for just a second before relaxing under your touch again, you both know it’s only a matter of time now. 

 I always get carried away on Ryomens section in these.

I just really love my weird little demon dude lmao.