#i need to write a whole thing on that i need to sort out my takes but

[bratbarzal]

The Secret of Us (LH43) 1/3

aka the sequel to let it happen

Pairing: Luke Hughes x Fem!Reader

WC: 21k (oops)

I felt it, you held it, do you miss us? wonder if you regret the secret of us.

General Warnings: angst (lol), a severe lack of proofreading, mentions of injuries, a couple of angsty flashbacks with avoidant behaviour and fade to black type smut

A/N: just want to say thank you guys for liking this so much 💖 seeing all the comments and the messages and people recommending this to others and the sweet things you're all saying (even if I betrayed you lol) made me so unbelievably happy!!! I could never let these two go out like that, I enjoy writing this dynamic way too much, and I also have way too much discussing this fic with people!! shoutout to the let it happen film club lmao!!! I hope you guys enjoy this sequel, and I hope it lives up to LIH, they really are my babies!!

and I know what you're thinking, maggie how could we ever trust you again after let it happen??? you can't!! and you shouldn't!!! but I wouldn't do that to you twice.

or would I???

I wouldn't 😌

OR WOULD I?!?!?!?! 😏

You need to start getting more comfortable saying no to people.

It’s something you tell yourself all the time, that being a people pleaser is going to lead to your downfall - it’s something you’ve always known.

So why you would ever possibly agree to attend a football game with your sorority sisters after weeks of hiding away in the safety of your childhood bedroom, you have no idea. You’ve spent the last 4 weeks alone convincing yourself to grow a backbone, and you’ve only been back in town a week. 7 whole days and your resolve has crumbled to pieces.

And now you’re squeezing yourself through a crowd of sweaty, yelling men to find your seat in the cramped spaces of Michigan Stadium, after already being packed like a clown into the back of your friend Molly’s car, and your head is throbbing, already.

A football game.

You at a football game.

It’s absurd.

Dressed in team colours with a ridiculous yellow M painted on your cheek like you’re some sort of local.

It’s your own version of a living hell, and you can’t wait for it to be over.

“Are you guys always sat this low?” You yell out to Molly as the rest of your friends amble in, surrounded now on all sides with no way out.

“Aren’t the seats, great?!” She yells back, louder than you, causing you to wince a little at the shrill sound in your ear.

The seats are not great, but you wouldn’t be happy anywhere in here.

You can barely even see the field, the sidelines packed with God-knows-who, and your back hurts already, and all you want is to go back to the version of you that was first asked if she wanted to come with. A version of you that should have told Molly straight up that you’d have rather sat at home plucking at any remaining body hair with a pair of pointed tweezers than to come to a Michigan Football game.

“Oh, look!” Molly jumps, and you’re assuming she’s just going to point to her boyfriend, following her finger with a bored gaze. You’ve seen him, before. You don’t need to see him again.

Only Molly’s finger doesn’t point to her boyfriend.

It points to the sidelines - to a group of guys stood with a shorter girl with curly blonde hair.

Ellie’s down there, dressed in team colours, too. She’s stood next to Jack, who’s stood next to Quinn.

And you don’t even need to look past Quinn to know who’s gonna be stood beside him.

It’s way too late to go home, now, you fear.

Not when Molly is digging her phone out and pressing immediately on Ellie’s contact, and you can see the whole situation unfold in front of you. 

Ellie never has her phone on silent, and when it rings, it rings loud - a high-pitched, horrific tone that honestly sets off your fight or flight, and you can see the immediate reaction the boys have to it chiming in her hand. 

She answers, instantly, and you can hear Molly’s side of the conversation, guiding Ellie to where your group are up in the stands, waving like a lunatic until Ellie finds you all - and, as if your life isn’t bad enough, she then starts gesturing at you.

“Look who I managed to convince to come with!” She yells, still pointing like you’re some circus attraction, and, if you could remember what the ground felt like, too long in the stands, now, that you miss it, you would honestly want it to swallow you up.

Because obviously Ellie isn’t the only one looking.

Jack is looking.

And Quinn is looking.

And you know, once again without looking yourself, that the person beside Quinn now has his eyes on you, too.

The weight of them takes you back in a dizzying flash, and all of a sudden, you’re back in the lake house, sobbing into your hands until you were pulled into the soft embrace of your best friend.

“Hey, you’re crying, what’s wrong?” Ellie cooed as she came over, throwing her arm around your shaking frame and rubbing a hand up and down your back. “What happened?”

“It’s nothing, I’m fine,” you tried through shaky breaths, attempting and entirely unconvincing smile, like it would at all mask the flood pouring down your cheeks, “Go back to your party, I’m just being dumb.”

“I’m not gonna leave you like this,” she told you, “What's going on, is it Luke?”

The mere mention of his name brought back the onslaught of tears, your face scrunching as you tried to hold them back, but it was no use. Every single part of you ached with regret, your throat, your chest, your limbs - and all you wanted to do was curl up and cry it out. “I fucked it all up, El.”

“No,” she reassured you, “He fucked things up, he should never have spoken about you like that, it wasn’t fair. Not if the two of you are into each other, he shouldn’t be saying things like that.”

“He was right, though,” you sobbed, “I’m a mess, I just ruin everything good, I don’t even know why.”

“Aw, babe, no-,” 

“I told him I’d go out with Cole. I don’t even know why, I just wanted him to stop trying to make things work, he kept trying to tell me that he didn’t mean any of it, but I know he did.”

“Do you?” She asked, “Want to go out with Cole?”

“No, of course I don’t.” You shook your head, although you didn’t know how obvious it was, especially to everybody else, how little you wanted to be with anybody that wasn’t Luke. “I just want to go back to this morning, before I heard him say any of that stuff.”

“Why don’t you come downstairs, huh? We can find him, and the two of you can try to talk again-,”

“I can’t,” you refused, the thought of trying to communicate your feelings while you looked the way you did - eyes red raw and face all swollen - filling you with anxiety. “Can you just tell people I’m sick if they ask? I know it’s your birthday but I can’t go down there, Ellie.”

“Okay,” she had agreed, although the worry in her eyes made you feel even worse - missing your best friend’s birthday party because you were too chicken to face your feelings?

What sort of friend does that?

“I’ll come check on you, though. And tomorrow, you’re gonna have a serious conversation with Luke, alright? You can’t keep pushing people away, it isn’t good for you.”

“I know,” you sniffled, “I promise, I’ll try tomorrow.”

But trying had been futile. Luke wanted nothing to do with you - he could barely even look your way. He didn’t come downstairs for breakfast the next day, and when he finally did, he turned straight back around. Every time you tried to talk to him, he would shut you down, and by the tenth day of trying, you’d given up, entirely - booking yourself a ticket home, packing your things up one night and leaving the morning after. 

The following weeks were spent wallowing back home with your mom - texting Ellie, waiting for him to reach out, even though you knew he wouldn’t. Watching sad movies, staying inside, spending your days alone, while your mom was at work, and trying not to miss him so much.

And coming back to Michigan had only been made easy by the fact that he would be gone - due to go back to training in Jersey, and the two of you wouldn’t cross paths.

It won’t hurt as much, you had thought, if you didn’t have to see him.

But now here Luke is, following Ellie’s gaze as she waves up to you in the stands, stood on the sidelines of the football game you’d only attended to finally get yourself out of the house - still in Michigan, stood at the end of the path you thought no longer led to him. 

This might be the first time he’s met your eye in a while, and there’s a visceral feeling that shoots straight through you - your heart falling into an alarming, irregular thump that reverberates through your entire body, and it’s a strange sensation, like the slowing of time, the blurring of everything around you but him. 

His arm is held to his front with a sling, and you try to ignore the way your stomach turns at the sight of it. It’s nothing to do with you, he doesn’t want you to care. He doesn’t even want to talk to you, and you don’t want to talk to him, either - not anymore. Not after almost 6 weeks of silence - of forcing yourself to think about anything but him, like you even could.

You offer a tight lipped smile and a wave to Ellie, and try to ignore his presence for as long as you can, try to watch the game, to focus on your friends in the stands beside you - only, he keeps looking back. Craning his neck, surveying the crowd as it fills up just to find you, and your heart starts to hammer in your chest every time you catch his eye.

What happened to him avoiding you at all costs? What happened to ignoring your attempts to talk, the knocks at his door, the pleading, persuasive looks you’d try to give him when it all got a little too much in the end. 

Why can’t he just let you slip away into nothingness, like it would be so much easier to do?

Your phone buzzes in your back pocket as you’re trying to focus on the game, the desire to flee growing by the second - cramped and claustrophobic in your seat, dying for a drink and a minute of reprieve away from the crowd, away from Luke and whatever weird telekinetic powers he has on your heart.

Luke: can we talk?

Luke: I’ll be at the closest concessions in 5

You slip your phone back into your pocket without responding, and by the time you look back down to where he had been stood, he’s gone. 

You should be relieved. 

Maybe if you ignore his message, he’ll stop looking at you.

Maybe this is where it ends, and you can finally let each other go - too far gone to fix, nothing left to say.

Only your legs are now moving, side stepping Molly and the other girls, along with the rest of the people in your row, and your mouth is apologising to those you bump into, and your feet are carrying you down the stairs to where you know he’ll be, sneakers squeaking against the sticky floor as you search for him in the small concessions queue.

He stands taller than most, waiting by the counter, facing the other way, and you take the second that his back is turned to you to reconsider.

Stuck in place, staring at broad shoulders you’d once spent tracing the freckles between while he slept, and wondering which might hurt more - walking away or hearing him out. 

He turns before you get the chance to choose, his eyes meeting yours , widening in surprise, as much as they can, considering his current predicament, and he immediately heads your way.

“Didn’t think you’d come,” Luke just about says as he precariously holds onto a plastic cup between his teeth, offering you the one in his free hand - what you assume is diet coke with ice sloshing a little over the rim and onto the already sticky floor. 

“Can hardly leave a one-armed man to navigate the concession stand on his own. Not one with your appetite, at least.” Your brows furrow when you notice the distinct lack of snacks in his hold, but you figure he prioritised using what little carrying capacity he had to get your drink. “Do you want me to hang around while you get something to eat? I can hold your drink,”

“I don’t have much of an appetite,” he says, clearer now that he can hold his cup in his hand instead of his mouth. “I’m on some pretty strong painkillers, can’t eat without feeling sick.”

“Oh,” you frown, eyeing the sling that holds his other arm. He had been fine when you left the lake house - and even last week, in Ellie’s story on instagram, he hadn’t seemed injured then. It must be a recent development, and so close to the season, for him to be out in public wearing a brace, it can’t be good. “What happened?”

“Took a pretty bad hit on the ice,” he shrugs with his other shoulder, lips turning down like he’s trying to play it off, “Been telling myself it’s karma.” The way he chuckles is distant and noncommittal, and not at all like all the ways you’re used to seeing him smile or laugh. His eyes don’t squint, his mouth barely turns up, barely pushes those tell-tale folds into his cheeks that you used to press at when he was close enough to do so. Back when being in such close proximity made your heart thump in a different way.

But maybe that’s for the best.

Maybe one of Luke Hughes’ signature crooked grins might have made you do something stupid, like touch him again. You’ve worked too hard to push away the feeling of wanting to for the past month. 

“Karma for what?” You ask instead, head tilting to survey the damage, like you’d even be able to see anything through the thick yellow hoodie he has on. It’s better than looking him in the eye, you think.

“For what I said to Cole,” he tells you, the shame that lines his words doing little to alleviate the way they so quickly jab at you, all the memories of that day and that conversation rushing back at you full-force. Memories you’ve worked really hard to suppress. “For hurting you. I probably deserved to get hurt, too.”

“I’d never want you to be hurt, Luke.” You say before you can think better of it, narrowed eyes meeting his finally, watching as they soften slightly, let your words sink in and melt like warm butter, seeping into his every pore and breaking down his hardened exterior. 

“Me neither,” he almost-whispers, “For you, I mean. I wouldn’t want you to be hurt.”

You nod, momentarily pressing your lips together, your focus dropping to a patch of lint on his hoody, clenching your free hand into a fist behind your back to save yourself from reaching out to pluck it off. 

“Is that all you wanted to see me for?”

You don’t want to be rude to him, but it’s hard, especially when every instinct in your body is telling you to push him away - to keep him at arms length where he can’t pull you back in. 

“No,” he utters quickly, his feet shuffling as if he wants to step forward, reduced the metaphorical distance you’re trying to force between the two of you. “I was hoping we could talk.”

You just about save yourself from having your jaw drop wide open.

You’d tried to talk to him last month, before you left, and he had wanted nothing more to do with you. 

“In the middle of a football game?” You frown, daring to glance up - taking notice of the panic in his eyes when he reads you like a book, can recognise your retreating form from a mile off, by now.

“No,” he blurts out, “No, I mean later, if you’re free. Somewhere else.”

“I don’t know-,”

“We’re having a barbecue back at the house,” he interrupts, a look on his face like he couldn’t possibly accept no for an answer. “Like an end of summer send-off thing, you should come over, I know the guys would want to say goodbye properly.”

“I don’t know if that’s a good idea,” you finish your earlier thought, “Besides, your family probably all hate me.”

“Why would they hate you?”

“Because of what happened with us,”

“Oh,” He frowns, “No, they don’t hate you, I promise, not even Jack.”

“I find that hard to believe,” you scoff - when he had helped Ellie move rooms back in the sorority house last week, he could barely even muster a smile to send your way. He hadn’t been his usual stand-offish self, but he had hardly been friendly, either. You didn’t expect laughs and hugs and welcome-backs, but after the two of you had kind of made up back at his cousin’s wedding, and things were finally solid between him and your best friend, you thought some kind of bridge had been built.

Apparently not.

“I didn’t tell them.”

“Oh,” you don’t know whether you feel relieved or disappointed. He can’t have been that heartbroken about the whole thing if he never told a soul, right? Even you told your mom when you got home - granted, she was a whole bottle of rosé deep into the night and seconds from falling into a wine coma, but you still at least acknowledged your feelings to somebody. 

What did he do, just bottle all whatever feelings remained up and send them off down the lake? Enjoy the rest of his summer like you never happened?

“I didn’t think you’d want me to,” he continues, “You never really liked me talking about us with other people, so I didn’t.”

“Right,” you nod, biting your tongue to save from throwing out a bitter, thanks. You spent the last month watching heart-wrenching sad movies in your bed all day and he just went about his life like the two of you were nothing That’s fine. That’s cool.

“Ellie’ll be there,” he tries again, like she won’t be attached to Jack’s hip all night and you’ll be left on your own. “And a few of the Michigan guys, if you need a ride back to campus. I’d offer to drive you, but,” he nods down to his arm, “Or you can stay, your room is still free.”

Yourroom. Like you have any claim on any part of his world, still.

“I’ll think about it,” you tell him, because you can’t fully bring yourself to say no to his face. It’ll be easier when you’re back home, later, and can just ignore his texts, if he even cares enough to send any. “I should get back.”

“I can walk you back,”

“You shouldn’t be in a crowd with your arm,” your head shakes and you step back, your body language saying more than your lips even dare. “It’s fine. Thanks for the drink.”

“No problem.” He chews at the corner of his lip as he watches you retreat, like he has more to say. 

Despite spending the last month doing everything in your power to wipe your thoughts clean of Luke Hughes, you want nothing more than to hear it - but where you’ve been suffering and relating every pathetic, sad song you hear back to him and fighting every urge to reach out through fear of rejection, he’s been ignoring your entire existence. Repressing whatever feelings he may have had and neglecting any instinct he might have had to reach out, too. 

“Promise me you will?” He calls out when you’re a little ways down the tunnel, causing you to turn back to see him in the same spot, “Think about it, I mean. I’d really like to talk to you.”

Your fingers tense at the mere mention of a promise tumbling from his lips, your pinky sending signals to your feet to run straight back to him, practically itching to reach out and link with his. Instead, you nod, eyes darting to the big M that stretches across his chest, easier to look at that and lie than into his hopeful gaze. 

“Sure,” you tell him, because you can hardly make a promise you can’t keep. 

Not to Luke.

You’re not coming.

Luke realistically knew as much when Ellie arrived on her own - immediately going over to Jack and sparing Luke a glance out of the corner of her eye as she whispered to his brother.

But it’s taken him almost 2 hours to really come to terms with the fact - to stop keeping an eye on the door and whipping his head around any time a newcomer enters the house. 

He should have known when you refused to make a promise to him - not like you owed him anything in the first place. Should have known when the few attempts you made at joking around with him like old times, you’d barely mustered a smile - that familiar glint in your eye that shone only for him watered down into a dull gaze you refused to hold. 

God, he’s an idiot, he thinks.

He should have spoken to you when he had the chance - those few times you had tried to offer an olive branch, pushing a pre-poured glass of juice his way at breakfast or making space for him on the couch he’s now conveniently slumped on, all alone.

It feels a little like a lost cause now, trying to reignite some sort of spark between the two of you - not when you won’t even hear him out.

He’d felt a bit of hope when you’d met him at the stadium, thinking his text might have been left on read - and even though he’d made the effort to buy you a drink, he hadn’t entirely expected you to turn up. 

He thinks maybe that had been the first thing to throw him for a loop - arranging a meeting on a whim and you actually making an appearance. Maybe that’s why he couldn’t form a coherent sentence, or relay any sort of confidence in himself or what he was trying to sell you on. 

Maybe that’s why he couldn’t convince you to come.

He can’t blame you - your last 10 days here at the house had been miserable, on his account, and if he was in your shoes, he wouldn’t come back, either. He wouldn’t hear himself out, wouldn’t forgive himself.

The night of Ellie’s party should have been where he drew the line at avoiding you - the initial aftermath of your fight still sizzling, too hot to touch while the both of you were still reeling.

The morning after, he had been hungover - throwing back drinks like nobody’s business just to drown you out - and there was no chance of having a serious conversation, then, even though he had woke up alone in his bed wanting nothing more than for you to be there.

He’d gone downstairs sometime in the early afternoon, ignoring his growling stomach until he couldn’t do it any more , and had trudged into the kitchen only to find you there with Cole.

The bitterness within him fought violently with his need to puke, and he stormed back up to his room, no longer having any sort of appetite, and stayed there for the rest of the day.

The days that followed were no better - avoiding you at every given opportunity, ignoring your pleading eyes, leaving no chance for you to speak to him, despite all the times he could see that you wanted to. He’d leave every room you entered, turn away from every conversation you joined, and the final nail in the coffin was probably the time he ignored you knocking on his bedroom door one night, the soft call of his name feeling like a knife that twisted in his gut. 

You were gone the next day - your bedroom door open and the room empty when he walked past, your seat at the table vacant when he came downstairs for breakfast, and he seemed to be the only one who didn’t know. Ellie seemed unbothered, already having moved into Jack’s room, Quinn was drinking the green tea you had bought, that no one else was supposed to touch, Alex probably wouldn’t have cared either way, and Cole was already talking about meeting up with some other girl.

“Wow,” Luke had scoffed, throwing himself into the chair beside Cole’s and sneaking a peak at his phone screen, suddenly feeling a burning need to call the guy out. He was to the entire reason you called things off with Luke, and now he was talking to someone else? “Her bed isn’t even cold and you’re already moving on, huh?”

Ellie had glared at him from across the table, and Jack had frowned too, no doubt wondering why after 10 days of complete silence about the whole thing, he was daring to bring you up now.

“What are you talking about?” Cole chuckled, leaning back in his chair and raising a brow at Luke, who just said your name in response, with a pointed stare. “What about her?”

“Thought you were ending your summer with a girlfriend.” 

“Dude, where the hell have you been?” Cole snorted, amused, if anything, “She couldn’t have turned me down quicker if she tried. Man to man, don’t ever follow instructions from that one,” he pointed over to Ellie, “She led me on a wild goose chase all summer just so that I’d help her get her guy.”

“Hey!” Ellie called from across the table, “It’s not my fault you have no game. And I would have gotten my guy just fine without your help.”

Before Cole could retort, spurred on by the way Jack was chucking by her side, Luke frowned, straightening in his chair. “She didn’t want to go out with you?”

“No, but before you say anything, it has nothing to do with my game, alright? She’s into someone else, I guess.”

“Someone else?” Luke’s eyes darted over to Ellie, who just rolled hers in response, turning her attention back to Jack before she excused herself from the table.

“That’s my guess,” Cole shrugged, “She said she wasn’t into me like that, but come on.”

Wasn’t into him?

That wasn’t what you had said to Luke.

“Sorry man,” Luke offered, absentmindedly, head craning to see which direction Ellie left in. “As you were.”

He jogged out of the kitchen and up the stairs, just about catching her before she disappeared into her and Jack’s room. “Hey, wait,” he had called, watching as she let out a heavy sigh and turned to look at him with narrowed eyes. “She turned him down?”

“Did you not just have this exact conversation with Cole?”

“Ellie, c’mon,” he pleaded, desperation creeping up inside - feeling a little too much like guilt, and causing a serious discomfort in the pit of his stomach. “She said she wanted to date him.”

“You’re so unbelievably stupid.”

It didn’t quite hit the same as when you said it, shame washing over him at the way Ellie was glaring at him. 

“She heard you tell him that she wasn’t girlfriend material, and that she would just be hard work, and not worth his time. Lucky for you, she didn’t hear the bullshit you said before that.” Regret formed like a heavy ball in his gut, the weight of it almost pushing him to keel over. “She said whatever she had to to get you off her back because it hurt her less to push you away.”

“I don’t-,”

“And you’re the dumbass who just let her do it.”

That’s not fair, he thought. What was he supposed to do, just watch you move on without a care in the world, cheering you on with a stupid grin on his face while his whole heart crumbled to pieces at the thought of you being with anybody else?

“I’m not a mind reader, Ellie,” he tried to defend himself, “I can’t keep pushing at a door that won’t open.”

“My God, do you have a peanut for a brain, Luke?” She had shoved at his chest, “She’s been holding the door open for the last ten days, and all you’ve done is walk past it. She wanted to talk to you, and you wouldn’t even look at her!”

