#i explained this scenario to my friends ages ago and i figured i might as well share it

[awfullyaster]

okay but imagine aaron’s head getting hit by an exy ball during a match and as a result getting amnesia and therefore forgetting his rlshp with kevin and all the time they spent together and later on aaron meets katelyn and they connect and they start dating and kevin says nothing ab how much it hurts him bc aaron is happy and who is he to ruin aaron’s chances of happiness? that’s all he wanted for him in the end, anyway. and it hurts and angers kevin when he sees him through the car window kissing katelyn goodbye as they drive to practice and the foxes know what’s happening cuz kevin sees it in their eyes but they don’t say anything either bc they know it’s kevin’s choice whether to tell aaron or not about what they had and kevin might admonish aaron a little harsher than everyone else but tries not to cuz he knows it’s pointless and immature but can’t help to do every once in a while and he just suffers in silence and he clenched his jaw so tight it started cramping when he saw aaron immediately run towards katelyn to pick her up and kiss her after the bearcat game so he had to look away and pretend it didn’t affect him because it’s not supposed to matter and aaron is only supposed to be his teammate on the exy team and not the love of his life so he focused on exy even more so as not to even think about aaron in any way or form as much as possible ( even though it never worked because he’s always thinking about aaron but he’ll do it again ) and if he can’t be on the court distracting himself he’ll continuously damage his liver with alcohol and not give a damn cuz what’s the point of living if he can’t live with his soulmate by his side? so kevin’s heart just withers until it’s all dust and ash and is taken away by the wind and even then he’ll still love aaron. but aaron will never know the love and trust and care that they shared.

[aibidil]

Ok millennials and parents of Gen Z, huddle time. What are we going to do about our Gen Z and (preemptively) Gen Alpha kids' politics? Especially those of us who are parents to Gen Z men? We've all seen the data showing that millennials aren't getting more conservative as we age. To give them credit where credit is due, Boomers were the ONLY age group to shift left in the 2024 US election. Millennials didn't move much from 2020, but it was slightly to the right. Gen X and Gen Z moved significantly to the right—9 points and 13 points, respectively. Gen Z men shifted 15 points to the right, while Gen Z women shifted 9 points to the right.

Obviously the left as a whole has some work to do here, but I can't help thinking that some of the work might be done by us as parents or friends of Gen Zers and, preemptively, Gen Alphas. (Maybe part of the issue is that most Gen Zers have Gen Xer parents, and we know that Gen X is the other age group that shifted significantly to the right?) These kids are coming of voting age in a really fucking difficult world political moment, and it makes sense to me that they need guidance in this venue like they do in the rest of life.

Clearly parents don't have control over our kids' politics, but we also have a huge ability to influence and help educate them. Some spit-balling thoughts of things we need to be doing:

Talk as rationally as we can about economics and how economic policies affect us. Help them understand what politicians are saying about the economy, e.g. what is a tariff? what causes inflation? If we aren't clear about these things, let's include them in our research trying to figure it out. I can't help but think that most Trump voters simply do not understand what a tariff is and what it will mean for US consumers, if it's passed

Help them learn to play out different scenarios—to think through what will happen down the line if various proposed policies were enacted. That is, help them to think logically about not just what will happen immediately after a policy is passed, but what that would be likely to happen next, and next, and next. This ability to think down the line is so important in so many parts of life, and it's not necessarily something that comes easy to most of us.

On abortion: This wasn't a huge issue this election in the US. That said, I've had really good luck talking with my boys about why abortion is important, and this is a case where the framing of the issue is so important. "Parenting is hard. Don't we want all kids to have parents who actually wanted to be parents? Do you think that someone who doesn't want kids, or knows they can't afford kids, or knows they can't handle kids should be forced to give birth? What would that mean for their baby?"

Talk about it whenever political issues affect you. It's much easier to understand politics when it touches your family, but if we don't talk about it, they won't understand it. For example, I've got a lot of chronic health issues, so health insurance has been a big political concern of mine. I can explain that insurers not very long ago used to be able to deny people coverage if they had any preexisting condition, and that it's only democrats and the pressure of the political left that accomplished getting rid of that. And now we need to make sure we keep that win, because it's the right thing, but also because here is how it would affect us

Talk about all the rights we have that are actually quite new. Lawrence v. Texas (legalizing consensual sodomy) was only in 2003! Gay marriage has only been nationwide since 2015! Explain why gay marriage is important. Not because we believe marriage is some mystical thing, but because it confers legal benefits like the ability to visit your sick partner in the hospital, to be the next of kin, to get spousal health insurance, etc. It's so easy to think these rights have been around longer than they have.

If we're worried about vulnerable people under a Trump presidency, talk about our worries in as concrete a way as possible, because if we aren't concrete, they are tempted to think we're being hyperbolic. "I'm worried that trans folks won't be able to access medical care or their medication because Trump has talked about passing laws to do that. I know that access to gender-affirming care is vital because suicide rates are high among trans folks if they can't access care. When I listen to politicians talk about trans people, it makes me angry and sad because they're stoking fears but those fears aren't based in reality. Meanwhile trans people will actually be hurt by these policies right away." Or about mass deportations: "Trump has promised to deport immigrants, which is wrong—how does he think our country will survive? The people he's talking about deporting are an important part of our society. And aren't we all immigrants, if we're not indigenous? But it's even worse than that because he isn't only talking about deporting undocumented people. The policies he's promised to enact also plan to deport even people who are here legally with visas or temporary protected status, and he wants to use a law from 1798 called the Alien Enemies Act to justify it. That's the same law they used to justify horrifically holding Asian Americans in camps during WW2! I worry for these fellow people because it's inhumane and I also know it would be terrible for the economy, which seems like it would be against the right's purported goals, doesn't it?"

Any time you start a discussion like this, listen to what they have to say in response. Don't shut them down! It's tempting to shut them down especially if they say some nonsense—especially if it seems like nonsense they're parroting from right-wing youtubers. It's so tempting. If it triggers you, buy yourself a minute to cool down by asking them to say more or explain what they mean.

Help them learn to vet news and images, especially in this age of AI. We can talk through our own thought processes when we hear a fact or story. How do you know if something—a fact, an image, a video—is true? What kind of process should you be running EVERYTHING through? We need to help them develop this skill so they don't give up on even trying and become full of despair at living in a post-truth world.

What other ideas do you have? Please add on. I feel such a sense of responsibility over my white Gen Z boys, and I know I can't be the only one who thinks we need a fucking plan. No one has ever parented in this environment before—let's help each other.

[l-i-b-e-r-t-y-m-u-t-u-a-l]

I watch the nimona movie finally with my family, and after watching my movie I was bowling my eyes out. The line "I see you" stabbed my heart too deeply. Like it somehow healed me, but it also didn't at the same time. Especially when Ballistar said it while looking directly at the camera/audience.

Every time I show anything I'm proud of to my parents they usually don't feel as enthusiastic, unless it's with my grades. My mom sometimes sounds moody or like she has an attitude when she doesn't, and it's common for her expression to be not fully shown because of that. My dad on the other hand, his tone is hard to figure out, unless he's mad. My dad's tone sounds more flat than my mom's, making a bit difficult to tell if he's really proud until he shows me physically.

My mother told me one day when we were going to the doctors that she might've accidentally put my sexuality down wrong, not understanding the question correctly. And I randomly told her that I was gender fluid. And she didn't understand why I randomly told her that but she still accepted nother the less (she didn't understand why I told her about my gender when she was talking about a mistake she might've made about my sexuality on a form).

Last night (considering it's morning in where I from.) My mother found me crying in our living room and sat down with me and just held me. It made me realize that my father might not accept me fully because of what I go as, even though she had told he he's slowly changing, thanks to the help of my step sibling coming out long ago. I explained to her that I was afraid of telling him because of his views on certain topics, and I thought the movie was a good way to shine some light that I may be who I am (physically). My mom told me that, a while back when I was younger I told them I felt like being a boy at some point. And it made me bawl even more, at the time of my age in that scenario, not knowing much of his view in this topic. My mom told me that my dad now might be more opening about it, since he has learn some about my other friends who don't go by the gender their given by birth (weather it be they're trans, nonbinary, etc) and now he has more insight of the community. But in the back of my mind I still fear that he might not accept me like my mom did, despite all of the support he has given he over the years. My heart feels like one day he might say something about me not being his daughter/son/child, weather my gender is in the scenario. All because of this. Even though countless times, he has reminded me that I'm his child, even though he didn't give life to me, wasn't there when I took my first step, watch me when I was a toddler to a child, I would be always one of his kids.

And as I'm typing this I'm starting to realize that my step brother might be in a similar position as my father, similar views as my dad. But he claims that he's 'trying' to called my step sibling the pronouns they want to be called, but gets upset or angry when called out by my step sibling when they are corrected or reminded that's their dead gender. I haven't seen them in a while so I don't know if he's still acts this way. My step sibling is way more open about it, since I was the first one to tell them about this, since i was also the first person for my step sibling to tell that they were nonbinary. Their mother is also just a straight up not changing their view set of them, still claiming them as a daughter, etc, anything going on the lines with the female pronouns. Because of this, if I come out to my dad and then he tells my step brother and then. My step brother tells my step sibling, their mother might be in the same room as them and that might make my dad not see my step siblings again for a long time. Their mother randomly not allowing my dad to see or have contacts with my step siblings one day when they were younger.

The movie made me felt seen as a person in general, that I'm not alone.

ANYWAYS! the movie in general was great! Sorry for the rant about that! I totally recommend anyone who hasn't seen nimona to go check it out! :)

[zzl0z3rxx]

Intro <3

Hii!! Erm this is my first time doing a into so pls bare with me here😭 This isn’t my 1st time on here or first acc. I was jus getting bored of my old acc so yaur

Erm so ig i’ll tell u some basic info

Im black 😭(so erm if ur racist pls stay like 6 ft away/jk but if u r racist I could care less bc I hate black ppl too 🥰/its giving uncle ruckus)

My fav emojis r:😭😔😛🥰😝💀🤓😼🙁

My fav colour is blue but I have more like sage green, red(all kinda tbh)/ any pastel colours/ and ermm I actually forgot 🙁

I draw erm yeah lol

Im problematic if u couldn’t tell 😭 but guys I promise im nice

My bday:6/26

Ermm i dont rlly have any preference for pronouns but im rlly jus used to she/her(not that im comfortable with those it’s just what my family uses bc ofc they would) but u can use any pronouns(actually no i do prefer he-him-they-them BUT ITS UP TO U GUYS BC IM A PPL PLEASER 😁😁😁😁😁😁)

Also u can call me by my real name Ari or some stupid nickname(pls make one for me) ALSO i have multiple little sonas like idk how to explain it like they’re all me/ for example:Adora Alex, Alex, Riri, Ri, Ira, Adora, and Axel and I think its more. Idk but like all them r the same person but in one IDK BC IDK IF ITS LIKE A DID THING OR NOT😭

I love-hate bugs like I made these lil comics with human designs for bugs and I love researching them but I hate seeing them irl😭 erm well im fine with grasshoppers and ants etc but others NO

Songs I like/love(NOT ALL BC WHO FINNA PUT ALL THAT)

(i love steve lacy/frank ocean/odd future/tyler, the creator/Dazey and the scouts/Destroy boys/AND LOITER SQUAD 😛😛)

ALSO IM NOT SHARING MY AGE ON HERE BC I DONT FEEL COMFORTABLE WITH DOING SO 🥰🥰🥰

My interests

Proships

Eddsworld

Among us(okay guys dont bully me but erm I used to draw among us nsfw/ IT WAS LIKE 2 MONTHS AGO DAWG😭)

Dead plate

Mitski

Tyler, the Creator(im literally getting audio cd’s for Christmas of his albums and I already have his vinyls except for bastard and goblin 😛)

Melanie Martinez

Incredibox Sprunki

Countryhumans(unfortunately 🙁/im a victim fr😔)

Countryballs ig

Ybf/your bf game(okay guys im just joking 😭)

Dick figures(I love this fandom so much, also unrelated but literally NOONE OR NOTHING CAN GET ME TO LIKE HOMESTUCK😭)

Fnf

Fnaf

My oc’s 😛

Pasta(like I rlly like pasta)

Ao3-Archive of our own

Scp

Htf-Happy tree friends

Oddbods(ik they literally don’t say shit and it’s cringe BUT I DONT GIVE A FLYING erm flip i was gonna say flip, but yeah jeff is my pookie fr 🥰🥰)

Necrophilia-other philia’s ig(idk if thats how u even spell it)

Mr. Circus Papa:Ghost eyes/The finger game/and the rest of his comics-art(some of his comics r on webtoon and other apps and u can see some art on patreon)(also bc i dont feel like putting it anywhere else, I DO NOT SUPPORT IRL INCEST OR OTHER STUFF THAT I SAID I ONLY LIKE FICTIONAL THINGS)

Erm im running out of things so MOVING ON

Also a lil not so fun fact/ I wear glasses 🥲

OKAY SO ERM I DONT RLLY HAVE A DNI BUTT(lol “butt”) I WILL SAY THIS IF YOU R LIKE 20-54(okay thats not even a possible scenario) DO NOT INTERACT PLSS but other than that ily guys :3

ALSO PLS DO DONT COME LEAVING DEATH THREATS OR HATE COMMENTS BC I WILL RECORD ME KMS/jk❤️🩷💕💕

Also this blog will be so boring and depressing 😭 like yk SH and vents and ED stuff ig but erm some other stuff this stuff will have ig(i dont wanna actually say bc yk digital footprint/lil bit too late for that bud)but like yk incest shotac0n and other crap idk im rlly lazy so I might not post at all(prob jus reblogs) OH WAIT ALSO I LIKE INVADER ZIM 🥰 forgot to mention that lol also I prob do have other interests too but idk oh I like coryxkenshin(idk how to spell his name😭) aphmau/SSSniperwolf/laurenzside and i kinda used to like inquisitor master(well I liked everyone besides her like yk sora, jaxx and etc.)

But erm guys I think that concludes this intro- OH MY OHIO SKIBIDI GYATT i forgot to tell yall, i know German 🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰🥰 but erm yeah thx for reading like fr tho bc not even my friends read the stuff I write for them 🙁 but yaur (i dont think im ever doing a intro again I rather just yap irl-I hate texting 😭)

ALSO IF U WANNA BMF PLSSSSS SAY SOMETHING IM SO LONELY LIKE PLS ASK TO BE MY FRIEND IM SO FREAKING DEPRESSED( I promise im cool :३) (Also if u need to vent my DM’S r always opened! Even tho I may reply late)

I made this at 1:00-2:46 am listening to loyalty by Kendrick im going to be so tired tomorrow 😭🙏(I gotta get up at 5:00 😁)

[animeomegas]

Imagine that Sasuke is having problems with his 'future alpha', he doesn't understand some dating methods and ends up 'reluctantly' going to ask Itachi's alpha.He just blushed saying 'I can't believe I'm doing this but I need some advice'.Itachi's alpha comes home late looking happy and Itachi holding his dog asking where he's been.

Anon: I think Sasuke would only start liking Itachi's alpha after they help him stand up to a bigger, stronger, more trained betas and/or Alphas. Because I don't see him as someone who might ask for help from anyone, and his brother's alpha somehow saw them bully him and push him around, so they tell him how to one up those annoying people. (Maybe buy him ice cream or something after). This young Sasuke vs Itachi's alpha thing should be a show, because I'd sell everything I own to watch it.

(Anon 1: This is a big brain idea, anon, thank you for your service 🤭 I changed it a little, how that's okay!)

(Anon 2: I think you're absolutely right that Itachi's alpha does something big for Sasuke when he's at a low point, and it ends up changing their relationship for the better in a lot of ways. I decided not to go with bullying though, because Sasuke seemed to fit this scenario moreso. Also, ahhh, I'm so happy you're liking this mini series!!!!! I'm having so much fun writing it and it fills me with joy that other people are enjoying it just as much!!!)

...

Okay, so, Sasuke has never been the most intuitive when it comes to emotions. And he’s also never been great at acknowledging or learning about culture surround a/b/o dynamics because he’s always been adamant that he doesn’t care for it or need it.

But now Sasuke is starting to think that may have been a mistake. Because things are going wrong with this whole courting situation (that Sasuke still can’t believe is happening to him.)

Things were fine! But now the alpha courting him is getting colder and not wanting to train as much, and Sasuke doesn’t know what’s changed! He’s angry and upset about it.

He’s been brooding for about a week about the whole situation, but now he’s decided to ask someone for advice.

His friends are useless. His mother just laughed and told him it would work out if it was supposed to. Shisui is on a mission. He’d rather die than ask Kakashi sensei. So, unfortunately, he had to ask his brother, even though he was sure to get some embarrassing and invasive questioning from him. The sadist.

So, he goes to see his brother.

Who isn’t there.

His brother’s alpha tells him that Itachi is out with their pup all day running errands and taking him for his bi yearly check-ups. But Sasuke needs to know what’s going wrong and how to fix this now! He doesn't have time to wait for Itachi to be done with his stupid errands!

His brother’s alpha notices how tense he is and asks if he would like to stay for some tea, and Sasuke accepts before he thinks about what he's doing. Their relationship is much better nowadays but Sasuke can’t help but feel a little awkward around them still.

…

“Here,” they say, sliding two teacups onto the table. “You like green tea, right? It’s the only type we have in, you know what Itachi’s like with tea.”

“Green tea is fine,” Sasuke says politely if a little stiff.

His brother’s alpha sits down at the other side of the couch with their own tea, and the two sit in silence for a bit, each sipping their own tea

“Sasuke,” they say, shooting him a concerned look. “If you need me to go and get Itachi, I can. You don’t look well, he’ll come back in an instant if you ask him to.”

“No,” Sasuke answers quickly. “It’s fine… I…”

Here goes nothing.

“I’m just having a bit of trouble at the moments, is all, and…”

Itachi’s alpha nods, obviously listening intently with a look of concern on his face that is making this both harder and easier for Sasuke at the same time.

“Go on, Sasuke, I’m listening.”

“I’m sure Itachi told you about my… my er situation,” Sasuke starts, wishing he could punch himself in the face for phrasing it like that.

“That someone’s courting you?” they ask gently.

Sasuke only nods, face burning. He can’t count the number of times he’s told Itachi’s alpha to their face that he’d rather die than enter a courtship. This is so awkward, why is he doing this?

“Did they do something to make you uncomfortable, Sasuke?” they ask immediately after seeing his hesitance. “Because if they did, we can sort it out together okay? It’s not your fault.”

“No!” Sasuke immediately protests far louder than he intended too. “They didn’t… They didn’t do anything, I just… I think I did something wrong…”

Sasuke pretends to drink his tea to avoid having to elaborate any more, despite the fact that it’s still too hot.

“What did you do that was wrong?” they ask, voice still quiet and soothing and Sasuke hates how comforting he finds it. Like it or not, his instincts had branded Itachi’s alpha as ‘safe’ many years ago.

“I don’t know,” Sasuke admits, fiddling with the rim of his cup. “They seemed sad one day and I just thought they had a bad day or something, but now they’re… cold.”

“They aren’t behaving how they were behaving before?”

Sasuke shakes his head.

“Is it possible they have an issue at home or with some of their friends? It might be something in their personal life that's upsetting them.”

Sasuke shakes his head again.

“They seem fine when they’re with everyone else…” he admits. “It’s just me.”

Sasuke forces back the burn of tears he can feel behind his eyes. He will not cry. He won’t do it.

His brother’s alpha hums sadly.

“And you want to figure out what happened?” Sasuke nods. “Okay, why don’t you walk me through what happened on the days leading up to the mood change.”

And so Sasuke does.

He tells them all about how they would meet for training every day and Sasuke would bring two bento boxes for lunch, and then they would sometimes go shopping or go out to eat. Things he hasn’t told anyone about yet. And as he's talking, he really can't see what the problem is, everything seems fine! But maybe Itachi’s alpha might know some alpha thing that he doesn't. Sasuke can easily admit that it’s not his forte.

“I see,” Itachi’s alpha says after Sasuke had finished his story. Sasuke’s tea sits cold on the table next to his brother’s mate’s empty cup. “I think I know what happened.”

Sasuke looks up immediately. No way they’ve already figured it out that easily!

“They thought you were rejecting them,” Itachi’s alpha says simply.

“Wha- But…we spent everyday together! How could that be a rejection?!”

“When an alpha is courting an omega,” they start to explain. “They’re trying as hard as they can to prove to that omega that they can be a good mate.”

“I know that,” Sasuke snaps.

“Listen to me for a second, Sasuke," they softly reprimand. "So, when an alpha, particularly a younger one, is courting an omega, they are very sensitive to rejection, they look for it everywhere.”

“Why?” Sasuke asks, dumbfounded.

“Well, when I was courting your brother, we weren’t that much older than you are now, and I remember thinking that he was the most perfect person in the whole world,” their eyes take on a faraway look as they reminisce. “I was so sure that he must have had hundreds of alphas clawing for his attention every day, and so I was desperate to prove to him that I could be a good mate.

“With every gift, on every date, I would watch his reaction to everything, overanalysing every laugh and smile and frown. I loved him so much, but I couldn’t help but think that he would reject me at any moment. He was too good for me, and I knew that. It always felt like he was humouring me, especially at first.”

“That’s stupid.”

“Yeah,” they laugh, unoffended by Sasuke’s harsh tone. “Looking back, I guess it was, but what I’m trying to tell you, is that I can see how some of your actions could have been taken as rejection by a young alpha who was expecting to be rejected.”

“But…” Sasuke says, looking lost. “I didn’t want to reject them, I don’t understand.”

“Here,” they continue patiently. “Let me explain it to you like this. When you went out to eat, you paid for yourself even though they offered, right? Because you didn't want to burden them?"

“Yeah,” Sasuke trails off, unsure what that has to do with anything.

“But to a young, hormonal alpha, you’re basically telling them that you don’t trust them to provide for you, the one thing they are trying most to convince you."

“But I wasn’t-“ Sasuke protests.

“I know you weren’t,” they reassure him. “But that’s the sort of thing that will run through an alpha’s head at that age when courting. Also, you told them you wanted to train with them because you thought they were strong because you wanted to compliment them, right?”

Sasuke blushes but nods.

“And that’s great to start with, but eventually they would probably start to wonder why you wouldn’t want to train just to spend time with them. And you also told them that you had plenty of leftovers to make their lunch with so that they wouldn’t feel like they were burdening you, right? But that just made them feel like you weren’t going out of your way to do something special for them, even though you were. Do you see what I mean now?”

Sasuke blinks, rapidly trying to wrap his head around all this new information.

“And I also have a guess as to what pushed them over the edge into thinking you were rejecting them.”

“What is it?” Sasuke demands. “Tell me.”

“Did they make that scarf for you by hand, Sasuke?”

“Yes,” says Sasuke hesitantly.

“And they scented it?”

Sasuke nods affirmative.

“Did you give anything back?”

“I… Just said thank you… is that not right?”

Itachi’s alpha shakes their head with a patient smile.

“A handmade and scented gift is the most important and meaningful courting gift that there is, Sasuke,” they explain. “It’s what you give to someone to ask them if they want to move from courting to something more serious, to intended mates.”

Sasuke blushes and feels some panic rising in his chest.

“I didn’t know!” he blurts, feeling the need to explain himself.

“I know,” they rush to reassure him. “But the etiquette dictates that the omega, if they wish to move onto that stage, gives the alpha a handmade and scented gift in return, no later than a week after the original gift was given. They must have been very nervous waiting for you, and very upset when you didn’t even let them down softly.”

“It’s been two weeks,” Sasuke whispers, mortified that he had missed something he should have known. This makes so much sense. The sudden depression, the awkwardness at training, the nerves after they had given him the scarf. He’s such an idiot. Against his will, Sasuke starts to feel tears burning at his eyes again. He messed everything up!

“Oh, Sasuke,” they say, scooting closer to him. They hesitantly lay a hand on his leg, and Sasuke makes no move to push them off. “It’s alright, you can fix it.”

“How?” he sniffs, furiously wiping away any tears that manage to escape. “They probably hate me now.”

“Come here,” they say, pulling him into a hug. And for the first time ever, Sasuke accepts a hug from his brother’s alpha.

“It’s alright,” they soothe. “We can fix this, I’ll help you.”

“What can I do?” he questions, feeling miserable.

“You need to make them something and scent it. Then you can explain what happened afterwards, but the gift should go a long way in smoothing over any ruffled feathers. I can help you make something, what do you want to make?”

Sasuke shrugs, still resting his head on his brother’s alpha’s shoulder.

“How about some cupcakes? Itachi and I were planning on doing some baking with the pup tomorrow, so I have all the supplies. And I’m sure we have some ribbon lying around, you can scent the ribbon and use it to tie up the box, how does that sound?”

“But what will you use tomorrow?” Sasuke asks, feeling a little better, but still red in the face.

“I can buy more, Sasuke, don’t worry, but this is a courting emergency, so we have to do it now, okay?”

