#i just did whatever for the horns and hair because it looks amazing like that

[1dont-really-know]

Now what kind of stitch is good for skin....

[goldencherriess]

The supreme lord of the bathroom.

Pairing: Percy Jackson x Fem! Reader

Summary: A new arrival at Camp Half-Blood announces new opportunities.

Word count: 5.5k

Warnings: angst if you squint, mentions of blood

Previous part || Series masterlist

Y/N blinked against the sunlight. It was pouring out the window onto her face like a golden cascade. Her ears caught sounds of laughter and chatter. It wasn’t the first time she woke up in the middle of a morning chaos. Life in Cabin 11 had always been that way, too lively for her likeliness. People always shuffling, talking loudly and giggling. It was a cabin which burst with life, but it was also too overcrowded. She rarely felt she got a breather to herself. Most of the time she was yearning to be left alone to her thoughts, but always a Hermes kid jumped at the opportunity to talk to her. She always shut them out. A side of her felt grateful for the warmth she was greeted with when she had first stepped into the cabin, but another side of her was longing to know to which cabin she truly belonged. 

Someone jumped on her bunk bed, dipping the mattress. “Wake up, sleepy head!”

“I’m already awake. You lot had awakened me up,” she replied groggily, opening one eye and gazing at the person who was currently taking most of her bed. 

The boy only shrugged innocently. “That’s Cabin 11 for ya. You’re stuck with us,” he grinned. “For a while,” he hastily added once he saw Y/N furrow. 

She only sighed, before getting up. “It’s been four years, Luke.”

Luke was the first who befriended her the day she stepped into the camp for the first time. She could still remember the warm smile he approached her with. 

“Yeah, but others had to wait longer. They still got claimed, though.”

“And others didn’t,” replied Y/N bitterly. 

Luke cast his eyes down. “I know, I’m sorry.” A smile spread on his lips again. “You know what I’ve heard?”

Y/N rolled her eyes, while she gathered her hair into a ponytail. “Amaze me.”

“The new kid. He killed the Minotaur. And Annabeth thinks he’s the one. You know, he might just be. Play your cards right and you might get yourself a quest. The quest.”

Y/N’s eyes widened and she let her hair fall back down. “Really?”

Luke opened his mouth to reply, but familiar hooves entered the cabin and interrupted him. The tall and lean figure of Chiron stood in the doorway, clapping his hands. “Everyone, everyone. Your attention, please.” Y/N turned her head, curiously taking in the sight of a golden-haired boy beside the centaur. “This is Percy Jackson, I trust you will see to whatever he needs.”

She turned back towards Luke. “Is this the kid?” she asked him, pointing towards the blonde. 

“That’s what I’ve heard.”

A grin spread out on Y/N’s face, illuminating her sharp features. “Great. I’ll make the introductions. Don’t interrupt me and let me approach him first. This could be important.”

“You’re so bossy.”

“Promise me, Luke!”

Luke raised his hands in surrender. “Alright, alright, I promise! Just don’t scare him off.”

She ignored him and took small steps towards the boy, analyzing his every move. She could tell he was feeling out of place, confused and furious. She could tell because she saw her younger self in his shy eyes and unsure steps. She crossed her arms and leaned on the banister beside his sleeping bag. He was just crouching and taking something out of a backpack when she spoke up. “So, you’re the one who killed the Minotaur?”

He got up and turned around abruptly. His gaze landed on Y/N and she thought his eyes resembled the deep sea and its secrets. “How did you-”

“News travels fast,” she shrugged. 

He only huffed. “Look, if you want to give me a hard time, just do it tomorrow. I can’t do any more today.”

“Are you the kid who killed the Minotaur? It’s a yes or no question,” repeated Y/N more firmly, straightening her back and distancing herself from the bannister. 

The boy’s eyes travelled to the horn besides his backpack.She followed his gaze. “So, you did. It’s true what they say.”

“Uh, yeah,” he replied, shuffling his feet. 

“What’s your name?” asked Y/N, taking a step closer towards the newcomer. She could feel Luke’s gaze burning holes into her back. 

“Percy.”

She smirked. “Welcome to Camp Half-Blood, Percy. I’m Y/N.” She stuck out her hand in greeting, and he shook it hesitantly. 

“Heard what happened to you on the hill,” a familiar voice said. Luke came up beside her, approaching Percy just as he did once to her. “And I just… wanted to say I’m really sorry.”

Percy’s gaze slipped towards Y/N, who was still closely watching him, before it fell, aimlessly looking around and taking in the sight of the wooden floor. 

“I know what you’re going through. Believe me.”

“You might not believe it yet, but you’re one of us,” said Y/N, lowering her head to catch his gaze. “You’re a demigod.”

He lifted his gaze, latching onto hers. He almost started at the intensity in them. They strangely reminded him of a thunderous sky in a storm. 

“I’m Luke. You met Y/N here. We’re your friends now.”

“Percy,” he replied, shaking Luke’s hand before his eyes panned to Y/N. She hesitantly smiled, before she turned around. “Settle in, no one’s doing your bed around here!” she yelled over her shoulder.

“Bossy,” he whispered under his breath. 

Luke chuckled lightly from beside him. “She means no harm. It’s just the way she is. We figured she might take after her godly parent.”

“Who’s her godly parent?” asked Percy, taking his gaze off Y/N, who was just picking up a set of arrows and a bow. 

Luke scratched the back of his head. “We, uh, we don’t know. She’s unclaimed. Has been for four years now.”

Percy nodded slowly. He understood. “Just like me,” he murmured.

⋅•⋅⊰∙∘☽༓☾∘∙⊱⋅•⋅

Y/N loved to watch the birds fly and sing between the emerald trees. She would sit for hours, glancing at the skies every once in a while, while she cleaned her arrows and bow. Today was no different. Sitting under a cooling shadow of a pine, she glanced upwards, catching the sight of an eagle slashing the skies in two. Annabeth was sitting besides her, talking her ear off. “He drools when he sleeps.”

“Does he?” she replied absently.

“Yes, but that’s unimportant. Irrelevant. I think he might be the one.”

Y/N’s lips curled. “I think so too. We might get that quest after all, Annie.”

Annabeth smiled back, her teeth glinting in the sunlight. Not a second later, her face turned serious. “Have you talked to him yet?”

Y/N raised an arrow to her eye level. It glistened. “Do you think it’s clean enough?”

Annabeth’s gaze slid to the silver tip of the arrow. “Yes. Did you talk to him yet?”

“Yes, I did.”

Annabeth raised an eyebrow. “And?”

“And he seems sad.”

“Obviously he would. He’s new and unclaimed.”

Y/N’s eyes flashed and she let her gaze slide away. “No, wait- I’m sorry, I didn’t mean-” Annabeth stuttered.

The eagle let out a cry and it flew away. “It’s quite alright, Annie. It’s the truth,” she smiled bitterly. “Plus, this is why I want that quest. A chance to prove myself and to get his attention.” Her ears recognized Luke’s voice, coming out of Cabin 11. Percy was walking beside him, his eyes shining in wonder. He was looking up at him like a child would look up to their older sibling. She recognized the look. She turned back towards Annabeth. “Got a strategy for Capture the Flag yet?”

“Working on it, but it’s coming around nicely,” smirked Annabeth. 

“Never doubted it. Meet you later to talk it through?”

“You got it.”

Y/N smiled before she waved her goodbye. Her steps carried her to the boys, before Clarisse La Rue, the resident bully of the camp (Y/N still vividly remembered her first week. She almost got herself beaten up by her at a Capture the Flag game, before a gust of wind hit Clarisse in a tree trunk, knocking her out for a half of day), bumped into Percy. He grunted, rubbing his shoulder. “Hey!”

Clarisse turned around and pushed him. He fell, the cold earth hitting his back. Y/N sped up, her bow clutched in her hand. 

“Woah! Hey, knock it off, Clarisse. It’s like his first day, come on,” voiced Luke.

 Y/N reached Percy, holding her hand out to him. He clasped it and she helped him to his feet. He threw her a shy smile and she acknowledged it with a nod. 

Clarisse’s face morphed into a look of false astonishment. “Wait, so this is the kid who killed the Minotaur. Is that right?”

“Uh, yeah?” Percy replied, looking around. 

Clarisse smiled wickedly. “I’ll bet.” She took a step towards him. “Look, you want attention around here, dummy?”

Y/N’s eyes shifted from Percy to Clarisse, her knuckles turning white on the bow. 

“You better be ready for it when it comes.” Clarisse snapped her head towards him, scaring Percy. He took a step back. She laughed and turned on her heels.

“Don’t you get bored, La Rue? Picking on kids half your size?” questioned Y/N, her voice firm and sure. 

Clarisse turned around slowly, her face as still as a stone, a cold and deadly look in her eyes. 

“Oh, right. You’re doing it for daddy,” continued Y/N. “Not working though, am I right?”

Clarisse’s lips twitched in anger. “Still unclaimed, L/N?”

Y/N felt a pang in her chest, but she smirked nonetheless, “Still afraid of me?”

Clarisse only scoffed before she turned her back on her, fisting her hands. 

“Well, she seems nice,” said Percy, pointing at Clarisse’s retreating form. 

“Ares kids,” sighed Luke. “They come by it honestly.”

“Don’t mind her too much,” said Y/N, her hands finally relaxing on the smooth wood of her bow. 

“You’re not afraid of her,” stated Percy, turning to look at her. Once again, he saw that bold look in her eyes. 

“Why should I? She’s just insecure. I’m afraid of nothing, I won’t start shaking in my boots because of a jealous Ares kid.”

“Why don’t they mess with you?”

A smirk bloomed on Luke’s face. “They know better.”

“Luke’s the strongest swordsman at camp and Y/N’s the best archer you’ll ever meet,” voiced Chris, a boy with an earthly brown complexion and jet black curls.

Percy blinked and Y/N could see the gears in his head turning. “So they leave you alone because’ glory’ ?”

Luke nodded.

“So if I get glory Clarisse wouldn’t mess with me either?”

“You learn fast,” said Y/N, regarding him with a glint in her gaze. 

“Exactly,” added Luke. 

"And people think I’m a big deal?” continued Percy, looking up at Hermes' child. 

Luke crossed his arms, nodding his head hesitantly. “Well, sorta, but-”

“And my dad’s got no choice but to claim me,” the blonde said, turning to look at Y/N, as if asking her for her approval. Her smirk fell. It was as if she was looking into a mirror, seeing her pain reflected in a kindred spirit, in the eyes of a boy who felt utterly confused and lost and furious at the world. 

“You can’t force the gods to do anything,” interjected Luke, before throwing Y/N a worried glance. 

“Well, yeah, but… it would make it harder for him to pretend I don’t exist, right?” shrugged Percy, slowly moving his gaze off Y/N to Luke. 

“Maybe.”

Y/N’s voice outpowered Luke’s, her hand once again clenching her bow, until her knuckles turned painfully white. “Definitely!” The boy in question gaped at her. 

A smile shone on Percy’s face, his eyes glinting with determination. “Well, great. Where do we start?”

⋅•⋅⊰∙∘☽༓☾∘∙⊱⋅•⋅

Y/N’s hands never quivered when she held a bow and an arrow in her hand. Whenever she held the weapons, she felt she had a sense of control she had lost the moment she found she was a demigod. She inhaled and slowly exhaled, grounding herself and emptying her head of thoughts. She slowly pulled the arrow and released it. The arrow cut the air and hit the target. A smile broke on her face and she lowered the bow. She turned to look at the golden-haired boy, who was already gazing at her with awe shimmering in his eyes. She handed him her bow. “Your turn.”

He took the bow out of her hand. “I wanna be very clear about this, I’ve never done anything like this before, and it looks super dangerous.”

Luke lifted a shoulder. “And you never killed a Minotaur before either, ‘till you did.”

“There’s a first for everything,” added Y/N, taking out an arrow. Her eyebrows disappeared under her hairline and she held out the weapon. Percy, unsure, shifted his weight, before he accepted the sharp, silvery arrow. 

An Apollo child drew out a lighter, but Y/N raised her hand in a warning, her head shaking in a very definite and clear “no”. Percy raised both of his arms and closed an eye, trying to focus on the target but it blurred in front of his eyes, much like the air would dance in a very torrid day in downtown New York. 

“You’re holding it wrong,” stated Y/N from beside him.

“Am I?” frowned Percy. 

She sighed. “Yes.”

 Percy could feel her come up behind him. Her fingertips touched his elbow, raising it slightly. “Stay straighter.” Percy straightened his back, feeling warmth creeping up his neck. “And relax your hold on the bow, it’s not going anywhere.” His fingers loosened around the bow. “Focus.” Percy thought that focusing would be a bit too hard when he could literally feel Y/N’s breath near his ear, but he tried nonetheless. 

She took a few steps back. “Release the arrow.” 

And he did just that, except the arrow didn’t comply with his will, it flew over everyone’s heads and it stabbed the dark earth. Apollo’s children shrieked and fell to the ground, in an attempt to shelter themselves from the furious arrow. Percy himself fell, a grimace painting his features. Y/N pulled her lips into a thin line, staring at the place the arrow landed. It shone in the sun.

“Should I try again?” questioned Percy meekly. 

“No!” Everyone yelled. 

“Tough luck,” said Y/N, looking down at Percy. 

“Right,” he mumbled before he stuck his hand out, a silent plea to be helped to his feet. 

Y/N extended her hand, but she only took the bow out of the boy’s hold. “See you around, newbie!” she yelled once she turned on her feet, marching towards where the arrow was mockingly glinting in the sun rays.

She was pretty sure she heard him swear under his breath. 

⋅•⋅⊰∙∘☽༓☾∘∙⊱⋅•⋅

The light was throwing pretty shades under the tree. A wind picked up and Y/N’s hair ruffled. She looked up at the tree. It was a beautiful pinetree. It was also a lifeline. She heard the stories about it, about how Thalia sacrificed her life to save Luke, Annabeth and Grover. Annie recounted it too many times, Y/N could now recite it in her sleep. She reached out a hand and touched the rough surface of the deep brown bark. It was like a prayer and she almost had the sudden urge to climb it, to regard the world, the wide, swaying blades of grass. To let the winds whip her face in a gentle caress, to let the smiling sun shine on her. 

She wasn’t afraid of heights. Growing up, while her mother was still very much alive, her cheeks still bursting with colour, she would get all her pants ripped just because she was stubborn enough to climb trees. She’d be closer to the sky, she used to say as an excuse. But then, she turned 5 years old and the wooden, rustic cabin was replaced by towering sky-scrapers. The once fresh mountain air was now thick and heavy. And the damp, dewed earth was taken by concrete floor. She hated the city, but it seemed that the city hated her back, as she did not find her place there. 

Light footsteps spoiled the silence and she knew who it was, before she turned around. 

“I think you would have gotten along,” Annabeth voiced.

Y/N turned around. Annabeth was looking up at the tree with longing in her eyes.

“I don’t know. Maybe.” 

She took a seat under the tree’s shade. Her friend followed suit, comfortable silence enveloping them both like gentle hands. Distant laughter could be heard and Y/N basked in the joyous sounds. 

“I watched him. He’s awful at archery and sword making.”

A snort escaped Y/N’s lips and she turned to look at her friend. “He is more than awful at archery. He’s horrendous. Never letting him get anywhere near a bow and an arrow again.. A danger to humanity.” She shook her head, laughing softly to herself.

Annabeth lightly smacked her arm. “Do not laugh! This is serious stuff! He needs to be quest worthy!”

Y/N’s chuckles subsided, a ghost of a smile still present on her lips. “You know I want this as much as you do, Annie. I’m just saying things as they are. Why sugarcoat it? He has no talent in archery.”

Annabeth huffed. “I’m still keeping a close eye on him.”

“You do that,” Y/N nodded. Then, as if she suddenly remembered something, she turned her whole body toward Annabeth, criss-crossing her legs. “What about Capture the Flag? Any progress on that?”

“Yes and no. Still figuring things out.”

Y/N started nodding, her lips slightly parted, but Athena’s daughter interrupted her. “You’re on my team, obviously.” And she bumped her shoulder with hers. 

A grin illuminated Y/N’s face and she giggled, bumping Annabeth right back. A blowing horn cut the air, announcing that it was dinner time. Annabeth got up with a grunt, dusting her pants, before reaching a hand out to Y/N and smiling down at her. Y/N let herself be pulled up and she threw Annabeth a mischievous grin. “Race you to the tables?”

But she didn’t give her time to answer, as her feet had a mind of her own and sprinted across the hill, down to the camp.

“You cheater!” she heard Annabeth yell, a note of laughter in her tone. 

The sun was casting down, bathing everything in fiery orange and Y/N was feeling good. 

⋅•⋅⊰∙∘☽༓☾∘∙⊱⋅•⋅

“Is there a Greek god of disappointment? Maybe someone should ask him if he’s missing a kid” Y/N heard Percy say, as she tried to catch her breath (she won the race as she proudly teased Annabeth about it). She picked up an ivory plate, before she waved her friend goodbye, catching sight of Percy’s golden hair. 

“Oizys… but she’s a goddess,” replied Chris, as Y/N squeezed herself between him and Luke. “And her whole thing isn’t really disappointment, it’s more like failure.” 

She wished for spaghetti, like her mother used to make her in the cold evenings (and then her aunt tried to pick up the recipe. Her spaghetti always turned out to taste like cardboard, the sauce too gelatinous, but the thought and her trying were endearing. She ate them all the same). The spaghetti morphed themselves in her plate, swirls of steam rising into the air. Its savoury aroma tickled Y/N’s nostrils and her stomach grumbled.

“How did the first day go?” she said, as she caught Percy’s blue gaze.

“Awful,” he replied, playing around with his food.

“Well, every first day is awful,” she shrugged. She remembered how miserable she felt on her first day at camp, missing her aunt and feeling confused. 

“Thanks, very reassuring.” He threw her a sarcastic smile.

“You’re welcome. Just a reality check.”

“What Y/N is trying to say is that this was just the first day, the others won’t be as bad,” voiced Luke.

“Yes, cause that’s exactly what I was trying to say,” said Y/N, rolling her eyes with a hint of a smile on her lips.

Luke bumped her shoulders with his. “Tone down the sarcasm. It’s his first day.” He then turned to look at Percy, reassuringly smiling at him. “We’re gonna find the thing that you’re good at. I know it.”

A bell chiming cut through the air and Luke turned around. “Our turn.”

“Our turn for what?” frowned Percy, looking at Y/N as she got up. 

“Prayers,” she smirked, before gulping down a fork full of spaghetti. They tasted just like she remembered. 

“Burnt offerings,” added Luke, picking up his own plate. “The gods like the smell, so it gets their attention before you say a prayer.”

Percy frowned. “They like the smell of burnt mac and cheese?”

“They like the smell of begging,” chuckled Chris, before taking his plate and leaving the table. 

Y/N cracked a smile, spiralling the spaghetti on her fork, the sauce dripping down the side of it, vermillion on silver. 

“You burn what you’ll miss the most. Then they really mean what you’re about to say, so they listen,” explained Luke. 

“Do they, though?” mumbled Y/N, mouth full of food. 

Luke didn’t seem to hear her, as he left the table, back straightened. Percy stared her down, lips slightly parted. Y/N gulped down the spaghetti, the sauce burning her throat. “What?” she asked harshly. Her eyebrows pinched. 

The boy jumped, as if out of a daze. “You just- You got something on your face.”

“Do I?” She hastily wiped her cheek, a wild look in her eyes. 

“Not there. There,” he replied, pointing at the corner of his mouth. 

Y/N wiped her mouth with the back of her hand. Red sauce painted her hand and she scoffed, before she licked it. Spices and the taste of home invaded her mouth once again. “Thanks,” she mumbled before she turned her back on him, taking steps toward the fire in the centre of the dining pavilion.