“I wasn’t ready! I thought she-,” 

He had thought you had taken Cole up on his offer of taking you out - had thought that’s the conversation he had stumbled into the day after the party - and he didn’t want to risk hearing anything about it, or seeing it in action.

“She said it didn’t matter.”

You had said that - he had asked you straight up, so there was no confusing it, but when he tried to remember, he can’t picture your eyes as you did. He must not have been looking, he thought, or maybe you weren’t looking at him. Either way, how’s he supposed to muster up a clear idea of your intentions if he can’t remember the look in your eyes as you spoke them. 

You couldn’t lie to him - you never could, even in the beginning, pretending to be aloof, pretending you weren’t into him, he could always see through you, back then, so why didn’t he try harder when it was something he didn’t want to hear?

“She’s really gone home? Not just back to Ann Arbor?”

“What are you gonna do?” Ellie scoffed, folding her arms across her chest, “Chase her down?”

“I don’t know, if I have to. We need to talk.”

“She’s probably back at her mom’s by now, she left pretty early. And I think it’s for the best if you leave her alone, Luke. She gave you a hundred chances to talk.”

“What am I supposed to do? I can’t just leave things like this, I made a mistake, I need her to know that, I need her to know I’m sorry.”

“It’s better if you both just cool off a little. She’s hurt that you’ve been ignoring her, it isn’t fair to keep playing hot and cold with her feelings.”

“That’s not what I-,”

“I know.” Ellie sighed, leaning against the wall and giving him a pitiful look as she finally took in just how panicked he had become, running hands through his hair and shifting between his feet. “Just give it time, that way you can both think about it, think about what you want to say without just saying things and not meaning them.”

And that’s all Luke has been doing since then.

Thinking about what he wants to say to you - thinking about how to fix things. All without knowing when it is that he would even see you again, or if you’d be willing to listen. 

He’d distracted himself with it - his mind stuck on just how bad he had messed things up, and it had put him into a rut - so much so, that he ended up hurting himself in training, an injury that would have him out for a good couple of months. And he had meant it, when he told you he thought it was karma, because he deserved a reality check, he thinks. It had shifted things into perspective, at least - because now he could stay in town a little longer, could try and make amends before he had to go home and properly start his season.

And when he’d noticed Ellie scanning the crowd back at the game, had followed her beaming smile all the way to you in the crowd, he thought his heart had stopped.

It had been 4 weeks since he’d seen you last - almost 6 since he’d spoken to you. Since he’d touched you, or kissed you, or seen you smile, and when your eyes meet his from the stands, widened and hesitant, he could tell you were feeling the same.

An insurmountable longing for something the two of you should never have thrown away.

He saw the truth, then, even as you looked away and diverted your attention back to Ellie - the truth he was too hurt to notice all those weeks ago back in your room in the lake house. 

That you felt the same way - you always had - you just weren’t used to it. Weren’t used to loving someone, or having them love you.

But he can’t quite tell if you still feel it.

He can’t expect you to, not with how reserved you’ve become.

He sighs, sinking into the cushions of the couch, legs stretched out and head thrown against the back as he squints against the light - the noise around him dwindling to a constant buzz. 

He’s too caught up in his head to notice when Ellie sinks down beside him until she nudges at his side, and he slowly looks her way.

“If it helps at all, I could tell she wanted to come.”

Luke snorts out a humourless laugh, eyes rolling. “If she wanted to come, she’d be here.” He says, the muscles in his jaw tensing. “She doesn’t want anything to do with me.”

“She doesn’t really open up to people,” Ellie sighs, and he can tell from the way she’s looking at him that’s only divulging this from a place of pity, although he guesses that’s better than her saying nothing at all. “It took us years to get to where we are, and even now I’m not sure she lets me all the way in, and we’re supposed to be best friends.”

“I feel like I don’t even know if she was ever into me in the first place,” he mutters, tracing at a scratch in the surface of the table. Even if he had thought different, back in the stadium, he can’t be so sure now that you haven’t shown. You’d have come if you still cared. “I’m still confused by the whole Cole thing-,”

“That was my fault,” Ellie interjects, “I thought I was doing the right thing, I didn’t realise that you two were-,” her teeth clash as she bites down, as if to stop saying the word, together. “Whatever you were. And she just got all in her head after she heard you saying all that stuff, it’s what she does, keeps her cards close to her chest until she loses them all.”

“That’s the problem, El,” Luke groans, “If she really liked me, she would have told you. If she was ever serious, you’d have known something was up. She wouldn’t have hidden it from her best friend and told me that she was gonna go out with Cole after all.”

“You know she turned him down, Luke, he said himself, she was into someone else.”

“Yeah, or so he assumed,” he grumbles, recalling the feeling he got when Cole had said as much, back on the day you left.

“And you know on my birthday when she overheard that conversation, she’d literally just told me that she liked you. That’s big for her, Luke. It might have taken her a while but she got there in the end. It’s your own fault for having such a big mouth and ruining it.”

“I told her I didn’t mean it,” he can’t help how whiney he sounds, lips pouting and a crease forming between his eyebrows. “I told her I was sorry.”

“And then you ignored her for almost two weeks until she had no choice but to leave. You don’t get to claim the moral high ground here, I’m sorry.”

“So what am I supposed to do? She won’t talk to me.”

“You just have to give her time, don’t give up again.” Ellie nudges him a little too forcefully, the sharp jut of her elbow in his ribs causing him to wince. “Really think about if there’s a version of you that could be friends.”

“What if I don’t want to be friends, what if I don’t wanna keep taking one step forward and three back?” 

“Then think about if you’d rather be nothing at all.”

“She hates me that much?”

“I don’t know, she stopped talking to me about it.” Ellie huffs, leaning back a little more into the couch. “But I’d take that as a no. If she hated you, neither of us would hear the end of it, trust me.”

He knows that’s true - all the odd comments you’d drop about Jack back in the beginning of summer. He knows you never hated Jack, but there was always a clear dislike, and you were never shy about voicing it to anyone willing to listen.

If you’re not talking about him at all, it means one of two things. You either give so little of a shit about him that you don’t see a use in bringing him up, or you don’t want to show vulnerability by admitting how much he hurt you.

He knows what he’d put his money on.

“Can’t you talk to her for me? Put a good word in?” He pleads, rounding his eyes in the hopes that Ellie’s pity extends to doing him a solid - he dedicated his entire summer to getting her and Jack together, after all.

“I think it’s best for the both of us if I stay out of her love life. My meddling is what got you guys into this mess in the first place.”

Luke sighs as he resumes his previous position, neck thrown against the back of the couch and eyes cast to the ceiling. 

Your room is right above - the bed on which you’d kissed him that first time, away from your scheming at the mall, still made and empty. The bed where you two would lay atop the covers, watching movies on the old staticky TV, sharing snacks between you and spouting commentary into the night.

He wonders, then, if you’d watched anything since the last time - before you left - and it’s that thought that has him pushing himself up and making his way up the stairs. 

Despite the amount of time since you were in here, it still kind of smells like you - like melon sunscreen and passionfruit perfume - and he casts a glance around for anything that might remain.

There’s nothing, though. No loose hair ties, forgotten jewellery, not even a book left behind.

And then he checks by the TV - the shelf below it housing a DVD player, and he powers it up just to press eject.

After a few seconds, a disc spins out.

Silver Linings Playbook, with Bradley Cooper and Jennifer Lawrence.

He might have seen it once or twice, can vaguely remember some of the storyline, but it isn’t until everybody has left the house a good hour or two later that he thinks he should watch it - if it’s the last movie you watched before you left - just to get an idea of your headspace. 

When he’s lounging on his own bed, the movie playing on his TV, Jennifer’s Tiffany saying to Bradley’s Pat, “I used to think that you were the best thing that ever happened to me, but now I think that you might maybe be the worst thing. And I'm sorry that I ever met you.” And it turns his stomach in a way he isn’t prepared for, tears pricking at his eyes at the thought of you watching this and thinking the same.

And then Pat responds, and Luke sits with the line for a good minute, pausing the movie as he ponders the response, "Good for you. Come on, let's go dance.” 

He wonders if you smiled the same way - soft and small, hopeful that one day the punches you throw to defend yourself are met with the same resistance, with a hand that grabs at them, and instead of fighting back, just pulls you closer.

It’s almost by instinct that he pulls his phone out, loading up the same app he always does when he’s watching a movie, ready to fill in a review when it gets to a part that resonates with him.

And there you are, on his friends feed - the last movie you logged being an hour ago, La La Land, which you had unsurprisingly given 5 stars, and had reviewed with just a quote - It’s pretty strange that we keep bumping into each other. Maybe it means something.

And he grins, really and genuinely beams, for what feels like the first time in a while, a small chuckle rumbling up from his chest as he checks for your review on Silver Linings - the same quote he loved so much sitting there under your 5 star rating. 

He doesn’t want to be nothing, he decides, then, like it was ever in question. 

And he realises it’s up to him to do something about it.

Luke’s first thought when it comes to fixing thing is to text you.

It’s simple, and it should be easy, but he sits staring at your name in his phone for 30 minutes trying to think of what would be best to say.

A casual, hey, in the hopes that you’d just instinctively type it back.

A call out, like, Bummed you couldn’t come over the other night, thinking you might have been feeling guilty.

A question, or even an invite, along the lines of, Do you want to meet somewhere? Because leaving someone hanging on an invite is just plain cruel.

But then he feels like he doesn’t want to force your hand - weirdly inspired by that La La Land quote you loved so much, about bumping into each other.

Only orchestrating a chance encounter was hard when you weren’t going out. Ellie had mentioned everybody going for drinks at one of the bars on campus, and you never turned up.

She told him your favourite coffee shop, and despite him hanging around all day one time, like a total creep, he didn’t catch sight of you once.

You weren’t with Ellie when he bumped into her at the mall, or at the diner, when he had gone for burgers with the guys and seen a few of your sorority sisters on the other side of the restaurant.

And even when Ellie had told him to come over to the house, that she’d take him into town to pick up some suits, because he was still in his sling and couldn’t drive himself, he had been disheartened to find out you wouldn’t be there - that you had a morning class, and Ellie hadn’t even seen you.

He settles for looking at the cute photo of you and Ellie on the mantle, greek letters painted on your cheeks, beaming smiles as you looked straight into the camera, and he still gets that twinge in his chest even looking at a photo.

A twinge that only grows when he hears a gasp from behind him, and he swiftly turns to see you at the bottom of the staircase, looking back at him, alarmed and surprised.

Luke’s eyes trail slowly up your bare legs, his throat going dry as they land on the oversized shirt you’re wearing - his shirt, he’s pretty sure, although he knows it’s probably best not to comment on that - before cutting up to your face, wide eyes staring back at him.

“What are you doing here?” You ask, stepping back toward the staircase where you rest your hand on the bannister, putting as much distance between the two of you as you can without completely retreating up the stairs. 

“I uh-,” he stutters, losing his train of thought as he stands there with his mouth agape, taking you in.

He hadn’t been prepared to see you, that much is clear - and especially not like this, dressed in his shirt, which you’ve obviously slept in, hair a little messy, skin bare of any makeup. It reminds him of those mornings in his bed, waking up before the rest of the house, your body bathed in the soft glow from the rising sun, trading sleepy kisses until you would sneak back off to your room.

It makes him yearn for that, again, and feelings like that need some kind of forewarning, otherwise they serve nothing but to make him ache.

“I said I’d drive him to an appointment,” Ellie says as she emerges from the kitchen, car keys in hand, “I though everyone had class this morning, you’re not gonna hand me in for having a guy in the house, are you?”

“I’m not a snitch,” you frown, tugging at the ends of his shirt, “I slept in, I didn’t think anyone else was here either.”

He didn’t exactly need the confirmation, considering your current state, but knowing you slept in his shirt makes the heat creep up his neck, his chest puffing as he really takes in the meaning of it.

So many things about you are screaming that you want nothing to do with him, but you’re sleeping in his old Michigan shirt, one you’d borrowed when your shoulders were burning out on a wakeboarding trip one day, he’s pretty sure - one he never even realised you kept.

“Do you need a ride?” She offers, stepping beside Luke, close enough that in order to look at Ellie, you pretty much have to look his way too, and every time you glance at him, he catches you. “We were gonna go get a drink before, so we’re heading your way anyway. Or you could come with, if you’re skipping."

“Uh, no,” you decline, without even thinking about it, Luke’s chest feeling a little tighter at just how quick you are to avoid being near him. “I’m gonna go to the library.”

“I could still drive you. I doubt you’d mind a detour, would you, Lukey?”

“No,” he breathes out, almost immediately, eyes staying on you. “I don’t mind.”

“It’s fine,” you offer Ellie a tight lipped smile, “I’ll walk.”

And that’s that - your figure retreating back up the stairs before Luke has anything to say about it, his shoulders slumping as Ellie offers a friendly pat to his back.

“C’mon then, I need to stop for gas, you’re paying.”

He follows Ellie out to the back of the house, where the girls usually park their cars off the street, and just as he’s climbing into Ellie’s Mini, he glances up to the one of the windows, just in time to catch the quick shift of a curtain.

“Don’t worry,” Ellie says as he adjusts the passenger seat, folding his long legs into the limited space, an assured smile sent his way before she starts up the car. “I’ve got a plan.”

“What happened to no more meddling?” He huffs as he buckled himself in.

“I can’t sit back and watch my best friend become boring trying to avoid you, Luke,” she sighs, “It’s borderline painful.” 

—

You don’t know when managing your social life became Ellie’s full time job - as if the two of you aren’t tumbling into the depths of your final year of school with very little direction or guidance - but you’re growing tired of it, quick.

First, it had been, you’re coming to the bar and I’m not taking no for an answer, except, she had taken no for an answer, she just relished in making you feel bad for it after.

Then it had been, I need your opinion on halloween costumes, and she had insisted you join her at the mall, but you had an appointment with the careers counsellor that you really couldn’t miss, and she had to settle with sending you photos, again adding incessant messages about how she wouldn’t let you turn down the next invitation out.

Never mind trying to avoid bumping into Luke during his extended stay, avoiding Ellie was becoming a real task - slipping out before she can corner you in the mornings and staying out most of the day.

She caught you off guard, the other day, though - inviting Luke around. Sure, you were supposed to be in class - would have been, if your alarm had gone off on time - but still, bringing him into your space was like crossing a line, breaking an unspoken rule.

She’s supposed to be on your side. She isn’t supposed to be bringing the guy who hurt you into your house and driving him around town like his personal assistant, all from the good of her heart.

She’s just trying to kiss up to Jack.

At least, you thought so, until she sent you a text later that day - a bunch of pictures of Luke in different suits, tailored perfectly to his lean figure, shirts that stretched taut across his broad shoulders and pants that clung perfectly to his hips, followed by the message, thoughts?

You had many, but none that you could possibly sent to her - only replying with a question mark until she apologised, claiming they were meant for Jack’s approval.

It became clear then, what she was doing - flaunting him in front of you until you burst at the seams, like one of those jackets looked like it was going to do in a few of the pictures from the back of Luke in the tailor shop. Sending you those had been no accident.

And that’s why you were sceptical when the weekend rolled around, and she was begging and pleading for you to go with her to a party at the hockey house - promising you that he was finally heading back to Jersey, and definitely wasn’t going to be around.

She’d buttered you up with groans of, I feel like I never see you anymore, and, school is stressing me out, already, I just want to let loose with my best friend!

And it was the promise that she’d let you wear a skirt you’ve been eyeing in her closet for the past two years that sealed the deal - a vintage Diesel mini that she had thrifted and guarded like her whole life depended on it. 

You can’t help it, anyway - it’s been so long since you’ve been out like that - probably summer being the last time - and you need to let loose too.

And that’s how you end up walking hand in hand through the front door, Ellie having styled your hair, the two of you looking like a million dollars, and it’s the first time in months that you aren’t disturbed by the feeling of eyes on you.

You kind of feel like your old self - confident, self-assured, like there isn’t a soul on earth who could possibly make you doubt yourself.

You wish the universe gave you at least five minutes to sit with that feeling before you saw him. 

Before you saw Luke, sling-free, bottle in hand, leaning against the wall, talking to Victoria Anderson, a girl you know he has history with - a girl you have history with, yourself.

You hate how quick the switch within you flips - the slight slump of your posture, the tension in your jaw, all your self-worth seeping from your pores like your body is actively trying to kill it.

Your hand slips from Ellie’s, immediately heading in the opposite direction to where Luke is - making a bee-line straight for the kitchen, straight for a drink.

Ellie is hot on your heels, grasping at your arm to keep up, “I’m sorry,” she calls after you.

“You said he wouldn’t be here,” you grumble, shoving through the swinging door and heading straight for the line of bottles on the counter. 

“What am I, his keeper?” She scoffs, trying to play it off as a lighthearted joke, but you can see it in her eyes that she knew. “I don’t know where he’s gonna be at all hours of the day.”

“You said he was going back to Jersey.”

“Yeah, well, I must have got my days mixed up!”

“Yeah, right,” you scoff, pouring out a shot from the first bottle you find without even reading the label, and throwing it back before you can think twice. You pour yourself a proper drink, after - a vodka with diet coke - and sip at it just to cool your nerves, trying to calm yourself down.

You don’t want to be mad at Ellie - whatever she’s doing, she’s doing it because she cares - but you’re so tired of overthinking this whole thing. All you want is a break from it all, and no one is willing to give you one.

“I’m gonna go find Ethan,” you tell her, figuring you can kill two birds with one stone - ask him about the class you missed the other morning, and avoid speaking to Luke, “If you want to make this up to me, I need you to tell Luke to steer clear, okay?”

“Fine,” she scowls, rolling her eyes as she has to pour her own drink.

You storm off back toward the door, and just as you get close, it swings open, the edge of it knocking straight into you - into the hand holding your freshly poured drink, which is now dripping down your front.

Your whole body tenses at the sensation of the liquid seeping through your shirt, only momentarily thankful that you hadn’t added ice before you remember the coke - remember the vintage skirt, with the light denim wash.

You hear Ellie groan from behind you, and you squeeze your eyes shut in the hopes that you’ll magically gain some sort of time travelling superpower - a rewind button, like Click.

“Are you okay?”

Of course it had to be him, you think - because you’ve somehow unsettled the entire balance of the universe, and this is how it’s decided to repay you, your eyes opening to find those concerned, grey-green eyes peering back at you. 

He takes the empty cup that’s being squished in your grip and tosses it into a trash can to the side before you feel a hesitant hand on your side, watching as he surveys the damage.

“And here I thought that skirt couldn’t get uglier.”

Victoria’s piercing blue eyes gleam back at you, a sinister smirk plastered on her lips, and you’re lunging before you even know it until a strong arm curls around your waist, the heat of his skin slipping straight into the gap between your skirt and t-shirt, and sending a shiver straight down the spine that’s now pressed to his front.

“Hey, c’mon,” he warns, pulling you back with enough force that there’s a good couple of feet between you and Victoria now, and her eyes narrow at all the points he’s touching you. “Let’s get you cleaned up.”

You think you only let him guide you away to piss her off - and it isn’t until he’s ushering you into the small downstairs bathroom and closing the door behind him that you realise how little consideration you put into that.

You watch as Luke retrieves a towel from the small cupboard by the door, forgetting he probably still knows this place like the back of his hand, and starts to work at the front of your t-shirt before you snatch it away.

“I’ve got it, thanks.” You snap, entirely frustrated with the whole situation than you think you are with him, a small swirling of guilt immediately bubbling up inside you. 

You dab at the skirt, first, hoping there’s some way that it’s salvageable, or Ellie’s going to murder you. You lean against the counter by the sink, and glance down at the damage. It looks just like a water stain, for now, unfortunately placed, but you won’t know for sure until it dries, and dabbing at it with a towel isn’t really going to fix that.

“Did she hurt your hand?” Luke asks, low voice breaking the silence you were starting to cherish, and it’s only then that you realise where the door hit you. Your knuckles ache a little, but you can still flex your fingers, so you figure they’ll just be bruised tomorrow.

You do wish you could have bruised them another way - maybe with a fist to Victoria Anderson’s smug grin - but you’re supposed to be a pacifist, so maybe not. If anyone’s going to break that pattern, it would be her - your rival in every way ever since you came to Michigan. Academically, in all the same classes, socially, in opposing sororities, and even romantically, with her somehow always looking out for the same guys.

She’d even been at one of the parties back at the lake house, with her hands all over Luke - you remember hearing her shrill laugh and feeling like someone had just drug their nails down a chalkboard, all semblance of peace instantly lost. 

You’re brought out of whatever fiery daydream even her name elicits with the touch of Luke’s fingers to yours, the soft brush of his thumb over your knuckles as he checks for any real damage.

“I’m fine,” you croak out, dazed a little by the feeling before you tear your hand away, “It was just a knock.”

“You want me to kick her ass?”

You blame the shot you took for the way you snort out a laugh - caught by surprise and unable to even consider the reaction, slipping straight back into your unguarded self around him - like the walls you’ve tried so hard to rebuild just dissolved. Not even a knock or a tumble of bricks, just them fading into nothing like magic.

Luke smiles back, soft and hesitant, like he’s waiting for you to fade away, too.

And then there’s that silence you thought you wanted - heavy and tense, and it’s too much for you to handle, so you slip past him, wordlessly, and head straight back to the door. 

And just as your fingers grasp at the handle and you prepare yourself to pull, a large hand lays flat on the surface beside you, trapped by a warm chest closing in on your back.

It’s quiet for a minute, the dull thump of the bass from the music somewhere else in the house now distant and fading, and the room feels charged way beyond the atmosphere of the party you’ve been away from a little too long.

You see the bend in his elbow before you feel his breath on the back of your neck, and you can feel the distance closing - an inch or two now, so close that you have to stay vigilant not to take even the slightest step back.

“Luke,” you breathe, your throat stinging in preparation for some sort of hurt, and your lip trembling until you start to chew on it.

“Just one more minute.”

“You have to let me go.”

“Please, I just want to talk.”