“Okay.”

…

Itachi comes back from his errands just in time to watch his mate helping his little brother tie a ribbon around a box of cupcakes. The kitchen is covered in baking supplies and empty bowls of batter.

Did they bake cupcakes together?

Itachi can’t believe it. He had been trying to get them to get along better for years.

When Sasuke sees him standing in the door, he blushes and, holding the box of cupcakes to his chest, pushes past him and out the door with a quick nothing more than a quick and murmured greeting.

His pup wiggles in his arms and demands to be put down. He obliges and they immediately run to his alpha for a hug.

“Hey there, buddy, have a good day?”

“It was boring,” they complain. “And the mednin had cold fingers.”

Itachi’s alpha laughs.

“Well, I know something that might make you feel better,” they tease.

“What?! What?!”

“Uncle Sasuke made you something very special,” they say, bringing down a spare cupcake from on top of the counter, iced in his pup's favourite colour. The way his pup’s eyes widen at the sight of it, makes Itachi smile. “You can have it after dinner, okay, and next time we see uncle Sasuke we have to remember to say thank you.”

Itachi watches in amusement as his pup nods furiously and immediately runs off to go wash up for dinner, despite the fact that Itachi hasn’t even started cooking it yet.

“Did you and Sasuke bake together?” Itachi asks, still unbelieving of what he had seen.

You smile, understanding how crazy that must have been for Itachi to walk in on.

“Yes, we… had a little bonding session,” they say. “I’ll tell you about it later, I promise.”

Itachi accepts the answer despite his curiosity and joins his alpha is cleaning the kitchen so that he can start cooking dinner.

And if both of them were smiling too much, well, neither of them brought it up.

[inviouswriting]

Family with you

Simeon x fem!reader

Some light smuts mixed in, but mostly fluff. Nothing graphic but enough to be cut.

If mc was already a mother when arriving to Devildom with their child. Needed something for myself too. 

TW: for reasoning behind the father figure not in as a result of them leaving, or uninterested. Abandoning mc. 

When you had first arrived at Devildom, the others were surprised to the child with you. Looking no older than between five to seven and hiding behind you. Lucifer was first to be taken aback by this exchange, and Diavolo immediately is dropping down to say hello.

Things progressed as they normally did afterwards. You had a stronger backbone when it came to threats and reminded the demons that you’ll have their horns and wings if anything happened to your child. 

You are single, and comforted your child as best as you can in a world full of demons. Diavolo set up a special way for your child to be cared for while you attended RAD. Spending time with Barbatos, to learn from him rather than be around all the chaos.

When you met Simeon, it was like something clicked between you two. Barbatos had brought your child to you at the end of the day, and Simeon is already enamored by them. His eyes shined at seeing them, and you feel trusting of the angel. Luke sees a potential friend, close in age, able to relax, though he felt more like an older brother figure. 

“Why not visit us a little more?” Simeon offers, and you take him up on the offer for any peace and quiet from House of Lamentations. A steady relationship bloomed between you and Simeon. Alot of the time spent guiding both Luke and your child in the right directions.

When Simeon asked how your child came to be, you felt your face hot at mentioning everything prior to Devildom, whether a joyful one or a unpleasant. Your child was someone you never regretted, even out of wedlock. 

Simeon understood the question he asked was personal, and remembered how it sounded from an angel.

“I mean genuinely, I am not asking you or putting you under a confessional. I am just curious, do you have anyone in your life... in the human world?” You see the dusting of pink on his face, and it clicks for you.

“No, they’re not in the picture anymore.” At your words Simeon takes your hands into his own, realizing he has a full chance. 

“Would you go on some dates with me then?” You are surprised at this, and want to say yes, but your eyes drift to your child playing a game with Luke. 

“I’d love to, but who would watch them?” You haven’t quite trusted the brothers, the closest one you feel you could is Beelzebub, and Asmodeus. 

“I think Barbatos can, he does enjoy both Luke and your child. I’m sure it would be fine to escape for an evening.” He offers solutions, and you agree to a date.  Agreeing was easier than the actual planning.

The night arrived, and you are dressed nicer than you normally are. Asmodeus being supportive and helped with an outfit that accents a Ristorante Six date. Simeon took care of arranging Luke and your child to be with Barbatos to learn how to cook some things together.

All that was needed was you, so Simeon met you at the restaurant. When he first saw you, he thought you really are an angel in disguise. Once inside, you talk about your life prior to Devildom, him learning more about the things you’ve gone through to raise this child, the hardships you’ve faced and he feels more protective of the idea of being with you.

Simeon walked with you for hours afterwards, you went back to House of Lamentations to drop off food you had leftovers from to Beelzebub. Promising him at least a dessert. The rest of the evening was spent walking through the city portion with Simeon. Getting to know him, his ranking as an angel, how he is raising Luke almost as a child of his own.

“More like grandson.” He amuses aloud, and you gently poke his sides. A moment is stilled between you and he takes his first kiss with you overlooking the Devildom.

After that first date, many more were had, till you are sure you are inseparable to Simeon as much as your child is so fond of Luke. 

When you became so entangled in your angels life and him in yours. You find yourself yearning for the love you two have made. Seeing him fall head over heels with your child, you laugh at moments when he is tender and gentle teaching them different ways. 

There have been only a few fights, only when it came to how you chose to raise your child. A little more firmness than Simeon letting Luke have free reign to learn from his own mistakes. You still had a role as a mother, and reminded Simeon that it works for him, but not for you in some aspects. You reminded your child of boundaries whenever Luke showed discomfort in sharing something.

After an evening of sharing insecurities with Simeon, explaining how hard it has been being alone. He runs his hands through your hair to remind you, you are not alone anymore. You question if he finds you attractive, the hour late, and you both knew Luke and your child sound asleep.

Simeon expresses his desires in you, even when you shyly bared yourself to him, he graciously kissed any marks left on your body from carrying those years ago. Didn’t care of your breasts were a little uneven, or what others have said as a “mom” body. Whether you were skinny or you never lost the weight, belly that sagged or didn’t look right to yourself.

“This is the result of the miracle you have brought into the world. And you are far more beautiful than you realize.” Simeon looks over every spot of you, blue eyes curious to the scars he may see, whether you had a rough pregnancy, or the scars left to save you both. He leaves no spot unkissed, letting you feel truly seen and loved more than the first time a man took interest only to leave later on.

Simeon sees the faint hurt in your eyes when it is reflected after kissing a spot that flared a memory. He replaces that memory with his own touch, reminding you that he loves you even as he loves you till you are clutching his bedsheets or pillows.

In the morning you feel wonderful, renewed and shy as those dark arms are wound around you possessively. Simeon not wanting to let go of you yet, your eyes being greeted to his face first thing, blue eyes meeting yours. 

You tease each other, tease long enough that Simeon coaxes you into a softer session with him in the shower together. Where he holds you up against the wall and any of those smut novels never compared to the things an angel has done to you.

When you broke the news to both Luke and your child about your relationship, Luke is surprised and almost unsure, questioning Simeon about whether he wants to risk his job as an angel. Simeon refutes this with.

“There are no risks involved, I’m in love.” You realize he could lose his wings.. you don’t want to make him choose. Your child on the other hand looks at Simeon with love in them. That an angel could literally be their father.

“Does this mean you’ll get married?” The thought crosses your mind with Simeon glancing to you, perhaps hopeful of your thoughts on the idea.

“It might mean that, if he wants to be.” You feel a squeeze in your hand from Simeon, and you catch his gaze. He is successful in the things he does, and he shines unique as an angel.

“I would love that. To have a family with you. Perhaps once we are in the human world?” Simeon asks, and you nod to make that a goal. 

The path to marriage was longer, going through so much, that the evening when Simeon actually asks you to marry him, you thought he was joking. It was on his birthday, and you had spent the day with him. Luke and your child set up a pleasant surprise for you both, getting Barbatos and Diavolo in on this unique exchange.

“Of course!” You are happy to no end and Simeon is relieved. The ceremony is held on the spot, as a more private exchange. The brothers agreed once you had chosen Simeon solely.

It isn’t until you were given a honeymoon to Diavolo’s private island that the need for your angel was truly awakened. Spending almost every day with him and night finding out just how much Simeon wanted you more than you realized. You wondered how much he held back from the first time you were together. 

Soon you settle into a routine with the new life with Simeon. That it surprised you when you found out you are pregnant again. Fear rises in you, as this was the scenario you had the first time. Perfectly happy, then it came crashing down when the other half didn’t want to be involved.

So you hide it from Simeon, for now. You wanted to wait before you told him, to see if your body could handle another. It isn’t until you are lying down fatigued that Simeon catches on. His fingers are tender as they touch your stomach to sense life, giving you a firm stare for not telling him sooner.

“My love, how long have you known?” He questions, he is already pressing his face to say hi to the life forming. 

“Only a few weeks... I wanted to be sure that this one will stay.” Simeon looks up smiling, the intensity in his eyes fades.

“My lamb... how could you keep this wonderful secret from me.” Your hands card through dark brown hair, bright blue eyes peek up more framed by dark skin. He is over the moon and nuzzles his face into your belly. 

You smile and feel a little guilty he found out this way. You wanted to tell him, and see him full of joy instead of concern. Though his happy expression keeps you from spoiling him too much. You learn him and his ways of showing love, but this side of him. 

You are amazed at how much he dotes and loves you. Seeing the blush on his face realizing all those sleepless nights resulted in a life that is of you and him. That this brings you two closer than ever.

When Simeon looks up he sees your eyes brimming with tears and he freaks wondering if he did something wrong.

“Please don’t leave me...” You plead him, and he remembers that years ago that a child is the reason your first doesn’t have a father. Whether by them leaving, vanishing, or expressing unwanted. He sees the pain return to your eyes, the wound that he had spent so many times trying to mend to heal your heart.

Simeon moves to sit with you and cups your face into his hands as he presses loving kiss after kiss.

“Never will leave you. Not now, not ever.” You tremble in sobs at the shock still going through you of the fear settling in, that it “could” happen. He could grow tired, just like before. When things got tough and they just left. 

Simeon sees the hurt still, and it takes coaxing from him to get you to curl up into his side. His colder hands pressed to your forehead as a nausea wave hits you and you let go of all your fears and tell him you are afraid he will leave you.

He assures you, he is there permanently, he won’t leave, not unless you chase him out yourself. And that breaks you of your spell, the fear of pushing a literal angel away overwhelms you and you raise up to kiss him like you haven’t before.

You still had hours before Luke and your child would be home, you spend the next few hours entangled together. You and Simeon on the floor of the house you call home. His hands going over every speck of you, and kissing away your worries. He is surprised when you take initiative to ride him, and your love making with the angel is truly felt through every nerve that you hold onto each other tight.

When you woke up much later, Simeon is next to you in the bed you share, just watching your face serenely. Foreheads pressed together.

“What time is it?” You question him, and start to raise to look at a clock and Simeon guides you to lie down.

“Almost time to make dinner. We still have time before they’re back. Let me spend this time with you?” You look at him and lay your head back down next to his. He seeks out your left hand to rub at your wedding band, while his other hand presses over your belly. He’s more loving here than what he did hours ago, touches you with such tenderness that you feel your heart thudding in your chest.

You indulge Simeon as he presses loving kisses and you both discuss the possible baby names. Simeon ever grateful you choose to be with him and love him.

[clanwarrior-tumbly]

ayup, clanny! have you seen the AGOTI mod yet? if yes, can you do some headcanons or a scenario where the newly imprisoned AGOTI meets the unwilling warden of the void who’s been trying to escape for a few years (i think time moves faster in the void), so they team up to get out. When Cherry and Keith show up, Cherry actually recognizes the warden as the crazy talented old producer for her and Tabi before they mysteriously disappeared, and they all end up escaping and the warden becomes AGOTI’s new producer. -🎋🦊

Ooooh nice idea! I love the mod so yes ......

"Ugh..stupid-ass demon scumbags!" Agoti stormed around the Void in anger, jumping from one floating rock to the next. "They couldn't handle me taking the spotlight?! What kinda bullshit is that?!!"

"Hey buddy, you might wanna chill out-"

"SHUT UP, ASSHOLE!!" Spinning around, the tendrils of his hair lashed out at the other person who spoke.

But he was surprised when you dodged the attack. With little effort you grabbed his hair and flipped him over, sending him crashing to the ground. He groaned in pain and opened his eyes, shocked to see the electrified prong aimed at his chest.

Though he also saw you were covered in armor, sporting a symbol of some kind on your chestplate. "I'm giving you one more chance to calm down." You warned. "I really don't like hurting people."

"Yeah? Well you really kicked the shit outta me just now.." Agoti hissed, but ultimately decided to give in. "Fine. I'm cool. Can ya point that thing somewhere else?"

You nodded and held your spear back to your side, while he got up and dusted himself off. "Who are you anyway?"

"The Warden of the Void. I assume you're that hotheaded "A Guy On The In-""

"Just call me Agoti. It's less of a mouthful." He put his hands on his hips, looking around at the white sky. "So you're the warden of this place? This goddamn prison that I shouldn't even be in.."

"I heard a lot of folks say that but..I'm inclined to agree with you."

He did a double-take. "Wait, really?"

"According to this log.." Waving your hand, you brought up a hologram that displayed his profile. "You're here for...outshining every singer in your town and threatening the careers of two famous rockstars?"

"...what the fuck..so they weren't bullshitting?"

"No. To be sent here because of that is an unusual punishment."

"So you can't enter a plea deal or whatever? Make those jerks come in here instead?"

"Unfortunately I can't." You made the hologram disappear. "In a way I was wrongfully imprisoned, too."

Agoti seemed baffled, so you explained how you were sent here ages ago. You've forgotten what you previously did, but one day you were just randomly given the duties of the Void's warden. Anything you needed to subdue and process prisoners was granted to you--but you could never leave even if your sentence was finished.

You've sought out ways of escaping for years...without much success. But you didn't wanna get caught, and until Agoti came here, you had no actual incentive to leave.

Once you finished your story, the screen demon hummed in thought. "So..you want out, I want out. I bet we can make something happen." With a toothy grin, he offered his hand to you. "How 'bout you show me the ropes and I'll help you find an escape? Deal?"

"It could take us a long time to figure that out." You hesitated. "You should be aware that time moves exceptionally fast in this dimension. Minutes out there are like hours in here-"

"So what? Better to start finding a way out now than later. C'mon.." Agoti was growing impatient, but fortunately he managed to get through to you, as you shook his hand.

"Alright, Agoti. It's a deal." You smiled.

...........

Neither you or Agoti knew how long it's been since you made that deal to help each other escape.

But finally, you figured it out. The solution was right there in front of you all along:

A singing battle

Singing was the key to escaping this place. With the combined soundwaves of two singers, a portal to the real world could be produced.

Now the only problem was...you were never really a singer, and Agoti was. So it wouldn't be a fair match that can create a strong-enough portal.

"You're tellin' me there ain't another goddamn singer here?!!" He fumed one day as you regrettably told him no other prisoner was proficient in music. "Great..juuuuuust GREAT!! We spent all this time and got nothing out of-!"

"Wait, what's that?"

Agoti looked to where you were pointing, seeing a portal opening up in the sky, before two figures fell out of it: a boy with blue hair and a girl in a red dress.

They crash landed onto the platform you and Agoti were on, miraculously suffering no injuries of any kind.

"Huh..this is new.." He remarked as he approached the couple.

The blue-haired boy made a beeping noise, standing up and rubbing his head. You noticed the microphone in his hands, but more notably..you recognized the girl who was with him.

"My apologies but..have we met?"

"Hm?" The brunette looked up at you, surprised, though you could see her eyes flash with recognition. "Are you...[y/n]?"

"[Y/n]? You two know each other?" Agoti quirked an eyebrow, bewildered. He hadn't known your actual name until now.

"Yeah, a long time ago I was her music producer. But last time I saw her she was with someone else." You mused, trying to remember who her last boyfriend was. "It was.....Tabi wasn't it, Charlotte?"

"Woah woah...Tabi dated her?!! No way. He never told me about that!"

"Yeah um..we were together for a while," Charlotte awkwardly chuckled. "But....I-I'd rather not talk about it. I just have a new boyfriend now. He's Keith." She gestured to the blue-haired guy.

"Yeah! And..uh...skee deh beh doo bop!" Keith pointed at Agoti, who looked offended by whatever he said.

But he went back to snarling at the pair, manifesting a microphone out of thin air as he stepped closer. "Another singer, huh? Well I hope you have better insults than that! Because we're all gonna be here a while....a very long one."

Knowing what was about to happen, you decided to stand by them and make sure nobody else interrupted, while Charlotte hopped onto a nearby floating rock.

And so you watched Agoti and Keith have a rap battle, in which your friend kept losing again and again. You did try to warn him not to lose his temper, as this could be the only chance of you two escaping this prison.

But his frustration and impatience got the better of him, as by the third round he turned the platform into a giant speaker and sent it flying into the air. Poor Charlotte was clinging onto the rock for dear life, but you caught her and tried to keep steady as the platform swayed.

"Well..so much for "staying calm"." You sighed as Agoti shouted at his rival, berating him for "insulting him", before the two had one final showdown.

Although he lost yet again, their combined efforts managed to breach a portal into the dimension, and you all escaped through it.

Finally..you and Agoti were free from this hell.

~Epilogue~

In the weeks following the events in the Void, you've decided to become Agoti's new music producer once his career started back up. Thanks to your talent, the fans returned in no time at all.

The main issue was him previously making a competition out of singing, so he decided to perform his music locally and lose the ego...just a little bit of it.

Meanwhile Solazar, his friend and manager, was concerned about Charlotte and her ties to the family that trapped you to begin with.

Though the two of you just brushed that aside for the time being, wanting a chance to experience the real world again.

It was good to be back.

[morifinwes]

Lauraa I finished all the fics, apart from decay (currently reading that now) and I love it sm! Especially the lip gloss one lmao the whole thing was so hilarious to me XD but also like the concept of lwj wearing lipgloss is >>> -yibobibo

@yibobibo then i'm going to rec you some more!! the lip gloss one was !!!!! ajsksks yes!! lwj wearing lipgloss is just so!! good!!

modern

this one is the painful one i talked about:

visitations by var_abelasan (12K, wip, divorced wangxian, post divorce, most of this is angst, uhm lowkey don't but also do want wangxian to end up together, it's messy, the jiangs & lans are shitty, wwx was in prison (brief mentions of that but it's kind of a major plot point), mxy & xy are the little brothers he never wanted but wwx picked them up anyways)

"Wei Ying-" Lan Zhan says, stutters, "I'm sorry." 

And now Wei Wuxian sees it, the red rimming Lan Zhan's eyes, the rumpled edges of his blazer. There is an old, familiar urge for him to reach over, to hold Lan Zhan's hand and smooth his hair, to tell him that everything will be fine. 

"We're all a bit sorry about this, I think," he says instead, and finds that he means it. For Lan Xichen and Lan Wangji and everyone else in that Guanyin temple, the pain must be unbearably fresh, like skin just flayed open. But Wei Wuxian's chest had been cracked open a long time ago, his wounds licked and cauterized and sewn shut over five long years - Ever hurting, but a dull, constant ache, "It's really alright, Lan Zhan."

 

Five years after being accused of corporate espionage and losing everything, the Guanyin Scandal breaks open and Wei Wuxian finds a familiar face at his door.

please don't let me be misunderstood by sysrae (3K, partly deaf!wwx, lwj notices, nobody else does though, idk wwx is like made out of fucking steel or some shit)

Lan Wangji has known Wei Ying for a fortnight, the first time he sees him get hit by a car.

light by redkosmos (10K, blind!lwj, which causes angst, but they manage it, best friends to lovers, fluff, lwj being insecure and feeling like a burden, college au kind of? but it doesn't matter too much)

The realization slowly dawns on him.

He can never again see the brightness of Wei Ying's eyes, the way they crescent when he smiles, never again see the rich black of his hair, the mess of it in the early mornings, never again see the beautiful tan of his skin, the beauty of the scars and marks adorned on it, how he wears his clothes, how it hugs his frame beautifully, how he looks like he's adorably swimming in cloth when he wears Lan Zhan's, and-

(Lan Zhan loses his vision in a car accident and learns to cope with it.)

don't leave me by trippinonskies (19K, brief very brief mention of lwj cheating, he doesn't but wwx is afraid lwj is cheating on him or just wants to break up with him, (he doesn't), marriage proposal, lwj acting distant = wwx's insecurities show up, fluff, angst and comfort)

Lan Zhan! Where are you lost today?” Wei Wuxian finally asks, at the end of his patience.

Lan Zhan looks a little guilty as he looks at Wei Wuxian, “Sorry, just a lot of work to deal with.”

Lie.

If there is one thing Lan Zhan can’t do, it’s lying. Especially to Wei Wuxian. But he doesn’t question Lan Zhan. He just accepts the reply, too scared to know that he is right. Too scared to know the truth.

// or where Lan Zhan is too hung up in planning the perfect proposal and ends up accidently ignoring Wei Wuxian making the other think that he wants to break up //

want you closer by xiaobucephalus ((3K, HORSES, only in the background tho, but wwx is an equestrian vet, which is so fucking valid bro, the lans own horses, a sick bunny, lwj the bunny parent!, super cute, dark bay throughoutbred chenqing is honestly so valid)

“Thank you,” Lan Zhan said, breathing a sigh of relief.

“Don’t thank me, Lan Zhan,” Wei Ying laughed again, his voice warming the chill of fear that had settled in his chest. “I’ve been looking for an excuse to get into your hutch for a while anyway.”

safe in your thoughts by anonymous (20K, it's a cherry magic au???? (i haven't watched it, but you have i think?), horny lwj but only for wwx (always for wwx))

Wei Wuxian learns three very important things on the night of his twenty-seventh birthday.

One, that Lan Wangji is ridiculously funny, which Wei Wuxian had known before but what Wei Wuxain hadn’t expected was Lan Wangji to be funny at his brother’s expense.

Two, that Wei Wuxian had finally gone mad, absolutely mental at the ripe age of twenty seven because nothing else would explain the third thing he had learnt.

Third, and the most unbelievable of the lot, that Lan Wangji wants to fuck him.

iura by yoo_im_finally_writing (1K, only added bcs op is right and wwx would've the cutest german accent, it's more fun if you understand german so hit me up if you want translations for the german sentences)

Wei Ying calls in the middle of the night to talk about German law, and Lan Zhan tries very hard not to fall asleep. Or at least, not to let Wei Ying notice he's falling asleep. (As best friends do.)

breathe in the air, the last of its kind by wereworm / @neverdoingmuch (27K, getting together, jealous!lwj, but also kind of supportive, brief mention of cheating bcs of miscommunication, no actual cheating tho, college au, lwj pov)

Following Wei Ying’s line of sight, Lan Wangji can barely prevent a smile from crossing his lips when he sees the short row of rabbit statuettes placed at the front of the display. Silver, with bright gems for eyes, they look elegant yet lively and animated.

“A-Yuan would love one of those,” Wei Ying murmurs, almost as if to himself.

Lan Wangji frowns; the rabbits, while cute, don’t seem like a suitable gift for Wei Ying’s A-Yuan.

...

It’s only when he glances back at the rabbits and notices what has been placed on display behind them, that the pieces fall into place. They’re engagement rings, there’s no doubt about it. Lan Wangji feels his heart sink – Wei Ying isn’t just dating A-Yuan, he wants to propose to him.

Or: the five times Lan Wangji thinks that A-Yuan is Wei Ying’s boyfriend and the one time he learns the truth.

paint smears on sunny days by snowshadowao3 / @angstsexual (53K, getting together, art teacher!wwx, single parent!lwj, they're rich if i remember right, wwx & lwj are both good with kids!!!, this is so good actually, fluff)

To say that he runs to his car would be incorrect, as he is a Lan, and running is both undignified and unnecessary unless in immediate danger. Nor does he slam his key into the ignition, or aggressively swerve around the cars on the freeway, or have a mild panic attack at the fact he is picking A-Yuan up late from school for the first time ever.

He comes close, though.

By the time he arrives, it’s 4:35PM, and he has imagined about fifty different worse-case scenarios. The door is partly open when he gets to it, a messy label of 104B—Art Room scrawled with chalk on a placard next to the faded wood. As he opens it fully, he expects to see a wailing, terrified child, or perhaps a scene of utter misery and betrayal.

What he finds is his son, hands covered in paint, being sung to by a beautiful, dark-haired stranger.

“Ducks live in the pond, yellow ducks, happy ducks!”

Lan Wangji stops in his tracks.

(Or: Falling in love with your son’s art teacher, in five parts)

no bunny compares by gusucloudbunny (4K, god this is cute, fluff)

“Lan Zhan!” Wei Wuxian cornered his friend one week before his birthday. “If you could have anything in the world, what would it be?”

Lan Wangji furrowed his brow at Wei Wuxian, not exactly sure how to answer that question in a truthful manner that didn’t involve confessing his undying love for his best friend.