The flames were dancing playfully. It was as if they were twirling in a never-ending tango and for a moment she thought she saw a woman smile in the golden light of the flames. She blinked and the flames stared back at her. She scraped the remaining spaghetti off with the fork into the fire. The flames heightened and the smell of home reached her nostrils. “To my father. Please, show yourself,” she whispered. 

She gave up guessing a long time ago. Her first guess was Apollo. But then again, she didn’t have a talent for singing, nor did she have a knack for writing (and if you were to ask her, she didn’t make a good nurse either). After a while, she realised that she might be the daughter of a minor god or one of the many children of a major one, a nameless and faceless child in a crowd of thousands. 

The fire gave one last puff and crackle and she turned back to the table, where she put back the plate. Percy was still there, watching her every move. Her eyes snapped to his. They really resembled the ocean. Her lips curled slightly, in a smirk. “See you tomorrow, newbie. You’d better show your Minotaur-killing skills at Capture the Flag.”

And she turned on her heels, marching towards Cabin 11. 

“Wait, what’s that?” she heard him yell. 

Her smile broadened, her fingers twitching at the thought that she’d hold her bow again. 

⋅•⋅⊰∙∘☽༓☾∘∙⊱⋅•⋅

Capture the Flag was a glory induced event for the demigods at Camp Half-Blood. For Y/N was no different. She looked forward to the energised atmosphere, the wind-swept woods, the cathartic battle cries. She loved the feeling of freedom and the confidence she felt when holding her trusted bow in hand. But most of all, she looked forward to winning.

“The first team to retrieve the opposing flag and return it across the river shall be the victor,” Chiron’s sure voice boomed across the woods. Y/N stood proudly with the bow in her hand and a fistful of arrows on her back, “As always, there will be no maining and no killing. I trust these rules will be respected.  Any magical items you may possess, are permitted as well. Every camper who is not injured has to play. Prisoners may be disarmed but may not be bound or gagged. Let the games begin!”

A conch horn blew, announcing the start of Capture the Flag and Y/N grinned, a sense of confidence surging through her veins. The Red Team let out furious battle cries and The Blue Team responded just as much. 

“All right. We have twenty minutes before the second conch and game on,” said Annabeth as she came up to her, Luke and Percy ( who was very much fidgeting, but Y/N chose not to say anything about it, as she thought it would hurt his ego. Not that she cared, but she needed her team to focus and win).  “You know what you're doing?”

“Yes, m’am” nodded Luke. 

She turned towards Y/N, who smirked. “Always.”

Luke started to walk away, but Annabeth speaking up stopped him in his tracks. “Hey. Today feel like a winning day to you?”

Luke slowly nodded. “I’ll see you on the other side.”

Y/N saluted Annabeth and Luke before her gaze slid towards the blonde, who was silently watching the interaction. “See you later, newbie! Try to not get yourself killed!”.

And she was off, on her way, running through the woods, going over Annabeth’s plan. Do what you do best, climb up trees, arrows ready. Watch over Percy, make sure they end up near the river. I’ll be right there, watching on, she said to her. 

Her feet skidded down muddy paths, the smell of fresh grass and pine trees enveloping her. She heard an eagle croaking and she looked up, catching sight of it as it flew across the camp. She stopped, heaving. She turned towards the tree beside her and she put the arrow on her back, before she proceeded climbing it. The rough bark scraped her palm, drawing blood, but she felt like a child, playing in the backyard. Once she reached a safe branch, she looked at the horizon, the red helmets of the rival team weaving between the emerald green of the woods. She scoffed before she closed her eyes, inhaling. A wind caressed her cheek and a second conch blew. She snapped her eyes open, her mind void of any other thoughts beside the desire to win. She jumped from branch to branch, from tree to tree before she came across a clearing. She recognized Percy’s blonde mop of hair, as he laid on a log with his eyes closed, his fingers playing with a leaf. She leaned against the bark, watching him.

For a split moment, she wondered what was going through his mind. He looked so peaceful, different from the many times she felt him tense or stiffen. She also had the urge to just let her eyes close and enjoy the silence and the sweet sounds nature had to offer, but the scarlet helmets of the opposing team caught her attention. She straightened  her back, slowly taking out her bow. 

Percy warily sat up, watching as Clarisse took off her helmet and chucked it towards the woods. “Flag’s that way. It’s not here,” he pointed to the other side of the woods. 

“We know,” replied Clarisse. “Yeah, glory’s fine. Revenge is more fun.” 

She slammed her spear onto the ground. The weapon crackled to life with orange light. Y/N tightened her hold onto the bow and she took out an arrow, watching as Percy hastily grabbed his shield and sword. 

“No maiming. It’s like the one rule,” he said, body stiff. 

“Yeah, I guess I’ll lose dessert privileges for a while. I’ll live,” smirked Clarisse before she attacked Percy. 

Y/N swore under her breath as she watched the boy struggle, swiftly dodging every strike. She raised the arrow and the bow, targeting one of Clarisse’s team mates. Percy fell onto his knee, after he managed to counterattack Clarisse’s crackling spear. Y/N inhaled and exhaled before she released the arrow. It swished, cutting the air, before it stabbed the earth near the foot of The Red Team player. The boy backed in shock, and Clarisse looked around, eyebrows furrowed. “Who’s there?” she yelled.

Percy threw a glance upwards, his gaze meeting Y/N’s. She gave him a solemn nod, before she backed into the shadows. The distraction gave him enough time to swipe his sword at Clarisse. She met his attack with one of her own, pushing him with her spear. He fell backwards, over the log, the wind knocked out of him. Y/N grimaced, she took out another arrow, ready to intervene once again. 

“I’m actually not interested in maiming or killing you, believe it or not,” Clarisse stated. “I just want you to admit you’re a fraud. It’d make me feel better.”

Y/N raised the bow. The arrow was ready to be launched.

“Are you feeling up to that yet?” asked Clarisse as Y/N released the arrow. It implanted itself at her feet and the girl took a step back, shock painting her features. Percy got up, speeding through the woods. 

“Guess that’s a no,” said Clarisse, after she recovered from the shock, taking after him. 

Y/N put the bow on her back and she jumped from the tree, landing on her feet. 

“Great aim!” she heard a familiar voice say. 

Y/N smiled. “Thanks, Annie.”

The girl appeared beside her, a blue Yankees cap in her hand. She was grinning. “We’re winning this.”

Y/N opened her mouth to reply, a sense of urgency taking over her brain as she remembered that Percy was still very much alone in a three-to-one fight, but a blood-curdling scream interrupted her. She snapped towards the source of the sound and let the feet carry her to it, the woods whizzing past her. She stumbled onto the shore just as Luke and their team arrived, triumphantly holding the flag and cheering. The scarlet flag was swaying in the wind.

Her gaze found the blonde. Clarisse was holding him by the armour. She pushed him away, once the Blue Team invaded the shore. Percy fell to his knees, his chest heaving. 

Y/N let out a breath in relief as she approached the boy. “You alright?”

He looked up to her and she noted his left eye was slowly turning purple. Blood stained his cheek. He tried to catch his breath, gulping. “Yeah,” he managed to say. 

“You did well,” she replied as she stuck out her hand. He looked at it, before his hand touched hers, and she heaved him up. His eyebrows furrowed as his gaze met hers. He opened his mouth but no words came out.

“Not bad, hero,” Annabeth voiced as she took off her cap, appearing before them.

“Were you here the whole time?” questioned Percy, a note of annoyance seeping into his tone. 

“Yes.”

“You were here the whole time and you didn’t help me?” He briefly glanced at Y/N. “I mean, even Y/N helped, but you didn’t?”

Annabeth simply shrugged. “Yes.”

“Why?” asked Percy in disbelief. 

Y/N glanced behind her shoulder, catching sight of Clarisse scowling her way. Y/N figured Clarisse might have realised where the arrows came from. She threw her a brief smile. 

“Listen… Percy,” she heard Annabeth say. “I’m sorry.”

A splash echoed and Y/N whipped her head around. Percy had fallen into the water, angrily staring at Annabeth. “What is wrong with you?” he yelled. He got up, small waves washing onto the shore. 

At first, Y/N thought her eyes were deceiving her, but they couldn’t have, they never did. She had the best aim and target in the whole camp, they never let her down, not once. She watched in amazement as Percy’s injuries healed right before her eyes, water dripping down his arms and face. Her lips parted. 

“I don’t understand,” said Percy, looking at Annabeth before he moved his gaze onto Y/N. 

A blue glow caught her attention and she raised her gaze. A shining trident was hovering over Percy and Y/N blinked, a puff of air escaping her lips. 

“Your dad’s calling,” smiled Annabeth in awe. 

Y/N’s lips twitched and she felt how the blood in her veins turned to ice, the green-eyed monster invading her thoughts. Perseus Jackson had been claimed, in just a few days. She remained unclaimed up to this day, even after four years of waiting, of praying and of capturing flags.

 Suddenly, the idea of getting a quest spurred her on and she knew that Percy’s arrival at camp and claiming hadn’t been a coincidence. She could feel it in the wind. A storm was bubbling. 

⋅•⋅⊰∙∘☽༓☾∘∙⊱⋅•⋅

A/N: and we're off to a start! I'm very excited to share the next chapter. Stuff is about to go down.

If you'd like to be added to my main tag list or the series tag list, drop a comment or send me an ask!

Lots of love xx

Main tag list: @bohemianrhapsody86 @andreead @asgards-princess-of-mischief @islayhawkin

Series tag list: @mynicknameisgasoline @constellation-archive @leptitlu @br3nt-12 @utterlyunawarewriter

[circeswhore]

It was a simple arrangement. You always did accuse bustier women of having "more tits than brains" so being able to exchange one for the other seemed reasonable. And you were clever! You had a mind that actually worked, that wasn't filled with hot pink bubbles and rotted out with platinum blonde hair dye, so you figured that you could trade away some of your intelligence and still be reasonably smart and add a little bit more to your bust. It was a win-win. Your thumb hovered over the button on your phone, a small wave of apprehension staying your hand, relying on a deep breath to push through it. As soon as you push the button, the world shifts around you.

The changes are subtle. You don't feel any less intelligent, though you know from experience that it's a hard thing to gauge on your own. You glance downward and your eyes go wide, not only shocked that you're sporting a pair of wobbly C cup tits, but you're actually wearing something to show them off! Nothing in your wardrobe was like this before and even your new bra is frillier and fancier than the plain, beige A cups society forced you to wear. Your knees come together as you give your breasts an experimental squeeze, their sensitivity far beyond anything you could have imagined. It feels incredible. For the first time, you feel sexy.

And the button still sits on your phone screen.

Your heart thunders in your chest. If one push did this, what would another one do? Or one after that? Your IQ doesn't seem to have dropped that much, so you could probably afford another push or two. Maybe even three.

Of course, the dumber you get, the harder it becomes to stop yourself. Your boobies just keep growing, pushing past DDs and Gs and Ms, your bra turning to lavish patterns and colors back to simple designs as your choice in bras becomes limited by size. As your brains shift to your tits, your wardrobe shifts, too, showing off more and more of your boobs to highlight the center of your personality. Your clothes become skintight and in bright, simple colors. Even your hair grows out, long wavy strands in a bright, dyed blonde. Other parts of your body plump up, too, mainly your ass and your lips, your face covered in make-up to advertise yourself as the bimbo you are.

By the end of it, you still don't feel dumb, but mostly because your sense of self-awareness has all but vanished. Your thumb is stuck between your plump lips, partially because it's comfortable and partially to keep yourself from drooling into your cleavage. You're a bubbly bimbo without a care or a thought in the world. Some of the words are a little tricky when you look at your phone again, but you manage to make out what it says: "Button makes boobies bigger?! Hehehe, okay! Like, whatever you say, Mr. Button!"

When the world settles down around you, things are very different. You're not wearing clothes at all, save for a headband on your head with two little horns. You're on your hands and knees, your massive breasts hanging beneath you, resting on the cold ground. A large and growing puddle of milk spreads out around you. You want to call for help, but your lips are full and clumsy, letting out instead a sound that sounds dangerously like a Moo! After a few moments of braying, the door in front of you swings open. "What is it, Lilac? What is it, little cow? Oh you poor thing. Did the suction cups come undone again?" The nice lady (who smells amazing) leads you back up to a place where you can lean forward, resting your arms and your knees against padded supports, your huge udders hanging beneath you. The milkers are a bit cold when they first grab hold of your nipples, but the temperature warms up quickly, watching as your milk races down the tubes. "There we go, that's better, isn't it?" Your owner sighs as she scratches behind your ear and under your chin. "Sometimes I wish you were smarter, Lilac. Maybe you would have been a real person like me instead of a cow. It's like being this busty left you with no brains left at all! Ah well. I'll be back to change out the canisters in a little bit."

💕💕💕

[lilykatelyn-blog]

Hello! I read your kinktober day 1 and omgg it was amazing

Would u consider writing pt-2?

Also,please add me to the taglist<3

𝓓𝓪𝔂 1 - 𝓵.𝓶𝓱 - LILY’S KINKTOBER PT. 2

Pairing: DomDemon!Lee Know x SubAngelFem!Reader Genre: fluff, smut,

Notes: hey! Ofc! You’re added rn! And here is part 2. I’m so glad a lot of you liked it!

Warnings: making out, his horns are sensitive, hickeys, ass kink bc it’s Lee Minho, unsafe sex, not big dick Lee know but long dick Lee know, references to cheating on you with Jisung bc.. well, you get it, grinding, bondage, d/s dynamics.

pt 1.

Well, obviously you stayed, since he asked you to. So you were just cooking when he just barged into his apartment. “AH- oh hey! You stayed!” He looked like he had nearly shit his pants before he softened up. “Yeah, I made dinner. Sit.” You replied, engrossed in what you were cooking. You heard silence and assumed he was sitting and on his phone or something. “What are you- oh.” He came up behind you and he back hugged you, you were surprised until you felt him hug you. “I’m hugging you because I honestly did not think you would stay, Angel.” You could feel his breath on your neck as you continued cooking your dinner. Now after a while, you finished it and plated it. ��Dinners ready, Min.” You both sat down and you eagerly watched his reaction. “Is- have I been missing out on this for all my fucking life? What the hell, this is delicious!” He exclaimed looking like a child whose mom just cooked his favorite food, simply making you chuckle. “Glad you enjoy it, love.” You two still needed to discuss your current positions considering you two live literally an eternity away from each other. “Angel, I’m.. glad you stayed.” He made a show of gagging after saying it, but you knew he was genuine. “Hmm, me too. Now can we please watch die hard?” “Fine, this is like the 100th time tho.” He knew all the lines and who said them at what exact time at this point. But for you, he’d burn the world to ashes if it meant making you smile.

you honestly had no idea how you got here, one minute you were watching Alan Rickman (may he rest in peace 🕊️), the next you were on Minho, moaning as his tongue slipped into your mouth. His kisses were no longer slow and sensual, but messy and passionate. His actions led to you wanting more, more friction, more kissing, more everything, which eventually resulted in you slowly moving back and forth on his semi. “Mmh- Jagi- just like that-“ his sentence was ended in a long drawn out moan, his hands went straight to your ass, guiding you back and forth. “Wai- wait,” he softly pushed you off, stopping you. “Was ‘bout to come, have to be in you-“ he got cut off by you grabbing him by the back of his head and kissing him while unbuckling his belt. “C-can’t hold up the glamour anymore, Jagi.” He warned, making you scoff, you’ve seen him multiple times. “Whatever, let it run free, babe.” You took his dick in your hand, slowly stroking him as you watched his horns come out, and then his tail, and finally his wings. his breaths were speeding up, a telltale of his high approaching. “Ngh- coming!” His hot cum spurted onto his clothed chest and your hand. Coming down from his high, he took off his shirt, along with yours. “Got to feel these beautiful tits, baby. Saints, where have these been all my fucking life?” He murmured while taking your bra off and fondling your tits, causing you to giggle. “Since when do you believe in saints?” You asked in a playful manner. “Since you woke up in my house.” Came his simple reply, sucking on your left tit.

You released a wanton moan, grabbing his hair. “That’s it, pull my hair, Angel.” Causing you to pull it harder, he pulled away, going to pull your pants down, discarding them in an unknown corner of the room. He went for your neck and sucking on it, not caring about the consequences in your heated moment. “Hold on a second love, I’m going to get something.” He walked over to the dresser, grabbing a pair of handcuffs. You practically gushed with arousal at the sight. “Hands please.” He gestured to your hands, cuffing them tightly behind your back. “Too tight?” He softly asked, whispering in your ear. You shook your head no, unable to speak for fear that your voice would squeak. “On your knees, love.” Roughly pushing your face down into the pillows, lining his cock up with your entrance. He slowly pushes into you, releasing a throaty groan, while your mouth hung open in a silent moan. His slow and shallow thrusts turned fast and deep, making your moans increase in volume, while his groans got deeper, his voice getting lower. “Fuck, I need to feel you deeper Angel.” Flipping you around, he pushed your knees to your chest, pushing in with no warning, thrusting in fast and deep. “Minho-! Nngh! I’m coming!” You screamed, reaching your high. “Me too, Angel.” He managed to grunt out, riding you through your high, reaching his own and releasing inside of you. You were on the verge of passing out, so he got up and got a damp washcloth and wiped you down. “I know, it’s gonna hurt, sorry.” He apologized softly as you squirmed from overstimulation. After he cleaned you up, he fell on his back next to you, hugging your waist as you cuddled up in his bare chest. “You know, I always thought you were in love with Jisung.” You joked, giving him a kiss on his cheek. “Hmm, who says I’m not? And I’m just needing sex.” “Because Jisung’s married, idiot.” You laughed, falling asleep next to him as he laughed with you and admired you. Oh, how he would love to spend the rest of his life with you, and he will, even if it takes burning the world for you.

TAGLIST:

@aaasia111, @hgema, @obeythemasters, @imwithurmother, @unlikelysublimekryptonite, @virluna148, @sanzusfavgf, @ivyisnotokay, @stanskzsstuff,@luvkpopp

[sleepy0s]

The Ariana Griande concert

Havent written Ariana much so lemme know any tips!

Some au facts for this certain one-shot

Allay Grian! (I felt like Allay grian made the most sense to be a singer cos there like musical??)

His voice sounds different due to Allay stuff- makes it higher pitched?

Hermits know he's an Allay but no one knows he's Ariana Griande (Not even pearl- very important for this)

I've decided. When Grian is just grian he is he/they and when he's being Ariana Griande has she/they

This is my longest one yet! (1303 words)

—---------------------------------------

“Pearl! Pearl! I got them!” Gem came sprinting round the corner, clutching four tickets in her hands

 “Let me see!” Scar pushed Pearl to the side wanting to see the tickets, 

“Gem! You're the best!How did you get four VIP tickets?!” If Scars Vex wings worked then you best believe he would be floating

. “I have friends.” She smiled, handing the tickets out to her friends before pocketting her own. “We are forever in your debt Gem.” Scar bowed down, almost hitting Mumbo in the nose on his way back up. 

“What are you doing?” The voice made all four jump, having not noticed Grian get closer, the small allay was trying to climb Mumbo to see what was in his hands but was failing due to the suit material. “Gem just got us V.I.P tickets!” He made sure to take a pause after each letter in VIP, Grian just looked at him, sliding down the suit. “To who?” 

“Ariana Griande, of course!” Pearl responded before Mumbo could.

Now, they’re not sure what they expected from Grian but it certainly wasn’t for him to lay on the floor and sigh in what seemed to be sadness, “Grian?? You all good down there?” Gem put her arm out to help him get up- he took this as a chance to climb onto Gems shoulders instead, whatever her fault. “Yep. I'm fine.” Scar however seemed offended that Grian had responded this way to such an idol, “G, do you not like Ariana? She is the best idol in the world and you need to agree.” Grians response was a sad sigh as he hopped of Gems shoulder and fluttered towards his base. (Can you blame the guy tho? He just found out four of his friends were going to be at his concert, pressure much.)