You turn, slowly,  and you don’t know why you do it to yourself, because it’s inevitable you’ll fall prey to the pleading look in his eyes. Your back falls against the door, and you’re craning your neck to look up at him, blinking slow as his eyes flicker between your own.

Every passing second feels like a minute, and just as you’re about to give in - to tell him to go ahead and talk, the door vibrates behind you, a fist banging into the other side.

“Please tell me the skirt is okay!”

You press a hand flat to his chest and push, wedging some much needed space between the two of you - enough that you can swing the door open and face Ellie, and save yourself from plunging into whatever rabbit hole that would have taken you down.

“I won’t know until it’s dry, but if it’s bad, we’ll take it to the cleaners, okay?”

“Ugh,” Ellie groans, grabbing you by the hand and dragging you back to the kitchen for another drink, “I’m so running her ass over the next time I see her on the street.”

You look back at Luke, still stood in the doorway, watching the whole way until you disappear around the corner, and it’s only when you can’t see him anymore that your heart rate returns to an acceptable speed.

You successfully manage to avoid Luke for a good couple of hours, almost forgetting him, miraculously, despite being in a house filled with his closest friends. There’s even a point where you think he might have left, until you stumble out into the backyard to a group setting up a small fire to keep warm.

You’re too buzzed to comment on the legality of it, so far gone that the thought of campus police coming around barely even crosses your mind, and you throw yourself down into one of the camp chairs with a drink in hand as the group discuss how to pass the time.

You can’t remember who suggests Never Have I Ever, too distracted by the figure settling down on the opposite side of the fire, long limps stretching almost comically out of the small chair, meeting your eyes for a moment before you look away at the arrival of Nick, who comes with cards in hand. 

You’d usually make some sort of comment about how juvenile it is, but there’s this part of you that’s probably trying to cling a little to that, lately, so you let it pass, leaning almost sleepily back into your chair as it kicks off.

The game is pretty tame compared to other times you’ve played it, stuff like, never have I ever crashed a car, and, never have I ever broken a bone, coming from the top of the deck, and there’s only a few complaints about it needing more spice before it gets to Ellie’s turn to pick, a few people down from you. 

“Never have I ever,” Ellie drags out before picking a card, flipping between her manicured fingers and smiling slowly as she reads the rest, “Been in love,” she coos, turning it to show the rest of the group with a love-struck grin.

A chorus of groans sing out from around the circle, Luca reaching to swipe the card from Ellie as she takes a big chug from her red cup. “That’s so lame,” he huffs, “Pick another, this isn’t the Ellie show. We get it, you're happy, doesn't mean the rest of us should suffer.”

You glance down at your empty cup as the two of them start to argue about the rules of the game, Ellie grumbling how she didn’t write the cards, and Luca retorting with how she could have at least gone off-script to make it a little more interesting.

If you had any semblance of your inhibitions, any control of your reactions, your gaze would have stayed on the last few drops swirling around the base of your drink. Your eyes wouldn’t have trailed up slowly, past the dancing flames of the makeshift-campfire, and fallen onto another cup at the opposite side of the circle.

It wouldn’t have watched intently as long, slender fingers raised to bring said cup up, pressing to parted lips, the contents gulped down as you stare at the movement of his throat around the liquid.

When you dare to look higher, you find him already staring back at you, piercing green eyes burning hotter than the fire between you, and your own throat goes dry as you watch. 

And of course he makes a show of it, squaring his shoulders and swiping a thumb across his bottom lip to make sure there's no residue. No evidence of all that he had just admitted to. Nothing but the memory of it burned already into the back of your retinas, lingering like an ache all the way down your spine.

No one else seems to notice - but you suppose that’s just how things go between you and Luke. One more secret to add to the ever-growing pile.

Your hand trembles as if it wants to copy him, but you’re thankful for the last shred of dignity you have that tells you that even if you wanted to drink - even if you could play it off as assuming the question had been vetoed, and you were just quenching your thirst in the brief break in the game - there’s nothing left. Even if you wanted to drink - which you brain is so loudly telling you that you don’t - you can’t.

And when Luke’s gaze shifts, lowers painstakingly slow as everything else fades to background noise around the two of you, you don’t know why you find yourself tilting your cup when his eyes land on it, making a show of just how empty it is.

“You’re not gonna drink?” Ethan frowns from beside you, a nudge of his elbow knocking at yours and bringing you back down to earth with a painful splat.

Why would he assume that?

“What?” You ask, frowning as you meet his chocolate brown eyes, the reflection of the flames basking them in a warm, melting glow. 

“He said never have I ever been kicked out of a bar,” he chuckles, quirking a brow as your face morphs from one of confusion to one of recollection. “I know for a fact you have.”

“Oh, right,” you laugh, nervously, the reaction coming out more like a stuttered breath as the panic swirling in your chest dissipates just the slightest. “I’m running on empty. I’m gonna go get a refill.”

Ethan nods as he shuffles a little to let you out of the circle, watching with narrowed eyes as you lift yourself from the chair and edge your way out of the group and back towards the house.

The kitchen is thankfully empty when you get back inside, sliding the door shut behind you to block out the noise, your thoughts overbearing enough without still being able to hear everyone yelling out in the yard.

You move almost on autopilot, heading for the row of bottles on the counter and reaching straight for the vodka you’ve been mixing with diet coke all night.

You pour out a measured shot first, swirl it in the cup before lifting the it straight to your lips, leaving little room to think much more about it, and throwing your head back.

The liquid burns the whole way down - all the way from the back of your mouth, past your aching chest, and into the pit of your stomach, pooling there in a nauseating bubble of heat and regret - and you don’t know entirely if the need to drink was just to quench your thirst, to alleviate the warmth spiking up your neck, to quell the rampant beating of your heart, or to play along with the game. With Luke’s game.

Maybe some mysteries are better left unsolved. 

He wasn’t in love with you.

You think you’d know. He would have told you - he’s hardly shy about voicing his opinion, you learned that the hard way. 

He’s just being cruel, now, you’ve convinced yourself - probably payback for earlier, for leaving him in the bathroom and telling him to let you go. One final act of defiance, because he has to have the last word.

God, why would you even play along?

You shouldn’t have even looked his way - should have kept your eyes down, then you wouldn’t still be feeling like your whole body is on fire. 

Your eyes dart up at the sound of the screen door opening, and your heart thuds in your chest at the sight of who walks through.

You hold your breath as he slowly makes his way toward you - cautious steps carrying him toward the counter where you stand, and he places his empty cup on the surface beside yours, 

“You can’t avoid me forever.”

“I don’t have to avoid you forever,” you shrug, circling around him and trying not to let him trap you again, “I just have to avoid you until you go home.”

“I don’t want to go home without us talking,” he grasps at your wrist before you can fully get past him, levelling you with a tired look, one that says he’s resigned to his fate, but he can’t rest until he tries one last time. “Please.”

“Luke,” you groan, the remnants of intoxication slowly fading into exhaustion. 

“Just one conversation.” He begs, “Then you can be done with me, I’ll leave you alone.”

Your lips twist as you try not to give under the weight of his softened, pleading gaze. He’s persistent, you’ll give him that - and he’s technically surpassed the efforts you had made back before you left the house toward the end of summer, now almost 3 weeks since you had turned him down back at the football game. 

And do you really want him to leave you alone? You’re not entirely sure. Maybe talking to him can help you finally figure that out. 

“Fine.” You acquiesce. “One conversation.”

“You want me to walk you home?” He asks, his voice soft and low, a tilt to his head that makes his curls shuffle and a caring glint in his eye that makes your legs feel like jelly. It’s probably for the best if he does, you think, you’re at a serious fall-risk now. Tired and buzzed, a lethal combination.

You nod, wordlessly, watching as he seemingly tries to fight a small smile, straightening up to swipe your cup, stacking it with his own and throwing it in the trash. 

“C’mon, I already gave Ellie a heads up, I’ll come back for her.”

You soften a little at the thought of him considering her - even if it isn’t about you. If it’s on Jack’s behalf, and he’s just being a good brother, him looking out for your best friend is still sweet.

You let him guide you out of the house, and it’s quiet in a way you can’t stand, walking side by side down the otherwise empty street.

“You’re out of your sling, then?” You don’t know why you feel better to make small talk - but waiting with bated breath for him to say what he’s been trying to for so long now makes your heart pound almost painfully against your ribcage. 

“Yeah,” he flexes his arm a little, as if to prove a point. “I’m back in Jersey at the end of the week, will probably be doing no contact training for a while.”

“How long until you’re playing again?”

“They’re saying it’s looking like November,” he tells you, “Which sucks, but at least I don’t need surgery like Jack.”

“Do you miss it?” You ask, conscious of the way your steps are slowly turning toward his and trying to straighten yourself up. “Being back in New Jersey with your team, with Jack?”

���Jack doesn’t give anybody a chance to miss him, you should know that by now.” He grumbles, "In my texts 24/7 like it’s his second job.”

“Ellie’s too,” you tell him in a breathy chuckle, crossing your arms over your torso just to keep your hands busy with something as he shoves his back in the pockets of his jeans. “I don’t know where he finds the time,”

“He doesn’t need time, he’s annoying to his very core.” Luke scoffs, “I do miss the guys though, but there’s a couple group chats. And I’d probably miss the guys here if I was back there.”

“So either way you’re missing somebody?”

He gives an affirmative hum, kicking a rock down the side of the curb, figuring you don’t quite realise just how true that question rings to him. The sorority house is at the end of the path, now - closer than either of you really anticipated, and you almost start to panic, like the walls are closing in on you, like you’re running out of time.

“Listen-,”

“Look-,”

You both stop in the middle of the sidewalk, looking at each other wide eyed until you press your lips together, and gesture for him to carry on.

“I miss you,” he says, plain and simple, like it’s all he can muster up - and if you’re honest, it’s all you want to hear, an acknowledgement that without you in his life, there’s this gaping hole that no one else can fill. “I know that if I want to fix things between us, that I should give you this huge speech about how much I fucked things up, and that I should have trusted you, and listened to you when you tried to talk to me, and I do think all those things. I know those things, but I’ve been trying to figure out how to say them without it sounding like some bullshit excuse, and I figure I just need to be honest with you.

“I feel like the whole time we were together, I was waiting for the other shoe to drop, you know, like I could never just be in the moment with you because I felt like it was gonna end. And I think maybe you were doing the same.”

It’s crazy, you think, how well he knows you.

“And neither of us were ever gonna be ready to be anything more, because we weren’t even acknowledging that this thing between us probably wasn’t healthy.”

You’re quite thankful for the sting in the back of your throat, because you don’t know what you’d say to that, if you could speak.

It hurts to hear it, but he’s right. 

“I just wanted to believe it was a good thing for as long as you’d let me, and when you said you’d have dated Cole, and that you’d have thrown it all away, and I just left without a fight, I-,” he blinks, like he’s trying to rid himself of the tears welling in the corners of his eyes, like he doesn’t want to give in and let them shed. “I don’t know, I thought it was best to avoid you all together than watch you put that final nail in the coffin, or whatever.”

“You know I never went out with Cole, right?”

“I know. He told me before he left for training camp. The day you left. Almost considered running after you to apologise for being such a dick. Even thought about flagging you down in departures at Wayne County.”

You let that thought sit for a moment - Luke chasing you down like something out of one of the romantic comedies you would watch together - like the angsty movies you watched after you went home, laying on your bed and wishing the two of you could have had a happy ending. 

“Probably for the best you didn’t chase me through the airport,” you tell him with a wistful smile, “declarations of love freak me out,”

“I thought they might.” He chuckles, breathily, his heart not entirely in it.

“I also took the greyhound.”

“You know serial killers get those things, right.”

“You watch too many movies.”

His eyes flicker to yours, then, knowing and amused - like a new inside joke has cemented itself into your dynamic. 

“I don’t want to be nothing with you.”

It’s a weird statement, almost nonsensical, but you get it.

It’s what you’ve been trying for ever since you left Michigan, after all, and especially after you returned.

You let the thought settle for a moment, your lips twisting and your eyes tearing up as you watch him wait for a response.

“You really hurt me, Luke.” Your voice trembles as you say it, and you think you’re only part spurred on by liquid courage, the rest of it probably the incessant need to open up to somebody.

“I know,” he practically whispers back, choked up as much as you are. 

“I don’t think I can do that again.”

He nods, pressing his tongue to the side of his cheek like he’s trying not to press you on it, stepping back ever so slightly and huffing out a deep breath.

You almost think he might retreat, entirely - accepting your reluctance this final time and letting you go, just like you’d asked, earlier.

“What about if it’s not,” he shakes his head, sighing as he tries to think of the best way to say it, “What if it’s not romantic, between us?”

“You really think we could be friends?”

“You don’t?” He asks, wincing a little like the thought of anything else is painful.

“We’re hardly gonna see each other,” you tell him, “Is there really any point in keeping it up?”

“I’d like to try.”

You don’t know what concept hurts you the most, the thought of trying and failing, or not trying at all. Either way, you lose him.

You wish, for a moment, you were in any way good at math - that you could work out the statistic for the other option, the one where it actually works.

The option where neither of you get hurt, and you get to keep him.

You imagine that it’s slim.

“I don’t know, Luke,” you sigh, unable to shake the heaviness of your doubt, “It feels like we’re just stretching out the inevitable, here.”

“I don’t think so,” he fights back, taking that step forward that he just took back, “Just friends, it doesn’t have to be anything more than that. Hell, if you want to build up to friends, I’ll take that, too. Just not nothing. I miss you too much to be nothing.”

You miss him, too. You missed him the past 3 weeks while he’s been in town, and the two of you have somehow managed to avoid seeing each other for the most part. You missed him for the month you were back at your mom’s house. You missed him those ten days over in the lake house, when he was still technically right in front of you the whole time.

“Can I think about it?”

“Yeah!” He nods, eagerly, the slight etching of a smile spreading across his lips. “Yes, you can think about it.”

You nod back, then, hesitant and before you can do something stupid, like wrap your arms around him as a goodbye, you step away.

You bid him goodnight, offering a thank you for walking you home, and you retreat into the safety of the house, watching through the window by the front door until he disappears back down the street. 

The start of your semester passes in a chaotic blur, and you very quickly, and very frantically, find yourself panicking a little about the what’s-next of it all.

With the last few months of your headspace occupied entirely by a certain brunette, you realise quickly that you really need to knuckle down and figure out what you’re going to do with yourself once school is over.

And that’s what brings you to New York City in the middle of October - one of your very few prospects for the aftermath of your college career discussed over iced teas in Midtown, Manhattan, before you’re crossing state lines through the Holland Tunnel and scrambling to get ready in the hotel room you and Ellie had booked.

You don’t know how you managed to hide all of your efforts behind a veil of secrecy, but Ellie had been all too distracted by you agreeing to accompany her to Jack’s team halloween party in Jersey City, and so she had little brain power left to question where you disappeared off to, or why you’d possibly have any sort of appointment anywhere near here as soon as you told her she could pick up a costume for you.

You should have known it would be something ridiculous, evidenced by the poofy yellow dress and cartoonish crown she had left on your bed for you to change into. 

When you emerge from the bathroom, fully dressed, she’s stood in her Princess Peach costume - the colour palette a lot more complementary to her than the yellow is to you, but you can hardly fight her on it now - especially knowing Jack is out there somewhere dressed as Mario.

You don’t know how it slips your mind that he and Luke play for the same team, or that they’re brothers, or that he could possibly at the same party, dressed as Luigi. Not until you and Ellie are walking into the party a little after it starts, and you meet his eye for the first time in a couple of weeks, your mouth falling agape as you realise just what Ellie has done.

You don’t even have a second to call her out before she’s prancing off to some far side of the room with Jack, all over him after their own extended time apart, and you literally have no option but to sidle up to Luke, tail between your legs, cringing at the entire situation as you stand beside him in a room full of his peers after you had only just shut him down not long ago.

Thankfully, it’s Luke - and he would rather choke than make you feel uncomfortable about it.

He offers an easy smile, amused, even, as he greets you from the tall table he’s occupying, handing you the beer he just opened for himself and reaching for another from the table behind him. 

“I don’t even know why I agreed to come with them, I knew they’d just split and make out in the corner,” you roll your eyes, taking a swig from the bottle and grimacing a little at the taste. “I don’t even know anybody.”

“You know me,” he shrugs, “I don’t mind keeping you company.”

“Yeah right,” you scoff, “You literally just came back, the last thing you need is to be lumped in a corner with me all night when you’ve hardly seen your teammates for months. I’m just gonna duck out in a little bit, no one will care.”

“I’ll care,” he chuckles lightheartedly, the ease in which the statement slips out and the certainty in which you feel it sends a slight shiver down your spine. “I’ve been back in training for a week, trust me, I’ve already had enough.”

You sigh, trying to ignore the convincing look he’s giving you - head titled, a lopsided smile and eyes filled with hope.

It was only just under two weeks ago that you told him you didn’t want to be friends, so you can’t really understand why he’s so intent on you sticking around. He should be personally ordering you an Uber back to your hotel and pushing you out of the door, but he’s giving you this pleading pout now that’s making you think his night would fall to pieces if you left so soon.

The thing is, you’re not that great around people you don’t know, not lately, anyway - especially not when those people are all big, bulky high performance athletes (and Jack) and their drop dead gorgeous partners. You feel like an intruder, like you don’t belong, and you can’t imagine anything happening to change your mind.

“I still feel like such an outsider at these things,” Luke huffs, elbows resting on the tall table in front of you, his body leaning onto it in the absence of any stools nearby until he’s more around your height. “This is the first time Jack’s brought anybody with him so I can’t exactly stick to his side like normal.”

You frown.

Is he serious?

Luke has never been the type to stick to his brother’s side - not from what you’ve seen, anyway, and you’d pretty much spent your entire summer observing the guy - you’re way past the point of trying to deny that, now.

“Isn’t that Seamus over there?” You point to the opposite side of the room, where you’re pretty sure you recognise another of yours and Luke’s previous classmates. “Aren’t you two friends?”

“We got into a pretty heated discussion during Thursday Night Football the other night, we’re on a break.”

You almost forgot how quick Luke can be, the slight quiver in the corner of his mouth giving away his attempts at deception, but you’re hardly in any position to call him out on it.

He’s trying to do you a favour, after all.

“In fact, I need you to stay for my protection. He might be out for my neck, you can’t let me die in a Luigi costume, that would be cruel.”

You snort as you take him in in his entirety, from the ridiculous hat, to the stretched out one-piece outfit topped off with a pair of white sneakers.

“Speaking of, aren’t you supposed to have a moustache?”

“It’s in my pocket, didn’t want to make Jack feel bad, ‘cause he can’t grow one and all,” he mutters, reaching into the front of the outfit to retrieve the stick-on prop, the back still taped up and in-tact. 

“Right,” you scoff, taking it from his hand and peeling the tape, “Jack can’t grow facial hair.”

You reach forward and press it to his upper lip, holding it in place until it sticks, careful not to actually touch his mouth in the process.

“I can grow it,” he rolls his eyes, “I just don’t suit it.”

“I don’t know,” you shrug as you pull back, admiring the results and trying not to laugh, “I’d say you suit it just fine.”

You reach into the pocket of your own dress to retrieve your phone, and snap a picture just to show him, pressing your lips together as you see his eyes widen in horror.

“Delete that,” he huffs, and you just about manage to stop him before he rips the thing off.

“No,” you whine, “Keep it on, it’s funny!”

“I don’t want to look funny, I want to look cool and hot.” He huffs, frowning when he seemingly realises how ridiculous that sounds.

“Halloween costumes aren’t supposed to be hot.”

“Easy for you to say, Princess,” he gestures down to your dress, and you once again have a visceral reaction to how natural it is for him to say things like that. You feel your ears going warm, and you break eye contact just so that he doesn’t see straight through you.

“I meant to say, sorry about this,” you gesture down, too, all of a sudden feeling every fibre of the costume that’s covering your skin, “I don’t know why I didn’t connect the dots sooner when Ellie said she and Jack were doing Mario and Peach. She just said she’d get me a costume, I didn’t think that we’d be-,”

“A couple?” 

“Yeah.”

“It’s no big deal,” Luke shrugs, sipping at his drink with a nonchalant frown. “S’just a costume. Besides, what else could you have been? I don’t think they sell sexy Goomba outfits.”

“Please,” you scoff, swatting lightly at the blue overalls stretched across his chest. “Don’t be ridiculous, if anything, I’d be sexy Toad.”

“Hmm,” he considers, with a long glance down your figure. “That might have actually worked.”

You feel the heat creep back up your neck before you can regulate yourself, not concealed at all by the sweetheart neckline of your dress, or the way Luke’s eye linger on any exposed bit of skin.

You press your lips together and divert your attention to Jack and Ellie in the corner, feeling every extended inch of Luke’s presence beside you, your heart thumping at the mere proximity of him, and you start to chew on your bottom lip. 

“Can’t believe we tried so hard to get them together,” you mumble, watching as they start to kiss, “They’re disgusting.”

“Absolutely revolting,” he agrees, “We were out of our minds all summer.”

You know he’s referring to the scheme you two kept up, you’re the one who even brought the topic into conversation, but you can’t help the instinctive way your chest starts to ache again at the mere mention of summer.

The two of you had talked about this, back in Ann Arbor, before he had come back to Jersey. You’re supposed to be over it, but it doesn’t make it hurt any less. You swallow thickly before reaching for your drink and chugging down the contents, avoiding his gaze as he watches you.

The thought of leaving crosses your mind again, but there’s a larger part of you that has missed this - missed him, maybe - a little too much, and those weeks back in Michigan last month had only served to weaken your resolve.

Keeping your distance had been a giant failure from the second you started to attempt it, and Luke is persistent - that much has always been obvious - so denying him any sort of contact is just pointless, now.

You had thought, back when he had dropped you off at the house the other week, that turning down his offer of friendship had been the right thing to do. You’d told him you would think about it, but it was always going to end up in rejection.

He’s in Jersey, you’re in Michigan. He has a really hectic schedule and career, and you’re supposed to be putting your head down and studying for your final year.

He broke your heart, and you broke his right back.

But you realise that you were naive to think that your paths would hardly cross.