Wei Wuxian is on a mission to get Lan Wangji the perfect gift for his birthday. What Wei Wuxian doesn't know is that the only thing Lan Wangji truly wants is him.

wei wuxian's week of realizing things by photojenny (12K, i have read this multiple times, i always forget what happens, idk why but my notes say it's good, the tags say drunkji makes an appearance and i'm always up for that)

"Lan Zhan, do you like Mianmian?" asked Wei Wuxian.

Lan Wangji blinked, and stared. It was not the first time Lan Wangji had questioned the perceptiveness of the boy he had a crush on. Wei Wuxian had been smart in the class they had taken together. Yet time and time again, Wei Wuxian had tested the old wisdom that there are no stupid questions.

---

Lan Wangji must figure out how to confess when Wei Wuxian is the most oblivious person he's ever met.

are you my wisdom tooth? because i'd like to take you out by yellowcarnations (1K, crack, fluff, lwj stop flirting with a stranger, even if he is your husband, drunkji but make it to max level)

Lan Zhan wakes up and he has no idea where he is.

There are bright lights and his jaw hurts, he doesn't who this man next to his bed is but oh he might be in love, maybe, probably, definitely.

–

based off that guy-forgets-who-his-wife-is-and-hits-on-her vid but its wangxian.

beep! goes his heart by wearing_tearing (3K, fluff, lwj is like "he, he likes me right? he likes me" and everyone is like "yes, yes he does")

“Wei Ying’s heart monitor,” Lan Wangji starts.

Wen Qing blinks at him. “Yes?”

“It beeps.”

“That’s… what they generally do, yes.”

“The beeps change,” Lan Wangji continues, “when others are around.”

*

Wei Ying’s heart only sings for Lan Wangji.

canon

obedient and bellicose by thunderwear (19K, lwj is cursed by the lan elders, they notice too late, fix-it fic kind of?, lqr being a good uncle and lxc is a good brother, wwx accidentally uses the curse but he doesn't know about it)

It took Lan Wangji a long time to realize he was cursed. Too long really, anyone else would have noticed so much sooner. The problem was, he liked following the rules.

Ella Enchanted AU that no one needed but I wanted.

hello my old heart, how have you been? by ravenditefairylights (10K, amnesia, fluff, wwx taking care of lwj, so much fluff and softness, angst too but not that much)

The issue is, Lan Wangji brings his thoughts back before they stray too far, that it is impossible for someone to be in his bed, unless Lan Wangji himself invited them. He has not. He would remember doing so, and besides, all his night clothes are still on and there is no headache to imply that he was inebriated last night. No, the situation is simple.

There is someone in Lan Wangji’s bed. It is impossible for anyone to be in Lan Wangji’s bed, and yet that doesn’t seem to have stopped the stranger.

or lan wangji wakes up, and wei ying is there. he doesn't understand how or why, and he can understand even less why his hallucination of wei ying is so insistent on bathing him, and braiding his hair, on holding him and fixing his clothes. why the hallucination of wei ying seems so happy to see him.

teach me the way by likeafox (58K, rogue cultivator!wwx, horny wangxian, lwj wants wwx to teach him how to be a good lover, ....wwx is a virgin, the porn is the plot, but there's less of it than i thought)

"I do not wish to leave my future spouse… dissatisfied with my intimate knowledge,” Lan Zhan says, very seriously. “I am hoping to find an instructor, to better prepare myself for such matters."

Wei Ying feels his mouth drop open. He's pretty sure the Second Jade of Lan just told him he's a virgin who wants to learn how to do sex good.

Rogue Cultivator Wei Wuxian is the stuff of local legends. Some of those legends are even true! The ones about his tremendous experience in bed, on the other hand, are not so true. Which becomes a problem when Lan Wangji, on the verge of an arranged marriage and worried he won’t know how to please his future spouse, enlists Wei Ying's help to teach him the art of love-making. Wei Ying's great at improvisation, though, and is pretty sure he's got this sex mentor thing under control. What could possibly go wrong

other aus

of god: my love unholy by tunnelodfawn (3K, tw blood / war, dark!lwj, god!wwx, kind of poetry)

Lan Zhan takes everything as a sign from his god. The blood staining his fingertips—a holy anointment. He sanctifies himself through blood. The strings of his guqin gleam red in the sun—a divine blessing. This is an instrument of destruction. A single note—a cry of power—and in this note the voice of his god unravels the earthly threads tethering man to earth.

The Yiling Patriarch blesses Lan Zhan with war. Wei Wuxian blesses Lan Zhan with agility. Wei Ying blesses Lan Zhan with love.

The base of the Yiling Patriarch’s shrine is the home of Lan Zhan’s knees. He worships. There is something of the blasphemous and the unholy in his prayers. He prays not for victory but for the sight of Wei Ying. Bless me with your presence, he begs.

Or, wherein, Lan Zhan bridges the gap between the mortal and the divine—the worshipper and the god—with blood.

the river and the sea by sasamelons / @sasamelons (7K, soulmate au, arranged marriage (wangxian with each other), they're both kind of dumb but i love it)

Lan Wangji gritted his teeth, wishing to just be left alone. "I am looking for my soulmate," he ground out.

"Oh."

It took Lan Wangji a few moments to realize that Wei Wuxian had stopped following him. When he looked back, the other boy seemed to be frozen to the spot, eyes wide and lips still parted. He quickly looked away when he saw Lan Wangji looking back. "I see. Well, have a good trip!"

--

At six years old, Lan Zhan met his soulmate on the streets of Yiling and promptly lost him again.

At sixteen years old, Lan Wangji met his betrothed and was determined not to like him.

[byproducts-of-my-imagination]

Pining [Akaashi Keiji 1/2]

1.2k words.  There will be some form of closure.  Eventually.  Someday.

Sorry if you already saw this, I took it down an am reposting because tumblr glitched and yeeted all my stuff.  

It's not the first time this has happened, not the first time you've woken up with his image in your mind.  It hurts all the same, that deep aching regret which cuts like a knife.  It wasn't even like you were super close to Akaashi Keiji.  He had plenty of closer friends on the volleyball team.  It was a schoolgirl crush that took root in you and refused to die.  Even though years and years have passed, nothing will be able to erase his gunmetal blue eyes from your memories, or his beautiful skin, pale in the moonlight.  It's like they say: you never forget your first love.  To some extent that's true, but not everyone still thinks of their first love after years of separation, or during other relationships.  You've never been able to love properly because of him and it sucks ass.

Slogging through assignment after assignment is numbing, but you've been forced to get used to it.  Life is life, and work is going to be there no matter what you do.  College is not worth the hype, but you do it anyways.  You do it because you've been told your entire life that you absolutely need to, that a degree is a requisite in the workforce.  You do it because everyone else does, another link in a chain of struggling students just trying to have a life.  

It's annoying, the way it just bites at you from time to time.  Like your brain just won't let him go.  You hear him calling your name, with that teasing lilt in his voice.  You feel the familiar brush of his shoulder against yours just like he did when he used to walk you to class, ages ago in high school.  The worst thing is that you still have the random trinkets he gave you over the years, in the box on your shelf where you store things most precious to you.  You're stuck in a vicious cycle, repeating memories from so long ago.  You see him in your dreams like you see movies in theaters.  He's been immortalized in your mind and you've been doomed to love him forever.  

But you have to let him go at some point, right?  In the later years of high school, when you saw him less and less, you barely thought about him.  But it only took one short "hey" in the hallways for that feeling to come crashing back, for you to start fixating on him again.  It's really not healthy, but you can't help it.  In your sparse interactions, he gave you hope each time.  You could hope that he loved you too, probably mistaking friendly affection for real affection.  

When you separated to different schools, that was the end of it.  At least, for a while.  A fresh start only seemed to temporarily distract you.  Since you stopped thinking about him during the day, he came back at night to haunt your dreams.

And so it goes.  

Your brain likes to play cruel tricks on you.  It likes to dream of way too detailed scenarios with him, little everyday things, domestic snapshots that make your heart ache.  Imagining him there, with you.  

Your heart squeezes, like it's the last time you'll see him.  The last time you did, you didn't know.  But even if you had known, what good would it have done you?  Now every time he shows up, it feels like the last.  And he'll never know.  And you'll never know if he feels the same.  Which he likely doesn't.

You never could say goodbye.

Imagine your surprise, to find him in your class one day back in high school.  Just after an offhand conversation about it.  Dare you hope to think he transferred to be with you?  Do you even dare to get your hopes up for him?  To be brushed aside, again?  

It's just a coincidence, you tell yourself.  Just a coincidence, you say.  Just a coincidence, you pray.  

You imagine.  It's all you can do at this point, imagine him.  That perfection that is Akaashi Keiji.  After years of not seeing him, he's more like a figment of your imagination.  You know the way you picture him is outdated, you know for sure he's grown.  But you as much as you try to imagine what he looks like currently, you can't.  It's a defense mechanism, perhaps, a way to preserve those times, the person he used to be.  Maybe it's a way to hold on.  Maybe it's because you know the current him and the current you have too much distance to ever happen.  

You entertain the idea of sending him a text.  You have him on social media, but he's not active.  Although you do see that he always likes Bokuto’s posts, his handle shows as the first one, taunting you each time.  “Liked by keiji.akaashi and 25,381 others.”  The social media algorithms know you too well.  They know you visit his empty profile too often for your own good.

He wouldn't see a text from you, you reason, coming up with excuse after excuse for your cowardice.  You don't say what your subconscious nudges at you.  It'd be devastating if he saw it and didn't respond, or worse, didn't remember who you were.  Because there's no guarantee he would remember.  You'd think he would, but there's a chance he doesn't.  And you can't take that chance.  You couldn't face yourself, if he'd forgotten you.  Because it'd shatter you, and feed the devil on your shoulder.  It would invalidate what you've spent hours dreaming of.  Tears prick at your eyes, mind running a mile a minute.  What if he actually forgot who you were?  It'd ruin you. He'd ruin you, no matter what outcome.  

There's just no way to explain that magnetism.  All your friends thought it was a simple crush, a brief infatuation that would fade eventually.  Maybe he liked you back at one point.  You’re pretty sure he did, at least a little bit.  But even if he did, it wouldn't work.  A lopsided relationship is a one way ticket to splitsville.  Because there's no way, no way he loves you as much as you love him.  You couldn't take it if he did.  

And so it goes.

Whenever it's time to make a wish —birthdays, fallen eyelashes, dandelions, auspicious times— you used to wish he'd love you.  After a few wishes, you decided you didn't need him to love you.  You just wanted to see him, as pathetic as that sounds.  So you began to wish, wish for a chance encounter with him.  You've long since given that up, but every time you hear, "make a wish" it's like you default to wishing to see him.  

It's terrible, the way you habitually look for him whenever you go anywhere.  The way you sweep a room to look for his figure, to feel his presence.  Maybe wishes do come true.  But your wishes have never come true.  He's never there.  Completely unavailable to you.  

He was your god given solace.  He still is somehow, still is your shelter, your protector.  You're not really okay with the fact that that might never change.

[therianimal]

My System’s Experiences: switching hosts and a disconnected past

It took years before we realized that the complete personality shifts we experienced at various points in our life was us switching between hosts. Before I was host (or even existed at all), there was Lucas; a few years before him, Eren. The earliest host we know of is 4 years old and was the host during our preschool years. It seems inconceivable that we wouldn’t know - but as a system that has no amnesia, experiences the world as “different people sharing a single consciousness”, experiences switching less like “stepping back” and more like changing perspectives, and exists in a place between median and multiple, these changes disguised themselves as life phases.

It made sense to us that being 16 would feel different than being 12, and we were aware that changing over time was a normal experience for children and teenagers. Sure, it seemed weird that as a child we were definitely a girl, during our early teen years we were likely nonbinary and during our late teen years we were a trans man - it was never really clear to us WHY we changed so much.

That is, until I realized that we were plural, and that we have always been different people who simply passed the mantle of Host along like some kind of hereditary monarchy. It seems somewhat obvious now - the fact that I used to say things like “back when I was Lucas”, that I didn’t have childhood memories of being a therian, and that each “life phase” involved a completely different personality, set of interests, and sense of self were all signs. Even my dad is prone to saying things like “You’re a completely different person now than you were when you were 16″ (I really get a kick out of the double meaning). But it wasn’t until I started to consider that I (we!) might be plural that the truth about our past hosts came out into the open.

Our obliviousness can be accounted for by another issue: the specifics of how we switched hosts. I like to compare the scenario to mitosis - one member gradually becoming two. It would take months before the two people were distinct, at which time the new member would usurp as the new host and the previous one would go into dormancy. Because it’s so gradual we can't pinpoint an exact moment when each switch happened, and it's sometimes hard to clarify whether a past event happened to one member or another.

I’ve started to refer to the mid-mitosis host as “proto”, thqe in between of Lucas and me being “proto-Blue”. Lucas was a trans man and emo, and I’m a mascfem nonbinary person who isn’t particularly alt - our mid-self was still trans but more gender nonconforming and no longer 100% male, and they still listened to emo and rock music but had moved away from the clothing style. This "self" doesn't exist in our system as an actual person - it was simply an in-between stage. This host change (and all the others as far as we can tell) was fluid and not at all a sudden switch.

When Lucas returned from dormancy, it was chaos. He had been functionally asleep for three years - in the meantime, I had broken up on bad terms with his best friend/girlfriend, socially detransitioned (he had worked hard to come out as a trans man), and thrown away most of his old clothing and possessions. Trump had even become president, which was honestly one of the most overwhelming things. And he suddenly had to confront the fact that we were plural, that he had not always been host, and most of all that he had lost several years of (what he thought was) his life. I had to confront similar issues, but for me it was gradual while for him it was all at once.

Since then, several of our past hosts have reawakened - but not all. There are large unaccounted for periods of time, presumably involving still-dormant system members. It’s difficult to talk about our/”my” past, because when referring to things that occurred between the ages of 15 and 17 I can usually say “Lucas did X”, but how do I refer to the incidences that happened to unknown hosts? On top of that, due to years of assuming we were one person and each of us claiming past events as “my past”, it’s not that easy to say that X event belongs to one person and Y belongs to another. Things that happened to Eren while she was host often feel just as relevant to me, personally, as things that happened while I was host.

This all creates a confusing communication barrier, and risks creating conflicts between members - for example if I say “I got a perfect score on the reading portion of the SAT when I was 12!” would that be unfairly taking credit for Eren’s accomplishments, or simply describing an element of our shared narrative that feels relevant to me? There has been at least one conflict with another member where I was accused of selectively taking credit for their good deeds and accomplishments while disowning failures and negative actions - I believe that was a misunderstanding, but clearly it’s complicated.

I, as an individual, have only existed for four years. It sounds strange to say that as a 22 year old, but it’s true. This sometimes makes it alienating to spend time in identity-based communities like the therian, otherkin, transgender, and other LGBTQ communities. I once attempted to join a trans Amino, only to find that I was required to explain my “trans self discovery story” in an introduction post - it wasn’t even optional! How do I explain “In our teenage years, Eren felt disconnected from gender but couldn’t put it into words. Then we learned about trans people, and Lucas discovered over the course of a few months that he was a trans man. I knew I was nonbinary from day one (four years ago), though figuring out the details has taken a few years.” To someone who knows nothing about plurality, it’s incomprehensible.

Of course I could have made something up or oversimplified things, but at the time I was on Amino to discover my truth, not hide my truth. Due to the “born this way” narrative, saying something like “I identified as a trans man in my teen years, but later on identified as nonbinary” would imply that our experiences as a trans man were fake or the result of a confused misnomer, when they were very real. Directly undermining our experiences and our reality for the sake of community really sucks; I quickly left that Amino.

I’ve had similar issues in the therian community. I first realized I was a therian/nonhuman before realizing I was a member of a plural system, which caused all sorts of confusion for me. I joined the Therian Guide forums and learned from their posts and resources that “If you didn’t have therianthropy related experiences as a child, that means you’re just a confused human who’s been influenced by the internet and is having a wishkin phase." I wanted to believe that wasn’t the case, but the argument made sense and I had no counterargument to make against it and no way to explain why that rule wouldn’t apply to me.

Even now it sometimes feels alienating to encounter online threads and posts centered around the question “What signs did you experience as a child?”. I know that other people’s experience don’t invalidate mine, and vice versa, but it still sometimes makes me feel out of place. Rationally I understand that nonhuman experiences are highly varied and that's okay! - but insecurity isn't rational. I’m still acclimating to the idea that as a pluran my nonhuman experiences will probably never be the same as a “stereotypical” otherkin or therian (if such a thing exists).

I went into this essay expecting to write a short post about how my lack of childhood/teen years has sometimes caused me to feel alienated in the therian community. But as I was writing I realized I had a lot to say about my system, and felt compelled to change angles and truly discuss our host history. It might be a bit random, but I hope that at least some people will find it interesting.

[sgt-paul]

Paul McCartney Is Still Trying to Figure Out Love – The New York Times Magazine

By David Marchese, Nov. 29, 2020

Paul McCartney, like the rest of us, this year found himself with an unexpected amount of time stuck indoors. Unlike the rest of us — or most of us, anyway — he used that time to record a new album. The pandemic-induced circumstances of its creation may mark “McCartney III” as an outlier in the former Beatle’s catalog, but as its title suggests, it does have precedents: Like “McCartney” (1970) and “McCartney II” (1980), the album, out Dec. 18, was primarily recorded by McCartney alone, with him playing nearly all the instruments and handling all the production. “At no point,” McCartney said, “did I think: I’m making an album. I’d better be serious. This was more like: You’re locked down. You can do whatever the hell you want.” Which was a gas, as always. “What I’m amazed with,” McCartney explained, “is that I’m not fed up with music. Because, strictly speaking, I should have gotten bored years ago.”

It seems to me that working on music by yourself, as you did on the new album, might allow for some insights about what you do and how you do it. So are there aspects of “McCartney III” that represent creative growth to you? 

The idea of growing and adding more arrows to your bow is nice, but I’m not sure if I’m interested in it. The thing is, when I look back to “Yesterday,” which was written when I was 21 or something, there’s me talking like a 90-year-old: “Suddenly I’m not half the man I used to be.” Things like that and “Eleanor Rigby” have a kind of wisdom. You would naturally think, OK, as I get older I’m going to get deeper, but I’m not sure that’s true. I think it’s a fact of life that personalities don’t change much. Throughout your life, there you are.

Is there anything different about the nature of your musical gift today at 78 than in 1980 or 1970 or when you first started writing songs? 

It’s the story that you’re telling. That changes. When I first said to John, “I’ve written a few songs,” they were simple. My first song was called “I Lost My Little Girl” — four chords. Then we went into the next phase of songwriting, which was talking to our fans. Those were songs like “Thank You Girl,” “Love Me Do,” “Please Please Me.” Then came a rich vein as we got more mature, with things like “Let It Be,” “The Long and Winding Road.” But basically I think it’s all the same, and you get lucky sometimes. Like, “Let It Be” came from a dream where my mother had said that phrase. “Yesterday” came from a dream of a melody. I’m a great believer in dreams. I’m a great rememberer of dreams.

What’s the last interesting dream you had? 

Last night’s was pretty good.

What was it? 

It was of a sexual nature, so I’m not sure it’s good for the Kids section. Pretty cool, though. Very interesting, dreams of a sexual nature when you’re married. Because your married head is in the dream saying: “Don’t do this. Don’t go here.” And just to let you know, I didn’t. It was still a good dream.

You know, I was conscious of not mentioning the Beatles early in this interview, and you’ve already mentioned them a few times. So let me ask you: The band broke up 50 years ago. You were in it for roughly 10 years. When you’re not doing interviews or playing concerts, how central to your own story of your life are those 10 years from half a century ago? 

Very. It was a great group. That’s commonly acknowledged.

Generally speaking. 

[Laughs.] It’s like your high school memories — those are my Beatles memories. This is the danger: At a dinner party, I am liable to tell stories about my life, and people already know them. I can see everyone stifling a yawn. But the Beatles are inescapable. My daughter Mary will send me a photo or a text a few times a week: “There you were on an advert” or “I heard you on the radio.” The thing that amazes me now, because of my venerable age, is that I will be with, like, one of New York’s finest dermatologists, and he will be a rabid Beatles fan. All of that amazes me. We were trying to get known, we were trying to do good work and we did it. So to me, it’s all happy memories.

“McCartney III” will come out very close to the 40th anniversary of John Lennon’s death. Has your processing of what happened to him changed over the years? 

It’s difficult for me to think about. I rerun the scenario in my head. Very emotional. So much so that I can’t really think about it. It kind of implodes. What can you think about that besides anger, sorrow? Like any bereavement, the only way out is to remember how good it was with John. Because I can’t get over the senseless act. I can’t think about it. I’m sure it’s some form of denial. But denial is the only way that I can deal with it. Having said that, of course I do think about it, and it’s horrible. You do things to help yourself out of it. I did an interview with Sean, his son. That was nice — to talk about how cool John was and fill in little gaps in his knowledge. So it’s little things that I am able to do, but I know that none of them can get over the hill and make it OK. But you know, after he was killed, he was taken to Frank Campbell’s funeral parlor in New York. I’m often passing that. I never pass it without saying: “All right, John. Hi, John.”

And how about your perspective on the work you did together? Has that changed? 

I always thought it was good. I still think it’s good. Sometimes I had to reassure him that it was good. I remember one time he said to me: “What are they going to think of me when I’m dead? Am I going to be remembered?” I felt like the older brother, even though he was older than me. I said: “John, listen to me. You are going to be so remembered. You are so [expletive] great that there’s no way that this disappears.” I guess that was a moment of insecurity on his part. He straightened me up on other occasions. It was a great collaboration. I can’t think of any better collaboration, and there have been millions. I feel very lucky. We happened upon each other in Liverpool through a friend of mine, Ivan Vaughan. Ivan said, “I think you’d like this mate of mine.” Everyone’s lives have magic, but that guy putting me and John together and then George getting on a bus — an awful lot of coincidences had to happen to make the Beatles.

People always ask you about John. I’ve noticed they rarely ask about George, who of course also died relatively young. 

John is probably the one in the group you would remember, but the circumstances of his death were particularly harrowing. When you die horrifically, you’re remembered more. But I like your point, which is: What about George? I often think of George because he was my little buddy. I was thinking the other day of my hitchhiking bursts. This was before the Beatles. I suddenly was keen on hitchhiking, so I sold this idea to George and then John.

I know this memory. You and George hitchhiked to Paignton.

Yeah, Exeter and Paignton. We did that, and then I also hitchhiked with John. He and I got as far as Paris. What I was thinking about was — it’s interesting how I was the instigator. Neither of them came to me and said, “Should we go hitchhiking?” It was me, like, “I’ve got this great idea.”

Why is that interesting? 

My theory is that attitude followed us into our recording career. Everyone was hanging out in the sticks, and I used to ring them up and say, “Guys, it’s time for an album.” Then we’d all come in, and they’d all be grumbling. “He’s making us work.” We used to laugh about it. So the same way I instigated the hitchhiking holidays, I would put forward ideas like, “It’s time to make an album.” I don’t remember Ringo, George or John ever ringing me up and saying that.

How strange is it to share an idle recollection from your youth, as you just did with that hitchhiking story, and then have the person to whom you’re sharing it — in this case, me — know the memory? It seems as though it would be weird. 

It’s quite annoying, David. It’s like people at dinner yawning when I’m telling stories. This keeps happening to me.

I even know the details. You and George slept on the beach. 

That’s right.

Some Salvation Army girls kept you warm. 

Yes.

Then at some point you sat on a car battery and zapped your ass? 

That was George who did that! I have a very clear recollection. He showed me the scar. Let’s set the record straight: It was George’s ass, and it was a burn the exact shape of a zip from his jeans.

Do you remember the last thing George said to you? 

We said silly things. We were in New York before he went to Los Angeles to die, and they were silly but important to me. And, I think, important to him. We were sitting there, and I was holding his hand, and it occurred to me — I’ve never told this — I don’t want to hold George’s hand. You don’t hold your mate’s hands. I mean, we didn’t anyway. And I remember he was getting a bit annoyed at having to travel all the time — chasing a cure. He’d gone to Geneva to see what they could do. Then he came to a special clinic in New York to see what they could do. Then the thought was to go to L.A. and see what they could do. He was sort of getting a bit, “Can’t we just stay in one place?” And I said: “Yes, Speke Hall. Let’s go to Speke Hall.” That was one of the last things we said to each other, knowing that he would be the only person in the room who would know what Speke Hall was. You probably know what the hell it is.

Yep.

I can’t amaze you with anything! Anyway, the nice thing for me when I was holding George’s hands, he looked at me, and there was a smile.

How many good Beatles stories are there left to tell that haven’t been told? 

There are millions. Sometimes the reason is that they’re too private, and I don’t want to go gossiping. But the main stories do get told and told again.

Can you think of one now that you haven’t told before? 