~ ~ ~

Ok, so it turns out Gem is Amazing. They had front row seats to the concert and would be able to see everything perfectly, she had managed to get her hands on some merch so all four were decked out.

Gem was wearing a nice laced white shirt with a baby pink skirt, her hair was put high pigtails (One of Ariana's signature hairstyles) with two bows clipped on.

Pearl was wearing a pink shoulderless shirt, a bandana wrapped around her wrist, and her hair had been put into a plait with pink ribbon.

Mumbo was wearing pink glasses (Vampires don't do well with the lights), he had a pink jacket on which was covered with pins.

Scar, who was arguably the most enthusiastic, was rocking a pink cowboy hat, heart shaped glasses, a half buttoned up white and pink striped shirt (Think limited life) and had a bag covered in pins, bandanas and keychains.

So yea. They were decked out.

~ ~ ~

They had gotten there early and had been waiting for around half an hour (Though all would claim it was worth it) and now, finally the lights were dimming around the stadium  signalling the start was near, all the chatter quieted down as people looked to the stage. 

“I'm so excited!” Scar whispered from beside Mumbo

“Scar shush. I'm concentrating.” Pearl elbowed him, making him shush,.Just in time as well because suddenly a bright pink light appeared on the stage and a platform rose from underneath the stage, and there she was! Ariana Griande rose from the stage, wearing a sleeveless white shirt and a gorgeous red and pink skirt, her hair was put in high pigtails with ribbons wrapped around. It was genius really, the pink she had claimed as ‘hers’ matched the light blue of her wings and the small horns in between her hair.

“Good evening Ladies, Gents, Hybrids and Humans!” The four screamed at her entrance, waving their hands in the hopes she would notice them, “I hope everyones having a lovely night, and hopefully you're happy to be here!” She began walking to the front of the stage waving at audience members as she spoke, “We have an action packed night ahead of us, so first let’s just have a little talk!” She gave a young girl a high five, causing the girl to scream, someone threw a poster up luckily, Ariana caught it before it hit her, “Guys, please don't throw stuff.” Ariana began talking and walking again, just chatting normally as if one would with a friend about how her day had been and occasionally pointing the mic towards someone else to let them respond. 

She got to Scar, Mumbo, Pearl and Gem and gave them each a high five and smile, and honestly they looked like they were on the edge of passing out. “All right everyone! I think it's time we start!” 

~ ~ ~

The concert was around 2 hours long and honestly they wished it was longer. But now it was time for the best part. “We get to meet her!? Gem I dont think ive said it enough but you're amazing.” Pearl was smiling madly, hugging Gem as if she was going to disappear, “Yep, Yep I know- pearl. I can't. Breath.” Pearl immediately let go, making sure she was okay before running to go find the VIP line. “Pearl, wait up!” Mumbo called after her.

The three met her at the line, she had gotten near the front and was talking to one of the body guards, who seemed to know her? “Pearl! We're here!” Gem waved her hands in the air to get Pearl's attention as they got closer. 

“Ah! You guys made it! Look, meet my friend Martyn!” The three introduced themselves to Pearl's friend, “Martyn I wish we could talk longer but it's nearly our turn!” Martyn just laughed and gave Pearl a hug, promising that they would have to meet up sometime.

Scar dragged them forwards once it was their turn to meet Ariana Griande.

“Hello! Welcome, it's lovely to meet you!” Ariana smiled at them happily, from where she was sitting. “Hello! We are such big fans!!” Gem led the group to sit on the seats opposite Ariana. “It's great to see you so enthusiastic. Is there anything you'd like? I can do signatures, photos, could just chat, or really anything you’d like- under reason of course.”  There were probably loads of things she shouldn't do, but c'mon. They were gonna do anything bad. Hopefully. “Can you sign our photos? Please??” Mumbo had been put in charge of holding all four photos, and happily handed them over to Ariana to sign them. “I am so going to brag about this to Grian.” Scar said, causing Ariana to chuckle, The five talked for a bit, it was mainly just questions like if she had any pets, her favourite song she had made, just the normal things you ask your Idol. But obviously others needed a go so they had to leave, “Would you guys like a picture before you leave?” Ariana asked,

“Yes please!” Scar answered for the group as they all stood up to take the photo.

“Alright! Have a lovely night you guys! I hope to see you at the next concert!” Ariana smiled happily at them as they left the Private room, and headed back to the hub.

~ ~ ~

Scar popped around Grians base the next morning, poor lad looked exhausted. What had he been up to whilst they were at the concert? 

“Griannn!” He called out in a sing-songy voice, “Guess what I gottt”

Grian just sighed, rolling over and looking at scar, who was proudly showing off his Signed Ariana Griande poster. 

Grian rolled back over, “Scar, that's great and I love you. BUT. Its 5am go back to sleep.” Scar laughed a bit before wishing Grian a good sleep and leaving his base, promising to tell Grian all about the concert once he was more awake

[favorvn]

(I'm sorry for the mistakes, English is not my native language) (*/ω＼) Hi, yesterday I found out about Favor and fell in love with your game. First of all, for her artistic style - it's damn beautiful, Z is both frightening, but at the same time admires and attracts (both his hair and horns ~ and I want to touch them). The fact that I can't see his eyes, but I've seen hints of what they look like (I've managed to read your entire Tumblr several times) makes my imagination work like never before! Secondly, for references to real religion. I am practically not interested in this, and my knowledge is extremely superficial, but if I understood and remembered everything correctly, then the fact that you did not invent (to some extent) any fictional religion in the universe of the game (I have absolutely nothing against this), but turned to an existing religion, causes me to repeat the admiration. I have so many questions about the game, but in order not to drag out an already long message, I will ask only some of them (I hope you don't mind). 1) Will you see angels in this game? 2) You mentioned that if Z does not find the means to immortality for Y/N, then he will simply seduce him (her) so that he goes to hell, to him. What would Y/N's "life" in hell be like? (if it's not spoilers) 3) Referring to your mentions described above, it became interesting to me. Let's say Z has found a means to immortality, but Y/N is against it? What if he (she) wants to live an ordinary human life and, when the time comes, die? Will he try to convince you/N to become immortal, or will he do everything without his (her) consent? 4) Given how old Z is, how many human languages does he know? I apologize if my questions turned out to be stupid or strange. And I apologize if my words may have seemed rude, I assure you, not a single word of mine had a non-native meaning. Many thanks for the amazing game from one of the first (I believe) fans in the CIS. I am looking forward to the release of the continuation of the story! (I speak without pressure and attempts to hurry up somehow). Please take good care of your physical and mental health! (⌒▽⌒)☆

(Oh, and also taking this opportunity, I congratulate you and Z on Valentine's Day! (*^.^*))

Thank you SO much for the detailed and thoughtful message, I'm sure this took forever to write, but I am so touched 🥰!

I will say about religion: In the game, I mainly use ideas from Christianity/ Catholicism/Judaism/Islam ect as a base, I try to take common aspects and common and contrasting ideas that cross amongst monotheistic religions. A lot of the topics in this game surrounding religion or religious ideas and values are thoughts I tend to wonder about often. Religion is a contentious topic, so I do want to say that whatever the game is saying or asking doesn't mean it's right or accurate to everyone, it is just my personal creation at the end of the day.

And when we get to that point in the game, I am definitely interested in hearing what others have to say.

But onto your questions:

1. Yes

2. I would imagine Z would take care of MC and show them the ropes. Z would make sure MC didn't get recruited into any demon armies so they could stick around him all of the time and not have to be around other demons. - I don't plan to get to this point in the game, so it's kinda up to interpretation.

3. Z would do everything in their power to win over MC either immortality or to hell with him. If MC ends up in Heaven, Z would essentially be separated from MC and Z isn't willing to risk that outcome.

4. Z knows a few human languages, but mainly old ones (as he only really interacted with humans long ago). He just recently picked up English (from his 20 movies, some video games, and fellow demons). Z is a fast learner, thankfully because he has a lot to learn about the human world.

Your questions aren't stupid! Thank you SO much for taking the time to read everything and then ask them 🥰💕 It really made me happy! I'm happy to have a fan in the CIS (I actually have plans for a slavic character in the future!) Thank you again for your time and care into these questions!

[shockpulse]

Demon HRT

A story by Shockpulse, inspired by countless amazing artists and authors.

"I've thought about it for a long time." she had told the doctor, "Years, decades, in fact. Since I was 5 or 6. Maybe it's just unhealthy coping mechanisms that caused me to have violent thoughts about those around me, but whatever the case, I was stuck with these 'sinful' urges."

"And how did that make you feel?" he had inquired.

"Alienated. Unlike those around me. My upbringing told me that my thoughts were evil, and I was supposed to feel ashamed of them. But.... I didn't. I embraced them. I labeled myself a 'demon' because of them, and I finally felt happy with who I was supposed to be. Well, I still felt like I didn't belong in this body for gender reasons, but now I had two transition goals to reach for."

"You say 'I', but your system had a different host back then, right?"

"Well, yes, but I'm sort of a.... mixture. Of the two previous hosts, I mean. I share a lot of their feelings and memories, while being a unique person. All three of us have shared these thoughts. Jonathan's agender and Melissa sees herself as a cis girl, so it's no wonder I'd be trans, too." she stated, knowing it was obvious to her, but not to someone outside her own head, "Oh. You meant the demon part, didn't you? Melissa even used to call herself 'Princess of Demons' online, and Jonathan still feels distanced from humanity. It's a strong feeling that we've shared throughout the years, and our newest alter, Zephaniah, doesn't even have a 'humanoid' shape. Even if most of us don't feel like demons, it's a strong enough feeling for me to seek out your help. I really, really want my outside to match my insides. I mean, even better if you could give us the ability to shapeshift at will, but I'll take what I can get, heh."

---

She looked at the pills in her hand, three oblong tablets of deep purple, not unlike the blue-green ones she already took for her gender HRT. She was nervous. Changing biochemistry was one thing, but these pills were going to change her in ways it would almost seem like magic.

"What are a few more pills? I take so many already...." she murmered, before quickly popping them into her mouth and swallowing them with a gulp of soda, the soft drink's fizz doing wonders to override the disgusting taste in her mouth.

At first, there were no outward changes, though within a few days she started feeling overheated and nauseous, as her insides began the slow process of changing her body in ways more dramatic than regular HRT had ever done. Within a month, the nubs of horns had sprouted from her forehead, her nails had started to become long claws, and she had to stop wearing shoes as her feet had elongated and become digitgrade. Over the following years, the pain was unimaginable, far worse than any she had or would experience in her soon-to-be-immortal lifespan. Once, she couldn't sleep for a week straight due to her tail forming, growing new bones one by one. However, she told herself that it would all be worth it in the end, and her spouse did all they could to support her through this difficult time.

Eventually, she finally felt like herself in her body. Ram-like horns curled around the sides of her face, framing her short, bright pink hair and pitch-black eyes. Her teeth had changed, pushed out by a sharper set of replacements, and she had grown accustomed to her sharp claws and other new anatomy. Although people would stop and stare at her, she new that she was comfortable in her own skin at last, and that was what really mattered.

[iheartgracie]

Red Soft Quotes

“An angry Chevrolet screamed on its horn, and the guy at the wheel threw up a middle finger, holding it out the window. Red pretended to catch it, slipping it into the chest pocket of her blue-and-yellow-check shirt, treasuring it forever.”

“But I know what your life looks like from here, Red. You’re the strongest person I ever met. Who else gets up after being shot in the chest, twice? Still standing after everything you’ve been through. You saved that cop, by the way. She was fine. She has a twelve-year-old daughter. I checked, because I knew that would be important to you. You are amazing. I’m not sure enough people have ever told you that, and I’m sorry about that too. You can do anything you want, be anything you want, and whatever road you go down, Red, I know your mom would be so proud of you.”

“Red turned back to Arthur. “Well, good thing you’re not spending a whole week in this cramped RV. Oh…wait.” Red smiled at him.

“Brazil nuts,” Red said.

Arthur’s face screwed up. “What?”

“I used to be allergic to them as a kid, but I’m not anymore. Isn’t that weird, that a person can just change like that?”

“Hello, sweetie, how’s it going?”

“Yeah, good. No official complaints to file.”

“Could Red climb under the table to get out? Urgh, no: too many legs.”

“Oliver finally drew back, bowing his head like he was waiting for someone to personally congratulate him.

“Congratulations,” Red said, resisting the urge to add one small clap”

“But then there were other times she wasn’t even sure he remembered her name. Not like it was a difficult one: think primary colors.”

“I have to pee.” She suddenly remembered, voicing it as she did.

“Ever the lady,” Simon commented.

“Well, you can’t go in the RV now we’ve jacked it up,” Oliver said, slightly breathless, slightly irritated, still pumping away at the lever. “You’ll have to find a bush.”

“I might upgrade to a tree, thanks,”

“You know, in all this time, I’ve never asked you,” he said. “Why did your parents call you Red?”

“Oh, well, that’s easy,” she said. “Because of my natural bright red hair color.” She reached back to tug at a strand of her dull blond hair.”

“Would you think closet-beach-ball-mop-man was real if you saw him out and about?” she asked, looking at Maddy’s reflection.

“I might, at a quick glance.”

“Why don’t you just ask him out while you’re at it? You’d have cute kids.”

[dearcraziness]

Chapter 75.

In the morning, the devils woke up refreshed and well-rested. Bendy was making sponge cakes with caramel cream and white chocolate crumbs while Lara was combing her hair. After breakfast, in the company of Boris and Alice, sweethearts were solving crosswords, sudoku, playing Sea Battle. After discussing yesterday's surprisingly pleasant dream, the imps kissed, the demon straightened a strand of hair near the girl's face.

"You have such sweet lips, vanilla... And not only the lips..."

"Stop it, baby..."

"Oh, sorry, Larry, I didn't mean to embarrass you..."

"It's okay, I was just joking... You kiss me as gently as on our first date..."

"Oh, violet, touching my lips to your face is just as quivering and exciting as the first time..."

"Sometimes you kiss me below the head, in the neck, for example... It's also nice..."

"The main thing is you feel good..." the young man bent down and, holding the girl by the waist with both hands, leaned his lips against the chin of his beloved, then to the place she mentioned. The demon raised his head, his voice sounded near the girl's ear, "May I kiss you here?..."

"Of course..."

The girl felt the lips of her beloved, which opened a little, making the imp's ear slightly moist. She closed her eyes and smiled contentedly. The young man looked at his precious one with interest, took her in his arms and covered her entire face with gentle kisses.

In the evening, when Bendy was cooking noodles with chanterelles and chicken in cream sauce, Lara decided to read in the book 'Psychology of Relationships' what the devil's recent kiss meant. Of course, the girl understood the young man was guided primarily by love and care, however, she was interested in an alternative interpretation of her beloved's actions. On page two hundred and seventy-six, Lara found a description of this type of kiss :

"The ear is a very sensitive organ, that's why your lover kisses this part, they usually open their mouth slightly. It means they want you phisically."

The imp closed the book, she was amazed by the last sentence; however, she wasn't against their closeness, but she didn't feel as if she was ready to take their relationship to a new level. She didn't think for very long, because the devil came into the room and called her for dinner. She nodded weakly, looking away.

"What's wrong, Larry?... You were thinking so deeply..."

"No, I was just a little doubtful..."

"Tell me what your thoughts were about..."

"Let's discuss after dinner... It's not urgent..."

"Alright, as you wish... Come on, sweetheart..."

It was getting dark outside. Only moon was shining in the sky, the stars seemed to have disappeared from the wide blue blanket. Bendy sat down next to Lara, who was looking away. She wasn't sad, just lost in her thoughts.

"Dear, it's not easy to guess your intentions from your behavior today... Did I upset you with something?..."

"No, honey... I just read the meaning of a kiss in the ear..."

"Oh, you didn't like what was written?... I was just going to please you, surprise you in the positive sense of the word..."

"I know; the book gave two explanations..."

The girl whispered near the young man's horn, the demon instantly blushed. He looked up in embarrassment, speaking hurriedly, "Laurie, believe me, I didn't mean it at all!... How could I have thought of such a thing before our wedding... Probably, on a subconscious level, I had a desire to deepen our connection not only spiritually, but also physically; however, I understand we're both not ready... Besides, kisses, although important, aren't the most important - sincere conversations, discussion of topics close to the heart are much more significant... Forgive me for my vehemence..."

"Don't apologize, I like your kisses... They' re one of the many reasons for my joy... Maybe my inner voice wants to try something new - I'm not sure if the time has come... We'll find other activities for the evening, right?..."

"Of course, dear!... Whatever we do, we'll have fun next to each other... We haven't yet opened the board games 'Imagine and portray', 'Show your creative personality'... Recently, new fashion trend magazines have arrived to you, and fresh issues of scientific, physical phenomena in different worlds, dimensions were sent to me..."

Sweethearts let go of awkward feelings and had a great evening. Bendy was telling Lara funny stories, she was laughing at his jokes for a long time. The imps hugged; the girl decided to try to tickle the young man a little, as he sometimes did, but Lara's action did not have the proper effect on Bendy - the demon smiled, kissed the imp several times and began to tickle her himself. The devils were smiling broadly, the demoness lay down on a snow-white sheet, the young man kissed her a couple more times ; however, there was something new in their poses : the demon was sitting on his knees over his beloved ; her legs were located between his left and right shins ; their bodies were at a small distance from each other ; the young man's hands rested on the bed near the the palms of the girl; the demoness's hands were relaxed bent at the elbows, lying freely near the wizard's hands ; Bendy's face was covered with a red hue - their bodies hadn't taken such positions before.

"Larry, sorry!..." he spoke nervously, quickly pulling away. "I don't know what came over me today..."

"No, Bendy, wait..." the girl took him by the forearm. "I like this feeling..."

"I also experience pleasant sensations... Even embarrassing situations which make my heart beat faster don't change the comfort and coziness next to you..."

"I think today can still bring its surprises..."

"You mean you don't mind trying?... We're both worried, so it's better to think carefully about whether we're ready..."

"Could you?..."

"One word from you and I'll do everything as you wish..."

"I'll say two words: not now..."

"Alright, sweetheart..."

Bendy sat down next to Lara, who turned on her right side, leaning on her elbow.

"You probably didn't know yourself what you wanted more..."

"I thought it wasn't necessary thing to do yet... There are millions of things which can bring you great happiness..."

"Hmm..."

"Why are you frowning, the light of my eyes?..."

"You control your emotions pretty well..."

"I can't allow impulsive actions take control... I'm trying to figure out what you want most right now... Seems like you don't mind talking, just like me..."

"Right... Perhaps I'm just not attractive enough to cause an uncontrolled flow of feelings..."

"Lara, don't doubt the power of your beauty, please!... You're so alluring and appealing, sometimes it's quite difficult for me to control myself, but your preferences are above all..."

"That's right, you don't act against my will, even if you have the opportunity..."

"Sunshine, I just can't behave otherwise... I love you very much..."

"Many creatures say these words to each other, but everyone understands the word 'love' differently..."

"In my opinion, this is a feeling you sincerely believe in, cherish with all your heart... In other words, love is eternity..."

"I think so... What time is it already?..."

"Two o'clock in the morning... Wow, you probably really want to sleep..."

"Not yet..."

"Then let's prolong our conversation..."

When the time was nearing morning, the devils fell asleep. The next day, the rays of the sun began to play on the spring foliage. A new joyful sunshine burst in, waking up friends, drawing a cheerful expressions on their faces. Warm and cozy gatherings in the kitchen, in the garden resumed, smiles lit up the lives of wizards, prompting them to share happiness with each other...

[bisexualbumblebee-writes]

The Insiders Chapter 18: Off to the Rodeo- Darry Curtis x Ruth Bellows

Word Count: 2.4k

July 10, 1965

“You ready?” Darry asked as he walked out to the living room, where Ruth sat already dressed and ready to go. 

“Have been,” the woman retorted with a teasing grin. “I thought girls were supposed to be the ones to take forever to get ready.” 