Your best friend is dating his brother. You have so many mutual friends that you can hardly avoid him when he’s back in town. And beyond all that, you miss the versions of the two of you that just got on - before it all got messy in the summer. 

The banter, the inside jokes, the deep understanding of how each other worked.

And you had regretted it since - turning his offer down. 

Bringing it back up again is daunting, though. Opening yourself up to him, to say that you’d been thinking about him this whole time, and feel a deep, ever growing pit in your stomach now at the thought of being nothing, just like he had said he felt.

“Listen,” you start, with all intentions of figuring it out as you go along, only now feeling a serious urge to fix things, somehow, before you go back home, tomorrow, “I-,”

“Hold on, I gotta introduce you to someone. Hey, Pesce,” he calls out to his ever so-slightly taller teammate as he passes nearby, waving him to stop by the table the two of you are at before he walks away. He introduces you both by name, and you don’t miss the silent interaction between the two of them as he does, wide eyes and wiggling brows, a telepathic taunt from Brett and a wordless warning from Luke. “She’s my friend from back in Michigan, and he’s been my rehab buddy.”

You allow yourself to be distracted by that - not Ellie’s friend. His. Not a plus one of a plus one, or an outsider hovering around the edges of a private party. Someone he wants his teammates to know.

You like it more than you ever thought you would.

You feel your lips turning up into a natural smile, and a weight lifting off your shoulders - 7 words erasing the need for an entire conversation, already.

You probably could have told him to go fuck himself and that you hated his guts back on the street outside your sorority, and he’d still be out here calling you his friend.

Persistent.

“It’s nice to meet you,” you tell Brett, reaching out to shake his hand, matching his firm grip and meeting his steely gaze. 

“You too,” he smiles back, “I’ve heard-,”

“Lukey! Finally got a girl to notice you, huh?”

Another of Luke’s teammates approaches the table, and the absolute comedy of being introduced to a bunch of people in ridiculous costumes isn’t lost on you as he comes closer, a gigantic, teasing smirk almost overshadowed by a glaring red headpiece he wears.

“Nice to see ya, Curtis,” you watch as Luke embraces his other teammate, a wry, crooked grin on his face as he rolls his eyes fondly, and you try to ignore the weight of Brett’s discerning gaze on you. When he introduces you this time, Curtis shows no sign of recognition at your name, offering you a kind smile and extending his hand for you to shake. 

“Not talking your head off, is he? We’ve tried to train it out of him, but he’s a stubborn thing,” he chuckles, ruffling Luke’s hair like he’s petting an excitable puppy. 

“I’m used to it by now,” you shrug back, smiling when Luke scoffs, returning to your side.

“Nice costume,” Curtis looks Luke up and down, and it’s like you can see him trying to formulate a joke in his head, your lips twisting as you notice Luke anticipating the same, watching with a raised brow and a bored roll of his eyes. “That might be the closest we ever come to seeing you with facial hair.”

“Big talk coming from a dude dressed as shrimp.”

“I’m obviously a lobster, Luke.” 

“Obviously,” Luke mimics back like a child, his face sour and his lips pouted as his older teammate just laughs in his face. 

“C’mon, man,” Brett claps a hand on Curtis’ back, “Enough bruising the kid’s ego, you owe me a drink, remember?”

He knocks his free fist against Luke’s as he passes, offering you a wink and a nice to meet you before he’s guiding Curtis over to the bar and leaving the two of you alone, once more. 

“Sorry about them,” Luke mutters, “I could save them both from a burning building and they’d still treat me like their annoying baby brother.”

“It’s cute,” you shrug, sipping at your drink and catching his eye as they narrow toward you, clearly taking further offence at your choice of adjective. “They do it ‘cause they love you, Luke, it’s sweet.”

You try not to react to what you’ve just said - try not to think of that sentiment in the context of your own interactions with Luke, lightheartedly poking fun at him just to get a reaction because he can be so gut-wrenchingly adorable. 

It’s not the same.

But you can tell he’s thinking it too, looking at you with eyes that see straight through you, and a tilt to his head that’s almost mocking. 

“I uhm,” he sighs, stepping back a little closer to you and leaning down on the table so that he has to look up to meet your eye, “I told Pesch about you. About us.”

You blink back at him, waiting for him to say more - not really knowing how to respond, because you kind of had a feeling anyway. Brett has the worst poker face you’ve ever seen in your life. 

“It’s just been me and him training together, and we were getting to know each other, and you know how it is, he asked me about how I spent my summer, and about girls, and there’s just you for both, so it sorta just came out. Plus, I kinda felt like I had to talk about it with someone or I was gonna go crazy.” 

You look down, giving a slight nod of understanding - because you do get it. 

Also, the confirmation of something you’ve been wondering is kind of a relief. He hadn’t started anything with anyone else after you left, or back in Michigan, when you were making everything so hard on him.

There’s just him for you, too.

And it’s really hard, having one person consume your thoughts in such a way when you have no outlet to properly talk it through with anyone.

You never felt like you could talk to Ellie about any of it, and having all these feelings fizzing up inside you for so long is starting to make you feel like a volcano on the brink of eruption. 

Luke had done the sensible thing, finding an unaffiliated third party and seeking advice from someone with no bias. No scathing comments from his brothers, judgement from any of the guys back in Michigan or pitiful looks from your best friend.

“I didn’t say anything bad,” he assures you, “Not that there is anything bad, I promise I don’t think poorly of you or anything, and I wouldn’t go around telling random people if I did, especially not my teammates, I don’t want you to think-,”

“Luke, it’s fine,” you place a hand on his forearm, his eyes snapping up to meet yours at the slightest touch, wide and alarmed, like he feels like he’s digging himself into a hole. “I get it. Sometimes I feel like I’m gonna go crazy, too.”

“You do?” He frowns, like that was the last thing he expected you to say. 

You had told him you were hurt, so it can’t come as that much of a surprise that you feel some type of way about everything that went down between the two of you.

You’re not that heartless.

“What did you say to him?” You ask, hoping to engage with his incessant need to talk, rather than any attempt to eke information out of you. “About us?”

“Just that I didn’t like how we left things,” he tells you as you lean beside him, “It’s hard, not knowing where we stand, or what it’s gonna be like when I see you again. I still get the urge all the time to text you, even about stupid things. Someone was telling me about this Matthew McConaughey movie the other day, and I thought of you. Wanted to ask if you’d seen it.”

“It’s probably safe to assume I’ve seen all the Matthew McConaughey films. Even the bad ones.”

“It wasn’t on your Letterboxd.”

You swat at his bicep, your lips turning slowly into a grin as you can’t help but laugh at how little he cares about hiding his intentions.

You’d caught onto him monitoring your account somewhere between him coincidentally watching Notting Hill a couple days after you did while he was back in Michigan, the five star rating he gave to Call Me By Your Name, and him somehow knowing all the most obscure but gut-wrenching quotes from all the movies that really tore your heart out - writing them in his reviews like he was talking to you in some secret language that only the two of you spoke.

I think I’d miss you even if we never met, from The Wedding Date. 

I’ll do anything to make you happy. Tell me what you want me to do and I’ll do it, from Past Lives.

There will be a piece of you in me always, from Her.

All movies you had listed after going home from the lake house - had laid in bed with teary eyes and trembling lips for the most part, and associated all those same quotes with him, too. And even without you putting them in your own reviews, he just knew every time which part of the movie made you think of your relationship.

You’d even tried baiting him out with Barbie, the other week, snorting to yourself despite your heartache when you imagined him seriously typing out, I only exist within the warmth of your gaze, without it, I'm just a little blonde guy who can't do flips, and hoping you would see it.

If anyone else had done it, it would probably have been corny. You’d have blocked them, the level of perception and lowkey invasion of privacy making your skin crawl - but Luke seeing you was different. Him being on the same wavelength - feeling the same feelings, thinking the same thoughts - was something you couldn’t ignore. 

“You’re not supposed to admit to cyber stalking me, you idiot.”

“What?” He chuckles, rubbing at his arm, “I missed watching movies with you.”

He shrugs at that like it’s nothing, but you can feel your cheeks go warm even if his don’t. You missed watching movies with him too - missed the long stretch of his legs far surpassing yours on top of the sheets, and the way he’d hold out candy for you to get some every few minutes. 

“Plus, you were stalking me, too. Why else would you be watching The Mighty Ducks on a Saturday night?” 

“I thought it might teach me about hockey.” You frown, although you’d been all too caught up with just how cute those movies were. You still know very little about the sport, but you can still appreciate the charm of a young Joshua Jackson.

Luke smiles, lopsided and gentle, but you know by now that’s his version of cocky - the kind of smile that shows you that something you’ve said has scratched at his ego, and he’s banking it somewhere in the back of his head.

“I can teach you,” he says, his voice an octave lower as he leans in - and you know he isn’t doing it on purpose, but it makes the hairs on the back of your arms raise, how he almost purrs over to you. “Can give you a crash course if you want?”

“Now?”

“Nah,” he sips at his drink, “Another time. Need an excuse to text you remember?”

“You can text me whenever,” you tell him, chewing at the corner of your bottom lip as he smirks at you, “Just so you know.”

You don’t tell him that you’ve been waiting for him to do it, anyway.

That for those first few days after he finally left Michigan, every buzz of your phone had your heart rate doubling. 

The first instant you had started to regret your decision, you had been hoping he would still try to change your mind.

You don’t tell him you started following a random team update account for news on how he was getting on with his injury, because he wasn’t letting you know, himself, or that you once spent an hour reporting people trolling him or talking smack in the comments just for something to do.

“What about FaceTime?”

“Don’t push your luck.”

To say you were planning on leaving as soon as you had arrived, you enjoyed yourself way more than you thought you would with Luke and his teammates - in fact, you’d probably go as far as to say it’s one of the best nights you’ve had since the summer.

Luke had introduced you to pretty much everybody, flitting around the room and making the rounds, and it had been nice to see how normal and nice everybody was - instantly making you felt like you belonged, to the point where you figured out that Luke had only said all that stuff about feeling like an outsider because he knew that was how you felt, knew it would tug at your heartstrings and make you stay.

You know from how close he is with the guys back in Michigan that Luke loves his teammates, but seeing it in action for the first time had been sweet. Seeing the other guys ruffling at his hair, play fighting, throwing their arms around him and indulging him in his corny jokes kind of made you feel less tense about the way you’re so instinctively affectionate with him. 

Even after what had happened toward the end of summer, and swearing off any sort of romantic connection since, you still want to touch him, still want to be near him, and while you don’t think his teammates exactly have those same thoughts, it makes you feel a little more normal, how much they all love him. Makes you feel less like you should be wedging all this distance between the two of you - because if they all love him like this, then why can’t you?

You don’t even realise that Ellie and Jack have long snuck off until you get a text to say not to come back to the hotel, and that Jack’s bed is freshly clean for you to sleep in. The thought of it is gross, but you figure that two athletes will have a comfy couch, so you’re not all that bothered in the end.

Plus, it gives you more time with Luke - to have a proper conversation, to figure things out. So, when it’s time to leave, and he ushers you out of the bar with a hand on the small of your back, you let him cross the boundaries of being nothing, and lean into his touch until you’re out in the cold, wrapping your arms around yourself as he shrugs off his jacket.

“Put this on,” he demands, throwing it to you and watching as you catch it with a clumsy grip, “We’re walking.”

“Walking?” You ask, stumbling to catch up with him as he starts to make his way down the street, his long strides making it incredibly difficult, especially in the stupid costume heels you’re wearing. You ease into his jacket as you move, shaking your arms until your fingers just about peak out of the ends, and relishing the warmth that encapsulates your body.

“Yeah, it’s 10 minutes. I know that sounds like a lifetime in campus terms, but I’m assuming you still know how to walk.”

You scoff as you pretty much jog to keep up, taking rushed, small steps until you just about make it to his side. “I don’t have a car, remember, I walk everywhere. I just assumed we’d be getting an Uber or something."

“S’good for you,” he shrugs, “Clears the mind. And it’s only a few blocks back to the apartment. I can show you all the best breakfast spots for you and Ellie to visit before you leave tomorrow.”

“But it’s dark out.”

“What, you’re scared of the dark, now?” He looks down at you from the corner of his eye, his height advantage meaning you can so clearly see the amused way in which his mouth curves up on the side closest to you. 

“I’m scared of being abducted in a back alley and brutally murdered so that my organs can be sold on the black market.”

“That happens more on the other side of the river,” he hooks a thumb in the general direction of what you assume is the Hudson, but it could be anywhere for all you know. This is your first time in New Jersey, and your brief expedition into Manhattan in the morning had done very little to clue you in on the lay of the land.

“Murder is an international issue, Luke, I don’t think they draw the line at what state they do it in, look it up.”

“You watch too much TV,” he chuckles, “Who’s gonna mess with you when I’m around? Look at me,” he gestures down to his ridiculous costume, “I’m the picture of intimidation. You don’t think I’d protect you from the black market organ thieves?”

“You’re dressed like an Italian plumber, you dork, and you’ve got arms like toothpicks, they’d probably kill you first just for fun.” You retort, grabbing at his arm to bring him back to your pace. You almost can’t believe that in the brief expanse of one evening, you could possibly have returned to this level of comfort, but you’re trying not to think too hard about it - especially with a mind partially loosened up by a couple of drinks. “Could you at least slow down? Your legs are like twice the length of mine.”

“Aw,” he pouts, “Do you want me to carry you?”

“Don’t joke, I’d pay good money for a piggy back right now.”

“Shame I’ve got such toothpick arms then, isn’t it?” he fakes an exaggerated smile, and you narrow your eyes until he drops it.

You huff as he carries on, thankful at the slightly slower pace he seems to have adopted, and the way his chin keeps jutting in your direction to check on how well you’re keeping up.

“What about a fireman’s carry?” You suggest, looking up at him with pleading eyes and pouted lips.

“The best you’ll get is me giving you my gloves to wear as socks and I’ll carry your shoes for you.”

“And if I step on glass, cut into a vein and bleed out?”

“I suppose then I’d carry you.”

This feels familiar.

Feels comfortable and right, and when you look back on those nights in September when you had seen him - at the football game, in the living room back at the sorority, and the party at the hockey house, this is what you’d felt like you had been missing.

It doesn’t have to be awkward, or charged, or tense between the two of you. 

Maybe it can be like this again.

Like it was in the beginning, before everything got messed up.

“I meant to ask earlier,” he nudges at you with his elbow, “Ellie said you had an appointment over in Midtown,”

“You’re such a stalker,” you snort, shaking your head with a wry smile as you glance over at him, “Literally the snoopiest guy I’ve ever met.”

“Snoopiest?” He scoffs, “It’s called curiosity. I can’t wonder what my friend did with their day, now? I’m snoopy?”

“There’s a masters programme at NYU,” your eyes dart down to the floor as you start to tell him, figuring that you’ll feel less nervous if it just feels like you’re speaking in general, instead of confiding in him. There’s also a part of you spurred on by his immediate adoption of you being his friend - still reeling from the ease in which he had been introducing you as such to everyone all night. Opening up to him is just as easy, and now that you’re embracing the dynamic, it’s like the pieces that form all the resistance within you are shifting out of place, creating a bunch of cracks for him to seep straight into. “One of my sorority sisters has a cousin who’s in her final year, she set up a meeting so that I could talk about my application.”

“You’re applying to NYU?” He asks, quickening his step until he is a little ahead of you, turning on his feet until he’s walking backwards, giving you no chance of ignoring his presence anymore. 

“I’m thinking about it,” you shrug, “It isn’t a done deal, so don’t tell anybody.”

“I can keep a secret,” he promises, and that same ache starts to form in your chest again, at just how well you know that to be true.

“Plus, it’s a long-shot, so even if I did apply, I probably wouldn’t get in, and I don’t want to get Ellie’s hopes up that I’ll be sticking around.”

You have a job lined up elsewhere already for when you graduate - an entry level role in a PR agency over in Chicago, close to home, close to your mom - but the more you’re considering it, the less sure you are. The job would be pretty much you getting taken advantage of for being a recent graduate, and furthering your education could help secure something bigger and better. But throwing away a sure thing seems stupid, and you don’t really want to do so if you don’t have something else secured.  

“Getting into the NHL is a long shot, and you’ve just spent the night in a room full of people who made it happen,” Luke tells you, ducking his head a little lower until you look him in the eye, “Don’t underestimate yourself, you’re really smart, you’ll get in if you do end up applying.”

The way he says it is so sure - so different to anybody else, who you feel like is just saying it to make you feel better. Luke believes it, you can see it in the way he looks at you, confident and certain of your abilities more than you’ve ever been in yourself.

“I don’t think you can call you getting into the NHL a long shot, unfortunately,” you tell him, your lips twisting in the corner as you bite back a smile when he starts to frown. 

“Not you too with the nepotism stuff,” he scoffs, only partially feigning offence.

You swat at his chest, “Hey, I’d never,” you gasp, “I meant ‘cause you’re so talented.”

“I bet you did,” he snorts, falling back into step beside you, a little closer this time, your elbows knocking as you continue to walk. “Haven’t even played yet this season, what would you know about my talent?”

You think it’s the way he’s leaning in a little that seems to hypnotise you, rendering you a speechless, practically-spluttering mess as you struggle to form words or a single, coherent thought. You wonder if this is how he felt, all those times when you turned on the charm and innuendo and purposely tried to push his buttons. Defenceless and weak. 

“I’ll tell you what I do have a talent for,” he straightens up a little, increasing the space between you so that you feel like you can at least breathe again. “Important old man voice. If you ever need to put someone down as a phoney reference.”

“I’ll bare that in mind when the NYU admissions board loosens their policy on Kevin McAllister level schemes, thanks,” you chuckle, your smile lingering when he returns it, cheeks folding into a lopsided grin. 

“Hey, give a guy some credit, there’s a little Ferris Bueller in there too.”

“Yeah, ‘cause schools love Ferris Bueller types.” You scoff, “You’re such an idiot.”

You glance over to see him pretty much beaming in response, and, if you were a betting person, you’d put all your money on knowing his exact train of thought.

You have a tell, after all, you remember, for when you’re enjoying yourself more than you think you should be.

Walking back to his apartment gives the two of you a little time to properly catch up - away from tense conversations and teary admissions - he tells you about his training, you tell him about school, and it feels like seconds pass before he’s ushering you into his building with that same guided hand on your lower back, the heat of his touch felt even through his jacket, and into the elevator. 

You stand by his side as it slowly ascends, hands buried in the warmth of his jacket pockets and ever so often meeting his eye in the reflection of mirrored doors before you glance away with a flush to your cheeks.

Every time you look back, he’s smiling a little, soft and small, but sure of himself in a way that makes all those hardened parts of you melt a little inside. 

There’s something different about him that you can’t quite put your finger on - something in the way he carries himself, around his teammates, around you, even just in general - like he stands taller, somehow. Like here in Jersey, he makes a point to hold himself up a little more, and it makes you cherish the version of him you had, those months ago - vulnerable and raw.

You hadn’t appreciated at the time, just how much of himself he gave to you - all the little quirks and insights you got to see - but you appreciate them, now. 

“I had fun tonight,” you tell him, smiling instinctively when he meets your eye, “Thanks for not letting me leave.”

“Thanks for not leaving,” he chuckles, the doors opening in front of you and that hand going straight to your back again until he’s guiding you towards his apartment. “It’s been nice just talking to you again, I missed it.”

“Me too,” you admit, because there’s really no use in keeping it bottled up when he’s so freely opening himself up to you. He so easily tells you that he misses you, and wants to speak to you, and it enjoys your company, so you not doing the same only feels like you’re doing yourself a disservice - especially when admitting as much back to him earns you one of those cute, crooked smiles he’s so good at giving. 

He holds open the door for you and you have to brush past him to go in, but your hesitance to touch has long dissipated throughout the night, so you don’t entirely mind when he follows you straight in, and you can feel the heat of his presence.

“Are you wanting to go straight to bed?” He asks, hand on your waist as he passes you and heads for the kitchen, flicking on the lights under the cabinets and getting two glasses down from one of the cupboards.

“I probably should,” you huff, despite wanting to stretch this out with Luke - your mind going back to I miss watching movies with you, and considering flopping down onto the couch and putting something on, for old time’s sake. “Is your couch comfy? I don’t really want to sleep in Jack’s bed.”

“You can sleep in mine,” he offers, before he even has a second to consider it.

“Oh, I don’t know-,”

“I’ll go in Jack’s, it’s fine,” he nods down the hall, gesturing you to follow as he carries two glasses of water, knocking the handle to the room on the left until the door opens and letting you go in first. 

The sheets are the same as on his bed back at the lake house, and it’s the first thing that takes you aback, a familiar grey-blue comforter that you already feel the softness of from across the room, and a cream throw haphazardly thrown across the top. 

You can tell the sheets aren’t entirely fresh - slightly crumpled, and not-very-neatly made, pillows askew - but if you’re sleeping in Luke’s bed, weirdly enough, you would probably prefer it that way.

“Sorry, I should have tidied up a little,” he chuckles nervously as he passes you to place a glass down on the nightstand. 

“It’s fine,” you shrug, stepping forward just to fall down onto his bed - the mattress plush enough that you already feel yourself sinking into it, tension easing away from your muscles. 

You’re kind of glad you kept an eye on him, watching his gaze shift to the way your dress now rides up on your thighs, and the bob of his Adam’s apple as he swallows thickly before looking away.

“I’ll just get something to change into then I’ll get outta your hair,” he mumbles, trying to busy himself with something else as a distraction. Just before he can pass you to his closet, you reach out to grab at his wrist, and it’s almost like muscle memory is forcing you to do so - something within you not allowing him to get away.

He’s in front of you now, close enough that you kind of have to crane your neck the whole way to look up at him, and you watch as his eyes drag slowly from the point of contact to meet yours, every movement he makes unhurried and purposeful. 

“I just wanted to say thank you again, for tonight,” you start, speaking without any real plan as to what you want to say, but wanting to keep him just a little longer, “For keeping me company, and letting me stay in here-,”

“It’s no big deal-,”

“And for not letting me push you away.”