Hmm. I will rake through the embers. Oh, I’ll tell you one! I thought of one this morning. It’s pretty good. I don’t think I’ve told it. You’re going to have to say in the article, “I forced this out of him,” because it’s a bit telling-out-of-school.

I am hereby twisting your arm. 

So when we did the album “Abbey Road,” the photographer was set up and taking the pictures that ended up as the album cover. Linda was also there taking incidental pictures. She has some that are of us — I think it was all four of us — sitting on the steps of Abbey Road studios, taking a break from the session, and I’m in quite earnest conversation with John. This morning I thought, I remember why. John’s accountants had rung my accountants and said: “Someone’s got to tell John he’s got to fill in his tax returns. He’s not doing it.” So I was trying to say to him, “Listen, man, you’ve got to do this.” I was trying to give him the sensible advice on not getting busted for not doing your taxes. That’s why I looked so earnest. I don’t think I’ve told that story before.

Tax filings — that’s some deep arcana. 

I have dredged the barrel.

I know that your goal with making music is to do something that pleases yourself. What’s most pleasing to you on the new album? 

I’m very happy with “Women and Wives.” I’ve been reading a book about Lead Belly. I was looking at his life and thinking about the blues scene of that day. I love that tone of voice and energy and style. So I was sitting at my piano, and I’m thinking about Huddie Ledbetter, and I started noodling around in the key of D minor, and this thing came to me. “Hear me women and wives” — in a vocal tone like what I imagine a blues singer might make. I was taking clues from Lead Belly, from the universe, from blues. And why I’m pleased with it is because the lyrics are pretty good advice. It’s advice I wouldn’t mind getting myself.

There’s a song on “McCartney III,” “Pretty Boys,” that is kind of unusual for you in how the music is sort of unassuming but the lyrics have an almost sinister edge. What inspired that one? 

I’ll tell you exactly. I’ve been photographed by many photographers through the years. And when you get down to London, doing sessions with people like David Bailey, they can get pretty energetic in the studio. It’s like “Blow-Up,” [the director Michelangelo Antonioni’s 1966 film thriller about a fashion photographer, thought to be loosely based on David Bailey] you know? “Give it to me! [Expletive] the lens!” And it’s like: “What? No, I’m not going to.” But I understand why they’re doing that. They’re that kind of artist. So you allow it. Certain photographers — they tend to be very good photographers, by the way — can be totally out of line in the studio. So “Pretty Boys” is about male models. And going around New York or London, you see the lines of bicycles for hire. It struck me that they’re like models, there to be used. It’s most unfortunate.

“Lavatory Lil” is another song I was curious about. That’s quite a title. 

“Lavatory Lil” is a parody of someone I didn’t like. Someone I was working with who turned out to be a bit of a baddie. I thought things were great; it turned nasty. So I made up the character Lavatory Lil and remembered some of the things that had gone on and put them in the song. I don’t need to be more specific than that. I will never divulge who it was.

I have another bigger-picture question. In your experience, how is the love in a marriage different at different stages of your life and in different marriages?

I don’t think it’s different. It’s always a splendid puzzle. Even though I write love songs, I don’t think I know what’s going on. It would be great if it was smooth and wonderful all the time, but you get pockets of that, and sometimes it’s — you could be annoying. To Nancy I’m pretty complex, with everything I’ve been through.

In what ways? 

I’m some poor working-class kid from Liverpool. I’ve done music all my life. I’ve had huge success, and people often try to do what I want, so you get a false feeling of omnipotence. All that together makes a complex person. We’re all complex. Well, maybe I’m more complex than other people because of coming from poverty.

And how do you think about money these days? 

It has obviously changed. What has stayed the same is the central core. When I was in Liverpool as a kid, I used to listen to people’s conversations. I remember a couple of women going on about money: “Ah, me and my husband, we’re always arguing about money.” And I remember thinking very consciously, “OK, I’ll solve that; I will try to get money.” That set me off on the “Let’s not have too many problems with money” trail. What happened also was, not having much money, when anything came into the house, it was important. It was important when my weekly comic was delivered. Or my penpal — I had a penpal in Spain, Rodrigo — when his letter came through, that was a big event. When they had giveaways in comics with little trinkets, I kept them all. Some people would say that’s a hoarding instinct, but not having anything when I was a kid has stuck with me as far as money. You know, I’m kind of crazy. My wife is not. She knows you can get rid of things you don’t need.

You’re a hoarder? 

I’m a keeper. If I go somewhere and I get whatever I bought in a nice bag, I will want to keep the bag. My rationale is that I might want to put my sandwiches in it tomorrow. Whereas Nancy says, “We’ll get another bag.” In that way, my attitude toward money hasn’t changed that much. It’s the same instinct to preserve. One of the great things now about money is what you can do with it. Family and friends, if they have any medical problem, I can just say, “I’ll help.” The nicest thing about having money is you can help people with it.

Something that has been a constant for you musically is your ability to keep coming up with melodies. It’s there on the new album — the melodies all flow. Is your facility for writing a catchy melody ever an obstacle to getting the songs to be more than just catchy? Because a good tune by itself is not always enough to make a good song. “Bip Bop” would be an example of that. Do you know what I’m saying? 

No, I know. “Bip Bop” is not lyrically stunning. I was always embarrassed about that song. Literally, it goes, “Bip Bop / take your bottom dollar.” It’s inconsequential. But I mentioned that to a friend, a producer, a few years ago, and he said, “That’s my favorite song of yours.” So you don’t know what people like. It’s enough if I like it and enjoyed putting it on record and don’t particularly want to think of any more lyrics. I don’t want to sweat it. Sometimes maybe it would be better if I sweated it. Once or twice I tried to sweat it, and I hated it. It’s like, What are you doing this for?

Sixty-something years into writing songs, do you feel any closer to knowing where melodies come from? 

No. There is something with my ability to write music that I don’t think I’m necessarily responsible for. It just seems to come easier to me — touch wood — than it does to some people. That’s it. I’m a fortunate man.

[skeezsbbygirl]

call me that too + kim seungmin

this one’s for anon who requested a seungmin scenario with a dash of oppa kink. i didn’t go too overboard hehe, just a sprinkle of a suggestive theme at the end (i’ll leave it to your imagination asdjhfrirgjgl cuz i can’t handle them feelssss ugh)

nonetheless, I hope you guys enjoy! oh and thank you for the love that you guys are showing for “peaches + bang chan” uwuuuu (ღ˘⌣˘ღ)

REQUEST BOX IS STILL OPEN. STREAM GOD’S MENU AND VOTE FOR OUR BOYS.

[5:12 p.m.] A yawn escaped your lips as you managed to go through all your assigned lectures for the day. You logged out from your university's portal and shut your laptop close, not wanting to stare at the bright screen any longer. You sauntered towards the kitchen and opened the drawer that contained all your caffeine-related pick-me-ups. As you were about to grab a mug, your actions were halted by your phone's ringtone, signalling a call as it rang on the coffee table from your apartment's living room. You managed to accept the call before it was dropped.

SeungMong <3

"Hey," you answered, sauntering back to the kitchen as you cradled your phone in between your right ear and shoulder to keep your hands free. "Baby, are you busy?" Seungmin asked. You shook your head but you mentally facepalmed as you remembered that the boy on the other line couldn't see you, "No. I just finished some school stuff. What's up?"

"Can you come over? Chan-hyung wants to take us out for dinner," Seungmin replied and you could faintly hear Jisung and Changbin screaming in the background -- something about Chan covering food expenses for the first time. You lightly chuckled and responded, "Yeah sure, I'll be there in twenty."

An hour passed and you were all gathered at the boys’ go-to restaurant, which was three blocks down from your university's dormitory.

"Am I dreaming?" Jisung teased as he hopped off Chan's car, Changbin and Jeongin not far behind him. “Somebody drive him back home,” Chan groaned to which the younger one giggled, jumping on his back in the process. “Hyung, come on. I was just poking fun at you,” Jisung cooed at the elder, earning him a light flick on the forehead from Chan.

You beamed at the sight of the boys playfully bickering. “Pay attention to me,” Seungmin whined and nudged your shoulder. You broke into a cheesy grin and gave his cheek a peck, “You always have my attention.”

Seungmin extended a hand towards you, to which you gladly complied, squeezing his hand three times as you intertwined your hand with his -- your silent way of saying ‘I love you’. 

Soon after, you guys were seated inside the restaurant and you fell into each of your own said conversations. 

“How was your day?” Seungmin asked as he adjusted his seat closer to yours. “Better now that I’m with you,” you said in a voice soft with affection. Seungmin chuckled, “Stop it.” You shook your head, leaning closer so that your forehead touched his. “You’re so cute,” you teased, which earned you a pout from the older male. “You do know that I’m a year older than you, right?” Seungmin bragged. You rolled your eyes, “Your point being?”

Seungmin sighed in defeat, opting to plant a kiss on your lips, but you were interrupted by multiple groans and a chorus of complains. “Get a room already!” Felix exclaimed with his hands covering his eyes, a poor attempt to discard the sight of yours and Seungmin’s “sickening” affection, as Minho described it. You stuck a tongue out at Felix, “Stop being so bitter.”

Felix faked sob and Jeongin joined in on his act, embracing the older male and patting his head.

Soon, your playful banter came to an end as your orders arrived. You guys were eating in silence, uttering a compliment here and there towards the dishes that you were served, until Hyunjin called for your attention.

“Oh, (y/n), before I forget,” the older male started, only stopping for a second to sip on his drink. “I found that outline you’ve been looking for,” he continued. “Please tell me you have it,” you pleaded, eager to finish the book review that your professor has quested upon your class a week ago. Hyunjin nodded, “The copy is in the car, I got you.”

You cheered as you reached out your hand to give him a high-five. “You’re the best, oppa.”

With your response, Hyunjin immediately side-eyed Seungmin’s reaction. He might have known something or at least sensed something, specifically when Seungmin blabbered -- well, more like ranted -- about you not calling him the said endearment you just used on Hyunjin a few seconds ago. 

Let’s rewind, shall we?

Hyunjin was an hour away from a deadline, and yes, he admits that he may have finished his project sooner, but a certain someone, who goes by the name of Jisung, decided that it would be more fun to play video games over at Felix and Changbin’s dorm. “That stupid project isn’t even due for another day. Chill out, dude,” Jisung claimed with burgeoning excitement. Instead of turning his friend down -- or better, kicking his tempting ass out of the dorm -- he caved in.

Hours later, he was cramming at least two days worth of work into an hour. Then comes your boyfriend, Seungmin. “Hyunjin!” the younger male called out from their dorm’s entrance. “In here!” Hyunjin hollered, his fingers still hot on his laptop’s keyboard, seven more questions and a descriptive about his said stand on the project, and he’ll be done -- both figuratively and literally, his brain’s slowly pan-frying itself to destruction. He mentally cursed Jisung.

“Procrastination at its finest,” Seungmin mocked as he entered Hyunjin’s room. “You can nag me later, bur right now I have to finish this and then kick Jisung’s ass,” Hyunjin said with firm persistence. The younger lad sighed and sat down on a bean bag at the corner of the room. “I don’t have the energy to nag,” Seungmin whispered, but Hyunjin still managed to catch his words. He jokingly rolled his eyes, finding slight amusement towards Seungmin’s puppy expression.

“You and (y/n), had a fight?” Hyunjin asked, his attention still on his laptop but he figured he needed Seungmin for a little background noise to keep him sane, plus the guy’s one of his best friends. “Not really,” Seungmin disagreed. “Then, what got you all gloomy?” Hyunjin insisted, but he was only met with silence.

“Seungmo, come on, spill.”

“She addresses you as an ‘oppa’,” Seungmin blurted out after a few seconds. “Who addresses me as what?” Hyunjin asked, his eyebrows contorted in confusion. “(y/n),” Seungmin answered as he buried his face in his arms. “Seungmo, you do know that she does that to everybody that’s older than her, right?” Hyunjin replied, “It’s called being polite.”

“Well, I call it being unfair.”

Hyunjin chuckled in amusement, “Please elaborate.”

“You and I are the same age, which means that I’m older than her too, but she doesn’t call me that,” Seungmin whined.

And that’s how Seungmin ended up being silent for the rest of the night. You, being unaware of the situation, shrugged it off, thinking that he was just exhausted from his vocal lessons. Until, Hyunjin decided to let you in on the puppy’s cause of gloominess.

“Here, now go ace that literature course,” Hyunjin handed you the outline he promised, giving your head a pat in the process. “Thank you, oppa.”

“One more thing, (y/n),” Hyunjin said as he leaned down and whispered, “Seungmin wants to be called that too.”

“Huh?” you turned to him in confusion, but Hyunjin just stared at you and decided that you would come into revelation in a few seconds. “Oh,” you gasped, eyes lighting up in the process. “That’s why he’s been acting weird,” you added. Hyunjin smiled in approval, “Do something and wipe that pout off his face.”

The car ride back to your dorm was silent. Seungmin kept his eyes on the road, no words were exchanged between the two of you and he clearly showed no effort of doing so any time soon. You’re slowly running out of time as your building came into view a few minutes later. Seungmin slowly stopped the car and got out, he jogged towards your side and opened the door for you.

Go time.

“I’ll text you when I get home,” Seungmin said. His expression was sad but he still managed to give you a kiss on the forehead. He was about to pull away but you prevented him from doing so by holding his face in your hands. You stared at him lovingly, thanking the universe for bringing this man into your life. 

“I love you, oppa,” you whispered, but loud enough for him to hear you. 

A soft gasp escaped from his lips as his eyes widened, “What did you just call me?”

“Oppa, why?” you giggled and gave his nose a kiss. “Don’t get me wrong, I feel like I’m on top of the world right now, but you never call me that,” Seungmin wondered, his arms now wrapped around your waist, allowing him to pull you closer. “Let’s just say, a little bird told me,” you teased.

“Hwang Hyunjin!”

You laughed, “Don’t get mad at him.”

“Listen,” you called back for his attention, “I don’t call you oppa because I use that on everybody who’s older than me, well close friends of course, but you know what I mean.”

“And you, Kim Seungmin, are not just anybody. You’re my person, my everything, my whole world. You’re special to me and you matter the most,” you explained, pouring your feelings out for the said man. You were about to say more in order to get rid of Seungmin’s doubt, but he cut you off with a kiss.

You guys were practically making out in your dormitory’s parking lot, but it’s the least of your worries right now.

You pulled away first as you tried to catch your breath. “I love you so much, (y/n),” Seungmin confessed, his expression now darker as you witnessed his eyes fill with desire. “And I’ll prove that to you.”

“What do you mean, oppa?”

Seungmin leaned down, his lips dangerously close to your ear. “Don’t test me, baby.”

You whimpered in response, “Do whatever you want. I’m all yours, oppa.”

[suituuup]

pieces - chapter eight

Five years ago, Chloe dropped off the face of the Earth. Beca didn’t expect to see her again dancing in a strip club, out of all places.

rated: E (drug use and emotional abuse in early chapters)

ao3 link

*

Chapter seven was published yesterday, in case you missed it! I was too lazy to make a tumblr post.

*

The term rollercoaster didn’t seem strong enough to describe the last six weeks of Chloe’s life. 

Seeing Beca again. Leaving Marco. Getting clean. Finding out she was pregnant. 

She felt like she needed to stop and take a minute to remind herself to breathe, but the weight pressing on her chest prevented her from sucking enough oxygen into her lungs.

“You’re…” Beca blinked twice in slow succession. “...pregnant. With a baby.” She grimaced in the next beat, releasing a breath. “Sorry, I-- I wasn’t expecting that.” 

Chloe couldn't blame her for being shocked. She swallowed thickly and cleared the lump from her throat. “I made an appointment for an abortion. Tomorrow.”

Tears sprang up into her eyes before she could stop them, and she lifted a hand to her mouth to muffle the sob itching to come out. 

“I’m sorry,” she croaked out, shaking her head. 

“Chlo…” Beca murmured, setting a hand over Chloe’s back and the other one on Chloe’s. “You don’t need to apologize. What you’re going through is incredibly hard, and… if an abortion is what you feel is the best option, then that’s what you should do.” 

Chloe had always wanted to have kids one day, but this was the worst possible timing. She didn’t have a place to raise that baby, or a job, not to mention that she was a recovering addict. 

She nodded along to Beca’s words, as though attempting to convince herself further. 

“Do you want me to come with you?” Beca asked. “To the appointment?” 

Chloe hesitated. “I don’t want you to miss work because of me.” 

“You’re more important than work,” Beca argued softly as her thumb stroked Chloe’s knuckles back and forth. “And I don’t think you should be doing this on your own, you know? But I don’t want to overstep either, so it’s completely up to you.” 

Chloe sniffled, reaching up to wipe her tears away. “I… I think I’d like it if you could be there.” 

“Done,” Beca instantly said, nodding firmly. She cleared her throat following a few beats of silence. “So um, is there anything you should do for your recovery? Now that you’re out of rehab, I mean.” 

“The therapist there recommended one in the city, I need to call and book an appointment. I’m going to my first NA meeting in two days. Otherwise, I’ve been told having a routine could really help? Like go for a morning walk, do some yoga, cook, clean… that sort of stuff. But all I want to do right now is crash for a few hours.” 

Beca nodded. “Sounds like a plan. Let me know if I can do anything to make things easier on you, okay?” 

Chloe managed a small smile despite how heavy her heart felt. “I’m already so grateful for what you’re doing for me, Bec.” 

“It’s what friends do. Help each other out.” 

Chloe ended up sleeping for four hours straight. She had never felt so exhausted in her life, and she guessed it was a mix of the physical and emotional toll of pregnancy and rehab finally hitting her. She didn’t eat much for dinner and mostly pushed her food around in her plate, knowing most of it would come back up as it had for the last few days. 

She and Beca got to the clinic ten minutes before Chloe’s appointment that next morning, and after filling out the paperwork, they were led into an exam room, where Chloe was asked to change into a paper gown. She sat down on the edge of the bed once she was changed, her eyes sweeping over the many baby pictures lining the wall. 

Her attention shifted to the door when it opened, a middle-aged woman stepping inside. 

“Hello, Chloe,” she greeted with a soft, reassuring smile. “I’m Dr. Harris.” 

“Hi,” Chloe returned quietly. “This is my friend Beca.” 

“Nice to meet you both,” Dr. Harris said as she approached. “I was told you’re here to terminate your pregnancy?”

“I-- yes.” 

“Okay. As one of the nurses probably told you over the phone, I need to check how far along you are first so we can figure out if a procedure is required,” she explained, setting her chart down and snapping on a pair of gloves. “When was your last period?” 

“I-- I’m not sure.”

She used to take the pill. But when you’re fortunate if you remember to eat one meal a day, it’s also easy to forget to renew your birth control prescription. That was just another detail among the many in her life that seemingly had ceased to have consequences or meaning the further she slipped down that rabbit hole. 

“Okay, that’s alright. Can you lie down please, and put your feet in the stirrups? I need to do a vaginal ultrasound so we can see better.” 

Chloe nodded, scooting back and lifting her feet. She reached for Beca’s hand as nerves sprouted in her belly, immensely grateful for her presence. 

“This might not be the most comfortable feeling, but I’ll try to be as gentle as possible,” Dr. Harris said as she placed a condom over the wand before slowly inserting it. She tapped a few keys on the ultrasound machine, gently moving the wand around until a clear image popped up on the screen. It was another minute before she spoke again. “Okay… given the size of the embryo, you’re about seven weeks along, Chloe.” 

Chloe puffed out a breath as a kaleidoscope of emotions swept through her. This was her baby, up there on the screen, and the sight of it suddenly made her question everything and ask something that she would regret shortly after. “Can I-- can I listen to the heartbeat?”

The doctor glanced at her. “Are you sure?” 

“Yeah,” Chloe confirmed. “I’m sure.” 

Nodding, Dr. Harris pushed another key, and the most beautiful sound filled the room a second later. A steady, strong woosh woosh. Tears sprang to Chloe’s eyes, and she felt a squeeze to her hand as she attempted not to let them fall. Her own heart constricted in her chest, so hard it was nearly painful. 

“Turn if off, please,” she croaked out, shaking her head as her lids slammed shut, those tears sliding down her cheeks and curling around her chin. 

The doctor shut off the machine and withdrew the wand a few seconds later. “You can put your legs down, Chloe.” 

Chloe nodded and straightened, taking the tissue Beca offered her and blowing her nose with it. 

Dr. Harris watched on, her eyes soft. “You still have some time before making a decision.”

“Did it look healthy?” She found herself asking, then figured she should explain. “I just got out of rehab. I did cocaine and drank a fair amount of alcohol on a daily basis up until four weeks ago. And I was given um...” Chloe scratched her forehead as she raked her brain for the medication name. “Gabapentin for the first two weeks of rehab to help with withdrawal.” 

Dr. Harris’ features remained professional as she nodded slowly. “The heartbeat is strong, and I didn’t catch anything abnormal. The risk of miscarriage is more present than for other pregnancies as the drugs crossed through the placenta when you were still using, and that up to twelve weeks. Problems could occur during and after the pregnancy. But the baby could also be perfectly healthy, since you stopped in the early stages of pregnancy. It’s hard to tell.” 

Chloe’s mind swam with all these possible scenarios, and she didn’t know whether to listen to her brain or her gut feeling. “How-- how much time do I have to decide?” 

Dr. Harris slipped her hands into the pockets of her lab coat. “Abortion is legal up to 25 weeks in New York state. Up to ten weeks, you can take a pill, past that a surgical procedure is needed.” 

Chloe sniffled, swiping the back of her hand under her runny nose. “Okay. Thank you.” 

Dr. Harris cast them both a tight-lipped smile. “Of course. I’ll leave informational pamphlets at the desk for you to read, as well as my phone number should you have any questions.” 

“Thanks,” Beca said as the doctor walked out, then focused back on Chloe, reaching out to brush her hair back behind her ear. “I’ll give you a few minutes to get dressed? I can go get those pamphlets in the meantime.” 

Chloe nodded, her insides caving in as soon as the door clicked shut behind Beca. She gripped the edges of the exam cot hard, her nails digging into the leather and her breathing turning chopped as a mix of panic and sadness unleashed within her. 

It all seemed unfair, but she knew her own recklessness was the root of the situation she found herself in. 

She eventually managed to calm herself down enough to get dressed, meeting Beca by the desk ten minutes later. The walk home was silent, and Chloe was grateful Beca didn’t push her to talk. She didn’t even know how to process her own thoughts, let alone speaking them aloud. 

A few days passed. Chloe slept a lot, and tried to keep herself busy the rest of the time. One hour each morning consisted of hugging the toilet while she puked her guts out, and the rest of her day was spent craving that warm embrace of the rush cocaine once brought her. 

The temptation was there. She knew there was a store on the corner of Beca’s street that sold booze, and she knew there was enough change in the bowl by the front door to afford at least a couple beers. 

Yet, she couldn’t bring herself to. Not after seeing that tiny blob on that screen and listening to its heartbeat, because the biggest part of her wanted this. She knew it deep down, but she couldn’t silence those same voices that had been making her life hell for the past four years, telling her that she was bound to fail at this like she did with everything else. 

Chloe woke up that Saturday morning to a churning stomach. Scrambling out of bed, she stumbled to the bathroom across the hall and made it just in time to empty the contents of her stomach into the ceramic bowl.

She slumped back against the wall afterwards, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand as she reached out to flush the toilet with the other. Chloe glanced up when Beca appeared around the corner, a sympathetic smile curving her lips as she stepped closer and handed Chloe a steaming mug. 

“Ginger tea. I read it helps with morning sickness.”

Chloe accepted it with a quiet thank you. She cradled the mug between her palms, her head tilting back against the tile behind her as she exhaled. “You can sit, if you want.”

Beca nodded and lowered herself next to her in the tight space, their thighs and shoulders touching. “Do you… want to talk?”

Chloe sucked in a sharp breath. “I feel… lost,” she croaked out, her head rolling to the side to look at Beca. “Before the appointment, I was so sure terminating the pregnancy was the wise option, but then I saw it on that screen and heard its heartbeat and…”

“You realized the wise decision is maybe not what you want?” Beca supplied when Chloe trailed off. 

“I’ve always wanted to be a mom,” Chloe whispered before she broke eye-contact, focusing on the mug she held in her hands as she blinked away the tears filling her eyes. “But it’s crazy to even consider it, right? I don’t have a job, I don’t have my own place, and I’m still battling with my own mind because I crave something. All day, every day since my last hit.”

“But you didn’t cave,” Beca pointed out softly. “I know it’s only been four days since you got out of rehab, but you didn’t cave, and that’s already an accomplishment of its own.” 

“I just… I don’t want to harm this baby more than I’ve possibly already done,” Chloe admitted quietly. 