“I’m taking my sweet time,” he joked in response, slicking back the sides of his hair and grabbing his keys. “It’s gonna be a fun day.”

“I’m excited,” she agreed as she walked out. As usual, he held the doors open for her, for which she thanked him as she climbed into the truck. Darry climbed into the passenger seat and honked the horn, signaling the others to hurry up. While Ponyboy and Piper climbed into the backseat Dally, Tuesday, Soda and Charlie got into the bed of the truck. Once they were all in, Darry drove off towards the fair. As Ruth glanced out the window she sighed happily. 

“Oh, I just love fairs,” she gushed. 

“I’ve only been there once,” Darry admitted, making her look at him in surprise. 

“Really?” The man nodded. 

“Really, I went with my parents and Soda before Pony was born,” he responded with a fond smile. “Soda could barely walk.”

“Aww Dar,” Ruth cooed. “Well this is gonna be a lot of fun. I used to go every year with my parents until I graduated high school. I think it’ll be more fun with you guys, though.” 

“I can’t believe I’m letting Soda be in a rodeo,” he laughed softly.

“It’ll be great, he’ll do amazing,” she responded confidently. 

“Yeah, but what kind of guardian am I?”

“A good one. You’re letting him do something he wants, and he’ll be safe while doing it because he’s been practicing nonstop,” she answered with a small, reassuring smile. 

“I guess,” Darry shrugged as he pulled up to the fairgrounds and parked. 

“Best part is that it’s free admission since Dal and Soda are competing,” she added with a toothy grin. 

“Good, those two are finally useful,” he retorted. Ruth giggled then hopped out to go check in with the rodeo team and grab their admission bracelets. By the time she got back the others were out of the truck and waiting for her to pass them out, which she did before repeating what the official she talked to told her. 

 “Alright guys,” she said loud enough for everyone to hear. “Rodeo starts right at 8:00. Dally and Soda, you need to be with the other competitors by 7:00 or 7:30 to prepare. Horse riding comes first then bulls immediately after. Until then you guys are okay to do whatever you want. Got it?” 

“Alright mom,” Darry joked, pushing her arm gently. The woman huffed jokingly and returned the gesture. 

“Alright losers, get lost.” She watched as they all ran inside, then looked at Darry when he grabbed her hand. 

“C’mon, let’s unwind and have some fun. They can handle themselves,” he said with a relaxed smile. It was a kind of smile she hadn’t seen since before his parents passed, and the mere sight made her grin herself. 

“Come on then,” she giggled, leading him inside. 

“I’m so happy I get to share this time with you,” Darry muttered fondly. 

“I am too,” she responded in the same tone, kissing his cheek. “What would you like to do first?” 

“Let’s get you a carnival prize,” he answered after a moment. “I’ll win you something.”

“Okay,” she giggled. “Pick your game.” After looking around he led her over to one of those games with a hammer and a bell. 

“I’m gonna win big for you,” he bragged with a bright smile. 

“Really now?” She asked amusedly, crossing her arms.

“Really,” he reaffirmed, paying the vendor and taking the hammer. 

“Alright then. Go for it baby,” she cheered. Darry nodded and turned back to the game, bringing the hammer down. Ruth shouldn’t have been surprised when he maxed out the game, but she did laugh when he stepped back and posed like a Greek god. 

“Don’t ever underestimate the power of Darrel Curtis!” He chanted. The woman giggled as she clapped for him. 

“I stand corrected.” 

“Pick whatever prize you want, I’m off the menu though,” he joked.

“Dang, I was really hoping I could have you,” she teased as she picked out a large stuffed elephant.

“Well, maybe, just for today” he said with a laugh, kissing the top of her head before leading her away. They walked in contented silence for a few minutes, just staying happy with each other’s presence as they watched the carnival goers. 

“This is so nice,” Darry muttered, breaking the silence. 

“It is. It’s nice to forget about your worries for one night, huh?” She agreed. 

“Really is. Truly,” he nodded as he led her to sit at a bench. Ruth smiled fondly at him then kissed his cheek. The man hummed thoughtfully as he wrapped an arm around her. 

“You ever think about having kids or getting married?” He asked. “Like watching your kids run around in places like this and just being- being happy?”

“A few times,” she admitted with a nod. “But I want to make sure both you and me are ready for it and that we want kids.” Her using ‘you’ instead of ‘my husband’ made Darry blush a pretty shade of red. 

“Gee, I didn’t mean that soon” he muttered, a little embarrassed. “I feel like I’ve already got kids on my hands.” Despite the fact that he tried to play it off as a joke, both he and Ruth knew that at least part of him was telling the truth. The woman smiled softly and nodded. 

“Well duh, I mean after that Dar. Of course I don’t want kids yet.” 

“That’s good. To be honest, if you asked me twice I’d probably just say yes, and that would be a predicament,” he admitted with a laugh, earning a laugh from her as well. 

“Oh my god, Dar,” she shook her head amusedly. Darry nudged her a bit. 

“Well, I’m glad you’ve decided that I’m the one at least,” he teased. 

“Of course I did. I only date to marry,” she retorted as if it were obvious. 

“Oh, well my bad,” he chuckled. “I’ve had a few girls in my life who didn’t think the same.” Ruth shrugged. 

“Well they weren’t me.” 

“They weren’t. They sure weren’t.”

“I’m better?” 

“Far better. Some of those girls didn’t have a brain in their head,” he answered with a shrug, making her smile. 

“Yeah, sometimes those girls are just looking for a pretty face to match theirs.” 

“you callin’ my face pretty?” 

“Maybe” she shrugged noncommittally. Darry chuckled and kissed her cheek. 

“You’re a sweetheart,” he muttered. “I think we’re perfect for one another, Ruth.” The woman couldn’t even begin to conceal her joy at his words. 

“I think so too, Darry. I really do love you,” she admitted quietly. The man looked down at her with a look that she could only describe as adoration. 

“I love you too,” he responded in the same tone. 

“And I’m glad we found our way back to each other,” she continued before looking down embarrassedly. “You know, I had the biggest crush on you in high school.”

“Oh I know,” he said, laughing. “I was just too nervous to ask out a soc. My mom bought flowers for me to give to you one time and I threw ‘em in the garbage after I saw you cause I got so nervous.” 

“Aww Darry that is so sweet,” she giggled. “I don’t think it helped our relationship any, though. For the longest time I thought you didn’t like me because anytime I wanted to talk to you you’d avoid me.” 

“Avoid is a strong word,” Darry defended. “I don’t know, I was pretty nervous. I had some other boys threatening me too, not that I was scared, but you were a hot commodity and I didn’t wanna screw it up. If me yelling at Tuesday and Sodapop like that didn’t get you to run I suppose nothing will.” 

“Darry my family’s Italian,” she retorted in a flat tone. “It takes a lot more than a screaming match to chase me away.” 

“Hopefully things are smooth sailing for a while,” the man concluded, making her nod as she took a quick glance at her watch. 

“Rodeo is about to start, we should head over,” she said, standing. Darry agreed and they stood, heading towards the stadium. They ended up finding Ponyboy and Piper on the way there so they walked into the stadium with them. 

“You think Soda will be okay?” The younger Curtis boy asked as they took their seats. 

“Hell if I know, if he’s not I’ll kick his teeth in for making me say yes.” Once again he said it in a joking way, but both he and Ruth knew there was some truth to it. Nevertheless, the woman laughed softly.

“Way to kick a guy while he’s down,” she joked shortly before the rodeo began. It didn’t take long for her to notice the way Darry was sitting. He looked equal parts nervous and stressed. He didn’t wanna have to jump down there and carry his kid brother out. Without saying anything at first she took his hand in hers and squeezed it gently in an attempt to comfort him. 

“Hey, it’ll be okay,” she said gently once his attention was on her. For a moment the man just sat there, but he ultimately nodded. 

“Yeah…” he trailed off slowly as his eyes met hers. “Yeah you’re right.” The couple shared a smile before facing forward again. First came the calf tying, then came the barrel racing, which was Soda’s event. And, to everyone’s surprise, he set a new record!

“And with that Sodapop Curtis ends at 12.36 seconds, making it the new record!” The announcer exclaimed. Sodapop laughed a little in disbelief as he climbed out of the pen. Ruth, meanwhile, had jumped to her feet and cheered as loud as she could along with Ponyboy. Darry stood after a moment and followed their lead, though he was much more restrained. The woman didn’t notice as she faced him with the biggest ecstatic smile on her face. 

“He did it!” She yelled excitedly, grabbing his arm.

“He did it,” he repeated with a firm nod, eyes staying on his younger brother. Ruth knew what he wanted to do. 

“If you wanna go to him I can save your seat,” she informed him. Darry didn’t need to be told twice before he jogged down the stairs towards Soda and Charlie, who were hugging.  The woman watched them talk for a while as the rest of the rodeo’s events continued. Darry finally made his way back to her as the announcer informed the stands about Dally, who was bull riding that night.

“Well I feel a world better, and I’m pretty tired too,” he laughed as he plopped back down in his seat.

“I’m sure everyone else will be too by the time this is over,” she responded amusedly.  Darry nodded in agreement, then grabbed his keys. 

“C’mon, let’s go wait in the lot. Too many people here,” he said, standing up. Ruth nodded and informed Ponyboy and Piper of what they’d be doing. The younger couple nodded, saying that they’d leave when the others left, then Darry and Ruth were out of there. As they walked back to the car the woman didn’t miss the way her boyfriend kept yawning.

“Want me to drive home?” She offered. “I think I have more energy than you.” 

“That’d be swell,” he nodded before laughing. “I’m about half dead.” Ruth laughed with him and patted his shoulder before hopping into the truck, him sliding into the passenger seat afterward. 

“Wow, it feels odd to sit here,” he admitted amusedly. “I stopped letting Soda drive cause he kept wearing out my breaks, stopping so fast.”

“Why am I not surprised?” She asked with an amused grin. 

“You shouldn’t be, that kid lives life in the fast lane.”

“Have you ever let Tuesday drive?” 

“God no,” he laughed. “She’d tear up my truck too. Plus, I’m too scared to watch that kid grow up.” Ruth was simultaneously surprised and not surprised by his confession. 

“Dar, honey, you’re gonna have to let them grow up at some point,” she muttered with a sympathetic look. 

“Well I know,” he sighed.  “It just makes me feel so… out of touch? Or I guess helpless?”

“I get it, I really do. But don’t forget you also have your own life to think about. At some point you’ll need to loosen the reign on your sibling’s lives and worry about yours.” 

“I’m worried they’ll just leave. I’m surprised Soda has hung around, ‘specially with Charlie and all that- I just don’t want the house to be so empty, I don’t want them making the wrong choices…” He trailed off in thought before continuing in a much quieter tone. “I don’t wanna let my parents down.”

“You’re not gonna let your parents down, Darry,” Ruth stated without hesitation. “I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, you’re doing your best with them and that’s all your parents would have wanted. But I don’t think they’d like you putting your life on hold to keep them in line. People are supposed to make mistakes sometimes, that’s how they grow.” Darry could do little more than laugh, voice slightly pained, once she finished speaking. He didn’t quite know what to say to her. Thankfully he didn’t have to say anything as the others finally reached the truck and climbed in. 

“Let’s go.” The woman nodded and pulled out of the parking lot, heading for the Curtis home. A small smile slipped onto her face when she felt a familiar hand slide onto her thigh lazily, and she glanced at her boyfriend out of the corner of her eye every so often. 

“I love you, Ruth,” Darry said. Despite the fact that it was barely audible it still managed to break the peaceful silence. Not that Ruth was mad about it. 

“I love you too, Darry.” The man grinned. 

“Why don’t we walk down to the duck pond tomorrow after work?” He asked. “I’ll set up a picnic, we can feed the ducks, it’ll be great.” 

The duck pond he was referring to was sort of hidden away in a park roughly fifteen minutes from the Curtis house. According to Darry it was somewhere that their parents used to take them to when they were younger. When they passed the Curtis siblings sort of used it as a place to hide away when they wanted to remember the happy memories of their parents. Darry had shown it to her not long after her dad passed, hoping that it would bring comfort to her the way it did for him. Ruth’s smile widened as she nodded.

“I’d like that a lot,” she responded softly as she pulled into the driveway. “For now, though, let’s get to bed. I’m exhausted.” 

“As the lady wishes,” Darry chuckled before hopping out of the truck. He opened the door for her and helped her out, then they both went up to bed and fell asleep content in each other’s arms.

[grantspectortrash]

Head Over Heels

Pairing: Steve Harrington x Fem Henderson!Reader

Summary: After hanging out together, both you and Steve realise you've had feelings for one another this whole time.

Warnings/tags: No warnings, just very fluffy, very cute stuff. Teasing and banter-filled conversations. Very wholesome.

Word Count: 6.1K

A/N: This is set in season 2 but one conversation uses season 4 dialogue. I've not been able to stop thinking about this whole scenario, but I hope you guys enjoy as well! ((Also I know the title is unoriginal, sue me))

---

"Dusty, you're going to be late!" You yell from the front door, slinging your car keys around your finger. It's your younger brother's Snow Ball dance tonight and you promised your mom you'd take him there and pick him up afterward.

"If you don't get your ass down here in five I swear-"

"Hold on! I don't understand!" Dustin is still upstairs, and his voice trails off as you hear him bustling around in his room. You haven't seen him since your mom left for work, which was an hour ago. Apparently, he's perfecting his hair so that he'll 'get all the ladies'. Those were Dustin's words - not your own - and you can't believe how much he's grown up in the past year.

He kept secrets from you now. He hung out with his friends way more than he hung out with you and, worst of all, he started caring about if girls liked him or not.

"I'm leaving soon!" You check your watch once more.

The dance starts at seven and you have fifteen minutes to get your brother out of the door and to the high school.

You hear Dustin switch off his bedroom light and run down the stairs at lightning speed.

"Y/N, I forgot to tell you-" Your brother's about to say something to you when you take in what he's wearing for the first time. He's got a bow tie on, with a cute suit and shirt and he's wearing his homemade Ghostbuster shoes, which are totally just some plain old Reeboks covered in red pen scribbles.

"Hold up, Dust! Look at you!" You smile, seriously unbelieving how cute he looks. "And look at your hair!"

You grab his head and stare down at his hair in amazement, “You look so good, dude! Who taught you to do all of this?”

Dustin wriggles out of your grip and straightens up his suit, “Thanks, thanks, about that…”

There’s the sound of a car horn outside. You stare at Dustin in confusion and he gives you a sheepish smile, “I know mom asked you to take me, but I kind of asked someone. And, I need to go. Now.”

Your confusion slowly turns into shock, "Oh my God, is it because you didn't want your older sister embarrassing you? Because I bet Nancy's taking Mike. You know I would never cramp your style, because honestly? You cramp me out."

Dustin sticks his tongue out at you, before giving you a shit-eating grin. "Whatever. You're just jealous because I wanted someone cool to take me to the dance. But, if you're so worried, come with."

He doesn’t give you time to answer, he just pushes you out of the way of the front door and opens it. The car horn sounds again and you hear a yell, “Henderson!”

Your curiosity wins over your confusion and you turn the hallway light off and lock the front door behind you.

There, parked on the street outside of your house, is Steve Harrington.

Dustin runs up to the car and does a three-sixty spin so Steve can see what he’s wearing. Steve has a massive grin on his face, “Dude, you did the hair!”

You walk up to the car, standing slightly behind your brother. “So you’re the dingus my brother has been hanging out with all this time.”

You smile, shaking your head. You had known Steve for years. To you, Steve used to be the world's biggest douchebag and the school's king - with a capital K - then the whole thing with Nancy happened and it seemed like everybody unanimously voted for Steve to be kicked off the popular gang's table. Now he was just like everyone else and, apparently, was best friends with your brother.

"Oh hey, another Henderson." Steve casually throws up a hand in a small wave. "You coming along for the ride?"

Dustin opens the passenger side door and slides in while Steve makes a quick remark about wiping shoes before getting in the car. Dustin ignores him.

You open the back door and sit behind your brother. "Yeah well, I was meant to be driving him. But since he has it covered, I guess the best I can do is be a supportive chaperone."

"Fine by me. Buckle up, you've got like ten minutes Henderson. Uh, young Henderson, I mean."

"We have names, you know." Dustin makes a comment that earns a laugh from you. Steve waves it off and starts driving.

You stay silent for most of the drive, mainly listening to Steve and Dustin bickering. You’re surprised at how close the pair are, and as you watch Dustin laugh at one of Steve’s corny jokes, you realise just how much Dustin needs someone like Steve in his life. With no dad, no older brother, Dustin didn’t have a father figure or even just another guy to look up to. You're surprised that Steve turns out to be that guy, but you’re glad that he’s there for your brother.

“You two are seriously giving me a headache.” You joke and the pair of them high five, as if it was their mission to annoy you.

"Anyway, Dusty, got any girls you've got your eye on?" You lean forward towards your brother and blow little kisses at him. He shoves his hand in your face, and you back off.

"You're annoying. And that's the completely wrong question to be asking. It's whether or not any girls have their eye on me that I'm worried about."

"Hey, you know you have nothing to worry about." Steve chimes in, "Remember what I taught you."

Dustin sighs, "Yeah I know. It's just Lucas has Max, and Mike has El-"

"Who's El? Ellen? From down the road?" You interject, not knowing who this girl was. And you knew most people in Hawkins. Small towns were like that.

"She's uh-" Steve looks at Dustin, not sure how to finish his sentence. Your brother recovers by saying: "She's new. Yeah. A new girl."

"Rightttt." You decide to back off from the conversation. Something seemed to be going on, and you weren't sure what.

Steve turns down the road towards the high school and your train of thought gets distracted. There's loud music blaring from the gym hall. Kids are everywhere, all dressed up and looking cute. Balloons the size of watermelons loom over the kids as they walk through the entrance. Steve stops right outside, "Here we are."

Dustin has gone strangely quiet. He instantly reaches for the interior mirror and starts touching his hair.

“Hey, you look great.” Steve is suddenly gentle, all the joking around gone from his voice. He closes the interior mirror. “You look great, ok?”

You pipe up from the back, “He’s right Dusty, you’re gonna knock ‘em dead.”

“I know.” He replies, but the confidence is lacking in his voice.

“Look, your sister’s right. You’re going to go in there, look like a million bucks and slam them!”

“Yeah, okay!” There’s a smile on Dustin’s face now, “Like a lion!”

He growls, the way he always does when he thinks he’s being an absolute lady-killer. You shake your head and Steve’s eyebrow raises, “Yeah bud, maybe don’t do that. Just go out there and have the best time okay?”

Steve claps Dustin on the shoulder and your brother reaches for his seat belt, nodding furiously.

“Go crazy, dude. See you at ten?”

Dustin gets out of the car and looks back at you. “See you at ten. Bye guys, wish me luck!”

He slams the door behind him and heads inside, his back upright and a little bit of swagger in his walk. You can’t help but smile.

Steve clears his throat, as if finally realising that now Dustin’s gone it’s just the two of you, and you roll your eyes.

“Wanna get something to eat? I could do with something to eat.” You ask. Without even asking for permission you unbuckle your seatbelt and clamber into the front seat, feet first.

“Hey! Oh my God!” Steve watches you with bewildered eyes as you get comfy and strap yourself back in.

“What? My brother gets the front seat and I don’t? Oh come on.” You shake your head in fake disapproval.

You don’t particularly care how you act around Steve. The pair of you had been in the same classes at school practically since Kindergarten. You had witnessed the time he had shoved a green crayon up his nose and he’d seen you fall flat on your face during sports day, while doing the egg and spoon race. Egg had ended up in your hair.

It wasn’t that you guys had ever been particularly close, you just didn’t care what he thought of you. Plus, if he was friends with your brother then he was no cooler than you were.

You think all of this while he continues to stare at you in shock. You raise your voice slightly, “Harrington, food or no?”