It might be the first time you’ve ever owned up to it - being the master of your own downfall, or the downfall of your relationship with Luke, and anything you still could have been after the fact - and it isn’t easy, admitting that you’re the problem.

But you feel like you owe it to him, as a reward for all this resilience in the face of your constant rejection. He’s been nothing but patient, and you’ve been nothing but hard work, and you’re willing to admit, now, that you’re done with it.

He smiles, eyes knowing, the relieved, breathy sigh he gives dissolving all the guilt that’s building in the depths of your gut, and sinks down beside you on the bed, his thigh brushing yours as he settles in. 

Hours ago, being this close would have terrified you. You’d have shut down, turned away, shuffled across the sheets until there was a healthy distance between the two of you, but you don’t move. You just turn, a little, to be able to meet his eye.

“Are you saying you’re done with that?” He asks, a little hesitant, assuming, probably, that you won’t be entirely open with him.

But you nod, chewing at the corner of your bottom lip as he presses his own together, eyes darting a little lower.

“So we’re friends?” He asks, his voice low, the depth of it causing a weird vibration to wrack down your body - a buzz that won’t go away, now that he’s this close, and he’s looking at you the way he is. 

“If that’s what you still want to be.”

The thought of him changing his mind makes you a little dizzy, an ache growing in your chest again at the thought of being nothing - but you’d deserve it, you think, after all the times you turned him down. 

It would hurt, but, as always, it would be your own doing. 

“And we won’t ever be more?”

The pleading tone in which he asks makes the back of your throat go dry, and all you can do to respond, now, is shake your head. Slowly, and hesitantly, but it shakes all the same, tears welling in the corners of your eyes as you take in his resigned acceptance.

And then, something shifts.

A subtle shake of his head, as if he’s fighting an inner monologue, and then an assured switch in his demeanour - a tilt of his head as he surveys your reluctance, and the swipe of his tongue to wet his lips, like he’s preparing to fight back.

“If I kissed you right now,” he asks, voice still low, eyes lower, pinned to the curve of your lips as they part as if by instinct, “Would you tell me to stop?”

“Luke,” you warn, no more than a whisper as you watch his lips too, “We can’t.”

“That’s not what I asked,” his eyes trail slowly up until your gazes meet, and his head tilts again in question, blinking heavily before he asks, “Would you push me away?”

Your lips form around a response that you can’t even think to give back, opening around an answer you’re not ready to give at all, and all your body wants to do is deny. You fight the urge to shake your head, but you think that it’s a losing battle, especially considering how much your brain feels like it’s being rattled around anyway.

You don’t know what you do to make him move forward, but you figure by now you don’t actually have to do anything. He can probably read your mind at this point, spurred on no doubt by the way your eyelids flutter closed when he’s close enough, and the tip of his nose presses to yours, slow, heavy breaths falling into the decreasing space between the two of you. 

You should stop him. You know that.

It isn’t good for either of you, letting this carry on, leaving the edges of your relationship so frayed that even the smallest tug could pull the whole thing apart, thread by thread. 

You should tell him to stop, should push him away, should hold a lighter to the loose ends and singe them together to prevent further damage. You’ve only just settled on friends, and now you’re not sure, again.

But the second he gets this close, you’re not in charge, anymore.

It’s like some force of nature takes over, brings the two of you together like tectonic plates meeting, and causing unfathomable destruction to both of your hearts in the aftermath.  

His kiss is so instantly tender that it hurts already, tears prickling at the seams of your scrunched-closed eyes, and all you can do is push through the pain. You kiss him back, lips closing around his again and again as your faces smush together, and you start to feel the passion consume him - something takes over almost like an urgency, where you’re clawing at his the front of his costume and he’s clutching at your waist, doing anything physically possible to close whatever gap still sits between you.

The pressure of his lips is almost bruising, now, but you like it that way - soft exhales puffing out from his nose so that he doesn’t have to part to catch his breath, fingers pressing so hard into your flesh that you hope they leave a mark.

He tastes just how you remember, and it takes you back all those months to summer - to stolen kisses over centre consoles and making out in his bed when everyone else was out. There’s a part of you that feels giddy with it, just like you had then, partaking in something so precious that was just for the two of you, and it starts to distract you from what this actually is.

A mistake. 

You pull away instead of pushing, bringing your chin back until your lips part with much effort, a hmmph and a furrow of your brow, and you can’t bring yourself to open your scrunched eyes, not yet, but you know when he’s going to chase.

“Luke,” you whisper in warning before your eyes flutter open and you peer up at him through your lashes. He looks so soft, you think, despite all the ways he tries not to. Despite the sharp line of his jaw, and the hardened look in his eyes. You feel your walls crumbling at just the sight of him - defenceless to his charms, once again, because how much could Luke possibly hurt you? “Friends don’t do that.”

“Maybe our friendship starts tomorrow,” he hums back, “Maybe we get this out of our systems one more time.”

And it’s sitting on the precipice of that feeling you’ve been chasing since July that has you considering it - ever so close to finally getting closure on whatever the two of you were, or could have been.

Getting it out of your system sounds healthy. Sounds like a clean slate, a fresh start, and you have no doubt that if you’re going to be friends with Luke Hughes, that it’s exactly what you need in order to do so. 

Because, if you’re honest, it’s that exact thing that’s been holding you back this entire time - closure. With such an abrupt end to what the two of you had, how could you ever possibly close that chapter mid-sentence? How could you ever move on?

“One more time,” you try to sound stern, try to convince yourself of your own words, “Then we have to let this go.”

“You got it.”

“No more Luke, I mean it.” You have to push down this feeling of impending doom, or you’ll never get anywhere, but you need to warn him one last time, just to be safe. “Strictly friends after tonight.”

“I already agreed, can you please just let me kiss you again?”

“Okay, fine, just,” you huff, hands splayed across his broad chest and pushing until your bodies part, his butt shuffling back on the bed. “Take the costume off, first, I’m not feeding into whatever dorky cosplay fetish you probably have.”

You’re only part joking, but it’s the only way you know how to relieve the tension a little, and your nerves start to dissipate at his reaction.

He chuckles, with the kind of cocky smile that makes your heart jump, reaching behind himself to unzip the back of his costume with an affectionate shake of his head. He stands, then, to shuck it off, the whole thing dropping off of him until he kicks it across the floor, towards his laundry hamper, then stands in just his briefs, which are slung low on his waist. “You can keep yours on, I don’t mind,” he tells you when you’re distracted by the taut, defined lines on his stomach, eyes trailing slowly up to meet his, gleaming back at you.

“You’d love that wouldn’t you,” you scoff, watching as he draws closer, shuffling back a little on the bed to accommodate him, “You absolute freak.” 

“You can’t sit there and pretend you don’t want me to call you princess again.” He smirks, bending down until his hands are on either side of your hips, and you’re leaning back with your fingers pressed into his sheets and your head craned back to meet his eye, “Saw you getting all flustered about it, earlier.”

“Shut up,” you huff, curling a hand around the back of his neck and pulling him down into you - the two of you colliding in a clumsy, messy kiss. His body crawls over yours, encapsulating you entirely in an intoxicating warmth, and you find yourself melting into his every touch - large hands running down your sides, settling on your waist, and the other easing its way under the skirt of your costume. 

You put both hands to use too, one remaining behind his neck, scratching into the grown out curls that sit there and tugging when he starts to tickle up your thigh, the other on the warm skin of his chest - the rampant thud of his heart beating against your palm.

One more time, just to get him out of your system.

And then you can be friends.

What could possibly go wrong?

another a/n: I'll try to finish the next part asap!! thank you for reading, I know this was long lmao!! would love to hear your thoughts!!!!

[mickyschumacher]

[RED STRING!]

𝐒𝐔𝐌𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐘: spending valentine's day alone, franco thinks he fallen in love at first sight. the only problem? the connection between you too is tied with an invisible string.

𝐖𝐀𝐑𝐍𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐒: fluff, poor humour, coffee shop trope!, kind of a you belong with me vibe with the whole writing thing, lot's and lot's of yapping, very subtle red string/invisible string vibes – more fate vibes ig , technically not strangers to lovers but it is what it is, franco and reader are just the most adorable and talkative people ever, and last but not least, google translated spanish cus why not

𝐏𝐀𝐈𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐆: franco colapinto x fem!reader

𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐃 𝐂𝐎𝐔𝐍𝐓: 2.6k

𝐀/𝐍: the second fic of my series! not going to lie, this didn't turn out the way i wanted it to turn out. esp since it's technically my first franco fic but i had to pull through. maybe i'll edit this someday (or make a pt 2). 🤷🏽‍♀️ // as usual, poorly proofreaddddd

𝐡𝐚𝐧𝐝 𝐢𝐧 𝐡𝐞𝐚𝐫𝐭 𝐬𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐞𝐬 | 𝐦𝐚𝐬𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐥𝐢𝐬𝐭

Franco looked around him at his local coffee shop, suppressing the urge to look disgusted. It was Valentine’s Day and his favourite spot was littered with people in relationships. The ‘public display’ in PDA was truly well and alive.  

Franco, of course, as every year before this one, was spending Valentine’s alone. He wasn’t sure what it was. But none of his relationships lasted till then nor did they start around the holiday. It must’ve been some sort of curse. Because everyone else around him was happily all mushy and in love.  

Still, coffee was much needed. Especially on a day like this.   

Franco took a step forward, ordering his usual. While he preferred to have a cup of mate with someone he cherished, all the people close to him were out today. Leaving him all alone with his caffeine addiction.  

A server of the coffee shop cleared his throat, capturing Franco’s attention. “Señor, esa señora de ahí olvidó sus llaves y su café. ¿Le importaría dárselo mientras espera? Estamos un poco cortos de personal en este momento.” Sir, that lady over there forgot her keys and her coffee. Do you mind giving it to her while you wait? We are a little short-staffed right now. 

Franco nodded and smiled. “Sure. No problem.”  

He turned around with the cup of coffee and keys, trying to spot you and boy, did he. Franco almost stumbled into the person next to him. The world was slowing down for him as you played with a small child at a table.  

Franco watched quietly and carefully. He watched your hair fall around your face softly while you pulled faces with the kid, making him laugh. He could tell the kid was technically third-wheeling his parents. The child was probably feeling bored as hell.  

And then there you were. Playing with the kid, pretending to do some God-awful magic, and cracking jokes that would only ever make a child laugh.  

Franco could’ve sworn you were the most beautiful pattern of beauty he had ever seen. Your eyes sparkled as though they held the entire world in them. Your smile... a social service healing those around you, he was sure of it. Your laugh he only needed to hear once and it would play forever in head.  

He watched you bid the child goodbye, waving to the very last second. Franco couldn’t help but smile to himself as you took a seat and waited presumably for your coffee.  

He blinked, free hand searching his pockets. No marker. He turned to the cash register, spotting an idle marker pen. Smoothly, he picked up the marker and began writing on the outside of your cup as he held the lid of the marker in his mouth.  

Finishing his artwork, Franco stared at the cup and then you. If there was a God out there, now was the time to prove it to him.  

Franco took in a deep breath, pocketing the marker, and began walking over to your table. Gently, he placed down your cup of coffee and keys. “Sorry to startle you. But you forgot your keys over there with your coffee,” he murmured.  

You flickered your eyes up to him and this time Franco was a hundred percent sure – it was love at first sight.  

“Thank you,” you smiled softly, “Sorry for the hassle.” 

Franco shook his head. “Really, it’s no problem.” 

He could only pray that you had some sort of interest in him as he walked away to receive his own coffee.  

Please look at the cup, please look at the cup, please look at the cup– 

You peered at your cup, spotting all the extra ink written over it. A small smile formed as you read the writing.  

“If this coffee was as good as your smile, it’d be the best cup in town. Want to go out on a date sometime?” 

You looked up, meeting Franco’s blue eyes as he smiled, holding up his coffee as a kind gesture. Laughing softly, you mouthed, “When?” 

Franco furrowed his brows. “When what?” He mouthed back, raising his hands with a small shrug.  

You turned your cup to face him, finger tapping the word date. You raised your brows, jutting your chin to your coffee.  

Franco suppressed his wide smile, trying to maintain his composure. He opened his mouth and this time sound fell out. “How about now?” 

The corners of your mouth teetered up, begging to break into a smile. “Now?” You asked and he nodded, chest rising with hope.  

You stood up from your table, shoving your house keys in your pocket. Raising your hand, you beckoned for him to follow you as you walked out of the coffee shop. The loudness of Valentine’s moved from the store and into the streets. Balloons wavered off the streets, red and pink glittered every window of every retail outlet, and lovers were found per every inch of pavement.  

Franco walked alongside you, stretching out his hand. “Officially... I’m Franco.” 

You looked at his hand and then back at him. Grinning, you went to shake his hand only to pull back at the static shock flowing through your hands. You widened your eyes. “Sparks and all, huh Franco?” You teased, shaking his hand fully the time as you introduced yourself.  

“Beautiful name for a beautiful girl,” he commented, making your cheeks flush. 

“Please, I bet you say that to all the girls you give coffee cups to,” you retorted, taking a sip of your drink.  

Franco took in a deep breath. “Well to be honest, I’ve never asked anyone out like that before.” 

You mulled over his words. “Hmm... well, if I’m also being honest, I’ve never accepted anyone’s date like that before either. Or anyone’s for that matter.” 

Franco paused in the street, making you widen your eyes. He blinked at you blankly, seriousness clouding his eyes as he processed the new information. “No one’s asked you out on a date before?” 

You shook your head meekly, tilting your head in confusion as his mouth fell open. “I am witnessing a crime... I am witnessing a crime,” he muttered to himself. 

This was ludicrous. How had no one ever asked you out before? Franco wasn’t sure about an Almighty but he was sure that if one did exist, God carved you specifically and sent you down here on Earth to put everyone to shame.  

“I honestly can’t tell if I should be happy or sad hearing this,” Franco stated, walking back to you with a small frown. “Didn’t you have any crushes growing up?” 

Your walk down the street resumed. “A few. But I never asked them out. And neither did they.” 

Franco was beginning to wonder if he should just rip his ears. “But why not? Anyone would be lucky to be even in the same room as you let alone ask you out.” 

You smiled at Franco’s seriousness. “Thank you,” you laughed, “I guess I was scared of rejection? I don’t know... I always thought it was just a silly crush, so... and besides, I’m not really good at talking to people.” 

Franco furrowed his brows as you both turned a corner. What on earth were you talking about? “But you’re talking to me just fine. And that kid in the coffee shop? He seemed pretty happy to talk to you.” 

You hummed, taking another sip of your coffee. “Kids are easy to placate. Not easy to talk too. And as for you... I don’t know. Something about you makes it easy to do so.” 

Franco reminded himself to breathe. He knew what you meant. It felt like he had known you for a while. “Where did you grow up?” 

“Here in Pilar,” you commented. “And then I moved when I turned seven.” 

Franco’s mouth fell open while his eyes widened. “Me too! Well, not the moving part. But I was born here in Pilar too!” 

A quiet laugh escaped your mouth. “Small world, huh?” 

He nodded as a strange tingle crawled up his back. “Yeah... something like that,” he smiled, supressing his confusion. He couldn’t really explain it. But it felt like there was something beyond you being born in the place as him. As though it wasn’t just a coincidence but something fateful.  

Franco shook his head, breaking his trance upon seeing the familiar sight of his local reserve. “Oh hey, you brought us to my favourite walk!” He cheered, immediately beaming at the sight.  

You blinked at the sight of his smile.  

So pretty...  

It was strange. What was this warm feeling in your chest? So familiar and yet so new. 

“Your favourite walk?” You asked after clearing your throat. “This is my favourite walk.” 

Franco raised his brows, surprised. “Is that so?” 

“Yep,” you stated, “I used to walk it all the time before I moved. I’m happy it didn’t change much when I came back. Especially that small bridge over the river. I love that one. I used to feed the ducks over there.” 

It was just before you had moved. You came to this walk almost every day with your mother as a six-year-old, with a bag of peas, seeds, and lettuce in your small hands. With all the excitement in the world, you would rush over to the bridge, finding a small group of ducks waiting for you. And then you’d spend the next thirty minutes tirelessly waving your hands with the food you had brought for them.  

Although... now that you were going down memory lane, you were pretty sure you had a friend you did it with. You couldn’t really remember who it was though.  

“You want to go to the bridge then?” Franco queried, breaking your trance.  

You smiled and nodded. “Sure.” 

By the time you arrived to the bridge, you had finished your coffees, putting them in a nearby bin. In that time, you had both enjoyed reminiscing small parts of the walk such as the seasonal flowers, the lopsided fencepost that never seemed to get fixed even as a child, and the bird fountain that ever seemed to get quite the attention from birds as it did kids. 

It was astonishing how many things you both remembered, although you supposed Franco had been here far longer than you have.  

“Here we are!” Franco cheered, waving his hands to welcome you the bridge.  

You laughed softly at the kids nearby who seemed to be slightly startled by Franco’s loudness.  

Franco watched you smile widely, taking in the bridge once again while you walked around. It was like you were trying to commit it to memory. Or as though you were trying to place a memory over it. Whatever it was... you looked beautiful. You weren’t just placed on this earth but the earth was made for you.  

“Does it look the same?” Franco queried, walking next to you as you both leaned over the bridge, watching river water trickle down a multitude of rocks.  

“Basically,” you affirmed, eyeing the tall grass surrounding the river’s edges. “It’s grown. But so have I.” 

Franco nodded slowly. He understood what you meant. In a sense nothing had changed. The river grew with the time, changing its landscape. For you, coming back to Pilar after so long, you had also grown. Coming back here was both jarring yet nostalgic.  

Franco let out a small exhale. “Did you come here every day when you were younger?” 

You grinned. “I practically lived here. I’d come with some food and there was this kid–” 

A yelp fell from your lips as the children nearby rushed past you, yelling “Ducklings!” 

The world began to tilt with your balance, leaving you attempting to grapple the air. Out of your peripheral, you could see Franco’s eyes widen, hands instantly reaching out to grab you.  

And just like that, the world was still. 

Your chest heaved with shock as you met Franco’s blue eyes, speechless. You think he asked you if you were okay but all you could think about was his hands on your waist. All you managed to do was nod.  

Franco slowly reeled you back up, eyes fixated on the familiar pendant hanging from your neck that had escaped from your small fall.  

“What’s wrong...” You trailed off, throat closing as Franco’s finger trailed the chain of your necklace, landing on the pendant.  

Wordlessly, his hand went to his neck, taking out another necklace. But not just any ordinary necklace. The same replica as your own.  

You furrowed your brows as realisation hit you. “We know each other.” 

Franco blinked in disbelief. “You’re... You’re the girl who used to live three houses down from me!” 

“And you’re the boy who fed ducks with me!” You retorted, mouth agape. 

Talk about a small world... 

You and Franco stayed silent for couple of seconds, trying process what you were just learning. What were the odds of you and Franco had known each other before he wrote on your coffee cup this morning? Probably higher than zero but it was weird that it had happened. 

You looked back at Franco when you heard him laugh. Raising a brow, you questioned why he was so joyful all of a sudden.  

“I knew things were beginning to get a bit too familiar,” he admitted, shaking his head with a small smile. 

You tilted your head, confusion pouring onto your face. “What do you mean?” 

“I mean,” Franco let out a small exhale, “Well I didn’t think about it too much when you said you moved. It was just strange. But then you brought us here. And then there were the ducks. And the way you looked at the place... and then the necklace.” 

A chuckle made its way past your lips. You remembered. “The one we begged our moms to buy on your birthday.” 

You smiled softly as a comfortable silence settled between the both of you. Looking at Franco briefly, you couldn’t help but think that meeting today at that coffee shop and forgetting your keys was fate. Who could’ve thought it would lead to series of coincidences such as your natural urge to bring him to this place.  

In some other strange way, your mind knew. You just had yet to piece together the puzzle.  

“You know what’s so funny though?” Franco queried, turning to face you.  

“What?” You asked. 

Franco grinned. “It’s so weird that we met today. On Valentine’s Day... because I asked you out on a date. I just remember having the biggest crush on you as kids. And now...” 

Your cheeks burned at his words. You remembered young Franco quite well. He was always so talkative, just as he was now. But around you, he seemed to forget how to speak. He’d just listen as you talked on and on.  

Right now, it seemed as those roles were reversed.  

“And now?” You queried, fingers tightening on the bridge’s railing.  

Franco stared at you for what felt like the longest second and took out the marker in his pocket. With his hand as his blank canvas, the marker began gliding on his skin. 

You waited for him, unsure of what to expect. You didn’t even really know what you wanted Franco to say. All you wanted to hear was that he wanted the same thing as you. Something more.  

Franco cleared his throat capturing his attention. A nervous smile washed over his face, clearly reaching his eyes. Slowly he turned his hand towards you, ink splotched all over it.  

“And now I wonder whether I can ask for a second date?”  

An almost relieved sigh fell from your lips, turning into a small quiet laugh. Reaching over, you grabbed the marker from him and began writing on your own hand.  

You smiled, showing your hand to him.  

“Of course! :)" 

Franco couldn’t help but grin. It was stupid but he loved it.  

It was just another thing he could now remember you by.  

Another thing that tied him to you. 