Beca nodded, and reached out to take one of Chloe’s hands, tugging it into her lap gently. “If keeping this baby is what you want to do, those things you’re worried about have solutions. You may not have a place of your own, but I’m not kicking you out. Even with a baby. This is home for you as long as you want or need it. A job shouldn’t be too difficult to find. Maybe it won’t be the greatest one on earth to start with, but it will be something to get your head back in the game,” she paused, tilting her head to the side and seeking Chloe’s gaze. “And what you just said? About not caving because of the baby? I can’t think of a better proof of your ability to be a great mom. You’re already putting that baby before your own needs, and I can’t even fathom how great and out of control those can become, and I think that’s admirable. And for what it’s worth, I think you should trust what your gut tells you. I listened to my brain instead of my heart once, and ended up making one of the biggest mistakes of my life.” 

Chloe let Beca’s words resonate within her, basking in the temporary peace they brought her. There was no doubt about where her gut feeling lay on this.

“I feel like I’m turning your life upside down,” she whispered after a while, sniffling. “You’ve done so much for me already, I don’t want to keep abusing from your generosity, or jeopardize your relationship with Sarah.” 

“You’re not abusing anything, Chlo. I promise,” Beca murmured with a squeeze to her hand. A stretch of silence settled between them, until Beca spoke again. “You still have time to think about it. Just know that whatever you decide to do, I’ll support it.” 

Over the next week, Chloe found herself picturing what it would be like, caring and nurturing for that baby and raising them. For the first time in five years, cocaine wasn’t the first thing she thought about when she woke up, or the last thing on her mind before going to sleep. 

For the first time in five years, it felt like she had purpose, in trying her best to be the mom her child deserved. That meant staying clean, leaving those demons behind where they belonged, and getting her life back together one day at a time, for that innocent being that came to light in the darkest time of her life. 

She woke up earlier than usual that morning, and headed to the bathroom to pee, pausing as she caught sight of her reflection in the mirror. A soft gasp escaped as she lifted her shirt and ran her palm over the barely perceptible swell in her lower belly. It wasn’t there yesterday, and Chloe felt tears pool in her eyes. 

Happy ones. 

“Hey there, little one,” she croaked out, her heart swelling against her ribcage as she rubbed slow circles over her skin. “We’ll be okay, won’t we?” 

She puffed out a long breath, a watery smile breaking through. 

One day at a time. 

[just2bubbly]

Celebrity Crush

Masterlist

Summary

“Did Mom have a celebrity crush on Dad?“

This revolves around Kaider but from Torin's POV and Peony here refers to Kai and Cinder's child.

When Peony (gen 2) comes up with a very strange question to Torin!

Ship: Kaider

Words: 1590 words

Torin’ perspective-

"Torin-da, did Mom have a celebrity crush on Dad?" The six-year-old asked the royal advisor with wonder-waiting eyes.

The Advisor on the other hand was very much panicked, wondering how the young princess got to know about the word 'crush'. He suspected she had picked on this word from one of her visit to Carswell Thorne. He wanted to rub the fact that 'Sending his daughter to Mr Thorne was not the best decision' in Emperor Kaito's face- but he would do no such thing.

"Where did you learn the word 'crush' Peony?" he asked dodging her previous question.

"Uh-.. Actually, Uncle Thorne said that Aunt Cress had a crush on him, so I just searched what the word meant." She said avoiding eye contact, just like any child caught red-handedly stealing from the jar of cookies would do.

"I don't think you should look into words like 'crush' as the age of 6" he warned, collecting his stuff to leave.

"But Torin-da, I am about to turn 7 next month" she swore, running off to block him from leaving away.

"Well, that does not make you any older to know about the word, young lady." He said with a bit of grand-fatherly authority to his voice. Not necessarily that he was scolding the curious child; she was hardly the one being scolded because of her cute actions and sweet voice.

"Torin-da but what of my earlier question?" she asked her voice full of determination.

"Why don't you go and ask Kaito?" he suggested, obviously playing the child around. He remembered how even Kai had taken up liking to the word 'shit' when he had heard President Vargas saying it. He had pestered Torin with his questions for weeks but due to royal protocol, Torin faced his curiousness with nothing but an emotionless face. At last, he had gone to former Emperor Rikan, who had laughed at Kai and explained a few things to the young prince, years ago.

"Torin-da!" she shouted in his face to get his attention, "Did Mommy have a celebrity crush on Dad?" she continued.

"Why do you think that?" he cross-questioned the little princess who was set on a mission to know if Cinder had a crush on Kai.

"Well, you see Mommy was a mechanic before she became the Queen and Dad- well he was THE PRINCE, so he was a celebrity" she explained slowly as if explaining two plus two equals four to a child. Even though little Peony looked like Cinder, she had taken after Kai in all ways possible. She had picked up her parent's sarcasm like she would not. However, her speaking style, her small conquests in the Palace reminded Torin too much of little Kai.

"Your Mommy was the Princess of Luna too, Peony. Why would she have a crush on Kai?"

She stared at him with a look of confusion upon that remark, another one of Kai's speciality again. After what felt like a few minutes of silence, she blamed, "Torin-da you are fooling me around. I can see through it. Tell me did Mom have a celebrity crush on Dad? "

He sighed realizing that it was going to be one interesting afternoon with little Peony. Hence, he decided to keep his work aside for some time and sat down with the little child on the nearby sofa.

"You see Peony darling, I think it was the other way around." He stated.

"Meaning?" she asked, her curiosity perked up, now that Torin was giving her his full attention.

"I mean that Daddy had a celebrity crush on Mommy!" he exclaimed to the very confused child.

"Really?" she asked with her eyes full of doubt, she was only believing it because the royal advisor was saying things.

"Yeah," he said with the same wondrous tone as that of the six- soon-to-be seven-year-old.

"You are saying that Mommy was Daddy's celebrity crush growing up?" she asked to confirm with her wide brown eyes.

Torin nodded. He waited to continue till she had digested this new piece of information.

"Actually Kai idolized your Mom for some amount of time and he was so in love with her." He said, wondering if Peony was interested to hear about her parents or for that matter, her parent's love life or was he over-stepping some of his boundaries-

"Continue Torin-da! And what do you mean by idolizing?" she crowed, cutting short his train of thought.

"Idolize means someone who they want to be like-as in worship or admiring Peony" he explained to the child who had yet time to master the vast oceans of the English language.

This unknown information seemed to increase her curiosity ten folds. The little child had no idea how Kai had a crush the size of Luna on the young princess Selene and later on mechanic Cinder, who turned out to be the same person. He internally smiled- wondering what a calamity it would have been if Selene and Cinder would not be the same person!

She subtly asked, "But why would The Emperor idolize a mechanic?"

"Peony," he said somewhat scolding the child, "all jobs are important, just because the emperor is famous does not mean that the mechanic is not an important part of the society. Your mother was the best one in the entire New Beijing. I am not sure but I think she is yet the Best Mechanic in the city."

"Sorry", she muttered under her breath while he continued with his narration. The six-year-old had no idea what her parents had gone through. They had yet decided against telling her about their hardships, so he decided to keep the descriptions at the minimum.

"Your Mom was a Hero for the world. You might not know it, but she saved the world even while being a mechanic- She was brave. Your Dad liked her for that, he admired her bravery. Later, when your mom was fighting against evil, your dad could not help her but that did not stop him from thinking of her every single second."

"Torin-da, are you saying Dad liked Mom before her?" she asked now seeing the entire scenario in an entirely different light.

"I guess yes." He confirmed, smilingly at the little child's innocence to understanding her parent's life.

"As far as I remember, Kai was completely blinded by his love for the scrawny mechanic he had seen in a garage, which would be your Mom, Peony"

"Did he talk about Mom to you, when she was being a hero?" she blurted.

"Not exactly, he just thought about her. I was not very fond of your Mom back then." He confessed.

"Why? Mom is so lovely!" she exclaimed, already defending The Empress.

"We had different thoughts and I did not know her back then but it would be a story for another day, Peony."

She nodded, obviously not liking things being kept hidden from her. She was a born seeker for information- especially her parents. Why everyone adored them was much of a mystery to her until recently!

"Torin-da, I want to confirm so Dad liked Mom as a mechanic and not as a Lunar Queen?" she asked.

"Absolutely! He had that-"

"Celebrity crush!" she provided, clapping her hands.

Laughing at the child's antics, he said, "Yeah, your Dad had a 'Celebrity crush' on Mom."

"I am going to tell Mom this- Bye Torin-da!" She said running off to find Cinder. Peony looked like someone who had just learned a dear secret and was about to break it off to their best friend. She had no idea how her mom already knew that. The Emperor might still have a celebrity crush on his wife, he will never know.

Collecting his things, he was ready to walk out of the chamber. Until, the Emperor walked on him, a look of amusement on his face.

"Torin, "

"Your Majesty-" he said out of habit, doubting that Kai might have heard the entire conversation between the two.

"-I had a celebrity crush on Cinder?"

"Oh! Please Kaito, the child insisted to know the truth. Besides you do have a crush on Cinder."

"Stop telling my daughter that, Torin," he said, the tip of his ears slightly turning red.

"Well Peony might have guessed it sooner rather than later, Your Majesty-' he said, grinning at the Emperor.

"And if I were you I would stop her before she goes to The Empress," he advised.

"There's nothing to hide about what Cinder already knows of. However, if she comes to me lecturing about morals and values that Peony should learn, I am definitely sending her to you, Torin"

It was another interesting afternoon for the royal advisor with his new student. Only God knew how many more were to come yet!

__

A/N: This was not actually Kaider fluff but Kaider fluff at the same time and I also wanted to write something from Torin's perspective so here's my take. I think it turned out pretty good. I had to actually ask my cousin if he knew meanings of words like 'admire' or 'idolize' to figure out if Peony would know them. Torin-da was supposed to mean like ‘dada’ used in the sense of grandfather in many Asian countries. Phew! things I have to do for imagining things!

Be sure to like, reblog and comment, if you like it!

[army-author]

jungkook scenario | the village idiots

❝ Only an idiot would lose their soulmate. Yet this is exactly what you’ve managed to do. In your small village rumours travel fast, and it’s soon whispered on all the street corners that Jungkook is destined to be with you. That only makes his visit home at Christmas all the more awkward for you… ❞

➸ prompt: I returned to my childhood town for the holidays. You’re my estranged childhood friend, and - wow! - you grew up to be hot!

➸ pairing: jungkook x female reader

➸ warnings: mild swearing

➸ requested by anon | 15k words | fluff, mild angst, childhood friends au, soulmate au

➸ author’s note: can you believe I actually got something written in time for christmas, because I can’t!? I hope you all enjoy it! I combined some of my favourite tropes, since I have no self control. I hope you enjoy fluff with a serious chance of diabetes! (and sorry for any spelling or grammar mistakes! I’m pretty tired!)

[Sixteen Years Ago]

The soulmate system is easy. Only an idiot could loose their soulmate.

Yet, this is exactly what you manage to do at the age of three. All when a boy, the same age as you, with black hair falling into his dark eyes, rams into you on his tricycle. And your soulmate watch falls off before you can even read what it says, or know when you were supposed to meet your soulmate.

Broken. That’s what you think it is. Not just your watch. But you, yourself - broken. You’re destined to never pair with anyone else. A complex thought for a three-year-old to grapple with.

This is how you get into that predicament:

It’s your first day of nursery school. You’re walking through the playground, clutching at your mother’s hand, and glancing around at the faces of all the new children, with a strange mixture of curiosity and nerves brewing inside you.

All you can focus on is the void of noise swallowing up your eardrums, as children scream around you. Their faces blend together in unfamiliarity as they run by. Yet, you know that you should be looking out for their faces, catching their eyes in the reflection of your own. That’s how you’re meant to meet your soulmate. You don’t know much about the world at the age of three – you don’t even know how to read properly yet – but you know how soulmates find one another. When your eyes meet, your watches, which have been counting down to this fateful moment, will fall off, and you’ll both realise that this is the person you’ve been waiting for.

Your mother has explained it all to you – telling you that soulmates are like best friends that stay with you forever. You don’t quite understand it, but you know that you want a best friend forever.

That’s why you can’t wait until you can read. More specifically, you can’t wait until you can read the time written on your watch, and find out how long your wait will be – how long your forever best friend will have you waiting for their appearance.

You keep asking your mother if she can read your watch for you, tell you when you should expect your soulmate, and every time she patiently explains that only the wearer of the watch can read the timer on it.

“You’ll just have to be patient, sweetie,” your mother says every time you bombard her with questions.

You’ve been trying to teach yourself numbers so you can read the watch as soon as possible, asking your parents any time you pass a sign with a number - “What’s that one? What does that mean?”

But at the age of three, reading a watch is just a little too complicated for you. Much to your frustration.

“Never mind, sweetie,” your mother says when she finds you staring gloomily at your watch  - a regular occurrence “You’ll figure it out soon enough.”

“But mum,” you always whine, “What if I’m meant to meet my soulmate before I can even read my watch?”

“Well,” your mum wraps an arm around your shoulder, “It’s very rare that soulmates meet each other at such a young age. But if it does happen to you – you’ll know because your watch will fall off, and someone else’s watch will fall off as well – that person will be your soulmate.”

You nod, burying your face in her sweater, smelling of baking bread and primroses, like she always does. It sounds so simple when she explains it like that.

But it’s not simple. Not for you at least.

You grip your mother’s hand, as she leads you across the playground, towards your nursery school. The children around you are all so noisy. As you search the faces around you, you feel at the watch on your wrist, still clasped on tightly. None of them are your soulmate then.

As you walk on, a young boy zooms past you on a tricycle, stopping you in your tracks, watching after him as he flies by, wheels skidding on the gravel of the playground.

“They should really watch where they’re going,” your mother eyes a group of boys, following after the first boy on their tricycles.

You turn your eyes to them, wary, as they rumble noisily towards you.

Your gaze fixes on one boy, laughing as he pedals faster and faster, his black hair pushed back off his forehead as he gains speed, his face cracking up with laughter, his friends skidding around him. He’s going faster and faster, pedals pushing the wheels harder, to the point that you think he might leave the ground.  The whirring of his wheels fills your ears, as he careens forward. All too late you realise he’s careening towards you.

It happens in slow motion.

His eyes turn to you, widening. You can see your scared face reflected in his dark pupils.

BANG!

You’re on the ground. You know that before you open your eyes. You can feel the scratch of gravel against your cheek.

You sit up slowly, looking up. The boy is standing over you, worry clouding his eyes. He’s saying something to you. He seems on the verge of tears.

Blinking past him, you see your mother bending over you. A group of curious children has formed around you. You frown, fixing your eyes on your mother’s lips as she speaks at you, your senses slowly trickling back, firing messages to your brain. “Are you alright, sweetie?”

You nod. You don’t feel hurt, just shocked. You lift your hand to clutch onto your mother’s for reassurance. Your wrist feels lighter than normal. You frown, blinking away the fog from your brain.

Your mother helps you to your feet, brushing the dirt off your shirt for you.

“I’m so sorry,” the boy who crashed into you is beside you, wringing his hands together, and biting his lips. “Are you okay?”

When you don’t answer, he turns to your mother. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to.”

Your mother nods her head. “Don’t worry. It’ll be okay.”

As your mother leads you by the hand, away from the crowd of children and towards the nursery school, murmuring about getting you cleaned up, the boy follows behind you, not seeming to believe your mother’s assertion that you’re okay.

But you don’t feel okay. Something is wrong. The light feeling at your wrist is letting you know.

You dig your heels into the ground, pulling your mother to a stop. “M-my watch.” Your breath catches in your throat.

“What’s that?” Your mother’s brow furrows, turning her gaze to your own worried expression.

“My watch. I lost it.” You pull up your sleeve to check what you already know. It’s gone.

“Oh, it must have fallen off when you fell over,” your mother says, as you drag her back the way you’ve come.

Your eyes scan the grey of the gravel, yawning back blankly at your searching eyes, as you trace the area, until a glimmer catches your gaze. The unmistakable silver of a watch, glinting by the base of a plant pot at the nursery school entrance, a few feet from the spot you fell.

You dart across to retrieve it, desperate to put it back on, where it can go back to doing its job of counting down the days until you meet your soulmate. You get the sense that if it isn’t on your wrist it will stop working. Turning the it over, your eyes fall on the watch face, where a crack perfectly separates the glass in half, splitting it across the centre. The numbers on the watch aren’t moving any more, no longer counting down, just large gaping circles staring back at you.

Your eyes start to sting, as you try to put the watch back on, fiddling with the clasp. Your fingers feel as slippery as butter. But despite your desperate attempts, the watch keeps sliding off, tumbling back to the ground with a sad clinking.

“I think it’s broken,” your voice shakes, as you stare up at your mother, hoping that she’ll have some grown-up solution. “It won’t go back on.”

Your mother frowns, leaning down to try and help you with the clasp, but her well practiced hands still can’t affix the watch to your wrist.

“What do the numbers say?” she asks you, a note of urgency in her voice.

“I – I’m not sure,” you stammer.

Behind you, the boy who knocked you down is still hanging around. “What’s the matter?” he asks.

“My soulmate watch…” you hold it up to show him the cracked face.

“Is it meant to look like that?” the boy asks, wrinkling his nose at the shattered glass.

“No,” tears begin to stream down your face as the reality of the situation hits you, “It’s broken. It’s broken because of you.” Before thinking, you step forward, and push the boy in the chest, so that he wobbles back on unsteady legs.

His face crumples. “I didn’t mean to break it.”

“It’s your fault,” you continue, voice raising as you move towards him, your fists flailing at him in frustration, “You broke it, you broke it!”

And so, your nursery school teacher comes out to find you and the young boy in a snivelling heap on the ground, both crying, as you throw punches at his chest, and he wards off your attacks with arms raised over himself in self-defence.

“Alright, break it up!” You feel a hand grabbing around your arm, pulling you away, and you stare up at the face of your new teacher. “What is the meaning of this?”

Faced with an angry grown-up, you only sob harder, overcome with anger.

Your mother steps forward. “I am so so sorry. She’s not normally like this.”

The teacher raises an eyebrow. “Is this your daughter?”

Your mother nods her head.

“Care to explain why she’s starting fights?”

“He hit me on his tricycle,” you shout out, before your mother can answer.

“It was an accident,” the boy sniffles.

“And he broke my soulmate watch,” you continue, kicking out, trying to reach the boy again.

The teacher’s grip around your arm gets tighter. “Alright. Be that as it may, that’s still no reason to get violent.”

It takes a lot of pulling to get you inside, and seated on a chair across from the boy, as your mother and the teacher watch you apologise to the boy. The teacher makes the two of you shake hands, which you do rather reluctantly.

“So, you say that your soulmate watch fell off,” the teacher says, bending down to look into your face after the performed rigmarole of apologising for fighting.

You nod, struggling to meet her gaze.

“And that it’s broken.”

Another nod.

“You’re sure that it didn’t just fall off because you’ve met your soulmate?”

In all the turbulence, that thought hadn’t occurred to you. You don’t answer.

“Did any other child happen to lose a watch around the same time?” your teacher presses.

You shrug, shoulders heaving up and down. You don’t know. In all the confusion you didn’t notice anything but the ringing in your ears and the erratic beating of your own heart.

There were so many new faces around you when your watch fell off. Any one of those children could have been the one. You don’t know. You didn’t get a sense in your heart, like you had expected you would, knowing instinctively who your soulmate was. All the children were strangers to you – no one stood out.

The teacher nods, as if she’s decided something. “I’ll check with the rest of the children. Don’t you worry. We’ll find your soulmate, no trouble.”

She heads out of the room, towards the playground, and your mother ushers you out after her. You’re aware of the boy following behind you. You’re already beginning to feel bad about your outburst, but despite all instincts, you refuse to turn around and acknowledge him.

Outside, your teacher is rounding up the children, herding them into a disorderly line, where she holds up your broken watch in front of them. You watch it glinting in her hand, heartstrings pulled taught.

“Listen up,” the teacher’s voice booms out, commanding the children’s attention, “I have an important question for everyone. One of the children here had their watch fall off. Which means they might have met their soulmate. Now, I need you to answer truthfully. Did anyone else’s soulmate watch fall off this morning?”

The children remain silent, some pulling at their jumper hems, some chewing on their fingers.

“No one?” The teacher’s eyes scan the group.

Some children check their wrists, but no one steps forward.

The teacher turns back to your mother, handing your watch back. “Sorry. It was worth a try.”

A cold settles in your stomach. No soulmate. What does that mean?

“I’m so sorry.” Behind you, you hear the voice of the boy who knocked you over. “I really didn’t mean to break your watch.”

You shrug. You’re too drained to be angry any more. “It was just an accident.”

The boy nods. “Do – do you still think we could be friends after that?”

This catches you off guard. You didn’t expect to go from fighting him with your fists, to getting an offering of friendship. Maybe violence really is the answer, despite what your mother always says.

“I guess,” you pretend to think over the boy’s question, “We can be friends if you really want.”

The boy’s face lights up, and you realise you aren’t angry any more. “My name’s Jeon Jungkook,” he says, smile scrunching up his face.

That’s how the two of you become friends.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Present Day]

Everyone says that Jeon Jungkook is your soulmate.

In a small village rumours travel quickly, and the story of the girl who lost her soulmate at nursery school has travelled well around the small streets in the many years since it happened.

You’re not so sure. Maybe there’s a chance Jungkook is your soulmate. After all, it’s a strange coincidence that he lost his soulmate as well. But he couldn’t have known that when he first ran into you. It’s been so long since you’ve last seen him. Surely, if you were meant to be together, you would be with him now. Soulmates will find a way to be with each other. That’s what your mother has taught you to believe. If Jungkook was your soulmate he would be here.

Yet he isn’t. He’s far way. On the other side of the country, living with his dad. And you’re stuck in your small village, serving beers to the locals at your nearest pub, making some money over the Christmas holidays. Despite being old enough to live independently, you still haven’t moved from the village, attending the local university, and living in a small house an old family friend rents out to you. When you imagined going to university, you didn’t expect to be living so close to your old childhood home. But life doesn’t always go the way you expect.

You sigh as another customer turns away from the bar, beer in hand, walking slowly back to their table – the classic, ‘I really don’t want to spill my drink’ walk. You can’t help but glance at your watch. It’s a simple one, the kind that tells the time, not a soulmate watch. It’s twenty minutes to midnight. You knew your shifts would be late when you started this part time job, but the sleepless nights still get to you. You stifle a yawn.

Despite everything wrong with this job, at least it’s a good distraction this time of year. Christmas is the worst holiday for you. Having no soulmate, you’re left to sit alone, while couples that have been busy working all year spend quality time together, snuggled up from the cold, leaving you frozen, with no one to thaw you out.

At least in this pub most of the people you serve are groups of young friends, rather than couples, so you don’t have your lack of soulmate rubbed in your face.

The door of the pub opens, dragging you from your moping. A smile spreads across your face as you recognise the face.

“Taehyung!”

He shakes rain water from his hair as he walks up the bar, unwinding his scarf. “Hello!” He leans on the counter, smiling, “Thought I’d pop in to see how you’re doing.”

You smile, grateful for the distraction – some stimulation to keep you awake. “i’m doing fine. Nothing to complain about.”

Taehyung’s brows furrow. “No complaining? That’s not like you.”

You make a swipe at him across the table, and he ducks your lunge, tutting:

“If you’re going to physically abuse me, you won’t be getting a tip.”

“You weren’t going to tip me anyway,” you call him out.

“You got me there.”

“So, what’s new with you?” You lean on the bar, taking some of the weight off your feet. Your worn trainers were a poor choice for tonight, with soles barely there to support you.

“Nothing much,” Taehyung says, “Although I have some news that might interest you.”

“Oh yeah?”

Taehyung slams his palms against the counter, in an impromptu drum roll. “I’ve been messaging Jungkook recently. Apparently he’s visiting here for the holidays. To see his mum again.”

That name has piqued your interest. You try not to sound too invested. “Jungkook?”

Taehyung raises his eyebrows, and you blush. You already know what he’s going to say.

“Don’t,” you warn.

Too late – he’s going down that rabbit hole. “Are you excited to see your estranged soulmate?”

You shake your head, “You don’t really believe he’s my soulmate?”

“Why not?” Taehyung pouts at you, “Both of you lost your soulmates. In a small village like this that can’t be coincidence.”

“Yes it can. We have no idea when Jungkook lost his soulmate,” you remind him, “So I’m not going to accept that he’s my soulmate, just because he happens to be lacking a soulmate too.”

“Well,” Taehyung pushes off from the counter, standing up straight, “Maybe you’ll figure out that you’re destined to be together when he shows up tomorrow.”

You open and shut your mouth, unsure how to respond. It’s been so long since you’ve seen Jungkook, and now he’s being thrust back into your life. For so long he’s just been a name whispered in conjunction with your own by old ladies gossiping on street corners - “She’s the one who lost her soulmate, you know?” “Is that so?” “I heard her soulmate is supposed to be that Jeon boy.”

“I’ll tell him to drop into the pub and say hello,” Taehyung says with a wink, moving towards the door.