“Right. Yeah. Sure.” He fiddles with the keys and pulls away, leaving the school grounds and back onto the road.

“There’s a diner a couple of streets down.” You say, vaguely pointing in that direction, “We could get some burgers or something.”

“Burgers?” Steve retorts, a frown on his face.

“Yeah you know, those round things that go in between a bun? Usually with tomatoes and lettuce. Ring any bells?” You sling your left leg up, so your foot is on the seat and your arms cup your knee.

Steve clocks your movement, glancing at your body as he makes a right. He takes one hand off the wheel and gently pushes your leg, so your foot falls off the seat and goes back to the floor. His hands are warm.

“No feets on seats, Henderson. And I know what a burger is, idiot. I just don’t usually take girls out to go get burgers.” He shrugs nonchalantly, but you notice how he’s still subconsciously driving towards the diner.

“Oh yeah, how could I forget? King Steve is an absolute dreamboat who takes all of his dates straight back to his place so you can get frisky and then forget about each other the next day.” You laugh at your own comment.

“Hey that’s my love life you’re talking about! I’m not all about the sex, you know.”

He pulls into a parking space outside of the diner and kills the ignition.

“I’ll believe it when I see it, Steve.”

You get out the car, making sure your own car keys and purse are still in your back pocket. Steve gets out and you enter the diner together.

It’s semi-busy, meaning that there’s a few regulars in there and - with it being a Friday night - there’s two families with loud kids and a sheriff’s deputy on duty drinking a coffee. A waitress greets you at the door.

“Table for two, please.” You smile, and she leads you and Steve towards one of the window booths. You shake your head, and only express your emotions when Steve is sat opposite you, and the waitress is gone.

“She’s sat us in a booth.”

“Yeah, so?” Steve frowns at you, running a hand through his hair.

“They sit couples at booths. Booths are for like elderly couples who come in every Sunday to have waffles for breakfast with black coffee and all that jazz. They think we’re a couple.”

“Oh.” He says in a small voice, then, “In that case, this is the first time I’ve taken a girl out for burgers on a date.”

He’s waiting for your reaction to his comment, and once you laugh, he laughs with you. He gives you a giddy smile, as if he’s proud of himself.

“A date… interesting.” You’re not really sure what to say, but you’re glad when the waitress comes back to you just in time.

“Are you guys ready to order?” She asks. She’s wearing a white dress with a pink pinafore, an outfit that accompanied the diner’s new and updated look. They had a refurb a year ago, and you had to admit you appreciate the style.

“Yeah, just a cheeseburger, regular fries and…a vanilla milkshake. Thanks.” You reel off your order, hesitating when you can’t choose between vanilla and chocolate.

The waitress turns to Steve. “You know what? I’ll have what she’s having. Thank you.”

The waitress makes a note of it and walks off. You move in your seat and your foot accidentally hits Steve’s. You both apologise at the same time, and it’s the first time you feel awkward around him. There’s silence between the two of you for a couple of minutes.

“So,” He breaks the ice, subconsciously thumbing through his hair again, “How’s life been treating you, Henderson? What’s the big plan when school's over?”

“Oh, you know. Fine. Life’s fine. I’m trying to apply to colleges and stuff, hopefully it’ll work out. I dunno. Or I’ll just get a job at like Family Video, or something.” A smile plays on your lips, “And you’ve completely forgotten my name, haven’t you? You call Dusty ‘Henderson’ because you think it’s cool or whatever, but I reckon with me it’s because you can’t remember.”

“That is so not true!” Steve pulls a face of shock, “I can’t believe you’d think that!”

You shrug and start to laugh. “Just saying.”

“You think I’d forget you? Y/N Henderson? The girl who got egg in her hair? The girl who’s first kiss was freaking Johnny Liner at our very own Snow Ball? The Y/N Henderson who helped me with my math homework when we were in eighth grade?”

The waitress comes over with two identical plates, setting them down and completely interrupting Steve’s speech. You both say thank you, but neither of you touch the food. You’re waiting for Steve to continue, and he does.

“Plus I’d like to remind you I sit two rows behind you in Mr Herbert’s class and your name gets called for attendance every day, idiot. Plus you have those stupid little stickers on all of your books that say your name. So, I could never forget you.”

He looks at you with a smug smile, with one cocky raised eyebrow, and takes an aggressive bite out of his burger. You’re taken aback. Of course you’ve known Steve for forever, and everything he’d said was completely correct, but you never realised Steve had paid attention to any of those things.

“Okay.” You smile, impressed. “You win this time.”

You eat your burger and fries in semi-silence. "Don't You Want Me" by The Human League is playing on the diner's radio, and Steve mumbles along in between mouthfuls of food.

The pair of you chat about mundane things, how well you're doing in basically all of your classes, how Steve's basketball career is going, how Dustin was annoying and endearing at the same time.

If you concentrated really hard, pretended really hard, you could almost imagine that this was normal. Like you and Steve getting dinner together was a weekly reoccurrence. A small part of you wished this was normal but you knew - deep down you knew - that tomorrow the normal would go on existing. Steve would hang out with Dustin, he'd still sit two rows behind you in Mr Herbert's class, but he would go back to pretending you didn't exist. He'd be the guy who used to be popular and you'd just be Dustin's sister. A nobody who'd never been popular. It's just the way it was.

You think all of this while absentmindedly dipping a fry into your milkshake, pulling it out and eating it. Steve stops half-singing/half-eating, and stares at you.

"What was that?" He says, gesturing to your milkshake.

"What was what?" You shake your head and pop the last bit of your burger in your mouth.

"The whole milkshake and potato combination, Y/N. Nobody does that." Steve has finished his burger and has a handful of fries left.

"Well, I do it. It's good. Trust me." You reach over to pick up one of his fries. You dunk it in his milkshake before he can protest and you pull it out. "Try it."

You wave the milkshake-dipped fry by his face and he shakes his head at you, smiling. "This better be good, Henderson, or your ass is grass."

He takes the fry into his mouth and the tips of your fingers connect with his lips for just a second. You try not to think about it.

Instead, you watch his reaction. The instant confusion, the pause when he finally appreciates the combination of salt and vanilla in his mouth. He starts to nod.

"You know what? You win with that one, we're even now." He grins at you, picks up his last remaining fries and takes the liberty of dunking them in your milkshake.

"Steve!" You exclaim, you voice louder than it was meant to. One of the families look around at you, and you try not to notice. "You bastard."

He simply winks at you as he shoves the fries into his mouth. "Can't help it." He says, openly speaking with his mouth full.

You both finish your meals at a similar time. Now, there's a different song on the diner's radio - one you're not familiar with. But Steve knows it. And he's he's air-guitaring, to himself. Which is totally embarrassing.

"Oh how the mighty fall. You're an absolute nerd, Steve Harrington." You laugh at him.

"Thank you," He smiles stupidly, "Your brother would say the same."

The pair of you lapse into silence, and you find yourself watching as Steve rakes a hand through his hair not once, but three times. He's looking out the window, then sharply turns to look at you, as if he's about to say something. When he clocks you're already staring, you both avert your eyes.

The waitress comes over and any awkwardness is washed away. She takes your plates and Steve pulls out some notes from his pocket, counting the amount he'll need. You pull out your purse from your back pocket, trying to see what change you have.

"Hey," He puts one hand on yours and closes your purse, "this one's on me."

He pays and the waitress walks off.

"You didn't have to do that." You chide while you put your purse away.

"Yeah, well, I did. Now come on." Steve slides out from the booth and stands up. You glance at your watch, it's only half past eight. You didn't need to pick Dustin up for another hour and a half.

"It's not time yet, we've still got ages." You frown.

Steve rolls his eyes at you, "Y/N, did you really think we were gonna sit here all evening? We can do other stuff, you know. Come on."

He gestures for you to hurry up and you oblige. The pair of you leave the diner and get back into his car. He makes an offhand comment about checking shoes before getting in, which seems to be habit at this point, and you nod, but don't bother checking.

"You Henderson's are useless." He shakes his head as he starts the car. He backs out, and then you're on the road again.

"Why thank you. I pride myself on it." You reply, your voice dripping in sarcasm. Steve ignores your comment and pushes a cassette into the deck. It starts playing Head Over Heels by Tears For Fears.

"So where are you taking me, anyway?" You ask. You're genuinely curious, and also slightly confused. You didn't know what Steve did in his spare time, apart from play basketball and hang out with your brother. You didn't see him other than in the hallways and during your classes together. Whatever Steve got up to, and wherever he went, was a complete mystery to you.

Beside you, Steve seems to have relaxed. He's not glancing at you every second to make sure your feet aren't on the seat and he's tapping away at the steering wheel to the tune of the song. He looks at you briefly to smile.

"There's a road in the forest that pops out just by this random field. It looks over like all of Hawkins. It's really nice this time of night. Thought you might want to see it." He nods, half to himself, half in time with the music.

His voice is gentle and full of earnest, and you wonder since when did Steve care about what you might like? You respond the only way you know how, with sarcasm.

"Oh, right. So you're going to take me to the middle of nowhere where there's absolutely nobody else around. Let me guess, that's where you take all the girls?" You smirk, rolling your eyes.

"Hey, no." He frowns, looking over to you briefly, "I told you earlier. I'm not just about the sex and stuff, you know."

"Yeah, you said." There seems to be genuine hurt in his voice, and you wonder what he's thinking. "Are you still in love with Nancy?"

The question falls out of your mouth before you can stop it.

You reach a red light at an intersection in the middle of the town. At this time of night there's not many on the road but the light is on red anyway.

"No." Steve shakes his head and you swear the look he gives you is almost disappointed. "No, definitely not. Look, let me tell you something. And you better not say anything to anyone, okay? Swear?"

He's staring at you now, his voice full of sincerity. You feel like you can't look away, surprised by his sudden seriousness. "Yeah, okay. Promise."

You pull your eyes away long enough to notice the light's have changed, but Steve is still looking at you. "Uh, Steve, it's green."

He looks away, notices you're right, and drives on. Head Over Heels is still playing.

"Right. So, you promise? Okay. The thing is right, when I was a baby I used to crawl backwards. Like full on reverse, all the time."

"Okay?"

"I guess somewhere in my tiny Harrington brain I thought I was doing the right thing. And then, one day, I reversed my sorry little ass down a flight of stairs. My head got a right bump. You know, landed straight on my little noggin'. Which I guess explains a whole lot of stuff."

"You can say that again." You laugh. Steve has made his way to the edge of the forest now, and he turns off down a smaller track, leading up to the top of the hill.

"Anyway, in a round about way, that's kind of what happened with Nancy. I was acting like an asshole because I thought it was right, and I liked her because I thought it was right and then she dumped me and told me she didn't love me and it was like the biggest bump on the head since I was a baby. Made me realise a lot of stuff."

"Right. Okay." Your throat suddenly seems smaller, and you find yourself biting the inside of your cheek. Why is Steve opening up to you like this?

"At first I thought if I dated a lot of girls, I would eventually find the one. You know? Like get through as many girls as possible in order to find her."

"Ew." You interject.

"It's gross, I know. I know that now."

He looks at you as you reach the edge of the track. The forest opens up to reveal a small car park, and an open space of grass and flowers. You can see the stars in the sky, even without getting out of the car.

"Now, I think I might have known the one all along. And just didn't realise it. And now I want to do everything I can not to mess it up like I messed everything up with Nancy. Does that make sense?"

Steve has stopped the car now, and the engine's just running. It seems the cassette is only the one song - Head Over Heels - over and over again. It's started now for the second time and Steve looks over at you, waiting for your answer.

"Yeah, yeah it makes sense, Steve. Good to hear it." On nervous instinct, you pull your leg up so your knee is against your chest and your foot is on the seat. Steve says nothing.

"I'm impressed." This time your sarcasm is fake, because you don't know what else to do and it's been too serious for too long, "You're gonna keep it in your pants. Bravo."

You can't help but smile, being mean to him was so much easier than being serious.

"I hate you, Henderson." He's shaking his head at you, but his eyes are flitting between your eyes and your lips and you suddenly can't breath. Your thoughts are racing at a hundred miles per minute and it seems warm in Steve's car. It's very, very warm.

This wasn't normal - normal was Steve pretending you didn't exist. Normal was you watching Steve in the hallways but always telling yourself you didn't. This, the way your heart is beating way too fast, wasn't normal.

"No you don't." You can barely whisper your remark. Steve leans over and kisses you.

It's short and it's sweet and he still tastes of vanilla milkshake. He pulls away and gives you a small smile.

"Yeah, I guess you're right."

He cuts the ignition and get's out of the car in one fell swoop. It leaves you flustered and you take a deep breath before following out of the car.

"It feels so good to get that off my chest." He's looking at you from across the car, "Just don't tell Dustin. He'll kill me if he knew I had the hots for his sister."

"Not if I don't kill you first. You...you've had feelings for me this whole time? And said nothing?"

Steve crosses the front of the car and comes to stand beside you. He reaches for your hands which are at your sides, and he holds them in between the two of you. You stare down at your intertwined fingers, and it feels right.

"It's been a long time coming. I didn't know it, not at first. I thought...I don't know...that we were just friends? Like you would never want some asshole popular guy who played basketball and had to get help with maths homework in eighth grade. Like I was just the kid who shoved a crayon up his nose."

Steve's comment makes you laugh and he raises his eyebrows at you, "See! Who would want to date someone like that? It's not until I had my ass handed to me and I started hanging out with your brother and those other little shits Mike and Will and all of them, that it made me realise who I really am. I've grown up a lot in the last year, and I don't want to be that idiot who loses the best person he's ever known because he's been too blind to see it all these years."

You stare at him, mouth agape and brain empty. Did Steve, Steve freaking Harrington, just say that to you?

When you finally find your voice, and Steve is smirking a little, all you can say is: "You're unbelievable."

Steve responds by letting go of your hands and scooping you up in arms, pulling you against his body and lifting you from your feet.

"I thought you'd say something like that. Come on, Henderson, let's see the view."

He carries you towards the middle of the field, where you laugh and kick and try to wriggle from his grip, but he's surprisingly strong. Every time you whack him he gives you little kisses on wherever he can get you. The pair of you are laughing hysterically by the time he sets you down and you smack him on the arm.

"I hate you."

"No you don't." Steve smirks, copying your comment from earlier, and he turns you to face the view.

From the field, you can see most of Hawkins. You can see streetlights and the lights of people's homes. Cars seem like toy versions of themselves they're so small, and from here you can see the glittered and glammed school where Dustin's Snow Ball is. There's the faint sound of music - Time After Time, if your ears are picking it up correctly.

"Woah. It's pretty up here." You're genuinely impressed. "I take back the comments about you bringing girls here for sex. It's way too peaceful and calm up here for that."

Steve snakes his hand into yours, "You're forgiven, for now." He squeezes your hand, letting you know he's just messing with you, as always. "Can you hear the music?"

"Yeah. A little." Your eyes don't want to tear themselves away from Hawkins. You've lived there all your life, yet now, something makes it seem even more special. It really does look beautiful.

"Wanna dance?" Steve's words make you look away. He's already smiling when you turn to face him.

You nod, and the pair of you slow dance to the very faint sounds of the Snow Ball music. You can't believe it's happening, and you never want the moment to end. Because when it does, what if your worst fears happen? What if you have this one night together, and things go back to the way they were?

You push the thoughts away.

"Now, why couldn't it been like this at our Snow Ball?" Steve whispers as you dance in slow circles.

"Because you were dancing with Lacey Bradbury." You recall the memory even now. You laugh, unbelieving that you still remember that after all these years.

"Damn." Steve pulls away slightly and you look up at him. He's grinning, "You're right. Wonder why you'd remember that..." He laughs and you go back to resting your head on his chest.

"Yeah, as if you're not the one who remembers that my first kiss was at the Snow Ball. Perv."

Steve attempts to tickle your sides and you worm away from him, but still move in your slow circle. He settles his hands back on your sides.

"It was Johnny freaking Liner, man. The snottiest little kid I've ever met. Even then I knew you deserved better. So, yeah, I do remember that. Sue me."

There's a beat of silence where the song changes, but even from far away you know the tune immediately. It's not one for a slow dance, but that doesn't stop you and Steve.

"For the record, if I hadn't of been such a stupid asshole back then, I would've walked straight up to you and asked you to dance with me. I swear on my life."

You smile into Steve, his scent engulfing you. His arms are wrapped around your body and the two of you are practically one at this point.

You stay like that, dancing in slow circles, for a long time.

"We need to go." Steve finally whispers into your ear.

"Do we have to?" You pull away, trying to glance at your watch in the darkness. "Surely Dusty can survive a few minutes without us."

"It's nearly ten. As annoying as that little shit is, he'll be even more annoying if he figures out what's happening here. Plus, we have every night to slow dance."

"You promise?" You ask as you and Steve make your way back to the car.

"I promise, Henderson."

"Good, otherwise I'm telling everyone that you were a super dumb baby!" You laugh and give Steve a push with your shoulder, "Race you to the car?"

The pair of you full on sprint to the car, and you wonder if Steve is letting you win because you're a few pegs ahead of him. When you beat him, he ends up looking at you in amazement.

"Why the hell aren't you on the athletics team? Jeez." Steve's slightly out of breath and laughing.

"Because who would run the book club if I'm off running laps all the time?" You joke, trying to suck in the cold night air, "And, truthfully, I don't want to show you up as the best sportsman in Hawkins High."

"Ha, yeah right." Steve unlocks the car and the both of you get in. This time, he doesn't make a comment about the shoes, and he takes the cassette out of the deck. "I think I made my point with this one. Thank you Roland Orzabal."

Steve kisses the tape, flings it into the backseat and turns the car around. "Let's go get your brother and hope he's not as smart as everyone says he is. Otherwise, we're busted."

He heads back down the track, back to the streets of Hawkins. The pair of you sit in a comfortable silence, while you sneak glances at him. You can't help but smile.

"That smile isn't gonna come off your face, is it?" Steve asks without even looking at you. You're about ten minutes from the school now.

"Oh shut up." You playfully hit Steve's arm and try to stop yourself from smiling. "You seem pretty happy yourself."

"Well duh," Steve finally looks at you, his eyes sparkling. "I mean, of course we might have to hide it from Dustin for a bit, but now I get to boast that Y/N Henderson, book club leader and apparently athletic superstar, is my girlfriend."

"Girlfriend? Is that what I am?" Your voice is full of fake surprise just to tease Steve but secretly, you're ecstatic.

"Yes!" He takes his hand off the wheel to grab yours, "Abso-friggin-lutely." He brings your intertwined hands to his mouth and kisses the back of your hand.

"Now, you might wanna get in the backseat before Dustin murders the both of us."

You're five minutes away from the school now, and you unbuckle yourself while Steve drives. You shimmy yourself and dive head-first into the back seat, which earns a light slap on the ass from Steve before you turn to sit back down.

"Hey, Harrington! Watch it!" You laugh as you re-buckle yourself into the backseat.

"Sorry, couldn't resist." He turns to wink at you.

At ten on the dot, Dustin is waiting outside the high school with his friends. Just like your brother predicted, Lucas is holding hands with Max while Mike is holding hands with a girl you've never met. You assume it's El. Both Dustin and Will are stood alone, but both of them have huge smiles on their faces.

When you reach the group, Steve rolls down the passenger side window.

"Steve!" The gang all yell in unison, each one of them bearing a huge grin.

"It was awesome!" Mike says.

"Max even kissed me." Lucas wiggles his eyebrows.

"Hey, shut it!" Max interjects.

"It was fun." The new girl, this El girl, has a slight accent to her voice, as if she doesn't speak English very well.

"Oh hey, Y/N's here." Will points at you in the back seat.

"Hey guys! Looks like you had fun!" You poke your head out a bit so the gang can see you properly. They all say hi to you in unison - it was weird how in sync those kids could be.

"See you kids soon yeah, get home safe." Steve comments to the kids and they all nod. Everyone makes a point of saying their goodbyes and Dustin gets in the car. Steve drives off.