© 𝐌𝐈𝐂𝐊𝐘𝐒𝐂𝐇𝐔𝐌𝐀𝐂𝐇𝐄𝐑 

[acexsmhking]

HEY BAE CAN U WRITE EYELESS JACK W/ A GN READER WHO HELPS HIM W/ DAILY THINGS BC OF HIS YK.. BLINDNESS? I THINK ITS CUTE IDK LIKE HELPIN HIM W/ WASHING OFF DIRT AND GRIME OR MAKING FOOD OR TYING HIS SHOES(idk which canon or fanon jack u write tho my bad😔) BUT YEA THANKS BAE I LOVE UR STORIES💗💗

𝐓𝐫𝐢𝐬𝐭𝐟𝐮𝐥

(𝗮𝗱𝗷.) 𝗱𝗲𝗲𝗽𝗹𝘆 𝘆𝗲𝘁, 𝗿𝗼𝗺𝗮𝗻𝘁𝗶𝗰𝗮𝗹𝗹𝘆 𝗺𝗲𝗹𝗮𝗻𝗰𝗵𝗼𝗹𝘆

˚₊· ͟͟͞͞➳❥ Jack x GN!Reader

Summary: GN!Reader having to navigate a relationship with Jack, learning new habits and adapting constantly

Warning(s): 18+ content, mentions of sexual content, mentions of inner turmoil, slight angst, descriptions of gore, descriptions of human consumption, mentions of kidnapping, alienation from family and friends, controlling behaviors

Jack is very used to his life, he’s been like this for almost a decade now. However, adjusting to another person? Yeah you have to help him with that one

Jack is very.. what’s the simplest word.. ah! Yes, greedy. He kinda of really just takes you, kidnaps you, so now instead of a nice comfy, cozy warm home you’re stuck in some random hole or cave

…not Bonita

Your life basically completely shifts a whole 360° until you can find a way to completely communicate with each other

It’s not that Jack doesn’t want to meet your needs, he’s just.. so.. him and he’s forgotten anything of a human life so he just tries.. everything

He tries making you a nest; full of warm furs and pelts, laying atop you during winter so you don’t freeze to death, even letting you make a fire in the den to stay warm, giving you the best slabs of meat or organs from a kill

However, that isn’t human. It isn’t sustainable enough for a modern day person. He’s utterly distressed on why you keep getting sick, losing weight, constant shivers during cold weather

He cannot figure out how to take care of you. After a while he starts trying to really learn what you’re TRYING to say. Taking you more and more rivers and creeks to bathe, finding more editable vegetation for you, fruits and letting you cook your meat at least in peace

He also starts letting you wander into closer stores and shops to get new things you’ll need. Clothes, toothbrush, deodorant, etc. All in all helping Jack with day to day things is more so focused on your uh.. relationship(??)

He is kind though! He’s never hurt you and tries to be more and more gentle with you subconsciously. He lays on your lap and lets you play with his hair or ears. He lets you comb and braid his hair, do his nails, help wash him

By now, let’s be honest if you’re in an apartment you’ve more than lost that shit. Family and friends putting up missing posters and announcements. And while sure you do still have your phone, it’s not like it’s functional anymore. And how would u even tell someone about this?

Jack tries to communicate with you more, letting you speak and speak even if he doesn’t really understand and nodding along

He starts bring home more food so he can spend more time with you and you don’t feel lonely

Learning how to speak to Jack is a very very difficult thing, he doesn’t speak much of anything and he’s far too possessive to let Toby near you and teach the one thing he does speak

However, let’s say you do manage to make Jack take you back home. Wowie do you have a lot of work to do. So much that maybe staying missing is really for the best

So. Many. Phone calls

You have to get resituated so you probably are staying with a friend or family during this time… which Jack doesn’t like. But you thankfully manage to keep him at bay and hidden somehow

Getting legal things handled takes a long time, police are rather consistent in check-ins and asking you all sorts of questions. And these strange.. agents? Keep coming to your door asking things. But you don’t give up Jack

You’ve stranglely gotten attached to him, probably some sort of Stockholm Syndrome but he’s so nice to cuddle that really it’s a fair trade

Once things are settled, you find yourself in a better position and living. You start teaching Jack newer things

One, you have to help him learn the layout of wherever you both are now living. It takes a short amount of time since Jack can echolocate so he’s not just useless on his own

…you’re gonna have to find a place with faux pet friendly hardwood. While he can retract his feety nails he can still get a little excited when you get home or just absentmindedly scratch it

So no real hardwood or carpet floors for you

HATES THE TV

It’s loud, and spooky

Loves the shower though, even though he doesn’t really… fit.. in it

You have to get a detachable shower head for him

Food is strange. Jack has a very adaptable digestive systems so he can eat literally anything without problem. He just still doesn’t really understand the whole cooking thing

He likes the oven though! Very warm

You’ll often find Jack laying by the heaters or oven when they’re on, he’s attracted to heat

You have to invest in a place with high ceilings btw. He’s already 6’10 right now and doesn’t seem to stop growing..

He does NOT like doorways, still hits his head sometimes

Big. Bed.

He actually loves it though, I mean you’re gonna need the strongest reinforcement bed frame ever but he does really like the bed!

He understand why you probably missed it

You have to tell him not to make biscuits on the bed or couch.. messes them up

Clothes, yes you have to help him with. He doesn’t wear shoes so you’re spared from that but you do probably have to learn some sewing to make him more and more clothes

You find out he is actually very picky about what kind of fabrics he likes lol

When he’s about to leave for hunts he actually likes when you do his hair. Braiding it or pinning it up so it’s not in his face as much!

Also learning how to clean his mask, it’s a very strange material that you aren’t familiar with. It doesn’t quite feel like anything you’ve ever touch. Not a metal, crystals, porcelain or plastic. Definitely not fabric

Conclusion, yeah you’re gonna have to help Jack with a lot. However those things are just human things. So good luck

: ̗̀➛ Thank you for the ask Anon and all your support! I’m sure this wasn’t quite what you were expecting mostly cause I haven’t talked about my version of Jack a lot but I actually appreciate how much this allowed me to talk bout him more and struggles you’d face being with him! Love y’all make sure to stay safe! —Ace

[portraitofalinkonfyre]

Oh my God I'm such a twilight girlie you write him so good!!! Like I'm a blushing mess here giggling kicking feet the whole nine yards. Also making him thic is such a accurate power move 🤭🤤 one of these days I'd love to hear all your thoughts on the different 🍆 sizes for the links I just know it'd be glorious until then I shall devour all your writing repeatedly while imagining hot blondes (your four rut one is my absolute favorite I must confess)

Anon you flatter me!!

Hyrule: 4.9 inches. Now, before you come at me in the comments for making our fairy prince smaller than Four, hear me out: like I've said before, and continue to say, penis size is heavily affected by both genes and external factors, and even a slight discrepancy in either one can had mixed outcomes. 'But Fyre, we came here for sin, not a biology lesson!!', some of you may gripe, but I promise there's method to this madness. Ever since starting his first adventure at the ripe age of 9 or 10, Hyrule has been on constant alert because of 1) the literal cult trying to steal his blood to reincarnate a giant pig man and 2) the fact that his world is quite literally a wasteland with minimal food/tainted water/and all sorts of other nasty things. I can't even imagine the stress he was under during those frankly crucial developmental years, so it's highly likely that his body just... didn't fully develop due to a combination of him not getting enough to eat/drink and being on the run for most of his life (i.e lots of stress + probably a horrific sleep schedule). Moreover, both of these factors are what's known as endocrine disruptors, which can heavily affect mental and physical growth.

But now onto the dick-cannons: while he may not be the largest or thickest, I like to think Hyrule has a pretty good handle on what he's doing regardless*. Definitely not circumcised, considering his background (someone please tell him how to wash).

*(I once saw a headcannon that Hyrule probably used sex as a form of payment when things got tough, which I think is very underrated and absolutely true.)

Four: 5.5 inches. So I DEFINITELY did too much research on Four's, but I think y'all need to hear this. While I love the headcannon about Four's dick being 4 inches because his name is quite literally 'Four', I'm not sure anyone has tried to tackle this conundrum with his heritage in mind. Typically, penis size is influenced by parental genes, the person's own unique genes, and a combination of other external factors. For Four, we know for certain that he has Hylian parents, BUT he's also part Minish because of the events of Minish Cap. The Minish are typically described as anthropomorphic mouse people, so we can comfortably use mice as the basis for this genetic addition. Now, mice typically have a penis size of 10% of their body length (tip of nose to base of tail), which would concurrently put Four at 0.458333333 in feet, or 5.5 inches.

Dick-canons: probably circumcised. He's got the vibe of being pretty unassuming, but then he whips it out and everything suddenly makes sense. Balls* are on the bigger side (BREED), but no one's complaining.

*(Have you seen mice balls?? They're fucking [tee hee] massive. View at your own risk, but I couldn't have stopped the idea of Four like this if I tried. Yes yes I know this is a rat, but close enough!)

Wild: 5.6 inches. This one was probably the most difficult, because Wild's just... an average guy*. He doesn't have any non-Hylian transformations or crazy evolution history under his belt (tee tee), so all that really leaves is his height–which isn't a truly reliable measure of penile length, BUT we take what we can get in this blog–and background. It's somewhat implied that his father was a knight/someone who worked for the kingdom, which means he and Warriors were likely raised in very similar situations, though Wild's likely was a bit more stressful. For one, he pulled the Master Sword from its pedestal at the ripe old age of 12, and was immediately shipped off to guard Princess Zelda while she attempted to awaken her powers. While not as extreme as Hyrule's backstory, this is still a great deal of pressure for a child who arguably had a very peaceful life before finding the Master Sword, but I don't think he suffered any developmental conditions; even with the stress of finding out you're the Hero of Hyrule before you even finish puberty, it's reasonable to assume that Wild was physically cared for by the royal family, if only for the fact that his destiny was to defeat Ganon. Not just that, but there's the whole other issue of being stuck in a shrine for 100 years after dying; I'm no doctor, but that doesn't sound like favorable conditions for anyone. Obviously, the shrine heals him, but is that all it does? It's a well-known fact that water isn't good for skin**, especially considering he laid in it without moving for a century, so it's hard to imagine how his dick looked after the bath to end all baths.

Dick-canons: it glows– assuming he actually does have a penis, it's fairly average looking. Probably circumcised for military/cleanliness reasons, but he does have a very lovely vein running up the side of the shaft that always looks like it's about to pulse out of his dick. He should probably get that check out. Average sized balls, maybe a bit on the small side due to 100 years of cold water exposure.

*(I'm just going to come out and say this: all the Links are, at their core, average guys. Twilight was a goat herder. Time may or may not have been birthed by a tree and raised by tree people. Hyrule is just a simple traveler. Wind wasn't even chosen, he just wanted to save his sister. That's why they're so likable... they're not born special, or heroic, or anything. They're just dudes. Regular, selfless, boring, amazing dudes. Anyways enjoy the rest of my insanity.)

**(Is it wrinkly? Dried up? Completely and totally detached?? Laying in water for even a few days can cause severe medical complications, such as open sores, loss of skin elasticity, bacterial and fungal infections, and tissue decomposition. Cold water can temporarily slow the effects of decomposition because of adipocere formation, which is a phenomenon in which a waxy substance forms over the skin as a byproduct of fat decomposition, but not for 100 years. By this logic, Wild shouldn't be on this list because he shouldn't have a dick.)

Legend: 6 inches. Y'all already know where this is going. Unlike his successor, Legend didn't begin his first adventure until the age of 12, and lived a fairly stable life before hand thanks to his Uncle. This means that there likely wouldn't be too many developmental factors to worry about in determining the dick-cannons, so now we must turn to his rabbit-ifying encounter from his first adventure. I'm going to use the eastern cottontail rabbit (Sylvilagus floridanus) for this example because they're one of the most widely studied/available rabbit species. Now, cottontails typically reach 14-19 inches in length, but I'm going to go with 20 inches for Legend because he is CHONK, and also 20 is a lot easier to do math with. Keeping this in mind, WikiVet has informed me that rabbit penises can range from 20 to 45 mm in length. I'm going with 45 mm (4.5 inches) because he's a big boy and I also want him to have a big dick, so, when paired with the 20 inch body length, you'll find that approximately 8.86% of a rabbit's length is dick. Now that we know dick-to-body ratio, all that needs to be done is put that against Legend's height of 5'6", which leaves us with 5.8476 inches, but I added an extra 2 in to account for the fact that he is also hylian. It just feels right.

Dick-canons: Definitely a good choice if you're not sure what you want; bunny boy has many talents. Definitely has some breeder balls*, and I firmly believe he's curved just right for maximum pleasure. Probably circumcised because of his uncle, but he's secretly glad because it means he doesn't have to clean it like he would if he wasn't.

*(Yup, we're doing this again. Scientifically, rabbits have some of the highest sex drives of any animal, and are capable of breeding six hours after giving birth [WTF], which means this absolutely applies to Legend. He is never not down for a fuck.)

Sky: 6.3 inches. Prepare yourself because this one is very speculative. So, Sky was born on Skyloft, a set of islands in the sky. He was trained as a knight for most of his life and had a generally very peaceful life, so no endocrine disruptors or developmental discrepancies to worry about. Moreover, we know he started his journey at seventeen, which means he's at the tail-end of development. Now, instead of turning to some type of animal encounter, I'll turn to his Hylian heritage to answer this conundrum. I doubt there's anything out there with Skyloft's exact elevation, but it does appear to be a decent few thousand feet above the cloud barrier, which I've discovered are most likely altocumulus clouds, which typically form at an elevation between 6,000 to 20,000 feet. To calculate this, I watched a Skyward Sword gameplay video and determined that, in-game, it takes approximately 1:02.87 to reach the surface, and, assuming Sky/Link, is going at terminal velocity (the fastest an object can go while in motion, which happens to be 120 mph for belly-to-earth skydiving), this would put Skyloft at a roughly 7,544.4 foot elevation, which aligns with the altocumulus cloud prediction. There are only so many places on Earth that match such a high elevation, but I'm going to choose the Himalayas (which are inhabited by the Tibetan people, which are already known to have more capillaries and a more specialized hemoglobin function due to living in higher altitudes) as our comparer-region. Using this information, we can safely assume that Skyloftians, though fictional, who evolved in a very similar environment, may exhibit some similar traits to the modern-day Tibetan people.

While researching, I also discovered an incredibly interesting phenomenon called "airplane boners", which is a scientific occurrence where changes in pressure can cause erections (i.e. flying on a place), and decided that this would be perfect fuel for my scholarly degeneracy, which leads me to my next point: Sky has a big dick as an evolutionary response to what is colloquially known as the 'airplane boner'. Not convinced? Let me explain. When a penis is erect, arteries in the pelvic/penile region dilate to allow for greater blood flow, which thus increases the size of the penis itself. Now, imagine being at a high elevation for your whole life, surrounded by people whose ancestors have never lived anywhere else. I firmly believe that Skyloftians are well-endowed as an evolutionary response that allows the sustainment of larger blood vessels as a sort-of defense against high air pressure. Natural selection favors these traits because they ultimately lead to reproduction, which is the single-most important characteristic of evolution. 6.3 inches was a bit of an educated guess, but I believe that because the people of Skyloft evolved in a closed high-altitude ecosystem, it's entirely reasonable for Sky to be THICC because his body has a adapted to handle a greater hemoglobin factor and increased vascular capacity, likely in the penile region.

Dick-canons: due to the blood-vessel evolution, Sky's dick is likely thicker than average, with some very visible veins running up the sides; so many that it likely makes his dick appear incredibly flushed when erect. Contrary to what some of you may think, I don't think he has large balls, because it is likely more advantageous to have a smaller scrotum to combat the elements/conserve heat. So no breeder balls for him, but that doesn't mean he can't breed you just as good ;)

Twilight: 6.8 inches. I feel like this goes without saying, but he's a country boy. He's hung. Twilight grew up in Ordon, a close-knit community where everyone takes care of everyone, which means he most definitely had a very good childhood. Like some of the others, I see no reason to bring up developmental challenges due to being chased by a cult or some similar bullshit, so we're going to skip right to his transformation of a wolf at the beginning of his journey. Contrary to Legend and Four, I do not believe that this transformation affected him significantly in terms of penis appearance/size. Twilight was 17 when his adventure began, which means he already is at the end of physical development from a biological standpoint, and, in Linked Universe, his tattoos appear to be the only true physical mark on his hylian body, so it's safe to assume that we don't need to take this into consideration. Now, some of you may say: "Fyre, but your theories were so crazy for the other ones and now you're saying Twilight's hung because he's country??" Yes. Yes, I am saying that.

BUT.

There's a pretty solid theory running around that Twilight is a very small part Gerudo, due to Talon (Malon's father) having married/banged a Gerudo woman in secret. In LOZ, it's fairly obvious that the Gerudo are supposed to emulate modern-day Middle Eastern culture, which a study by the National Institute of Health states have an average penis length of 14.34, or 5.6 inches. Obviously, this is nowhere near 6.8, but this is also a race of mythical female warriors, so everything's a little skewed. However, in every iteration we see of the Gerudo, they're always tall, somewhat aggressive, and visibly muscled, which are all indicators of above-average levels of testosterone. This is highly important because, in addition to being required to build muscle mass, testosterone is heavily responsible for penis growth during puberty, meaning that Twilight could very well be the way he is because of this naturally-increased testosterone production (i.e why he's so visibly muscled compared to the other Links), plus an assumed more efficient vascular system due to his heritage. Adding on to this, Twilight likely already has booming levels of testosterone due to his very physical, very labor-intensive occupation as a rancher, plus the fact that he's in the prime of his life. In short, he's doing everything right: he eats well, works out, and has fairly decent emotional and mental health, all of which can be correlated with optimal penile development.

Dick-canons: Breeder balls to the MAX. All that extra testosterone has got to go somewhere, and it ain't his head. Fairly girthy, so prep is a necessity. Has one big vein right under the head that honest-to-god throbs when he's turned-on. Probably not circumcised because Ordon is fairly closed-off and I can't see them as being sticklers for that.

Warriors: 7 inches. While height isn't directly correlated with dick size, it is reasonable to assume that Warriors would be a bit higher on the list because of this, as well as his overall health in comparison to Hyrule and/or Legend. It's hinted that Warriors was raised in a very military-esque lifestyle, so it's not a surprise that he wouldn't have any true developmental setbacks in terns of penile length. Now, that doesn't mean we can't analyze the reasons why he's like this. Being raised in a militant environment means he was fed appropriately, participated in training regularly, and was likely taught stress-regulation habits (does he use them? no, but at least he knew them during his developmental years). Like Twilight, increased muscle mass is typically linked to elevated testosterone levels, and since Warriors has been training his whole life, it's reasonable to assume that these factors had a positive impact on his penile development. He and Twilight are very similar in this regard, except Twilight's size comes a bit more from favorable, wack genetics, though they both make sure to take care of themselves. However, Warriors is shown to be somewhat vain in Linked Universe canon (to the point that the other heroes have a running joke on it), which means it shouldn't be put past him to try more... under-the-table methods to ensue his 'perfection' reaches all aspects of his body, dick absolutely included. I'll leave it up to y'all on whether it's actual herbal/medical enhancements or sheer force of arrogance, but it's still a fun thought!

Dick-canons: Definitely circumcised (if not, definitely obsessed over keeping that shit squeaky clean). He's not as girthy as Twilight or Sky, but it'll definitely feel like he is from the way he wields it* during the deed. Doesn't have the biggest balls, but they'll definitely smack against any ass he can get his hands on.

*(There's a lot of speculation on whether Warriors is a manwhore or not, but I believe he's got experience. Definitely not in relationships, but one-night stands? Tavern hook-ups? He's done more of those than he's [un]willing to admit, but when it's someone he honestly, truly cares about? Slap a blush on him and call him a virgin, because he sure acts like it!)

Time: 7.3 inches. I saved the best for last. I want to preface this by saying that Time is HUGE, so obvious he's got to have a bitchbreaker in those britches, right? Right? Not exactly, because the version of Time we see in Linked Universe is the 'second' version; the one who got sent back in time by Zelda for Majora's Mask. This is HUGELY relevant because, honestly? Time likely took terrible care of himself over the course of Ocarina of Time, or at least somewhat neglected his needs in favor of completing his quest. Then, when he was sent back to being 12 years old in a new timeline by Zelda (Majora's Mask), you cannot convince me that he didn't have a major epiphany on how to actually take care of himself now that he was literally given another chance to get it right. He still trains, hard, but also knows his limits and, for the first time in his new life, he actually makes a point to start eating vegetables and drinking milk*, which give him all the essential nutrients to bridge the gap between surviving and living, especially during these crucial developmental years. Time genuinely makes an attempt to try. For himself, this time. And it pays off in the form of that fat-ass cock ;)

Dick-canons: a true bitchbreaker that will rail you six ways to Sunday. Not circumcised (bro was basically birthed by a tree), and definitely has breeder balls; he basically acts like he's in rut, and Twilight's got to get that trait from somewhere. Probably pretty veiny, like his hands (HNNNN), with just the slightest curve that'll have him hitting all the right spots.

*(Lon Lon milk all the way, my good readers.)

And, of course, I had to consult google:

[keeryhours]

do you trust me? - eddie munson

Vampire! Eddie Munson x female! reader

Main Masterlist

Eddie Munson Masterlist

Summary:

Something about Eddie has changed.

Warnings:

Smut (18+), unprotected p in v, creampie, blood drinking, mentions of injuries and a near death experience

Word Count: 1.6k

A/N:

This is my first time writing something supernatural, so I’m a little nervous! This was written for horny poker in the discord, so in about 45 minutes. I just wanted to share it here! I hope you enjoy 💕 Thank you once again LOML Roz @punkrockmlchael for my banner!

Something was wrong with Eddie. He came back from the Upside Down…different.

You had been grateful he came back at all. He had nearly died there, Dustin crying his eyes out as he slowly dragged Eddie’s unconscious, mutilated body back to the trailer. You had nearly collapsed when you saw him, your boyfriend, covered in demobat bite marks and bleeding profusely. You didn’t understand how he was still alive. He shouldn’t be alive.

He spent weeks recovering in the hospital, you by his side the entire time. He was the old Eddie once he woke up, cracking jokes and making you smile even before he was out of the woods, as the doctors put it. But he made a full recovery, much faster than anyone expected. It was a miracle.

Then, something about Eddie began to change.

For one thing, Eddie had always been hot. But now he was otherworldly. His brown curls shined in the light in a way they never had before, never frizzy and always perfect. His chocolate doe eyes had darkened. His skin was clear and pale. And he never left the trailer anymore.

You assumed it was the trauma of what he’d been through, but he seemed in fine spirits whenever you’d visit. In fact, he was always in a good mood, happy to see you. But he wouldn’t leave.