“You… you don’t have to,” you call after him, but the door is already swinging shut behind him, and with your brain slamming back to reality, you realise that it’s gone past midnight, and you should be closing up the pub.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Sixteen Years Ago]

You sit with Jungkook on the swings in your local park. It’s been a few weeks since he clattered into you on his tricycle, and the ordeal is mostly forgotten – apart from your now bare wrist.

Jungkook is crunching on a chocolate biscuit, while you stare across enviously at his snacks. On the other side of the park, your neighbour Taehyung is spinning himself around on the roundabout. His laughter floats through to you on the still air.

Jungkook catches your eyes, glued to his biscuits. Wordlessly, he reaches across the gap between you, to offer you one. As he stretches across, you notice:

“You don’t have a watch, Jungkook.”

Jungkook looks down at his bare wrist, as Taehyung wobbles off the roundabout, and precariously makes his way towards you, unstable on his feet.

“Does that mean you’ve found your soulmate already?” you ask, curiosity fizzing inside you.

“What you taking about?” Taehyung asks, leaning himself against the metal frame holding the swings, steadying himself.

“Jungkook doesn’t have a soulmate watch,” you say.

“Oh yeah?” Taehyung stares across in mild curiosity at your new friend.

“I’m not allowed to wear my watch,” Jungkook explains, licking at his fingers to get the last of the biscuit crumbs.

“Not allowed?” You wrinkle your brow, confused. “Why?”

Jungkook huffs out his cheeks, and begins reciting, like his parents probably always tell him, “I’ll be given my soulmate watch when I’m old enough to understand the significance of having a soulmate. My parents say that children aren’t old enough to get soulmates.”

“But…” you chew on your lips, cogs turning in your brain, “What if you’re supposed to meet your soulmate before your parents let you wear your watch? What if you miss them because of that?” You’re thinking of your own soulmate, who you may have lost because of a faulty watch. You don’t want your new friend to be subject to the same fate.

Jungkook shrugs. “If that happens, my parents wouldn’t want me to be with my soulmate anyways. They say I’m too young for a relationship like that.”

You wrinkle your nose. “They seem strict.”

Jungkook nods glumly.

“When will you be old enough for a soulmate,” you ask.

“When I’m fifteen.”

Your jaw drops. That seems like an eternity away for your young brain. You can barely comprehend being five years old, let alone fifteen. “That’s so long!”

Jungkook shrugs. “Well, my parents didn’t meet each other until they were in their late twenties, and they say that’s the best age to meet your soulmate.”

Suddenly, Taehyung, who’s been silent for an uncharacteristically long time, lets out a loud gasp. “Hey!” He turns to you. “Didn’t you lose your watch recently?”

You nod your head, confused by his visible excitement.

“What if you two are soulmates?” Taehyung blurts, finger flicking back and forth between you and Jungkook, like he’s doing some complicated maths in his head – one plus one equals soulmates.

Jungkook glances at you, then wrinkles his nose, “Ew, no way. She’s not my soulmate. She’s my friend.”

“She can be both,” Taehyung says with the authority of a child that’s one year older than you.

“No way,” Jungkook sticks out his tongue, “You have to kiss soulmates, and give them hugs, and be in love with them, and all that stuff’s yucky.”

You nod, “Yeah, Taehyung. There’s no way Jungkook’s my soulmate. I punched him when I first met him. And if he was my real soulmate I wouldn’t have punched him, would I?” This logic makes sense to you. Soulmates never punch each other upon meeting. It should be love at first sight, right? With you, it was frustration at first sight.

Taehyung shrugs. “You could still be soulmates.”

“No way!” You and Jungkook both exclaim at the same time, and then both yell, “Jinx!” at each other and keep repeating, “Jinx! Jinx Jinx!” while Taehyung rolls his eyes at you.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Present Day]

You hold back a yawn, feeling it tugging at your jaw, tempting, as you wave off another set of customers. This evening of work has felt particularly long. It’s been quiet, with only a small group of friends laughing over card games in the corner, and occasionally coming up for another round of drinks. You’ve spent most of your time perched behind the bar, scrolling through your phone, and willing the hours to pass quicker. At the back of your mind, you remember Taehyung’s promise to send Jungkook your way. But as the clock counts closer to midnight, your hope of seeing him is fading.

Your head snaps up when you hear the door opening – a new customer. The orange glare of the streetlights shines into the pub, reflecting off the wet pavement beyond the door. Through the artificial light, steps a figure you can’t take your eyes from. You know his face, familiar, yet strangely different – like buying your favourite brand of chocolate, only to discover that the company’s changed the recipe.

“Jeon Jungkook,” you’re left an incompetent mess, unable to say anything but his name as he stands in front of you, loosening the buttons on his coat.

“Hey,” he smiles at you.

He’s changed so much from the last time you saw him, you’re almost surprised you recognised him. Yet there’s something still familiar in the twinkle of his dark diamond eyes, and the scrunch of his nose as his smile eases wider. His hair is longer, falling across his face, framing his cheeks in ebony.

Jungkook has grown up to be – you’ll be damned for thinking this – incredibly hot.

You swallow down this thought, embarrassed it entered your head. This is Jungkook – your childhood friend. You can still envision him when he was old enough to be picking worms out of the mud. You shouldn’t be thinking like this about him.

It occurs to you that you’ve been standing staring for far too long – more than is ever socially acceptable. But he hasn’t said anything to you. And you haven’t said anything to him either, and now it’s awkward.

You take a breath to speak, just as he opens his mouth, and you both stutter to silence again. You indicate with your hand – he should go first, but he shakes his head firmly, and nods your way – you should go first, and you both mime back and forth at each other that the other should speak, until at last you break, saying:

“Can I get you anything to drink?”

Jungkook presses his lips together, squinting at the drinks behind the bar, “Uh… just… water will be fine.”

You raise your brow. “Nothing more exciting for you?”

He laughs and shakes his head, “No. I don’t handle my drinks very well. And I don’t want to make a fool of myself in front of you after just meeting you again.”

You laugh, and grab him a glass from behind the bar, filling it with water. Over the counter, he continues:

“I hope you don’t think that I came into this pub just for the water.”

You slide his cup across the counter to him. “Didn’t you?”

“No,” he fumbles in his coat for his wallet, eyes still on you, “Taehyung told me you’d be here.”

“Tap water’s free by the way,” you say, as Jungkook rifles through his wallet.

“Oh, right.” He chokes on a laugh, “My brain’s like mush tonight.”

You smile sympathetically, “I know the feeling. Having to stay up for work most nights has left me with only two functioning brain cells.”

Jungkook chuckles at this, a genuine smile carving out his face.

Rather than taking his drink and going, Jungkook stays standing in front of you, a smile playing on his lips. “It’s really good to see you again.”

“You too.” You can’t fight off a smile. Seeing Jungkook is filling you with the warmth of your childhood spent with him, all flooding back in a rush of lazy days lounging on the grass, and running around the village park, swinging yourself off swings, and trying to make each other sick on the roundabout.

You’re excited to talk to Jungkook, until you hear the pub door opening. Normally you’d be glad of a new customer, but Jungkook’s a special customer – the only one you want to pay attention to.

“Listen,” you speak up as Jungkook takes hold of his glass, “I’ll be finished work in about fifteen minutes. If you’d like to stick around until then, we could… I don’t know… go for a walk or something. Get a chance to chat – catch up.”

Jungkook nods, and steps out of the way to let your new customers forward to order. “I’ll be here,” he promises, before turning away to find himself a seat.

As you serve your new customers, you can’t help but smile, excitement bubbling through your veins at the prospect of getting to spend some time with Jungkook.

As you keep working, cleaning up behind the bar, your eyes keep dancing back to Jungkook, where he sits in the corner, watching his old village out the window and sipping his water. Once or twice, his eyes find yours, watching him, and you quickly pull your gaze away, embarrassed to have been caught staring. The fleeting eye contact pulls your heart into a tight knot.

At last, the final customer leaves, and you can slip out from behind the bar to flip over the sing on the door to read ‘CLOSED”. With a final check that everything behind the bar is in order, you grab your coat, and head over to the table Jungkook’s sat at.

“Hey.”

He looks up at your voice, a smile spreading across his face. “You done now?”

You nod, and Jungkook chuckles:

“Stupid question. Sorry.”

He stands up quickly, bumping into the table as he does so, and laughing again, as he collects his coat and scarf from the back of his chair, and pulls them on.

As you open up the door, letting him out, a gust of cold air bursts in, stealing the breath from your throat. You pull your coat tight around you, hoping to block out the icy wind as you step into the street.

“Where to?” you ask, and Jungkook shrugs:

“You know this place better than I do.”

“You probably still know it pretty well. This place has barely changed since you left,” you say, picking a random direction, and leading him down the pavement.

“I suppose it hasn’t,” Jungkook observes, “I was expecting it to be different to how I remembered, but it’s almost the exact same… Well, except everyone’s gotten older, and some of the buildings look a bit worse for wear.”

“That’s just how it is here,” you say, “There’s never any change. In some ways it’s charming because of that. But it’s also….”

“Boring?” Jungkook suggests.

“Yeah,” you huff out a puff of misted air, “It’s boring.”

Jungkook nods, pressing his lips together. Silence falls between you, and the wind blows harder, roaring against your frozen ears.

“Listen,” Jungkook shoves his hands into the depths of his pockets as he speaks, “This should probably have been the first thing I said to you. But I guess I’m doing it now instead. I need to say I’m sorry.”

You pause on your path, steps faltering. “Why are you apologising to me?”

“I should have messaged you while we were apart,” Jungkook says, “I lost your number, and then, when it eventually turned up it felt like I had left it too long to pick up any kind of conversation with you, so I chickened out and never ended up calling at all.”

You shake your head. “Don’t worry about it. I could have always asked Taehyung for your number. I knew he had it. But I never did. I guess I worried he might think it was weird, me chasing after your number like that… It was stupid of me.”

Jungkook nods. “Yeah, pretty stupid. Not any worse than me. I should have just called you anyway.”

You laugh. “Yep – we’re both idiots. You especially.”

“Hey,” Jungkook brushes against you with his shoulder, gently bumping you, “That’s mean.”

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” you bump him back, “You know I only tease because I like you.”

Glancing over, you see him smiling at the pavement. “Yeah. I really missed you, you know?”

“Me too,” you say.

Around the corner, the old park that you used to play at as kids emerges.

“Oh, no way,” Jungkook stops in front of it, eyes gleaming, “This is just how I remember it.”

“It’s another thing that hasn’t changed here,” you stop beside him, hesitating in front of a panorama of childhood memories that rush back with the shape of the small slide and the squeak of the swings as they move in the wind.

Jungkook turns to you, nose scrunching up in childish glee. “Shall we? For old time’s sake?”

You grin back. “Yeah!”

The gate creaks as Jungkook opens it, just as it always did, swinging closed with a clang.

Jungkook runs over to the swings, and you chase after him, taking up the swing seat beside him. Kicking yourself off with a push of your heels, the world around you swings back and forth as the sky looms closer, then falls away again. If you reach up at the highest point of your swing, you feel you could catch the clouds in your hands, melt them on your fingers.

“This brings back memories,” Jungkook says, swinging back and forth beside you, in the opposite direction to you, so you only occasionally catch sight of his face, looking back at you.

You hum in agreement, but the wind snatches away the sound, so you reply, “Yes, it does.”

Your mind falls back to the many times you would come here after school, laughing at inside jokes that didn’t makes sense to anyone but you and Jungkook, the many experiences you had here with Jungkook – the time that you fell off the swing, and scraped your knee, and he helped you back to your house; the time that you spent all your pocket money on sweets, which you then ate, sitting on the climbing frame, until you were nearly sick from the sugar. You fingers feel strangely hot on the cold metal of the swing chains as you remember the last time you sat with Jungkook on these swings, right before he left your village. Your cheeks heat up.

The both of you are silent. You wonder if Jungkook is remembering the same moment you are – if you should bring it up.

At last, Jungkook cracks the silence. “You know… Taehyung keeps going on about the two of us being soulmates, telling me we’re both idiots for not getting together.”

A wry smile spreads across your face. “Yeah, he’s the same way with me.” You can’t help but laugh.

“Part of me wonders if he’s right,” Jungkook says.

You pause, fingers wrapping round the cold metal of the swing chain - an attempt to ground yourself in reality.

Jungkook continues, “The thought kept going through my head once he brought it up with me recently… And I was thinking… Well… Even if we’re not soulmates, there’s no harm in trying things out together.”

You remember Jungkook had suggested something similar just before he left you – a chance of love snatched away with his sudden move. The memory still stings.

“What do you mean?” You already know what he means. You heart clambers into your mouth.

“I mean, I would like to try… dating. If you’ll have me,” Jungkook stares across at you, catching you in a gaze you can’t look away from. “Even if we’re not soulmates… we’re both single,” he continues, “And we might never know who our soulmates are. There’s no harm in trying, right?”

You can barely find your tongue to respond. “But, you… you live so far away now.”

“We could make it work,” Jungkook says, “If you wanted to?”

You turn the thought over in your head. You know this will probably end like it did last time, with Jungkook snatched out of you life, only a distant memory. You glance across at him, drinking in his matured face. This isn’t the boy you grew up with. This is someone else. Someone, who’ll maybe, just maybe, fend off the loneliness chilling your heart. “I- I’d like that,” you reply.

“Yeah?” Jungkook’s face breaks into a wide smile, squishing his nose up in the way you always liked when he was a child.

“Yeah,” you nod, “I mean… why not?”

“Yeah.” Jungkook nods.

“Yeah…”

You both fall silent again. You suddenly realise you don’t know where to go from here. How are you supposed to continue with someone who might not – but then again might – be your soulmate?

Jungkook seems just as unsure as you, rubbing at the back of his neck, as he stares up at the expanse of stars above him.

“So… what exactly does dating involve?” you ask, feeling stupid as soon as the words leave your lips.

“Uh… dating?”

“Well obviously,” you chuckle, “But what does a date with Jeon Jungkook involve exactly?”

“Hmmm,” Jungkook considers this, “It probably involves getting coffee together. Tomorrow. At, shall we say… eleven thirty?”

“It’s a date.” You stick out your hand to him. “Let’s shake on it.”

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Ten Years Ago]

The unthinkable had happened.

And Jungkook doesn’t want to think about it. He doesn’t want to think about anything as he stomps through the rain.

The drops pelting down on the hood of his coat sound like coins rattling. He sloshes through puddles, ignoring how the water soaks into his shoes. The streetlights shine down on the rain that glazes the pavement, leaving yellow rings rippling across the ground.

Jungkook blinks past the raindrops, seeing the village park ahead of him, swing sets shining under the sheen of rain.

Tramping forward, he sits down on one of the swings, ignoring the cold rain seeping into the seat of his jeans.

Pushing himself off the ground, his feet splash up water. He doesn’t want to think of it.

Doesn’t want to think of the divorce.

Now he’s thinking about it.

So rare. It’s so rare for two soulmates to get together, and then decide that they’re not compatible anymore. How did it happen to his parents of all people? The two people he thought were living happily, despite their arguments? Was he blind, should he have spotted the warning signs, helped his parents out more? What could he have done to stop this? Could he have done anything?

He’s thinking too much. He pushes himself off the ground, swinging forward further, falling back. He stares up at the sky, the raindrops streaking down to stain his cheeks. If he leans his head back far enough he can see the ground behind him, hanging upside down, falling towards him as he swings back. It makes him dizzy. A better feeling than the confusion clouding his brain.

“Thought I would find you here.”

Jungkook sits up straight on the swing, seeing his father standing in front of him, umbrella in hand.

“What are you doing here?” The question sounds more aggressive than Jungkook intended. “I thought I said I wanted to be left alone.”

“I know, Jungkook,” his father says, “But it’s cold and damp out here. I want you to come home.”

“Well I don’t want to go home,” Jungkook folds his arms across his chest, trying not to shiver, not wanting to show his father that he’s right – it’s bitterly cold outside.

“I know,” his father says, “But you’ll get sick out here.”

Jungkook remains quiet.

His dad sighs, and comes across to sit on the swing next to him.

“Listen,” he begins, hesitating, “I know this is tough for you. It’s strange to see two soulmates separate. But, I do know that at one point in my life, your mother was my soulmate. She was perfect for me. But we’ve both changed a lot. We’re very different people now. And we’re not making each other happy anymore.”

“You never really believed in the soulmate system, did you?” Jungkook accuses.

His dad makes a noise like he’s going to respond, but no words come out.

“That’s why you don’t want me to have my watch until I’m older. You don’t think it’ll do me any good, knowing who my soulmate is. Just because you were unhappy with your soulmate.”

“That’s not true,” his father says, but Jungkook butts in:

“It is true! You expect me to be just as unhappy with my soulmate, so you don’t want me to find them. Isn’t that it? All this time I thought you were keeping me from my watch because you thought it would do me good. But you have no real idea what’s good for me, do you?”

His father is silent.

Jungkook squeezes his eyes shut against the glare of the streetlights on the rain soaked ground. If he squeezes hard enough, the tears won’t come.

“I should have know.” Jungkook jumps up, and walks away from his father. He can hear him calling him back, but he ignores him, picking up the pace, speed kicking up, until he’s running, rain splashing up his legs.

Anger is thundering through him, warming him despite the cold. He’s going to find his watch. He knows his parents keep it in their room somewhere. He’s going to take it, and he won’t let his parents take it back.

He deserves to know who his soulmate is.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Present Day]

You’re overthinking this. It’s just a date. Nothing to get worked up over.

But it’s your first date. Ever. And you have no idea what to expect.

As you stare at the collection of clothes spread haphazardly across your bed, this decision seems harder than the choice of name for your first born child. What are you supposed to wear? Should you dress casually? Or will Jungkook think you aren’t taking this seriously enough if you don’t wear your best clothes?

Your phone goes off, vibrating violently on your bedside table, and you grab it to check who’s messaging you. Taehyung’s name flashes up on screen: Heard you have a date today! ;)

You smile to yourself. Of course Taehyung’s already found out about you and Jungkook. You text back: You head right.

You barely have the time to return your attention to you choice in clothing before your phone is buzzing again: Good luck. Not that you need it! :P

A smile spreads across your face, which immediately disappears when your eye catches the time on your phone screen. Shit! You’re going to be late.

With no time left to decide, you grab a pair of jeans and a knitted sweater, throwing them on, struggling to get your arms through the sleeves as you bump down the stairs, wildly grabbing for your shoes.

The walk to the cafe where you decided to meet Jungkook is a short one – but a sweaty one, as you power walk the entire way, holding back from running for fear of all eyes gluing to you, as you make a spectacle of yourself.

As you throw open the cafe door, with the tinkle of the bell above your head, Jungkook stands up from his table with a smile on his face.

“Hey,” you walk over to his table, trying to catch your breath, and hoping your face isn’t too red, “Sorry I’m late. You weren’t waiting long, were you?”

He shakes his head quickly, “No, no.”

You follow him over the the cafe counter with a relieved laugh. “Good. It took me way to long to decide what to wear, and I kind of lost track of time.”

“I know the feeling,” Jungkook flashes you a look with his melted chocolate eyes, “I was so nervous this morning!”

“Me too,” you laugh at yourself, “Guess there was no need to be.”

“No,” a soft smile settles across Jungkook’s face as he looks at you, until the barista draws his attention away, asking him what he wants to drink.

As you read over the cafe’s menu behind the counter, an odd shiver runs down your spine, like a drip of icy water has slid past the collar of your sweater. You turn back to the cafe, and catch the eyes of the other customers, all glued on you and Jungkook – there’s Margaret, the old lady who lives across the street from you, with her friend Alice; there’s your primary school teacher, a friend of your mother’s; there’s the father of your old babysitter - all people you know. And they’re all murmuring amongst themselves, eyes flickering between you and Jungkook. A warmth sweeps across your face, burning your nose.

“Can I help you?” You jump, realising that the barista has been talking to you.

“Oh, right,” you shake yourself, turning away from the curious eyes fixed on you, “Can I have a flat white please?”

Having ordered your coffees, you  and Jungkook return to your table. Seated opposite from you, Jungkook blows at the steam rising from his coffee, while you lean towards him to whisper, “I feel like everyone’s staring at us.”

Jungkook’s eyes are glued to his coffee as he swirls it round and round with a wooden stirrer, watching the cloudy patterns of milk mixing through the coffee. “Yeah, I couldn’t help noticing that myself.” His shoulders shake with a quiet laugh. “I kind of forgot what it’s like in a small village like this - that you can’t get away with doing anything in secret here.” His eyes bounce up to meet yours, catching you off guard with their brightness, “In the city no body knows who you are, and you can go anywhere without bumping into a familiar face. In some ways it’s nice. It gives you privacy.”

You nod, “Yeah… it’s kind of awkward here, isn’t it? We’re going to be the topic of gossip all over town now. People will be saying that we’re getting married next.”

“And that you’re pregnant with our third child.”

“And actually we’ve been married for three years, and you’re filing for a divorce.”

Jungkook’s head bobs down in a snort of laughter. “I forgot how ridiculous the rumours can get.” He scratches at the back of his neck, “Maybe I should have chosen somewhere more discrete for our first date.”

“It’s no problem.” A smirk plays across your face as a plan comes into your head. “Why don’t we give them something to really gossip about?”

A grin rises on Jungkook’s face to match your own. “What did you have in mind?”

With a burst of bravery, you lean across the table towards him, and Jungkook, taking your cue, leans closer, tilting his head forward.

Your lips connect with a rush of warmth through your body, and a rush of blood to the head, leaving every limb feeling tingly. You’re not sure how long you should kiss Jungkook, how much tongue should be involved, or if Margaret will be telling your mother about this, but all other thoughts begin to melt away as Jungkook’s mouth moves against your own, using you in strange new ways that you have never experienced before. He pulls away from you far too soon, leaving you hovering over the table, with your eyes fluttering open, like you’re waking up for the first time, a brand new person.

Jungkook grins across at you. “Am I that good a kisser?”

You blush, sitting back in your seat. “Don’t flatter yourself.” A smile lets him know he is that good.

All eyes are definitely on you now.

“I think it’s time we leave,” Jungkook says with a laugh, gaze sweeping the cafe.

You’re only too happy to comply, gathering your coat and scarf from the back of your chair.

With a barely contained giggle, you and Jungkook collapse out of the door into the cold December air, where you promptly descent into laughter.

“Did you see their faces?” Jungkook wheezes.

You lean against him, gasping in cold air, with your ribs feeling like they’re about to snap, “Those old ladies looked so happy to have a new story to spread around.”

“I’m pretty happy too,” Jungkook says, with a shy smile directed your way, “I got a kiss out of it.”

“You can certainly get more of those,” you promise. It surprises you how easy it is to be like this around Jungkook, like the two of you are meant to be by each other’s side, laughing at life together..

As you walk down the street, you manage to restore your composure, “It’s nice to be back with you, Jungkook.”

“You too,” he says, “I’m just sorry I haven’t been here in a while.”

“Do- do you mind me asking why that is?”

Jungkook breathes out a sigh, “Honestly, I’ve been putting off coming to visit my mum.”

“You don’t get on with her, huh?”

Jungkook pauses in his path. You stop a few steps ahead of him. “Not really,” he admits, “I know I should. I mean, she’s my mum. She’s family. But part of me blames her for losing my soulmate, I suppose. And she’s never really seen eye to eye with me when it comes to the topic of soulmates.”

You decide not to pry further, knowing Jungkook will open up more when he wants to.

The two of you continue walking, twisting your way down familiar streets, past old houses lounging behind neatly trimmed hedges. Without thinking, your hand slips comfortably into Jungkook’s. He pulls up the sleeve of his coat so your palm can press against his, without the fabric getting in the way.

Suddenly, a shout across the street grabs your attention. “Well, if it isn’t the two love-birds!”

You glance over, and a smile brightens your face when you see Taehyung, waving across at you. He glances up and down the street, then runs over to the two of you. “Hey!”

“Hi, Taehyung,” you smile.

“How’s the date going?” He wiggles his eyebrows at you.

“Pretty good, I’d say,”Jungkook grins, “We’ve already managed to make ourselves the talk of the village by showing up together at the cafe.”

Taehyung laughs. “Sounds about right for this village.” He’s silent for a second, then suddenly exclaims: “Hey, if you’re wanting to get out of the village for a bit, me and a few other friends are taking the bus into town his evening. We’re going to be visiting the new club that’s just opened there. It’s meant to be really good. And less people will know you there. That means less people gossiping about seeing you together.”

Jungkook looks to you, eyebrows raised, waiting for you to call the shots.

“It’s been a while since I’ve had a good night out,” you say, “And I am off work for the next few days. It would be a shame to waste that freedom.”

“That’s the spirit,” Taehyung slaps you on the back, while you and Jungkook share a smile.

Maybe getting out of the village is just what you and Jungkook need.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

The clubs is already throbbing with bodies when you arrive. You can’t hear anything over the blast of the bass, vibrating through your bones. But that doesn’t matter, as Jungkook offers you a beer. All you care about are his eyes on yours, drowning you in melted chocolate. Holding up his own glass to you, you see his mouth form around the words “To us!” and you shout back “To us!” hoping he can hear you over the music.