"Honestly it was so good! There was music and at first nobody wanted to dance with me but I did what you said, I looked like a million bucks and everything. And, Nancy danced with me. She said I'm her favourite. She is sooo hot."

Dustin rambles with excitement, flitting his head between Steve and you to make sure you're both listening.

"Glad you had a good time, dude." You reach forward to ruffle Dustin's hair and he swats you away.

"It was great. Even if the girls my age didn't dance with me. Nancy said in time they'll come to love me. Realise how amazing I am."

"Yeah, Nancy can really give some great advice sometimes." Steve says to Dustin, smiling. It gets a smile out of you too, recalling your previous conversation with Steve.

"So, what did you guys do?" Dustin asks.

"Oh you know, got some burgers. Nothing crazy." Steve replies nonchalantly, but he looks at you in the rear view mirror with a smirk on his face, and you catch his glance. You grin ear to ear.

"Yeah. Totally boring stuff. I'm sure you had a way better night, Dust."

"Steve is totally boring, right?" Dustin replies, adding to the banter so the pair of you are being mean to Steve.

"Hey, quit it Henderson!" Steve remarks.

"Which one?" You and your brother reply at the exact same time, which makes all three of you laugh.

You don't think you've ever been this happy in your whole life, and suddenly you're very grateful for your brother and his nerd best friend, Steve Harrington.

[tragedyofdevotion]

Vengeance

Do you like revenge stories? I do.

So, this is a revenge story against the overwhelmingly powerful dragon fae.

Yandere Malleus x f! reader

Warning; major character deaths

You stood on the balcony of the Castle overlooking the Valley of Thrones.

“Look! My King! Isn’t the scenery magnificent? “ You cried out looking at the collared companion beside you, one of his two signature horns turned into sand from your previous attack.

He did not look at the scene in front of him. He did not dare to look at it. So, instead he looked at you. You looked genuinely happy, smiling wholeheartedly.

That smile made him fall for you all over again despite the situation. Compared to that smile, all other smiles you had showed him the entire time looked fake, terribly so.

Well they didn’t just LOOKED fake. They WERE indeed fake. The countless bodies surrounding the two proved it. That you were an amazing actor, who played your role diligently for thousands of years starting that day.

“Please stop!” he cried out at last. Unable to continue looking at the country he built and protected with blood and sweat slowly turning into ash. “They didn’t do anything wrong! I am the only sinner here. You can do whatever you want to me. So, please, please let them go.”

...

“You can do whatever you want to me. So, please, please let them go,” you said, standing in front of your dear friend. Not long after the dragon stole you to his dungeon, all your friends and your pet monster came to save you.

“What are you talking about. You are my lackey. So, if you were to remain here, there would be no one to buy me tuna. So, I...” the monster stopped for a moment to take a breath. Considering all the damage he received, maybe it is painful even to speak. “We will be taking you back to NRC. We will be taking back our daily life.”

However you ignored your pet’s words and your breaking heart. There is only so much a magic less human can do but you can at least try to placate your oh-so-powerful husband. “I will do anything, everything you wish. I won’t try to run anymore and I-I will be loving and affectionate towards you. I will be the Queen of your dreams. I promise you. So, just please don’t kill them.

What if you erased their memories? They can live their lives happily. And they won’t bother with us anymore, too.” You smiled a little as if you have found an amazing solution.

“They tried to stole what is mine. There must be punishments for that.”

“(Y/n) is not yours. And she will never be. She is mine. And you are the thief! Stealing her because you know she will never look your way.” Your lover, the lion beast man, shouted with anger. This visibly angered your kidnapper/ husband and he summoned the green fire to let your friends BURN.

And he smiled as if their screams of agony are the best music ever.

And you cried, and plead the dragon fae to stop. But he didn’t until they all turned into ash and got carried by the wind.

...

“Well I felt a sense of de ja vu there. Did you feel that, too?” You asked the King. Perhaps realizing what you meant, the man’s expression grew more pale.

As you said that, a green-haired knight came running towards you, a long sword in hand. He stood in front of the King protectively when he himself was full of injuries and bruises.

“Sebek! How could you hold your sword against me! Did you forget I am your Queen?” You said as you looked at the knight with eyes full of fake hurt. “You also said I am your dear friend, remember?”

“Stop sprouting nonsense! You are a traitor! You conspired with the humans and sold our country out. You have no right to call yourself our Queen! “

At that you laughed mockingly. “You dare say that when you are the ones who made me your Queen against my will.”

“Wh-What do you mean? Perhaps you are still hang up over that? That was thousands of years ago! After all this time you still can’t forget-ahhh!!”

Before he could finish his sentence, you shoot him with your blue fire ball, the same one your cat from a long time ago used. “What do you mean forget? Would you be able to forget what you are seeing right now? “ You laughed again, this time maniacally, as you watch fire consuming his body. “I will never forget much less forgive what you have done. I have always been dreaming of this moment ever since that day. Thanks to you guys I had an eternity to plan for this. That is why I told you guys that one day, you will regret turning me into a fae. I, who was originally a magic less human, became able to use magic because of that too.”

“Instead of reminiscing the past, let’s just enjoy what we have right now. My King, why don’t you help your most loyal attendant? He look terribly in pain. You no longer have your general by your side. Would you really let go of your knight, too? Oh! I forgot. You can’t move right now because of my magic, right?”

The King said nothing back to you and just shed a tear as his last loyal subject turned into ash and got carried by the wind.

“How do you feel right now? Frustrated? Hurt? Betrayed? I hope you felt them all because I did, too,” said the woman who once was his Queen. “It is almost funny how the tables have turned.”

“However, my entertainment must come to an end as the humans view you too dangerous a threat to leave you hanging. It’s a shame. I would like to watch you suffer more. But rules are rules. So...”

“The King’s roar!” You summoned the unique magic of your lover from a long time ago.

At that the horned man turned into sand…

“I did it everyone. I finally did it. I brought justice for you all.” You coughed blood. The side affects of the numerous potion you drank to enhance your magic are starting now. You smiled. "Just wait for a few more minutes and I can finally come home to you guys. And in the next life, let’s live happily ever after..," said the woman, as she cried alone atop the ruins she created…

[floral-poisons]

I know this is probably a boring and unoriginal request but i really wanna see your take on it if you want to write it ....

pining headcanons for the boys- thats it- thank you for your time- bye-

hey anon! it’s not a boring and unoriginal request! i haven’t gotten any pining requests yet. this was a fun one to write! pining is always so cute you know. i hope these head canons live up to what you imagine! 💕

also i’m sorry if some of these are short. i wrote them while on my train back to school. </3

NRC STAFF

dire crowley

crowley’s going to call you into the office more often just to ask how you’re doing. in general, he wants to know how you’re doing in your personal life and if you’re healthy. if you were a drama, he’s invested. he becomes the person you go to if you want to complain (he’s not going to lie though, he does enjoy hearing you dish out some drama). crowley isn’t one to listen to people much check up on them so this is an entirely new person.

ashton vargas

ashton’s going to start pestering you to go on jogs with him, most certainly. or do any sort of physical activity with him. he finds that the best conversations happen when two people are jogging and wants to get to know you more. so it seems like a natural conclusion. no doubt he’s also showing off in front of you and subtle bragging.

mozus trein

he would let you take care of lucius. he’d let you handle his cat as long as you were careful of course. but that’s the biggest sign of trust and pining. it’s also him talking to you about anything other than school and academia. it’s pretty unique and an honor to learn more about his personal life.

divus crewel

staying after work to talk to you is certainly a sign that divus is pining. he’s definitely the teacher that wants to go back home asap after the day’s over. but he’ll stay after for you and even help you in whatever club you’re advising. the true indicator of pining is when he lets you touch his coat and even wear it. that’s a sign that he really likes you.

sam

it starts with discounts at his shop. you need something? here it is at a discounted price. physical goods don’t have as much meaning as you to sam. he’s also most definitely willing to cook for you and provide everything you need. most certainly, he also compliments you a lot. “you look very nice today (y/n). is that a new ring?” “your hair looks amazing! how’d you do it?” “are you hungry? did you eat?”

DIASOMNIA

malleus draconia

this may be because i’m listening to “she wolf / loba” by shakira. but he plays the violin for you. it was an offhand comment about how much you love the sound of a violin. so what better way to show he cares about you than learning how to play the violin? it’s a lot tougher than he thought and his horns sometimes gets in the way. but when he finally masters it, he gives you a private showing during one of your private tea parties. he will serenade you and he wants you to see that he pays attention to every little detail about you.

lilia vanrouge

lilia is old enough that i believe he wouldn’t pine for that long. like he definitely knows he’s attracted to you and would like to be as forward as possible. if he does pine, it’s going to be through small actions. you need help with something? he’s got you. and he most certainly will tell you stories that other students and people have never heard of. he wants to impress you and he likes seeing how interested you are in his life. it’s an indicator that you pay the same amount of detail as he does.

silver

you know silver is pining when he falls asleep in your presence. he feels comfortable enough in your presence to be at ease and let his guard down. you think it’s entirely normal until lilia says it isn’t. silver is someone with his guard up often due to his job. so being able to relax is a clear sign of trust and pining.

sebek zigvolt

malleus is his whole life. so when he starts spending a lot more time with you, it’s a clear sign that sebek is pining. he’s not sure how to go about it but one thing is for certain: going to the library with you is a lot more important than watching over malleus while he practices the violin (a strange new hobby). sebek is supportive regardless of what you do and this certainly comes out when he’s pining after you. you plays sports? he’s going to all your games. you work at the mostro lounge? he’s there everyday. you play an instrument? he’s going to all your concerts. you’re an influencer? he’ll gladly help you set up.

HEARTSLABYUL

riddle rosehearts

riddle’s going to let you in his personal space. he strikes me as someone who values his personal space greatly so him letting you hug him, kiss his cheek, put your arms around his shoulders is a really big deal. even trey is surprised. riddle’s face also goes extremely red (like when he is angry) when you do touch him. he coughs and says it’s nothing but really his heart is beating so fast he can’t keep up. riddle’s also willing to overlook rules more much to ace’s dismay.

trey clover

trey’s all about learning what your favorite dessert is. he’ll make it and keep trying until the recipe is right. you wonder why he goes through all the effort even though it’s not your birthday. he says it’s because you’re friends but the truth is, it’s not. he wants you to see that he’s willing to try anything to make you happy even if it was just baking.

cater diamond

he sets his phone down. that’s it. cater’s pining after you right? how else would he listen intently to everything you’re saying! he doesn’t care about trends or photos or magicam when he’s with you. he wants to listen to you and you get his undivided attention. and even when he’s talking to you, his phone is in his pocket or the screen is down, away from his face. he can get carried away with talking to you too and could care less about what’s going on online.

ace trappola

ace giving you gifts is strange. it’s probably small gifts too where he mutters that “it reminded me of you.” you thank him and don’t think much of it until deuce points it out that ace is being extra nice. and crashing over at ramshackle a lot more. even riddle is tired of having to write sleepover slips for ace. ace wants to be close to you and to show that he’s always thinking about you.

deuce spade

deuce wants you to see the honor student instead of the punk (regardless he still comes out). he’s set on showing you that he’s responsible and organized. need help with your homework? he’ll tutor you! need an alchemy partner? he’ll gladly volunteer! that doesn’t mean he isn’t protective either. people are immediately set off when they see how angry deuce can truly be so if someone’s bothering you? deuce will take care of it. he’ll be extremely sheepish afterwards.

POMEFIORE

vil schoenheit

touching. lots of physical touch. it’s not just me being a simp i promise. vil won’t outright say he’s pining but he shows it through touch. touching your shoulders, touching your arm, wrapping his arms around your shoulders or waist. just lots of touches that you presume are friendly. it’s just vil being friendly right? but friends aren’t always this touchy. at this point people already think you’re dating!

rook hunt

a lot more observation and a lot more of the flowery descriptions he sees. vil is the one to witness most of this as rook follows you around from a distance and admires everything you do. at first, he presumes it’s just him taking interest in you like how he takes interest in leona. but gradually, he begins to realize that he doesn’t normally watch his fellow peers for this long. he begins falling for you as he slowly understands everything about you.

epel felmier

quality time. in his mind, if you he spends time with you, then you will begin to notice how much more he can be. he carves apples for you just to hear your voice of gratitude. he studies with you to help the both of you pass. he performs spells to see the sense of wonder in your eyes. he’ll even go to town and go shopping with you if it means spending time with you. but you think it’s mostly what friends do until vil tells you that it really isn’t.

SAVANACLAW

leona kingscholar

the man is begrudgingly being nicer this time around. he usually doesn’t care and will have ruggie do things. but upon getting to know you and eventually falling for you, he begins to be more active. you want to go see a movie? he’ll give up sleep to spend time with you. you want a snack? no problem. he’ll go get it and wait on line for you. his acts of kindness put you off a bit but when you ask, you get a sheepish look and a clearly forced response of fake annoyance.

ruggie bucchi

ruggie’s going to stop the teasing when he begins to pine for you. of course he has his moments here and now but it’s not as much as before. he’s too busy admiring how excellent you are at everything whether it be alchemy, flying, or cooking. whatever you’re doing, he thinks you’re doing great. you find him zoning out a little bit when you guys are hanging out together and it’s because he’s thinking about you.

jack howl

jack’s going to be all about impressing you. he wants you to see the best version of himself possible. he’ll make sure you’re watching to score a goal in spelldrive, watch as he waits tables, get that alchemy equation right on the board. it’s also clear that jack wants you to be involved with the things he enjoys. he’ll invite you out to activities a lot more often so the two of you could spend time together.

OCTAVINELLE

azul ashengrotto

azul’s not a good cook. but he will certainly learn how to cook for you. he goes through the trouble of buying cookbooks and putting the wish granting aside to improve his skills. he has you try out recipes to change the mostro lounge menu. in general, azul’s going to put work aside to spend time. the mostro lounge and students’ requests can wait if you want to go shopping or look at the stars. you wonder why he’s spending so much time with you, not realizing it’s because he’s secretly pining for you. and it’s not obvious to outsiders too aside from jade and floyd.

jade leech

jade puts a lot of effort in his hobbies like mushroom foraging and growing his own mushrooms. but for you? he keeps his mushrooms on the side. he takes more interest in your own hobbies and even takes some of them on because he enjoys them. this gives you something in common, especially if you don’t like mushrooms. but if you do, he’s happy to show off his mushroom collection and take you foraging for them. he also definitely takes you to a special spot on the mountain he usually visits.

floyd leech

floyd’s going to do what he does best: tease. he’s most definitely going to tease you more than he did before. but there’s also an air of protectiveness with him. only HE can tease you. if someone else teases you, he goes out of his way to give them a stinging glare. worse, if someone approaches you when you don’t want it, he’ll wrap his arm around your shoulder and go, “what the hell do you want!” it’s enough to get people to back off. he wants to make sure you’re safe and comfortable.

SCARABIA

kalim al-asim

much like vil and epel, kalim would be all about physical touch and quality time. he wants to be with you and has already decided on that. he shows how he pines through the touches on your shoulders and asking if you want to try jamil’s cooking. there’s definitely a lot of heated cheeks and sheepish looks as you do something that makes him swoon for you. he wants to give you nothing for the best. while pining, the man’s also probably trying to plan the best crush confession to ever exist.

jamil viper

jamil starts by asking around about you. he wants to know everything. you don’t know this of course. grim finds it weird and probably makes an offhand remark about the scarabia vice prefect asking what your favorite food is. gradually, he starts doing acts of service to try to get your attention. need help in alchemy? he’s got you. need some food and you missed dinner? he’ll cook you up a hot meal. need someone to snuggle with during a thunderstorm? yes he would but he would certainly be very embarrassed the whole time. you eventually realize that jamil likes you when you bring something personal jamil’s talked about and everyone looks at you like you said something out of character about him.

IGNIHYDE

idia shroud

pining for idia? that’s going to involve a lot of pep talk. he wishes to approach you and he will if you’re alone. but if you’re with other people? forget it. the nerves get the best of him and he will be a fumbling mess which is an impression he doesn’t want to leave on you. he gradually starts inviting you over to play games or study so the two of you have some quality time together. he even lets you win too!! sometimes you notice his hair becoming orange when he’s around you but usually you brush it off as his anxiety. not until ortho asks if you like like idia.

[jackrrabbit]

Adversary /// Overhaul x f!Reader (18+)

Summary: You make a deal with the devil to save your life, but it turns out Overhaul’s not interested in your soul.

A/N: Remember when I said I was going to do a fantasy collab and then dipped for like 9 months? Hahaha…anyway…

@pleasantanathema @ present-mel @shadowworks—if it’s not too late, here’s my part for the Pleasant & Strider Fantasy AU Writing Collab from a million years ago. Go check out the masterlist and gorge yourself on these amazing pieces!!

Tags/Warnings: dubcon, demon fuckery & occult things, big heresy/sacrilege/perversion of religion, sex in a church ft. Catholic sex guilt, other than that it’s not that bad lol, inexperienced reader, mild degradation, shameless camp and demon-fucking clichés, Overhaul calls you “little girl” 👉👈

He doesn’t look like a demon.

Not that you really know what demons are supposed to look like. But…red skin, right? Fangs and claws and swirling masses of bad energy. Maybe cloven hooves for feet. Yes, that’s the Disney version—but even if you didn’t expect a cartoon personification of evil, you didn’t expect this.

He looks like a doctor, you think. Lab coat hanging open, surgery mask pushed down under his jaw, stethoscope draped over his shoulders. No, he’s a little young to really look like a doctor…an intern, you amend, shifting back in your hospital bed. He looks like he fits right in here, not a hair out of place. Except for, you know, the polished black horns curling out of the sides of his skull.

Overhaul. It was written in the book. That’s the only thing you have to call him in your head.

He’s standing in the center of the sigil you drew at the foot of your bed before midnight, surveying the room critically without meeting your gaze. He looks annoyed—that’s not a good sign, is it?—but then again, of course he’s annoyed. You’d be annoyed too if you got summoned out of your cozy hell dimension in the middle of the night. According to the book, you’re lucky he even showed up…although ‘lucky’ isn’t really how you’d describe yourself most days.

“So,” Overhaul says after a long moment of silence in which you question every choice you’ve made in your relatively short life. “You’re dying.”

You nod.

“And you don’t want to be.”

You nod again, wondering if you’re supposed to be contributing more to this conversation. It’s a bit difficult when your mouth is so dry it feels like you’ve been eating dirt, but you suppose being in the presence of an unholy servant of Satan will do that to a person.

“Fine.” He sighs, frowns, and then finally lowers his gaze onto yours—and you shiver.

Those eyes. No human has eyes like that.

“Make me an offer,” Overhaul tells you, and through his open mouth you catch a flash of sharp white teeth.

Okay. Okay. The chirping of the heart monitor speeds up (as if it weren’t obvious enough that you’re terrified) and you fold your knees up to your chest and fidget with your ring and think. He’s giving you a chance to establish parameters. You’re supposed to start with his end of the deal, the thing you want from him. That’s what it said to do in the grimoire, aka the 19th century demonology volume your creepy cousin brought back from her pagan anthropology research trip in rural France. The one you keep hidden under your bed because your mother would burn it if she knew you were reading about summoning demons.

Offer nothing to a hell creature without first telling him your price. You know the words by heart, both the winding calligraphy of the original French from the grimoire and the rushed scrawl of the English translation your cousin left for you in sheets of lined paper layered between the pages of the book for you to read. Really, this is her fault. She was the one who slipped you the book, who told you that it worked, who snuck you the ingredients for the summoning. She was the one who left a bookmark at the chapter on this particular demon, one that specializes in ‘Contrat pour Remédier au Déséquilibre des Quatre Humeurs’, which she said meant a contract to cure any illness. Even his ‘name’ is translated in her hand, practically an afterthought in the margins of the page.

‘Le Malin qui Ravage et Rebâtit’— Overhaul?