You laid in bed with him now, cuddled beneath his arm and under his blankets. He always felt cold now. You wondered if he had developed some sort of anemia or some complication from the blood loss. But he was still your Eddie, and he still gave the best cuddles.

You had your leg thrown over his hip, and his hand rested on your thigh, rubbing small circles into it. You had been laying there in silence this whole time, just enjoying each other’s company.

Eddie moved then, placing a hand on the side of your head and turning you to look up at him. He gazed into your eyes with his nearly black ones, a gentle smile on his lips. “I love you. So much,” he said, and then he leaned in, pressing his soft lips to yours.

You kissed him back happily, and it didn’t take long for him to deepen the kiss, tongue dipping into your mouth and hand gripping onto your hip. You moaned into his kiss, and he moved on top of you, slotting his lithe body between your legs. His lips trailed down your jaw and to your neck, where he stopped.

“Baby,” he muttered, his voice a low rumble against your neck. He nuzzled into it, breathing in your scent, his lips just barely grazing your skin.

“Hmm?” You hummed, eyes closed as you were lost in the feeling of Eddie’s body on yours.

“Do you trust me?” He asked, his voice just as low as before. You could barely hear him.

“‘Course I do,” you said. Your hand absentmindedly played with Eddie’s hair as he continued nuzzling into your neck.

“Good,” he said. “I’m going to try something, okay? I need you to trust me.”

You nodded lightly. “Okay, Eds. I trust you.” And you did, wholeheartedly. You would follow Eddie to the ends of the earth.

“Okay. Just…okay.” Eddie nuzzled into your neck again, tongue darting out to taste your skin. You moaned at the feeling, as Eddie hummed in approval at the taste.

Then, you felt two sharp pricks impaled into your neck.

Your eyes went wide and you gasped, your instinct to push him away, but Eddie wasn’t moving. The pain shot through your body, but less than a few seconds later, it faded. Not only faded, but turned into the most warm, all encompassing bliss you’d ever felt in your life.

“Oh,” you moaned, eyes falling closed from the pure ecstasy of the feeling, of whatever it was Eddie was doing to you. Your mind went hazy, your brain clouding.

You felt the sharp pins disappearing from your neck, and all too quickly the bliss faded away. You were confused. Eddie pulled back, and looked you in the eyes.

He had blood smeared all around his mouth. His lips were parted, and you could see the sharp points of his canines. They had not looked like that five minutes ago. Your eyes were wide, fear struck into your heart. What the fuck?

“Do you still trust me?” He asked, nuzzling his forehead against yours. “Do you want me to continue?”

“I…” You had no idea what was going on, and you were pretty convinced you were dreaming. But with everything you’d seen in the Upside Down, nothing surprised you anymore. You would ask questions later. “You can keep going.”

Eddie smiled, and it looked sinister with the blood all over his lips and chin. He slowly lowered his lips to your ear.

“I’m going to make you feel so good, my little dove.”

He quickly peeled both of your clothes off, leaving you both completely naked. He lowered his head back to your neck, and you shivered, from the cold or from anticipation you weren’t entirely sure. “Ready?” He asked quietly.

“Mmhmm,” you hummed again, hands wrapped around his broad shoulders. You felt the pain again, making you jump, but then the bliss washed over your body a second time, relaxing every muscle.

Eddie drank from your body, the taste like nothing he’d ever experienced. Like the finest wine in the world, the sweetest nectar. It made him impossibly hard.

He reached between your bodies as he continued to drink, dragging his tip through your folds. You were wet, so wet, and you moaned at the feeling of him pressed up against your hole. He pushed inside, sinking every inch of his length into you. Did he get bigger?

Eddie slowly pulled his hips back before rolling them back into you. You let out a mix between a moan and a gasp, never having felt something so incredible in your life. He filled you perfectly as he drained you at the same time, it was…indescribable. The most perfect feeling that ever could have existed. The kind of full body bliss people chased their whole lives and never achieved.

Eddie moaned loudly as he continued his movements, his cock throbbing inside of you. It was like every drop of blood he drank from you was rushing straight to his pulsing cock. He fucked you slowly though, every single centimeter of movement absolute heaven. He wanted to savor it.

You could feel an orgasm quickly approaching already, and it had only been a few minutes. Your pussy was clenching around Eddie’s cock, only drawing hotter moans from him. “Eddie…I’m gonna…”

You didn’t even get the sentence out before an orgasm washed over you, turning your vision white, your ears ringing from the intensity. Your mouth dropped open in a silent scream of pure pleasure, back arching into Eddie’s body.

He sped up his thrusts, fucking into you a little harder and faster now. Eddie had never felt something as incredible in his life, this was nothing like any sex he’d ever experienced. The feeling of your hot blood running down his throat, into his body, filling him with warmth, pure euphoria. He never wanted this to end.

“Eddie, Eddie, oh god, oh god,” you moaned. You could feel that tension building in your belly again. You had never cum so close together like this, never experienced such an intense orgasm as the one you’d just had. You would think you’d need to recover, but no, oh god, you were-

“Eddie, baby, I’m gonna cum again, oh fuck-!”

You came even harder the second time, and you really did scream this time. If you had been less out of it, you might have worried about the entire trailer park hearing you.

Eddie let out the most sinful moan, fucking into you hard and fast now. His hips snapped into yours at a brutal pace, and your body felt weak beneath him, like you couldn’t even move, could do nothing but lay there and take the pleasure he was giving you.

Eddie’s free hand gripped bruises into your hip as he thrusted in one, two, three more times, before letting out a primal groan as he came inside of you more than he ever had before. His cock throbbed inside of you as he shot rope after rope of cum into your tight, wet, perfect pussy. It seemed endless, and you had never felt so full and blissed out in your life.

You felt Eddie remove his teeth from your neck first, his tongue licking up the excess blood that dripped down your skin, savoring every drop. Both of your bodies shuddered as he held you tight, his face still buried in your neck, breathing in your scent as he caught his breath and composed himself.

Finally he pulled back, looking down at you with his big dark eyes. “Are you okay?” He asked gently. “Was that okay?”

“That was…I don’t know what that was.” You laughed, breathless. “The most incredible thing I’ve ever experienced? The best sex I’ve ever had?”

He laughed, licking the blood off his lips. “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner. I didn’t know how to, uh…bring it up.”

“It’s okay,” you said, gently brushing his hair out of his face. “I’m glad you trusted me with it.”

“I’m glad you trusted me, enough to let me do this.” He leaned down and pressed a gentle kiss to your lips, fangs gone now. “I love you. In life and in death.”

You smiled. “I love you, Eds.”

tagging some besties who may be interested :)

@punkrockmlchael @the-witty-pen-name @losingmygrasponreality @fizzing-imagines

[pinkcutiepiee]

Sirius Black Confessing his Feelings💌

Day 1 of 5 day of my Valentines Writing Event💌 || Masterlist 🍓

Sirius confesses his feelings for you. But you don’t believe him straight away💌

Hogwarts Uni AU. All characters are written as 20+. Not a house-specific reader.

Word count: 796

[A/N]: I'm seeing Ben Barnes live tonight so it only seemed fitting to start the Valentine's event with Sirius<3

Maybe gonna write a part 2<3

You watch from across the courtyard as Sirius and his friends are, you assume, planning yet another one of their infamous pranks. It was hard to tell, but that guess was the most likely. The pranks could be an inconvenience and frustrating, to say the least. It was true that none of their pranks affected you directly, but the way they indirectly affected you, when you were trying to study, hang out with your friends, or even concentrate in class, annoyed you.

Which is why you hated the way you found yourself becoming more and more attracted to Sirius. He was charming, undoubtedly so, and attractive. You often found yourself seeking him out, purposely studying somewhere close to him just to catch a glimpse. It almost made the pranks tolerable. He was way out of your league, you weren’t even sure that he knew you existed.

Which is why, when he approached you, you were more than certain that it was some sort of mistake, or (the more probable reason for his sudden approach) a prank. Quickly returning to your book, you hope that he didn’t see you staring. In attempt to slow your racing heart, you take a deep breath and try harder to focus on the words in front of you.

“Hey…” he started when he finally reached you. If you weren't so focused on how nervous you felt in that current moment, your rapid heart rate, or sweaty palms, you typically would have picked up on the hint of nervousness in his own voice. Or the way he anxiously played with his fingers, and the way he ran his fingers through his raven hair.

“What is it, Black?” All you wanted was for this whole interaction to be over. The last thing you wanted was for the one person you’re interested in romantically to use you for one of his pranks; to be laughed at by him and his friends. The thought hurt more than the idea of him simply just not knowing of your existence.

He takes a deep breath: “I just wanted to ask you if you wanted to go out with me sometime… kinda like a date because I think I’m in love with you and I think you’re really pretty, and I’m really nervous to ask…” he rambles. If you wasn’t convinced that this was a prank, you would have found the nervous rambling cute. But there was no way.

“You’re in love with me? You’re expecting me to believe that?” It broke your heart, to say the least, that this was the prank the Marauders decided to pull on you. it was just another cruel reminder of this never being a relationship that could work. No matter how much you craved it.

The look of disappointment and confusion on his face when he hears your words look very real, though. Feeling almost guilty, you look away, mentally reminding yourself why he’s actually here. None of his words were true. The way his friends watch the interaction tells you that much. They aren’t laughing, though. In fact, it looks almost as if they are watching with a sense of hope.

“Yes… it is true, please you need to believe me,” he now sits next to you - your breath hitching at the sudden close proximity. You noticed by the way he stiffened slightly when your knees touched slightly that it affected him too. Not being able to look at him, you take a deep breath, as he rakes his fingers through his hair yet again. An anxious tell.

“Why would it be?” He responds when you ask him if this is a prank, finally looking into his dark eyes. Watching him closely, you start to believe him.

After taking a moment figure out what exactly you wanted to say, you a deep breath, you start to speak; “I just never thought that… someone like you would find someone like me…”

“Perfect? But that’s what you are,” Sirius says when you don’t continue, as he grabs your hand gently. By the look on his face when he does, you know it wasn’t his intention, but you like it. So you hold onto his hand before he can pull away. You smile softly at his compliment.

“Well, for the record, I think you’re pretty perfect too… and in response to your question, I would love to go out with you… just tell your friends they need to be a little more subtle,” you joke, seeing the way that James, Remus, and Peter are staring at Sirius and you, hand in hand.

Sirius laughs softly, agreeing, as he squeezes your hand softly, running his thumb across your knuckle. Maybe this could be the start of a beautiful love story.

[creampuffqueen]

Hey I just finished Legacy of Yangchen and am going crazy over it (lol) -- any fic recs for someone new to the Yangchen novels fandom?

hi!!! welcome! we're very glad to have you here; the novels are so so so good and it always makes me so happy to see more people reading them!!

as for fic recs, honestly the tags on ao3 are very small, so pretty easy to search through. but i do have a few suggestions as well :)

first off, have to toot my horn for just a second as i have... quite a few fics written 😅 all of them are linked on my fic masterpost, but to save you some time, i'll give you the ao3 link to all of them - they all take place post-canon, and i sorted them into a series so they can be read in chronological order, called The Next Steps! there's a bit of everything; fluff, smut, angst, etc. feel free to jump around as well, none of my fics actually require any other fics to understand them.

next, of course, i have to hype up my lovely mutual @katkastrofa <3 every one of her pieces is so utterly amazing i truly can't choose a favorite!! we're always talking yangchen, and all our combined inspiration has resulted in so many lovely fics. definitely check out her profile!!

another mutual of mine @junipernight also writes some absolutely amazing things; fun and fluffy in the best way possible!

and then here's just some more links to other works i love (honestly i love every work in the tag but if i had to pick a few):

Warmth by katnissisbrown

Small ripples in the surface by Faa

with you all night by poetroe

Go on and pull me under with you by yellow_salt

layers of clouds by starbitz

the world falls away, and it's only us by xAlthaia

Sunset by Strawberry_Yumi

there are also some really amazing artists in this fandom! @thyinum, @ghxxuls and @marigoliad just to name a few (goliad is who drew my profile pic :3)

finally, for a whole collection of yangchen novels/yangvik content, check out @yangvikweek2024! i hosted the event back in july, and the turnout was truly amazing!!

thank you so much for the ask! happy reading, and my inbox is always open for Yangchen Thoughts if you ever need a place to send them!

[neonpaperlanterns]

Hello! Could I request another Dog Day x reader smut?

Just like the last request it’s mainly bodily worship this time dog day is doing it, payment for last time. And because the reader had a long day at work. Upon worshiping though a new discovery about the readers affections is revealed alongside dog days…leads to steamy action.

Again romantic language/love confessions (loved how you did it last time), both nobs to the whole process, dogday being unintentional hot to the reader, and the reader makes dog day more horny then it first seems. (He admits it after the deed is done). Also these two try to be quiet…both aren’t especially dog day.

Bonus: Kissy Missy and Poppy act as if they didn’t hear anything yet they definitely knew what happened! Excellent job on the last request btw!

[A/n: MINORS DO NOT ENTER, 18+ I'm sorry this took so long and also I've never written smut before. This is probably terrible but I hope you enjoy it either way. Also Thank you, I'm glad you like my writing.]

[All of you]

Can I?

DogDay could hear as the shower turned on. The pipes groaning to life as you washed away the day. He was trying not to listen but he could focus on nothing else. The bed creaked underneath his weight as he fidgeted. Unable to stay still as he waited for you.

He wrung his hands together as his foot tapped against the plush carpet. You never took overly long showers but today he sort of wished you would. DogDay needed more time to prepare himself. 

He didn’t understand how you just did things. How you could just adapt and roll with whatever came your way. It was a stark contrast to him and how he sat here jittery, wishing he had just a little more time.

“Penny for your thoughts?” The sound of your voice made him jump. Fumbling to turn around he ended up slipping half off the bed. His arms outstretched as he fisted the comforter.

“You okay DD?” A smile was spreading across your face as you toweled off your hair. He nodded a bit dumbly as he worried the fabric between his fingers. Words caught in his throat as he watched you. There was still a subtle tension in your shoulders and he wanted to help you but his mouth felt full of cotton.

“Are you sure everything is okay?” Your mouth was set in a small pout as you eyed him. Dropping your hair towel you climbed onto the bed, gaze soft yet suspicious.

“Because if something is wrong you shoul-” DogDay cut you off by grabbing your ankle and dragging you closer. A small oomph sound left you as your back bounced against the mattress. Fixing his gaze down he rubbed circles into your skin, he couldn’t bring himself to look up at you.

Not yet anyways.

“Nothin’s wrong.” He tried to sound casual but he was anything but.

“Then what’s up?” You inquired, your patience was never ending. Swallowing around the lump in his throat he tentatively peeked up at you. DogDay could feel heat crawling up his chest as he swallowed again, his throat suddenly very dry.

“I was…” He trailed off, averting his gaze once more. “Would it be okay if I….” He let his hand slowly rise up to run along the underside of your calf. “I wanna do for you what you did for me.” He spoke barely above a whisper.

“Oh!” Your voice was pitched a bit higher as what sounded like a nervous laugh left you. 

“Would that be okay?” Alright it’s out there, he did it. He heard you suck in a breath as your other foot bounced against the bed.

“Are you sure?” A low laugh left him at your question. Shouldn’t he be the one asking that?

“Yes I’m sure.” He thinks this is the first time he was reassuring you. Looking up at you he watches your face as he carefully places a chaste kiss to the top of your foot. Your skin is still warm from the shower as he tentatively moves his mouth upward. He can feel the muscles in your legs tense as he passes over your knee. 

“Are you doing okay?” He asks against the inside of your thigh and you respond with a thin yes. Your cheeks are colored a dark crimson as he moves to the other leg. Feeling a bit emboldened by your flustered expression he plants a kiss on the juncture of your hip. An airy gasp leaves you as your back arches off of the bed. 

DogDay stalls, mouth hovering above the band of your sleep shorts. There is silence for a moment as he flicks he gaze up towards you. Something hot slithers down his spine as he eyes meet yours. Your pupils are dilated as you gesture for him to continue. Your shirt bunches up as he traces along the dip in your waist. He can feel little tremors running along your back as he moves his hands to knead at the skin of your thighs. 

“You’re so soft. You know that.” He mutters against your ribs. He can feel as your hand comes up, nimble fingers run along the back of his neck. It makes him shiver as he turns, placing a kiss on your forearm. DogDay can hear how hard your heart is beating as he nuzzles along your chest. He knew you made his heart beat this hard, he had no idea he did the same. 

“I love you.” It came out breathy as he mouthed along your exposed shoulder. “So much. I don’t know what I would do without you.” Squeezing the back of your thighs had your back arching into his chest, the originally loose grip you had on him tightening. 

“Kiss?” You asked so sweetly as your head reached up, lips slightly pursed and DogDay would never dream to refuse you. Leaning down he slotted his mouth against yours. A low sigh left you as you seemed to just melt into him. It made something hot pool in his stomach and he couldn’t help but hold you tighter against him.

Hands fumbled along warm skin, pushing and pulling at fabric exposing more to inexperienced trembling fingers. Adoration and arousal swirled in his mind as you met his every caress with one of your own. He wanted to keep going, the way you moved against him made it hard to think of anything else yet he needed to know if this was actually okay.

“Is this alright?” DogDay pulled away as he brushed along the now naked dip of your hip. “Do you want to sleep with me? Because I really want to sleep with you but only if you want to.” Doubt crept along the edges of his mind but was immediately swept away in the wake of your smile, it was a gentle thing overflowing with love as you propped yourself up.

“Yes.” You pecked him on the nose as you wiggled out from under him. “You have no idea how much I want this. How much I want you.” Your confession had him reeling and his mouth going dry as you slipped out of your clothes. 

This was happening. 

This was really happening.

Feeling bolder than he really was, DogDay grabbed for you. Hands wrapped around your thighs as you met in the middle. Lips collided as he rolled his hips against yours. It sent a shudder running along his spine and he pressed closer, needing to feel as much of you as possible. Your hands pawed at him, gently but insistently as he did his best to work you open. He was shaking so bad he thought he was going to mess up but the pleased mewls that were falling from your kiss swollen lips were helping to alleviate his nerves. 

“DogDay~” You moaned out his name and he couldn’t take this anymore. Propping himself up he fumbled as he lined himself up with your entrance. Breathing heavily he made eye contact with your heavily lidded gaze. A cheeky lazy grin spread across your face as you wiggled your hips at him. 

“You have no idea what you do to me.” And before you could respond DogDay thrust his hips forward. You moaned in unison as he slowly sunk into your heat.

“You’re so warm inside.” He panted. “And soft. How are you so soft everywhere?” He groaned, pushing a miniscule amount further into you. Your mouth opened as if you were going to say something but he wasn’t done yet, he had so much more he wanted to say. Angling his hips he thrust forward, he wasn’t entirely sure what he did but it had you throwing your head back and a beautifully loud moan escaping you.

“God Angel I love you so much.” He dug his thumbs into your hips. “You’re so wonderful and perfect.” Your arms reached up, lips pursing again as you silently asked for a kiss. 

“Not yet Angel.” you let out a whine and it almost broke him. “I know, I know. I’m sorry but ah~” DogDay gasped as you locked your legs around his waist, forcing him deeper. 

“Please?” You pet along his shoulders and really he couldn’t say no to you. DogDay would never get tired of kissing you. He never wanted to come up for air, he wanted to stay like this forever. “Harder, please~” you push your hips up to meet his thrusts. “I promise I won't break.” You say between kisses and it had him groaned. Moving his hands he shoves one under your shoulders as he plants the other beside your head.

He would do anything you wanted. 

Your nails bite into his skin as they drag down his back and you’re chanting his name like a prayer, telling him how much you love him, how good he is making you feel. It has his hips stuttering and his rhythm becoming sloppy. Your walls flutter around him as he grinds down. You nip at his ear and he grits his teeth, trying and failing not to finish. But his climax washed over him in shuddering waves, his hips didn't stop though. He can’t, not until you feel as good as he does. 

Shivers rack down his back as he feels overly sensitive but he doesn’t stop until he feels you clamp down around him. Your body goes tense as you pull him down, moaning into his mouth as you reach your peak. 

“I love you.”

“I love you too.” 

In the morning after you have untangled yourself, you drag him into the shower. It’s a tight squeeze, the space not made for him but you insist on having him here. On gently gliding the washcloth over him and mumbling sweet nothings against the now clean fur. It makes heat pool in his stomach again and he reaches for you, intent on returning the affection but there is a knocking at the door. 

It’s Poppy, her and Kissy are hungry and while DogDay is tempted to pretend he didn’t hear them because you are pressed so tight and warm against him, he knows he can’t. 

When you both emerge from the bathroom he notes that both of the girls are not, not looking at either of you. You don’t seem to notice their not looks and go about making breakfast. Humming something you heard on the radio as you whisk the eggs together and that’s when Poppy leans over, giving him a pat on the leg and a thumbs up. Embarrassment burns hot across his face as he sinks down into the chair. He should have let them go hungry.

[talthorn-sylvoran]

Daily Writing Challenge Feb 2025: Day 2 - Cage/Power

Kicking the door open into his personal sanctuary away from time, Talthorn clutches the weakened form his small friend in arms. His wild, ragged look didn't suit the magi but it didn't matter to him as long as he was able to find the answer within his research to save this boy. After looking around this room that was in dire need of tending and cleaning, the door automatically closes he brings Ka'ness to the bed to rest in. It had not been touched or stirred in some time, but the magi would give to the other until he could conjure up something much better.

"Here. You can rest here....." Talthorn carefully puts down the boy and looks him over much as a physician. Observing how he was reacting to the concoction that he had made and administered.

"That is all I ever do is rest. I'd rather sit up if you don't mind, old man..." Ka'ness laughs at the other and looks over the area with curiosity. A good deal of the pain had been numbed, but breathing was still difficult. And of course the whole matter of not being able to walk anymore was a pain for someone that was so used to being as active as he was.

"I do mind." Talthorn speaks rather sternly and furrows his brows. And just as he gestures for the other to lie down, the boy begins with his questions.