One beer turns into two, turns into three, leaving your head in a happy haze, as you push your way closer to the centre of the dance floor. Jungkook’s arms wrap around you, as you move in time to the beat, and you stop caring about the other people around you. None of them know you. You’ve managed to loose Taehyung and his friends already. It’s just you and Jungkook, and the music moving in waves through your bodies, like you’ve merged into one living, breathing being, joined by the beat. Jungkook’s body presses closer to you, and all the nerves in you spark at the sensation of him against you. Looking up, his face is bright in the spinning lights. You lean closer, breathing the same air as him, not minding the scent of beer. You’re hypnotised by his eyes, drawn in closer, closer. You can make out every small imperfection on his face, faint freckles, a loose eyelash on his cheek. His lips are so close, they’re almost brushing yours.

And then you’re kissing him. It’s not like the kiss in the cafe. This one isn’t for show, to get the neighbours talking. This is purely, unapologetically Jungkook, and all the feeling that comes from him. It’s the taste of his tongue, rough against your own. It’s the softness of his lips, pressing to the shape you cast for him. It’s the nip of his teeth on the tender skin of your bottom lip, sharp and sweet to you.

The rest of the night passes in a blur - all you’ll remember later is the pounding beat of the drums, and the beat of your own heart as Jungkook’s body moves against you in a slow dance all of your own, while the rest of the club pulses around you, cutting you into your own world, with your own atmosphere, revolving around your own bright sun.

When Jungkook speaks into your ear, breath hot on your skin - “Want to get out of here?” - you’re ready to comply.

The bus ride back to your village is spent giggling in the back seat, leaning against Jungkook, as he draws silly faces for you on the fogged up window, and whispers about the other bus passengers, making up reasons for them to be getting the bus at half one in the morning.

You barely know yourself as you lead Jungkook back to your house. If you had been told a week ago that you’d be going home with someone this evening, you would have laughed. You’ve been single for so long, so starved of touch, any scenario with this outcome seemed farcical. You refuse the urge to pinch yourself.

Bursting into your house, the empty rooms fill with your laughter, as you and Jungkook collapse onto your sofa, without even bothering to turn on the light. You end up underneath Jungkook, his weight holding you down, pressing comfortingly. In the darkness, Jungkook’s lips find yours, with a quiet desperation. These are the kisses of someone as starved for physical contact as you are. You respond back with the same intensity, lungs pulling air between kisses, head dizzy from alcohol and the strength of his affection.

You’d be a fool if you didn’t realise where this is going. Your stomach flips over, as the two of you sit up, bodies tangled together as you straddle Jungkook’s thighs. His hand slips under your shirt, hesitant at first, waiting for you to give him the go ahead. You can only press your lips to his all the more fervently in answer, and his fingers trail across your exposed skin, exploring, like he’s marking out a map of your body.

Suddenly he pulls away, leaving you breathless and cold. In the fog of alcohol your head tries to bend around the heat he ripped from you, wanting desperately to grab it back.

“What’s wrong?” You fumble blindly for the lamp by your sofa, wincing as you douse the room in light.

Jungkook is sitting across from you, his hair mussed up and his cheeks pink. “I’m just not sure about this,” he says, “Are we moving too fast?”

“What do you mean?” Your heart clenches.

“It’s just,” Jungkook puffs out his cheeks in a sigh, “We don’t even know if we’re soulmates. What if we’re not? What if our real soulmates are out there somewhere, just waiting for us to show up?”

“You think I haven’t worried about that myself?” Your eyes search his, just as mesmerising as ever. You refuse to let yourself get sucked in, blinking past the haze in your head, “Obviously I worry about that. But I’m so tired of being alone. I want what everyone else has. I just…” you hang your head, “I want to love somebody.”

“I know,” Jungkook nods, “Me too. That’s why I don’t want to rush into this. I don’t want to be doing this just because I’m desperate for a cure to my loneliness.”

The two of you fall silent. At last Jungkook speaks up. “I should probably get going. My mum will have a fit if I’m back late.”

“Alright,” you nod. You know Jungkook is right, you should slow things down, be sure that this – the two of you, together – is something you really want.

Still, as you wave him off at the front step, you can’t help but feel disappointed. You wish your love life could be as simple as everyone else’s seems to be – that you could have your soulmate watch fall off, and immediately know who you’re meant to be with. And that you would never doubt a kiss after it’s happened.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Ten Years Ago]

The numbers stare back at Jungkook, blank and lifeless, as he stands in his parents room, watch in hand.

The screen reads: 00:00.

His timer is up. That’s what this means. He’s met his soulmate somewhere already, without knowing it, without a watch to guide him to the person he was supposed to be with.

Anger burns in his stomach.

“Jungkook!” His mother runs into the room, switching on the lights. The brightness of the bulbs blinds him, leaving him blinking. “What are you doing with that?” his mother demands.

“Taking what belongs to me,” Jungkook holds up the watch, and his mother’s eyes widen.

“How did you find that?” she asks, taking a step forward and making a grab for it.

Jungkook swings out of the way, clutching the watch to his chest. “It didn’t take too long to look through your drawers.”

His mother’s face reddens. “You shouldn’t be going through my things, Jungkook.”

“Well then you shouldn’t have taken something that belongs to me,” Jungkook replies, not caring that he’s being rude. He’s too angry to care about anything, but the blank numbers on his watch.

“Did you read it already?” she demands, stepping back. Her face is lined with worry, cracks of age etched into her skin.

“Yes,” Jungkook clutches the watch tighter in his hand, feeling the cold metal cut into his skin. His jaw clenches, defiant against his mother, as she draws herself up to her full hight, not quite as tall as he is. It wasn’t long ago that she towered above him.

“After your father and I told you not to? Demanded that you didn’t?” Anger simmers in her voice, below a barely concealed disappointment.

“Yes,” Jungkook remains monotone with her, feeling his teeth grinding together, holding him back from snapping at her – the woman who stopped him from finding his soulmate, prevented him finding love.

“You give that back now,” his mother holds out her hand to him, bare palm demanding.

“No,” Jungkook shakes his head, stepping back.

“Jungkook,” his mother’s tone is strong, unaccepting of his answer, “That’s no way to talk to me.”

Jungkook pockets his watch, watching his mother carefully, letting her watch for herself as he disobeys her. He doesn’t need to say anything. Slinking past her, as she shouts after him, he heads out of the room, across the landing to his own room, where he slams the door, immune to the shouts of his name behind him.

Here, with no eyes on him, he pulls out the watch again, looking at the blank zeroes that stare back, heartless and cold. So his parents have spoiled his soulmate connection because their own soulmate connections have failed. In keeping him from it, they were keeping him from what every other person was going to easily walk into as they journeyed through life – companionship, friendship, a promise that they wouldn’t be lonely again. And for what? Because it hadn’t worked out for them?

With a sudden surge of rage, Jungkook lunges for his bed, and grabbing a pillow, pounds it with his fists, until the breath has gone from his chest, and the tears are gone from his eyes. Leaning down, he rests his head against the pillow he was just assaulting, feeling its comforting softness resting against him, and the thought crosses his mind of how much he wants a soulmate for moments like this, when he’s feeling weak and broken. He wants someone to stay by his side, to comfort him, run a hand through his hair, and promise him everything will be okay.

But it’s not okay. He’s stuck without a soulmate. And somewhere out there, his other half is living with no soulmate, wondering where he is, and why he never showed up in their life when their watch went off.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Present Day]

You wake to a knock on your door. A glance at your phone lets you know that it’s almost midday, on the twenty third of December. Later than you had meant to sleep in. You can still feel the alcohol in your system, not enough to give you a full-blown hangover, but enough to make you roll over with a groan, hoping for more sleep.

Another knock rattles on the door, and you sigh, pushing yourself out of bed. “Alright, alright, I’m coming,” you mutter, knowing the person at the door won’t hear you. You scramble for clothes, before padding down the stairs to open the door.

The bright sunlight greets you, with a brighter smile from-

“Jungkook?” You stare up at him, “What are you doing here?”

He steps into your house, without giving you an answer, leading you towards your living room. “I think I’ve figured out how to fix our soulmate problem.”

“Uh huh?” You flop down on your sofa, rubbing sleep from your eyes, and trying to get your brain in gear.

“So,” Jungkook sits down next to you, warmth radiating out from him, making you want to melt back into bed, maybe with him by your side this time, “I was wondering if it’s possible to find out when soulmate watches were set to go off, even after their timer has already gone off.”

“Yeah?”

“And it turns out that there are a few watchmakers than can wind back watches to figure out the dates they were set to come off. There aren’t many of them. But they do exist.”

“Yeah?” your brain is still half asleep, not quite processing what Jungkook is saying.

“Don’t you get it?” Jungkook stares you dead in the eyes, “If we take my watch to one of these watchmakers, we can see if it was set to go off on the day your watch fell off. We can figure out if you really are my soulmate.”

Your brain finally snaps awake. “This is really a thing we can do?”

“Yeah. I mean, our nearest watchmaker is quite far away. But sure it’s a thing we can do. If you don’t mind a long drive?”

You’re on your feet, before your brain can catch up with your body, leaving you wobbling. “What are you waiting for, let’s go!”

“Now?” Jungkook stares up at you.

“Sure, why not?”

“Well… it’s the twenty third of December,” Jungkook reminds you, “The roads are going to be a nightmare with everyone trying to get home to their families. Not to mention there’s heavy snow forecast for this evening.”

You feel yourself deflate. “Ah, right. So we should probably wait, right?”

“I guess,” Jungkook says, and then the two of you fall silent.

You turn the thought over in your head. The possibility of knowing once and for all if Jungkook is your soulmate – if the fluttering in your heart is the real deal, or just the jittery hope that love is even an option for you.

“Oh, what the hell,” you look down at Jungkook, “I need to know.”

Jungkook grins, “And here I was, hoping you would talk me out of this crazy idea.”

“No way,” you shake your head, “I’m just as crazy as you are.”

“So… road trip?” Jungkook raises his brows expectantly.

“Just wait. First breakfast. Then, road trip!”

Jungkook grins, “Can’t forget breakfast.”

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

Jungkook wasn’t exaggerating when he said the roads would be a nightmare today. You stare out at the sea of cars on all sides of you, sitting at a standstill, with passengers and drivers looking just as hopeless as you feel. The sky above your is a dark grey, and around you, car lights are beginning to turn on as evening sets in.

“We’re never going to get moving,” you groan, leaning your head against the cold window.

“Sure we are,” Jungkook shifts into first gear, rolling the car forward, “Look at that. We gained some ground.”

“Yeah… an inch,” you say.

“An inch is better than nothing,” Jungkook says, and you bite back on any immature jokes you could make, turning your attention to the radio instead:

“How about we have some music?” You turn the volume up as the notes of ‘Let it Snow’ start swimming through the stuffy air of the car.

“I’d rather it didn’t snow,” Jungkook addresses the radio, “At least until we get home again.”

You glance up at the grey clouds that have been consistently gathering above you all day. The sky is dark now, and you can barely tell if that’s because it’s getting late in the day, or just because the heavens are threatening a storm. Maybe both.

Trying to remain positive despite the aching in your muscles from sitting for so long, you begin singing along, putting on a silly voice to coax a smile out of Jungkook as the car rolls forward a few more inches.

Shyly, Jungkook begins to sing along with you, and you trail off, listening intently to Jungkook, awed by his voice. He continues on, not noticing you’ve stopped singing with him, until the song comes to an end. “What?” he glances over at you, “You’re staring at me.”

“Sorry,” you flush, “I just- I never realised you could sing, Jungkook.”

“Huh?” It’s his turn to blush. “I’m not that good.”

“Sure you are! You sing like an angel.”

The tips of his ears are turning red. “Oh, stop flattering me.”

“I need you to know how talented you are, Jungkook, damnit.”

“Oh yeah, well if you’re going to be complimenting me, then you better expect some compliments in return.”

A smile tugs at you lips, “Yeah? You got compliments for me?”

“Sure I do.” Around you, the traffic begins moving again, slowly. “For starters, you’re beautiful!” Jungkook keeps his eyes on the road, rolling forward, but he can’t hide the smile on his face as he talks about you, “And you’re really funny. You’ve got the perfect sense of humour. Not to mention you’re kind. And you’re willing to put up with all my crazy ideas - liking driving miles to find a watchmaker on the off chance he might be able to tell us when I was supposed to meet my soulmate. And you’re also really beautiful. Did I already say that?” He laughs at himself, clearly embarrassed by his rambling. “I guess what I’m trying to say is that if you end up being my soulmate, then I’m a very lucky man.”

You can’t do anything but smile, cheeks hurting, unused to stretching so far. Jungkook has rendered you speechless. You want to tell him so much – that he’s beautiful too, that you love his jokes, his passion, his gentleness, that you think you’d be very lucky if he turned out to be your soulmate too, but the words stick in your throat.

Above you, the heavy clouds begin to release their first flakes of snow with a gentle sigh.

Somehow, you get the sense, Jungkook already knows all you want to tell him.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

The clock on the car dashboard reads 11:00pm. You can barely see the road in front of you, dimly lit by the car's headlights. You’ve made your way through all the traffic, and are somehow still making barely any progress on the road. The windscreen is obscured by a flurry of snowflakes, occasionally punctuated by the windscreen wipers, giving you a brief glimpse of the snow drowning the road in white.

“Jungkook,” you murmur across to him, “We really need to stop.”

“We’re nearly there,” Jungkook insists. You can hear the rough scratch of sleepiness in his voice.

But you know you need to stop driving soon. Jungkook’s tired, and despite turning up the volume of the radio until it’s blasting obnoxious Christmas tunes at full volume, you know Jungkook can’t fight the battle against sleep for much longer.

“We both need rest,” you insist, “We’ll get there tomorrow. But for now we need to stop.”

Jungkook is about to argue back, until a yawn catches him off guard. Blinking tired eyes at the dark road ahead, he relents: “Alright, I’ll turn in at the next service station.”

You watch carefully for the signs directing you to the service station. Through the snow, the sign pointing for a hotel almost feels like a mirage at first. Relief floods through your veins as you turn into the car park, safe, as the snow falls silently around you, covering you in a muffling blanket.

“You okay with sleeping in there?” Jungkook nods at the hotel sign, barely staying up above the entrance. Somebody’s scratched off the “T” and the “L” so it reads “HO E”.

“Anything’s better than sleeping in the car,” you tell him, and so the two of you jump out, and make a break for the hotel, scrambling to escape the bitter cold.

As Jungkook pulls the door open for you, you’re greeted with the smell of damp. You remind yourself of what you had said just a few seconds ago: Anything’s better than sleeping in the car. You’re beginning to doubt that.

Jungkook speaks to the tired looking receptionists, who hands you over a set of keys, telling him it’s the only room they have left.

“Thank you,” Jungkook smiles, before leading you towards the stairwell. The two of you make your way up the rickety old stairs, creaking under your weight.

“I’m regretting not packing a clean set of clothes,” Jungkook admits, as he locates your room down the corridor, “Or a toothbrush for that matter.”

“Don’t worry,” you say, “I didn’t bring those things either. We’ll just have to rough it together.”

Jungkook shrugs apologetically, “I really didn’t think the drive would take this long. Maps said it would only be a five hour drive.”

“That was without snow or Christmas traffic,” you remind him, as he fights with the door, trying to unlock it. With a couple of hard shoves, the door finally shudders open with a blood curdling creak, and you’re greeted with your room, if you could even call it a room. The whole space is taken up by a double bed, covered with grey sheets that might have been white once upon a time.

“Well,” Jungkook steps inside, “I’m beginning to think sleeping in the car might have been a better idea.”

“The car would certainly have had more space,” you laugh, closing the door behind you, with some force, so that it stays shut.

On closer inspection, the small door you had expected to be a cupboard turns out to be the en suit, almost the size of a cupboard itself.

“I guess it’s a good thing we didn’t bring any luggage,” you joke, “We’d have no room for it.”

“I suppose so,” Jungkook says, “If you want to look on the bright side.”

With no luggage with you, it doesn’t take the two of you long to get ready for bed. The two of you take the toothpaste the hotel left out for you, using your fingers to spread the paste around as best you can. It’s not the cleanest your teeth have ever been, but it’s better than nothing. That’s all you can say for this hotel in general. It’s better than nothing.

Defeated, the two of you crash into your bed, too tired to be embarrassed by the prospect of sharing a bed for the first time.

You roll away from Jungkook, snuggling the blankets up around you, and try to fall asleep. As soon as you close your eyes though, thoughts begin to bombard you, doubts springing up like daisies – what if Jungkook isn’t your soulmate, and this trip is all for nothing? Worse – what if the watchmaker reveals who Jungkook’s real soulmate is, and he goes off with them instead?

Rolling onto your back, you stare up at the ceiling, where, in the dim light from outside, you can see the shape of a damp patch on the ceiling. It looks like a map of the USA if you squint.

“You still awake?” Jungkook’s voice breaks the silence, raspy and deep.

“Yeah…”

“I can’t sleep,” Jungkook admits.

“Me neither.”

“What’s keeping you up?” Jungkook asks.

“Well,” you bite your lip, “I’m worried about what will happen once we find out when your watch was meant to come off… I’m worried I won’t be your soulmate.”

Jungkook considers this silently. You swallow, focussing on the strange USA-shaped damp patch on the ceiling.

“Well,” Jungkook finally speaks up, “I’ve been thinking… Even if it turns out that we’re not soulmates… I’d still like to be with you.”

You hadn’t been expecting that. You sit up, looking down at Jungkook. His eyes gleam up at you, reflecting the street lights from outside.

“What?” he asks, frowning up at your face.

“You mean that, Jungkook?”

His voice is soft, firm. “Of course I mean it. I like you. I like you a lot. And I get a sense I’m dangerously close to falling in love with you. Frankly, I don’t care if we’re soulmates. I want to be with you, regardless of what the watchmaker says. I want to see if we can make things work.” He pauses. “I’m sorry for last night. When we got back from clubbing. I guess I panicked because I thought we were moving too fast. And I was worried there was someone out there who was meant to be with you, when I wasn’t. But I can feel it now, even if I’m not your soulmate, I want to be yours – if you want me?”

The only answer you can give to that is to lean down over Jungkook, and press a gentle kiss to his warm lips. “I want that too,” you whisper the answer into his skin, lowering yourself back onto the bed. He wraps his arms around you, drawing you closer, and that’s the last thing you remember before sleep finally takes you captive.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Ten Years Ago]

You’re sitting on the swing in the village park, Jungkook on the swing beside you. The sky before you sparkles out with a kaleidoscope of stars, bright and clear with no clouds to hide them. Your breath comes out in clouds of fog as you push yourself back and forth.

“You said there was something you wanted to tell me?” you press Jungkook.

He asked you to come over and meet him, but you’ve spent the past few minutes talking over small, inconsequential things. You knew you would have to bring it up eventually, his reason for calling you out here.

“Yeah,” Jungkook huffs out a sigh, the mist of his breath rising in front of him, to melt into the air. “See, the thing is… I’m moving away.”

The whole world shifts then, like the earth, spinning on its orbit, has suddenly accelerated forward faster than you were prepared for. You’ve spent so much time with Jungkook, he’s one of your closest friends, one you’ve known for so long. A life without him in your small village seems like a different life entirely, lived in a new body – like you’re not yourself, like you’re losing a part of you.

“Oh,” is all you can say.

“It’s because of the divorce,” Jungkook explains, pushing himself back on the swing, and tipping his head back to stare up at the spilled contents of the milky-way. “My dad’s moving away, and taking me with him. Mum’s staying here.”

Of course, you already knew about the divorce. Nothing stayed a secret in the small village, and you had heard your neighbours whispering about Jungkook’s parents. Everyone had also managed to hear about Jungkook’s lack of a soulmate. He had told you about it soon after he found his watch himself, and you hadn’t had any way to respond, only being able to offer him a hug. You knew what it was like to have no soulmate – to face a future without the promise of a partner. But you couldn’t express that him. Not in any way that felt adequate for the weight of sadness you could feel around him.

“I see.” You know your replies are stiff, but you don’t know what else to say.

Silence ebbs in, feeling heavy in your ears. You stare up at the sky, where the stars wink back at you, offering no answer for the sudden empty feeling in your heart.

“I’ll miss you,” you say at last. It’s something you know you should say, and when you finally push it past your throat, you realise it’s easy to admit. You’ll miss Jungkook so much.

“I’ll miss you too,” he pushes himself around on his swing, so that he’s angled towards you, chains of the swing twisting. “I suppose I should confess this now before I leave…” he presses his lips together, “I thought that because the two of us are soulmate-less, the two of us might eventually end up together.”

“Like, soulmates… but not?” you ask.

“Yeah,” Jungkook nods.

You twist around in your swing as well, facing him. You’re grateful for the darkness of the park, which hides the blush on your face, as a swarm of emotions swim to the surface. You hadn’t considered it before, but it makes sense that the people who don’t have soulmates should be paired together. And Jungkook’s such a good friend. Isn’t that what a soulmate is anyway? A really good friend, who stays with you forever.

But Jungkook can’t stay with you forever.

“I would have liked that,” you admit, your heart jolting into your throat as you speak, and choking you up, so you can’t continue that thought any further.

“Me too,” Jungkook smiles sadly. Pushing himself up off the swing, he walks over to you, hands gripping onto the chains of the swing you’re sat on.

He’s so close that you can see the reflections of the orange streetlights in his dark brown eyes. The ghost of his breath waltzes across your cheeks.

You don’t quite realise what you’re doing, or what he’s doing, until his lips are upon yours, warm and soft.

The whole world seems to pause, as if it’s holding its breath, with the stars twinkling above your heads as the only indication that time is moving forward.

The kiss is short, barely a few seconds, but it’s now imprinted on your brain forever, repeating a thousand times over. A thought stabs painfully at you: If you never find your soulmate,  that could be both your first and your last kiss.

Your stomach fills with ice, as Jungkook pulls away, murmuring, “I’ll miss you so much.”

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

[Present Day]

You awaken with Jungkook stirring beside you. Blinking, you look up to him with a smile as he sits up in bed, stretching his arms above his head. His hair is falling across his face, messy and tangled, but he looks better than he ever has as your heart fills with the hope that the two of you have a future together.

“You’ll never guess what,” Jungkook says, as he goes to open the curtains.

“What?”

Outside, the snow has calmed down, a snug blanket lying over the ground, leaving the world peaceful – a far contrast from the wild flurries of ice last night. Jungkook points out the window at the sign in the car park, “We’re only a mile away from the town the watchmaker lives in.”

And despite how awful the weather was last night, and how scared you were on the road with Jungkook, you can’t help but laugh. “I guess we better go find that damn watchmaker then, since we’ve come all this way.”

“Right!” Jungkook grins, “But remember, no matter what the outcome of all of this… we’ll stay together, so long as that’s what you want.”

“It’s what I want.” You’ve never been more sure.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

The centre of the town is bustling when you arrive. There are people milling around, some frantically buying last minute gifts, others out to enjoy the atmosphere and the bright Christmas light.

You feel like an oddity, scouring the streets for a watch shop while the rest of the town prepares for Christmas.

“This is it!” Jungkook’s voice directs you towards him, a few feet ahead of you, where he’s found the shop you were looking for. You run over to him, excited – until you see the ‘Closed for Christmas’ sign hanging on the door in cheery shades of red and green that don’t match your mood.

“No way,” you can’t hide the disappointment in your voice, “We drove all the way here...for this?”

Jungkook shrugs. “Maybe we’re just not meant to know if we’re soulmates or not.”

You’re ready to turn around, and try to make the most of the town that you’ve taken so long to drive to – when you hear a voice from behind.

“Excuse me?”

You turn around to see a small old lady in front of you.

“Hello,” you say, smiling at her.

“Are you looking for the watchmaker?” she asks.

Jungkook nods, “We were. We heard he can wind back soulmate watches that have stopped, to see when their timer was meant to go off. Do you know if that’s true?”

The old lady gives a smile, her wrinkles stretching as she does so. “Yes, that’s so. Why were you wondering?”

“Well,” Jungkook pulls his watch out from his pocket. It’s silver chain glints in the Christmas lights. “We wanted to find out when this watch was meant to go off. It’ll help us figure out if we’re soulmates.”

“You don’t know if you're soulmates?” the old lady frowns.

“My watch fell off when I was very young,” you explain, “I was never sure if it was a malfunction or not. And Jungkook never wore his watch as a child, so we have no way of knowing if it was supposed to fall off with mine.”

“I see,” the old woman’s eyes twinkled, “It’s just that when I saw you as I walked past, I was so sure you were soulmates. This might sound strange, but the two of you remind me of myself and my husband when we were younger.”

You smile, a warmth spreading through your chest, heating your body despite the cold.