You looked up the literal meaning of this phrase on your own. It did not reassure you.

“Girl.” His voice is cold, irate. Your eyes snap back up to his and it feels like that burning gaze is laser-beaming into your skull. “Do not test me. My time is limited…as is yours.”

You swallow. “How long do I have left?”

“Less than a single human year,” he tells you without a trace of sympathy. “Seven months, twelve days, three hours. Or so. You’ll be too exhausted to leave this bed in four months, and the pain will become intolerable in six… By the end, you’ll wish—“

“Stop,” you breathe out. The heart monitor is beeping wildly and you squeeze your knees into your chest, trying to calm down your breathing. “Stop, I—I want to live.”

“Of course you do.” Overhaul’s lip curls. “How very predictable.”

Be specific, you remind yourself, doing your best to ignore the stifling disapproval from the man—the demon—in front of you. Something about him (maybe how clean-cut he looks, maybe the indisputable authority in his demeanor) makes you want to impress him. But you didn’t turn your back on your religion—you didn’t draw pagan symbols on the floor in chalk, fill silver cups with various questionable substances (including your own virgin blood), and turn the crucifix your mother hung over your bed upside-down so you could let a demon make you feel guilty for wanting to survive. “I want to be cured. I’m okay with whatever natural death I have instead when I’m older, I just don’t want to die of this illness. I want you to make me healthy.”

“Simple enough. What else?”

‘Simple’? Your heart surges with something you’ve felt very little of since your initial diagnosis—hope. “T-That’s it. Just the cure.”

Overhaul glares at you. “Humans… Every vice in the world available to you, and you limit yourselves to the basest priority of survival.”

“But you can do it? You can cure me?” you persist.

Overhaul steps forward (quiet, so quiet you wonder if he really moved) and holds a hand out to you past the foot of your bed—you hesitate, and a second later you can see the muscles in his hand flex, stretching the latex of his plastic gloves tight over his knuckles.

Just do it. You give him your hand. Carefully. Like you’re scared the contact will burn you. It doesn’t (although his skin feels warmer than yours), but after a moment his grip tightens, sliding down past your hand to circle the fragile bones of your wrist and squeeze.

“Ow?” You wince.

The demon’s eyes flicker closed for a second, lips moving silently like he’s talking to himself—and then he drops your hand unceremoniously back onto your lap. “You could be cured before the sun rises this morning. I doubt your stay in the hospital will extend past the end of the week.”

He sounds bored, voice as flat and passionless as it was earlier, but your heart is soaring. Cured. You’ve lived with this illness for so many years, you can’t remember the last time someone told you you could be cured. And getting out of the hospital that soon? You can just imagine taking down all the decorations from the walls of your room here and setting them up in your old bedroom at home. You could see friends on the weekend and not take an oxygen bag, you could get a job or—or apply to college, you could have a life—

“That is…assuming you have something to offer me in exchange for the cure.”

Your stomach drops. You’d almost forgotten about the other half of the deal.

“Don’t tell me I came all this way for nothing.” Overhaul steps back, and the orange light of the candles you set sends strange shadows over his arrogant face. The fires look brighter now, and you find yourself tracing the lines of those shining black horns. In an odd way, they look natural—so organically framing his temples that you can’t imagine him without them.

“N-No, of course not. I have some money—I mean, my mom has some, and I can get it for you…” Which is half the truth. If you know anything, it’s that your mother’s spent most of her savings on your treatment and care. You probably have more debt than you have money in the bank right now—you’d try to get rid of that, too, if you hadn’t read in the book how important it is to keep your request as simple and straightforward as possible.

…Although it’s apparently not enough. Overhaul’s eyes narrow, molten gold irises carved into slits. “Even if I had a use for human money, do you really believe your life is worth so little?”

“No—no,” you say quickly. “I just thought—in case you were interested—”

The air crackles with energy, the candle flames spark bright blood-red, and the hair on your arms stands straight up. “I am not.”

“Okay! I get it.” You wave your hands back and forth, pulling your IV line from side to side with the motion. The book was very clear about staying calm and rational while you work out the terms of the deal, but that’s easier said than done when you have a real live (live?) hell creature in front of you. You always knew this was going to be the hard part—all the stories say there’s only one thing that a demon would be interested in, and no matter how inviting the prospect of living past this illness is, you know you’d rather die than sell your immortal soul to the devil. “I’ll give you anything except my soul! And—and don’t hurt anyone I care about, or— just don’t hurt anyone, okay? Other than that, if there’s anything I can give you, I will.”

Overhaul’s lip curls, baring a thin strip of those unnaturally sharp canines. “And is your soul really so valuable?”

This throws you for a loop. Isn’t that the standard deal? A soul for a wish? That’s how it’s supposed to work—at least in this twisted version of reality where you can summon a demon to perform unholy miracles for you. But if you think about it, it doesn’t really make sense, does it? Why would your soul be valuable to him? You can’t form an argument, especially since you’re not willing to barter it away in the first place.

Your mouth is pursed open as you search for a response, but Overhaul doesn’t seem willing to wait. A gloved hand wraps its way around the railing at the side of your bed, and he leans in closer. “Little girl…what makes you think you possess anything I desire?”

Little girl. You’re not a little girl, you’re a grown woman—and yet there’s no untruth in the statement. In front of him you feel insignificant, immature, weak. You have nothing real to offer, and something tells you that you’re not going to get rid of the demon you summoned without a sacrifice you’re not willing to make.

You twist your ring around your finger—the nervous habit you haven’t bothered to break because you’ve always had more important things to worry about—and the glint of silver in the candlelight must catch Overhaul’s eye because before you even notice him moving, your delicate hand is trapped in his larger one to give him a better view of the tiny piece of jewelry. “What is this?”

“It’s—um, a ring. A purity ring.” Has he never seen one before? Well…actually, that makes sense.

Overhaul turns your hand over in his without touching the band of silver. He’s looking at it closely, inspecting the lovingly engraved cross in the design and the inscription on the other side. “Matthew 5:8,” he reads out.

“…Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God,” you recite cautiously. It feels wrong to speak the words in front of him, but somehow you can’t help yourself.

Overhaul’s hand doesn’t leave yours. “This ring is important to you.”

“It’s a symbol of a—a promise I made to God. To save myself for my future husband.”

“To ‘save yourself’? To save what?”

You can’t believe you’re explaining this to a literal demon. You close your eyes and inhale slowly and taste smoke. “My…virginity. It’s a promise that I won’t have sex until I enter into a biblical marriage.”

At this, Overhaul is quiet. You give him a moment to answer, half expecting him to question why you think God cares about your sexual status (honestly, you’d be lying if you said you haven’t wondered this yourself), but he stays quiet until you peek up at him to try and gauge the look on his coldly handsome face.

He’s still staring at the ring. He hasn’t touched it—maybe he can’t, because of the cross?—and through the latex, his skin feels hotter than a human’s is supposed to be.

“Is there…” you start, but you trail off when you realize you have nothing to ask. You give a little tug to try and take your hand away and you’re surprised when your wrist actually slides out of his grip to fall back on the nest of sheets in your lap. You didn’t think he’d let you go so easily.

Overhaul turns his head to the side, eyes drilling into you so you feel like you should lower your gaze. The candlelight flickers in strange shadows over his horns. “This will do,” he says quietly.

“What?”

“In exchange for your cure.” The demon taps his own left ring finger, the place where the purity ring sits on your hand, and your heart soars. He actually wants that? It’s just a simple silver band, not worth much, but you’re not going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Maybe it has some special significance because of the religious connotation. Your mother will be angry you’ve lost it, but you’re happy to cope with that if it means living to actually get married!

“Yes!” you blurt out before he has a chance to rethink his offer. Sure, you’ll miss the purity ring—you’ve had it since you were a kid, after all—but there’s no question you’re getting the better end of this deal. At least in your opinion.

Something flashes through his yellow eyes, something you don’t even want to try and identify. “The contract, then.”

You barely have time to notice that his voice has gentled, that it’s practically silken in comparison to before, when the candlelight flickers again and suddenly the contract is everywhere. Everywhere. Writing appears on every surface in the room, covering the walls, stretching over the ceiling, coiling around the sides of the hospital equipment and decorating your bedsheets until you and Overhaul are the only untouched surfaces in sight. The characters are inscribed in red, dark red like—don’t think about that, you tell yourself squeamishly. You can make out some of the letters, even a word here or there—French, you recognize, mixed with what looks like Latin and interspersed with what you can only guess are runes.

“I can’t read this,” you tell him, fidgeting with your ring for what you now realize will be the last time.

“I only need your name,” he purrs, and then you feel a fragile weight in your hand: a feather, pearl-black and glossy and too large to belong to any bird you can think of, its angled tip glistening with wet ink. There’s an empty space in the writing before you, and Overhaul’s gloved hand comes to yours again to guide you into place.

This feels wrong…then again, of course it does. Even if you’re getting off relatively easy and just losing your ring rather than your soul, you’re still making a deal with a demon. You sign your name, forcing yourself to think about the future you have ahead of you rather than a disapproving white-bearded caricature of The Man Upstairs wagging his finger at you for haggling with a literal servant of Satan. People have done worse things to survive, haven’t they? It’s just a ring.

You set the feather down and Overhaul sighs, thick black eyelashes obscuring his intense gaze for a moment—and then the contract is gone, leaving your hospital room as blank and sterile as it’s supposed to be (well, aside from the candles and all the other ritual stuff you threw together to summon a demon in the first place).

“Are you going to cure—heal me now?” you ask.

“…Patience, little girl.” He’s pulling his glove off, peeling it down his fingers to bare the pale skin of his hand. You catch your breath and wonder what this is going to feel like, and then the tips of his fingers meet your cheek and—

you stop breathing.

It doesn’t hurt.

Or if it does, you don’t remember the pain a second later when breath floods back into your lungs. What you do feel is energy. Strength in your muscles, blood pumping through your veins, every inhale and exhale as light as a bird and freer. You feel healthy. You’re surprised you even remember what health feels like but you do: it’s like you’ve only been half alive, and now life is surging into you and through you and around you, bubbling up in your core like a spring overflowing. You blink rapidly, thinking you might cry from the sheer pleasure of it, but when you open your mouth it’s laughter that comes out. You’re healthy. You’re alive. You barely notice the IV line literally falling off of your skin because the hole where it entered your vein is sealed shut and healed perfectly.

No more needles. No more hospitals. Even without all the monitors beeping out your heart rate and measuring your vitals, there’s not a shred of doubt in your mind that you’re cured.

“Thank you!” you laugh, looking up at Overhaul and for the first time, not caring that he’s evil incarnate. “I feel—I’m okay! It worked!”

“Of course it did.” His expression is inscrutable, but he lets you have a few moments to enjoy your newfound health.

You roll your shoulders back, flex each muscle you can isolate one by one to test, make fists with your fingers and then run them over your hair, which is already thicker and shinier than it was a moment ago. Your body thrums with energy—you want to run, to feel the ground against your bare feet and the cold night air on your face, and you think you could do it! Your legs are already swinging over the side of your cot, ready to run barefoot out of the hospital if that’s what it takes, but before you can stand up Overhaul’s pushing you back down onto the bed.

“Have you forgotten your end of the bargain already?”

Honestly you did forget, but only for a second, only because you were so excited to just be outside again. “Oh, yeah. Of course.” Your hand goes to your left ring finger, ready to slip the ring off and hand it over, but Overhaul shakes his head.

“Not here.”

“What—?”

You’re falling. Your hospital room is disappearing, the image of your walls and your window and your bed disintegrating into yawning black, and you’re falling through it into nothing, into emptiness, and Overhaul’s still-bare hand in yours is the only anchor you have so you clutch onto it and squeeze your eyes shut. You want to scream—that’s the sane thing to do when you’re falling through miles and miles of empty space, right?—but when you open your throat the sound is swallowed up just like the light was…

Overhaul’s hand burns into yours, an improbable lifeline that you pull closer more out of terror than conscious thought. The slick, empty air rushes around you and you think I am going to die like this and then, incredibly, as soon as you’ve accepted your imminent demise, you feel your back mold onto a chilled, flat surface, vertebra by vertebra up to the back of your head, as if you’ve been lain down onto it.

Your heart thuds in your ears and you brace for an impact because your body hasn’t quite accepted yet that it’s not falling anymore—but at the same time, you know you’re lying down on something. You pry your fingers away from their vice-grip on Overhaul’s arm and feel around blindly for what’s underneath you, and when it seems reasonably tangible you let yourself open your eyes.

Way above, vaulted dozens of feet over your head, is a ceiling studded with gilt-edged frescoes and stained glass. It’s raining (even though it wasn’t in the hospital, you think) but through the massive panes of colored glass there’s enough oily blue light to make out that you’re in a church.

You’re in a church, with a demon. Isn’t that against the rules?

You sit up stiffly and look over at Overhaul, who’s standing at your side and looking down at you…which is how you realize the soft, cold surface you’ve been deposited onto is the blanket on top of the altar in the sanctuary. “Where...did you take me?”

“You should know this place.”

And you do, when you look around. It’s empty now and you’ve never been here at night, but this is a church your mother would bring you to when you were little, back before the disease got so bad you couldn’t risk traveling to it anymore. This is where you took your purity vow…the ring feels heavy on your hand. “Why—why—“

“I can’t stand human hospitals. Filthy places… How that reek of illness and death doesn’t bother your kind, I’ll never understand.” Overhaul pulls his latex glove back on. He’s dressed differently now, no longer impersonating a doctor—black shirt, black pants, and a…bird mask in red leather and gold. So are you, as a matter of fact. Instead of your hospital gown, you’re in a gauzy white dress that’s already been pushed up to pool around the tops of your thighs.

The slip is too thin for the cold, and you can feel your nipples standing up under the cloth so you fold your arms over your chest and hug yourself. “Why did you take me here?” The sound of your voice echoes off the walls eerily and you wish you hadn’t spoken so loudly. The reflection of your words sounds girlish, nervous.

“I told you. Your side of our contract.” Even in this dark, the angular features of his face are clearly concentrating—on you. “Are you already having second thoughts? Such a fickle little thing…”

“You mean the ring?” You reach for it again, ready to tear it off and throw it at him if that’s what it takes to see your deal through, but Overhaul snatches your hand away, pinning it above you.

“Not the ring,” he says. “The promise.”

The…promise?

A chill makes its way down your spine despite the heat radiating off the demon’s body and onto yours. “I don’t understand.”

“The promise,” Overhaul repeats—and you hear a sound almost like wings flapping and then he’s on the altar with you, knees straddling your hips as a single hand holds both your wrists above your head. “To remain a virgin until marriage. Your promise to God.”

A streak of lightning cracks down on the other side of the stained glass window behind the altar, illuminating the room briefly in spectacular pits of red and orange and yellow…and then it’s dark again, and the only color you can make out is the gold in Overhaul’s eyes.

“I’m going to break it,” he murmurs, lowering his head toward your ear right as the answering thunder rolls through the sanctuary, up through the altar, up into you.

///

Méfiez-vous de son piège, the grimoire said. Beware of the catch.

Of course it wasn’t just a ring.

Overhaul’s fingers are in—inside you, his middle and ring finger pumping through the length of your cunt like they belong there, like you were made to be touched this way. A mixture of your juices and your own spit cling to the latex because he made you suck his fingers before he put them in you and he hasn’t bothered to take his gloves off—not that you asked. You’ve been too busy biting your lip to try and muffle the moans that he keeps forcing out of you. He’s bracing himself on top of you with one hand and fingering you with the other, so your own hands are free to push into your eyes and hide your face…until he yanks your arm back and stops.

“Look at me.”

Your eyes are screwed shut and you shake your head back and forth, the movement shuddering your whole body right down to your pussy wrapped around Overhaul’s fingers. He slows the movement and kneels back, pushing one of your thighs up into your chest as he does it.

“Look at me.”

And you’re not sure whether it’s some unearthly power he has over you or the plain old deterioration of your willpower, but you can’t refuse him. You crack your eyes open and he’s glaring down at you, skin pale as ice in the blue light. Once he’s satisfied that you’re watching, the demon leans back in to fuck your cunt with his fingers, slowly at first and then quicker when he hits something inside of you—a spot, a place on the inner wall of your pussy that makes you feel like you’ve been shocked— heat blooms through you like blood in water and you gasp and he curls his fingers up to pet over that spot again.

“Wait—wait, that’s—it feels—weird!” You’ve never felt like this before. You’re not supposed to feel like this, it’s wrong.

“I understand you’ve never touched yourself, but don’t pretend you don’t like it.” Overhaul says, voice as indifferent and calm as ever even though your cunt is dripping clear sticky liquid over the plastic of his glove.

He pushes back in and grinds his palm over the little button on the top of your pussy—your clit?—and you want to scream. “No, I—I don’t—nnhh...”

Do you like it? The demon’s body is so hot next to yours, like he’s running a fever except you’re the one going out of your mind… You’ve heard metaphors for sexual pleasure before (that it’s like having something to drink when you’re dying of thirst; or that it’s the ultimate act of intimacy, love in physical form) but all of that’s a fucking lie. There’s nothing to compare it to, no reference that makes sense, because it doesn’t make sense—you don’t even want him to keep going, do you? You’re only doing this because you signed your name on a devil’s contract, because you don’t want to die and there’s no alternative…but that doesn’t explain why you feel so warm from the inside out, why you’re squirming and your hips are rocking involuntarily no matter how much you try to keep still. This isn’t right. You feel like you’ve been lied to.

A good girl wouldn’t like this.

Overhaul isn’t going to let you close your eyes, so you don’t—but the sounds coming out of your mouth are so…indecent (and how can you think these things about yourself? the word feels like someone else is saying it when you hear it in your head) that your hand is drifting up to your mouth before you can stop yourself, trying to stifle all of it…

“Let your voice out. I want you to hear yourself moan.”

Long fingers slide their way out of your pussy and then move up to rub quick little circles around your clit and you moan, like a whore, like a girl getting her cunt rubbed by a demon— “Oh, uhhhn—something, it’s—coming—“ There’s something building up in your core—a peak, a climax, something that makes you fist your hands in the nightgown he put you in (so tight you’re surprised the thin fabric hasn’t torn) and tilt your hips up into him, begging without words because you don’t have any to express what your body is asking for…

But he doesn’t give it to you. Overhaul takes his hand away from your pussy and the shock of the cool air after his too-hot touch is almost enough to send you over that edge—almost. Not quite. And without it, you’re left shivering and quaking, thighs twitching as your baser instincts beg you to just put your hand between your legs for once and hump your fingers to completion if the demon won’t do it.

You’re not going to risk that, though. Not when Overhaul’s dragging your body closer, bunching up the blanket on the altar under your spine, so your pelvis is angled to his… He’s already shirtless and you hear him unzipping his pants but you can’t bring yourself to actually look at him, even when you feel something hard and hot nudging up against your inner thigh and then aligning to your sticky wet slit.

“This will hurt a bit, but I want you to look,” he says, and you don’t even understand at first until you make yourself feel it—his cock, pushing up against your tight cunt to finish this, this perversion of what your first time was supposed to be…

And what was it supposed to be? Roses and candles and soft kisses? A nameless, faceless husband unzipping your wedding dress and making love to you with the lights off? The way the demon touches you should be cruel in comparison but it isn’t, it’s lighting fires under your skin and turning your brains to mush, so how is your body supposed to tell the difference?

It’ll hurt, you know that, you’ve heard enough about sex to know that it always hurts the first time for girls…women. It was already a stretch to fit his fingers in your virgin pussy, so of course his cock is going to hurt. You turn your head toward the window at your side and try on look out at the rain drawing rivulets like veins over the glass, something to focus on instead of him.

“I said look,” the demon hisses, and his hips push forward a bit and you bite off a whimper of pain. “Watch me take your virginity…look at your tight little cunt swallowing me up just like it was made to.”