"So you live here too?" Ka'ness asks and then his eyes enlarge seeing above him. He gestures toward the library archives above their heads, with the floating materials of many ages with amazement.

"Yes." The magi answers simply. "This is my...research area. A very boring place with nothing of interest." he lies not wanting the other to be distracted, but erks as the boy points upward to where the magical materials lingered and sorted themselves. "Yes, well. Perhaps there are a few things of note for someone not used to its properties."

The youth gives him an unimpressed look with his attempt at fibbing to him. "And what do you research in this boring place where there is nothing of interest?" he inquires as Talthorn looks like he push his head to get him to lie down.

"Boring things! A perfect place and time to sleep for now." The magi replies trying very hard to keep his composure so maybe he could convince his friend to rest! He had to get back to finding the answer to thi-

"I am not going to rest well until you tell me." Ka'ness says directly and continues to look around, already his breath stagger a bit.

Talthorn breathes out slowly as he weighs his options. Sleep potions were not beyond him, but he knew children had to be handled differently for more consistent results. He is already conducting spells on the side, to conjure water and have the bowl of it come to him with help of magic. His mutters to heat the liquid, so he could soak and ring out a cloth, he and Ka'ness meet eyes and have a sort of staring contest.

"This is my Sanctuary. A place where I observe, research and record the world's events and unravel their secrets." Talthorn speaks reluctantly at first, and offers the washcloth to his friend. "It's my true purpose and passion as you might know to a certain extent. Here I am granted the gift of extra time. You are the only visitor that has seen it."

As the boy freshens up a bit, he asks over the cloth. "By yourself. For years. Watching the world. Locked up in here." Ka'ness thinks about this with some hesitation in his glance. "You're right, that does sound boring. And lonely." he smirks at the magi. "Sounds more like a prison, than a Sanctuary."

"See? I told you, very b--" Talthorn jolts at this comments and speaks strongly. "It's not a prison! It's a place I have all the freedom to concentrate on what I wish in the intensities I desire. I have knowledge and understanding of this world and many others that many deities would envy." he speaks with confidence about his cumulative collections in libraries and mind.

"But you keep it here. Locked up with you." Ka'ness says carefully and gestures to library above them again with a circle of his finger.

"It will be passed on to generations after me." Talthorn puffs out his chest in another fib, because he had long forgotten how that would be something he would do. "No more questions. You have your answers to those for now. Now it is rest time." he points sternly.

Ka'ness looks at him with large eyes, the rims still glowing in a cursed darkness. "Maybe after a story? You kind of owe me. For....leaving....for so long...." It seems he was not above guilt to get some additional time with his parental figure he has missed for entirely too long.

Talthorn's finger wavers and he draws it back trying to disguise his emotion. If Ka'ness rested he would be able to sneak away to do more research for his condition! But his boy made such a simple request and the magi didn't have the heart to turn him down after all he had done. "One story then...." He still had time to mend those broken promises....

(( Glimpses of the past following this story . Talthorn's awakening happens at the end of this event, forever changing his life. ALL THE FEELS ))

@daily-writing-challenge

[starkspondwater]

Peer Pressure- Kyle Broflovski x Shy!Reader (fluff)

Part 1 x, Part 2 x, Part 3 x

Summary: You and Kyle have been going steady for a while, and it's been wonderful. But it seems like everyone else is doing much more than you two, is that a problem?

A/n: I originally wasn't going to write more for this series but had a wonderful request to continue it from @gaaraismyboyfriend! I wanted to time skip a bit since they're kind of already established. I also may have written this to make up for my own shitty boyfriends in hs

Warnings: none? Mention of sex and tits I guess but not smut.

Kyle was the perfect boyfriend. You were absolutely, without a doubt, sure of that.

It had been months of sweet dates, long walks, study sessions, and visits to the local park. Three lovely months where you got to know him, everything that made him the boy that gave you butterflies and so much more.

Kindness seemed to radiate from him when it came to you, always checking in and ensuring that you were doing alright. He was sweet and polite at first, just as nervous and tentative as you were, but over time began to show some of his silliness, cracking you open and loosening you up.

Small, stolen moments, a brush of the lips between classes, kisses shared grew between the two of you as you found comfort in one another. Back then you had never once imagined the two of you tangled onto his bed, lips and tongues seeking solace with each other. Of course, you still became embarrassed as whimpers and other sounds made their way out of your mouth, but Kyle only seemed to love them, pushing harder against your lips.

There was something about the way he looked at you when he pulled away, the need to breathe becoming too great to ignore. Green eyes intensely peering at you, taking in every inch of your face, so filled with affection that you felt nothing but warmth bloom.

Unfortunately, these sessions never lasted long. Steps stomp up the stairs eventually banging into Kyle’s room, revealing Ike Broflovski equipped with a wide grin.

“Ike! Out!” Kyle was always exasperated with the kid. From weird new slang to just being an annoying little boy in general, he was always at his limit. He had often told you how Ike was lucky he had you as otherwise he’d resurrect his little game of ‘don’t kick the baby.’

“Sheesh, no need to be so quick!” with a wicked glint in his eyes, Ike laughed. “It’s not like you’re getting any anyway, loser!” Slapping the door he left, leaving Kyle to flip the bird at empty space. The whole interaction wasn’t unusual, as you came to find out. It honestly would've been funny had you not already had that particular activity on your mind.

The more you got to know Kyle, the more you spent time with him, the more you were aware that he was a boy. The smell, the voice, his laughter, these things you had already known about, but always being in close proximity to him made them more distracting. 

You had heard girls in Gym talking about boyfriends and hookups, giggling filling the locker room. Stories of steamy nights in cars and love filled rendezvous had you blushing into your own little locker, little ears listening eagerly. Boys, from their talks, always seemed interested in one thing for the most part - sex. The thought of that terrified you. 

The past few weeks, the idea of it had been bouncing around in your head. Was Kyle thinking about that sort of thing? Has he already done that? What if you weren’t ready? It went on and on, filling your brain with anxiety.

Kyle never once pushed you. Never asked for anything more, or tried to sneakily maneuver his hands anywhere else. Even in the middle of making out, his hands stayed respectful, not once straying from your hips or face. You had no issue with that at all, but a small part of you wondered if maybe he did want those sorts of things…just not with you. 

___

“...and then she flashed me those nipple rings!” Kenny held up his hands, mimicking a camera shot. “I’m telling you boys, it was bee-aye-yew-ti-full!”

“I a-a-always wondered if that w-was true or just a rumor,” Jimmy snickered.  “Gotta say, you are a l-l-lucky man, Ken.”

“What can I say, tits love me!”

Kyle laughed with the rest of them, shaking his head at his close friend’s antics. Kenny’s storytelling was always prime entertainment. Out of all the guys, he seemed to have the most stories to tell, each different and full of excitement. Feeling a nudge to his side, Kyle turned.

“So, what about you and your girl, Broflovski? You’ve been going for a while now, I assume you’ve copped a feel or two.” Clyde winked at the redhead.

“Nah, we’ve been taking it slow,” which Kyle had no issue with. Once he really met you, not just the cute little version of you that gained his interest, he was hooked. Line and sinker. Hell, probably the whole boat too.

“Really? Like not even second base?” Kenny chimed in. The rest of the guys leaned in, eyes on Kyle.

“Second base? What is this, 6th grade?” Kyle gave him an incredulous look. “And you guys know her, she’s a little shy. I don’t want to rush her or anything.”

“If she’s giving you blue balls, I know Nelly’s blind enough to let you take her out.” Cartman’s voice grated his ears, anger instantaneously blossoming. 

“Shut your goddamn mouth, fat ass! I don’t have blue balls!” Stan was up in a matter of seconds, quick to intervene between the two. “And what we do is none of your business anyway!”

“Hey man, we’re not trying to start anything,” Kenny held up a hand in surrender. “You know Cartman likes to start shit. We’re all good here. Let’s just dial it back a bit. Anyway…Tolkein, how’s that one gig going?”

With the subject change, Kyle’s rage simmered. It was just like Cartman to do this, as he did with every little relationship he had growing up. Well, he liked his relationship with you just fine, he didn’t need anyone, much less fat boy, nitpicking it.

Kyle could admit that he wanted to do more with you, he was a teenage boy after all. You were soft and fit so wonderfully into him that it would be impossible not to wonder about what more you both could do. He knew exactly all the things he’d like to do, that is. However, at the end of the day he was just happy to be around you. That in and of itself made him feel luckier than any other boy at that table.

___

“Are you alright?” The worried tone Kyle’s voice took on had you quickly looking up at him. 

“Of course, why?” You knew you had been a little off lately, but around Kyle you tried your hardest to hide it. You thought you had even been doing a good job of it until now.

“Just…if something was wrong, you’d tell me?” A featherlight touch on your shoulder guided you into his bedroom as he talked.

“Of course I would.” looking into his eyes you felt nervous. Here he was being so sweet and attentive, and you couldn’t even talk to him properly about this one thing. The worry that had cemented itself inside your heart kept growing and growing, and it was getting harder to ignore.

It took no time at all for you two to tangle together, lips moving and hearts beating together. Normally your head felt fuzzy during this, the whole world going out of focus as you lost yourself in everything that was Kyle, but today you could only focus on his still hand at your hip. As if he could sense the change in you, Kyle pulled back.

“Are you sure nothing is wrong?” He squeezed your hip lightly before you felt his thumb rubbing soothing circles. “You know you can tell me anything right? You can trust me.”

You bit your lip, thinking about the weight that had been building in your chest for weeks. Hesitantly, you asked the one question that continuously had been on your mind.

“Do you…Do you not want to have sex with me?” Kyle’s eyes shot wide open.

“What do you mean? Why on earth would you even think that?” In one motion, Kyle had you both upright once more.

“It’s just, you never really push for more…I thought that meant that you…” You could feel your throat closing, emotions choking your words.

“You thought I didn’t want to.” He finished for you. With a sigh, Kyle thought for a moment. “Is that something you want to do? Because I was under the impression you were more comfortable taking things slow.”

You glanced away as heat erupted on your face. Just bringing up the subject itself made you feel strange, and to actually talk about it was worse! Gentle hands cradle your head, bringing your gaze back up.

“You know I’m fine with that, yes? I’ll go any speed you need here. I don’t care how quickly we do things, or how far we go.” Green eyes searched yours for a second, as though gauging your reaction. “I’ll tell you right now, it’s not that I don’t want to do anything, because my god I do. Please don’t doubt that. But I need you to be comfortable with the steps we take.”

“I’m not very experienced Kyle, with anything. You were my first kiss, you know?”

“Neither am I! I haven’t done much more than this.” Kyle smiled, lightly caressing your cheeks. “We can take those steps together when you’re ready. I’m not going anywhere. I just want you.” A small kiss to your nose punctuated his sentence as he finally let go of your face.

A slam of the door alerted you to the arrival of Ike, his feet already stomping up the stairs. Kyle reached over, grabbing both of your backpacks and bringing them close as he resettled himself on the bed.

“Well, it’s about time we actually do that homework,” he chuckled, looking back at you. “Are we okay?”

Everything from the past weeks seemed to melt away, making way for relief. Kyle just had a way of making you feel seen and cared for, making you feel safe. You loved him, truly loved him, and were falling more and more every time he spoke.

“I love you.” Those three words slipped past your lips before you could stop them. Kyle’s eyes were on you, wide in surprise before a grin began to overtake his features. Quick as a whip he pulled you over to him, arms wrapped around you nice and snug. Pressing his lips to your hair, he inhaled.

“I love you, so so much.” Pressing another kiss onto you, he laughed. “I’ve been thinking it for a while, but thought you might find it too soon.”

“Really?” You strained to look up at him from your position on his chest.

“Really really. Stan’s been teasing me about it for weeks.” He recalled Stan walking in on him scrolling through photos of the two of you on his phone. Kyle had been so captivated he didn’t even notice the boy looking right over his shoulder until Stan loudly proclaimed that he was ‘whipped.’

“I mean…is it too soon, you think?”

“Nuh uh, we already said it, and I plan on saying it every moment I can.” Kyle smirked to himself a bit, knowing how flustered you could get. “Starting now. I love you, I love you, I-”

“Kyle!” You buried your head into his chest, hiding the flush against him. 

_

“This is so goddamn gay you guys.” Ike lightly kicked open the door, a bag of chips crinkling in his hands.

“Ike! Out now! You should be thankful I can’t get to you you little-” Kyle jolted a bit but stayed where he was, hands cradling your sides. 

You couldn’t help but laugh at the whole situation. Oh how lucky you felt at this moment, even with this small interruption.

[icewindandboringhorror]

I made a few new wax seal stamps out of clay (like the ones I did for my worldbuilding stuff forever ago), this time just of random symbols that I thought might look good done in the style of painting over the raised part of the wax or etc. :0c Some of them aren't carved deep enough to really show up that well, but overall they worked okay for being clay lol

[akkivee]

i was yet again lol trying to see if i could classify the divisions by story beats, eg posse is the lore division, now that the six division tracks are over and so far i’m of the opinion that it’s

❤️💙: the wordbuilding divisions!!!!! mtc’s angle is primarily shows the corruption within chuuoku and the effects it has, and bb’s shows the world grappling with all of chuuoku’s bullshit, and a lot of that revolves around money issues caused for insane taxes on the people (capitalism kills)

💛🩶: lore divisions!!!! their stories tend to introduce or build on concepts. fp has a hand in every story thread ever and as does mtr, tho i think??? mtr has more focus on other areas whereas posse eventually gets around to each point lol

🧡💜: as crazy as it is to say this when fp is right there lol, i think nagosaka’s the bonds divisions. all four of dh’s main drama tracks have them dealing with their bonds as a trio and three of those tracks are them fighting to keep that bond from fraying bc of their own inaction. bat’s has them protecting their bonds, and their very wide scope of bonds like a community almost, against the actions/interference of outsiders trying to harm the three of them thru their community

[st4rstudent]

i feel somewhat responsible for this, even if i’m not the one saying these things. I’m genuinely so sorry.

No need to apologize! It's not one singular person doing it and truth be told I don't think it's a large majority that thinks that (albeit the ones that do are quite vocal). I didn't mean to upset anyone or anything when complaining about it, I was just letting off some steam.

Having a yap session under the cut sorry I feel like rambling under your ask anon.

Admittedly, I do think there are reasonings for people thinking this way. A lot of the focus with Clash has been on the cogs, especially after the 1.3 update. Which I can't say I blame them! Managers were something new and exciting and (from what I can tell) really separated them from the other servers. I don't blame them for wanting to put focus on that because that was their thing. Alongside other things, but majorly when you hear Clash the managers are mentioned in someway shape or form. But as we all know, toons ended up taking the short stick from this. This isn't helped by the gameplay itself, being mainly a fetch-quest deal so you often only talk to npcs once or twice unless if they're repeated ones and the taskline wasn't entirely accessible on the wiki for a while (shoutout to the wiki maintainers. The taskline script is a savior). Which I'm quite excited to see if they deal with this issue with the rewrite. I imagine they will, but anyways. Social media posts would often contain more managers than toons, which I also believe they're starting to fix. And ontop of this, I believe most of the team in the early era of the sever is gone, so there's been some stuff lost in the change. So yeah, dialogue/writing has been kind of rocky. AGAIN- I am completely aware of the rewrite going on and I am not judging them harshly based off of their current state. I'm very appreciative of the fact that they took the time to listen and are focusing on trying to fix it up. And then there's also fandom mischaracterization- especially of the cogs. Forgive me for mentioning mischaracterization because normally I wouldn't really care (I've mischaracterized characters before..especially in my younger years. I think it's just a process of learning an having fun and I hate to limit anyone because of it). With that being said, there's a lot of baby-fying and coddling of the managers. Especially with those who have more 'sympathetic' stories (Misty, Chip, Winston specifically). Don't get me wrong, I like these characters and I can appreciate the story they're trying to tell, but I feel like so many people will hear their dialogue and then misplace their anger. People get mad at Bessie for trying to protect HER lighthouse or at the Elders for trying to keep YOTT safe (lets not forget Winston was there to brainwash toons). Yes, yes technically there would've been better ways to do it but consider this: The toons are scared. Their homes, stores, lives are being taken over by a big corporation that has more resources that they do. They don't have the privilege of waiting, seeing, and gathering. And then people forget that the company has such a huge role in both toons and cogs lives. If you're mad over the mistreatment of Misty or the fact that Winston is still in the dungeon, your anger should be directed at the company who doesn't care. I may be completely wrong in saying this, but I feel like the stories with almost all of the managers is a reflection of the company. The toons are only trying to protect themself and their environments and yet this seems to go forgotten when people start bashing them. And of course, I'd consider myself a toon guy so me saying all this and complaining may come off as "I HATE the cogs and everyone who posts only about them!" and for clarification that's not true. You all know how much I like that little brain thing. The cogs are interesting, their designs are fun, I don't blame people for liking them because I do too. I just wish that the thought process behind so many of these discussions wasn't so cog focused because I believe that this anger at the toons for, RIGHTFULLY, defending themselves helps push this mischaracterization of them as a whole. That they're mean, boring, unlikeable while the opposite is true. Yes there are some, what I'd consider, "filler" dialogue from the shopkeepers. This is just because of the gameplay. But there are some funny and cute moments with them if people would just listen and read.

Which also brings me into another point: people skip the dialogue. I've caught myself doing this before (on my first account. I have 4 accounts total, so I reread the dialogue on like 3 of them). But people will complain about lack of toon personalities while doing this. It's like reading through a comic book, only looking at the drawings, and then complaining because there "isn't a storyline". Luckily, there's been efforts to keep track of the dialogue on the wiki but I doubt a lot of people are going through and reading the entire script. It just feels very disingenuous to criticize the dialogue when you haven't even read it. Likewise, people don't seem to read the blogposts either. This is both from a dialogue aspect and from an update aspect (people continuously asking about hammerspace/mix-and-match under unrelated posts).

[blackcatxmagic]

Smiling - and always happy to be talking to a writer - Copper told the florist, "It's just that there is a lot of darkness in the world, and sometimes putting it to paper helps you deal with it, at least it does in my case, like I said." At least, that was true until the darkness became too much, but Copper wasn't about to tell a stranger that. "I actually think horror is easier than comedy to be honest," he went on. "Comedy is hard in the written form I think because everyone might read it differently. It's not like on TV or in movies where you can be sure to portray it the way you intended. But that's also why I like writing. I like that everyone gets something different out of it." As he listened to the woman talk about her writing, Copper nodded, realizing their writing choices were more aligned than he thought. "I've written supernatural horror, but I'm more comfortable writing more real-world things." Just like they'd said, it was a way of dealing with the real life horror of the world.

Writing about hope was another thing Copper could understand. "I'm the same way," he replied. "I think there's a place for stories with dark endings, but...sometimes it feels like such a bummer. You read a whole book with these characters, where they struggle and fight, and then sometimes it's just not enough. It feels a little too close to real life." He didn't always feel this way about it though, not until he realized just how realistic it was. He appreciated Vivian offering encouragement about The Twilight Cauldron and how it was run. "Thank you," he said, "I actually am really grateful for that feedback. It was something I was worried about. I've never owned a business before, but I needed a change when I came here." That was a huge understatement of course. "The next time you come in," Copper said, "you get a free drink. And if you want to write in there sometime, that's okay too. I don't have any sort of rule where you have to buy something, though...obviously that's appreciated." Copper laughed before adding, "Writers have to help each other out, you know?"

Vivian’s eyes widened in pleasant surprise at Copper’s enthusiasm. She hadn’t expected him to be a writer too, and definitely didn’t expect him to be into horror. Her smile grew as she considered the idea of talking shop with someone who shared that passion. "No way," she said with a small laugh, the surprise of it clearly showing in her expression. "Horror? That’s awesome. I’ve always admired writers who can dive into that sort of dark, nitty gritty stuff. It’s not easy to get the tension just right, especially if it's real world horror, where sensitivity is key, too."

She tilted her head slightly, trying to think of how best to describe the genre of her writing. “Does it make me sound less professional if I say that I'm not sure?" She laughed. "I write fiction, but in real world settings. I love weaving in bits of dark themes and psychological horror, but the real stuff. Nothing supernatural, no ghosts other than those of the past.” She gave him a knowing look. "The world is a pretty terrifying place on its own, so it’s not too far off from what you’re working with, I'm sure."

Vivian paused, glancing at Copper thoughtfully. "I get what you mean though. I think for me the appeal is more writing hope, even amongst the worst things. Reminds me that I can find hopeful things in real life, too." Her gaze softened as she leaned back slightly, her fingers idly tracing the edge of the notebook she still had tucked under her arm.

She chuckled a little at his name comment, the playful edge in her voice returning. "Well, I can’t say I’ve met many Coppers, you're right. That’s a pretty unique one, but I can totally see it. It suits you." Her smile grew just a bit. "If it makes you feel any better, I didn't even realise it changed ownership." The Twilight Cauldron ran smoothly and pleasantly when Vivian last visited.

[princesjackpot]

SO unfortunately for me because Captain is getting changed so much I now have the dilemma of Riku's persona choices. Again 💀

Lugh (second tier) is fine. I am adamant that is not changing - mostly because it fits but also because if I'm honest Lugh is my favourite Irish Celtic God and if I can be self indulgent with Mordred I can be self indulgent with Lugh.

Pimpernel on the other hand is trickier (surprise surprise). I think the reason I am so fixated on getting this right is because the initial persona to me is the most important one - its the one that people tend to remember the most and I feel like it's an important representation of the character.

I think what Pimpernel does fit with, in the context of the new stuff, is Riku's idea of rebellion? Perhaps? Like a gentleman hero who is a master of disguise and saves people from a terrible fate (that is a very bare bones view of Pimpernel mind you) makes sense on paper.

I think what I need to do is define Riku's idea of rebellion. It's kind of hard to put it in to words if I'm honest lol - I know Riku in my head he is like my best friend but when I try to explain it its like uhm 🧍‍♂️

None of this means that I'm actually going to change the persona - if anything this is just me typing my thoughts out.

[liquidstar]

a friend who'd wait :)