“Do you know who my husband is?” the old lady continues, with a twinkle in her eye, and you shake your head. She leans forward, as if she’s about to divulge a great secret. “He’s the watchmaker you’re looking for.” She smiles at the surprise settling on your face. “If you want, you can visit our house, and I’ll have him take a look at that watch.”

“Oh, I couldn’t,” Jungkook says, “I wouldn’t want to make him work on Christmas Eve if he’s taken the day off.”

“Oh nonsense,” the woman flaps her hands at Jungkook, wafting off his concerns. “It’s no problem. Consider it an act of good Christmas cheer.”

Jungkook glances at you, and you give a reassuring smile. “That’s very kind,” you say, “We’d love to take you up on the offer if it’s not too much trouble.”

The lady’s wrinkled face breaks into a smile. “No trouble at all!”

You find yourself being led down twisting roads towards the old lady’s house as she tells you about how she and her husband met – in a situation similar to yours. Her husband had been wearing his watch. She hadn’t. She told you that when she was younger she used to believe that soulmates were a farce, and so refused to wear her watch. When she bumped into her future husband, she hadn’t realised that she was the reason his watch fell off – it wasn’t until he chased her down the street with such determination not to loose her, waving his watch in her face, that he managed to convince her that soulmates were worth believing in.

“That’s how my husband got into mending watches, you see,” the lady goes on, as you walk beside her, Jungkook on her other side, “He wants to help people who are unsure who their soulmates are.”

You smile at Jungkook, as the lady points up ahead, “That’s my house. We’re almost there.”

As she unlocks the door, she calls for her husband, before bustling towards the kitchen. “Let me make you a cup of tea.”

You’re ushered into a quaintly decorated living room, with a steaming cup of tea placed into hand, explaining your situation to the watchmaker, as he turns over Jungkook’s watch in his hands.

“I’ll see what I can do with this then,” the old man says, with a kind smile, taking the watch into his back room. You watch him through the open door, as he fixes his glasses on his face, and begins work.

By your side, Jungkook’s hand comes to rest on your knee – a gentle reminder that even if the watch tells that you aren’t soulmates, he’ll still be there for you.

The wait is long – or maybe it only seems that way, because you’re aware that you’re waiting. You try to listen carefully, as the old lady keeps you entertained, telling stories of other couples her husband has helped, but at the back of your mind, Jungkook’s soulmate watch keeps flashing up, in shades of silver.

At last, with the all of the tea drunk, the watchmaker emerges from his work room, handing the watch back to Jungkook.

“Well?” You can tell Jungkook is holding his breath.

“That watch was set to go off sixteen years ago,” the watchmaker says, “To be precise it was set to go off on the fourth of September, sixteen years ago, at quarter past nine.”

Your gaze falls on Jungkook. His eyes are a mirror of your own – shining, wide and bright. You don’t need to check. You’ve got the date memorised by heart – the day you lost your watch, the day that Jungkook careened into your life on his tricycle, destroying your watch, and making your life all the better by existing in it.

“Well, is that the date you were hoping for?” the watchmaker asks, but his wife quickly shushes him:

“Can’t you tell from their faces. That’s the right date alright!”

You can’t hold back as you barrel into Jungkook’s arms, not even caring that you’re being watched. He���s planting kisses across your face, spreading warmth along the paths his lips travel.

Of course, you knew that he would stay with you, even if you weren’t soulmates. And that these kisses would come, even if the date differed. But a part of you also knew that you were soulmates all along, that you didn’t need a watchmaker to tell you the truth. You didn’t need to check what you already knew – what the whole village knew. Maybe you really were an idiot for not believing all this time. The boy who broke your soulmate watch, was the boy who was your soulmate all along.

- ✻ ✻ ✻ -

It’s almost midnight by the time you make it back to your village, the Christmas lights still illuminating the small streets, warm and familiar, as Jungkook’s car pulls up in your drive.

“Is it alright if I stay the night?” Jungkook asks.

“You’re always welcome,” you tell him, getting out of the car, and leading him to the house.

The both of you are still too excited by the events of the day to go to sleep, so you end up on the couch, with mugs of instant hot chocolate steaming in your hands.

“So, where do we go from here?” you ask Jungkook. You’re not sure what you’re supposed to do once you get a soulmate. Especially if you’ve known this soulmate for most of your life.

“Well, for one thing,” Jungkook says, sipping on his hot chocolate, “I’m going to have to start taking more trips to see my mum.”

“You mean trips to see me,” you nudge him with your foot.

“Of course,” he bows his head graciously, “Obviously I’ll be coming over to see you. But we can at least pretend for my mum’s sake. Make her feel special.”

You laugh. “That’s odd for someone who doesn’t get on with his mum.”

Jungkook shrugs. “She might have been misguided, but in the end, her actions didn’t stop me from finding who I was meant to be with. And I suppose I never really needed the watch, even though I thought I did. So maybe she was onto something after all, even if she didn’t realise that herself.”

You nod, “I know what you mean. It’s like I’ve always known on a subconscious level that I was going to fall for you.”

Jungkook’s ears turn pink with pleasure. “So you’d say you’ve fallen for me?”

“Obviously. Completely. Head over heels.”

On the wall across from you, the clock ticks over from 11:59 to 00:00.

“Happy Christmas,” Jungkook smiles across at you.

“Happy Christmas, Jungkook.”

- END -

[effymaybe]

Even when the seasons change (I don’t)

Jenlisa AU -

Jennie doesn’t like nightclubs. She goes, anyway. Maybe there’s something there for her. 

Electropop music is blasting against her eardrums, vibrant neon lights are blinding her narrowed stare, her feet are hurting due to the high heels she chose -much to Jisoo’s amusement- to go to the club she was going to have oh so much fun at, and Jennie is wondering for the fifth time in the night what the hell she was thinking about.

She enjoys going out with her friends, truly, but sweaty people sliding against her body in an attempt to keep up with their friends – and sometimes with not so innocent purposes – is not exactly her favorite scenario. She prefers slightly expensive bars, with dark wooden furniture and elaborated drinks she can actually take her time choosing. And definitely places that are not so overpopulated that it’s hard to find your way to the exit and then a taxi to go back home when your best friend meets the love of her life. Which is kind of her situation right now. She doesn’t actually know if the angelical-looking blonde Jisoo spotted leaning over the bar asking for a drink is the brunette’s soulmate, but judging for the expression of astonishment her friend wore for ten long minutes before growing the guts to approach the girl, Jennie guesses it might as well be the case. Leave it to Jisoo to find love in a club.

Jennie sighs as she stares down to the orange-y substance in her plastic glass. She sips it carefully, not as disgusted by the cheap drink as she thought she would be, and her mood almost lifts up a bit until she catches the sight of a guy that might as well double her age staring at her with a lascivious expression. She’s about to turn around and actually kind of run, but somebody grasps her arm tightly, making Jennie gasp.

“Don’t go. Meet Chaeyoung!”, Jisoo half-screams over the music.

Jennie doesn’t even think about it. She’d rather be a third wheel than a disgusting man’s next pray.

She doesn’t have much choice, anyway, because her friend is already dragging her to where the beautiful blonde is sitting, a pinkish drink in her hand.

The girl has the grace to smile at Jennie actually, without seeming annoyed at all, and the brunette has the flash thought that if Jisoo were to actually date this girl, she would approve without major questioning.

“Chae”, Jisoo begins, her mouth curling upwards in a whipped smile, “this is Jennie, my best friend. Jennie, this is Chae”.

“I don’t have any titles”, the blonde comments humorously, gifting Jennie a grin as she holds her hand for the brunette to shake, “for now, at least”.

Jennie smiles back, turning to see her friend blushing deeply with sparkly hope shinning in her coffee eyes.

“You better not be going for the ‘best friend’ one because that’d be awkward…probably for all of us”.

Chaeyoung laughs openly now, and she stops only to smirk at Jisoo.

“Yeah… not the title I had in mind”.

“That’s a relief”, the shortest brunette flirts back, and Jennie is torn between having a bit of fun at expenses of Jisoo’s blush or leaving the girls at their thing so she can fight for a taxi and wrap herself in favorite blankets.

When Jisoo and her not-best-friend-to-be stare at each other suggestively for a long, tense moment, Jennie makes her decision.

“Hey, I’m gonna leave you to-”

“No!”, her friend interrupts, snapping out of her spell, “Chaeyoung is not alone”.

Jennie looks at her friend with an eyebrow dangerously raised.

“What?”

“She means that I came with my friend, Lisa”.

The tallest brunette parts her lips in mid-surprise before shaking her head.

Come on, there is no way…

“I think it’s Lisa, Lisa, you know?”

“What? There is no way”.

“Lisa, my best friend Lisa, went to Kyungnam”.

“Our high school”, Jisoo states proudly.

“There were, like, at least other fifty Lisas at our school”.

“Yeah? How many were ridiculously tall, had Barbie eyes and an annoying laugh?”

Jennie frowns unconsciously at the vague insult and crosses her arms with the hint of a stubborn pout drawing on her lips.

“Also, she has mentioned you”, Chaeyoung comments, her voice careless, but her eyes boring into Jennie’s.

“What?”

“I mean; she has mentioned a Jennie… a few times. Maybe more. The way she described you was… extravagant to me, but now that I see you I definitely get it”.

Jisoo is full smirking right now, her eyes singing a loud ‘Itoldyou’ tune that Jennie despises, but she’s too busy trying to keep her thoughts at bay to search for a creative insult.

“Look, I just don’t think… It’s much of a casua-”

“Jennie?”

Jennie shuts her mouth as her eyes widen in sincere surprise. Her spine tenses and it actually takes her a few moments to get over her skepticism because it can’t be.

She turns around hesitatingly, slowly, taking the time to compose herself before facing the girl that broke her heart seven years ago.

And there she is.

Lisa. High school beauty, Barbie-eyes, model-tall Lisa, looking as young as ever, now with her chocolate hair caressing past her mid-back. She’s wearing skinny jeans and a crop top that allows her to show off her still prominent abs, framed in a leather jacket that makes her look just the right amount of dangerous.

She looks so alluring, so Lisa, that Jennie can almost hear her whispering sweet things in a bathroom stall. Sweet lies. All that time ago.

“Lisa?”, Jennie tries, as if she doesn’t know, but the tallest girl does not answer for a moment, her mouth still open, her eyes running up and down staring at her figure as if desperately trying to look for something.

So she waits until Lisa’s eyes meet hers, and the girl seems to finally snap out of her stupor.

“I- wow, Jennie, you are… here”.

The brunette smiles softly, finding Lisa’s amazement a bit puzzling.

“Yeah… not my scenario, I guess?”

The tallest girl denies with her head quickly as she takes a step forward.

“No, no, I mean, you look amazing, perfectly here, but”, she stumbles with her words, “I’m surprised. It’s been many years”, she finishes, and Jennie shifts in her place.

“Yeah, you are right. I’m quite surprised as well”.

Lisa doesn’t say anything else, just stares at her with burning gaze that looked as if it wanted to tell a whole story by itself. They just stay like that for a moment before the sound of fake coughs make her turn around, slowly enough to catch the tallest girl’s face transform from amazement, to annoyance, to renewed surprise.

“What? Chae?”, Lisa asks, her eyes falling into her best friend’s figure and then moving to look at Jisoo, both sitting at the bar with twin amused expressions.

Jennie doesn’t fail to notice the way Chaeyoung’s hand caresses Jisoo’s thigh absentmindedly.

“Jisoo and I just met”, the pinkish-blonde explains, “and she happens to be Jennie’s best friend”.

“Yeah… I remember”, Lisa murmurs, her brain clearly still trying to catch up with all the information.

“It’s all kind of crazy, right?”, Jisoo adds now, a smirk adorning her expression.

“Destiny”, Chaeyoung agrees, and her hand inches closer to Jisoo’s upper thigh, now less casually and more purposefully.

The shortest brunette coughs, bushing deeply, but Lisa and Jennie are too occupied taking into each other to realize.

The tallest blonde stands up from her booth suddenly, taking Jisoo’s hand and prompting her to follow her.

“We are going to the bathroom”, she announces, and the other two girls stare at them with surprise.

“Really, the bathroom?”, Lisa asks, her head tilted to look at her best friend with slight disapproval.

Chaeyoung merely shrugs, smiling almost predatory, “You do what you have to do”.

Jisoo is still blushing, probably more prominently than before, but she’s visibly excited as she follows the blonde in a rush to the bathroom stalls.

Jennie and Lisa are left alone, surrounded by a sea of people, hyperaware of their situation.

“Uh, so-”

“Want a drink?”, Lisa asks suddenly.

Jennie stares at her with hesitance plain in her face.

“I mean I can buy you a drink and we can talk – catch up… If you want”.

The brunette finds herself nodding. She really hopes her chat with Lisa will be worth the five hours she spent choosing for her outfit.

“What do you want?”

“Whatever you are having is fine”, she answers, and offers a grateful smile, putting her now empty cup on top of the bar.

Lisa smiles back, clearly relieved, the tension of her shoulders almost gone completely.

Jennie is left then, with some minutes to think.

She kind of feels that she should leave.

Her thing with Lisa didn’t las for that long, really, and it happened many years ago. It shouldn’t have been an irreplaceable, unforgettable event of her life.

But it was.

It was because she loved. She loved truly for the first time, with passion, and dizziness, and heart clenches, and tears, and whispered words. She loved deeply, from the bottom of her heart to the extension of her body. She opened herself, body, mind, and soul, wrapped herself up in the prettiest smiles she could muster and handed herself to Lisa, to her deep voice, to her delicate hands.

And she was hurt just as strongly as she loved.

“Jen?”

“Oh, sorry, thanks”.

The brunette takes the glass the tallest girl is offering and sips on the red liquid inside of the cup. It tastes good, and Jennie grins slightly.

Lisa seems extremely pleased with her reaction, a big smile extending on her face.

“You haven’t changed much. Just managed to get even prettier”, the youngest states, and Jennie tries not to think about the compliment too much.

“You look the same as well. Maybe even taller”.

Lisa laughs openly, and Jennie smiles into her glass.

“It’s the heels. So, how is it going for you?”

“Well. I’m an interior designer”.

“One of the best in the city, I’ve been told”.

Jennie raises her eyebrows in sincere surprise.

“You’ve been asking?”

Lisa swallows.

“Everywhere”.

Jennie takes a deep breath and a big sip of her drink.

Come on, she must be doing… her thing.

“I’m sure they are exaggerating. How about you? How are you doing?”

“I opened my own dance studio like two months ago”.

The brunette is struck with sincere happiness, her face breaking out in an excited smile.

“Really? Lisa, that’s great! I thought you were studying to become a lawyer, though”.

“I was”, Lisa explains, her eyes softening in a way Jennie is surprised to realize she has never seen before, “but I decided to follow my heart”.

“I so happy for you, then”.

“I am happy too… It’s something I should have been done a lot of time ago.”

“Choosing dancing?” Jennie asks.

“Following my heart”.

Lisa’s coffee eyes burn on Jennie’s, her expression tinted with longing. The brunette becomes a bit restless, but she tries to shake off the warmth that threatens with filling her chest.

It’s not like that.

“Well, I’m glad you did. My humble opinion is; you were born to dance”.

Lisa chuckles a bit, her cheeks slightly flushed.

“You’ve always been supportive. Thank you for that. You should pass by some day! Your own dancing skills are impressive as well”.

“Ah, you are just saying it”, the brunette teases, “I haven’t danced since high school”.

“What? Seriously?”

Lisa looks genuinely surprised, and Jennie can’t help but to duck her head a bit to hide a slight blush.

“Well, it’s not like I had a lot of time to do so… also, where I am supposed to dance?”

“I don’t know… it would be great if you’d known someone who… you know… owns a dance studio”.

The brunette chuckles airily and takes a sip of her drink.

“You would have to work very hard with me”.

Lisa gasps.

“That’s totally not true! You are a great dancer!”

The brunette raises her eyebrows playfully.

“Really”.

“Yeah! Besides, you would immediately be my favorite student”.

“And what’s the benefit of being your favorite?”.

Lisa pauses for a second.

“Uh…golden star stickers?”

Jennie laughs again, this time more freely, and Lisa can’t help but to join in, the feeling of achievement spreading through her body. She drinks a bit of the content of her plastic glass but immediately ditches it. She wants to be fully aware of the moment.

“I guess I have to start polishing apples, then”.

The brunette is almost startled when she looks at Lisa, the tallest girl’s eyes exuding a warmth that she can almost feel wrapping up her soul. The softness of her features reflect a fondness that can’t be there, just can’t be there.

“Just bring yourself”.

Jennie stares at the tallest girl as her eyes drift to her side briefly, a somewhat somber expression making itself apparent in her doe eyes, only to set her gaze in the brunette once again.

She shifts, trying to anchor herself, looking for any topic to deflect her mind from the feeling that is blooming in her chest.

“So… how-”

“I miss you, Jennie”.

Jennie stares back at Lisa, her eyes wide.

“What?”

“I’m sorry. I won’t interrupt again. I just wanted you to know. It was driving me crazy”.

And Jennie sees with astonishment the way the other girl’s eyes begin to become watery.

“Lisa…”

The girl stares at her side once again, somewhat annoyed, but turns to Jennie once again.

“I’ve been meaning to tell you this for years. I just want you to know, Jen”, she moves closer, their faces just some inches apart, “you are the best thing that ever happened to me and I miss you. I miss you so much”.

“Lisa, I… don’t know what to say”.

“You don’t have to say anything. I know I fucked up in ways… Oh, just-”.

And Lisa leaves her like that, rushing past her, her heartbeat hammering against her chest, a blush spreading from her cheeks to her neck, and Jennie has no idea what could possibly had made the tallest girl disappear from her personal space in such a touching moment, so she turns her head to follow the brunette’s figure. She sees Lisa’s back facing her, the girl talking to a mildly-good-looking guy that reminds Jennie of the jocks Lisa dated in high school - the jocks she chose to cheat on her with in high school – and feels tears rushing to her eyes.

Again.

Fucking again.

Jock guy smiles at Lisa crookedly, leans in, and Jennie can’t see it anymore. She runs out of the bar, sliding through heated bodies, her cheeks wet with hot tears as her body burns with shame and regret.

She makes it out of the place quite quickly, but doesn’t stop until she reaches a half-illuminated alley, not fond of the idea of tons of people watching her cry for her high school girlfriend. Once again.

She covers her face with her hands as she thinks how could she have been so stupid, so naïve to think that the girl who had broken her heart so many times would even think about-

“Jennie, please!”

The brunette hugs herself as Lisa’s voice reaches her ears.

“Jen, where are you? Please, talk to me”, the tallest girl’s voice sounds completely shattered, but Jennie remains quiet.

Steps sound closer, and the dark brunette knows that Lisa is about to find her.

“Jen- oh, you are here”.

Lisa rushes to her as if she just found something invaluable that she had lost many years ago.

“Leave”.

“Jennie, let me explain”.

“What do you have to explain? That you were telling me oh how much you missed me, but decided to ditch me for some half-decent-looking guy?”

“No! I…”

“I can’t believe I was so fucking stupid, honestly, it’s clear that you don’t care”.

“Jennie, it’s not like that!”

“But you never did, did you? I knew this, I know this and yet you manage to-”

“He wasn’t trying to get me; he was trying to get you!”

The wind blows between the girls as a beat of silence makes itself present.

“What?”

“He was staring at you, and then… gesturing, and then he called his friends and I was trying to tell you everything I never told you, and he was there being a fucking prick. And I felt this rush… this need to protect you like I never did, and take you home, and cuddle watching all those Disney movies you love, and attempt to cook all the waffles you can eat, and just do anything on my hands and beyond to show you that I love you so fucking much. I’ve been in love with you for so many years and I never could… I never had the damn guts to show you how much whipped for you I am, how easily you can destroy my heart. Fuck! Fuck that fucking guy. I love you so much”.

Lisa is painting now, each of the words she uttered echoing in Jennie’s mind almost as if foreign.

When the tallest girl beings to cry - to sob loudly between her hands – shattered in a way that nobody has witnessed before, Jennie snaps out of it. She takes a step closer and lets her right hand press against a wet cheek.

Lisa doesn’t hesitate to put her own hand over Jennie’s, desperately trying to anchor herself.

“It has always been you, Jen. I know I fucked up many times, and I understand if you can’t forgive me, but”, Lisa’s voice breaks, “I want you to know. All those boys meant nothing. I cried every time I kissed somebody that wasn’t you. Back when we were together… and also after we broke up. I just wanted you. And they weren’t you.”.

Jennie feels her own tears running down her cheeks.

“Then why, Lisa?”

“Because of my parents. I wanted to make them proud, keep the whole ‘Manoban’ name squeaky clean and all. And they wanted me to get straight As, to be popular, to marry a rich man, to become a lawyer…fuck, they even thought about what kind of dog I should have… a damn poodle”.

Jennie lets out a watery snort.

“I don’t think that you look like the poodle type”.

Lisa smiles brokenly, and Jennie’s heart aches.

Back to the time when they were together, Lisa always wanted her parents to be proud. It is true. Jennie saw her spending days and days studying for tests, late at night, early in the morning, the dark spots under her eyes becoming darker and darker each passing day. She saw her befriending all that trashy people not even Lisa herself could stand for more than ten minutes. She saw her giving up dancing. She saw her losing the stars in her eyes, losing her bright smile, losing her cheerful aura. She saw her crying, sobbing, breaking herself again and again just to earn a pat on her back.

“What do you want, Lisa?”

Jennie caresses the tallest girl’s cheek softly.

“I want the two things I’ve ever loved. Dancing…and you”.

The shortest brunette stares at Lisa for a moment.

“It’s fine if I can’t have you. I know what I did is not worth forgiving. I just… want you in my life. As a friend. Or anything you’d like. I just want to know if you could…at least tolerate me”.

“Lisa, you broke my heart, almost beyond repair”.

Trusting is hard.

The tallest girl lets her head hang low in shame.

“I know”.

Jennie takes a step closer, now both girls’ bodies almost touching.

“So you better do a great job fixing it”.

But I can do it again… just one more time.

Lisa’s head snaps quickly, her eyes widening as she reaches out with her hand to grasp Jennie’s arms gently.

“Jen?”

“I love you back, Lis. I… this is not rational. I’m terrified, but I don’t know what else to do. I just can’t help it. I love you back. So much, I think we can move on. I think we can work it out”.

Lisa gasps, and lets her arms wrap themselves around Jennie’s waist, unsure about the shortest girl’s reaction. When she simply smiles and puts her hands on her shoulders, Lisa launches her body forward to hug her lover tightly.

“I’ll make it worth it, Jen. I promise. I love you so, so much. Thank you. Thank you”.

Jennie simply hums in content against the girl’s collarbone, her thoughts a bit dizzy due half to the contact and half to the sweet memories triggered by Lisa’s perfume.

When Lisa pulls slightly away, their faces are left some inches away.

“We would have to… get to know each other again”, Jennie whispers, and the tallest girl is shedding tears once again, staring at her with the heat of absolute devotion.

“Go on a date with me?”, she blurts unsure, and the vulnerable look in her eyes almost makes Jennie melt.

“Mmh… I don’t know”, the shortest girl plays.

“We can do anything you want”.

Jennie laughs.

“I want you to have fun as well”.

“We’ve always had fun together. I’m sure now won’t be different”.

“You know how to charm a girl. It’s a deal”.

Lisa smiles beamingly and squeezes Jennie’s waist a bit.

“Thank you”.

“Thank you? So I don’t get a kiss?”

The tallest girl looks surprised, but not less excited.

“You want one?”

“A few, actually.”.

Lisa inches closer, not keen on losing an opportunity as such.

“To make up for the time lost?”, she asks.

“Yes. And to take profit from the time we have now”.

And Lisa lets her lips melt against Jennie. They dance in a way they’ve learnt out of practice, they’ve always gotten out of pure chemistry. Both girls feel their breaths leaving their lungs as their minds try to catch up with the feeling of finally, finally being where they wanted to be. When Lisa tilts her head a bit to find another blissful angle, Jennie lets out a soft mewl, and the tallest girl has the faint thought that she would do absolutely anything for her lover’s happiness.

No more fear.

“I’ve been looking for you for years. Everywhere. I searched for you at the better spots to watch the sunsets. I visited all the dog cafés with dark wooden furniture in town. I went out every hill around the city to see if I could find you gazing at the stars”.

Lisa’s confession is murmured against Jennie’s lips.

“Out of all the places possible, I didn’t expect to find you here”.

Jennie pulls slightly away to stare at Lisa’s eyes, her own hands entangling in long, chocolate hair.

“And yet, you found me”.

“I found you”.

Lisa lets her lips press against Jennie’s mouth, the bridge of her nose, her forehead, her left cheek.

“And I’m not letting you go. Never”, a pause, “unless you want me to”.

Jennie smiles as she hugs Lisa again, entertaining again her thought of going home and wrapping herself in her softest blankets.

This time, with somebody just by her side.

She does not want Lisa to let her go.