“N-No—“ you whine, even though it’s not like you can ignore it. “Don’t make me, don’t make me look, I can’t—“

“Then look at me.”

It’s what he wants, some kind of wicked satisfaction he gets off on, but you’re lucky enough to even get an option so you choose that one, shifting your gaze up into his face instead of the place where his cock is pressing deeper and deeper inside you. Overhaul’s eyes are half-lidded and it’s hard to tell from behind the mask but the look on his face is…pleasure? No, that would be too human. Restraint, at least. He could just thrust up into your body in one stroke, but he wants you to feel it for some reason.

Maybe because it’s a worse betrayal of your chastity if you want to get fucked.

Lucky for you, though, you can barely feel anything aside from the pain. The heat you felt building earlier is draining out of you even as Overhaul tilts deeper, layering his chest over yours. You’re almost grateful for the modest barrier the dress provides between your torso and the solid muscle of his abdomen. His cock in your pussy feels like it’s too big too deep too much and it’s the first time you’ve felt like your body wasn’t created specifically for this purpose so you hold it tight.

“Does it hurt?”

A second of clarity makes you want to snarl (of course it fucking hurts, I’m losing my virginity to a demon I summoned from hell) and you dig your fingernails into your palms to stop yourself from saying it out loud. Overhaul pulls out a fraction of an inch and then pushes back in and you feel like the breath’s being pushed out of your lungs. “Yes! Yes, it—it hurts—“

“I can make you enjoy it…for a price,” he sighs, settling into a slow rocking motion of his hips pushing into yours.

And you want to, every sore muscle in your cunt is telling you to give in and give up, give him what he wants so you can enjoy it like he says—but you’d rather hate every second of this than make another deal. You shake your head quickly and because you’re still too afraid to look away from him, you don’t miss the look of surprise that flits across his face before he tamps it down. “I don’t—I don’t want to—like it,” you gasp out between thrusts. “It’s better if—if it h-hurts…”

This time it’s obvious—his eyes really do widen, and you feel some petty triumph at having caught him off guard like this. Who’s predictable now? you think—and then he’s lifting one hand off the altar at the side of your head and tugging his glove off with his teeth, and you don’t even have time to be afraid of what he’s going to do to you because it’s too late, his bare fingers are already stroking over your mound and onto your core, massaging into the flesh of your stomach so he can feel his own cock sliding in and out of you—

and it doesn’t hurt anymore?

You only have a second to try and understand—he cured you, he healed the pain from your first time just like he healed your illness?—before he hooks his grip under your thigh and folds your legs into your chest so he can fuck into you harder than before. His cock slaps into your pussy and you can hear it, hear how wet your filthy little cunt is, smeared through with your juices. It’s sick—the sound of skin against skin, and the moaning you can’t hold back, you sound like a woman in a porno and you wish the pain would come back just so you could keep hating what he’s doing to you. “What—what did you do—“

The demon ignores you. “It feels good, doesn’t it.”

“Nn—“ It’s deeper like this…deeper and rougher and you can feel it. Now that the pain’s been reduced to the dull ache of a stretched muscle, you can feel everything—his cock sliding against that same spot in your cunt that makes you want to squeal, the friction of his body moving against your clit, all of it, everything you wanted to block out— he pumps into you and you hear your breath sobbing out a moan a second out of rhythm, the sounds of you bouncing on demon cock echoing over the walls. “Please—ah, ahhh…”

“‘Please?’ Are you begging—me, little girl?” Overhaul pushes your thigh up and drags his cock through you, excruciatingly slow, forcing you to feel the thick head slide over every gummy wall in your slick pussy.

You shake your head, mewl, try to force your hips to stop rocking back into his and grinding your clit against him. But you can’t. You’re a—you were a virgin, for fuck’s sake! Overhaul’s immortal. Probably thousands of years of experience on how to make you feel like you want this, like you’re only alive in the places he touches you… You’re at his mercy, if he has any. You never stood a chance.

“Then are you begging your god?” His body lowers directly onto yours and like you’re being controlled by puppet strings your arms fold around him and rake your fingernails uselessly into the smooth skin of his back. You can feel the vibration of his mirthless laughter through his chest. “It must hurt terribly…to know he isn’t listening.”

“Don’t—stop, please,” you sob. “Don’t say—don’t stop—please!”

“Listen to yourself, girl—“ Overhaul’s breath is faster now, but you don’t have time to question it because you feel your peak coming again, the tension rising up through your cunt and your abdomen, harsher and crueler than when his fingers were in you but you want it just as much. More. “Has he ever answered your prayers? Has he...ahh, fuck—who’s the one giving you what you need?”

“No— please, please just let me let me, please—“ You’re talking nonsense now, begging for the release—at least then it’ll be over, and you need it, you need it so badly you feel your muscles locking up, cramping, your ankles crossing each other behind Overhaul’s back.

“Good girl,” the demon breathes, and then he lifts off you so he’s kneeling upright with the two of you still connected, his thick, heavy cock still speared in your pussy, and his fingers come down again to rub at your clit. Everything’s so wet you can hear the motion of his fingers slicking themselves through your juices, sliding up and down the little button over and over and it feels so good that a tiny part of you almost wants to drag it out, to savor it, but the rest of your body is going to die, is going to go crazy if the demon doesn’t let you cum right now, right now, right now!

And he does. Praise the Lord. The pads of Overhaul’s fingers pass over your clit one last time and your head rolls back, your throat moves but you can’t even make a sound, your legs shake and you cum.

You didn’t know it was like this.

Your cunt squeezes down on his cock, throbbing and pulsing and your toes literally curl (you didn’t think that was a real thing!) and your vision goes black for a moment and—oh fuck oh fuck i want this i want more how is it possible that i’ve never felt like this—you understand, more intimately than ever, why sex is wrong:

because nothing that makes you feel this good could possibly come without a cost, could it?

///

It must take longer than you thought for you to come back to your senses, because when you regain awareness of your body you’re in your hospital bed. You’re clean, too, and you wonder for a second if Overhaul bothered to clean you up? Or no…he probably just snapped his fingers and transported you back to your room. You’re not really sure how it works.

What you are sure of, however, is that you just got fucked by a demon. You’re sore in places that you didn’t know it was possible to be sore, and there are already bruises forming on the flesh of your thighs from how tight he was holding you. You don’t really have time to inspect these, though, because apparently your…ordeal (if you can call it that) isn’t over.

Overhaul’s still here.

He’s facing the hints of sunrise through the east window, dressed again in the immaculate lab coat and surgeon’s mask. “You’re awake,” he says without looking at you.

You nod hesitantly. You’re not really sure what the protocol is in this situation, but at least you’ve finally held up your side of the contract, right? And so has he. Despite having been up all night doing sinful things, you’re still itching to get out of this bed and test the limits of your healthy body. “You’re…going to leave, right?”

“Yes—”

At that, you sigh in relief and settle back into your starched bedsheets.

“But there’s one more thing you owe me.”

“Goddamnit,” you swear for the very first time in your life. After what you just did, taking the Lord’s name in vain seems like a relatively minor sin.

Overhaul’s mildly irritated expression doesn’t change, but he holds his hand out to you, palm up, the way you imagine someone would if they were helping you out of a car or requesting a dance at an old-fashioned ball. And really, you want all of this to be over—you want to get out of this hospital, you want to taste what the air outside is like, you want to distract yourself from what you just gave up in exchange for a future. At this point you’re just going to have to hope God isn’t as picky about the whole premarital sex thing as you grew up believing.

So you put your hand in Overhaul’s.

Slowly, carefully, like he’s afraid it’ll burn him, he slides your purity ring down your finger and balances it in the palm of his bare hand. It sizzles when he touches it, glowing orange until it eventually burns down into a ash-black circle in the center of his palm. Once he’s satisfied that your pretty little ring has been reduced to nothing more than a scorch mark, he closes his hand around yours and you feel something sharp, painfully hot, etching onto your finger.

It’s over in a second, but you still yelp and yank your hand away from him as soon as he lets you. “Ah—ow, what was that?”

He burned you, he literally burned you! He’s already healed it, but there’s still a thin, pale scar, an intentional one left wrapping around the skin at the base of your left ring finger. Like a wedding ring.

When you look close, you can make out a symbol on the back of your finger where the cross used to sit—and even though your conscious mind doesn’t recognize it, the sight of it rings out something inside your ribcage, deeper and truer than flesh and blood. It’s the devil’s mark, you think. It’s his.

“…A promise,” Overhaul says softly, and even though it’s a chilly morning, you can feel the heat of his hands on yours a long time after he vanishes back into the dark.

[panlight]

If the Cullens formed a family band, what instrument would each of them play?

Edward on piano seems the obvious answer, but synthesizer or even keytar would be way more fun. For some reason I’m seeing this as an 80s new wave band. I guess because Edward said he liked music in the 80s. 

Emmett on drums. He’s just got that chaotic, aggressive percussionist energy. 

Rosalie on lead guitar. She’s gonna be the star, she’s gonna be the best. Vocals too. HUGE 80s hair and amazing 80s makeup. 

I liked that bit in the “Masque” short with Esme and the cello, so maybe she plays bass (guitar). There’s also some good symbolism about Esme being sort of like this underlying support for the family that doesn’t usually get a whole lot of attention but it wouldn’t sound right without it. 

I feel like Carlisle has “the manager” vibe, but he also did study music back in his early vampire years. I just get the sense he tried it out and realized he enjoyed listening to music more than playing it, and/or that his playing was technically perfect but very precise and dry. Maybe he plays rhythm guitar.

He and Esme also do background vocals. Again, the support system.

Alice shares lead vocals with Rosalie and plays any random instrument they need for a particular song. Another guitar. A flute. A French horn. A Sousaphone. An ocarina. Whatever. Also manages the “look” of the band. The 80s fashions are at her direction. 

Jasper doesn’t really want to be here but Alice gave him a tambourine and said “it will be fun!” so here he is. 

[lynn0x1]

Potions and pining

(Stray Kids Hyunjin)

Summary: you tutor Hyunjin in potions and pining lots of pining. Hogwarts au. Ravenclaw!Reader Slytherin!hyunjin Jaemin is mentioned.

Genre: its mostly just fluff

cw: mild swearing

word count: ~1.8k

a/n: i truly had no thoughts while writing this. I have no idea where it came from but here we are. Enjoy! <3

Personally I see Hyunjin as a Slytherin

Just look at him

Cunning, ambitious, determined, charming, a certain disregard for the rules

The boy was made to be put in Slytherin

Did I mention he was super charming?

Well he sure is

Like girls would fawn over him

And I mean who wouldn’t?

He was a great quidditch player as well

His grades however weren’t the greatest.

This results in Seungmin, his Ravenclaw friend, dragging him into the library to study.

Hyunjin of course refuses to study

But gives in after realising that if he doesn’t get better grades he won’t be allowed to play quidditch.

RIP Hyunjin

Hyunjin was trying and failing nearly all his subjects

This obviously frustrated Hyunjin

Potions was his worst subject

No matter how much attention he puts in class and reading he was hopeless

Probably slamming his head on the table

Seungmin was giving up on him as well

But!

Seungmin remembered you

A kind hearted fellow Ravenclaw

So one Friday evening Seungmin went up to you while you were reviewing your care of magical creatures notes

⚬ “Hey (y/n)!”

You looked up and saw your housemate and smiled at him

⚬ “What’s up?”

⚬ “Uh you know Hyunjin? The Slytherin”

In your head you were like who tf doesn’t know Hyunjin

While on the outside you were just like

⚬ “Yeah, what about him?”

⚬ “He kinda needs your help.”

You stared at Seungmin in surprise

Hyunjin?? the boy who gets girls (and guys) and the seeker for quidditch needs your help?? What??

⚬ “Help for??” You asked

⚬ “Potions.”

You looked at him weirdly

Seungmin was amazing at all his lessons and he was a far better wizard than you would be.

Why on earth would he ask you to help Hyunjin?

You weren’t amazing in potions compared to other subjects

Even though you were one of the best at it in your class you were much better at other subjects

⚬ “Um sure. I’ll be here tomorrow around the same time.”

Seungmin is like OH MY GOD THANK YOU JSJSK

You laugh and pack up your things to leave

SKIPPING AHEAD TO SATURDAY EVENING

You walk into the library

You looked around a bit trying to find Hyunjin

You didn’t see him

So you decided to sit where you usually do and wait for him.

A few minutes passed when you suddenly hear somebody frantically bursting into the library.

You looked up from your books and saw an out of breath, tie loosely around his neck, messy haired Hyunjin with a satchel hanging over his shoulder.

Take a moment to just imagine that

You’re welcome

⚬ “Sorry I just came from quidditch practice. Am I late?” He said in between breaths

You smiled as you shook your head

Im-

You kinda awkwardly stare at each other

Both of you knew the other because you were in a few classes together

However you never really talked to each other

You decided to break the awkward silence (caw caw caw)

⚬ “So what do you have trouble with in potions?”

⚬ “The whole thing.”

Hyunjin proceeds to give a whole rant on how whatever the professor says just sounds like a horn and he just can’t understand.

You laugh and bring out your potions notes

The two of you slowly review all the notes together him asking what some terms mean and you explaining them

Once you finally finish going through everything with him

Hyunjin’s face just lights up

The boy final understands

This goes on for about 2 weeks

You help Hyunjin with potions anytime both of you were free

You lowkey had a crush on Hyunjin

And who wouldn’t?

He’s charming, funny, handsome and just everything about him could make anyone fall for him

He always tried his best sometimes brings you snacks

But you knew you had no chance with him, at least that’s what you thought

Hyunjin knew you before you started tutoring him because you, my friend, were almost always at the top of the class

When he first heard you beat Seungmin in a Transfiguration test the boy was shook

No one could beat Seungmin

Except you lmao

The next test was coming up in a week

You weren’t tutoring Hyunjin that day as he had Quidditch practice

Seungmin was helping you memorise how to make Felix Filicis potion

Your brain was kinda fried after having several tests that week so things weren’t so smooth

⚬ “IT'S NOT THAT HARD”

⚬ “THATS EASY FOR YOU TO SAY”

Earlier that day you promised to hang out with a friend after his Quidditch practice which was ending soon

⚬ “I’m gonna go and hang out with Jaemin today.”

⚬ “Jaemin the Hufflepuff? You actually have friends outside your own house?”

⚬ “HEY THIS IS BULLYING”

you walked up to the quidditch pitch and waited for Jaemin.

While he was leaving the pitch Hyunjin noticed you and Jaemin walking together away from the changing area

Hyunjin furrowed his eyebrows

Since when were you close with Jaemin?

[since first year when you and Jaemin shared a train carriage together keep up Hyunjin 🙄]

Now Hyunjin becomes sulky and his friends notice

⚬ “What’s wrong?”

⚬ (Hyunjin shaking his head) “Nothings wrong I’m perfectly fine”

⚬ “You sure? cuz you basically look like someone stole the last piece of chocolate from you”

⚬ (Seungmin not looking up from his notes) “He’s jealous cuz (y/n)’s hanging out with Jaemin”

(everyone else: *gasp*)

⚬ “I AM NOT”

But the more he thought about it the more he realised he might have a tiiiinnyyy crush on you

The way his heart went HSKAKJSKJDKS every time you leaned in to explain something

The way you push your hair away when it fell onto your face

The way your nose scrunched when you were focused on a question

OK MAYBE HE WAS WHIPPED FOR YOU

So Hyunjin did the only thing he could think of

Rant about his crush to Felix for almost a whole day

Felix is watching Hyunjin a little more than confused

⚬ “Dude, just tell them”

⚬ “YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND.”

Meanwhile you were also gushing your feelings for Hyunjin to Jaemin

Jaemin later hears Felix complaining about Hyunjin ranting about his crush aka you for so long that he thought he almost went deaf

Jaemin being a pretty smart boi concludes since neither of you plan on confessing, he comes up with a plan with Felix

Now the two of them plan to lock you two up after you finish your test

Unfortunately they failed

Seungmin catches wind of the two Hufflepuffs failed attempt at making you confess to each other and does his own plotting

He straights up tells Hyunjin you like him

⚬ “THEY WHAT?”

⚬ “Stop yelling. They’re in the astronomy tower now, go!”

And so he runs up to the astronomy tower

When he opened the door he saw you reading some astronomy books while checking the ceiling which was covered in stars

Deciding to play the cool card he nonchalantly sat next to you

Which caused you to jump because WHAT THE HECK YOU DON'T JUST SNEAK UP ON SOMEONE HYUNJIN

⚬ “WHAT THE FUCK.”

⚬ (Hyunjin laughing at your reaction) “Relax it's just me”

THAT DOESN'T MAKE IT BETTER

You do some small talk talking about life and what not

You’re trying to stop your heart from bursting with uwus because of Hyunjin

It doesn’t help that Hyunjin keeps flirting with you which makes you all flustered and shy

Hyunjin finds it very cute btw

⚬ “Hyunjin... why are you here? I thought you hated astronomy as high as the stars are.”

⚬ (Hyunjin acting all smug) “well I like you more than I hate astronomy”

You’re like oh ok WAIT

DID HE JUST

YES HE DID (Y/N)

If you thought you were a mess before well now you’re completely gone

Trying to make some sense of what he just said

He just meant it as a friend thing right??????

RIGHT????

Hyunjin sees your malfunctioning and scoffs

⚬ “Do I seriously need to spell it out for you? I thought Ravenclaws were smart smh.”

⚬ “HEY I'M THE ONE THAT TUTORS YOU.”

⚬ “BUT YOU CAN'T EVEN TAKE A HINT!”

⚬ “WHAT HINT?”

⚬ “SEE!”

After a bit of back and forth

Hyunjin is 100% done with you

You are oblivious/in denial

Hyunjin thinks that Seungmin tricked him

You are trying to logically think of what he just said

Then it hit you

⚬ “Oh…”

Hyunjin looked at you funnily

⚬ “Finally taking the hint?”

He smiled sadly

He laid down on the floor looking at the star filled ceiling

⚬ “I guess you don’t like me back. Seungmin said you did but I guess it was just to get me to confess and stop pining my feelings.”

⚬ “But I do like you..”

This made Hyunjin bolt straight up

He’s looked at you and furrowed his eyebrows

You… you couldn’t possibly have meant that… right? Hyunjin thought

⚬ “Stop messing around…”

You gave Hyunjin a weird look

Mess around?? WHAT DO YOU MEAN MESS AROUND??

(God both of you are frustrating)

⚬ “What do you-”

⚬ “Don’t tell me you like me just because I like you. You don’t have to like me back. It’s fine, I'll deal with my feelings eventually.”

⚬ “Hyunjin-”

⚬ “I don’t want you to like me just because I confessed. I don’t want you to feel pressured into going out with me just because I like you.”

⚬ “But-”

⚬ “I’m sure you like someone else. I mean Jaemin is pretty good looking and you guys seem really close. I’m sure you would like guys like him…”

You just stared at him in disbelief while he ranted

⚬ “... so I guess I’m just saying I’m sorry. It was just wishful thinking that you like me back.”

Hyunjin looked at the floor in defeat, taking in some breaths after talking for so long.

You quietly crawled up to him and gave him a small peck on the cheek.

Which made his head jerk up

⚬ “Wha-.”

⚬ “I like you too.”

Hyunjin just stared at you blinking several times

⚬ “I like you too. Honestly I didn’t think you would like me back. You’re the Hwang Hyunjin. One of the most famous wizards in school.”

He just stared at you, mouth agape

⚬ “Well what are you gonna do about it?” you teased

And you know what he did? >~<

He grabbed your hand and dragged you to the Hufflepuff dorm where the other boys were hanging out

And he gave you a big phat kiss in front of them lol

⚬ “MY EYES HAVE BEEN T A I N T E D!”

⚬ “I’m happy for you but dear merlin did you have to do that in front of us?”

⚬ “GET OUT OF THE DORM YOU'RE NOT WELCOME ANYMORE.” Minho chucked a book at him.